{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_19447/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_19447","id":"gutenberg_19447","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/19447","summary":null,"tags":["Category: History - Other","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Freemasons"],"text":"Produced by Ted Garvin and the Online Distributed\nProofreaders Europe at http://dp.rastko.net.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n                             MORALS AND DOGMA\n                                  OF THE\n                   ANCIENT AND ACCEPTED SCOTTISH RITE\n                                    OF\n                               FREEMASONRY\n\n\n                             PREPARED FOR THE\n               SUPREME COUNCIL OF THE THIRTY-THIRD DEGREE\n                                 FOR THE\n               SOUTHERN JURISDICTION OF THE UNITED STATES\n                                   AND\n                      PUBLISHED BY ITS AUTHORITY.\n\n\n\nCHARLESTON A.'. M.'. 5632\n\nEntered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1871, by ALBERT PIKE,\n\nIn the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. Entered\naccording to Act of Congress, in the year 1906, by THE SUPREME COUNCIL\nOF THE SOUTHERN JURISDICTION, A. A. S. R., U. S. A.,\n\nIn the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, L. H.\nJenkins, Inc. Edition Book Manufacturers Richmond. Va. Reprinted,\nFebruary, 1944.\n\n\n\n\nPREFACE.\n\n\nThe following work has been prepared by authority of the Supreme Council\nof the Thirty-third Degree, for the Southern Jurisdiction of the United\nStates, by the Grand Commander, and is now published by its direction.\nIt contains the Lectures of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite in\nthat jurisdiction, and is specially intended to be read and studied by\nthe Brethren of that obedience, in connection with the Rituals of the\nDegrees. It is hoped and expected that each will furnish himself with a\ncopy, and make himself familiar with it; for which purpose, as the cost\nof the work consists entirely in the printing and binding, it will be\nfurnished at a price as moderate as possible. No _individual_ will\nreceive pecuniary profit from it, except the agents for its sale.\n\nIt has been copyrighted, to prevent its republication elsewhere, and the\ncopyright, like those of all the other works prepared for the Supreme\nCouncil, has been assigned to Trustees for that Body. Whatever profits\nmay accrue from it will be devoted to purposes of charity.\n\nThe Brethren of the Rite in the United States and Canada will be\nafforded the opportunity to purchase it, nor is it _forbidden_ that\nother Masons shall; but they will not be solicited to do so.\n\nIn preparing this work, the Grand Commander has been about equally\nAuthor and Compiler; since he has extracted quite half its contents from\nthe works of the best writers and most philosophic or eloquent thinkers.\nPerhaps it would have been better and more acceptable if he had\nextracted more and written less.\n\nStill, perhaps half of it is his own; and, in incorporating here the\nthoughts and words of others, he has continually changed and added to\nthe language, often intermingling, in the same sentences, his own words\nwith theirs. It not being intended for the world at large, he has felt\nat liberty to make, from all accessible sources, a Compendium of the\nMorals and Dogma of the Rite, to re-mould sentences, change and add to\nwords and phrases, combine them with his own, and use them as if they\n_were_ his own, to be dealt with at his pleasure and so availed of as to\nmake the whole most valuable for the purposes intended. He claims,\ntherefore, little of the merit of authorship, and has not cared to\ndistinguish his own from that which he has taken from other sources,\nbeing quite willing that every portion of the book, in turn, may be\nregarded as borrowed from some old and better writer.\n\nThe teachings of these Readings are not sacramental, so far as they go\nbeyond the realm of Morality into those of other domains of Thought and\nTruth. The Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite uses the word \"Dogma\" in\nits true sense, of _doctrine_, or _teaching_; and is not _dogmatic_ in\nthe odious sense of that term. Every one is entirely free to reject and\ndissent from whatsoever herein may seem to him to be untrue or unsound.\nIt is only required of him that he shall weigh what is taught, and give\nit fair hearing and unprejudiced judgment. Of course, the ancient\ntheosophic and philosophic speculations are not embodied as part of the\n_doctrines_ of the Rite; but because it is of interest and profit to\nknow what the Ancient Intellect thought upon these subjects, and because\nnothing so conclusively proves the radical difference between our human\nand the animal nature, as the capacity of the human mind to entertain\nsuch speculations in regard to itself and the Deity. But as to these\nopinions themselves, we may say, in the words of the learned Canonist,\nLudovicus Gomez: _\"Opiniones secundum varietatem, temporum senescant et\nintermoriantur, ali\u00e6que divers\u00e6 vel prioribus contrarioe renescantur et\ndeinde pubescant.\"_\n\nTitles of Degrees as herein given have in some instances been changed.\nCorrect titles are as follows:\n\n1\u00b0--Apprentice.\n2\u00b0--Fellow-craft.\n3\u00b0--Master.\n4\u00b0--Secret Master.\n5\u00b0--Perfect Master.\n6\u00b0--Intimate Secretary.\n7\u00b0--Provost and Judge.\n8\u00b0--Intendant of the Building.\n9\u00b0--Elu of the Nine.\n10\u00b0--Elu of the Fifteen.\n11\u00b0--Elu of the Twelve.\n12\u00b0--Master Architect.\n13\u00b0--Royal Arch of Solomon.\n14\u00b0--Perfect Elu.\n15\u00b0--Knight of the East.\n16\u00b0--Prince of Jerusalem.\n17\u00b0--Knight of the East and West.\n18\u00b0--Knight Rose Croix.\n19\u00b0--Pontiff.\n20\u00b0--Master of the Symbolic Lodge.\n21\u00b0--Noachite or Prussian Knight.\n22\u00b0--Knight of the Royal Axe or Prince of Libanus.\n23\u00b0--Chief of the Tabernacle.\n24\u00b0--Prince of the Tabernacle.\n25\u00b0--Knight of the Brazen Serpent.\n26\u00b0--Prince of Mercy.\n27\u00b0--Knight Commander of the Temple.\n28\u00b0--Knight of the Sun or Prince Adept.\n29\u00b0--Scottish Knight of St. Andrew.\n30\u00b0--Knight Kadosh.\n31\u00b0--Inspector Inquisitor\n32\u00b0--Master of the Royal Secret.\n\n\n\n\nMORALS AND DOGMA.\n\nLODGE OF PERFECTION.\n\n\n\n\nMORALS AND DOGMA.\n\n[Illustration]\n\nI.\n\nAPPRENTICE.\n\nTHE TWELVE-INCH RULE AND THE COMMON GAVEL.\n\n\nForce, unregulated or ill-regulated, is not only wasted in the void,\nlike that of gunpowder burned in the open air, and steam unconfined by\nscience; but, striking in the dark, and its blows meeting only the air,\nthey recoil and bruise itself. It is destruction and ruin. It is the\nvolcano, the earthquake, the cyclone;--not growth and progress. It is\nPolyphemus blinded, striking at random, and falling headlong among the\nsharp rocks by the impetus of his own blows.\n\nThe blind Force of the people is a Force that must be economized, and\nalso managed, as the blind Force of steam, lifting the ponderous iron\narms and turning the large wheels, is made to bore and rifle the cannon\nand to weave the most delicate lace. It must be regulated by Intellect.\nIntellect is to the people and the people's Force, what the slender\nneedle of the compass is to the ship--its soul, always counselling the\nhuge mass of wood and iron, and always pointing to the north. To attack\nthe citadels built up on all sides against the human race by\nsuperstitions, despotisms, and prejudices, the Force must have a brain\nand a law. Then its deeds of daring produce permanent results, and there\nis real progress. Then there are sublime conquests. Thought is a force,\nand philosophy should be an energy, finding its aim and its effects in\nthe amelioration of mankind. The two great motors are Truth and Love.\nWhen all these Forces are combined, and guided by the Intellect, and\nregulated by the RULE of Right, and Justice, and of combined and\nsystematic movement and effort, the great revolution prepared for by the\nages will begin to march. The POWER of the Deity Himself is in\nequilibrium with His WISDOM. Hence the only results are HARMONY.\n\nIt is because Force is ill regulated, that revolutions prove failures.\nTherefore it is that so often insurrections, coming from those high\nmountains that domineer over the moral horizon, Justice, Wisdom, Reason,\nRight, built of the purest snow of the ideal after a long fall from rock\nto rock, after having reflected the sky in their transparency, and been\nswollen by a hundred affluents, in the majestic path of triumph,\nsuddenly lose themselves in quagmires, like a California river in the\nsands.\n\nThe onward march of the human race requires that the heights around it\nshould blaze with noble and enduring lessons of courage. Deeds of daring\ndazzle history, and form one class of the guiding lights of man. They\nare the stars and coruscations from that great sea of electricity, the\nForce inherent in the people. To strive, to brave all risks, to perish,\nto persevere, to be true to one's self, to grapple body to body with\ndestiny, to surprise defeat by the little terror it inspires, now to\nconfront unrighteous power, now to defy intoxicated triumph--these are\nthe examples that the nations need and the light that electrifies them.\n\nThere are immense Forces in the great caverns of evil beneath society;\nin the hideous degradation, squalor, wretchedness and destitution, vices\nand crimes that reek and simmer in the darkness in that populace below\nthe people, of great cities. There disinterestedness vanishes, every one\nhowls, searches, gropes, and gnaws for himself. Ideas are ignored, and\nof progress there is no thought. This populace has two mothers, both of\nthem stepmothers--Ignorance and Misery. Want is their only guide--for\nthe appetite alone they crave satisfaction. Yet even these may be\nemployed. The lowly sand we trample upon, cast into the furnace, melted,\npurified by fire, may become resplendent crystal.\n\nThey have the brute force of the HAMMER, but their blows help on the\ngreat cause, when struck within the lines traced by the RULE held by\nwisdom and discretion.\n\nYet it is this very Force of the people, this Titanic power of the\ngiants, that builds the fortifications of tyrants, and is embodied in\ntheir armies. Hence the possibility of such tyrannies as those of which\nit has been said, that \"Rome smells worse under Vitellius than under\nSulla. Under Claudius and under Domitian there is a deformity of\nbaseness corresponding to the ugliness of the tyranny. The foulness of\nthe slaves is a direct result of the atrocious baseness of the despot. A\nmiasma exhales from these crouching consciences that reflect the master;\nthe public authorities are unclean, hearts are collapsed, consciences\nshrunken, souls puny. This is so under Caracalla, it is so under\nCommodus, it is so under Heliogabalus, while from the Roman senate,\nunder C\u00e6sar, there comes only the rank odor peculiar to the eagle's\neyrie.\"\n\nIt is the force of the people that sustains all these despotisms, the\nbasest as well as the best. That force acts through armies; and these\noftener enslave than liberate. Despotism there applies the RULE. Force\nis the MACE of steel at the saddle-bow of the knight or of the bishop in\narmor. Passive obedience by force supports thrones and oligarchies,\nSpanish kings, and Venetian senates. Might, in an army wielded by\ntyranny, is the enormous sum total of utter weakness; and so Humanity\nwages war against Humanity, in despite of Humanity. So a people\nwillingly submits to despotism, and its workmen submit to be despised,\nand its soldiers to be whipped; therefore it is that battles lost by a\nnation are often progress attained. Less glory is more liberty. When the\ndrum is silent, reason sometimes speaks.\n\nTyrants use the force of the people to chain and subjugate--that is,\n_enyoke_ the people. Then they plough with them as men do with oxen\nyoked. Thus the spirit of liberty and innovation is reduced by bayonets,\nand principles are struck dumb by cannonshot; while the monks mingle\nwith the troopers, and the Church militant and jubilant, Catholic or\nPuritan, sings Te Deums for victories over rebellion.\n\nThe military power, not subordinate to the civil power, again the HAMMER\nor MACE of FORCE, independent of the RULE, is an armed tyranny, born\nfull-grown, as Athene sprung from the brain of Zeus. It spawns a\ndynasty, and begins with C\u00e6sar to rot into Vitellius and Commodus. At\nthe present day it inclines to _begin_ where formerly dynasties _ended_.\n\nConstantly the people put forth immense strength, only to end in immense\nweakness. The force of the people is exhausted in indefinitely\nprolonging things long since dead; in governing mankind by embalming old\ndead tyrannies of Faith; restoring dilapidated dogmas; regilding faded,\nworm-eaten shrines; whitening and rouging ancient and barren\nsuperstitions; saving society by multiplying parasites; perpetuating\nsuperannuated institutions; enforcing the worship of symbols as the\nactual means of salvation; and tying the dead corpse of the Past, mouth\nto mouth, with the living Present. Therefore it is that it is one of the\nfatalities of Humanity to be condemned to eternal struggles with\nphantoms, with superstitions, bigotries, hypocrisies, prejudices, the\nformulas of error, and the pleas of tyranny. Despotisms, seen in the\npast, become respectable, as the mountain, bristling with volcanic rock,\nrugged and horrid, seen through the haze of distance is blue and smooth\nand beautiful. The sight of a single dungeon of tyranny is worth more,\nto dispel illusions, and create a holy hatred of despotism, and to\ndirect FORCE aright, than the most eloquent volumes. The French should\nhave preserved the Bastile as a perpetual lesson; Italy should not\ndestroy the dungeons of the Inquisition. The Force of the people\nmaintained the Power that built its gloomy cells, and placed the living\nin their granite sepulchres.\n\nThe FORCE of the people cannot, by its unrestrained and fitful action,\nmaintain and continue in action and existence a free Government once\ncreated. That Force must be limited, restrained, conveyed by\ndistribution into different channels, and by roundabout courses, to\noutlets, whence it is to issue as the law, action, and decision of the\nState; as the wise old Egyptian kings conveyed in different canals, by\nsub-division, the swelling waters of the Nile, and compelled them to\nfertilize and not devastate the land. There must be the _jus et norma_,\nthe law and _Rule_, or _Gauge_, of constitution and law, within which\nthe public force must act. Make a breach in either, and the great\nsteam-hammer, with its swift and ponderous blows, crushes all the\nmachinery to atoms, and, at last, wrenching itself away, lies inert and\ndead amid the ruin it has wrought.\n\nThe FORCE of the people, or the popular will, in action and exerted,\nsymbolized by the GAVEL, regulated and guided by and acting within the\nlimits of LAW and ORDER, symbolized by the TWENTY-FOUR-INCH RULE, has\nfor its fruit LIBERTY, EQUALITY, and FRATERNITY,--liberty regulated by\nlaw; equality of rights in the eye of the law; brotherhood with its\nduties and obligations as well as its benefits.\n\nYou will hear shortly of the _Rough_ ASHLAR and the _Perfect_ ASHLAR, as\npart of the jewels of the Lodge. The rough Ashlar is said to be \"a\nstone, as taken from the quarry, in its rude and natural state.\" The\nperfect Ashlar is said to be \"a stone made ready by the hands of the\nworkmen, to be adjusted by the working-tools of the Fellow-Craft.\" We\nshall not repeat the explanations of these symbols given by the York\nRite. You may read them in its printed monitors. They are declared to\nallude to the self-improvement of the individual craftsman,--a\ncontinuation of the same superficial interpretation.\n\nThe rough Ashlar is the PEOPLE, as a mass, rude and unorganized. The\nperfect Ashlar, or cubical stone, symbol of perfection, is the STATE,\nthe rulers deriving their powers from the consent of the governed; the\nconstitution and laws speaking the will of the people; the government\nharmonious, symmetrical, efficient,--its powers properly distributed and\nduly adjusted in equilibrium.\n\nIf we delineate a cube on a plane surface thus: [Illustration:] we have\nvisible _three_ faces, and _nine_ external lines, drawn between _seven_\npoints. The complete cube has _three_ more faces, making _six_; _three_\nmore lines, making _twelve_; and _one_ more point, making _eight_. As\nthe number 12 includes the sacred numbers, 3, 5, 7, and 3 times 3, or 9,\nand is produced by adding the sacred number 3 to 9; while its own two\nfigures 1, 2, the unit or monad, and duad, added together, make the\nsame sacred number 3; it was called the perfect number; and the cube\nbecame the symbol of perfection.\n\nProduced by FORCE, acting by RULE; hammered in accordance with lines\nmeasured by the Gauge, out of the rough Ashlar, it is an appropriate\nsymbol of the Force of the people, expressed as the constitution and law\nof the State; and of the State itself the three visible faces represent\nthe three departments,--the Executive, which executes the laws; the\nLegislative, which makes the laws; the Judiciary, which interprets the\nlaws, applies and enforces them, between man and man, between the State\nand the citizens. The three invisible faces, are Liberty, Equality, and\nFraternity,--the threefold soul of the State--its vitality, spirit, and\nintellect.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThough Masonry neither usurps the place of, nor apes religion, prayer is\nan essential part of our ceremonies. It is the aspiration of the soul\ntoward the Absolute and Infinite Intelligence, which is the One Supreme\nDeity, most feebly and misunderstandingly characterized as an\n\"ARCHITECT.\" Certain faculties of man are directed toward the\nUnknown--thought, meditation, prayer. The unknown is an ocean, of which\nconscience is the compass. Thought, meditation, prayer, are the great\nmysterious pointings of the needle. It is a spiritual magnetism that\nthus connects the human soul with the Deity. These majestic irradiations\nof the soul pierce through the shadow toward the light.\n\nIt is but a shallow scoff to say that prayer is absurd, because it is\nnot possible for us, by means of it, to persuade God to change His\nplans. He produces foreknown and foreintended effects, by the\ninstrumentality of the forces of nature, all of which are _His_ forces.\nOur own are part of these. Our free agency and our will are forces. We\ndo not absurdly cease to make _efforts_ to attain wealth or happiness,\nprolong life, and continue health, because we cannot by any effort\nchange what is predestined. If the effort also is predestined, it is not\nthe less _our_ effort, made of _our free will_. So, likewise, we pray.\nWill is a force. Thought is a force. Prayer is a force. Why should it\nnot be of the law of God, that prayer, like Faith and Love, should have\nits effects? Man is not to be comprehended as a starting-point, or\nprogress as a goal, without those two great forces, Faith and Love.\nPrayer is sublime. Orisons that beg and clamor are pitiful. To deny the\nefficacy of prayer, is to deny that of Faith, Love, and Effort. Yet the\neffects produced, when our hand, moved by our will, launches a pebble\ninto the ocean, never cease; and every uttered word is registered for\neternity upon the invisible air.\n\nEvery Lodge is a Temple, and as a whole, and in its details symbolic.\nThe Universe itself supplied man with the model for the first temples\nreared to the Divinity. The arrangement of the Temple of Solomon, the\nsymbolic ornaments which formed its chief decorations, and the dress of\nthe High-Priest, all had reference to the order of the Universe, as then\nunderstood. The Temple contained many emblems of the seasons-the sun,\nthe moon, the planets, the constellations Ursa Major and Minor, the\nzodiac, the elements, and the other parts of the world. It is the Master\nof this Lodge, of the Universe, Hermes, of whom Kh\u016br\u016bm is the\nrepresentative, that is one of the lights of the Lodge.\n\nFor further instruction as to the symbolism of the heavenly bodies, and\nof the sacred numbers, and of the temple and its details, you must wait\npatiently until you advance in Masonry, in the mean time exercising your\nintellect in studying them for yourself. To study and seek to interpret\ncorrectly the symbols of the Universe, is the work of the sage and\nphilosopher. It is to decipher the writing of God, and penetrate into\nHis thoughts.\n\nThis is what is asked and answered in our catechism, in regard to the\nLodge.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nA \"Lodge\" is defined to be \"an assemblage of Freemasons, duly\ncongregated, having the sacred writings, square, and compass, and a\ncharter, or warrant of constitution, authorizing them to work.\" The room\nor place in which they meet, representing some part of King Solomon's\nTemple, is also called the Lodge; and it is that we are now considering.\n\nIt is said to be supported by three great columns, WISDOM, FORCE or\nSTRENGTH, and BEAUTY, represented by the Master, the Senior Warden, and\nthe Junior Warden; and these are said to be the columns that support the\nLodge, \"because Wisdom, Strength, and Beauty, are the perfections of\neverything, and nothing can endure without them.\" \"Because,\" the York\nRite says, \"it is necessary that there should be Wisdom to conceive,\nStrength to support, and Beauty to adorn, all great and important\nundertakings.\" \"Know ye not,\" says the Apostle Paul, \"that ye are the\ntemple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? If any man\ndesecrate the temple of God, him shall God destroy, for the temple of\nGod is holy, which temple ye are.\"\n\nThe Wisdom and Power of the Deity are in equilibrium. The laws of\nnature and the moral laws are not the mere despotic mandates of His\nOmnipotent will; for, then they might be changed by Him, and order\nbecome disorder, and good and right become evil and wrong; honesty and\nloyalty, vices; and fraud, ingratitude, and vice, virtues. Omnipotent\npower, infinite, and existing alone, would necessarily not be\nconstrained to consistency. Its decrees and laws could not be immutable.\nThe laws of God are not obligatory on us because they are the enactments\nof His POWER, or the expression of His WILL; but because they express\nHis infinite WISDOM. They are not right because they are His laws, but\nHis laws because they are right. From the equilibrium of infinite wisdom\nand infinite force, results perfect harmony, in physics and in the moral\nuniverse. Wisdom, Power, and Harmony constitute one Masonic triad. They\nhave other and profounder meanings, that may at some time be unveiled to\nyou.\n\nAs to the ordinary and commonplace explanation, it may be added, that\nthe wisdom of the Architect is displayed in combining, as only a\nskillful Architect can do, and as God has done everywhere,--for example,\nin the tree, the human frame, the egg, the cells of the\nhoneycomb--strength, with grace, beauty, symmetry, proportion,\nlightness, ornamentation. That, too, is the perfection of the orator and\npoet--to combine force, strength, energy, with grace of style, musical\ncadences, the beauty of figures, the play and irradiation of imagination\nand fancy; and so, in a State, the warlike and industrial force of the\npeople, and their Titanic strength, must be combined with the beauty of\nthe arts, the sciences, and the intellect, if the State would scale the\nheights of excellence, and the people be really free. Harmony in this,\nas in all the Divine, the material, and the human, is the result of\nequilibrium, of the sympathy and opposite action of contraries; a single\nWisdom above them holding the beam of the scales. To reconcile the moral\nlaw, human responsibility, free-will, with the absolute power of God;\nand the existence of evil with His absolute wisdom, and goodness, and\nmercy,--these are the great enigmas of the Sphynx.\n\nYou entered the Lodge between two columns. They represent the two which\nstood in the porch of the Temple, on each side of the great eastern\ngateway. These pillars, of bronze, four fingers breadth in thickness,\nwere, according to the most authentic account--that in the First and\nthat in the Second Book of Kings, confirmed in Jeremiah--eighteen cubits\nhigh, with a capital five cubits high. The shaft of each was four cubits\nin diameter. A cubit is one foot 707/1000. That is, the shaft of each\nwas a little over thirty feet eight inches in height, the capital of\neach a little over eight feet six inches in height, and the diameter of\nthe shaft six feet ten inches. The capitals were enriched by\npomegranates of bronze, covered by bronze net-work, and ornamented with\nwreaths of bronze; and appear to have imitated the shape of the\nseed-vessel of the lotus or Egyptian lily, a sacred symbol to the Hindus\nand Egyptians. The pillar or column on the right, or in the south, was\nnamed, as the Hebrew word is rendered in our translation of the Bible,\nJACHIN: and that on the left BOAZ. Our translators say that the first\nword means, \"_He shall establish_;\" and the second, \"_In it is\nstrength._\"\n\nThese columns were imitations, by Kh\u016br\u016bm, the Tyrian artist, of the\ngreat columns consecrated to the Winds and Fire, at the entrance to the\nfamous Temple of Malkarth, in the city of Tyre. It is customary, in\nLodges of the York Rite, to see a celestial globe on one, and a\nterrestrial globe on the other; but these are not warranted, if the\nobject be to imitate the original two columns of the Temple. The\nsymbolic meaning of these columns we shall leave for the present\nunexplained, only adding that Entered Apprentices keep their\nworking-tools in the column JACHIN; and giving you the etymology and\nliteral meaning of the two names.\n\nThe word _Jachin_, in Hebrew, is [Hebrew]. It was probably pronounced\n_Ya-kayan_, and meant, as a verbal noun, _He that strengthens_; and\nthence, _firm, stable, upright_.\n\nThe word _Boaz_ is [Hebrew] Baaz. [Hebrew] means _Strong, Strength,\nPower, Might, Refuge, Source of Strength, a Fort_. The [Hebrew] prefixed\nmeans \"_with_\" or \"_in_,\" and gives the word the force of the Latin\ngerund, _roborando--Strengthening_.\n\nThe former word also means _he will establish_, or _plant in an erect\nposition_--from the verb [Hebrew] _K\u016bn, he stood erect_. It probably\nmeant _Active_ and _Vivifying Energy_ and _Force_; and _Boas, Stability,\nPermanence_, in the _passive_ sense.\n\nThe Dimensions of the Lodge, our Brethren of the York Rite say, \"are\nunlimited, and its covering no less than the canopy of Heaven.\" \"To this\nobject,\" they say, \"the mason's mind is continually directed, and\nthither he hopes at last to arrive by the aid of the theological ladder\nwhich Jacob in his vision saw ascending from earth to Heaven; the three\nprincipal rounds of which are denominated Faith, Hope, and Charity; and\nwhich admonish us to have Faith in God, Hope in Immortality, and Charity\nto all mankind.\" Accordingly a ladder, sometimes with nine rounds, is\nseen on the chart, resting at the bottom on the earth, its top in the\nclouds, the stars shining above it; and this is deemed to represent that\nmystic ladder, which Jacob saw in his dream, set up on the earth, and\nthe top of it reaching to Heaven, with the angels of God ascending and\ndescending on it. The addition of the three principal rounds to the\nsymbolism, is wholly modern and incongruous. The ancients counted seven\nplanets, thus arranged: the Moon, Mercury, Venus, the Sun, Mars,\nJupiter, and Saturn. There were seven heavens and seven spheres of these\nplanets; on all the monuments of Mithras are seven altars or pyres,\nconsecrated to the seven planets, as were the seven lamps of the golden\ncandelabrum in the Temple. That these represented the planets, we are\nassured by Clemens of Alexandria, in his Stromata, and by Philo Judaeus.\nTo return to its source in the Infinite, the human soul, the ancients\nheld, had to ascend, as it had descended, through the seven spheres. The\nLadder by which it reascends, has, according to Marsilius Ficinus, in\nhis Commentary on the Ennead of Plotinus, seven degrees or steps; and in\nthe Mysteries of Mithras, carried to Rome under the Emperors, the\nladder, with its seven rounds, was a symbol referring to this ascent\nthrough the spheres of the seven planets. Jacob saw the Spirits of God\nascending and descending on it; and above it the Deity Himself. The\nMithraic Mysteries were celebrated in caves, where gates were marked at\nthe four equinoctial and solstitial points of the zodiac; and the seven\nplanetary spheres were represented, which souls needs must traverse in\ndescending from the heaven of the fixed stars to the elements that\nenvelop the earth; and seven gates were marked, one for each planet,\nthrough which they pass, in descending or returning. We learn this from\nCelsus, in Origen, who says that the symbolic image of this passage\namong the stars, used in the Mithraic Mysteries, was a ladder reaching\nfrom earth to Heaven, divided into seven steps or stages, to each of\nwhich was a gate, and at the summit an eighth one, that of the fixed\nstars. The symbol was the same as that of the seven stages of Borsippa,\nthe Pyramid of vitrified brick, near Babylon, built of seven stages, and\neach of a different color. In the Mithraic ceremonies, the candidate\nwent through seven stages of initiation, passing through many fearful\ntrials and of these the high ladder with seven rounds or steps was the\nsymbol. You see the Lodge, its details and ornaments, by its Lights. You\nhave already heard what these Lights, the greater and lesser, are said\nto be, and how they are spoken of by our Brethren of the York Rite. The\nHoly Bible, Square, and Compasses, are not only styled the Great Lights\nin Masonry, but they are also technically called the Furniture of the\nLodge; and, as you have seen, it is held that there is no Lodge without\nthem. This has sometimes been made a pretext for excluding Jews from our\nLodges, because they cannot regard the New Testament as a holy book. The\nBible is an indispensable part of the furniture of a Christian Lodge,\nonly because it is the sacred book of the Christian religion. The Hebrew\nPentateuch in a Hebrew Lodge, and the Koran in a Mohammedan one, belong\non the Altar; and one of these, and the Square and Compass, properly\nunderstood, are the Great Lights by which a Mason must walk and work.\nThe obligation of the candidate is always to be taken on the sacred book\nor books of his religion, that he may deem it more solemn and binding;\nand therefore it was that you were asked of what religion you were. We\nhave no other concern with your religious creed. The Square is a right\nangle, formed by two right lines. It is adapted only to a plane surface,\nand belongs only to geometry, earth-measurement, that trigonometry which\ndeals only with planes, and with the earth, which the ancients supposed\nto be a plane. The Compass describes circles, and deals with spherical\ntrigonometry, the science of the spheres and heavens. The former,\ntherefore, is an emblem of what concerns the earth and the body; the\nlatter of what concerns the heavens and the soul. Yet the Compass is\nalso used in plane trigonometry, as in erecting perpendiculars; and,\ntherefore, you are reminded that, although in this Degree both points of\nthe Compass are under the Square, and you are now dealing only with the\nmoral and political meaning of the symbols, and not with their\nphilosophical and spiritual meanings, still the divine ever mingles with\nthe human; with the earthly the spiritual intermixes; and there is\nsomething spiritual in the commonest duties of life. The nations are not\nbodies-politic alone, but also souls-politic; and woe to that people\nwhich, seeking the material only, forgets that it has a soul. Then we\nhave a race, petrified in dogma, which presupposes the absence of a soul\nand the presence only of memory and instinct, or demoralized by lucre.\nSuch a nature can never lead civilization. Genuflexion before the idol\nor the dollar atrophies the muscle which walks and the will which moves.\nHieratic or mercantile absorption diminishes the radiance of a people,\nlowers its horizon by lowering its level, and deprives it of that\nunderstanding of the universal aim, at the same time human and divine,\nwhich makes the missionary nations. A free people, forgetting that it\nhas a soul to be cared for, devotes all its energies to its material\nadvancement. If it makes war, it is to subserve its commercial\ninterests. The citizens copy after the State, and regard wealth, pomp,\nand luxury as the great goods of life. Such a nation creates wealth\nrapidly, and distributes it badly. Thence the two extremes, of monstrous\nopulence and monstrous misery; all the enjoyment to a few, all the\nprivations to the rest, that is to say, to the people; Privilege,\nException, Monopoly, Feudality, springing up from Labor itself: a false\nand dangerous situation, which, making Labor a blinded and chained\nCyclops, in the mine, at the forge, in the workshop, at the loom, in the\nfield, over poisonous fumes, in miasmatic cells, in unventilated\nfactories, founds public power upon private misery, and plants the\ngreatness of the State in the suffering of the individual. It is a\ngreatness ill constituted, in which all the material elements are\ncombined, and into which no moral element enters. If a people, like a\nstar, has the right of eclipse, the light ought to return. The eclipse\nshould not degenerate into night.\n\nThe three lesser, or the Sublime Lights, you have heard, are the Sun,\nthe Moon, and the Master of the Lodge; and you have heard what our\nBrethren of the York Rite say in regard to them, and why they hold them\nto be Lights of the Lodge. But the Sun and Moon do in no sense light the\nLodge, unless it be symbolically, and then the lights are not they, but\nthose things of which they are the symbols. Of what they are the symbols\nthe Mason in that Rite is not told. Nor does the Moon in any sense rule\nthe night with regularity.\n\nThe Sun is the ancient symbol of the life-giving and generative power of\nthe Deity. To the ancients, light was the cause of life; and God was the\nsource from which all light flowed; the _essence_ of Light, the\n_Invisible_ Fire, developed as Flame _manifested_ as light and splendor.\nThe Sun was His manifestation and visible image; and the Sab\u00e6ans\nworshipping the Light-God, _seemed_ to worship the Sun, in whom they saw\nthe manifestation of the Deity.\n\nThe Moon was the symbol of the passive capacity of nature to produce,\nthe female, of which the life-giving power and energy was the male. It\nwas the symbol of Isis, Astarte, and Artemis, or Diana. The \"_Master of\nLife_\" was the Supreme Deity, above both, and manifested through both;\nZeus, the Son of Saturn, become King of the Gods; Horus, son of Osiris\nand Isis, become the Master of Life; Dionusos or Bacchus, like Mithras,\nbecome the author of Light and Life and Truth.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe Master of Light and Life, the Sun and the Moon, are symbolized in\nevery Lodge by the Master and Wardens: and this makes it the duty of the\nMaster to dispense light to the Brethren, by himself, and through the\nWardens, who are his ministers.\n\n\"Thy sun,\" says ISAIAH to Jerusalem, \"shall no more go down, neither\nshall thy moon withdraw itself; for the LORD shall be thine everlasting\nlight, and the days of thy mourning shall be ended. Thy people also\nshall be all righteous; they shall inherit the land forever.\" Such is\nthe type of a free people.\n\nOur northern ancestors worshipped this triune Deity; ODIN, the Almighty\nFATHER; FREA, his wife, emblem of universal matter; and THOR, his son,\nthe mediator. But above all these was the Supreme God, \"the author of\neverything that existeth, the Eternal, the Ancient, the Living and Awful\nBeing, the Searcher into concealed things, the Being that never\nchangeth.\" In the Temple of Eleusis (a sanctuary lighted only by a\nwindow in the roof, and representing the Universe), the images of the\nSun, Moon, and Mercury, were represented.\n\n\"The Sun and Moon,\" says the learned Bro.'. DELAUNAY, \"represent the two\ngrand principles of all generations, the active and passive, the male\nand the female. The Sun represents the actual light. He pours upon the\nMoon his fecundating rays; both shed their light upon their offspring,\nthe Blazing Star, or HORUS, and the three form the great Equilateral\nTriangle, in the centre of which is the omnific letter of the Kabalah,\nby which creation is said to have been effected.\"\n\nThe ORNAMENTS of a Lodge are said to be \"the Mosaic Pavement, the\nIndented Tessel, and the Blazing Star.\" The Mosaic Pavement, chequered\nin squares or lozenges, is said to represent the ground-floor of King\nSolomon's Temple; and the Indented Tessel \"that beautiful tesselated\nborder which surrounded it.\" The Blazing Star in the centre is said to\nbe \"an emblem of Divine Providence, and commemorative of the star which\nappeared to guide the wise men of the East to the place of our Saviour's\nnativity.\" But \"there was no stone seen\" within the Temple. The walls\nwere covered with planks of cedar, and the floor was covered with planks\nof fir. There is no evidence that there was such a pavement or floor in\nthe Temple, or such a bordering. In England, anciently, the\nTracing-Board was surrounded with an indented border; and it is only in\nAmerica that such a border is put around the Mosaic pavement. The\ntesser\u00e6, indeed, are the squares or lozenges of the pavement. In\nEngland, also, \"the indented or denticulated border\" is called\n\"tesselated,\" because it has four \"tassels,\" said to represent\nTemperance, Fortitude, Prudence, and Justice. It was termed the Indented\nTrassel; but this is a misuse of words. It is a _tesserated_ pavement,\nwith an indented border round it.\n\nThe pavement, alternately black and white, symbolizes, whether so\nintended or not, the Good and Evil Principles of the Egyptian and\nPersian creed. It is the warfare of Michael and Satan, of the Gods and\nTitans, of Balder and Lok; between light and shadow, which is darkness;\nDay and Night; Freedom and Despotism; Religious Liberty and the\nArbitrary Dogmas of a Church that thinks for its votaries, and whose\nPontiff claims to be infallible, and the decretals of its Councils to\nconstitute a gospel.\n\nThe edges of this pavement, if in lozenges, will necessarily be indented\nor denticulated, toothed like a saw; and to complete and finish it a\nbordering is necessary. It is completed by tassels as ornaments at the\ncorners. If these and the bordering have any symbolic meaning, it is\nfanciful and arbitrary.\n\nTo find in the BLAZING STAR of five points an allusion to the Divine\nProvidence, is also fanciful; and to make it commemorative of the Star\nthat is said to have guided the Magi, is to give it a meaning\ncomparatively modern. Originally it represented SIRIUS, or the Dog-star,\nthe forerunner of the inundation of the Nile; the God ANUBIS, companion\nof Isis in her search for the body of OSIRIS, her brother and husband.\nThen it became the image of HORUS, the son of OSIRIS, himself symbolized\nalso by the Sun, the author of the Seasons, and the God of Time; Son of\nIsis, who was the universal nature, himself the primitive matter,\ninexhaustible source of Life, spark of uncreated fire, universal seed of\nall beings. It was HERMES, also, the Master of Learning, whose name in\nGreek is that of the God Mercury. It became the sacred and potent sign\nor character of the Magi, the PENTALPHA, and is the significant emblem\nof Liberty and Freedom, blazing with a steady radiance amid the\nweltering elements of good and evil of Revolutions, and promising serene\nskies and fertile seasons to the nations, after the storms of change and\ntumult.\n\nIn the East of the Lodge, over the Master, inclosed in a triangle, is\nthe Hebrew letter Y\u014cD [Hebrew] or [Hebrew]. In the English and\nAmerican Lodges the Letter G.'. is substituted for this, as the initial\nof the word GOD, with as little reason as if the letter D., initial of\nDIEU, were used in French Lodges instead of the proper letter. Y\u014cD\nis, in the Kabalah, the symbol of Unity, of the Supreme Deity, the first\nletter of the Holy Name; and also a symbol of the Great Kabalistic\nTriads. To understand its mystic meanings, you must open the pages of\nthe Sohar and Siphra de Zeniutha, and other kabalistic books, and ponder\ndeeply on their meaning. It must suffice to say, that it is the Creative\nEnergy of the Deity, is represented as a _point_, and that point in the\ncentre of the _Circle_ of immensity. It is to us in this Degree, the\nsymbol of that unmanifested Deity, the Absolute, who has no name.\n\nOur French Brethren place this letter Y\u014cD in the centre of the\nBlazing Star. And in the old Lectures, our ancient English Brethren\nsaid, \"The Blazing Star or Glory in the centre refers us to that grand\nluminary, the Sun, which enlightens the earth, and by its genial\ninfluence dispenses blessings to mankind.\" They called it also in the\nsame lectures, an emblem of PRUDENCE. The word _Prudentia_ means, in its\noriginal and fullest signification, _Foresight_; and, accordingly, the\nBlazing Star has been regarded as an emblem of Omniscience, or the\nAll-seeing Eye, which to the Egyptian Initiates was the emblem of\nOsiris, the Creator. With the Y\u014cD in the centre, it has the\nkabalistic meaning of the Divine Energy, manifested as Light, creating\nthe Universe.\n\nThe Jewels of the Lodge are said to be six in number. Three are called\n\"_Movable_,\" and three \"_Immovable_.\" The SQUARE, the LEVEL, and the\nPLUMB were anciently and properly called the Movable Jewels, because\nthey pass from one Brother to another. It is a modern innovation to call\nthem immovable, because they must always be present in the Lodge. The\nimmovable jewels are the ROUGH ASHLAR, the PERFECT ASHLAR or CUBICAL\nSTONE, or, in some Rituals, the DOUBLE CUBE, and the TRACING-BOARD, or\nTRESTLE-BOARD.\n\nOf these jewels our Brethren of the York Rite say: \"The _Square_\ninculcates Morality; the _Level_, Equality; and the _Plumb_, Rectitude\nof Conduct.\" Their explanation of the immovable Jewels may be read in\ntheir monitors.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nOur Brethren of the York Rite say that \"there is represented in every\nwell-governed Lodge, a certain point, within a circle; the point\nrepresenting an individual Brother; the Circle, the boundary line of his\nconduct, beyond which he is never to suffer his prejudices or passions\nto betray him.\"\n\nThis is not to _interpret_ the symbols of Masonry. It is said by some,\nwith a nearer approach to interpretation, that the point within the\ncircle represents God in the centre of the Universe. It is a common\nEgyptian sign for the Sun and Osiris, and is still used as the\nastronomical sign of the great luminary. In the Kabalah the point is\nY\u014cD, the Creative Energy of God, irradiating with light the circular\nspace which God, the universal Light, left vacant, wherein to create the\nworlds, by withdrawing His substance of Light back on all sides from one\npoint.\n\nOur Brethren add that, \"this circle is embordered by two perpendicular\nparallel lines, representing Saint John the Baptist and Saint John the\nEvangelist, and upon the top rest the Holy Scriptures\" (an open book).\n\"In going round this circle,\" they say, \"we necessarily touch upon these\ntwo lines as well as upon the Holy Scriptures; and while a Mason keeps\nhimself circumscribed within their precepts, it is impossible that he\nshould materially err.\"\n\nIt would be a waste of time to comment upon this. Some writers have\nimagined that the parallel lines represent the Tropics of Cancer and\nCapricorn, which the Sun alternately touches upon at the Summer and\nWinter solstices. But the tropics are not perpendicular lines, and the\nidea is merely fanciful. If the parallel lines ever belonged to the\nancient symbol, they had some more recondite and more _fruitful_\nmeaning. They probably had the same meaning as the twin columns Jachin\nand Boaz. That meaning is not for the Apprentice. The adept may find it\nin the Kabalah. The JUSTICE and MERCY of God are in equilibrium, and the\nresult is HARMONY, because a Single and Perfect Wisdom presides over\nboth.\n\nThe Holy Scriptures are an entirely modern addition to the symbol, like\nthe terrestrial and celestial globes on the columns of the portico. Thus\nthe ancient symbol has been denaturalized by incongruous additions, like\nthat of Isis weeping over the broken column containing the remains of\nOsiris at Byblos.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nMasonry has its decalogue, which is a law to its Initiates. These are\nits Ten Commandments:\n\nI. [Symbol: Earth]: God is the Eternal, Omnipotent, Immutable WISDOM\n      and Supreme INTELLIGENCE and Exhaustless LOVE.\n    Thou shalt adore, revere, and love Him!\n    Thou shalt honor Him by practising the virtues!\n\nII. [Symbol: Full moon]: Thy religion shall be, to do good because\n      it is a pleasure to thee, and not merely because it is a duty.\n    That thou mayest become the friend of the wise man, thou\n      shalt obey his precepts!\n    Thy soul is immortal! Thou shalt do nothing to degrade it!\n\nIII. [Symbol: Earth]: Thou shalt unceasingly war against vice!\n    Thou shalt not do unto others that which thou wouldst not\n      wish them to do unto thee!\n    Thou shalt be submissive to thy fortunes, and keep burning\n      the light of wisdom!\n\nIV. [Symbol: Full moon]: Thou shalt honor thy parents!\n    Thou shalt pay respect and homage to the aged!\n    Thou shalt instruct the young!\n    Thou shalt protect and defend infancy and innocence!\n\nV. [Symbol: Earth]: Thou shalt cherish thy wife and thy children!\n    Thou shalt love thy country, and obey its laws!\n\nVI. [Symbol: Full moon]: Thy friend shall be to thee a second self!\n    Misfortune shall not estrange thee from him!\n    Thou shalt do for his memory whatever thou wouldst do for him, if he\n       were living!\n\nVII. [Symbol: Earth]: Thou shalt avoid and flee from insincere\n      friendships!\n    Thou shalt in everything refrain from excess.\n    Thou shalt fear to be the cause of a stain on thy memory!\n\nVIII. [Symbol: Full moon]: Thou shalt allow no passions to become thy\n       master!\n    Thou shalt make the passions of others profitable lessons\n      to thyself!\n    Thou shalt be indulgent to error!\n\nIX. [Symbol: Earth]: Thou shalt hear much: Thou shalt speak little: Thou\n      shalt act well!\n    Thou shalt forget injuries!\n    Thou shalt render good for evil!\n    Thou shalt not misuse either thy strength or thy superiority!\n\nX. [Symbol: Full moon]: Thou shalt study to know men; that thereby thou\n      mayest learn to know thyself!\n    Thou shalt ever seek after virtue!\n    Thou shalt be just!\n    Thou shalt avoid idleness!\n\nBut the great commandment of Masonry is this: \"A new commandment give I\nunto you: that ye love one another! He that saith he is in the light,\nand hateth his brother, remaineth still in the darkness.\"\n\nSuch are the moral duties of a Mason. But it is also the duty of Masonry\nto assist in elevating the moral and intellectual level of society; in\ncoining knowledge, bringing ideas into circulation, and causing the mind\nof youth to grow; and in putting, gradually, by the teachings of axioms\nand the promulgation of positive laws, the human race in harmony with\nits destinies.\n\nTo this duty and work the Initiate is apprenticed. He must not imagine\nthat he can effect nothing, and, therefore, despairing, become inert. It\nis in this, as in a man's daily life. Many great deeds are done in the\nsmall struggles of life. There is, we are told, a determined though\nunseen bravery, which defends itself, foot to foot, in the darkness,\nagainst the fatal invasion of necessity and of baseness. There are noble\nand mysterious triumphs, which no eye sees, which no renown rewards,\nwhich no flourish of trumpets salutes. Life, misfortune, isolation,\nabandonment, poverty, are battle-fields, which have their\nheroes,--heroes obscure, but sometimes greater than those who become\nillustrious. The Mason should struggle in the same manner, and with the\nsame bravery, against those invasions of necessity and baseness, which\ncome to nations as well as to men. He should meet _them_, too, foot to\nfoot, even in the darkness, and protest against the national wrongs and\nfollies; against usurpation and the first inroads of that hydra,\nTyranny. There is no more sovereign eloquence than the truth in\nindignation. It is more difficult for a people to keep than to gain\ntheir freedom. The Protests of Truth are always needed. Continually, the\nright must protest against the fact. There is, in fact, Eternity in the\nRight. The Mason should be the Priest and Soldier of that Right. If his\ncountry should be robbed of her liberties, he should still not despair.\nThe protest of the Right against the Fact persists forever. The robbery\nof a people never becomes prescriptive. Reclamation of its rights is\nbarred by no length of time. Warsaw can no more be Tartar than Venice\ncan be Teutonic. A people may endure military usurpation, and subjugated\nStates kneel to States and wear the yoke, while under the stress of\nnecessity; but when the necessity disappears, if the people is fit to be\nfree, the submerged country will float to the surface and reappear, and\nTyranny be adjudged by History to have murdered its victims.\n\nWhatever occurs, we should have Faith in the Justice and overruling\nWisdom of God, and Hope for the Future, and Loving-kindness for those\nwho are in error. God makes visible to men His will in events; an\nobscure text, written in a mysterious language. Men make their\ntranslations of it forthwith, hasty, incorrect, full of faults,\nomissions, and misreadings. We see so short a way along the arc of the\ngreat circle! Few minds comprehend the Divine tongue. The most\nsagacious, the most calm, the most profound, decipher the hieroglyphs\nslowly; and when they arrive with their text, perhaps the need has long\ngone by; there are already twenty translations in the public square--the\nmost incorrect being, as of course, the most accepted and popular. From\neach translation, a party is born; and from each misreading, a faction.\nEach party believes or pretends that it has the only true text, and each\nfaction believes or pretends that it alone possesses the light.\nMoreover, factions are blind men, who aim straight, errors are excellent\nprojectiles, striking skillfully, and with all the violence that springs\nfrom false reasoning, wherever a want of logic in those who defend the\nright, like a defect in a cuirass, makes them vulnerable.\n\nTherefore it is that we shall often be discomfited in combating error\nbefore the people. Ant\u00e6us long resisted Hercules; and the heads of the\nHydra grew as fast as they were cut off. It is absurd to say that\n_Error, wounded, writhes in pain, and dies amid her worshippers_. Truth\nconquers slowly. There is a wondrous vitality in Error. Truth, indeed,\nfor the most part, shoots over the heads of the masses; or if an error\nis prostrated for a moment, it is up again in a moment, and as vigorous\nas ever. It will not die when the brains are out, and the most stupid\nand irrational errors are the longest-lived.\n\nNevertheless, Masonry, which is Morality and Philosophy, must not cease\nto do its duty. We never know at what moment success awaits our\nefforts--generally when most unexpected--nor with what effect our\nefforts are or are not to be attended. Succeed or fail, Masonry must not\nbow to error, or succumb under discouragement. There were at Rome a few\nCarthaginian soldiers, taken prisoners, who refused to bow to Flaminius,\nand had a little of Hannibal's magnanimity. Masons should possess an\nequal greatness of soul. Masonry should be an energy; finding its aim\nand effect in the amelioration of mankind. Socrates should enter into\nAdam, and produce Marcus Aurelius, in other words, bring forth from the\nman of enjoyments, the man of wisdom. Masonry should not be a mere\nwatch-tower, built upon mystery, from which to gaze at ease upon the\nworld, with no other result than to be a convenience for the curious. To\nhold the full cup of thought to the thirsty lips of men; to give to all\nthe true ideas of Deity; to harmonize conscience and science, are the\nprovince of Philosophy. Morality is Faith in full bloom. Contemplation\nshould lead to action, and the absolute be practical; the ideal be made\nair and food and drink to the human mind. Wisdom is a sacred communion.\nIt is only on that condition that it ceases to be a sterile love of\nScience, and becomes the one and supreme method by which to unite\nHumanity and arouse it to concerted action. Then Philosophy becomes\nReligion.\n\nAnd Masonry, like History and Philosophy, has eternal duties--eternal,\nand, at the same time; simple--to oppose Caiaphas as Bishop, Draco or\nJefferies as Judge, Trimalcion as Legislator, and Tiberius as Emperor.\nThese are the symbols of the tyranny that degrades and crushes, and the\ncorruption that defiles and infests. In the works published for the use\nof the Craft we are told that the three great tenets of a Mason's\nprofession, are Brotherly Love, Relief, and Truth. And it is true that a\nBrotherly affection and kindness should govern us in all our intercourse\nand relations with our brethren; and a generous and liberal philanthropy\nactuate us in regard to all men. To relieve the distressed is peculiarly\nthe duty of Masons--a sacred duty, not to be omitted, neglected, or\ncoldly or inefficiently complied with. It is also most true, that Truth\nis a Divine attribute and the foundation of every virtue. To be true,\nand to seek to find and learn the Truth, are the great objects of every\ngood Mason.\n\nAs the Ancients did, Masonry styles Temperance, Fortitude, Prudence, and\nJustice, the four cardinal virtues. They are as necessary to nations as\nto individuals. The people that would be Free and Independent, must\npossess Sagacity, Forethought, Foresight, and careful Circumspection,\nall which are included in the meaning of the word Prudence. It must be\ntemperate in asserting its rights, temperate in its councils, economical\nin its expenses; it must be bold, brave, courageous, patient under\nreverses, undismayed by disasters, hopeful amid calamities, like Rome\nwhen she sold the field at which Hannibal had his camp. No Cann\u00e6 or\nPharsalia or Pavia or Agincourt or Waterloo must discourage her. Let her\nSenate sit in their seats until the Gauls pluck them by the beard. She\nmust, above all things, be just, not truckling to the strong and warring\non or plundering the weak; she must act on the square with all nations,\nand the feeblest tribes; always keeping her faith, honest in her\nlegislation, upright in all her dealings. Whenever such a Republic\nexists, it will be immortal: for rashness, injustice, intemperance and\nluxury in prosperity, and despair and disorder in adversity, are the\ncauses of the decay and dilapidation of nations.\n\n\n\n\nII.\n\nTHE FELLOW-CRAFT.\n\n\nIn the Ancient Orient, all religion was more or less a mystery and there\nwas no divorce from it of philosophy. The popular theology, taking the\nmultitude of allegories and symbols for realities, degenerated into a\nworship of the celestial luminaries, of imaginary Deities with human\nfeelings, passions, appetites, and lusts, of idols, stones, animals,\nreptiles. The Onion was sacred to the Egyptians, because its different\nlayers were a symbol of the concentric heavenly spheres. Of course the\npopular religion could not satisfy the deeper longings and thoughts, the\nloftier aspirations of the Spirit, or the logic of reason. The first,\ntherefore, was taught to the initiated in the Mysteries. There, also, it\nwas taught by symbols. The vagueness of symbolism, capable of many\ninterpretations, reached what the palpable and conventional creed could\nnot. Its indefiniteness acknowledged the abstruseness of the subject: it\ntreated that mysterious subject mystically: it endeavored to illustrate\nwhat it could not explain; to excite an appropriate _feeling_, if it\ncould not develop an adequate _idea_; and to make the image a mere\nsubordinate conveyance for the conception, which itself never became\nobvious or familiar.\n\nThus the knowledge now imparted by books and letters, was of old\nconveyed by symbols; and the priests invented or perpetuated a display\nof rites and exhibitions, which were not only more attractive to the eye\nthan words, but often more suggestive and more pregnant with meaning to\nthe mind.\n\nMasonry, successor of the Mysteries, still follows the ancient manner of\nteaching. Her ceremonies are like the ancient mystic shows,--not the\nreading of an essay, but the opening of a problem, requiring research,\nand constituting philosophy the arch-expounder. Her symbols are the\ninstruction she gives. The lectures are endeavors, often partial and\none-sided, to interpret these symbols. He who would become an\naccomplished Mason must not be content merely to hear, or even to\nunderstand, the lectures; he must, aided by them, and they having, as\nit were, marked out the way for him, study, interpret, and develop these\nsymbols for himself.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThough Masonry is identical with the ancient Mysteries, it is so only in\nthis qualified sense: that it presents but an imperfect image of their\nbrilliancy, the ruins only of their grandeur, and a system that has\nexperienced progressive alterations, the fruits of social events,\npolitical circumstances, and the ambitious imbecility of its improvers.\nAfter leaving Egypt, the Mysteries were modified by the habits of the\ndifferent nations among whom they were introduced, and especially by the\nreligious systems of the countries into which they were transplanted. To\nmaintain the established government, laws, and religion, was the\nobligation of the Initiate everywhere; and everywhere they were the\nheritage of the priests, who were nowhere willing to make the common\npeople co-proprietors with themselves of philosophical truth.\n\nMasonry is not the Coliseum in ruins. It is rather a Roman palace of the\nmiddle ages, disfigured by modern architectural improvements, yet built\non a Cyclop\u00e6an foundation laid by the Etruscans, and with many a stone\nof the superstructure taken from dwellings and temples of the age of\nHadrian and Antoninus.\n\nChristianity taught the doctrine of FRATERNITY; but repudiated that of\npolitical EQUALITY, by continually inculcating obedience to Caesar, and\nto those lawfully in authority. Masonry was the first apostle of\nEQUALITY. In the Monastery there is _fraternity_ and _equality_, but no\n_liberty_. Masonry added that also, and claimed for man the three-fold\nheritage, LIBERTY, EQUALITY, and FRATERNITY.\n\nIt was but a development of the original purpose of the Mysteries, which\nwas to teach men to know and practice their duties to themselves and\ntheir fellows, the great practical end of all philosophy and all\nknowledge.\n\nTruths are the springs from which duties flow; and it is but a few\nhundred years since a new Truth began to be distinctly seen; that MAN IS\nSUPREME OVER INSTITUTIONS, AND NOT THEY OVER HIM. Man has _natural_\nempire over _all_ institutions. They are for him, according to his\ndevelopment; not he for them. This seems to us a very simple statement,\none to which all men, everywhere, ought to assent. But once it was a\ngreat new Truth,--not revealed until governments had been in existence\nfor at least five thousand years. Once revealed, it imposed new duties\non men. Man owed it to _himself_ to be free. He owed it to his _country_\nto seek to give _her_ freedom, or maintain her in that possession. It\nmade Tyranny and Usurpation the enemies of the Human Race. It created a\ngeneral outlawry of Despots and Despotisms, temporal and spiritual. The\nsphere of Duty was immensely enlarged. Patriotism had, henceforth, a new\nand wider meaning. Free Government, Free Thought, Free Conscience, Free\nSpeech! All these came to be inalienable rights, which those who had\nparted with them or been robbed of them, or whose ancestors had lost\nthem, had the right summarily to retake. Unfortunately, as Truths always\nbecome perverted into falsehoods, and are falsehoods when misapplied,\n_this_ Truth became the Gospel of Anarchy, soon after it was first\npreached.\n\nMasonry early comprehended this Truth, and recognized its own enlarged\nduties. Its symbols then came to have a wider meaning; but it also\nassumed the mask of Stone-masonry, and borrowed its working-tools, and\nso was supplied with new and apt symbols. It aided in bringing about the\nFrench Revolution, disappeared with the Girondists, was born again with\nthe restoration of order, and sustained Napoleon, because, though\nEmperor, he acknowledged the right of the people to select its rulers,\nand was at the head of a nation refusing to receive back its old kings.\nHe pleaded, with sabre, musket, and cannon, the great cause of the\nPeople against Royalty, the right of the French people even to make a\nCorsican General their Emperor, if it pleased them.\n\nMasonry felt that this Truth had the Omnipotence of God on its side; and\nthat neither Pope nor Potentate could overcome it. It was a truth\ndropped into the world's wide treasury, and forming a part of the\nheritage which each generation receives, enlarges, and holds in trust,\nand of necessity bequeaths to mankind; the personal estate of man,\nentailed of nature to the end of time. And Masonry early recognized it\nas true, that to set forth and develop a truth, or any human excellence\nof gift or growth, is to make, greater the spiritual glory of the race;\nthat whosoever aids the march of a Truth, and makes the thought a thing,\nwrites in the same line with MOSES, and with Him who died upon the\ncross; and has an intellectual sympathy with the Deity Himself.\n\nThe best gift we can bestow on man is manhood. It is that which Masonry\nis ordained of God to bestow on its votaries: not sectarianism and\nreligious dogma; not a rudimental morality, that may be found in the\nwritings of Confucius, Zoroaster, Seneca, and the Rabbis, in the\nProverbs and Ecclesiastes; not a little and cheap common-school\nknowledge; but manhood and science and philosophy.\n\nNot that Philosophy or Science is in opposition to Religion. For\nPhilosophy is but that knowledge of God and the Soul, which is derived\nfrom observation of the manifested action of God and the Soul, and from\na wise analogy. It is the intellectual guide which the religious\nsentiment needs. The true religious philosophy of an imperfect being, is\nnot a system of creed, but, as SOCRATES thought, an infinite search or\napproximation. Philosophy is that intellectual and moral progress, which\nthe religious sentiment inspires and ennobles.\n\nAs to Science, it could not walk alone, while religion was stationary.\nIt consists of those matured inferences from experience which all other\nexperience confirms. It realizes and unites all that was truly valuable\nin both the old schemes of mediation,--one _heroic_, or the system of\naction and effort; and the _mystical_ theory of spiritual, contemplative\ncommunion. \"Listen to me,\" says GALEN, \"as to the voice of the\nEleusinian Hierophant, and believe that the study of Nature is a mystery\nno less important than theirs, nor less adapted to display the wisdom\nand power of the Great Creator. _Their_ lessons and demonstrations were\nobscure, but _ours_ are clear and unmistakable.\"\n\nWe deem that to be the best knowledge we can obtain of the Soul of\nanother man, which is furnished by his actions and his life-long\nconduct. Evidence to the contrary, supplied by what another man informs\nus that this Soul has said to his, would weigh little against the\nformer. The first Scriptures for the human race were written by God on\nthe Earth and Heavens. The reading of these Scriptures is Science.\nFamiliarity with the grass and trees, the insects and the infusoria,\nteaches us deeper lessons of love and faith than we can glean from the\nwritings of F\u00c9N\u00c9LON and AUGUSTINE. The great Bible of God is ever\nopen before mankind.\n\nKnowledge is convertible into power, and axioms into rules of utility\nand duty. But knowledge itself is not Power. Wisdom is Power; and her\nPrime Minister is JUSTICE, which is the perfected law of TRUTH. The\npurpose, therefore, of Education and Science is to make a man wise. If\nknowledge does not make him so, it is wasted, like water poured on the\nsands. To know the _formulas_ of Masonry, is of as little value, by\nitself, as to know so many words and sentences in some barbarous African\nor Australasian dialect To know even the _meaning_ of the symbols, is\nbut little, unless that adds to our wisdom, and also to our charity,\nwhich is to justice like one hemisphere of the brain to the other.\n\nDo not lose sight, then, of the true object of your studies in Masonry.\nIt is to add to your estate of wisdom, and not merely to your knowledge.\nA man may spend a lifetime in studying a single specialty of\nknowledge,--botany, conchology, or entomology, for instance,--in\ncommitting to memory names derived from the Greek, and classifying and\nreclassifying; and yet be no wiser than when he began. It is the great\ntruths as to all that most concerns a man, as to his rights, interests,\nand duties, that Masonry seeks to teach her Initiates.\n\nThe wiser a man becomes, the less will he be inclined to submit tamely\nto the imposition of fetters or a yoke, on his conscience or his person.\nFor, by increase of wisdom he not only better _knows_ his rights, but\nthe more highly _values_ them, and is more conscious of his worth and\ndignity. His pride then urges him to assert his independence. He becomes\nbetter _able_ to assert it also; and better able to assist others or his\ncountry, when they or she stake all, even existence, upon the same\nassertion. But mere knowledge makes no one independent, nor fits him to\nbe free. It often only makes him a more useful slave. Liberty is a curse\nto the ignorant and brutal.\n\nPolitical science has for its object to ascertain in what manner and by\nmeans of what institutions political and personal freedom may be secured\nand perpetuated: not license, or the mere right of every man to vote,\nbut entire and absolute freedom of thought and opinion, alike free of\nthe despotism of monarch and mob and prelate; freedom of action within\nthe limits of the general law enacted for all; the Courts of Justice,\nwith impartial Judges and juries, open to all alike; weakness and\npoverty equally potent in those Courts as power and wealth; the avenues\nto office and honor open alike to all the worthy; the military powers,\n_in war or peace_, in strict subordination to the civil power; arbitrary\narrests for acts not known to the law as crimes, impossible; Romish\nInquisitions, Star-Chambers, Military Commissions, unknown; the means\nof instruction within reach of the children of all; the right of Free\nSpeech; and accountability of all public officers, civil and military.\n\nIf Masonry needed to be justified for imposing political as well as\nmoral duties on its Initiates, it would be enough to point to the sad\nhistory of the world. It would not even need that she should turn back\nthe pages of history to the chapters written by Tacitus: that she should\nrecite the incredible horrors of despotism under Caligula and Domitian,\nCaracalla and Commodus, Vitellius and Maximin. She need only point to\nthe centuries of calamity through which the gay French nation passed; to\nthe long oppression of the feudal ages, of the selfish Bourbon kings; to\nthose times when the peasants were robbed and slaughtered by their own\nlords and princes, like sheep; when the lord claimed the first-fruits of\nthe peasant's marriage-bed; when the captured city was given up to\nmerciless rape and massacre; when the State-prisons groaned with\ninnocent victims, and the Church blessed the banners of pitiless\nmurderers, and sang Te Deums for the crowning mercy of the Eve of St.\nBartholomew.\n\nWe might turn over the pages, to a later chapter,--that of the reign of\nthe Fifteenth Louis, when young girls, hardly more than children, were\nkidnapped to serve his lusts; when _lettres de cachet_ filled the\nBastile with persons accused of no crime, with husbands who were in the\nway of the pleasures of lascivious wives and of villains wearing orders\nof nobility; when the people were ground between the upper and the\nnether millstone of taxes, customs, and excises; and when the Pope's\nNuncio and the Cardinal de la Roche-Ayman, devoutly kneeling, one on\neach side of Madame du Barry, the king's abandoned prostitute, put the\nslippers on her naked feet, as she rose from the adulterous bed. Then,\nindeed, suffering and toil were the two forms of man, and the people\nwere but beasts of burden.\n\nThe true Mason is he who labors strenuously to help his Order effect its\ngreat purposes. Not that the Order can effect them by itself; but that\nit, too, can help. It also is one of God's instruments. It is a Force\nand a Power; and shame upon it, if it did not exert itself, and, if need\nbe, sacrifice its children in the cause of humanity, as Abraham was\nready to offer up Isaac on the altar of sacrifice. It will not forget\nthat noble allegory of Curtius leaping, all in armor, into the great\nyawning gulf that opened to swallow Rome. It will TRY. It shall not be\n_its_ fault if the day _never_ comes when man will no longer have to\nfear a conquest, an invasion, a usurpation, a rivalry of nations with\nthe armed hand, an interruption of civilization depending on a\nmarriage-royal, or a birth in the hereditary tyrannies; a partition of\nthe peoples by a Congress, a dismemberment by the downfall of a dynasty,\na combat of two religions, meeting head to head, like two goats of\ndarkness on the bridge of the Infinite: when they will no longer have to\nfear famine, spoliation, prostitution from distress, misery from lack of\nwork, and all the brigandages of chance in the forest of events: when\nnations will gravitate about the Truth, like stars about the light, each\nin its own orbit, without clashing or collision; and everywhere Freedom,\ncinctured with stars, crowned with the celestial splendors, and with\nwisdom and justice on either hand, will reign supreme.\n\nIn your studies as a Fellow-Craft you must be guided by REASON, LOVE and\nFAITH.\n\nWe do not now discuss the differences between Reason and Faith, and\nundertake to define the domain of each. But it is necessary to say, that\neven in the ordinary affairs of life we are governed far more by what we\n_believe_ than by what we _know_; by FAITH and ANALOGY, than by REASON.\nThe \"Age of Reason\" of the French Revolution taught, we know, what a\nfolly it is to enthrone Reason by itself as supreme. Reason is at fault\nwhen it deals with the Infinite. There we must revere and believe.\nNotwithstanding the calamities of the virtuous, the miseries of the\ndeserving, the prosperity of tyrants and the murder of martyrs, we\n_must_ believe there is a wise, just, merciful, and loving God, an\nIntelligence and a Providence, supreme over all, and caring for the\nminutest things and events. A Faith is a necessity to man. Woe to him\nwho believes nothing!\n\nWe believe that the soul of another is of a certain nature and possesses\ncertain qualities, that he is generous and honest, or penurious and\nknavish, that she is virtuous and amiable, or vicious and ill-tempered,\nfrom the countenance alone, from little more than a glimpse of it,\nwithout the means of _knowing_. We venture our fortune on the signature\nof a man on the other side of the world, whom we never saw, upon the\nbelief that he is honest and trustworthy. We believe that occurrences\nhave taken place, upon the assertion of others. We believe that one will\nacts upon another, and in the reality of a multitude of other phenomena\nthat Reason cannot explain.\n\nBut we ought _not_ to believe what Reason authoritatively denies, that\nat which the sense of right revolts, that which is absurd or\nself-contradictory, or at issue with experience or science, or that\nwhich degrades the character of the Deity, and would make Him\nrevengeful, malignant, cruel, or unjust.\n\nA man's Faith is as much his own as his Reason is. His Freedom consists\nas much in his faith being free as in his will being uncontrolled by\npower. All the Priests and Augurs of Rome or Greece had not the right to\nrequire Cicero or Socrates to believe in the absurd mythology of the\nvulgar. All the Imaums of Mohammedanism have not the right to require a\nPagan to believe that Gabriel dictated the Koran to the Prophet. All the\nBrahmins that ever lived, if assembled in one conclave like the\nCardinals, could not gain a right to compel a single human being to\nbelieve in the Hindu Cosmogony. No man or body of men _can_ be\ninfallible, and authorized to decide what other men shall believe, as to\nany tenet of faith. Except to those who first receive it, every religion\nand the truth of all inspired writings depend on _human_ testimony and\ninternal evidences, to be judged of by Reason and the wise analogies of\nFaith. Each man must necessarily have the right to judge of their truth\nfor himself; because no one man can have any higher or better right to\njudge than another of equal information and intelligence.\n\nDomitian claimed to be the Lord God; and statues and images of him, in\nsilver and gold, were found throughout the known world. He claimed to be\nregarded as the God of all men; and, according to Suetonius, began his\nletters thus: \"_Our Lord and God commands that it should be done so and\nso_;\" and formally decreed that no one should address him otherwise,\neither in writing or by word of mouth. Palfurius Sura, the philosopher,\nwho was his chief delator, accusing those who refused to recognize his\ndivinity, however much _he_ may have believed in that divinity, had not\nthe right to demand that a single Christian in Rome or the provinces\nshould do the same.\n\nReason is far from being the only guide, in morals or in political\nscience. Love or loving-kindness must keep it company, to exclude\nfanaticism, intolerance, and persecution, to all of which a morality too\nascetic, and extreme political principles, invariably lead. We must\nalso have faith in ourselves, and in our fellows and the people, or we\nshall be easily discouraged by reverses, and our ardor cooled by\nobstacles. We must not listen to Reason alone. Force comes more from\nFaith and Love: and it is by the aid of these that man scales the\nloftiest heights of morality, or becomes the Saviour and Redeemer of a\nPeople. Reason must hold the helm; but these supply the motive power.\nThey are the wings of the soul. Enthusiasm is generally unreasoning; and\nwithout it, and Love and Faith, there would have been no RIENZI, or\nTELL, or SYDNEY, or any other of the great patriots whose names are\nimmortal. If the Deity had been merely and only All-wise and All-mighty,\nHe would never have created the Universe.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nIt is GENIUS that gets Power; and its prime lieutenants are FORCE and\nWISDOM. The unruliest of men bend before the leader that has the sense\nto see and the will to do. It is Genius, that rules with God-like Power;\nthat unveils, with its counsellors, the hidden human mysteries, cuts\nasunder with its word the huge knots, and builds up with its word the\ncrumbled ruins. At its glance fall down the senseless idols, whose\naltars have been on all the high places and in all the sacred groves.\nDishonesty and imbecility stand abashed before it. Its single Yea or Nay\nrevokes the wrongs of ages, and is heard among the future generations.\nIts power is immense, because its wisdom is immense. Genius is the Sun\nof the political sphere. Force and Wisdom, its ministers, are the orbs\nthat carry its light into darkness, and answer it with their solid\nreflecting Truth.\n\nDevelopment is symbolized by the use of the Mallet and Chisel; the\ndevelopment of the energies and intellect, of the individual and the\npeople. Genius may place itself at the head of an unintellectual,\nuneducated, unenergetic nation; but in a free country, to cultivate the\nintellect of those who elect, is the only mode of securing intellect and\ngenius for rulers. The world is seldom ruled by the great spirits,\nexcept after dissolution and new birth. In periods of transition and\nconvulsion, the Long Parliaments, the Robespierres and Marats, and the\nsemi-respectabilities of intellect, too often hold the reins of power.\nThe Cromwells and Napoleons come later. After Marius and Sulla and\nCicero the rhetorician, C\u00c6SAR. The great intellect is often too sharp\nfor the granite of this life. Legislators may be very ordinary men; for\nlegislation is very ordinary work; it is but the final issue of a\nmillion minds.\n\nThe power of the purse or the sword, compared to that of the spirit, is\npoor and contemptible. As to _lands_, you may have agrarian laws, and\nequal partition. But a man's intellect is all his own, held direct from\nGod, an inalienable fief. It is the most potent of weapons in the hands\nof a paladin. If the people comprehend Force in the physical sense, how\nmuch more do they reverence the intellectual! Ask Hildebrand, or Luther,\nor Loyola. They fall prostrate before it, as before an idol. The mastery\nof mind over mind is the only conquest worth having. The other injures\nboth, and dissolves at a breath; rude as it is, the great cable falls\ndown and snaps at last. But this dimly resembles the dominion of the\nCreator. It does not need a subject like that of Peter the Hermit. If\nthe stream be but bright and strong, it will sweep like a spring-tide to\nthe popular heart. Not in word only, but in intellectual act lies the\nfascination. It is the homage to the Invisible. This power, knotted with\nLove, is the golden chain let down into the well of Truth, or the\ninvisible chain that binds the ranks of mankind together.\n\nInfluence of man over man is a law of nature, whether it be by a great\nestate in land or in intellect. It may mean slavery, a deference to the\neminent human judgment. Society hangs spiritually together, like the\nrevolving spheres above. The free country, in which intellect and genius\ngovern, will endure. Where they serve, and other influences govern, the\nnational life is short. All the nations that have tried to govern\nthemselves by their smallest, by the incapables, or merely respectables,\nhave come to nought. Constitutions and Laws, without Genius and\nIntellect to govern, will not prevent decay. In that case they have the\ndry-rot and the life dies out of them by degrees.\n\nTo give a nation the franchise of the Intellect is the only sure mode of\nperpetuating freedom. This will compel exertion and generous care for\nthe people from those on the higher seats, and honorable and intelligent\nallegiance from those below. Then political public life will protect all\nmen from self-abasement in sensual pursuits, from vulgar acts and low\ngreed, by giving the noble ambition of just imperial rule. To elevate\nthe people by teaching loving-kindness and wisdom, with power to him who\nteaches best: and so to develop the free State from the rough\nashlar:--this is the great labor in which Masonry desires to lend a\nhelping hand.\n\nAll of us should labor in building up the great monument of a nation,\nthe Holy House of the Temple. The cardinal virtues must not be\npartitioned among men, becoming the exclusive property of some, like the\ncommon crafts. ALL are apprenticed to the partners, Duty and Honor.\n\nMasonry is a march and a struggle toward the Light. For the individual\nas well as the nation, Light is Virtue, Manliness, Intelligence,\nLiberty. Tyranny over the soul or body, is darkness. The freest people,\nlike the freest man, is always in danger of relapsing into servitude.\nWars are almost always fatal to Republics. They create tyrants, and\nconsolidate their power. They spring, for the most part, from evil\ncounsels. When the small and the base are intrusted with power,\nlegislation and administration become but two parallel series of errors\nand blunders, ending in war, calamity, and the necessity for a tyrant.\nWhen the nation feels its feet sliding backward, as if it walked on the\nice, the time has come for a supreme effort. The magnificent tyrants of\nthe past are but the types of those of the future. Men and nations will\nalways sell themselves into slavery, to gratify their passions and\nobtain revenge. The tyrant's plea, necessity, is always available; and\nthe tyrant once in power, the necessity of providing for his safety\nmakes him savage. Religion is a power, and he must control that.\nIndependent, its sanctuaries might rebel. Then it becomes unlawful for\nthe people to worship God in their own way, and the old spiritual\ndespotisms revive. Men must believe as Power wills, or die; and even if\nthey may believe as they will, all they have, lands, houses, body, and\nsoul, are stamped with the royal brand. \"_I am the State_,\" said Louis\nthe Fourteenth to his peasants; \"_the very shirts on your backs are\nmine, and I can take them if I will_.\"\n\nAnd dynasties so established endure, like that of the C\u00e6sars of Rome, of\nthe C\u00e6sars of Constantinople, of the Caliphs, the Stuarts, the\nSpaniards, the Goths, the Valois, until the race wears out, and ends\nwith lunatics and idiots, who _still_ rule. There is no concord among\nmen, to end the horrible bondage. The State falls inwardly, as well as\nby the outward blows of the incoherent elements. The furious human\npassions, the sleeping human indolence, the stolid human ignorance, the\nrivalry of human castes, are as good for the kings as the swords of the\nPaladins. The worshippers have all bowed so long to the old idol, that\nthey cannot go into the streets and choose another Grand Llama. And so\nthe effete State floats on down the puddled stream of Time, until the\ntempest or the tidal sea discovers that the worm has consumed its\nstrength, and it crumbles into oblivion.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nCivil and religious Freedom must go hand in hand; and Persecution\nmatures them both. A people content with the thoughts made for them by\nthe priests of a church will be content with Royalty by Divine\nRight,--the Church and the Throne mutually sustaining each other. They\nwill smother schism and reap infidelity and indifference; and while the\nbattle for freedom goes on around them, they will only sink the more\napathetically into servitude and a deep trance, perhaps occasionally\ninterrupted by furious fits of frenzy, followed by helpless exhaustion.\n\nDespotism is not difficult in any land that has only known one master\nfrom its childhood; but there is no harder problem than to perfect and\nperpetuate free government by the people themselves; for it is not one\nking that is needed: all must be kings. It is easy to set up Masaniello,\nthat in a few days he may fall lower than before. But free government\ngrows slowly, like the individual human faculties; and like the\nforest-trees, from the inner heart outward. Liberty is not only the\ncommon birth-right, but it is lost as well by non-user as by mis-user.\nIt depends far more on the universal effort than any other human\nproperty. It has no single shrine or holy well of pilgrimage for the\nnation; for its waters should burst out freely from the whole soil.\n\nThe free popular power is one that is only known in its strength in the\nhour of adversity: for all its trials, sacrifices and expectations are\nits own. It is trained to think for itself, and also to act for itself.\nWhen the enslaved people prostrate themselves in the dust before the\nhurricane, like the alarmed beasts of the field, the free people stand\nerect before it, in all the strength of unity, in self-reliance, in\nmutual reliance, with effrontery against all but the visible hand of\nGod. It is neither cast down by calamity nor elated by success.\n\nThis vast power of endurance, of forbearance, of patience, and of\nperformance, is only acquired by continual exercise of all the\nfunctions, like the healthful physical human vigor, like the individual\nmoral vigor.\n\nAnd the maxim is no less true than old, that eternal vigilance is the\nprice of liberty. It is curious to observe the universal pretext by\nwhich the tyrants of all times take away the national liberties. It is\nstated in the statutes of Edward II., that the justices and the sheriff\nshould no longer be elected by the people, on account of the riots and\ndissensions which had arisen. The same reason was given long before for\nthe suppression of popular election of the bishops; and there is a\nwitness to this untruth in the yet older times, when Rome lost her\nfreedom, and her indignant citizens declared that tumultuous liberty is\nbetter than disgraceful tranquillity.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nWith the Compasses and Scale, we can trace all the figures used in the\nmathematics of planes, or in what are called GEOMETRY and TRIGONOMETRY,\ntwo words that are themselves deficient in meaning. GEOMETRY, which the\nletter G in most Lodges is _said_ to signify, means _measurement_ of\n_land_ or the earth--or Surveying; and TRIGONOMETRY, the measurement of\ntriangles, or figures with three sides or angles. The latter is by far\nthe most appropriate name for the science intended to be expressed by\nthe word \"Geometry.\" Neither is of a meaning sufficiently wide: for\nalthough the vast surveys of great spaces of the earth's surface, and of\ncoasts, by which shipwreck and calamity to mariners are avoided, are\neffected by means of triangulation;--though it was by the same method\nthat the French astronomers measured a degree of latitude and so\nestablished a scale of measures on an immutable basis; though it is by\nmeans of the immense triangle that has for its base a line drawn in\nimagination between the place of the earth now and its place six months\nhence in space, and for its apex a planet or star, that the distance of\nJupiter or Sirius from the earth is ascertained; and though there is a\ntriangle still more vast, its base extending either way from us, with\nand past the horizon into immensity, and its apex infinitely distant\nabove us; to which corresponds a similar infinite triangle belo _what is\nabove equalling what is below, immensity equalling immensity_;--yet the\nScience of Numbers, to which Pythagoras attached so much importance, and\nwhose mysteries are found everywhere in the ancient religions, and most\nof all in the Kabalah and in the Bible, is not sufficiently expressed by\neither the word \"_Geometry_\" or the word \"_Trigonometry_.\" For that\nscience includes these, with Arithmetic, and also with Algebra,\nLogarithms, the Integral and Differential Calculus; and by means of it\nare worked out the great problems of Astronomy or the Laws of the Stars.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nVirtue is but heroic bravery to _do_ the thing thought to be true, in\nspite of all enemies of flesh or spirit, in despite of all temptations\nor menaces. Man is accountable for the _up_rightness of his doctrine,\nbut not for the rightness of it. Devout enthusiasm is far easier than a\ngood action. The end of thought is action; the sole purpose of Religion\nis an Ethic. Theory, in political science, is worthless, except for the\npurpose of being realized in practice.\n\nIn every _credo_, religious or political as in the soul of man, there\nare two regions, the Dialectic and the Ethic; and it is only when the\ntwo are harmoniously blended, that a perfect discipline is evolved.\nThere are men who dialectically are Christians, as there are a multitude\nwho dialectically are Masons, and yet who are ethically Infidels, as\nthese are ethically of the Profane, in the strictest\nsense:--intellectual believers, but practical atheists--men who will\nwrite you \"Evidences,\" in perfect faith in their logic, but cannot carry\nout the Christian or Masonic doctrine, owing to the strength, or\nweakness, of the flesh. On the other hand, there are many dialectical\nskeptics, but ethical believers, as there are many Masons who have never\nundergone initiation; and as ethics are the end and purpose of religion,\nso are ethical believers the most worthy. He who _does_ right is better\nthan he who _thinks_ right.\n\nBut you must not act upon the hypothesis that all men are hypocrites,\nwhose conduct does not square with their sentiments. No vice is more\nrare, for no task is more difficult, than systematic hypocrisy. When the\nDemagogue becomes a Usurper it does not follow that he was all the time\na hypocrite. Shallow men only so judge of others.\n\nThe truth is, that creed has, in general, very little influence on the\nconduct; in religion, on that of the individual; in politics, on that of\nparty. As a general thing, the Mahometan, in the Orient, is far more\nhonest and trustworthy than the Christian. A Gospel of Love in the\nmouth, is an Avatar of Persecution in the heart. Men who believe in\neternal damnation and a literal sea of fire and brimstone, incur the\ncertainty of it, according to their creed, on the slightest temptation\nof appetite or passion. Predestination insists on the necessity of good\nworks. In Masonry, at the least now of passion, one speaks ill of\nanother behind his back; and so far from the \"Brotherhood\" of Blue\nMasonry being real, and the solemn pledges contained in the use of the\nword \"Brother\" being complied with, extraordinary pains are taken to\nshow that Masonry is a sort of abstraction, which scorns to interfere in\nworldly matters. The rule may be regarded as universal, that, where\nthere is a choice to be made, a Mason will give his vote and influence,\nin politics and business, to the less qualified profane in preference to\nthe better qualified Mason. One will take an oath to oppose any unlawful\nusurpation of power, and then become the ready and even eager instrument\nof a usurper. Another will call one \"Brother,\" and then play toward him\nthe part of Judas Iscariot, or strike him, as Joab did Abner, under the\nfifth rib, with a lie whose authorship is not to be traced. Masonry does\nnot change human nature, and cannot make honest men out of born knaves.\n\nWhile you are still engaged in preparation, and in accumulating\nprinciples for future use, do not forget the words of the Apostle James:\n\"For if any be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like unto a\nman beholding his natural face in a glass, for he beholdeth himself, and\ngoeth away, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was; but\nwhoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and continueth, he being\nnot a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be\nblessed in his work. If any man among you seem to be religious, and\nbridleth not his tongue, but deceiveth his own heart, this man's\nreligion is vain.... Faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being an\nabstraction. A man is justified by works, and not by faith only.... The\ndevils believe,--and tremble.... As the body without the heart is dead,\nso is faith without works.\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nIn political science, also, free governments are erected and free\nconstitutions framed, upon some simple and intelligible theory. Upon\nwhatever theory they are based, no sound conclusion is to be reached\nexcept by carrying the theory out without flinching, both in argument on\nconstitutional questions and in practice. Shrink from the true theory\nthrough timidity, or wander from it through want of the logical faculty,\nor transgress against it through passion or on the plea of necessity or\nexpediency, and you have denial or invasion of rights, laws that offend\nagainst first, principles, usurpation of illegal powers, or abnegation\nand abdication of legitimate authority.\n\nDo not forget, either, that as the showy, superficial, impudent and\nself-conceited will almost always be preferred, even in utmost stress of\ndanger and calamity of the State, to the man of solid learning, large\nintellect, and catholic sympathies, because he is nearer the common\npopular and legislative level, so the highest truth is not acceptable to\nthe mass of mankind.\n\nWhen SOLON was asked if he had given his countrymen the _best_ laws, he\nanswered, _\"The best they are capable of receiving.\"_ This is one of the\nprofoundest utterances on record; and yet like all great truths, so\nsimple as to be rarely comprehended. It contains the whole philosophy of\nHistory. It utters a truth which, had it been recognized, would have\nsaved men an immensity of vain, idle disputes, and have led them into\nthe clearer paths of knowledge in the Past. It means this,--that all\ntruths are _Truths of Period_, and not truths for eternity; that\nwhatever great fact has had strength and vitality enough to make itself\nreal, whether of religion, morals, government, or of whatever else, and\nto find place in this world, has been a truth _for the time, and as good\nas men were capable of receiving_.\n\nSo, too, with great men. The intellect and capacity of a people has a\nsingle measure,--that of the great men whom Providence gives it, and\nwhom it _receives_. There have always been men too great for their time\nor their people. Every people makes _such_ men only its idols, as it is\ncapable of comprehending.\n\nTo impose ideal truth or law upon an incapable and merely _real_ man,\nmust ever be a vain and empty speculation. The laws of sympathy govern\nin this as they do in regard to men who are put at the head. We do not\nknow, as yet, what qualifications the sheep insist on in a leader. With\nmen who are too high intellectually, the mass have as little sympathy as\nthey have with the stars. When BURKE, the wisest statesman England ever\nhad, rose to speak, the House of Commons was depopulated as upon an\nagreed signal. There is as little sympathy between the mass and the\nhighest TRUTHS. The highest truth, being incomprehensible to the man of\nrealities, as the highest man is, and largely above his level, will be a\ngreat unreality and falsehood to an unintellectual man. The profoundest\ndoctrines of Christianity and Philosophy would be mere jargon and babble\nto a Potawatomie Indian. The popular explanations of the symbols of\nMasonry are fitting for the multitude that have swarmed into the\nTemples,--being fully up to the level of their capacity. Catholicism\nwas a vital truth in its earliest ages, but it became obsolete, and\nProtestantism arose, flourished, and deteriorated. The doctrines of\nZOROASTER were the best which the ancient Persians were fitted to\nreceive; those of CONFUCIUS were fitted for the Chinese; those of\nMOHAMMED for the idolatrous Arabs of his age. Each was Truth for the\ntime. Each was a GOSPEL, preached by a REFORMER; and if any men are so\nlittle fortunate as to remain content therewith, when others have\nattained a higher truth, it is their misfortune and not their fault.\nThey are to be pitied for it, and not persecuted.\n\nDo not expect easily to convince men of the truth, or to lead them to\nthink aright. The subtle human intellect can weave its mists over even\nthe clearest vision. Remember that it is eccentric enough to ask\nunanimity from a jury; but to ask it from any large number of men on any\npoint of political faith is amazing. You can hardly get two men in any\nCongress or Convention to agree;--nay, you can rarely get one to agree\nwith _himself_. The political church which chances to be supreme\nanywhere has an indefinite number of tongues. How then can we expect men\nto agree as to matters beyond the cognizance of the senses? How can we\ncompass the Infinite and the Invisible with any chain of evidence? Ask\nthe small sea-waves what they murmur among the pebbles! How many of\nthose words that come from the invisible shore are lost, like the birds,\nin the long passage? How vainly do we strain the eyes across the long\nInfinite! We must be content, as the children are, with the pebbles that\nhave been stranded, since it is forbidden us to explore the hidden\ndepths.\n\nThe Fellow-Craft is especially taught by this not to become wise in his\nown conceit. Pride in unsound theories is worse than ignorance. Humility\nbecomes a Mason. Take some quiet, sober moment of life, and add together\nthe two ideas of Pride and Man; behold him, creature of a span, stalking\nthrough infinite space in all the grandeur of littleness! Perched on a\nspeck of the Universe, every wind of Heaven strikes into his blood the\ncoldness of death; his soul floats away from his body like the melody\nfrom the string. Day and night, like dust on the wheel, he is rolled\nalong the heavens, through a labyrinth of worlds, and all the creations\nof God are flaming on every side, further than even his imagination can\nreach. Is this a creature to make for himself a crown of glory, to deny\nhis own flesh, to mock at his fellow, sprung with him from that dust to\nwhich both will soon return? Does the proud man not err? Does he not\nsuffer? Does he not die? When he reasons, is he never stopped short by\ndifficulties? When he acts, does he never succumb to the temptations of\npleasure? When he lives, is he free from pain? Do the diseases not claim\nhim as their prey? When he dies, can he escape the common grave? Pride\nis not the heritage of man. Humility should dwell with frailty, and\natone for ignorance, error and imperfection.\n\nNeither should the Mason be over-anxious for office and honor, however\ncertainly he may feel that he has the capacity to serve the State. He\nshould neither seek nor spurn honors. It is good to enjoy the blessings\nof fortune; it is better to submit without a pang to their loss. The\ngreatest deeds are not done in the glare of light, and before the eyes\nof the populace. He whom God has gifted with a love of retirement\npossesses, as it were, an additional sense; and among the vast and noble\nscenes of nature, we find the balm for the wounds we have received among\nthe pitiful shifts of policy; for the attachment to solitude is the\nsurest preservative from the ills of life.\n\nBut Resignation is the more noble in proportion as it is the less\npassive. Retirement is only a morbid selfishness, if it prohibit\nexertions for others; as it is only dignified and noble, when it is the\nshade whence the oracles issue that are to instruct mankind; and\nretirement of this nature is the sole seclusion which a good and wise\nman will covet or command. The very philosophy which makes such a man\ncovet the _quiet_, will make him eschew the _inutility_ of the\nhermitage. Very little praiseworthy would LORD BOLINGBROKE have seemed\namong his haymakers and ploughmen, if among haymakers and ploughmen he\nhad looked with an indifferent eye upon a profligate minister and a\nvenal Parliament. Very little interest would have attached to his beans\nand vetches, if beans and vetches had caused him to forget that if he\nwas happier on a farm he could be more useful in a Senate, and made him\nforego, in the sphere of a bailiff, all care for re-entering that of a\nlegislator.\n\nRemember, also, that there is an education which quickens the Intellect,\nand leaves the heart hollower or harder than before. There are ethical\nlessons in the laws of the heavenly bodies, in the properties of earthly\nelements, in geography, chemistry, geology, and all the material\nsciences. Things are symbols of Truths. Properties are symbols of\nTruths. Science, not teaching moral and spiritual truths, is dead and\ndry, of little more real value than to commit to the memory a long row\nof unconnected dates, or of the names of bugs or butterflies.\n\nChristianity, it is said, begins from the burning of the false gods by\nthe people themselves. Education begins with the burning of our\nintellectual and moral idols: our prejudices, notions, conceits, our\nworthless or ignoble purposes. Especially it is necessary to shake off\nthe love of worldly gain. With Freedom comes the longing for worldly\nadvancement. In that race men are ever falling, rising, running, and\nfalling again. The lust for wealth and the abject dread of poverty delve\nthe furrows on many a noble brow. The gambler grows old as he watches\nthe chances. Lawful hazard drives Youth away before its time; and this\nYouth draws heavy bills of exchange on Age. Men live, like the engines,\nat high pressure, a hundred years in a hundred months; the ledger\nbecomes the Bible, and the day-book the Book of the Morning Prayer.\n\nHence flow overreachings and sharp practice, heartless traffic in which\nthe capitalist buys profit with the lives of the laborers, speculations\nthat coin a nation's agonies into wealth, and all the other devilish\nenginery of Mammon. This, and greed for office, are the two columns at\nthe entrance to the Temple of Moloch. It is doubtful whether the latter,\nblossoming in falsehood, trickery, and fraud, is not even more\npernicious than the former. At all events they are twins, and fitly\nmated; and as either gains control of the unfortunate subject, his soul\nwithers away and decays, and at last dies out. The souls of half the\nhuman race leave them long before they die. The two greeds are twin\nplagues of the leprosy, and make the man unclean; and whenever they\nbreak out they spread until \"they cover all the skin of him that hath\nthe plague, from his head even to his foot.\" Even the raw flesh of the\nheart becomes unclean with it.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nAlexander of Macedon has left a saying behind him which has survived his\nconquests: _\"Nothing is nobler than work.\"_ Work only can keep even\nkings respectable. And when a king is a king indeed, it is an honorable\noffice to give tone to the manners and morals of a nation; to set the\nexample of virtuous conduct, and restore in spirit the old schools of\nchivalry, in which the young manhood may be nurtured to real greatness.\nWork and wages _will_ go together in men's minds, in the most royal\ninstitutions. We must ever come to the idea of real work. The rest that\nfollows labor should be sweeter than the rest which follows rest.\n\nLet no Fellow-Craft imagine that the work of the lowly and uninfluential\nis not worth the doing. There is no legal limit to the possible\ninfluences of a good deed or a wise word or a generous effort. Nothing\nis really small. Whoever is open to the deep penetration of nature knows\nthis. Although, indeed, no absolute satisfaction may be vouchsafed to\nphilosophy, any more in circumscribing the cause than in limiting the\neffect, the man of thought and contemplation falls into unfathomable\necstacies in view of all the decompositions of forces resulting in\nunity. All works for all. Destruction is not annihilation, but\nregeneration.\n\nAlgebra applies to the clouds; the radiance of the star benefits the\nrose; no thinker would dare to say that the perfume of the hawthorn is\nuseless to the constellations. Who, then, can calculate the path of the\nmolecule? How do we know that the creations of worlds are not determined\nby the fall of grains of sand? Who, then, understands the reciprocal\nflow and ebb of the infinitely great and the infinitely small; the\nechoing of causes in the abysses of beginning, and the avalanches of\ncreation? A fleshworm is of account; the small is great; the great is\nsmall; all is in equilibrium in necessity. There are marvellous\nrelations between beings and things; in this inexhaustible Whole, from\nsun to grub, there is no scorn: all need each other. Light does not\ncarry terrestrial perfumes into the azure depths, without knowing what\nit does with them; night distributes the stellar essence to the sleeping\nplants. Every bird which flies has the thread of the Infinite in its\nclaw. Germination includes the hatching of a meteor, and the tap of a\nswallow's bill, breaking the egg; and it leads forward the birth of an\nearth-worm and the advent of a Socrates. Where the telescope ends the\nmicroscope begins. Which of them the grander view? A bit of mould is a\nPleiad of flowers--a nebula is an ant-hill of stars.\n\nThere is the same and a still more wonderful interpenetration between\nthe things of the intellect and the things of matter. Elements and\nprinciples are mingled, combined, espoused, multiplied one by another,\nto such a degree as to bring the material world and the moral world into\nthe same light. Phenomena are perpetually folded back upon themselves.\nIn the vast cosmical changes the universal life comes and goes in\nunknown quantities, enveloping all in the invisible mystery of the\nemanations, losing no dream from no single sleep, sowing an animalcule\nhere, crumbling a star there, oscillating and winding in curves; making\na force of Light, and an element of Thought; disseminated and\nindivisible, dissolving all save that point without length, breadth, or\nthickness. The MYSELF; reducing everything to the Soul-atom; making\neverything blossom into God; entangling all activities, from the highest\nto the lowest, in the obscurity of a dizzying mechanism; hanging the\nflight of an insect upon the movement of the earth; subordinating,\nperhaps, if only by the identity of the law, the eccentric evolutions of\nthe comet in the firmament, to the whirlings of the infusoria in the\ndrop of water. A mechanism made of mind, the first motor of which is the\ngnat, and its last wheel the zodiac.\n\nA peasant-boy, guiding Bl\u00fccher by the right one of two roads, the other\nbeing impassable for artillery, enables him to reach Waterloo in time to\nsave Wellington from a defeat that would have been a rout; and so\nenables the kings to imprison Napoleon on a barren rock in mid-ocean. An\nunfaithful smith, by the slovenly shoeing of a horse, causes his\nlameness, and, he stumbling, the career of his world-conquering rider\nends, and the destinies of empires are changed. A generous officer\npermits an imprisoned monarch to end his game of chess before leading\nhim to the block; and meanwhile the usurper dies, and the prisoner\nreascends the throne. An unskillful workman repairs the compass, or\nmalice or stupidity disarranges it, the ship mistakes her course, the\nwaves swallow a Caesar, and a new chapter is written in the history of a\nworld. What we call accident is but the adamantine chain of indissoluble\nconnection between all created things. The locust, hatched in the\nArabian sands, the small worm that destroys the cotton-boll, one making\nfamine in the Orient, the other closing the mills and starving the\nworkmen and their children in the Occident, with riots and massacres,\nare as much the ministers of God as the earthquake; and the fate of\nnations depends more on them than on the intellect of its kings and\nlegislators. A civil war in America will end in shaking the world; and\nthat war may be caused by the vote of some ignorant prize-fighter or\ncrazed fanatic in a city or in a Congress, or of some stupid boor in an\nobscure country parish. The electricity of universal sympathy, of\naction and reaction, pervades everything, the planets and the motes in\nthe sunbeam. FAUST, with his types, or LUTHER, with his sermons, worked\ngreater results than Alexander or Hannibal. A single thought sometimes\nsuffices to overturn a dynasty. A silly song did more to unseat James\nthe Second than the acquittal of the Bishops. Voltaire, Condorcet, and\nRousseau uttered words that will ring, in change and revolutions,\nthroughout all the ages.\n\nRemember, that though life is short, Thought and the influences of what\nwe do or say are immortal; and that no calculus has yet pretended to\nascertain the law of proportion between cause and effect. The hammer of\nan English blacksmith, smiting down an insolent official, led to a\nrebellion which came near being a revolution. The word well spoken, the\ndeed fitly done, even by the feeblest or humblest, cannot help but have\ntheir effect. More or less, the effect is inevitable and eternal. The\nechoes of the greatest deeds may die away like the echoes of a cry among\nthe cliffs, and what has been done seem to the human judgment to have\nbeen without result. The unconsidered act of the poorest of men may fire\nthe train that leads to the subterranean mine, and an empire be rent by\nthe explosion.\n\nThe power of a free people is often at the disposal of a single and\nseemingly an unimportant individual;--a terrible and truthful power; for\nsuch a people feel with one heart, and therefore can lift up their\nmyriad arms for a single blow. And, again, there is no graduated scale\nfor the measurement of the influences of different intellects upon the\npopular mind. Peter the Hermit held no office, yet what a work he\nwrought!\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nFrom the political point of view there is but a single principle,--the\nsovereignty of man over himself. This sovereignty of one's self over\none's self is called LIBERTY. Where two or several of these\nsovereignties associate, the State begins. But in this association there\nis no abdication. Each sovereignty parts with a certain portion of\nitself to form the common right. That portion is the same for all. There\nis equal contribution by all to the joint sovereignty. This identity of\nconcession which each makes to all, is EQUALITY. The common right is\nnothing more or less than the protection of all, pouring its rays on\neach. This protection of each by all, is FRATERNITY.\n\nLiberty is the summit, Equality the base. Equality is not all vegetation\non a level, a society of big spears of grass and stunted oaks, a\nneighborhood of jealousies, emasculating each other. It is, civilly, all\naptitudes having equal opportunity; politically, all votes having equal\nweight; religiously, all consciences having equal rights.\n\nEquality has an organ;--gratuitous and obligatory instruction. We must\nbegin with the right to the alphabet. The primary school _obligatory_\nupon all; the higher school _offered_ to all. Such is the law. From the\nsame school for all springs equal society. Instruction! Light! all comes\nfrom Light, and all returns to it.\n\nWe must learn the thoughts of the common people, if we would be wise and\ndo any good work. We must look at men, not so much for what Fortune has\ngiven to them with her blind old eyes, as for the gifts Nature has\nbrought in her lap, and for the use that has been made of them. We\nprofess to be equal in a Church and in the Lodge: we shall be equal in\nthe sight of God when He judges the earth. We may well sit on the\npavement together here, in communion and conference, for the few brief\nmoments that constitute life.\n\nA Democratic Government undoubtedly has its defects, because it is made\nand administered by men, and not by the Wise Gods. It cannot be concise\nand sharp, like the despotic. When its ire is aroused it develops its\nlatent strength, and the sturdiest rebel trembles. But its habitual\ndomestic rule is tolerant, patient, and indecisive. Men are brought\ntogether, first to differ, and then to agree. Affirmation, negation,\ndiscussion, solution: these are the means of attaining truth. Often the\nenemy will be at the gates before the babble of the disturbers is\ndrowned in the chorus of consent. In the Legislative office deliberation\nwill often defeat decision. Liberty can play the fool like the Tyrants.\n\nRefined society requires greater minuteness of regulation; and the steps\nof all advancing States are more and more to be picked among the old\nrubbish and the new materials. The difficulty lies in discovering the\nright path through the chaos of confusion. The adjustment of mutual\nrights and wrongs is also more difficult in democracies. We do not see\nand estimate the relative importance of objects so easily and clearly\nfrom the level or the waving land as from the elevation of a lone peak,\ntowering above the plain; for each looks through his own mist.\n\nAbject dependence on constituents, also, is too common. It is as\nmiserable a thing as abject dependence on a minister or the favorite of\na Tyrant. It is rare to find a man who can speak out the simple truth\nthat is in him, honestly and frankly, without fear, favor, or affection,\neither to Emperor or People.\n\nMoreover, in assemblies of men, faith in each other is almost always\nwanting, unless a terrible pressure of calamity or danger from without\nproduces cohesion. Hence the constructive power of such assemblies is\ngenerally deficient. The chief triumphs of modern days, in Europe, have\nbeen in pulling down and obliterating; not in building up. But Repeal is\nnot Reform. Time must bring with him the Restorer and Rebuilder.\n\nSpeech, also, is grossly abused in Republics; and if the use of speech\nbe glorious, its abuse is the most villainous of vices. Rhetoric, Plato\nsays, is the art of ruling the minds of men. But in democracies it is\ntoo common to _hide_ thought in words, to _overlay_ it, to babble\nnonsense. The gleams and glitter of intellectual soap-and-water bubbles\nare mistaken for the rainbow-glories of genius. The worthless pyrites is\ncontinually mistaken for gold. Even intellect condescends to\nintellectual jugglery, balancing thoughts as a juggler balances pipes on\nhis chin. In all Congresses we have the inexhaustible flow of babble,\nand Faction's clamorous knavery in discussion, until the divine power of\nspeech, that privilege of man and great gift of God, is no better than\nthe screech of parrots or the mimicry of monkeys. The mere talker,\nhowever fluent, is barren of deeds in the day of trial.\n\nThere are men voluble as women, and as well skilled in fencing with the\ntongue: prodigies of speech, misers in deeds. Too much talking, like too\nmuch thinking, destroys the power of action. In human nature, the\nthought is only made perfect by deed. Silence is the mother of both. The\ntrumpeter is not the bravest of the brave. Steel and not brass wins the\nday. The great doer of great deeds is mostly slow and slovenly of\nspeech. There are some men born and bred to betray. Patriotism is their\ntrade, and their capital is speech. But no noble spirit can plead like\nPaul and be false to itself as Judas.\n\nImposture too commonly rules in republics; they seem to be ever in their\nminority; their guardians are self-appointed; and the unjust thrive\nbetter than the just. The Despot, like the night-lion roaring, drowns\nall the clamor of tongues at once, and speech, the birthright of the\nfree man, becomes the bauble of the enslaved.\n\nIt is quite true that republics only occasionally, and as it were\naccidentally, select their wisest, or even the less incapable among the\nincapables, to govern them and legislate for them. If genius, armed with\nlearning and knowledge, will grasp the reins, the people will reverence\nit; if it only modestly offers itself for office, it will be smitten on\nthe face, even when, in the straits of distress and the agonies of\ncalamity, it is indispensable to the salvation of the State. Put it upon\nthe track with the showy and superficial, the conceited, the ignorant,\nand impudent, the trickster and charlatan, and the result shall not be a\nmoment doubtful. The verdicts of Legislatures and the People are like\nthe verdicts of juries,--sometimes right by accident.\n\nOffices, it is true, are showered, like the rains of Heaven, upon the\njust and the unjust. The Roman Augurs that used to laugh in each other's\nfaces at the simplicity of the vulgar, were also tickled with their own\nguile; but no Augur is needed to lead the people astray. They readily\ndeceive themselves. Let a Republic begin as it may, it will not be out\nof its minority before imbecility will be promoted to high places; and\nshallow pretence, getting itself puffed into notice, will invade all the\nsanctuaries. The most unscrupulous partisanship will prevail, even in\nrespect to judicial trusts; and the most unjust appointments constantly\nbe made, although every improper promotion not merely confers one\nundeserved favor, but may make a hundred honest cheeks smart with\ninjustice.\n\nThe country is stabbed in the front when those are brought into the\nstalled seats who should slink into the dim gallery. Every stamp of\nHonor, ill-clutched, is stolen from the Treasury of Merit.\n\nYet the entrance into the public service, and the promotion in it,\naffect both the rights of individuals and those of the nation. Injustice\nin bestowing or withholding office ought to be so intolerable in\ndemocratic communities that the least trace of it should be like the\nscent of Treason. It is not universally true that all citizens of equal\ncharacter have an equal claim to knock at the door of every public\noffice and demand admittance. When any man presents himself for service\nhe has a right to aspire to the highest body at once, if he can show his\nfitness for such a beginning,--that he is fitter than the rest who\noffer themselves for the same post. The entry into it can only justly be\nmade through the door of merit. And whenever any one aspires to and\nattains such high post, especially if by unfair and disreputable and\nindecent means, and is afterward found to be a signal failure, he should\nat once be beheaded. He is the worst among the public enemies.\n\nWhen a man sufficiently reveals himself, all others should be proud to\ngive him due precedence. When the power of promotion is abused in the\ngrand passages of life whether by People, Legislature, or Executive, the\nunjust decision recoils on the judge at once. That is not only a gross,\nbut a willful shortness of sight, that cannot discover the deserving. If\none will look hard, long, and honestly, he will not fail to discern\nmerit, genius, and qualification; and the eyes and voice of the Press\nand Public should condemn and denounce injustice wherever she rears her\nhorrid head.\n\n_\"The tools to the workmen!\"_ no other principle will save a Republic\nfrom destruction, either by civil war or the dry-rot. They tend to\ndecay, do all we can to prevent it, like human bodies. If they try the\nexperiment of governing themselves by their smallest, they slide\ndownward to the unavoidable abyss with tenfold velocity; and there never\nhas been a Republic that has not followed that fatal course.\n\nBut however palpable and gross the inherent defects of democratic\ngovernments, and fatal as the results finally and inevitably are, we\nneed only glance at the reigns of Tiberius, Nero, and Caligula, of\nHeliogabalus and Caracalla, of Domitian and Commodus, to recognize that\nthe difference between freedom and despotism is as wide as that between\nHeaven and Hell. The cruelty, baseness, and insanity of tyrants are\nincredible. Let him who complains of the fickle humors and inconstancy\nof a free people, read Pliny's character of Domitian. If the great man\nin a Republic cannot win office without descending to low arts and\nwhining beggary and the judicious use of sneaking lies, let him remain\nin retirement, and use the pen. Tacitus and Juvenal held no office. Let\nHistory and Satire punish the pretender as they crucify the despot. The\nrevenges of the intellect are terrible and just.\n\nLet Masonry use the pen and the printing-press in the free State against\nthe Demagogue; in the Despotism against the Tyrant. History offers\nexamples and encouragement. All history, for four thousand years, being\nfilled with violated rights and the sufferings of the people, each\nperiod of history brings with it such protest as is possible to it.\nUnder the C\u00e6sars there was no insurrection, but there was a Juvenal. The\narousing of indignation replaces the Gracchi. Under the C\u00e6sars there is\nthe exile of Syene; there is also the author of the Annals. As the\nNero's reign darkly they should be pictured so. Work with the graver\nonly would be pale; into the grooves should be poured a concentrated\nprose that bites.\n\nDespots are an aid to thinkers. Speech enchained is speech terrible. The\nwriter doubles and triples his style, when silence is imposed by a\nmaster upon the people. There springs from this silence a certain\nmysterious fullness, which filters and freezes into brass in the\nthoughts. Compression in the history produces conciseness in the\nhistorian. The granitic solidity of some celebrated prose is only a\ncondensation produced by the Tyrant. Tyranny constrains the writer to\nshortenings of diameter which are increases of strength. The Ciceronian\nperiod, hardly sufficient upon Verres, would lose its edge upon\nCaligula.\n\nThe Demagogue is the predecessor of the Despot. One springs from the\nother's loins. He who will basely fawn on those who have office to\nbestow, will betray like Iscariot, and prove a miserable and pitiable\nfailure. Let the new Junius lash such men as they deserve, and History\nmake them immortal in infamy; since their influences culminate in ruin.\nThe Republic that employs and honors the shallow, the superficial, the\nbase,\n\n          \"who crouch\n    Unto the offal of an office promised,\"\n\nat last weeps tears of blood for its fatal error. Of such supreme folly,\nthe sure fruit is damnation. Let the nobility of every great heart,\ncondensed into justice and truth, strike such creatures like a\nthunderbolt! If you can do no more, you can at least condemn by your\nvote, and ostracise by denunciation.\n\nIt is true that, as the Czars are absolute, they have it in their power\nto select the best for the public service. It is true that the beginner\nof a dynasty generally does so; and that when monarchies are in their\nprime, pretence and shallowness do not thrive and prosper and get power,\nas they do in Republics. All do not gabble in the Parliament of a\nKingdom, as in the Congress of a Democracy. The incapables do not go\nundetected there, _all_ their lives.\n\nBut dynasties speedily decay and run out. At last they dwindle down into\nimbecility; and the dull or flippant Members of Congresses are at least\nthe intellectual peers of the vast majority of kings. The great man, the\nJulius Caesar, the Charlemagne, Cromwell, Napoleon, reigns of right. He\nis the wisest and the strongest. The incapables and imbeciles succeed\nand are usurpers; and fear makes them cruel. After Julius came Caracalla\nand Galba; after Charlemagne, the lunatic Charles the Sixth. So the\nSaracenic dynasty dwindled out; the Capets, the Stuarts, the Bourbons;\nthe last of these producing Bomba, the ape of Domitian.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nMan is by nature cruel, like the tigers. The barbarian, and the tool of\nthe tyrant, and the civilized fanatic, enjoy the sufferings of others,\nas the children enjoy the contortions of maimed flies. Absolute Power,\nonce in fear for the safety of its tenure, cannot but be cruel.\n\nAs to ability, dynasties invariably cease to possess any after a few\nlives. They become mere shams, governed by ministers, favorites, or\ncourtesans, like those old Etruscan kings, slumbering for long ages in\ntheir golden royal robes, dissolving forever at the first breath of day.\nLet him who complains of the shortcomings of democracy ask himself if he\nwould prefer a Du Barry or a Pompadour, governing in the name of a Louis\nthe Fifteenth, a Caligula making his horse a consul, a Domitian, \"that\nmost savage monster,\" who sometimes drank the blood of relatives,\nsometimes employing himself with slaughtering the most distinguished\ncitizens before whose gates fear and terror kept watch; a tyrant of\nfrightful aspect, pride on his forehead, fire in his eye, constantly\nseeking darkness and secrecy, and only emerging from his solitude to\nmake solitude. After all, in a free government, the Laws and the\nConstitution are above the Incapables, the Courts correct their\nlegislation, and posterity is the Grand Inquest that passes judgment on\nthem. What is the exclusion of worth and intellect and knowledge from\ncivil office compared with trials before Jeffries, tortures in the dark\ncaverns of the Inquisition, Alva-butcheries in the Netherlands, the Eve\nof Saint Bartholomew, and the Sicilian Vespers?\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe Abb\u00e9 Barruel in his _Memoirs for the History of Jacobinism_,\ndeclares that Masonry in France gave, as its secret, the words Equality\nand Liberty, leaving it for every honest and religious Mason to explain\nthem as would best suit his principles; but retained the privilege of\nunveiling in the higher Degrees the meaning of those words, as\ninterpreted by the French Revolution. And he also excepts English Masons\nfrom his anathemas, because in England a Mason is a peaceable subject of\nthe civil authorities, no matter where he resides, engaging in no plots\nor conspiracies against even the worst government. England, he says,\ndisgusted with an Equality and a Liberty, the consequences of which she\nhad felt in the struggles of her Lollards, Anabaptists, and\nPresbyterians, had \"purged her Masonry\" from all explanations tending to\noverturn empires; but there still remained adepts whom disorganizing\nprinciples bound to the Ancient Mysteries.\n\nBecause true Masonry, unemasculated, bore the banners of Freedom and\nEqual Rights, and was in rebellion against temporal and spiritual\ntyranny, its Lodges were proscribed in 1735, by an edict of the States\nof Holland. In 1737, Louis XV. forbade them in France. In 1738, Pope\nClement XII. issued against them his famous Bull of Excommunication,\nwhich was renewed by Benedict XIV.; and in 1743 the Council of Berne\nalso proscribed them. The title of the Bull of Clement is, \"The\nCondemnation of the Society of Conventicles _de Liberi Muratari_, or of\nthe Freemasons, under the penalty of _ipso facto_ excommunication, the\nabsolution from which is reserved to the Pope alone, except at the point\nof death.\" And by it all bishops, ordinaries, and inquisitors were\nempowered to punish Freemasons, \"as vehemently suspected of heresy,\" and\nto call in, if necessary, the help of the secular arm; that is, to cause\nthe civil authority to put them to death.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nAlso, false and slavish political theories end in brutalizing the State.\nFor example, adopt the theory that offices and employments in it are to\nbe given as rewards for services rendered to party, and they soon become\nthe prey and spoil of faction, the booty of the victory of faction;--and\nleprosy is in the flesh of the State. The body of the commonwealth\nbecomes a mass of corruption, like a living carcass rotten with\nsyphilis. All unsound theories in the end develop themselves in one foul\nand loathsome disease or other of the body politic. The State, like the\nman, must use constant effort to _stay_ in the paths of virtue and\nmanliness. The habit of electioneering and begging for office\nculminates in bribery _with_ office, and corruption _in_ office.\n\nA chosen man has a visible trust from God, as plainly as if the\ncommission were engrossed by the notary. A nation cannot renounce the\nexecutorship of the Divine decrees. As little can Masonry. It must labor\nto do its duty knowingly and wisely. We must remember that, in free\nStates, as well as in despotisms, Injustice, the spouse of Oppression,\nis the fruitful parent of Deceit, Distrust, Hatred, Conspiracy, Treason,\nand Unfaithfulness. Even in assailing Tyranny we must have Truth and\nReason as our chief weapons. We must march into that fight like the old\nPuritans, or into the battle with the abuses that spring up in free\ngovernment, with the flaming sword in one hand, and the Oracles of God\nin the other.\n\nThe citizen who cannot accomplish well the smaller purposes of public\nlife, cannot compass the larger. The vast power of endurance,\nforbearance, patience, and performance, of a free people, is acquired\nonly by continual exercise of all the functions, like the healthful\nphysical human vigor. If the individual citizens have it not, the State\nmust equally be without it. It is of the essence of a free government,\nthat the people should not only be concerned in making the laws, but\nalso in their execution. No man ought to be more ready to obey and\nadminister the law than he who has helped to make it. The business of\ngovernment is carried on for the benefit of all, and every co-partner\nshould give counsel and co-operation.\n\nRemember also, as another shoal on which States are wrecked, that free\nStates always tend toward the depositing of the citizens in strata, the\ncreation of castes, the perpetuation of the _jus divinum_ to office in\nfamilies. The more democratic the State, the more sure this result. For,\nas free States advance in power, there is a strong tendency toward\ncentralization, not from deliberate evil intention, but from the course\nof events and the indolence of human nature. The executive powers swell\nand enlarge to inordinate dimensions; and the Executive is always\naggressive with respect to the nation. Offices of all kinds are\nmultiplied to reward partisans; the brute force of the sewerage and\nlower strata of the mob obtains large representation, first in the lower\noffices, and at last in Senates; and Bureaucracy raises its bald head,\nbristling with pens, girded with spectacles, and bunched with ribbon.\nThe art of Government becomes like a Craft, and its guilds tend to\nbecome exclusive, as those of the Middle Ages.\n\nPolitical science may be much improved as a subject of speculation; but\nit should never be divorced from the actual national necessity. The\nscience of governing men must always be practical, rather than\nphilosophical. There is not the same amount of positive or universal\ntruth here as in the abstract sciences; what is true in one country may\nbe very false in another; what is untrue to-day may become true in\nanother generation, and the truth of to-day be reversed by the judgment\nof to-morrow. To distinguish the casual from the enduring, to separate\nthe unsuitable from the suitable, and to make progress even possible,\nare the proper ends of policy. But without actual knowledge and\nexperience, and communion of labor, the dreams of the political doctors\nmay be no better than those of the doctors of divinity. The reign of\nsuch a caste, with its mysteries, its myrmidons, and its corrupting\ninfluence, may be as fatal as that of the despots. Thirty tyrants are\nthirty times worse than one.\n\nMoreover, there is a strong temptation for the governing people to\nbecome as much slothful and sluggards as the weakest of absolute kings.\nOnly give them the power to get rid, when caprice prompts them, of the\ngreat and wise men, and elect the little, and as to all the rest they\nwill relapse into indolence and indifference. The central power,\ncreation of the people, organized and cunning if not enlightened, is the\nperpetual tribunal set up by them for the redress of wrong and the rule\nof justice. It soon supplies itself with all the requisite machinery,\nand is ready and apt for all kinds of interference. The people may be a\nchild all its life. The central power may not be able to suggest the\nbest scientific solution of a problem; but it has the easiest means of\ncarrying an idea into effect. If the purpose to be attained is a large\none, it requires a large comprehension; it is proper for the action of\nthe central power. If it be a small one, it may be thwarted by\ndisagreement. The central power must step in as an arbitrator and\nprevent this. The people may be too averse to change, too slothful in\ntheir own business, unjust to a minority or a majority. The central\npower must take the reins when the people drop them.\n\nFrance became centralized in its government more by the apathy and\nignorance of its people than by the tyranny of its kings. When the\ninmost parish-life is given up to the direct guardianship of the State,\nand the repair of the belfry of a country church requires a written\norder from the central power, a people is in its dotage. Men are thus\nnurtured in imbecility, from the dawn of social life. When the central\ngovernment feeds part of the people it prepares all to be slaves. When\nit directs parish and county affairs, they are slaves already. The next\nstep is to regulate labor and its wages.\n\nNevertheless, whatever follies the free people may commit, even to the\nputting of the powers of legislation in the hands of the little\ncompetent and less honest, despair not of the final result. The terrible\nteacher, EXPERIENCE, writing his lessons on hearts desolated with\ncalamity and wrung by agony, will make them wiser in time. Pretence and\ngrimace and sordid beggary for votes will some day cease to avail. Have\nFAITH, and struggle on, against all evil influences and discouragements!\nFAITH is the Saviour and Redeemer of nations. When Christianity had\ngrown weak, profitless, and powerless, the Arab Restorer and Iconoclast\ncame, like a cleansing hurricane. When the battle of Damascus was about\nto be fought, the Christian bishop, at the early dawn, in his robes, at\nthe head of his clergy, with the Cross once so triumphant raised in the\nair, came down to the gates of the city, and laid open before the army\nthe Testament of Christ. The Christian general, THOMAS, laid his hand on\nthe book, and said, _\"Oh God! IF our faith be true, aid us, and deliver\nus not into the hands of its enemies!\"_ But KHALED, _\"the Sword of\nGod,\"_ who had marched from victory to victory, exclaimed to his wearied\nsoldiers, _\"Let no man sleep! There will be rest enough in the bowers of\nParadise; sweet will be the repose never more to be followed by labor.\"_\nThe faith of the Arab had become stronger than that of the Christian,\nand he conquered.\n\nThe Sword is also, in the Bible, an emblem of SPEECH, or of the\nutterance of thought. Thus, in that vision or apocalypse of the sublime\nexile of Patmos, a protest in the name of the ideal, overwhelming the\nreal world, a tremendous satire uttered in the name of Religion and\nLiberty, and with its fiery reverberations smiting the throne of the\nC\u00e6sars, a sharp two-edged sword comes out of the mouth of the Semblance\nof the Son of Man, encircled by the seven golden candlesticks, and\nholding in his right hand seven stars. \"The Lord,\" says Isaiah, \"hath\nmade my mouth like a sharp sword.\" \"I have slain them,\" says Hosea, \"by\nthe words of my mouth.\" \"The word of God,\" says the writer of the\napostolic letter to the Hebrews, \"is quick and powerful, and sharper\nthan any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul\nand spirit.\" \"The sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God,\" says\nPaul, writing to the Christians at Ephesus. \"I will fight against them\nwith the sword of my mouth,\" it is said in the Apocalypse, to the angel\nof the church at Pergamos.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe spoken discourse may roll on strongly as the great tidal wave; but,\nlike the wave, it dies at last feebly on the sands. It is heard by few,\nremembered by still fewer, and fades away, like an echo in the\nmountains, leaving no token of power. It is nothing to the living and\ncoming generations of men. It was the _written_ human speech, that gave\npower and permanence to human thought. It is this that makes the whole\nhuman history but one individual life.\n\nTo write on the rock is to write on a solid parchment; but it requires a\npilgrimage to see it. There is but one copy, and Time wears even that.\nTo write on skins or papyrus was to give, as it were, but one tardy\nedition, and the rich only could procure it. The Chinese stereotyped not\nonly the unchanging wisdom of old sages, but also the passing events.\nThe process tended to suffocate thought, and to hinder progress; for\nthere is continual wandering in the wisest minds, and Truth writes her\nlast words, not on clean tablets, but on the scrawl that Error has made\nand often mended.\n\nPrinting made the movable letters prolific. Thenceforth the orator spoke\nalmost visibly to listening nations; and the author wrote, like the\nPope, his \u0153cumenic decrees, _urbi et orbi_, and ordered them to be\nposted up in all the market-places; remaining, if he chose, impervious\nto human sight. The doom of tyrannies was thenceforth sealed. Satire and\ninvective became potent as armies. The unseen hands of the Juniuses\ncould launch the thunderbolts, and make the ministers tremble. One\nwhisper from this giant fills the earth as easily as Demosthenes filled\nthe Agora. It will soon be heard at the antipodes as easily as in the\nnext street. It travels with the lightning under the oceans. It makes\nthe mass one man, speaks to it in the same common language, and elicits\na sure and single response. Speech passes into thought, and thence\npromptly into act. A nation becomes truly one, with one large heart and\na single throbbing pulse. Men are invisibly present to each other, as\nif already spiritual beings; and the thinker who sits in an Alpine\nsolitude, unknown to or forgotten by all the world, among the silent\nherds and hills, may flash his words to all the cities and over all the\nseas.\n\nSelect the thinkers to be Legislators; and avoid the gabblers. Wisdom is\nrarely loquacious. Weight and depth of thought are unfavorable to\nvolubility. The shallow and superficial are generally voluble and often\npass for eloquent. More words, less thought,--is the general rule. The\nman who endeavors to say something worth remembering in every sentence,\nbecomes fastidious, and condenses like Tacitus. The vulgar love a more\ndiffuse stream. The ornamentation that does not cover strength is the\ngewgaws of babble.\n\nNeither is dialectic subtlety valuable to public men. The Christian\nfaith has it, had it formerly more than now; a subtlety that might have\nentangled Plato, and which has rivalled in a fruitless fashion the\nmystic lore of Jewish Rabbis and Indian Sages. It is not this which\nconverts the heathen. It is a vain task to balance the great thoughts of\nthe earth, like hollow straws, on the finger-tips of disputation. It is\nnot this kind of warfare which makes the Cross triumphant in the hearts\nof the unbelievers; but the actual power that lives in the Faith.\n\nSo there is a political scholasticism that is merely useless. The\ndexterities of subtle logic rarely stir the hearts of the people, or\nconvince them. The true apostle of Liberty, Fraternity and Equality\nmakes it a matter of life and death. His combats are like those of\nBossuet,--combats to the death. The true apostolic fire is like the\nlightning: it flashes conviction into the soul. The true word is verily\na two-edged sword. Matters of government and political science can be\nfairly dealt with only by sound reason, and the logic of common sense:\nnot the common sense of the ignorant, but of the wise. The acutest\nthinkers rarely succeed in becoming leaders of men. A watchword or a\ncatchword is more potent with the people than logic, especially if this\nbe the least metaphysical. When a political prophet arises, to stir the\ndreaming, stagnant nation, and hold back its feet from the irretrievable\ndescent, to heave the land as with an earthquake, and shake the\nsilly-shallow idols from their seats, his words will come straight from\nGod's own mouth, and be thundered into the conscience. He will reason,\nteach, warn, and rule. The real \"Sword of the Spirit\" is keener than\nthe brightest blade of Damascus. Such men rule a land, in the strength\nof justice, with wisdom and with power. Still, the men of dialectic\nsubtlety often rule well, because in practice they forget their\nfinely-spun theories, and use the trenchant logic of common sense. But\nwhen the great heart and large intellect are left to the rust in private\nlife, and small attorneys, brawlers in politics, and those who in the\ncities would be only the clerks of notaries, or practitioners in the\ndisreputable courts, are made national Legislators, the country is in\nher dotage, even if the beard has not yet grown upon her chin.\n\nIn a free country, human speech must needs be free; and the State _must_\nlisten to the maunderings of folly, and the screechings of its geese,\nand the brayings of its asses, as well as to the golden oracles of its\nwise and great men. Even the despotic old kings allowed their wise fools\nto say what they liked. The true alchemist will extract the lessons of\nwisdom from the babblings of folly. He will hear what a man has to say\non any given subject, even if the speaker end only in proving himself\nprince of fools. Even a fool will sometimes hit the mark. There is some\ntruth in all men who are not compelled to suppress their souls and speak\nother men's thoughts. The finger even of the idiot may point to the\ngreat highway.\n\nA people, as well as the sages, must learn to forget. If it neither\nlearns the new nor forgets the old, it is fated, even if it has been\nroyal for thirty generations. To unlearn is to learn; and also it is\nsometimes needful to learn again the forgotten. The antics of fools make\nthe current follies more palpable, as fashions are shown to be absurd by\ncaricatures, which so lead to their extirpation. The buffoon and the\nzany are useful in their places. The ingenious artificer and craftsman,\nlike Solomon, searches the earth for his materials, and transforms the\nmisshapen matter into glorious workmanship. The world is conquered by\nthe head even more than by the hands. Nor will any assembly talk\nforever. After a time, when it has listened long enough, it quietly puts\nthe silly, the shallow, and the superficial to one side,--it thinks, and\nsets to work.\n\nThe human thought, especially in popular assemblies, runs in the most\nsingularly crooked channels, harder to trace and follow than the blind\ncurrents of the ocean. No notion is so absurd that it may not find a\nplace there. The master-workman must train these notions and vagaries\nwith his two-handed hammer. They twist out of the way of the\nsword-thrusts; and are invulnerable all over, even in the heel, against\nlogic. The martel or mace, the battle-axe, the great double-edged\ntwo-handed sword must deal with follies; the rapier is no better against\nthem than a wand, unless it be the rapier of ridicule.\n\nThe SWORD is also the symbol of _war_ and of the _soldier_. Wars, like\nthunder-storms, are often necessary to purify the stagnant atmosphere.\nWar is not a demon, without remorse or reward. It restores the\nbrotherhood in letters of fire. When men are seated in their pleasant\nplaces, sunken in ease and indolence, with Pretence and Incapacity and\nLittleness usurping all the high places of State, war is the baptism of\nblood and fire, by which alone they can be renovated. It is the\nhurricane that brings the elemental equilibrium, the concord of Power\nand Wisdom. So long as these continue obstinately divorced, it will\ncontinue to chasten.\n\nIn the mutual appeal of nations to God, there is the acknowledgment of\nHis might. It lights the beacons of Faith and Freedom, and heats the\nfurnace through which the earnest and loyal pass to immortal glory.\nThere is in war the doom of defeat, the quenchless sense of Duty, the\nstirring sense of Honor, the measureless solemn sacrifice of\ndevotedness, and the incense of success. Even in the flame and smoke of\nbattle, the Mason discovers his brother, and fulfills the sacred\nobligations of Fraternity.\n\nTwo, or the Duad, is the symbol of Antagonism; of Good and Evil, Light\nand Darkness. It is Cain and Abel, Eve and Lilith, Jachin and Boaz,\nOrmuzd and Ahriman, Osiris and Typhon.\n\nThree, or the Triad, is most significantly expressed by the equilateral\nand the right-angled triangles. There are _three_ principal colors or\nrays in the rainbow, which by intermixture make _seven_. The three are\nthe _blue_, the _yellow_, and the _red_. The Trinity of the Deity, in\none mode or other, has been an article in all creeds. He creates,\npreserves, and destroys. He is the generative _power_, the productive\n_capacity_, and the _result_. The immaterial man, according to the\nKabalah, is composed of _vitality_, or _life_, the breath of life; of\n_soul_ or _mind_, and _spirit_. Salt, sulphur, and mercury are the great\nsymbols of the alchemists. To them man was body, soul, and spirit.\n\nFour is expressed by the square, or four-sided right-angled figure. Out\nof the symbolic Garden of Eden flowed a river, dividing into _four_\nstreams,--PISON, which flows around the land of gold, or light; GIHON,\nwhich flows around the land of Ethiopia or Darkness; HIDDEKEL, running\neastward to Assyria; and the EUPHRATES. Zechariah saw _four_ chariots\ncoming out from between two mountains of bronze, in the first of which\nwere _red_ horses; in the second, _black_; in the third, _white_; and in\nthe fourth, _grizzled_: \"and these were the four winds of the heavens,\nthat go forth from standing before the Lord of all the earth.\" Ezekiel\nsaw the _four_ living creatures, each with _four_ faces and _four_\nwings, the faces of a _man_ and a _lion_, an _ox_ and an _eagle_; and\nthe _four_ wheels going upon their _four_ sides; and Saint John beheld\nthe _four_ beasts, full of eyes before and behind, the LION, the young\nOX, the MAN, and the flying EAGLE. _Four_ was the signature of the\nEarth. Therefore, in the 148th Psalm, of those who must praise the Lord\non the land, there are _four_ times _four_, and _four_ in particular of\nliving creatures. Visible nature is described as the _four_ quarters of\nthe world, and the _four_ corners of the earth. \"There are _four_,\" says\nthe old Jewish saying, \"which take the first place in this world: _man_,\namong the creatures; the _eagle_ among birds; the _ox_ among cattle; and\nthe _lion_ among wild beasts.\" Daniel saw _four_ great beasts come up\nfrom the sea.\n\nFIVE is the Duad added to the Triad. It is expressed by the five-pointed\nor blazing star, the mysterious Pentalpha of Pythagoras. It is\nindissolubly connected with the number _seven_. Christ fed His disciples\nand the multitude with _five_ loaves and _two_ fishes, and of the\nfragments there remained _twelve_, that is, _five_ and _seven_, baskets\nfull. Again He fed them with _seven_ loaves and a few little fishes, and\nthere remained _seven_ baskets full. The _five_ apparently small\nplanets, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn, with the two greater\nones, the Sun and Moon, constituted the _seven_ celestial spheres.\n\nSEVEN was the peculiarly sacred number. There were _seven_ planets and\nspheres presided over by _seven_ archangels. There were _seven_ colors\nin the rainbow; and the Phoenician Deity was called the HEPTAKIS or God\nof _seven_ rays; _seven_ days of the week; and _seven_ and _five_ made\nthe number of months, tribes, and apostles. Zechariah saw a golden\ncandlestick, with _seven_ lamps and _seven_ pipes to the lamps, and an\nolive-tree on each side. Since he says, \"the _seven_ eyes of the Lord\nshall rejoice, and shall see the plummet in the hand of Zerubbabel.\"\nJohn, in the Apocalypse, writes _seven_ epistles to the _seven_\nchurches. In the _seven_ epistles there are _twelve_ promises. What is\nsaid of the churches in praise or blame, is completed in the number\n_three_. The refrain, \"_who has ears to hear_,\" etc., has _ten_ words,\ndivided by _three_ and _seven_, and the _seven_ by _three_ and _four_;\nand the _seven_ epistles are also so divided. In the seals, trumpets,\nand vials, also, of this symbolic vision, the _seven_ are divided by\n_four_ and _three_. He who sends his message to Ephesus, \"holds the\n_seven_ stars in his right hand, and walks amid the _seven_ golden\nlamps.\"\n\nIn _six_ days, or periods, God created the Universe, and paused on the\n_seventh_ day. Of clean beasts, Noah was directed to take by _sevens_\ninto the ark; and of fowls by _sevens_; because in _seven_ days the rain\nwas to commence. On the _seven_teenth day of the month, the rain began;\non the _seven_teenth day of the _seventh_ month, that ark rested on\nArarat. When the dove returned, Noah waited _seven_ days before he sent\nher forth again; and again _seven_, after she returned with the\nolive-leaf. Enoch was the _seventh_ patriarch, Adam included, and Lamech\nlived 777 years.\n\nThere were _seven_ lamps in the great candlestick of the Tabernacle and\nTemple, representing the _seven_ planets. _Seven_ times Moses sprinkled\nthe anointing oil upon the altar. The days of consecration of Aaron and\nhis sons were _seven_ in number. A woman was unclean _seven_ days after\nchild-birth; one infected with leprosy was shut up _seven_ days; _seven_\ntimes the leper was sprinkled with the blood of a slain bird; and\n_seven_ days afterwards he must remain abroad out of his tent. _Seven_\ntimes, in purifying the leper, the priest was to sprinkle the\nconsecrated oil; and _seven_ times to sprinkle with the blood of the\nsacrificed bird the house to be purified. _Seven_ times the blood of the\nslain bullock was sprinkled on the mercy-seat; and _seven_ times on the\naltar. The _seventh_ year was a Sabbath of rest; and at the end of\n_seven_ times _seven_ years came the great year of jubilee. _Seven_ days\nthe people ate unleavened bread, in the month of Abib. _Seven_ weeks\nwere counted from the time of first putting the sickle to the wheat. The\nFeast of the Tabernacles lasted _seven_ days.\n\nIsrael was in the hand of Midian _seven_ years before Gideon delivered\nthem. The bullock sacrificed by him was _seven_ years old. Samson told\nDelilah to bind him with _seven_ green withes; and she wove the _seven_\nlocks of his head, and afterwards shaved them off. Balaam told Barak to\nbuild for him _seven_ altars. Jacob served _seven_ years for Leah and\n_seven_ for Rachel. Job had _seven_ sons and _three_ daughters, making\nthe perfect number _ten_. He had also _seven_ thousand sheep and _three_\nthousand camels. His friends sat down with him _seven_ days and _seven_\nnights. His friends were ordered to sacrifice _seven_ bullocks and\n_seven_ rams; and again, at the end, he had _seven_ sons and _three_\ndaughters, and twice _seven_ thousand sheep, and lived an hundred and\nforty, or twice _seven_ times _ten_ years. Pharaoh saw in his dream\n_seven_ fat and _seven_ lean kine, _seven_ good ears and _seven_ blasted\nears of wheat; and there were _seven_ years of plenty, and _seven_ of\nfamine. Jericho fell, when _seven_ priests, with _seven_ trumpets, made\nthe circuit of the city on _seven_ successive days; once each day for\nsix days, and _seven_ times on the seventh. \"The _seven_ eyes of the\nLord,\" says Zechariah, \"run to and fro through the whole earth.\" Solomon\nwas _seven_ years in building the Temple. _Seven_ angels, in the\nApocalypse, pour out _seven_ plagues, from _seven_ vials of wrath. The\nscarlet-colored beast, on which the woman sits in the wilderness, has\n_seven_ heads and _ten_ horns. So also has the beast that rises up out\nof the sea. _Seven_ thunders uttered their voices. _Seven_ angels\nsounded _seven_ trumpets. _Seven_ lamps, of fire, the _seven_ spirits of\nGod, burned before the throne; and the Lamb that was slain had _seven_\nhorns and _seven_ eyes.\n\nEIGHT is the first cube, that of _two_. NINE is the square of _three_,\nand represented by the triple triangle.\n\nTEN includes all the other numbers. It is especially _seven_ and\n_three_; and is called the number of perfection. Pythagoras represented\nit by the TETRACTYS, which had many mystic meanings. This symbol is\nsometimes composed of dots or points, sometimes of commas or y\u014dds, and\nin the Kabalah, of the letters of the name of Deity. It is thus\narranged:\n\n   ,\n  , ,\n , , ,\n, , , ,\n\nThe Patriarchs from Adam to Noah, inclusive, are _ten_ in number, and\nthe same number is that of the Commandments.\n\nTWELVE is the number of the lines of equal length that form a cube. It\nis the number of the months, the tribes, and the apostles; of the oxen\nunder the Brazen Sea, of the stones on the breast-plate of the high\npriest.\n\n\n\n\nIII.\n\nTHE MASTER.\n\n\nTo understand literally the symbols and allegories of Oriental books as\nto ante-historical matters, is willfully to close our eyes against the\nLight. To translate the symbols into the trivial and commonplace, is the\nblundering of mediocrity.\n\n_All_ religious expression is symbolism; since we can _describe_ only\nwhat we _see_, and the true objects of religion are THE SEEN. The\nearliest instruments of education were symbols; and they and all other\nreligious forms differed and still differ according to external\ncircumstances and imagery, and according to differences of knowledge and\nmental cultivation. All language is symbolic, so far as it is applied to\nmental and spiritual phenomena and action. All _words_ have, primarily,\na _material_ sense, however they may afterward get, for the ignorant, a\nspiritual _non_-sense. \"To retract,\" for example, is to _draw back_, and\nwhen applied to a _statement_, is symbolic, as much so as a picture of\nan arm drawn back, to express the same thing, would be. The very word\n\"_spirit_\" means \"_breath,_\" from the Latin verb _, breathe_.\n\nTo present a visible symbol to the eye of another is not necessarily to\ninform him of the meaning which that symbol has to you. Hence the\nphilosopher soon superadded to the symbols explanations addressed to the\near, susceptible of more precision, but less effective and impressive\nthan the painted or sculptured forms which he endeavored to explain. Out\nof these explanations grew by degrees a variety of narrations, whose\ntrue object and meaning were gradually forgotten, or lost in\ncontradictions and incongruities. And when these were abandoned, and\nPhilosophy resorted to definitions and formulas, its language was but a\nmore complicated symbolism, attempting in the dark to grapple with and\npicture ideas impossible to be expressed. For as with the visible\nsymbol, so with the word: to utter it to you does not inform you of the\n_exact_ meaning which it has to _me_; and thus religion and philosophy\nbecame to a great extent disputes as to the meaning of words. The most\nabstract expression for DEITY, which language can supply, is but a\n_sign_ or _symbol_ for an object beyond our comprehension, and not more\ntruthful and adequate than the images of OSIRIS and VISHNU, or their\nnames, except as being less sensuous and explicit. We avoid sensuousness\nonly by resorting to simple negation. We come at last to define spirit\nby saying that it is not matter. Spirit is--spirit.\n\nA single example of the symbolism of _words_ will indicate to you one\nbranch of Masonic study. We find in the English Rite this phrase: \"I\nwill always _hail_, ever conceal, and never reveal;\" and in the\nCatechism, these:\n\nQ.'. \"_I hail_.\"\n\nA.'. \"_I conceal_;\"\n\nand ignorance, misunderstanding the word \"_hail_,\" has interpolated the\nphrase, \"From whence do you _hail_?\"\n\nBut the word is really \"_hele_,\" from the Anglo-Saxon verb \u00d0elan,\n_helan_, to _cover, hide_, or _conceal_. And this word is rendered by\nthe Latin verb _tegere_, to _cover_ or _roof over_. \"That ye fro me no\nthynge woll hele,\" says Gower. \"They _hele_ fro me no priuyte,\" says the\nRomaunt of the Rose. \"To _heal_ a house,\" is a common phrase in Sussex;\nand in the west of England, he that covers a house with slates is called\na _Healer_. Wherefore, to \"_heal_\" means the same thing as to\n\"_tile_,\"--itself symbolic, as meaning, primarily, to _cover_ a house\nwith _tiles_,--and means to _cover, hide_, or _conceal_. Thus language\ntoo is symbolism, and words are as much misunderstood and misused as\nmore material symbols are.\n\nSymbolism tended continually to become more complicated; and all the\npowers of Heaven were reproduced on earth, until a web of fiction and\nallegory was woven, partly by art and partly by the ignorance of error,\nwhich the wit of man, with his limited means of explanation, will never\nunravel. Even the Hebrew Theism became involved in symbolism and\nimage-worship, borrowed probably from an older creed and remote regions\nof Asia,--the worship of the Great Semitic Nature-God AL or ELS and its\nsymbolical representations of JEHOVAH Himself were not even confined to\npoetical or illustrative language. The priests were monotheists: the\npeople idolaters.\n\nThere are dangers inseparable from symbolism, which afford an impressive\nlesson in regard to the similar risks attendant on the use of language.\nThe imagination, called in to assist the reason, usurps its place or\nleaves its ally helplessly entangled in its web. Names which stand for\nthings are confounded with them; the means are mistaken for the end; the\ninstrument of interpretation for the object; and thus symbols come to\nusurp an independent character as truths and persons. Though perhaps a\nnecessary path, they were a dangerous one by which to approach the\nDeity; in which many, says PLUTARCH, \"mistaking the sign for the thing\nsignified, fell into a ridiculous superstition; while others, in\navoiding one extreme, plunged into the no less hideous gulf of\nirreligion and impiety.\"\n\nIt is through the Mysteries, CICERO says, that we have learned the first\nprinciples of life; wherefore the term \"initiation\" is used with good\nreason; and they not only teach us to live more happily and agreeably,\nbut they soften the pains of death by the hope of a better life\nhereafter.\n\nThe Mysteries were a Sacred Drama, exhibiting some legend significant of\nnature's changes, of the visible Universe in which the Divinity is\nrevealed, and whose import was in many respects as open to the Pagan as\nto the Christian. Nature is the great Teacher of man; for it is the\nRevelation of God. It neither dogmatizes nor attempts to tyrannize by\ncompelling to a particular creed or special interpretation. It presents\nits symbols to us, and adds nothing by way of explanation. It is the\ntext without the commentary; and, as we well know, it is chiefly the\ncommentary and gloss that lead to error and heresy and persecution. The\nearliest instructors of mankind not only adopted the lessons of Nature,\nbut as far as possible adhered to her method of imparting them. In the\nMysteries, beyond the current traditions or sacred and enigmatic\nrecitals of the Temples, few explanations were given to the spectators,\nwho were left, as in the school of nature, to make inferences for\nthemselves. No other method could have suited every degree of\ncultivation and capacity. To employ nature's universal symbolism instead\nof the technicalities of language, rewards the humblest inquirer, and\ndiscloses its secrets to every one in proportion to his preparatory\ntraining and his power to comprehend them. If their philosophical\nmeaning was above the comprehension of some, their moral and political\nmeanings are within the reach of all.\n\nThese mystic shows and performances were not the reading of a lecture,\nbut the opening of a problem. Requiring research, they were calculated\nto arouse the dormant intellect. They implied no hostility to\nPhilosophy, because Philosophy is the great expounder of symbolism;\nalthough its ancient interpretations were often ill-founded and\nincorrect. The alteration from symbol to dogma is fatal to beauty of\nexpression, and leads to intolerance and assumed infallibility.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nIf, in teaching the great doctrine of the divine nature of the Soul, and\nin striving to explain its longings after immortality, and in proving\nits superiority over the souls of the animals, which have no aspirations\nHeavenward, the ancients struggled in vain to express the _nature_ of\nthe soul, by comparing it to FIRE and LIGHT, it will be well for us to\nconsider whether, with all our boasted knowledge, we have any better or\nclearer idea of its nature, and whether we have not despairingly taken\nrefuge in having none at all. And if they erred as to its original place\nof abode, and understood literally the mode and path of its descent,\nthese were but the accessories of the great Truth, and probably, to the\nInitiates, mere allegories, designed to make the idea more palpable and\nimpressive to the mind.\n\nThey are at least no more fit to be smiled at by the self-conceit of a\nvain ignorance, the wealth of whose knowledge consists solely in words,\nthan the _bosom_ of Abraham, as a home for the _spirits_ of the just\ndead; the gulf of actual fire, for the eternal torture of _spirits_; and\nthe City of the New Jerusalem, with its walls of jasper and its edifices\nof pure gold like clear glass, its foundations of precious stones, and\nits gates each of a single pearl. \"I knew a man,\" says PAUL, \"caught up\nto the third Heaven; ... that he was caught up into Paradise, and heard\nineffable words, which it is not possible for a man to utter.\" And\nnowhere is the antagonism and conflict between the spirit and body more\nfrequently and forcibly insisted on than in the writings of this\napostle, nowhere the Divine nature of the soul more strongly asserted.\n\"With the mind,\" he says, \"I serve the law of God; but with the flesh\nthe law of sin.... As many as are led by the Spirit of God, are the sons\nof GOD.... The earnest expectation of the created waits for the\nmanifestation of the sons of God.... The created shall be delivered from\nthe bondage of corruption, of the flesh liable to decay, into the\nglorious liberty of the children of God.\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nTwo forms of government are favorable to the prevalence of falsehood\nand deceit. Under a Despotism, men are false, treacherous, and deceitful\nthrough fear, like slaves dreading the lash. Under a Democracy they are\nso as a means of attaining popularity and office, and because of the\ngreed for wealth. Experience will probably prove that these odious and\ndetestable vices will grow most rankly and spread most rapidly in a\nRepublic. When office and wealth become the gods of a people, and the\nmost unworthy and unfit most aspire to the former, and fraud becomes the\nhighway to the latter, the land will reek with falsehood and sweat lies\nand chicane. When the offices are open to all, merit and stern integrity\nand the dignity of unsullied honor will attain them only rarely and by\naccident. To be able to serve the country well, will cease to be a\nreason why the great and wise and learned should be selected to render\nservice. Other qualifications, less honorable, will be more available.\nTo adapt one's opinions to the popular humor; to defend, apologize for,\nand justify the popular follies; to advocate the expedient and the\nplausible; to caress, cajole, and flatter the elector; to beg like a\nspaniel for his vote, even if he be a negro three removes from\nbarbarism; to profess friendship for a competitor and stab him by\ninnuendo; to set on foot that which at third hand shall become a lie,\nbeing cousin-german to it when uttered, and yet capable of being\nexplained away,--who is there that has not seen these low arts and base\nappliances put into practice, and becoming general, until success cannot\nbe surely had by any more honorable means?--the result being a State\nruled and ruined by ignorant and shallow mediocrity, pert self-conceit,\nthe greenness of unripe intellect, vain of a school-boy's smattering of\nknowledge.\n\nThe faithless and the false in public and in political life, will be\nfaithless and false in private. The jockey in politics, like the jockey\non the race-course, is rotten from skin to core. Everywhere he will see\nfirst to his own interests, and whoso leans on him will be pierced with\na broken reed. His ambition is ignoble, like himself; and therefore he\nwill seek to attain office by ignoble means, as he will seek to attain\nany other coveted object,--land, money, or reputation.\n\nAt length, office and honor are divorced. The place that the small and\nshallow, the knave or the trickster, is deemed competent and fit to\nfill, ceases to be worthy the ambition of the great and capable; or if\nnot, these shrink from a contest, the weapons to be used wherein are\nunfit for a gentleman to handle. Then the habits of unprincipled\nadvocates in law courts are naturalized in Senates, and pettifoggers\nwrangle there, when the fate of the nation and the lives of millions are\nat stake. States are even begotten by villainy and brought forth by\nfraud, and rascalities are justified by legislators claiming to be\nhonorable. Then contested elections are decided by perjured votes or\nparty considerations; and all the practices of the worst times of\ncorruption are revived and exaggerated in Republics.\n\nIt is strange that reverence for truth, that manliness and genuine\nloyalty, and scorn of littleness and unfair advantage, and genuine faith\nand godliness and large-heartedness should diminish, among statesmen and\npeople, as civilization advances, and freedom becomes more general, and\nuniversal suffrage implies universal worth and fitness! In the age of\nElizabeth, without universal suffrage, or Societies for the Diffusion of\nUseful Knowledge, or popular lecturers, or Lyc\u00e6a, the statesman, the\nmerchant, the burgher, the sailor, were all alike heroic, fearing God\nonly, and man not at all. Let but a hundred or two years elapse, and in\na Monarchy or Republic of the same race, nothing is _less_ heroic than\nthe merchant, the shrewd speculator, the office-seeker, fearing man\nonly, and God not at all. Reverence for greatness dies out, and is\nsucceeded by base envy of greatness. Every man is in the way of many,\neither in the path to popularity or wealth. There is a general feeling\nof satisfaction when a great statesman is displaced, or a general, who\nhas been for his brief hour the popular idol, is unfortunate and sinks\nfrom his high estate. It becomes a misfortune, if not a crime, to be\nabove the popular level.\n\nWe should naturally suppose that a nation in distress would take counsel\nwith the wisest of its sons. But, on the contrary, great men seem never\nso scarce as when they are most needed, and small men never so bold to\ninsist on infesting place, as when mediocrity and incapable pretence and\nsophomoric greenness, and showy and sprightly incompetency are most\ndangerous. When France was in the extremity of revolutionary agony, she\nwas governed by an assembly of provincial pettifoggers, and Robespierre,\nMarat, and Couthon ruled in the place of Mirabeau, Vergniaud, and\nCarnot. England was governed by the Rump Parliament, after she had\nbeheaded her king. Cromwell extinguished one body, and Napoleon the\nother.\n\nFraud, falsehood, trickery, and deceit in national affairs are the\nsigns of decadence in States and precede convulsions or paralysis. To\nbully the weak and crouch to the strong, is the policy of nations\ngoverned by small mediocrity. The tricks of the canvass for office are\nre-enacted in Senates. The Executive becomes the dispenser of patronage,\nchiefly to the most unworthy; and men are bribed with offices instead of\nmoney, to the greater ruin of the Commonwealth. The Divine in human\nnature disappears, and interest, greed, and selfishness takes it place.\nThat is a sad and true allegory which represents the companions of\nUlysses changed by the enchantments of Circe into swine.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\"Ye cannot,\" said the Great Teacher, \"serve God and Mammon.\" When the\nthirst for wealth becomes general, it will be sought for as well\ndishonestly as honestly; by frauds and overreachings, by the knaveries\nof trade, the heartlessness of greedy speculation, by gambling in stocks\nand commodities that soon demoralizes a whole community. Men will\nspeculate upon the needs of their neighbors and the distresses of their\ncountry. Bubbles that, bursting, impoverish multitudes, will be blown up\nby cunning knavery, with stupid credulity as its assistants and\ninstrument. Huge bankruptcies, that startle a country like the\nearthquakes, and are more fatal, fraudulent assignments, engulfment of\nthe savings of the poor, expansions and collapses of the currency, the\ncrash of banks, the depreciation of Government securities, prey on the\nsavings of self-denial, and trouble with their depredations the first\nnourishment of infancy and the last sands of life, and fill with inmates\nthe churchyards and lunatic asylums. But the sharper and speculator\nthrives and fattens. If his country is fighting by a levy en masse for\nher very existence, he aids her by depreciating her paper, so that he\nmay accumulate fabulous amounts with little outlay. If his neighbor is\ndistressed, he buys his property for a song. If he administers upon an\nestate, it turns out insolvent, and the orphans are paupers. If his bank\nexplodes, he is found to have taken care of himself in time. Society\nworships its paper-and-credit kings, as the old Hindus and Egyptians\nworshipped their worthless idols, and often the most obsequiously when\nin actual solid wealth they are the veriest paupers. No wonder men think\nthere ought to be another world, in which the injustices of this may be\natoned for, when they see the friends of ruined families begging the\nwealthy sharpers to give alms to prevent the orphaned victims from\nstarving, until they may find ways of supporting themselves.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nStates are chiefly avaricious of commerce and of territory. The latter\nleads to the violation of treaties, encroachments upon feeble neighbors,\nand rapacity toward their wards whose lands are coveted. Republics are,\nin this, as rapacious and unprincipled as Despots, never learning from\nhistory that inordinate expansion by rapine and fraud has its inevitable\nconsequences in dismemberment or subjugation. When a Republic begins to\nplunder its neighbors, the words of doom are already written on its\nwalls. There is a judgment already pronounced of God upon whatever is\nunrighteous in the conduct of national affairs. When civil war tears the\nvitals of a Republic, let it look back and see if it has not been guilty\nof injustices; and if it has, let it humble itself in the dust!\n\nWhen a nation becomes possessed with a spirit of commercial greed,\nbeyond those just and fair limits set by a due regard to a moderate and\nreasonable degree of general and individual prosperity, it is a nation\npossessed by the devil of commercial avarice, a passion as ignoble and\ndemoralizing as avarice in the individual; and as this sordid passion is\nbaser and more unscrupulous than ambition, so it is more hateful, and at\nlast makes the infected nation to be regarded as the enemy of the human\nrace. To grasp at the lion's share of commerce, has always at last\nproven the ruin of States, because it invariably leads to injustices\nthat make a State detestable; to a selfishness and crooked policy that\nforbid other nations to be the friends of a State that cares only for\nitself.\n\nCommercial avarice in India was the parent of more atrocities and\ngreater rapacity, and cost more human lives, than the nobler ambition\nfor extended empire of Consular Rome. The nation that grasps at the\ncommerce of the world cannot but become selfish, calculating, dead to\nthe noblest impulses and sympathies which ought to actuate States. It\nwill submit to insults that wound its honor, rather than endanger its\ncommercial interests by war; while, to subserve those interests, it will\nwage unjust war, on false or frivolous pretexts, its free people\ncheerfully allying themselves with despots to crush a commercial rival\nthat has ared to exile its kings and elect its own ruler.\n\nThus the cold calculations of a sordid self-interest, in nations\ncommercially avaricious, always at last displace the sentiments and\nlofty impulses of Honor and Generosity by which they rose to greatness;\nwhich made Elizabeth and Cromwell alike the protectors of Protestants\nbeyond the four seas of England, against crowned Tyranny and mitred\nPersecution; and, if they had lasted, would have forbidden alliances\nwith Czars and Autocrats and Bourbons to re-enthrone the Tyrannies of\nIncapacity, and arm the Inquisition anew with its instruments of\ntorture. The soul of the avaricious nation petrifies, like the soul of\nthe individual who makes gold his god. The Despot will occasionally act\nupon noble and generous impulses, and help the weak against the strong,\nthe right against the wrong. But commercial avarice is essentially\negotistic, grasping, faithless, overreaching, crafty, cold, ungenerous,\nselfish, and calculating, controlled by considerations of self-interest\nalone. Heartless and merciless, it has no sentiments of pity, sympathy,\nor honor, to make it pause in its remorseless career; and it crushes\ndown all that is of impediment in its way, as its keels of commerce\ncrush under them the murmuring and unheeded waves.\n\nA war for a great principle ennobles a nation. A war for commercial\nsupremacy, upon some shallow pretext, is despicable, and more than aught\nelse demonstrates to what immeasurable depths of baseness men and\nnations can descend. Commercial greed values the lives of men no more\nthan it values the lives of ants. The slave-trade is as acceptable to a\npeople enthralled by that greed, as the trade in ivory or spices, if the\nprofits are as large. It will by-and-by endeavor to compound with God\nand quiet its own conscience, by compelling those to whom it sold the\nslaves it bought or stole, to set them free, and slaughtering them by\nhecatombs if they refuse to obey the edicts of its philanthropy.\n\nJustice in no wise consists in meting out to another that exact measure\nof reward or punishment which we think and decree his merit, or what we\ncall his crime, which is more often merely his error, deserves. The\njustice of the father is not incompatible with forgiveness by him of the\nerrors and offences of his child. The Infinite Justice of God does not\nconsist in meting out exact measures of punishment for human frailties\nand sins. We are too apt to erect our own little and narrow notions of\nwhat is right and just into the law of justice, and to insist that God\nshall adopt that as His law; to measure off something with our own\nlittle tape-line, and call it God's love of justice. Continually we\nseek to ennoble our own ignoble love of revenge and retaliation, by\nmisnaming it justice.\n\nNor does justice consist in strictly governing our conduct toward other\nmen by the rigid rules of legal right. If there were a community\nanywhere, in which all stood upon the strictness of this rule there\nshould be written over its gates, as a warning to the unfortunates\ndesiring admission to that inhospitable realm, the words which DANTE\nsays are written over the great gate of Hell: \"LET THOSE WHO ENTER HERE\nLEAVE HOPE BEHIND!\" It is not just to pay the laborer in field or\nfactory or workshop his current wages and no more, the lowest\nmarket-value of his labor, for so long only as we need that labor and he\nis able to work; for when sickness or old age overtakes him, that is to\nleave him and his family to starve; and God will curse with calamity the\npeople in which the children of the laborer out of work eat the boiled\ngrass of the field, and mothers strangle their children, that they may\nbuy food for themselves with the charitable pittance given for burial\nexpenses. The rules of what is ordinarily termed \"_Justice_,\" may be\npunctiliously observed among the fallen spirits that are the aristocracy\nof Hell.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nJustice, divorced from sympathy, is selfish indifference, not in the\nleast more laudable than misanthropic isolation. There is sympathy even\namong the hair-like oscillatorias, a tribe of simple plants, armies of\nwhich may be discovered, with the aid of the microscope, in the tiniest\nbit of scum from a stagnant pool. For these will place themselves, as if\nit were by agreement, in separate companies, on the side of a vessel\ncontaining them, and seem marching upward in rows; and when a swarm\ngrows weary of its situation, and has a mind to change its quarters,\neach army holds on its way without confusion or intermixture, proceeding\nwith great regularity and order, as if under the directions of wise\nleaders. The ants and bees give each other mutual assistance, beyond\nwhat is required by that which human creatures are apt to regard as the\nstrict law of justice.\n\nSurely we need but reflect a little, to be convinced that the individual\nman is but a fraction of the unit of society, and that he is\nindissolubly connected with the rest of his race. Not only the actions,\nbut the will and thoughts of other men make or mar his fortunes,\ncontrol his destinies, are unto him life or death, dishonor or honor.\nThe epidemics, physical and moral, contagious and infectious, public\nopinion, popular delusions, enthusiasms, and the other great electric\nphenomena and currents, moral and intellectual, prove the universal\nsympathy. The vote of a single and obscure man, the utterance of\nself-will, ignorance, conceit, or spite, deciding an election and\nplacing Folly or Incapacity or Baseness in a Senate, involves the\ncountry in war, sweeps away our fortunes, slaughters our sons, renders\nthe labors of a life unavailing, and pushes on, helpless, with all our\nintellect to resist, into the grave.\n\nThese considerations ought to teach us that justice to others and to\nourselves is the same; that we cannot define our duties by mathematical\nlines ruled by the square, but must fill with them the great circle\ntraced by the compasses; that the circle of humanity is the limit, and\nwe are but the point in its centre, the drops in the great Atlantic, the\natom or particle, bound by a mysterious law of attraction which we term\nsympathy to every other atom in the mass; that the physical and moral\nwelfare of others cannot be indifferent to us; that we have a direct and\nimmediate interest in the public morality and popular intelligence, in\nthe well-being and physical comfort of the people at large. The\nignorance of the people, their pauperism and destitution, and consequent\ndegradation, their brutalization and demoralization, are all diseases;\nand we cannot rise high enough above the people, nor shut ourselves up\nfrom them enough, to escape the miasmatic contagion and the great\nmagnetic currents.\n\nJustice is peculiarly indispensable to nations. The unjust State is\ndoomed of God to calamity and ruin. This is the teaching of the Eternal\nWisdom and of history. \"Righteousness exalteth a nation; but wrong is a\nreproach to nations.\" \"The Throne is established by Righteousness. Let\nthe lips of the Ruler pronounce the sentence that is Divine; and his\nmouth do no wrong in judgment!\" The nation that adds province to\nprovince by fraud and violence, that encroaches on the weak and plunders\nits wards, and violates its treaties and the obligation of its\ncontracts, and for the law of honor and fair-dealing substitutes the\nexigencies of greed and the base precepts of policy and craft and the\nignoble tenets of expediency, is predestined to destruction; for here,\nas with the individual, the consequences of wrong are inevitable and\neternal.\n\nA sentence is written against all that is unjust, written by God in the\nnature of man and in the nature of the Universe, because it is in the\nnature of the Infinite God. No wrong is really successful. The gain of\ninjustice is a loss; its pleasure, suffering. Iniquity often seems to\nprosper, but its success is its defeat and shame. If its consequences\npass by the doer, they fall upon and crush his children. It is a\nphilosophical, physical, and moral truth, in the form of a threat, that\nGod visits the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, to the third\nand fourth generation of those who violate His laws. After a long while,\nthe day of reckoning always comes, to nation as to individual; and\nalways the knave deceives himself, and proves a failure.\n\nHypocrisy is the homage that vice and wrong pay to virtue and justice.\nIt is Satan attempting to clothe himself in the angelic vesture of\nlight. It is equally detestable in morals, politics, and religion; in\nthe man and in the nation. To do injustice under the pretence of equity\nand fairness; to reprove vice in public and commit it in private; to\npretend to charitable opinion and censoriously condemn; to profess the\nprinciples of Masonic beneficence, and close the ear to the wail of\ndistress and the cry of suffering; to eulogize the intelligence of the\npeople, and plot to deceive and betray them by means of their ignorance\nand simplicity; to prate of purity, and peculate; of honor, and basely\nabandon a sinking cause; of disinterestedness, and sell one's vote for\nplace and power, are hypocrisies as common as they are infamous and\ndisgraceful. To steal the livery of the Court of God to serve the Devil\nwithal; to pretend to believe in a God of mercy and a Redeemer of love,\nand persecute those of a different faith; to devour widows houses, and\nfor a pretence make long prayers; to preach continence, and wallow in\nlust; to inculcate humility, and in pride surpass Lucifer; to pay tithe,\nand omit the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy and faith; to\nstrain at a gnat, and swallow a camel; to make clean the outside of the\ncup and platter, keeping them full within of extortion and excess; to\nappear outwardly righteous unto men, but within be full of hypocrisy and\niniquity, is indeed to be like unto whited sepulchres, which appear\nbeautiful outward, but are within full of bones of the dead and of all\nuncleanness.\n\nThe Republic cloaks its ambition with the pretence of a desire and duty\nto \"extend the area of freedom,\" and claims it as its \"manifest destiny\"\nto annex other Republics or the States or Provinces of others to itself,\nby open violence, or under obsolete, empty, and fraudulent titles. The\nEmpire founded by a successful soldier, claims its ancient or natural\nboundaries, and makes necessity and its safety the plea for open\nrobbery. The great Merchant Nation, gaining foothold in the Orient,\nfinds a continual necessity for extending its dominion by arms, and\nsubjugates India. The great Royalties and Despotisms, without a plea,\npartition among themselves a Kingdom, dismember Poland, and prepare to\nwrangle over the dominions of the Crescent. To maintain the balance of\npower is a plea for the obliteration of States. Carthage, Genoa, and\nVenice, commercial Cities only, must acquire territory by force or\nfraud, and become States. Alexander marches to the Indus; Tamerlane\nseeks universal empire; the Saracens conquer Spain and threaten Vienna.\n\nThe thirst for power is never satisfied. It is insatiable. Neither men\nnor nations ever have power enough. When Rome was the mistress of the\nworld, the Emperors caused themselves to be worshipped as gods. The\nChurch of Rome claimed despotism over the soul, and over the whole life\nfrom the cradle to the grave. It gave and sold absolutions for past and\nfuture sins. It claimed to be infallible in matters of faith. It\ndecimated Europe to purge it of heretics. It decimated America to\nconvert the Mexicans and Peruvians. It gave and took away thrones; and\nby excommunication and interdict closed the gates of Paradise against\nNations. Spain, haughty with its dominion over the Indies, endeavored to\ncrush out Protestantism in the Netherlands, while Philip the Second\nmarried the Queen of England, and the pair sought to win that kingdom\nback to its allegiance to the Papal throne. Afterward Spain attempted to\nconquer it with her \"invincible\" Armada. Napoleon set his relatives and\ncaptains on thrones, and parcelled among them half of Europe. The Czar\nrules over an empire more gigantic than Rome. The history of all is or\nwill be the same,--acquisition, dismemberment, ruin. There is a judgment\nof God against all that is unjust.\n\nTo seek to subjugate the _will_ of others and take the _soul_ captive,\nbecause it is the exercise of the highest power, seems to be the highest\nobject of human ambition. It is at the bottom of all proselyting and\npropagandism, from that of Mesmer to that of the Church of Rome and the\nFrench Republic. That was the apostolate alike of Joshua and of Mahomet.\nMasonry alone preaches Toleration, the right of man to abide by his own\nfaith, the right of all States to govern themselves. It rebukes alike\nthe monarch who seeks to extend his dominions by conquest, the Church\nthat claims the right to repress heresy by fire and steel, and the\nconfederation of States that insist on maintaining a union by force and\nrestoring brotherhood by slaughter and subjugation.\n\nIt is natural, when we are wronged, to desire revenge; and to persuade\nourselves that we desire it less for our own satisfaction than to\nprevent a repetition of the wrong, to which the doer would be encouraged\nby immunity coupled with the profit of the wrong. To submit to be\ncheated is to encourage the cheater to continue; and we are quite apt to\nregard ourselves as God's chosen instruments to inflict His vengeance,\nand for Him and in His stead to discourage wrong by making it fruitless\nand its punishment sure. Revenge has been said to be \"a kind of wild\njustice;\" but it is always taken in anger, and therefore is unworthy of\na great soul, which ought not to suffer its equanimity to be disturbed\nby ingratitude or villainy. The injuries done us by the base are as much\nunworthy of our angry notice as those done us by the insects and the\nbeasts; and when we crush the adder, or slay the wolf or hyena, we\nshould do it without being moved to anger, and with no more feeling of\nrevenge than we have in rooting up a noxious weed.\n\nAnd if it be not in human nature not to take revenge by way of\npunishment, let the Mason truly consider that in doing so he is God's\nagent, and so let his revenge be measured by justice and tempered by\nmercy. The law of God is, that the consequences of wrong and cruelty and\ncrime shall be their punishment; and the injured and the wronged and the\nindignant are as much His instruments to enforce that law, as the\ndiseases and public detestation, and the verdict of history and the\nexecration of posterity are. No one will say that the Inquisitor who has\nracked and burned the innocent; the Spaniard who hewed Indian infants,\nliving, into pieces with his sword, and fed the mangled limbs to his\nbloodhounds; the military tyrant who has shot men without trial, the\nknave who has robbed or betrayed his State, the fraudulent banker or\nbankrupt who has beggared orphans, the public officer who has violated\nhis oath, the judge who has sold injustice, the legislator who has\nenabled Incapacity to work the ruin of the State, ought not to be\npunished. Let them be so; and let the injured or the sympathizing be the\ninstruments of God's just vengeance; but always out of a higher feeling\nthan mere personal revenge.\n\nRemember that every moral characteristic of man finds its prototype\namong creatures of lower intelligence; that the cruel foulness of the\nhyena, the savage rapacity of the wolf, the merciless rage of the tiger,\nthe crafty treachery of the panther, are found among mankind, and ought\nto excite no other emotion, when found in the man, than when found in\nthe beast. Why should the true man be angry with the geese that hiss,\nthe peacocks that strut, the asses that bray, and the apes that imitate\nand chatter, although they wear the human form? Always, also, it remains\ntrue, that it is more noble to forgive than to take revenge; and that,\nin general, we ought too much to despise those who wrong us, to feel the\nemotion of anger, or to desire revenge.\n\nAt the sphere of the _Sun_, you are in the region of LIGHT. The\nHebrew word for _gold_, ZAHAB, also means _Light_, of which the Sun is\nto the Earth the great source. So, in the great Oriental allegory of the\nHebrews, the River PISON compasses the land of _Gold_ or _Light_; and\nthe River GIHON the land of _Ethiopia_ or _Darkness_.\n\nWhat light _is_, we no more know than the ancients did. According to the\nmodern hypothesis, it is _not_ composed of luminous particles shot out\nfrom the sun with immense velocity; but that body only impresses, on the\nether which fills all space, a powerful vibratory movement that extends,\nin the form of luminous waves, beyond the most distant planets,\nsupplying them with light and heat. To the ancients, it was an\noutflowing from the Deity. To us, as to them, it is the apt symbol of\ntruth and knowledge. To us, also, the upward journey of the soul through\nthe Spheres is symbolical; but we are as little informed as they whence\nthe soul comes, where it has its origin, and whither it goes after\ndeath. They endeavored to have _some_ belief and faith, _some_ creed,\nupon those points. At the present day, men are satisfied to think\nnothing in regard to all that, and only to believe that the soul is a\n_something_ separate from the body and out-living it, but whether\nexisting before it, neither to inquire nor care. No one asks whether it\nemanates from the Deity, or is created out of nothing, or is generated\nlike the body, and the issue of the souls of the father and the mother.\nLet us not smile, therefore, at the ideas of the ancients, until we have\na better belief; but accept their symbols as meaning that the soul is of\na Divine nature, originating in a sphere nearer the Deity, and returning\nto that when freed from the enthrallment of the body; and that it can\nonly return there when purified of all the sordidness and sin which\nhave, as it were, become part of its substance, by its connection with\nthe body.\n\nIt is not strange that, thousands of years ago, men worshipped the Sun,\nand that to-day that worship continues among the Parsees. Originally\nthey looked beyond the orb to the invisible God, of whom the Sun's\nlight, seemingly identical with generation and life, was the\nmanifestation and outflowing. Long before the Chald\u00e6an shepherds watched\nit on their plains, it came up regularly, as it now does, in the\nmorning, like a god, and again sank, like a king retiring, in the west,\nto return again in due time in the same array of majesty. We worship\nImmutability. It was that steadfast, immutable character of the Sun that\nthe men of Baalbec worshipped. His light-giving and life-giving powers\nwere secondary attributes. The one grand idea that compelled worship was\nthe characteristic of God which they saw reflected in his light, and\nfancied they saw in its originality the changelessness of Deity. He had\nseen thrones crumble, earthquakes shake the world and hurl down\nmountains. Beyond Olympus, beyond the Pillars of Hercules, he had gone\ndaily to his abode, and had come daily again in the morning to behold\nthe temples they built to his worship. They personified him as BRAHMA,\nAMUN, OSIRIS, BEL, ADONIS, MALKARTH, MITHRAS, and APOLLO; and the\nnations that did so grew old and died. Moss grew on the capitals of the\ngreat columns of his temples, and he shone on the moss. Grain by grain\nthe dust of his temples crumbled and fell, and was borne off on the\nwind, and still he shone on crumbling column and architrave. The roof\nfell crashing on the pavement, and he shone in on the Holy of Holies\nwith unchanging rays. It was not strange that men worshipped the Sun.\n\nThere is a water-plant, on whose broad leaves the drops of water roll\nabout without uniting, like drops of mercury. So arguments on points of\nfaith, in politics or religion, roll over the surface of the mind. An\nargument that convinces one mind has no effect on another. Few\nintellects, or souls that are the negations of intellect have any\nlogical power or capacity. There is a singular obliquity in the human\nmind that makes the false logic more effective than the true with\nnine-tenths of those who are regarded as men of intellect. Even among\nthe judges, not one in ten can argue logically. Each mind sees the\ntruth, distorted through its own medium. Truth, to most men, is like\nmatter in the spheroidal state. Like a drop of cold water on the surface\nof a red-hot metal plate, it dances, trembles, and spins, and never\ncomes into contact with it; and the mind may be plunged into truth, as\nthe hand moistened with sulphurous acid may into melted metal, and be\nnot even warmed by the immersion.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe word _Khair\u016bm_ or _Kh\u016br\u016bm_ is a compound one. Gesenius\nrenders _Kh\u016br\u016bm_ by the word _noble_ or _free-born: Kh\u016br_\nmeaning _white, noble_. It also means the opening of a window, the\nsocket of the eye. _Khri_ also means _white_, or an _opening_; and\n_Khris_, the orb of the Sun, in _Job_ viii. 13 and x. 7. _Krishna_ is\nthe Hindu Sun-God. _Khur_, the Parsi word, is the literal name of the\nSun.\n\nFrom _Kur_ or _Khur_, the Sun, comes Khora, a name of Lower Egypt. The\nSun, Bryant says in his Mythology, was called _Kur_; and Plutarch says\nthat the Persians called the Sun _K\u016bros. Kurios, Lord_, in Greek,\nlike _Adona\u00ef, Lord_, in Ph\u0153nician and Hebrew, was applied to the Sun.\nMany places were sacred to the Sun, and called _Kura, Kuria, Kuropolis,\nKurene, Kureschata, Kuresta_, and _Corusia_ in Scythia.\n\nThe Egyptian Deity called by the Greeks \"_Horus_,\" was _Her-Ra_. or\n_Har-oeris, Hor_ or _Har_, the Sun. _Hari_ is a Hindu name of the Sun.\n_Ari-al, Ar-es, Ar, Aryaman, Areimonios_, the AR meaning _Fire_ or\n_Flame_, are of the same kindred. _Hermes_ or _Har-mes_, (_Aram, Remus,\nHaram, Harameias_), was Kadmos, the Divine Light or Wisdom. _Mar-kuri_,\nsays Movers, is _Mar_, the Sun.\n\nIn the Hebrew, AOOR, is Light, Fire, or the Sun. Cyrus, said Ctesias,\nwas so named from _Kuros_, the Sun. _Kuris_, Hesychius says, was Adonis.\nApollo, the Sun-god, was called _Kurraios_, from _Kurra_, a city in\nPhocis. The people of _Kurene_, originally Ethiopians or Cuthites,\nworshipped the Sun under the title of _Achoor_ and _Ach\u014dr_.\n\nWe know, through a precise testimony in the ancient annals of Ts\u016br,\nthat the principal festivity of _Mal-karth_, the incarnation of the Sun\nat the Winter Solstice, held at Ts\u016br, was called his _rebirth_ or his\n_awakening_, and that it was celebrated by means of a pyre, on which the\ngod was supposed to regain, through the aid of fire, a new life. This\nfestival was celebrated in the month _Peritius (Barith)_, the second day\nof which corresponded to the 25th of December. KHUR-UM, King of Tyre,\n_Movers_ says, first performed this ceremony. These facts we learn from\n_Josephus, Servius_ on the \u00c6neid, and the _Dionysiacs_ of _Nonnus_; and\nthrough a coincidence that cannot be fortuitous, the same day was at\nRome the _Dies Natalis Solis Invicti_, the festal day of the invincible\nSun. Under this title, HERCULES, HAR-_acles_, was worshipped at Ts\u016br.\nThus, while the temple was being erected, the death and resurrection of\na Sun-God was annually represented at Ts\u016br, by Solomon's ally, at the\nwinter solstice, by the pyre of MAL-KARTH, the Ts\u016brian Haracles.\n\nAROERIS or HAR-_oeris_, the elder HORUS, is from the same old root that\nin the Hebrew has the form _A\u016br_, or, with the definite article\nprefixed, _Ha\u016br_, Light, or _the_ Light, splendor, flame, the Sun and\nhis rays. The hieroglyphic of the younger HORUS was the point in a\ncircle; of the Elder, a pair of eyes; and the festival of the thirtieth\nday of the month _Epiphi_, when the sun and moon were supposed to be in\nthe same right line with the earth, was called \"_The birth-day of the\neyes of Horus_.\"\n\nIn a papyrus published by Champollion, this god is styled \"_Har-oeri_,\nLord of the Solar Spirits, the beneficent eye of the Sun.\" Plutarch\ncalls him \"_Har-pocrates_;\" but there is no trace of the latter part of\nthe name in the hieroglyphic legends. He is the son of OSIRIS and ISIS;\nand is represented sitting on a throne supported by _lions_; the same\nword, in Egyptian, meaning _Lion_ and _Sun_. So Solomon made a great\nthrone of ivory, plated with gold, with six steps, at each arm of which\nwas a lion, and one on each side to each step, making seven on each\nside.\n\nAgain, the Hebrew word [Hebrew], _Khi_, means \"_living;_\" and [Hebrew]\n_r\u00e2m, \"was, or shall be, raised or lifted up_.\" The latter is the same\nas [Hebrew], [Hebrew], [Hebrew], r\u014dm, ar\u014dm, har\u016bm, whence\n_Aram_, for Syria, or _Aram\u00e6a, High_-land. _Khair\u016bm_, therefore,\nwould mean \"_was raised up to life, or living_.\"\n\nSo, in Arabic, _hrm_, an unused root, meant, _\"was high,\" \"made great,\"\n\"exalted_;\" and _H\u00eerm_ means an _ox_, the symbol of the Sun in Taurus,\nat the Vernal Equinox.\n\nKHURUM, therefore, improperly called _Hiram_, is KHUR-OM, the same as\n_Her-ra_, _Her-mes_, and _Her-acles_, the \"_Heracles Tyrius Invictus_,\"\nthe personification of Light and the Son, the Mediator, Redeemer, and\nSaviour. From the Egyptian word _Ra_ came the Coptic _O\u016bro_, and the\nHebrew _A\u016br_, Light. _Har-oeri_, is _Hor_ or _Har_, the chief or\n_master_. _Hor_ is also heat; and _hora_, season or hour; and hence in\nseveral African dialects, as names of the Sun, _Airo, Ayero, eer, uiro,\nghurrah_, and the like. The royal name rendered _Pharaoh_, was PHRA,\nthat is, _Pai-ra_, the Sun.\n\nThe legend of the contest between _Hor-ra_ and _Set_, or _Set-nu-bi_,\nthe same as _Bar_ or _Bal_, is older than that of the strife between\n_Osiris_ and _Typhon_; as old, at least, as the nineteenth dynasty. It\nis called in the Book of the Dead, \"The day of the battle between Horus\nand Set.\" The later myth connects itself with Phoenicia and Syria. The\nbody of OSIRIS went ashore at _Gebal_ or _Byblos_, sixty miles above\nTs\u016br. You will not fail to notice that in the name of each murderer of\nKh\u016br\u016bm, that of the Evil God Bal is found.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nHar-oeri was the god of TIME, as well as of Life. The Egyptian legend\nwas that the King of Byblos cut down the tamarisk-tree containing the\nbody of OSIRIS, and made of it a column for his palace. Isis, employed\nin the palace, obtained possession of the column, took the body out of\nit, and carried it away. Apuleius describes her as \"a beautiful female,\nover whose divine neck her long thick hair hung in graceful ringlets;\"\nand in the procession female attendants, with ivory combs, seemed to\ndress and ornament the royal hair of the goddess. The palm-tree, and the\nlamp in the shape of a boat, appeared in the procession. If the symbol\nwe are speaking of is not a mere modern invention, it is to these things\nit alludes.\n\n[Illustration: Hieroglyph]\n\nThe identity of the legends is also confirmed by this hieroglyphic\npicture, copied from an ancient Egyptian monument, which may also\nenlighten you as to the Lion's grip and the Master's gavel.\n\n[Hebrew: \u05d0\u05d1], in the ancient Phoenician character, [Symbols], and in the\nSamaritan, [Symbols], A B, (the two letters representing the numbers 1,\n2, or Unity and Duality, means _Father_, and is a primitive noun, common\nto all the Semitic languages.)\n\nIt also means an Ancestor, Originator, Inventor, Head, Chief or Ruler,\nManager, Overseer, Master, Priest, Prophet.\n\n[Hebrew: \u05d0\u05d1\u05d9] simply Father, when it is in construction, that is, when\nit precedes another word, and in English the preposition \"of\" is\ninterposed, as [Hebrew: \u05d0\u05d1\u05d9-\u05d0\u05dc], Abi-Al, the Father of Al.\n\nAlso, the final Y\u014dd means \"my\"; so that [Hebrew: \u05d0\u05d1\u05d9] by itself means\n\"My father.\" [Hebrew: \u05d3\u05d5\u05d9\u05d3 \u05d0\u05d1\u05d9], David my father, 2 _Chron._ ii. 3.\n\n[Hebrew: \u05d5], (Vav) final is the possessive pronoun \"his\"; and [Hebrew:\n\u05d0\u05d1\u05d9\u05d5], _Abiu_ (which we read \"Abif\") means \"of my father's.\" Its full\nmeaning, as connected with the name of Kh\u016br\u016bm, no doubt is, \"formerly\none of my father's servants,\" or \"slaves.\"\n\nThe name of the Phoenician artificer is, in Samuel and Kings, [Hebrew:\n\u05d4\u05d9\u05e8\u05dd] and [Hebrew: \u05d4\u05d9\u05e8\u05d5\u05dd]--[_2 Sam._ v. 11; 1 _Kings_ v. 15; 1 _Kings_\nvii. 40]. In Chronicles it is [Hebrew: \u05d4\u05d5\u05e8\u05dd], with the addition of\n[Hebrew: \u05d0\u05d1\u05d9] [_2 Chron._ ii. 12]; and of [Hebrew: \u05d0\u05d1\u05d9\u05d5]. [_2 Chron._\niv. 16].\n\nIt is merely absurd to add the word \"_Abif_\" or \"_Abiff_,\" as part of\nthe name of the artificer. And it is almost as absurd to add the word\n\"_Abi_,\" which was a _title_ and not part of the name. Joseph says\n[_Gen._ xlv. 8], \"God has constituted me _'Ab l'Paraah_, as Father to\nParaah, _i.e._, Vizier or Prime Minister.\" So Haman was called the\nSecond Father of Artaxerxes; and when King Kh\u016br\u016bm used the phrase\n\"Kh\u016br\u016bm Abi,\" he meant that the artificer he sent Schlomoh was the\nprincipal or chief workman in his line at Ts\u016br.\n\nA medal copied by Montfaucon exhibits a female nursing a child, with\nears of wheat in her hand, and the legend (Iao). She is seated on\nclouds, a star at her head, and three ears of wheat rising from an altar\nbefore her.\n\nHORUS was the _mediator_, who was buried three days, was regenerated,\nand triumphed over the evil principle.\n\nThe word HERI, in Sanscrit, means _Shepherd_, as well as _Saviour_.\nCRISHNA is called _Heri_, as JESUS called Himself the _Good Shepherd_.\n\n[Hebrew: \u05d4\u05d5\u05e8], _Kh\u016br_, means an aperture of a window, a cave, or the\neye. Also it means white. In Syriac, [Symbols].\n\n[Hebrew: \u05d4\u05e8] also means an opening, and noble, free-born, high-born.\n[Hebrew: \u05d4\u05e8\u05dd], KHURM means consecrated, devoted; in \u00c6thiopic [Symbols]\nIt is the name of a city, [_Josh_. xix. 38]; and of a man, [_Ezr_. ii.\n32, x. 31; _Neh_. iii. 11].\n\n[Hebrew: \u05d4\u05d9\u05d4\u05d4], _Khirah_, means nobility, a noble race.\n\nBuddha is declared to comprehend in his own person the essence of the\nHindu Trimurti; and hence the tri-literal monosyllable _Om_ or _Aum_ is\napplied to him as being essentially the same as Brahma-Vishnu-Siva. He\nis the same as Hermes, Thoth, Taut, and Teutates. One of his names is\nHeri-maya or Her-maya, which are evidently the same name as Hermes and\nKhirm or Kh\u016brm. Heri, in Sanscrit, means _Lord_.\n\nA learned Brother places over the two symbolic pillars, from right to\nleft, the two words [Symbols] and [Symbols] [Hebrew: \u05d9\u05d4\u05d5] and [Hebrew:\n\u05d1\u05e2\u05dc], IHU and BAL: followed by the hieroglyphic equivalent,\n[Hieroglyphic: ] of the Sun-God, Amun-ra. Is it an accidental\ncoincidence, that in the name of each murderer are the two names of the\nGood and Evil Deities of the Hebrews; for _Yu-bel_ is but _Yehu-Bal_ or\n_Yeho-Bal?_ and that the three final syllables of the names, _a, o, um_,\nmake A.U.M. the sacred word of the Hindoos, meaning the Triune-God,\nLife-giving, Life-preserving, Life-destroying: represented by the mystic\ncharacter [Mystic Character: Y].\n\nThe genuine _Acacia_, also, is the thorny tamarisk, the same tree which\ngrew up around the body of Osiris. It was a sacred tree among the Arabs,\nwho made of it the idol Al-Uzza, which Mohammed destroyed. It is\nabundant as a bush in the Desert of Thur: and of it the \"crown of\nthorns\" was composed, which was set on the forehead of Jesus of\nNazareth. It is a fit type of immortality on account of its tenacity of\nlife; for it has been known, when planted as a door-post, to take root\nagain and shoot out budding boughs over the threshold.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nEvery commonwealth must have its periods of trial and transition,\nespecially if it engages in war. It is certain at some time to be wholly\ngoverned by agitators appealing to all the baser elements of the popular\nnature; by moneyed corporations; by those enriched by the depreciation\nof government securities or paper; by small attorneys, schemers,\nmoney-jobbers, speculators and adventurers--an ignoble oligarchy,\nenriched by the distresses of the State, and fattened on the miseries of\nthe people. Then all the deceitful visions of equality and the rights of\nman end; and the wronged and plundered State can regain a real liberty\nonly by passing through \"great varieties of untried being,\" purified in\nits transmigration by fire and blood.\n\nIn a Republic, it soon comes to pass that parties gather round the\nnegative and positive poles of some opinion or notion, and that the\nintolerant spirit of a triumphant majority will allow no deviation from\nthe standard of orthodoxy which it has set up for itself. Freedom of\nopinion will be professed and pretended to, but every one will exercise\nit at the peril of being banished from political communion with those\nwho hold the reins and prescribe the policy to be pursued. Slavishness\nto party and obsequiousness to the popular whims go hand in hand.\nPolitical independence only occurs in a fossil state; and men's opinions\ngrow out of the acts they have been constrained to do or sanction.\nFlattery, either of individual or people, corrupts both the receiver and\nthe giver; and adulation is not of more service to the people than to\nkings. A C\u00e6sar, securely seated in power, cares less for it than a free\ndemocracy; nor will his appetite for it grow to exorbitance, as that of\na people will, until it becomes insatiate. The effect of liberty to\nindividuals is, that they may do what they please; to a people, it is to\na great extent the same. If accessible to flattery, as this is always\ninterested, and resorted to on low and base motives, and for evil\npurposes, either individual or people is sure, in doing what it pleases,\nto do what in honor and conscience should have been left undone. One\nought not even to risk congratulations, which may soon be turned into\ncomplaints; and as both individuals and peoples are prone to make a bad\nuse of power, to flatter them, which is a sure way to mislead them, well\ndeserves to be called a crime.\n\nThe first principle in a Republic ought to be, \"that no man or set of\nmen is entitled to exclusive or separate emoluments or privileges from\nthe community, but in consideration of public services; which not being\ndescendible, neither ought the offices of magistrate, legislature, nor\njudge, to be hereditary.\" It is a volume of Truth and Wisdom, a lesson\nfor the study of nations, embodied in a single sentence, and expressed\nin language which every man can understand. If a deluge of despotism\nwere to overthrow the world, and destroy all institutions under which\nfreedom is protected, so that they should no longer be remembered among\nmen, this sentence, preserved, would be sufficient to rekindle the\nfires of liberty and revive the race of free men.\n\nBut, to _preserve_ liberty, another must be added: \"that a free State\ndoes not confer office as a reward, especially for questionable\nservices, unless she seeks her own ruin; but all officers are _employed_\nby her, in consideration solely of their will and ability to render\nservice in the future; and therefore that the best and most competent\nare always to be preferred.\"\n\nFor, if there is to be any other rule, that of hereditary succession is\nperhaps as good as any. By no other rule is it possible to preserve the\nliberties of the State. By no other to intrust the power of making the\nlaws to those only who have that keen instinctive sense of injustice and\nwrong which enables them to detect baseness and corruption in their most\nsecret hiding-places, and that moral courage and generous manliness and\ngallant independence that make them fearless in dragging out the\nperpetrators to the light of day, and calling down upon them the scorn\nand indignation of the world. The flatterers of the people are never\nsuch men. On the contrary, a time always comes to a Republic, when it is\nnot content, like Tiberius, with a single Sejanus, but must have a host;\nand when those most prominent in the lead of affairs are men without\nreputation, statesmanship, ability, or information, the mere hacks of\nparty, owing their places to trickery and _want_ of qualification, with\nnone of the qualities of head or heart that make great and wise men,\nand, at the same time, filled with all the narrow conceptions and bitter\nintolerance of political bigotry. These die; and the world is none the\nwiser for what they have said and done. Their names sink in the\nbottomless pit of oblivion; but their acts of folly or knavery curse the\nbody politic and at last prove its ruin.\n\nPoliticians, in a free State, are generally hollow, heartless, and\nselfish. Their own aggrandisement is the end of their patriotism; and\nthey always look with secret satisfaction on the disappointment or fall\nof one whose loftier genius and superior talents overshadow their own\nself-importance, or whose integrity and incorruptible honor are in the\nway of their selfish ends. The influence of the small aspirants is\nalways against the great man. _His_ accession to power may be almost for\na lifetime. One of themselves will be more easily displaced, and each\nhopes to succeed him; and so it at length comes to pass that men\nimpudently aspire to and actually win the highest stations, who are\nunfit for the lowest clerkships; and incapacity and mediocrity become\nthe surest passports to office.\n\nThe consequence is, that those who feel themselves competent and\nqualified to serve the people, refuse with disgust to enter into the\nstruggle for office, where the wicked and jesuitical doctrine that all\nis fair in politics is an excuse for every species of low villainy; and\nthose who seek even the highest places of the State do not rely upon the\npower of a magnanimous spirit, on the sympathizing impulses of a great\nsoul, to stir and move the people to generous, noble, and heroic\nresolves, and to wise and manly action; but, like spaniels erect on\ntheir hind legs, with fore-paws obsequiously suppliant, fawn, flatter,\nand actually beg for votes. Rather than descend to this, they stand\ncontemptuously aloof, disdainfully refusing to court the people, and\nacting on the maxim, that \"mankind has no title to demand that we shall\nserve them in spite of themselves.\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nIt is lamentable to see a country split into factions, each following\nthis or that great or brazen-fronted leader with a blind, unreasoning,\nunquestioning hero-worship; it is contemptible to see it divided into\nparties, whose sole end is the spoils of victory, and their chiefs the\nlow, the base, the venal and the small. Such a country is in the last\nstages of decay, and near its end, no matter how prosperous it may seem\nto be. It wrangles over the volcano and the earthquake. But it is\ncertain that no government can be conducted by the men of the people,\nand for the people, without a rigid adherence to those principles which\nour reason commends as fixed and sound. These must be the tests of\nparties, men, and measures. Once determined, they must be inexorable in\ntheir application, and all must either come up to the standard or\ndeclare against it. Men may betray: principles never can. Oppression is\none invariable consequence of misplaced confidence in treacherous man,\nit is never the result of the working or application of a sound, just,\nwell-tried principle. Compromises which bring fundamental principles\ninto doubt, in order to unite in one party men of antagonistic creeds,\nare frauds, and end in ruin, the just and natural consequence of fraud.\nWhenever you have settled upon your theory and creed, sanction no\ndeparture from it in practice, on any ground of expediency. It is the\nMaster's word. Yield it up neither to flattery nor force! Let no defeat\nor persecution rob you of it! Believe that he who once blundered in\nstatesmanship will blunder again; that such blunders are as fatal as\ncrimes; and that political near-sightedness does not improve by age.\nThere are always more impostors than seers among public men, more false\nprophets than true ones, more prophets of Baal than of Jehovah; and\nJerusalem is always in danger from the Assyrians.\n\nSallust said that after a State has been corrupted by luxury and\nidleness, it may by its mere greatness bear up under the burden of its\nvices. But even while he wrote, Rome, of which he spoke, had played out\nher masquerade of freedom. Other causes than luxury and sloth destroy\nRepublics. If small, their larger neighbors extinguish them by\nabsorption. If of great extent, the cohesive force is too feeble to hold\nthem together, and they fall to pieces by their own weight. The paltry\nambition of small men disintegrates them. The want of wisdom in their\ncouncils creates exasperating issues. Usurpation of power plays its\npart, incapacity seconds corruption, the storm rises, and the fragments\nof the incoherent raft strew the sandy shores, reading to mankind\nanother lesson for it to disregard.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe Forty-seventh Proposition is older than Pythagoras. It is this: \"In\nevery right-angled triangle, the sum of the squares of the base and\nperpendicular is equal to the square of the hypothenuse.\"\n\nThe square of a number is the product of that number, multiplied by\nitself. Thus, 4 is the square of 2, and 9 of 3.\n\nThe first ten numbers are: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10;\ntheir squares are          1, 4, 9,16,25,36,49,64,81,100;\nand                           3, 5, 7, 9,11,13,15,17, 19\nare the differences between each square and that which precedes\nit; giving us the sacred numbers, 3, 5, 7, and 9.\n\nOf these numbers, the square of 3 and 4, added together, gives the\nsquare of 5; and those of 6 and 8, the square of 10; and if a\nright-angled triangle be formed, the base measuring 3 or 6 parts, and\nthe perpendicular 4 or 8 parts, the hypothenuse will be 5 or 10 parts;\nand if a square is erected on each side, these squares being subdivided\ninto squares each side of which is one part in length, there will be as\nmany of these in the square erected on the hypothenuse as in the other\ntwo squares together.\n\nNow the Egyptians arranged their deities in _Triads_; the FATHER or the\nSpirit or Active Principle or _Generative Power_; the MOTHER, or Matter,\nor the Passive Principle, or the _Conceptive_ Power; and the SON,\n_Issue_ or _Product_, the Universe, proceeding from the two principles.\nThese were OSIRIS, ISIS, and HORUS. In the same way, PLATO gives us\n_Thought_ the _Father_; Primitive _Matter_ the _Mother_; and _Kosmos_\nthe _World_, the _Son_, the Universe animated by a soul. Triads of the\nsame kind are found in the Kabalah.\n\nPLUTARCH says, in his book _De Iside et Osiride_, \"But the better and\ndiviner nature consists of three,--that which exists within the\nIntellect only, and Matter, and that which proceeds from these, which\nthe Greeks call Kosmos; of which three, Plato is wont to call the\nIntelligible, the 'Idea, Exemplar, and Father'; Matter, 'the Mother, the\nNurse, and the place and receptacle of generation'; and the issue of\nthese two, 'the Offspring and Genesis,'\" the KOSMOS, \"a word signifying\nequally _Beauty_ and _Order_, or the Universe itself.\" You will not fail\nto notice that Beauty is symbolized by the Junior Warden in the South.\nPlutarch continues to say that the Egyptians compared the universal\nnature to what they called the most beautiful and perfect triangle, as\nPlato does, in that nuptial diagram, as it is termed, which he has\nintroduced into his Commonwealth. Then he adds that this triangle is\nright-angled, and its sides respectively as 3, 4, and 5; and he says,\n\"We must suppose that the perpendicular is designed by them to\nrepresent the masculine nature, the base the feminine, and that the\nhypothenuse is to be looked upon as the offspring of both; and\naccordingly the first of them will aptly enough represent OSIRIS, or the\nprime cause; the second, ISIS, or the receptive capacity; the last,\nHORUS, or the common effect of the other two. For 3 is the first number\nwhich is composed of even and odd; and 4 is a square whose side is equal\nto the even number 2; but 5, being generated, as it were, out of the\npreceding numbers, 2 and 3, may be said to have an equal relation to\nboth of them, as to its common parents.\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\nThe _clasped hands_ is another symbol which was used by PYTHAGORAS. It\nrepresented the number 10, the sacred number in which all the preceding\nnumbers were contained; the number expressed by the mysterious\nTETRACTYS, a figure borrowed by him and the Hebrew priests alike from\nthe Egyptian sacred science, and which ought to be replaced among the\nsymbols of the Master's Degree, where it of right belongs. The Hebrews\nformed it thus, with the letters of the Divine name:\n\n[Illustration]\n\nThe _Tetractys_ thus leads you, not only to the study of the Pythagorean\nphilosophy as to numbers, but also to the Kabalah, and will aid you in\ndiscovering the True Word, and understanding what was meant by \"The\nMusic of the Spheres.\" Modern science strikingly confirms the ideas of\nPythagoras in regard to the properties of numbers, and that they govern\nin the Universe. Long before his time, nature had extracted her\ncube-roots and her squares.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nAll the FORCES at man's disposal or under man's control, or subject to\nman's influence, are his _working tools_. The friendship and sympathy\nthat knit heart to heart are a force like the attraction of cohesion,\nby which the sandy particles became the solid rock. If this law of\nattraction or cohesion were taken away, the material worlds and suns\nwould dissolve in an instant into thin invisible vapor. If the ties of\nfriendship, affection, and love were annulled, mankind would become a\nraging multitude of wild and savage beasts of prey. The sand hardens\ninto rock under the immense superincumbent pressure of the ocean, aided\nsometimes by the irresistible energy of fire; and when the pressure of\ncalamity and danger is upon an order or a country, the members or the\ncitizens ought to be the more closely united by the cohesion of sympathy\nand inter-dependence.\n\nMorality is a force. It is the magnetic attraction of the heart toward\nTruth and Virtue. The needle, imbued with this mystic property, and\npointing unerringly to the north, carries the mariner safely over the\ntrackless ocean, through storm and darkness, until his glad eyes behold\nthe beneficent beacons that welcome him to safe and hospitable harbor.\nThen the hearts of those who love him are gladdened, and his home made\nhappy; and this gladness and happiness are due to the silent,\nunostentatious, unerring monitor that was the sailor's guide over the\nweltering waters. But if drifted too far northward, he finds the needle\nno longer true, but pointing elsewhere than to the north, what a feeling\nof helplessness falls upon the dismayed mariner, what utter loss of\nenergy and courage! It is as if the great axioms of morality were to\nfail and be no longer true, leaving the human soul to drift helplessly,\neyeless like Prometheus, at the mercy of the uncertain, faithless\ncurrents of the deep.\n\nHonor and Duty are the pole-stars of a Mason, the Dioscuri, by never\nlosing sight of which he may avoid disastrous shipwreck. These Palinurus\nwatched, until, overcome by sleep, and the vessel no longer guided\ntruly, he fell into and was swallowed up by the insatiable sea. So the\nMason who loses sight of these, and is no longer governed by their\nbeneficent and potential force, is lost, and sinking out of sight, will\ndisappear unhonored and unwept.\n\nThe force of electricity, analogous to that of sympathy, and by means of\nwhich great thoughts or base suggestions, the utterances of noble or\nignoble natures, flash instantaneously over the nerves of nations; the\nforce of growth, fit type of immortality, lying dormant three thousand\nyears in the wheat-grains buried with their mummies by the old\nEgyptians; the forces of expansion and contraction, developed in the\nearthquake and the tornado, and giving birth to the wonderful\nachievements of steam, have their parallelisms in the moral world, in\nindividuals, and nations. Growth is a necessity for nations as for men.\nIts cessation is the beginning of decay. In the nation as well as the\nplant it is mysterious, and it is irresistible. The earthquakes that\nrend nations asunder, overturn thrones, and engulf monarchies and\nrepublics, have been long prepared for, like the volcanic eruption.\nRevolutions have long roots in the past. The force exerted is in direct\nproportion to the previous restraint and compression. The true statesman\nought to see in progress the causes that are in due time to produce\nthem; and he who does not is but a blind leader of the blind.\n\nThe great changes in nations, like the geological changes of the earth,\nare slowly and continuously wrought. The waters, falling from Heaven as\nrain and dews, slowly disintegrate the granite mountains; abrade the\nplains, leaving hills and ridges of denudation as their monuments; scoop\nout the valleys, fill up the seas, narrow the rivers, and after the\nlapse of thousands on thousands of silent centuries, prepare the great\nalluvia for the growth of that plant, the snowy envelope of whose seeds\nis to employ the looms of the world, and the abundance or penury of\nwhose crops shall determine whether the weavers and spinners of other\nrealms shall have work to do or starve.\n\nSo Public Opinion is an immense force; and its currents are as\ninconstant and incomprehensible as those of the atmosphere.\nNevertheless, in free governments, it is omnipotent; and the business of\nthe statesman is to find the means to shape, control, and direct it.\nAccording as that is done, it is beneficial and conservative, or\ndestructive and ruinous. The Public Opinion of the civilized world is\nInternational Law; and it is so great a force, though with no certain\nand fixed boundaries, that it can even constrain the victorious despot\nto be generous, and aid an oppressed people in its struggle for\nindependence.\n\nHabit is a great force; it is second nature, even in trees. It is as\nstrong in nations as in men. So also are Prejudices, which are given to\nmen and nations as the passions are,--as forces, valuable, if properly\nand skillfully availed of; destructive, if unskillfully handled.\n\nAbove all, the Love of Country, State Pride, the Love of Home, forces of\nimmense power. Encourage them all. Insist upon them in your public men.\nPermanency of home is necessary to patriotism. A migratory race will\nhave little love of country. State pride is a mere theory and chimera,\nwhere men remove from State to State with indifference, like the Arabs,\nwho camp here to-day and there to-morrow.\n\nIf you have Eloquence, it is a mighty force. See that you use it for\ngood purposes--to teach, exhort, ennoble the people, and not to mislead\nand corrupt them. Corrupt and venal orators are the assassins of the\npublic liberties and of public morals.\n\nThe Will is a force; its limits as yet unknown. It is in the power of\nthe will that we chiefly see the spiritual and divine in man. There is a\nseeming identity between his will that moves other men, and the Creative\nWill whose action seems so incomprehensible. It is the men of _will_ and\n_action_, not the men of pure intellect, that govern the world.\n\nFinally, the three greatest moral forces are FAITH, which is the only\ntrue WISDOM, and the very foundation of all government; HOPE, which is\nSTRENGTH, and insures success; and CHARITY, which is BEAUTY, and alone\nmakes animated, united effort possible. These forces are within the\nreach of all men; and an association of men, actuated by them, ought to\nexercise an immense power in the world. If Masonry does not, it is\nbecause she has ceased to possess them.\n\nWisdom in the man or statesman, in king or priest, largely consists in\nthe due appreciation of these forces; and upon the general\n_non_-appreciation of some of them the fate of nations often depends.\nWhat hecatombs of lives often hang upon the not weighing or not\nsufficiently weighing the force of an idea, such as, for example, the\nreverence for a flag, or the blind attachment to a form or constitution\nof government!\n\nWhat errors in political economy and statesmanship are committed in\nconsequence of the over-estimation or under-estimation of particular\nvalues, or the non-estimation of some among them! Everything, it is\nasserted, is the product of human labor; but the gold or the diamond\nwhich one accidentally finds without labor is not so. What is the value\nof the labor bestowed by the husbandman upon his crops, compared with\nthe value of the sunshine and rain, without which his labor avails\nnothing? Commerce carried on by the labor of man, adds to the value of\nthe products of the field, the mine, or the workshop, by their\ntransportation to different markets; but how much of this increase is\ndue to the rivers down which these products float, to the winds that\nurge the keels of commerce over the ocean!\n\nWho can estimate the value of morality and manliness in a State, of\nmoral worth and intellectual knowledge? These are the sunshine and rain\nof the State. The winds, with their changeable, fickle, fluctuating\ncurrents, are apt emblems of the fickle humors of the populace, its\npassions, its heroic impulses, its enthusiasms. Woe to the statesman who\ndoes not estimate these as values!\n\nEven music and song are sometimes found to have an incalculable value.\nEvery nation has some song of a proven value, more easily counted in\nlives than dollars. The Marseillaise was worth to revolutionary France,\nwho shall say how many thousand men?\n\nPeace also is a great element of prosperity and wealth; a value not to\nbe calculated. Social intercourse and association of men in beneficent\nOrders have a value not to be estimated in coin. The illustrious\nexamples of the Past of a nation, the memories and immortal thoughts of\nher great and wise thinkers, statesmen, and heroes, are the invaluable\nlegacy of that Past to the Present and Future. And all these have not\nonly the values of the loftier and more excellent and priceless kind,\nbut also an actual _money_-value, since it is only when co-operating\nwith or aided or enabled by these, that human labor creates wealth. They\nare of the chief elements of material wealth, as they are of national\nmanliness, heroism, glory, prosperity, and immortal renown.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nProvidence has appointed the three great disciplines of _War_, the\n_Monarchy_ and the _Priesthood_, all that the CAMP, the PALACE, and the\nTEMPLE may symbolize, to train the multitudes forward to intelligent and\npremeditated combinations for all the great purposes of society. The\nresult will at length be free governments among men, when virtue and\nintelligence become qualities of the multitudes; but for ignorance such\ngovernments are impossible. Man advances only by degrees. The removal of\none pressing calamity gives courage to attempt the removal of the\nremaining evils, rendering men more sensitive to them, or perhaps\nsensitive for the first time. Serfs that writhe under the whip are not\ndisquieted about their political rights; manumitted from personal\nslavery, they become sensitive to political oppression. Liberated from\narbitrary power, and governed by the law alone, they begin to scrutinize\nthe law itself, and desire to be governed, not only by law, but by what\nthey deem the best law. And when the civil or temporal despotism has\nbeen set aside, and the municipal law has been moulded on the principles\nof an enlightened jurisprudence, they may wake to the discovery that\nthey are living under some priestly or ecclesiastical despotism, and\nbecome desirous of working a reformation there also.\n\nIt is quite true that the advance of humanity is slow, and that it often\npauses and retrogrades. In the kingdoms of the earth we do not see\ndespotisms retiring and yielding the ground to self-governing\ncommunities. We do not see the churches and priesthoods of Christendom\nrelinquishing their old task of governing men by imaginary terrors.\nNowhere do we see a populace that could be safely manumitted from such a\ngovernment. We do not see the great religious teachers aiming to\ndiscover truth for themselves and for others; but still ruling the\nworld, and contented and compelled to rule the world, by whatever dogma\nis already accredited; themselves as much bound down by this necessity\nto govern, as the populace by their need of government. Poverty in all\nits most hideous forms still exists in the great cities; and the cancer\nof pauperism has its roots in the hearts of kingdoms. Men there take no\nmeasure of their wants and their own power to supply them, but live and\nmultiply like the beasts of the field,--Providence having apparently\nceased to care for them. Intelligence never visits these, or it makes\nits appearance as some new development of villainy. War has not ceased;\nstill there are battles and sieges. Homes are still unhappy, and tears\nand anger and spite make hells where there should be heavens. So much\nthe more necessity for Masonry! So much wider the field of its labors!\nSo much the more need for it to begin to be true to itself, to revive\nfrom its asphyxia, to repent of its apostasy to its true creed!\n\nUndoubtedly, labor and death and the sexual passion are essential and\npermanent conditions of human existence, and render perfection and a\nmillennium on earth impossible. Always,--it is the decree of Fate!--the\nvast majority of men must toil to live, and cannot find time to\ncultivate the intelligence. Man, knowing he is to die, will not\nsacrifice the present enjoyment for a greater one in the future. The\nlove of woman cannot die out; and it has a terrible and uncontrollable\nfate, increased by the refinements of civilization. Woman is the\nveritable syren or goddess of the young. But society can be improved;\nand free government is possible for States; and freedom of thought and\nconscience is no longer _wholly_ utopian. Already we see that Emperors\nprefer to be elected by universal suffrage; that States are conveyed to\nEmpires by vote; and that Empires are administered with something of the\nspirit of a Republic, being little else than democracies with a single\nhead, ruling through one man, one representative, instead of an assembly\nof representatives. And if Priesthoods still govern, they now come\nbefore the laity to prove, by stress of argument, that they _ought_ to\ngovern. They are obliged to evoke the very reason which they are bent on\nsupplanting.\n\nAccordingly, men become daily more free, because the freedom of the man\nlies in his reason. He can reflect upon his own future conduct, and\nsummon up its consequences; he can take wide views of human life, and\nlay down rules for constant guidance. Thus he is relieved of the tyranny\nof sense and passion, and enabled at any time to live according to the\nwhole light of the knowledge that is within him, instead of being\ndriven, like a dry leaf on the wings of the wind, by every present\nimpulse. Herein lies the freedom of the man as regarded in connection\nwith the necessity imposed by the omnipotence and fore-knowledge of God.\nSo much light, so much liberty. When emperor and church appeal to reason\nthere is naturally universal suffrage.\n\nTherefore no one need lose courage, nor believe that labor in the cause\nof Progress will be labor wasted. There is no waste in nature, either of\nMatter, Force, Act, or Thought. A Thought is as much the end of life as\nan Action; and a single Thought sometimes works greater results than a\nRevolution, even Revolutions themselves. Still there should not be\ndivorce between Thought and Action. The true Thought is that in which\nlife culminates. But all wise and true Thought produces Action. It is\ngenerative, like the light; and light and the deep shadow of the passing\ncloud are the gifts of the prophets of the race. Knowledge, laboriously\nacquired, and inducing habits of sound Thought,--the reflective\ncharacter,--must necessarily be rare. The multitude of laborers cannot\nacquire it. Most men attain to a very low standard of it. It is\nincompatible with the ordinary and indispensable avocations of life. A\nwhole world of error as well as of labor, go to make one reflective\nman. In the most advanced nation of Europe there are more ignorant than\nwise, more poor than rich, more automatic laborers, the mere creatures\nof habit, than reasoning and reflective men. The proportion is at least\na thousand to one. Unanimity of opinion is so obtained. It only exists\namong the multitude who do not think, and the political or spiritual\npriesthood who think for that multitude, who think how to guide and\ngovern them. When men begin to reflect, they begin to differ. The great\nproblem is to find guides who will not seek to be tyrants. This is\nneeded even more in respect to the heart than the head. Now, every man\nearns his special share of the produce of human labor, by an incessant\nscramble, by trickery and deceit. Useful knowledge, honorably acquired,\nis too often used after a fashion not honest or reasonable, so that the\nstudies of youth are far more noble than the practices of manhood. The\nlabor of the farmer in his fields, the generous returns of the earth,\nthe benignant and favoring skies, tend to make him earnest, provident,\nand grateful; the education of the market-place makes him querulous,\ncrafty, envious, and an intolerable niggard.\n\nMasonry seeks to be this beneficent, unambitious, disinterested guide;\nand it is the very condition of all great structures that the sound of\nthe hammer and the clink of the trowel should be always heard in some\npart of the building. With faith in man, hope for the future of\nhumanity, loving-kindness for our fellows, Masonry and the Mason must\nalways work and teach. Let each do that for which he is best fitted. The\nteacher also is a workman. Praiseworthy as the active navigator is, who\ncomes and goes and makes one clime partake of the treasures of the\nother, and one to share the treasures of all, he who keeps the\nbeacon-light upon the hill is also at his post.\n\nMasonry has already helped cast down some idols from their pedestals,\nand grind to impalpable dust some of the links of the chains that held\nmen's souls in bondage. That there has been progress needs no other\ndemonstration than that you may now reason with men, and urge upon them,\nwithout danger of the rack or stake, that no doctrines can be\napprehended as truths if they contradict each other, or contradict other\ntruths given us by God. Long before the Reformation, a monk, who had\nfound his way to heresy without the help of Martin Luther, not venturing\nto breathe aloud into any living ear his anti-papal and treasonable\ndoctrines, wrote them on parchment, and sealing up the perilous record,\nhid it in the massive walls of his monastery. There was no friend or\nbrother to whom he could intrust his secret or pour forth his soul. It\nwas some consolation to imagine that in a future age some one might find\nthe parchment, and the seed be found not to have been sown in vain. What\nif the truth should have to lie dormant as long before germinating as\nthe wheat in the Egyptian mummy? Speak it, nevertheless, again and\nagain, and let it take its chance!\n\nThe rose of Jericho grows in the sandy deserts of Arabia and on the\nSyrian housetops. Scarcely six inches high, it loses its leaves after\nthe flowering season, and dries up into the form of a ball. Then it is\nuprooted by the winds, and carried, blown, or tossed across the desert,\ninto the sea. There, feeling the contact of the water, it unfolds\nitself, expands its branches, and expels its seeds from their\nseed-vessels. These, when saturated with water, are carried by the tide\nand laid on the sea-shore. Many are lost, as many individual lives of\nmen are useless. But many are thrown back again from the sea-shore into\nthe desert, where, by the virtue of the sea-water that they have\nimbibed, the roots and leaves sprout and they grow into fruitful plants,\nwhich will, in their turns, like their ancestors, be whirled into the\nsea. God will not be less careful to provide for the germination of the\ntruths you may boldly utter forth. \"_Cast_,\" He has said, \"_thy bread\nupon the waters, and after many days it shall return to thee again_.\"\n\nInitiation does not change: we find it again and again, and always the\nsame, through all the ages. The last disciples of Pascalis Martinez are\nstill the children of Orpheus; but they adore the realizer of the\nantique philosophy, the Incarnate Word of the Christians.\n\nPythagoras, the great divulger of the philosophy of numbers, visited all\nthe sanctuaries of the world. He went into Judaea, where he procured\nhimself to be circumcised, that he might be admitted to the secrets of\nthe Kabalah, which the prophets Ezekiel and Daniel, not without some\nreservations, communicated to him. Then, not without some difficulty, he\nsucceeded in being admitted to the Egyptian initiation, upon the\nrecommendation of King Amasis. The power of his genius supplied the\ndeficiencies of the imperfect communications of the Hierophants, and he\nhimself became a Master and a Revealer.\n\nPythagoras defined God: a Living and Absolute Verity clothed with\nLight.\n\nHe said that the Word was Number manifested by Form.\n\nHe made all descend from the _Tetractys_, that is to say, from the\nQuaternary.\n\nGod, he said again, is the Supreme Music, the nature of which is\nHarmony.\n\nPythagoras gave the magistrates of Crotona this great religious,\npolitical and social precept:\n\n\"There is no evil that is not preferable to Anarchy.\"\n\nPythagoras said, \"Even as there are three divine notions and three\nintelligible regions, so there is a triple word, for the Hierarchical\nOrder always manifests itself by threes. There are the word simple, the\nword hieroglyphical, and the word symbolic: in other terms, there are\nthe word that expresses, the word that conceals, and the word that\nsignifies; the whole hieratic intelligence is in the perfect knowledge\nof these three degrees.\"\n\nPythagoras enveloped doctrine with symbols, but carefully eschewed\npersonifications and images, which, he thought, sooner or later produced\nidolatry.\n\nThe Holy Kabalah, or tradition of the children of Seth, was carried from\nChald\u00e6a by Abraham, taught to the Egyptian priesthood by Joseph,\nrecovered and purified by Moses, concealed under symbols in the Bible,\nrevealed by the Saviour to Saint John, and contained, entire, under\nhieratic figures analogous to those of all antiquity, in the Apocalypse\nof that Apostle.\n\nThe Kabalists consider God as the Intelligent, Animated, Living\nInfinite. He is not, for them, either the aggregate of existences, or\nexistence in the abstract, or a being philosophically definable. He is\n_in_ all, _distinct_ from all, and _greater_ than all. His name even is\nineffable; and yet this name only expresses the human ideal of His\ndivinity. What God is in Himself, it is not given to man to comprehend.\n\nGod is the absolute of Faith; but the absolute of _Reason_ is BEING,\n[Hebrew]. \"_I am that I am_,\" is a wretched translation.\n\nBeing, Existence, is by itself, and because it Is. The reason of Being,\nis Being itself. We may inquire, \"Why does something exist?\" that is,\n\"Why does such or such a thing exist?\" But we cannot, without being\nabsurd, ask, \"Why Is Being?\" That would be to suppose Being before\nBeing. If Being had a cause, that cause would necessarily Be; that is,\nthe cause and effect would be identical.\n\nReason and science demonstrate to us that the modes of Existence and\nBeing balance each other in equilibrium according to harmonious and\nhierarchic laws. But a hierarchy is synthetized, in ascending, and\nbecomes ever more and more monarchial. Yet the reason cannot pause at a\nsingle chief, without being alarmed at the abysses which it seems to\nleave above this Supreme Monarch. Therefore it is silent, and gives\nplace to the Faith it adores.\n\nWhat is certain, even for science and the reason, is, that the idea of\nGod is the grandest, the most holy, and the most useful of all the\naspirations of man; that upon this belief morality reposes, with its\neternal sanction. This belief, then, is in humanity, the most real of\nthe phenomena of being; and if it were false, nature would affirm the\nabsurd; nothingness would give form to life, and God would at the same\ntime be and not be.\n\nIt is to this philosophic and incontestable reality, which is termed The\nIdea of God, that the Kabalists give a name. In this name all others are\ncontained. Its cyphers contain all the numbers; and the hieroglyphics of\nits letters express all the laws and all the things of nature.\n\nBEING is BEING: the reason of Being is in Being: in the Beginning is the\nWord, and the Word in logic formulated Speech, the spoken Reason; the\nWord is in God, and is God Himself, manifested to the Intelligence. Here\nis what is above all the philosophies. This we must believe, under the\npenalty of never truly knowing anything, and relapsing into the absurd\nskepticism of Pyrrho. The Priesthood, custodian of Faith, wholly rests\nupon this basis of knowledge, and it is in its teachings we must\nrecognize the Divine Principle of the Eternal Word.\n\nLight is not Spirit, as the Indian Hierophants believed it to be; but\nonly the instrument of the Spirit. It is not the body of the\nProtoplastes, as the Theurgists of the school of Alexandria taught, but\nthe first physical manifestation of the Divine afflatus. God eternally\ncreates it, and man, in the image of God, modifies and seems to multiply\nit.\n\nThe high magic is styled \"The Sacerdotal Art,\" and \"The Royal Art.\" In\nEgypt, Greece, and Rome, it could not but share the greatnesses and\ndecadences of the Priesthood and of Royalty. Every philosophy hostile to\nthe national worship and to its mysteries, was of necessity hostile to\nthe great political powers, which lose their grandeur, if they cease, in\nthe eyes of the multitudes, to be the images of the Divine Power. Every\nCrown is shattered, when it clashes against the Tiara.\n\nPlato, writing to Dionysius the Younger, in regard to the nature of the\nFirst Principle, says: \"I must write to you in enigmas, so that if my\nletter be intercepted by land or sea, he who shall read it may in no\ndegree comprehend it.\" And then he says, \"All things surround their\nKing; they are, on account of Him, and He alone is the cause of good\nthings, Second for the Seconds and Third for the Thirds.\"\n\nThere is in these few words a complete summary of the Theology of the\nSephiroth. \"The _King_\" is AINSOPH, Being Supreme and Absolute. From\nthis centre, _which_ is _everywhere_, all things ray forth; but we\nespecially conceive of it in three manners and in three different\nspheres. In the _Divine_ world (AZILUTH), which is that of the First\nCause, and wherein the whole Eternity of Things in the beginning existed\nas Unity, to be afterward, during Eternity uttered forth, clothed with\nform, and the attributes that constitute them matter, the First\nPrinciple is Single and First, and yet not the VERY Illimitable Deity,\nincomprehensible, undefinable; but Himself in so far as manifested by\nthe Creative Thought. To compare littleness with infinity,--Arkwright,\nas inventor of the spinning-jenny, and not the _man_ Arkwright\n_otherwise_ and _beyond that_. All we can know of the Very God is,\ncompared to His Wholeness, only as an infinitesimal fraction of a unit,\ncompared with an infinity of Units.\n\nIn the World of Creation, which is that of Second Causes [the Kabalistic\nWorld BRIAH], the Autocracy of the First Principle is complete, but we\nconceive of it only as the Cause of the Second Causes. Here it is\nmanifested by the Binary, and is the Creative Principle passive.\nFinally: in the third world, YEZIRAH, or of Formation, it is revealed in\nthe perfect Form, the Form of Forms, the World, the Supreme Beauty and\nExcellence, the Created Perfection. Thus the Principle is at once the\nFirst, the Second, and the Third, since it is All in All, the Centre and\nCause of all. It is not _the genius of Plato_ that we here admire. We\nrecognize only _the exact knowledge of the Initiate_.\n\nThe great Apostle Saint John did not borrow from the philosophy of Plato\nthe opening of his Gospel. Plato, on the contrary, drank at the same\nsprings with Saint John and Philo; and John in the opening verses of his\nparaphrase, states the first principles of a dogma common to many\nschools, but in language especially belonging to Philo, whom it is\nevident he had read. The philosophy of Plato, the greatest of human\nRevealers, could _yearn toward_ the Word made man; the Gospel alone\ncould give him to the world.\n\nDoubt, in presence of Being and its harmonies; skepticism, in the face\nof the eternal mathematics and the immutable laws of Life which make the\nDivinity present and visible everywhere, as the Human is known and\nvisible by its utterances of word and act,--is this not the most foolish\nof superstitions, and the most inexcusable as well as the most dangerous\nof all credulities? Thought, we know, is not a result or consequence of\nthe organization of matter, of the chemical or other action or reaction\nof its particles, like effervescence and gaseous explosions. On the\ncontrary, the fact that Thought is manifested and realized in act human\nor act divine, proves the existence of an Entity, or Unity, that thinks.\nAnd the Universe is the Infinite Utterance of one of an infinite number\nof Infinite Thoughts, which cannot but emanate from an Infinite and\nThinking Source. The cause is always equal, at least, to the effect; and\nmatter cannot think, nor could it cause itself, or exist without cause,\nnor could nothing _produce_ either forces or things; for in void\nnothingness no Forces can inhere. Admit a self-existent Force, and its\nIntelligence, or an Intelligent cause of it is admitted, and at once GOD\nIs.\n\nThe Hebrew allegory of the Fall of Man, which is but a special variation\nof a universal legend, symbolizes one of the grandest and most universal\nallegories of science.\n\nMoral Evil is Falsehood in actions; as Falsehood is Crime in words.\n\nInjustice is the essence of Falsehood; and every false word is an\ninjustice.\n\nInjustice is the death of the Moral Being, as Falsehood is the poison of\nthe Intelligence.\n\nThe perception of the Light is the dawn of the Eternal Life, in Being.\nThe Word of God, which creates the Light, seems to be uttered by every\nIntelligence that can take cognizance of Forms and will look. \"Let the\nLight BE! The Light\", in fact, exists, in its condition of splendor, for\nthose eyes alone that gaze at it; and the Soul, amorous of the spectacle\nof the beauties of the Universe, and applying its attention to that\nluminous writing of the Infinite Book which is called \"The Visible,\"\nseems to utter, as God did on the dawn of the first day, that sublime\nand creative word, \"BE! LIGHT!\"\n\nIt is not beyond the tomb, but in life itself, that we are to seek for\nthe mysteries of death. Salvation or reprobation begins here below and\nthe terrestrial world too has its Heaven and its Hell. Always, even here\nbelow, virtue is rewarded; always, even here below vice is punished; and\nthat which makes us sometimes believe in the impunity of evil-doers is\nthat riches, those instruments of good and of evil, seem sometimes to be\ngiven them at hazard. But woe to unjust men, when they possess the key\nof gold! It opens, for _them_, only the gate of the tomb and of Hell.\n\nAll the true Initiates have recognized the usefulness of toil and\nsorrow. \"Sorrow,\" says a German poet, \"is the dog of that unknown\nshepherd who guides the flock of men.\" To learn to suffer, to learn to\ndie, is the discipline of Eternity, the immortal Novitiate.\n\nThe allegorical picture of Cebes, in which the Divine Comedy of Dante\nwas sketched in Plato's time, the description whereof has been preserved\nfor us, and which many painters of the middle age have reproduced by\nthis description, is a monument at once philosophical and magical. It is\na most complete moral synthesis, and at the same time the most audacious\ndemonstration ever given of the Grand Arcanum, of that secret whose\nrevelation would overturn Earth and Heaven. Let no one expect us to give\nthem its explanation! He who passes behind the veil that hides this\nmystery, understands that it is in its very nature inexplicable, and\nthat it is death to those who win it by surprise, as well as to him who\nreveals it.\n\nThis secret is the Royalty of the Sages, the Crown of the Initiate whom\nwe see redescend victorious from the summit of Trials, in the fine\nallegory of Cebes. The Grand Arcanum makes him master of gold and the\nlight, which are at bottom the same thing, he has solved the problem of\nthe quadrature of the circle, he directs the perpetual movement, and he\npossesses the philosophical stone. Here the Adepts will understand us.\nThere is neither interruption in the toil of nature, nor gap in her\nwork. The Harmonies of Heaven correspond to those of Earth, and the\nEternal Life accomplishes its evolutions in accordance with the same\nlaws as the life of a dog. \"God has arranged all things by weight,\nnumber, and measure,\" says the Bible; and this luminous doctrine was\nalso that of Plato.\n\nHumanity has never really had but one religion and one worship. This\nuniversal light has had its uncertain mirages, its deceitful\nreflections, and its shadows; but always, after the nights of Error, we\nsee it reappear, one and pure like the Sun.\n\nThe magnificences of worship are the life of religion, and if Christ\nwishes poor ministers, His Sovereign Divinity does not wish paltry\naltars. Some Protestants have not comprehended that worship is a\nteaching, and that we must not create in the imagination of the\nmultitude a mean or miserable God. Those oratories that resemble\npoorly-furnished offices or inns, and those worthy ministers clad like\nnotaries or lawyer's clerks, do they not necessarily cause religion to\nbe regarded as a mere puritanic formality, and God as a Justice of the\nPeace?\n\nWe scoff at the Augurs. It is so easy to scoff, and so difficult well to\ncomprehend. Did the Deity leave the whole world without Light for two\nscore centuries, to illuminate only a little corner of Palestine and a\nbrutal, ignorant, and ungrateful people? Why always calumniate God and\nthe Sanctuary? Were there never any others than rogues among the\npriests? Could no honest and sincere men be found among the Hierophants\nof Ceres or Diana, of Dionusos or Apollo, of Hermes or Mithras? Were\nthese, then, all deceived, like the rest? Who, then, constantly deceived\nthem, without betraying themselves, during a series of centuries?--for\nthe cheats are not immortal! Arago said, that outside of the pure\nmathematics, he who utters the word \"impossible,\" is wanting in prudence\nand good sense.\n\nThe true name of Satan, the Kabalists say, is that of Yahveh reversed;\nfor Satan is not a black god, but the negation of God. The Devil is the\npersonification of Atheism or Idolatry.\n\nFor the Initiates, this is not a _Person_, but a _Force_, created for\ngood, but which _may_ serve for evil. _It is the instrument of Liberty\nor Free Will_. They represent this Force, which presides over the\nphysical generation, under the mythologic and horned form of the God\nPAN; thence came the he-goat of the Sabbat, brother of the Ancient\nSerpent, and the Light-bearer or _Phosphor_, of which the poets have\nmade the false Lucifer of the legend.\n\nGold, to the eyes of the Initiates, is Light condensed. They style the\nsacred numbers of the Kabalah \"golden numbers,\" and the moral teachings\nof Pythagoras his \"golden verses.\" For the same reason, a mysterious\nbook of Apuleius, in which an ass figures largely, was called \"The\nGolden Ass.\"\n\nThe Pagans accused the Christians of worshipping an ass, and they did\nnot invent this reproach, but it came from the Samaritan Jews, who,\nfiguring the data of the Kabalah in regard to the Divinity by Egyptian\nsymbols, also represented the Intelligence by the figure of the Magical\nStar adored under the name of _Remphan_, Science under the emblem of\nAnubis, whose name they changed to _Nibbas_, and the vulgar faith or\ncredulity under the figure of _Thartac_, a god represented with a book,\na cloak, and the head of an ass. According to the Samaritan Doctors,\nChristianity was the reign of _Thartac_, blind Faith and vulgar\ncredulity erected into a universal oracle, and preferred to Intelligence\nand Science.\n\nSynesius, Bishop of Ptolema\u00efs, a great Kabalist, but of doubtful\northodoxy, wrote:\n\n\"The people will always mock at things easy to be misunderstood; it must\nneeds have impostures.\"\n\n\"A Spirit,\" he said, \"that loves wisdom and contemplates the Truth close\nat hand, is forced to disguise it, to induce the multitudes to accept\nit.... Fictions are necessary to the people, and the Truth becomes\ndeadly to those who are not strong enough to contemplate it in all its\nbrilliance. If the sacerdotal laws allowed the reservation of judgments\nand the allegory of words, I would accept the proposed dignity on\ncondition that I might be a philosopher at home, and abroad a narrator\nof apologues and parables.... In fact, what can there be in common\nbetween the vile multitude and sublime wisdom? The truth must be kept\nsecret, and the masses need a teaching proportioned to their imperfect\nreason.\"\n\nMoral disorders produce physical ugliness, and in some sort realize\nthose frightful faces which tradition assigns to the demons.\n\nThe first Druids were the true children of the Magi, and their\ninitiation came from Egypt and Chald\u00e6a, that is to say, from the pure\nsources of the primitive Kabalah. They adored the Trinity under the\nnames of _Isis_ or _Hesus_, the Supreme Harmony; of _Belen_ or\n_Bel_ which in Assyrian means Lord, a name corresponding to that of\nADONA\u00cf; and of _Camul_ or _Cama\u00ebl_, a name that in the Kabalah\npersonifies the Divine Justice. Below this triangle of Light they\nsupposed a divine reflection, also composed of three personified rays:\nfirst, _Teutates_ or _Teuth_, the same as the _Thoth_ of the Egyptians,\nthe Word, or the Intelligence formulated; then Force and Beauty, whose\nnames varied like their emblems. Finally, they completed the sacred\nSeptenary by a mysterious image that represented the progress of the\ndogma and its future realizations. This was a young girl veiled, holding\na child in her arms; and they dedicated this image to \"The Virgin who\nwill become a mother;--_Virgini paritur\u0153_.\"\n\nHertha or Wertha, the young Isis of Gaul, Queen of Heaven, the Virgin\nwho was to bear a child, held the spindle of the Fates, filled with wool\nhalf white and half black; because she presides over all forms and all\nsymbols, and weaves the garment of the Ideas.\n\nOne of the most mysterious pantacles of the Kabalah, contained in the\nEnchiridion of Leo III., represents an equilateral triangle reversed,\ninscribed in a double circle. On the triangle are written, in such\nmanner as to form the prophetic Tau, the two Hebrew words so often found\nappended to the Ineffable Name, [Hebrew: \u05d0\u05dc\u05d4\u05de] and [Hebrew: \u05e6\u05d1\u05d0\u05d5\u05d4],\nALOHAYIM, or the Powers, and TSABAOTH, or the starry Armies and their\nguiding spirits; words also which symbolize the Equilibrium of the\nForces of Nature and the Harmony of Numbers. To the three sides of the\ntriangle belong the three great Names [Hebrew: \u05d0\u05e8\u05e0\u05d9,\u05d9\u05d4\u05d5\u05d4], and [Hebrew:\n\u05d0\u05e0\u05dc\u05d0], IAHAVEH, ADONA\u00cf, and AGLA. Above the first is written in Latin,\n_Formatio_, above, the second _Reformatio_, and above the third,\n_Transformatio_. So Creation is ascribed to the FATHER, Redemption or\nReformation to the SON, and Sanctification or Transformation to the HOLY\nSPIRIT, answering unto the mathematical laws of Action, Reaction, and\nEquilibrium. IAHAVEH is also, in effect, the Genesis or Formation of\ndogma, by the elementary signification of the four letters of the Sacred\nTetragram; ADONA\u00cf is the realization of this dogma in the Human Form, in\nthe Visible LORD, who is the Son of God or the perfect Man; and AGLA\n(formed of the initials of the four words _Ath Gebur Laula\u00efm Adona\u00ef_)\nexpresses the synthesis of the whole dogma and the totality of the\nKabalistic science, clearly indicating by the hieroglyphics of which\nthis admirable name is formed the Triple Secret of the Great Work.\n\nMasonry, like all the Religions, all the Mysteries, Hermeticism and\nAlchemy, _conceals_ its secrets from all except the Adepts and Sages, or\nthe Elect, and uses false explanations and misinterpretations of its\nsymbols to mislead those who deserve only to be misled; to conceal the\nTruth, which it calls Light, from them, and to draw them away from it.\nTruth is not for those who are unworthy or unable to receive it, or\nwould pervert it. So God Himself incapacitates many men, by\ncolor-blindness, to distinguish colors, and leads the masses away from\nthe highest Truth, giving them the power to attain only so much of it as\nit is profitable to them to know. Every age has had a religion suited to\nits capacity.\n\nThe Teachers, even of Christianity, are, in general, the most ignorant\nof the true meaning of that which they teach. There is no book of which\nso little is known as the Bible. To most who read it, it is as\nincomprehensible as the Sohar.\n\nSo Masonry jealously conceals its secrets, and intentionally leads\nconceited interpreters astray. There is no sight under the sun more\npitiful and ludicrous at once, than the spectacle of the Prestons and\nthe Webbs, not to mention the later incarnations of Dullness and\nCommonplace, undertaking to \"explain\" the old symbols of Masonry, and\nadding to and \"improving\" them, or inventing new ones.\n\nTo the Circle inclosing the central point, and itself traced between two\nparallel lines, a figure purely Kabalistic, these persons have added the\nsuperimposed Bible, and even reared on that the ladder with three or\nnine rounds, and then given a vapid interpretation of the whole, so\nprofoundly absurd as actually to excite admiration.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nIV.\n\nSECRET MASTER.\n\n\nMasonry is a succession of allegories, the mere vehicles of great\nlessons in morality and philosophy. You will more fully appreciate its\nspirit, its object, its purposes, as you advance in the different\nDegrees, which you will find to constitute a great, complete, and\nharmonious system.\n\nIf you have been disappointed in the first three Degrees, _as you have\nreceived them_, and if it has seemed to you that the performance has not\ncome up to the promise, that the lessons of morality are not new, and\nthe scientific instruction is but rudimentary, and the symbols are\nimperfectly explained, remember that the ceremonies and lessons of those\nDegrees have been for ages more and more accommodating themselves, by\ncurtailment and sinking into commonplace, to the often limited memory\nand capacity of the Master and Instructor, and to the intellect and\nneeds of the Pupil and Initiate; that they have come to us from an age\nwhen symbols were used, not to _reveal_ but to _conceal_; when the\ncommonest learning was confined to a select few, and the simplest\nprinciples of morality seemed newly discovered truths; and that these\nantique and simple Degrees now stand like the broken columns of a\nroofless Druidic temple, in their rude and mutilated greatness; in many\nparts, also, corrupted by time, and disfigured by modern additions and\nabsurd interpretations. They are but the entrance to the great Masonic\nTemple, the triple columns of the portico.\n\nYou have taken the first step over its threshold, the first step toward\nthe inner sanctuary and heart of the temple. You are in the path that\nleads up the slope of the mountain of Truth; and it depends upon your\nsecrecy, obedience, and fidelity, whether you will advance or remain\nstationary.\n\nImagine not that you will become indeed a Mason by learning what is\ncommonly called the \"work,\" or even by becoming familiar with our\ntraditions. Masonry has a history, a literature, a philosophy. Its\nallegories and traditions will teach you much; but much is to be sought\nelsewhere. The streams of learning that now flow full and broad must be\nfollowed to their heads in the springs that well up in the remote past,\nand you will there find the origin and meaning of Masonry.\n\nA few rudimentary lessons in architecture, a few universally admitted\nmaxims of morality, a few unimportant traditions, whose real meaning is\nunknown or misunderstood, will no longer satisfy the earnest inquirer\nafter Masonic truth. Let whoso is content with these, seek to climb no\nhigher. He who desires to understand the harmonious and beautiful\nproportions of Freemasonry must read, study, reflect, digest, and\ndiscriminate. The true Mason is an ardent seeker after knowledge; and he\nknows that both books and the antique symbols of Masonry are vessels\nwhich come down to us full-freighted with the intellectual riches of the\nPast; and that in the lading of these argosies is much that sheds light\non the history of Masonry, and proves its claim to be acknowledged the\nbenefactor of mankind, born in the very cradle of the race.\n\nKnowledge is the most genuine and real of human treasures; for it is\nLight, as Ignorance is Darkness. It is the _development_ of the human\nsoul, and its acquisition the _growth_ of the soul, which at the birth\nof man knows nothing, and therefore, in one sense, may be said to _be_\nnothing. It is the seed, which has in it the _power_ to grow, to\nacquire, and by acquiring to be developed, as the seed is developed into\nthe shoot, the plant, the tree. \"We need not pause at the common\nargument that by learning man excelleth man, in that wherein man\nexcelleth beasts; that by learning man ascendeth to the heavens and\ntheir motions, where in body he cannot come, and the like. Let us rather\nregard the dignity and excellency of knowledge and learning in that\nwhereunto man's nature doth most aspire, which is immortality or\ncontinuance. For to this tendeth generation, and raising of Houses and\nFamilies; to this buildings, foundations, and monuments; to this tendeth\nthe desire of memory, fame, and celebration, and in effect the strength\nof all other human desires.\" That our influences shall survive us, and\nbe living forces when we are in our graves; and not merely that our\nnames shall be remembered; but rather that our works shall be read, our\nacts spoken of, our names recollected and mentioned when we are dead, as\nevidences that those influences live and rule, sway and control some\nportion of mankind and of the world,--this is the aspiration of the\nhuman soul. \"We see then how far the monuments of genius and learning\nare more durable than monuments of power or of the hands. For have not\nthe verses of Homer continued twenty-five hundred years or more, without\nthe loss of a syllable or letter, during which time infinite palaces,\ntemples, castles, cities, have decayed and been demolished? It is not\npossible to have the true pictures or statues of Cyrus, Alexander,\nCaesar, no, nor of the Kings or great personages of much later years;\nfor the originals cannot last, and the copies cannot but lose of the\nlife and truth. But the images of men's genius and knowledge remain in\nbooks, exempted from the wrong of time, and capable of perpetual\nrenovation. Neither are they fitly to be called images, because they\ngenerate still, and cast their seeds in the minds of others, provoking\nand causing infinite actions and opinions in succeeding ages; so that if\nthe invention of the ship was thought so noble, which carrieth riches\nand commodities from place to place, and consociateth the most remote\nregions in participation of their fruits, how much more are letters to\nbe magnified, which, as ships, pass through the vast seas of time, and\nmake ages so distant to participate of the wisdom, illumination, and\ninventions, the one of the other.\"\n\nTo learn, to attain knowledge, to be wise, is a necessity for every\ntruly noble soul; to teach, to communicate that knowledge, to share that\nwisdom with others, and not churlishly to lock up his exchequer, and\nplace a sentinel at the door to drive away the needy, is equally an\nimpulse of a noble nature, and the worthiest work of man.\n\n\"There was a little city,\" says the Preacher, the son of David, \"and few\nmen within it; and there came a great King against it and besieged it,\nand built great bulwarks against it. Now there was found, in it a poor\nwise man, and he by his wisdom delivered the city; yet no man remembered\nthat same poor man. Then, said I, wisdom is better than strength:\nnevertheless, the poor man's wisdom is despised, and his words are not\nheard.\" If it should chance to you, my brother, to do mankind good\nservice, and be rewarded with indifference and forgetfulness only,\nstill be not discouraged, but remember the further advice of the wise\nKing. \"In the morning sow the seed, and in the evening withhold not thy\nhand; for thou knowest not which shall prosper, this or that, or whether\nboth shall be alike good.\" Sow you the seed, whoever reaps. Learn, that\nyou may be enabled to do good and do so because it is right, finding in\nthe act itself ample reward and recompense.\n\nTo attain the truth, and to serve our fellows, our country, and\nmankind--this is the noblest destiny of man. Hereafter and all your life\nit is to be your object. If you desire to ascend to that destiny,\nadvance! If you have other and less noble objects, and are contented\nwith a lower flight, halt here! let others scale the heights, and\nMasonry fulfill her mission.\n\nIf you will advance, gird up your loins for the struggle! for the way is\nlong and toilsome. Pleasure, all smiles, will beckon you on the one\nhand, and Indolence will invite you to sleep among the flowers, upon the\nother. Prepare, by secrecy, obedience, and fidelity, to resist the\nallurements of both!\n\nSecrecy is indispensable in a Mason of whatever Degree. It is the first\nand almost the only lesson taught to the Entered Apprentice. The\nobligations which we have each assumed toward every Mason that lives,\nrequiring of us the performance of the most serious and onerous duties\ntoward those personally unknown to us until they demand our aid,--duties\nthat must be performed, even at the risk of life, or our solemn oaths be\nbroken and violated, and we be branded as false Masons and faithless\nmen, teach us how profound a folly it would be to betray our secrets to\nthose who, bound to us by no tie of common obligation, might, by\nobtaining them, call on us in their extremity, when the urgency of the\noccasion should allow us no time for inquiry, and the peremptory mandate\nof our obligation compel us to do a brother's duty to a base impostor.\n\nThe secrets of our brother, when communicated to us, must be sacred, if\nthey be such as the law of our country warrants us to keep. We are\nrequired to keep none other, when the law that we are called on to obey\nis indeed a law, by having emanated from the only source of power, the\nPeople. Edicts which emanate from the mere arbitrary will of a despotic\npower, contrary to the law of God or the Great Law of Nature,\ndestructive of the inherent rights of man, violative of the right of\nfree thought, free speech, free conscience, it is lawful to rebel\nagainst and strive to abrogate.\n\nFor obedience to the Law does not mean submission to tyranny; nor that,\nby a profligate sacrifice of every noble feeling, we should offer to\ndespotism the homage of adulation. As every new victim falls, we _may_\nlift our voice in still louder flattery. We _may_ fall at the proud\nfeet, we _may_ beg, as a boon, the honor of kissing that bloody hand\nwhich has been lifted against the helpless. We may do more: we may bring\nthe altar and the sacrifice, and implore the God not to ascend too soon\nto Heaven. This we may do, for this we have the sad remembrance that\nbeings of a human form and soul have done. But this is all we can do. We\ncan constrain our tongues to be false, our features to bend themselves\nto the semblance of that passionate adoration which we wish to express,\nour knees to fall prostrate; but our heart we cannot constrain. There\nvirtue must still have a voice which is not to be drowned by hymns and\nacclamations; there the crimes which we laud as virtues, are crimes\nstill, and he whom we have made a God is the most contemptible of\nmankind; if, indeed, we do not feel, perhaps, that we are ourselves\nstill more contemptible.\n\nBut that law which is the fair expression of the will and judgment of\nthe people, is the enactment of the whole and of every individual.\nConsistent with the law of God and the great law of nature, consistent\nwith pure and abstract right as tempered by necessity and the general\ninterest, as contra-distinguished from the private interest of\nindividuals, it is obligatory upon all, because it is the work of all,\nthe will of all, the solemn judgment of all, from which there is no\nappeal.\n\nIn this Degree, my brother, you are especially to learn the duty of\nobedience to that law. There is one true and original law, conformable\nto reason and to nature, diffused over all, invariable, eternal, which\ncalls to the fulfillment of duty, and to abstinence from injustice, and\ncalls with that irresistible voice which is felt in all its authority\nwherever it is heard. This law cannot be abrogated or diminished, or its\nsanctions affected, by any law of man. A whole senate, a whole people,\ncannot dissent from its paramount obligation. It requires no commentator\nto render it distinctly intelligible: nor is it one thing at Rome,\nanother at Athens; one thing now, and another in the ages to come; but\nin all times and in all nations, it is, and has been, and will be, one\nand everlasting;--one as that God, its great Author and Promulgator,\nwho is the Common Sovereign of all mankind, is Himself One. No man can\ndisobey it without flying, as it were, from his own bosom, and\nrepudiating his nature; and in this very act he will inflict on himself\nthe severest of retributions, even though he escape what is regarded as\npunishment.\n\nIt is our duty to obey the laws of our country, and to be careful that\nprejudice or passion, fancy or affection, error and illusion, be not\nmistaken for conscience. Nothing is more usual than to pretend\nconscience in all the actions of man which are public and cannot be\nconcealed. The disobedient refuse to submit to the laws, and they also\nin many cases pretend conscience; and so disobedience and rebellion\nbecome conscience, in which there is neither knowledge nor revelation,\nnor truth nor charity, nor reason nor religion. Conscience is tied to\nlaws. Right or sure conscience is right reason reduced to practice, and\nconducting moral actions, while perverse conscience is seated in the\nfancy or affections--a heap of irregular principles and irregular\ndefects--and is the same in conscience as deformity is in the body, or\npeevishness in the affections. It is not enough that the conscience be\ntaught by nature; but it must be taught by God, conducted by reason,\nmade operative by discourse, assisted by choice, instructed by laws and\nsober principles; and then it _is_ right, and it _may_ be sure. All the\ngeneral measures of justice, are the laws of God, and therefore they\nconstitute the general rules of government for the conscience; but\nnecessity also hath a large voice in the arrangement of human affairs,\nand the disposal of human relations, and the dispositions of human laws;\nand these general measures, like a great river into little streams, are\ndeduced into little rivulets and particularities, by the laws and\ncustoms, by the sentences and agreements of men, and by the absolute\ndespotism of necessity, that will not allow perfect and abstract justice\nand equity to be the sole rule of civil government in an imperfect\nworld; and that must needs be law which is for the greatest good of the\ngreatest number.\n\nWhen thou vowest a vow unto God, defer not to pay it. It is better thou\nshouldest not vow than thou shouldest vow and not pay. Be not rash with\nthy mouth, and let not thine heart be hasty to utter anything before\nGod: for God is in Heaven, and thou art upon earth; therefore let thy\nwords be few. Weigh well what it is you promise; but once the promise\nand pledge are given remember that he who is false to his obligation\nwill be false to his family, his friends, his country, and his God.\n\n_Fides servanda est_: Faith plighted is ever to be kept, was a maxim and\nan axiom even among pagans. The virtuous Roman said, either let not that\nwhich seems expedient be base, or if it _be_ base, let it not seem\nexpedient. What is there which that so-called expediency can bring, so\nvaluable as that which it takes away, if it deprives you of the name of\na good man and robs you of your integrity and honor? In all ages, he who\nviolates his plighted word has been held unspeakably base. The word of a\nMason, like the word of a knight in the times of chivalry, once given\nmust be sacred; and the judgment of his brothers, upon him who violates\nhis pledge, should be stern as the judgments of the Roman Censors\nagainst him who violated his oath. Good faith is revered among Masons as\nit was among the Romans, who placed its statue in the capitol, next to\nthat of Jupiter Maximus Optimus; and we, like them, hold that calamity\nshould always be chosen rather than baseness; and with the knights of\nold, that one should always die rather than be dishonored.\n\nBe faithful, therefore, to the promises you make, to the pledges you\ngive, and to the vows that you assume, since to break either is base and\ndishonorable.\n\nBe faithful to your family, and perform all the duties of a good father,\na good son, a good husband, and a good brother.\n\nBe faithful to your friends; for true friendship is of a nature not only\nto survive through all the vicissitudes of life, but to continue through\nan endless duration; not only to stand the shock of conflicting\nopinions, and the roar of a revolution that shakes the world, but to\nlast when the heavens are no more, and to spring fresh from the ruins of\nthe universe.\n\nBe faithful to your country, and prefer its dignity and honor to any\ndegree of popularity and honor for yourself; consulting its interest\nrather than your own, and rather than the pleasure and gratification of\nthe people, which are often at variance with their welfare.\n\nBe faithful to Masonry, which is to be faithful to the best interests of\nmankind. Labor, by precept and example, to elevate the standard of\nMasonic character, to enlarge its sphere of influence, to popularize its\nteachings, and to make all men know it for the Great Apostle of Peace,\nHarmony, and Good-will on earth among men; of Liberty, Equality, and\nFraternity.\n\nMasonry is useful to all men: to the learned, because it affords them\nthe opportunity of exercising their talents upon subjects eminently\nworthy of their attention; to the illiterate, because it offers them\nimportant instruction; to the young, because it presents them with\nsalutary precepts and good examples, and accustoms them to reflect on\nthe proper mode of living; to the man of the world, whom it furnishes\nwith noble and useful recreation; to the traveller, whom it enables to\nfind friends and brothers in countries where else he would be isolated\nand solitary; to the worthy man in misfortune, to whom it gives\nassistance; to the afflicted, on whom it lavishes consolation; to the\ncharitable man, whom it enables to do more good, by uniting with those\nwho are charitable like himself; and to all who have souls capable of\nappreciating its importance, and of enjoying the charms of a friendship\nfounded on the same principles of religion, morality, and philanthropy.\n\nA Freemason, therefore, should be a man of honor and of conscience,\npreferring his duty to everything beside, even to his life; independent\nin his opinions, and of good morals; submissive to the laws, devoted to\nhumanity, to his country, to his family; kind and indulgent to his\nbrethren, friend of all virtuous men, and ready to assist his fellows by\nall means in his power.\n\nThus will you be faithful to yourself, to your fellows, and to God, and\nthus will you do honor to the name and rank of SECRET MASTER; which,\nlike other Masonic honors, degrades if it is not deserved.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nV.\n\nPERFECT MASTER.\n\n\nThe Master Kh\u016br\u016bm was an industrious and an honest man. What he was\nemployed to do he did diligently, and he did it well and faithfully. _He\nreceived no wages that were not his due_. Industry and honesty are the\nvirtues peculiarly inculcated in this Degree. They are common and homely\nvirtues; but not for that beneath our notice. As the bees do not love or\nrespect the drones, so Masonry neither loves nor respects the idle and\nthose who live by their wits; and least of all those parasitic acari\nthat live upon themselves. For those who are indolent are likely to\nbecome dissipated and vicious; and perfect honesty, which ought to be\nthe common qualification of all, is more rare than diamonds. To do\nearnestly and steadily, and to do faithfully and honestly that which we\nhave to do--perhaps this wants but little, when looked at from every\npoint of view, of including the whole body of the moral law; and even in\ntheir commonest and homeliest application, these virtues belong to the\ncharacter of a Perfect Master.\n\nIdleness is the burial of a living man. For an idle person is so useless\nto any purposes of God and man, that he is like one who is dead,\nunconcerned in the changes and necessities of the world; and he only\nlives to spend his time, and eat the fruits of the earth. Like a vermin\nor a wolf, when his time comes, he dies and perishes, and in the\nmeantime is nought. He neither ploughs nor carries burdens: all that he\ndoes is either unprofitable or mischievous.\n\nIt is a vast work that any man may do, if he never be idle: and it is a\nhuge way that a man may go in virtue, if he never go out of his way by a\nvicious habit or a great crime: and he who perpetually reads good\nbooks, if his parts be answerable, will have a huge stock of knowledge.\n\nSt. Ambrose, and from his example, St. Augustine, divided every day into\nthese _tertias_ of employment: eight hours they spent in the necessities\nof nature and recreation: eight hours in charity, in doing assistance to\nothers, dispatching their business, reconciling their enmities,\nreproving their vices, correcting their errors, instructing their\nignorance, and in transacting the affairs of their dioceses; and the\nother eight hours they spent in study and prayer.\n\nWe think, at the age of twenty, that life is much too long for that\nwhich we have to learn and do; and that there is an almost fabulous\ndistance between our age and that of our grandfather. But when, at the\nage of sixty, if we are fortunate enough to reach it, or unfortunate\nenough, as the case may be, and according as we have profitably invested\nor wasted our time, we halt, and look back along the way we have come,\nand cast up and endeavor to balance our accounts with time and\nopportunity, we find that we have made life much too short, and thrown\naway a huge portion of our time. Then we, in our mind, deduct from the\nsum total of our years the hours that we have needlessly passed in\nsleep; the working-hours each day, during which the surface of the\nmind's sluggish pool has not been stirred or ruffled by a single\nthought; the days that we have gladly got rid of, to attain some real or\nfancied object that lay beyond, in the way between us and which stood\nirksomely the intervening days; the hours worse than wasted in follies\nand dissipation, or misspent in useless and unprofitable studies; and we\nacknowledge, with a sigh, that we could have learned and done, in half a\nscore of years well spent, more than we _have_ done in all our forty\nyears of manhood.\n\nTo learn and to do!--this is the soul's work here below. The soul grows\nas truly as an oak grows. As the tree takes the carbon of the air, the\ndew, the rain, and the light, and the food that the earth supplies to\nits roots, and by its mysterious chemistry transmutes them into sap and\nfibre, into wood and leaf, and flower and fruit, and color and perfume,\nso the soul imbibes knowledge and by a divine alchemy changes what it\nlearns into its own substance, and grows from within outwardly with an\ninherent force and power like those that lie hidden in the grain of\nwheat.\n\nThe soul hath its senses, like the body, that may be cultivated,\nenlarged, refined, as itself grows in stature and proportion; and he\nwho cannot appreciate a fine painting or statue, a noble poem, a sweet\nharmony, a heroic thought, or a disinterested action, or to whom the\nwisdom of philosophy is but foolishness and babble, and the loftiest\ntruths of less importance than the price of stocks or cotton, or the\nelevation of baseness to office, merely lives on the level of\ncommonplace, and fitly prides himself upon that inferiority of the\nsoul's senses, which is the inferiority and imperfect development of the\nsoul itself.\n\nTo sleep little, and to study much; to say little, and to hear and think\nmuch; to learn, that we may be able to do, and then to do, earnestly and\nvigorously, whatever may be required of us by duty, and by the good of\nour fellows, our country, and mankind,--these are the duties of every\nMason who desires to imitate the Master Kh\u016br\u016bm.\n\nThe duty of a Mason as an honest man is plain and easy. It requires of\nus honesty in contracts, sincerity in affirming, simplicity in\nbargaining, and faithfulness in performing. Lie not at all, neither in a\nlittle thing nor in a great, neither in the substance nor in the\ncircumstance, neither in word nor deed: that is, pretend not what is\nfalse; cover not what is true; and let the measure of your affirmation\nor denial be the understanding of your contractor; for he who deceives\nthe buyer or the seller by speaking what is true, in a sense not\nintended or understood by the other, is a liar and a thief. A Perfect\nMaster must avoid that which deceives, equally with that which is false.\n\nLet your prices be according to that measure of good and evil which is\nestablished in the fame and common accounts of the wisest and most\nmerciful men, skilled in that manufacture or commodity; and the gain\nsuch, which, without scandal, is allowed to persons in all the same\ncircumstances.\n\nIn intercourse with others, do not do all which thou mayest lawfully do;\nbut keep something within thy power; and, because there is a latitude of\ngain in buying and selling, take not thou the utmost penny that is\nlawful, or which thou thinkest so; for although it be lawful, yet it is\nnot safe; and he who gains all that he can gain lawfully, this year,\nwill possibly be tempted, next year, to gain something unlawfully.\n\nLet no man, for his own poverty, become more oppressing and cruel in his\nbargain; but quietly, modestly, diligently, and patiently recommend his\nestate to God, and follow his interest, and leave the success to Him.\n\nDetain not the wages of the hireling; for every degree of detention of\nit beyond the time, is injustice and uncharitableness, and grinds his\nface till tears and blood come out; but pay him exactly according to\ncovenant, or according to his needs.\n\nReligiously keep all promises and covenants, though made to your\ndisadvantage, though afterward you perceive you might have done better;\nand let not any precedent act of yours be altered by any after-accident.\nLet nothing make you break your promise, unless it be unlawful or\nimpossible; that is, either out of your nature or out of your civil\npower, yourself being under the power of another; or that it be\nintolerably inconvenient to yourself, and of no advantage to another; or\nthat you have leave expressed or reasonably presumed.\n\nLet no man take wages or fees for a work that he cannot do, or cannot\nwith probability undertake; or in some sense profitably, and with ease,\nor with advantage manage. Let no man appropriate to his own use, what\nGod, by a special mercy, or the Republic, hath made common; for that is\nagainst both Justice and Charity.\n\nThat any man should be the worse for us, and for our direct act, and by\nour intention, is against the rule of equity, of justice, and of\ncharity. We then do not that to others, which we would have done to\nourselves; for we grow richer upon the ruins of their fortune.\n\nIt is not honest to receive anything from another without returning him\nan equivalent therefor. The gamester who wins the money of another is\ndishonest. There should be no such thing as bets and gaming among\nMasons: for no honest man should desire that for nothing which belongs\nto another. The merchant who sells an inferior article for a sound\nprice, the speculator who makes the distresses and needs of others fill\nhis exchequer are neither fair nor honest, but base, ignoble, unfit for\nimmortality.\n\nIt should be the earnest desire of every Perfect Master so to live and\ndeal and act, that when it comes to him to die, he may be able to say,\nand his conscience to adjudge, that no man on earth is poorer, because\nhe is richer; that what he hath he has honestly earned, and no man can\ngo before God, and claim that by the rules of equity administered in His\ngreat chancery, this house in which we die, this land we devise to our\nheirs, this money that enriches those who survive to bear our name, is\nhis and not ours, and we in that forum are only his trustees. For it is\nmost certain that God is just, and will sternly enforce every such\ntrust; and that to all whom we despoil, to all whom we defraud, to all\nfrom whom we take or win anything whatever, without fair consideration\nand equivalent, He will decree a full and adequate compensation.\n\nBe careful, then, that thou receive no wages, here or elsewhere, that\nare not thy due! For if thou dost, thou wrongst some one, by taking that\nwhich in God's chancery belongs to him; and whether that which thou\ntakest thus be wealth, or rank, or influence, or reputation or\naffection, thou wilt surely be held to make full satisfaction.\n\n[Illustration] [Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nVI.\n\nINTIMATE SECRETARY.\n\n[Confidential Secretary.]\n\n\nYou are especially taught in this Degree to be zealous and faithful; to\nbe disinterested and benevolent; and to act the peacemaker, in case of\ndissensions, disputes, and quarrels among the brethren.\n\nDuty is the moral magnetism which controls and guides the true Mason's\ncourse over the tumultuous seas of life. Whether the stars of honor,\nreputation, and reward do or do not shine, in the light of day or in the\ndarkness of the night of trouble and adversity, in calm or storm, that\nunerring magnet still shows him the true course to steer, and indicates\nwith certainty where-away lies the port which not to reach involves\nshipwreck and dishonor. He follows its silent bidding, as the mariner,\nwhen land is for many days not in sight, and the ocean without path or\nlandmark spreads out all around him, follows the bidding of the needle,\nnever doubting that it points truly to the north. To perform that duty,\nwhether the performance be rewarded or unrewarded, is his sole care. And\nit doth not matter, though of this performance there may be no\nwitnesses, and though what he does will be forever unknown to all\nmankind.\n\nA little consideration will teach us that Fame has other limits than\nmountains and oceans; and that he who places happiness in the frequent\nrepetition of his name, may spend his life in propagating it, without\nany danger of weeping for new worlds, or necessity of passing the\nAtlantic sea.\n\nIf, therefore, he who imagines the world to be filled with his actions\nand praises, shall subduct from the number of his encomiasts all those\nwho are placed below the flight of fame, and who hear in the valley of\nlife no voice but that of necessity; all those who imagine themselves\ntoo important to regard him, and consider the mention of his name as a\nusurpation of their time; all who are too much or too little pleased\nwith themselves to attend to anything external; all who are attracted by\npleasure, or chained down by pain to unvaried ideas; all who are\nwithheld from attending his triumph by different pursuits; and all who\nslumber in universal negligence; he will find his renown straitened by\nnearer bounds than the rocks of Caucasus; and perceive that no man can\nbe venerable or formidable, but to a small part of his fellow-creatures.\nAnd therefore, that we may not languish in our endeavors after\nexcellence, it is necessary that, as Africanus counsels his descendants,\nwe raise our eyes to higher prospects, and contemplate our future and\neternal state, without giving up our hearts to the praise of crowds, or\nfixing our hopes on such rewards as human power can bestow.\n\nWe are not born for ourselves alone; and our country claims her share,\nand our friends their share of us. As all that the earth produces is\ncreated for the use of man, so men are created for the sake of men, that\nthey may mutually do good to one another. In this we ought to take\nnature for our guide, and throw into the public stock the offices of\ngeneral utility, by a reciprocation of duties; sometimes by receiving,\nsometimes by giving, and sometimes to cement human society by arts, by\nindustry, and by our resources.\n\nSuffer others to be praised in thy presence, and entertain their good\nand glory with delight; but at no hand disparage them, or lessen the\nreport, or make an objection; and think not the advancement of thy\nbrother is a lessening of thy worth. Upbraid no man's weakness to him to\ndiscomfit him, neither report it to disparage him, neither delight to\nremember it to lessen him, or to set thyself above him; nor ever praise\nthyself or dispraise any man else, unless some sufficient worthy end do\nhallow it.\n\nRemember that we usually disparage others upon slight grounds and little\ninstances; and if a man be highly commended, we think him sufficiently\nlessened, if we can but charge one sin of folly or inferiority in his\naccount. We should either be more severe to ourselves, or less so to\nothers, and consider that whatsoever good any one can think or say of\nus, we can tell him of many unworthy and foolish and perhaps worse\nactions of ours, any one of which, done by another, would be enough,\nwith _us_, to destroy his reputation.\n\nIf we think the people wise and sagacious, and just and appreciative,\nwhen they praise and make idols of _us_, let us not call them unlearned\nand ignorant, and ill and stupid judges, when our neighbor is cried up\nby public fame and popular noises.\n\nEvery man hath in his own life sins enough, in his own mind trouble\nenough, in his own fortunes evil enough, and in performance of his\noffices failings more than enough, to entertain his own inquiry; so that\ncuriosity after the affairs of others cannot be without envy and an ill\nmind. The generous man will be solicitous and inquisitive into the\nbeauty and order of a well-governed family, and after the virtues of an\nexcellent person; but anything for which men keep locks and bars, or\nthat blushes to see the light, or that is either shameful in manner or\nprivate in nature, this thing will not be his care and business.\n\nIt should be objection sufficient to exclude any man from the society of\nMasons, that he is not disinterested and generous, both in his acts, and\nin his opinions of men, and his constructions of their conduct. He who\nis selfish and grasping, or censorious and ungenerous, will not long\nremain within the strict limits of honesty and truth, but will shortly\ncommit injustice. He who loves himself too much must needs love others\ntoo little; and he who habitually gives harsh judgment will not long\ndelay to give unjust judgment.\n\nThe generous man is not careful to return no more than he receives; but\nprefers that the balances upon the ledgers of benefits shall be in his\nfavor. He who hath received pay in full for all the benefits and favors\nthat he has conferred, is like a spendthrift who has consumed his whole\nestate, and laments over an empty exchequer. He who requites my favors\nwith ingratitude adds to, instead of diminishing, my wealth; and he who\ncannot return a favor is equally poor, whether his inability arises from\npoverty of spirit, sordidness of soul, or pecuniary indigence.\n\nIf he is wealthy who hath large sums invested, and the mass of whose\nfortune consists in obligations that bind other men to pay him money, he\nis still more so to whom many owe large returns of kindnesses and\nfavors. Beyond a moderate sum each year, the wealthy man merely\n_invests_ his means: and that which he _never_ uses is still like\nfavors unreturned and kindnesses unreciprocated, an actual and real\nportion of his fortune.\n\nGenerosity and a liberal spirit make men to be humane and genial,\nopen-hearted, frank, and sincere, earnest to do good, easy and\ncontented, and well-wishers of mankind. They protect the feeble against\nthe strong, and the defenceless against rapacity and craft. They succor\nand comfort the poor, and are the guardians, under God, of his innocent\nand helpless wards. They value friends more than riches or fame, and\ngratitude more than money or power. They are noble by God's patent, and\ntheir escutcheons and quarterings are to be found in heaven's great book\nof heraldry. Nor can any man any more be a Mason than he can be a\ngentleman, unless he is generous, liberal, and disinterested. To be\nliberal, but only of that which is our own; to be generous, but only\nwhen we have first been just; to give, when to give deprives us of a\nluxury or a comfort, this is Masonry indeed.\n\nHe who is worldly, covetous, or sensual must change before he can be a\ngood Mason. If we are governed by inclination and not by duty; if we are\nunkind, severe, censorious, or injurious, in the relations or\nintercourse of life; if we are unfaithful parents or undutiful children;\nif we are harsh masters or faithless servants; if we are treacherous\nfriends or bad neighbors or bitter competitors or corrupt unprincipled\npoliticians or overreaching dealers in business, we are wandering at a\ngreat distance from the true Masonic light.\n\nMasons must be kind and affectionate one to another. Frequenting the\nsame temples, kneeling at the same altars, they should feel that respect\nand that kindness for each other, which their common relation and common\napproach to one God should inspire. There needs to be much more of the\nspirit of the ancient fellowship among us; more tenderness for each\nother's faults, more forgiveness, more solicitude for each other's\nimprovement and good fortune; somewhat of brotherly feeling, that it be\nnot shame to use the word \"_brother_.\"\n\nNothing should be allowed to interfere with that kindness and affection:\nneither the spirit of business, absorbing, eager, and overreaching,\nungenerous and hard in its dealings, keen and bitter in its\ncompetitions, low and sordid in its purposes; nor that of ambition,\nselfish, mercenary, restless, circumventing, living only in the opinion\nof others, envious of the good fortune of others, miserably vain of its\nown success, unjust, unscrupulous, and slanderous.\n\nHe that does me a favor, hath bound me to make him a return of\nthankfulness. The obligation comes not by covenant, nor by his own\nexpress intention; but by the nature of the thing; and is a duty\nspringing up within the spirit of the obliged person, to whom it is more\nnatural to love his friend, and to do good for good, than to return evil\nfor evil; because a man may forgive an injury, but he must never forget\na good turn. He that refuses to do good to them whom he is bound to\nlove, or to love that which did him good, is unnatural and monstrous in\nhis affections, and thinks all the world born to minister to him; with a\ngreediness worse than that of the sea, which, although it receives all\nrivers into itself, yet it furnishes the clouds and springs with a\nreturn of all they need. Our duty to those who are our benefactors is,\nto esteem and love their persons, to make them proportionable returns of\nservice, or duty, or profit, according as we can, or as they need, or as\nopportunity presents itself; and according to the greatness of their\nkindnesses.\n\nThe generous man cannot but regret to see dissensions and disputes among\nhis brethren. Only the base and ungenerous delight in discord. It is the\npoorest occupation of humanity to labor to make men think worse of each\nother, as the press, and too commonly the pulpit, changing places with\nthe hustings and the tribune, do. The duty of the Mason is to endeavor\nto make man think better of his neighbor; to quiet, instead of\naggravating difficulties; to bring together those who are severed or\nestranged; to keep friends from becoming foes, and to persuade foes to\nbecome friends. To do this, he must needs control his own passions, and\nbe not rash and hasty, nor swift to take offence, nor easy to be\nangered.\n\nFor anger is a professed enemy to counsel. It is a direct storm, in\nwhich no man can be heard to speak or call from without; for if you\ncounsel gently, you are disregarded; if you urge it and be vehement, you\nprovoke it more. It is neither manly nor ingenuous. It makes marriage to\nbe a necessary and unavoidable trouble; friendships and societies and\nfamiliarities, to be intolerable. It multiplies the evils of\ndrunkenness, and makes the levities of wine to run into madness. It\nmakes innocent jesting to be the beginning of tragedies. It turns\nfriendship into hatred; it makes a man lose himself, and his reason and\nhis argument, in disputation. It turns the desires of knowledge into an\nitch of wrangling. It adds insolency to power. It turns justice into\ncruelty, and judgment into oppression. It changes discipline into\ntediousness and hatred of liberal institution. It makes a prosperous man\nto be envied, and the unfortunate to be unpitied.\n\nSee, therefore, that first controlling your own temper, and governing\nyour own passions, you fit yourself to keep peace and harmony among\nother men, and especially the brethren. Above all remember that Masonry\nis the realm of peace, and that \"_among Masons there must be no\ndissension, but only that noble emulation, which can best work and best\nagree_.\" Wherever there is strife and hatred among the brethren, there\nis no Masonry; for Masonry is Peace, and Brotherly Love, and Concord.\n\nMasonry is the great Peace Society of the world. Wherever it exists, it\nstruggles to prevent international difficulties and disputes; and to\nbind Republics, Kingdoms, and Empires together in one great band of\npeace and amity. It would not so often struggle in vain, if Masons knew\ntheir power and valued their oaths.\n\nWho can sum up the horrors and woes accumulated in a single war? Masonry\nis not dazzled with all its pomp and circumstance, all its glitter and\nglory. War comes with its bloody hand into our very dwellings. It takes\nfrom ten thousand homes those who lived there in peace and comfort, held\nby the tender ties of family and kindred. It drags them away, to die\nuntended, of fever or exposure, in infectious climes; or to be hacked,\ntorn, and mangled in the fierce fight; to fall on the gory field, to\nrise no more, or to be borne away, in awful agony, to noisome and horrid\nhospitals. The groans of the battle-field are echoed in sighs of\nbereavement from thousands of desolated hearths. There is a skeleton in\nevery house, a vacant chair at every table. Returning, the soldier\nbrings worse sorrow to his home, by the infection which he has caught,\nof camp-vices. The country is demoralized. The national mind is brought\ndown, from the noble interchange of kind offices with another people, to\nwrath and revenge, and base pride, and the habit of measuring brute\nstrength against brute strength, in battle. Treasures are expended, that\nwould suffice to build ten thousand churches, hospitals, and\nuniversities, or rib and tie together a continent with rails of iron. If\nthat treasure were sunk in the sea, it would be calamity enough; but it\nis put to worse use; for it is expended in cutting into the veins and\narteries of human life, until the earth is deluged with a sea of blood.\n\nSuch are the lessons of this Degree. You have vowed to make them the\nrule, the law, and the guide of your life and conduct. If you do so, you\nwill be entitled, because fitted, to advance in Masonry. If you do not,\nyou have already gone too far.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nVII.\n\nPROVOST AND JUDGE.\n\n\nThe lesson which this Degree inculcates is JUSTICE, in decision and\njudgment, and in our intercourse and dealing with other men.\n\nIn a country where trial by jury is known, every intelligent man is\nliable to be called on to act as a judge, either of fact alone, or of\nfact and law mingled; and to assume the heavy responsibilities which\nbelong to that character.\n\nThose who are invested with the power of judgment should judge the\ncauses of all persons uprightly and impartially, without any personal\nconsideration of the power of the mighty, or the bribe of the rich, or\nthe needs of the poor. That is the cardinal rule, which no one will\ndispute; though many fail to observe it. But they must do more. They\nmust divest themselves of prejudice and preconception. They must hear\npatiently, remember accurately, and weigh carefully the facts and the\narguments offered before them. They must not leap hastily to\nconclusions, nor form opinions before they have heard all. They must not\npresume crime or fraud. They must neither be ruled by stubborn pride of\nopinion, nor be too facile and yielding to the views and arguments of\nothers. In deducing the motive from the proven act, they must not assign\nto the act either the best or the worst motives, but those which they\nwould think it just and fair for the world to assign to it, if they\nthemselves had done it; nor must they endeavor to make many little\ncircumstances, that weigh nothing separately, weigh much together, to\nprove their own acuteness and sagacity. These are sound rules for every\njuror, also, to observe.\n\nIn our intercourse with others, there are two kinds of injustice: the\nfirst of those who offer an injury; the second, of those who have it in\ntheir power to _avert_ an injury from those to whom it is offered, and\nyet do it not. So _active_ injustice may be done in two ways--by force\nand by fraud,--of which force is lion-like, and fraud fox-like,--both\nutterly repugnant to social duty, but fraud the more detestable.\n\nEvery wrong done by one man to another, whether it affect his person,\nhis property, his happiness, or his reputation, is an offense against\nthe law of justice. The field of this Degree is therefore a wide and\nvast one; and Masonry seeks for the most impressive mode of enforcing\nthe law of justice, and the most effectual means of preventing wrong and\ninjustice.\n\nTo this end it teaches this great and momentous truth: that wrong and\ninjustice once done cannot be undone; but are eternal in their\nconsequences; once committed, are numbered with the irrevocable Past;\nthat the wrong that is done _contains_ its own retributive penalty as\nsurely and as naturally as the acorn contains the oak. Its consequences\nare its punishment; it needs no other, and can have no heavier; they are\ninvolved in its commission, and cannot be separated from it. A wrong\ndone to another is an injury done to our own Nature, an offence against\nour own souls, a disfiguring of the image of the Beautiful and Good.\nPunishment is not the execution of a sentence, but the occurrence of an\neffect. It is ordained to follow guilt, not by the decree of God as a\njudge, but by a law enacted by Him as the Creator and Legislator of the\nUniverse. It is not an arbitrary and artificial annexation, but an\nordinary and logical consequence; and therefore must be borne by the\nwrong-doer, and through him may flow on to others. It is the decision of\nthe infinite justice of God, in the form of law.\n\nThere can be no interference with, or remittance of, or protection from,\nthe natural effects of our wrongful acts. God will not interpose between\nthe cause and its consequence; and in that sense there can be no\nforgiveness of sins. The act which has debased our soul may be repented\nof, may be turned from; but the injury is done. The debasement may be\nredeemed by after-efforts, the stain obliterated by bitterer struggles\nand severer sufferings; but the efforts and the endurance which might\nhave raised the soul to the loftiest heights are now exhausted in merely\nregaining what it has lost. There must always be a wide difference\nbetween him who only ceases to do evil, and him who has always done\nwell.\n\nHe will certainly be a far more scrupulous watcher over his conduct, and\nfar more careful of his deeds, who believes that those deeds will\ninevitably bear their natural consequences, exempt from after\nintervention, than he who believes that penitence and pardon will at any\ntime unlink the chain of sequences. Surely we shall do less wrong and\ninjustice, if the conviction is fixed and embedded in our souls that\neverything done is done irrevocably, that even the Omnipotence of God\ncannot _uncommit_ a deed, cannot make that _undone_ which has _been\ndone_; that every act of ours _must_ bear its allotted fruit, according\nto the everlasting laws,--must remain forever ineffaceably inscribed on\nthe tablets of Universal Nature.\n\nIf you have wronged another, you may grieve, repent, and resolutely\ndetermine against any such weakness in future. You may, so far as it is\npossible, make reparation. It is well. The injured party may forgive\nyou, according to the meaning of human language; but the deed is _done_;\nand all the powers of Nature, were they to conspire in your behalf,\ncould not make it _undone_; the consequences to the body, the\nconsequences to the soul, though no man may perceive them, _are there_,\nare written in the annals of the Past, and must reverbrate throughout\nall time.\n\nRepentance for a wrong done, bears, like every other act, its own fruit,\nthe fruit of purifying the heart and amending the Future, but not of\neffacing the Past. The commission of the wrong is an irrevocable act;\nbut it does not incapacitate the soul to do right for the future. Its\nconsequences cannot be expunged; but its course need not be pursued.\nWrong and evil perpetrated, though ineffaceable, call for no despair,\nbut for efforts more energetic than before. Repentance is still as valid\nas ever; but it is valid to secure the Future, not to obliterate the\nPast.\n\nEven the pulsations of the air, once set in motion by the human voice,\ncease not to exist with the sounds to which they gave rise. Their\nquickly-attenuated force soon becomes inaudible to human ears. But the\nwaves of air thus raised perambulate the surface of earth and ocean, and\nin less than twenty hours, every atom of the atmosphere takes up the\naltered movement due to that infinitesimal portion of primitive motion\nwhich has been conveyed to it through countless channels, and which\nmust continue to influence its path throughout its future existence. The\nair is one vast library on whose pages is forever written all that man\nhas ever said or even whispered. There, in their mutable, but unerring\ncharacters, mixed with the earliest, as well as the latest signs of\nmortality, stand forever recorded, vows unredeemed, promises\nunfulfilled; perpetuating, in the movements of each particle, all in\nunison, the testimony of man's changeful will. God reads that book,\nthough we cannot.\n\nSo earth, air, and ocean are the eternal witnesses of the acts that we\nhave done. No motion impressed by natural causes or by human agency is\never obliterated. The track of every keel which has ever disturbed the\nsurface of the ocean remains forever registered in the future movements\nof all succeeding particles which may occupy its place. Every criminal\nis by the laws of the Almighty irrevocably chained to the testimony of\nhis crime; for every atom of his mortal frame, through whatever changes\nits particles may migrate, will still retain, adhering to it through\nevery combination, some movement derived from that very muscular effort\nby which the crime itself was perpetrated.\n\nWhat if our faculties should be so enhanced in a future life as to\nenable us to perceive and trace the ineffaceable consequences of our\nidle words and evil deeds, and render our remorse and grief as eternal\nas those consequences themselves? No more fearful punishment to a\nsuperior intelligence can be conceived, than to see still in action,\nwith the consciousness that it must continue in action forever, a cause\nof wrong put in motion by itself ages before.\n\nMasonry, by its teachings, endeavors to restrain men from the commission\nof injustice and acts of wrong and outrage. Though it does not endeavor\nto usurp the place of religion, still its code of morals proceeds upon\nother principles than the municipal law; and it condemns and punishes\noffences which neither that law punishes nor public opinion condemns. In\nthe Masonic law, to cheat and overreach in trade, at the bar, in\npolitics, are deemed no more venial than theft; nor a deliberate lie\nthan perjury; nor slander than robbery; nor seduction than murder.\n\nEspecially it condemns those wrongs of which the doer induces another to\npartake. _He_ may repent; _he_ may, after agonizing struggles, regain\nthe path of virtue; _his_ spirit may reachieve its purity through much\nanguish, after many strifes; but the weaker fellow-creature whom he led\nastray, whom he made a sharer in his guilt, but whom he cannot make a\nsharer in his repentance and amendment, whose downward course (the first\nstep of which _he_ taught) he cannot check, but is compelled to\nwitness,--what forgiveness of sins can avail him there? _There_ is his\nperpetual, his inevitable punishment, which no repentance can alleviate,\nand no mercy can remit.\n\nLet us be just, also, in judging of other men's motives. We know but\nlittle of the real merits or demerits of any fellow-creature. We can\nrarely say with certainty that this man is more guilty than that, or\neven that this man is very good or very wicked. Often the basest men\nleave behind them excellent reputations. There is scarcely one of us who\nhas not, at some time in his life, been on the edge of the commission of\na crime. Every one of us can look back, and shuddering see the time when\nour feet stood upon the slippery crags that overhung the abyss of guilt;\nand when, if temptation had been a little more urgent, or a little\nlonger continued, if penury had pressed us a little harder, or a little\nmore wine had further disturbed our intellect, dethroned our judgment,\nand aroused our passions, our feet would have slipped, and we should\nhave fallen, never to rise again.\n\nWe may be able to say--\"_This_ man has lied, has pilfered, has forged,\nhas embezzled moneys intrusted to him; and _that_ man has gone through\nlife with clean hands.\" But we cannot say that the former has not\nstruggled long, though unsuccessfully, against temptations under which\nthe second would have succumbed without an effort. We can say which has\nthe cleanest _hands_ before _man_; but not which has the cleanest _soul_\nbefore God. We may be able to say, _this_ man has committed adultery,\nand _that_ man has been ever chaste; but we cannot tell but that the\ninnocence of one may have been due to the coldness of his heart, to the\nabsence of a motive, to the presence of a fear, to the slight degree of\nthe temptation; nor but that the fall of the other may have been\npreceded by the most vehement self-contest, caused by the most\nover-mastering frenzy, and atoned for by the most hallowing repentance.\nGenerosity as well as niggardliness may be a mere yielding to native\ntemperament; and in the eye of Heaven, a long life of beneficence in one\nman may have cost less effort, and may indicate less virtue and less\nsacrifice of interest, than a few rare hidden acts of kindness wrung by\nduty out of the reluctant and unsympathizing nature of the other. There\nmay be more real merit, more self-sacrificing effort, more of the\nnoblest elements of moral grandeur, in a life of failure, sin, and\nshame, than in a career, to our eyes, of stainless integrity.\n\nWhen we condemn or pity the fallen, how do we know that, tempted like\nhim, we should not have fallen like him, as soon, and perhaps with less\nresistance? How can we know what _we_ should do if we were out of\nemployment, famine crouching, gaunt, and hungry, on our fireless hearth,\nand our children wailing for bread? _We fall not because we are not\nenough tempted!_ He that _hath_ fallen may be at heart as honest as we.\nHow do we know that _our_ daughter, sister, wife, could resist the\nabandonment, the desolation, the distress, the temptation, that\nsacrificed the virtue of their poor abandoned sister of shame? Perhaps\nthey also have not fallen, because they have not been sorely tempted!\nWisely are we directed to pray that we may not be exposed to temptation.\n\nHuman justice must be ever uncertain. How many judicial murders have\nbeen committed through ignorance of the phenomena of insanity! How many\nmen hung for murder who were no more murderers at heart than the jury\nthat tried and the judge that sentenced them! It may well be doubted\nwhether the administration of human laws, in every country, is not one\ngigantic mass of injustice and wrong. God seeth not as man seeth; and\nthe most abandoned criminal, black as he is before the world, may yet\nhave continued to keep some little light burning in a corner of his\nsoul, which would long since have gone out in that of those who walk\nproudly in the sunshine of immaculate fame, if they had been tried and\ntempted like the poor outcast.\n\nWe do not know even the _outside_ life of men. We are not competent to\npronounce even on their _deeds_. We do not know half the acts of\nwickedness or virtue, even of our most immediate fellows. We cannot say,\nwith certainty, even of our nearest friend, that he has not committed a\nparticular sin, and broken a particular commandment. Let each man ask\nhis own heart! Of how many of our best and of our worst acts and\nqualities are our most intimate associates utterly unconscious! How many\nvirtues does not the world give us credit for, that we do not possess;\nor vices condemn us for, of which we are not the slaves! It is but a\nsmall portion of our evil deeds and thoughts that ever comes to light;\nand of our few redeeming goodnesses, the largest portion is known to\nGod alone.\n\nWe shall, therefore, be just in judging of other men, only when we are\ncharitable; and we should assume the prerogative of judging others only\nwhen the duty is forced upon us; since we are so almost certain to err,\nand the consequences of error are so serious. No man need covet the\noffice of judge; for in assuming it he assumes the gravest and most\noppressive responsibility. Yet you have assumed it; we all assume it;\nfor man is ever ready to judge, and ever ready to condemn his neighbor,\nwhile upon the same state of case he acquits himself. See, therefore,\nthat you exercise your office cautiously and charitably, lest, in\npassing judgment upon the criminal, you commit a greater wrong than that\nfor which you condemn him, and the consequences of which must be\neternal.\n\nThe faults and crimes and follies of other men are not unimportant to\nus; but form a part of our moral discipline. War and bloodshed at a\ndistance, and frauds which do not affect our pecuniary interest, yet\ntouch us in our feelings, and concern our moral welfare. They have much\nto do with all thoughtful hearts. The public eye may look unconcernedly\non the miserable victim of vice, and that shattered wreck of a man may\nmove the multitude to laughter or to scorn. But to the Mason, it is the\nform of sacred humanity that is before him; it is an erring\nfellow-being; a desolate, forlorn, forsaken soul; and his thoughts,\nenfolding the poor wretch, will be far deeper than those of\nindifference, ridicule, or contempt. All human offences, the whole\nsystem of dishonesty, evasion, circumventing, forbidden indulgence, and\nintriguing ambition, in which men are struggling with each other, will\nbe looked upon by a thoughtful Mason, not merely as a scene of mean\ntoils and strifes, but as the solemn conflicts of immortal minds, for\nends vast and momentous as their own being. It is a sad and unworthy\nstrife, and may well be viewed with indignation; but that indignation\nmust melt into pity. For the stakes for which these gamesters play are\nnot those which they imagine, not those which are in sight. For example,\nthis man plays for a petty office, and gains it; but the real stake he\ngains is sycophancy, uncharitableness, slander, and deceit.\n\nGood men are too proud of their goodness. They are respectable; dishonor\ncomes not near them; their countenance has weight and influence; their\nrobes are unstained; the poisonous breath of calumny has never been\nbreathed upon their fair name. How easy it is for them to look down with\nscorn upon the poor degraded offender; to pass him by with a lofty step;\nto draw up the folds of their garment around them, that they may not be\nsoiled by his touch! Yet the Great Master of Virtue did not so; but\ndescended to familiar intercourse with publicans and sinners, with the\nSamaritan woman, with the outcasts and the Pariahs of the Hebrew world.\n\nMany men think themselves better, in proportion as they can detect sin\nin others! When they go over the catalogue of their neighbor's unhappy\nderelictions of temper or conduct, they often, amidst much apparent\nconcern, feel a secret exultation, that destroys all their own\npretensions to wisdom and moderation, and even to virtue. Many even take\nactual pleasure in the sins of others; and this is the case with every\none whose thoughts are often employed in agreeable comparisons of his\nown virtues with his neighbors' faults.\n\nThe power of gentleness is too little seen in the world; the subduing\ninfluences of pity, the might of love, the control of mildness over\npassion, the commanding majesty of that perfect character which mingles\ngrave displeasure with grief and pity for the offender. So it is that a\nMason should treat his brethren who go astray. Not with bitterness; nor\nyet with good-natured easiness, nor with worldly indifference, nor with\nthe philosophic coldness, nor with a laxity of conscience, that accounts\neverything well, that passes under the seal of public opinion; but with\ncharity, with pitying loving-kindness.\n\nThe human heart will not bow willingly to what is infirm and wrong in\nhuman nature. If it yields to us, it must yield to what is divine in us.\nThe wickedness of my neighbor cannot submit to my wickedness; his\nsensuality, for instance, to my anger against his vices. My faults are\nnot the instruments that are to arrest his faults. And therefore\nimpatient reformers, and denouncing preachers, and hasty reprovers, and\nangry parents, and irritable relatives generally fail, in their several\ndepartments, to reclaim the erring.\n\nA moral offence is sickness, pain, loss, dishonor, in the immortal part\nof man. It is guilt, and misery added to guilt. It is itself calamity;\nand brings upon itself, in addition, the calamity of God's disapproval,\nthe abhorrence of all virtuous men, and the soul's own abhorrence. Deal\nfaithfully, but patiently and tenderly, with this evil! It is no matter\nfor petty provocation, nor for personal strife, nor for selfish\nirritation.\n\nSpeak kindly to your erring brother! God pities him: Christ has died for\nhim: Providence waits for him: Heaven's mercy yearns toward him; and\nHeaven's spirits are ready to welcome him back with joy. Let your voice\nbe in unison with all those powers that God is using for his recovery!\n\nIf one defrauds you, and exults at it, he is the most to be pitied of\nhuman beings. He has done himself a far deeper injury than he has done\nyou. It is he, and not you, whom God regards with mingled displeasure\nand compassion; and His judgment should be your law. Among all the\nbenedictions of the Holy Mount there is not one for this man; but for\nthe merciful, the peacemakers, and the persecuted they are poured out\nfreely.\n\nWe are all men of like passions, propensities, and exposures. There are\nelements in us all, which might have been perverted, through the\nsuccessive processes of moral deterioration, to the worst of crimes. The\nwretch whom the execration of the thronging crowd pursues to the\nscaffold, is not worse than any one of that multitude might have become\nunder similar circumstances. He is to be condemned indeed, but also\ndeeply to be pitied.\n\nIt does not become the frail and sinful to be vindictive toward even the\nworst criminals. We owe much to the good Providence of God, ordaining\nfor us a lot more favorable to virtue. We all had that within us, that\nmight have been pushed to the same excess. Perhaps we should have fallen\nas he did, with less temptation. Perhaps we _have_ done acts, that, in\nproportion to the temptation or provocation, were less excusable than\nhis great crime. Silent pity and sorrow for the victim should mingle\nwith our detestation of the guilt. Even the pirate who murders in cold\nblood on the high seas, is such a man as you or I might have been.\nOrphanage in childhood, or base and dissolute and abandoned parents; an\nunfriended youth; evil companions; ignorance and want of moral\ncultivation; the temptations of sinful pleasure or grinding poverty;\nfamiliarity with vice; a scorned and blighted name; seared and crushed\naffections; desperate fortunes; these are steps that might have led any\none among us to unfurl upon the high seas the bloody flag of universal\ndefiance; to wage war with our kind; to live the life and die the death\nof the reckless and remorseless free-booter. Many affecting\nrelationships of humanity plead with us to pity him. His head once\nrested on a mother's bosom. He was once the object of sisterly love and\ndomestic endearment. Perhaps his hand, since often red with blood, once\nclasped another little loving hand at the altar. Pity him then; his\nblighted hopes and his crushed heart! It is proper that frail and erring\ncreatures like us should do so; should feel the crime, but feel it as\nweak, tempted, and rescued creatures should. It may be that when God\nweighs men's crimes, He will take into consideration the temptations and\nthe adverse circumstances that led to them, and the opportunities for\nmoral culture of the offender; and it may be that our own offences will\nweigh heavier than we think, and the murderer's lighter than according\nto man's judgment.\n\nOn all accounts, therefore, let the true Mason never forget the solemn\ninjunction, necessary to be observed at almost every moment of a busy\nlife: \"JUDGE NOT, LEST YE YOURSELVES BE JUDGED: FOR WHATSOEVER JUDGMENT\nYE MEASURE UNTO OTHERS, THE SAME SHALL IN TURN BE MEASURED UNTO YOU.\"\nSuch is the lesson taught the Provost and Judge.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nVIII.\n\nINTENDANT OF THE BUILDING.\n\n\nIn this Degree you have been taught the important lesson, that none are\nentitled to advance in the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite, who have\nnot by study and application made themselves familiar with Masonic\nlearning and jurisprudence. The Degrees of this Rite are not for those\nwho are content with the mere work and ceremonies, and do not seek to\nexplore the mines of wisdom that lie buried beneath the surface. You\nstill advance toward the Light, toward that star, blazing in the\ndistance, which is an emblem of the Divine Truth, given by God to the\nfirst men, and preserved amid all the vicissitudes of ages in the\ntraditions and teachings of Masonry. How far you will advance, depends\nupon yourself alone. Here, as everywhere in the world, Darkness\nstruggles with Light, and clouds and shadows intervene between you and\nthe Truth.\n\nWhen you shall have become imbued with the morality of Masonry, with\nwhich you yet are, and for some time will be exclusively occupied,--when\nyou shall have learned to practice all the virtues which it inculcates;\nwhen they become familiar to you as your Household Gods; then will you\nbe prepared to receive its lofty philosophical instruction, and to scale\nthe heights upon whose summit Light and Truth sit enthroned. Step by\nstep men must advance toward Perfection; and each Masonic Degree is\nmeant to be one of those steps. Each is a development of a particular\nduty; and in the present you are taught charity and benevolence; to be\nto your brethren an example of virtue; to correct your own faults; and\nto endeavor to correct those of your brethren.\n\nHere, as in all the Degrees, you meet with the emblems and the names of\nDeity, the true knowledge of whose character and attributes it has ever\nbeen a chief object of Masonry to perpetuate. To appreciate His infinite\ngreatness and goodness, to rely implicitly on His Providence, to revere\nand venerate Him as the Supreme Architect, Creator, and Legislator of\nthe universe, is the first of Masonic duties.\n\nThe Battery of this Degree, and the five circuits which you made around\nthe Lodge, allude to the five points of fellowship, and are intended to\nrecall them vividly to your mind. To go upon a brother's errand or to\nhis relief, even barefoot and upon flinty ground; to remember him in\nyour supplications to the Deity; to clasp him to your heart, and protect\nhim against malice and evil-speaking; to uphold him when about to\nstumble and fall; and to give him prudent, honest, and friendly counsel,\nare duties plainly written upon the pages of God's great code of law,\nand first among the ordinances of Masonry.\n\nThe first sign of the Degree is expressive of the diffidence and\nhumility with which we inquire into the nature and attributes of the\nDeity; the second, of the profound awe and reverence with which we\ncontemplate His glories; and the third, of the sorrow with which we\nreflect upon our insufficient observance of our duties, and our\nimperfect compliance with His statutes.\n\nThe distinguishing property of man is to search for and follow after\ntruth. Therefore, when relaxed from our necessary cares and concerns, we\nthen covet to see, to hear, and to learn somewhat; and we esteem\nknowledge of things, either obscure or wonderful, to be the\nindispensable means of living happily. Truth, Simplicity, and Candor are\nmost agreeable to the nature of mankind. Whatever is virtuous consists\neither in Sagacity, and the Perception of Truth; or in the preservation\nof Human Society, by giving to every man his due, and observing the\nfaith of contracts; or in the greatness and firmness of an elevated and\nunsubdued mind; or in observing order and regularity in all our words\nand in all our actions; in which consist Moderation and Temperance.\n\nMasonry has in all times religiously preserved that enlightened faith\nfrom which flow sublime Devotedness, the sentiment of Fraternity\nfruitful of good works, the spirit of indulgence and peace, of sweet\nhopes and effectual consolations; and inflexibility in the\naccomplishment of the most painful and arduous duties. It has always\npropagated it with ardor and perseverance; and therefore it labors at\nthe present day more zealously than ever. Scarcely a Masonic discourse\nis pronounced, that does not demonstrate the necessity and advantages of\nthis faith, and especially recall the two constitutive principles of\nreligion, that _make_ all religion,--love of God, and love of neighbor.\nMasons carry these principles into the bosoms of their families and of\nsociety. While the Sectarians of former times enfeebled the religious\nspirit, Masonry, forming one great People over the whole globe, and\nmarching under the great banner of Charity and Benevolence, preserves\nthat religious feeling, strengthens it, extends it in its purity and\nsimplicity, as it has always existed in the depths of the human heart,\nas it existed even under the dominion of the most ancient forms of\nworship, but where gross and debasing superstitions forbade its\nrecognition.\n\nA Masonic Lodge should resemble a bee-hive, in which all the members\nwork together with ardor for the common good. Masonry is not made for\ncold souls and narrow minds, that do not comprehend its lofty mission\nand sublime apostolate. Here the anathema against lukewarm souls\napplies. To comfort misfortune, to popularize knowledge, to teach\nwhatever is true and pure in religion and philosophy, to accustom men to\nrespect order and the proprieties of life, to point out the way to\ngenuine happiness, to prepare for that fortunate period, when all the\nfactions of the Human Family, united by the bonds of Toleration and\nFraternity, shall be but one household,--these are labors that may well\nexcite zeal and even enthusiasm.\n\nWe do not now enlarge upon or elaborate these ideas. We but utter them\nto you briefly, as hints, upon which you may at your leisure reflect.\nHereafter, if you continue to advance, they will be unfolded, explained,\nand developed.\n\nMasonry utters no impracticable and extravagant precepts, certain,\nbecause they are so, to be disregarded. It asks of its initiates nothing\nthat it is not possible and even easy for them to perform. Its teachings\nare eminently practical; and its statutes can be obeyed by every just,\nupright, and honest man, no matter what his faith or creed. Its object\nis to attain the greatest practical good, without seeking to make men\nperfect. It does not meddle with the domain of religion, nor inquire\ninto the mysteries of regeneration. It teaches those truths that are\nwritten by the finger of God upon the heart of man, those views of duty\nwhich have been wrought out by the meditations of the studious,\nconfirmed by the allegiance of the good and wise, and stamped as\nsterling by the response they find in every uncorrupted mind. It does\nnot dogmatize, nor vainly imagine dogmatic certainty to be attainable.\n\nMasonry does not occupy itself with crying down this world, with its\nsplendid beauty, its thrilling interests, its glorious works, its noble\nand holy affections; nor exhort us to detach our hearts from this\nearthly life, as empty, fleeting, and unworthy, and fix them upon\nHeaven, as the only sphere deserving the love of the loving or the\nmeditation of the wise. It teaches that man has high duties to perform,\nand a high destiny to fulfill, on this earth; that this world is not\nmerely the portal to another; and that this life, though not our only\none, is an integral one, and the particular one with which we are here\nmeant to be concerned; that the Present is our scene of action, and the\nFuture for speculation and for trust; that man was sent upon the earth\nto live in it, to enjoy it, to study it, to love it, to embellish it, to\nmake the most of it. It is his country, on which he should lavish his\naffections and his efforts. It is here his influences are to operate. It\nis his house, and not a tent; his home, and not _merely_ a school. He is\nsent into this world, not to be constantly hankering after, dreaming of,\npreparing for another; but to do his duty and fulfill his destiny on\nthis earth; to do all that lies in his power to improve it, to render it\na scene of elevated happiness to himself, to those around him, to those\nwho are to come after him. His life here is _part_ of his immortality;\nand this world, also, is among the stars.\n\nAnd thus, Masonry teaches us, will man best prepare for that Future\nwhich he hopes for. The Unseen cannot hold a higher Place in our\naffections than the Seen and the Familiar. The law of our being is Love\nof Life, and its interests and adornments; love of the world in which\nour lot is cast, engrossment with the interests and affections of earth.\nNot a low or sensual love; not love of wealth, of fame, of ease, of\npower, of splendor. Not low worldliness; but the love of Earth as the\ngarden on which the Creator has lavished such miracles of beauty; as the\nhabitation of humanity, the arena of its conflicts, the scene of its\nillimitable progress, the dwelling-place of the wise, the good, the\nactive, the loving, and the dear; the place of opportunity for the\ndevelopment by means of sin and suffering and sorrow, of the noblest\npassions, the loftiest virtues, and the tenderest sympathies.\n\nThey take very unprofitable pains, who endeavor to persuade men that\nthey are obliged wholly to despise this world, and all that is in it,\neven whilst they themselves live here. God hath not taken all that pains\nin forming and framing and furnishing and adorning the world, that they\nwho were made by Him to live in it should despise it. It will be enough,\nif they do not love it too immoderately. It is useless to attempt to\nextinguish all those affections and passions which are and always will\nbe inseparable from human nature. As long as the world lasts, and honor\nand virtue and industry have reputation in the world, there will be\nambition and emulation and appetite in the best and most accomplished\nmen in it; and if there were not, more barbarity and vice and wickedness\nwould cover every nation of the world, than it now suffers under.\n\nThose only who feel a deep interest in, and affection for, this world,\nwill work resolutely for its amelioration. Those who undervalue this\nlife, naturally become querulous and discontented, and lose their\ninterest in the welfare of their fellows. To serve them, and so to do\nour duty as Masons, we must feel that the object is worth the exertion;\nand be content with this world in which God has placed us, until He\npermits us to remove to a better one. He is here with us, and does not\ndeem this an unworthy world.\n\nIt is a serious thing to defame and belie a whole world; to speak of it\nas the abode of a poor, toiling, drudging, ignorant, contemptible race.\nYou would not so discredit your family, your friendly circle, your\nvillage, your city, your country. The world is not a wretched and a\nworthless one; nor is it a misfortune, but a thing to be thankful for,\nto be a man. If life is worthless, so also is immortality.\n\nIn society itself, in that living mechanism of human relationships that\nspreads itself over the world, there is a finer essence within, that as\ntruly moves it, as any power, heavy or expansive, moves the sounding\nmanufactory or the swift-flying car. The man-machine hurries to and fro\nupon the earth, stretches out its hands on every side, to toil, to\nbarter, to unnumbered labors and enterprises; and almost always the\nmotive, that which moves it, is something that takes hold of the\ncomforts, affections, and hopes of social existence. True, the mechanism\noften works with difficulty, drags heavily, grates and screams with\nharsh collision. True, the essence of finer motive, becoming intermixed\nwith baser and coarser ingredients, often clogs, obstructs, jars, and\nderanges the free and noble action of social life. But he is neither\ngrateful nor wise, who looks cynically on all this, and loses the fine\nsense of social good in its perversions. That I can be a _friend_, that\nI can _have_ a friend, though it were but one in the world; that fact,\nthat wondrous good fortune, we may set against all the sufferings of our\nsocial nature. That there is such a place on earth as a _home_, that\nresort and sanctuary of in-walled and shielded joy, we may set against\nall the surrounding desolations of life. That one can be a true, social\nman, can speak his true thoughts, amidst all the janglings of\ncontroversy and the warring of opinions; that fact from within,\noutweighs all facts from without.\n\nIn the visible aspect and action of society, often repulsive and\nannoying, we are apt to lose the due sense of its invisible blessings.\nAs in Nature it is not the coarse and palpable, not soils and rains, nor\neven fields and flowers, that are so beautiful, as the invisible spirit\nof wisdom and beauty that pervades it; so in society, it is the\ninvisible, and therefore unobserved, that is most beautiful.\n\nWhat nerves the arm of toil? If man minded himself alone, he would fling\ndown the spade and axe, and rush to the desert; or roam through the\nworld as a wilderness, and make that world a desert. His home, which he\nsees not, perhaps, but once or twice in a day, is the invisible bond of\nthe world. It is the good, strong, and noble faith that men have in each\nother, which gives the loftiest character to business, trade, and\ncommerce. Fraud occurs in the rush of business; but it is the exception.\nHonesty is the rule; and all the frauds in the world cannot tear the\ngreat bond of human confidence. If they could, commerce would furl its\nsails on every sea, and all the cities of the world would crumble into\nruins. The bare character of a man on the other side of the world, whom\nyou never saw, whom you never will see, you hold good for a bond of\nthousands. The most striking feature of the political state is not\ngovernments, nor constitutions, nor laws, nor enactments, nor the\njudicial power, nor the police; but the universal will of the people to\nbe governed by the common weal. Take off that restraint, and no\ngovernment on earth could stand for an hour.\n\nOf the many teachings of Masonry, one of the most valuable is, that we\nshould not depreciate this life. It does not hold, that when we reflect\non the destiny that awaits man on earth, we ought to bedew his cradle\nwith our tears; but, like the Hebrews, it hails the birth of a child\nwith joy, and holds that his birthday should be a festival.\n\nIt has no sympathy with those who profess to have proved this life, and\nfound it little worth; who have deliberately made up their minds that it\nis far more miserable than happy; because its employments are tedious,\nand their schemes often baffled, their friendships broken, or their\nfriends dead, its pleasures palled, and its honors faded, and its paths\nbeaten, familiar, and dull.\n\nMasonry deems it no mark of great piety toward God to disparage, if not\ndespise, the state that He has ordained for us. It does not absurdly set\nup the claims of another world, not in comparison merely, but in\ncompetition, with the claims of this. It looks upon both as parts of one\nsystem. It holds that a man may make the best of this world and of\nanother at the same time. It does not teach its initiates to think\nbetter of other works and dispensations of God, by thinking meanly of\nthese. It does not look upon life as so much time lost; nor regard its\nemployments as trifles unworthy of immortal beings; nor tell its\nfollowers to fold their arms, as if in disdain of their state and\nspecies; but it looks soberly and cheerfully upon the world, as a\ntheatre of worthy action, of exalted usefulness, and of rational and\ninnocent enjoyment.\n\nIt holds that, with all its evils, life is a blessing. To deny that is\nto destroy the basis of all religion, natural and revealed. The very\nfoundation of all religion is laid on the firm belief that God is good;\nand if this life is an evil and a curse, no such belief can be\nrationally entertained. To level our satire at humanity and human\nexistence, as mean and contemptible; to look on this world as the\nhabitation of a miserable race, fit only for mockery and scorn; to\nconsider this earth as a dungeon or a prison, which has no blessing to\noffer but escape from it, is to extinguish the primal light of faith and\nhope and happiness, to destroy the basis of religion, and Truth's\nfoundation in the goodness of God. If it indeed be so, then it matters\nnot what else is true or not true; speculation is vain and faith is\nvain; and all that belongs to man's highest being is buried in the ruins\nof misanthropy, melancholy, and despair.\n\nOur love of life; the tenacity with which, in sorrow and suffering, we\ncling to it; our attachment to our home, to the spot that gave us birth,\nto any place, however rude, unsightly, or barren, on which the history\nof our years has been written, all show how dear are the ties of kindred\nand society. Misery makes a greater impression upon us than happiness;\nbecause the former is not the habit of our minds. It is a strange,\nunusual guest, and we are more conscious of its presence. Happiness\nlives with us, and we forget it. It does not excite us, nor disturb the\norder and course of our thoughts. A great agony is an epoch in our life.\nWe remember our afflictions, as we do the storm and earthquake, because\nthey are out of the common course of things. They are like disastrous\nevents, recorded because extraordinary; and with whole and unnoticed\nperiods of prosperity between. We mark and signalize the times of\ncalamity; but many happy days and unnoted periods of enjoyment pass,\nthat are unrecorded either in the book of memory, or in the scanty\nannals of our thanksgiving. We are little disposed and less able to call\nup from the dim remembrances of our past years, the peaceful moments,\nthe easy sensations, the bright thoughts, the quiet reveries, the\nthrongs of kind affections in which life flowed on, bearing us almost\nunconsciously upon its bosom, because it bore us calmly and gently.\n\nLife is not only good; but it has been glorious in the experience of\nmillions. The glory of all human virtue clothes it. The splendors of\ndevotedness, beneficence, and heroism are upon it; the crown of a\nthousand martyrdoms is upon its brow. The brightness of the soul shines\nthrough this visible and sometimes darkened life; through all its\nsurrounding cares and labors. The humblest life may feel its connection\nwith its Infinite Source. There is something mighty in the frail inner\nman; something of immortality in this momentary and transient being. The\nmind stretches away, on every side, into infinity. Its thoughts flash\nabroad, far into the boundless, the immeasurable, the infinite; far into\nthe great, dark, teeming future; and become powers and influences in\nother ages. To know its wonderful Author, to bring down wisdom from the\nEternal Stars, to bear upward its homage, gratitude, and love, to the\nRuler of all worlds, to be immortal in our influences projected far into\nthe slow-approaching Future, makes life most worthy and most glorious.\n\nLife is the wonderful creation of God. It is light, sprung from void\ndarkness; power, waked from inertness and impotence; being created from\nnothing; and the contrast may well enkindle wonder and delight. It is a\nrill from the infinite, overflowing goodness; and from the moment when\nit first gushes up into the light, to that when it mingles with the\nocean of Eternity, that Goodness attends it and ministers to it. It is a\ngreat and glorious gift. There is gladness in its infant voices; joy in\nthe buoyant step of its youth; deep satisfaction in its strong maturity;\nand peace in its quiet age. There is good for the good; virtue for the\nfaithful; and victory for the valiant. There is, even in this humble\nlife, an infinity for those whose desires are boundless. There are\nblessings upon its birth; there is hope in its death; and eternity in\nits prospect. Thus earth, which binds many in chains, is to the Mason\nboth the starting-place and goal of immortality. Many it buries in the\nrubbish of dull cares and wearying vanities; but to the Mason it is the\nlofty mount of meditation, where Heaven, and Infinity and Eternity are\nspread before him and around him. To the lofty-minded, the pure, and the\nvirtuous, this life is the beginning of Heaven, and a part of\nimmortality.\n\nGod hath appointed one remedy for all the evils in the world; and that\nis a contented spirit. We may be reconciled to poverty and a low\nfortune, if we suffer contentedness and equanimity to make the\nproportions. No man is poor who doth not think himself so; but if, in a\nfull fortune, with impatience he desires more, he proclaims his wants\nand his beggarly condition. This virtue of contentedness was the sum of\nall the old moral philosophy, and is of most universal use in the whole\ncourse of our lives, and the only instrument to ease the burdens of the\nworld and the enmities of sad chances. It is the great reasonableness of\ncomplying with the Divine Providence, which governs all the world, and\nhath so ordered us in the administration of His great family. It is fit\nthat God should dispense His gifts as He pleases; and if we murmur here,\nwe may, at the next melancholy, be troubled that He did not make us to\nbe angels or stars.\n\nWe ourselves make our fortunes good or bad; and when God lets loose a\nTyrant upon us, or a sickness, or scorn, or a lessened fortune, if we\nfear to die, or know not how to be patient, or are proud, or covetous,\nthen the calamity sits heavy on us. But if we know how to manage a noble\nprinciple, and fear not death so much as a dishonest action, and think\nimpatience a worse evil than a fever, and pride to be the greatest\ndisgrace as well as the greatest folly, and poverty far preferable to\nthe torments of avarice, we may still bear an even mind and smile at the\nreverses of fortune and the ill-nature of Fate.\n\nIf thou hast lost thy land, do not also lose thy constancy; and if thou\nmust die sooner than others, or than thou didst expect, yet do not die\nimpatiently. For no chance is evil to him who is content, and to a man\nnothing is miserable unless it be unreasonable. No man can make another\nman to be his slave, unless that other hath first enslaved himself to\nlife and death, to pleasure or pain, to hope or fear; command these\npassions, and you are freer than the Parthian Kings.\n\nWhen an enemy reproaches us, let us look on him as an impartial relator\nof our faults; for he will tell us truer than our fondest friend will,\nand we may forgive his anger, whilst we make use of the plainness of his\ndeclamation. The ox, when he is weary, treads truest; and if there be\nnothing else in abuse, but that it makes us to walk warily, and tread\nsure for fear of our enemies, that is better than to be flattered into\npride and carelessness.\n\nIf thou fallest from thy employment in public, take sanctuary in an\nhonest retirement, being indifferent to thy gain abroad, or thy safety\nat home. When the north wind blows hard, and it rains sadly, we do not\nsit down in it and cry; but defend ourselves against it with a warm\ngarment, or a good fire and a dry roof. So when the storm of a sad\nmischance beats upon our spirits, we may turn it into something that is\ngood, if we resolve to make it so; and with equanimity and patience may\nshelter ourselves from its inclement pitiless pelting. If it develop our\npatience, and give occasion for heroic endurance, it hath done us good\nenough to recompense us sufficiently for all the temporal affliction;\nfor so a wise man shall overrule his stars; and have a greater influence\nupon his own content, than all the constellations and planets of the\nfirmament.\n\nCompare not thy condition with the few above thee, but to secure thy\ncontent, look upon those thousands with whom thou wouldst not, for any\ninterest, change thy fortune and condition. A soldier must not think\nhimself unprosperous, if he be not successful as Alexander or\nWellington; nor any man deem himself unfortunate that he hath not the\nwealth of Rothschild; but rather let the former rejoice that he is not\nlessened like the many generals who went down horse and man before\nNapoleon, and the latter that he is not the beggar who, bareheaded in\nthe bleak winter wind holds out his tattered hat for charity. There may\nbe many who are richer and more fortunate; but many thousands who are\nvery miserable, compared to thee.\n\nAfter the worst assaults of Fortune, there will be something left to\nus,--a merry countenance, a cheerful spirit, and a good conscience, the\nProvidence of God, our hopes of Heaven, our charity for those who have\ninjured us; perhaps a loving wife, and many friends to pity, and some to\nrelieve us; and light and air, and all the beauties of Nature; we can\nread, discourse, and meditate; and having still these blessings, we\nshould be much in love with sorrow and peevishness to lose them all, and\nprefer to sit down on our little handful of thorns.\n\nEnjoy the blessings of this day, if God sends them, and the evils of it\nbear patiently and calmly; for this day only is ours: we are dead to\nyesterday, and we are not yet born to the morrow. When our fortunes are\nviolently changed, our spirits are unchanged, if they always stood in\nthe suburbs and expectation of sorrows and reverses. The blessings of\nimmunity, safeguard, liberty, and integrity deserve the thanksgiving of\na whole life. We are quit from a thousand calamities, every one of\nwhich, if it were upon us, would make us insensible of our present\nsorrow, and glad to receive it in exchange for that other greater\naffliction.\n\nMeasure your desires by your fortune and condition, not your fortunes by\nyour desires: be governed by your needs, not by your fancy; by nature,\nnot by evil customs and ambitious principles. It is no evil to be poor,\nbut to be vicious and impatient. Is that beast better, that hath two or\nthree mountains to graze on, than the little bee that feeds on dew or\nmanna, and lives upon what falls every morning from the store-houses of\nHeaven, clouds and Providence?\n\nThere are some instances of fortune and a fair condition that cannot\nstand with some others; but if you desire this, you must lose that, and\nunless you be content with one, you lose the comfort of both. If you\ncovet learning, you must have leisure and a retired life; if honors of\nState and political distinctions, you must be ever abroad in public, and\nget experience, and do all men's business, and keep all company, and\nhave no leisure at all. If you will be rich, you must be frugal; if you\nwill be popular, you must be bountiful; if a philosopher, you must\ndespise riches. If you would be famous as Epaminondas, accept also his\npoverty, for it added lustre to his person, and envy to his fortune, and\nhis virtue without it could not have been so excellent. If you would\nhave the reputation of a martyr, you must needs accept his persecution;\nif of a benefactor of the world, the world's injustice; if truly great,\nyou must expect to see the mob prefer lesser men to yourself.\n\nGod esteems it one of His glories, that He brings good out of evil; and\ntherefore it were but reason we should trust Him to govern His own world\nas He pleases; and that we should patiently wait until the change\ncometh, or the reason is discovered.\n\nA Mason's contentedness must by no means be a mere contented\nselfishness, like his who, comfortable himself, is indifferent to the\ndiscomfort of others. There will always be in this world wrongs to\nforgive, suffering to alleviate, sorrow asking for sympathy, necessities\nand destitution to relieve, and ample occasion for the exercise of\nactive charity and beneficence. And he who sits unconcerned amidst it\nall, perhaps enjoying his own comforts and luxuries the more, by\ncontrasting them with the hungry and ragged destitution and shivering\nmisery of his fellows, is not contented, but selfish and unfeeling.\n\nIt is the saddest of all sights upon this earth, that of a man lazy and\nluxurious, or hard and penurious, to whom want appeals in vain, and\nsuffering cries in an unknown tongue. The man whose hasty anger hurries\nhim into violence and crime is not half so unworthy to live. He is the\nfaithless steward, that embezzles what God has given him in trust for\nthe impoverished and suffering among his brethren. The true Mason must\nbe and must have a right to be content with himself; and he can be so\nonly when he lives not for himself alone, but for others also, who need\nhis assistance and have a claim upon his sympathy.\n\n\"Charity is the great channel,\" it has been well said, \"through which\nGod passes all His mercy upon mankind. For we receive absolution of our\nsins in proportion to our forgiving our brother. This is the rule of our\nhopes and the measure of our desire in this world; and on the day of\ndeath and judgment, the great sentence upon mankind shall be transacted\naccording to our alms, which is the other part of charity. God himself\nis love; and every degree of charity that dwells in us is the\nparticipation of the Divine nature.\"\n\nThese principles Masonry reduces to practice. By them it expects you to\nbe hereafter guided and governed. It especially inculcates them upon him\nwho employs the labor of others, forbidding him to discharge them, when\nto want employment is to starve; or to contract for the labor of man or\nwoman at so low a price that by over-exertion they must sell him their\nblood and life at the same time with the labor of their hands.\n\nThese Degrees are also intended to teach _more_ than morals. The symbols\nand ceremonies of Masonry have more than one meaning. They rather\n_conceal_ than _disclose_ the Truth. They _hint_ it only, at least; and\ntheir varied meanings are only to be discovered by reflection and study.\nTruth is not only symbolized by Light, but as the ray of light is\nseparable into rays of different colors, so is truth separable into\nkinds. It is the province of Masonry to teach _all_ truths--not moral\ntruth alone, but political and philosophical, and even religious truth,\nso far as concerns the great and essential principles of each. The\nsphynx was a symbol. To whom has it disclosed its inmost meaning? Who\nknows the symbolic meaning of the pyramids?\n\nYou will hereafter learn who are the chief foes of human liberty\nsymbolized by the assassins of the Master Kh\u016br\u016bm; and in their\nfate you may see foreshadowed that which we earnestly hope will\nhereafter overtake those enemies of humanity, against whom Masonry has\nstruggled so long.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nIX.\n\nELECT OF THE NINE.\n\n[Elu of the Nine.]\n\n\nOriginally created to reward fidelity, obedience, and devotion, this\nDegree was consecrated to bravery, devotedness, and patriotism; and your\nobligation has made known to you the duties which you have assumed. They\nare summed up in the simple mandate, \"Protect the oppressed against the\noppressor; and devote yourself to the honor and interests of your\nCountry.\"\n\nMasonry is not \"speculative,\" nor theoretical, but experimental; not\nsentimental, but practical. It requires self-renunciation and\nself-control. It wears a stern face toward men's vices, and interferes\nwith many of our pursuits and our fancied pleasures. It penetrates\nbeyond the region of vague sentiment; beyond the regions where\nmoralizers and philosophers have woven their fine theories and\nelaborated their beautiful maxims, to the very depths of the heart,\nrebuking our littlenesses and meannesses, arraigning our prejudices and\npassions, and warring against the armies of our vices.\n\nIt wars against the passions that spring out of the bosom of a world of\nfine sentiments, a world of admirable sayings and foul practices, of\ngood maxims and bad deeds; whose darker passions are not only restrained\nby custom and ceremony, but hidden even from itself by a veil of\nbeautiful sentiments. This terrible solecism has existed in all ages.\nRomish sentimentalism has often covered infidelity and vice; Protestant\nstraightness often lauds spirituality and faith, and neglects homely\ntruth, candor, and generosity; and ultra-liberal Rationalistic\nrefinement sometimes soars to heaven in its dreams, and wallows in the\nmire of earth in its deeds.\n\nThere may be a world of Masonic sentiment; and yet a world of little or\nno Masonry. In many minds there is a vague and general sentiment of\nMasonic charity, generosity, and disinterestedness, but no practical,\nactive virtue, nor habitual kindness, self-sacrifice, or liberality.\nMasonry plays about them like the cold though brilliant lights that\nflush and eddy over Northern skies. There are occasional flashes of\ngenerous and manly feeling, transitory splendors, and momentary gleams\nof just and noble thought, and transient coruscations, that light the\nHeaven of their imagination; but there is no vital warmth in the heart;\nand it remains as cold and sterile as the Arctic or Antarctic regions.\nThey _do_ nothing; they gain no victories over themselves; they make no\nprogress; they are still in the Northeast corner of the Lodge, as when\nthey first stood there as Apprentices; and they do not cultivate\nMasonry, with a cultivation, determined, resolute, and regular, like\ntheir cultivation of their estate, profession, or knowledge. Their\nMasonry takes its chance in general and inefficient sentiment,\nmournfully barren of results; in words and formulas and fine\nprofessions.\n\nMost men have _sentiments_, but not _principles_. The former are\ntemporary sensations, the latter permanent and controlling impressions\nof goodness and virtue. The former are general and involuntary, and do\nnot rise to the character of virtue. Every one feels them. They flash up\nspontaneously in every heart. The latter are rules of action, and shape\nand control our conduct; and it is these that Masonry insists upon.\n\nWe approve the right; but pursue the wrong. It is the old story of human\ndeficiency. No one abets or praises injustice, fraud, oppression,\ncovetousness, revenge, envy, or slander; and yet how many who condemn\nthese things, are themselves guilty of them. It is no rare thing for him\nwhose indignation is kindled at a tale of wicked injustice, cruel\noppression, base slander, or misery inflicted by unbridled indulgence;\nwhose anger flames in behalf of the injured and ruined victims of wrong;\nto be in some relation unjust, or oppressive, or envious, or\nself-indulgent, or a careless talker of others. How wonderfully\nindignant the penurious man often is, at the avarice or want of public\nspirit of another!\n\nA great Preacher well said, \"Therefore thou art inexcusable. O Man,\nwhosoever thou art, that judgest; for wherein thou judgest another, thou\ncondemnest thyself: for thou that judgest, doest the same things.\" It is\namazing to see how men can talk of virtue and honor, whose life denies\nboth. It is curious to see with what a marvellous facility many bad men\nquote Scripture. It seems to comfort their evil consciences, to use good\nwords; and to gloze over bad deeds with holy texts, wrested to their\npurpose. Often, the more a man talks about Charity and Toleration, the\nless he has of either; the more he talks about Virtue, the smaller stock\nhe has of it. The mouth speaks out of the abundance of the heart; but\noften the very reverse of what the man practises. And the vicious and\nsensual often express, and in a sense feel, strong disgust at vice and\nsensuality. Hypocrisy is not so common as is imagined.\n\nHere, in the Lodge, virtue and vice are matters of reflection and\nfeeling only. There is little opportunity here, for the practice of\neither; and Masons yield to the argument here, with facility and\nreadiness; because nothing is to follow. It is easy, and safe, here, to\n_feel_ upon these matters. But to-morrow, when they breathe the\natmosphere of worldly gains and competitions, and the passions are again\nstirred at the opportunities of unlawful pleasure, all their fine\nemotions about virtue, all their generous abhorrence of selfishness and\nsensuality, melt away like a morning cloud.\n\nFor the time, their emotions and sentiments are sincere and real. Men\nmay be really, in a certain way, interested in Masonry, while fatally\ndeficient in virtue. It is not always hypocrisy. Men pray most fervently\nand sincerely, and yet are constantly guilty of acts so bad and base, so\nungenerous and unrighteous, that the crimes that crowd the dockets of\nour courts are scarcely worse.\n\nA man may be a good sort of man in general, and yet a very bad man in\nparticular: good in the Lodge and bad in the world; good in public, and\nbad in his family; good at home, and bad on a journey or in a strange\ncity. Many a man earnestly desires to be a good Mason. He says so, and\nis sincere. But if you require him to resist a certain passion, to\nsacrifice a certain indulgence, to control his appetite at a particular\nfeast, or to keep his temper in a dispute, you will find that he does\nnot wish to be a good Mason, _in that particular case_; or, wishing, is\nnot able to resist his worse impulses.\n\nThe _duties_ of life are more than life. The law imposeth it upon every\ncitizen, that he prefer the urgent service of his country before the\nsafety of his life. If a man be commanded, saith a great writer, to\nbring ordnance or munition to relieve any of the King's towns that are\ndistressed, then he cannot for any danger of tempest justify the\nthrowing of them overboard; for there it holdeth which was spoken by the\nRoman, when the same necessity of weather was alleged to hold him from\nembarking: \"_Necesse est ut eam, non ut vivam_:\" it needs that I go: it\nis not necessary I should live.\n\nHow ungratefully he slinks away, who dies, and does nothing to reflect a\nglory to Heaven! How barren a tree he is, who lives, and spreads, and\ncumbers the ground, yet leaves not one seed, not one good work to\ngenerate another after him! All cannot leave alike; yet all may leave\n_something_, answering their proportions and their kinds. Those are dead\nand withered grains of corn, out of which there will not one ear spring.\nHe will hardly find the way to Heaven, who desires to go thither alone.\n\nIndustry is never wholly unfruitful. If it bring not joy with the\nincoming profit, it will yet banish mischief from thy busied gates.\nThere is a kind of good angel waiting upon Diligence that ever carries a\nlaurel in his hand to crown her. How unworthy was that man of the world\nwho never did aught, but only lived and died! That we have liberty to do\nanything, we should account it a gift from the favoring Heavens; that we\nhave minds sometimes inclining us to use that liberty well, is a great\nbounty of the Deity.\n\nMasonry is action, and not inertness. It requires its Initiates to WORK,\nactively and earnestly, for the benefit of their brethren, their\ncountry, and mankind. It is the patron of the oppressed, as it is the\ncomforter and consoler of the unfortunate and wretched. It seems to it a\nworthier honor to be the instrument of advancement and reform, than to\nenjoy all that rank and office and lofty titles can bestow. It is the\nadvocate of the common people in those things which concern the best\ninterests of mankind. It hates insolent power and impudent usurpation.\nIt pities the poor, the sorrowing, the disconsolate; it endeavors to\nraise and improve the ignorant, the sunken, and the degraded.\n\nIts fidelity to its mission will be accurately evidenced, by the extent\nof the efforts it employs, and the means it sets on foot, to improve the\npeople at large and to better their condition; chiefest of which,\nwithin its reach, is to aid in the education of the children of the\npoor. An intelligent people, informed of its rights, will soon come to\nknow its power, and cannot long be oppressed; but if there be not a\nsound and virtuous populace, the elaborate ornaments at the top of the\npyramid of society will be a wretched compensation for the want of\nsolidity at the base. It is never safe for a nation to repose on the lap\nof ignorance: and if there ever was a time when public tranquillity was\ninsured by the absence of knowledge, that season is past. Unthinking\nstupidity cannot sleep, without being appalled by phantoms and shaken by\nterrors. The improvement of the mass of the people is the grand security\nfor popular liberty; in the neglect of which, the politeness,\nrefinement, and knowledge accumulated in the higher orders and wealthier\nclasses will some day perish like dry grass in the hot fire of popular\nfury.\n\nIt is not the mission of Masonry to engage in plots and conspiracies\nagainst the civil government. It is not the fanatical propagandist of\nany creed or theory; nor does it proclaim itself the enemy of kings. It\nis the apostle of liberty, equality, and fraternity; but it is no more\nthe high-priest of republicanism than of constitutional monarchy. It\ncontracts no entangling alliances with any sect of theorists, dreamers,\nor philosophers. It does not know those as its Initiates who assail the\ncivil order and all lawful authority, at the same time that they propose\nto deprive the dying of the consolations of religion. It sits apart from\nall sects and creeds, in its own calm and simple dignity, the same under\nevery government. It is still that which it was in the cradle of the\nhuman race, when no human foot had trodden the soil of Assyria and\nEgypt, and no colonies had crossed the Himalayas into Southern India,\nMedia, or Etruria.\n\nIt gives no countenance to anarchy and licentiousness; and no illusion\nof glory, or extravagant emulation of the ancients inflames it with an\nunnatural thirst for ideal and Utopian liberty. It teaches that in\nrectitude of life and sobriety of habits is the only sure guarantee for\nthe continuance of political freedom; and it is chiefly the soldier of\nthe sanctity of the laws and the rights of conscience.\n\nIt recognizes it as a truth, that necessity, as well as abstract right\nand ideal justice, must have its part in the making of laws, the\nadministration of affairs, and the regulation of relations in society.\nIt sees, indeed, that necessity rules in all the affairs of man. It\nknows that where any man, or any number or race of men, are so imbecile\nof intellect, so degraded, so incapable of self-control, so inferior in\nthe scale of humanity, as to be unfit to be intrusted with the highest\nprerogatives of citizenship, the great law of necessity, for the peace\nand safety of the community and country, requires them to remain under\nthe control of those of larger intellect and superior wisdom. It trusts\nand believes that God will, in his own good time, work out his own great\nand wise purposes; and it is willing to wait, where it does not see its\nown way clear to some certain good.\n\nIt hopes and longs for the day when all the races of men, even the\nlowest, will be elevated, and become fitted for political freedom; when,\nlike all other evils that afflict the earth, pauperism, and bondage or\nabject dependence, shall cease and disappear. But it does not preach\nrevolution to those who are fond of kings, nor rebellion that can end\nonly in disaster and defeat, or in substituting one tyrant for another,\nor a multitude of despots for one.\n\nWherever a people is fit to be free and to govern itself, and generously\nstrives to be so, there go all its sympathies. It detests the tyrant,\nthe lawless oppressor, the military usurper, and him who abuses a lawful\npower. It frowns upon cruelty, and a wanton disregard of the rights of\nhumanity. It abhors the selfish employer, and exerts its influence to\nlighten the burdens which want and dependence impose upon the workman,\nand to foster that humanity and kindness which man owes to even the\npoorest and most unfortunate brother.\n\nIt can never be employed, in any country under Heaven, to teach a\ntoleration for cruelty, to weaken moral hatred for guilt, or to deprave\nand brutalize the human mind. The dread of punishment will never make a\nMason an accomplice in so corrupting his countrymen, and a teacher of\ndepravity and barbarity. If anywhere, as has heretofore happened, a\ntyrant should send a satirist on his tyranny to be convicted and\npunished as a libeller, in a court of justice, a Mason, if a juror in\nsuch a case, though in sight of the scaffold streaming with the blood of\nthe innocent, and within hearing of the clash of the bayonets meant to\noverawe the court, would rescue the intrepid satirist from the tyrant's\nfangs, and send his officers out from the court with defeat and\ndisgrace.\n\nEven if all law and liberty were trampled under the feet of Jacobinical\ndemagogues or a military banditti, and great crimes were perpetrated\nwith a high hand against all who were deservedly the objects of public\nveneration; if the people, overthrowing law, roared like a sea around\nthe courts of justice, and demanded the blood of those who, during the\ntemporary fit of insanity and drunken delirium, had chanced to become\nodious to it, for true words manfully spoken, or unpopular acts bravely\ndone, the Masonic juror, unawed alike by the single or the many-headed\ntyrant, would consult the dictates of duty alone, and stand with a noble\nfirmness between the human tigers and their coveted prey.\n\nThe Mason would much rather pass his life hidden in the recesses of the\ndeepest obscurity, feeding his mind even with the visions and\nimaginations of good deeds and noble actions, than to be placed on the\nmost splendid throne of the universe, tantalized with a denial of the\npractice of all which can make the greatest situation any other than the\ngreatest curse. And if he has been enabled to lend the slightest step to\nany great and laudable designs; if he has had any share in any measure\ngiving quiet to private property and to private conscience, making\nlighter the yoke of poverty and dependence, or relieving deserving men\nfrom oppression; if he has aided in securing to his countrymen that best\npossession, peace; if he has joined in reconciling the different\nsections of his own country to each other, and the people to the\ngovernment of their own creating; and in teaching the citizen to look\nfor his protection to the laws of his country, and for his comfort to\nthe good-will of his countrymen; if he has thus taken his part with the\nbest of men in the best of their actions, he may well shut the book,\neven if he might wish to read a page or two more. It is enough for his\nmeasure. He has not lived in vain.\n\nMasonry teaches that all power is delegated for the good, and not for\nthe injury of the People; and that, when it is perverted from the\noriginal purpose, the compact is broken, and the right ought to be\nresumed; that resistance to power usurped is not merely a duty which man\nowes to himself and to his neighbor, but a duty which he owes to his\nGod, in asserting and maintaining the rank which He gave him in the\ncreation. This principle neither the rudeness of ignorance can stifle\nnor the enervation of refinement extinguish. It makes it base for a man\nto suffer when he ought to act; and, tending to preserve to him the\noriginal destinations of Providence, spurns at the arrogant assumptions\nof Tyrants and vindicates the independent quality of the race of which\nwe are a part.\n\nThe wise and well-informed Mason will not fail to be the votary of\nLiberty and Justice. He will be ready to exert himself in their defence,\nwherever they exist. It cannot be a matter of indifference to him when\nhis own liberty and that of other men, with whose merits and capacities\nhe is acquainted, are involved in the event of the struggle to be made;\nbut his attachment will be to the cause, as the cause of man; and not\nmerely to the country. Wherever there is a people that understands the\nvalue of political justice, and is prepared to assert it, that is his\ncountry; wherever he can most contribute to the diffusion of these\nprinciples and the real happiness of mankind, that is his country. Nor\ndoes he desire for any country any other benefit than justice.\n\nThe true Mason identifies the honor of his country with his own. Nothing\nmore conduces to the beauty and glory of one's country than the\npreservation against all enemies of its civil and religious liberty. The\nworld will never willingly let die the names of those patriots who in\nher different ages have received upon their own breasts the blows aimed\nby insolent enemies at the bosom of their country.\n\nBut also it conduces, and in no small measure, to the beauty and glory\nof one's country, that justice should always be administered there to\nall alike, and neither denied, sold, nor delayed to any one; that the\ninterest of the poor should be looked to, and none starve or be\nhouseless, or clamor in vain for work; that the child and the feeble\nwoman should not be overworked, or even the apprentice or slave be\nstinted of food or overtasked or mercilessly scourged; and that God's\ngreat laws of mercy, humanity, and compassion should be everywhere\nenforced, not only by the statutes, but also by the power of public\nopinion. And he who labors, often against reproach and obloquy, and\noftener against indifference and apathy, to bring about that fortunate\ncondition of things when that great code of divine law shall be\neverywhere and punctually obeyed, is no less a patriot than he who bares\nhis bosom to the hostile steel in the ranks of his country's soldiery.\n\nFor fortitude is not only seen resplendent on the field of battle and\namid the clash of arms, but he displays its energy under every\ndifficulty and against every assailant. He who wars against cruelty,\noppression, and hoary abuses, fights for his country's honor, which\nthese things soil; and her honor is as important as her existence.\nOften, indeed, the warfare against those abuses which disgrace one's\ncountry is quite as hazardous and more discouraging than that against\nher enemies in the field; and merits equal, if not greater reward.\n\nFor those Greeks and Romans who are the objects of our admiration\nemployed hardly any other virtue in the extirpation of tyrants, than\nthat love of liberty, which made them prompt in seizing the sword, and\ngave them strength to use it. With facility they accomplish the\nundertaking, amid the general shout of praise and joy; nor did they\nengage in the attempt so much as an enterprise of perilous and doubtful\nissue, as a contest the most glorious in which virtue could be\nsignalized; which infallibly led to present recompense; which bound\ntheir brows with wreaths of laurel, and consigned their memories to\nimmortal fame.\n\nBut he who assails hoary abuses, regarded perhaps with a superstitious\nreverence, and around which old laws stand as ramparts and bastions to\ndefend them; who denounces acts of cruelty and outrage on humanity which\nmake every perpetrator thereof his personal enemy, and perhaps make him\nlooked upon with suspicion by the people among whom he lives, as the\nassailant of an established order of things of which he assails only the\nabuses, and of laws of which he attacks only the violations,--he can\nscarcely look for present recompense, nor that his living brows will be\nwreathed with laurel. And if, contending against a dark array of\nlong-received opinions, superstitions, obloquy, and fears, which most\nmen dread more than they do an army terrible with banners, the Mason\novercomes, and emerges from the contest victorious; or if he does _not_\nconquer, but is borne down and swept away by the mighty current of\nprejudice, passion, and interest; in either case, the loftiness of\nspirit which he displays merits for him more than a mediocrity of fame.\n\nHe has already lived too long who has survived the ruin of his country;\nand he who can enjoy life after such an event deserves not to have lived\nat all. Nor does he any more deserve to live who looks contentedly upon\nabuses that disgrace, and cruelties that dishonor, and scenes of misery\nand destitution and brutalization that disfigure his country; or sordid\nmeanness and ignoble revenges that make her a by-word and a scoff among\nall generous nations; and does not endeavor to remedy or prevent either.\n\nNot often is a country at war; nor can every one be allowed the\nprivilege of offering his heart to the enemy's bullets. But in these\npatriotic labors of peace, in preventing, remedying, and reforming\nevils, oppressions, wrongs, cruelties, and outrages, every Mason can\nunite; and every one can effect something, and share the honor and glory\nof the result.\n\nFor the cardinal names in the history of the human mind are few and\neasily to be counted up; but thousands and tens of thousands spend their\ndays in the preparations which are to speed the predestined change, in\ngathering and amassing the materials which are to kindle and give light\nand warmth, when the fire from Heaven shall have descended on them.\nNumberless are the sutlers and pioneers, the engineers and artisans, who\nattend the march of intellect. Many move forward in detachments, and\nlevel the way over which the chariot is to pass, and cut down the\nobstacles that would impede its progress; and these too have their\nreward. If they labor diligently and faithfully in their calling, not\nonly will they enjoy that calm contentment which diligence in the\nlowliest task never fails to win; not only will the sweat of their brows\nbe sweet, and the sweetener of the rest that follows; but, when the\nvictory is at last achieved, they will come in for a share in the glory;\neven as the meanest soldier who fought at Marathon or at King's Mountain\nbecame a sharer in the glory of those saving days; and within his own\nhousehold circle, the approbation of which approaches the nearest to\nthat of an approving conscience, was looked upon as the representative\nof all his brother-heroes; and could tell such tales as made the tear\nglisten on the cheek of his wife, and lit up his boy's eyes with an\nunwonted sparkling eagerness. Or, if he fell in the fight, and his place\nby the fireside and at the table at home was thereafter vacant, that\nplace was sacred; and he was often talked of there in the long winter\nevenings; and his family, was deemed fortunate in the neighborhood,\nbecause it had had a hero in it, who had fallen in defence of his\ncountry.\n\nRemember that life's length is not measured by its hours and days, but\nby that which we have done therein for our country and kind. A useless\nlife is short, if it last a century; but that of Alexander was long as\nthe life of the oak, though he died at thirty-five. We may do much in a\nfew years, and we may do nothing in a lifetime. If we but eat and drink\nand sleep, and let everything go on around us as it pleases; or if we\nlive but to amass wealth or gain office or wear titles, we might as well\nnot have lived at all; nor have we any right to expect immortality.\n\nForget not, therefore, to what you have devoted yourself in this Degree:\ndefend weakness against strength, the friendless against the great, the\noppressed against the oppressor! Be ever vigilant and watchful of the\ninterests and honor of your country! and may the Grand Architect of the\nUniverse give you that strength and wisdom which shall enable you well\nand faithfully to perform these high duties!\n\n[Illustration]\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nX.\n\n\nILLUSTRIOUS ELECT OF THE FIFTEEN.\n\n[Elu of the Fifteen.]\n\n\nThis Degree is devoted to the same objects as those of the Elu of Nine;\nand also to the cause of Toleration and Liberality against Fanaticism\nand Persecution, political and religious; and to that of Education,\nInstruction, and Enlightenment against Error, Barbarism, and Ignorance.\nTo these objects you have irrevocably and forever devoted your hand,\nyour heart, and your intellect; and whenever in your presence a Chapter\nof this Degree is opened, you will be most solemnly reminded of your\nvows here taken at the altar.\n\nToleration, holding that every other man has the same right to his\nopinion and faith that we have to ours; and liberality, holding that as\nno human being can with certainty say, in the clash and conflict of\nhostile faiths and creeds, what is truth, or that _he_ is _surely_ in\npossession of it, so every one should feel that it is quite possible\nthat another equally honest and sincere with himself, and yet holding\nthe contrary opinion, may himself be in possession of the truth, and\nthat whatever one firmly and conscientiously believes, _is_ truth, _to\nhim_--these are the mortal enemies of that fanaticism which persecutes\nfor opinion's sake, and initiates crusades against whatever it, in its\nimaginary holiness, deems to be contrary to the law of God or verity of\ndogma. And education, instruction, and enlightenment are the most\ncertain means by which fanaticism and intolerance can be rendered\npowerless.\n\nNo true Mason scoffs at honest convictions and an ardent zeal in the\ncause of what one believes to be truth and justice. But he does\nabsolutely deny the right of any man to assume the prerogative of Deity,\nand condemn another's faith and opinions as deserving to be punished\nbecause heretical. Nor does he approve the course of those who endanger\nthe peace and quiet of great nations, and the best interest of their own\nrace by indulging in a chimerical and visionary philanthropy--a luxury\nwhich chiefly consists in drawing their robes around them to avoid\ncontact with their fellows, and proclaiming themselves holier than they.\n\nFor he knows that such follies are often more calamitous than the\nambition of kings; and that intolerance and bigotry have been infinitely\ngreater curses to mankind than ignorance and error. Better _any_ error\nthan persecution! Better _any_ opinion than the thumb-screw, the rack,\nand the stake! And he knows also how unspeakably absurd it is, for a\ncreature to whom himself and everything around him are mysteries, to\ntorture and slay others, because they cannot think as he does in regard\nto the profoundest of those mysteries, to understand which is utterly\nbeyond the comprehension of either the persecutor or the persecuted.\n\nMasonry is not a religion. He who makes of it a religious belief,\nfalsifies and denaturalizes it. The Brahmin, the Jew, the Mahometan, the\nCatholic, the Protestant, each professing his peculiar religion,\nsanctioned by the laws, by time, and by climate, must needs retain it,\nand cannot have two religions; for the social and sacred laws adapted to\nthe usages, manners, and prejudices of particular countries, are the\nwork of men.\n\nBut Masonry teaches, and has preserved in their purity, the cardinal\ntenets of the old primitive faith, which underlie and are the foundation\nof all religions. All that ever existed have had a basis of truth; and\nall have overlaid that truth with errors. The primitive truths taught by\nthe Redeemer were sooner corrupted, and intermingled and alloyed with\nfictions than when taught to the first of our race. Masonry is the\nuniversal morality which is suitable to the inhabitants of every clime,\nto the man of every creed. It has taught no doctrines, except those\ntruths that tend directly to the well-being of man; and those who have\nattempted to direct it toward useless vengeance, political ends, and\nJesuitism, have merely perverted it to purposes foreign to its pure\nspirit and real nature.\n\nMankind outgrows the sacrifices and the mythologies of the childhood of\nthe world. Yet it is easy for human indolence to linger near these\nhelps, and refuse to pass further on. So the unadventurous Nomad in the\nTartarian wild keeps his flock in the same close-cropped circle where\nthey first learned to browse, while the progressive man roves ever forth\n\"to fresh fields and pastures new.\"\n\nThe latter is the true Mason; and the best and indeed the only good\nMason is he who with the power of business does the work of life; the\nupright mechanic, merchant, or farmer, the man with the power of\nthought, of justice, or of love, he whose whole life is one great act of\nperformance of Masonic duty. The natural use of the strength of a strong\nman or the wisdom of a wise one, is to do the _work_ of a strong man or\na wise one. The natural work of Masonry is practical life; the use of\nall the faculties in their proper spheres, and for their natural\nfunction. Love of Truth, justice, and generosity as attributes of God,\nmust appear in a life marked by these qualities; that is the only\neffectual ordinance of Masonry. A profession of one's convictions,\njoining the Order, assuming the obligations, assisting at the\nceremonies, are of the same value in science as in Masonry; the natural\nform of Masonry is goodness, morality, living a true, just,\naffectionate, self-faithful life, from the motive of a good man. It is\nloyal obedience to God's law.\n\nThe good Mason does the good thing which comes in his way, and because\nit comes in his way; from a love of duty, and not merely because a law,\nenacted by man or God, commands his _will_ to do it. He is true to his\nmind, his conscience, heart, and soul, and feels small temptation to do\nto others what he would not wish to receive from them. He will deny\nhimself for the sake of his brother near at hand. His _desire_ attracts\nin the line of his _duty_, both being in conjunction. Not in vain does\nthe poor or the oppressed look up to him. You find such men in all\nChristian sects, Protestant and Catholic, in all the great religious\nparties of the civilized world, among Buddhists, Mahometans, and Jews.\nThey are kind fathers, generous citizens, unimpeachable in their\nbusiness, beautiful in their daily lives. You see their Masonry in their\nwork and in their play. It appears in all the forms of their activity,\nindividual, domestic, social, ecclesiastical, or political. True Masonry\nwithin must be morality without. It must become _eminent_ morality,\nwhich is philanthropy. The true Mason loves not only his kindred and his\ncountry, but all mankind; not only the good, but also the evil, among\nhis brethren. He has more goodness than the channels of his daily life\nwill hold. It runs over the banks, to water and to feed a thousand\nthirsty plants. Not content with the duty that lies along his track, he\ngoes out to seek it; not only _willing_, he has a salient _longing_ to\ndo good, to spread his truth, his justice, his generosity, his Masonry\nover all the world. His daily life is a profession of his Masonry,\npublished in perpetual good-will to men. He _can_ not be a persecutor.\n\nNot more naturally does the beaver build or the mocking-bird sing his\nown wild, gushing melody, than the true Mason lives in this beautiful\noutward life. So from the perennial spring swells forth the stream, to\nquicken the meadow with new access of green, and perfect beauty bursting\ninto bloom. Thus Masonry does the work it was meant to do. The Mason\ndoes not sigh and weep, and make grimaces. He lives right on. If his\nlife is, as whose is not, marked with errors, and with sins, he ploughs\nover the barren spot with his remorse, sows with new seed, and the old\ndesert blossoms like a rose. He is not confined to set forms of thought,\nof action, or of feeling. He accepts what his mind regards as true, what\nhis conscience decides is right, what his heart deems generous and\nnoble; and all else he puts far from him. Though the ancient and the\nhonorable of the Earth bid him bow down to them, his stubborn knees bend\nonly at the bidding of his manly soul. His Masonry is his freedom before\nGod, not his bondage unto men. His mind acts after the universal law of\nthe intellect, his conscience according to the universal moral law, his\naffections and his soul after the universal law of each, and so he is\nstrong with the strength of God, in this four-fold way communicating\nwith Him.\n\nThe old theologies, the philosophies of religion of ancient times, will\nnot suffice us now. The duties of life are to be done; we are to do\nthem, consciously obedient to the law of God, not atheistically, loving\nonly our selfish gain. There are sins of trade to be corrected.\nEverywhere morality and philanthropy are needed. There are errors to be\nmade way with, and their place supplied with new truths, radiant with\nthe glories of Heaven. There are great wrongs and evils, in Church and\nState, in domestic, social, and public life, to be righted and outgrown.\nMasonry cannot in our age forsake the broad way of life. She must\njourney on in the open street, appear in the crowded square, and teach\nmen by her deeds, her life more eloquent than any lips.\n\nThis Degree is chiefly devoted to TOLERATION; and it inculcates in the\nstrongest manner that great leading idea of the Ancient Art, that a\nbelief in the one True God, and a moral and virtuous life, constitute\nthe only religious requisites needed to enable a man to be a Mason.\n\nMasonry has ever the most vivid remembrance of the terrible and\nartificial torments that were used to put down new forms of religion or\nextinguish the old. It sees with the eye of memory the ruthless\nextermination of all the people of all sexes and ages, because it was\ntheir misfortune not to know the God of the Hebrews, or to worship Him\nunder the wrong name, by the savage troops of Moses and Joshua. It sees\nthe thumb-screws and the racks, the whip, the gallows, and the stake,\nthe victims of Diocletian and Alva, the miserable Covenanters, the\nNon-Conformists, Servetus burned, and the unoffending Quaker hung. It\nsees Cranmer hold his arm, now no longer erring, in the flame until the\nhand drops off in the consuming heat. It sees the persecutions of Peter\nand Paul, the martyrdom of Stephen, the trials of Ignatius, Polycarp,\nJustin, and Irenaeus; and then in turn the sufferings of the wretched\nPagans under the Christian Emperors, as of the Papists in Ireland and\nunder Elizabeth and the bloated Henry. The Roman Virgin naked before the\nhungry lions; young Margaret Graham tied to a stake at low-water mark,\nand there left to drown, singing hymns to God until the savage waters\nbroke over her head; and all that in all ages have suffered by hunger\nand nakedness, peril and prison, the rack, the stake, and the sword,--it\nsees them all, and shudders at the long roll of human atrocities. And it\nsees also the oppression still practised in the name of religion--men\nshot in a Christian jail in Christian Italy for reading the Christian\nBible; in almost every Christian State, laws forbidding freedom of\nspeech on matters relating to Christianity; and the gallows reaching its\narm over the pulpit.\n\nThe fires of Moloch in Syria, the harsh mutilations in the name of\nAstarte, Cybele, Jehovah; the barbarities of imperial Pagan Torturers;\nthe still grosser torments which Roman-Gothic Christians in Italy and\nSpain heaped on their brother-men; the fiendish cruelties to which\nSwitzerland, France, the Netherlands, England, Scotland, Ireland,\nAmerica, have been witnesses, are none too powerful to warn man of the\nunspeakable evils which follow from mistakes and errors in the matter of\nreligion, and especially from investing the God of Love with the cruel\nand vindictive passions of erring humanity, and making blood to have a\nsweet savor in his nostrils, and groans of agony to be delicious to his\nears.\n\nMan never had the right to usurp the unexercised prerogative of God, and\ncondemn and punish another for his belief. Born in a Protestant land, we\nare of that faith. If we had opened our eyes to the light under the\nshadows of St. Peter's at Rome, we should have been devout Catholics;\nborn in the Jewish quarter of Aleppo, we should have contemned Christ as\nan imposter; in Constantinople, we should have cried \"_Allah il Allah_,\nGod is great and Mahomet is his prophet!\" Birth, place, and education\ngive us our faith. Few believe in any religion because they have\nexamined the evidences of its authenticity, and made up a formal\njudgment, upon weighing the testimony. Not one man in ten thousand knows\nanything about the _proofs_ of his faith. We believe what we are taught;\nand those are most fanatical who know least of the evidences on which\ntheir creed is based. Facts and testimony are not, except in very rare\ninstances, the ground-work of faith. It is an imperative law of God's\nEconomy, unyielding and inflexible as Himself, that man shall accept\nwithout question the belief of those among whom he is born and reared;\nthe faith so made a part of his nature resists all evidence to the\ncontrary; and he will disbelieve even the evidence of his own senses,\nrather than yield up the religious belief which has grown up in him,\nflesh of his flesh and bone of his bone.\n\nWhat is truth to _me_ is not truth to _another_. The same arguments and\nevidences that convince one mind make no impression on another. This\ndifference is in men at their birth. No man is entitled positively to\nassert that _he_ is right, where other men, equally intelligent and\nequally well-informed, hold directly the opposite opinion. Each thinks\nit impossible for the other to be sincere, and each, as to that, is\nequally in error. \"_What is truth_?\" was a profound question, the most\nsuggestive one ever put to man. Many beliefs of former and present times\nseem incomprehensible. They startle us with a new glimpse into the human\nsoul, that mysterious thing, more mysterious the more we note its\nworkings. Here is a man superior to myself in intellect and learning;\nand yet he sincerely believes what seems to me too absurd to merit\nconfutation; and I cannot conceive, and sincerely do not believe, that\nhe is both sane and honest. _And yet he is both_. His reason is as\nperfect as mine, and he is as honest as I.\n\nThe fancies of a lunatic are realities, _to him_. Our dreams are\nrealities _while they last_; and, in the Past, no more _un_real than\nwhat we have acted in our waking hours. No man can say that he hath as\nsure possession of the truth as of a chattel. When men entertain\nopinions diametrically opposed to each other, and each is honest, who\nshall decide which hath the Truth; and how can either say with certainty\nthat _he_ hath it? We know not what _is_ the truth. That we ourselves\nbelieve and feel absolutely certain that our own belief is true, is in\nreality not the slightest proof of the fact, seem it never so certain\nand incapable of doubt to us. No man is responsible for the rightness of\nhis faith; but only for the _up_rightness of it.\n\nTherefore no man hath or ever had a right to persecute another for his\nbelief; for there cannot be two antagonistic rights; and if one can\npersecute another, because he himself is satisfied that the belief of\nthat other is erroneous, the other has, for the same reason, equally as\ncertain a right to persecute him.\n\nThe truth comes to us tinged and colored with our prejudices and our\npreconceptions, which are as old as ourselves, and strong with a divine\nforce. It comes to us as the image of a rod comes to us through the\nwater, bent and distorted. An argument sinks into and convinces the mind\nof one man, while from that of another it rebounds like a ball of ivory\ndropped on marble. It is no merit in a man to have a particular faith,\nexcellent and sound and philosophic as it may be, when he imbibed it\nwith his mother's milk. It is no more a merit than his prejudices and\nhis passions.\n\nThe sincere Moslem has as much right to persecute us, as we to persecute\nhim; and therefore Masonry wisely requires no more than a belief in One\nGreat All-Powerful Deity, the Father and Preserver of the Universe.\nTherefore it is she teaches her votaries that toleration is one of the\nchief duties of every good Mason, a component part of that charity\nwithout which we are mere hollow images of true Masons, mere sounding\nbrass and tinkling cymbals.\n\nNo evil hath so afflicted the world as intolerance of religious opinion.\nThe human beings it has slain in various ways, if once and together\nbrought to life, would make a nation of people; left to live and\nincrease, would have doubled the population of the civilized portion of\nthe globe; among which civilized portion it chiefly is that religious\nwars are waged. The treasure and the human labor thus lost would have\nmade the earth a garden, in which, but for his evil passions, man might\nnow be as happy as in Eden.\n\nNo man truly obeys the Masonic law who _merely_ tolerates those whose\nreligious opinions are opposed to his own. Every man's opinions are his\nown private property, and the rights of all men to maintain each his own\nare perfectly equal. Merely to _tolerate_, to _bear with_ an opposing\nopinion, is to assume it to be heretical; and assert the _right_ to\npersecute, if we would; and claim our _toleration_ of it as a merit. The\nMason's creed goes further than that. No man, it holds, has any right in\nany way to interfere with the religious belief of another. It holds that\neach man is absolutely sovereign as to his own belief, and that belief\nis a matter absolutely foreign to all who do not entertain the same\nbelief; and that, if there were any right of persecution at all, it\nwould in all cases be a mutual right; because one party has the same\nright as the other to sit as judge in his own case; and God is the only\nmagistrate that can rightfully decide between them. To that great Judge,\nMasonry refers the matter; and opening wide its portals, it invites to\nenter there and live in peace and harmony, the Protestant, the Catholic,\nthe Jew, the Moslem; every man who will lead a truly virtuous and moral\nlife, love his brethren, minister to the sick and distressed, and\nbelieve in the ONE, _All-Powerful, All-Wise, everywhere-Present_ GOD,\n_Architect, Creator_, and _Preserver of all things_, by whose universal\nlaw of Harmony ever rolls on this universe, the great, vast, infinite\ncircle of successive Death and Life:--to whose INEFFABLE NAME let all\ntrue Masons pay profoundest homage! for whose thousand blessings poured\nupon us, let us feel the sincerest gratitude, now, henceforth, and\nforever!\n\nWe may well be tolerant of each other's creed; for in every faith there\nare excellent moral precepts. Far in the South of Asia, Zoroaster taught\nthis doctrine:\n\n     \"On commencing a journey. The Faithful should turn his thoughts\n     toward Ormuzd, and confess him, in the purity of his heart, to be\n     King of the World; he should love him, do him homage, and serve\n     him. He must be upright and charitable, despise the pleasures of\n     the body, and avoid pride and haughtiness, and vice in all its\n     forms, and especially falsehood, one of the basest sins of which,\n     man can be guilty. He must forget injuries and not avenge himself.\n     He must honor the memory of his parents and relatives. At night,\n     before retiring to sleep, he should rigorously examine his\n     conscience, and repent of the faults which weakness or ill-fortune\n     had caused him to commit.\"\n\nHe was required to pray for strength to persevere in the Good, and to\nobtain forgiveness for his errors. It was his duty to confess his faults\nto a Magus, or to a layman renowned for his virtues, or to the Sun.\nFasting and maceration were prohibited; and, on the contrary, it was his\nduty suitably to nourish the body and to maintain its vigor, that his\nsoul might be strong to resist the Genius of Darkness; that he might\nmore attentively read the Divine Word, and have more courage to perform\nnoble deeds.\n\nAnd in the North of Europe the Druids taught devotion to friends,\nindulgence for reciprocal wrongs, love of deserved praise, prudence,\nhumanity, hospitality, respect for old age, disregard of the future,\ntemperance, contempt of death, and a chivalrous deference to woman.\nListen to these maxims from the Hava Maal, or Sublime Book of Odin:\n\n     \"If thou hast a friend, visit him often; the path will grow over\n     with grass, and the trees soon cover it, if thou dost not\n     constantly walk upon it. He is a faithful friend, who, having but\n     two loaves, gives his friend one. Be never first to break with thy\n     friend; sorrow wrings the heart of him who has no one save himself\n     with whom to take counsel. There is no virtuous man who has not\n     some vice, no bad man who has not some virtue. Happy he who obtains\n     the praise and good-will of men; for all that depends on the will\n     of another is hazardous and uncertain. Riches flit away in the\n     twinkling of an eye; they are the most inconstant of friends;\n     flocks and herds perish, parents die, friends are not immortal,\n     thou thyself diest; I know but one thing that doth not die, the\n     judgment that is passed upon the dead. Be humane toward those whom\n     thou meetest on the road. If the guest that cometh to thy house is\n     a-cold, give him fire; the man who has journeyed over the mountains\n     needs food and dry garments. Mock not at the aged; for words full\n     of sense come often from the wrinkles of age. Be moderately wise,\n     and not over-prudent. Let no one seek to know his destiny, if he\n     would sleep tranquilly. There is no malady more cruel than to be\n     discontented with our lot. The glutton eats his own death; and the\n     wise man laughs at the fool's greediness. Nothing is more injurious\n     to the young than excessive drinking; the more one drinks the more\n     he loses his reason; the bird of forgetfulness sings before those\n     who intoxicate themselves, and wiles away their souls. Man devoid\n     of sense believes he will live always if he avoids war; but, if the\n     lances spare him, old age will give him no quarter. Better live\n     well than live long. When a man lights a fire in his house, death\n     comes before it goes out.\"\n\nAnd thus said the Indian books:\n\n     \"Honor thy father and mother. Never forget the benefits thou hast\n     received. Learn while thou art young. Be submissive to the laws of\n     thy country. Seek the company of virtuous men. Speak not of God but\n     with respect. Live on good terms with thy fellow-citizens. Remain\n     in thy proper place. Speak ill of no one. Mock at the bodily\n     infirmities of none. Pursue not unrelentingly a conquered enemy.\n     Strive to acquire a good reputation. Take counsel with wise men.\n     The more one learns, the more he acquires the faculty of learning.\n     Knowledge is the most permanent wealth. As well be dumb as\n     ignorant. The true use of knowledge is to distinguish good from\n     evil. Be not a subject of shame to thy parents. What one learns in\n     youth endures like the engraving upon a rock. He is wise who knows\n     himself. Let thy books be thy best friends. When thou attainest an\n     hundred years, cease to learn. Wisdom is solidly planted, even on\n     the shifting ocean. Deceive no one, not even thine enemy. Wisdom is\n     a treasure that everywhere commands its value. Speak mildly, even\n     to the poor. It is sweeter to forgive than to take vengeance.\n     Gaming and quarrels lead to misery. There is no true merit without\n     the practice of virtue. To honor our mother is the most fitting\n     homage we can pay the Divinity. There is no tranquil sleep without\n     a clear conscience. He badly understands his interest who breaks\n     his word.\"\n\nTwenty-four centuries ago these were the Chinese Ethics:\n\n     \"The Philosopher [Confucius] said, 'SAN! my doctrine is simple, and\n     easy to be understood.' THSENG-TSEU replied, 'that is certain.' The\n     Philosopher having gone out, the disciples asked what their master\n     had meant to say. THSENG-TSEU responded, 'The doctrine of our\n     Master consists solely in being upright of heart, and loving our\n     neighbor as we love ourself.'\"\n\nAbout a Century later, the Hebrew law said,\n\n     \"If any man hate his neighbor ... then shall ye do unto him, as he\n     had thought to do unto his brother ... Better is a neighbor that\n     is near, than a brother afar off ... Thou shalt love thy neighbor\n     as thyself.\"\n\nIn the same fifth century before Christ, SOCRATES the Grecian said,\n\"Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.\"\n\nThree generations earlier, ZOROASTER had said to the Persians:\n\n     \"Offer up thy grateful prayers to the Lord, the most just and pure\n     Ormuzd, the supreme and adorable God, who thus declared to his\n     Prophet Zerdusht: 'Hold it not meet to do unto others what thou\n     wouldst not desire done unto thyself; do that unto the people,\n     which, when done to thyself, is not disagreeable unto thee.'\"\n\nThe same doctrine had been long taught in the schools of Babylon,\nAlexandria, and Jerusalem. A Pagan declared to the Pharisee HILLEL, that\nhe was ready to embrace the Jewish religion, if he could make known to\nhim in a few words a summary of the whole law of Moses. \"That which thou\nlikest not done to thyself,\" said Hillel, \"do it not unto thy neighbor.\nTherein is all the law: the rest is nothing but the commentary upon it.\"\n\n     \"Nothing is more natural,\" said CONFUCIUS, \"nothing more simple,\n     than the principles of that morality which I endeavor, by salutary\n     maxims, to inculcate in you ... It is humanity; which is to say,\n     that universal charity among all of our species, without\n     distinction. It is uprightness; that is, that rectitude of spirit\n     and of heart, which makes one seek for truth in everything, and\n     desire it, without deceiving one's self or others. It is, finally,\n     sincerity or good faith; which is to say, that frankness, that\n     openness of heart, tempered by self-reliance, which excludes all\n     feints and all disguising, as much in speech as in action.\"\n\nTo diffuse useful information, to further intellectual refinement, sure\nforerunner of moral improvement, to hasten the coming of the great day,\nwhen the dawn of general knowledge shall chase away the lazy, lingering\nmists of ignorance and error, even from the base of the great social\npyramid, is indeed a high calling, in which the most splendid talents\nand consummate virtue may well press onward, eager to bear a part. From\nthe Masonic ranks ought to go forth those whose genius and not their\nancestry ennoble them, to open to all ranks the temple of science, and\nby their own example to make the humblest men emulous to climb steps no\nlonger inaccessible, and enter the unfolded gates burning in the sun.\n\nThe highest intellectual cultivation is perfectly compatible with the\ndaily cares and toils of working-men. A keen relish for the most sublime\ntruths of science belongs alike to every class of mankind. And, as\nphilosophy was taught in the sacred groves of Athens, and under the\nPortico, and in the old Temples of Egypt and India, so in our Lodges\nought Knowledge to be dispensed, the Sciences taught, and the Lectures\nbecome like the teachings of Socrates and Plato, of Agassiz and Cousin.\n\nReal knowledge never permitted either turbulence or unbelief; but its\nprogress is the forerunner of liberality and enlightened toleration.\nWhoso dreads these may well tremble; for he may be well assured that\ntheir day is at length come, and must put to speedy flight the evil\nspirits of tyranny and persecution, which haunted the long night now\ngone down the sky. And it is to be hoped that the time will soon arrive,\nwhen, as men will no longer suffer themselves to be led blindfolded in\nignorance, so will they no more yield to the vile principle of judging\nand treating their fellow-creatures, not according to the intrinsic\nmerit of their _actions_, but according to the accidental and\ninvoluntary coincidence of their _opinions_.\n\nWhenever we come to treat with entire respect those who conscientiously\ndiffer from ourselves, the only practical effect of a difference will\nbe, to make us enlighten the ignorance on one side or the other, from\nwhich it springs, by instructing them, if it be theirs; ourselves, if it\nbe our own; to the end that the only kind of unanimity may be produced\nwhich is desirable among rational beings,--the agreement proceeding from\nfull conviction after the freest discussion.\n\nThe Elu of Fifteen ought therefore to take the lead of his\nfellow-citizen, not in frivolous amusements, not in the degrading\npursuits of the ambitious vulgar; but in the truly noble task of\nenlightening the mass of his countrymen, and of leaving his own name\nencircled, not with barbaric splendor, or attached to courtly gewgaws,\nbut illustrated by the honors most worthy of our rational nature;\ncoupled with the diffusion of knowledge, and gratefully pronounced by a\nfew, at least, whom his wise beneficence has rescued from ignorance and\nvice.\n\nWe say to him, in the words of the great Roman: \"Men in no respect so\nnearly approach to the Deity, as when they confer benefits on men. To\nserve and do good to as many as possible,--there is nothing greater in\nyour fortune than that you should be able, and nothing finer in your\nnature, than that you should be desirous to do this.\" This is the true\nmark for the aim of every man and Mason who either prizes the enjoyment\nof pure happiness, or sets a right value upon a high and unsullied\nrenown. And if the benefactors of mankind, when they rest from their\nnoble labors, shall be permitted to enjoy hereafter, as an appropriate\nreward of their virtue, the privilege of looking down upon the blessings\nwith which their exertions and charities, and perhaps their toils and\nsufferings have clothed the scene of their former existence, it will\nnot, in a state of exalted purity and wisdom, be the founders of mighty\ndynasties, the conquerors of new empires, the C\u00e6sars, Alexanders, and\nTamerlanes; nor the mere Kings and Counsellors, Presidents and Senators,\nwho have lived for their party chiefly, and for their country only\nincidentally, often sacrificing to their own aggrandizement or that of\ntheir faction the good of their fellow-creatures;--it will not be they\nwho will be gratified by contemplating the monuments of their inglorious\nfame; but those will enjoy that delight and march in that triumph, who\ncan trace the remote effects of their enlightened benevolence in the\nimproved condition of their species, and exult in the reflection, that\nthe change which they at last, perhaps after many years, survey, with\neyes that age and sorrow can make dim no more,--of Knowledge become\nPower,--Virtue sharing that Empire,--Superstition dethroned, and Tyranny\nexiled, is, if even only in some small and very slight degree, yet still\nin _some_ degree, the fruit, precious if costly, and though late repaid\nyet long enduring, of their own self-denial and strenuous exertion, of\ntheir own mite of charity and aid to education wisely bestowed, and of\nthe hardships and hazards which they encountered here below.\n\nMasonry requires of its Initiates and votaries nothing that is\nimpracticable. It does not demand that they should undertake to climb to\nthose lofty and sublime peaks of a theoretical and imaginary unpractical\nvirtue, high and cold and remote as the eternal snows that wrap the\nshoulders of Chimborazo, and at least as inaccessible as they. It asks\nthat alone to be done which is easy to be done. It overtasks no one's\nstrength, and asks no one to go beyond his means and capacities. It does\nnot expect one whose business or profession yields him little more than\nthe wants of himself and his family require, and whose time is\nnecessarily occupied by his daily vocations, to abandon or neglect the\nbusiness by which he and his children live, and devote himself and his\nmeans to the diffusion of knowledge among men. It does not expect him to\npublish books for the people, or to lecture, to the ruin of his private\naffairs, or to found academies and colleges, build up libraries, and\nentitle himself to statues.\n\nBut it does require and expect every man of us to do something, within\nand according to his means; and there is no Mason who _cannot_ do _some_\nthing, if not alone, then by combination and association.\n\nIf a Lodge cannot aid in founding a school or an academy it can still do\nsomething. It can educate one boy or girl, at least, the child of some\npoor or departed brother. And it should never be forgotten, that in the\npoorest unregarded child that seems abandoned to ignorance and vice\n_may_ slumber the virtues of a Socrates, the intellect of a Bacon or a\nBossuet, the genius of a Shakespeare, the capacity to benefit mankind of\na Washington; and that in rescuing him from the mire in which he is\nplunged, and giving him the means of education and development, the\nLodge that does it may be the direct and immediate means of conferring\nupon the world as great a boon as that given it by John Faust the boy of\nMentz; may perpetuate the liberties of a country and change the\ndestinies of nations, and write a new chapter in the history of the\nworld.\n\nFor we never know the importance of the act we do. The daughter of\nPharaoh little thought what she was doing for the human race, and the\nvast unimaginable consequences that depended on her charitable act, when\nshe drew the little child of a Hebrew woman from among the rushes that\ngrew along the bank of the Nile, and determined to rear it as if it were\nher own.\n\nHow often has an act of charity, costing the doer little, given to the\nworld a great painter, a great musician, a great inventor! How often has\nsuch an act developed the ragged boy into the benefactor of his race! On\nwhat small and apparently unimportant circumstances have turned and\nhinged the fates of the world's great conquerors. There is no law that\nlimits the returns that shall be reaped from a single good deed. The\nwidow's mite may not only be as acceptable to God, but may produce as\ngreat results as the rich man's costly offering. The poorest boy, helped\nby benevolence, may come to lead armies, to control senates, to decide\non peace and war, to dictate to cabinets; and his magnificent thoughts\nand noble words may be law many years hereafter to millions of men yet\nunborn.\n\nBut the opportunity to effect a great good does not often occur to any\none. It is worse than folly for one to lie idle and inert, and expect\nthe accident to befall him, by which his influences shall live forever.\nHe can expect that to happen, only in consequence of one or many or all\nof a long series of acts. He can expect to benefit the world only as men\nattain other results; by continuance by persistence, by a steady and\nuniform habit of laboring for the enlightenment of the world, to the\nextent of his means and capacity.\n\nFor it is, in all instances, by steady labor, by giving enough of\napplication to our work, and having enough of time for the doing of it,\nby regular pains-taking, and the plying of constant assiduities, and not\nby any process of legerdemain, that we secure the strength and the\nstaple of real excellence. It was thus that Demosthenes, clause after\nclause, and sentence after sentence, elaborated to the uttermost his\nimmortal orations. It was thus that Newton pioneered his way, by the\nsteps of an ascending geometry, to the mechanism of the Heavens, and Le\nVerrier added a planet to our Solar System.\n\nIt is a most erroneous opinion that those who have left the most\nstupendous monuments of intellect behind them, were not differently\nexercised from the rest of the species, but only differently gifted;\nthat they signalized themselves only by their talent, and hardly ever by\ntheir industry; for it is in truth to the most strenuous application of\nthose commonplace faculties which are diffused among all, that they are\nindebted for the glories which now encircle their remembrance and their\nname.\n\nWe must not imagine it to be a vulgarizing of genius, that it should be\nlighted up in any other way than by a direct inspiration from Heaven;\nnor overlook the steadfastness of purpose, the devotion to some single\nbut great object, the unweariedness of labor that is given, not in\nconvulsive and preternatural throes, but by little and little as the\nstrength of the mind may bear it; the accumulation of many small\nefforts, instead of a few grand and gigantic, but perhaps irregular\nmovements, on the part of energies that are marvellous; by which former\nalone the great results are brought out that write their enduring\nrecords on the face of the earth and in the history of nations and of\nman.\n\nWe must not overlook these elements, to which genius owes the best and\nproudest of her achievements; nor imagine that qualities so generally\npossessed as patience and pains-taking, and resolute industry, have no\nshare in upholding a distinction so illustrious as that of the\nbenefactor of his kind.\n\nWe must not forget that great results are most ordinarily produced by an\naggregate of many contributions and exertions; as it is the invisible\nparticles of vapor, each separate and distinct from the other, that,\nrising from the oceans and their bays and gulfs, from lakes and rivers,\nand wide morasses and overflowed plains, float away as clouds, and\ndistill upon the earth in dews, and fall in showers and rain and snows\nupon the broad plains and rude mountains, and make the great navigable\nstreams that are the arteries along which flows the life-blood of a\ncountry.\n\nAnd so Masonry can do much, if each Mason be content to do his share,\nand if their united efforts are directed by wise counsels to a common\npurpose. \"It is for God and for Omnipotency to do mighty things in a\nmoment; but by degrees to grow to greatness is the course that He hath\nleft for man.\"\n\nIf Masonry will but be true to her mission, and Masons to their promises\nand obligations--if, re-entering vigorously upon a career of\nbeneficence, she and they will but pursue it earnestly and\nunfalteringly, remembering that our contributions to the cause of\ncharity and education then deserve the greatest credit when it costs us\nsomething, the curtailing of a comfort or the relinquishment of a\nluxury, to make them--if we will but give aid to what were once\nMasonry's great schemes for human improvement, not fitfully and\nspasmodically, but regularly and incessantly, as the vapors rise and the\nsprings run, and as the sun rises and the stars come up into the\nheavens, then we may be sure that great results will be attained and a\ngreat work done. And then it will most surely be seen that Masonry is\nnot effete or impotent, nor degenerated nor drooping to a fatal decay.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nXI.\n\nSUBLIME ELECT OF THE TWELVE;\nOR\nPRINCE AMETH.\n\n[Elu of the Twelve.]\n\n\nThe duties of a Prince Ameth are, to be earnest, true, reliable, and\nsincere; to protect the people against illegal impositions and\nexactions; to contend for their political rights, and to see, as far as\nhe may or can, that those bear the burdens who reap the benefits of the\nGovernment.\n\nYou are to be true unto all men.\n\nYou are to be frank and sincere in all things.\n\nYou are to be earnest in doing whatever it is your duty to do.\n\nAnd no man must repent that he has relied upon your resolve, your\nprofession, or your word.\n\nThe great distinguishing characteristic of a Mason is sympathy with his\nkind. He recognizes in the human race one great family, all connected\nwith himself by those invisible links, and that mighty net-work of\ncircumstance, forged and woven by God.\n\nFeeling that sympathy, it is his first Masonic duty to serve his\nfellow-man. At his first entrance into the Order, he ceases to be\nisolated, and becomes one of a great brotherhood, assuming new duties\ntoward every Mason that lives, as every Mason at the same moment assumes\nthem toward him.\n\nNor are those duties on his part confined to Masons alone. He assumes\nmany in regard to his country, and especially toward the great,\nsuffering masses of the common people; for they too are his brethren,\nand God hears them, inarticulate as the moanings of their misery are. By\nall proper means, of persuasion and influence, and otherwise, if the\noccasion and emergency require, he is bound to defend them against\noppression, and tyrannical and illegal exactions.\n\nHe labors equally to defend and to improve the people. He does not\nflatter them to mislead them, nor fawn upon them to rule them, nor\nconceal his opinions to humor them, nor tell them that they can never\nerr, and that their voice is the voice of God. He knows that the safety\nof every free government, and its continuance and perpetuity depend upon\nthe virtue and intelligence of the common people; and that, unless their\nliberty is of such a kind as arms can neither procure nor take away;\nunless it is the fruit of manly courage, of justice, temperance, and\ngenerous virtue--unless, being such, it has taken deep root in the minds\nand hearts of the people at large, there will not long be wanting those\nwho will snatch from them by treachery what they have acquired by arms\nor institutions.\n\nHe knows that if, after being released from the toils of war, the people\nneglect the arts of peace; if their peace and liberty be a state of\nwarfare; if war be their only virtue, and the summit of their praise,\nthey will soon find peace the most adverse to their interests. It will\nbe only a more distressing war; and that which they imagined liberty\nwill be the worst of slavery. For, unless by the means of knowledge and\nmorality, not frothy and loquacious, but genuine, unadulterated, and\nsincere, they clear the horizon of the mind from those mists of error\nand passion which arise from ignorance and vice, they will always have\nthose who will bend their necks to the yoke as if they were brutes; who,\nnotwithstanding all their triumphs, will put them up to the highest\nbidder, as if they were mere booty made in war; and find an exuberant\nsource of wealth and power, in the people's ignorance, prejudice, and\npassions.\n\nThe people that does not subjugate the propensity of the wealthy to\navarice, ambition, and sensuality, expel luxury from them and their\nfamilies, keep down pauperism, diffuse knowledge among the poor, and\nlabor to raise the abject from the mire of vice and low indulgence, and\nto keep the industrious from starving in sight of luxurious festivals,\nwill find that it has cherished, in that avarice, ambition, sensuality,\nselfishness, and luxury of the one class, and that degradation, misery,\ndrunkenness, ignorance, and brutalization of the other, more stubborn\nand intractable despots at home than it ever encountered in the field;\nand even its very bowels will be continually teeming with the\nintolerable progeny of tyrants.\n\nThese are the first enemies to be subdued; this constitutes the campaign\nof Peace; these are triumphs, difficult indeed, but bloodless; and far\nmore honorable than those trophies which are purchased only by slaughter\nand rapine; and if not victors in this service, it is in vain to have\nbeen victorious over the despotic enemy in the field.\n\nFor if any people thinks that it is a grander; a more beneficial, or a\nwiser policy, to invent subtle expedients by stamps and imposts, for\nincreasing the revenue and draining the life-blood of an impoverished\npeople; to multiply its naval and military force; to rival in craft the\nambassadors of foreign states; to plot the swallowing up of foreign\nterritory; to make crafty treaties and alliances; to rule prostrate\nstates and abject provinces by fear and force; than to administer\nunpolluted justice to the people, to relieve the condition and raise the\nestate of the toiling masses, redress the injured and succor the\ndistressed and conciliate the discontented, and speedily restore to\nevery one his own; then that people is involved in a cloud of error, and\nwill too late perceive, when the illusion of these mighty benefits has\nvanished, that in neglecting these, which it thought inferior\nconsiderations, it has only been precipitating its own ruin and despair.\n\nUnfortunately, every age presents its own special problem, most\ndifficult and often impossible to solve; and that which this age offers,\nand forces upon the consideration of all thinking men, is this--how, in\na populous and wealthy country, blessed with free institutions and a\nconstitutional government, are the great masses of the manual-labor\nclass to be enabled to have steady work at fair wages, to be kept from\nstarvation, and their children from vice and debauchery, and to be\nfurnished with that degree, not of mere reading and writing, but of\n_knowledge_, that shall fit them intelligently to do the duties and\nexercise the privileges of freemen; even to be intrusted with the\ndangerous right of suffrage?\n\nFor though we do not know why God, being infinitely merciful as well as\nwise, has so ordered it, it seems to be unquestionably his law, that\neven in civilized and Christian countries, the large mass of the\npopulation shall be fortunate, if, during their whole life, from infancy\nto old age, in health and sickness, they have enough of the commonest\nand coarsest food to keep themselves and their children from the\ncontinual gnawing of hunger--enough of the commonest and coarsest\nclothing to protect themselves and their little ones from indecent\nexposure and the bitter cold; and if they have over their heads the\nrudest shelter.\n\nAnd He seems to have enacted this law--which no human community has yet\nfound the means to abrogate--that when a country becomes populous,\ncapital shall concentrate in the hands of a limited number of persons,\nand labor become more and more at its mercy, until mere manual labor,\nthat of the weaver and ironworker, and other artisans, eventually ceases\nto be worth more than a bare subsistence, and often, in great cities and\nvast extents of country, not even that, and goes or crawls about in\nrags, begging, and starving for want of work.\n\nWhile every ox and horse can find work, and is worth being fed, it is\nnot always so with man. To be employed, to have a chance to work at\nanything like fair wages, becomes the great engrossing object of a man's\nlife. The capitalist can live without employing the laborer, and\ndischarges him whenever that labor ceases to be profitable. At the\nmoment when the weather is most inclement, provisions dearest, and rents\nhighest, he turns him off to starve. If the day-laborer is taken sick,\nhis wages stop. When old, he has no pension to retire upon. His children\ncannot be sent to school; for before their bones are hardened they must\nget to work lest they starve. The man, strong and able-bodied, works for\na shilling or two a day, and the woman shivering over her little pan of\ncoals, when the mercury drops far below zero, after her hungry children\nhave wailed themselves to sleep, sews by the dim light of her lonely\ncandle, for a bare pittance, selling her life to him who bargained only\nfor the work of her needle.\n\nFathers and mothers slay their children, to have the burial-fees, that\nwith the price of one child's life they may continue life in those that\nsurvive. Little girls with bare feet sweep the street crossings, when\nthe winter wind pinches them, and beg piteously for pennies of those who\nwear warm furs. Children grow up in squalid misery and brutal ignorance;\nwant compels virgin and wife to prostitute themselves; women starve and\nfreeze, and lean up against the walls of workhouses, like bundles of\nfoul rags, all night long, and night after night, when the cold rain\nfalls, and there chances to be no room for them within; and hundreds of\nfamilies are crowded into a single building, rife with horrors and\nteeming with foul air and pestilence; where men, women and children\nhuddle together in their filth; all ages and all colors sleeping\nindiscriminately together; while, in a great, free, Republican State, in\nthe full vigor of its youth and strength, one person in every seventeen\nis a pauper receiving charity.\n\nHow to deal with this apparently inevitable evil and mortal disease is\nby far the most important of all social problems. What is to be done\nwith pauperism and over-supply of labor? How is the life of any country\nto last, when brutality and drunken semi-barbarism vote, and hold\noffices in their gift, and by fit representatives of themselves control\na government? How, if not wisdom and authority, but turbulence and low\nvice are to exalt to senatorships miscreants reeking with the odors and\npollution of the hell, the prize-ring, the brothel, and the\nstock-exchange, where gambling is legalized and rascality is laudable?\n\nMasonry will do all in its power, by direct exertion and co-operation,\nto improve and inform as well as to protect the people; to better their\nphysical condition, relieve their miseries, supply their wants, and\nminister to their necessities. Let every Mason in this good work do all\nthat may be in his power.\n\nFor it is true now, as it always was and always will be, that to be free\nis the same thing as to be pious, to be wise, to be temperate and just,\nto be frugal and abstinent, and to be magnanimous and brave; and to be\nthe opposite of all these is the same as to be a slave. And it usually\nhappens, by the appointment, and, as it were, retributive justice of the\nDeity, that people which cannot govern themselves, and moderate their\npassions, but crouch under the slavery of their lusts and vices, are\ndelivered up to the sway of those whom they abhor, and made to submit to\nan involuntary servitude.\n\nAnd it is also sanctioned by the dictates of justice and by the\nconstitution of Nature, that he who, from the imbecility or derangement\nof his intellect, is incapable of governing himself, should, like a\nminor, be committed to the government of another.\n\nAbove all things let us never forget that mankind constitutes one great\nbrotherhood; all born to encounter suffering and sorrow, and therefore\nbound to sympathize with each other.\n\nFor no tower of Pride was ever yet high enough to lift its possessor\nabove the trials and fears and frailities of humanity. No human hand\never built the wall, nor ever shall, that will keep out affliction,\npain, and infirmity. Sickness and sorrow, trouble and death, are\ndispensations that level everything. They know none, high nor low. The\nchief wants of life, the great and grave necessities of the human soul,\ngive exemption to none. They make all poor, all weak. They put\nsupplication in the mouth of every human being, as truly as in that of\nthe meanest beggar.\n\nBut the principle of misery is not an evil principle. We err, and the\nconsequences teach us wisdom. All elements, all the laws of things\naround us, minister to this end; and through the paths of painful error\nand mistake, it is the design of Providence to lead us to truth and\nhappiness. If erring only taught us to err; if mistakes confirmed us in\nimprudence; if the miseries caused by vicious indulgence had a natural\ntendency to make us more abject slaves of vice, then suffering would be\nwholly evil. But, on the contrary, all tends and is designed to produce\namendment and improvement. Suffering is the discipline of virtue; of\nthat which is infinitely better than happiness, and yet embraces in\nitself all essential happiness. It nourishes, invigorates, and perfects\nit. Virtue is the prize of the severely-contested race and hard-fought\nbattle; and it is worth all the fatigue and wounds of the conflict. Man\nshould go forth with a brave and strong heart, to battle with calamity.\nHe is to master it, and not let it become _his_ master. He is not to\nforsake the post of trial and of peril; but to stand firmly in his lot,\nuntil the great word of Providence shall bid him fly, or bid him sink.\nWith resolution and courage the Mason is to do the work which it is\nappointed for him to do, looking through the dark cloud of human\ncalamity, to the end that rises high and bright before him. The lot of\nsorrow is great and sublime. None suffer forever, nor for nought, nor\nwithout purpose. It is the ordinance of God's wisdom, and of His\nInfinite Love, to procure for us infinite happiness and glory.\n\nVirtue is the truest liberty; nor is he free who stoops to passions; nor\nhe in bondage who serves a noble master. Examples are the best and most\nlasting lectures; virtue the best example. He that hath done good deeds\nand set good precedents, in sincerity, is happy. Time shall not outlive\nhis worth. He lives truly after death, whose good deeds are his pillars\nof remembrance; and no day but adds some grains to his heap of glory.\nGood works are seeds, that after sowing return us a continual harvest;\nand the memory of noble actions is more enduring than monuments of\nmarble.\n\nLife is a school. The world is neither prison nor penitentiary, nor a\npalace of ease, nor an amphitheatre for games and spectacles; but a\nplace of instruction, and discipline. Life is given for moral and\nspiritual training; and the entire course of the great school of life is\nan education for virtue, happiness, and a future existence. The periods\nof Life are its terms; all human conditions, its forms; all human\nemployments, its lessons. Families are the primary departments of this\nmoral education; the various circles of society, its advanced stages;\nKingdoms and Republics, its universities.\n\nRiches and Poverty, Gayeties and Sorrows, Marriages and Funerals, the\nties of life bound or broken, fit and fortunate, or untoward and\npainful, are all lessons. Events are not blindly and carelessly flung\ntogether. Providence does not school one man, and screen another from\nthe fiery trial of its lessons. It has neither rich favorites nor poor\nvictims. One event happeneth to all. One end and one design concern and\nurge all men.\n\nThe prosperous man has been at school. Perhaps he has thought that it\nwas a great thing, and he a great personage; but he has been merely a\npupil. He thought, perhaps, that he was Master, and had nothing to do,\nbut to direct and command; but there was ever a Master above him, the\nMaster of Life. _He_ looks not at our splendid state, or our many\npretensions, nor at the aids and appliances of our learning; but at our\nlearning itself. He puts the poor and the rich upon the same form; and\nknows no difference between them, but their progress.\n\nIf from prosperity we have learned moderation, temperance, candor,\nmodesty, gratitude to God, and generosity to man, then we are entitled\nto be honored and rewarded. If we have learned selfishness,\nself-indulgence, wrong-doing, and vice, to forget and overlook our less\nfortunate brother, and to scoff at the providence of God, then we are\nunworthy and dishonored, though we have been nursed in affluence, or\ntaken our degrees from the lineage of an hundred noble descents; as\ntruly so, in the eye of Heaven, and of all right-thinking men, as though\nwe lay, victims of beggary and disease, in the hospital, by the hedge,\nor on the dung-hill. The most ordinary human equity looks not at the\nschool, but at the scholar; and the equity of Heaven will not look\nbeneath that mark.\n\nThe poor man also is at school. Let him take care that he learn, rather\nthan complain. Let him hold to his integrity, his candor, and his\nkindness of heart. Let him beware of envy, and of bondage, and keep his\nself-respect. The body's toil is nothing. Let him beware of the mind's\ndrudgery and degradation. While he betters his condition if he can, let\nhim be more anxious to better his soul. Let him be willing, while poor,\nand even if always poor, to learn poverty's great lessons, fortitude,\ncheerfulness, contentment, and implicit confidence in God's Providence.\nWith these, and patience, calmness, self-command, disinterestedness, and\naffectionate kindness, the humble dwelling may be hallowed, and made\nmore dear and noble than the loftiest palace. Let him, above all things,\nsee that he lose not his independence. Let him not cast himself, a\ncreature poorer than the poor, an indolent, helpless, despised beggar,\non the kindness of others. Every man should choose to have God for his\nMaster, rather than man; and escape not from this school, either by\ndishonesty or alms-taking, lest he fall into that state, worse than\ndisgrace, where he can have no respect for himself.\n\nThe ties of Society teach us to love one another. That is a miserable\nsociety, where the absence of affectionate kindness is sought to be\nsupplied by punctilious decorum, graceful urbanity, and polished\ninsincerity; where ambition, jealousy, and distrust rule, in place of\nsimplicity, confidence, and kindness.\n\nSo, too, the social state teaches modesty and gentleness; and from\nneglect, and notice unworthily bestowed on others, and injustice, and\nthe world's failure to appreciate us, we learn patience and quietness,\nto be superior to society's opinion, not cynical and bitter, but gentle,\ncandid, and affectionate still.\n\nDeath is the great Teacher, stern, cold, inexorable, irresistible; whom\nthe collected might of the world cannot stay or ward off. The breath,\nthat parting from the lips of King or beggar, scarcely stirs the hushed\nair, cannot be bought, or brought back for a moment, with the wealth of\nEmpires. What a lesson is this, teaching our frailty and feebleness, and\nan Infinite Power beyond us! It is a fearful lesson, that never becomes\nfamiliar. It walks through the earth in dread mystery, and lays its\nhands upon all. It is a universal lesson, that is read everywhere and by\nall men. Its message comes every year and every day. The past years are\ncrowded with its sad and solemn mementoes; and death's finger traces its\nhandwriting upon the walls of every human habitation.\n\nIt teaches us Duty; to act our part well; to fulfill the work assigned\nus. When one is dying, and after he is dead, there is but one question:\n_Has he lived well?_ There is no evil in death but that which life\nmakes.\n\nThere are hard lessons in the school of God's Providence; and yet the\nschool of life is carefully adjusted, in all its arrangements and tasks,\nto man's powers and passions. There is no extravagance in its teachings;\nnor is anything done for the sake of present effect. The whole course of\nhuman life is a conflict with difficulties; and, if rightly conducted, a\nprogress in improvement. It is never too late for man to learn. Not part\nonly, but the whole, of life is a school. There never comes a time, even\namidst the decays of age, when it is fit to lay aside the eagerness of\nacquisition, or the cheerfulness of endeavor. Man walks, all through the\ncourse of life, in patience and strife, and sometimes in darkness; for,\nfrom patience is to come perfection; from strife, triumph is to issue;\nfrom the cloud of darkness the lightning is to flash that shall open the\nway to eternity.\n\nLet the Mason be faithful in the school of life, and to all its lessons!\nLet him not learn nothing, nor care not whether he learns or not. Let\nnot the years pass over him, witnesses of only his sloth and\nindifference; or see him zealous to acquire everything but virtue. Nor\nlet him labor only for himself; nor forget that the humblest man that\nlives is his brother, and hath a claim on his sympathies and kind\noffices; and that beneath the rough garments which labor wears may beat\nhearts as noble as throb under the stars of princes.\n\n    God, who counts by souls, not stations,\n      Loves and pities you and me;\n    For to Him all vain distinctions\n      Are as pebbles on the sea.\n\nNor are the other duties inculcated in this Degree of less importance.\nTruth, a Mason is early told, is a Divine attribute and the foundation\nof every virtue; and frankness, reliability, sincerity,\nstraightforwardness, plain-dealing, are but different modes in which\nTruth develops itself. The dead, the absent, the innocent, and those\nthat trust him, no Mason will deceive willingly. To all these he owes a\nnobler justice, in that they are the most certain trials of human\nEquity. Only the most abandoned of men, said Cicero will deceive him,\nwho would have remained uninjured if he had not trusted. All the noble\ndeeds that have beat their marches through succeeding ages have\nproceeded from men of truth and genuine courage. The man who is always\ntrue is both virtuous and wise; and thus possesses the greatest guards\nof safety: for the law has not power to strike the virtuous; nor can\nfortune subvert the wise.\n\nThe bases of Masonry being morality and virtue, it is by studying one\nand practising the other, that the conduct of a Mason becomes\nirreproachable. The good of Humanity being its principal object,\ndisinterestedness is one of the first virtues that it requires of its\nmembers; for that is the 'source of justice and beneficence.\n\nTo pity the misfortunes of others; to be humble, but without meanness;\nto be proud, but without arrogance; to abjure every sentiment of hatred\nand revenge; to show himself magnanimous and liberal, without\nostentation and without profusion; to be the enemy of vice; to pay\nhomage to wisdom and virtue; to respect innocence; to be constant and\npatient in adversity, and modest in prosperity; to avoid every\nirregularity that stains the soul and distempers the body--it is by\nfollowing these precepts that a Mason will become a good citizen, a\nfaithful husband, a tender father, an obedient son, and a true brother;\nwill honor friendship, and fulfill with ardor the duties which virtue\nand the social relations impose upon him.\n\nIt is because Masonry imposes upon us these duties that it is properly\nand significantly styled _work_; and he who imagines that he becomes a\nMason by merely taking the first two or three Degrees, and that he may,\nhaving leisurely stepped upon that small elevation, thenceforward\nworthily wear the honors of Masonry, without labor or exertion, or\nself-denial or sacrifice, and that there is nothing to be _done_ in\nMasonry, is strangely deceived.\n\nIs it true that nothing remains to be done in Masonry?\n\nDoes one Brother no longer proceed by law against another Brother of his\nLodge, in regard to matters that could be easily settled within the\nMasonic family circle?\n\nHas the duel, that hideous heritage of barbarism, interdicted among\nBrethren by our fundamental laws, and denounced by the municipal code,\nyet disappeared from the soil we inhabit? Do Masons of high rank\nreligiously refrain from it; or do they not, bowing to a corrupt public\nopinion, submit to its arbitrament, despite the scandal which it\noccasions to the Order, and in violation of the feeble restraint of\ntheir oath?\n\nDo Masons no longer form uncharitable opinions of their Brethren, enter\nharsh judgments against them, and judge themselves by one rule and their\nBrethren by another?\n\nHas Masonry any well-regulated system of charity? Has it done that which\nit should have done for the cause of education? Where are its schools,\nits academies, its colleges, its hospitals, and infirmaries?\n\nAre political controversies now conducted with no violence and\nbitterness?\n\nDo Masons refrain from defaming and denouncing their Brethren who differ\nwith them in religious or political opinions?\n\nWhat grand social problems or useful projects engage our attention at\nour communications? Where in our Lodges are lectures habitually\ndelivered for the real instruction of the Brethren? Do not our sessions\npass in the discussion of minor matters of business, the settlement of\npoints of order and questions of mere administration, and the admission\nand advancement of Candidates, whom after their admission we take no\npains to instruct?\n\nIn what Lodge are our ceremonies explained and elucidated; corrupted as\nthey are by time, until their true features can scarcely be\ndistinguished; and where are those great primitive truths of revelation\ntaught, which Masonry has preserved to the world?\n\nWe have high dignities and sounding titles. Do their possessors qualify\nthemselves to enlighten the world in respect to the aims and objects of\nMasonry? Descendants of those Initiates who governed empires, does your\ninfluence enter into practical life and operate efficiently in behalf of\nwell-regulated and constitutional liberty?\n\nYour debates should be but friendly conversations. You need concord,\nunion, and peace. Why then do you retain among you men who excite\nrivalries and jealousies; why permit great and violent controversy and\nambitious pretensions? How do your own words and acts agree? If your\nMasonry is a nullity, how can you exercise any influence on others?\n\nContinually you praise each other, and utter elaborate and high-wrought\neulogies upon the Order. Everywhere you assume that you are what you\nshould be, and nowhere do you look upon yourselves as you are. Is it\ntrue that all our actions are so many acts of homage to virtue? Explore\nthe recesses of your hearts; let us examine ourselves with an impartial\neye, and make answer to our own questioning! Can we bear to ourselves\nthe consoling testimony that we always rigidly perform our duties; that\nwe even _half_ perform them?\n\nLet us away with this odious self-flattery! Let us be men, if we cannot\nbe sages! The laws of Masonry, above others excellent, cannot wholly\nchange men's natures. They enlighten them, they point out the true way;\nbut they can lead them in it, only by repressing the fire of their\npassions, and subjugating their selfishness. Alas, these conquer, and\nMasonry is forgotten!\n\nAfter praising each other all our lives, there are always excellent\nBrethren, who, over our coffins, shower unlimited eulogies. Every one of\nus who dies, however useless his life, has been a model of all the\nvirtues, a very child of the celestial light. In Egypt, among our old\nMasters, where Masonry was more cultivated than vanity, no one could\ngain admittance to the sacred asylum of the tomb until he had passed\nunder the most solemn judgment. A grave tribunal sat in judgment upon\nall, even the kings. They said to the dead, \"Whoever thou art, give\naccount to thy country of thy actions! What hast thou done with thy time\nand life? The law interrogates thee, thy country hears thee, Truth sits\nin judgment on thee!\" Princes came there to be judged, escorted only by\ntheir virtues and their vices. A public accuser recounted the history of\nthe dead man's life, and threw the blaze of the torch of truth on all\nhis actions. If it were adjudged that he had led an evil life, his\nmemory was condemned in the presence of the nation, and his body was\ndenied the honors of sepulture. What a lesson the old Masonry taught to\nthe sons of the people!\n\nIs it true that Masonry is effete; that the acacia, withered, affords no\nshade; that Masonry no longer marches in the advance-guard of Truth? No.\nIs freedom yet universal? Have ignorance and prejudice disappeared from\nthe earth? Are there no longer enmities among men? Do cupidity and\nfalsehood no longer exist? Do toleration and harmony prevail among\nreligious and political sects? There are works yet left for Masonry to\naccomplish, greater than the twelve labors of Hercules; to advance ever\nresolutely and steadily; to enlighten the minds of the people, to\nreconstruct society, to reform the laws, and improve the public morals.\nThe eternity in front of it is as infinite as the one behind. And\nMasonry cannot cease to labor in the cause of social progress, without\nceasing to be true to itself, without ceasing to be Masonry.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n[Illustration: T.D.I.C.G.]\n\n\n\n\nXII.\n\nGRAND MASTER ARCHITECT.\n\n[Master Architect.]\n\n\nThe great duties that are inculcated by the lessons taught by the\nworking-instruments of a Grand Master Architect, demanding so much of\nus, and taking for granted the capacity to perform them faithfully and\nfully, bring us at once to reflect upon the dignity of human nature, and\nthe vast powers and capacities of the human soul; and to that theme we\ninvite your attention in this Degree. Let us begin to rise from earth\ntoward the Stars.\n\nEvermore the human soul struggles toward the light, toward God, and the\nInfinite. It is especially so in its afflictions. Words go but a little\nway into the depths of sorrow. The thoughts that writhe there in\nsilence, that go into the stillness of Infinitude and Eternity, have no\nemblems. Thoughts enough come there, such as no tongue ever uttered.\nThey do not so much want human sympathy, as higher help. There is a\nloneliness in deep sorrow which the Deity alone can relieve. Alone, the\nmind wrestles with the great problem of calamity, and seeks the solution\nfrom the Infinite Providence of Heaven, and thus is led directly to God.\n\nThere are many things in us of which we are not distinctly conscious. To\nwaken that slumbering consciousness into life, and so to lead the soul\nup to the Light, is one office of every great ministration to human\nnature, whether its vehicle be the pen, the pencil, or the tongue. We\nare unconscious of the intensity and awfulness of the life within us.\nHealth and sickness, joy and sorrow, success and disappointment, life\nand death, love and loss, are familiar words upon our lips; and we do\nnot know to what depths they point within us.\n\nWe seem never to know what _any_ thing means or is worth until we have\nlost it. Many an organ, nerve, and fibre in our bodily frame performs\nits silent part for years, and we are quite unconscious of its value. It\nis not until it is injured that we discover that value, and find how\nessential it was to our happiness and comfort. We never know the full\nsignificance of the words, \"property,\" \"ease,\" and \"health;\" the wealth\nof meaning in the fond epithets, \"parent,\" \"child,\" \"beloved,\" and\n\"friend,\" until the thing or the person is taken away; until, in place\nof the bright, visible being, comes the awful and desolate shadow, where\n_nothing_ is: where we stretch out our hands in vain, and strain our\neyes upon dark and dismal vacuity. Yet, in that vacuity, we do not\n_lose_ the object that we loved. It becomes only the more real to us.\nOur blessings not only brighten when they depart, but are fixed in\nenduring reality; and love and friendship receive their everlasting seal\nunder the cold impress of death.\n\nA dim consciousness of infinite mystery and grandeur lies beneath all\nthe commonplace of life. There is an awfulness and a majesty around us,\nin all our little worldliness. The rude peasant from the Apennines,\nasleep at the foot of a pillar in a majestic Roman church, seems not to\nhear or see, but to dream only of the herd he feeds or the ground he\ntills in the mountains. But the choral symphonies fall softly upon his\near, and the gilded arches are dimly seen through his half-slumbering\neyelids.\n\nSo the soul, however given up to the occupations of daily life, cannot\nquite lose the sense of where it is, and of what is above it and around\nit. The scene of its actual engagements may be small; the path of its\nsteps, beaten and familiar; the objects it handles, easily spanned, and\nquite worn out with daily uses. So it may be, and amidst such things\nthat we all live. So we live our little life; but Heaven is above us and\nall around and close to us; and Eternity is before us and behind us; and\nsuns and stars are silent witnesses and watchers over us. We are\nenfolded by Infinity. Infinite Powers and Infinite spaces lie all around\nus. The dread arch of Mystery spreads over us, and no voice ever pierced\nit. Eternity is enthroned amid Heaven's myriad starry heights; and no\nutterance or word ever came from those far-off and silent spaces. Above,\nis that awful majesty; around us, everywhere, it stretches off into\ninfinity; and beneath it is this little struggle of life, this poor\nday's conflict, this busy ant-hill of Time.\n\nBut from that ant-hill, not only the talk of the streets, the sounds of\nmusic and revelling, the stir and tread of a multitude, the shout of joy\nand the shriek of agony go up into the silent and all-surrounding\nInfinitude; but also, amidst the stir and noise of visible life, from\nthe inmost bosom of the visible man, there goes up an imploring call, a\nbeseeching cry, an asking, unuttered, and unutterable, for revelation,\nwailingly and in almost speechless agony praying the dread arch of\nmystery to break, and the stars that roll above the waves of mortal\ntrouble, to speak; the enthroned majesty of those awful heights to find\na voice; the mysterious and reserved heavens to come near; and all to\ntell us what they alone know; to give us information of the loved and\nlost; to make known to us what we are, and whither we are going.\n\nMan is encompassed with a dome of incomprehensible wonders. In him and\nabout him is that which should fill his life with majesty and\nsacredness. Something of sublimity and sanctity has thus flashed down\nfrom heaven into the heart of every one that lives. There is no being so\nbase and abandoned but hath some traits of that sacredness left upon\nhim; something, so much perhaps in discordance with his general repute,\nthat he hides it from all around him; some sanctuary in his soul, where\nno one may enter; some sacred inclosure, where the memory of a child is,\nor the image of a venerated parent, or the remembrance of a pure love,\nor the echo of some word of kindness once spoken to him; an echo that\nwill never die away.\n\nLife is no negative, or superficial or worldly existence. Our steps are\nevermore haunted with thoughts, far beyond their own range, which some\nhave regarded as the reminiscences of a pre-existent state. So it is\nwith us all, in the beaten and worn track of this worldly pilgrimage.\nThere is more here, than the world we live in. It is not all of life to\nlive. An unseen and infinite presence is here; a sense of something\ngreater than we possess; a seeking, through all the void wastes of life,\nfor a good beyond it; a crying out of the heart for interpretation; a\nmemory of the dead, touching continually some vibrating thread in this\ngreat tissue of mystery.\n\nWe all not only have better intimations, but are capable of better\nthings than we know. The pressure of some great emergency would develop\nin us powers, beyond the worldly bias of our spirits; and Heaven so\ndeals with us, from time to time, as to call forth those better things.\nThere is hardly a family in the world so selfish, but that, if one in it\nwere doomed to die--one, to be selected by the others,--it would be\nutterly impossible for its members, parents and children, to choose out\nthat victim; but that each would say, \"I will die; but I cannot choose.\"\nAnd in how many, if that dire extremity had come, would not one and\nanother step forth, freed from the vile meshes of ordinary selfishness,\nand say, like the Roman father and son, \"Let the blow fall on me!\" There\nare greater and better things in us all, than the world takes account\nof, or than _we_ take note of; if we would but find them out. And it is\none part of our Masonic culture to _find_ these traits of power and\nsublime devotion, to revive these faded impressions of generosity and\nself-sacrifice, the almost squandered bequests of God's love and\nkindness to our souls; and to induce us to yield ourselves to their\nguidance and control.\n\nUpon all conditions of men presses down one impartial law. To all\nsituations, to all fortunes, high or low, the _mind_ gives their\ncharacter. They are, in effect, not what they are in themselves, but\nwhat they are to the feeling of their possessors. The King may be mean,\ndegraded, miserable; the slave of ambition, fear, voluptuousness, and\nevery low passion. The Peasant may be the real Monarch, the moral master\nof his fate, a free and lofty being, more than a Prince in happiness,\nmore than a King in honor.\n\nMan is no bubble upon the sea of his fortunes, helpless and\nirresponsible upon the tide of events. Out of the same circumstances,\ndifferent men bring totally different results. The same difficulty,\ndistress, poverty, or misfortune, that breaks down one man, builds up\nanother and makes him strong. It is the very attribute and glory of a\nman, that he can bend the circumstances of his condition to the\nintellectual and moral purposes of his nature, and it is the power and\nmastery of his will that chiefly distinguish him from the brute.\n\nThe faculty of moral will, developed in the child, is a new element of\nhis nature. It is a new power brought upon the scene, and a ruling\npower, delegated from Heaven. Never was a human being sunk so low that\nhe had not, by God's gift, the power to rise. Because God commands him\nto rise, it is certain that he _can_ rise. Every man has the power, and\nshould use it, to make all situations, trials, and temptations\ninstruments to promote his virtue and happiness; and is so far from\nbeing the creature of circumstances, that _he_ creates and controls\n_them_, making them to be all that they are, of evil or of good, to him\nas a moral being.\n\nLife is what we make it, and the world is what we make it. The eyes of\nthe cheerful and of the melancholy man are fixed upon the same creation;\nbut very different are the aspects which it bears to them. To the one,\nit is all beauty and gladness; the waves of ocean roll in light, and the\nmountains are covered with day. Life, to him, flashes, rejoicing, upon\nevery flower and every tree that trembles in the breeze. There is more\nto him, everywhere, than the eye sees; a presence of profound joy on\nhill and valley, and bright, dancing water. The other idly or mournfully\ngazes at the same scene, and everything wears a dull, dim, and sickly\naspect. The murmuring of the brooks is a discord to him, the great roar\nof the sea has an angry and threatening emphasis, the solemn music of\nthe pines sings the requiem of his departed happiness; the cheerful\nlight shines garishly upon his eyes and offends him. The great train of\nthe seasons passes before him like a funeral procession; and he sighs,\nand turns impatiently away. The eye makes that which it looks upon; the\near makes its own melodies and discords; the world without reflects the\nworld within.\n\nLet the Mason never forget that life and the world are what we make them\nby our social character; by our adaptation, or want of adaptation to the\nsocial conditions, relationships, and pursuits of the world. To the\nselfish, the cold, and the insensible, to the haughty and presuming, to\nthe proud, who demand more than they are likely to receive, to the\njealous, ever afraid they shall not receive enough, to those who are\nunreasonably sensitive about the good or ill opinions of others, to all\nviolators of the social laws, the rude, the violent, the dishonest, and\nthe sensual,--to all these, the social condition, from its very nature,\nwill present annoyances, disappointments, and pains, appropriate to\ntheir several characters. The benevolent affections will not revolve\naround selfishness; the cold-hearted must expect to meet coldness; the\nproud, haughtiness; the passionate, anger; and the violent, rudeness.\nThose who forget the rights of others, must not be surprised if their\nown are forgotten; and those who stoop to the lowest embraces of sense\nmust not wonder, if others are not concerned to find their prostrate\nhonor, and lift it up to the remembrance and respect of the world.\n\nTo the gentle, many will be gentle; to the kind, many will be kind. A\ngood man will find that there is goodness in the world; an honest man\nwill find that there is honesty in the world; and a man of principle\nwill find principle and integrity in the minds of others.\n\nThere are no blessings which the mind may not convert into the bitterest\nof evils; and no trials which it may not transform into the noblest and\ndivinest blessings. There are no temptations from which assailed virtue\nmay not gain strength, instead of falling before them, vanquished and\nsubdued. It is true that temptations have a great power, and virtue\noften falls; but the might of these temptations lies not in themselves,\nbut in the feebleness of our own virtue, and the weakness of our own\nhearts. We rely too much on the strength of our ramparts and bastions,\nand allow the enemy to make his approaches, by trench and parallel, at\nhis leisure. The offer of dishonest gain and guilty pleasure makes the\nhonest man more honest, and the pure man more pure. They raise his\nvirtue to the height of towering indignation. The fair occasion, the\nsafe opportunity, the tempting chance become the defeat and disgrace of\nthe tempter. The honest and upright man does not wait until temptation\nhas made its approaches and mounted its batteries on the last parallel.\n\nBut to the impure, the dishonest, the false-hearted, the corrupt, and\nthe sensual, occasions come every day, and in every scene, and through\nevery avenue of thought and imagination. He is prepared to capitulate\nbefore the first approach is commenced; and sends out the white flag\nwhen the enemy's advance comes in sight of his walls. He _makes_\noccasions; or, if opportunities come not, evil _thoughts_ come, and he\nthrows wide open the gates of his heart and welcomes those bad visitors,\nand entertains them with a lavish hospitality.\n\nThe business of the world absorbs, corrupts, and degrades one mind,\nwhile in another it feeds and nurses the noblest independence,\nintegrity, and generosity. Pleasure is a poison to some, and a healthful\nrefreshment to others. To one, the world is a great harmony, like a\nnoble strain of music with infinite modulations; to another, it is a\nhuge factory, the clash and clang of whose machinery jars upon his ears\nand frets him to madness. Life is substantially the same thing to all\nwho partake of its lot. Yet some rise to virtue and glory; while others,\nundergoing the same discipline, and enjoying the same privileges, sink\nto shame and perdition.\n\nThorough, faithful, and honest endeavor to improve, is always\nsuccessful, and the highest happiness. To sigh sentimentally over human\nmisfortune, is fit only for the mind's childhood; and the mind's misery\nis chiefly its own fault; appointed, under the good Providence of God,\nas the punisher and corrector of its fault. In the long run, the mind\nwill be happy, just in proportion to its fidelity and wisdom. When it is\nmiserable, it has planted the thorns in its own path; it grasps them,\nand cries out in loud complaint; and that complaint is but the louder\n_confession_ that the thorns which grew there, _it_ planted.\n\nA certain kind and degree of spirituality enter into the largest part of\neven the most ordinary life. You can carry on no business, without some\nfaith in man. You cannot even dig in the ground, without a reliance on\nthe unseen result. You cannot think or reason or even step, without\nconfiding in the inward, spiritual principles of your nature. All the\naffections and bonds, and hopes and interests of life centre in the\nspiritual; and you know that if that central bond were broken, the world\nwould rush to chaos.\n\nBelieve that there is a God; that He is our father; that He has a\npaternal interest in our welfare and improvement; that He has given us\npowers, by means of which we may escape from sin and ruin; that He has\ndestined us to a future life of endless progress toward perfection and a\nknowledge of Himself--believe this, as every Mason should, and you can\nlive calmly, endure patiently, labor resolutely, deny yourselves\ncheerfully, hope steadfastly, and be conquerors in the great struggle of\nlife. Take away any one of these principles, and what remains for us?\nSay that there is no God; or no way opened for hope and reformation and\ntriumph, no heaven to come, no rest for the weary, no home in the bosom\nof God for the afflicted and disconsolate soul; or that God is but an\nugly blind _Chance_ that stabs in the dark; or a _some_what that is,\nwhen attempted to be defined, a _no_what, emotionless, passionless, the\nSupreme _Apathy_ to which all things, good and evil, are alike\nindifferent; or a jealous God who revengefully visits the sins of the\nfathers on the children, and when the fathers have eaten sour grapes,\nsets the children's teeth on edge; an arbitrary supreme _Will_, that has\nmade it _right_ to be virtuous, and wrong to lie and steal, because IT\n_pleased_ to _make_ it so rather than otherwise, retaining the power to\nreverse the law; or a fickle, vacillating, inconstant Deity, or a cruel,\nbloodthirsty, savage Hebrew or Puritanic one; and we are but the sport\nof chance and the victims of despair; hapless wanderers upon the face of\na desolate forsaken, or accursed and hated earth; surrounded by\ndarkness, struggling with obstacles, toiling for barren results and\nempty purposes, distracted with doubts, and misled by false gleams of\nlight; wanderers with no way, no prospect, no home; doomed and deserted\nmariners on a dark and stormy sea, without compass or course, to whom no\nstars appear; tossing helmless upon the weltering, angry waves, with no\nblessed haven in the distance whose guiding-star invites us to its\nwelcome rest.\n\nThe religious faith thus taught by Masonry is indispensable to the\nattainment of the great ends of life; and must therefore have been\ndesigned to be a part of it. We are made for this faith; and there must\nbe something, somewhere, for us to believe in. We cannot grow\nhealthfully, nor live happily, without it. It is therefore _true_. If we\ncould cut off from any soul all the principles taught by Masonry, the\nfaith in a God, in immortality, in virtue, in essential rectitude, that\nsoul would sink into sin, misery, darkness, and ruin. If we could cut\noff all sense of these truths, the man would sink at once to the grade\nof the animal.\n\nNo man can suffer and be patient, can struggle and conquer, can improve\nand be happy, otherwise than as the swine are, without conscience,\nwithout hope, without a reliance on a just, wise, and beneficent God. We\nmust, of necessity, embrace the great truths taught by Masonry, and live\nby them, to live happily. \"_I put my trust in God_,\" is the protest of\nMasonry against the belief in a cruel, angry, and revengeful God, to be\nfeared and not reverenced by His creatures.\n\nSociety, in its great relations, is as much the creation of Heaven as is\nthe system of the Universe. If that bond of gravitation that holds all\nworlds and systems together, were suddenly severed, the universe would\nfly into wild and boundless chaos. And if we were to sever all the moral\nbonds that hold society together; if we could cut off from it every\nconviction of Truth and Integrity, of an authority above it, and of a\nconscience within it, it would immediately rush to disorder and\nfrightful anarchy and ruin. The religion we teach is therefore as really\na principle of things, and as certain and true, as gravitation.\n\nFaith in moral principles, in virtue, and in God, is as necessary for\nthe guidance of a man, as instinct is for the guidance of an animal. And\ntherefore this faith, as a principle of man's nature, has a mission as\ntruly authentic in God's Providence, as the principle of instinct. The\npleasures of the soul, too, must depend on certain principles. They must\nrecognize a soul, its properties and responsibilities, a conscience, and\nthe sense of an authority above us; and these are the principles of\nfaith. No man can suffer and be patient, can struggle and conquer, can\nimprove and be happy, without conscience, without hope, without a\nreliance on a just, wise, and beneficent God. We must of necessity\nembrace the great truths taught by Masonry, and live by them, to live\nhappily. Everything in the universe has fixed and certain laws and\nprinciples for its action;--the star in its orbit, the animal in its\nactivity, the physical man in his functions. And he has likewise fixed\nand certain laws and principles as a spiritual being. His soul does not\ndie for want of aliment or guidance. For the rational soul there is\nample provision. From the lofty pine, rocked in the darkening tempest,\nthe cry of the young raven is heard; and it would be most strange if\nthere were no answer for the cry and call of the soul, tortured by want\nand sorrow and agony. The total rejection of all moral and religious\nbelief would strike out a principle from human nature, as essential to\nit as gravitation to the stars, instinct to animal life, the circulation\nof the blood to the human body.\n\nGod has ordained that life shall be a social state. We are members of a\ncivil community. The life of that community depends upon its moral\ncondition. Public spirit, intelligence, uprightness, temperance,\nkindness, domestic purity, will make it a happy community, and give it\nprosperity and continuance. Wide-spread selfishness, dishonesty,\nintemperance, libertinism, corruption, and crime, will make it\nmiserable, and bring about dissolution and speedy ruin. A whole people\nlives one life; one mighty heart heaves in its bosom; it is one great\npulse of existence that throbs there. One stream of life flows there,\nwith ten thousand intermingled branches and channels, through all the\nhomes of human love. One sound as of many waters, a rapturous jubilee or\na mournful sighing, comes up from, the congregated dwellings of a whole\nnation.\n\nThe Public is no vague abstraction; nor should that which is done\nagainst that Public, against public interest, law, or virtue, press but\nlightly on the conscience. It is but a vast expansion of individual\nlife; an ocean of tears, an atmosphere of sighs, or a great whole of joy\nand gladness. It suffers with the suffering of millions; it rejoices\nwith the joy of millions. What a vast crime does he commit,--private man\nor public man, agent or contractor, legislator or magistrate, secretary\nor president,--who dares, with indignity and wrong, to strike the bosom\nof the Public Welfare, to encourage venality and corruption, and\nshameful sale of the elective franchise, or of office; to sow\ndissension, and to weaken the bonds of amity that bind a Nation\ntogether! What a huge iniquity, he who, with vices like the daggers of a\nparricide, dares to pierce that mighty heart, in which the ocean of\nexistence is flowing!\n\nWhat an unequalled interest lies in the virtue of every one whom we\nlove! In his virtue, nowhere but in his virtue, is garnered up the\nincomparable treasure. What care we for brother or friend, compared with\nwhat we care for his honor, his fidelity, his reputation, his kindness?\nHow venerable is the rectitude of a parent! How sacred his reputation!\nNo blight that can fall upon a child, is like a parent's dishonor.\nHeathen or Christian, every parent would have his child do well; and\npours out upon him all the fullness of parental love, in the one desire\nthat he _may_ do well; that he may be worthy of his cares, and his\nfreely bestowed pains; that he may walk in the way of honor and\nhappiness. In that way he cannot walk one step without virtue. Such is\nlife, in its relationships. A thousand ties embrace it, like the fine\nnerves of a delicate organization; like the strings of an instrument\ncapable of sweet melodies, but easily put out of tune or broken, by\nrudeness, anger, and selfish indulgence.\n\nIf life could, by any process, be made insensible to pain and pleasure;\nif the human heart were hard as adamant, then avarice, ambition, and\nsensuality might channel out their paths in it, and make it their beaten\nway; and none would wonder or protest. If we could be patient under the\nload of a mere worldly life; if we could bear that burden as the beasts\nbear it; then, _like_ beasts, we might bend all our thoughts to the\nearth; and no call from the great Heavens above us would startle us\nfrom our plodding and earthly course.\n\nBut we art _not_ insensible brutes, who can refuse the call of reason\nand conscience. The soul is capable of remorse. When the great\ndispensations of life press down upon us, we weep, and suffer and\nsorrow. And sorrow and agony desire other companionships than\nworldliness and irreligion. We are not willing to bear those burdens of\nthe heart, fear, anxiety, disappointment, and trouble, without any\nobject or use. We are not willing to suffer, to be sick and afflicted,\nto have our days and months lost to comfort and joy, and overshadowed\nwith calamity and grief, without advantage or compensation; to barter\naway the dearest treasures, the very sufferings, of the heart; to sell\nthe life-blood from failing frame and fading cheek, our tears of\nbitterness and groans of anguish, for nothing. Human nature, frail,\nfeeling, sensitive, and sorrowing, cannot bear to suffer for nought.\n\nEverywhere, human life is a great and solemn dispensation. Man,\nsuffering, enjoying, loving, hating, hoping, and fearing, chained to the\nearth and yet exploring the far recesses of the universe, has the power\nto commune with God and His angels. Around this great action of\nexistence the curtains of Time are drawn; but there are openings through\nthem which give us glimpses of eternity. God looks down upon this scene\nof human probation. The wise and the good in all ages have interposed\nfor it, with their teachings and their blood. Everything that exists\naround us, every movement in nature, every counsel of Providence, every\ninterposition of God, centres upon one point--the fidelity of man. And\neven if the ghosts of the departed and remembered could come at midnight\nthrough the barred doors of our dwellings, and the shrouded dead should\nglide through the aisles of our churches and sit in our Masonic Temples,\ntheir teachings would be no more eloquent and impressive than the dread\nrealities of life; than those memories of misspent years, those ghosts\nof departed opportunities, that, pointing to our conscience and\neternity, cry continually in our ears, \"_Work while the day lasts! for\nthe night of death cometh, in which no man can work_.\"\n\nThere are no tokens of public mourning for the calamity of the soul. Men\nweep when the body dies; and when it is borne to its rest, they follow\nit with sad and mournful procession. But for the dying soul there is no\nopen lamentation; for the lost soul there are no obsequies.\n\nAnd yet the mind and soul of man have a value which nothing else has.\nThey are worth a care which nothing else is worth; and to the single,\nsolitary individual, they ought to possess an interest which nothing\nelse possesses. The stored treasures of the heart, the unfathomable\nmines that are in the soul to be wrought, the broad and boundless realms\nof Thought, the freighted argosy of man's hopes and best affections, are\nbrighter than gold and dearer than treasure.\n\nAnd yet the mind is in reality little known or considered. It is _all_\nwhich man permanently _is_, his inward being, his divine energy, his\nimmortal thought, his boundless capacity, his infinite aspiration; and\nnevertheless, few value it for what it is worth. Few see a brother-mind\nin others, through the rags with which poverty has clothed it, beneath\nthe crushing burdens of life, amidst the close pressure of worldly\ntroubles, wants and sorrows. Few acknowledge and cheer it in that humble\nblot, and feel that the nobility of earth, and the commencing glory of\nHeaven are there.\n\nMen do not feel the worth of their own souls. They are proud of their\nmental powers; but the intrinsic, inner, infinite _worth_ of their own\nminds they do not perceive. The poor man, admitted to a palace, feels,\nlofty and immortal being as he is, like a mere ordinary thing amid the\nsplendors that surround him. He sees the carriage of wealth roll by him,\nand forgets the intrinsic and eternal dignity of his own mind in a poor\nand degrading envy, and feels as an humbler creature, because others are\nabove him, not in mind, but in mensuration. Men respect themselves,\naccording as they are more wealthy, higher in rank or office, loftier in\nthe world's opinion, able to command more votes, more the favorites of\nthe people or of Power.\n\nThe difference among men is not so much in their nature and intrinsic\npower, as in the faculty of communication. Some have the capacity of\nuttering and embodying in words their thoughts. All men, more or less,\n_feel_ those thoughts. The glory of genius and the rapture of virtue,\nwhen rightly revealed, are diffused and shared among unnumbered minds.\nWhen eloquence and poetry speak; when those glorious arts, statuary,\npainting, and music, take audible or visible shape; when patriotism,\ncharity, and virtue speak with a thrilling potency, the hearts of\nthousands glow with kindred joy and ecstasy. If it were not so, there\nwould be no eloquence; for eloquence is that to which other hearts\nrespond; it is the faculty and power of _making_ other hearts respond.\nNo one is so low or degraded, as not sometimes to be touched with the\nbeauty of goodness. No heart is made of materials so common, or even\nbase, as not sometimes to respond, through every chord of it, to the\ncall of honor, patriotism, generosity, and virtue. The poor African\nSlave will die for the master or mistress, or in defence of the\nchildren, whom he loves. The poor, lost, scorned, abandoned, outcast\nwoman will, without expectation of reward, nurse those who are dying on\nevery hand, utter strangers to her, with a contagious and horrid\npestilence. The pickpocket will scale burning walls to rescue child or\nwoman, unknown to him, from the ravenous flames.\n\nMost glorious is this capacity! A power to commune with God and His\nAngels; a reflection of the Uncreated Light; a mirror that can collect\nand concentrate upon itself all the moral splendors of the Universe. It\nis the soul alone that gives any value to the things of this world; and\nit is only by raising the soul to its just elevation above all other\nthings, that we can look rightly upon the purposes of this earth. No\nsceptre nor throne, nor structure of ages, nor broad empire, can compare\nwith the wonders and grandeurs of a single thought. That alone, of all\nthings that have been made, comprehends the Maker of all. That alone is\nthe key which unlocks all the treasures of the Universe; the power that\nreigns over Space, Time, and Eternity. That, under God, is the Sovereign\nDispenser to man of all the blessings and glories that lie within the\ncompass of possession, or the range of possibility. Virtue, Heaven, and\nImmortality exist not, nor ever will exist for us except as they exist\nand will exist, in the perception, feeling, and thought of the glorious\nmind.\n\nMy Brother, in the hope that you have listened to and understood the\nInstruction and Lecture of this Degree, and that you feel the dignity of\nyour own nature and the vast capacities of your own soul for good or\nevil, I proceed briefly to communicate to you the remaining instruction\nof this Degree.\n\nThe Hebrew word, in the old Hebrew and Samaritan character, suspended in\nthe East, over the five columns, is ADONA\u00cf, one of the names of God,\nusually translated Lord; and which the Hebrews, in reading, always\nsubstitute for the True Name, which is for them ineffable.\n\nThe five columns, in the five different orders of architecture, are\nemblematical to us of the five principal divisions of the Ancient and\nAccepted Scottish Rite:\n\n1.--The _Tuscan_, of the three blue Degrees, or the primitive Masonry.\n\n2.--The _Doric_, of the ineffable Degrees, from the fourth to the\nfourteenth, inclusive.\n\n3.--The _Ionic_, of the fifteenth and sixteenth, or second temple\nDegrees.\n\n4.--The _Corinthian_, of the seventeenth and eighteenth Degrees, or\nthose of the new law.\n\n5.--The _Composite_, of the philosophical and chivalric Degrees\nintermingled, from the nineteenth to the thirty-second, inclusive.\n\nThe North Star, always fixed and immutable for us, represents the point\nin the centre of the circle, or the Deity in the centre of the Universe.\nIt is the especial symbol of duty and of faith. To it, and the seven\nthat continually revolve around it, mystical meanings are attached,\nwhich you will learn hereafter, if you should be permitted to advance,\nwhen you are made acquainted with the philosophical doctrines of the\nHebrews.\n\nThe Morning Star, rising in the East, Jupiter, called by the Hebrews\nTsad\u014dc or Tsydyk, _Just_, is an emblem to us of the ever-approaching\ndawn of perfection and Masonic light.\n\nThe three great lights of the Lodge are symbols to us of the Power,\nWisdom, and Beneficence of the Deity. They are also symbols of the first\nthree _Sephiroth_, or Emanations of the Deity, according to the Kabalah,\n_Kether_, the omnipotent divine _will_; _Chochmah_, the divine\nintellectual _power_ to _generate_ thought, and _Binah_, the divine\nintellectual _capacity_ to _produce_ it--the two latter, usually\ntranslated _Wisdom_ and _Understanding_, being the _active_ and the\n_passive_, the _positive_ and the _negative_, which we do not yet\nendeavor to explain to you. They are the columns Jachin and Boaz, that\nstand at the entrance to the Masonic Temple.\n\nIn another aspect of this Degree, the Chief of the Architects [[Hebrew:\n\u05e8\u05d1 \u05d1\u05e0\u05d9\u05dd], Rab Banaim,] symbolizes the constitutional executive head and\nchief of a free government; and the Degree teaches us that no free\ngovernment can long endure, when the people cease to select for their\nmagistrates the best and the wisest of their statesmen; when, passing\nthese by, they permit factions or sordid interests to select for them\nthe small, the low, the ignoble, and the obscure, and into such hands\ncommit the country's destinies. There is, after all, a \"divine right\" to\ngovern; and it is vested in the ablest, wisest, best, of every nation.\n\"Counsel is mine, and sound wisdom: I am understanding: I am power: by\nme kings do reign, and princes decree justice; by me princes rule, and\nnobles, even all the magistrates of the earth.\"\n\nFor the present, my Brother, let this suffice. We welcome you among us,\nto this peaceful retreat of virtue, to a participation in our\nprivileges, to a share in our joys and our sorrows.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nXIII.\n\nROYAL ARCH OF SOLOMON.\n\n\nWhether the legend and history of this Degree are historically true, or\nbut an allegory, containing in itself a deeper truth and a profounder\nmeaning, we shall not now debate. If it be but a legendary myth, you\nmust find out for yourself what it means. It is certain that the word\nwhich the Hebrews are not now permitted to pronounce was in common use\nby Abraham, Lot, Isaac, Jacob, Laban, Rebecca, and even among tribes\nforeign to the Hebrews, before the time of Moses; and that it recurs a\nhundred times in the lyrical effusions of David and other Hebrew poets.\n\nWe know that for many centuries the Hebrews have been forbidden to\npronounce the Sacred Name; that wherever it occurs, they have for ages\nread the word _Adona\u00ef_ instead; and that under it, when the masoretic\npoints, which represent the vowels, came to be used, they placed those\nwhich belonged to the latter word. The possession of the true\npronunciation was deemed to confer on him who had it extraordinary and\nsupernatural powers; and the Word itself, worn upon the person, was\nregarded as an amulet, a protection against personal danger, sickness,\nand evil spirits. We know that all this was a vain superstition, natural\nto a rude people, necessarily disappearing as the intellect of man\nbecame enlightened; and wholly unworthy of a Mason.\n\nIt is noticeable that this notion of the sanctity of the Divine Name or\nCreative Word was common to all the ancient nations. The Sacred Word HOM\nwas supposed by the ancient Persians (who were among the earliest\nemigrants from Northern India) to be pregnant with a mysterious power;\nand they taught that by its utterance the world was created. In India it\nwas forbidden to pronounce the word AUM or OM, the Sacred Name of the\nOne Deity, manifested as Brahma, Vishna, and Seeva.\n\nThese superstitious notions in regard to the efficacy of the Word, and\nthe prohibition against pronouncing it, could, being errors, have formed\nno part of the pure primitive religion, or of the esoteric doctrine\ntaught by Moses, and the full knowledge of which was confined to the\nInitiates; unless the whole was but an ingenious invention for the\nconcealment of some other Name or truth, the interpretation and meaning\nwhereof was made known only to the _select few_. If so, the common\nnotions in regard to the Word grew up in the minds of the people, like\nother errors and fables among all the ancient nations, out of original\ntruths and symbols and allegories misunderstood. So it has always been\nthat allegories, intended as vehicles of truth, to be understood by the\nsages, have become or bred errors, by being literally accepted.\n\nIt is true, that before the masoretic points were invented (which was\nafter the beginning of the Christian era), the pronunciation of a word\nin the Hebrew language could not be known from the characters in which\nit was written. It was, therefore, _possible_ for that of the name of\nthe Deity to have been forgotten and lost. It is certain that its true\npronunciation is not that represented by the word Jehovah; and therefore\nthat _that_ is not the true name of Deity, nor the Ineffable Word.\n\nThe ancient symbols and allegories always had more than one\ninterpretation. They always had a _double_ meaning, and sometimes _more_\nthan two, one serving as the envelope of the other. Thus the\n_pronunciation_ of the word was a symbol; and that pronunciation and the\nword itself were lost, when the knowledge of the true nature and\nattributes of God faded out of the minds of the Jewish people. That is\n_one_ interpretation--_true, but not the inner and profoundest one_.\n\nMen were figuratively said to forget the _name_ of God, when they lost\nthat _knowledge_, and worshipped the heathen deities, and burned incense\nto them on the high places, and passed their children through the fire\nto Moloch.\n\nThus the attempts of the ancient Israelites and of the Initiates to\nascertain the True Name of the Deity, and its pronunciation, and the\nloss of the True Word, are an allegory, in which are represented the\ngeneral ignorance of the true nature and attributes of God, the\nproneness of the people of Judah and Israel to worship other deities,\nand the low and erroneous and dishonoring notions of the Grand Architect\nof the Universe, which all shared except a few favored persons; for even\nSolomon built altars and sacrificed to Astarat, the goddess of the\nTsidunim, and Malc\u016bm, the Aam\u016bnite god, and built high places for Kam\u016bs,\nthe Moabite deity, and Malec the god of the Beni-Aam\u016bn. The true nature\nof God was unknown to them, like His name; and they worshipped the\ncalves of Jeroboam, as in the desert they did that made for them by\nAar\u016bn.\n\nThe mass of the Hebrews did not believe in the existence of one only God\nuntil a late period in their history. Their early and popular ideas of\nthe Deity were singularly low and unworthy. Even while Moses was\nreceiving the law upon Mount Sinai, they forced Aar\u016bn to make them an\nimage of the Egyptian god Apis, and fell down and adored it. They were\never ready to return to the worship of the gods of the Mitzraim; and\nsoon after the death of Joshua they became devout worshippers of the\nfalse gods of all the surrounding nations. \"Ye have borne,\" Amos, the\nprophet, said to them, speaking of their forty years' journeying in the\ndesert, under Moses, \"the tabernacle of your Malec and Kai\u016bn your idols,\nthe star of your god, which ye made to yourselves\".\n\nAmong them, as among other nations, the conceptions of God formed by\nindividuals varied according to their intellectual and spiritual\ncapacities; poor and imperfect, and investing God with the commonest and\ncoarsest attributes of humanity, among the ignorant and coarse; pure and\nlofty among the virtuous and richly gifted. These conceptions gradually\nimproved and became purified and ennobled, as the nation advanced in\ncivilization--being lowest in the historical books, amended in the\nprophetic writings, and reaching their highest elevation among the\npoets.\n\nAmong _all_ the ancient nations there was one faith and one idea of\nDeity for the enlightened, intelligent, and educated, and another for\nthe common people. To this rule the Hebrews were no exception. Yehovah,\nto the mass of the people, was like the gods of the nations around them,\nexcept that he was the _peculiar_ God, first of the family of Abraham,\nof that of Isaac, and of that of Jacob, and afterward the _National_\nGod; and, as they believed, _more powerful_ than the other gods of the\nsame nature worshipped by their neighbors--\"Who among the Baalim is\nlike unto thee, O Yehovah?\"--expressed their whole creed.\n\nThe Deity of the early Hebrews talked to Adam and Eve in the garden of\ndelight, as he walked in it in the cool of the day; he conversed with\nKayin; he sat and ate with Abraham in his tent; that patriarch required\na visible token, before he would believe in his positive promise; he\npermitted Abraham to expostulate with him, and to induce him to change\nhis first determination in regard to Sodom; he wrestled with Jacob; he\nshowed Moses his person, though not his face; he dictated the minutest\npolice regulations and the dimensions of the tabernacle and its\nfurniture, to the Israelites; he insisted on and delighted in sacrifices\nand burnt-offerings; he was angry, jealous, and revengeful, as well as\nwavering and irresolute; he allowed Moses to reason him out of his fixed\nresolution utterly to destroy his people; he commanded the performance\nof the most shocking and hideous acts of cruelty and barbarity. He\nhardened the heart of Pharaoh; he repented of the evil that he had said\nhe would do unto the people of Nineveh; and he did it not, to the\ndisgust and anger of Jonah.\n\nSuch were the popular notions of the Deity; and either the priests had\nnone better, or took little trouble to correct these notions; or the\npopular intellect was not enough enlarged to enable them to entertain\nany higher conceptions of the Almighty.\n\nBut such were not the ideas of the intellectual and enlightened few\namong the Hebrews, It is certain that _they_ possessed a knowledge of\nthe true nature and attributes of God; as the same class of men did\namong the other nations--Zoroaster, Menu, Confucius, Socrates, and\nPlato. But their doctrines on this subject were esoteric; they did not\ncommunicate them to the people at large, but only to a favored few; and\nas they were communicated in Egypt and India, in Persia and Ph\u0153nicia, in\nGreece and Samothrace, in the greater mysteries, to the Initiates.\n\nThe communication of this knowledge and other secrets, some of which are\nperhaps lost, constituted, under other names, what we now call\n_Masonry_, or _Free_ or _Frank-Masonry_. That knowledge was, in one\nsense, _the Lost Word_, which was made known to the Grand Elect,\nPerfect, and Sublime Masons. It would be folly to pretend that the\n_forms_ of Masonry were the same in those ages as they are now. The\npresent name of the Order, and its titles, and the names of the Degrees\nnow in use, were not then known. Even Blue Masonry cannot trace back\nits _authentic_ history, _with its present Degrees_, further than the\nyear 1700, _if so far_. But, by whatever _name_ it was known in this or\nthe other country, Masonry existed as it now exists, the same in spirit\nand at heart, not only when Solomon builded the temple, but centuries\nbefore--before even the first colonies emigrated into Southern India,\nPersia, and Egypt, from the cradle of the human race.\n\nThe Supreme, Self-existent, Eternal, All-wise, All-powerful, Infinitely\nGood, Pitying, Beneficent, and Merciful Creator and Preserver of the\nUniverse was the same, by whatever name he was called, to the\nintellectual and enlightened men of all nations. The name was nothing,\nif not a symbol and representative hieroglyph of his nature and\nattributes. The name AL represented his remoteness _above_ men, his\n_inaccessibility_; BAL and BALA, his _might_; ALOHIM, his various\n_potencies_; IHUH, _existence_ and the _generation_ of things. None of\nhis names, among the Orientals, were the symbols of a divinely infinite\nlove and tenderness, and all-embracing mercy. As MOLOCH or MALEK he was\nbut an omnipotent _monarch_, a tremendous and irresponsible _Will_; as\nADONA\u00cf, only an arbitrary LORD and _Master_; as AL _Shada\u00ef_, _potent_\nand a DESTROYER.\n\nTo communicate true and correct ideas in respect of the Deity was one\nchief object of the mysteries. In them, Kh\u016br\u016bm the King, and Kh\u016br\u016bm the\nMaster, obtained their knowledge of him and his attributes; and in them\nthat knowledge was taught to Moses and Pythagoras.\n\nWherefore nothing forbids you to consider the whole legend of this\nDegree, like that of the Master's, an allegory, representing the\nperpetuation of the knowledge of the True God in the sanctuaries of\ninitiation. By the subterranean vaults you may understand the places of\ninitiation, which in the ancient ceremonies were generally under ground.\nThe Temple of Solomon presented a symbolic image of the Universe; and\nresembled, in its arrangements and furniture, all the temples of the\nancient nations that practised the mysteries. The system of numbers was\nintimately connected with their religions and worship, and has come down\nto us in Masonry; though the esoteric meaning with which the numbers\nused by us are pregnant is unknown to the vast majority of those who use\nthem. Those numbers were especially employed that had a reference to the\nDeity, represented his attributes, or figured in the frame-work of the\nworld, in time and space, and formed more or less the bases of that\nframe-work. These were universally regarded as sacred, being the\nexpression of order and intelligence, the utterances of Divinity\nHimself.\n\nThe Holy of Holies of the Temple formed a cube; in which, drawn on a\nplane surface, there are 4+3+2=9 _lines_ visible, and three sides or\nfaces. It corresponded with the number _four_, by which the ancients\npresented _Nature_, it being the number of substances or corporeal\nforms, and of the elements, the cardinal points and seasons, and the\n_secondary_ colors. The number _three_ everywhere represented the\nSupreme Being. Hence the name of the Deity, engraven upon the\n_triangular_ plate, and that sunken into the _cube_ of agate, taught the\nancient Mason, and teaches us, that the true knowledge of God, of His\nnature and His attributes, is written by Him upon the leaves of the\ngreat Book of Universal Nature, and may be read there by all who are\nendowed with the requisite amount of intellect and intelligence. This\nknowledge of God, so written there, and of which Masonry has in all ages\nbeen the interpreter, is _the Master Mason's Word_.\n\nWithin the Temple, all the arrangements were mystically and symbolically\nconnected with the same system. The vault or ceiling, starred like the\nfirmament, was supported by twelve columns, representing the twelve\nmonths of the year. The border that ran around the columns represented\nthe zodiac, and one of the twelve celestial signs was appropriated to\neach column. The brazen sea was supported by twelve oxen, three looking\nto each cardinal point of the compass.\n\nAnd so in our day every Masonic Lodge represents the Universe. Each\nextends, we are told, from the rising to the setting sun, from the South\nto the North, from the surface of the Earth to the Heavens, and from the\nsame to the centre of the globe. In it are represented the sun, moon,\nand stars; three great torches in the East, West, and South, forming a\ntriangle, give it light; and, like the Delta or Triangle suspended in\nthe East, and inclosing the Ineffable Name, indicate, by the\nmathematical equality of the angles and sides, the beautiful and\nharmonious proportions which govern in the aggregate and details of the\nUniverse; while those sides and angles represent, by their number,\nthree, the Trinity of Power, Wisdom, and Harmony, which presided at the\nbuilding of this marvellous work. These three great lights also\nrepresent the great mystery of the three principles, of creation,\ndissolution or destruction, and reproduction or regeneration,\nconsecrated by all creeds in their numerous Trinities.\n\nThe luminous pedestal, lighted by the perpetual flame within, is a\nsymbol of that light of _Reason_, given by God to man, by which he is\nenabled to read in the Book of Nature the record of the thought, the\nrevelation of the attributes of the Deity.\n\nThe three Masters, Adoniram, Joabert, and Stolkin, are types of the True\nMason, who seeks for knowledge from pure motives, and that he may be the\nbetter enabled to serve and benefit his fellow-men; while the\ndiscontented and presumptuous Masters who were buried in the ruins of\nthe arches represent those who strive to acquire it for unholy purposes,\nto gain power over their fellows, to gratify their pride, their vanity,\nor their ambition.\n\nThe Lion that guarded the Ark and held in his mouth the key wherewith to\nopen it, figuratively represents Solomon, the Lion of the Tribe of\nJudah, who preserved and communicated the key to the true knowledge of\nGod, of His laws, and of the profound mysteries of the moral and\nphysical Universe.\n\nENOCH [[Hebrew: \u05d7\u05e0\u05d5\u05da], Khan\u014dc], we are told, walked with God three\nhundred years, after reaching the age of sixty-five--\"walked with God,\nand he was no more, for God had taken him.\" His name signified in the\nHebrew, INITIATE or INITIATOR. The legend of the columns, of granite and\nbrass or bronze, erected by him, is probably symbolical. That of bronze,\nwhich survived the flood, is supposed to symbolize the mysteries, of\nwhich Masonry is the legitimate successor--from the earliest times the\ncustodian and depository of the great philosophical and religious\ntruths, unknown to the world at large, and handed down from age to age\nby an unbroken current of tradition, embodied in symbols, emblems, and\nallegories.\n\nThe legend of this Degree is thus, partially, interpreted. It is of\nlittle importance whether it is in anywise historical. For its value\nconsists in the lessons which it inculcates, and the duties which it\nprescribes to those who receive it. The parables and allegories of the\nScriptures are not less valuable than history. Nay, they are more so,\nbecause ancient history is little instructive, and truths are concealed\nin and symbolized by the legend and the myth. There are profounder\nmeanings concealed in the symbols of this Degree, connected with the\nphilosophical system of the Hebrew Kabalists, which you will learn\nhereafter, if you should be so fortunate as to advance. They are\nunfolded in the higher Degrees. The _lion_ [[Hebrew: \u05d0\u05e8\u05d9\u05d4,\u05d0\u05e8\u05d9] _Arai_,\n_Araiah_, which also means the _altar_] still holds in his mouth the key\nof the enigma of the sphynx.\n\nBut there is one application of this Degree, that you are now entitled\nto know; and which, remembering that Kh\u016br\u016bm, the Master, is the symbol\nof human freedom, you would probably discover for yourself.\n\nIt is not enough for a people to _gain_ its liberty. It must _secure_\nit. It must not intrust it to the keeping, or hold it at the pleasure,\nof any one man. The keystone of the Royal Arch of the great Temple of\nLiberty is a fundamental law, charter, or constitution; the expression\nof the fixed habits of thought of the people, embodied in a written\ninstrument, or the result of the slow accretions and the consolidation\nof centuries; the same in war as in peace; that cannot be hastily\nchanged, nor be violated with impunity, but is sacred, like the Ark of\nthe Covenant of God, which none could touch and live.\n\nA permanent constitution, rooted in the affections, expressing the will\nand judgment, and built upon the instincts and settled habits of thought\nof the people, with an independent judiciary, an elective legislature of\ntwo branches, an executive responsible to the people, and the right of\ntrial by jury, will guarantee the liberties of a people, if it be\nvirtuous and temperate, without luxury, and without the lust of conquest\nand dominion, and the follies of visionary theories of impossible\nperfection.\n\nMasonry teaches its Initiates that the pursuits and occupations of this\nlife, its activity, care, and ingenuity, the predestined developments of\nthe nature given us by God, tend to promote His great design, in making\nthe world; and are not at war with the great purpose of life. It teaches\nthat everything is beautiful in its time, in its place, in its appointed\noffice; that everything which man is put to do, if rightly and\nfaithfully done, naturally helps to work out his salvation; that if he\nobeys the genuine principles of his calling, he will be a good man: and\nthat it is only by neglect and non-performance of the task set for him\nby Heaven, by wandering into idle dissipation, or by violating their\nbeneficent and lofty spirit, that he becomes a bad man. The appointed\naction of life is the great training of Providence; and if man yields\nhimself to it, he will need neither churches nor ordinances, except for\nthe _expression_ of his religious homage and gratitude.\n\nFor there is a religion of toil. It is not all drudgery, a mere\nstretching of the limbs and straining of the sinews to tasks. It has a\nmeaning and an intent. A living heart pours life-blood into the toiling\narm; and warm affections inspire and mingle with man's labors. They are\nthe _home_ affections. Labor toils a-field, or plies its task in cities,\nor urges the keels of commerce over wide oceans; but home is its centre;\nand thither it ever goes with its earnings, with the means of support\nand comfort for others; offerings sacred to the thought of every true\nman, as a sacrifice at a golden shrine. Many faults there are amidst the\ntoils of life; many harsh and hasty, words are uttered; but still the\ntoils go on, weary and hard and exasperating as they often are. For in\nthat home is age or sickness, or helpless infancy, or gentle childhood,\nor feeble woman, that must not want. If man had no other than mere\nselfish impulses, the scene of labor which we behold around us would not\nexist.\n\nThe advocate who fairly and honestly presents his case, with a feeling\nof true self-respect, honor, and conscience, to help the tribunal on\ntowards the right conclusion, with a conviction that God's justice\nreigns there, is acting a religious part, leading that day a religious\nlife; or else right and justice are no part of religion. Whether, during\nall that day, he has once appealed, in form or in terms, to his\nconscience, or not; whether he has once spoken of religion and God, or\nnot; if there has been the inward purpose, the conscious intent and\ndesire, that sacred justice should triumph, he has that day led a good\nand _religious_ life, and made a most essential contribution to that\nreligion of life and of society, the cause of equity between man and\nman, and of truth and right action in the world.\n\nBooks, to be of religious tendency in the Masonic sense, need not be\nbooks of sermons, of pious exercises, or of prayers. Whatever inculcates\npure, noble, and patriotic sentiments, or touches the heart with the\nbeauty of virtue, and the excellence of an upright life, accords with\nthe religion of Masonry, and is the Gospel of literature and art. That\nGospel is preached from many a book and painting, from many a poem and\nfiction, and review and newspaper; and it is a painful error and\nmiserable narrowness, not to recognize these wide-spread agencies of\nHeaven's providing; not to see and welcome these many-handed\ncoadjutors, to the great and good cause. The oracles of God do not speak\nfrom the pulpit alone.\n\nThere is also a religion of society. In business, there is much more\nthan sale, exchange, price, payment; for there is the sacred faith of\nman in man. When we repose perfect confidence in the integrity of\nanother; when we feel that he will not swerve from the right, frank,\nstraightforward, conscientious course, for any temptation; his integrity\nand conscientiousness are the image of God to us; and when we believe in\n_it_, it is as great and generous an act, as when we believe in the\nrectitude of the Deity.\n\nIn gay assemblies for amusement, the good affections of life gush and\nmingle. If _they_ did not, these gathering-places would be as dreary and\nrepulsive as the caves and dens of outlaws and robbers. When friends\nmeet, and hands are warmly pressed, and the eye kindles and the\ncountenance is suffused with gladness, there is a religion between their\nhearts; and each loves and worships the True and Good that is in the\nother. It is not policy, or self-interest, or selfishness that spreads\nsuch a charm around that meeting, but the halo of bright and beautiful\naffection.\n\nThe same splendor of kindly liking, and affectionate regard, shines like\nthe soft overarching sky, over all the world; over all places where men\nmeet, and walk or toil together; not over lovers' bowers and\nmarriage-altars alone, not over the homes of purity and tenderness\nalone; but over all tilled fields, and busy workshops, and dusty\nhighways, and paved streets. There is not a worn stone upon the\nsidewalks, but has been the altar of such offerings of mutual kindness;\nnor a wooden pillar or iron railing against which hearts beating with\naffection have not leaned. How many soever other elements there are in\nthe stream of life flowing through these channels, _that_ is surely here\nand everywhere; honest, heartfelt, disinterested, inexpressible\naffection.\n\nEvery Masonic Lodge is a temple of religion; and its teachings are\ninstruction in religion. For here are inculcated disinterestedness,\naffection, toleration, devotedness, patriotism, truth, a generous\nsympathy with those who suffer and mourn, pity for the fallen, mercy for\nthe erring, relief for those in want, Faith, Hope, and Charity. Here we\nmeet as brethren, to learn to know and love each other. Here we greet\neach other gladly, are lenient to each other's faults, regardful of each\nother's feelings, ready to relieve each other's wants. This is the true\nreligion revealed to the ancient patriarchs; which Masonry has taught\nfor many centuries, and which it will continue to teach as long as time\nendures. If unworthy passions, or selfish, bitter, or revengeful\nfeelings, contempt, dislike, hatred, enter here, they are intruders and\nnot welcome, strangers uninvited, and not guests.\n\nCertainly there are many evils and bad passions, and much hate and\ncontempt and unkindness everywhere in the world. We cannot refuse to see\nthe evil that is in life. But _all_ is not evil. We still see God in the\nworld. There is good amidst the evil. The hand of mercy leads wealth to\nthe hovels of poverty and sorrow. Truth and simplicity live amid many\nwiles and sophistries. There are good hearts underneath gay robes, and\nunder tattered garments also.\n\nLove clasps the hand of love, amid all the envyings and distractions of\nshowy competition; fidelity, pity, and sympathy hold the long\nnight-watch by the bedside of the suffering neighbor, amidst the\nsurrounding poverty and squalid misery. Devoted men go from city to city\nto nurse those smitten down by the terrible pestilence that renews at\nintervals its mysterious marches. Women well-born and delicately\nnurtured nursed the wounded soldiers in hospitals, before it became\nfashionable to do so; and even poor lost women, whom God alone loves and\npities, tend the plague-stricken with a patient and generous heroism.\nMasonry and its kindred Orders teach men to love each other, feed the\nhungry, clothe the naked, comfort the sick, and bury the friendless\ndead. Everywhere God finds and blesses the kindly office, the pitying\nthought, and the loving heart.\n\nThere is an element of good in all men's lawful pursuits and a divine\nspirit breathing in all their lawful affections. The ground on which\nthey tread is holy ground. There is a natural religion of life,\nanswering, with however many a broken tone, to the religion of nature.\nThere is a beauty and glory in Humanity, in man, answering, with however\nmany a mingling shade, to the loveliness of soft landscapes, and\nswelling hills, and the wondrous glory of the starry heavens.\n\nMen may be virtuous, self-improving, and religious _in_ their\nemployments. Precisely for that, those employments were made. All their\nsocial relations, friendship, love, the ties of family, were made to be\nholy. They may be religious, not by a kind of protest and resistance\nagainst their several vocations; but by conformity to their true spirit.\nThose vocations do not _exclude_ religion; but _demand_ it, for their\nown perfection. They may be religious laborers whether in field or\nfactory; religious physicians, lawyers, sculptors, poets, painters, and\nmusicians. They may be religious in all the toils and in all the\namusements of life. Their life may be a religion; the broad earth its\naltar; its incense the very breath of life; its fires ever kindled by\nthe brightness of Heaven.\n\nBound up with our poor, frail life, is the mighty thought that spurns\nthe narrow span of all visible existence. Ever the soul reaches outward,\nand asks for freedom. It looks forth from the narrow and grated windows\nof sense, upon the wide immeasurable creation; it knows that around it\nand beyond it lie outstretched the infinite and everlasting paths.\n\nEverything within us and without us ought to stir our minds to\nadmiration and wonder. We are a mystery encompassed with mysteries. The\nconnection of mind with matter is a mystery; the wonderful telegraphic\ncommunication between the brain and every part of the body, the power\nand action of the will. Every familiar step is more than a story in a\nland of enchantment. The power of movement is as mysterious as the power\nof thought. Memory, and dreams that are the indistinct echoes of dead\nmemories are alike inexplicable. Universal harmony springs from infinite\ncomplication. The momentum of every step we take in our dwelling\ncontributes in part to the order of the Universe. We are connected by\nties of thought, and even of matter and its forces, with the whole\nboundless Universe and all the past and coming generations of men.\n\nThe humblest object beneath our eye as completely defies our scrutiny as\nthe economy of the most distant star. Every leaf and every blade of\ngrass holds within itself secrets which no human penetration will ever\nfathom. No man can tell what is its principle of life. No man can know\nwhat his power of secretion is. Both are inscrutable mysteries. Wherever\nwe place our hand we lay it upon the locked bosom of mystery. Step where\nwe will, we tread upon wonders. The sea-sands, the clods of the field,\nthe water-worn pebbles on the hills, the rude masses of rock, are traced\nover and over, in every direction, with a handwriting older and more\nsignificant and sublime than all the ancient ruins and all the\noverthrown and buried cities that past generations have left upon the\nearth; for it is the handwriting of the Almighty.\n\nA Mason's great business with life is to read the book of its teaching;\nto find that life is not the doing of drudgeries, but the hearing of\noracles. The old mythology is but a leaf in that book; for it peopled\nthe world with spiritual natures; and science, many-leaved, still\nspreads before us the same tale of wonder.\n\nWe shall be just as happy hereafter, as we are pure and upright, and no\nmore, just as happy as our character prepares us to be, and no more. Our\nmoral, like our mental character, is not formed in a moment; it is the\nhabit of our minds; the result of many thoughts and feelings and\nefforts, bound together by many natural and strong ties. The great law\nof Retribution is, that all coming experience is to be affected by every\npresent feeling; every future moment of being must answer for every\npresent moment; one moment, sacrificed to vice, or lost to improvement,\nis _forever_ sacrificed and lost; an hour's delay to enter the right\npath, is to put us back so far, in the everlasting pursuit of happiness;\nand every sin, even of the best men, is to be thus answered for, if not\naccording to the full measure of its ill-desert, yet according to a rule\nof unbending rectitude and impartiality.\n\nThe law of retribution presses upon every man, whether he thinks of it\nor not. It pursues him through all the courses of life, with a step that\nnever falters nor tires, and with an eye that never sleeps. If it were\nnot so, God's government would not be impartial; there would be no\ndiscrimination; no moral dominion; no light shed upon the mysteries of\nProvidence.\n\nWhatsoever a man soweth, that, and not something else, shall he reap.\nThat which we are doing, good or evil, grave or gay, that which we do\nto-day and shall do to-morrow; each thought, each feeling, each action,\neach event; every passing hour, every breathing moment; all are\ncontributing to form the character, according to which we are to be\njudged. Every particle of influence that goes to form that\naggregate,--our character,--will, in that future scrutiny, be sifted out\nfrom the mass; and, particle by particle, with ages perhaps intervening,\nfall a distinct contribution to the sum of our joys or woes. Thus every\nidle word and idle hour will give answer in the judgment.\n\nLet us take care, therefore, what we sow. An evil temptation comes upon\nus; the opportunity of unrighteous gain, or of unhallowed indulgence,\neither in the sphere of business or pleasure, of society or solitude. We\nyield; and plant a seed of bitterness and sorrow. To-morrow it will\nthreaten discovery. Agitated and alarmed, we cover the sin, and bury it\ndeep in falsehood and hypocrisy. In the bosom where it lies concealed,\nin the fertile soil of kindred vices, that sin dies not, but thrives and\ngrows; and other and still other germs of evil gather around the\naccursed root; until, from that single seed of corruption, there springs\nup in the soul all that is horrible in habitual lying, knavery, or vice.\nLoathingly, often, we take each downward step; but a frightful power\nurges us onward; and the hell of debt, disease, ignominy, or remorse\ngathers its shadows around our steps even on earth; and are yet but the\nbeginnings of sorrows. The evil deed may be done in a single moment; but\nconscience never dies, memory never sleeps; guilt never can become\ninnocence; and remorse can never whisper peace.\n\nBeware, thou who art tempted to evil! Beware what thou layest up for the\nfuture! Beware what thou layest up in the archives of eternity! Wrong\nnot thy neighbor! lest the thought of him thou injurest, and who suffers\nby thy act, be to thee a pang which years will not deprive of its\nbitterness! Break not into the house of innocence, to rifle it of its\ntreasure; lest when many years have passed over thee, the moan of its\ndistress may not have died away from thine ear! Build not the desolate\nthrone of ambition in thy heart; nor be busy with devices, and\ncircumventings, and selfish schemings; lest desolation and loneliness be\non thy path, as it stretches into the long futurity! Live not a useless,\nan impious, or an injurious life! for bound up with that life is the\nimmutable principle of an endless retribution, and elements of God's\ncreating, which will never spend their force, but continue ever to\nunfold with the ages of eternity. Be not deceived! God has formed thy\nnature, thus to answer to the future. His law can never be abrogated,\nnor His justice eluded; and forever and ever it win be true, that\n\"_Whatsoever a man soweth, that also he shall reap_.\"\n\n[Illustration: Decorative]\n\n\n\n\nXIV.\n\nGRAND ELECT, PERFECT, AND SUBLIME MASON.\n\n[Perfect Elu.]\n\n\nIt is for each individual Mason to discover the secret of Masonry, by\nreflection upon its symbols and a wise consideration and analysis of\nwhat is said and done in the work. Masonry does not _inculcate_ her\ntruths. She states them, once and briefly; or hints them, perhaps,\ndarkly; or interposes a cloud between them and eyes that would be\ndazzled by them. \"_Seek_, and ye shall _find_,\" knowledge and the truth.\n\nThe practical object of Masonry is the physical and moral amelioration\nand the intellectual and spiritual improvement of individuals and\nsociety. Neither can be effected, except by the dissemination of truth.\nIt is falsehood in doctrines and fallacy in principles, to which most of\nthe miseries of men and the misfortunes of nations are owing. Public\nopinion is rarely right on any point; and there are and always will be\nimportant truths to be substituted in that opinion in the place of many\nerrors and absurd and injurious prejudices. There are few truths that\npublic opinion has not at some time hated and persecuted as heresies,\nand few errors that have not at some time seemed to it truths radiant\nfrom the immediate presence of God. There are moral maladies, also, of\nman and society, the treatment of which requires not only boldness, but\nalso, and more, prudence and discretion; since they are more the fruit\nof false and pernicious doctrines, moral, political, and religious, than\nof vicious inclinations.\n\nMuch of the Masonic secret manifests itself, without revealing it, to\nhim who even partially comprehends all the Decrees in proportion as he\nreceives them; and particularly to those who advance to the highest\nDegrees of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite. That Rite raises a\ncorner of the veil, even in the degree of Apprentice; for it there\ndeclares that Masonry is a _worship_.\n\nMasonry labors to improve the social order by enlightening men's minds,\nwarming their hearts with the love of the good, inspiring them with the\ngreat principle of human fraternity, and requiring of its disciples that\ntheir language and actions shall conform to that principle, that they\nshall enlighten each other, control their passions, abhor vice, and pity\nthe vicious man as one afflicted with a deplorable malady.\n\nIt is the universal, eternal, immutable religion, such as God planted it\nin the heart of universal humanity. No creed has ever been long-lived\nthat was not built on this foundation. It is the base, and they are the\nsuperstructure. \"Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father\nis this, to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to\nkeep himself unspotted from the world.\" \"Is not _this_ the fast that I\nhave chosen? to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy\nburdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every\nyoke?\" The ministers of this religion are all Masons who comprehend it\nand are devoted to it; its sacrifices to God are good works, the\nsacrifices of the base and disorderly passions, the offering up of\nself-interest on the altar of humanity, and perpetual efforts to attain\nto all the moral perfection of which man is capable.\n\nTo make honor and duty the steady beacon-lights that shall guide your\nlife-vessel over the stormy seas of time; to do that which it is right\nto do, not because it will insure you success, or bring with it a\nreward, or gain the applause of men, or be \"the best policy,\" more\nprudent or more advisable; but because it is right, and therefore\n_ought_ to be done; to war incessantly against error, intolerance,\nignorance, and vice, and yet to pity those who err, to be tolerant even\nof intolerance, to teach the ignorant, and labor to reclaim the vicious,\nare some of the duties of a Mason.\n\nA good Mason is one that can look upon death, and see its face the same\ncountenance with which he hears its story; that \"I endure all the labors\"\nof his life with his soul supporting his body, that can equally despise\nriches when he hath them and when he hath them not; that is, not sadder\nif they are in his neighbor's exchequer, nor more lifted up if they\nshine around about his own walls; one that is not moved with good\nfortune coming to him, nor going from him; that can look upon another\nman's lands with equanimity and pleasure, as if they were his own; and\nyet look upon his own, and use them too, just as if they were another\nman's; that neither spends his goods prodigally and foolishly, nor yet\nkeeps them avariciously and like a miser; that weighs not benefits by\nweight and number, but by the mind and circumstances of him who confers\nthem; that never thinks his charity expensive, if a worthy person be the\nreceiver; that does nothing for opinion's sake, but everything for\nconscience, being as careful of his thoughts as of his acting in markets\nand theatres, and in as much awe of himself as of a whole assembly; that\nis, bountiful and cheerful to his friends, and charitable and apt to\nforgive his enemies; that loves his country, consults its honor, and\nobeys its laws, and desires and endeavors nothing more than that he may\ndo his duty and honor God. And such a Mason may reckon his life to be\nthe life of a man, and compute his months, not by the course of the sun,\nbut by the zodiac and circle of his virtues.\n\nThe whole world is, but one republic, of which each nation is a family,\nand every individual a child. Masonry, not in anywise derogating from\nthe differing duties which the diversity of states requires, tends to\ncreate a new people, which, composed of men of many nations and tongues,\nshall all be bound together by the bonds of science, morality, and\nvirtue.\n\nEssentially philanthropic, philosophical, and progressive, it has for\nthe basis of its dogma a firm belief in the existence of God and his\nprovidence, and of the immortality of the soul; for its object, the\ndissemination of moral, political, philosophical, and religious truth,\nand the practice of all the virtues. In every age, its device has been,\n\"Liberty, Equality, Fraternity,\" with constitutional government, _law,\norder, discipline_, and _subordination_ to legitimate\nauthority--_government_ and not _anarchy_.\n\nBut it is neither a political party nor a religious sect. It embraces\nall parties and all sects, to form from among them all a vast fraternal\nassociation. It recognizes the dignity of human nature, and man's right\nto such freedom as he is fitted for; and it knows nothing that should\nplace one man below another, except ignorance, debasement, and crime,\nand the necessity of subordination to lawful will and authority.\n\nIt is philanthropic; for it recognizes the great truth that all men are\nof the same origin, have common interests, and should co-operate\ntogether to the same end.\n\nTherefore it teaches its members to love one another, to give to each\nother mutual assistance and support in all the circumstances of life, to\nshare each other's pains and sorrows, as well as their joys and\npleasures; to guard the reputations, respect the opinions, and be\nperfectly tolerant of the errors, of each other, in matters of faith and\nbeliefs.\n\nIt is philosophical, because it teaches the great Truths concerning the\nnature and existence of one Supreme Deity, and the existence and\nimmortality of the soul. It revives the Academy of Plato, and the wise\nteachings of Socrates. It reiterates the maxims of Pythagoras,\nConfucius, and Zoroaster, and reverentially enforces the sublime lessons\nof Him who died upon the Cross.\n\nThe ancients thought that universal humanity acted under the influence\nof two opposing Principles, the Good and the Evil: of which the Good\nurged men toward Truth, Independence, and Devotedness; and the Evil\ntoward Falsehood, Servility, and Selfishness. Masonry represents the\nGood Principle and constantly wars against the evil one. It is the\nHercules, the Osiris, the Apollo, the Mithras, and the Ormuzd, at\neverlasting and deadly feud with the demons of ignorance, brutality,\nbaseness, falsehood, slavishness of soul, intolerance, superstition,\ntyranny, meanness, the insolence of wealth, and bigotry.\n\nWhen despotism and superstition, twin-powers of evil and darkness,\nreigned everywhere and seemed invincible and immortal, it invented, to\navoid persecution, the mysteries, that is to say, the allegory, the\nsymbol, and the emblem, and transmitted its doctrines by the secret mode\nof initiation. Now, retaining its ancient symbols, and in part its\nancient ceremonies, it displays in every civilized country its banner,\non which in letters of living light its great principles are written;\nand it smiles at the puny efforts of kings and popes to crush it out by\nexcommunication and interdiction.\n\nMan's views in regard to God, will contain only so much positive truth\nas the human mind is capable of receiving; whether that truth is\nattained by the exercise of reason, or communicated by revelation. It\nmust necessarily be both limited and alloyed, to bring it within the\ncompetence of finite human intelligence. Being finite, we can form no\ncorrect or adequate idea of the Infinite; being material, we can form no\nclear conception of the Spiritual. We do believe in and know the\ninfinity of Space and Time, and the spirituality of the Soul; but the\n_idea_ of that infinity and spirituality eludes us. Even Omnipotence\ncannot infuse infinite conceptions into finite minds; nor can God,\nwithout first entirely changing the conditions of our being, pour a\ncomplete and full knowledge of His own nature and attributes into the\nnarrow capacity of a human soul. Human intelligence could not grasp it,\nnor human language express it. The visible is, necessarily, the measure\nof the invisible.\n\nThe consciousness of the individual reveals _itself_ alone. His\nknowledge cannot pass beyond the limits of his own being. His\nconceptions of other things and other beings _are only his conceptions_.\nThey are not those things or beings themselves. The living principle of\na living Universe must be INFINITE; while all _our_ ideas and\nconceptions are _finite_, and applicable only to finite beings.\n\nThe Deity is thus not an object of _knowledge_, but of _faith_; not to\nbe approached by the _understanding_, but by the _moral sense_; not to\nbe _conceived_, but to be _felt_. All attempts to embrace the Infinite\nin the conception of the Finite are, and must be only accommodations to\nthe frailty of man. Shrouded from human comprehension in an obscurity\nfrom which a chastened imagination is awed back, and Thought retreats in\nconscious weakness, the Divine Nature is a theme on which man is little\nentitled to dogmatize. Here the philosophic Intellect becomes most\npainfully aware of its own insufficiency.\n\nAnd yet it is here that man most dogmatizes, classifies and describes\nGod's attributes, makes out his map of God's nature, and his inventory\nof God's qualities, feelings, impulses, and passions; and then hangs and\nburns his brother, who, as dogmatically as he, makes out a different map\nand inventory. The common understanding has no humility. _Its_ God is an\n_incarnate_ Divinity. Imperfection imposes its own limitations on the\nIllimitable, and clothes the Inconceivable Spirit of the Universe in\nforms that come within the grasp of the senses and the intellect, and\nare derived from that infinite and imperfect nature which is but God's\ncreation.\n\nWe are all of us, though not all equally, mistaken. The cherished dogmas\nof each of us are not, as we fondly suppose, the pure truth of God; but\nsimply our own special form of error, our guesses at truth, the\nrefracted and fragmentary rays of light that have fallen upon our own\nminds. Our little systems have their day, and cease to be; they are but\nbroken lights of God; and He is more than they. Perfect truth is not\nattainable anywhere. We style this Degree that of Perfection; and yet\nwhat it teaches is imperfect and defective. Yet we are not to relax in\nthe pursuit of truth, nor contentedly acquiesce in error. It is our duty\nalways to press forward in the search; for though absolute truth is\nunattainable, yet the amount of error in our views is capable of\nprogressive and perpetual diminution; and thus Masonry is a continual\nstruggle toward the light.\n\nAll errors are not equally innocuous. That which is most injurious is to\nentertain unworthy conceptions of the nature and attributes of God; and\nit is this that Masonry symbolizes by ignorance of the True Word. The\ntrue word of a Mason is, not the entire, perfect, absolute truth in\nregard to God; but the highest and noblest conception of Him that our\nminds are capable of forming; and this _word_ is Ineffable, because one\nman cannot communicate to another his own conception of Deity; since\nevery man's conception of God must be proportioned to his mental\ncultivation, and intellectual powers, and moral excellence. God is, as\nman conceives Him, the reflected image of man himself.\n\nFor every man's conception of God must vary with his mental cultivation\nand mental powers. If any one contents himself with any _lower_ image\nthan his intellect is capable of grasping, then he contents himself with\nthat which is false _to him_, as well as false _in fact_. If lower than\nhe can reach, he must needs _feel_ it to be false. And if we, of the\nnineteenth century after Christ, adopt the conceptions of the nineteenth\ncentury before Him; if _our_ conceptions of God are those of the\nignorant, narrow-minded, and vindictive Israelite; then we think worse\nof God, and have a lower, meaner, and more limited view of His nature,\nthan the faculties which He has bestowed are capable of grasping. The\nhighest view we can form is nearest to the truth. If we acquiesce in any\nlower one, we acquiesce in an untruth. We feel that it is an affront and\nan indignity to Him, to conceive of Him as cruel, short-sighted,\ncapricious and unjust; as a jealous, an angry, a vindictive Being.\n\nWhen we examine our conceptions of His character, if we can conceive of\na loftier, nobler, higher, more beneficent, glorious, and magnificent\ncharacter, then this latter is to us the true conception of Deity; _for\nnothing can be imagined more excellent than He_.\n\nReligion, to obtain currency and influence with the great mass of\nmankind, must needs be alloyed with such an amount of error as to place\nit far below the standard attainable by the higher human capacities. A\nreligion as pure as the loftiest and most cultivated human reason could\ndiscern, would not be comprehended by, or effective over, the less\neducated portion of mankind. What is Truth to the philosopher, would not\nbe Truth, nor have the effect of Truth, to the peasant. The religion of\nthe many must necessarily be more incorrect than that of the refined and\nreflective few, not so much in its essence as in its forms, not so much\nin the spiritual idea which lies latent at the bottom of it, as in the\nsymbols and dogmas in which that idea is embodied. The truest religion\nwould, in many points, not be comprehended by the ignorant, nor\nconsolatory to them, nor guiding and supporting for them. The doctrines\nof the Bible are often not clothed in the language of strict truth, but\nin that which was fittest to convey to a rude and ignorant people the\npractical essentials of the doctrine. A perfectly pure faith, free from\nall extraneous admixtures, a system of noble theism and lofty morality,\nwould find too little preparation for it in the common mind and heart,\nto admit of prompt reception by the masses of mankind; and Truth might\nnot have reached us, if it had not borrowed the wings of Error.\n\nThe Mason regards God as a Moral Governor, as well as an Original\nCreator; as a God at hand, and not merely one afar off in the distance\nof infinite space, and in the remoteness of Past or Future Eternity. He\nconceives of Him as taking a watchful and presiding interest in the\naffairs of the world, and as influencing the hearts and actions of men.\n\nTo him, God is the great Source of the World of Life and Matter; and\nman, with his wonderful corporeal and mental frame, His direct work. He\nbelieves that God has made men with different intellectual capacities;\nand enabled some, by superior intellectual power, to see and originate\ntruths which are hidden from the mass of men. He believes that when it\nis His will that mankind should make some great step forward, or achieve\nsome pregnant discovery, He calls into being some intellect of more than\nordinary magnitude and power, to give birth to new ideas, and grander\nconceptions of the Truths vital to Humanity.\n\nWe hold that God has so ordered matters in this beautiful and\nharmonious, but mysteriously-governed Universe, that one great mind\nafter another will arise, from time to time, as such are needed, to\nreveal to men the truths that are wanted, and the amount of truth than\ncan be borne. He so arranges, that nature and the course of events shall\nsend men into the world, endowed with that higher mental and moral\norganization, in which grand truths, and sublime gleams of spiritual\nlight will spontaneously and inevitably arise. These speak to men by\ninspiration.\n\nWhatever Hiram really was, he is the type, perhaps an imaginary type, to\nus, of humanity in its highest phase; an exemplar of what man may and\nshould become, in the course of ages, in his progress toward the\nrealization of his destiny; an individual gifted with a glorious\nintellect, a noble soul, a fine organization, and a perfectly balanced\nmoral being; an earnest of what humanity may be, and what we believe it\nwill hereafter be in God's good time; _the possibility of the race made\nreal_.\n\nThe Mason believes that God has arranged this glorious but perplexing\nworld with a purpose, and on a plan. He holds that every man sent upon\nthis earth, and especially every man of superior capacity, has a duty to\nperform, a mission to fulfill, a baptism to be baptized with; that every\ngreat and good man possesses some portion of God's truth, which he must\nproclaim to the world, and which must bear fruit in his own bosom. In a\ntrue and simple sense, he believes all the pure, wise, and intellectual\nto be inspired, and to be so for the instruction, advancement, and\nelevation of mankind. That kind of inspiration, like God's omnipresence,\nis not limited to the few writers claimed by Jews, Christians, or\nMoslems, but is co-extensive with the race. It is the consequence of a\nfaithful use of our faculties. Each man is its subject, God is its\nsource, and Truth its only test. It differs in degrees, as the\nintellectual endowments, the moral wealth of the soul, and the degree of\ncultivation of those endowments and faculties differ. It is limited to\nno sect, age, or nation. It is wide as the world and common as God. It\nwas not given to a few men, in the infancy of mankind, to monopolize\ninspiration, and bar God out of the soul. We are not born in the dotage\nand decay of the world. The stars are beautiful as in their prime; the\nmost ancient Heavens are fresh and strong. God is still everywhere in\nnature. Wherever a heart beats with love, wherever Faith and Reason\nutter their oracles, there is God, as formerly in the hearts of seers\nand prophets. No soil on earth is so holy as the good man's heart;\nnothing is so full of God. This inspiration is not given to the learned\nalone, not alone to the great and wise, but to every faithful child of\nGod. Certain as the open eye drinks in the light, do the pure in heart\nsee God; and he who lives truly, feels Him as a presence within the\nsoul. The conscience is the very voice of Deity.\n\nMasonry, around whose altars the Christian, the Hebrew, the Moslem, the\nBrahmin, the followers of Confucius and Zoroaster, can assemble as\nbrethren and unite in prayer to the one God who is above _all_ the\nBaalim, must needs leave it to each of its Initiates to look for the\nfoundation of his faith and hope to the written scriptures of his own\nreligion. For itself it finds those truths definite enough, which are\nwritten by the finger of God upon the heart of man and on the pages of\nthe book of nature. Views of religion and duty, wrought out by the\nmeditations of the studious, confirmed by the allegiance of the good and\nwise, stamped as sterling by the response they find in every uncorrupted\nmind, commend themselves to Masons of every creed, and may well be\naccepted by all.\n\nThe Mason does not pretend to dogmatic certainty, nor vainly imagine\nsuch certainty attainable. He considers that if there were no written\nrevelation, he could safely rest the hopes that animate him and the\nprinciples that guide him, on the deductions of reason and the\nconvictions of instinct and consciousness. He can find a sure foundation\nfor his religious belief, in these deductions of the intellect and\nconvictions of the heart. For reason proves to him the existence and\nattributes of God; and those spiritual instincts which he feels are the\nvoice of God in his soul, infuse into his mind a sense of his relation\nto God, a conviction of the beneficence of his Creator and Preserver,\nand a hope of future existence; and his reason and conscience alike\nunerringly point to virtue as the highest good, and the destined aim and\npurpose of man's life.\n\nHe studies the wonders of the Heavens, the frame-work and revolutions of\nthe Earth, the mysterious beauties and adaptations of animal existence,\nthe moral and material constitution of the human creature, so fearfully\nand wonderfully made; and is satisfied that God IS; and that a Wise and\nGood Being is the author of the starry Heavens above him, and of the\nmoral world within him; and his mind finds an adequate foundation for\nits hopes, its worship, its principles of action, in the far-stretching\nUniverse, in the glorious firmament, in the deep, full soul, bursting\nwith unutterable thoughts.\n\nThese are truths which every reflecting mind will unhesitatingly\nreceive, as not to be surpassed, nor capable of improvement; and fitted,\nif obeyed, to make earth indeed a Paradise, and man only a little lower\nthan the angels. The worthlessness of ceremonial observances, and the\nnecessity of active virtue; the enforcement of purity of heart as the\nsecurity for purity of life, and of the government of the thoughts, as\nthe originators and forerunners of action; universal philanthropy,\nrequiring us to love all men, and to do unto others that and that only\nwhich we should think it right, just, and generous for them to do unto\nus; forgiveness of injuries; the necessity of self-sacrifice in the\ndischarge of duty; humility; genuine sincerity, and _being_ that which\nwe _seem_ to be; all these sublime precepts need no miracle, no voice\nfrom the clouds, to recommend them to our allegiance, or to assure us of\ntheir divine origin. They command obedience by virtue of their inherent\nrectitude and beauty; and have been, and are, and will be the law in\nevery age and every country of the world. God revealed them to man in\nthe beginning.\n\nTo the Mason, God is our Father in Heaven, to be Whose especial children\nis the sufficient reward of the peacemakers, to see Whose face the\nhighest hope of the pure in heart; Who is ever at hand to strengthen His\ntrue worshippers; to Whom our most fervent love is due, our most humble\nand patient submission; Whose most acceptable worship is a pure and\npitying heart and a beneficent life; in Whose constant presence we live\nand act, to Whose merciful disposal we are resigned by that death which,\nwe hope and believe, is but the entrance to a better life; and Whose\nwise decrees forbid a man to lap his soul in an elysium of mere indolent\ncontent.\n\nAs to our feelings toward Him and our conduct toward man, Masonry\nteaches little about which men can differ, and little from which they\ncan dissent. He is our _Father_; and we are all _brethren_. This much\nlies open to the most ignorant and busy, as fully as to those who have\nmost leisure and are most learned. This needs no Priest to teach it, and\nno authority to indorse it; and if every man did that only which is\nconsistent with it, it would exile barbarity, cruelty, intolerance,\nuncharitableness, perfidy, treachery, revenge, selfishness, and all\ntheir kindred vices and bad passions beyond the confines of the world.\n\nThe true Mason, sincerely holding that a Supreme God created and governs\nthis world, believes also that He governs it by laws, which, though\nwise, just, and beneficent, are yet steady, unwavering, inexorable. He\nbelieves that his agonies and sorrows are ordained for _his_ chastening,\n_his_ strengthening, _his_ elaboration and development; because they are\nthe necessary results of the operation of laws, the best that could be\ndevised for the happiness and purification of the species, and to give\noccasion and opportunity for the practice of all the virtues, from the\nhomeliest and most common, to the noblest and most sublime; or perhaps\nnot even that, but the best adapted to work out the vast, awful,\nglorious, eternal designs of the Great Spirit of the Universe. He\nbelieves that the ordained operations of nature, which have brought\nmisery to him, have, from the very unswerving tranquility of their\ncareer, showered blessings and sunshine upon many another path; that the\nunrelenting chariot of Time, which has crushed or maimed him in its\nallotted course, is pressing onward to the accomplishment of those\nserene and mighty purposes, to have contributed to which, even as a\nvictim, is an honor and a recompense. He takes this view of Time and\nNature and God, and yet bears his lot without murmur or distrust;\nbecause it is a portion of a system, the best possible, because ordained\nby God. He does not believe that God loses sight of _him_, while\nsuperintending the march of the great harmonies of the Universe; nor\nthat it was not foreseen, when the Universe was created, its laws\nenacted, and the long succession of its operations pre-ordained, that in\nthe great march of those events, he would suffer pain and undergo\ncalamity. He believes that his individual good entered into God's\nconsideration, as well as the great cardinal results to which the course\nof all things is tending.\n\nThus believing, he has attained an eminence in virtue, the highest, amid\n_passive_ excellence, which humanity can reach. He finds his reward and\nhis support in the reflection that he is an unreluctant and\nself-sacrificing co-operator with the Creator of the Universe; and in\nthe noble consciousness of being worthy and capable of so sublime a\nconception, yet so sad a destiny. He is then truly entitled to be\ncalled a Grand Elect, Perfect, and Sublime Mason. He is content to fall\nearly in the battle, if his body may but form a stepping-stone for the\nfuture conquests of humanity.\n\nIt cannot be that God, Who, we are certain, is perfectly good, can\nchoose us to suffer pain, unless either we are ourselves to receive from\nit an antidote to what is evil in ourselves, or else as such pain is a\nnecessary part in the scheme of the Universe, which as a whole is good.\nIn either case, the Mason receives it with submission. He would not\nsuffer unless it was ordered so. Whatever his creed, if he believes that\nGod is, and that He cares for His creatures, he cannot doubt that; nor\nthat it would not have been so ordered, unless it was either better for\nhimself, or for some other persons, or for some things. To complain and\nlament is to murmur against God's will, and worse than unbelief.\n\nThe Mason, whose mind is cast in a nobler mould than those of the\nignorant and unreflecting, and is instinct with a diviner life,--who\nloves truth more than rest, and the peace of Heaven rather than the\npeace of Eden,--to whom a loftier being brings severer cares,--who knows\nthat man does not live by pleasure or content alone, but by the presence\nof the power of God,--must cast behind him the hope of any other repose\nor tranquillity, than that which is the last reward of long agonies of\nthought; he must relinquish all prospect of any Heaven save that of\nwhich trouble is the avenue and portal; he must gird up his loins, and\ntrim his lamp, for a work that must be done, and must not be negligently\ndone. If he does not like to live in the furnished lodgings of\ntradition, he must build his own house, his own system of faith and\nthought, for himself.\n\nThe hope of success, and not the hope of reward, should be our\nstimulating and sustaining power. Our object, and not ourselves, should\nbe our inspiring thought. Selfishness is a sin, when temporary, and for\ntime. Spun out to eternity, it does not become celestial prudence. We\nshould toil and die, not for Heaven or Bliss, but for Duty.\n\nIn the more frequent cases, where we have to join our efforts to those\nof thousands of others, to contribute to the carrying forward of a great\ncause; merely to till the ground or sow the seed for a very distant\nharvest, or to prepare the way for the future advent of some great\namendment; the amount which each one contributes to the achievement of\nultimate success, the portion of the price which justice should assign\nto each as his especial production, can never be accurately ascertained.\nPerhaps few of those who have ever labored, in the patience of secrecy\nand silence, to bring about some political or social change, which they\nfelt convinced would ultimately prove of vast service to humanity, lived\nto see the change effected, or the anticipated good flow from it. Fewer\nstill of them were able to pronounce what appreciable weight their\nseveral efforts contributed to the achievement of the change desired.\nMany will doubt, whether, in truth, these exertions have any influence\nwhatever; and, discouraged, cease all active effort.\n\nNot to be thus discouraged, the Mason must labor to elevate and purify\nhis _motives_, as well as sedulously cherish the conviction, assuredly a\ntrue one, that in this world there is no such thing as effort thrown\naway; that in all labor there is profit; that all sincere exertion, in a\nrighteous and unselfish cause, is _necessarily_ followed, in spite of\nall appearance to the contrary, by an appropriate and proportionate\nsuccess; that _no_ bread cast upon the waters can be wholly lost; that\n_no_ seed planted in the ground can fail to quicken in due time and\nmeasure; and that, however we may, in moments of despondency, be apt to\ndoubt, not only whether our cause will triumph, but whether, if it does,\nwe shall have contributed to its triumph,--there is One, Who has not\nonly seen every exertion we have made, but Who can assign the exact\ndegree in which each soldier has assisted to gain the great victory over\nsocial evil. No good work is done wholly in vain.\n\nThe Grand Elect, Perfect, and Sublime Mason will in nowise deserve that\nhonorable title, if he has not that strength, that will, that\nself-sustaining energy; that Faith, that feeds upon no earthly hope, nor\never thinks of victory, but, content in its own consummation, combats\nbecause it ought to combat, rejoicing fights, and still rejoicing falls.\n\nThe Augean Stables of the World, the accumulated uncleanness and misery\nof centuries, require a mighty river to cleanse them thoroughly away;\nevery drop we contribute aids to swell that river and augment its force,\nin a degree appreciable by God, though not by man; and he whose zeal is\ndeep and earnest, will not be over-anxious that his individual drops\nshould be distinguishable amid the mighty mass of cleansing and\nfertilizing waters; far less that, for the sake of distinction, it\nshould flow in ineffective singleness away.\n\nThe true Mason will not be careful that his name should be inscribed\nupon the mite which he casts into the treasury of God. It suffices him\nto know that if he has labored, with purity of purpose, in any good\ncause, he _must_ have contributed to its success; that the _degree_ in\nwhich he has contributed is a matter of infinitely small concern; and\nstill more, that the consciousness of having so contributed, however\nobscurely and unnoticed, is his sufficient, even if it be his sole,\nreward. Let every Grand Elect, Perfect, and Sublime Mason cherish this\nfaith. It is a duty. It is the brilliant and never-dying light that\nshines within and through the symbolic pedestal of alabaster, on which\nreposes the perfect cube of agate, symbol of duty, inscribed with the\ndivine name of God. He who industriously sows and reaps is a good\nlaborer, and worthy of his hire. But he who sows that which shall be\nreaped by others, by those who will know not of and care not for the\nsower, is a laborer of a nobler order, and, worthy of a more excellent\nreward.\n\nThe Mason does not exhort others to an ascetic undervaluing of this\nlife, as an insignificant and unworthy portion of existence; for that\ndemands feelings which are unnatural, and which, therefore, if attained,\nmust be morbid, and if merely professed, insincere; and teaches us to\nlook rather to a future life for the compensation of social evils, than\nto this life for their cure; and so does injury to the cause of virtue\nand to that of social progress. Life is real, and is earnest, and it is\nfull of duties to be performed. It is the beginning of our immortality.\nThose only who feel a deep interest and affection for this world will\nwork resolutely for its amelioration; those whose affections are\ntransferred to Heaven, easily acquiesce in the miseries of earth,\ndeeming them hopeless, befitting, and ordained; and console themselves\nwith the idea of the amends which are one day to be theirs. It is a sad\ntruth, that those most decidedly given to spiritual contemplation, and\nto making religion rule in their hearts, are often most apathetic toward\nall improvement of this world's systems, and in many cases virtual\nconservatives of evil, and hostile to political and social reform, as\ndiverting men's energies from eternity.\n\nThe Mason does not war with his own instincts, macerate the body into\nweakness and disorder, and disparage what he sees to be beautiful,\nknows to be wonderful, and feels to be unspeakably dear and fascinating.\nHe does not put aside the nature which God has given him, to struggle\nafter one which He has _not_ bestowed. He knows that man is sent into\nthe world, not a spiritual, but a composite being, made up of body and\nmind, the body having, as is fit and needful in a material world, its\nfull, rightful, and allotted share. His life is guided by a full\nrecognition of this fact. He does not deny it in bold words, and admit\nit in weaknesses and inevitable failings. He believes that his\nspirituality will come in the next stage of his being, when he puts on\nthe spiritual body; that his body will be dropped at death; and that,\nuntil then, God meant it to be commanded and controlled, but not\nneglected, despised, or ignored by the soul, under pain of heavy\nconsequences.\n\nYet the Mason is not indifferent as to the fate of the soul, after its\npresent life, as to its continued and eternal being, and the character\nof the scenes in which that being will be fully developed. These are to\nhim topics of the profoundest interest, and the most ennobling and\nrefining contemplation. They occupy much of his leisure; and as he\nbecomes familiar with the sorrows and calamities of this life, as his\nhopes are disappointed and his visions of happiness here fade away; when\nlife has wearied him in its race of hours; when he is harassed and\ntoil-worn, and the burden of his years weighs heavy on him, the balance\nof attraction gradually inclines in favor of another life; and he clings\nto his lofty speculations with a tenacity of interest which needs no\ninjunction, and will listen to no prohibition. They are the consoling\nprivilege of the aspiring, the wayworn, the weary, and the bereaved.\n\nTo him the contemplation of the Future lets in light upon the Present,\nand develops the higher portions of his nature. He endeavors rightly to\nadjust the respective claims of Heaven and earth upon his time and\nthought, so as to give the proper proportions thereof to performing the\nduties and entering into the interests of this world, and to preparation\nfor a better; to the cultivation and purification of his own character,\nand to the public service of his fellow-men.\n\nThe Mason does not dogmatize, but entertaining and uttering his own\nconvictions, he leaves everyone else free to do the same; and only hopes\nthat the time will come, even if after the lapse of ages, when all men\nshall form one great family of brethren, and one law alone, the law of\nlove, shall govern God's whole Universe.\n\nBelieve as you may, my brother; if the Universe is not, to you, without\na God, and if man is not like the beast that perishes, but hath an\nimmortal soul, we welcome you among us, to wear, as we wear, with\nhumility, and conscious of your demerits and shortcomings, the title of\nGrand Elect, Perfect, and Sublime Mason.\n\nIt was not without a secret meaning, that _twelve_ was the number of the\nApostles of Christ, and _seventy-two_ that of his Disciples: that John\naddressed his rebukes and menaces to the _Seven_ churches, the number of\nthe Archangels and the Planets. At Babylon were the Seven Stages of\nBersippa, a pyramid of Seven stories, and at Ecbatana Seven concentric\ninclosures, each of a different color. Thebes also had Seven gates, and\nthe same number is repeated again and again in the account of the flood.\nThe Sephiroth, or Emanations, _ten_ in number, three in one class, and\nseven in the other, repeat the mystic numbers of Pythagoras. Seven\nAmschaspands or planetary spirits were invoked with Ormuzd: Seven\ninferior Rishis of Hindustan were saved with the head of their family in\nan ark: and Seven ancient personages alone returned with the British\njust man, Hu, from the dale of the grievous waters. There were Seven\nHeliad\u00e6, whose father Helias, or the Sun, once crossed the sea in a\ngolden cup; Seven Titans, children of the older Titan, Kronos or Saturn;\nSeven Corybantes; and Seven Cabiri, sons of Sydyk; Seven primeval\nCelestial spirits of the Japanese, and Seven Karfesters who escaped from\nthe deluge and began to be the parents of a new race, on the summit of\nMount Albordi. Seven Cyclopes, also, built the walls of Tiryus.\n\nCelsus, as quoted by Origen, tells us that the Persians represented by\nsymbols the two-fold motion of the stars, fixed and planetary, and the\npassage of the Soul through their successive spheres. They erected in\ntheir holy caves, in which the mystic rites of the Mithriac Initiations\nwere practised, what he denominates a high _ladder_, on the Seven steps\nof which were Seven gates or portals, according to the number of the\nSeven principal heavenly bodies. Through these the aspirants passed,\nuntil they reached the summit of the whole; and this passage was styled\na transmigration through the spheres.\n\nJacob saw in his dream a _ladder_ planted or set on the earth, and its\ntop reaching to Heaven, and the Malaki Alohim ascending and descending\non it, and above it stood IHUH, declaring Himself to be Ihuh-Alhi\nAbraham. The word translated _ladder_, is [Hebrew: \u05e1\u05dc\u05dd] _Salam_, from\n[Hebrew: \u05e1\u05dc\u05dc], _Salal_, raised, elevated, reared up, exalted, piled up\ninto a heap, _Aggeravit_. [Hebrew: \u05e1\u05dc\u05dc\u05d4] Salalah, means a heap, rampart,\nor other accumulation of earth or stone, artificially made; and [Hebrew:\n\u05e1\u05dc\u05e2], _Salaa_ or _Salo_, is a rock or cliff or boulder, and the name of\nthe city of Petra. There is no ancient Hebrew word to designate a\npyramid.\n\nThe symbolic mountain Meru was ascended by Seven steps or stages; and\nall the pyramids and artificial tumuli and hillocks thrown up in flat\ncountries were imitations of this fabulous and mystic mountain, for\npurposes of worship. These were the \"High Places\" so often mentioned in\nthe Hebrew books, on which the idolaters sacrificed to foreign gods.\n\nThe pyramids were sometimes square, and sometimes round. The sacred\nBabylonian tower [[Hebrew: \u05de\u05d2\u05d3\u05dc], Magdol], dedicated to the great Father\nBal, was an artificial hill, of pyramidal shape, and Seven stages, built\nof brick, and each stage of a different color, representing the Seven\nplanetary spheres by the appropriate color of each planet. Meru itself\nwas said to be a single mountain, terminating in three peaks, and thus a\nsymbol of the Trimurti. The great Pagoda at Tanjore was of six stories,\nsurmounted by a temple as the seventh, and on this three spires or\ntowers. An ancient pagoda at Deogur was surmounted by a tower,\nsustaining the mystic egg and a trident. Herodotus tells us that the\nTemple of Bal at Babylon was a tower composed of Seven towers, resting\non an eighth that served as basis, and successively diminishing in size\nfrom the bottom to the top; and Strabo tells us it was a pyramid.\n\nFaber thinks that the Mithriac _ladder_ was really a pyramid with Seven\nstages, each provided with a narrow door or aperture, through each of\nwhich doors the aspirant passed, to reach the summit, and then descended\nthrough similar doors on the opposite side of the pyramid; the ascent\nand descent of the Soul being thus represented.\n\nEach Mithriac cave and all the most ancient temples were intended to\nsymbolize the Universe, which itself was habitually called the Temple\nand habitation of Deity. Every temple was the world in miniature; and\nso the whole world was one grand temple. The most ancient temples were\nroofless; and therefore the Persians, Celts, and Scythians strongly\ndisliked artificial covered edifices. Cicero says that Xerxes burned the\nGrecian temples, on the express ground that the whole world was the\nMagnificent Temple and Habitation of the Supreme Deity. Macrobius says\nthat the entire Universe was judiciously deemed by many the Temple of\nGod. Plato pronounced the real Temple of the Deity to be the world; and\nHeraclitus declared that the Universe, variegated with animals and\nplants and stars was the only genuine Temple of the Divinity.\n\nHow completely the Temple of Solomon was symbolic, is manifest, not only\nfrom the continual reproduction in it of the sacred numbers and of\nastrological symbols in the historical descriptions of it; but also, and\nyet more, from the details of the imaginary reconstructed edifice, seen\nby Ezekiel in his vision. The Apocalypse completes the demonstration,\nand shows the kabalistic meanings of the whole. The Symbola\nArchitectonica are found on the most ancient edifices; and these\nmathematical figures and instruments, adopted by the Templars, and\nidentical with those on the gnostic seals and abrax\u00e6, connect their\ndogma with the Chaldaic, Syriac, and Egyptian Oriental philosophy. The\nsecret Pythagorean doctrines of numbers were preserved by the monks of\nThibet, by the Hierophants of Egypt and Eleusis, at Jerusalem, and in\nthe circular Chapters of the Druids; and they are especially consecrated\nin that mysterious book, the Apocalypse of Saint John.\n\nAll temples were surrounded by pillars, recording the number of the\nconstellations, the signs of the zodiac, or the cycles of the planets;\nand each one was a microcosm or symbol of the Universe, having for roof\nor ceiling the starred vault of Heaven.\n\nAll temples were originally open at the top, having for roof the sky.\nTwelve pillars described the belt of the zodiac. Whatever the number of\nthe pillars, they were mystical everywhere. At Abury, the Druidic temple\nreproduced all the cycles by its columns. Around the temples of\nChilminar in Persia, of Baalbec, and of Tukhti Schlomoh in Tartary, on\nthe frontier of China, stood _forty_ pillars. On each side of the temple\nat P\u00e6stum were fourteen, recording the Egyptian cycle of the dark and\nlight sides of the moon, as described by Plutarch; the whole\nthirty-eight that surrounded them recording the two meteoric cycles so\noften found in the Druidic temples.\n\nThe theatre built by Scaurus, in Greece, was surrounded by 360 columns;\nthe Temple at Mecca, and that at Iona in Scotland by 360 stones.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nMORALS AND DOGMA\n\n\nCHAPTER OF ROSE CROIX\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nXV.\n\nKNIGHT OF THE EAST OR OF THE SWORD.\n\n[Knight of the East, of the Sword, or of the Eagle.]\n\n\nThis Degree, like all others in Masonry, is symbolical. Based upon\nhistorical truth and authentic tradition, it is still an allegory. The\nleading lesson of this Degree is Fidelity to obligation, and Constancy\nand Perseverance under difficulties and discouragement.\n\nMasonry is engaged in her crusade,--against ignorance, intolerance,\nfanaticism, superstition, uncharitableness, and error. She does not sail\nwith the trade-winds, upon a smooth sea, with a steady free breeze, fair\nfor a welcoming harbor; but meets and must overcome many opposing\ncurrents, baffling winds, and dead calms.\n\nThe chief obstacles to her success are the apathy and faithlessness of\nher own selfish children, and the supine indifference of the world. In\nthe roar and crush and hurry of life and business, and the tumult and\nuproar of politics, the quiet voice of Masonry is unheard and unheeded.\nThe first lesson which one learns, who engages in any great work of\nreform or beneficence, is, that men are essentially careless, lukewarm,\nand indifferent as to everything that does not concern their own\npersonal and immediate welfare. It is to single men, and not to the\nunited efforts of many, that all the great works of man, struggling\ntoward perfection, are owing. The enthusiast, who imagines that he can\ninspire with his own enthusiasm the multitude that eddies around him, or\neven the few who have associated themselves with him as co-workers, is\ngrievously mistaken; and most often the conviction of his own mistake is\nfollowed by discouragement and disgust. To do all, to pay all, and to\nsuffer all, and then, when despite all obstacles and hindrances, success\nis accomplished, and a great work done, to see those who opposed or\nlooked coldly on it, claim and reap all the praise and reward, is the\ncommon and almost universal lot of the benefactor of his kind.\n\nHe who endeavors to serve, to benefit, and improve the world, is like a\nswimmer, who struggles against a rapid current, in a river lashed into\nangry waves by the winds. Often they roar over his head, often they beat\nhim back and baffle him. Most men yield to the stress of the current,\nand float with it to the shore, or are swept over the rapids; and only\nhere and there the stout, strong heart and vigorous arms struggle on\ntoward ultimate success.\n\nIt is the motionless and stationary that most frets and impedes the\ncurrent of progress; the solid rock or stupid dead tree, rested firmly\non the bottom, and around which the river whirls and eddies: the Masons\nthat doubt and hesitate and are discouraged; that disbelieve in the\ncapability of man to improve; that are not disposed to toil and labor\nfor the interest and well-being of general humanity; that expect others\nto do all, even of that which they do not oppose or ridicule; while they\nsit, applauding and doing nothing, or perhaps prognosticating failure.\n\nThere were many such at the rebuilding of the Temple. There were\nprophets of evil and misfortune--the lukewarm and the indifferent and\nthe apathetic; those who stood by and sneered; and those who thought\nthey did God service enough if they now and then faintly applauded.\nThere were ravens croaking ill omen, and murmurers who preached the\nfolly and futility of the attempt. The world is made up of such; and\nthey were as abundant then as they are now.\n\nBut gloomy and discouraging as was the prospect, with lukewarmness\nwithin and bitter opposition without, our ancient brethren persevered.\nLet us leave them engaged in the good work, and whenever to us, as to\nthem, success is uncertain, remote, and contingent, let us still\nremember that the only question for us to ask, as true men and Masons,\nis, what does duty require; and not what will be the result and our\nreward if we do our duty. Work on with the Sword in one hand, and the\nTrowel in the other!\n\nMasonry teaches that God is a Paternal Being, and has an interest in his\ncreatures, such as is expressed in the title _Father_; an interest\nunknown to all the systems of Paganism, untaught in all the theories of\nphilosophy; an interest not only in the glorious beings of other\nspheres, the Sons of Light, the dwellers in Heavenly worlds, but in us,\npoor, ignorant, and unworthy; that He has pity for the erring, pardon\nfor the guilty, love for the pure, knowledge for the humble, and\npromises of immortal life for those who trust in and obey Him.\n\nWithout a belief in Him, life is miserable, the world is dark, the\nUniverse disrobed of its splendors, the intellectual tie to nature\nbroken, the charm of existence dissolved, the great hope of being lost;\nand the mind, like a star struck from its sphere, wanders through the\ninfinite desert of its conceptions, without attraction, tendency,\ndestiny, or end.\n\nMasonry teaches, that, of all the events and actions, that take place in\nthe universe of worlds and the eternal succession of ages, there is not\none, even the minutest, which God did not forever foresee, with all the\ndistinctness of immediate vision, combining all, so that man's free will\nshould be His instrument, like all the other forces of nature.\n\nIt teaches that the soul of man is formed by Him for a purpose; that,\nbuilt up in its proportions, and fashioned in every part, by infinite\nskill, an emanation from His spirit, its nature, necessity, and design\nare virtue. It is so formed, so moulded, so fashioned, so exactly\nbalanced, so exquisitely proportioned in every part, that sin introduced\ninto it is misery; that vicious thoughts fall upon it like drops of\npoison; and guilty desires, breathing on its delicate fibres, make\nplague-spots there, deadly as those of pestilence upon the body. It is\nmade for virtue, and not for vice; for purity, as its end, rest, and\nhappiness. Not more vainly would we attempt to make the mountain sink to\nthe level of the valley, the waves of the angry sea turn back from its\nshores and cease to thunder upon the beach, the stars to halt in their\nswift courses, than to change any one law of our own nature. And one of\nthose laws, uttered by God's voice, and speaking through every nerve\nand fibre, every force and element, of the moral constitution He has\ngiven us, is that we must be upright and virtuous; that if tempted we\nmust resist; that we must govern our unruly passions, and hold in hand\nour sensual appetites. And this is not the dictate of an arbitrary will,\nnor of some stern and impracticable law; but it is part of the great\nfirm law of harmony that binds the Universe together: not the mere\nenactment of arbitrary will; but the dictate of Infinite Wisdom.\n\nWe know that God is good, and that what He does is right. This known,\nthe works of creation, the changes of life, the destinies of eternity,\nare all spread before us, as the dispensations and counsels of infinite\nlove. This known, we then know that the love of God is working to\nissues, like itself, beyond all thought and imagination good and\nglorious; and that the only reason why we do not understand it, is that\nit is _too_ glorious for us to understand. God's love takes care for\nall, and nothing is neglected. It watches over all, provides for all,\nmakes wise adaptations for all; for age, for infancy, for maturity, for\nchildhood; in every scene of this or another world; for want, weakness,\njoy, sorrow, and even for sin. All is good and well and right; and shall\nbe so forever. Through the eternal ages the light of God's beneficence\nshall shine hereafter, disclosing all, consummating all, rewarding all\nthat deserve reward. Then we shall see, what now we can only believe.\nThe cloud will be lifted up, the gate of mystery be passed, and the full\nlight shine forever; the light of which that of the Lodge is a symbol.\nThen that which caused us trial shall yield us triumph; and that which\nmade our heart ache shall fill us with gladness; and we shall then feel\nthat there, as here, the only true happiness is to learn, to advance,\nand to improve; which could not happen unless we had commenced with\nerror, ignorance, and imperfection. We must pass through the darkness,\nto reach the light.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nXVI.\n\nPRINCE OF JERUSALEM.\n\n\nWe no longer expect to rebuild the Temple at Jerusalem. To us it has\nbecome but a symbol. To us the whole world is God's Temple, as is every\nupright heart. To establish all over the world the New Law and Reign of\nLove, Peace, Charity, and Toleration, is to build that Temple, most\nacceptable to God, in erecting which Masonry is now engaged. No longer\nneeding to repair to Jerusalem to worship, nor to offer up sacrifices\nand shed blood to propitiate the Deity, man may make the woods and\nmountains his Churches and Temples, and worship God with a devout\ngratitude, and with works of charity and beneficence to his fellow-men.\nWherever the humble and contrite heart silently offers up its adoration,\nunder the overarching trees, in the open, level meadows, on the\nhill-side, in the glen, or in the city's swarming streets; there is\nGod's House and the New Jerusalem.\n\nThe Princes of Jerusalem no longer sit as magistrates to judge between\nthe people; nor is their number limited to five. But their duties still\nremain substantially the same, and their insignia and symbols retain\ntheir old significance. Justice and Equity are still their\ncharacteristics. To reconcile disputes and heal dissensions, to restore\namity and peace, to soothe dislikes and soften prejudices, are their\npeculiar duties; and they know that the peacemakers are blessed.\n\nTheir emblems have been already explained. They are part of the language\nof Masonry; the same now as it was when Moses learned it from the\nEgyptian Hierophants.\n\nStill we observe the spirit of the Divine law, as thus enunciated to our\nancient brethren, when the Temple was rebuilt, and the book of the law\nagain opened:\n\n\"Execute true judgment; and show mercy and compassion every man to his\nbrother. Oppress not the widow nor the fatherless, the stranger nor the\npoor; and let none of you imagine evil against his brother in his heart.\nSpeak ye every man the truth to his neighbor; execute the judgment of\nTruth and Peace in your gates; and love no false oath; for all these I\nhate, saith the Lord.\n\n\"Let those who have power rule in righteousness, and Princes in\njudgment. And let him that is a judge be as an hiding-place from the\nwind, and a covert from the tempest; as rivers of water in a dry place;\nas the shadow of a great rock in a weary land. Then the vile person\nshall no more be called liberal; nor the churl bountiful; and the work\nof justice shall be peace; and the effect of justice, quiet and\nsecurity; and wisdom and knowledge shall be the stability of the times.\nWalk ye righteously and speak uprightly; despise the gains of\noppression, shake from your hands the contamination of bribes; stop not\nyour ears against the cries of the oppressed, nor shut your eyes that\nyou may not see the crimes of the great; and you shall dwell on high,\nand your place of defence be like munitions of rocks.\"\n\nForget not these precepts of the old Law; and especially do not forget,\nas you advance, that every Mason, however humble, is your brother, and\nthe laboring man your peer! Remember always that all Masonry is work,\nand that the trowel is an emblem of the Degrees in this Council. Labor,\nwhen rightly understood, is both noble and ennobling, and intended to\ndevelop man's moral and spiritual nature, and not to be deemed a\ndisgrace or a misfortune.\n\nEverything around us is, in its bearings and influences, moral. The\nserene and bright morning, when we recover our conscious existence from\nthe embraces of sleep; when, from that image of Death God calls us to a\nnew life, and again gives us existence, and His mercies visit us in\nevery bright ray and glad thought, and call for gratitude and content;\nthe silence of that early dawn, the hushed silence, as it were, of\nexpectation; the holy eventide, its cooling breeze, its lengthening\nshadows, its falling shades, its still and sober hour; the sultry\nnoontide and the stern and solemn midnight; and Spring-time, and\nchastening Autumn; and Summer, that unbars our gates, and carries us\nforth amidst the ever-renewed wonders of the world; and Winter, that\ngathers us around the evening hearth:--all these, as they pass, touch by\nturns the springs of the spiritual life in us, and are conducting that\nlife to good or evil. The idle watch-hand often points to something\nwithin us; and the shadow of the gnomon on the dial often falls upon the\nconscience.\n\nA life of labor is not a state of inferiority or degradation. The\nAlmighty has not cast man's lot beneath the quiet shades, and amid glad\ngroves and lovely hills, with no task to perform; with nothing to do but\nto rise up and eat, and to lie down and rest. He has ordained that\n_Work_ shall be done, in all the dwellings of life, in every productive\nfield, in every busy city, and on every wave of every ocean. And this He\nhas done, because it has pleased Him to give man a nature destined to\nhigher ends than indolent repose and irresponsible profitless\nindulgence; and because, for developing the energies of such a nature,\nwork was the necessary and proper element. We might as well ask why He\ncould not make two and two be six, as why He could not develop these\nenergies without the instrumentality of work. They are equally\nimpossibilities.\n\nThis, Masonry teaches, as a great Truth; a great moral landmark, that\nought to guide the course of all mankind. It teaches its toiling\nchildren that the scene of their daily life is all spiritual, that the\nvery implements of their toil, the fabrics they weave, the merchandise\nthey barter, are designed for spiritual ends; that so believing, their\ndaily lot may be to them a sphere for the noblest improvement. That\nwhich we do in our intervals of relaxation, our church-going, and our\nbook-reading, are especially designed to prepare our minds for the\n_action_ of Life. We are to hear and read and meditate, that we may\n_act_ well; and the _action_ of Life is itself the great field for\nspiritual improvement. There is no task of industry or business, in\nfield or forest, on the wharf or the ship's deck, in the office or the\nexchange, but has spiritual ends. There is no care or cross of our daily\nlabor, but was especially ordained to nurture in us patience, calmness,\nresolution, perseverance, gentleness, disinterestedness, magnanimity.\nNor is there any tool or implement of toil, but is a part of the great\nspiritual instrumentality.\n\nAll the relations of life, those of parent, child, brother, sister,\nfriend, associate, lover and beloved, husband, wife, are moral,\nthroughout every living tie and thrilling nerve that bind them together.\nThey cannot subsist a day nor an hour without putting the mind to a\ntrial of its truth, fidelity, forbearance, and disinterestedness.\n\nA great city is one extended scene of moral action. There is no blow\nstruck in it but has a purpose, ultimately good or bad, and therefore\nmoral. There is no action performed, but has a motive; and motives are\nthe special jurisdiction of morality. Equipages, houses, and furniture\nare symbols of what is moral, and they in a thousand ways minister to\nright or wrong feeling. Everything that belongs to us, ministering to\nour comfort or luxury, awakens in us emotions of pride or gratitude, of\nselfishness or vanity; thoughts of self-indulgence, or merciful\nremembrances of the needy and the destitute.\n\nEverything acts upon and influences us. God's great law of sympathy and\nharmony is potent and inflexible as His law of gravitation. A sentence\nembodying a noble thought stirs our blood; a noise made by a child frets\nand exasperates us, and influences our actions.\n\nA world of spiritual objects, influences, and relations lies around us\nall. We all vaguely deem it to be so; but he only lives a charmed life,\nlike that of genius and poetic inspiration, who communes with the\nspiritual scene around him, hears the voice of the spirit in every\nsound, sees its signs in every passing form of things, and feels its\nimpulse in all action, passion, and being. Very near to us lies the\nmines of wisdom; unsuspected they lie all around us. There is a secret\nin the simplest things, a wonder in the plainest, a charm in the\ndullest.\n\nWe are all naturally seekers of wonders. We travel far to see the\nmajesty of old ruins, the venerable forms of the hoary mountains, great\nwater-falls, and galleries of art. And yet the world-wonder is all\naround us; the wonder of setting suns, and evening stars, of the magic\nspring-time, the blossoming of the trees, the strange transformations of\nthe moth; the wonder of the Infinite Divinity and of His boundless\nrevelation. There is no splendor beyond that which sets its morning\nthrone in the golden East; no dome sublime as that of Heaven; no beauty\nso fair as that of the verdant, blossoming earth; no place, however\ninvested with the sanctities of old time, like that home which is hushed\nand folded within the embrace of the humblest wall and roof.\n\nAnd all these are but the symbols of things, far greater and higher. All\nis but the clothing of the spirit. In this vesture of time is wrapped\nthe immortal nature: in this show of circumstance and form stands\nrevealed the stupendous reality. Let man but be, as he is, a living\nsoul, communing with himself and with God, and his vision becomes\neternity; his abode, infinity; his home, the bosom of all-embracing\nlove.\n\nThe great problem of Humanity is wrought out in the humblest abodes; no\nmore than this is done in the highest. A human heart throbs beneath the\nbeggar's gabardine; and that and no more stirs with its beating the\nPrince's mantle. The beauty of Love, the charm of Friendship, the\nsacredness of Sorrow, the heroism of Patience, the noble Self-sacrifice,\nthese and their like, alone, make life to be life indeed, and are its\ngrandeur and its power. They are the priceless treasures and glory of\nhumanity; and they are not things of condition. All places and all\nscenes are alike clothed with the grandeur and charm of virtues such as\nthese.\n\nThe million occasions will come to us all, in the ordinary paths of our\nlife, in our homes, and by our firesides, wherein we may act as nobly,\nas if, all our life long, we led armies, sat in senates, or visited beds\nof sickness and pain. Varying every hour, the million occasions will\ncome in which we may restrain our passions, subdue our hearts to\ngentleness and patience, resign our own interest for another's\nadvantage, speak words of kindness and wisdom, raise the fallen, cheer\nthe fainting and sick in spirit, and soften and assuage the weariness\nand bitterness of their mortal lot. To every Mason there will be\nopportunity enough for these. They cannot be written on his tomb; but\nthey will be written deep in the hearts of men, of friends, of children,\nof kindred all around him, in the book of the great account, and, in\ntheir eternal influences, on the great pages of the Universe.\n\nTo such a destiny, at least, my Brethren, let us all aspire! These laws\nof Masonry let us all strive to obey! And so may our hearts become true\ntemples of the Living God! And may He encourage our zeal, sustain our\nhopes, and assure us of success!\n\n[Illustration]\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nXVII.\n\nKNIGHT OF THE EAST AND WEST.\n\n\nThis is the first of the Philosophical Degrees of the Ancient and\nAccepted Scottish Rite; and the beginning of a course of instruction\nwhich will fully unveil to you the heart and inner mysteries of Masonry.\nDo not despair because you have often seemed on the point of attaining\nthe inmost light, and have as often been disappointed. In all time,\ntruth has been hidden under symbols, and often under a succession of\nallegories: where veil after veil had to be penetrated before the true\nLight was reached, and the essential truth stood revealed. The Human\nLight is but an imperfect reflection of a ray of the Infinite and\nDivine.\n\nWe are about to approach those ancient Religions which once ruled the\nminds of men, and whose ruins encumber the plains of the great Past, as\nthe broken columns of Palmyra and Tadmor lie bleaching on the sands of\nthe desert. They rise before us, those old, strange, mysterious creeds\nand faiths, shrouded in the mists of antiquity, and stalk dimly and\nundefined along the line which divides Time from Eternity; and forms of\nstrange, wild, startling beauty mingled in the vast throngs of figures\nwith shapes monstrous, grotesque, and hideous.\n\nThe religion taught by Moses, which, like the laws of Egypt, enunciated\nthe principle of exclusion, borrowed, at every period of its existence,\nfrom all the creeds with which it came in contact. While, by the studies\nof the learned and wise, it enriched itself with the most admirable\nprinciples of the religions of Egypt and Asia, it was changed, in the\nwanderings of the People, by everything that was most impure or\nseductive in the pagan manners and superstitions. It was one thing in\nthe times of Moses and Aaron, another in those of David and Solomon, and\nstill another in those of Daniel and Philo.\n\nAt the time when John the Baptist made his appearance in the desert,\nnear the shores of the Dead Sea, all the old philosophical and religious\nsystems were approximating toward each other. A general lassitude\ninclined the minds of all toward the quietude of that amalgamation of\ndoctrines for which the expeditions of Alexander and the more peaceful\noccurrences that followed, with the establishment in Asia and Africa of\nmany Grecian dynasties and a great number of Grecian colonies, had\nprepared the way. After the intermingling of different nations, which\nresulted from the wars of Alexander in three-quarters of the globe, the\ndoctrines of Greece, of Egypt, of Persia, and of India, met and\nintermingled everywhere. All the barriers that had formerly kept the\nnations apart, were thrown down; and while the People of the West\nreadily connected their faith with those of the East, those of the\nOrient hastened to learn the traditions of Rome and the legends of\nAthens. While the Philosophers of Greece, all (except the disciples of\nEpicurus) more or less Platonists, seized eagerly upon the beliefs and\ndoctrines of the East,--the Jews and Egyptians, before then the most\nexclusive of all peoples, yielded to that eclecticism which prevailed\namong their masters, the Greeks and Romans.\n\nUnder the same influences of toleration, even those who embraced\nChristianity, mingled together the old and the new, Christianity and\nPhilosophy, the Apostolic teachings and the traditions of Mythology. The\nman of intellect, devotee of one system, rarely displaces it with\nanother in all its purity. The people take such a creed as is offered\nthem. Accordingly, the distinction between the esoteric and the exoteric\ndoctrine, immemorial in other creeds, easily gained a foothold among\nmany of the Christians; and it was held by a vast number, even during\nthe preaching of Paul, that the writings of the Apostles were\nincomplete; that they contained only the germs of another doctrine,\nwhich must receive from the hands of philosophy, not only the systematic\narrangement which was wanting, but all the development which lay\nconcealed therein. The writings of the Apostles, they said, in\naddressing themselves to mankind in general, enunciated only the\narticles of the vulgar faith; but transmitted the mysteries of knowledge\nto superior minds, to the Elect,--mysteries handed down from generation\nto generation in esoteric traditions; and to this science of the\nmysteries they gave the name of [[Greek: \u0393\u03bd\u03ce\u03c3\u03b9\u03c2] Gn\u014dsis].\n\nThe Gnostics derived their leading doctrines and ideas from Plato and\nPhilo, the Zend-avesta and the Kabalah, and the Sacred books of India\nand Egypt; and thus introduced into the bosom of Christianity the\ncosmological and theosophical speculations, which had formed the larger\nportion of the ancient religions of the Orient, joined to those of the\nEgyptian, Greek, and Jewish doctrines, which the Neo-Platonists had\nequally adopted in the Occident.\n\nEmanation from the Deity of all spiritual beings, progressive\ndegeneration of these beings from emanation to emanation, redemption and\nreturn of all to the purity of the Creator; and, after the\nre-establishment of the primitive harmony of all, a fortunate and truly\ndivine condition of all, in the bosom of God; such were the fundamental\nteachings of Gnosticism. The genius of the Orient, with its\ncontemplations, irradiations, and intuitions, dictated its doctrines.\nIts language corresponded to its origin. Full of imagery, it had all the\nmagnificence, the inconsistencies, and the mobility of the figurative\nstyle.\n\nBehold, it said, the light, which emanates from an immense centre of\nLight, that spreads everywhere its benevolent rays; so do the spirits of\nLight emanate from the Divine Light. Behold, all the springs which\nnourish, embellish, fertilize, and purify the Earth; they emanate from\none and the same ocean; so from the bosom of the Divinity emanate so\nmany streams, which form and fill the universe of intelligences. Behold\nnumbers, which all emanate from one primitive number, all resemble it,\nall are composed of its essence, and still vary infinitely; and\nutterances, decomposable into so many syllables and elements, all\ncontained in the primitive Word, and still infinitely various; so the\nworld of Intelligences emanated from a Primary Intelligence, and they\nall resemble it, and yet display an infinite variety of existences.\n\nIt revived and combined the old doctrines of the Orient and the\nOccident; and it found in many passages of the Gospels and the Pastoral\nletters, a warrant for doing so. Christ himself spoke in parables and\nallegories, John borrowed the enigmatical language of the Platonists,\nand Paul often indulged in incomprehensible rhapsodies, the meaning of\nwhich could have been clear to the Initiates alone.\n\nIt is admitted that the cradle of Gnosticism is probably to be looked\nfor in Syria, and even in Palestine. Most of its expounders wrote in\nthat corrupted form of the Greek used by the Hellenistic Jews, and in\nthe Septuagint and the New Testament; and there was a striking analogy\nbetween their doctrines and those of the Jud\u00e6o-Egyptian Philo, of\nAlexandria; itself the seat of three schools, at once philosophic and\nreligious--the Greek, the Egyptian, and the Jewish.\n\nPythagoras and Plato, the most mystical of the Grecian Philosophers (the\nlatter heir to the doctrines of the former), and who had travelled, the\nlatter in Egypt, and the former in Ph\u0153nicia, India, and Persia, also\ntaught the esoteric doctrine and the distinction between the initiated\nand the profane. The dominant doctrines of Platonism were found in\nGnosticism. Emanation of Intelligences from the bosom of the Deity; the\ngoing astray in error and the sufferings of spirits, so long as they are\nremote from God, and imprisoned in matter; vain and long-continued\nefforts to arrive at the knowledge of the Truth, and re-enter into their\nprimitive union with the Supreme Being; alliance of a pure and divine\nsoul with an irrational soul, the seat of evil desires; angels or demons\nwho dwell in and govern the planets, having but an imperfect knowledge\nof the ideas that presided at the creation; regeneration of all beings\nby their return to the [[Greek: \u03ba\u03cc\u03c3\u03bc\u03bf\u03c2 \u03bd\u03bf\u03b7\u03c4\u03cc\u03c2], kosmos no\u0113tos], the\nworld of Intelligences, and its Chief, the Supreme Being; sole possible\nmode of re-establishing that primitive harmony of the creation, of\nwhich the music of the spheres of Pythagoras was the image; these were\nthe analogies of the two systems; and we discover in them some of the\nideas that form a part of Masonry; in which, in the present mutilated\ncondition of the symbolic Degrees, they are disguised and overlaid with\nfiction and absurdity, or present themselves as casual hints that are\npassed by wholly unnoticed.\n\nThe distinction between the esoteric and exoteric doctrines (a\ndistinction purely Masonic), was always and from the very earliest times\npreserved among the Greeks. It remounted to the fabulous times of\nOrpheus; and the mysteries of Theosophy were found in all their\ntraditions and myths. And after the time of Alexander, they resorted for\ninstruction, dogmas, and mysteries, to all the schools, to those of\nEgypt and Asia, as well as those of Ancient Thrace, Sicily, Etruria, and\nAttica.\n\nThe Jewish-Greek School of Alexandria is known only by two of its\nChiefs, Aristobulus and Philo, both Jews of Alexandria in Egypt.\nBelonging to Asia by its origin, to Egypt by its residence, to Greece by\nits language and studies, it strove to show that all truths embedded in\nthe philosophies of other countries were transplanted thither from\nPalestine. Aristobulus declared that all the facts and details of the\nJewish Scriptures were so many allegories, concealing the most profound\nmeanings, and that Plato had borrowed from them all his finest ideas.\nPhilo, who lived a century after him, following the same theory,\nendeavored to show that the Hebrew writings, by their system of\nallegories, were the true source of all religious and philosophical\ndoctrines. According to him, the literal meaning is for the vulgar\nalone. Whoever has meditated on philosophy, purified himself by virtue,\nand raised himself by contemplation, to God and the intellectual world,\nand received their inspiration, pierces the gross envelope of the\nletter, discovers a wholly different order of things, and is initiated\ninto mysteries, of which the elementary or literal instruction offers\nbut an imperfect image. A historical fact, a figure, a word, a letter, a\nnumber, a rite, a custom, the parable or vision of a prophet, veils the\nmost profound truths; and he who has the key of science will interpret\nall according to the light he possesses.\n\nAgain we see the symbolism of Masonry, and the search of the Candidate\nfor light. \"Let men of narrow minds withdraw,\" he says, \"with closed\nears. We transmit the divine mysteries to those who have received the\nsacred initiation, to those who practise true piety, and who are not\nenslaved by the empty trappings of words or the preconceived opinions of\nthe pagans.\"\n\nTo Philo, the Supreme Being was the Primitive Light, or the Archetype of\nLight, Source whence the rays emanate that illuminate Souls. He was also\nthe Soul of the Universe, and as such acted in all its parts. He Himself\nfills and limits His whole Being. His Powers and Virtues fill and\npenetrate all. These Powers [Greek: \u0394\u03c5\u03bd\u03ac\u03bc\u03b5\u03b9\u03c2, dunameis] are Spirits\ndistinct from God, the \"Ideas\" of Plato personified. He is without\nbeginning, and lives in the prototype of Time [\u03b1\u03b9\u03c9\u03bd, aion].\n\nHis image is THE WORD [Greek: \u039b\u03bf\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2], a form more brilliant than fire;\nthat not being the _pure_ light. This LOGOS dwells in God; for the\nSupreme Being makes to Himself within His Intelligence the types or\nideas of everything that is to become reality in this World. The LOGOS\nis the vehicle by which God acts on the Universe, and may be compared to\nthe speech of man.\n\nThe LOGOS being the World of Ideas [Greek: \u03ba\u03cc\u03c3\u03bc\u03bf\u03c2 \u03bd\u03bf\u03b7\u03c4\u03cc\u03c2], by means\nwhereof God has created visible things, He is the most ancient God, in\ncomparison with the World, which is the youngest production. The LOGOS,\n_Chief of Intelligence_, of which He is the general representative, is\nnamed _Archangel, type_ and _representative_ of all spirits, even those\nof mortals. He is also styled the man-type and primitive man, Adam\nKadmon.\n\nGod only is Wise. The wisdom of man is but the reflection and image of\nthat of God. He is the Father, and His WISDOM the mother of creation:\nfor He united Himself with WISDOM [[Greek: \u03a3\u03bf\u03c6\u03b9\u03b1], Sophia], and\ncommunicated to it the germ of creation, and it brought forth the\nmaterial world. He created the ideal world only, and caused the material\nworld to be made real after its type, by His LOGOS, which is His speech,\nand at the same time the Idea of Ideas, the Intellectual World. The\nIntellectual City was but the _Thought_ of the Architect, who meditated\nthe creation, according to that plan of the Material City.\n\nThe Word is not only the Creator, but occupies the place of the Supreme\nBeing. Through Him all the Powers and Attributes of God act. On the\nother side, as first representative of the Human Family, He is the\nProtector of men and their Shepherd.\n\nGod gives to man the Soul or Intelligence, which exists before the body,\nand which he unites with the body. The reasoning Principle comes from\nGod through the Word, and communes with God and with the Word; but there\nis also in man an irrational Principle, that of the inclinations and\npassions which produce disorder, emanating from inferior spirits who\nfill the air as ministers of God. The body, taken from the Earth, and\nthe irrational Principle that animates it concurrently with the rational\nPrinciple, are hated by God, while the rational soul which He has given\nit, is, as it were, captive in this prison, this coffin, that\nencompasses it. The present condition of man is not his primitive\ncondition, when he was the image of the Logos. He has fallen from his\nfirst estate. But he may raise himself again, by following the\ndirections of WISDOM [Greek: \u03a3\u03bf\u03c6\u03b9\u03b1] and of the Angels which God has\ncommissioned to aid him in freeing himself from the bonds of the body,\nand combating Evil, the existence whereof God has permitted, _to furnish\nhim the means of exercising his liberty_. The souls that are purified,\nnot by the Law but by light, rise to the Heavenly regions, to enjoy\nthere a perfect felicity. Those that persevere in evil go from body to\nbody, the seats of passions and evil desires. The familiar lineaments of\nthese doctrines will be recognized by all who read the Epistles of St.\nPaul, who wrote after Philo, the latter living till the reign of\nCaligula, and being the contemporary of Christ.\n\nAnd the Mason is familiar with these doctrines of Philo: that the\nSupreme Being is a centre of Light whose rays or emanations pervade the\nUniverse; for that is the Light for which all Masonic journeys are a\nsearch, and of which the sun and moon in our Lodges are only emblems:\nthat Light and Darkness, chief enemies from the beginning of Time,\ndispute with each other the empire of the world; which we symbolize by\nthe candidate wandering in darkness and being brought to light: that the\nworld was created, not by the Supreme Being, but by a secondary agent,\nwho is but His WORD the [Greek: \u039b\u03bf\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2], and by types which are but his\nideas, aided by an INTELLIGENCE, or WISDOM [Greek: \u03a3\u03bf\u03c6\u03b9\u03b1], which gives\none of His Attributes; in which we see the occult meaning of the\nnecessity of recovering \"the Word\"; and of our two columns of STRENGTH\nand WISDOM, which are also the two parallel lines that bound the circle\nrepresenting the Universe: that the visible world is the image of the\ninvisible world; that the essence of the Human Soul is the image of God,\nand it existed before the body; that the object of its terrestrial life\nis to disengage itself of its body or its sepulchre; and that it will\nascend to the Heavenly regions whenever it shall be purified; in which\nwe see the meaning, now almost forgotten in our Lodges, of the mode of\npreparation of the candidate for apprenticeship, and his tests and\npurifications in the first Degree, according to the Ancient and Accepted\nScottish Rite.\n\nPhilo incorporated in his eclecticism neither Egyptian nor Oriental\nelements. But there were other Jewish Teachers in Alexandria who did\nboth. The Jews of Egypt were slightly jealous of, and a little hostile\nto, those of Palestine, particularly after the erection of the sanctuary\nat Leontopolis by the High-Priest Onias; and therefore they admired and\nmagnified those sages, who, like Jeremiah, had resided in Egypt. \"The\nwisdom of Solomon\" was written at Alexandria, and, in the time of St.\nJerome, was attributed to Philo; but it contains principles at variance\nwith his. It personifies Wisdom, and draws between its children and the\nProfane, the same line of demarcation that Egypt had long before taught\nto the Jews. That distinction existed at the beginning of the Mosaic\ncreed. Moshah himself was an Initiate in the mysteries of Egypt, as he\nwas compelled to be, as the adopted son of the daughter of Pharaoh,\n_Thouoris_, daughter of _Sesostris-Ramses_; who, as her tomb and\nmonuments show, was, in the right of her infant husband, Regent of Lower\nEgypt or the Delta at the time of the Hebrew Prophet's birth, reigning\nat Heliopolis. She was also, as the reliefs on her tomb show, a\nPriestess of HATHOR and NEITH, the two great primeval goddesses. As her\nadopted son, living in her Palace and presence forty years, and during\nthat time scarcely acquainted with his brethren the Jews, the law of\nEgypt compelled his initiation: and we find in many of his enactments\nthe intention of preserving, between the common people and the\nInitiates, the line of separation which he found in Egypt. Moshah and\nAharun his brother, the whole series of High-Priests, the Council of the\n70 Elders, Salomon and the entire succession of Prophets, were in\npossession of a higher science; and of that science Masonry is, at\nleast, the lineal descendant. It was familiarly known as THE KNOWLEDGE\nOF THE WORD.\n\nAM\u016aN, at first the God of Lower Egypt only, where Moshah was reared [a\nword that in Hebrew means Truth], was the Supreme God. He was styled\n\"_the Celestial Lord, who sheds Light on hidden things_.\" He was the\nsource of that divine life, of which the _crux ansata_ is the symbol;\nand the source of all power. He united all the attributes that the\nAncient Oriental Theosophy assigned to the Supreme Being. He was the\n[Greek: \u03c0\u03bb\u03ae\u03c1\u03c9\u03bc\u03b1] (Pleroma), or \"_Fullness of things_,\" for He\ncomprehended in Himself everything; and the LIGHT; for he was the\nSun-God. He was unchangeable in the midst of everything phenomenal in\nhis worlds. He _created_ nothing; but everything _emanated_ from Him;\nand of Him all the other Gods were but manifestations.\n\nThe Ram was His living symbol; which you see reproduced in this Degree,\nlying on the book with seven seals on the tracing-board. He caused the\ncreation of the world by the Primitive Thought [[Greek: \u0395\u03bd\u03bd\u03bf\u03b9\u03b1],\nEnnoia], or _Spirit_ [[Greek: \u03a0\u03bd\u03b5\u03c5\u03bc\u03b1], Pneuma], that issued from him by\nmeans of his _Voice_ or the WORD; and which _Thought_ or _Spirit_ was\npersonified as the Goddess NEITH. She, too, was a divinity of _Light_,\nand mother of the Sun; and the Feast of Lamps was celebrated in her\nhonor at Sais. The Creative _Power_, another manifestation of Deity,\nproceeding to the creation conceived of in her, the Divine\n_Intelligence_, produced with its Word the Universe, symbolized by an\negg issuing from the mouth of KNEPH; from which egg came PHTHA, image of\nthe Supreme Intelligence as realized in the world, and the type of that\nmanifested in man; the principal agent, also, of Nature, or the creative\nand productive Fire. PHRE or RE, the Sun, or Celestial Light, whose\nsymbol was [Mystic Symbol: \u25cb], the point within a circle, was the son of\nPHTHA; and TIPHE, his wife, or the celestial firmament, with the seven\ncelestial bodies, animated by spirits of genii that govern them, was\nrepresented on many of the monuments, clad in blue or yellow, her\ngarments sprinkled with stars, and accompanied by the sun, moon, and\nfive planets; and she was the type of Wisdom, and they of the Seven\nPlanetary Spirits of the Gnostics, that with her presided over and\ngoverned the sublunary world.\n\nIn this Degree, unknown for a hundred years to those who have practised\nit, these emblems reproduced refer to these old doctrines. The lamb, the\nyellow hangings strewed with stars, the seven columns, candlesticks, and\nseals all recall them to us.\n\nThe Lion was the symbol of ATHOM-RE, the Great God of Upper Egypt; the\nHawk, of RA or PHRE; the Eagle, of MENDES; the Bull, of APIS; and three\nof these are seen under the platform on which our altar stands.\n\nThe first HERMES was the INTELLIGENCE or WORD of God. Moved with\ncompassion for a race living without law, and wishing to teach them\nthat they sprang from His bosom, and to point out to them the way that\nthey should go [the books which the first Hermes, the same with Enoch,\nhad written on the mysteries of divine science, in the sacred\ncharacters, being unknown to those who lived after the flood], God sent\nto man OSIRIS and ISIS, accompanied by THOTH, the incarnation or\nterrestrial repetition of the first HERMES; who taught men the arts,\nscience, and the ceremonies of religion; and then ascended to Heaven or\nthe Moon. OSIRIS was the Principle of Good. TYPHON, like AHRIMAN, was\nthe principle and source of all that is evil in the moral and physical\norder. Like the Satan of Gnosticism, he was confounded with Matter.\n\nFrom Egypt or Persia the new Platonists borrowed the idea, and the\nGnostics received it from them, that man, in his terrestrial career, is\nsuccessively under the influence of the Moon, of Mercury, of Venus, of\nthe Sun, of Mars, of Jupiter, and of Saturn, until he finally reaches\nthe Elysian Fields; an idea again symbolized in the Seven Seals.\n\nThe Jews of Syria and Judea were the direct precursors of Gnosticism;\nand in their doctrines were ample oriental elements. These Jews had had\nwith the Orient, at two different periods, intimate relations,\nfamiliarizing them with the doctrines of Asia, and especially of Chaldea\nand Persia;--their forced residence in Central Asia under the Assyrians\nand Persians; and their voluntary dispersion over the whole East, when\nsubjects of the Seleucid\u00e6 and the Romans. Living near two-thirds of a\ncentury, and many of them long afterward, in Mesopotamia, the cradle of\ntheir race; speaking the same language, and their children reared with\nthose of the Chaldeans, Assyrians, Medes, and Persians, and receiving\nfrom them their names (as the case of Danayal, who was called\nB\u00e6ltasatsar, proves), they necessarily adopted many of the doctrines of\ntheir conquerors. Their descendants, as Azra and Nahamaiah show us,\nhardly desired to leave Persia, when they were allowed to do so. They\nhad a special jurisdiction, and governors and judges taken from their\nown people; many of them held high office, and their children were\neducated with those of the highest nobles. Danayal was the friend and\nminister of the King, and the Chief of the College of the Magi at\nBabylon; if we may believe the book which bears his name, and trust to\nthe incidents related in its highly figurative and imaginative style.\nMordecai, too, occupied a high station, no less than that of Prime\nMinister, and Esther or Astar, his cousin, was the Monarch's wife.\n\nThe Magi of Babylon were expounders of figurative writings, interpreters\nof nature, and of dreams,--astronomers and divines; and from their\ninfluences arose among the Jews, after their rescue from captivity, a\nnumber of sects, and a new exposition, the mystical interpretation, with\nall its wild fancies and infinite caprices. The _Aions_ of the Gnostics,\nthe _Ideas_ of Plato, the _Angels_ of the Jews, and the _Demons_ of the\nGreeks, all correspond to the _Ferouers_ of Zoroaster.\n\nA great number of Jewish families remained permanently in their new\ncountry; and one of the most celebrated of their schools was at Babylon.\nThey were soon familiarized with the doctrine of Zoroaster, which itself\nwas more ancient than Kuros. From the system of the Zend-Avesta they\nborrowed, and subsequently gave large development to, everything that\ncould be reconciled with their own faith; and these additions to the old\ndoctrine were soon spread, by the constant intercourse of commerce, into\nSyria and Palestine.\n\nIn the Zend-Avesta, God is Illimitable Time. No origin can be assigned\nto Him: He is so entirely enveloped in His glory, His nature and\nattributes are so inaccessible to human Intelligence, that He can be\nonly the object of a silent Veneration. Creation took place by emanation\nfrom Him. The first emanation was the primitive _Light_, and from that\nthe King of Light, ORMUZD. By the \"WORD,\" _Ormuzd_ created the world\npure. He is its preserver and judge; a Being Holy and Heavenly;\nIntelligence and Knowledge; the First-born of Time without limits; and\ninvested with all the Powers of the Supreme Being.\n\nStill he is, strictly speaking, the _Fourth_ Being. He had a _Ferouer_,\na pre-existing Soul [in the language of Plato, a _type_ or _ideal_]; and\nit is said of Him, that He existed from the beginning, in the primitive\n_Light_. But, that _Light_ being but an element, and His _Ferouer_ a\ntype, he is, in ordinary language, _the First-born_ of\nZEROUANE-AKHERENE. Behold, again, \"THE WORD\" of Masonry; the _Man_, on\nthe Tracing-Board of this Degree; the LIGHT toward which all Masons\ntravel.\n\nHe created after his own image, six Genii called _Amshaspands_, who\nsurround his Throne, are his organs of communication with inferior\nspirits and men, transmit to Him their prayers, solicit for them His\nfavors, and serve them as models of purity and perfection. Thus we have\nthe _Demiourgos_ of Gnosticism, and the six _Genii_ that assist him.\nThese are the Hebrew Archangels of the planets.\n\nThe names of these _Amshaspands_ are Bahman, Ardibehest, Schariver,\nSapandomad, Khordad, and Amerdad.\n\nThe fourth, the Holy SAPANDOMAD, created the first man and woman.\n\nThen ORMUZD created 28 _Izeds_, of whom MITHRAS is the chief. They\nwatch, with _Ormuzd_ and the _Amshaspands_, over the happiness, purity,\nand preservation of the world, which is under their government; and they\nare also models for mankind and interpreters of men's prayers. With\n_Mithras_ and _Ormuzd_, they make a _pleroma_ [or complete number] of\n30, corresponding to the thirty Aions of the Gnostics, and to the\n_ogdoade, dodecade_, and _decade_ of the Egyptians. _Mithras_ was the\nSun-God, invoked with, and soon confounded with him, becoming the object\nof a special worship, and eclipsing _Ormuzd_ himself.\n\nThe third order of pure spirits is more numerous. They are the\n_Ferouers_, the THOUGHTS of Ormuzd, or the IDEAS which he conceived\nbefore proceeding to the creation of things. They too are superior to\nmen. They protect them during their life on earth; they will purify them\nfrom evil at their resurrection. They are their tutelary genii, from the\nfall to the complete regeneration.\n\nAHRIMAN, second-born of the Primitive Light, emanated from it, pure like\nORMUZD; but, proud and ambitious, yielded to jealousy of the First-born.\nFor his hatred and pride, the Eternal condemned him to dwell, for 12,000\nyears, in that part of space where no ray of light reaches; the black\nempire of darkness. In that period the struggle between _Light_ and\n_Darkness, Good_ and _Evil_, will be terminated.\n\nAHRIMAN scorned to submit, and took the field against ORMUZD. To the\ngood spirits created by his Brother, he opposed an innumerable army of\nEvil Ones. To the seven _Amshaspands_ he opposed seven _Archdevs_,\nattached to the seven Planets; to the _Izeds_ and _Ferouers_ an equal\nnumber of _Devs_, which brought upon the world all moral and physical\nevils. Hence _Poverty, Maladies, Impurity, Envy, Chagrin, Drunkenness,\nFalsehood, Calumny_, and their horrible array.\n\nThe image of Ahriman was the Dragon, confounded by the Jews with Satan\nand the Serpent-Tempter. After a reign of 3000 years, Ormuzd had created\nthe Material World, in six periods, calling successively into existence\nthe Light, Water, Earth, plants, animals, and Man. But Ahriman concurred\nin creating the earth and water; for darkness was already an element,\nand Ormuzd could not exclude its Master. So also the two concurred in\nproducing Man. Ormuzd produced, by his Will and Word, a Being that was\nthe type and source of universal life for everything that exists under\nHeaven. He placed in man a pure principle, or Life, proceeding from the\nSupreme Being. But Ahriman destroyed that pure principle, in the form\nwherewith it was clothed; and when Ormuzd had made, of its recovered and\npurified essence, the first man and woman, Ahriman seduced and tempted\nthem with wine and fruits; the woman yielding first.\n\nOften, during the three latter periods of 3000 years each, Ahriman and\nDarkness are, and are to be, triumphant. But the pure souls are assisted\nby the Good Spirits; the Triumph of Good is decreed by the Supreme\nBeing, and the period of that triumph will infallibly arrive. When the\nworld shall be most afflicted with the evils poured out upon it by the\nspirits of perdition, three Prophets will come to bring relief to\nmortals. SOSIOSCH, the principal of the Three, will regenerate the\nearth, and restore to it its primitive beauty, strength, and purity. He\nwill judge the good and the wicked. After the universal resurrection of\nthe good, he will conduct them to a home of everlasting happiness.\nAhriman, his evil demons, and all wicked men, will also be purified in a\ntorrent of melted metal. The law of Ormuzd will reign everywhere; all\nmen will be happy; all, enjoying unalterable bliss, will sing with\nSosiosch the praises of the Supreme Being.\n\nThese doctrines, the details of which were sparingly borrowed by the\nPharisaic Jews, were much more fully adopted by the Gnostics; who taught\nthe restoration of all things, their return to their original pure\ncondition, the happiness of those to be saved, and their admission to\nthe feast of Heavenly Wisdom.\n\nThe doctrines of Zoroaster came originally from Bactria, an Indian\nProvince of Persia. Naturally, therefore, it would include Hindu or\nBuddhist elements, as it did. The fundamental idea of Buddhism was,\nmatter subjugating the intelligence, and intelligence freeing itself\nfrom that slavery. Perhaps something came to Gnosticism from China.\n\"Before the chaos which preceded the birth of Heaven and Earth,\" says\nLao-Tseu, \"a single Being existed, immense and silent, immovable and\never active--the mother of the Universe. I know not its name: but I\ndesignate it by the word _Reason_. Man has his _type_ and _model_ in the\nEarth; Earth in Heaven; Heaven in Reason; and Reason in Itself.\" Here\nagain are the _Ferouers_, the _Ideas_, the _Aions_--the REASON or\nINTELLIGENCE \u0395\u03bd\u03bd\u03bf\u03b9\u03b1, SILENCE \u03a3\u03b9\u03b3\u03ae, WORD \u039b\u03bf\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2, and WISDOM \u03a3\u03bf\u03c6\u03b9\u03b1 of the\nGnostics.\n\nThe dominant system among the Jews after their captivity was that of the\nPharoschim or Pharisees. Whether their name was derived from that of the\nParsees, or followers of Zoroaster, or from some other source, it is\ncertain that they had borrowed much of their doctrine from the Persians.\nLike them they claimed to have the exclusive and mysterious knowledge,\nunknown to the mass. Like them they taught that a constant war was waged\nbetween the Empire of Good and that of Evil. Like them they attributed\nthe sin and fall of man to the demons and their chief; and like them\nthey admitted a special protection of the righteous by inferior beings,\nagents of Jehovah. All their doctrines on these subjects were at bottom\nthose of the Holy Books; but singularly developed; and the Orient was\nevidently the source from which those developments came.\n\nThey styled themselves _Interpreters_; a name indicating their claim to\nthe exclusive possession of the true meaning of the Holy Writings, by\nvirtue of the oral tradition which Moses had received on Mount Sinai,\nand which successive generations of Initiates had transmitted, as they\nclaimed, unaltered, unto them. Their very costume, their belief in the\ninfluences of the stars, and in the immortality and transmigration of\nsouls, their system of angels and their astronomy, were all foreign.\n\nSadduceeism arose merely from an opposition essentially Jewish, to these\nforeign teachings, and that mixture of doctrines, adopted by the\nPharisees, and which constituted the popular creed.\n\nWe come at last to the _Essenes_ and _Therapeuts_, with whom this Degree\nis particularly concerned. That intermingling of oriental and occidental\nrites, of Persian and Pythagorean opinions, which we have pointed out in\nthe doctrines of Philo, is unmistakable in the creeds of these two\nsects.\n\nThey were less distinguished by metaphysical speculations than by simple\nmeditations and moral practices. But the latter always partook of the\nZoroastrian principle, that it was necessary to free the soul from the\ntrammels and influences of matter; which led to a system of abstinence\nand maceration entirely opposed to the ancient Hebraic ideas, favorable\nas they were to physical pleasures.\n\nIn general, the life and manners of these mystical associations, as\nPhilo and Josephus describe them, and particularly their prayers at\nsunrise, seem the image of what the Zend-Avesta prescribes to the\nfaithful adorer of Ormuzd; and some of their observances cannot\notherwise be explained.\n\nThe Therapeuts resided in Egypt, in the neighborhood of Alexandria; and\nthe Essenes in Palestine, in the vicinity of the Dead Sea. But there was\nnevertheless a striking coincidence in their ideas, readily explained by\nattributing it to a foreign influence. The Jews of Egypt, under the\ninfluence of the School of Alexandria, endeavored in general to make\ntheir doctrines harmonize with the traditions of Greece; and thence\ncame, in the doctrines of the Therapeuts, as stated by Philo, the many\nanalogies between the Pythagorean and Orphic ideas, on one side, and\nthose of Judaism on the other: while the Jews of Palestine, having less\ncommunication with Greece, or contemning its teachings, rather imbibed\nthe Oriental doctrines, which they drank in at the source and with which\ntheir relations with Persia made them familiar. This attachment was\nparticularly shown in the Kabalah, which belonged rather to Palestine\nthan to Egypt, though extensively known in the latter; and furnished the\nGnostics with some of their most striking theories.\n\nIt is a significant fact, that while Christ spoke often of the Pharisees\nand Sadducees, He never once mentioned the Essenes, between whose\ndoctrines and His there was so great a resemblance, and, in many points,\nso perfect an identity. Indeed, they are not named, nor even distinctly\nalluded to, anywhere in the New Testament.\n\nJohn, the son of a Priest who ministered in the Temple at Jerusalem, and\nwhose mother was of the family of Aharun, was in the deserts until the\nday of his showing unto Israel. He drank neither wine nor strong drink.\nClad in hair-cloth, and with a girdle of leather, and feeding upon such\nfood as the desert afforded, he preached, in the country about Jordan,\nthe baptism of repentance, for the remission of siri-s; that is, the\nnecessity of repentance proven by _reformation_. He taught the people\ncharity and liberality; the publicans, justice, equity, and fair\ndealing; the soldiery, peace, truth, and contentment; to do violence to\nnone, accuse none falsely, and be content with their pay. He inculcated\nthe necessity of a virtuous life, and the folly of trusting to their\ndescent from Abraham.\n\nHe denounced both Pharisees and Sadducees as a generation of vipers,\nthreatened with the anger of God. He baptized those who confessed their\nsins. He preached in the desert; and therefore in the country where the\nEssenes lived, professing the same doctrines. He was imprisoned before\nChrist began to preach. Matthew mentions him without preface or\nexplanation; as if, apparently, his history was too well known to need\nany. \"In those days,\" he says, \"came John the Baptist, preaching in the\nwilderness of Judea.\" His disciples frequently fasted; for we find them\nwith the Pharisees coming to Jesus to inquire why _His_ Disciples did\nnot fast as often as they; and He did not denounce _them_, as His habit\nwas to denounce the Pharisees; but answered them kindly and gently.\n\nFrom his prison, John sent two of his disciples to inquire of Christ:\n\"Art thou he that is to come, or do we look for another?\" Christ\nreferred them to his miracles as an answer; and declared to the people\nthat John was a prophet, and more than a prophet, and that no greater\nman had ever been born; but that the humblest Christian was his\nsuperior. He declared him to be Elias, who was to come.\n\nJohn had denounced to Herod his marriage with his brother's wife as\nunlawful; and for this he was imprisoned, and finally executed to\ngratify her. His disciples buried him; and Herod and others thought he\nhad risen from the dead and appeared again in the person of Christ. The\npeople all regarded John as a prophet; and Christ silenced the Priests\nand Elders by asking them whether he was inspired. They feared to excite\nthe anger of the people by saying that he was not. Christ declared that\nhe came \"in the way of righteousness\"; and that the lower classes\nbelieved him, though the Priests and Pharisees did not.\n\nThus John, who was often consulted by Herod, and to whom that monarch\nshowed great deference, and was often governed by his advice; whose\ndoctrine prevailed very extensively among the people and the publicans,\ntaught _some_ creed older than Christianity. That is plain: and it is\nequally plain, that the very large body of the Jews that adopted his\ndoctrines, were neither Pharisees nor Sadducees, but the humble, common\npeople. They must, therefore, have been Essenes. It is plain, too, that\nChrist applied for baptism as a sacred rite, well known and long\npracticed. It was becoming to him, he said, to fulfill all\nrighteousness.\n\nIn the 18th chapter of the Acts of the Apostles we read thus: \"And a\ncertain Jew, named Apollos, born at Alexandria, an eloquent man, and\nmighty in the Scriptures, came to Ephesus. This man _was instructed in\nthe way of the Lord_, and, being fervent in spirit, _he spake and taught\ndiligently the things of the Lord, knowing only the baptism of John_;\nand he began to speak boldly in the synagogue; whom, when Aquilla and\nPriscilla had heard, they took him unto them, and expounded unto him\n_the way of God_ more perfectly.\"\n\nTranslating this from the symbolic and figurative language into the true\nordinary sense of the Greek text, it reads thus: \"And a certain Jew,\nnamed Apollos, an Alexandrian by birth, an eloquent man, and of\nextensive learning, came to Ephesus. He had learned in the mysteries the\ntrue doctrine in regard to God; and, being a zealous enthusiast, he\nspoke and taught diligently the truths in regard to the Deity, having\nreceived no other baptism than that of John.\" He knew nothing in regard\nto Christianity; for he had resided in Alexandria, and had just then\ncome to Ephesus; being, probably, a disciple of Philo, and a Therapeut.\n\n\"That, in all times,\" says St. Augustine, \"is the Christian religion,\nwhich to know and follow is the most sure and certain health, called\naccording to that name, but not according to the thing itself, of which\nit is the name; for the thing itself, which is now called the Christian\nreligion, _really was known to the Ancients_, nor was wanting at any\ntime from the beginning of the human race, until the time when Christ\ncame in the flesh; from whence the true religion, which had previously\nexisted, began to be called Christian; and this in our days is the\nChristian religion, not as having been wanting in former times, but as\nhaving, in later times, received this name.\" The disciples were first\ncalled \"Christians,\" at Antioch, when Barnabas and Paul began to preach\nthere.\n\nThe Wandering or Itinerant Jews or Exorcists, who assumed to employ the\nSacred Name in exorcising evil spirits, were no doubt Therapeutae or\nEssenes.\n\n\"And it came to pass,\" we read in the 19th chapter of the Acts, verses 1\nto 4, \"that while Apollos was at Corinth, Paul, having passed through\nthe upper parts of Asia Minor, came to Ephesus; and finding certain\n_disciples_, he said to them, 'Have ye received the Holy Ghost since ye\nbecame Believers?' And they said unto him, 'We have not so much as heard\nthat there _is_ any Holy Ghost.' And he said to them, 'In what, then,\nwere you baptized?' And they said 'In John's baptism.' Then said Paul,\n'John indeed baptized with the baptism of repentance, saying to the\npeople that they should believe in Him who was to come after him, that\nis, in Jesus Christ. When they heard this, they were baptized in the\nname of the Lord Jesus.\"\n\nThis faith, taught by John, and so nearly Christianity, could have been\nnothing but the doctrine of the Essenes; and there can be no doubt that\nJohn belonged to that sect. The place where he preached, his macerations\nand frugal diet, the doctrines he taught, all prove it conclusively.\nThere was no other sect to which he _could_ have belonged; certainly\nnone so numerous as his, _except_ the Essenes.\n\nWe find, from the two letters written by Paul to the brethren at\nCorinth, that City of Luxury and Corruption, that there were contentions\namong them. Rival sects had already, about the 57th year of our era,\nreared their banners there, as followers, some of Paul, some of Apollos,\nand some of Cephas. Some of them denied the resurrection. Paul urged\nthem to adhere to the doctrines taught by himself, and had sent Timothy\nto them to bring them afresh to their recollection.\n\nAccording to Paul, Christ was to come again. He was to put an end to all\nother Principalities and Powers, and finally to Death, and then be\nHimself once more merged in God; _who should then be all in all_.\n\nThe forms and ceremonies of the Essenes were symbolical. They had,\naccording to Philo the Jew, four Degrees; the members being divided into\ntwo Orders, the _Practici_ and _Therapeutici_; the latter being the\ncontemplative and medical Brethren; and the former the active,\npractical, business men. They were Jews by birth; and had a greater\naffection for each other than the members of any other sect. Their\nbrotherly love was intense. They fulfilled the Christian law, \"Love one\nanother.\" They despised riches. No one was to be found among them,\nhaving more than another. The possessions of one were intermingled with\nthose of the others; so that they all had but one patrimony, and were\nbrethren. Their piety toward God was extraordinary. Before sunrise they\nnever spake a word about profane matters; but put up certain prayers\nwhich they had received from their forefathers. At dawn of day, and\nbefore it was light, their prayers and hymns ascended to Heaven. They\nwere eminently faithful and true, and the Ministers of Peace. They had\nmysterious ceremonies, and initiations into their mysteries; and the\nCandidate promised that he would ever practise fidelity to all men, and\nespecially to those in authority, \"because no one obtains the government\nwithout God's assistance.\"\n\nWhatever they said, was firmer than an oath; but they avoided swearing,\nand esteemed it worse than perjury. They were simple in their diet and\nmode of living, bore torture with fortitude, and despised death. They\ncultivated the science of medicine and were very skillful. They deemed\nit a good omen to dress in white robes. They had their own courts, and\npassed righteous judgments. They kept the Sabbath more rigorously than\nthe Jews.\n\nTheir chief towns were Engaddi, near the Dead Sea, and Hebron. Engaddi\nwas about 30 miles southeast from Jerusalem, and Hebron about 20 miles\nsouth of that city. Josephus and Eusebius speak of them as an ancient\nsect; and they were no doubt the first among the Jews to embrace\nChristianity: with whose faith and doctrine their own tenets had so many\npoints of resemblance, and were indeed in a great measure the same.\nPliny regarded them as a very ancient people.\n\nIn their devotions they turned toward the rising sun; as the Jews\ngenerally did toward the Temple. But they were no idolaters; for they\nobserved the law of Moses with scrupulous fidelity. They held all things\nin common, and despised riches, their wants being supplied by the\nadministration of Curators or Stewards. The Tetractys, composed of round\ndots instead of jods, was revered among them. This being a Pythagorean\nsymbol, evidently shows their connection with the school of Pythagoras;\nbut their peculiar tenets more resemble those of Confucius and\nZoroaster; and probably were adopted while they were prisoners in\nPersia; which explains their turning toward the Sun in prayer.\n\nTheir demeanor was sober and chaste. They submitted to the\nsuperintendence of governors whom they appointed over themselves. The\nwhole of their time was spent in labor, meditation, and prayer; and they\nwere most sedulously attentive to every call of justice and humanity,\nand every moral duty. They believed in the unity of God. They supposed\nthe souls of men to have fallen, by a disastrous fate, from the regions\nof purity and light, into the bodies which they occupy; during their\ncontinuance in which they considered them confined as in a prison.\nTherefore they did not believe in the resurrection of the body; but in\nthat of the soul only. They believed in a future state of rewards and\npunishments; and they disregarded the ceremonies or external forms\nenjoined in the law of Moses to be observed in the worship of God;\nholding that the words of that lawgiver were to be understood in a\nmysterious and recondite sense, and not according to their literal\nmeaning. They offered no sacrifices, except at home; and by meditation\nthey endeavored, as far as possible, to isolate the soul from the body,\nand carry it back to God.\n\nEusebius broadly admits \"that the ancient Therapeut\u00e6 were Christians;\nand that their ancient writings were our Gospels and Epistles.\"\n\nThe ESSENES were of the Eclectic Sect of Philosophers, and held PLATO in\nthe highest esteem; they believed that true philosophy, the greatest and\nmost salutary gift of God to mortals, was scattered, in various\nportions, through all the different Sects; and that it was,\nconsequently, the duty of every wise man to gather it from the several\nquarters where it lay dispersed, and to employ it, thus reunited, in\ndestroying the dominion of impiety and vice.\n\nThe great festivals of the Solstices were observed in a distinguished\nmanner by the Essenes; as would naturally be supposed, from the fact\nthat they reverenced the Sun, not as a god, but as a symbol of light and\nfire; the fountain of which, the Orientals supposed God to be. They\nlived in continence and abstinence, and had establishments similar to\nthe monasteries of the early Christians.\n\nThe writings of the Essenes were full of mysticism, parables, enigmas,\nand allegories. They believed in the esoteric and exoteric meanings of\nthe Scriptures; and, as we have already said, they had a warrant for\nthat in the Scriptures themselves. They found it in the Old Testament,\nas the Gnostics found it in the New. The Christian writers, and even\nChrist himself, recognized it as a truth, that all Scripture had an\ninner and an outer meaning. Thus we find it said as follows, in one of\nthe Gospels:\n\n\"Unto you it is given to know the mystery of the Kingdom of God; but\nunto men _that are without_, all these things are done in parables; that\nseeing, they may see and not perceive, and hearing they may hear and not\nunderstand.... And the disciples came and said unto him, 'Why speakest\nThou the truth in parables?'--He answered and said unto them, 'Because\nit is given unto _you_ to know the mysteries of the Kingdom of Heaven,\nbut to _them_ it is not given.'\"\n\nPaul, in the 4th chapter of his Epistle to the Galatians, speaking of\nthe simplest facts of the Old Testament, asserts that they are _an\nallegory_. In the 3d chapter of the second letter to the Corinthians, he\ndeclares himself a minister of the New Testament, appointed by God; \"Not\nof the letter, but of the spirit; for the letter killeth.\" Origen and\nSt. Gregory held that the Gospels were not to be taken in their literal\nsense; and Athanasius admonishes us that \"Should we understand sacred\nwrit according to the letter, we should fall into the most enormous\nblasphemies.\"\n\nEusebius said, \"Those who preside over the Holy Scriptures, philosophize\nover them, and expound their literal sense by allegory.\"\n\nThe sources of our knowledge of the Kabalistic doctrines, are the books\nof Jezirah and Sohar, the former drawn up in the second century, and the\nlatter a little later; but containing materials much older than\nthemselves. In their most characteristic elements, they go back to the\ntime of the exile. In them, as in the teachings of Zoroaster, everything\nthat exists emanated from a source of infinite LIGHT. Before everything,\nexisted THE ANCIENT OF DAYS, the KING OF LIGHT; a title often given to\nthe Creator in the _Zend-Avesta_ and the code of the _Saba\u00e6ns_. With the\nidea so expressed is connected the pantheism of India. THE KING OF\nLIGHT, THE ANCIENT, is ALL THAT IS. He is not only the real cause of all\nExistences; he is Infinite [AINSOPH]. He is HIMSELF: there is nothing in\nHim that We can call _Thou_.\n\nIn the Indian doctrine, not only is the Supreme Being the real cause of\nall, but he is the only real Existence: all the rest is illusion. In the\nKabalah, as in the Persian and Gnostic doctrines, He is the Supreme\nBeing unknown to all, the \"Unknown Father.\" The world is his revelation,\nand subsists only in Him. His attributes are reproduced there, with\ndifferent modifications, and in different degrees, so that the Universe\nis His Holy Splendor: it is but His Mantle; but it must be revered in\nsilence. All beings have emanated from the Supreme Being: The nearer a\nbeing is to Him, the more perfect it is; the more remote in the scale,\nthe less its purity.\n\nA ray of Light, shot from the Deity, is the cause and principle of all\nthat exists. It is at once Father and Mother of All, in the sublimest\nsense. It penetrates everything; and without it nothing can exist an\ninstant. From this double FORCE, designated by the two parts of the word\nI. H. U. H. emanated the FIRST-BORN of God, the Universal FORM, in which\nare contained all beings; the Persian and Platonic Archetype of things,\nunited with the Infinite by the primitive ray of Light.\n\nThis First-Born is the Creative Agent, Conservator, and animating\nPrinciple of the Universe. It is THE LIGHT OF LIGHT. It possesses the\nthree Primitive Forces of the Divinity, LIGHT, SPIRIT, and LIFE \u03a6\u03ce\u03c2,\n\u03a0\u03bd\u03b5\u03c5\u03bc\u03ac, and \u0396\u03c9\u03b7. As it has received what it gives, Light and Life, it is\nequally considered as the generative and conceptive Principle, the\nPrimitive Man, ADAM KADMON. As such, it has revealed itself in ten\nemanations or _Sephiroth_, which are not ten different beings, nor even\nbeings at all; but sources of life, vessels of Omnipotence, and types of\nCreation. They are _Sovereignty_ or _Will, Wisdom, Intelligence,\nBenignity, Severity, Beauty, Victory, Glory, Permanency_, and _Empire_.\nThese are attributes of God; and this idea, that God reveals Himself by\nHis attributes, and that the human mind cannot perceive or discern God\nHimself, in his works, but only his mode of manifesting Himself, is a\nprofound Truth. We know of the Invisible only what the Visible reveals.\n\n_Wisdom_ was called NOUS and LOGOS [and \u039d\u03bf\u03c5\u0303\u03c2 \u039b\u03bf\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2], INTELLECT or the\nWORD. _Intelligence_, source of the oil of anointing, responds to the\nHoly Ghost of the Christian Faith.\n\n_Beauty_ is represented by green and yellow. _Victory_ is\nYAHOVAH-TSABAOTH, the column on the right hand, the column _Jachin:\nGlory_ is the column _Boaz_, on the left hand. And thus our symbols\nappear again in the Kabalah. And again the LIGHT, the object of our\nlabors, appears as the creative power of Deity. The circle, also, was\nthe special symbol of the first Sephirah, Kether, or the Crown.\n\nWe do not further follow the Kabalah in its four Worlds of Spirits,\n_Aziluth, Briah, Yezirah_, and _Asiah_, or of _emanation, creation,\nformation_, and _fabrication_, one inferior to and one emerging from the\nother, the superior always enveloping the inferior; its doctrine that,\nin all that exists, there is nothing purely material; that all comes\nfrom God, and in all He proceeds by irradiation; that everything\nsubsists by the Divine ray that penetrates creation; and all is united\nby the Spirit of God, which is the life of life; so that all is God; the\nExistences that inhabit the four worlds, inferior to each other in\nproportion to their distance from the Great King of Light: the contest\nbetween the good and evil Angels and Principles, to endure until the\nEternal Himself comes to end it and re-establish the primitive harmony;\nthe four distinct parts of the Soul of Man; and the migrations of impure\nsouls, until they are sufficiently purified to share with the Spirits of\nLight the contemplation of the Supreme Being whose Splendor fills the\nUniverse.\n\nThe WORD was also found in the Ph\u0153nician Creed. As in all those of Asia,\na WORD of God, written in starry characters, by the planetary\nDivinities, and communicated by the Demi-Gods, as a profound mystery, to\nthe higher classes of the human race, to be communicated by them to\nmankind, created the world. The faith of the Ph\u0153nicians was an emanation\nfrom that ancient worship of the Stars, which in the creed of Zoroaster\nalone, is connected with a faith in one God. Light and Fire are the most\nimportant agents in the Phoenician faith. There is a race of children of\nthe Light. They adored the Heaven with its Lights, deeming it the\nSupreme God.\n\nEverything emanates from a Single Principle, and a Primitive Love, which\nis the Moving Power of All and governs all. Light, by its union with\nSpirit, whereof it is but the vehicle or symbol, is the Life of\neverything, and penetrates everything. It should therefore be respected\nand honored everywhere; for everywhere it governs and controls.\n\nThe Chaldaic and Jerusalem Paraphrasts endeavored to render the phrase,\nDEBAR-YAHOVAH \u05d3\u05d1\u05e8 \u05d9\u05d4\u05d5\u05d4, the Word of God, a personalty, wherever they met\nwith it. The phrase, \"And God created man,\" is, in the Jerusalem Targum,\n\"And the Word of IHUH created man.\"\n\nSo, in xxviii. Gen. 20,21, where Jacob says: \"If God [\u05d9\u05d4\u05d9\u05d4 \u05d0\u05dc\u05d4\u05d9 IHIH\nALHIM] will be with me...\" then shall IHUH be my ALHIM [Hebrew ]; UHIH\nIHUH Li LALHIM; and this stone shall be God's House [[Hebrew].. IHIH\nBITH ALHIM]: Onkelos paraphrases it, \"If the word of IHUH will be my\nhelp ... then the word of IHUH shall be my God\".\n\nSo, in iii. Gen. 8, for \"The Voice of the Lord God\" [[Hebrew], IHUH\nALHIM], we have, \"The Voice of the Word of IHUH.\"\n\nIn ix. Wisdom, 1, \"O God of my Fathers and Lord of Mercy! who has made\nall things with thy word.. [Greek: \u03ad\u03bd \u03bb\u03cc\u03b3\u03bf\u03c5 \u03c3\u03bf\u03c5.]\"\n\nAnd in xviii. Wisdom, 15, \"Thine Almighty Word [Greek: \u039b\u03bf\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2] leaped\ndown from Heaven.\"\n\nPhilo speaks of the Word as being the same with God. So in several\nplaces he calls it \"[Greek: \u03b4\u03b5\u03cd\u03c4\u03b5\u03c1\u03bf\u03c2 \u0398\u03b5\u03af\u03bf\u03c2 \u039b\u00f3\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2],\" the Second Divinity;\n\"[Greek: \u03b5\u03af\u03bc\u03ce\u03bd\u03c4\u03bf\u03c5\u0398\u03b5\u03bf\u03cd],\" the Image of God: the Divine Word that made all\nthings: \"the [Greek: \u03c5\u03c0\u03b1\u03c1\u03c7\u03bf\u03c2],\" substitute, of God; and the like.\n\nThus, when John commenced to preach, had been for ages agitated, by the\nPriests and Philosophers of the East and West, the great questions\nconcerning the eternity or creation of matter: immediate or intermediate\ncreation of the Universe by the Supreme God; the origin, object, and\nfilial extinction of evil; the relations between the intellectual and\nmaterial worlds, and between God and man; and the creation, fall,\nredemption, and restoration to his first estate, of man.\n\nThe Jewish doctrine, differing in this from all the other Oriental\ncreeds, and even from the Alohayistic legend with which the book of\nGenesis commences, attributed the creation to the immediate action of\nthe Supreme Being. The Theosophists of the other Eastern Peoples\ninterposed more than one intermediary between God and the world. To\nplace between them but a single Being, to suppose for the production of\nthe world but a single intermediary, was, in their eyes, to lower the\nSupreme Majesty. The interval between God, who is perfect Purity, and\nmatter, which is base and foul, was too great for them to clear it at a\nsingle step. Even in the Occident, neither Plato nor Philo could thus\nimpoverish the Intellectual World.\n\nThus, Cerinthus of Ephesus, with most of the Gnostics, Philo, the\nKabalah, the Zend-Avesta, the Puranas, and all the Orient, deemed the\ndistance and antipathy between the Supreme Being and the material world\ntoo great, to attribute to the former the Creation of the latter. Below,\nand emanating from, or created by, the Ancient of Days, the Central\nLight, the Beginning, or First Principle [[Greek: \u0391\u03c1\u03c7\u03ae]], one, two, or\nmore Principles, Existences or Intellectual Beings were imagined, to\nsome one or more of whom [without any immediate creative act on the part\nof the Great Immovable, Silent Deity], the immediate creation of the\nmaterial and mental universe was due.\n\nWe have already spoken of many of the speculations on this point. To\nsome, the world was created by the LOGOS or WORD, first manifestation\nof, or emanation from, the Deity. To others, the beginning of creation\nwas by the emanation of a ray of LIGHT, creating the principle of\n_Light_ and _Life_. The Primitive THOUGHT, creating the inferior\nDeities, a succession of INTELLIGENCES, the Iynges of Zoroaster, his\n_Amshaspands_, _Izeds_, and _Ferouers_, the _Ideas_ of Plato, the\n_Aions_ of the Gnostics, the _Angels_ of the Jews, the _Nous_, the\n_Demiourgos_, the DIVINE REASON, the _Powers_ or _Forces_ of Philo, and\nthe Alohayim, Forces or Superior Gods of the ancient legend with which\nGenesis begins,--to these and other intermediaries the creation was\nowing. No restraints were laid on the Fancy and the Imagination. The\nveriest Abstractions became Existences and Realities. The attributes of\nGod, personified, became Powers, Spirits, Intelligences.\n\nGod was the _Light of Light_, _Divine Fire_, the _Abstract\nIntellectuality_, the _Root_ or _Germ_ of the Universe. _Simon Magus_,\nfounder of the Gnostic faith, and many of the early Judaizing\nChristians, admitted that the manifestations of the Supreme Being, as\nFATHER, or JEHOVAH, SON or CHRIST, and HOLY SPIRIT, were only so many\ndifferent _modes_ of Existence, or _Forces_ [[Greek: \u03b4\u03c5\u03bd\u03b1\u03bc\u03b5\u03b9\u03c2]] of the\nsame God. To others they were, as were the multitude of Subordinate\nIntelligences, real and distinct beings.\n\nThe Oriental imagination revelled in the creation of these Inferior\nIntelligences, Powers of Good and Evil, and Angels. We have spoken of\nthose imagined by the Persians and the Kabalists. In the Talmud, every\nstar, every country, every town, and almost every tongue has a Prince of\nHeaven as its Protector. JEHUEL is the guardian of fire, and MICHAEL, of\nwater. Seven spirits assist each; those of fire being _Seraphiel_,\n_Gabriel_, _Nitriel_, _Tammael_, _Tchimschiel_, _Hadarniel_, and\n_Sarniel_. These seven are represented by the square columns of this\nDegree, while the columns JACHIN and BOAZ represent the angels of fire\nand water. But the columns are not representatives of these alone.\n\nTo Basilides, God was without name, uncreated, at first containing and\nconcealing in Himself the Plenitude of His Perfections; and when these\nare by Him displayed and manifested, there result as many particular\nExistences, all analogous to Him, and still and always Him. To the\nEssenes and the Gnostics, the East and the West both devised this faith;\nthat the Ideas, Conceptions, or Manifestations of the Deity were so many\nCreations, so many Beings, all God, nothing without Him, but more than\nwhat we now understand by the word _ideas_. They emanated from and were\nagain merged in God. They had a kind of middle existence between our\nmodern ideas, and the intelligences or ideas, elevated to the rank of\ngenii, of the Oriental mythology.\n\nThese personified attributes of Deity, in the theory of Basilides, were\nthe [Greek: \u03a0\u03c1\u03c9\u03c4\u03cc\u03b3\u03bf\u03bd\u03bf\u03c2] or _First-born_, [Greek: \u039d\u03bf\u03c5\u0303\u03c2][_Nous_ or\n_Mind_]: from it emanates [Greek: \u039b\u03bf\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2] [_Logos_, or THE WORD] from it\n[Greek: \u03a6\u03c1\u03cc\u03bd\u03b7\u03c3\u03b9\u03c2]: [_Phronesis, Intellect_]: from it [Greek: \u03a3\u03bf\u03c6\u03b9\u03b1]\n[_Sophia, Wisdom_]: from it [Greek: \u0394\u03cd\u03bd\u03b1\u03bc\u03b9\u03c2] [_Dunamis, Power_]: and\nfrom it [Greek: \u0394\u03b9\u03ba\u03b1\u03b9\u03bf\u03c3\u03cd\u03bd\u03b7] [_Dikaiosune, Righteousness_]: to which\nlatter the Jews gave the name of [Greek: \u0395\u03b9\u03c1\u03b7\u03bd\u03b7] [_Eirene, Peace_, or\n_Calm_], the essential characteristics of Divinity, and harmonious\neffect of all His perfections. The whole number of successive emanations\nwas 365, expressed by the Gnostics, in Greek letters, by the mystic word\n[Greek: \u0391\u0392\u03a1\u0391\u039e\u0391\u03a3] [_Abraxas_]; designating God as manifested, or the\naggregate of his manifestations; but not the Supreme and Secret God\nHimself. These three hundred and sixty-five Intelligences compose\naltogether the Fullness or _Plenitude_ [[Greek: \u03a0\u03bb\u03b7\u03c1\u03c9\u03bc\u03b1]] of the Divine\nEmanations.\n\nWith the Ophites, a sect of the Gnostics, there were seven inferior\nspirits [inferior to Ialdabaoth, the Demiourgos or Actual Creator]:\n_Micha\u00ebl, Suri\u00e8l, Rapha\u00ebl, Gabriel, Thauthabaoth, Erataoth_, and\n_Athaniel_, the genii of the stars called the Bull, the Dog, the Lion,\nthe Bear, the Serpent, the Eagle, and the Ass that formerly figured in\nthe constellation Cancer, and symbolized respectively by those animals;\nas _Ialdabaoth, Iao, Adona\u00ef, Elo\u00ef, Ora\u00ef_, and _Astapha\u00ef_ were the genii\nof Saturn, the Moon, the Sun, Jupiter, Venus, and Mercury.\n\nThe WORD appears in all these creeds. It is the _Ormuzd_ of Zoroaster,\nthe _Ainsoph_ of the Kabalah, the _Nous_ of Platonism and Philonism, and\nthe _Sophia_ or _Demiourgos_ of the Gnostics.\n\nAnd all these creeds, while admitting these different manifestations of\nthe Supreme Being, held that His identity was immutable and permanent.\nThat was Plato's distinction between the Being always the same [Greek:\n\u03c4\u03cc \u03cc\u03c5] and the perpetual flow of things incessantly changing, the\nGenesis.\n\nThe belief in dualism in some shape, was universal. Those who held that\neverything emanated from God, aspired to God, and re-entered into God,\nbelieved that, among those emanations were two adverse Principles, of\nLight and Darkness, Good and Evil. This prevailed in Central Asia and in\nSyria; while in Egypt it assumed the form of Greek speculation. In the\nformer, a second Intellectual Principle was admitted, active in its\nEmpire of Darkness, audacious against the Empire of Light. So the\nPersians and Sabeans understood it. In Egypt, this second Principle was\nMatter, as the word was used by the Platonic School, with its sad\nattributes, Vacuity, Darkness, and Death. In their theory, matter could\nbe animated only by the low communication of a principle of divine life.\nIt resists the influences that would spiritualize it. That resisting\nPower is Satan, the rebellious Matter, Matter that does not partake of\nGod.\n\nTo many there were two Principles; the Unknown Father, or Supreme and\nEternal God, living in the centre of the Light, happy in the perfect\npurity of His being; the other, eternal Matter, that inert, shapeless,\ndarksome mass, which they considered as the source of all evils, the\nmother and dwelling-place of Satan.\n\nTo Philo and the Platonists, there was a Soul of the world, creating\nvisible things, and active in them, as agent of the Supreme\nIntelligence; realizing therein the ideas communicated to Him by that\nIntelligence, and which sometimes excel His conceptions, but which He\nexecutes without comprehending them.\n\nThe Apocalypse or Revelations, by whomever written, belongs to the\nOrient and to extreme antiquity. It reproduces what is far older than\nitself. It paints, with the strongest colors that the Oriental genius\never employed, the closing scenes of the great struggle of Light, and\nTruth, and Good, against Darkness, Error, and Evil; personified in that\nbetween the New Religion on one side, and Paganism and Judaism on the\nother. It is a particular application of the ancient myth of Ormuzd and\nhis Genii against Ahriman and his Devs; and it celebrates the final\ntriumph of Truth against the combined powers of men and demons. The\nideas and imagery are borrowed from every quarter; and allusions are\nfound in it to the doctrines of all ages. We are continually reminded\nof the Zend-Avesta, the Jewish Codes, Philo, and the Gnosis. The Seven\nSpirits surrounding the Throne of the Eternal, at the opening of the\nGrand Drama, and acting so important a part throughout, everywhere the\nfirst instruments of the Divine Will and Vengeance, are the Seven\nAmshaspands of Parsism; as the Twenty-four Ancients, offering to the\nSupreme Being the first supplications and the first homage, remind us of\nthe Mysterious Chiefs of Judaism, foreshadow the Eons of Gnosticism, and\nreproduce the twenty-four Good Spirits created by Ormuzd and inclosed in\nan egg.\n\nThe Christ of the Apocalypse, First-born of Creation and of the\nResurrection, is invested with the characteristics of the Ormuzd and\nSosiosch of the Zend-Avesta, the Ainsoph of the Kabalah and the\nCarpistes [Greek: \u039a\u03b1\u03c1\u03c0\u03b9\u03c3\u03c4\u03b7\u03c2] of the Gnostics. The idea that the true\nInitiates and Faithful become Kings and Priests, is at once Persian,\nJewish, Christian, and Gnostic. And the definition of the Supreme Being,\nthat He is at once Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end--He that\nwas, and is, and is to come, _i.e._, Time illimitable, is Zoroaster's\ndefinition of Zerouane-Akherene.\n\nThe depths of Satan which no man can measure; his triumph for a time by\nfraud and violence; his being chained by an angel; his reprobation and\nhis precipitation into a sea of metal; his names of the Serpent and the\nDragon; the whole conflict of the Good Spirits or celestial armies\nagainst the bad; are so many ideas and designations found alike in the\nZend-Avesta, the Kabalah, and the Gnosis.\n\nWe even find in the Apocalypse that singular Persian idea, which regards\nsome of the lower animals as so many Devs or vehicles of Devs.\n\nThe guardianship of the earth by a good angel, the renewing of the earth\nand heavens, and the final triumph of pure and holy men, are the same\nvictory of Good over Evil, for which the whole Orient looked.\n\nThe gold, and white raiments of the twenty-four Elders are, as in the\nPersian faith, the signs of a lofty perfection and divine purity.\n\nThus the Human mind labored and struggled and tortured itself for ages,\nto explain to itself what it felt, without confessing it, to be\nexplicable. A vast crowd of indistinct abstractions, hovering in the\nimagination, a train of words embodying no tangible meaning, an\ninextricable labyrinth of subtleties, was the result.\n\nBut one grand idea ever emerged and stood prominent and unchangeable\nover the weltering chaos of confusion. God is great and good, and wise.\nEvil and pain and sorrow are temporary and for wise and beneficent\npurposes. They _must_ be consistent with God's goodness, purity, and\ninfinite perfection; and there _must_ be a mode of explaining them, if\nwe could but find it out; as, in all ways we will endeavor to do.\nUltimately, Good will prevail, and Evil be overthrown. God alone _can_\ndo this, and He _will_ do it, by an Emanation from Himself, assuming the\nHuman form and redeeming the world.\n\nBehold the object, the end, the result, of the great speculations and\nlogomachies of antiquity; the ultimate annihilation of evil, and\nrestoration of Man to his first estate, by a Redeemer, a Masayah, a\nChristos, the incarnate Word, Reason, or Power of Deity.\n\nThis Redeemer is the Word or Logos, the Ormuzd of Zoroaster, the Ainsoph\nof the Kabalah, the Nous of Platonism and Philonism; He that was in the\nBeginning with God, and was God, and by Whom everything was made. That\nHe was looked for by all the People of the East is abundantly shown by\nthe Gospel of John and the Letters of Paul; wherein scarcely anything\nseemed necessary to be said in proof that such a Redeemer was to come;\nbut all the energies of the writers are devoted to showing that Jesus\nwas that Christos whom all the nations were expecting; the \"Word,\" the\nMasayah, the Anointed or Consecrated One.\n\nIn this Degree the great contest between good and evil, in anticipation\nof the appearance and advent of the Word or Redeemer is symbolized; and\nthe mysterious esoteric teachings of the Essenes and the Cabalists. Of\nthe practices of the former we gain but glimpses in the ancient writers;\nbut we know that, as their doctrines were taught by John the Baptist,\nthey greatly resembled those of greater purity and more nearly perfect,\ntaught by Jesus; and that not only Palestine was full of John's\ndisciples, so that the Priests and Pharisees did not dare to deny John's\ninspiration; but his doctrine had extended to Asia Minor, and had made\nconverts in luxurious Ephesus, as it also had in Alexandria in Egypt;\nand that they readily embraced the Christian faith, of which they had\nbefore not even heard.\n\nThese old controversies have died away, and the old faiths have faded\ninto oblivion. But Masonry still survives, vigorous and strong, as when\nphilosophy was taught in the schools of Alexandria and under the\nPortico; teaching the same old truths as the Essenes taught by the\nshores of the Dead Sea, and as John the Baptist preached in the Desert;\ntruths imperishable as the Deity, and undeniable as Light. Those truths\nwere gathered by the Essenes from the doctrines of the Orient and the\nOccident, from the Zend-Avesta and the Vedas, from Plato and Pythagoras,\nfrom India, Persia, Ph\u0153nicia, and Syria, from Greece and Egypt, and from\nthe Holy Books of the Jews. Hence we are called Knights of the East and\nWest, because their doctrines came from both. And these doctrines, the\nwheat sifted from the chaff, the Truth separated from Error, Masonry has\ngarnered up in her heart of hearts, and through the fires of\npersecution, and the storms of calamity, has brought them and delivered\nthem unto us. That God is One, immutable, unchangeable, infinitely just\nand good; that Light will finally overcome Darkness,--Good conquer Evil,\nand Truth be victor over Error;--these, rejecting all the wild and\nuseless speculations of the Zend-Avesta, the Kabalah, the Gnostics, and\nthe Schools, are the religion and Philosophy of Masonry.\n\nThose speculations and fancies it is useful to study; that knowing in\nwhat worthless and unfruitful investigations the mind may engage, you\nmay the more value and appreciate the plain, simple, sublime,\nuniversally-acknowledged truths, which have in all ages been the Light\nby which Masons have been guided on their way; the Wisdom and Strength\nthat like imperishable columns have sustained and will continue to\nsustain its glorious and magnificent Temple.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nXVIII.\n\n\nKNIGHT ROSE CROIX.\n\n[Prince Rose Croix.]\n\n\nEach of us makes such applications to his own faith and creed, of the\nsymbols and ceremonies of this Degree, as seems to him proper. With\nthese special interpretations we have here nothing to do. Like the\nlegend of the Master Kh\u016br\u016bm, in which some see figured the condemnation\nand sufferings of Christ; others those of the unfortunate Grand Master\nof the Templars; others those of the first Charles, King of England; and\nothers still the annual descent of the Sun at the winter Solstice to the\nregions of darkness, the basis of many an ancient legend; so the\nceremonies of this Degree receive different explanations; each\ninterpreting them for himself, and being offended at the interpretation\nof no other.\n\nIn no other way could Masonry possess its character of Universality;\nthat character which has ever been peculiar to it from its origin; and\nwhich enables two Kings, worshippers of different Deities, to sit\ntogether as Masters, while the walls of the first temple arose; and the\nmen of Gebal, bowing down to the Ph\u0153nician Gods, to work by the side of\nthe Hebrews to whom those Gods were abomination; and to sit with them in\nthe same Lodge as brethren.\n\nYou have already learned that these ceremonies have one general\nsignificance, to every one, of every faith, who believes in God, and the\nsoul's immortality.\n\nThe primitive men met in no Temples made with human hands. \"God,\" said\nStephen, the first Martyr, \"dwelleth not in Temples made with hands.\" In\nthe open air, under the overarching mysterious sky, in the great\nWorld-Temple, they uttered their vows and thanksgivings, and adored the\nGod of Light; of that Light that was to them the type of Good, as\ndarkness was the type of Evil.\n\nAll antiquity solved the enigma of the existence of Evil, by supposing\nthe existence of a Principle of Evil, of Demons, fallen Angels, an\nAhriman, a Typhon, a Siva, a Lok, or a Satan, that, first falling\nthemselves, and plunged in misery and darkness, tempted man to his fall,\nand brought sin into the world. All believed in a future life, to be\nattained by purification and trials; in a state or successive states of\nreward and punishment; and in a Mediator or Redeemer, by whom the Evil\nPrinciple was to be overcome, and the Supreme Deity reconciled to His\ncreatures. The belief was general, that He was to be born of a Virgin,\nand suffer a painful death. The Indians called him Chrishna; the\nChinese, Kioun-tse; the Persians, Sosiosch; the Chaldeans, Dhou-vanai;\nthe Egyptians, Har-Oeri; Plato, Love; and the Scandinavians, Balder.\n\nChrishna, the Hindoo Redeemer, was cradled and educated among Shepherds.\nA Tyrant, at the time of his birth, ordered all the male children to be\nslain. He performed miracles, say his legends, even raising the dead. He\nwashed the feet of the Brahmins, and was meek and lowly of spirit. He\nwas born of a Virgin; descended to Hell, rose again, ascended to Heaven,\ncharged his disciples to teach his doctrines, and gave them the gift of\nmiracles.\n\nThe first Masonic Legislator whose memory is preserved to us by history,\nwas Buddha, who, about a thousand years before the Christian era,\nreformed the religion of Manous. He called to the Priesthood all men,\nwithout distinction of caste, who felt themselves inspired by God to\ninstruct men. Those who so associated themselves formed a Society of\nProphets under the name of Samaneans. They recognized the existence of a\nsingle uncreated God, in whose bosom everything grows, is developed and\ntransformed. The worship of this God reposed upon the obedience of all\nthe beings He created. His feasts were those of the Solstices. The\ndoctrines of Buddha pervaded India, China, and Japan. The Priests of\nBrahma, professing a dark and bloody creed, brutalized by Superstition,\nunited together against Buddhism, and with the aid of Despotism,\nexterminated its followers. But their blood fertilized the new doctrine,\nwhich produced a new Society under the name of Gymnosophists; and a\nlarge number, fleeing to Ireland, planted their doctrines there, and\nthere erected the round towers, some of which still stand, solid and\nunshaken as at first visible monuments of the remotest ages.\n\nThe Ph\u0153nician Cosmogony, like all others in Asia, was the Word of God,\nwritten in astral characters, by the planetary Divinities, and\ncommunicated by the Demi-gods, as a profound mystery, to the brighter\nintelligences of Humanity, to be propagated by them among men. Their\ndoctrines resembled the Ancient Sabeism, and being the faith of Hiram\nthe King and his namesake the Artist, are of interest to all Masons.\nWith them, the First Principle was half material, half spiritual, a dark\nair, animated and impregnated by the spirit; and a disordered chaos,\ncovered with thick darkness. From this came the WORD, and thence\ncreation and generation; and thence a race of men, children of light,\nwho adored Heaven and its Stars as the Supreme Being; and whose\ndifferent gods were but incarnations of the Sun, the Moon, the Stars,\nand the Ether. _Chrysor_ was the great igneous power of Nature, and\n_Baal_ and _Malakarth_ representations of the Sun and Moon, the latter\nword, in Hebrew, meaning Queen.\n\nMan had fallen, but not by the tempting of the serpent. For, with the\nPh\u0153nicians, the serpent was deemed to partake of the Divine Nature, and\nwas sacred, as he was in Egypt. He was deemed to be immortal, unless\nslain by violence, becoming young again in his old age, by entering into\nand consuming himself. Hence the Serpent in a circle, holding his tail\nin his mouth, was an emblem of eternity. With the head of a hawk he was\nof a Divine Nature, and a symbol of the sun. Hence one Sect of the\nGnostics took him for their good genius, and hence the brazen serpent\nreared by Moses in the Desert, on which the Israelites looked and lived.\n\n\"Before the chaos, that preceded the birth of Heaven and Earth,\" said\nthe Chinese Lao-Tseu, \"a single Being existed, immense and silent,\nimmutable and always acting; the mother of the Universe. I know not the\nname of that Being, but I designate it by the word Reason. Man has his\nmodel in the earth, the earth in Heaven, Heaven in Reason, and Reason in\nitself.\"\n\n\"I am,\" says Isis, \"Nature; parent of all things, the sovereign of the\nElements, the primitive progeny of Time, the most exalted of the\nDeities, the first of the Heavenly Gods and Goddesses, the Queen of the\nShades, the uniform countenance; who dispose with my rod the numerous\nlights of Heaven, the salubrious breezes of the sea, and the mournful\nsilence of the dead; whose single Divinity the whole world venerates in\nmany forms, with various rites and by many names. The Egyptians, skilled\nin ancient lore, worship me with proper ceremonies, and call me by my\ntrue name, Isis the Queen.\"\n\nThe Hindu Vedas thus define the Deity:\n\n\"He who surpasses speech, and through whose power speech is expressed,\nknow thou that He is Brahma; and not these perishable things that man\nadores.\n\n\"He whom Intelligence cannot comprehend, and He alone, say the sages,\nthrough whose Power the nature of Intelligence can be understood, know\nthou that He is Brahma; and not these perishable things that man adores.\n\n\"He who cannot be seen by the organ of sight, and through whose power\nthe organ of seeing sees, know thou that He is Brahma; and not these\nperishable things that man adores.\n\n\"He who cannot be heard by the organ of hearing, and through whose power\nthe organ of hearing hears, know thou that He is Brahma; and not these\nperishable things that man adores.\n\n\"He who cannot be perceived by the organ of smelling, and through whose\npower the organ of smelling smells, know thou that He is Brahma; and not\nthese perishable things that man adores.\"\n\n\"When God resolved to create the human race,\" said _Arius_, \"He made a\nBeing that He called The WORD, The Son, _Wisdom_, to the end that this\nBeing might give existence to men.\" This WORD is the _Ormuzd_ of\nZoroaster, the _Ainsoph_ of the Kabalah, the [Greek: \u039d\u03bf\u03c5\u0303\u03c2] of Plato and\nPhilo, the _Wisdom_ or _Demiourgos_ of the Gnostics.\n\nThat is the True Word, the knowledge of which our ancient brethren\nsought as the priceless reward of their labors on the Holy Temple: the\nWord of Life, the Divine Reason, \"in whom was Life, and that Life the\nLight of men\"; \"which long shone in darkness, and the darkness\ncomprehended it not;\" the Infinite Reason that is the Soul of Nature,\nimmortal, of which the Word of this Degree reminds us; and to believe\nwherein and revere it, is the peculiar duty of every Mason.\n\n\"In the beginning,\" says the extract from some older work with which\nJohn commences his Gospel, \"was the Word, and the Word was near to God,\nand the Word was God. All things were made by Him, and without Him was\nnot anything made that was made. In Him was Life, and the life was the\nLight of man; and the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness did\nnot contain it.\"\n\nIt is an old tradition that this passage was from an older work. And\nPhilostorgius and Nicephorus state, that when the Emperor Julian\nundertook to rebuild the Temple, a stone was taken up, that covered the\nmouth of a deep square cave, into which one of the laborers, being let\ndown by a rope, found in the centre of the floor a cubical pillar, on\nwhich lay a roll or book, wrapped in a fine linen cloth, in which, in\ncapital letters, was the foregoing passage.\n\nHowever this may have been, it is plain that John's Gospel is a polemic\nagainst the Gnostics; and, stating at the outset the current doctrine in\nregard to the creation by the Word, he then addresses himself to show\nand urge that this Word was Jesus Christ.\n\nAnd the first sentence, fully rendered into our language, would read\nthus: \"When the process of emanation, of creation or evolution of\nexistences inferior to the Supreme God began, the Word came into\nexistence and was: and this word was [Greek: \u03c0\u03c1\u03bf\u03c2 \u03c4\u03bf\u03bd \u0398\u03b5\u03bf\u03bd] _near to_\nGod; _i.e._ the immediate or first emanation from God: and it was God\nHimself, developed or manifested in that particular mode, and in action.\nAnd by that Word everything that is was created.\"--And thus Tertullian\nsays that God made the World out of nothing, by means of His Word,\nWisdom, or Power.\n\nTo Philo the Jew, as to the Gnostics, the Supreme Being was the\n_Primitive Light_, or _Archetype of Light_,--_Source_ whence the rays\nemanate that illuminate Souls. He is the _Soul_ of the World, and as\nsuch acts everywhere. He himself fills and bounds his whole existence,\nand his forces fill and penetrate everything. His Image is the WORD\n[LOGOS], a form more brilliant than fire, which is not pure light. This\nWORD dwells in God; for it is within His Intelligence that the Supreme\nBeing frames for Himself the Types of Ideas of all that is to assume\nreality in the Universe. The WORD is the Vehicle by which God acts on\nthe Universe; the World of Ideas by means whereof God has created\nvisible things; the more Ancient God, as compared with the Material\nWorld; Chief and General Representative of all Intelligences; the\nArchangel, type and representative of all spirits, even those of\nMortals; the type of Man; the primitive man himself. These ideas are\nborrowed from Plato. And this WORD is not only the Creator [\"_by Him was\neverything made that was made_\"], but acts _in the place_ of God; and\nthrough him act all the Powers and Attributes of God. And also, as first\nrepresentative of the human race, he is the protector of Men and their\nShepherd, the \"Ben H'Adam,\" or Son of Man.\n\nThe actual condition of Man is not his primitive condition, that in\nwhich he was the image of the Word. His unruly passions have caused him\nto fall from his original lofty estate. But he may rise again, by\nfollowing the teachings of Heavenly Wisdom, and the Angels whom God\ncommissions to aid him in escaping from the entanglements of the body;\nand by fighting bravely against Evil, the existence of which God has\nallowed solely to furnish him with the means of exercising his free\nwill.\n\nThe Supreme Being of the Egyptians was _Am\u016bn_, a secret and concealed\nGod, the Unknown Father of the Gnostics, the Source of Divine Life, and\nof all force, the Plenitude of all, comprehending all things in Himself,\nthe original Light. He _creates_ nothing; but everything _emanates_ from\nHim: and all other Gods are but his manifestations. From Him, by the\nutterance of a Word, emanated _Neith_, the Divine Mother of all things,\nthe Primitive THOUGHT, the FORCE that puts everything in movement, the\nSPIRIT everywhere extended, the _Deity of Light and Mother of the Sun_.\n\nOf this Supreme Being, _Osiris_ was the image, Source of all Good in the\nmoral and physical world, and constant foe of Typhon, the Genius of\nEvil, the Satan of Gnosticism, brute matter, deemed to be always at feud\nwith the spirit that flowed from the Deity; and over whom Har-Oeri, the\nRedeemer, Son of Isis and Osiris, is finally to prevail.\n\nIn the Zend-Avesta of the Persians the Supreme Being is _Time without\nlimit_, ZERUANE AKHERENE.--No origin could be assigned to Him; for He\nwas enveloped in His own Glory, and His Nature and Attributes were so\ninaccessible to human Intelligence, that He was but the object of a\nsilent veneration. The commencement of Creation was by emanation from\nHim. The first emanation was the Primitive Light, and from this Light\nemerged _Ormuzd_, the _King of Light_, who, by the WORD, created the\nWorld in its purity, is its Preserver and Judge, a Holy and Sacred\nBeing, Intelligence and Knowledge, Himself Time without limit, and\nwielding all the powers of the Supreme Being.\n\nIn this Persian faith, as taught many centuries before our era, and\nembodied in the Zend-Avesta, there was in man a pure Principle,\nproceeding from the Supreme Being, produced by the Will and Word of\nOrmuzd. To that was united an impure principle, proceeding from a\nforeign influence, that of Ahriman, the Dragon, or principle of Evil.\nTempted by Ahriman, the first man and woman had fallen; and for twelve\nthousand years there was to be war between _Ormuzd_ and the Good Spirits\ncreated by him, and _Ahriman_ and the Evil ones whom he had called into\nexistence.\n\nBut pure souls are assisted by the Good Spirits, the Triumph of the Good\nPrinciple is determined upon in the decrees of the Supreme Being, and\nthe period of that triumph will infallibly arrive. At the moment when\nthe earth shall be most afflicted with the evils brought upon it by the\nSpirits of perdition, three Prophets will appear to bring assistance to\nmortals. Sosiosch, Chief of the Three, will regenerate the world, and\nrestore to it its primitive Beauty, Strength, and Purity. He will judge\nthe good and the wicked. After the universal resurrection of the Good,\nthe pure Spirits will conduct them to an abode of eternal happiness.\nAhriman, his evil Demons, and all the world, will be purified in a\ntorrent of liquid burning metal. The Law of Ormuzd will rule everywhere;\nall men will be happy; all, enjoying an unalterable bliss, will unite\nwith Sosiosch in singing the praises of the Supreme Being.\n\nThese doctrines, with some modifications, were adopted by the Kabalists\nand afterward by the Gnostics.\n\nApollonius of Tyana says: \"We shall render the most appropriate worship\nto the Deity, when to that God whom we call the First, who is One, and\nseparate from all, and after whom we recognize the others, we present no\nofferings whatever, kindle to Him no fire, dedicate to Him no sensible\nthing; for he needs nothing, even of all that natures more exalted than\nours could give. The earth produces no plant, the air nourishes no\nanimal, there is in short nothing, which would not be impure in his\nsight. In addressing ourselves to Him, we must use only the higher word,\nthat, I mean, which is not expressed by the mouth,--the silent inner\nword of the spirit.... From the most Glorious of all Beings, we must\nseek for blessings, by that which is most glorious in ourselves; and\nthat is the spirit, which needs no organ.\"\n\nStrabo says: \"This one Supreme Essence is that which embraces us all,\nthe water and the land, that which we call the Heavens, the World, the\nNature of things. This Highest Being should be worshipped, without any\nvisible image, in sacred groves. In such retreats the devout should lay\nthemselves down to sleep, and expect signs from God in dreams.\"\n\nAristotle says: \"It has been handed down in a mythical form, from the\nearliest times to posterity, that there are Gods, and that The Divine\ncompasses entire nature. All besides this has been added, after the\nmythical style, for the purpose of persuading the multitude, and for the\ninterest of the laws and the advantage of the State. Thus men have given\nto the Gods human forms, and have even represented them under the figure\nof other beings, in the train of which fictions followed many more of\nthe same sort. But if, from all this, we separate the original\nprinciple, and consider it alone, namely, that the first Essences are\nGods, we shall find that this has been divinely said; and since it is\nprobable that philosophy and the arts have been several times, so far as\nthat is possible, found and lost, such doctrines may have been preserved\nto our times as the remains of ancient wisdom.\"\n\nPorphyry says: \"By images addressed to sense, the ancients represented\nGod and his powers--by the visible they typified the invisible for those\nwho had learned to read in these types, as in a book, a treatise on the\nGods. We need not wonder if the ignorant consider the images to be\nnothing more than wood or stone; for just so, they who are ignorant of\nwriting see nothing in monuments but stone, nothing in tablets but wood,\nand in books but a tissue of papyrus.\"\n\nApollonius of Tyana held, that birth and death are only in appearance;\nthat which separates itself from the _one_ substance (the _one_ Divine\nessence), and is caught up by matter, seems to be born; that, again,\nwhich releases itself from the bonds of matter, and is reunited with the\none Divine Essence, seems to die. There is, at most, an alteration\nbetween becoming visible and becoming invisible. In all there is,\nproperly speaking, but the one essence, which alone acts and suffers, by\nbecoming all things to all; the Eternal God, whom men wrong, when they\ndeprive Him of what properly can be attributed to Him only, and transfer\nit to other names and persons.\n\nThe New Platonists substituted the idea of the Absolute, for the Supreme\nEssence itself;--as the first, simplest principle, anterior to all\nexistence; of which nothing determinate can be predicated; to which no\nconsciousness, no self-contemplation can be ascribed; inasmuch as to do\nso, would immediately imply a quality, a distinction of subject and\nobject. This Supreme Entity can be known only by an intellectual\nintuition of the Spirit, transcending itself, and emancipating itself\nfrom its own limits.\n\nThis mere logical tendency, by means of which men thought to arrive at\nthe conception of such an absolute, the [Greek: \u03cc\u03bd], was united with a\ncertain mysticism, which, by a transcendent state of feeling,\ncommunicated, as it were, to this abstraction what the mind would\nreceive as a reality. The absorption of the Spirit into that\nsuperexistence ([Greek: \u03c4\u03cc \u03ad\u03c0\u03ad\u03ba\u03b5\u03b9\u03bd\u03b1 \u03c4\u03ae\u03c2 \u03bf\u03cd\u03c3\u03af\u03b1\u03c2]), so as to be entirely\nidentified with it, or such a revelation of the latter to the spirit\nraised above itself, was regarded as the highest end which the spiritual\nlife could reach.\n\nThe New Platonists' idea of God, was that of One Simple Original\nEssence, exalted above all plurality and all becoming; the only true\nBeing; unchangeable, eternal [[Greek: \u0395\u03ca\u03c2 \u03ce\u03bd \u03ad\u03bd\u03af \u03c4\u03ce \u03bd\u03cd\u03bd \u03c4\u03cc \u03ac\u03b5\u03b9 \u03c0\u03b5\u03c0\u03bb\u03ae\u03c1\u03c9\u03ba\u03b5\n\u03ba\u03b1\u03af \u03bc\u03cc\u03bd\u03bf\u03bd \u03ad\u03c3\u03c4\u03b9 \u03c4\u03cc \u03ba\u03b1\u03c4\u03ac \u03c4\u03bf\u03cd\u03c4\u03bf\u03bd \u03cc\u03bd\u03c4\u03c9\u03c2 \u03ce\u03bd]]: from whom all Existence in its\nseveral gradations has emanated--the world of Gods, as nearest akin to\nHimself, being first, and at the head of all. In these Gods, that\nperfection, which in the Supreme Essence was inclosed and unevolved, is\nexpanded and becomes knowable. They serve to exhibit in different forms\nthe image of that Supreme Essence, to which no soul can rise, except by\nthe loftiest flight of contemplation; and after it has rid itself from\nall that pertains to sense--from all manifoldness. They are the\nmediators between man (amazed and stupefied by manifoldness) and the\nSupreme Unity.\n\nPhilo says: \"He who disbelieves the miraculous, simply as the\nmiraculous, neither knows God, nor has he ever sought after Him; for\notherwise he would have understood, by looking at that truly great and\nawe-inspiring sight, the miracle of the Universe, that these miracles\n(in God's providential guidance of His people) are but child's play for\nthe Divine Power. But the truly miraculous has become despised through\nfamiliarity. The universal, on the contrary, although in itself\ninsignificant, yet, through our love of novelty, transports us with\namazement.\"\n\nIn opposition to the anthropopathism of the Jewish Scriptures, the\nAlexandrian Jews endeavored to purify the idea of God from all admixture\nof the Human. By the exclusion of every human passion, it was sublimated\nto a something devoid of all attributes, and wholly transcendental; and\nthe mere Being [Greek: \u03cc\u03bd], the Good, in and by itself, the Absolute of\nPlatonism, was substituted for the personal Deity [[Hebrew: \u05d9\u05d4\u05d5\u05d4]] of\nthe Old Testament. By soaring upward, beyond all created existence, the\nmind, disengaging itself from the Sensible, attains to the intellectual\nintuition of this Absolute Being; of whom, however, it can predicate\nnothing but existence, and sets aside all other determinations as not\nanswering to the exalted nature of the Supreme Essence.\n\nThus Philo makes a distinction between those who are in the proper sense\nSons of God, having by means of contemplation raised themselves to the\nhighest Being, or attained to a knowledge of Him, in His immediate\nself-manifestation, and those who know God only in his mediate\nrevelation through his operation--such as He declares Himself in\ncreation--in the revelation still veiled in the letter of\nScripture--those, in short, who attach themselves simply to the Logos,\nand consider this to be the Supreme God; who are the sons of the Logos,\nrather than of the True Being, (\u03cc\u03bd)\n\n\"God,\" says Pythagoras, \"is neither the object of sense, nor subject to\npassion, but invisible, only intelligible, and supremely intelligent In\nHis body He is like the _light_, and in His soul He resembles truth. He\nis the universal _spirit_ that pervades and diffuseth itself over all\nnature. All beings receive their _life_ from Him. There is but one only\nGod, who is not, as some are apt to imagine, seated above the world,\nbeyond the orb of the Universe; but being Himself all in all, He sees\nall the beings that fill His immensity; the only Principle, the _Light_\nof Heaven, the Father of all. He _produces everything_; He orders and\ndisposes everything; He is the REASON, the LIFE, and the MOTION of all\nbeing.\"\n\n\"I am the LIGHT of the world; he that followeth Me shall not walk in\nDARKNESS, but shall have the LIGHT OF LIFE.\" So said the Founder of the\nChristian Religion, as His words are reported by John the Apostle.\n\nGod, say the sacred writings of the Jews, appeared to Moses in a FLAME\nOF FIRE, in the midst of a bush, which was not consumed. He descended\nupon Mount Sinai, as the smoke of a _furnace_; He went before the\nchildren of Israel, by day, in a pillar of cloud and, by night, in a\npillar of _fire_, to give them _light_. \"Call _you_ on the name of\n_your_ Gods,\" said Elijah the Prophet to the Priests of Baal, \"and I\nwill call upon the name of ADONAI; and the God that answereth _by fire_,\nlet him be God.\"\n\nAccording to the Kabalah, as according to the doctrines of Zoroaster,\neverything that exists has emanated from a source of infinite light.\nBefore all things, existed _the Primitive Being_, THE ANCIENT OF DAYS,\n_the Ancient King of Light_; a title the more remarkable, because it is\nfrequently given to the Creator in the Zend-Avesta, and in the Code of\nthe Sabeans, and occurs in the Jewish Scriptures.\n\nThe world was His Revelation, God revealed; and subsisted only in Him.\nHis attributes were there reproduced with various modifications and in\ndifferent degrees; so that the Universe was His Holy Splendor, His\nMantle. He was to be adored in silence; and perfection consisted in a\nnearer approach to Him.\n\nBefore the creation of worlds, the PRIMITIVE LIGHT filled all space, so\nthat there was no void. When the Supreme Being, existing in this Light,\nresolved to display His perfections, or manifest them in worlds, He\nwithdrew within Himself, formed around Him a void space, and shot forth\nHis first emanation, a ray of light; the cause and principle of\neverything that exists, uniting both the generative and conceptive\npower, which penetrates everything, and without which nothing could\nsubsist for an instant.\n\nMan fell, seduced by the Evil Spirits most remote from the Great King of\nLight; those of the fourth world of spirits, Asiah, whose chief was\nBelial. They wage incessant war against the pure Intelligences of the\nother worlds, who, like the Amshaspands, Izeds, and Ferouers of the\nPersians are the tutelary guardians of man. In the beginning, all was\nunison and harmony; full of the same divine light and perfect purity.\nThe Seven Kings of Evil fell, and the Universe was troubled. Then the\nCreator took from the Seven Kings the principles of Good and of Light,\nand divided them among the four worlds of Spirits, giving to the first\nthree the Pure Intelligences, united in love and harmony, while to the\nfourth were vouchsafed only some feeble glimmerings of light.\n\nWhen the strife between these and the good angels shall have continued\nthe appointed time, and these Spirits enveloped in darkness shall long\nand in vain have endeavored to absorb the Divine light and life, then\nwill the Eternal Himself come to correct them. He will deliver them from\nthe gross envelopes of matter that hold them captive, will re-animate\nand strengthen the ray of light or spiritual nature which they have\npreserved, and re-establish throughout the Universe that primitive\nHarmony which was its bliss.\n\nMarcion, the Gnostic, said, \"The Soul of the True Christian, adopted as\na child by the Supreme Being, to whom it has long been a stranger,\nreceives from Him the Spirit and Divine life. It is led and confirmed,\nby this gift, in a pure and holy life, like that of God; and if it so\ncompletes its earthly career, in charity, chastity, and sanctity, it\nwill one day be disengaged from its material envelope, as the ripe grain\nis detached from the straw, and as the young bird escapes from its\nshell. Like the angels, it will share in the bliss of the Good and\nPerfect Father, re-clothed in an aerial body or organ, and made like\nunto the Angels in Heaven.\"\n\nYou see, my brother, what is the meaning of Masonic \"Light.\" You see why\nthe EAST of the Lodge, where the initial letter of the Name of the Deity\noverhangs the Master, is the place of Light. Light, as\ncontradistinguished from darkness, is Good, as contradistinguished from\nEvil: and it is that Light, the true knowledge of Deity, the Eternal\nGood, for which Masons in all ages have sought. Still Masonry marches\nsteadily onward toward that Light that shines in the great distance, the\nLight of that day when Evil, overcome and vanquished, shall fade away\nand disappear forever, and Life and Light be the one law of the\nUniverse, and its eternal Harmony.\n\nThe Degree of Rose teaches three things;--the unity, immutability and\ngoodness of God; the immortality of the Soul; the ultimate defeat and\nextinction of evil and wrong and sorrow, by a Redeemer or Messiah, yet\nto come, if he has not already appeared.\n\nIt replaces the three pillars of the old Temple, with three that have\nalready been explained to you,--Faith [in God, mankind, and man's self],\nHope [in the victory over evil, the advancement of Humanity, and a\nhereafter], and Charity [relieving the wants and tolerant of the errors\nand faults of others]. To be trustful to be hopeful, to be indulgent;\nthese, in an age of selfishness, of ill opinion of human nature, of\nharsh and bitter judgment, are the most important Masonic Virtues, and\nthe true supports of every Masonic Temple. And they are the old pillars\nof the Temple under different names. For he only is wise who judges\nothers charitably; he only is strong who is hopeful; and there is no\nbeauty like a firm faith in God, our fellows and ourself.\n\nThe second apartment, clothed in mourning, the columns of the Temple\nshattered and prostrate, and the brethren bowed down in the deepest\ndejection, represents the world under the tyranny of the Principle of\nEvil; where virtue is persecuted and vice rewarded; where the righteous\nstarve for bread, and the wicked live sumptuously and dress in purple\nand fine linen; where insolent ignorance rules, and learning and genius\nserve; where King and Priest trample on liberty and the rights of\nconscience; where freedom hides in caves and mountains, and sycophancy\nand servility fawn and thrive; where the cry of the widow and the orphan\nstarving for want of food, and shivering with cold, rises ever to\nHeaven, from a million miserable hovels; where men, willing to labor,\nand starving, they and their children and the wives of their bosoms, beg\nplaintively for work, when the pampered capitalist stops his mills;\nwhere the law punishes her who, starving, steals a loaf, and lets the\nseducer go free; where the success of a party justifies murder, and\nviolence and rapine go unpunished; and where he who with many years'\ncheating and grinding the faces of the poor grows rich, receives office\nand honor in life, and after death brave funeral and a splendid\nmausoleum:--this world, where, since its making, war has never ceased,\nnor man paused in the sad task of torturing and murdering his brother;\nand of which ambition, avarice, envy, hatred, lust, and the rest of\nAhriman's and Typhon's army make a Pandemonium: this world, sunk in sin,\nreeking with baseness, clamorous with sorrow and misery. If any see in\nit also a type of the sorrow of the Craft for the death of Hiram, the\ngrief of the Jews at the fall of Jerusalem, the misery of the Templars\nat the ruin of their order and the death of De Molay, or the world's\nagony and pangs of woe at the death of the Redeemer, it is the right of\neach to do so.\n\nThe third apartment represents the consequences of sin and vice and the\nhell made of the human heart, by its fiery passions. If any see in it\nalso a type of the Hades of the Greeks, the Gehenna of the Hebrews, the\nTartarus of the Romans, or the Hell of the Christians, or only of the\nagonies of remorse and the tortures of an upbraiding conscience, it is\nthe right of each to do so.\n\nThe fourth apartment represents the Universe, freed from the insolent\ndominion and tyranny of the Principle of Evil, and brilliant with the\ntrue Light that flows from the Supreme Deity; when sin and wrong, and\npain and sorrow, remorse and misery shall be no more forever; when the\ngreat plans of Infinite Eternal Wisdom shall be fully developed; and all\nGod's creatures, seeing that all apparent evil and individual suffering\nand wrong were but the drops that went to swell the great river of\ninfinite goodness, shall know that vast as is the power of Deity, His\ngoodness and beneficence are infinite as His power. If any see in it a\ntype of the peculiar mysteries of any faith or creed, or an allusion to\nany past occurrences, it is their right to do so. Let each apply its\nsymbols as he pleases. To all of us they typify the universal rule of\nMasonry,--of its three chief virtues, Faith, Hope and Charity; of\nbrotherly love and universal benevolence. We labor here to no other end.\nThese symbols need no other interpretation.\n\nThe obligations of our Ancient Brethren of the Rose were to fulfill\nall the duties of friendship, cheerfulness, charity, peace, liberality,\ntemperance and chastity: and scrupulously to avoid impurity,\nhaughtiness, hatred, anger, and every other kind of vice. They took\ntheir philosophy from the old Theology of the Egyptians, as Moses and\nSolomon had done, and borrowed its hieroglyphics and the ciphers of the\nHebrews. Their principal rules were, to exercise the profession of\nmedicine charitably and without fee, to advance the cause of virtue,\nenlarge the sciences, and induce men to live as in the primitive times\nof the world.\n\nWhen this Degree had its origin, it is not important to inquire; nor\nwith what different rites it has been practised in different countries\nand at various times. It is of very high antiquity. Its ceremonies\ndiffer with the degrees of latitude and longitude, and it receives\nvariant interpretations. If we were to examine all the different\nceremonials, their emblems, and their formulas, we should see that all\nthat belongs to the primitive and essential elements of the order, is\nrespected in every sanctuary. All alike practise virtue, that it may\nproduct fruit. All labor, like us, for the extirpation of vice, the\npurification of man, the development of the arts and sciences, and the\nrelief of humanity.\n\nNone admit an adept to their lofty philosophical knowledge, and\nmysterious sciences, until he has been purified at the altar of the\nsymbolic Degrees. Of what importance are differences of opinion as to\nthe age and genealogy of the Degree, or variance in the practice,\nceremonial and liturgy, or the shade of color of the banner under which\neach tribe of Israel marched, if all revere the Holy Arch of the\nsymbolic Degrees, first and unalterable source of Free Masonry; if all\nrevere our conservative principles, and are with us in the great\npurposes of our organization?\n\nIf, anywhere, brethren of a particular religious belief have been\nexcluded from this Degree, it merely shows how gravely the purposes and\nplan of Masonry may be misunderstood. For whenever the door of any\nDegree is closed against him who believes in one God and the soul's\nimmortality, on account of the other tenets of his faith, that Degree is\nMasonry no longer. No Mason has the right to interpret the symbols of\nthis Degree for another, or to refuse him its mysteries, if he will not\ntake them with the explanation and commentary superadded.\n\nListen, my brother, to _our_ explanation of the symbols of the Degree,\nand then give them such further interpretation as you think fit.\n\nThe _Cross_ has been a sacred symbol from the earliest Antiquity. It is\nfound upon all the enduring monuments of the world, in Egypt, in\nAssyria, in Hindostan, in Persia, and on the Buddhist towers of Ireland.\nBuddha was said to have died upon it. The Druids cut an oak into its\nshape and held it sacred, and built their temples in that form. Pointing\nto the four quarters of the world, it was the symbol of universal\nnature. It was on a cruciform tree, that Chrishna was said to have\nexpired, pierced with arrows. It was revered in Mexico.\n\nBut its peculiar meaning in this Degree, is that given to it by the\nAncient Egyptians. _Thoth_ or _Phtha_ is represented on the oldest\nmonuments carrying in his hand the _Crux Ansata_, or _Ankh_, [a Tau\ncross, with a ring or circle over it]. He is so seen on the double\ntablet of Shufu and Noh Shufu, builders of the greatest of the Pyramids,\nat Wady Meghara, in the peninsula of Sinai. It was the hieroglyphic for\n_life_, and with a triangle prefixed meant _life-giving_. To us\ntherefore it is the symbol of _Life_--of that life that emanated from\nthe Deity, and of that Eternal Life for which all hope; through our\nfaith in God's infinite goodness.\n\nThe ROSE was anciently sacred to Aurora and the Sun. It is symbol of\n_Dawn_, of the resurrection of Light and the renewal of life, and\ntherefore of the dawn of the first day, and more particularly of the\nresurrection: and the Cross and Rose together are therefore\nhieroglyphically to be read, _the Dawn of Eternal Life_ which all\nNations have hoped for by the advent of a Redeemer.\n\nThe _Pelican_ feeding her young is an emblem of the large and bountiful\nbeneficence of Nature, of the Redeemer of fallen man, and of that\nhumanity and charity that ought to distinguish a Knight of this Degree.\n\nThe Eagle was the living Symbol of the Egyptian God _Mendes_ or\n_Menthra_, whom _Sesostris-Ramses_ made one with _Amun-Re_, the God of\nThebes and Upper Egypt, and the representative of the Sun, the word RE\nmeaning _Sun_ or _King_.\n\nThe _Compass_ surmounted with a crown signifies that notwithstanding the\nhigh rank attained in Masonry by a Knight of the Rose Croix, equity and\nimpartiality are invariably to govern his conduct.\n\nTo the word INRI, inscribed on the Crux Ansata over the Master's Seat,\nmany meanings have been assigned. The Christian Initiate reverentially\nsees in it the initials of the inscription upon the cross on which\nChrist suffered--_Iesus Nazarenus Rex Iud\u00e6orum_. The sages of Antiquity\nconnected it with one of the greatest secrets of Nature, that of\nuniversal regeneration. They interpreted it thus, _Igne Natura renovatur\nIntegra_; [entire nature is renovated by fire]: The Alchemical or\nHermetic Masons framed for it this aphorism, _Igne nitrum roris\ninvenitur_. And the Jesuits are charged with having applied to it this\nodious axiom, _Justum necare reges impios_. The four letters are the\ninitials of the Hebrew words that represent the four elements--_Iammim_,\nthe seas or water; _Hour_, fire; _Rouach_, the air, and _Iebeschah_, the\ndry earth. How we read it, I need not repeat to you.\n\nThe CROSS, [Illustration: Glyph] was the Sign of the Creative Wisdom or\nLogos, the Son of God. Plato says, \"He expressed him upon the Universe\nin the figure of the letter X. The next Power to the Supreme God Was\ndecussated or figured in the shape of a Cross on Universe.\" Mithras\nsigned his soldiers on the forehead with a Cross. [Glyph] is the mark\nof 600, the mysterious cycle of the Incarnations.\n\nWe constantly see the Tau and the Resh united thus [Glyph]. These two\nletters, in the old Samaritan, as found in Arius, stand, the first for\n400, the second for 200-600. This is the Staff of Osiris, also, and his\nmonogram, and was adopted by the Christians as a Sign. On a medal of\nConstantius is this inscription, \"_In hoc signo victor cris_ [Glyph].\"\nAn inscription in the Duomo at Milan reads, \"[Glyph] et [Glyph].\n_Christi-Nomina-Sancta-Tene\u00ef_.\"\n\nThe Egyptians used as a Sign of their God Canobus, a [Glyph] or a\n[Glyph] indifferently. The Vaishnavas of India have also the same Sacred\nTau, which they also mark with Crosses, thus [Glyph], and with\ntriangles, thus, [Glyph]. The vestments of the priests of Horus were\ncovered with these Crosses [Glyph]. So was the dress of the Lama of\nThibet. The Sectarian marks of the Jains are [Glyph]. The distinctive\nbadge of the Sect of Xac Japonicus is [Glyph]. It is the Sign of Fo,\nidentical with the Cross of Christ.\n\nOn the ruins of Mandore, in India, among other mystic emblems, are the\nmystic triangle, and the interlaced triangle, [Glyph]. This is also\nfound on ancient coins and medals, excavated from the ruins of Oojein\nand other ancient cities of India.\n\nYou entered here amid gloom and into shadow, and are clad in the apparel\nof sorrow. Lament, with us, the sad condition of the Human race, in this\nvale of tears! the calamities of men and the agonies of nations! the\ndarkness of the bewildered soul, oppressed by doubt and apprehension!\n\nThere is no human soul that is not sad at times. There is no thoughtful\nsoul that does not at times despair. There is perhaps none, of all that\nthink at all of anything beyond the needs and interests of the body,\nthat is not at times startled and terrified by the awful questions\nwhich, feeling as though it were a guilty thing for doing so, it\nwhispers to itself in its inmost depths. Some Demon seems to torture it\nwith doubts, and to crush it with despair, asking whether, after all, it\nis certain that its convictions are true and its faith well founded:\nwhether it is indeed sure that a God of Infinite Love and Beneficence\nrules the Universe, or only some great remorseless Fate and iron\nNecessity, hid in impenetrable gloom, and to which men and their\nsufferings and sorrows, their hopes and joys, their ambitions and deeds,\nare of no more interest or importance than the motes that dance in the\nsunshine; or a Being that amuses Himself with the incredible vanity and\nfolly, the writhings and contortions of the insignificant insects that\ncompose Humanity, and idly imagine that they resemble the Omnipotent.\n\"What are we,\" the Tempter asks, \"but puppets in a show-box? O\nOmnipotent destiny, pull our strings gently! Dance us mercifully off our\nmiserable little stage!\"\n\n\"Is it not,\" the Demon whispers, \"merely the inordinate vanity of man\nthat causes him now to pretend to himself that he is like unto God in\nintellect, sympathies and passions, as it was that which, at the\nbeginning, made him believe that he was, in his bodily shape and organs,\nthe very image of the Deity? Is not his God merely his own shadow,\nprojected in gigantic outlines upon the clouds? Does he not create for\nhimself a God out of himself, by merely adding indefinite extension to\nhis own faculties, powers, and passions?\"\n\n\"Who,\" the Voice that will not be always silent whispers, \"has ever\nthoroughly satisfied himself with his own arguments in respect to his\nown nature? Who ever demonstrated to himself, with a conclusiveness that\nelevated the belief to certainty, that he was an immortal spirit,\ndwelling only temporarily in the house and envelope of the body, and to\nlive on forever after that shall have decayed? Who ever has demonstrated\nor ever can demonstrate that the intellect of Man differs from that of\nthe wiser animals, otherwise than in degree? Who has ever done more than\nto utter nonsense and incoherencies in regard to the difference between\nthe instincts of the dog and the reason of Man? The horse, the dog, the\nelephant, are as conscious of their identity as we are. They think,\ndream, remember, argue with themselves, devise, plan, and _reason_. What\nis the intellect and intelligence of the man but the intellect of the\nanimal in a higher degree or larger quantity?\" In the _real_ explanation\nof a single thought of a dog, all metaphysics will be condensed.\n\nAnd with still more terrible significance, the Voice asks, in what\nRespect the masses of men, the vast swarms of the human race, have\nproven themselves either wiser or better than the animals in whose eyes\na higher intelligence shines than in _their_ dull, unintellectual orbs;\nin what respect they have proven themselves worthy of or suited for an\nimmortal life. Would that be a prize of any value to the vast majority?\nDo they show, here upon earth, any capacity to improve, any fitness for\na state of existence in which they could not crouch to power, like\nhounds dreading the lash or tyrannize over defenceless weakness; in\nwhich they could not hate and persecute, and torture, and exterminate;\nin which they could not trade, and speculate, and over-reach, and entrap\nthe unwary and cheat the confiding and gamble and thrive, and sniff with\nself-righteousness at the short-comings of others, and thank God that\nthey were not like other men? What, to immense numbers of men, would be\nthe value of a Heaven where they could not lie and libel, and ply base\navocations for profitable returns?\n\nSadly we look around us, and read the gloomy and dreary records of the\nold dead and rotten ages. More than eighteen centuries have staggered\naway into the spectral realm of the Past, since Christ, teaching the\nReligion of Love, was crucified, that it might become a Religion of\nHate; and His Doctrines are not yet even nominally accepted as true by a\nfourth of mankind. Since His death, what incalculable swarms of human\nbeings have lived and died in total unbelief of all that we deem\nessential to Salvation! What multitudinous myriads of souls, since the\ndarkness of idolatrous superstition settled down, thick and\nimpenetrable, upon the earth, have flocked up toward the eternal Throne\nof God, to receive His judgment?\n\nThe Religion of Love proved to be, for seventeen long centuries, as much\nthe Religion of Hate, and infinitely more the Religion of Persecution,\nthan Mahometanism, its unconquerable rival. Heresies grew up before the\nApostles died; and God hated the Nicola\u012btans, while John, at Patmos,\nproclaimed His coming wrath. Sects wrangled, and each, as it gained the\npower, persecuted the other, until the soil of the whole Christian world\nwas watered with the blood, and fattened on the flesh, and whitened with\nthe bones, of martyrs, and human ingenuity was taxed to its utmost to\ninvent new modes by which tortures and agonies could be prolonged and\nmade more exquisite.\n\n\"By what right\" whispers the Voice, \"does this savage, merciless,\npersecuting animal, to which the sufferings and writhings of others of\nits wretched kind furnish the most pleasurable sensations, and the mass\nof which care only to eat, sleep, be clothed, and wallow in sensual\npleasures, and the best of which wrangle, hate, envy, and, with few\nexceptions, regard their own interests alone,--with what right does it\nendeavor to delude itself into the conviction that it is _not_ an\nanimal, as the wolf, the hyena, and the tiger are, but a somewhat\nnobler, a spirit destined to be immortal, a spark of the essential\nLight, Fire and Reason, which are God? What other immortality than one\nof selfishness could this creature enjoy? Of what other is it capable?\nMust not immortality commence _here_ and is not _life_ a part of it? How\nshall death change the base nature of the base soul? Why have not those\nother animals that only faintly imitate the wanton, savage, human\ncruelty and thirst for blood, the same right as man has, to expect a\nresurrection and an Eternity of existence, or a Heaven of Love?\"\n\n_The world improves_. Man ceases to persecute,--when the persecuted\nbecome too numerous and strong, longer to submit to it. That source of\npleasure closed, men exercise the ingenuities of their cruelty on the\nanimals and other living things below them. To deprive other creatures\nof the life which God gave them, and this not only that we may eat their\nflesh for food, but out of mere savage wantonness, is the agreeable\nemployment and amusement of man, who prides himself on being the Lord of\nCreation, and a little lower than the Angels. If he can no longer use\nthe rack, the gibbet, the pincers, and the stake, he can hate, and\nslander, and delight in the thought that he will, hereafter, luxuriously\nenjoying the sensual beatitudes of Heaven, see with pleasure the\nwrithing agonies of those justly damned for daring to hold opinions\ncontrary to his own, upon subjects totally beyond the comprehension both\nof them and him.\n\nWhere the armies of the despots cease to slay and ravage, the armies of\n\"Freedom\" take their place, and, the black and white commingled,\nslaughter and burn and ravish. Each age re-enacts the crimes as well as\nthe follies of its predecessors, and still war licenses outrage and\nturns fruitful lands into deserts, and God is thanked in the Churches\nfor bloody butcheries, and the remorseless devastators, even when\nswollen by plunder, are crowned with laurels and receive ovations.\n\nOf the whole of mankind, not one in ten thousand has any aspirations\nbeyond the daily needs of the gross animal life. In this age and in all\nothers, all men except a few, in most countries, are born to be mere\nbeasts of burden, co-laborers with the horse and the ox. Profoundly\nignorant, even in \"civilized\" lands, they think and reason like the\nanimals by the side of which they toil. For them, God, Soul, Spirit,\nImmortality, are mere words, without any real meaning. The God of\nnineteen-twentieths of the Christian world is only Bel, Moloch, Zeus,\nor at best Osiris, Mithras, or Adona\u00ef, under another name, worshipped\nwith the old Pagan ceremonies and ritualistic formulas. It is the Statue\nof Olympian Jove, worshipped as the Father, in the Christian Church that\nwas a Pagan Temple; it is the Statue of Venus, become the Virgin Mary.\nFor the most part, men do not in their hearts believe that God is either\njust or merciful. They fear and shrink from His lightnings and dread His\nwrath. For the most part, they only _think_ they believe that there is\nanother life, a judgment, and a punishment for sin. Yet they will none\nthe less persecute as Infidels and Atheists those who do not believe\nwhat they themselves imagine they believe, and which yet they do _not_\nbelieve, because it is incomprehensible to them in their ignorance and\nwant of intellect. To the vast majority of mankind, God is but the\nreflected image, in infinite space, of the earthly Tyrant on his Throne,\nonly more powerful, more inscrutable, and more implacable. To curse\nHumanity, the Despot need only _be_, what the popular mind has, in every\nage, imagined God.\n\nIn the great cities, the lower strata of the populace are equally\nwithout faith and without hope. The others have, for the most part, a\nmere blind faith, imposed by education and circumstances, and not as\nproductive of moral excellence or even common honesty as Mohammedanism.\n\"_Your property will be safe here_,\" said the Moslem; \"_There are no\nChristians here_.\" The philosophical and scientific world becomes daily\nmore and more unbelieving. Faith and Reason are not opposites, in\nequilibrium; but antagonistic and hostile to each other; the result\nbeing the darkness and despair of scepticism, avowed, or half-veiled as\nrationalism.\n\nOver more than three-fourths of the habitable globe, humanity still\nkneels, like the camels, to take upon itself the burthens to be tamely\nborne for its tyrants. If a Republic occasionally rises like a Star, it\nhastens with all speed to set in blood. The kings need not make war upon\nit, to crush it out of their way. It is only necessary to let it alone,\nand it soon lays violent hands upon itself. And when a people long\nenslaved shake off its fetters, it may well be incredulously asked,\n\n            Shall the braggart shout\n    For some blind glimpse of Freedom, link itself,\n    Through madness, hated by the wise, to law,\n            System and Empire?\n\nEverywhere in the world labor is, in some shape, the slave of capital;\ngenerally, a slave to be fed only so long as he can work; or, rather,\nonly so long as his work is profitable to the owner of the human\nchattel. There are famines in Ireland, strikes and starvation in\nEngland, pauperism and tenement-dens in New York, misery, squalor,\nignorance, destitution, the brutality of vice and the insensibility to\nshame, of despairing beggary, in all the human cesspools and sewers\neverywhere. Here, a sewing-woman famishes and freezes; there, mothers\nmurder their children, that those spared may live upon the bread\npurchased with the burial allowances of the dead starveling; and at the\nnext door young girls prostitute themselves for food.\n\nMoreover, the Voice says, this besotted race is not satisfied with\nseeing its multitudes swept away by the great epidemics whose causes are\nunknown, and of the justice or wisdom of which the human mind cannot\nconceive. It must also be ever at war. There has not been a moment since\nmen divided into Tribes, when all the world was at peace. Always men\nhave been engaged in murdering each other somewhere. Always the armies\nhave lived by the toil of the husbandman, and war has exhausted the\nresources, wasted the energies, and ended the prosperity of Nations. Now\nit loads unborn posterity with crushing debt, mortgages all estates, and\nbrings upon States the shame and infamy of dishonest repudiation.\n\nAt times, the baleful fires of war light up half a Continent at once; as\nwhen all the Thrones unite to compel a people to receive again a hated\nand detestable dynasty, or States deny States the right to dissolve an\nirksome union and create for themselves a separate government. Then\nagain the flames flicker and die away, and the fire smoulders in its\nashes, to break out again, after a time, with renewed and a more\nconcentrated fury. At times, the storm, revolving, howls over small\nareas only; at times its lights are seen, like the old beacon-fires on\nthe hills, belting the whole globe. No sea, but hears the roar of\ncannon; no river, but runs red with blood; no plain, but shakes,\ntrampled by the hoofs of charging squadrons; no field, but is fertilized\nby the blood of the dead; and everywhere man slays, the vulture gorges,\nand the wolf howls in the ear of the dying soldier. No city is not\ntortured by shot and shell; and no people fail to enact the horrid\nblasphemy of thanking a God of Love for victories and carnage. Te Deums\nare still sung for the Eve of St. Bartholomew and the Sicilian Vespers.\nMan's ingenuity is racked, and all his inventive powers are tasked, to\nfabricate the infernal enginery of destruction, by which human bodies\nmay be the more expeditiously and effectually crushed, shattered, torn,\nand mangled; and yet hypocritical[1] Humanity, drunk with blood and\ndrenched with gore, shrieks to Heaven at a single murder, perpetrated to\ngratify a revenge not more unchristian, or to satisfy a cupidity not\nmore ignoble, than those which are the promptings of the Devil in the\nsouls of Nations.\n\nWhen we have fondly dreamed of Utopia and the Millennium, when we have\nbegun almost to believe that man is _not_, after all, a tiger half\ntamed, and that the smell of blood will not wake the savage within him,\nwe are of a sudden startled from the delusive dream, to find the thin\nmask of civilization rent in twain and thrown contemptuously away. We\nlie down to sleep, like the peasant on the lava-slopes of Vesuvius. The\nmountain has been so long inert, that we believe its fires extinguished.\nRound us hang the clustering grapes, and the green leaves of the olive\ntremble in the soft night-air over us. Above us shine the peaceful,\npatient stars. The crash of a new eruption wakes us, the roar of the\nsubterranean thunders, the stabs of the volcanic lightning into the\nshrouded bosom of the sky; and we see, aghast, the tortured Titan\nhurling up its fires among the pale stars, its great tree of smoke and\ncloud, the red torrents pouring down its sides. The roar and the\nshriekings of Civil War are all around us: the land is a pandemonium:\nman is again a Savage. The great armies roll along their hideous waves,\nand leave behind them smoking and depopulated deserts. The pillager is\nin every house, plucking even the morsel of bread from the lips of the\nstarving child. Gray hairs are dabbled in blood, and innocent girlhood\nshrieks in vain to Lust for mercy. Laws, Courts, Constitutions,\nChristianity, Mercy, Pity, disappear. God seems to have abdicated, and\nMoloch to reign in His stead; while Press and Pulpit alike exult at\nuniversal murder, and urge the extermination of the Conquered, by the\nsword and the flaming torch; and to plunder and murder entitles the\nhuman beasts of prey to the thanks of Christian Senates.\n\nCommercial greed deadens the nerves of sympathy of Nations, and makes\nthem deaf to the demands of honor, the impulses of generosity, the\nappeals of those who suffer under injustice. Elsewhere, the universal\npursuit of wealth dethrones God and pays divine honors to Mammon and\nBaalzebub. Selfishness rules supreme: to win wealth becomes the whole\nbusiness of life. The villanies of legalized gaming and speculation\nbecome epidemic; treachery is but evidence of shrewdness; office becomes\nthe prey of successful faction; the Country, like Act\u00e6on, is torn by its\nown hounds, and the villains it has carefully educated to their trade,\nmost greedily plunder it, when it is _in extremis_.\n\nBy what right, the Voice demands, does a creature always engaged in the\nwork of mutual robbery and slaughter, and who makes his own interest his\nGod, claim to be of a nature superior to the savage beasts of which he\nis the prototype?\n\nThen the shadows of a horrible doubt fall upon the soul that would fain\nlove, trust and believe; a darkness, of which this that surrounded you\nwas a symbol. It doubts the truth of Revelation, its own spirituality,\nthe very existence of a beneficent God. It asks itself if it is not idle\nto hope for any great progress of Humanity toward perfection, and\nwhether, when it advances in one respect, it does not retrogress in some\nother, by way of compensation: whether advance in civilization is not\nincrease of selfishness: whether freedom does not necessarily lead to\nlicense and anarchy: whether the destitution and debasement of the\nmasses does not inevitably follow increase of population and commercial\nand manufacturing prosperity. It asks itself whether man is not the\nsport of a blind, merciless Fate: whether all philosophies are not\ndelusions, and all religions the fantastic creations of human vanity and\nself-conceit; and, above all, whether, when Reason is abandoned as a\nguide, the faith of Buddhist and Brahmin has not the same claims to\nsovereignty and implicit, unreasoning credence, as any other.\n\nHe asks himself whether it is not, after all, the evident and palpable\ninjustices of this life, the success and prosperity of the Bad, the\ncalamities, oppressions, and miseries of the Good, that are the bases of\nall beliefs in a future state of existence? Doubting man's capacity for\nindefinite progress here, he doubts the possibility of it anywhere; and\nif he does not doubt whether God exists, and is just and beneficent, he\nat least cannot silence the constantly recurring whisper, that the\nmiseries and calamities of men, their lives and deaths, their pains and\nsorrows, their extermination by war and epidemics, are phenomena of no\nhigher dignity, significance, and importance, in the eye of God, than\nwhat things of the same nature occur to other organisms of matter; and\nthat the fish of the ancient seas, destroyed by myriads to make room\nfor other species, the contorted shapes in which they are found as\nfossils testifying to their agonies; the coral insects, the animals and\nbirds and vermin slain by man, have as much right as he to clamor at the\ninjustice of the dispensations of God, and to demand an immortality of\nlife in a new universe, as compensation for their pains and sufferings\nand untimely death in this world.\n\nThis is not a picture painted by the imagination. Many a thoughtful mind\nhas so doubted and despaired. How many of us can say that our own faith\nis so well grounded and complete that we never hear those painful\nwhisperings within the soul? Thrice blessed are they who never doubt,\nwho ruminate in patient contenment like the kine, or doze under the\nopiate of a blind faith; on whose souls never rests that Awful Shadow\nwhich is the absence of the Divine Light.\n\nTo explain to themselves the existence of Evil and Suffering, the\nAncient Persians imagined that there were two Principles or Deities in\nthe Universe, the one of Good and the other of Evil, constantly in\nconflict with each other in struggle for the mastery, and alternately\novercoming and overcome. Over both, for the SAGES, was the One Supreme;\nand for _them_ Light was in the end to prevail over Darkness, the Good\nover the Evil, and even Ahriman and his Demons to part with their wicked\nand vicious natures and share the universal Salvation. It did not occur\nto them that the existence of the Evil Principle, by the consent of the\nOmnipotent Supreme, presented the same difficulty, and left the\nexistence of Evil as unexplained as before. The human mind is always\ncontent, if it can remove a difficulty a step further off. It cannot\nbelieve that the world rests on nothing, but is devoutly content when\ntaught that it is borne on the back of an immense elephant, who himself\nstands on the back of a tortoise. Given the tortoise, Faith is always\nsatisfied; and it has been a great source of happiness to multitudes\nthat they could believe in a Devil who could relieve God of the odium of\nbeing the Author of Sin.\n\nBut not to all is Faith sufficient to overcome this great difficulty.\nThey say, with the Suppliant,_\"Lord! I believe!\"_--but like him they are\nconstrained to add,_\"Help Thou my unbelief!\"_--Reason must, for these,\nco-operate and coincide with Faith, or they remain still in the darkness\nof doubt,--most miserable of all conditions of the human mind.\n\nThose, only, who care for nothing beyond the interests and pursuits of\nthis life, are uninterested in these great Problems. The animals, also,\ndo not consider them. It is the characteristic of an immortal Soul, that\nit should seek to satisfy itself of its immortality, and to understand\nthis great enigma, the Universe, If the Hottentot and the Papuan are not\ntroubled and tortured by these doubts and speculations, they are not,\nfor that, to be regarded as either wise or fortunate. The swine, also,\nare indifferent to the great riddles of the Universe, and are happy in\nbeing wholly unaware that it is the vast Revelation and Manifestation,\nin Time and Space, of a Single Thought of the Infinite God.\n\nExalt and magnify Faith as we will, and say that it begins where Reason\nends, it must, after all, have a foundation, either in Reason, Analogy,\nthe Consciousness, or human testimony. The worshipper of Brahma also has\nimplicit Faith in what seems to us palpably false and absurd. His faith\nrests neither in Reason, Analogy, or the Consciousness, but on the\ntestimony of his Spiritual teachers, and of the Holy Books. The Moslem\nalso believes, on the positive testimony of the Prophet; and the Mormon\nalso can say, _\"I believe this, because it is impossible.\"_ No faith,\nhowever absurd or degrading, has ever wanted these foundations,\ntestimony, and the books. Miracles, proven by unimpeachable testimony\nhave been used as a foundation for Faith, in every age; and the modern\nmiracles are better authenticated, a hundred times, than the ancient\nones.\n\nSo that, after all, Faith must flow out from some source within us, when\nthe evidence of that which we are to believe is not presented to our\nsenses, or it will in no case be the assurance of the truth of what is\nbelieved.\n\nThe Consciousness, or inhering and innate conviction, or the instinct\ndivinely implanted, of the verity of things, is the highest Possible\nevidence, if not the _only real_ proof, of the verity of certain things,\nbut only of truths of a limited class.\n\nWhat we call the Reason, that is, our imperfect human reason, not only\nmay, but assuredly will, lead us away from the Truth in regard to things\ninvisible and especially those of the Infinite, if we determine to\nbelieve nothing but that which _it_ can demonstrate, or _not_ to\nbelieve that which it can by its processes of logic prove to be\ncontradictory, unreasonable, or absurd. Its tape-line cannot measure the\narcs of Infinity. For example, to the Human reason, an Infinite Justice\nand an Infinite Mercy or Love, in the same Being, are inconsistent and\nimpossible. One, it can demonstrate necessarily excludes the other. So\nit can _demonstrate_ that as the Creation had a beginning, it\nnecessarily follows that an Eternity had elapsed before the Deity began\nto create, during which He was inactive.\n\nWhen we gaze, of a moonless clear night, on the Heavens glittering with\nstars, and know that each fixed star of all the myriads is a Sun, and\neach probably possessing its retinue of worlds, all peopled with living\nbeings, we sensibly feel our own unimportance in the scale of Creation,\nand at once reflect that much of what has in different ages been\nreligious faith, could never have been believed, if the nature, size,\nand distance of those Suns, and of our own Sun, Moon, and Planets, had\nbeen known to the Ancients as they are to us.\n\nTo them, all the lights of the firmament were created only to give light\nto the earth, as its lamps or candles hung above it. The earth was\nsupposed to be the only inhabited portion of the Universe. The world and\nthe Universe were synonymous terms. Of the immense size and distance of\nthe heavenly bodies, men had no conception. The Sages had, in Chald\u00e6ea,\nEgypt, India, China, and in Persia, and therefore the sages always had,\nan esoteric creed, taught only in the mysteries and unknown to the\nvulgar. No Sage, in either country, or in Greece or Rome, believed the\npopular creed. To them the Gods and the Idols of the Gods were symbols,\nand symbols of great and mysterious truths.\n\nThe Vulgar imagined the attention of the Gods to be continually centred\nupon the earth and man. The Grecian Divinities inhabited Olympus, an\ninsignificant mountain of the Earth. There was the Court of Zeus, to\nwhich Neptune came from the Sea, and Pluto and Persephon\u00e9 from the\nglooms of Tartarus in the unfathomable depths of the Earth's bosom. God\ncame down from Heaven and on Sinai dictated laws for the Hebrews to His\nservant Moses. The Stars were the guardians of mortals whose fates and\nfortunes were to be read in their movements, conjunctions, and\noppositions. The Moon was the Bride and Sister of the Sun, at the same\ndistance above the Earth, and, like the Sun, made for the service of\nmankind alone.\n\nIf, with the great telescope of Lord Rosse, we examine the vast nebul\u00e6\nof Hercules, Orion, and Andromeda, and find them resolvable into Stars\nmore numerous than the sands on the seashore; if we reflect that each of\nthese Stars is a Sun, like and even many times larger than ours,--each,\nbeyond a doubt, with its retinue of worlds swarming with life;--if we go\nfurther in imagination, and endeavor to conceive of all the infinities\nof space, filled with similar suns and worlds, we seem at once to shrink\ninto an incredible insignificance.\n\nThe Universe, which is the uttered Word of God, is _infinite_ in extent.\nThere is no empty space beyond creation on any side. The Universe, which\nis the Thought of God pronounced, never was _not_, since God never was\ninert; nor WAS, without thinking and creating. The forms of creation\nchange, the suns and worlds live and die like the leaves and the\ninsects, but the Universe itself is infinite and eternal, because God\nIs, Was, and Will forever Be, and never did _not_ think and create.\n\nReason is fain to admit that a Supreme Intelligence, infinitely powerful\nand wise, must have created this boundless Universe; but it also tells\nus that we are as unimportant in it as the zo\u00f6phytes and entozoa, or as\nthe invisible particles of animated life that float upon the air or\nswarm in the water-drop.\n\nThe foundations of our faith, resting upon the imagined interest of God\nin our race, an interest easily supposable when man believed himself the\nonly intelligent created being, and therefore eminently worthy the\nespecial care and watchful anxiety of a God who had only this earth to\nlook after, and its house-keeping alone to superintend, and who was\ncontent to create, in all the infinite Universe, only one single being,\npossessing a soul, and not a mere animal, are rudely shaken as the\nUniverse broadens and expands for us; and the darkness of doubt and\ndistrust settles heavy upon the Soul.\n\nThe modes in which it is ordinarily endeavored to satisfy our doubts,\nonly increase them. To _demonstrate_ the necessity for a cause of the\ncreation, is equally to demonstrate the necessity of a cause for that\ncause. The argument from plan and design only removes the difficulty a\nstep further off. We rest the world on the elephant, and the elephant on\nthe tortoise, and the tortoise on--nothing.\n\nTo tell us that the animals possess instinct only and that Reason\nbelongs to us alone, in no way tends to satisfy us of the radical\ndifference between us and them. For if the mental phenomena exhibited\nby animals that think, dream, remember, argue from cause to effect,\nplan, devise, combine, and communicate their thoughts to each other, so\nas to act rationally in concert,--if their love, hate, and revenge, can\nbe conceived of as results of the organization of matter, like color and\nperfume, the resort to the hypothesis of an immaterial Soul to explain\nphenomena of the same kind, only more perfect, manifested by the _human_\nbeing, is supremely absurd. That organized matter can think or even\n_feel_ at all, is the great insoluble mystery. \"Instinct\" is but a word\nwithout a meaning, or else it means inspiration. It is either the animal\nitself, or God _in_ the animal, that thinks, remembers, and reasons; and\ninstinct, according to the common acceptation of the term, would be the\ngreatest and most wonderful of mysteries,--no less a thing than the\ndirect, immediate, and continual promptings of the Deity,--for the\nanimals are not machines, or automata moved by springs, and the ape is\nbut a dumb Australian.\n\nMust we _always_ remain in this darkness of uncertainty, of doubt? Is\nthere _no_ mode of escaping from the labyrinth except by means of a\nblind faith, which explains nothing, and in many creeds, ancient and\nmodern, sets Reason at defiance, and leads to the belief either in a God\nwithout a Universe, a Universe without a God, or a Universe which is\nitself a God?\n\nWe read in the Hebrew Chronicles that Schlomoh the wise King caused to\nbe placed in front of the entrance to the Temple two huge columns of\nbronze, one of which was called YAKAYIN and the other BAHAZ; and these\nwords are rendered in our version _Strength_ and _Establishment_. The\nMasonry of the Blue Lodges gives no explanation of these symbolic\ncolumns; nor do the Hebrew Books advise us that they were symbolic. If\nnot so intended as symbols, they were subsequently understood to be\nsuch.\n\nBut as we are certain that everything _within_ the Temple was symbolic,\nand that the whole structure was intended to represent the Universe, we\nmay reasonably conclude that the columns of the portico also had a\nsymbolic signification. It would be tedious to repeat all the\ninterpretations which fancy or dullness has found for them.\n\nThe key to their true meaning is not undiscoverable. The perfect and\neternal distinction of the two primitive terms of the creative\nsyllogism, in order to attain to the demonstration of their harmony by\nthe analogy of contraries, is the second grand principle of that occult\nphilosophy veiled under the name \"_Kabalah_,\" and indicated by all the\nsacred hieroglyphs of the Ancient Sanctuaries, and of the rites, so\nlittle understood by the mass of the Initiates, of the Ancient and\nModern Free-Masonry.\n\nThe Sohar declares that everything in the Universe proceeds by the\nmystery of \"the Balance,\" that is, of Equilibrium. Of the Sephiroth, or\nDivine Emanations, Wisdom and Understanding, Severity and Benignity, or\nJustice and Mercy, and Victory and Glory, constitute pairs.\n\nWisdom, or the Intellectual Generative _Energy_, and Understanding, or\nthe _Capacity_ to be impregnated by the Active Energy and produce\nintellection or thought, are represented symbolically in the Kabalah as\nmale and female. So also are Justice and Mercy. Strength is the\nintellectual Energy or Activity; Establishment or Stability is the\nintellectual Capacity to produce, a passivity. They are the POWER of\n_generation_ and the CAPACITY of _production_. By WISDOM, it is said,\nGod creates, and by UNDERSTANDING establishes. These are the two Columns\nof the Temple, contraries like the Man and Woman, like Reason and Faith,\nOmnipotence and Liberty, Infinite Justice and Infinite. Mercy, Absolute\nPower or Strength to do even what is most unjust and unwise, and\nAbsolute Wisdom that makes it impossible to do it; Right and Duty. They\nwere the columns of the intellectual and moral world, the monumental\nhieroglyph of the antinomy necessary to the grand law of creation.\n\nThere must be for every Force a Resistance to support it, to every light\na shadow, for every Royalty a Realm to govern, for every affirmative a\nnegative.\n\nFor the Kabalists, Light represents the Active Principle, and Darkness\nor Shadow is analogous to the Passive Principle. Therefore it was that\nthey made of the Sun and Moon emblems of the two Divine Sexes and the\ntwo creative forces; therefore, that they ascribed to woman the\nTemptation and the first sin, and then the first labor, the maternal\nlabor of the redemption, because it is from the bosom of the darkness\nitself that we see the Light born again. The Void attracts the Full; and\nso it is that the abyss of poverty and misery, the Seeming Evil, the\nseeming empty nothingness of life, the temporary rebellion of the\ncreatures, eternally attracts the overflowing ocean of being, of riches,\nof pity, and of love. Christ completed the Atonement on the Cross by\ndescending into Hell.\n\nJustice and Mercy are contraries. If each be infinite, their\nco-existence seems impossible, and being equal, one cannot even\nannihilate the other and reign alone. The mysteries of the Divine Nature\nare beyond our finite comprehension; but so indeed are the mysteries of\nour own finite nature; and it is certain that in all nature harmony and\nmovement are the result of the equilibrium of opposing or contrary\nforces.\n\nThe analogy of contraries gives the solution of the most interesting and\nmost difficult problem of modern philosophy,--the definite and permanent\naccord of Reason and Faith, of Authority and Liberty of examination, of\nScience and Belief, of Perfection in God and Imperfection in Man. If\nscience or knowledge is the Sun, Belief is the Man; it is a reflection\nof the day in the night. Faith is the veiled Isis, the Supplement of\nReason, in the shadows which precede or follow Reason. It emanates from\nthe Reason, but can never confound it nor be confounded with it. The\nencroachments of Reason upon Faith, or of Faith on Reason, are eclipses\nof the Sun or Moon; when they occur, they make useless both the Source\nof Light and its reflection, at once.\n\nScience perishes by systems that are nothing but beliefs; and Faith\nsuccumbs to reasoning. For the two Columns of the Temple to uphold the\nedifice, they must remain separated and be parallel to each other. As\nsoon as it is attempted by violence to bring them together, as Samson\ndid, they are overturned, and the whole edifice falls upon the head of\nthe rash blind man or the revolutionist whose personal or national\nresentments have in advance devoted to death.\n\nHarmony is the result of an alternating preponderance of forces.\nWhenever this is wanting in government, government is a failure, because\nit is either Despotism or Anarchy. All theoretical governments, however\nplausible the theory, end in one or the other. Governments that are to\nendure are not made in the closet of Locke or Shaftesbury, or in a\nCongress or a Convention. In a Republic, forces that seem contraries,\nthat indeed are contraries, alone give movement and life. The Spheres\nare held in their orbits and made to revolve harmoniously and\nunerringly, by the concurrence, which seems to be the opposition, of two\ncontrary forces. If the centripetal force should overcome the\ncentrifugal and the equilibrium of forces cease, the rush of the\nSpheres to the Central Sun would annihilate the system. Instead of\nconsolidation the whole would be shattered into fragments.\n\nMan is a free agent, though Omnipotence is above and all around him. To\nbe free to do good, he must be free to do evil. The Light necessitates\nthe Shadow. A State is free like an individual in any government worthy\nof the name. The State is less potent than the Deity, and therefore the\nfreedom of the individual citizen is consistent with its Sovereignty.\nThese are opposites, but not antagonistic. So, in a union of States, the\nfreedom of the States is consistent with the Supremacy of the Nation.\nWhen either obtains the permanent mastery over the other, and they cease\nto be _in equilibrio_, the encroachment continues with a velocity that\nis accelerated like that of a falling body, until the feebler is\nannihilated, and then, there being no resistance to support the\nstronger, it rushes into ruin.\n\nSo, when the equipoise of Reason and Faith, in the individual or the\nNation, and the alternating preponderance cease, the result is,\naccording as one or the other is permanent victor, Atheism or\nSuperstition, disbelief or blind credulity; and the Priests either of\nUnfaith or of Faith become despotic.\n\n\"_Whomsoever God loveth, him he chasteneth_,\" is an expression that\nformulates a whole dogma. The trials of life are the blessings of life,\nto the individual or the Nation, if either has a Soul that is truly\nworthy of salvation. \"_Light and darkness_,\" said ZOROASTER, \"_are the\nworld's eternal ways_.\" The Light and the Shadow are everywhere and\nalways in proportion; the Light being the reason of being of the Shadow.\nIt is by trials only, by the agonies of sorrow and the sharp discipline\nof adversities, that men and Nations attain initiation. The agonies of\nthe garden of Gethsemane and those of the Cross on Calvary preceded the\nResurrection and were the means of Redemption. It is with prosperity\nthat God afflicts Humanity.\n\nThe Degree of Rose is devoted to and symbolizes the final triumph of\ntruth over falsehood, of liberty over slavery, of light over darkness,\nof life over death, and of good over evil. The great truth it inculcates\nis, that notwithstanding the existence of Evil, God is infinitely wise,\njust, and good: that though the affairs of the world proceed by no rule\nof right and wrong known to us the narrowness of our views, yet all _is_\nright, for it is the work of God; and all evils, all miseries, all\nmisfortunes, are but as drops in the vast current that is sweeping\nonward, guided by Him, to a great and magnificent result: that, at the\nappointed time, He will redeem and regenerate the world, and the\nPrinciple, the Power and the existence of Evil will then cease; that\nthis will be brought about by such means and instruments as He chooses\nto employ; whether by the merits of a Redeemer that has already appeared\nor a Messiah that is yet waited for, by an incarnation of Himself or by\nan inspired prophet, it does not belong to us as Masons to decide. Let\neach judge and believe for himself.\n\nIn the mean time, we labor to hasten the coming of that day. The morals\nof antiquity, of the law of Moses and of Christianity, are ours. We\nrecognize every teacher of Morality, every Reformer, as a brother in\nthis great work. The Eagle is to us the symbol of Liberty, the Compasses\nof Equality, the Pelican of Humanity, and our order of Fraternity.\nLaboring for these, with Faith, Hope, and Charity as our armor, we will\nwait with patience for the final triumph of Good and the complete\nmanifestation of the Word of God.\n\nNo one Mason has the right to measure for another, within the walls of a\nMasonic Temple, the degree of veneration which he shall feel for any\nReformer, or the Founder of any Religion. We teach a belief in no\nparticular creed, as we teach unbelief in none. Whatever higher\nattributes the Founder of the Christian Faith may, in our belief, have\nhad or not have had, none can deny that He taught and practised a pure\nand elevated morality, even at the risk and to the ultimate loss of His\nlife. He was not only the benefactor of a disinherited people, but a\nmodel for mankind. Devotedly He loved the children of Israel. To them He\ncame, and to them alone He preached that Gospel which His disciples\nafterward carried among foreigners. He would fain have freed the chosen\nPeople from their spiritual bondage of ignorance and degradation. As a\nlover of all mankind, laying down His life for the emancipation of His\nBrethren, He should be to all, to Christian, to Jew, and to Mahometan,\nan object of gratitude and veneration.\n\nThe Roman world felt the pangs of approaching dissolution. Paganism, its\nTemples shattered by Socrates and Cicero, had spoken its last word. The\nGod of the Hebrews was unknown beyond the limits of Palestine. The old\nreligions had failed to give happiness and peace to the world. The\nbabbling and wrangling philosophers had confounded all men's ideas,\nuntil they doubted of everything and had faith in nothing: neither in\nGod nor in his goodness and mercy, nor in the virtue of man, nor in\nthemselves. Mankind was divided into two great classes,--the master and\nthe slave; the powerful and the abject, the high and the low, the\ntyrants and the mob; and even the former were satiated with the\nservility of the latter, sunken by lassitude and despair to the lowest\ndepths of degradation.\n\nWhen, lo, a voice, in the inconsiderable Roman Province of Judea\nproclaims a new Gospel--a new \"God's Word,\" to crushed, suffering,\nbleeding humanity. Liberty of Thought, Equality of all men in the eye of\nGod, universal Fraternity! a new doctrine, a new religion; the old\nPrimitive Truth uttered once again!\n\nMan is once more taught to look upward to his God. No longer to a God\nhid in impenetrable mystery, and infinitely remote from human sympathy,\nemerging only at intervals from the darkness to smite and crush\nhumanity: but a God, good, kind, beneficent, and merciful: a Father,\nloving the creatures He has made, with a love immeasureable and\nexhaustless; Who feels for us, and sympathizes with us, and sends us\npain and want and disaster only that they may serve to develop in us the\nvirtues and excellences that befit us to live with Him hereafter.\n\nJesus of Nazareth, the \"Son of man,\" is the expounder of the new Law of\nLove. He calls to Him the humble, the poor, the Pariahs of the world.\nThe first sentence that He pronounces blesses the world, and announces\nthe new gospel: \"Blessed are they that mourn for they shall be\ncomforted.\" He pours the oil of consolation and peace upon every crushed\nand bleeding heart. Every sufferer is His proselyte. He shares their\nsorrows, and sympathizes with all their afflictions.\n\nHe raises up the sinner and the Samaritan woman, and teaches them to\nhope for forgiveness. He pardons the woman taken in adultery. He selects\nhis disciples not among the Pharisees or the Philosophers, but among the\nlow and humble, even of the fishermen of Galilee. He heals the sick and\nfeeds the poor. He lives among the destitute and the friendless. \"Suffer\nlittle children,\" He said, \"to come unto me; for of such is the kingdom\nof Heaven! Blessed are the humble-minded, for theirs is the kingdom of\nHeaven; the meek, for they shall inherit the Earth; the merciful, for\nthey shall obtain mercy; the pure in heart, for they shall see God; the\npeace-makers, for they shall be called the children of God! First be\nreconciled to they brother, and _then_ come and offer thy gift at the\naltar. Give to him that asketh thee, and from him that would borrow of\nthee turn not away! Love your enemies; bless them that curse you; do\ngood to them that hate you; and pray for them which despitefully use you\nand persecute you! All things whatsoever ye would that men should do to\nyou, do ye also unto them; for this is the law and the Prophets! He that\ntaketh not his cross, and followeth after Me, is not worthy of Me. A new\ncommandment I give unto you, that ye love one another: as I have loved\nyou, that ye also love one another: by this shall all know that ye are\nMy disciples. Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down\nhis life for his friend.\"\n\nThe Gospel of Love He sealed with His life. The cruelty of the Jewish\nPriesthood, the ignorant ferocity of the mob, and the Roman indifference\nto barbarian blood, nailed Him to the cross, and He expired uttering\nblessings upon humanity.\n\nDying thus, He bequeathed His teachings to man as an inestimable\ninheritance. Perverted and corrupted, they have served as a basis for\nmany creeds, and been even made the warrant for intolerance and\npersecution. We here teach them in their purity. They are our Masonry;\nfor to them good men of all creeds can subscribe.\n\nThat God is good and merciful, and loves and sympathizes with the\ncreatures He has made; that His finger is visible in all the movements\nof the moral, intellectual, and material universe; that we are His\nchildren, the objects of His paternal care and regard; that all men are\nour brothers, whose wants we are to supply, their errors to pardon,\ntheir opinions to tolerate, their injuries to forgive; that man has an\nimmortal soul, a free will, a right to freedom of thought and action;\nthat all men are equal in God's sight; that we best serve God by\nhumility, meekness, gentleness, kindness, and the other virtues which\nthe lowly can practise as well as the lofty; this is \"the new Law,\" the\n\"WORD,\" for which the world had waited and pined so long; and every true\nKnight of the Rose will revere the memory of Him who taught it, and\nlook indulgently even on those who assign to Him a character far above\nhis own conceptions or belief, even to the extent of deeming Him Divine.\n\nHear Philo, the Greek Jew. \"The contemplative soul, unequally guided,\nsometimes toward abundance and sometimes toward barrenness, though ever\nadvancing, is illuminated by the primitive ideas, the rays that emanate\nfrom the Divine Intelligence, whenever it ascends toward the Sublime\nTreasures. When, on the contrary, it descends, and is barren, it falls\nwithin the domain of those Intelligences that are termed Angels ... for,\nwhen the soul is deprived of the light of God, which leads it to the\nknowledge of things, it no longer enjoys more than a feeble and\nsecondary light, which gives it, not the understanding of things, but\nthat of words only, as in this baser world....\"\n\n\"... Let the narrow-souled withdraw, having their ears sealed up! We\ncommunicate the divine mysteries to those only who have received the\nsacred initiation, to those who practise true piety, and who are not\nenslaved by the empty pomp of words, or the doctrines of the pagans....\"\n\n\"... O, ye Initiates, ye whose ears are purified, receive this in your\nsouls, as a mystery never to be lost! Reveal it to no Profane! Keep and\ncontain it within yourselves, as an incorruptible treasure, not like\ngold or silver, but more precious than everything besides; for it is the\nknowledge of the Great Cause, of Nature, and of that which is born of\nboth. And if you meet an Initiate, besiege him with your prayers, that\nhe conceal from you no new mysteries that he may know, and rest not\nuntil you have obtained them! For me, although I was initiated in the\nGreat Mysteries by Moses, the Friend of God, yet, having seen Jeremiah,\nI recognized him not only as an Initiate, but as a Hierophant; and I\nfollow his school.\"\n\nWe, like him, recognize all Initiates as our Brothers. We belong to no\none creed or school. In all religions there is a basis of Truth; in all\nthere is pure Morality. All that teach the cardinal tenets of Masonry we\nrespect; all teachers and reformers of mankind we admire and revere.\n\nMasonry also has her mission to perform. With her traditions reaching\nback to the earliest times, and her symbols dating further back than\neven the monumental history of Egypt extends, she invites all men of all\nreligions to enlist under her banners and to war against evil,\nignorance, and wrong. You are now her knight, and to her service your\nsword is consecrated. May you prove a worthy soldier in a worthy\ncause!\n\n\n\n\nMORALS AND DOGMA.\n\n\nCOUNCIL OF KADOSH.\n\n\n\n\nXIX.\n\nGRAND PONTIFF.\n\n\nThe true Mason labors for the benefit of those who are to come after\nhim, and for the advancement and improvement of his race. That is a poor\nambition which contents itself within the limits of a single life. All\nmen who deserve to live, desire to survive their funerals, and to live\nafterward in the good that they have done mankind, rather than in the\nfading characters written in men's memories. Most men desire to leave\nsome work behind them that may outlast their own day and brief\ngeneration. That is an instinctive impulse, given by God, and often\nfound in the rudest human heart; the surest proof of the soul's\nimmortality, and of the fundamental difference between man and the\nwisest brutes. To plant the trees that, after we are dead, shall shelter\nour children, is as natural as to love the shade of those our fathers\nplanted. The rudest unlettered husbandman, painfully conscious of his\nown inferiority, the poorest widowed mother, giving her life-blood to\nthose who pay only for the work of her needle, will toil and stint\nthemselves to educate their child, that he may take a higher station in\nthe world than they;--and of such are the world's greatest benefactors.\n\nIn his influences that survive him, man becomes immortal, before the\ngeneral resurrection. The Spartan mother, who, giving her son his\nshield, said, \"WITH IT, OR UPON IT!\" afterward shared the government of\nLaced\u00e6mon with the legislation of Lycurgus; for she too made a law, that\nlived after her; and she inspired the Spartan soldiery that afterward\ndemolished the walls of Athens, and aided Alexander to conquer the\nOrient. The widow who gave Marion the fiery arrows to burn her own\nhouse, that it might no longer shelter the enemies of her infant\ncountry, the house where she had lain upon her husband's bosom, and\nwhere her children had been born, legislated more effectually for her\nState than Locke or Shaftesbury, or than many a Legislature has done,\nsince that State won its freedom.\n\nIt was of slight importance to the Kings of Egypt and the Monarchs of\nAssyria and Ph\u0153nicia, that the son of a Jewish woman, a foundling,\nadopted by the daughter of Sesostris Ramses, slew an Egyptian that\noppressed a Hebrew slave, and fled into the desert, to remain there\nforty years. But Moses, who might otherwise have become Regent of Lower\nEgypt, known to us only by a tablet on a tomb or monument, became the\ndeliverer of the Jews, and led them forth from Egypt to the frontiers of\nPalestine, and made for them a law, out of which grew the Christian\nfaith; and so has shaped the destinies of the world. He and the old\nRoman lawyers, with Alfred of England, the Saxon Thanes and Norman\nBarons, the old judges and chancellors, and the makers of the canons,\nlost in the mists and shadows of the Past,--these are our legislators;\nand we obey the laws that they enacted.\n\nNapoleon died upon the barren rock of his exile. His bones, borne to\nFrance by the son of a King, rest in the H\u00f4pital des Invalides, in the\ngreat city on the Seine. His Thoughts still govern France. He, and not\nthe People, dethroned the Bourbon, and drove the last King of the House\nof Orleans into exile. He, in his coffin, and not the People, voted the\ncrown to the Third Napoleon; and he, and not the Generals of France and\nEngland, led their united forces against the grim Northern Despotism.\n\nMahomet announced to the Arabian idolaters the new creed, \"_There is but\none God, and Mahomet, like Moses and Christ, is His Apostle_.\" For many\nyears unaided, then with the help of his family and a few friends, then\nwith many disciples, and last of all with an army, he taught and\npreached the Koran. The religion of the wild Arabian enthusiast\nconverting the fiery Tribes of the Great Desert, spread over Asia, built\nup the Saracenic dynasties, conquered Persia and India, the Greek\nEmpire, Northern Africa, and Spain, and dashed the surges of its fierce\nsoldiery against the battlements of Northern Christendom. The law of\nMahomet still governs a fourth of the human race; and Turk and Arab,\nMoor and Persian and Hindu, still obey the Prophet, and pray with their\nfaces turned toward Mecca; and he, and not the living, rules and reigns\nin the fairest portions of the Orient.\n\nConfucius still enacts the law for China; and the thoughts and ideas of\nPeter the Great govern Russia. Plato and the other great Sages of\nAntiquity still reign as the Kings of Philosophy, and have dominion over\nthe human intellect. The great Statesmen of the Past still preside in\nthe Councils of Nations. Burke still lingers in the House of Commons;\nand Berryer's sonorous tones will long ring in the Legislative Chambers\nof France. The influences of Webster and Calhoun, conflicting, rent\nasunder the American States, and the doctrine of each is the law and the\noracle speaking from the Holy of Holies for his own State and all\nconsociated with it: a faith preached and proclaimed by each at the\ncannon's mouth and consecrated by rivers of blood.\n\nIt has been well said, that when Tamerlane had builded his pyramid of\nfifty thousand human skulls, and wheeled away with his vast armies from\nthe gates of Damascus, to find new conquests, and build other pyramids,\na little boy was playing in the streets of Mentz, son of a poor artisan,\nwhose apparent importance in the scale of beings was, compared with that\nof Tamerlane, as that of a grain of sand to the giant bulk of the earth;\nbut Tamerlane and all his shaggy legions, that swept over the East like\na hurricane, have passed away, and become shadows; while printing, the\nwonderful invention of John Faust, the boy of Mentz, has exerted a\ngreater influence on man's destinies and overturned more thrones and\ndynasties than all the victories of all the blood-stained conquerors\nfrom Nimrod to Napoleon.\n\nLong ages ago, the Temple built by Solomon and our Ancient Brethren sank\ninto ruin, when the Assyrian Armies sacked Jerusalem. The Holy City is a\nmass of hovels cowering under the dominion of the Crescent; and the Holy\nLand is a desert. The Kings of Egypt and Assyria, who were\ncontemporaries of Solomon, are forgotten, and their histories mere\nfables. The Ancient Orient is a shattered wreck, bleaching on the shores\nof Time. The Wolf and the Jackal howl among the ruins of Thebes and of\nTyre, and the sculptured images of the Temples and Palaces of Babylon\nand Nineveh are dug from their ruins and carried into strange lands. But\nthe quiet and peaceful Order, of which the Son of a poor Ph\u0153nician Widow\nwas one of the Grand Masters, with the Kings of Israel and Tyre, has\ncontinued to increase in stature and influence, defying the angry waves\nof time and the storms of persecution. Age has not weakened its wide\nfoundations nor shattered its columns, nor marred the beauty of its\nharmonious proportions. Where rude barbarians, in the time of Solomon,\npeopled inhospitable howling wildernesses, in France and Britain, and in\nthat New World, not known to Jew or Gentile, until the glories of the\nOrient had faded, that Order has builded new Temples, and teaches to\nits millions of Initiates those lessons of peace, good-will, and\ntoleration, of reliance on God and confidence in man, which it learned\nwhen Hebrew and Giblemite worked side by side on the slopes of Lebanon,\nand the Servant of Jehovah and the Ph\u0153nician Worshipper of Bel sat with\nthe humble artisan in Council at Jerusalem.\n\nIt is the Dead that govern. The Living only obey. And if the Soul sees,\nafter death, what passes on this earth, and watches over the welfare of\nthose it loves, then must its greatest happiness consist in seeing the\ncurrent of its beneficent influences widening out from age to age, as\nrivulets widen into rivers, and aiding to shape the destinies of\nindividuals, families, States, the World; and its bitterest punishment,\nin seeing its evil influences causing mischief and misery, and cursing\nand afflicting men, long after the frame it dwelt in has become dust,\nand when both name and memory are forgotten.\n\nWe know not who among the Dead control our destinies. The universal\nhuman race is linked and bound together by those influences and\nsympathies, which in the truest sense do make men's fates. Humanity is\nthe unit, of which the man is but a fraction. What other men in the Past\nhave done, said, thought, makes the great iron network of circumstance\nthat environs and controls us all. We take our faith on trust. We think\nand believe as the Old Lords of Thought command us; and Reason is\npowerless before Authority.\n\nWe would make or annul a particular contract; but the Thoughts of the\ndead Judges of England, living when their ashes have been cold for\ncenturies, stand between us and that which we would do, and utterly\nforbid it. We would settle our estate in a particular way; but the\nprohibition of the English Parliament, its uttered Thought when the\nfirst or second Edward reigned, comes echoing down the long avenues of\ntime, and tells us we shall not exercise the power of disposition as we\nwish. We would gain a particular advantage of another; and the thought\nof the old Roman lawyer who died before Justinian, or that of Rome's\ngreat orator Cicero, annihilates the act, or makes the intention\nineffectual. This act, Moses forbids; that, Alfred. We would sell our\nland; but certain marks on a perishable paper tell us that our father or\nremote ancestor ordered otherwise; and the arm of the dead, emerging\nfrom the grave, with peremptory gesture prohibits the alienation. About\nto sin or err, the thought or wish of our dead mother, told us when we\nwere children, by words that died upon the air in the utterance, and\nmany a long year were forgotten, flashes on our memory, and holds us\nback with a power that is resistless.\n\nThus we obey the dead; and thus shall the living, when we are dead, for\nweal or woe, obey _us_. The Thoughts of the Past are the Laws of the\nPresent and the Future. That which we say and do if its effects last not\nbeyond our lives, is unimportant. That which shall live when we are\ndead, as part of the great body of law enacted by the dead, is the only\nact worth doing, the only Thought worth speaking. The desire to do\nsomething that shall benefit the world, when neither praise nor obloquy\nwill reach us where we sleep soundly in the grave, is the noblest\nambition entertained by man.\n\nIt is the ambition of a true and genuine Mason. Knowing the slow\nprocesses by which the Deity brings about great results, he does not\nexpect to reap as well as sow, in a single lifetime. It is the\ninflexible fate and noblest destiny, with rare exceptions, of the great\nand good, to work, and let others reap the harvest of their labors. He\nwho does good, only to be repaid in kind, or in thanks and gratitude, or\nin reputation and the world's praise, is like him who loans his money,\nthat he may, after certain months, receive it back with interest. To be\nrepaid for eminent services with slander, obloquy, or ridicule, or at\nbest with stupid indifference or cold ingratitude, as it is common, so\nit is no misfortune, except to those who lack the wit to see or sense to\nappreciate the service, or the nobility of soul to thank and reward with\neulogy, the benefactor of his kind. His influences live, and the great\nFuture will obey; whether it recognize or disown the lawgiver.\n\nMiltiades was fortunate that he was exiled; and Aristides that he was\nostracized, because men wearied of hearing him called \"The Just.\" Not\nthe Redeemer was unfortunate; but those only who repaid Him for the\ninestimable gift He offered them, and for a life passed in toiling for\ntheir good, by nailing Him upon the cross, as though He had been a slave\nor malefactor. The persecutor dies and rots, and Posterity utters his\nname with execration, but his victim's memory he has unintentionally\nmade glorious and immortal.\n\nIf not for slander and persecution, the Mason who would benefit his\nrace must look for apathy and cold indifference in those whose good he\nseeks, in those who ought to seek the good of others. Except when the\nsluggish depths of the Human Mind are broken up and tossed as with a\nstorm, when at the appointed time a great Reformer comes, and a new\nFaith springs up and grows with supernatural energy, the progress of\nTruth is slower than the growth of oaks; and he who plants need not\nexpect to gather. The Redeemer, at His death, had twelve disciples, and\none betrayed and one deserted and denied Him. It is enough for us to\nknow that the fruit will come in its due season. When, or who shall\ngather it, it does not in the least concern us to know. It is our\nbusiness to plant the seed. It is God's right to give the fruit to whom\nHe pleases; and if not to us, then is our action by so much the more\nnoble.\n\nTo sow, that others may reap; to work and plant for those who are to\noccupy the earth when we are dead; to project our influences far into\nthe future, and live beyond our time; to rule as the Kings of Thought,\nover men who are yet unborn; to bless with the glorious gifts of Truth\nand Light and Liberty those who will neither know the name of the giver,\nnor care in what grave his unregarded ashes repose, is the true office\nof a Mason and the proudest destiny of a man.\n\nAll the great and beneficent operations of Nature are produced by slow\nand often imperceptible degrees. The work of destruction and devastation\nonly is violent and rapid. The Volcano and the Earthquake, the Tornado\nand the Avalanche, leap suddenly into full life and fearful energy, and\nsmite with an unexpected blow. Vesuvius buried Pompeii and Herculaneum\nin a night; and Lisbon fell prostrate before God in a breath, when the\nearth rocked and shuddered; the Alpine village vanishes and is erased at\none bound of the avalanche; and the ancient forests fall like grass\nbefore the mower, when the tornado leaps upon them. Pestilence slays its\nthousands in a day; and the storm in a night strews the sand with\nshattered navies.\n\nThe Gourd of the Prophet Jonah grew up, and was withered, in a night.\nBut many years ago, before the Norman Conqueror stamped his mailed foot\non the neck of prostrate Saxon England, some wandering barbarian, of the\ncontinent then unknown to the world, in mere idleness, with hand or\nfoot, covered an acorn with a little earth, and passed on regardless, on\nhis journey to the dim Past. He died and was forgotten; but the acorn\nlay there still, the mighty force within it acting in the darkness. A\ntender shoot stole gently up; and fed by the light and air and frequent\ndews put forth its little leaves, and lived, because the elk or buffalo\nchanced not to place his foot upon and crush it. The years marched\nonward, and the shoot became a sapling, and its green leaves went and\ncame with Spring and Autumn. And still the years came and passed away\nagain, and William, the Norman Bastard, parcelled England out among his\nBarons, and still the sapling grew, and the dews fed its leaves, and the\nbirds builded their nests among its small limbs for many generations.\nAnd still the years came and went, and the Indian hunter slept in the\nshade of the sapling, and Richard Lion-Heart fought at Acre and Ascalon,\nand John's bold Barons wrested from him the Great Charter; and lo! the\nsapling had become a tree; and still it grew, and thrust its great arms\nwider abroad, and lifted its head still higher toward the Heavens;\nstrong-rooted, and defiant of the storms that roared and eddied through\nits branches; and when Columbus ploughed with his keels the unknown\nWestern Atlantic, and Cortez and Pizarro bathed the cross in blood; and\nthe Puritan, the Huguenot, the Cavalier, and the follower of Penn sought\na refuge and a resting-place beyond the ocean, the Great Oak still\nstood, firm-rooted, vigorous, stately, haughtily domineering over all\nthe forest, heedless of all the centuries that had hurried past since\nthe wild Indian planted the little acorn in the forest;--a stout and\nhale old tree, with wide circumference shading many a rood of ground;\nand fit to furnish timbers for a ship, to carry the thunders of the\nGreat Republic's guns around the world. And yet, if one had sat and\nwatched it every instant, from the moment when the feeble shoot first\npushed its way to the light until the eagles built among its branches,\nhe would never have seen the tree or sapling _grow_.\n\nMany long centuries ago, before the Chald\u00e6an Shepherds watched the\nStars, or Shufu built the Pyramids, one could have sailed in a\nseventy-four where now a thousand islands gem the surface of the Indian\nOcean; and the deep-sea lead would nowhere have found any bottom. But\nbelow these waves were myriads upon myriads, beyond the power of\nArithmetic to number, of minute existences, each a perfect living\ncreature, made by the Almighty Creator, and fashioned by Him for the\nwork it had to do. There they toiled beneath the waters, each doing its\nallotted work, and wholly ignorant of the result which God intended.\nThey lived and died, incalculable in numbers and almost infinite in the\nsuccession of their generations, each adding his mite to the gigantic\nwork that went on there under God's direction. Thus hath He chosen to\ncreate great Continents and Islands; and still the coral-insects live\nand work, as when they made the rocks that underlie the valley of the\nOhio.\n\nThus God hath chosen to create. Where now is firm land, once chafed and\nthundered the great primeval ocean. For ages upon ages the minute\nshields of infinite myriads of infusoria, and the stony stems of\nencrinites sunk into its depths, and there, under the vast pressure of\nits waters, hardened into limestone. Raised slowly from the Profound by\nHis hand, its quarries underlie the soil of all the continents, hundreds\nof feet in thickness; and we, of these remains of the countless dead,\nbuild tombs and palaces, as the Egyptians, whom we call ancient, built\ntheir pyramids.\n\nOn all the broad lakes and oceans the Great Sun looks earnestly and\nlovingly, and the invisible vapors rise ever up to meet him. No eye but\nGod's beholds them as they rise. There, in the upper atmosphere, they\nare condensed to mist, and gather into clouds, and float and swim around\nin the ambient air. They sail with its currents, and hover over the\nocean, and roll in huge masses round the stony shoulders of great\nmountains. Condensed still more by change of temperature, they drop upon\nthe thirsty earth in gentle showers, or pour upon it in heavy rains, or\nstorm against its bosom at the angry Equinoctial. The shower, the rain,\nand the storm pass away, the clouds vanish, and the bright stars again\nshine clearly upon the glad earth. The rain-drops sink into the ground,\nand gather in subterranean reservoirs, and run in subterranean channels,\nand bubble up in springs and fountains; and from the mountain-sides and\nheads of valleys the silver threads of water begin their long journey to\nthe ocean. Uniting, they widen into brooks and rivulets, then into\nstreams and rivers; and, at last, a Nile, a Ganges, a Danube, an Amazon,\nor a Mississippi rolls between its banks, mighty, majestic, and\nresistless, creating vast alluvial valleys to be the granaries of the\nworld, ploughed by the thousand keels of commerce and serving as great\nhighways, and as the impassable boundaries of rival nations; ever\nreturning to the ocean the drops that rose from it in vapor, and\ndescended in rain and snow and hail upon the level plains and lofty\nmountains; and causing him to recoil for many a mile before the\nheadlong rush of their great tide.\n\nSo it is with the aggregate of Human endeavor. As the invisible\nparticles of vapor combine and coalesce to form the mists and clouds\nthat fall in rain on thirsty continents, and bless the great green\nforests and wide grassy prairies, the waving meadows and the fields by\nwhich men live; as the infinite myriads of drops that the glad earth\ndrinks are gathered into springs and rivulets and rivers, to aid in\nlevelling the mountains and elevating the plains and to feed the large\nlakes and restless oceans; so all Human Thought, and Speech and Action,\nall that is done and said and thought and suffered upon the Earth\ncombine together, and flow onward in one broad resistless current toward\nthose great results to which they are determined by the will of God.\n\nWe build slowly and destroy swiftly. Our Ancient Brethren who built the\nTemples at Jerusalem, with many myriad blows felled, hewed, and squared\nthe cedars, and quarried the stones, and carved the intricate ornaments,\nwhich were to be the Temples. Stone after stone, by the combined effort\nand long toil of Apprentice, Fellow-Craft, and Master, the walls arose;\nslowly the roof was framed and fashioned; and many years elapsed before,\nat length, the Houses stood finished, all fit and ready for the Worship\nof God, gorgeous in the sunny splendors of the atmosphere of Palestine.\nSo they were built. A single motion of the arm of a rude, barbarous\nAssyrian Spearman, or drunken Roman or Gothic Legionary of Titus, moved\nby a senseless impulse of the brutal will, flung in the blazing brand;\nand, with no further human agency, a few short hours sufficed to consume\nand melt each Temple to a smoking mass of black unsightly ruin.\n\nBe patient, therefore, my Brother, and wait!\n\n    _The issues are with God: To do,\n     Of right belongs to us._\n\nTherefore faint not, nor be weary in well-doing! Be not discouraged at\nmen's apathy, nor disgusted with their follies, nor tired of their\nindifference! Care not for returns and results; but see only what there\nis to do, and do it, leaving the results to God! Soldier of the Cross!\nSworn Knight of Justice, Truth, and Toleration! Good Knight and True! be\npatient and work!\n\nThe Apocalypse, that sublime Kabalistic and prophetic Summary of all\nthe occult figures, divides its images into three Septenaries, after\neach of which there is silence in Heaven. There are Seven Seals to be\nopened, that is to say, Seven mysteries to know, and Seven difficulties\nto overcome, Seven trumpets to sound, and Seven cups to empty.\n\nThe Apocalypse is, to those who receive the nineteenth Degree, the\nApotheosis of that Sublime Faith which aspires to God alone, and\ndespises all the pomps and works of Lucifer. LUCIFER, the\n_Light-bearer!_ Strange and mysterious name to give to the Spirit of\nDarkness! Lucifer, the Son of the Morning! Is it _he_ who bears the\n_Light_, and with its splendors intolerable blinds feeble, sensual, or\nselfish Souls? Doubt it not! for traditions are full of Divine\nRevelations and Inspirations: and Inspiration is not of one Age nor of\none Creed. Plato and Philo, also, were inspired.\n\nThe Apocalypse, indeed, is a book as obscure as the Sohar.\n\nIt is written hieroglyphically with numbers and images; and the Apostle\noften appeals to the intelligence of the Initiated. \"Let him who hath\nknowledge, understand! let him who understands, calculate!\" he often\nsays, after an allegory or the mention of a number. Saint John, the\nfavorite Apostle, and the Depositary of all the Secrets of the Saviour,\ntherefore did not write to be understood by the multitude.\n\nThe Sephar Yezirah, the Sohar, and the Apocalypse are the completest\nembodiments of Occultism. They contain more meanings than words; their\nexpressions are figurative as poetry and exact as numbers. The\nApocalypse sums up, completes, and surpasses all the Science of Abraham\nand of Solomon. The visions of Ezekiel, by the river Chebar, and of the\nnew Symbolic Temple, are equally mysterious expressions, veiled by\nfigures of the enigmatic dogmas of the Kabalah, and their symbols are as\nlittle understood by the Commentators, as those of Free Masonry.\n\nThe Septenary is the Crown of the Numbers, because it unites the\nTriangle of the Idea to the Square of the Form.\n\nThe more the great Hierophants were at pains to conceal their absolute\nScience, the more they sought to add grandeur to and multiply its\nsymbols. The huge pyramids, with their triangular sides of elevation and\nsquare bases, represented their Metaphysics, founded upon the knowledge\nof Nature. That knowledge of Nature had for its symbolic key the\ngigantic form of that huge Sphinx, which has hollowed its deep bed in\nthe sand, while keeping watch at the feet of the Pyramids. The Seven\ngrand monuments called the Wonders of the World, were the magnificent\nCommentaries on the Seven lines that composed the Pyramids, and on the\nSeven mystic gates of Thebes.\n\nThe Septenary philosophy of Initiation among the Ancients may be summed\nup thus:\n\nThree Absolute Principles which are but One Principle: four elementary\nforms which are but one; all forming a Single Whole, compounded of the\nIdea and the Form.\n\nThe three Principles were these:\n\n1\u00ba. BEING IS BEING.\n\nIn Philosophy, identity of the Idea and of Being or Verity; in Religion,\nthe first Principle, THE FATHER.\n\n2\u00ba. BEING IS REAL.\n\nIn Philosophy, identity of Knowing and of Being or Reality; in Religion,\nthe LOCOS of Plato, the _Demiourgos_, the WORD.\n\n3\u00ba. BEING IS LOGIC.\n\nIn Philosophy, identity of the Reason and Reality; in Religion,\nProvidence, the Divine Action that makes real the Good, that which in\nChristianity we call THE HOLY SPIRIT.\n\nThe _union_ of all the Seven colors is the _White_, the analogous symbol\nof the GOOD: the _absence_ of all is the _Black_, the analogous symbol\nof the EVIL. There are three primary colors, _Red_, _Yellow_, and\n_Blue_; and four secondary, _Orange_, _Green_, _Indigo_, and _Violet_;\nand all these God displays to man in the rainbow; and they have their\nanalogies also in the moral and intellectual world. The same number,\n_Seven_, continually reappears in the Apocalypse, compounded of _three_\nand _four_; and these numbers relate to the last Seven of the Sephiroth,\nthree answering to BENIGNITY or MERCY, SEVERITY or JUSTICE, and BEAUTY\nor HARMONY; and four to _Netzach_, _H\u014dd_, _Yes\u014dd_, and _Malakoth_,\nVICTORY, GLORY, STABILITY, and DOMINATION. The same numbers also\nrepresent the _first_ three Sephiroth, KETHER, KHOKMAH, and BAINAH, or\n_Will_, _Wisdom_, and _Understanding_, which, with DAATH or\n_Intellection_ or _Thought_, are also four, DAATH not being regarded as\na Sephirah, not as the Deity acting, or as a potency, energy, or\nattribute, but as the Divine Action.\n\nThe Sephiroth are commonly figured in the Kabalah as constituting a\nhuman form, the ADAM KADMON or MACROCOSM. Thus arranged, the universal\nlaw of Equipoise is three times exemplified. From that of the Divine\nIntellectual, Active, Masculine ENERGY, and the Passive CAPACITY to\nproduce Thought, the action of THINKING results. From that of BENIGNITY\nand SEVERITY, HARMONY flows; and from that of VICTORY or an Infinite\novercoming, and GLORY, which, being Infinite, would seem to forbid the\nexistence of obstacles or opposition, results STABILITY or PERMANENCE,\nwhich is the perfect DOMINION of the Infinite WILL.\n\nThe last nine Sephiroth are included in, at the same time that they have\nflowed forth from, the first of all, KETHER, or the CROWN. Each also, in\nsuccession flowed from, and yet still remains included in, the one\npreceding it. The Will of God _includes_ His Wisdom, and His Wisdom _is_\nHis Will specially developed and acting. This Wisdom is the LOGOS that\ncreates, mistaken and personified by Simon Magus and the succeeding\nGnostics. By means of its utterance, the letter Y\u014cD, it creates the\nworlds, first in the Divine Intellect as an Idea, which invested with\nform became the fabricated World, the Universe of material reality. Y\u014cD\nand HE, two letters of the Ineffable Name of the Manifested Deity,\nrepresent the Male and the Female, the Active and the Passive in\nEquilibrium, and the VAV completes the Trinity and the Triliteral Name\n[Hebrew: \u05d9\u05d4\u05d5], the Divine Triangle, which with the repetition of the\n_He_ becomes the Tetragrammaton.\n\nThus the ten Sephiroth contain all the Sacred Numbers, _three_, _five_,\n_seven_, and _nine_, and the perfect Number _Ten_, and correspond with\nthe Tetractys of Pythagoras.\n\nBEING IS BEING, [Hebrew: \u05d0\u05d4\u05d9\u05d4 \u05d0\u05e9\u05e8 \u05d0\u05d4\u05d9\u05d4], _Ahayah Asar Ahayah_. This is\nthe Principle, the \"BEGINNING.\"\n\nIn the Beginning was, that is to say, IS, WAS, and WILL BE, the WORD,\nthat is to say, the REASON that _Speaks_.\n\n\u0395\u03bd \u03b1\u03c1\u03c7\u03b7 \u03b7\u03bd \u038c \u039b\u03bf\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2!\n\nThe Word is the reason of belief, and in it also is the expression of\nthe Faith which makes Science a living thing. The Word, \u039b\u03bf\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2, is the\nSource of Logic. Jesus is the Word Incarnate. The accord of the Reason\nwith Faith, of Knowledge with Belief, of Authority with Liberty, has\nbecome in modern times the veritable enigma of the Sphinx.\n\nIt is WISDOM that, in the Kabalistic Books of the Proverbs and\nEcclesiasticus, is the Creative Agent of God. Elsewhere in the Hebrew\nwritings it is [Hebrew: \u05d3\u05d1\u05e8 \u05d9\u05d4\u05d5\u05d4], _Debar Iahavah_, the Word of God. It\nis by His uttered Word that God reveals Himself to us; not alone in the\nvisible and invisible but intellectual creation, but also in our\nconvictions, consciousness, and instincts. Hence it is that certain\nbeliefs are universal. The conviction of all men that God is good led to\na belief in a Devil, the fallen _Lucifer_ or _Light-bearer_, Shaitan the\nAdversary, Ahriman and Tuph\u014dn, as an attempt to explain the existence of\nEvil, and make it consistent with the Infinite Power, Wisdom, and\nBenevolence of God.\n\nNothing surpasses and nothing equals, as a Summary of all the doctrines\nof the Old World, those brief words engraven by HERMES on a Stone, and\nknown under the name of \"_The Tablet of Emerald_:\" the Unity of Being\nand the Unity of the Harmonies, ascending and descending, the\nprogressive and proportional scale of the Word; the immutable law of the\nEquilibrium, and the proportioned progress of the universal analogies;\nthe relation of the Idea to the Word, giving the measure of the relation\nbetween the Creator and the Created, the necessary mathematics of the\nInfinite, proved by the measures of a single corner of the Finite;--all\nthis is expressed by this single proposition of the Great Egyptian\nHierophant:\n\n_\"What is Superior is as that which is Inferior, and what is Below is as\nthat which is Above, to form the Marvels of the Unity.\"_\n\n\n\n\nXX.\n\nGRAND MASTER OF ALL SYMBOLIC LODGES.\n\n\nThe true Mason is a practical Philosopher, who, under religious emblems,\nin all ages adopted by wisdom, builds upon plans traced by nature and\nreason the moral edifice of knowledge. He ought to find, in the\nsymmetrical relation of all the parts of this rational edifice, the\nprinciple and rule of all his duties, the source of all his pleasures.\nHe improves his moral nature, becomes a better man, and finds in the\nreunion of virtuous men, assembled with pure views, the means of\nmultiplying his acts of beneficence. Masonry and Philosophy, without\nbeing one and the same thing, have the same object, and propose to\nthemselves the same end, the worship of the Grand Architect of the\nUniverse, acquaintance and familiarity with the wonders of nature, and\nthe happiness of humanity attained by the constant practice of all the\nvirtues.\n\nAs Grand Master of all Symbolic Lodges, it is your especial duty to aid\nin restoring Masonry to its primitive purity. You have become an\ninstructor. Masonry long wandered in error. Instead of improving, it\ndegenerated from its primitive simplicity, and retrograded toward a\nsystem, distorted by stupidity and ignorance, which, unable to construct\na beautiful machine, made a complicated one. Less than two hundred years\nago, its organization was simple, and altogether moral, its emblems,\nallegories, and ceremonies easy to be understood, and their purpose and\nobject readily to be seen. It was then confined to a very small number\nof Degrees. Its constitutions were like those of a Society of Essenes,\nwritten in the first century of our era. There could be seen the\nprimitive Christianity, organized into Masonry, the school of Pythagoras\nwithout incongruities or absurdities; a Masonry simple and significant,\nin which it was not necessary to torture the mind to discover reasonable\ninterpretations; a Masonry at once religious and philosophical, worthy\nof a good citizen and an enlightened philanthropist.\n\nInnovators and inventors overturned that primitive simplicity.\nIgnorance engaged in the work of making Degrees, and trifles and gewgaws\nand pretended mysteries, absurd or hideous, usurped the place of Masonic\nTruth. The picture of a horrid vengeance, the poniard and the bloody\nhead, appeared in the peaceful Temple of Masonry, without sufficient\nexplanation of their symbolic meaning. Oaths out of all proportion with\ntheir object, shocked the candidate, and then became ridiculous, and\nwere wholly disregarded. Acolytes were exposed to tests, and compelled\nto perform acts, which, if real, would have been abominable; but being\nmere chimeras, were preposterous, and excited contempt and laughter\nonly. Eight hundred Degrees of one kind and another were invented:\nInfidelity and even Jesuitry were taught under the mask of Masonry. The\nrituals even of the respectable Degrees, copied and mutilated by\nignorant men, became nonsensical and trivial; and the words so corrupted\nthat it has hitherto been found impossible to recover many of them at\nall. Candidates were made to degrade themselves, and to submit to\ninsults not tolerable to a man of spirit and honor.\n\nHence it was that, practically, the largest portion of the Degrees\nclaimed by the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite, and before it by the\nRite of Perfection, fell into disuse, were merely communicated, and\ntheir rituals became jejune and insignificant. These Rites resembled\nthose old palaces and baronial castles, the different parts of which,\nbuilt at different periods remote from one another, upon plans and\naccording to tastes that greatly varied, formed a discordant and\nincongruous whole. Judaism and chivalry, superstition and philosophy,\nphilanthropy and insane hatred and longing for vengeance, a pure\nmorality and unjust and illegal revenge, were found strangely mated and\nstanding hand in hand within the Temples of Peace and Concord; and the\nwhole system was one grotesque commingling of incongruous things, of\ncontrasts and contradictions, of shocking and fantastic extravagances,\nof parts repugnant to good taste, and fine conceptions overlaid and\ndisfigured by absurdities engendered by ignorance, fanaticism, and a\nsenseless mysticism.\n\nAn empty and sterile pomp, impossible indeed to be carried out, and to\nwhich no meaning whatever was attached, with far-fetched explanations\nthat were either so many stupid platitudes or themselves needed an\ninterpreter; lofty titles, arbitrarily assumed, and to which the\ninventors had not condescended to attach any explanation that should\nacquit them of the folly of assuming temporal rank, power, and titles of\nnobility, made the world laugh, and the Initiate feel ashamed.\n\nSome of these titles we retain; but they have with us meanings entirely\nconsistent with that Spirit of Equality which is the foundation and\nperemptory law of its being of all Masonry. The _Knight_, with us, is he\nwho devotes his hand, his heart, his brain, to the Science of Masonry,\nand professes himself the Sworn Soldier of Truth: the Prince is he who\naims to be _Chief [Princeps]_, _first_, _leader_, among his equals, in\nvirtue and good deeds: the _Sovereign_ is he who, one of an order whose\nmembers are all Sovereigns, is Supreme only because the law and\nconstitutions are so, which he administers, and by which he, like every\nother brother, is governed. The titles, _Puissant_, _Potent_, _Wise_,\nand _Venerable_, indicate that power of Virtue, Intelligence, and\nWisdom, which those ought to strive to attain who are placed in high\noffice by the suffrages of their brethren: and all our other titles and\ndesignations have an esoteric meaning, consistent with modesty and\nequality, and which those who receive them should fully understand. As\nMaster of a Lodge it is your duty to instruct your Brethren that they\nare all so many constant lessons, teaching the lofty qualifications\nwhich are required of those who claim them, and not merely idle gewgaws\nworn in ridiculous imitation of the times when the Nobles and Priests\nwere masters and the people slaves: and that, in all true Masonry, the\nKnight, the Pontiff, the Prince, and the Sovereign are but the first\namong their equals: and the cordon, the clothing, and the jewel but\nsymbols and emblems of the virtues required of all good Masons.\n\nThe Mason kneels, no longer to present his petition for admittance or to\nreceive the answer, no longer to a man as his superior, who is but his\nbrother, but to his God; to whom he appeals for the rectitude of his\nintentions, and whose aid he asks to enable him to keep his vows. No one\nis degraded by bending his knee to God at the altar, or to receive the\nhonor of Knighthood as Bayard and Du Guesclin knelt. To kneel for other\npurposes, Masonry does not require. God gave to man a head to be borne\nerect, a port upright and majestic. We assemble in our Temples to\ncherish and inculcate sentiments that conform to that loftiness of\nbearing which the just and upright man is entitled to maintain, and we\ndo not require those who desire to be admitted among us, ignominiously\nto bow the head. We respect man, because we respect ourselves that he\nmay conceive a lofty idea of his dignity as a human being free and\nindependent. If modesty is a virtue, humility and obsequiousness to man\nare base: for there is a noble pride which is the most real and solid\nbasis of virtue. Man should humble himself before the Infinite God; but\nnot before his erring and imperfect brother.\n\nAs Master of a Lodge, you will therefore be exceedingly careful that no\nCandidate, in any Degree, be required to submit to any degradation\nwhatever; as has been too much the custom in some of the Degrees: and\ntake it as a certain and inflexible rule, to which there is _no_\nexception, that real Masonry requires of no man anything to which a\nKnight and Gentleman cannot honorably, and without feeling outraged or\nhumiliated submit.\n\nThe Supreme Council for the Southern Jurisdiction of the United States\nat length undertook the indispensable and long-delayed task of revising\nand reforming the work and rituals of the thirty Degrees under its\njurisdiction. Retaining the essentials of the Degrees and all the means\nby which the members recognize one another, it has sought out and\ndeveloped the leading idea of each Degree, rejected the puerilities and\nabsurdities with which many of them were disfigured, and made of them a\nconnected system of moral, religious, and philosophical instruction.\nSectarian of no creed, it has yet thought it not improper to use the old\nallegories, based on occurrences detailed in the Hebrew and Christian\nbooks, and drawn from the Ancient Mysteries of Egypt, Persia, Greece,\nIndia, the Druids and the Essenes, as vehicles to communicate the Great\nMasonic Truths; as it has used the legends of the Crusades, and the\nceremonies of the orders of Knighthood.\n\nIt no longer inculcates a criminal and wicked vengeance. It has not\nallowed Masonry to play the assassin: to avenge the death either of\nHiram, of Charles the 1st, or of Jacques De Molay and the Templars. The\nAncient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Masonry has now become, what\nMasonry at first was meant to be, a Teacher of Great Truths, inspired by\nan upright and enlightened reason, a firm and constant wisdom, and an\naffectionate and liberal philanthropy.\n\nIt is no longer a system, over the composition and arrangement of the\ndifferent parts of which, want of reflection, chance, ignorance, and\nperhaps motives still more ignoble presided; a system unsuited to our\nhabits, our manners, our ideas, or the world-wide philanthropy and\nuniversal toleration of Masonry; or to bodies small in number, whose\nrevenues should be devoted to the relief of the unfortunate, and not to\nempty show; no longer a heterogeneous aggregate of Degrees, shocking by\nits anachronisms and contradictions, powerless to disseminate light,\ninformation, and moral and philosophical ideas.\n\nAs Master, you will teach those who are under you, and to whom you will\nowe your office, that the decorations of many of the Degrees are to be\ndispensed with, whenever the expense would interfere with the duties of\ncharity, relief, and benevolence; and to be indulged in only by wealthy\nbodies that will thereby do no wrong to those entitled to their\nassistance. The essentials of all the Degrees may be procured at slight\nexpense; and it is at the option of every Brother to procure or not to\nprocure, as he pleases, the dress, decorations, and jewels of any Degree\nother than the 14th, 18th, 30th, and 32d.\n\nWe teach the truth of none of the legends we recite. They are to us but\nparables and allegories, involving and enveloping Masonic instruction;\nand vehicles of useful and interesting information. They represent the\ndifferent phases of the human mind, its efforts and struggles to\ncomprehend nature, God, the government of the Universe, the permitted\nexistence of sorrow and evil. To teach us wisdom, and the folly of\nendeavoring to explain to ourselves that which we are not capable of\nunderstanding, we reproduce the speculations of the Philosophers, the\nKabalists, the Mystagogues and the Gnostics. Every one being at liberty\nto apply our symbols and emblems as he thinks most consistent with truth\nand reason and with his own faith, we give them such an interpretation\nonly as may be accepted by all. Our Degrees may be conferred in France\nor Turkey, at Pekin, Ispah\u00e0n, Rome, or Geneva, in the city of Penn or in\nCatholic Louisiana, upon the subject of an absolute government or the\ncitizen of a Free State, upon Sectarian or Theist. To honor the Deity,\nto regard all men as our Brethren, as children, equally dear to Him, of\nthe Supreme Creator of the Universe, and to make himself useful to\nsociety and himself by his labor, are its teachings to its Initiates in\nall the Degrees.\n\nPreacher of Liberty, Fraternity, and Equality, it desires them to be\nattained by making men fit to receive them, and by the moral power of an\nintelligent and enlightened People. It lays no plots and conspiracies.\nIt hatches no premature revolutions; it encourages no people to revolt\nagainst the constituted authorities; but recognizing the great truth\nthat freedom follows fitness for freedom as the corollary follows the\naxiom, it strives to _prepare_ men to govern themselves.\n\nWhere domestic slavery exists, it teaches the master humanity and the\nalleviation of the condition of his slave, and moderate correction and\ngentle discipline; as it teaches them to the master of the apprentice:\nand as it teaches to the employers of other men, in mines,\nmanufactories, and workshops, consideration and humanity for those who\ndepend upon their labor for their bread, and to whom want of employment\nis starvation, and overwork is fever, consumption, and death.\n\nAs Master of a Lodge, you are to inculcate these duties on your\nbrethren. Teach the employed to be honest, punctual, and faithful as\nwell as respectful and obedient to all proper orders: but also teach the\nemployer that every man or woman who desires to work, has a right to\nhave work to do; and that they, and those who from sickness or\nfeebleness, loss of limb or of bodily vigor, old age or infancy, are not\nable to work, have a right to be fed, clothed, and sheltered from the\ninclement elements: that he commits an awful sin against Masonry and in\nthe sight of God, if he closes his workshops or factories, or ceases to\nwork his mines, when they do not yield him what he regards as sufficient\nprofit, and so dismisses his workmen and workwomen to starve; or when he\nreduces the wages of man or woman to so low a standard that they and\ntheir families cannot be clothed and fed and comfortably housed; or by\noverwork must give him their blood and life in exchange for the pittance\nof their wages: and that his duty as a Mason and Brother peremptorily\nrequires him to continue to employ those who else will be pinched with\nhunger and cold, or resort to theft and vice: and to pay them fair\nwages, though it may reduce or annul his profits or even eat into his\ncapital; for God hath but loaned him his wealth, and made him His\nalmoner and agent to invest it.\n\nExcept, as mere symbols of the moral virtues and intellectual qualities,\nthe tools and implements of Masonry belong exclusively to the first\nthree Degrees. They also, however, serve to remind the Mason who has\nadvanced further, that his new rank is based upon the humble labors of\nthe symbolic Degrees, as they are improperly termed, inasmuch as all the\nDegrees are symbolic.\n\nThus the Initiates are inspired with a just idea of Masonry, to wit,\nthat it is essentially WORK; both teaching and practising LABOR; and\nthat it is altogether emblematic. Three kinds of work are necessary to\nthe preservation and protection of man and society: manual labor,\nspecially belonging to the three blue Degrees; labor in arms, symbolized\nby the Knightly or chivalric Degrees; and intellectual labor, belonging\nparticularly to the Philosophical Degrees.\n\nWe have preserved and multiplied such emblems as have a true and\nprofound meaning. We reject many of the old and senseless explanations.\nWe have not reduced Masonry to a cold metaphysics that exiles everything\nbelonging to the domain of the imagination. The ignorant, and those\n_half_-wise, in reality, but _over_-wise in their own conceit, may\nassail our symbols with sarcasms; but they are nevertheless ingenious\nveils that cover the Truth, respected by all who know the means by which\nthe heart of man is reached and his feelings enlisted. The Great\nMoralists often had recourse to allegories, in order to instruct men\nwithout repelling them. But we have been careful not to allow our\nemblems to be too obscure, so as to require far-fetched and forced\ninterpretations. In our days, and in the enlightened land in which we\nlive, we do not need to wrap ourselves in veils so strange and\nimpenetrable, as to prevent or hinder instruction instead of furthering\nit; or to induce the suspicion that we have concealed meanings which we\ncommunicate only to the most reliable adepts, because they are contrary\nto good order or the well-being of society.\n\nThe Duties of the Class of _Instructors_, that is, the Masons of the\nDegrees from the 4th to the 8th, inclusive, are, particularly, to\nperfect the younger Masons in the words, signs and tokens and other work\nof the Degrees they have received; to explain to them the meaning of the\ndifferent emblems, and to expound the moral instruction which they\nconvey. And upon their report of proficiency alone can their pupils be\nallowed to advance and receive an increase of wages.\n\n_The Directors of the Work_, or those of the 9th, 10th, and 11th Degrees\nare to report to the Chapters upon the regularity, activity and proper\ndirection of the work of bodies in the lower Degrees, and what is needed\nto be enacted for their prosperity and usefulness. In the Symbolic\nLodges, they are particularly charged to stimulate the zeal of the\nworkmen, to induce them to engage in new labors and enterprises for the\ngood of Masonry, their country and mankind, and to give them fraternal\nadvice when they fall short of their duty; or, in cases that require it,\nto invoke against them the rigor of Masonic law.\n\n_The Architects_, or those of the 12th, 13th, and 14th, should be\nselected from none but Brothers well instructed in the preceding\nDegrees; zealous, and capable of discoursing upon that Masonry;\nillustrating it, and discussing the simple questions of moral\nphilosophy. And one of them, at every communication, should be prepared\nwith a lecture, communicating useful knowledge or giving good advice to\nthe Brethren.\n\n_The Knights_, of the 15th and 16th Degrees, wear the sword. They are\nbound to prevent and repair, as far as may be in their power, all\ninjustice, both in the world and in Masonry; to protect the weak and to\nbring oppressors to justice. Their works and lectures must be in this\nspirit. They should inquire whether Masonry fulfills, as far as it ought\nand can, its principal purpose, which is to succor the unfortunate. That\nit may do so, they should prepare propositions to be offered in the Blue\nLodges calculated to attain that end, to put an end to abuses, and to\nprevent or correct negligence. Those in the Lodges who have attained the\nrank of Knights, are most fit to be appointed Almoners, and charged to\nascertain and make known who need and are entitled to the charity of the\nOrder.\n\nIn the higher Degrees those only should be received who have sufficient\nreading and information to discuss the great questions of philosophy.\nFrom them the Orators of the Lodges should be selected, as well as those\nof the Councils and Chapters. They are charged to suggest such measures\nas are necessary to make Masonry entirely faithful to the spirit of its\ninstitution, both as to its charitable purposes, and the diffusion of\nlight and knowledge; such as are needed to correct abuses that have\ncrept in, and offences against the rules and general spirit of the\nOrder; and such as will tend to make it, as it was meant to be, the\ngreat Teacher of Mankind.\n\nAs Master of a Lodge, Council, or Chapter, it will be your duty to\nimpress upon the minds of your Brethren these views of the general plan\nand separate parts of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite; of its\nspirit and design; its harmony and regularity; of the duties of the\nofficers and members; and of the particular lessons intended to be\ntaught by each Degree.\n\nEspecially you are not to allow any assembly of the body over which you\nmay preside, to close, without recalling to the minds of the Brethren\nthe Masonic virtues and duties which are represented upon the Tracing\nBoard of this Degree. That is an imperative duty. Forget not that, more\nthan three thousand years ago, ZOROASTER said: \"_Be good, be kind, be\nhumane, and charitable; love your fellows; console the afflicted; pardon\nthose who have done you wrong._\" Nor that more than two thousand three\nhundred years ago CONFUCIUS repeated, also quoting the language of those\nwho had lived before himself: \"_Love thy neighbor as thyself: Do not to\nothers what thou wouldst not wish should be done to thyself: Forgive\ninjuries. Forgive your enemy, be reconciled to him, give him assistance,\ninvoke God in his behalf!_\"\n\nLet not the morality of your Lodge be inferior to that of the Persian or\nthe Chinese Philosopher.\n\nUrge upon your Brethren the teaching and the unostentatious practice of\nthe morality of the Lodge, without regard to times, places, religions,\nor peoples.\n\nUrge them to love one another, to be devoted to one another, to be\nfaithful to the country, the government, and the laws: for to serve the\ncountry is to pay a dear and sacred debt:\n\nTo respect all forms of worship, to tolerate all political and religious\nopinions; not to blame, and still less to condemn the religion of\nothers: not to seek to make converts; but to be content if they have the\nreligion of Socrates; a veneration for the Creator, the religion of good\nworks, and grateful acknowledgment of God's blessings:\n\nTo fraternize with all men; to assist all who are unfortunate; and to\ncheerfully postpone their own interests to that of the Order:\n\nTo make it the constant rule of their lives, to think well, to speak\nwell, and to act well:\n\nTo place the sage above the soldier, the noble, or the prince: and take\nthe wise and good as their models:\n\nTo see that their professions and practice, their teachings and conduct,\ndo always agree:\n\nTo make this also their motto: Do that which thou oughtest to do; let\nthe result be what it will.\n\nSuch, my Brother, are some of the duties of that office which you have\nsought to be qualified to exercise. May you perform them well; and in so\ndoing gain honor for yourself, and advance the great cause of Masonry,\nHumanity, and Progress.\n\n\n\n\nXXI.\n\nNOACHITE, OR PRUSSIAN KNIGHT.\n\n\nYou are especially charged in this Degree to be modest and humble, and\nnot vain-glorious nor filled with self-conceit. Be not wiser in your own\nopinion than the Deity, nor find fault with His works, nor endeavor to\nimprove upon what He has done. Be modest also in your intercourse with\nyour fellows, and slow to entertain evil thoughts of them, and reluctant\nto ascribe to them evil intentions. A thousand presses, flooding the\ncountry with their evanescent leaves, are busily and incessantly engaged\nin maligning the motives and conduct of men and parties, and in making\none man think worse of another; while, alas, scarcely one is found that\never, even accidentally, labors to make man think better of his fellow.\n\nSlander and calumny were never so insolently licentious in any country\nas they are this day in ours. The most retiring disposition, the most\nunobtrusive demeanor, is no shield against their poisoned arrows. The\nmost eminent public service only makes their vituperation and invective\nmore eager and more unscrupulous, when he who has done such service\npresents himself as a candidate for the people's suffrages.\n\nThe evil is wide-spread and universal. No man, no woman, no household,\nis sacred or safe from this new Inquisition. No act is so pure or so\npraiseworthy, that the unscrupulous vender of lies who lives by\npandering to a corrupt and morbid public appetite will not proclaim it\nas a crime. No motive is so innocent or so laudable, that he will not\nhold it up as villainy. Journalism pries into the interior of private\nhouses, gloats over the details of domestic tragedies of sin and shame,\nand deliberately invents and industriously circulates the most\nunmitigated and baseless falsehoods, to coin money for those who pursue\nit as a trade, or to effect a temporary result in the wars of faction.\n\nWe need not enlarge upon these evils. They are apparent to all and\nlamented over by all, and it is the duty of a Mason to do all in his\npower to lessen, if not to remove them. With the errors and even sins of\nother men, that do not personally affect us or ours, and need not our\ncondemnation to be odious, we have nothing to do; and the journalist has\nno patent that makes him the Censor of Morals. There is no obligation\nresting on us to trumpet forth our disapproval of every wrongful or\ninjudicious or improper act that every other man commits. One would be\nashamed to stand on the street corners and retail them orally for\npennies.\n\nOne ought, in truth, to write or speak against no other one in this\nworld. Each man in it has enough to do, to watch and keep guard over\nhimself. Each of us is sick enough in this great Lazaretto: and\njournalism and polemical writing constantly remind us of a scene once\nwitnessed in a little hospital; where it was horrible to hear how the\npatients mockingly reproached each other with their disorders and\ninfirmities: how one, who was wasted by consumption, jeered at another\nwho was bloated by dropsy: how one laughed at another's cancer of the\nface; and this one again at his neighbor's lock-jaw or squint; until at\nlast the delirious fever-patient sprang out of his bed, and tore away\nthe coverings from the wounded bodies of his companions, and nothing was\nto be seen but hideous misery and mutilation. Such is the revolting work\nin which journalism and political partisanship, and half the world\noutside of Masonry, are engaged.\n\nVery generally, the censure bestowed upon men's acts, by those who have\nappointed and commissioned themselves Keepers of the Public Morals, is\nundeserved. Often it is not only undeserved, but praise is deserved\ninstead of censure, and, when the latter is not undeserved, it is always\nextravagant, and therefore unjust.\n\nA Mason will wonder what spirit they are endowed withal, that can basely\nlibel at a man, even, that is fallen. If they had any nobility of soul,\nthey would with him condole his disasters, and drop some tears in pity\nof his folly and wretchedness: and if they were merely human and not\nbrutal, Nature did grievous wrong to human bodies, to curse them with\nsouls so cruel as to strive to add to a wretchedness already\nintolerable. When a Mason hears of any man that hath fallen into public\ndisgrace, he should have a mind to commiserate his mishap, and not to\nmake him more disconsolate. To envenom a name by libels, that already is\nopenly tainted, is to add stripes with an iron rod to one that is flayed\nwith whipping; and to every well-tempered mind will seem most inhuman\nand unmanly.\n\nEven the man who does wrong and commits errors often has a quiet home, a\nfireside of his own, a gentle, loving wife and innocent children, who\nperhaps do not know of his past errors and lapses--past and long\nrepented of; or if they do, they love him the better, because, being\nmortal, he hath erred, and being in the image of God, he hath repented.\nThat every blow at this husband and father lacerates the pure and tender\nbosoms of that wife and those daughters, is a consideration that doth\nnot stay the hand of the brutal journalist and partisan: but he strikes\nhome at these shrinking, quivering, innocent, tender bosoms; and then\ngoes out upon the great arteries of cities, where the current of life\npulsates, and holds his head erect, and calls on his fellows to laud him\nand admire him, for the chivalric act he hath done, in striking his\ndagger through one heart into another tender and trusting one.\n\nIf you seek for high and strained carriages, you shall, for the most\npart, meet with them in low men. Arrogance is a weed that ever grows on\na dunghill. It is from the rankness of that soil that she hath her\nheight and spreadings. To be modest and unaffected with our superiors is\nduty; with our equals, courtesy; with our inferiors, nobleness. There is\nno arrogance so great as the proclaiming of other men's errors and\nfaults, by those who understand nothing but the dregs of actions, and\nwho make it their business to besmear deserving fames. Public reproof is\nlike striking a deer in the herd: it not only wounds him, to the loss of\nblood, but betrays him to the hound, his enemy.\n\nThe occupation of the spy hath ever been held dishonorable, and it is\nnone the less so, now that with rare exceptions editors and partisans\nhave become perpetual spies upon the actions of other men. Their malice\nmakes them nimble-eyed, apt to note a fault and publish it, and, with a\nstrained construction, to deprave even those things in which the doer's\nintents were honest. Like the crocodile, they slime the way of others,\nto make them fall; and when that has happened, they feed their insulting\nenvy on the life-blood of the prostrate. They set the vices of other men\non high, for the gaze of the world, and place their virtues underground,\nthat none may note them. If they cannot wound upon proofs, they will do\nit upon likelihoods: and if not upon them, they manufacture lies, as\nGod created the world, out of nothing; and so corrupt the fair tempter\nof men's reputations; knowing that the multitude will believe them,\nbecause affirmations are apter to win belief, than negatives to uncredit\nthem; and that a lie travels faster than an eagle flies, while the\ncontradiction limps after it at a snail's pace, and, halting, never\novertakes it. Nay, it is contrary to the morality of journalism, to\nallow a lie to be contradicted in the place that spawned it. And even if\nthat great favor is conceded, a slander once raised will scarce ever\ndie, or fail of finding many that will allow it both a harbor and trust.\n\nThis is, beyond any other, the age of falsehood. Once, to be suspected\nof equivocation was enough to soil a gentleman's escutcheon; but now it\nhas become a strange merit in a partisan or statesman, always and\nscrupulously to tell the truth. Lies are part of the regular ammunition\nof all campaigns and controversies, valued according as they are\nprofitable and effective; and are stored up and have a market price,\nlike saltpetre and sulphur; being even more deadly than they.\n\nIf men weighed the imperfections of humanity, they would breathe less\ncondemnation. Ignorance gives disparagement a louder tongue than\nknowledge does. Wise men had rather know, than tell. Frequent dispraises\nare but the faults of uncharitable wit: and it is from where there is no\njudgment, that the heaviest judgment comes; for self-examination would\nmake all judgments charitable. If we even do know vices in men, we can\nscarce show ourselves in a nobler virtue than in the charity of\nconcealing them: if that be not a flattery persuading to continuance.\nAnd it is the basest office man can fall into, to make his tongue the\ndefamer of the worthy man.\n\nThere is but one rule for the Mason in this matter. If there be virtues,\nand he is called upon to speak of him who owns them, let him tell them\nforth impartially. And if there be vices mixed with them, let him be\ncontent the world shall know them by some other tongue than his. For if\nthe evil-doer deserve no pity, his wife, his parents, or his children,\nor other innocent persons who love him Way; and the bravo's trade,\npractised by him who stabs the defenceless for a price paid by\nindividual or party, is really no more respectable now than it was a\nhundred years ago, in Venice. Where we want experience, Charity bids us\nthink the best, and leave what we know not to the Searcher of Hearts;\nfor mistakes, suspicions, and envy often injure a clear fame; and there\nis least danger in a charitable construction.\n\nAnd, finally, the Mason should be humble and modest toward the Grand\nArchitect of the Universe, and not impugn His Wisdom, nor set up his own\nimperfect sense of Right against His Providence and dispensations, nor\nattempt too rashly to explore the Mysteries of God's Infinite Essence\nand inscrutable plans, and of that Great Nature which we are not made\ncapable to understand.\n\nLet him steer far away from all those vain philosophies, which endeavor\nto account for all that is, without admitting that there is a God,\nseparate and apart from the Universe which is his work: which erect\nUniversal Nature into a God, and worship it alone: which annihilate\nSpirit, and believe no testimony except that of the bodily senses:\nwhich, by logical formulas and dextrous collocation of words, make the\nactual, living, guiding, and protecting God fade into the dim mistiness\nof a mere abstraction and unreality, itself a mere logical formula.\n\nNor let him have any alliance with those theorists who chide the delays\nof Providence and busy themselves to hasten the slow march which it has\nimposed upon events: who neglect the practical, to struggle after\nimpossibilities: who are wiser than Heaven; know the aims and purposes\nof the Deity, and can see a short and more direct means of attaining\nthem, than it pleases Him to employ: who would have no discords in the\ngreat harmony of the Universe of things; but equal distribution of\nproperty, no subjection of one man to the will of another, no compulsory\nlabor, and still no starvation, nor destitution, nor pauperism.\n\nLet him not spend his life, as they do, in building a new Tower of\nBabel; in attempting to change that which is fixed by an inflexible law\nof God's enactment: but let him, yielding to the Superior Wisdom of\nProvidence, content to believe that the march of events is rightly\nordered by an Infinite Wisdom, and leads, though we cannot see it, to a\ngreat and perfect result,--let him be satisfied to follow the path\npointed out by that Providence, and to labor for the good of the human\nrace in that mode in which God has chosen to enact that good shall be\neffected: and above all, let him build no Tower of Babel, under the\nbelief that by ascending he will mount so high that God will disappear\nor be superseded by a great monstrous aggregate of material forces, or\nmere glittering, logical formula; but, evermore, standing humbly and\nreverently upon the earth and looking with awe and confidence toward\nHeaven, let him be satisfied that there is a _real_ God; a _person_, and\nnot a formula; a Father and a protector, who loves, and sympathizes, and\ncompassionates; and that the eternal ways by which He rules the world\nare infinitely wise, no matter how far they may be above the feeble\ncomprehension and limited vision of man.\n\n[Illustration: Lyre]\n\n\n\n\nXXII.\n\nKNIGHT OF THE ROYAL AXE\nOR\nPRINCE OF LIBANUS.\n\n\nSympathy with the great laboring classes, respect for labor itself, and\nresolution to do some good _work_ in our day and generation, these are\nthe lessons of this Degree, and they are purely Masonic. Masonry has\nmade a working-man and his associates the Heroes of her principal\nlegend, and himself the companion of Kings. The idea is as simple and\ntrue as it is sublime. From first to last, Masonry is _work_. It\nvenerates the Grand _Architect_ of the Universe. It commemorates the\n_building_ of a Temple. Its principal emblems are _the working tools_ of\nMasons and Artisans. It preserves the name of the first _worker_ in\n_brass_ and _iron_ as one of its pass-words. When the Brethren meet\ntogether, they are at _labor_. The Master is the _overseer_ who sets the\ncraft to _work_ and gives them proper instruction. Masonry is the\napotheosis of WORK.\n\nIt is the hands of brave, forgotten men that have made this great,\npopulous, cultivated world a world for _us_. It is _all_ work, and\n_forgotten_ work. The _real_ conquerors, creators, and eternal\nproprietors of every great and civilized land are all the heroic souls\nthat ever were in it, each in his degree: all the men that ever felled a\nforest-tree or drained a marsh, or contrived a wise scheme, or did or\nsaid a true or valiant thing therein. Genuine work alone, done\nfaithfully, is eternal, even as the Almighty Founder and World-builder\nHimself. All work is noble: a life of ease is not for any man, nor for\nany God. The Almighty Maker is not like one who, in old immemorial ages,\nhaving made his machine of a Universe, sits ever since, and sees it\n_go_. Out of that belief comes Atheism. The faith in an Invisible,\nUnnameable, Directing Deity, present everywhere in all that we see, and\nwork, and suffer, is the essence of all faith whatsoever.\n\nThe life of all Gods figures itself to us as a Sublime Earnestness,--of\nInfinite battle against Infinite labor Our highest religion is named the\nWorship of Sorrow. For the Son of Man there is no noble crown,\nwell-worn, or even ill-worn, but is a crown of thorns. Man's highest\ndestiny is not to be happy, to love pleasant things and find them. His\nonly true _un_happiness should be that he cannot work, and get his\ndestiny as a man fulfilled. The day passes swiftly over, our life passes\nswiftly over, and the night cometh, wherein no man can work. That night\nonce come, our happiness and unhappiness are vanished, and become as\nthings that never were. But our work is not abolished, and has not\nvanished. It remains, or the want of it remains, for endless Times and\nEternities.\n\nWhatsoever of morality and intelligence; what of patience, perseverance,\nfaithfulness, of method, insight, ingenuity, energy; in a word,\nwhatsoever of STRENGTH a man has in him, will lie written in the WORK he\ndoes. To work is to try himself against Nature and her unerring,\neverlasting laws: and they will return true verdict as to him. The\nnoblest Epic is a mighty Empire slowly built together, a mighty series\nof heroic deeds, a mighty conquest over chaos. Deeds are greater than\nwords. They have a life, mute, but undeniable; and grow. They people the\nvacuity of Time, and make it green and worthy.\n\nLabor is the truest emblem of God, the Architect and Eternal Maker;\nnoble Labor, which is yet to be the King of this Earth, and sit on the\nhighest Throne. Men without duties to do, are like trees planted on\nprecipices; from the roots of which all the earth has crumbled. Nature\nowns no man who is not also a Martyr. She scorns the man who sits\nscreened from all work, from want, danger, hardship, the victory over\nwhich is work; and has all his work and battling done by other men; and\nyet there are men who pride themselves that they and theirs have done no\nwork time out of mind. So neither have the swine.\n\nThe chief of men is he who stands in the van of men, fronting the peril\nwhich frightens back all others, and if not vanquished would devour\nthem. Hercules was worshipped for twelve labors. The Czar of Russia\nbecame a toiling shipwright, and worked with his axe in the docks of\nSaardam; and something came of that. Cromwell worked, and Napoleon; and\neffected somewhat.\n\nThere is a perennial nobleness and even sacredness in work. Be he never\nso benighted and forgetful of his high calling, there is always hope in\na man who actually and earnestly works: in Idleness alone is there\nperpetual Despair. Man perfects himself by working. Jungles are cleared\naway. Fair seed-fields rise instead, and stately cities; and withal, the\nman himself first ceases to be a foul unwholesome jungle and desert\nthereby. Even in the meanest sort of labor, the whole soul of man is\ncomposed into a kind of real harmony, the moment he begins to work.\nDoubt, Desire, Sorrow, Remorse, Indignation, and even Despair shrink\nmurmuring far off into their caves, whenever the man bends himself\nresolutely against his task. Labor is life. From the inmost heart of the\nworker rises his God-given Force, the Sacred Celestial Life-essence,\nbreathed into him by Almighty God; and awakens him to all nobleness, as\nsoon as work fitly begins. By it man learns Patience, Courage,\nPerseverance, Openness to light, readiness to own himself mistaken,\nresolution to do better and improve. Only by labor will man continually\nlearn the virtues. There is no Religion in stagnation and inaction; but\nonly in activity and exertion. There was the deepest truth in that\nsaying of the old monks, \"_laborare est orare_.\" \"He prayeth best who\nloveth best all things both great and small;\" and can man love except by\nworking earnestly to benefit that being whom he loves?\n\n\"Work; and therein have well-being,\" is the oldest of Gospels;\nunpreached, inarticulate, but ineradicable, and enduring forever. To\nmake Disorder, wherever found, an eternal enemy; to attack and subdue\nhim, and make order of him, the subject not of Chaos, but of\nIntelligence and Divinity, and of ourselves; to attack ignorance,\nstupidity and brute-mindedness, wherever found, to smite it wisely and\nunweariedly, to rest not while we live and it lives, in the name of God,\nthis is our duty as Masons; commanded us by the Highest God. Even He,\nwith his unspoken voice, more awful than the thunders of Sinai, or the\nsyllabled speech of the Hurricane, speaks to us. The Unborn Ages; the\nold Graves, with their long-moldering dust speak to us. The deep\nDeath-Kingdoms, the Stars in their never-resting course, all Space and\nall Time, silently and continually admonish us that we too must work\nwhile it is called to-day. Labor, wide as the Earth, has its summit in\nHeaven. To toil, whether with the sweat of the brow, or of the brain or\nheart, is worship,--the noblest thing yet discovered beneath the Stars.\nLet the weary cease to think that labor is a curse an doom pronounced by\nDeity. Without it there could be no true excellence in human nature.\nWithout it, and pain, and sorrow, where would be the human virtues?\nWhere Patience, Perseverance, Submission, Energy, Endurance, Fortitude,\nBravery, Disinterestedness, Self-Sacrifice, the noblest excellencies of\nthe Soul?\n\nLet him who toils complain not, nor feel humiliated! Let him look up,\nand see his fellow-workmen there, in God's Eternity; they alone\nsurviving there. Even in the weak human memory, they long survive, as\nSaints, as Heroes, and as Gods: they _alone_ survive, and people the\nunmeasured solitudes of Time.\n\nTo the primeval man, whatsoever good came, descended on him (as in mere\nfact, it ever does) direct from God; whatsoever duty lay visible for\nhim, this a Supreme God had prescribed. For the primeval man, in whom\ndwelt Thought, this Universe was all a Temple, life everywhere a\nWorship.\n\nDuty is with us ever; and evermore forbids us to be idle. To work with\nthe hands or brain, according to our requirements and our capacities, to\ndo that which lies before us to do, is more honorable than rank and\ntitle. Ploughers, spinners and builders, inventors, and men of science,\npoets, advocates, and writers, all stand upon one common level, and form\none grand, innumerable host, marching ever onward since the beginning of\nthe world: each entitled to our sympathy and respect, each a man and our\nbrother.\n\nIt was well to give the earth to man as a dark mass, whereon to labor.\nIt was well to provide rude and unsightly materials in the ore-bed and\nthe forest, for him to fashion into splendor and beauty. It was well,\nnot because of that splendor and beauty; but because the act creating\nthem is better than the things themselves; because exertion is nobler\nthan enjoyment; because the laborer is greater and more worthy of honor\nthan the idler. Masonry stands up for the nobility of labor. It is\nHeaven's great ordinance for human improvement. It has been broken down\nfor ages; and Masonry desires to build it up again. It has been broken\ndown, because men toil only because they must, submitting to it as, in\nsome sort, a degrading necessity; and desiring nothing so much on earth\nas to escape from it. They fulfill the great law of labor in the letter,\nbut break it in the spirit: they fulfill it with the muscles, but break\nit with the mind.\n\nMasonry teaches that every idler ought to hasten to some field of labor,\nmanual or mental, as a chosen and coveted theatre of improvement; but he\nis not impelled to do so, under the teachings of an imperfect\ncivilization. On the contrary, he sits down, folds his hands, and\nblesses and glorifies himself in his idleness. It is time that this\nopprobrium of toil were done away. To be ashamed of toil; of the dingy\nworkshop and dusty labor-field; of the hard hand, stained with service\nmore honorable than that of war; of the soiled and weather-stained\ngarments, on which Mother Nature has stamped, midst sun and rain, midst\nfire and steam, her own heraldic honors; to be ashamed of these tokens\nand titles, and envious of the flaunting robes of imbecile idleness and\nvanity, is treason to Nature, impiety to Heaven, a breach of Heaven's\ngreat Ordinance. TOIL, of brain, heart, or hand, is the only true\nmanhood and genuine nobility.\n\nLabor is a more beneficent ministration than man's ignorance\ncomprehends, or his complainings will admit. Even when its end is hidden\nfrom him, it is not mere blind drudgery. It is all a training, a\ndiscipline, a development of energies, a nurse of virtues, a school of\nimprovement. From the poor boy who gathers a few sticks for his mother's\nhearth, to the strong man who fells the oak or guides the ship or the\nsteam-car, every human toiler, with every weary step and every urgent\ntask, is obeying a wisdom far above his own wisdom, and fulfilling a\ndesign far beyond his own design.\n\nThe great law of human industry is this: that industry, working either\nwith the hand or the mind, the application of our powers to some task,\nto the achievement of some result, lies at the foundation of all human\nimprovement. We are not sent into the world like animals, to crop the\nspontaneous herbage of the field, and then to lie down in indolent\nrepose: but we are sent to dig the soil and plough the sea; to do the\nbusiness of cities and the work of manufactories. The world is the great\nand appointed school of industry. In an artificial state of society,\nmankind is divided into the idle and the laboring classes; but such was\nnot the design of Providence.\n\nLabor is man's great function, his peculiar distinction and his\nprivilege. From being an animal, that eats and drinks and sleeps only,\nto become a worker, and with the hand of ingenuity to pour his own\nthoughts into the moulds of Nature, fashioning them into forms of grace\nand fabrics of convenience, and converting them to purposes of\nimprovement and happiness, is the greatest possible step in privilege.\n\nThe Earth and the Atmosphere are man's laboratory. With spade and\nplough, with mining-shafts and furnaces and forges, with fire and steam;\nmidst the noise and whirl of swift and bright machinery, and abroad in\nthe silent fields, man was made to be ever working, ever experimenting.\nAnd while he and all his dwellings of care and toil are borne onward\nwith the circling skies, and the splendors of Heaven are around him, and\ntheir infinite depths image and invite his thought, still in all the\nworlds of philosophy, in the universe of intellect, man must be a\nworker. He is nothing, he can be nothing, can achieve nothing, fulfill\nnothing, without working. Without it, he can gain neither lofty\nimprovement nor tolerable happiness. The idle must hunt down the hours\nas their prey. To them Time is an enemy, clothed with armor; and they\nmust kill him, or themselves die. It never yet did answer, and it never\nwill answer, for any man to do nothing, to be exempt from all care and\neffort, to lounge, to walk, to ride, and to feast alone. No man can live\nin that way. God made a law against it: which no human power can annul,\nno human ingenuity evade.\n\nThe idea that a property is to be acquired in the course of ten or\ntwenty years, which shall suffice for the rest of life; that by some\nprosperous traffic or grand speculation, all the labor of a whole life\nis to be accomplished in a brief portion of it; that by dexterous\nmanagement, a large part of the term of human existence is to be\nexonerated from the cares of industry and self-denial, is founded upon a\ngrave mistake, upon a misconception of the true nature and design of\nbusiness, and of the conditions of human well-being. The desire of\naccumulation for the sake of securing a life of ease and gratification,\nof escaping from exertion and self-denial, is wholly wrong, though very\ncommon.\n\nIt is better for the Mason to live while he lives, and enjoy life as it\npasses: to live richer and die poorer. It is best of all for him to\nbanish from the mind that empty dream of future indolence and\nindulgence; to address himself to the business of life, as the school of\nhis earthly education; to settle it with himself now that independence,\nif he gains it, is not to give him exemption from employment. It is best\nfor him to know, that, in order to be a happy man, he must always be a\nlaborer, with the mind or the body, or with both: and that the\nreasonable exertion of his powers, bodily and mental, is not to be\nregarded as mere drudgery, but as a good discipline, a wise ordination,\na training in this primary school of our being, for nobler endeavors,\nand spheres of higher activity hereafter.\n\nThere are reasons why a Mason may lawfully and even earnestly desire a\nfortune. If he can fill some fine palace, itself a work of art, with the\nproductions of lofty genius; if he can be the friend and helper of\nhumble worth; if he can seek it out, where failing health or adverse\nfortune presses it hard, and soften or stay the bitter hours that are\nhastening it to madness or to the grave; if he can stand between the\noppressor and his prey, and bid the fetter and the dungeon give up their\nvictim; if he can build up great institutions of learning, and academies\nof art; if he can open fountains of knowledge for the people, and\nconduct its streams in the right channels; if he can do better for the\npoor than to bestow alms upon them--even to think of them, and devise\nplans for their elevation in knowledge and virtue, instead of forever\nopening the old reservoirs and resources for their improvidence; if he\nhas sufficient heart and soul to do all this, or part of it; if wealth\nwould be to him the handmaid of exertion, facilitating effort, and\ngiving success to endeavor; then may he lawfully, and yet warily and\nmodestly, desire it. But if it is to do nothing for him, but to minister\nease and indulgence, and to place his children in the same bad school,\nthen there is no reason why he should desire it.\n\nWhat is there glorious in the world, that is not the product of labor,\neither of the body or of the mind? What is history, but its record? What\nare the treasures of genius and art, but its work? What are cultivated\nfields, but its toil? The busy marts, the rising cities, the enriched\nempires of the world are but the great treasure-houses of labor. The\npyramids of Egypt, the castles and towers and temples of Europe, the\nburied cities of Italy and Mexico, the canals and railroads of\nChristendom, are but tracks, all round the world, of the mighty\nfootsteps of labor. Without it antiquity would not have been. Without\nit, there would be no memory of the past, and no hope for the future.\n\nEven utter indolence reposes on treasures that labor at some time gained\nand gathered. He that does nothing, and yet does not starve, has still\nhis significance; for he is a standing proof that somebody has at some\ntime worked. But not to such does Masonry do honor. It honors the\nWorker, the Toiler; him who produces and not alone consumes; him who\nputs forth his hand to add to the treasury of human comforts, and not\nalone to take away. It honors him who goes forth amid the struggling\nelements to fight his battle, and who shrinks not, with cowardly\neffeminacy, behind pillows of ease. It honors the strong muscle, and\nthe manly nerve, and the resolute and brave heart, the sweating brow,\nand the toiling brain. It honors the great and beautiful offices of\nhumanity, manhood's toil and woman's task; paternal industry and\nmaternal watching and weariness; wisdom teaching and patience learning;\nthe brow of care that presides over the State, and many-handed labor\nthat toils in workshop, field, and study, beneath its mild and\nbeneficent sway.\n\nGod has not made a world of rich men; but rather a world of poor men; or\nof men, at least, who must toil for a subsistence. That is, then, the\nbest condition for man, and the grand sphere of human improvement. If\nthe whole world could acquire wealth, (and one man is as much entitled\nto it as another, when he is born); if the present generation could lay\nup a complete provision for the next, as some men desire to do for their\nchildren; the world would be destroyed at a single blow. All industry\nwould cease with the necessity for it; all improvement would stop with\nthe demand for exertion; the dissipation of fortunes, the mischiefs of\nwhich are now countervailed by the healthful tone of society, would\nbreed universal disease, and break out into universal license; and the\nworld would sink, rotten as Herod, into the grave of its own loathsome\nvices.\n\nAlmost all the noblest things that have been achieved in the world, have\nbeen achieved by poor men; poor scholars, poor professional men, poor\nartisans and artists, poor philosophers, poets, and men of genius. A\ncertain staidness and sobriety, a certain moderation and restraint, a\ncertain pressure of circumstances, are good for man. His body was not\nmade for luxuries. It sickens, sinks, and dies under them. His mind was\nnot made for indulgence. It grows weak, effeminate, and dwarfish, under\nthat condition. And he who pampers his body with luxuries and his mind\nwith indulgence, bequeaths the consequences to the minds and bodies of\nhis descendants, without the wealth which was their cause. For wealth,\nwithout a law of entail to help it, has always lacked the energy even to\n_keep_ its own treasures. They drop from its imbecile hand. The third\ngeneration almost inevitably goes down the rolling wheel of fortune, and\nthere learns the energy necessary to rise again, if it rises at all;\nheir, as it is, to the bodily diseases, and mental weaknesses, and the\nsoul's vices of its ancestors, and _not_ heir to their wealth. And yet\nwe are, almost all of us, anxious to put our children, or to insure\nthat our grandchildren shall be put, on this road to indulgence, luxury,\nvice, degradation, and ruin; this heirship of hereditary disease, soul\nmalady, and mental leprosy.\n\nIf wealth were employed in promoting mental culture at home and works of\nphilanthropy abroad; if it were multiplying studies of art, and building\nup institutions of learning around us; if it were in every way raising\nthe intellectual character of the world, there could scarcely be too\nmuch of it. But if the utmost aim, effort, and ambition of wealth be, to\nprocure rich furniture, and provide costly entertainments, and build\nluxurious houses, and minister to vanity, extravagance, and ostentation,\nthere could scarcely be too little of it. To a certain extent it may\nlaudably be the minister of elegancies and luxuries, and the servitor of\nhospitality and physical enjoyment: but just in proportion as its\ntendencies, divested of all higher aims and tastes, are running that\nway, they are running to peril and evil.\n\nNor does that peril attach to individuals and families alone. It stands,\na fearful beacon, in the experience of Cities, Republics, and Empires.\nThe lessons of past times, on this subject, are emphatic and solemn. The\nhistory of wealth has always been a history of corruption and downfall.\nThe people never existed that could stand the trial. Boundless profusion\nis too little likely to spread for any people the theatre of manly\nenergy, rigid self-denial, and lofty virtue. You do not look for the\nbone and sinew and strength of a country, its loftiest talents and\nvirtues, its martyrs to patriotism or religion, its men to meet the days\nof peril and disaster, among the children of ease, indulgence, and\nluxury.\n\nIn the great march of the races of men over the earth, we have always\nseen opulence and luxury sinking before poverty and toil and hardy\nnurture. That is the law which has presided over the great processions\nof empire. Sidon and Tyre, whose merchants possessed the wealth of\nprinces; Babylon and Palmyra, the seats of Asiatic luxury; Rome, laden\nwith the spoils of a world, overwhelmed by her own vices more than by\nthe hosts of her enemies; all these, and many more, are examples of the\ndestructive tendencies of immense and unnatural accumulation: and men\nmust become more generous and benevolent, not more selfish and\neffeminate, as they become more rich, or the history of modern wealth\nwill follow in the sad train of all past examples.\n\nAll men desire distinction, and feel the need of some ennobling object\nin life. Those persons are usually most happy and satisfied in their\npursuits, who have the loftiest ends in view. Artists, mechanicians, and\ninventors, all who seek to find principles or develop beauty in their\nwork, seem most to enjoy it. The farmer who labors for the beautifying\nand scientific cultivation of his estate, is more happy in his labors\nthan one who tills his own land for a mere subsistence. This is one of\nthe signal testimonies which all human employments give to the high\ndemands of our nature. To gather wealth never gives such satisfaction as\nto bring the humblest piece of machinery to perfection: at least, when\nwealth is sought for display and ostentation, or mere luxury, and ease,\nand pleasure; and not for ends of philanthropy, the relief of kindred,\nor the payment of just debts, or as a means to attain some other great\nand noble object.\n\nWith the pursuits of multitudes is connected a painful conviction that\nthey neither supply a sufficient object, nor confer any satisfactory\nhonor. Why work, if the world is soon not to know that such a being ever\nexisted; and when one can perpetuate his name neither on canvas nor on\nmarble, nor in books, nor by lofty eloquence, nor statesmanship?\n\nThe answer is, that every man has a work to do in himself, greater and\nsublimer than any work of genius; and works upon a nobler material than\nwood or marble--upon his own soul and intellect, and may so attain the\nhighest nobleness and grandeur known on earth or in Heaven; may so be\nthe greatest of artists, and of authors, and his life, which is far more\nthan speech, may be eloquent.\n\nThe great author or artist only portrays what every man should _be_. He\n_conceives_, what we should _do_. He conceives, and represents moral\nbeauty, magnanimity, fortitude, love, devotion, forgiveness, the soul's\ngreatness. He portrays virtues, commended to our admiration and\nimitation. To embody these portraitures in our lives is the practical\nrealization of those great ideals of art. The magnanimity of Heroes,\ncelebrated on the historic or poetic page; the constancy and faith of\nTruth's martyrs; the beauty of love and piety glowing on the canvas; the\ndelineations of Truth and Right, that flash from the lips of the\nEloquent, are, in their essence only that which every man may feel and\npractise in the daily walks of life. The work of virtue is nobler than\nany work of genius; for it is a nobler thing to _be_ a hero than to\n_describe_ one, to _endure_ martyrdom than to _paint_ it, to _do_ right\nthan to _plead_ for it. Action is greater than writing. A good man is a\nnobler object of contemplation than a great author. There are but two\nthings worth living for: to do what is worthy of being written; and to\nwrite what is worthy of being read; and the greater of these is _the\ndoing_.\n\nEvery man has to do the noblest thing that any man can do or describe.\nThere is a wide field for the courage, cheerfulness, energy, and dignity\nof human existence. Let therefore no Mason deem his life doomed to\nmediocrity or meanness, to vanity or unprofitable toil, or to any ends\nless than immortal. No one can truly say that the grand prizes of life\nare for others, and he can do nothing. No matter how magnificent and\nnoble an act the author can describe or the artist paint, it will be\nstill nobler for you to go and _do_ that which one describes, or _be_\nthe model which the other draws.\n\nThe loftiest action that ever was described is not more magnanimous than\nthat which we may find occasion to do, in the daily walks of life; in\ntemptation, in distress, in bereavement, in the solemn approach to\ndeath. In the great Providence of God, in the great ordinances of our\nbeing, there is opened to every man a sphere for the noblest action. It\nis not even in extraordinary situations, where all eyes are upon us,\nwhere all our energy is aroused, and all our vigilance is awake, that\nthe highest efforts of virtue are usually demanded of us; but rather in\nsilence and seclusion, amidst our occupations and our homes; in wearing\nsickness, that makes no complaint; in sorely-tried honesty, that asks no\npraise; in simple disinterestedness, hiding the hand that resigns its\nadvantage to another.\n\nMasonry seeks to ennoble common life. Its work is to go down into the\nobscure and unsearched records of daily conduct and feeling; and to\nportray, not the ordinary virtue of an extraordinary life; but the more\nextraordinary virtue of ordinary life. What is done and borne in the\nshades of privacy, in the hard and beaten path of daily care and toil,\nfull of uncelebrated sacrifices; in the suffering, and sometimes\ninsulted suffering, that wears to the world a cheerful brow; in the long\nstrife of the spirit, resisting pain, penury, and neglect, carried on in\nthe inmost depths of the heart;--what is done, and borne, and wrought,\nand won there, is a higher glory, and shall inherit a brighter crown.\n\nOn the volume of Masonic life one bright word is written, from which on\nevery side blazes an ineffable splendor. That word is DUTY.\n\nTo aid in securing to all labor permanent employment and its just\nreward: to help to hasten the coming of that time when no one shall\nsuffer from hunger or destitution, because, though willing and able to\nwork, he can find no employment, or because he has been overtaken by\nsickness in the midst of his labor, are part of your duties as a Knight\nof the Royal Axe. And if we can succeed in making some small nook of\nGod's creation a little more fruitful and cheerful, a little better and\nmore worthy of Him,--or in making some one or two human hearts a little\nwiser, and more manful and hopeful and happy, we shall have done work,\nworthy of Masons, and acceptable to our Father in Heaven.\n\n\n\n\nXXIII.\n\nCHIEF OF THE TABERNACLE.\n\n\nAmong most of the Ancient Nations there was, in addition to their public\nworship, a private one styled the Mysteries; to which those only were\nadmitted who had been prepared by certain ceremonies called initiations.\n\nThe most widely disseminated of the ancient worships were those of Isis,\nOrpheus, Dionusos, Ceres and Mithras. Many barbarous nations received\nthe knowledge of the Mysteries in honor of these divinities from the\nEgyptians, before they arrived in Greece; and even in the British Isles\nthe Druids celebrated those of Dionusos, learned by them from the\nEgyptians.\n\nThe Mysteries of Eleusis, celebrated at Athens in honor of Ceres,\nswallowed up, as it were, all the others. All the neighboring nations\nneglected their own, to celebrate those of Eleusis; and in a little\nwhile all Greece and Asia Minor were filled with the Initiates. They\nspread into the Roman Empire, and even beyond its limits, \"those holy\nand august Eleusinian Mysteries,\" said Cicero, \"in which the people of\nthe remotest lands are initiated.\" Zosimus says that they embraced the\nwhole human race; and Aristides termed them the common temple of the\nwhole world.\n\nThere were, in the Eleusinian feasts, two sorts of Mysteries, the great,\nand the little. The latter were a kind of preparation for the former;\nand everybody was admitted to them. Ordinarily there was a novitiate of\nthree, and sometimes of four years.\n\nClemens of Alexandria says that what was taught in the great Mysteries\nconcerned the Universe, and was the completion and perfection of all\ninstruction; wherein things were seen as they were, and nature and her\nworks were made known.\n\nThe ancients said that the Initiates would be more happy after death\nthan other mortals; and that, while the souls of the Profane on leaving\ntheir bodies, would be plunged in the mire, and remain buried in\ndarkness, those of the Initiates would fly to the Fortunate Isles, the\nabode of the Gods.\n\nPlato said that the object of the Mysteries was to re-establish the soul\nin its primitive purity, and in that state of perfection which it had\nlost. Epictetus said, \"whatever is met with therein has been instituted\nby our Masters, for the instruction of man and the correction of\nmorals.\"\n\nProclus held that initiation elevated the soul, from a material,\nsensual, and purely human life, to a communion and celestial intercourse\nwith the Gods; and that a variety of things, forms, and species were\nshown Initiates, representing the first generation of the Gods.\n\nPurity of morals and elevation of soul were required of the Initiates.\nCandidates were required to be of spotless reputation and irreproachable\nvirtue. Nero, after murdering his mother, did not dare to be present at\nthe celebration of the Mysteries: and Antony presented himself to be\ninitiated, as the most infallible mode of proving his innocence of the\ndeath of Avidius Cassius.\n\nThe Initiates were regarded as the only fortunate men. \"It is upon us\nalone,\" says Aristophanes, \"shineth the beneficent day-star. We alone\nreceive pleasure from the influence of his rays; we, who are initiated,\nand who practise toward citizen and stranger every possible act of\njustice and piety.\" And it is therefore not surprising that, in time,\ninitiation came to be considered as necessary as baptism afterward was\nto the Christians; and that not to have been admitted to the Mysteries\nwas held a dishonor.\n\n\"It seems to me,\" says the great orator, philosopher, and moralist,\nCicero, \"that Athens, among many excellent inventions, divine and very\nuseful to the human family, has produced none comparable to the\nMysteries, which for a wild and ferocious life have substituted humanity\nand urbanity of manners. It is with good reason they use the term\n_initiation_; for it is through them that we in reality have learned the\nfirst principles of life; and they not only teach us to live in a manner\nmore consoling and agreeable, but they soften the pains of death by the\nhope of a better life hereafter.\"\n\nWhere the Mysteries originated is not known. It is supposed they came\nfrom India, by the way of Chald\u00e6a, into Egypt, and thence were carried\ninto Greece. Wherever they arose, they were practised among all the\nancient nations; and, as was usual, the Thracians, Cretans, and\nAthenians each claimed the honor of invention, and each insisted that\nthey had borrowed nothing from any other people.\n\nIn Egypt and the East, all religion, even in its most poetical forms,\nwas more or less a mystery; and the chief reason why, in Greece, a\ndistinct name and office were assigned to the Mysteries, was because the\nsuperficial popular theology left a want unsatisfied, which religion in\na wider sense alone could supply. They were practical acknowledgments of\nthe insufficiency of the popular religion to satisfy the deeper thoughts\nand aspirations of the mind. The vagueness of symbolism might perhaps\nreach what a more palpable and conventional creed could not. The former,\nby its indefiniteness, acknowledged the abstruseness of its subject; it\ntreated a mysterious subject mystically; it endeavored to illustrate\nwhat it could not explain; to excite an appropriate feeling, if it could\nnot develop an adequate idea; and made the image a mere subordinate\nconveyance for the conception, which itself never became too obvious or\nfamiliar.\n\nThe instruction now conveyed by books and letters was of old conveyed by\nsymbols; and the priest had to invent or to perpetuate a display of\nrites and exhibitions, which were not only more attractive to the eye\nthan words, but often to the mind more suggestive and pregnant with\nmeaning.\n\nAfterward, the institution became rather moral and political, than\nreligious. The civil magistrates shaped the ceremonies to political ends\nin Egypt; the sages who carried them from that country to Asia, Greece,\nand the North of Europe, were all kings or legislators. The chief\nmagistrate presided at those of Eleusis, represented by an officer\nstyled _King_: and the Priest played but a subordinate part.\n\nThe Powers revered in the Mysteries were all in reality Nature-Gods;\nnone of whom could be consistently addressed as mere heroes, because\ntheir nature was confessedly super-heroic. The Mysteries, only in fact a\nmore solemn expression of the religion of the ancient poetry, taught\nthat doctrine of the Theocracia or Divine Oneness, which even poetry\ndoes not entirely conceal. They were not in any open hostility with the\npopular religion, but only a more solemn exhibition of its symbols; or\nrather a part of itself in a more impressive form. The essence of all\nMysteries, as of all polytheism, consists in this, that the conception\nof an unapproachable Being, single, eternal, and unchanging, and that\nof a God of Nature, whose manifold power is immediately revealed to the\nsenses in the incessant round of movement, life, and death, fell asunder\nin the treatment, and were separately symbolized. They offered a\nperpetual problem to excite curiosity, and contributed to satisfy the\nall-pervading religious sentiment, which if it obtain no nourishment\namong the simple and intelligible, finds compensating excitement in a\nreverential contemplation of the obscure.\n\nNature is as free from dogmatism as from tyranny; and the earliest\ninstructors of mankind not only adopted her lessons, but as far as\npossible adhered to her method of imparting them. They attempted to\nreach the understanding through the eye; and the greater part of all\nreligious teaching was conveyed through this ancient and most impressive\nmode of \"exhibition\" or demonstration. The Mysteries were a sacred\ndrama, exhibiting some legend significant of Nature's change, of the\nvisible Universe in which the divinity is revealed, and whose import was\nin many respects as open to the Pagan, as to the Christian. Beyond the\ncurrent traditions or sacred recitals of the temple, few explanations\nwere given to the spectators, who were left, as in the school of nature,\nto make inferences for themselves.\n\nThe method of indirect suggestion, by allegory or symbol, is a more\nefficacious instrument of instruction than plain didactic language;\nsince we are habitually indifferent to that which is acquired without\neffort: \"The initiated are few, though many bear the thyrsus.\" And it\nwould have been impossible to provide a lesson suited to every degree of\ncultivation and capacity, unless it were one framed after Nature's\nexample, or rather a representation of Nature herself, employing her\nuniversal symbolism instead of technicalities of language, inviting\nendless research, yet rewarding the humblest inquirer, and disclosing\nits secrets to every one in Proportion to his preparatory training and\npower to comprehend them.\n\nEven if destitute of any formal or official enunciation of those\nimportant truths, which even in a cultivated age it was often found\ninexpedient to assert except under a veil of allegory, and which\nmoreover lose their dignity and value in proportion as they are learned\nmechanically as dogmas, the shows of the Mysteries certainly contained\nsuggestions if not lessons, which in the opinion not of one competent\nwitness only, but of many, were adapted to elevate the character of the\nspectators, enabling them to augur something of the purposes of\nexistence, as well as of the means of improving it, to live better and\nto die happier.\n\nUnlike the religion of books or creeds, these mystic shows and\nperformances were not the reading of a lecture, but the opening of a\nproblem, implying neither exemption from research, nor hostility to\nphilosophy: for, on the contrary, philosophy is the great Mystagogue or\nArch-Expounder of symbolism: though the interpretations by the Grecian\nPhilosophy of the old myths and symbols were in many instances as\nill-founded, as in others they are correct.\n\nNo better means could be devised to rouse a dormant intellect, than\nthose impressive exhibitions, which addressed it through the\nimagination: which, instead of condemning it to a prescribed routine of\ncreed, invited it to seek, compare, and judge. The alteration from\nsymbol to dogma is as fatal to beauty of expression, as that from faith\nto dogma is to truth and wholesomeness of thought.\n\nThe first philosophy often reverted to the natural mode of teaching; and\nSocrates, in particular, is said to have eschewed dogmas, endeavoring,\nlike the Mysteries, rather to awaken and develop in the minds of his\nhearers the ideas with which they were already endowed or pregnant, than\nto fill them with ready-made adventitious opinions.\n\nSo Masonry still follows the ancient manner of teaching. Her symbols are\nthe instruction she gives; and the lectures are but often partial and\ninsufficient one-sided endeavors to interpret those symbols. He who\nwould become an accomplished Mason, must not be content merely to hear\nor even to understand the lectures, but must, aided by them, and they\nhaving as it were marked out the way for him, study, interpret, and\ndevelop the symbols for himself.\n\nThe earliest speculation endeavored to express far more than it could\ndistinctly comprehend; and the vague impressions of the mind found in\nthe mysterious analogies of phenomena their most apt and energetic\nrepresentations. The Mysteries, like the symbols of Masonry, were but an\nimage of the eloquent analogies of Nature; both those and these\nrevealing no new secret to such as were or are unprepared, or incapable\nof interpreting their significance.\n\nEverywhere in the old Mysteries, and in all the symbolisms and\nceremonial of the Hierophant was found the same mythical personage, who,\nlike Hermes, or Zoroaster, unites Human Attributes with Divine, and is\nhimself the God whose worship he introduced, teaching rude men the\ncommencements of civilization through the influence of song, and\nconnecting with the symbol of his death, emblematic of that of Nature,\nthe most essential consolations of religion.\n\nThe Mysteries embraced the three great doctrines of Ancient Theosophy.\nThey treated of God, Man, and Nature. Dionusos, whose Mysteries Orpheus\nis said to have founded, was the God of Nature, or of the moisture which\nis the life of Nature, who prepares in darkness the return of life and\nvegetation, or who is himself the Light and Change evolving their\nvarieties. He was theologically one with Hermes, Prometheus, and\nPoseidon. In the Egean Islands he is Butes, Dardanus, Himeros, or\nImbros. In Crete he appears as Iasius or Zeus, whose worship remaining\nunveiled by the usual forms of mystery, betrayed to profane curiosity\nthe symbols, which, if irreverently contemplated, were sure to be\nmisunderstood. In Asia he is the long-stoled Bassareus coalescing with\nthe Sabazius of the Phrygian Corybantes: the same with the mystic\nIacchus, nursling or son of Ceres, and with the dismembered Zagreus, son\nof Persephon\u00e9.\n\nIn symbolical forms the Mysteries exhibited THE ONE, of which THE\nMANIFOLD is an infinite illustration, containing a moral lesson,\ncalculated to guide the soul through life, and to cheer it in death. The\nstory of Dionusos was profoundly significant. He was not only creator of\nthe world, but guardian, liberator, and Savior of the soul. God of the\nmany-colored mantle, he was the resulting manifestation personified, the\nall in the many, the varied year, life passing into innumerable forms.\n\nThe spiritual regeneration of man was typified in the Mysteries by the\nsecond birth of Dionusos as offspring of the Highest; and the agents and\nsymbols of that regeneration were the elements that affected Nature's\nperiodical purification--the air, indicated by the mystic fan or winnow;\nthe fire, signified by the torch; and the baptismal water, for water is\nnot only cleanser of all things, but the genesis or source of all.\n\nThese notions, clothed in ritual, suggested the soul's reformation and\ntraining, the moral purity formally proclaimed at Eleusis. He only was\ninvited to approach, who was \"of clean hands and ingenuous speech, free\nfrom all pollution, and with a clear conscience.\" \"Happy the man,\" say\nthe initiated in Euripides and Aristophanes, \"who purifies his life,\nand who reverently consecrates his soul in the thi\u0103sos of the God. Let\nhim take heed to his lips that he utter no profane word; let him be just\nand kind to the stranger, and to his neighbor; let him give way to no\nvicious excess, lest he make dull and heavy the organs of the spirit.\nFar from the mystic dance of the thi\u0103sos be the impure the evil speaker,\nthe seditious citizen, the selfish hunter after gain, the traitor; all\nthose, in short, whose practices are more akin to the riot of Titans\nthan to the regulated life of the Orphici, or the Curetan order of the\nPriests of Id\u00e6an Zeus.\"\n\nThe votary, elevated beyond the sphere of his ordinary faculties, and\nunable to account for the agitation which overpowered him, seemed to\nbecome divine in proportion as he ceased to be human; to be a d\u00e6mon or\ngod. Already, in imagination, the initiated were numbered among the\nbeatified. They alone enjoyed the true life, the Sun's true lustre,\nwhile they hymned their God beneath the mystic groves of a mimic\nElysium, and were really renovated or regenerated under the genial\ninfluence of their dances.\n\n\"They whom Proserpina guides in her mysteries,\" it was said, \"who\nimbibed her instruction and spiritual nourishment, rest from their\nlabors and know strife no more. Happy they who witness and comprehend\nthese sacred ceremonies! They are made to know the meaning of the riddle\nof existence by observing its aim and termination as appointed by Zeus;\nthey partake a benefit more valuable and enduring than the grain\nbestowed by Ceres; for they are exalted in the scale of intellectual\nexistence, and obtain sweet hopes to console them at their death.\"\n\nNo doubt the ceremonies of initiation were originally few and simple. As\nthe great truths of the primitive revelation faded out of the memories\nof the masses of the People, and wickedness became rife upon the earth,\nit became necessary to discriminate, to require longer probation and\nsatisfactory tests of the candidates, and by spreading around what at\nfirst were rather schools of instruction than mysteries, the veil of\nsecrecy, and the pomp of ceremony, to heighten the opinion of their\nvalue and importance.\n\nWhatever pictures later and especially Christian writers may draw of the\nMysteries, they must, not only originally, but for many ages, have\ncontinued pure; and the doctrines of natural religion and morals there\ntaught, have been of the highest importance; because both the most\nvirtuous as well as the most learned and philosophic of the ancients\nspeak of them in the loftiest terms. That they ultimately became\ndegraded from their high estate, and corrupted, we know.\n\nThe rites of initiation became progressively more complicated. Signs and\ntokens were invented by which the Children of Light could with facility\nmake themselves known to each other. Different Degrees were invented, as\nthe number of Initiates enlarged, in order that there might be in the\ninner apartment of the Temple a favored few, to whom alone the more\nvaluable secrets were entrusted, and who could wield effectually the\ninfluence and power of the Order.\n\nOriginally the Mysteries were meant to be the beginning of a new life of\nreason and virtue. The initiated or esoteric companions were taught the\ndoctrine of the One Supreme God, the theory of death and eternity, the\nhidden mysteries of Nature, the prospect of the ultimate restoration of\nthe soul to that state of perfection from which it had fallen, its\nimmortality, and the states of reward and punishment after death. The\nuninitiated were deemed Profane, unworthy of public employment or\nprivate confidence, sometimes proscribed as Atheists, and certain of\never-lasting punishment beyond the grave.\n\nAll persons were initiated into the lesser Mysteries; but few attained\nthe greater, in which the true spirit of them, and most of their secret\ndoctrines were hidden. The veil of secrecy was impenetrable, sealed by\noaths and penalties the most tremendous and appalling. It was by\ninitiation only, that a knowledge of the Hieroglyphics could be\nobtained, with which the walls, columns, and ceilings of the Temples\nwere decorated, and which, believed to have been communicated to the\nPriests by revelation from the celestial deities, the youth of all ranks\nwere laudably ambitious of deciphering.\n\nThe ceremonies were performed at dead of night, generally in apartments\nunder-ground, but sometimes in the centre of a vast Pyramid, with every\nappliance that could alarm and excite the candidate. Innumerable\nceremonies, wild and romantic, dreadful and appalling, had by degrees\nbeen added to the few expressive symbols of primitive observances, under\nwhich there were instances in which the terrified aspirant actually\nexpired with fear.\n\nThe pyramids were probably used for the purposes of initiation, as were\ncaverns, pagodas, and labyrinths; for the ceremonies required many\napartments and cells, long passages and wells. In Egypt a principal\nplace for the Mysteries was the island of Phil\u00e6 on the Nile, where a\nmagnificent Temple of Osiris stood, and his relics were said to be\npreserved.\n\nWith their natural proclivities, the Priesthood, that select and\nexclusive class, in Egypt, India, Ph\u0153nicia, Judea and Greece as well as\nin Britain and Rome, and wherever else the Mysteries were known, made\nuse of them to build wider and higher the fabric of their own power. The\npurity of no religion continues long. Rank and dignities succeed to the\nprimitive simplicity. Unprincipled, vain, insolent, corrupt, and venal\nmen put on God's livery to serve the Devil withal; and luxury, vice,\nintolerance, and pride depose frugality, virtue, gentleness, and\nhumility, and change the altar where they should be servants, to a\nthrone on which they reign.\n\nBut the Kings, Philosophers, and Statesmen, the wise and great and good\nwho were admitted to the Mysteries, long postponed their ultimate\nself-destruction, and restrained the natural tendencies of the\nPriesthood. And accordingly Zosimus thought that the neglect of the\nMysteries after Diocletian abdicated, was the chief cause of the decline\nof the Roman Empire; and in the year 364, the Proconsul of Greece would\nnot close the Mysteries, notwithstanding a law of the Emperor\nValentinian, lest the people should be driven to desperation, if\nprevented from performing them; upon which, as they believed, the\nwelfare of mankind wholly depended. They were practised in Athens until\nthe 8th century, in Greece and Rome for several centuries after Christ;\nand in Wales and Scotland down to the 12th century.\n\nThe inhabitants of India originally practised the Patriarchal religion.\nEven the later worship of Vishnu was cheerful and social; accompanied\nwith the festive song, the sprightly dance, and the resounding cymbal,\nwith libations of milk and honey, garlands, and perfumes from aromatic\nwoods and gums.\n\nThere perhaps the Mysteries commenced; and in them, under allegories,\nwere taught the primitive truths. We cannot, within the limits of this\nlecture, detail the ceremonies of initiation; and shall use general\nlanguage, except where something from those old Mysteries still remains\nin Masonry.\n\nThe Initiate was invested with a cord of three threads, so twined as to\nmake three times three, and called _zennar_. Hence comes our cable-tow.\nIt was an emblem of their triune Deity, the remembrance of whom we also\npreserve in the three chief officers of our Lodges, presiding in the\nthree quarters of that Universe which our Lodges represent; in our three\ngreater and three lesser lights, our three movable and three immovable\njewels, and the three pillars that support our Lodges.\n\nThe Indian Mysteries were celebrated in subterranean caverns and grottos\nhewn in the solid rock; and the Initiates adored the Deity, symbolized\nby the solar fire. The candidate, long wandering in darkness, truly\nwanted Light, and the worship taught him was the worship of God, the\nSource of Light. The vast Temple of Elephanta, perhaps the oldest in the\nworld, hewn out of the rock, and 135 feet square, was used for\ninitiations; as were the still vaster caverns of Salsette, with their\n300 apartments.\n\nThe periods of initiation were regulated by the increase and decrease of\nthe moon. The Mysteries were divided into four steps or Degrees. The\ncandidate might receive the first at eight years of age, when he was\ninvested with the zennar. Each Degree dispensed something of perfection.\n\"Let the wretched man,\" says the Hitopadesa, \"practise virtue, whenever\nhe enjoys one of the three or four religious Degrees; let him be\neven-minded with all created things, and that disposition will be the\nsource of virtue.\"\n\nAfter various ceremonies, chiefly relating to the unity and trinity of\nthe Godhead, the candidate was clothed in a linen garment without a\nseam, and remained under the care of a Brahmin until he was twenty years\nof age, constantly studying and practising the most rigid virtue. Then\nhe underwent the severest probation for the second Degree, in which he\nwas sanctified by the sign of the cross, which, pointing to the four\nquarters of the compass, was honored as a striking symbol of the\nUniverse by many nations of antiquity, and was imitated by the Indians\nin the shape of their temples.\n\nThen he was admitted to the Holy Cavern, blazing with light, where, in\ncostly robes, sat, in the East, West, and South, the three chief\nHierophants, representing the Indian tri-une Deity. The ceremonies there\ncommenced with an anthem to the Great God of Nature; and then followed\nthis apostrophe: \"O mighty Being! greater than Brahma! we bow down\nbefore Thee as the primal Creator! Eternal God of Gods! The World's\nMansion! Thou art the Incorruptible Being, distinct from all things\ntransient! Thou art before all Gods, the Ancient Absolute Existence, and\nthe Supreme Supporter of the Universe! Thou art the Supreme Mansion; and\nby Thee, O Infinite Form, the Universe was spread abroad.\"\n\nThe candidate, thus taught the first great primitive truth was called\nupon to make a formal declaration, that he would be tractable and\nobedient to his superiors; that he would keep his body pure; govern his\ntongue, and observe a passive obedience in receiving the doctrines and\ntraditions of the Order; and the firmest secrecy in maintaining\ninviolable its hidden and abstruse mysteries. Then he was sprinkled with\nwater (whence our _baptism_); certain words, now unknown, were whispered\nin his ear; and he was divested of his shoes, and made to go three times\naround the cavern. Hence our three circuits; hence we were neither\nbarefoot nor shod: and the words were the Pass-words of that Indian\nDegree.\n\nThe Gymnosophist Priests came from the banks of the Euphrates into\nEthiopia, and brought with them their sciences and their doctrines.\nTheir principal College was at Meroe, and their Mysteries were\ncelebrated in the Temple of Amun, renowned for his oracle. Ethiopia was\nthen a powerful State, which preceded Egypt in civilization, and had a\ntheocratic government. Above the King was the Priest, who could put him\nto death in the name of the Deity. Egypt was then composed of the\nThebaid only. Middle Egypt and the Delta were a gulf of the\nMediterranean. The Nile by degrees formed an immense marsh, which,\nafterward drained by the labor of man, formed Lower Egypt; and was for\nmany centuries governed by the Ethiopian Sacerdotal Caste, of Arabic\norigin; afterward displaced by a dynasty of warriors. The magnificent\nruins of Axoum, with its obelisks and hieroglyphics, temples, vast tombs\nand pyramids, around ancient Meroe, are far older than the pyramids near\nMemphis.\n\nThe Priests, taught by Hermes, embodied in books the occult and hermetic\nsciences, with their own discoveries and the revelations of the Sibyls.\nThey studied particularly the most abstract sciences, discovered the\nfamous geometrical theorems which Pythagoras afterward learned from\nthem, calculated eclipses, and regulated, nineteen centuries before\nC\u00e6sar, the Julian year. They descended to practical investigations as\nto the necessities of life, and made known their discoveries to the\npeople; they cultivated the fine arts, and inspired the people with that\nenthusiasm which produced the avenues of Thebes, the Labyrinth, the\nTemples of Karnac, Denderah, Edfou, and Phil\u00e6, the monolithic obelisks,\nand the great Lake Moeris, the fertilizer of the country.\n\nThe wisdom of the Egyptian Initiates, the high sciences and lofty\nmorality which they taught, and their immense knowledge, excited the\nemulation of the most eminent men, whatever their rank and fortune; and\nled them, despite the complicated and terrible trials to be undergone,\nto seek admission into the Mysteries of Osiris and Isis.\n\nFrom Egypt, the Mysteries went to Phoenicia, and were celebrated at\nTyre. Osiris changed his name, and become Adoni or Dionusos, still the\nrepresentative of the Sun; and afterward these Mysteries were introduced\nsuccessively into Assyria, Babylon, Persia, Greece, Sicily, and Italy.\nIn Greece and Sicily, Osiris took the name of Bacchus, and Isis that of\nCeres, Cybele, Rhea and Venus.\n\nBar Hebraeus says: \"Enoch was the first who invented books and different\nsorts of writing. The ancient Greeks declare that Enoch is the same as\nMercury Trismegistus [Hermes], and that he taught the sons of men the\nart of building cities, and enacted some admirable laws.... He\ndiscovered the knowledge of the Zodiac, and the course of the Planets;\nand he pointed out to the sons of men, that they should worship God,\nthat they should fast, that they should pray, that they should give\nalms, votive offerings, and tenths. He reprobated abominable foods and\ndrunkenness, and appointed festivals for sacrifices to the Sun, at each\nof the Zodiacal Signs.\"\n\nManetho extracted his history from certain pillars which he discovered\nin Egypt, whereon inscriptions had been made by Thoth, or the first\nMercury [or Hermes], in the sacred letters and dialect: but which were\nafter the flood translated from that dialect into the Greek tongue, and\nlaid up in the private recesses of the Egyptian Temples. These pillars\nwere found in subterranean caverns, near Thebes and beyond the Nile, not\nfar from the sounding statue of Memnon, in a place called Syringes;\nwhich are described to be certain winding apartments underground; made,\nit is said, by those who were skilled in ancient rites; who, foreseeing\nthe coming of the Deluge, and fearing lest the memory of their\nceremonies should be obliterated, built and contrived vaults, dug with\nvast labor, in several places.\n\nFrom the bosom of Egypt sprang a man of consummate wisdom, initiated in\nthe secret knowledge of India, of Persia, and of Ethiopia, named Thoth\nor Phtha by his compatriots, Taaut by the Phoenicians, Hermes\nTrismegistus by the Greeks, and Adris by the Rabbins. Nature seemed to\nhave chosen him for her favorite and to have lavished on him all the\nqualities necessary to enable him to study her and to know her\nthoroughly. The Deity had, so to say, infused into him the sciences and\nthe arts, in order that he might instruct the whole world.\n\nHe invented many things necessary for the uses of life, and gave them\nsuitable names; he taught men how to write down their thoughts and\narrange their speech; he instituted the ceremonies to be observed in the\nworship of each of the Gods; he observed the course of the stars; he\ninvented music, the different bodily exercises, arithmetic, medicine,\nthe art of working in metals, the lyre with three strings; he regulated\nthe three tones of the voice, the _sharp_, taken from autumn, the\n_grave_ from winter, and the _middle_ from spring, there being then but\nthree seasons. It was he who taught the Greeks the mode of interpreting\nterms and things, whence they gave him the name of [Greek: Hermes]\n[_Hermes_], which signifies _Interpreter_.\n\nIn Egypt he instituted hieroglyphics: he selected a certain number of\npersons whom he judged fitted to be the depositaries of his secrets, of\nsuch only as were capable of attaining the throne and the first offices\nin the Mysteries; he united them in a body, created them _Priests of the\nLiving God_, instructed them in the sciences and arts, and explained to\nthem the symbols by which they were veiled. Egypt, 1500 years before the\ntime of Moses, revered in the Mysteries ONE SUPREME GOD, called the ONLY\nUNCREATED. Under Him it paid homage to seven principal deities. It is to\nHermes, who lived at that period, that we must attribute the concealment\nor _veiling_ [_velation_] of the Indian worship, which Moses _unveiled_\nor _revealed_, changing nothing of the laws of Hermes, except the\nplurality of his mystic Gods.\n\nThe Egyptian Priests related that Hermes, dying, said: \"Hitherto I have\nlived an exile from my true country: now I return thither. Do not weep\nfor me: I return to that celestial country whither each goes in his\nturn. There is God. This life is but a death.\" This is precisely the\ncreed of the old Buddhists of Samaneans, who believed that from time to\ntime God sent Buddhas on earth, to reform men, to wean them from their\nvices, and lead them back into the paths of virtue.\n\nAmong the sciences taught by Hermes, there were secrets which he\ncommunicated to the Initiates only upon condition that they should bind\nthemselves, by a terrible oath, never to divulge them, except to those\nwho, after long trial, should be found worthy to succeed them. The Kings\neven prohibited the revelation of them on pain of death. This secret was\nstyled the Sacerdotal Art, and included alchemy, astrology, magism\n[magic], the science of spirits, etc. He gave them the key to the\nHieroglyphics of all these secret sciences, which were regarded as\nsacred, and kept concealed in the most secret places of the Temple.\n\nThe great secrecy observed by the initiated Priests, for many years, and\nthe lofty sciences which they professed, caused them to be honored and\nrespected throughout all Egypt, which was regarded by other nations as\nthe college, the sanctuary, of the sciences and arts. The mystery which\nsurrounded them strongly excited curiosity. Orpheus metamorphosed\nhimself, so to say, into an Egyptian. He was initiated into Theology and\nPhysics. And he so completely made the ideas and reasonings of his\nteachers his own, that his Hymns rather bespeak an Egyptian Priest than\na Grecian Poet: and he was the first who carried into Greece the\nEgyptian fables.\n\nPythagoras, ever thirsty for learning, consented even to be circumcised,\nin order to become one of the Initiates: and the occult sciences were\nrevealed to him in the innermost part of the sanctuary.\n\nThe Initiates in a particular science, having been instructed by fables,\nenigmas, allegories, and hieroglyphics, wrote mysteriously whenever in\ntheir works they touched the subject of the Mysteries, and continued to\nconceal science under a veil of fictions.\n\nWhen the destruction by Cambyses of many cities, and the ruin of nearly\nall Egypt, in the year 528 before our era, dispersed most of the Priests\ninto Greece and elsewhere, they bore with them their sciences, which\nthey continued to teach enigmatically, that is to say, ever enveloped in\nthe obscurities of fables and hieroglyphics; to the end that the vulgar\nherd, seeing, might see nothing, and hearing, might comprehend nothing.\nAll the writers drew from this source: but these Mysteries, concealed\nunder so many unexplained envelopes, ended in giving birth to a swarm of\nabsurdities, which, from Greece, spread over the whole earth.\n\nIn the Grecian Mysteries, as established by Pythagoras, there were three\nDegrees. A preparation of five years' abstinence and silence was\nrequired. If the candidate was found to be passionate or intemperate,\ncontentious, or ambitious of worldly honors and distinctions, he was\nrejected.\n\nIn his lectures, Pythagoras taught the mathematics, as a medium whereby\nto prove the existence of God from observation and by means of reason;\ngrammar, rhetoric, and logic, to cultivate and improve that reason,\narithmetic, because he conceived that the ultimate benefit of man\nconsisted in the science of numbers, and geometry, music, and astronomy,\nbecause he conceived that man is indebted to them for a knowledge of\nwhat is really good and useful.\n\nHe taught the true method of obtaining a knowledge of the Divine laws of\npurifying the soul from its imperfections, of searching for truth, and\nof practising virtue; thus imitating the perfections of God. He thought\nhis system vain, if it did not contribute to expel vice and introduce\nvirtue into the mind. He taught that the two most excellent things were,\nto speak the truth, and to render benefits to one another. Particularly\nhe inculcated Silence, Temperance, Fortitude, Prudence, and Justice. He\ntaught the immortality of the soul, the Omnipotence of God, and the\nnecessity of personal holiness to qualify a man for admission into the\nSociety of the Gods.\n\nThus we owe the particular mode of instruction in the Degree of\nFellow-Craft to Pythagoras; and that Degree is but an imperfect\nreproduction of his lectures. From him, too, we have many of our\nexplanations of the symbols. He arranged his assemblies due East and\nWest, because he held that Motion began in the East and proceeded to the\nWest. Our Lodges are said to be due East and West, because the Master\nrepresents the rising Sun, and of course must be in the East. The\npyramids, too, were built precisely by the four cardinal points. And our\nexpression, that our Lodges extend upward to the Heavens, comes from the\nPersian and Druidic custom of having to their Temples no roofs but the\nsky.\n\nPlato developed and spiritualized the philosophy of Pythagoras. Even\nEusebius the Christian admits, that he reached to the vestibule of\nTruth, and stood upon its threshold.\n\nThe Druidical ceremonies undoubtedly came from India; and the Druids\nwere originally Buddhists. The word _Druidh_, like the word _Magi_,\nsignifies wise or learned men; and they were at once philosophers,\nmagistrates, and divines.\n\nThere was a surprising uniformity in the Temples, Priests, doctrines,\nand worship of the Persian Magi and British Druids. The Gods of Britain\nwere the same as the Cabiri of Samothrace. Osiris and Isis appeared in\ntheir Mysteries, under the names of Hu and Ceridwen; and like those of\nthe primitive Persians, their Temples were enclosures of huge unhewn\nstones, some of which still remain, and are regarded by the common\npeople with fear and veneration. They were generally either circular or\noval. Some were in the shape of a circle to which a vast serpent was\nattached. The circle was an Eastern symbol of the Universe, governed by\nan Omnipotent Deity whose centre is everywhere, and his circumference\nnowhere: and the egg was an universal symbol of the world. Some of the\nTemples were winged, and some in the shape of a cross; the winged ones\nreferring to Kneph, the winged Serpent-Deity of Egypt; whence the name\nof _Navestock_, where one of them stood. Temples in the shape of a cross\nwere also found in Ireland and Scotland. The length of one of these vast\nstructures, in the shape of a serpent, was nearly three miles.\n\nThe grand periods for initiation into the Druidical Mysteries, were\nquarterly; at the equinoxes and solstices. In the remote times when they\noriginated, these were the times corresponding with the 13th of\nFebruary, 1st of May, 19th of August, and 1st of November. The time of\nannual celebration was May-Eve, and the ceremonial preparations\ncommenced at midnight, on the 29th of April. When the initiations were\nover, on May-Eve, fires were kindled on all the cairns and cromlechs in\nthe island, which burned all night to introduce the sports of May-day.\nThe festival was in honor of the Sun. The initiations were performed at\nmidnight; and there were three Degrees.\n\nThe Gothic Mysteries were carried Northward from the East, by Odin; who,\nbeing a great warrior, modelled and varied them to suit his purposes and\nthe genius of his people. He placed over their celebration twelve\nHierophants, who were alike Priests, Counsellors of State, and Judges\nfrom whose decision there was no appeal.\n\nHe held the numbers three and nine in peculiar veneration and was\nprobably himself the Indian Buddha. Every thrice-three months,\nthrice-three victims were sacrificed to the tri-une God.\n\nThe Goths had three great festivals; the most magnificent of which\ncommenced at the winter solstice, and was celebrated in honor of Thor,\nthe Prince of the Power of the Air. That being the longest night in the\nyear, and the one after which the Sun comes Northward, it was\ncommemorative of the Creation; and they termed it mother-night, as the\none in which the creation of the world and light from the primitive\ndarkness took place. This was the _Yule, Juul,_ or _Yeol_ feast, which\nafterward became Christmas. At this feast the initiations were\ncelebrated. Thor was the Sun, the Egyptian Osiris and Kneph, the\nPh\u0153nician Bel or Baal. The initiations were had in huge intricate\ncaverns, terminating, as all the Mithriac caverns did, in a spacious\nvault, where the candidate _was brought to light_.\n\nJoseph was undoubtedly initiated. After he had interpreted Pharaoh's\ndream, that Monarch made him his Prime Minister, let him ride in his\nsecond chariot, while they proclaimed before him, ABRECH![1] and set him\nover the land of Egypt. In addition to this, the King gave him a new\nname, Tsapanat-Pa\u00e4nakh, and married him to Asanat, daughter of Potai\nParang, a Priest of An or Hieropolis, where was the Temple of Athom-Re,\nthe Great God of Egypt; thus completely naturalizing him. He could not\nhave contracted this marriage, nor have exercised that high dignity,\nwithout being first initiated in the Mysteries. When his Brethren came\nto Egypt the second time, the Egyptians of his court could not eat with\nthem, as that would have been abomination, though they ate with Joseph;\nwho was therefore regarded not as a foreigner, but as one of themselves:\nand when he sent and brought his brethren back, and charged them with\ntaking his cup, he said, \"Know ye not that a man like me practises\ndivination?\" thus assuming the Egyptian of high rank initiated into the\nMysteries, and as such conversant with the occult sciences.\n\n[Footnote 1: An Egyptian word, meaning, _\"Bow down.\"_]\n\nSo also must Moses have been initiated: for he was not only brought up\nin the court of the King, as the adopted son of the King's daughter,\nuntil he was forty years of age; but he was instructed in all the\nlearning of the Egyptians, and married afterward the daughter of\nYethr\u016b, a Priest of An likewise. Strabo and Diodorus both assert that he\nwas himself a Priest of Heliopolis. Before he went into the Desert,\nthere were intimate relations between him and the Priesthood; and he had\nsuccessfully commanded, Josephus informs us, an army sent by the King\nagainst the Ethiopians. Simglicius asserts that Moses received from the\nEgyptians, in the Mysteries, the doctrines which he taught to the\nHebrews: and Clemens of Alexandria and Philo say that he was a\nTheologian and Prophet, and interpreter of the Sacred Laws. Manetho,\ncited by Josephus, says he was a Priest of Heliopolis, and that his true\nand original (Egyptian) name was Asersaph or Osarsiph.\n\nAnd in the institution of the Hebrew Priesthood, in the powers and\nprivileges, as well as the immunities and sanctity which he conferred\nupon them, he closely imitated the Egyptian institutions; making\n_public_ the worship of that Deity whom the Egyptian Initiates\nworshipped in private; and strenuously endeavoring to keep the people\nfrom relapsing into their old mixture of Chaldaic and Egyptian\nsuperstition and idol-worship, as they were ever ready and inclined to\ndo; even Ahar\u016bn, upon their first clamorous discontent, restoring the\nworship of Apis; as an image of which Egyptian God he made the golden\ncalf.\n\nThe Egyptian Priests taught in their great Mysteries, that there was one\nGod, Supreme and Unapproachable, who had _conceived_ the Universe by His\nIntelligence, before He _created_ it by His Power and Will. They were no\nMaterialists nor Pantheists; but taught that Matter was not eternal or\nco-existent with the great First Cause, but created by Him.\n\nThe early Christians, taught by the founder of their Religion, but in\ngreater perfection, those primitive truths that from the Egyptians had\npassed to the Jews, and been preserved among the latter by the Essenes,\nreceived also the institution of the Mysteries; adopting as their object\nthe building of the symbolic Temple, preserving the old Scriptures of\nthe Jews as their sacred book, and as the fundamental law, which\nfurnished the new veil of initiation with the Hebraic words and\nformulas, that, corrupted and disfigured by time and ignorance, appear\nin many of our Degrees.\n\nSuch, my Brother, is the doctrine of the first Degree of the Mysteries,\nor that of Chief of the Tabernacle, to which you have now been\nadmitted, and the moral lesson of which is, devotion to the service of\nGod, and disinterested zeal and constant endeavor for the welfare of\nmen. You have here received only hints of the true objects and purposes\nof the Mysteries. Hereafter, if you are permitted to advance, you will\narrive at a more complete understanding of them and of the sublime\ndoctrines which they teach. Be content, therefore, with that which you\nhave seen and heard and await patiently the advent of the greater light.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nXXIV.\n\nPRINCE OF THE TABERNACLE.\n\n\nSymbols were the almost universal language of ancient theology. They\nwere the most obvious method of instruction; for, like nature herself,\nthey addressed the understanding through the eye; and the most ancient\nexpressions denoting communication of religious knowledge, signify\nocular exhibition. The first teachers of mankind borrowed this method of\ninstruction; and it comprised an endless store of pregnant\nhieroglyphics. These lessons of the olden time were the riddles of the\nSphynx, tempting the curious by their quaintness, but involving the\npersonal risk of the adventurous interpreter. \"The Gods themselves,\" it\nwas said, \"disclose their intentions to the wise, but to fools their\nteaching is unintelligible;\" and the King of the Delphic Oracle was said\nnot to _declare_, nor on the other hand to _conceal_; but emphatically\nto \"_intimate_ or _signify_.\"\n\nThe Ancient Sages, both barbarian and Greek, involved their meaning in\nsimilar indirections and enigmas; their lessons were conveyed either in\nvisible symbols, or in those \"parables and dark sayings of old,\" which\nthe Israelites considered it a sacred duty to hand down unchanged to\nsuccessive generations. The explanatory tokens employed by man, whether\nemblematical objects or actions, symbols or mystic ceremonies, were like\nthe mystic signs and portents either in dreams or by the wayside,\nsupposed to be significant of the intentions of the Gods; both required\nthe aid of anxious thought and skillful interpretation. It was only by a\ncorrect appreciation of analogous problems of nature, that the will of\nHeaven could be understood by the Diviner, or the lessons of Wisdom\nbecome manifest to the Sage.\n\nThe Mysteries were a series of symbols; and what was _spoken_ there\nconsisted wholly of accessory explanations of the act or image; sacred\ncommentaries, explanatory of established symbols; with little of those\nindependent traditions embodying physical or moral speculation, in which\nthe elements or planets were the actors, and the creation and\nrevolutions of the world were intermingled with recollections of ancient\nevents: and yet with so much of that also, that nature became her own\nexpositor through the medium of an arbitrary symbolical instruction; and\nthe ancient views of the relation between the human and divine received\ndramatic forms.\n\nThere has ever been an intimate alliance between the two systems, the\nsymbolic and the philosophical, in the allegories of the monuments of\nall ages, in the symbolic writings of the priests of all nations, in the\nrituals of all secret and mysterious societies; there has been a\nconstant series, an invariable uniformity of principles, which come from\nan aggregate, vast, imposing, and true, composed of parts that fit\nharmoniously only there.\n\nSymbolical instruction is recommended by the constant and uniform usage\nof antiquity; and it has retained its influence throughout all ages, as\na system of mysterious communication. The Deity, in his revelations to\nman, adopted the use of material images for the purpose of enforcing\nsublime truths; and Christ taught by symbols and parables. The\nmysterious knowledge of the Druids was embodied in signs and symbols.\nTaliesin, describing his initiation, says: \"The secrets were imparted to\nme by the old Giantess (_Ceridwen_, or _Isis_), without the use of\naudible language.\" And again he says, \"I am a _silent_ proficient.\"\n\nInitiation was a school, in which were taught the truths of primitive\nrevelation, the existence and attributes of one God, the immortality of\nthe Soul, rewards and punishments in a future life, the phenomena of\nNature, the arts, the sciences, morality, legislation, philosophy, and\nphilanthropy, and what we now style psychology and metaphysics, with\nanimal magnetism, and the other occult sciences.\n\nAll the ideas of the Priests of Hindostan, Persia, Syria, Arabia,\nChald\u00e6a, Ph\u0153nicia, were known to the Egyptian Priests. The rational\nIndian philosophy, after penetrating Persia and Chald\u00e6a, gave birth to\nthe Egyptian Mysteries. We find that the use of Hieroglyphics was\npreceded in Egypt by that of the easily understood symbols and figures,\nfrom the mineral, animal, and vegetable kingdoms, used by the Indians,\nPersians, and Chald\u00e6ans to express their thoughts; and this primitive\nphilosophy was the basis of the modern philosophy of Pythagoras and\nPlato.\n\nAll the philosophers and legislators that made Antiquity illustrious,\nwere pupils of the initiation; and all the beneficent modifications in\nthe religions of the different people instructed by them were owing to\ntheir institution and extension of the Mysteries. In the chaos of\npopular superstitions, those Mysteries alone kept man from lapsing into\nabsolute brutishness. Zoroaster and Confucius drew their doctrines from\nthe Mysteries. Clemens of Alexandria, speaking of the Great Mysteries,\nsays: \"Here ends all instruction. Nature and all things are seen and\nknown.\" Had moral truths alone been taught the Initiate, the Mysteries\ncould never have deserved nor received the magnificent eulogiums of the\nmost enlightened men of Antiquity,--of Pindar, Plutarch, Isocrates,\nDiodorus, Plato, Euripides, Socrates, Aristophanes, Cicero, Epictetus,\nMarcus Aurelius, and others;--philosophers hostile to the Sacerdotal\nSpirit, or historians devoted to the investigation of Truth. No: all the\nsciences were taught there; and those oral or written traditions briefly\ncommunicated, which reached back to the first age of the world.\n\nSocrates said, in the Ph\u00e6do of Plato: \"It well appears that those who\nestablished the Mysteries, or secret assemblies of the initiated, were\nno contemptible personages, but men of great genius, who in the early\nages strove to teach us, under enigmas, that he who shall go to the\ninvisible regions without being purified, will be precipitated into the\nabyss; while he who arrives there, purged of the stains of this world,\nand accomplished in virtue, will be admitted to the dwelling-place of\nthe Deity.... The initiated are certain to attain the company of the\nGods.\"\n\nPretextatus, Proconsul of Achaia, a man endowed with all the virtues,\nsaid, in the 4th century, that to deprive the Greeks of those Sacred\nMysteries which bound together the whole human face, would make life\ninsupportable.\n\nInitiation was considered to be a mystical death; a descent into the\ninfernal regions, where every pollution, and the stains and\nimperfections of a corrupt and evil life were purged away by fire and\nwater; and the perfect _Epopt_ was then said to be _regenerated_,\n_new-born_, restored to a _renovated_ existence of _life_, _light_, and\n_purity_; and placed under the Divine Protection.\n\nA new language was adapted to these celebrations, and also a language of\nhieroglyphics, unknown to any but those who had received the highest\nDegree. And to them ultimately were confined the learning, the morality,\nand the political power of every people among which the Mysteries were\npractised. So effectually was the knowledge of the hieroglyphics of the\nhighest Degree hidden from all but a favored few, that in process of\ntime their meaning Was entirely lost, and none could interpret them. If\nthe same hieroglyphics were employed in the higher as in the lower\nDegrees, they had a different and more abstruse and figurative meaning.\nIt was pretended, in later times, that the sacred hieroglyphics and\nlanguage were the same that were used by the Celestial Deities.\nEverything that could heighten the mystery of initiation was added,\nuntil the very name of the ceremony possessed a strange charm, and yet\nconjured up the wildest fears. The greatest rapture came to be expressed\nby the word that signified to pass through the Mysteries.\n\nThe Priesthood possessed one third of Egypt. They gained much of their\ninfluence by means of the Mysteries, and spared no means to impress the\npeople with a full sense of their importance. They represented them as\nthe beginning of a new life of reason and virtue: the initiated, or\nesoteric companions were said to entertain the most agreeable\nanticipations respecting death and eternity, to comprehend all the\nhidden mysteries of Nature, to have their souls restored to the original\nperfection from which man had fallen; and at their death to be borne to\nthe celestial mansions of the Gods. The doctrines of a future state of\nrewards and punishments formed a prominent feature in the Mysteries; and\nthey were also believed to assure much temporal happiness and\ngood-fortune, and afford absolute security against the most imminent\ndangers by land and sea. Public odium was cast on those who refused to\nbe initiated. They were considered profane, unworthy of public\nemployment or private confidence; and held to be doomed to eternal\npunishment as impious. To betray the secrets of the Mysteries, to wear\non the stage the dress of an Initiate, or to hold the Mysteries up to\nderision, was to incur death at the hands of public vengeance.\n\nIt is certain that up to the time of Cicero, the Mysteries still\nretained much of their original character of sanctity and purity. And at\na later day, as we know, Nero, after committing a horrible crime, did\nnot dare, even in Greece, to aid in the celebration of the Mysteries;\nnor at a still later day was Constantine, the Christian Emperor, allowed\nto do so, after his murder of his relatives.\n\nEverywhere, and in all their forms, the Mysteries were funereal; and\ncelebrated the mystical death and restoration to life of some divine or\nheroic personage: and the details of the legend and the mode of the\ndeath varied in the different Countries where the Mysteries were\npractised.\n\nTheir explanation belongs both to astronomy and mythology; and the\nLegend of the Master's Degree is but another form of that of the\nMysteries, reaching back, in one shape or other, to the remotest\nantiquity.\n\nWhether Egypt originated the legend, or borrowed it from India or\nChald\u00e6a, it is now impossible to know. But the Hebrews received the\nMysteries from the Egyptians; and of course were familiar with _their\nlegend_,--known as it was to those Egyptian Initiates, Joseph and Moses.\nIt was the fable (or rather the _truth_ clothed in allegory and figures)\nof OSIRIS, the Sun, Source of Light and Principle of Good, and TYPHON,\nthe Principle of Darkness and Evil. In all the histories of the Gods and\nHeroes lay couched and hidden astronomical details and the history of\nthe operations of visible Nature; and those in their turn were also\nsymbols of higher and profounder truths. None but rude uncultivated\nintellects could long consider the Sun and Stars and the Powers of\nNature as Divine, or as fit objects of Human Worship; and _they_ will\nconsider them so while the world lasts; and ever remain ignorant of the\ngreat Spiritual Truths of which these are the hieroglyphics and\nexpressions.\n\nA brief summary of the Egyptian legend will serve to show the leading\nidea on which the Mysteries among the Hebrews were based.\n\nOsiris, said to have been an ancient King of Egypt, was the Sun; and\nIsis, his wife, the Moon: and his history recounts, in poetical and\nfigurative style, the annual journey of the Great Luminary of Heaven\nthrough the different Signs of the Zodiac.\n\nIn the absence of Osiris, Typhon, his brother, filled with envy and\nmalice, sought to usurp his throne; but his plans were frustrated by\nIsis. Then he resolved to kill Osiris. This he did, by persuading him to\nenter a coffin or sarcophagus, which he then flung into the Nile. After\na long search, Isis found the body, and concealed it in the depths of a\nforest; but Typhon, finding it there, cut it into fourteen pieces, and\nscattered them hither and thither. After tedious search, Isis found\nthirteen pieces, the fishes having eaten the other (the privates), which\nshe replaced of wood, and buried the body at Phil\u00e6; where a temple of\nsurpassing magnificence was erected in honor of Osiris.\n\nIsis, aided by her son Orus, Horus or Har-oeri, warred against Typhon,\nslew him, reigned gloriously, and at her death was reunited to her\nhusband, in the same tomb.\n\nTyphon was represented as born of the earth; the upper part of his body\ncovered with feathers, in stature reaching the clouds, his arms and legs\ncovered with scales, serpents darting from him on every side, and fire\nflashing from his mouth. Horus, who aided in slaying him, became the God\nof the Sun, answering to the Grecian Apollo; and Typhon is but the\nanagram of Python, the great serpent slain by Apollo.\n\nThe word Typhon, like Eve, signifies _a serpent_, and _life_.[2] By its\nform the serpent symbolizes life, which circulates through all nature.\nWhen, toward the end of autumn, the Woman (Virgo), in the constellations\nseems (upon the Chald\u00e6an sphere) to crush with her heel the head of the\nserpent, this figure foretells the coming of winter, during which life\nseems to retire from all beings, and no longer to circulate through\nnature. This is why Typhon signifies also a serpent, the symbol of\nwinter, which, in the Catholic Temples, is represented surrounding the\nTerrestrial Globe, which surmounts the heavenly cross, emblem of\nredemption. If the word Typhon is derived from _Tupoul_, it signifies a\ntree which produces apples (_mala_, evils), the Jewish origin of the\nfall of man. Typhon means also one who supplants, and signifies the\nhuman passions, which expel from our hearts the lessons of wisdom. In\nthe Egyptian Fable, Isis wrote the sacred word for the instruction of\nmen, and Typhon effaced it as fast as she wrote it. In morals, his name\nsignifies _Pride_, _Ignorance_, and _Falsehood_.\n\n[Footnote 2: [Hebrew:] Tsapanai, in Hebrew, means a serpent.]\n\nWhen Isis first found the body, where it had floated ashore near Byblos,\na shrub of _erica_ or tamarisk near it had, by the virtue of the body,\nshot up into a tree around it, and protected it; and hence our sprig of\nacacia. Isis was also aided in her search by Anubis, in the shape of a\ndog. He was Sirius or the Dog-Star, the friend and counsellor of Osiris,\nand the inventor of language, grammar, astronomy, surveying, arithmetic,\nmusic, and medical science; the first maker of laws; and who taught the\nworship of the Gods, and the building of Temples.\n\nIn the Mysteries, the nailing up of the body of Osiris in the chest or\nark was termed the _aphanism_, or disappearance [of the Sun at the\nWinter Solstice, below the Tropic of Capricorn], and the recovery of the\ndifferent parts of his body by Isis, the _Euresis_, finding. The\ncandidate went through a ceremony representing this, in all the\nMysteries everywhere. The main facts in the fable were the same in all\ncountries; and the prominent Deities were everywhere a male and a\nfemale.\n\nIn Egypt they were Osiris and Isis: in India, Mahadeva and Bhavani: in\nPh\u0153nicia, Thammuz (or Adonis) and Astarte: in Phrygia, Atys and Cybele:\nin Persia, Mithras and Asis: in Samothrace and Greece, Dionusos or\nSabazeus and Rhea: in Britain, Hu and Ceridwen: and in Scandinavia,\nWoden and Frea: and in every instance these Divinities represented the\nSun and the Moon.\n\nThe mysteries of Osiris, Isis, and Horus, seem to have been the model of\nall other ceremonies of initiation subsequently established among the\ndifferent peoples of the world. Those of Atys and Cybele, celebrated in\nPhrygia; those of Ceres and Proserpine, at Eleusis and many other places\nin Greece, were but copies of them. This we learn from Plutarch,\nDiodorus Siculus, Lactantius, and other writers; and in the absence of\ndirect testimony should necessarily infer it from the similarity of the\nadventures of these Deities; for the ancients held that the Ceres of the\nGreeks was the same as the Isis of the Egyptians; and Dionusos or\nBacchus as Osiris.\n\nIn the legend of Osiris and Isis, as given by Plutarch, are many details\nand circumstances other than those that we have briefly mentioned; and\nall of which we need not repeat here. Osiris married his sister Isis;\nand labored publicly with her to ameliorate the lot of men. He taught\nthem agriculture, while Isis invented laws. He built temples to the\nGods, and established their worship. Both were the patrons of artists\nand their useful inventions; and introduced the use of iron for\ndefensive weapons and implements of agriculture, and of gold to adorn\nthe temples of the Gods. He went forth with an army to conquer men to\ncivilization, teaching the people whom he overcame to plant the vine and\nsow grain for food.\n\nTyphon, his brother, slew him when the sun was in the sign of the\nScorpion, that is to say, at the Autumnal Equinox. They had been rival\nclaimants, says Synesius, for the throne of Egypt, as Light and Darkness\ncontend ever for the empire of the world. Plutarch adds, that at the\ntime when Osiris was slain, the moon was at its full; and therefore it\nwas in the sign opposite the Scorpion, that is, the Bull, the sign of\nthe Vernal Equinox.\n\nPlutarch assures us that it was to represent these events and details\nthat Isis established the Mysteries, in which they were reproduced by\nimages, symbols, and a religious ceremonial, whereby they were imitated:\nand in which lessons of piety were given, and consolations under the\nmisfortunes that afflict us here below. Those who instituted these\nMysteries meant to strengthen religion and console men in their sorrows\nby the lofty hopes found in a religious faith, whose principles were\nrepresented to them covered by a pompous ceremonial, and under the\nsacred veil of allegory.\n\nDiodorus speaks of the famous columns erected near Nysa, in Arabia,\nwhere, it was said, were two of the tombs of Osiris and Isis. On one was\nthis inscription: \"I am Isis, Queen of this country. I was instructed by\nMercury. No one can destroy the laws which I have established. I am the\neldest daughter of Saturn, most ancient of the Gods. I am the wife and\nsister of Osiris the King. I first made known to mortals the use of\nwheat. I am the mother of Orus the King. In my honor was the city of\nBubaste built. Rejoice, O Egypt, rejoice, land that gave me birth!\" ...\nAnd on the other was this: \"I am Osiris the King, who led my armies into\nall parts of the world, to the most thickly inhabited countries of\nIndia, the North, the Danube, and the Ocean. I am the eldest son of\nSaturn: I was born of the brilliant and magnificent egg, and my\nsubstance is of the same nature as that which composes light. There is\nno place in the Universe where I have not appeared, to bestow my\nbenefits and make known my discoveries.\" The rest was illegible.\n\nTo aid her in the search for the body of Osiris, and to nurse her infant\nchild Horus, Isis sought out and took with her Anubis, son of Osiris,\nand his sister Nephte. He, as we have said, was Sirius, the brightest\nstar in the Heavens. After finding him, she went to Byblos, and seated\nherself near a fountain, where she had learned that the sacred chest had\nstopped which contained the body of Osiris. There she sat, sad and\nsilent, shedding a torrent of tears. Thither came the women of the Court\nof Queen Astarte, and she spoke to them, and dressed their hair, pouring\nupon it deliciously perfumed ambrosia. This known to the Queen, Isis\nwas engaged as nurse for her child, in the palace, one of the columns of\nwhich was made of the erica or tamarisk, that had grown up over the\nchest containing Osiris, cut down by the King, and unknown to him, still\nenclosing the chest: which column Isis afterward demanded, and from it\nextracted the chest and the body, which, the latter wrapped in thin\ndrapery and perfumed, she carried away with her.\n\nBlue Masonry, ignorant of its import, still retains among its emblems\none of a woman weeping over a broken column, holding in her hand a\nbranch of acacia, myrtle, or tamarisk, while Time, we are told, stands\nbehind her combing out the ringlets of her hair. We need not repeat the\nvapid and trivial explanation there given, of this representation of\n_Isis_, weeping at Byblos, over the column torn from the palace of the\nKing, that contained the body of Osiris, while Horus, the God of Time,\npours ambrosia on her hair.\n\nNothing of this recital was historical; but the whole was an allegory or\nsacred fable, containing a meaning known only to those who were\ninitiated into the Mysteries. All the incidents were astronomical, with\na meaning still deeper lying behind _that_ explanation, and so hidden by\na double veil. The Mysteries, in which these incidents were represented\nand explained, were like those of Eleusis in their object, of which\nPausanias, who was initiated, says that the Greeks, from the remotest\nantiquity, regarded them as the best calculated of all things to lead\nmen to piety: and Aristotle says they were the most valuable of all\nreligious institutions, and thus were called mysteries par excellence;\nand the Temple of Eleusis was regarded as, in some sort, the common\nsanctuary of the whole earth, where religion had brought together all\nthat was most imposing and most august.\n\nThe object of all the Mysteries was to inspire men with piety, and to\nconsole them in the miseries of life. That consolation, so afforded, was\nthe hope of a happier future, and of passing, after death, to a state of\neternal felicity.\n\nCicero says that the Initiates not only received lessons which made life\nmore agreeable, but drew from the ceremonies happy hopes for the moment\nof death. Socrates says that those who were so fortunate as to be\nadmitted to the Mysteries, possessed, when dying, the most glorious\nhopes for eternity. Aristides says that they not only procure the\nInitiates consolations in the present life, and means of deliverance\nfrom the great weight of their evils, but also the precious advantage of\npassing after death to a happier state.\n\nIsis was the Goddess of Sais; and the famous Feast of Lights was\ncelebrated there in her honor. There were celebrated the Mysteries, in\nwhich were represented the death and subsequent restoration to life of\nthe God Osiris, in a secret ceremony and scenic representation of his\nsufferings, called the Mysteries of Night.\n\nThe Kings of Egypt often exercised the functions of the Priesthood; and\nthey were initiated into the sacred science as soon as they attained the\nthrone. So at Athens, the First Magistrate, or Archon-King,\nsuperintended the Mysteries. This was an image of the union that existed\nbetween the Priesthood and Royalty, in those early times when\nlegislators and kings sought in religion a potent political instrument.\n\nHerodotus says, speaking of the reasons why animals were deified in\nEgypt: \"If I were to explain these reasons, I should be led to the\ndisclosure of those holy matters which I particularly wish to avoid, and\nwhich, but from necessity, I should not have discussed at all.\" So he\nsays, \"The Egyptians have at Sais the tomb of a certain personage, whom\nI do not think myself permitted to specify. It is behind the Temple of\nMinerva.\" [The latter, so called by the Greeks, was really Isis, whose\nwas the often-cited enigmatical inscription, \"I am what was and is and\nis to come. No mortal hath yet unveiled me.\"] So again he says: \"Upon\nthis lake are represented by night the accidents which happened to him\nwhom I dare not name. The Egyptians call them their Mysteries.\nConcerning these, at the same time that I confess myself sufficiently\ninformed, I feel myself compelled to be silent. Of the ceremonies also\nin honor of Ceres, I may not venture to speak, further than the\nobligations of religion will allow me.\"\n\nIt is easy to see what was the great object of initiation and the\nMysteries; whose first and greatest fruit was, as all the ancients\ntestify, to civilize savage hordes, to soften their ferocious manners,\nto introduce among them social intercourse, and lead them into a way of\nlife more worthy of men. Cicero considers the establishment of the\nEleusinian Mysteries to be the greatest of all the benefits conferred by\nAthens on other commonwealths; their effects having been, he says, to\ncivilize men, soften their savage and ferocious manners, and teach them\nthe true principles of morals, which _initiate_ man into the only kind\nof life worthy of him. The same philosophic orator, in a passage where\nhe apostrophizes Ceres and Proserpine, says that mankind owes these\nGoddesses the first elements of moral life, as well as the first means\nof sustenance of physical life; knowledge of the laws, regulation of\nmorals, and those examples of civilization which have improved the\nmanners of men and cities.\n\nBacchus in Euripides says to Pentheus, that his new institution (the\nDionysiac Mysteries) deserved to be known, and that one of its great\nadvantages was, that it proscribed all impurity: that these were the\nMysteries of Wisdom, of which it would be imprudent to speak to persons\nnot initiated: that they were established among the Barbarians, who in\nthat showed greater wisdom than the Greeks, who had not yet received\nthem.\n\nThis double object, political and religious,--one teaching our duty to\nmen, and the other what we owe to the Gods; or rather, respect for the\nGods calculated to maintain that which we owe the laws, is found in that\nwell-known verse of Virgil, borrowed by him from the ceremonies of\ninitiation: \"Teach me to respect Justice and the Gods.\" This great\nlesson, which the Hierophant impressed on the Initiates, after they had\nwitnessed a representation of the Infernal regions, the Poet places\nafter his description of the different punishments suffered by the\nwicked in Tartarus, and immediately after the description of that of\nSisyphus.\n\nPausanias, likewise, at the close of the representation of the\npunishments of Sisyphus and the daughters of Danaus, in the Temple at\nDelphi, makes this reflection; that the crime or impiety which in them\nhad chiefly merited this punishment, was the contempt which they had\nshown for the Mysteries of Eleusis. From this reflection of Pausanias,\nwho was an Initiate, it is easy to see that the Priests of Eleusis, who\ntaught the dogma of punishment in Tartarus, included among the great\ncrimes deserving these punishments, contempt for and disregard of the\nHoly Mysteries; whose object was to lead men to piety, and thereby to\nrespect for justice and the laws, chief object of their institution, if\nnot the only one, and to which the needs and interest of religion itself\nwere subordinate; since the latter was but a means to lead more surely\nto the former; for the whole force of religious opinions being in the\nhands of the legislators to be wielded, they were sure of being better\nobeyed.\n\nThe Mysteries were not merely simple lustrations and the observation of\nsome arbitrary formulas and ceremonies; nor a means of reminding men of\nthe ancient condition of the race prior to civilization: but they led\nmen to piety by instruction in morals and as to a future life; which at\na very early day, if not originally, formed the chief portion of the\nceremonial.\n\nSymbols were used in the ceremonies, which referred to agriculture, as\nMasonry has preserved the ear of wheat in a symbol and in one of her\nwords; but their principal reference was to astronomical phenomena. Much\nwas no doubt said as to the condition of brutality and degradation in\nwhich man was sunk before the institution of the Mysteries; but the\nallusion was rather metaphysical, to the ignorance of the uninitiated,\nthan to the wild life of the earliest men.\n\nThe great object of the Mysteries of Isis, and in general of all the\nMysteries, was a great and truly politic one. It was to ameliorate our\nrace, to perfect its manners and morals, and to restrain society by\nstronger bonds than those that human laws impose. They were the\ninvention of that ancient science and wisdom which exhausted all its\nresources to make legislation perfect; and of that philosophy which has\never sought to secure the happiness of man, by purifying his soul from\nthe passions which can trouble it, and as a necessary consequence\nintroduce social disorder. And that they were the work of genius is\nevident from their employment of all the sciences, a profound knowledge\nof the human heart, and the means of subduing it.\n\nIt is a still greater mistake to imagine that they were the inventions\nof charlatanism, and means of deception. They may in the lapse of time\nhave degenerated into imposture and schools of false ideas; but they\nwere not so at the beginning; or else the wisest and best men of\nantiquity have uttered the most willful falsehoods. In process of time\nthe very allegories of the Mysteries themselves, Tartarus and its\npunishments, Minos and the other judges of the dead, came to be\nmisunderstood, and to be false because they were so; while at first they\nwere true, because they were recognized as merely the arbitrary forms in\nwhich truths were enveloped.\n\nThe object of the Mysteries was to procure for man a real felicity on\nearth by the means of virtue; and to that end he was taught that his\nsoul was immortal; and that error, sin, and vice must needs, by an\ninflexible law, produce their consequences. The rude representation of\nphysical torture in Tartarus was but an image of the certain,\nunavoidable, eternal consequences that flow by the law of God's\nenactment from the sin committed and the vice indulged in. The poets and\nmystagogues labored to propagate these doctrines of the soul's\nimmortality and the certain punishment of sin and vice, and to accredit\nthem with the people, by teaching them the former in their poems, and\nthe latter in the sanctuaries; and they clothed them with the charms,\nthe one of poetry, and the other of spectacles and magic illusions.\n\nThey painted, aided by all the resources of art, the virtuous man's\nhappy life after death, and the horrors of the frightful prisons\ndestined to punish the vicious. In the shades of the sanctuaries, these\ndelights and horrors were exhibited as spectacles, and the Initiates\nwitnessed religious dramas, under the name of _initiation_ and\n_mysteries_. Curiosity was excited by secrecy, by the difficulty\nexperienced in obtaining admission, and by the tests to be undergone.\nThe candidate was amused by the variety of the scenery, the pomp of the\ndecorations, the appliances of machinery. Respect was inspired by the\ngravity and dignity of the actors and the majesty of the ceremonial; and\nfear and hope, sadness and delight, were in turns excited.\n\nThe Hierophants, men of intellect, and well understanding the\ndisposition of the people and the art of controlling them, used every\nappliance to attain that object, and give importance and impressiveness\nto their ceremonies. As they covered those ceremonies with the veil of\nSecrecy, so they preferred that Night should cover them with its wings.\nObscurity adds to impressiveness, and assists illusion; and they used it\nto produce an effect upon the astonished Initiate. The ceremonies were\nconducted in caverns dimly lighted: thick groves were planted around the\nTemples, to produce that gloom that impresses the mind with a religious\nawe.\n\nThe very word _mystery_, according to Demetrius Phalereus, was a\nmetaphorical expression that denoted the secret awe which darkness and\ngloom inspired. The night was almost always the time fixed for their\ncelebration; and they were ordinarily termed _nocturnal_ ceremonies.\nInitiations into the Mysteries of Samothrace took place at night; as did\nthose of Isis, of which Apuleius speaks. Euripides makes Bacchus say,\nthat _his_ Mysteries were celebrated at night, because there is in night\nsomething august and imposing.\n\nNothing excites men's curiosity so much as Mystery, concealing things\nwhich they desire to know: and nothing so much increases curiosity as\nobstacles that interpose to prevent them from indulging in the\ngratification of their desires. Of this the Legislators and Hierophants\ntook advantage, to attract the people to their sanctuaries, and to\ninduce them to seek to obtain lessons from which they would perhaps have\nturned away with indifference, if they had been pressed upon them. In\nthis spirit of mystery they professed to imitate the Deity, who hides\nHimself from our senses, and conceals from us the springs by which He\nmoves the Universe. They admitted that they concealed the highest truths\nunder the veil of allegory, the more to excite the curiosity of men, and\nto urge them to investigation. The secrecy in which they buried their\nMysteries, had that end. Those to whom they were confided, bound\nthemselves, by the most fearful oaths, never to reveal them. They were\nnot allowed even to speak of these important secrets with any others\nthan the initiated; and the penalty of death was pronounced against any\none indiscreet enough to reveal them, or found in the Temple without\nbeing an Initiate; and any one who had betrayed those secrets, was\navoided by all, as excommunicated.\n\nAristotle was accused of impiety, by the Hierophant Eurymedon, for\nhaving sacrificed to the man\u00e9s of his wife, according to the rite used\nin the worship of Ceres. He was compelled to flee to Chalcis; and to\npurge his memory from this stain, he directed, by his will, the erection\nof a Statue to that Goddess. Socrates, dying, sacrificed to Esculapius,\nto exculpate himself from the suspicion of Atheism. A price was set on\nthe head of Diagoras, because he had divulged the Secret of the\nMysteries. Andocides was accused of the same crime, as was Alcibiades,\nand both were cited to answer the charge before the inquisition at\nAthens, where the People were the Judges. \u00c6schylus the Tragedian was\naccused of having represented the Mysteries on the stage; and was\nacquitted only on proving that he had never been initiated.\n\nSeneca, comparing Philosophy to initiation, says that the most sacred\nceremonies could be known to the adepts alone: but that many of their\nprecepts were known even to the Profane. Such was the case with the\ndoctrine of a future life, and a state of rewards and punishments beyond\nthe grave. The ancient legislators clothed this doctrine in the pomp of\na mysterious ceremony, in mystic words and magical representations, to\nimpress upon the mind the truths they taught, by the strong influence of\nsuch scenic displays upon the senses and imagination.\n\nIn the same way they taught the origin of the soul, its fall to the\nearth past the spheres and through the elements, and its final return to\nthe place of its origin, when, during the continuance of its union with\nearthly matter, the sacred fire, which formed its essence, had\ncontracted no stains, and its brightness had not been marred by foreign\nparticles, which, denaturalizing it, weighed it down and delayed its\nreturn. These metaphysical ideas, with difficulty comprehended by the\nmass of the Initiates, were represented by figures, by symbols, and by\nallegorical analogies; no idea being so abstract that men do not seek to\ngive it expression by, and translate it into, sensible images.\n\nThe attraction of Secrecy was enhanced by the difficulty of obtaining\nadmission. Obstacles and suspense redoubled curiosity. Those who aspired\nto the initiation of the Sun and in the Mysteries of Mithras in Persia,\nunderwent many trials. They commenced by easy tests and arrived by\ndegrees at those that were most cruel, in which the life of the\ncandidate was often endangered. Gregory Nazianzen terms them _tortures_\nand mystic _punishments_. No one can be initiated, says Suidas, until\nafter he has proven, by the most terrible trials, that he possesses a\nvirtuous soul, exempt from the sway of every passion, and at it were\nimpassible. There were twelve principal tests; and some make the number\nlarger.\n\nThe trials of the Eleusinian initiations were not so terrible; but they\nwere severe; and the suspense, above all, in which the aspirant was kept\nfor several years [the memory of which is retained in Masonry by the\n_ages_ of those of the different Degrees], or the interval between\nadmission to the _inferior_ and initiation in the _great_ Mysteries, was\na species of torture to the curiosity which it was desired to excite.\nThus the Egyptian Priests tried Pythagoras before admitting him to know\nthe secrets of the sacred science. He succeeded, by his incredible\npatience and the courage with which he surmounted all obstacles, in\nobtaining admission to their society and receiving their lessons. Among\nthe Jews, the Essenes admitted none among them, until they had passed\nthe tests or several Degrees.\n\nBy initiation, those who before were _fellow-citizens_ only, became\n_brothers_, connected by a closer bond than before, by mean of a\nreligious fraternity, which, bringing men nearer together united them\nmore strongly: and the weak and the poor could more readily appeal for\nassistance to the powerful and the wealthy, with whom religious\nassociation gave them a closer fellowship.\n\nThe Initiate was regarded as the favorite of the Gods. For him alone\nHeaven opened its treasures. Fortunate during life, he could, by virtue\nand the favor of Heaven, promise himself after death an eternal\nfelicity.\n\nThe Priests of the Island of Samothrace promised favorable winds and\nprosperous voyages to those who were initiated. It was promised them\nthat the CABIRI, and Castor and Pollux, the DIOSCURI, should appear to\nthem when the storm raged, and give them calms and smooth seas: and the\nScholiast of Aristophanes says that those initiated in the Mysteries\nthere were just men, who were privileged to escape from great evils and\ntempests.\n\nThe Initiate in the Mysteries of Orpheus, after he was purified, was\nconsidered as released from the empire of evil, and transferred to a\ncondition of life which gave him the happiest hopes. \"I have emerged\nfrom evil,\" he was made to say, \"and have attained good.\" Those\ninitiated in the Mysteries of Eleusis believed that the Sun blazed with\na pure splendor for them alone. And, as we see in the case of Pericles,\nthey flattered themselves that Ceres and Proserpine inspired them and\ngave them wisdom and counsel.\n\nInitiation dissipated errors and banished misfortune: and after having\nfilled the heart of man with joy during life, it gave him the most\nblissful hopes at the moment of death. We owe it to the Goddesses of\nEleusis, says Socrates, that we do not lead the wild life of the\nearliest men: and to them are due the flattering hopes which initiation\ngives us for the moment of death and for all eternity. The benefit which\nwe reap from these august ceremonies, says Aristides, is not only\npresent joy, a deliverance and enfranchisement from the old ills; but\nalso the sweet hope which we have in death of passing to a more\nfortunate state. And Theon says that participation of the Mysteries is\nthe finest of all things, and the source of the greatest blessings. The\nhappiness promised there was not limited to this mortal life; but it\nextended beyond the grave. There a new life was to commence, during\nwhich the Initiate was to enjoy a bliss without alloy and without limit.\nThe Corybantes promised eternal life to the Initiates of the Mysteries\nof Cybele and Atys.\n\nApuleius represents Lucius, while still in the form of an ass, as\naddressing his prayers to Isis, whom he speaks of as the same as Ceres,\nVenus, Diana, and Proserpine, and as illuminating the walls of many\ncities simultaneously with her feminine lustre, and substituting her\nquivering light for the bright rays of the Sun. She appears to him in\nhis vision as a beautiful female, \"over whose divine neck her long thick\nhair hung in graceful ringlets.\" Addressing him, she says, \"The parent\nof Universal nature attends thy call. The mistress of the Elements,\ninitiative germ of generations, Supreme of Deities, Queen of departed\nspirits, first inhabitant of Heaven, and uniform type of all the Gods\nand Goddesses, propitiated by thy prayers, is with thee. She governs\nwith her nod the luminous heights of the firmament, the salubrious\nbreezes of the ocean; the silent deplorable depths of the shades below;\none Sole Divinity under many forms, worshipped by the different nations\nof the Earth under many titles, and with various religious rites.\"\n\nDirecting him how to proceed, at her festival, to re-obtain his human\nshape, she says: \"Throughout the entire course of the remainder of thy\nlife, until the very last breath has vanished from thy lips, thou art\ndevoted to my service.... Under my protection will thy life be happy and\nglorious: and when, thy days being spent, thou shalt descend to the\nshades below, and inhabit the Elysian fields, there also, even in the\nsubterranean hemisphere, shalt thou pay frequent worship to me, thy\npropitious patron: and yet further: if through sedulous obedience,\nreligious devotion to my ministry, and inviolable chastity, thou shalt\nprove thyself a worthy object of divine favor, then shalt thou feel the\ninfluence of the power that I alone possess. The number of thy days\nshall be prolonged beyond the Ordinary decrees of fate.\"\n\nIn the procession of the festival, Lucius saw the image of the Goddess,\non either side of which were female attendants, that, \"with ivory combs\nin their hands, made believe, by the motion of their arms and the\ntwisting of their fingers, to comb and ornament the Goddess' royal\nhair.\" Afterward, clad in linen robes, came the initiated. \"The hair of\nthe women was moistened by perfume, and enveloped in a transparent\ncovering; but the men, terrestrial stars, as it were, of the great\nreligion, were thoroughly shaven, and their bald heads shone\nexceedingly.\"\n\nAfterward came the Priests, in robes of white linen. The first bore a\nlamp in the form of a boat, emitting flame from an orifice in the\nmiddle: the second, a small altar: the third, a golden palm-tree: and\nthe fourth displayed the figure of a left hand, the palm open and\nexpanded, \"representing thereby a symbol of equity and fair-dealing, of\nwhich the left hand, as slower than the right hand, and more void of\nskill and craft, is therefore an appropriate emblem.\"\n\nAfter Lucius had, by the grace of Isis, recovered his human form, the\nPriest said to him, \"Calamity hath no hold on those whom our Goddess\nhath chosen for her service, and whom her majesty hath vindicated.\" And\nthe people declared that he was fortunate to be \"thus after a manner\nborn again, and at once betrothed to the service of the Holy Ministry.\"\n\nWhen he urged the Chief Priest to initiate him, he was answered that\nthere was not a single one among the initiated, of a mind so depraved,\nor so bent on his own destruction, as, without receiving a special\ncommand from Isis, to dare to undertake her ministry rashly and\nsacrilegiously, and thereby commit an act certain to bring upon himself\na dreadful injury. \"For\", continued the Chief Priest, \"the gates of the\nshades below, and the care of our life being in the hands of the\nGoddess,--_the ceremony of initiation into the Mysteries is_, as it\nwere, _to suffer death_, with the precarious chance of resuscitation.\nWherefore the Goddess, in the wisdom of her Divinity, hath been\naccustomed to select as persons to whom the secrets of her religion can\nwith propriety be entrusted, those who, standing as it were on the\nutmost limit of the course of life they have completed, _may through her\nProvidence be in a manner born again_, and commence the career of a new\nexistence\".\n\nWhen he was finally to be initiated, he was conducted to the nearest\nbaths, and after having bathed, the Priest first solicited forgiveness\nof the Gods, and then sprinkled him all over with the clearest and\npurest water, and conducted him back to the Temple, \"where,\" says\nApuleius, \"after giving me some instruction, that mortal tongue is not\npermitted to reveal, he bade me for the succeeding ten days restrain my\nappetite, eat no animal food, and drink no wine.\"\n\nThese ten days elapsed, the Priest led him into the inmost recesses of\nthe Sanctuary. \"And here, studious reader,\" he continues, \"peradventure\nthou wilt be sufficiently anxious to know all that was said and done,\nwhich, were it lawful to divulge, I would tell thee; and, wert thou\npermitted to hear, thou shouldst know. Nevertheless, although the\ndisclosure would affix the penalty of rash curiosity to my tongue as\nwell as thy ears, yet will I, for fear thou shouldst be too long\ntormented with religious longing, and suffer the pain of protracted\nsuspense, tell the truth notwithstanding. Listen then to what I shall\nrelate. _I approached the abode of death; with my foot I pressed the\nthreshold of Proserpine's Palace. I was transported through the\nelements, and conducted back again. At midnight I saw the bright light\nof the sun shining. I stood in the presence of the Gods, the Gods of\nHeaven and of the Shades below; ay, stood near and worshipped._ And now\nhave I told thee such things that, hearing, thou necessarily canst not\nunderstand; and being beyond the comprehension of the Profane, I can\nenunciate without committing a crime.\"\n\nAfter night had passed, and the morning had dawned, the usual ceremonies\nwere at an end. Then he was consecrated by twelve stoles being put upon\nhim, clothed, crowned with palm-leaves, and exhibited to the people. The\nremainder of that day was celebrated as his birthday and passed in\nfestivities; and on the third day afterward, the same religious\nceremonies were repeated, including a religious breakfast, _\"followed by\na final consummation of ceremonies_.\"\n\nA year afterward, he was warned to prepare for initiation into the\nMysteries of \"the Great God, Supreme Parent of all the other Gods, the\ninvincible OSIRIS.\" \"For,\" says Apuleius, \"although there is a strict\nconnexion between the religions of both Deities, AND EVEN THE ESSENCE OF\nBOTH DIVINITIES IS IDENTICAL, the ceremonies of the respective\ninitiations are considerably different.\"\n\nCompare with this hint the following language of the prayer of Lucius,\naddressed to Isis; and we may judge what doctrines were taught in the\nMysteries, in regard to the Deity: \"O Holy and Perpetual Preserver of\nthe Human Race! ever ready to cherish Mortals by Thy munificence, and to\nafford Thy sweet maternal affection to the wretched under misfortune;\nWhose bounty is never at rest, neither by day nor by night, nor\nthroughout the very minutest particle of duration; Thou who stretchest\nforth Thy health-bearing right hand over the land and over the sea for\nthe protection of mankind, to disperse the storms of life, to unravel\nthe inextricable entanglement of the web of fate, to mitigate the\ntempests of fortune, and restrain the malignant influences of the\nstars,--_the Gods in Heaven adore Thee, the Gods in the shades below do\nThee homage, the stars obey Thee, the Divinities rejoice in Thee, the\nelements and the revolving seasons serve Thee!_ At Thy nod the winds\nbreathe, clouds gather, seeds grow, buds germinate; _in obedience to\nThee the Earth revolves_ AND THE SUN GIVES US LIGHT. IT IS THOU WHO\nGOVERNEST THE UNIVERSE AND TREADEST TARTARUS UNDER THY FEET.\"\n\nThen he was initiated into the nocturnal Mysteries of Osiris and\nSerapis: and afterward into those of Ceres at Rome: but of the\nceremonies in these initiations, Apuleius says nothing.\n\nUnder the Archonship of Euclid, bastards and slaves were excluded from\ninitiation; and the same exclusion obtained against the Materialists or\nEpicureans who denied Providence and consequently the utility of\ninitiation. By a natural progress, it came at length to be considered\nthat the gates of Elysium would open only for the Initiates, whose souls\nhad been purified and regenerated in the sanctuaries. But it was never\nheld, on the other hand, that initiation alone sufficed. We learn from\nPlato, that it was also necessary for the soul to be purified from every\nstain: and that the purification necessary was such as gave virtue,\ntruth, wisdom, strength, justice, and temperance.\n\nEntrance to the Temples was forbidden to all who had committed homicide,\neven if it were involuntary. So it is stated by both Isocrates and\nTheon. Magicians and Charlatans who made trickery a trade, and impostors\npretending to be possessed by evil spirits, were excluded from the\nsanctuaries. Every impious person and criminal was rejected; and\nLampridius states that before the celebration of the Mysteries, public\nnotice was given, that none need apply to enter but those against whom\ntheir consciences uttered no reproach, and who were certain of their own\ninnocence.\n\nIt was required of the Initiate that his heart and hands should be free\nfrom any stain. Porphyry says that man's soul, at death, should be\nenfranchised from all the passions, from hate, envy, and the others;\nand, in a word, _be as pure as it is required to be in the Mysteries_.\nOf course it is not surprising that parricides and perjurers, and\nothers who had committed crimes against God or man, could not be\nadmitted.\n\nIn the Mysteries of Mithras, a lecture was repeated to the Initiate on\nthe subject of Justice. And the great moral lesson of the Mysteries, to\nwhich all their mystic ceremonial tended, expressed in a single line by\nVirgil, was _to practise Justice and revere the Deity_;--thus recalling\nmen to justice, by connecting it with the justice of the Gods, who\nrequire it and punish its infraction. The Initiate could aspire to the\nfavors of the Gods, only because and while he respected the rights of\nsociety and those of humanity. \"The sun,\" says the chorus of Initiates\nin Aristophanes, \"burns with a pure light for us alone, who, admitted to\nthe Mysteries, observe the laws of piety in our intercourse with\nstrangers and our fellow-citizens.\" The rewards of initiation were\nattached to the practice of the social virtues. It was not enough to be\ninitiated merely. It was necessary to be faithful to the _laws_ of\ninitiation, which imposed on men duties in regard to their kind. Bacchus\nallowed none to participate in his Mysteries, but men who conformed to\nthe rules of piety and justice. Sensibility, above all, and compassion\nfor the misfortunes of others, were precious virtues, which initiation\nstrove to encourage. \"Nature,\" says Juvenal, \"has created us\ncompassionate, since it has endowed us with tears. Sensibility is the\nmost admirable of our senses. What man is truly worthy of the torch of\nthe Mysteries; who such as the Priest of Ceres requires him to be, if he\nregards the misfortunes of others as wholly foreign to himself?\"\n\nAll who had not used their endeavors to defeat a conspiracy; and those\nwho had on the contrary fomented one; those citizens who had betrayed\ntheir country, who had surrendered an advantageous post or place, or the\nvessels of the State, to the enemy; all who had supplied the enemy with\nmoney; and in general, all who had come short of their duties as honest\nmen and good citizens, were excluded from the Mysteries of Eleusis. To\nbe admitted there, one must have lived equitably, and with sufficient\ngood fortune not to be regarded as hated by the Gods.\n\nThus the Society of the Initiates was, in its principle, and according\nto the true purpose of its institution, a society of virtuous men, who\nlabored to free their souls from the tyranny of the passions, and to\ndevelop the germ of all the social virtues. And this was the meaning of\nthe idea, afterward misunderstood, that entry into Elysium was only\nallowed to the Initiates: because entrance to the sanctuaries was\nallowed to the virtuous only, and Elysium was created for virtuous souls\nalone.\n\nThe precise nature and details of the doctrines as to a future life, and\nrewards and punishments there, developed in the Mysteries, is in a\nmeasure uncertain. Little direct information in regard to it has come\ndown to us. No doubt, in the ceremonies there was a scenic\nrepresentation of Tartarus and the judgment of the dead, resembling that\nwhich we find in Virgil: but there is as little doubt that these\nrepresentations were explained to be allegorical. It is not our purpose\nhere to repeat the descriptions given of Elysium and Tartarus. That\nwould be aside from our object. We are only concerned with the great\nfact that the Mysteries taught the doctrine of the soul's immortality,\nand that, in some shape, suffering, pain, remorse, and agony, ever\nfollow sin as its consequences.\n\nHuman ceremonies are indeed but imperfect symbols; and the alternate\nbaptisms in fire and water intended to purify us into immortality, are\never in this world interrupted at the moment of their anticipated\ncompletion. Life is a mirror which reflects only to deceive, a tissue\nperpetually interrupted and broken, an urn forever fed, yet never full.\n\nAll initiation is but introductory to the great change of death Baptism,\nanointing, embalming, obsequies by burial or fire, are preparatory\nsymbols, like the initiation of Hercules before descending to the\nShades, pointing out the mental change which ought to precede the\nrenewal of existence. Death is the true initiation, to which sleep is\nthe introductory or minor mystery. It is the final rite which united the\nEgyptian with his God, and which opens the same promise to all who are\nduly prepared for it.\n\nThe body was deemed a prison for the soul; but the latter was not\ncondemned to eternal banishment and imprisonment. The Father of the\nWorlds permits its chains to be broken, and has provided in the course\nof Nature the means of its escape. It was a doctrine of immemorial\nantiquity, shared alike by Egyptians, Pythagoreans, the Orphici, and by\nthat characteristic Bacchic Sage, \"the Preceptor of the Soul,\" Silenus,\nthat death is far better than life; that the real death belongs to those\nwho on earth are immersed in the Lethe of its passions and fascinations,\nand that the true life commences only when the soul is emancipated for\nits return.\n\nAnd in this sense, as presiding over life and death, Dionusos is in the\nhighest sense _the_ LIBERATOR: since, like Osiris, he frees the soul,\nand guides it in its migrations beyond the grave, preserving it from the\nrisk of again falling under the slavery of matter or of some inferior\nanimal form, the purgatory of Metempsychosis; and exalting and\nperfecting its nature through the purifying discipline of his Mysteries.\n\"The great consummation of all philosophy,\" said Socrates, professedly\nquoting from traditional and mystic sources, \"is _Death_: He who pursues\nphilosophy aright, _is studying how to die_.\"\n\nAll soul is part of the Universal Soul, whose totality is Dionusos; and\nit is therefore he who, as Spirit of Spirits, leads back the vagrant\nspirit to its home, and accompanies it through the purifying processes,\nboth real and symbolical, of its earthly transit. He is therefore\nemphatically the _Mystes_ or Hierophant, the great Spiritual Mediator of\nGreek religion.\n\nThe human soul is itself [Greek: \u03b4\u03b1\u03b9\u03bc\u03bf\u03bd\u03b9\u03bf\u03c2] a God _within_ the mind,\ncapable through its own power of rivalling the canonization of the Hero,\nof making itself immortal by the practice of the good, and the\ncontemplation of the beautiful and true. The removal to the Happy\nIslands could only be understood mythically; everything earthly must\ndie; Man, like \u0152dipus, is wounded from his birth, his real elysium can\nexist only beyond the grave. Dionusos died and descended to the shades.\nHis passion was the great Secret of the Mysteries; as Death is the Grand\nMystery of existence. His death, typical of Nature's Death, or of her\nperiodical decay and restoration, was one of the many symbols of the\n_palingenesia_ or second birth of man.\n\nMan descended from the elemental Forces or Titans [Elohim], who fed on\nthe body of the Pantheistic Deity creating the Universe by\nself-sacrifice, commemorates in sacramental observance this mysterious\npassion; and while partaking of the raw flesh of the victim, seems to be\ninvigorated by a fresh draught from the fountain of universal life, to\nreceive a new pledge of regenerated existence. Death is the inseparable\nantecedent of life; the seed dies in order to produce the plant, and\nearth itself is rent asunder and dies at the birth of Dionusos. Hence\nthe significancy of the _phallus_, or of its inoffensive substitute, the\nobelisk, rising as an emblem of resurrection by the tomb of buried Deity\nat Lerna or at Sais.\n\nDionusos-Orpheus descended to the Shades to recover the lost Virgin of\nthe Zodiac, to bring back his mother to the sky as Thyone; or what has\nthe same meaning, to consummate his eventful marriage with Persephone,\nthereby securing, like the nuptials of his father with Semele or Dana\u00eb,\nthe perpetuity of Nature. His under-earth office is the depression of\nthe year, the wintry aspect in the alternations of bull and serpent,\nwhose united series makes up the continuity of Time, and in which,\nphysically speaking, the stern and dark are ever the parents of the\nbeautiful and bright.\n\nIt was this aspect, sombre for the moment, but bright by anticipation,\nwhich was contemplated in the Mysteries: the human sufferer was consoled\nby witnessing the severer trials of the Gods; and the vicissitudes of\nlife and death, expressed by apposite symbols, such as the sacrifice or\nsubmersion of the Bull, the extinction and re-illumination of the torch,\nexcited corresponding emotions of alternate grief and joy, that play of\npassion which was present at the origin of Nature, and which accompanies\nall her changes.\n\nThe greater Eleusini\u00e6; were celebrated in the month Bo\u00ebdromion, when the\nseed was buried in the ground, and when the year, verging to its\ndecline, disposes the mind to serious reflection. The first days of the\nceremonial were passed in sorrow and anxious silence, in fasting and\nexpiatory or lustral offices. On a sudden, the scene was changed: sorrow\nand lamentation were discarded, the glad name of Iacchus passed from\nmouth to mouth, the image of the God, crowned with myrtle and bearing a\nlighted torch, was borne in joyful procession from the Ceramicus to\nEleusis, where, during the ensuing night, the initiation was completed\nby an imposing revelation. The first scene was in the [Greek: \u03c0\u03c1\u03bf\u03bd\u03b1\u03bf\u03c2],\nor outer court of the sacred enclosure, where amidst utter darkness, or\nwhile the meditating God, the star illuminating the Nocturnal Mystery,\nalone carried an unextinguished torch, the candidates were overawed with\nterrific sounds and noises, while they painfully groped their way, as in\nthe gloomy cavern of the soul's sublunar migration; a scene justly\ncompared to the passage of the Valley of the Shadow of Death. For by the\nimmutable law exemplified in the trials of Psyche, man must pass through\nthe terrors of the under-world, before he can reach the height of\nHeaven. At length the gates of the _adytum_ were thrown open, a\nsupernatural light streamed from the illuminated statue of the Goddess,\nand enchanting sights and sounds, mingled with songs and dances, exalted\nthe communicant to a rapture of supreme felicity, realizing, as far as\nsensuous imagery could depict, the anticipated reunion with the Gods.\n\nIn the dearth of direct evidence as to the detail of the ceremonies\nenacted, or of the meanings connected with them, their tendency must be\ninferred from the characteristics of the contemplated deities with their\naccessory symbols and mythi, or from direct testimony as to the value of\nthe Mysteries generally.\n\nThe ordinary phenomena of vegetation, the death of the seed in giving\nbirth to the plant, connecting the sublimest hopes with the plainest\noccurrences, was the simple yet beautiful formula assumed by the great\nmystery in almost all religions, from the Zend-Avesta to the Gospel. As\nProserpina, the divine power is as the seed decaying and destroyed; as\nArtemis, she is the principle of its destruction; but Artemis Proserpina\nis also Cot\u0113 Soteria, the Saviour, who leads the Spirits of Hercules and\nHyacinthus to Heaven.\n\nMany other emblems were employed in the Mysteries,--as the dove, the\nmyrtle-wreath, and others, all significant of life rising out of death,\nand of the equivocal condition of dying yet immortal man.\n\nThe horrors and punishments of Tartarus, as described in the Ph\u00e6do and\nthe \u00c6neid, with all the ceremonies of the judgments of Minos, Eacus, and\nRhadamanthus, were represented, sometimes more and sometimes less fully,\nin the Mysteries; in order to impress upon the minds of the Initiates\nthis great lesson,--that we should be ever prepared to appear before the\nSupreme Judge, with a heart pure and spotless; as Socrates teaches in\nthe Gorgias. For the soul stained with crimes, he says, to descend to\nthe Shades, is the bitterest ill. To adhere to Justice and Wisdom, Plato\nholds, is our duty, that we may some day take that lofty road that leads\ntoward the heavens, and avoid most of the evils to which the soul is\nexposed in its subterranean journey of a thousand years. And so in the\nPh\u00e6do, Socrates teaches that we should seek here below to free our soul\nof its passions, in order to be ready to enter our appearance, whenever\nDestiny summons us to the Shades.\n\nThus the Mysteries inculcated a great moral truth, veiled with a fable\nof huge proportions and the appliances of an impressive spectacle, to\nwhich, exhibited in the sanctuaries, art and natural magic lent all\nthey had that was imposing. They sought to strengthen men against the\nhorrors of death and the fearful idea of utter annihilation. Death, says\nthe author of the dialogue, entitled _Axiochus_, included in the works\nof Plato, is but a passage to a happier state; but one must have lived\nwell, to attain that most fortunate result. So that the doctrine of the\nimmortality of the soul was consoling to the virtuous and religious man\nalone; while to all others it came with menaces and despair, surrounding\nthem with terrors and alarms that disturbed their repose during all\ntheir life.\n\nFor the material horrors of Tartarus, allegorical to the Initiate, were\nreal to the mass of the Profane; nor in latter times, did, perhaps many\nInitiates read rightly the allegory. The triple-walled prison, which the\ncondemned soul first met, round which swelled and surged the fiery waves\nof Phlegethon, wherein rolled roaring, huge, blazing rocks; the great\ngate with columns of adamant, which none save the Gods could crush;\nTisiphone, their warder, with her bloody robes; the lash resounding on\nthe mangled bodies of the miserable unfortunates, their plaintive\ngroans, mingled in horrid harmony with the clashings of their chains;\nthe Furies, lashing the guilty with their snakes; the awful abyss where\nHydra howls with its hundred heads, greedy to devour; Tityus, prostrate,\nand his entrails fed upon by the cruel vulture: Sisyphus, ever rolling\nhis rock; Ixion on his wheel; Tantalus tortured by eternal thirst and\nhunger, in the midst of water and with declicious fruits touching his\nhead; the daughters of Danaus at their eternal, fruitless task; beasts\nbiting and venomous reptiles stinging; and devouring flame eternally\nconsuming bodies ever renewed in endless agony; all these sternly\nimpressed upon the people the terrible consequences of sin and vice, and\nurged them to pursue the paths of honesty and virtue.\n\nAnd if, in the ceremonies of the Mysteries, these material horrors were\nexplained to the Initiates as mere symbols of the unimaginable torture,\nremorse, and agony that would rend the immaterial soul and rack the\nimmortal spirit, they were feeble and insufficient in the same mode and\nmeasure only, as all material images and symbols fall short of that\nwhich is beyond the cognizance of our senses: and the grave Hierophant,\nthe imagery, the paintings, the dramatic horrors, the funeral\nsacrifices, the august mysteries, the solemn silence of the sanctuaries,\nwere none the less impressive, because they were known to be but\nsymbols, that with material shows and images made the imagination to be\nthe teacher of the intellect.\n\nSo, too, it was represented, that except for the gravest sins there was\nan opportunity for expiation; and the tests of _water_, _air_, and\n_fire_ were represented; by means of which, during the march of many\nyears, the soul could be purified, and rise toward the ethereal regions;\nthat ascent being more or less tedious and laborious, according as each\nsoul was more or less clogged by the gross impediments of its sins and\nvices. Herein was shadowed forth, (how distinctly taught the Initiates\nwe know not), the doctrine that pain and sorrow, misfortune and remorse,\nare the inevitable _consequences_ that flow from sin and vice, as effect\nflows from cause; that by each sin and every act of vice the soul drops\nback and loses ground in its advance toward perfection: and that the\nground so lost is and will be in reality never so recovered as that the\nsin shall be as if it never had been committed; but that throughout all\nthe eternity of its existence, each soul shall be conscious that every\nact of vice or baseness it did on earth has made the distance greater\nbetween itself and ultimate perfection.\n\nWe see this truth glimmering in the doctrine, taught in the Mysteries,\nthat though slight and ordinary offences could be expiated by penances,\nrepentance, acts of beneficence, and prayers, grave crimes were mortal\nsins, beyond the reach of all such remedies. Eleusis closed her gates\nagainst Nero: and the Pagan Priests told Constantine that among all\ntheir modes of expiation there was none so potent as could wash from\n_his_ soul the dark spots left by the murder of his wife, and his\nmultiplied perjuries and assassinations.\n\nThe object of the ancient initiations being to ameliorate mankind and to\nperfect the intellectual part of man, the nature of the human soul, its\norigin, its destination, its relations to the body and to universal\nnature, all formed part of the mystic science; and to them in part the\nlessons given to the Initiate were directed. For it was believed that\ninitiation tended to his perfection, and to preventing the divine part\nwithin him, overloaded with matter gross and earthy, from being plunged\ninto gloom, and impeded in its return to the Deity. The soul, with them,\nwas not a mere conception or abstraction; but a reality including in\nitself life and thought; or, rather, of whose essence it was to live and\nthink.\n\nIt was material; but not brute, inert, inactive, lifeless, motionless,\nformless, lightless matter. It was held to be active, reasoning,\nthinking; its natural home in the highest regions of the Universe,\nwhence it descended to illuminate, give form and movement to, vivify,\nanimate, and carry with itself the baser matter; and whither it\nunceasingly tends to reascend, when and as soon as it can free itself\nfrom its connection with that matter. From that substance, divine,\ninfinitely delicate and active, essentially luminous, the souls of men\nwere formed, and by it alone, uniting with and organizing their bodies,\nmen _lived_.\n\nThis was the doctrine of Pythagoras, who learned it when he received the\nEgyptian Mysteries: and it was the doctrine of all who, by means of the\nceremonial of initiation, thought to purify the soul. Virgil makes the\nspirit of Anchises teach it to \u00c6neas: and all the expiations and\nlustrations used in the Mysteries were but symbols of those intellectual\nones by which the soul was to be purged of its vice-spots and stains,\nand freed of the incumbrance of its earthly prison, so that it might\nrise unimpeded to the source from which it came.\n\nHence sprung the doctrine of the transmigration of souls; which\nPythagoras taught as an allegory, and those who came after him received\nliterally. Plato, like him, drew his doctrines from the East and the\nMysteries, and undertook to translate the language of the symbols used\nthere, into that of Philosophy; and to prove by argument and\nphilosophical deduction, what, _felt_ by the consciousness, the\nMysteries taught by symbols as an indisputable fact,--the immortality of\nthe soul. Cicero did the same; and followed the Mysteries in teaching\nthat the Gods were but mortal men, who for their great virtues and\nsignal services had deserved that their souls should, after death, be\nraised to that lofty rank.\n\nIt being taught in the Mysteries, either by way of allegory, the meaning\nof which was not made known except to a select few, or, perhaps only at\na later day, as an actual reality, that the souls of the vicious dead\npassed into the bodies of those animals to whose nature their vices had\nmost affinity, it was also taught that the soul could avoid these\ntransmigrations, often successive and numerous, by the practice of\nvirtue, which would acquit it of them, free it from the circle of\nsuccessive generations, and restore it at once to its source. Hence\nnothing was so ardently prayed for by the Initiates, says Proclus, as\nthis happy fortune, which, delivering them from the empire of Evil,\nwould restore them to their true life, and conduct them to the place of\nfinal rest. To this doctrine probably referred those figures of animals\nand monsters which were exhibited to the Initiate, before allowing him\nto see the sacred light for which he sighed.\n\nPlato says, that souls will not reach the term of their ills, until the\nrevolutions of the world have restored them to their primitive\ncondition, and purified them from the stains which they have contracted\nby the contagion of fire, earth, and air. And he held that they could\nnot be allowed to enter Heaven, until they had distinguished themselves\nby the practice of virtue in some one of three several bodies. The\nManicheans allowed five: Pindar, the same number as Plato; as did the\nJews.\n\nAnd Cicero says, that the ancient soothsayers, and the interpreters of\nthe will of the Gods, in their religious ceremonies and initiations,\ntaught that we expiate here below the crimes committed in a prior life;\nand for that are born. It was taught in these Mysteries, that the soul\npasses through several states, and that the pains and sorrows of this\nlife are an expiation of prior faults.\n\nThis doctrine of transmigration of souls obtained, as Porphyry informs\nus, among the Persians and Magi. It was held in the East and the West,\nand that from the remotest antiquity. Herodotus found it among the\nEgyptians, who made the term of the circle of migrations from one human\nbody, through animals, fishes, and birds, to another human body, three\nthousand years. Empedocles even held that souls went into plants. Of\nthese, the laurel was the noblest, as of animals the lion; both being\nconsecrated to the Sun, to which, it was held in the Orient, virtuous\nsouls were to return. The Curds, the Chinese, the Kabbalists, all held\nthe same doctrine. So Origen held, and the Bishop Synesius, the latter\nof whom had been initiated, and who thus prayed to God: \"O Father, grant\nthat my soul, reunited to the light, may not be plunged again into the\ndefilements of earth!\" So the Gnostics held; and even the Disciples of\nChrist inquired if the man who was born blind, was not so punished for\nsome sin that he had committed before his birth.\n\nVirgil, in the celebrated allegory in which he develops the doctrines\ntaught in the Mysteries, enunciated the doctrine, held by most of the\nancient philosophers, of the pre-existence of souls, in the eternal fire\nfrom which they emanate; that fire which animates the Stars, and\ncirculates in every part of Nature: and the purifications of the soul,\nby fire, water, and air, of which he speaks, and which three modes were\nemployed in the Mysteries of Bacchus, were symbols of the passage of the\nsoul into different bodies.\n\nThe relations of the human soul with the rest of nature were a chief\nobject of the science of the Mysteries. The man was there brought face\nto face with entire nature. The world, and the spherical envelope that\nsurrounds it, were represented by a mystic egg, by the side of the image\nof the Sun-God whose Mysteries were celebrated. The famous Orphic egg\nwas consecrated to Bacchus in his Mysteries. It was, says Plutarch, an\nimage of the Universe, which engenders everything, and contains\neverything in its bosom. \"Consult,\" says Macrobius, \"the Initiates of\nthe Mysteries of Bacchus, who honor with special veneration the sacred\negg.\" The rounded and almost spherical form of its shell, he says, which\nencloses it on every side, and confines within itself the principles of\nlife, is a symbolic image of the world; and the world is the universal\nprinciple of all things.\n\nThis symbol was borrowed from the Egyptians, who also consecrated the\negg to Osiris, germ of Light, himself born, says Diodorus, from that\nfamous egg. In Thebes, in Upper Egypt, he was represented as emitting it\nfrom his mouth, and causing to issue from it the first principle of heat\nand light, or the Fire-God, Vulcan, or Phtha. We find this egg even in\nJapan, between the horns of the famous Mithriac Bull, whose attributes\nOsiris, Apis, and Bacchus all borrowed.\n\nOrpheus, author of the Grecian Mysteries, which he carried from Egypt to\nGreece, consecrated this symbol: and taught that matter, uncreated and\ninformous, existed from all eternity, unorganized, as chaos; containing\nin itself the Principles of all Existences confused and intermingled,\nlight with darkness, the dry with the humid, heat with cold; from which,\nit after long ages taking the shape of an immense egg, issued the purest\nmatter, or first substance, and the residue was divided into the four\nelements, from which proceeded heaven and earth and all things else.\nThis grand Cosmogonic idea he taught in the Mysteries; and thus the\nHierophant explained the meaning of the mystic egg, seen by the\nInitiates in the Sanctuary.\n\nThus entire Nature, in her primitive organization, was presented to him\nwhom it was wished to instruct in her secrets and initiate in her\nmysteries; and Clemens of Alexandria might well say that initiation was\na real physiology.\n\nSo Phanes, the Light-God, in the Mysteries of the New Orphics, emerged\nfrom the egg of chaos: and the Persians had the great egg of Ormuzd. And\nSanchoniathon tells us that in the Ph\u0153nician theology, the matter of\nchaos took the form of an egg; and he adds: \"Such are the lessons which\nthe Son of Thabion, first Hierophant of the Ph\u0153nicians, turned into\nallegories, in which physics and astronomy intermingled, and which he\ntaught to the other Hierophants, whose duty it was to preside at orgies\nand initiations; and who, seeking to excite the astonishment and\nadmiration of mortals, faithfully transmitted these things to their\nsuccessors and the Initiates.\"\n\nIn the Mysteries was also taught the division of the Universal Cause\ninto an Active and a Passive cause; of which two, Osiris and Isis,--the\nheavens and the earth were symbols. These two First Causes, into which\nit was held that the great Universal First Cause at the beginning of\nthings divided itself, were the two great Divinities, whose worship was,\naccording to Varro, inculcated upon the Initiates at Samothrace. \"As is\ntaught,\" he says, \"in the initiation into the Mysteries at Samothrace,\nHeaven and Earth are regarded as the two first Divinities. They are the\npotent Gods worshipped in that Island, and whose names are consecrated\nin the books of our Augurs. One of them is male and the other female;\nand they bear the same relation to each other as the soul does to the\nbody, humidity to dryness.\" The Curetes, in Crete, had builded an altar\nto Heaven and to Earth; whose Mysteries they celebrated at Gnossus, in a\ncypress grove.\n\nThese two Divinities, the Active and Passive Principles of the Universe,\nwere commonly symbolized by the generative parts of man and woman; to\nwhich, in remote ages, no idea of indecency was attached; the _Phallus_\nand _Cteis_, emblems of generation and production, and which, as such,\nappeared in the Mysteries. The Indian Lingam was the union of both, as\nwere the boat and mast and the point within a circle: all of which\nexpressed the same philosophical idea as to the Union of the two great\nCauses of Nature, which concur, one actively and the other passively, in\nthe generation of all beings: which were symbolized by what we now term\n_Gemini_, the Twins, at that remote period when the Sun was in that\nSign at the Vernal Equinox, and when they were Male and Female; and of\nwhich the Phallus was perhaps taken from the generative organ of the\nBull, when about twenty-five hundred years before our era he opened that\nequinox, and became to the Ancient World the symbol of the creative and\ngenerative Power.\n\nThe Initiates at Eleusis commenced, Proclus says, by invoking the two\ngreat causes of nature, the Heavens and the Earth, on which in\nsuccession they fixed their eyes, addressing to each a prayer. And they\ndeemed it their duty to do so, he adds, because they saw in them the\nFather and Mother of all generations. The concourse of these two agents\nof the Universe was termed in theological language a _marriage_.\nTertullian, accusing the Valentinians of having borrowed these symbols\nfrom the Mysteries of Eleusis, yet admits that in those Mysteries they\nwere explained in a manner consistent with decency, as representing the\npowers of nature. He was too little of a philosopher to comprehend the\nsublime esoteric meaning of these emblems, which will, if you advance,\nin other Degrees be unfolded to you.\n\nThe Christian Fathers contented themselves with reviling and ridiculing\nthe use of these emblems. But as they in the earlier times created no\nindecent ideas, and were worn alike by the most innocent youths and\nvirtuous women, it will be far wiser for us to seek to penetrate their\nmeaning. Not only the Egyptians, says Diodorus Siculus, but every other\npeople that consecrate this symbol (the Phallus), deem that they thereby\ndo honor to the Active Force of the universal generation of all living\nthings. For the same reason, as we learn from the geographer Ptolemy, it\nwas revered among the Assyrians and Persians. Proclus remarks that in\nthe distribution of the Zodiac among the twelve great Divinities, by\nancient astrology, six signs were assigned to the male and six to the\nfemale principle.\n\nThere is another division of nature, which has in all ages struck all\nmen, and which was not forgotten in the Mysteries; that of Light and\nDarkness, Day and Night, Good and Evil; which mingle with, and clash\nagainst, and pursue or are pursued by each other throughout the\nUniverse. The Great Symbolic Egg distinctly reminded the Initiates of\nthis great division of the world. Plutarch, treating of the dogma of a\nProvidence, and of that of the two principles of Light and Darkness,\nwhich he regarded as the basis of the Ancient Theology, of the Orgies\nand the Mysteries, as well among the Greeks as the Barbarians,--a\ndoctrine whose origin, according to him, is lost in the night of\ntime,--cites, in support of his opinion, the famous Mystic Egg of the\ndisciples of Zoroaster and the Initiates in the Mysteries of Mithras.\n\nTo the Initiates in the Mysteries of Eleusis was exhibited the spectacle\nof these two principles, in the successive scenes of Darkness and Light\nwhich passed before their eyes. To the profoundest darkness, accompanied\nwith illusions and horrid phantoms, succeeded the most brilliant light,\nwhose splendor blazed round the statue of the Goddess. The candidate,\nsays Dion Chrysostomus, passed into a mysterious temple, of astonishing\nmagnitude and beauty, where were exhibited to him many mystic scenes;\nwhere his ears were stunned with many voices; and where Darkness and\nLight successively passed before him. And Themistius in like manner\ndescribes the Initiate, when about to enter into that part of the\nsanctuary tenanted by the Goddess, as filled with fear and religious\nawe, wavering, uncertain in what direction to advance through the\nprofound darkness that envelopes him. But when the Hierophant has opened\nthe entrance to the inmost sanctuary, and removed the robe that hides\nthe Goddess, he exhibits her to the Initiate, resplendent with divine\nlight. The thick shadow and gloomy atmosphere which had environed the\ncandidate vanish; he is filled with a vivid and glowing enthusiasm, that\nlifts his soul out of the profound dejection in which it was plunged;\nand the purest light succeeds to the thickest darkness.\n\nIn a fragment of the same writer, preserved by Stob\u00e6us, we learn that\nthe Initiate, up to the moment when his initiation is to be consummated,\nis alarmed by every kind of sight: that astonishment and terror take his\nsoul captive; he trembles; cold sweat flows from his body; until the\nmoment when the Light is shown him,--a most astounding Light,--the\nbrilliant scene of Elysium, where he sees charming meadows overarched by\na clear sky, and festivals celebrated by dances; where he hears\nharmonious voices, and the majestic chants of the Hierophants; and views\nthe sacred spectacles. Then, absolutely free, and enfranchised from the\ndominion of all ills, he mingles with the crowd of Initiates, and,\ncrowned with flowers, celebrates with them the holy orgies, in the\nbrilliant realms of ether, and the dwelling-place of Ormuzd.\n\nIn the Mysteries of Isis, the candidate first passed through the dark\nvalley of the shadow of death; then into a place representing the\nelements or sublunary world, where the two principles clash and contend;\nand was finally admitted to a luminous region where the sun, with his\nmost brilliant light, put to rout the shades of night. Then he himself\nput on the costume of the Sun-God or the Visible Source of Ethereal\nLight, in whose Mysteries he was initiated; and passed from the empire\nof darkness to that of light. After having set his feet on the threshold\nof the palace of Pluto he ascended to the Empyrean, to the bosom of the\nEternal Principle of Light of the Universe, from which all souls and\nintelligences emanate.\n\nPlutarch admits that this theory of two Principles was the basis of all\nthe Mysteries, and consecrated in the religious ceremonies and Mysteries\nof Greece. Osiris and Typhon, Ormuzd and Ahriman, Bacchus and the Titans\nand Giants, all represented these principles. Phanes, the luminous God\nthat issued from the Sacred Egg, and Night, bore the sceptres in the\nMysteries of the New Bacchus. Night and Day were two of the eight Gods\nadored in the Mysteries of Osiris. The sojourn of Proserpine and also of\nAdonis, during six months of each year in the upper world, abode of\nlight, and six months in the lower or abode of darkness, allegorically\nrepresented the same division of the Universe.\n\nThe connection of the different initiations with the Equinoxes which\nseparate the Empire of the Nights from that of the Days, and fix the\nmoment when one of these principles begins to prevail over the other,\nshows that the Mysteries referred to the continual contest between the\ntwo principles of light and darkness, each alternately victor and\nvanquished. The very object proposed by them shows that their basis was\nthe theory of the two principles and their relations with the soul. \"We\ncelebrate the august Mysteries of Ceres and Proserpine,\" says the\nEmperor Julian, \"at the Autumnal Equinox, to obtain of the Gods that the\nsoul may not experience the malignant action of the Power of Darkness\nthat is then about to have sway and rule in Nature.\" Sallust the\nPhilosopher makes almost the same remark as to the relations of the soul\nwith the periodical march of light and darkness, during an annual\nrevolution; and assures us that the mysterious festivals of Greece\nrelated to the same. And in all the explanations given by Macrobius of\nthe Sacred Fables in regard to the Sun, adored under the names of\nOsiris, Horus, Adonis, Atys, Bacchus, etc., we invariably see that they\nrefer to the theory of the two Principles, Light and Darkness, and the\ntriumphs gained by one over the other. In April was celebrated the first\ntriumph obtained by the light of day over the length of the nights; and\nthe ceremonies of mourning and rejoicing had, Macrobius says, as their\nobject, the vicissitudes of the annual administration of the world.\n\nThis brings us naturally to the tragic portion of these religious\nscenes, and to the allegorical history of the different adventures of\nthe Principle, Light, victor and vanquished by turns, in the combats\nwaged with Darkness during each annual period. Here we reach the most\nmysterious part of the ancient initiations, and that most interesting to\nthe Mason who laments the death of his Grand Master Khir-Om. Over it\nHerodotus throws the august veil of mystery and silence. Speaking of the\nTemple of Minerva, or of that Isis who was styled the Mother of the\nSun-God, and whose Mysteries were termed _Isiac_, at Sais, he speaks of\na Tomb in the Temple, in the rear of the Chapel and against the wall;\nand says, \"It is the tomb of a man, whose name respect requires me to\nconceal. Within the Temple were great obelisks of stone [_phalli_], and\na circular lake paved with stones and revetted with a parapet. It seemed\nto me as large as that at Delos\" [where the Mysteries of Apollo were\ncelebrated]. \"In this lake the Egyptians celebrate, during the night,\nwhat they style the Mysteries, in which are represented the sufferings\nof the God of whom I have spoken above.\" This God was Osiris, put to\ndeath by Typhon, and who descended to the Shades and was restored to\nlife; of which he had spoken before.\n\nWe are reminded, by this passage, of the Tomb of Khir-Om, his death, and\nhis rising from the grave, symbolical of restoration of life; and also\nof the brazen Sea in the Temple at Jerusalem. Herodotus adds: \"I impose\nupon myself a profound silence in regard to these Mysteries, with most\nof which I am acquainted. As little will I speak of the initiations of\nCeres, known among the Greeks as Thesmophoria. What I shall say will not\nviolate the respect which I owe to religion.\"\n\nAthenagoras quotes this passage to show that not only the Statue but the\nTomb of Osiris was exhibited in Egypt, and a tragic representation of\nhis sufferings; and remarks that the Egyptians had mourning ceremonies\nin honor of their Gods, whose deaths they lamented; and to whom they\nafterward sacrificed as having passed to a state of immortality.\n\nIt is, however, not difficult, combining the different rays of light\nthat emanate from the different Sanctuaries, to learn the genius and the\nobject of these secret ceremonies. We have hints, and not details.\n\nWe know that the Egyptians worshipped the Sun, under the name of Osiris.\nThe misfortunes and tragical death of this God were an allegory relating\nto the Sun. Typhon, like Ahriman, represented Darkness. The sufferings\nand death of Osiris in the Mysteries of the Night were a mystic image of\nthe phenomena of Nature, and the conflict of the two great Principles\nwhich share the empire of Nature, and most influenced our souls. The Sun\nis neither born, dies, nor is raised to life: and the recital of these\nevents was but an allegory, veiling a higher truth.\n\nHorus, son of Isis, and the same as Apollo or the Sun, also died and was\nrestored again to life and to his mother; and the priests of Isis\ncelebrated these great events by mourning and joyous festival succeeding\neach other.\n\nIn the Mysteries of Phoenicia, established in honor of Thammuz or Adoni,\nalso the Sun, the spectacle of his death and resurrection was exhibited\nto the Initiates. As we learn from Meursius and Plutarch, a figure was\nexhibited representing the corpse of a young man. Flowers were strewed\nupon his body, the women mourned for him; a tomb was erected to him. And\nthese feasts, as we learn from Plutarch and Ovid, passed into Greece.\n\nIn the Mysteries of Mithras, the Sun-God, in Asia Minor, Armenia and\nPersia, the death of that God was lamented, and his resurrection was\ncelebrated with the most enthusiastic expressions of joy. A corpse, we\nlearn from Julian Firmicus, was shown the Initiates, representing\nMithras dead; and afterward his resurrection was announced; and they\nwere then invited to rejoice that the dead God was restored to life, and\nhad by means of his sufferings secured their salvation. Three months\nbefore, his birth had been celebrated, under the emblem of an infant,\nborn on the 25th of December, or the eighth day before the Kalends of\nJanuary.\n\nIn Greece, in the Mysteries of the same God, honored under the name of\nBakchos, a representation was given of his death, slain by the Titans;\nof his descent into hell, his subsequent resurrection, and his return\ntoward his Principle or the pure abode whence he had descended to unite\nhimself with matter. In the islands of Chios and Tenedos, his death was\nrepresented by the sacrifice of a man, actually immolated.\n\nThe mutilation and sufferings of the same Sun-God, honored in Phrygia\nunder the name of Atys, caused the tragic scenes that were, as we learn\nfrom Diodorus Siculus, represented annually in the Mysteries of Cybele,\nmother of the Gods. An image was borne there, representing the corpse of\na young man, over whose tomb tears were shed, and to whom funeral honors\nwere paid.\n\nAt Samothrace, in the Mysteries of the Cabiri or great Gods, a\nrepresentation was given of the death of one of them. This name was\ngiven to the Sun, because the Ancient Astronomers gave the name of Gods\nCabiri and of Samothrace to the two Gods in the Constellation Gemini;\nwhom others term Apollo and Hercules, two names of the Sun. Athenion\nsays that the young Cabirus so slain was the same as the Dionusos or\nBakchos of the Greeks. The Pelasgi, ancient inhabitants of Greece, and\nwho settled Samothrace, celebrated these Mysteries, whose origin is\nunknown: and they worshipped Castor and Pollux as patrons of navigation.\n\nThe tomb of Apollo was at Delphi, where his body was laid, after Python,\nthe Polar Serpent that annually heralds the coming of autumn, cold,\ndarkness, and winter, had slain him, and over whom the God triumphs, on\nthe 25th of March, on his return to the lamb of the Vernal Equinox.\n\nIn Crete, Jupiter Ammon, or the Sun in Aries, painted with the\nattributes of that equinoctial sign, the Ram or Lamb;--that Ammon who,\nMartianus Copella says, is the same as Osiris, Adoni, Adonis, Atys, and\nthe other Sun-Gods,--had also a tomb, and a religious initiation; one of\nthe principal ceremonies of which consisted in clothing the Initiate\nwith the skin of a white lamb. And in this we see the origin of the\napron of white sheep-skin, used in Masonry.\n\nAll these deaths and resurrections, these funeral emblems, these\nanniversaries of mourning and joy, these cenotaphs raised in different\nplaces to the Sun-God, honored under different names, had but a single\nobject, the allegorical narration of the events which happened here\nbelow to the Light of Nature, that sacred fire from which our souls were\ndeemed to emanate, warring with Matter and the dark Principle resident\ntherein, ever at variance with the Principle of Good and Light poured\nupon itself by the Supreme Divinity. All these Mysteries, says Clemens\nof Alexandria, displaying to us murders and tombs alone, all these\nreligious tragedies, had a common basis, variously ornamented: and that\nbasis was the fictitious death and resurrection of the Sun, Soul of the\nWorld, principle of life and movement in the Sublunary World, and source\nof our intelligences, which are but a portion of the Eternal Light\nblazing in that Star, their chief centre.\n\nIt was in the Sun that Souls, it was said, were purified: and to it they\nrepaired. It was one of the gates of the soul, through which the\ntheologians, says Porphyry, say that it re-ascends toward the home of\nLight and the Good. Wherefore, in the Mysteries of Eleusis, the Dadoukos\n(the first officer after the Hierophant, who represented the Grand\nDemiourgos or Maker of the Universe), who was posted in the interior of\nthe Temple, and there received the candidates, represented the Sun.\n\nIt was also held that the vicissitudes experienced by the Father of\nLight had an influence on the destiny of souls; which, of the same\nsubstance as he, shared his fortunes. This we learn from the Emperor\nJulian and Sallust the Philosopher. They are afflicted when he suffers:\nthey rejoice when he triumphs over the Power of Darkness which opposes\nhis sway and hinders the happiness of Souls, to whom nothing is so\nterrible as darkness. The fruit of the sufferings of the God, father of\nlight and Souls, slain by the Chief of the Powers of Darkness, and again\nrestored to life, was received in the Mysteries. \"His death works your\nSalvation;\" said the High Priest of Mithras. That was the great secret\nof this religious tragedy, and its expected fruit;--the resurrection of\na God, who, repossessing Himself of His dominion over Darkness, should\nassociate with Him in His triumph those virtuous Souls that by their\npurity were worthy to share His glory; and that strove not against the\ndivine force that drew them to Him, when He had thus conquered.\n\nTo the Initiate were also displayed the spectacles of the chief agents\nof the Universal Cause, and of the distribution of the world, in the\ndetail of its parts arranged in most regular order. The Universe itself\nsupplied man with the model of the first Temple reared to the Divinity.\nThe arrangement of the Temple of Solomon, the symbolic ornaments which\nformed its chief decorations, and the dress of the High Priest,--all, as\nClemens of Alexandria, Josephus and Philo state, had reference to the\norder of the world. Clemens informs us that the Temple contained many\nemblems of the Seasons, the Sun, the Moon, the planets, the\nconstellations Ursa Major and Minor, the zodiac, the elements, and the\nother parts of the world.\n\nJosephus, in his description of the High Priest's Vestments, protesting\nagainst the charge of impiety brought against the Hebrews by other\nnations, for contemning the Heathen Divinities, declares it false,\nbecause, in the construction of the Tabernacle, in the vestments of the\nSacrificers, and in the Sacred vessels, the whole World was in some sort\nrepresented. Of the three parts, he says, into which the Temple was\ndivided, two represent Earth and Sea, open to all men, and the third,\nHeaven, God's dwelling-place, reserved for Him alone. The twelve loaves\nof Shew-bread signify the twelve months of the year. The Candlestick\nrepresented the twelve signs through which the Seven Planets run their\ncourses; and the seven lights, those planets; the veils, of four colors,\nthe four elements; the tunic of the High Priest, the earth; the\nHyacinth, nearly blue, the Heavens; the ephod, of four colors, the whole\nof nature; the gold, Light; the breast-plate, in the middle, this earth\nin the centre of the world; the two Sardonyxes, used as clasps, the Sun\nand Moon; and the twelve precious stones of the breast-plate arranged by\nthrees, like the Seasons, the twelve months, and the twelve signs of the\nzodiac. Even the loaves were arranged in two groups of six, like the\nzodiacal signs above and below the Equator. Clemens, the learned Bishop\nof Alexandria, and Philo, adopt all these explanations.\n\nHermes calls the Zodiac, the Grent Tent,--Tabernaculum. In the Royal\nArch Degree of the American Rite, the Tabernacle has four veils, of\ndifferent colors, to each of which belongs a banner. The colors of the\nfour are White, Blue, Crimson, and Purple, and the banners bear the\nimages of the Bull, the Lion, the Man, and the Eagle, the Constellations\nanswering 2500 years before our era to the Equinoctial and Solstitial\npoints: to which belong four stars, Aldebaran, Regulus, Fomalhaut, and\nAntares. At each of these veils there are three words: and to each\ndivision of the Zodiac, belonging to each of these Stars, are three\nSigns. The four signs, Taurus, Leo, Scorpio, and Aquarius, were termed\nthe _fixed_ signs, and are appropriately assigned to the four veils.\n\nSo the Cherubim, according to Clemens and Philo, represented the two\nhemispheres: their wings, the rapid course of the firmament, and of time\nwhich revolves in the Zodiac. \"For the Heavens fly;\" says Philo,\nspeaking of the wings of the Cherubim: which were winged representations\nof the Lion, the Bull, the Eagle, and the Man; of two of which, the\nhuman-headed, winged bulls and lions, so many have been found at\nNimroud; adopted as beneficent symbols, when the Sun entered Taurus at\nthe Vernal Equinox and Leo at the Summer Solstice: and when, also, he\nentered Scorpio for which, on account of its malignant influences,\nAquila, the eagle was substituted, at the autumnal equinox; and Aquarius\n(the water-bearer) at the Winter Solstice.\n\nSo, Clemens says, the candlestick with seven branches represented the\nseven planets, like which the seven branches were arranged and\nregulated, preserving that musical proportion and system of harmony of\nwhich the sun was the centre and connection. They were arranged, says\nPhilo, by threes, like the planets above and those below the sun;\nbetween which two groups was the branch that represented him, the\nmediator or moderator of the celestial harmony. He is, in fact, the\nfourth in the musical scale, as Philo remarks, and Martianus Capella in\nhis hymn to the Sun.\n\nNear the candlestick were other emblems representing the heavens, earth,\nand the vegetative matter out of whose bosom the vapors arise. The whole\ntemple was an abridged image of the world. There were candlesticks with\nfour branches, symbols of the elements and the seasons; with twelve,\nsymbols of the signs; and even with three hundred and sixty, the number\nof days in the year, without the supplementary days. Imitating the\nfamous Temple of Tyre, where were the great columns consecrated to the\nwinds and fire, the Tyrian artist placed two columns of bronze at the\nentrance of the porch of the temple. The hemispherical brazen sea,\nsupported by four groups of bulls, of three each, looking to the four\ncardinal points of the compass, represented the bull of the Vernal\nEquinox, and at Tyre were consecrated to Astarte; to whom Hiram,\nJosephus says, had builded a temple, and who wore on her head a helmet\nbearing the image of a bull. And the throne of Solomon, with bulls\nadorning its arms, and supported on lions, like those of Horus in Egypt\nand of the Sun at Tyre; likewise referred to the Vernal Equinox and\nSummer Solstice.\n\nThose who in Thrace adored the sun, under the name of Saba-Zeus, the\nGrecian Bakchos, builded to him, says Macrobius, a temple on Mount\nZelmisso, its round form representing the world and the sun. A circular\naperture in the roof admitted the light, and introduced the image of\nthe sun into the body of the sanctuary, where he seemed to blaze as in\nthe heights of Heaven, and to dissipate the darkness within that temple\nwhich was a representative symbol of the world. There the passion,\ndeath, and resurrection of Bakchos were represented.\n\nSo the Temple of Eleusis was lighted by a window in the roof. The\nsanctuary so lighted, Dion compares to the Universe, from which he says\nit differed in size alone; and in it the great lights of nature played a\ngreat part and were mystically represented. The images of the Sun, Moon,\nand Mercury were represented there, (the latter the same as Anubis who\naccompanied Isis); and they are still the three lights of a Masonic\nLodge; except that for Mercury, the Master of the Lodge has been\nabsurdly substituted.\n\nEusebius names as the principal Ministers in the Mysteries of Eleusis,\nfirst, the _Hierophant_, clothed with the attributes of the Grand\nArchitect (Demiourgos) of the Universe. After him came the _Dadoukos_,\nor torch-bearer, representative of the Sun: then the altar-bearer,\nrepresenting the Moon: and last, the _Hieroceryx_, bearing the caduceus,\nand representing Mercury. It was not permissible to reveal the different\nemblems and the mysterious pageantry of initiation to the Profane; and\ntherefore we do not know the attributes, emblems, and ornaments of these\nand other officers; of which Apuleius and Pausanias dared not speak.\n\nWe know only that everything recounted there was marvellous; everything\ndone there tended to astonish the Initiate: and that eyes and ears were\nequally astounded. The Hierophant, of lofty height, and noble features,\nwith long hair, of a great age, grave and dignified, with a voice sweet\nand sonorous, sat upon a throne, clad in a long trailing robe; as the\nMotive-God of Nature was held to be enveloped in His work and hidden\nunder a veil which no mortal can raise. Even His name was concealed,\nlike that of the Demiourgos, whose name was ineffable.\n\nThe Dadoukos also wore a long robe, his hair long, and a bandeau on his\nforehead. Callias, when holding that office, fighting on the great day\nof Marathon, clothed with the insignia of his office, was taken by the\nBarbarians to be a King. The Dadoukos led the procession of the\nInitiates, and was charged with the Purifications.\n\nWe do not know the functions of the _Epibomos_ or assistant at the\naltar, who represented the moon. That planet was one of the two homes\nof souls, and one of the two great gates by which they descended and\nreascended. Mercury was charged with the conducting of souls through the\ntwo great gates; and in going from the sun to the moon they passed\nimmediately by him. He admitted or rejected them as they were more or\nless pure, and therefore the Hieroceryx or Sacred Herald, who\nrepresented Mercury was charged with the duty of excluding the Profane\nfrom the Mysteries.\n\nThe same officers are found in the procession of Initiates of Isis,\ndescribed by Apuleius. All clad in robes of white linen, drawn tight\nacross the breast, and close-fitting down to the very feet, came, first,\none bearing a lamp in the shape of a boat; second, one carrying an\naltar; and third, one carrying a golden palm-tree and the caduceus.\nThese are the same as the three officers at Eleusis, after the\nHierophant. Then one carrying an open hand, and pouring milk on the\nground from a golden vessel in the shape of a woman's breast. The hand\nwas that of justice: and the milk alluded to the Galaxy or Milky Way,\nalong which souls descended and remounted. Two others followed, one\nbearing a winnowing fan, and the other a water-vase; symbols of the\npurification of souls by air and water; and the third purification, by\nearth, was represented by an image of the animal that cultivates it, the\ncow or ox, borne by another officer.\n\nThen followed a chest or ark, magnificently ornamented, containing an\nimage of the organs of generation of Osiris, or perhaps of both sexes;\nemblems of the original generating and producing Powers. When Typhon,\nsaid the Egyptian fable, cut up the body of Osiris into pieces, he flung\nhis genitals into the Nile, where a fish devoured them. Atys mutilated\nhimself, as his Priests afterward did in imitation of him; and Adonis\nwas in that part of his body wounded by the boar: all of which\nrepresented the loss by the Sun of his vivifying and generative power,\nwhen he reached the Autumnal Equinox (the Scorpion that on old monuments\nbites those parts of the Vernal Bull), and descended toward the region\nof darkness and Winter.\n\nThen, says Apuleius, came \"one who carried in his bosom an object that\nrejoiced the heart of the bearer, a venerable effigy of the Supreme\nDeity, neither bearing resemblance to man, cattle, bird, beast, or any\nliving creature: an exquisite invention, venerable from the novel\noriginality of the fashioning; a wonderful, ineffable symbol of\nreligious mysteries, to be looked upon in profound silence. Such as it\nwas, its figure was that of a small urn of burnished gold, hollowed very\nartistically, rounded at the bottom, and covered all over the outside\nwith the wonderful hieroglyphics of the Egyptians. The spout was not\nelevated, but extended laterally, projecting like a long rivulet; while\non the opposite side was the handle, which, with similar lateral\nextension, bore on its summit an asp, curling its body into folds, and\nstretching upward, its wrinkled, scaly, swollen throat.\"\n\nThe salient basilisk, or royal ensign of the Pharaohs, often occurs on\nthe monuments--a serpent in folds, with his head raised erect above the\nfolds. The basilisk was the Phoenix of the serpent-tribe; and the vase\nor urn was probably the vessel, shaped like a cucumber, with a\nprojecting spout, out of which, on the monuments of Egypt, the priests\nare represented pouring streams of the _cruz ansata_ or Tau Cross, and\nof _sceptres_, over the kings.\n\nIn the Mysteries of Mithras, a sacred cave, representing the whole\narrangement of the world, was used for the reception of the Initiates.\nZoroaster, says Eubulus, first introduced this custom of consecrating\ncaves. They were also consecrated, in Crete, to Jupiter; in Arcadia, to\nthe Moon and Pan; and in the Island of Naxos, to Bacchus. The Persians,\nin the cave where the Mysteries of Mithras were celebrated, fixed the\nseat of that God, Father of Generation, or Demiourgos, near the\nequinoctial point of Spring, with the Northern portion of the world on\nhis right, and the Southern on his left.\n\nMithras, says Porphyry, presided over the Equinoxes, seated on a Bull,\nthe symbolical animal of the Demiourgos, and bearing a sword. The\nequinoxes were the gates through which souls passed to and fro, between\nthe hemisphere of light and that or darkness. The milky way was also\nrepresented, passing near each of these gates: and it was, in the old\ntheology, termed the pathway of souls. It is, according to Pythagoras,\nvast troops of souls that form that luminous belt.\n\nThe route followed by souls, according to Porphyry, or rather their\nprogressive march in the world, lying through the fixed stars and\nplanets, the Mithriac cave not only displayed the zodiacal and other\nconstellations, and marked gates at the four equinoctial and solstitial\npoints of the zodiac, whereat souls enter into and escape from the world\nof generations; and through which they pass to and fro between the\nrealms of light and darkness; but it represented the seven planetary\nspheres which they needs must traverse, in descending from the heaven of\nthe fixed stars to the elements that envelop the earth; and seven gates\nwere marked, one for each planet, through which they pass, in descending\nor returning.\n\nWe learn this from Celsus, in Origen; who says that the symbolical image\nof this passage among the Stars, used in the Mithriac Mysteries, was a\nladder, reaching from earth to Heaven, divided into seven steps or\nstages, to each of which was a gate, and at the summit an eighth, that\nof the fixed stars. The first gate says Celsus, was that of Saturn, and\nof lead, by the heavy nature whereof his dull slow progress was\nsymbolized. The second, of tin, was that of Venus, symbolizing her soft\nsplendor and easy flexibility. The third, of brass, was that of Jupiter,\nemblem of his solidity and dry nature. The fourth, of iron, was that of\nMercury, expressing his indefatigable activity and sagacity. The fifth,\nof copper, was that of Mars, expressive of his inequalities and variable\nnature. The sixth, of silver, was that of the Moon: and the seventh, of\ngold, that of the Sun. This order is not the real order of these\nPlanets; but a mysterious one, like that of the days of the Week\nconsecrated to them, commencing with Saturday, and _retrograding_ to\nSunday. It was dictated, Celsus says, by certain harmonic relations,\nthose of the fourth.\n\nThus there was an intimate connection between the Sacred Science of the\nMysteries, and ancient astronomy and physics; and the grand spectacle of\nthe Sanctuaries was that of the order of the Known Universe, or the\nspectacle of Nature itself, surrounding the soul of the Initiate, as it\nsurrounded it when it first descended through the planetary gates, and\nby the equinoctal and solstitial doors, along the Milky Way, to be for\nthe first time immured in its prison-house of matter. But the Mysteries\nalso represented to the candidate, by sensible symbols, the invisible\nforces which move this visible Universe, and the virtues, qualities, and\npowers attached to matter, and which maintain the marvellous order\nobserved therein. Of this Porphyry informs us.\n\nThe world, according to the philosophers of antiquity, was not a purely\nmaterial and mechanical machine. A great Soul, diffused everywhere,\nvivified all the members of the immense body of the Universe; and an\nIntelligence, equally great, directed all its movements, and maintained\nthe eternal harmony that resulted therefrom. Thus the Unity of the\nUniverse, represented by the symbolic egg, contained in itself two\nunits, the Soul and the Intelligence, which pervaded all its parts: and\nthey were to the Universe, considered as an animated and intelligent\nbeing, what intelligence and the soul of life are to the individuality\nof man.\n\nThe doctrine of the Unity of God, in this sense, was taught by Orpheus.\nOf this his hymn or palinode is a proof; fragments of which are quoted\nby many of the Fathers, as Justin, Tatian, Clemens of Alexandria, Cyril,\nand Theodoret, and the whole by Eusebius, quoting from Aristobulus. The\ndoctrine of the LOGOS (word) or the Noos (intellect), his incarnation,\ndeath, resurrection or transfiguration; of his union with matter, his\ndivision in the visible world, which he pervades, his return to the\noriginal Unity, and the whole theory relative to the origin of the soul\nand its destiny, were taught in the Mysteries, of which they were the\ngreat object.\n\nThe Emperor Julian, explains the Mysteries of Atys and Cybele by the\nsame metaphysical principles, respecting the demiurgical Intelligence,\nits descent into matter, and its return to its origin: and extends this\nexplanation to those of Ceres. And so likewise does Sallust the\nPhilosopher, who admits in God a secondary intelligent Force, which\ndescends into the generative matter to organize it. These mystical ideas\nnaturally formed a part of the sacred doctrine and of the ceremonies of\ninitiation, the object of which, Sallust remarks, was to unite man with\nthe World and the Deity; and the final term of perfection whereof was,\naccording to Clemens, the contemplation of nature, of real beings, and\nof causes. The definition of Sallust is correct. The Mysteries were\npractised as a means of perfecting the soul, of making it to know its\nown dignity, of reminding it of its noble origin and immortality, and\nconsequently of its relations with the Universe and the Deity, what was\nmeant by _real_ beings, was _invisible_ beings, _genii_, the _faculties_\nor _powers_ of nature; everything not a part of the _visible_ world,\nwhich was called, by way of opposition, _apparent_ existence. The theory\nof Genii, or Powers of Nature, and its Forces, personified, made part of\nthe Sacred Science of initiation, and of that religious spectacle of\ndifferent beings exhibited in the Sanctuary. It resulted from that\nbelief in the providence and superintendence of the Gods, which was one\nof the primary bases of initiation. The administration of the Universe\nby Subaltern Genii, to whom it is confided, and by whom good and evil\nare dispensed in the world, was a consequence of this dogma, taught in\nthe Mysteries of Mithras, where was shown that famous egg, shared\nbetween Ormuzd and Ahriman, each of whom commissioned twenty-four Genii\nto dispense the good and evil found therein; they being under twelve\nSuperior Gods, six on the side of Light and Good and six on that of\nDarkness and Evil.\n\nThis doctrine of the Genii, depositaries of the Universal Providence,\nwas intimately connected with the Ancient Mysteries, and adopted in the\nsacrifices and initiations both of Greeks and Barbarians. Plutarch says\nthat the Gods, by means of Genii, who are intermediates between them and\nmen, draw near to mortals in the ceremonies of initiation, at which the\nGods charge them to assist, and to distribute punishment and blessing.\nThus not the Deity, but His ministers, or a Principle and Power of Evil,\nwere deemed the authors of vice and sin and suffering: and thus the\nGenii or angels differed in character like men, some being good and some\nevil; some Celestial Gods, Archangels, Angels, and some Infernal Gods,\nDemons and fallen Angels.\n\nAt the head of the latter was their Chief, Typhon, Ahriman, or Shaitan,\nthe Evil Principle; who, having wrought disorder in nature, brought\ntroubles on men by land and sea, and caused the greatest ills, is at\nlast punished for his crimes. It was these events and incidents, says\nPlutarch, which Isis desired to represent in the ceremonial of the\nMysteries, established by her in memory of her sorrows and wanderings,\nwhereof she exhibited an image and representation in her Sanctuaries,\nwhere also were afforded encouragements to piety and consolation in\nmisfortune. The dogma of a Providence, he says, administering the\nUniverse by means of intermediary Powers, who maintain the connection of\nman with the Divinity, was consecrated in the Mysteries of the\nEgyptians, Phrygians, and Thracians, of the Magi and the Disciples of\nZoroaster; as is plain by their initiations, in which mournful and\nfunereal ceremonies mingled. It was an essential part of the lessons\ngiven the Initiates, to teach them the relations of their own souls with\nUniversal Nature, the greatest lessons of all, meant to dignify man in\nhis own eyes, and teach him his place in the Universe of things.\n\nThus the whole system of the Universe was displayed in all its parts to\nthe eyes of the Initiate; and the symbolic cave which represented it was\nadorned and clothed with all the attributes of that Universe. To this\nworld so organized, endowed with a double force, active and passive,\ndivided between light and darkness, moved by a living and intelligent\nForce, governed by Genii or Angels who preside over its different parts,\nand whose nature and character are more lofty or low in proportion as\nthey possess a greater or less portion of dark matter,--to this world\ndescends the soul, emanation of the ethereal fire, and exiled from the\nluminous region above the world. It enters into this dark matter,\nwherein the hostile Principles, each seconded by his troops of Genii,\nare ever in conflict, there to submit to one or more organizations in\nthe body which is its prison, until it shall at last return to its place\nof origin, its true native country, from which during this life it is an\nexile.\n\nBut one thing remained,--to represent its return, through the\nconstellations and planetary spheres, to its original home. The\ncelestial fire, the philosophers said, soul of the world and of fire, an\nuniversal principle, circulating above the Heavens, in a region\ninfinitely pure and wholly luminous, itself pure, simple, and unmixed,\nis above the world by its specific lightness. If any part of it (say a\nhuman soul) descends, it acts against its nature in doing so, urged by\nan inconsiderate desire of the intelligence, a perfidious love for\nmatter which causes it to descend, to know what passes here below, where\ngood and evil are in conflict. The Soul, a simple substance, when\nunconnected with matter, a ray or particle of the Divine Fire, whose\nhome is in Heaven, ever turns toward that home, while united with the\nbody, and struggles to return thither.\n\nTeaching this, the Mysteries strove to recall man to his divine origin,\nand point out to him the means of returning thither. The great science\nacquired in the Mysteries was knowledge of man's self, of the nobleness\nof his origin, the grandeur of his destiny, and his superiority over the\nanimals, which can never acquire this knowledge, and whom he resembles\nso long as he does not reflect upon his existence and sound the depths\nof his own nature.\n\nBy doing and suffering, by virtue and piety and good deeds, the soul was\nenabled at length to free itself from the body, and ascend along the\npath of the Milky Way, by the gate of Capricorn and by the seven\nspheres, to the place whence by many gradations and successive lapses\nand enthralments it had descended. And thus the theory of the spheres,\nand of the signs and intelligences which preside there, and the whole\nsystem of astronomy, were connected with that of the soul and its\ndestiny; and so were taught in the Mysteries, in which were developed\nthe great principles of physics and metaphysics as to the origin of the\nsoul, its condition here below, its destination, and its future fate.\n\nThe Greeks fix the date of the establishment of the Mysteries of Eleusis\nat the year 1423 B.C., during the reign of Erechtheus at Athens.\nAccording to some authors, they were instituted by Ceres herself; and\naccording to others, by that Monarch, who brought them from Egypt,\nwhere, according to Diodorus of Sicily, he was born. Another tradition\nwas, that Orpheus introduced them into Greece, together with the\nDionisiac ceremonies, copying the latter from the Mysteries of Osiris,\nand the former from those of Isis.\n\nNor was it at Athens only, that the worship and Mysteries of Isis,\nmetamorphosed into Ceres, were established. The B\u0153otians worshipped the\nGreat or Cabiric Ceres, in the recesses of a sacred grove, into which\nnone but Initiates could enter; and the ceremonies there observed, and\nthe sacred traditions of their Mysteries, were connected with those of\nthe Cabiri in Samothrace.\n\nSo in Argos, Phocis, Arcadia, Achaia, Messenia, Corinth, and many other\nparts of Greece, the Mysteries were practised, revealing everywhere\ntheir Egyptian origin and everywhere having the same general features;\nbut those of Eleusis, in Attica, Pausanius informs us, had been regarded\nby the Greeks, from the earliest times, as being as far superior to all\nthe others, as the Gods are to mere Heroes.\n\nSimilar to these were the Mysteries of Bona Dea, the Good Goddess, whose\nname, say Cicero and Plutarch, it was not permitted to any man to know,\ncelebrated at Rome from the earliest times of that city. It was these\nMysteries, practised by women alone, the secrecy of which was impiously\nviolated by Clodius. They were held at the Kalends of May; and,\naccording to Plutarch, much of the ceremonial greatly resembled that of\nthe Mysteries of Bakchos.\n\nThe Mysteries of Venus and Adonis belonged principally to Syria and\nPh\u0153nicia, whence they passed into Greece and Sicily. Venus or Astarte\nwas the Great Female Deity of the Ph\u0153nicians, as Hercules, Melkarth or\nAdoni was their Chief God. Adoni, called by the Greeks Adonis, was the\nlover of Venus. Slain by a wound in the thigh inflicted by a wild boar\nin the chase, the flower called anemone sprang from his blood. Venus\nreceived the corpse and obtained from Jupiter the boon that her lover\nshould thereafter pass six months of each year with her, and the other\nsix in the Shades with Proserpine; an allegorical description of the\nalternate residence of the Sun in the two hemispheres. In these\nMysteries his death was represented and mourned, and after this\nmaceration and mourning were concluded, his resurrection and ascent to\nHeaven were announced.\n\nEzekiel speaks of the festivals of Adonis under the name of those of\nThammuz, an Assyrian Deity, whom every year the women mourned, seated at\nthe doors of their dwellings. These Mysteries, like the others, were\ncelebrated in the Spring, at the Vernal Equinox, when he was restored to\nlife; at which time, when they were instituted, the Sun (ADON, Lord, or\nMaster) was in the Sign Taurus, the domicile of Venus. He was\nrepresented with horns, and the hymn of Orpheus in his honor styles him\n\"the two-horned God;\" as in Argos Bakchos was represented with the feet\nof a bull.\n\nPlutarch says that Adonis and Bakchos were regarded as one and the same\nDeity; and that this opinion was founded on the great similarity in very\nmany respects between the Mysteries of these two Gods.\n\nThe Mysteries of Bakchos were known as the Sabazian, Orphic, and\nDionysiac Festivals. They went back to the remotest antiquity among the\nGreeks, and were attributed by some to Bakchos himself, and by others to\nOrpheus. The resemblance in ceremonial between the observances\nestablished in honor of Osiris in Egypt, and those in honor of Bakchos\nin Greece, the mythological traditions of the two Gods, and the symbols\nused in the festivals of each, amply prove their identity. Neither the\nname of Bakchos, nor the word _orgies_ applied to his feasts, nor the\nsacred words Used in his Mysteries, are Greek, but of foreign origin.\nBakchos was an Oriental Deity, worshipped in the East, and his orgies\ncelebrated there, long before the Greeks adopted them. In the earliest\ntimes he was worshipped in India, Arabia, and Bactria.\n\nHe was honored in Greece with public festivals, and in simple or\ncomplicated Mysteries, varying in ceremonial in various places, as was\nnatural, because his worship had come thither from different countries\nand at different periods. The people who celebrated the complicated\nMysteries were ignorant of the meaning of many words which they used,\nand of many emblems which they revered. In the Sabazian Feasts, for\nexample [from Saba-Zeus an oriental name of this Deity], the words EVOI,\nSABOI, were used, which are in nowise Greek; and a serpent of gold was\nthrown into the bosom of the Initiate, in allusion to the fable that\nJupiter had, in the form of a serpent, had connection with Proserpina,\nand begotten Bakchos, the bull; whence the enigmatical saying, repeated\nto the Initiates, that a bull engendered a dragon or serpent, and the\nserpent in turn engendered the bull, who became Bakchos: the meaning of\nwhich was, that the bull [Taurus, which then opened the Vernal Equinox,\nand the Sun in which Sign, figuratively represented by the Sign itself,\nwas Bakchos, Dionusos, Saba-Zeus, Osiris, etc.], and the Serpent,\nanother constellation, occupied such relative positions in the Heavens,\nthat when one rose the other set, and _vice versa_.\n\nThe serpent was a familiar symbol in the Mysteries of Bakchos. The\nInitiates grasped them with their hands, as Orphiucus does on the\ncelestial globe, and the Orpheo-telestes, or purifier of candidates did\nthe same, crying, as Demosthenes taunted \u00c6schines with doing in public\nat the head of the women whom his mother was to imitate, EVOI, SABOI,\nHYES ATT\u00ca, ATT\u00ca, HYES!\n\nThe Initiates in these Mysteries had preserved the ritual and ceremonies\nthat accorded with the simplicity of the earliest ages, and the manners\nof the first men. The rules of Pythagoras were followed there. Like the\nEgyptians, who held wool unclean, they buried no Initiate in woolen\ngarments. They abstained from bloody sacrifices; and lived on fruits or\nvegetables or inanimate things. They imitated the life of the\ncontemplative Sects of the Orient; thus approximating to the tranquility\nof the first men, who lived exempt from trouble and crimes in the bosom\nof a profound peace. One of the most precious advantages promised by\ntheir initiation was, to put a man in communion with the Gods, by\npurifying his soul of all the passions that interfere with that\nenjoyment, and dim the rays of divine light that are communicated to\nevery soul capable of receiving them, and that imitate their purity. One\nof the degrees of initiation was the state of inspiration to which the\nadepts were claimed to attain. The Initiates in the Mysteries of the\nLamb, at Pepuza, in Phrygia, professed to be inspired, and prophesied;\nand it was claimed that the soul, by means of these religious\nceremonies, purified of all stain, could see the Gods in this life, and\ncertainly, in all cases, after death.\n\nThe sacred gates of the Temple, where the ceremonies of initiation were\nperformed, were opened but once in each year, and no stranger was ever\nallowed to enter it. Night threw her veil over these august Mysteries,\nwhich could be revealed to no one. There the sufferings of Bakchos were\nrepresented, who, like Osiris, died, descended to hell and rose to life\nagain; and raw flesh was distributed to the Initiates, which each ate,\nin memory of the death of the Deity, torn in pieces by the Titans.\n\nThese Mysteries also were celebrated at the Vernal Equinox; and the\nemblem of generation, to express the active energy and generative power\nof the Divinity, was a principal symbol. The Initiates wore garlands and\ncrowns of myrtle and laurel.\n\nIn these Mysteries, the aspirant was kept in terror and darkness to\nperform the three days and nights; and was then made [Greek: A\u03d5\u03b1\n\u03c5\u03b9\u03c3\u03bc\u03bf\u03c2], or ceremony representing the death of Bakchos, the same\nmythological personage with Osiris. This was effected by confining him\nin a close cell, that he might seriously reflect, in solitude and\ndarkness, on the business he was engaged in: and his mind be prepared\nfor the reception of the sublime and mysterious truths of primitive\nrevelation and philosophy. This was a symbolic death; the deliverance\nfrom it, regeneration; after which he was called [Greek: \u03b4\u03b9\u03d5\u03c5\u03b7\u03c2] or\ntwin-born. While confined in the cell, the pursuit of Typhon after the\nmangled body of Osiris, and the search of Rhea or Isis for the same,\nwere enacted in his hearing; the initiated crying aloud the names of\nthat Deity derived from the Sanscrit. Then it was announced that the\nbody was found; and the aspirant was liberated amid shouts of joy and\nexultation.\n\nThen he passed through a representation of Hell and Elysium. \"Then,\"\nsaid an ancient writer, \"they are entertained with hymns and dances,\nwith the sublime doctrines of sacred knowledge, and with wonderful and\nholy visions. And now become perfect and initiated, they are FREE, and\nno longer under restraint; but, crowned and triumphant, they walk up and\ndown the regions of the blessed, converse with pure and holy men, and\ncelebrate the sacred Mysteries at pleasure.\" They were taught the nature\nand objects of the Mysteries, and the means of making themselves known,\nand received the name of Epopts; were fully instructed in the nature and\nattributes of the Divinity, and the doctrine of a future state; and\nmade acquainted with the unity and attributes of the Grand Architect of\nthe Universe, and the true meaning of the fables in regard to the Gods\nof Paganism: the great Truth being often proclaimed, that \"Zeus is the\nprimitive Source of all things; there is ONE God; ONE power, and ONE\nrule over all.\" And after full explanation of the many symbols and\nemblems that surrounded them, they were dismissed with the barbarous\nwords [Greek: \u039a\u03bf\u03b3\u03be] and [Greek: \u039f\u03bc\u03c0\u03b1\u03be], corruptions of the Sanscrit\nwords, Kanska Aom Pakscha; meaning, _object of our wishes, God,\nSilence_, or _Worship the Deity in Silence_.\n\nAmong the emblems used was the rod of Bakchos; which once, it was said,\nhe cast on the ground, and it became a serpent; and at another time he\nstruck the rivers Orontes and Hydaspes with it, and the waters receded\nand he passed over dry-shod. Water was obtained, during the ceremonies,\nby striking a rock with it. The Bakch\u00e6 crowned their heads with\nserpents, carried them in vases and baskets, and at the [Greek:\n\u0395\u03c5\u03c1\u03b7\u03c3\u03b9\u03db], or finding, of the body of Osiris, cast one, alive, into the\naspirant's bosom.\n\nThe Mysteries of Atys in Phrygia, and those of Cybele his mistress, like\ntheir worship, much resembled those of Adonis and Bakchos, Osiris and\nIsis. Their Asiatic origin is universally admitted, and was with great\nplausibility claimed by Phrygia, which contested the palm of antiquity\nwith Egypt. They, more than any other people, mingled allegory with\ntheir religious worship, and were great inventors of fables; and their\nsacred traditions as to Cybele and Atys, whom all admit to be Phrygian\nGods, were very various. In all, as we learn from Julius Firmicus, they\nrepresented by allegory the phenomena of nature, and the succession of\nphysical facts, under the veil of a marvellous history.\n\nTheir feasts occurred at the equinoxes, commencing with lamentation,\nmourning, groans, and pitiful cries for the death of Atys; and ending\nwith rejoicings at his restoration to life.\n\nWe shall not recite the different versions of the legend of Atys and\nCybele, given by Julius Firmicus, Diodorus, Arnobius, Lactantius,\nServius, Saint Augustine, and Pausanias. It is enough to say that it is\nin substance this: that Cybele, a Phrygian Princess, who invented\nmusical instruments and dances, was enamored of Atys, a youth; that\neither he in a fit of frenzy mutilated himself or was mutilated by her\nin a paroxysm of jealousy; that he died, and afterward, like Adonis,\nwas restored to life. It is the Ph\u0153nician fiction as to the Sun-God,\nexpressed in other terms, under other forms, and with other names.\n\nCybele was worshipped in Syria, under the name of Rhea. Lucian says that\nthe Lydian Atys there established her worship and built her temple. The\nname of Rhea is also found in the ancient cosmogony of the Ph\u0153nicians by\nSanchoniathon. It was Atys the Lydian, says Lucian, who, having been\nmutilated, first established the Mysteries of Rhea, and taught the\nPhrygians, the Lydians, and the people of Samothrace to celebrate them.\nRhea, like Cybele, was represented drawn by lions, bearing a drum, and\ncrowned with flowers. According to Varro, Cybele represented the earth.\nShe partook of the characteristics of Minerva, Venus, the Moon, Diana,\nNemesis, and the Furies; was clad in precious stones; and her High\nPriest wore a robe of purple and a tiara of gold.\n\nThe Grand Feast of the Syrian Goddess, like that of the Mother of the\nGods at Rome, was celebrated at the Vernal Equinox. Precisely at that\nequinox the Mysteries of Atys were celebrated, in which the Initiates\nwere taught to expect the rewards of a future life, and the flight of\nAtys from the jealous fury of Cybele was described, his concealment in\nthe mountains and in a cave, and his self-mutilation in a fit of\ndelirium; in which act his priests imitated him. The feast of the\npassion of Atys continued three days; the first of which was passed in\nmourning and tears; to which afterward clamorous rejoicings succeeded;\nby which, Macrobius says, the Sun was adored under the name of Atys. The\nceremonies were all allegorical, some of which, according to the Emperor\nJulian, could be explained, but more remained covered with the veil of\nmystery. Thus it is that symbols, outlast their explanations, as many\nhave done in Masonry, and ignorance and rashness substitute new ones.\n\nIn another legend, given by Pausanias, Atys dies, wounded like Adonis by\na wild boar in the organs of generation; a mutilation with which all the\nlegends ended. The pine-tree under which he was said to have died, was\nsacred to him; and was found upon many monuments, with a bull and a ram\nnear it; one the sign of exaltation of the Sun, and the other of that of\nthe Moon.\n\nThe worship of the Sun under the name of Mithras belonged to Persia,\nwhence that name came, as did the erudite symbols of that worship. The\nPersians, adorers of Fire, regarded the Sun as the most brilliant abode\nof the fecundating energy of that element, which gives life to the\nearth, and circulates in every part of the Universe, of which it is, as\nit were, the soul. This worship passed from Persia into Armenia,\nCappadocia, and Cilicia, long before it was known at Rome. The Mysteries\nof Mithras flourished more than any others in the imperial city. The\nworship of Mithras commenced to prevail there under Trajan. Hadrian\nprohibited these Mysteries, on account of the cruel scenes represented\nin their ceremonial: for human victims were immolated therein, and the\nevents of futurity looked for in their palpitating entrails. They\nreappeared in greater splendor than ever under Commodus, who with his\nown hand sacrificed a victim to Mithras: and they were still more\npractised under Constantine and his successors, when the Priests of\nMithras were found everywhere in the Roman Empire, and the monuments of\nhis worship appeared even in Britain.\n\nCaves were consecrated to Mithras, in which were collected a multitude\nof astronomical emblems; and cruel tests were required of the Initiates.\n\nThe Persians built no temples; but worshipped upon the summits of hills,\nin enclosures of unhewn stones. They abominated images, and made the Sun\nand Fire emblems of the Deity. The Jews borrowed this from them, and\nrepresented God as appearing to Abraham in a flame of fire, and to Moses\nas a fire at Horeb and on Sinai.\n\nWith the Persians, Mithras, typified in the Sun, was the invisible\nDeity, the Parent of the Universe, the Mediator. In Zoroaster's cave of\ninitiation, the Sun and Planets were represented over-head, in gems and\ngold, as also was the Zodiac. The Sun appeared emerging from the back of\nTaurus. Three great pillars, Eternity, Fecundity, and Authority,\nsupported the roof; and the whole was an emblem of the Universe.\n\nZoroaster, like Moses, claimed to have conversed face to face, as man\nwith man, with the Deity; and to have received from Him a system of pure\nworship, to be communicated only to the virtuous, and those who would\ndevote themselves to the study of Philosophy. His fame spread over the\nworld, and pupils came to him from every country. Even Pythagoras was\nhis scholar.\n\nAfter his novitiate, the candidate entered the cavern of initiation, and\nwas received on the point of a sword presented to his naked left\nbreast, by which he was slightly wounded. Being crowned with olive,\nanointed with balsam of benzoin, and otherwise prepared, he was purified\nwith fire and water, and went through seven stages of initiation. The\nsymbol of these stages was a high ladder with seven rounds or steps. In\nthem, he went through many fearful trials, in which darkness displayed a\nprincipal part. He saw a representation of the wicked in Hades; and\nfinally emerged from darkness into light. Received in a place\nrepresenting Elysium, in the brilliant assembly of the initiated, where\nthe Archimagus presided, robed in blue, he assumed the obligations of\nsecrecy, and was entrusted with the Sacred Words, of which the Ineffable\nName of God was the chief.\n\nThen all the incidents of his initiation were explained to him: he was\ntaught that these ceremonies brought him nearer the Deity; and that he\nshould adore the consecrated Fire, the gift of that Deity and His\nvisible residence. He was taught the sacred characters known only to the\ninitiated; and instructed in regard to the creation of the world, and\nthe true philosophical meaning of the vulgar mythology; and especially\nof the legend of Ormuzd and Ahriman, and the symbolic meaning of the six\nAmshaspands created by the former: _Bahman_, the Lord of Light;\n_Ardibehest_, the Genius of Fire; _Shariver_, the Lord of Splendor and\nMetals; _Stapandomad_, the Source of Fruitfulness; _Khordad_, the Genius\nof Water and Time; and _Amerdad_, the protector of the Vegetable World,\nand the prime cause of growth. And finally he was taught the true nature\nof the Supreme Being, Creator of Ormuzd and Ahriman, the Absolute First\nCause, styled ZERUANE AKHERENE.\n\nIn the Mithriac initiation were several Degrees. The first, Tertullian\nsays, was that of Soldier of Mithras. The ceremony of reception\nconsisted in presenting the candidate a crown, supported by a sword. It\nwas placed near his head, and he repelled it, saying, \"Mithras is my\ncrown.\" Then he was declared the soldier of Mithras, and had the right\nto call the other Initiates fellow-soldiers or companions in arms. Hence\nthe title _Companions_ in the Royal Arch Degree of the American Rite.\n\nThen he passed, Porphyry says, through the Degree of the Lion,--the\nconstellation Leo, domicile of the Sun and symbol of Mithras, found on\nhis monuments. These ceremonies were termed at Rome Leontic and Heliac;\nand _Coratia_ or _Hiero-Coracia_, of the Raven, a bird consecrated to\nthe Sun, and a sign placed in the Heavens below the Lion, with the\nHydra, and also appearing on the Mithriac monuments.\n\nThence he passed to a higher Degree, where the Initiates were called\n_Perses_ and children of the Sun. Above them were the _Fathers_, whose\nchief or Patriarch was styled Father of Fathers or _Pater Patratus_. The\nInitiates also bore the title of _Eagles_ and _Hawks_, birds consecrated\nto the Sun in Egypt, the former sacred to the God Mendes, and the latter\nthe emblem of the Sun and Royalty.\n\nThe little island of Samothrace was long the depositary of certain\naugust Mysteries, and many went thither from all parts of Greece to be\ninitiated. It was said to have been settled by the ancient Pelasgi,\nearly Asiatic colonists in Greece. The Gods adored in the Mysteries of\nthis island were termed CABIRI, an oriental word, from _Cabar_, great.\nVarro calls the Gods of Samothrace, _Potent Gods_. In Arabic, Venus is\ncalled _Cabar_. Varro says that the Great Deities whose Mysteries were\npractised there, were Heaven and Earth. These were but symbols of the\nActive and Passive Powers or Principles of universal generation. The two\nTwins, Castor and Pollux, or the Dioscuri, were also called the Gods of\nSamothrace; and the Scholiast of Apollonius, citing Mnaseas, gives the\nnames of Ceres, Proserpine, Pluto, and Mercury, as the four Cabiric\nDivinities worshipped at Samothrace, as Axieros, Axiocersa, Axiocersus,\nand Casmillus. Mercury was, there as everywhere, the minister and\nmessenger of the Gods; and the young servitors of the altars and the\nchildren employed in the Temples were called Mercuries or Casmilli, as\nthey were in Tuscany, by the Etrusci and Pelasgi, who worshipped the\nGreat Gods.\n\nTarquin the Etruscan was an Initiate of the Mysteries of Samothrace; and\nEtruria had its Cabiri as Samothrace had. For the worship of the Cabiri\nspread from that island into Etruria, Phrygia, and Asia Minor: and it\nprobably came from Ph\u0153nicia into Samothrace: for the Cabiri are\nmentioned by Sanchoniathon; and the word _Cabar_ belongs to the Hebrew,\nPh\u0153nician, and Arabic languages.\n\nThe Dioscuri, tutelary Deities of Navigation, with Venus, were invoked\nin the Mysteries of Samothrace. The constellation Auriga, or Pha\u00ebton,\nwas also honored there with imposing ceremonies. Upon the Argonautic\nexpedition, Orpheus, an Initiate of these Mysteries, a storm arising,\ncounselled his companions to put into Samothrace. They did so, the storm\nceased, and they were initiated into the Mysteries there, and sailed\nagain with the assurance of a fortunate voyage, under the auspices of\nthe Dioscuri, patrons of sailors and navigation.\n\nBut much more than that was promised the Initiates. The Hierophants of\nSamothrace made something infinitely greater to be the object of their\ninitiations; to wit, the consecration of men to the Deity, by pledging\nthem to virtue; and the assurance of those rewards which the justice of\nthe Gods reserves for Initiates after death. This, above all else, made\nthese ceremonies august, and inspired everywhere so great a respect for\nthem, and so great a desire to be admitted to them. That originally\ncaused the island to be styled _Sacred_. It was respected by all\nnations. The Romans, when masters of the world, left it its liberty and\nlaws. It was an asylum for the unfortunate, and a sanctuary inviolable.\nThere men were absolved of the crime of homicide, if not committed in a\ntemple.\n\nChildren of tender age were initiated there, and invested with the\nsacred robe, the purple cincture, and the crown of olive, and seated\nupon a throne, like other Initiates. In the ceremonies was represented\nthe death of the youngest of the Cabiri, slain by his brothers, who fled\ninto Etruria, carrying with them the chest or ark that contained his\ngenitals: and there the Phallus and the sacred ark were adored.\nHerodotus says that the Samothracian Initiates understood the object and\norigin of this reverence paid the Phallus, and why it was exhibited in\nthe Mysteries. Clemens of Alexandria says that the Cabiri taught the\nTuscans to revere it. It was consecrated at Heliopolis in Syria, where\nthe Mysteries of a Divinity having many points of resemblance with Atys\nand Cybele were represented. The Pelasgi connected it with Mercury; and\nit appears on the monuments of Mithras; always and everywhere a symbol\nof the life-giving power of the Sun at the Vernal Equinox.\n\nIn the Indian Mysteries, as the candidate made his three circuits, he\npaused each time he reached the South, and said, \"I copy the example of\nthe Sun, and follow his beneficent course.\" Blue Masonry has retained\nthe Circuits, but has utterly lost the explanation; which is, that in\nthe Mysteries the candidate invariably represented the Sun, descending\nSouthward toward the reign of the Evil Principle, Ahriman, Siba, or\nTyphon (darkness and winter); there figuratively to be slain, and after\na few days to rise again from the dead, and commence to ascend to the\nNorthward.\n\nThen the death of Sita was bewailed; or that of Cama, slain by Iswara,\nand committed to the waves on a chest, like Osiris and Bacchus; during\nwhich the candidate was terrified by phantoms and horrid noises.\n\nThen he was made to personify Vishnu, and perform his avatars, or\nlabors. In the first two he was taught in allegories the legend of the\nDeluge: in the first he took three steps at right angles, representing\nthe three huge steps taken by Vishnu in that avatar; and hence the three\nsteps in the Master's Degree ending at right angles.\n\nThe nine avatars finished, he was taught the necessity of faith, as\nsuperior to sacrifices, acts of charity, or mortifications of the flesh.\nThen he was admonished against five crimes, and took a solemn obligation\nnever to commit them. He was then introduced into a representation of\nParadise; the Company of the Members of the Order, magnificently\narrayed, and the Altar with a fire blazing upon it, as an emblem of the\nDeity.\n\nThen a new name was given him, and he was invested in a white robe and\ntiara, and received the signs, tokens, and lectures. A cross was marked\non his forehead, and an inverted level, or the Tau Cross, on his breast.\nHe received the sacred cord, and divers amulets or talismans; and was\nthen invested with the sacred Word or Sublime Name, known only to the\ninitiated, the Triliteral A.U.M.\n\nThen the multitude of emblems was explained to the candidate; the arcana\nof science hidden under them, and the different virtues of which the\nmythological figures were mere personifications. And he thus learned the\nmeaning of those symbols, which, to the uninitiated, were but a maze of\nunintelligible figures.\n\nThe third Degree was a life of seclusion, after the Initiate's children\nwere capable of providing for themselves; passed in the forest, in the\npractice of prayers and ablutions, and living only on vegetables. He was\nthen said to be born again.\n\nThe fourth was absolute renunciation of the world, self-contemplation\nand self-torture; by which Perfection was thought to be attained, and\nthe soul merged in the Deity.\n\nIn the second Degree, the Initiate was taught the Unity of the Godhead,\nthe happiness of the patriarchs, the destruction by the Deluge, the\ndepravity of the heart, and the necessity of a mediator, the instability\nof life, the final destruction of all created things, and the\nrestoration of the world in a more perfect form. They inculcated the\nEternity of the Soul, explained the meaning of the doctrine of the\nMetempsychosis, and held the doctrine of a state of future rewards and\npunishments: and they also earnestly urged that sins could only be\natoned for by repentance, reformation, and voluntary penance; and not by\nmere ceremonies and sacrifices.\n\nThe Mysteries among the Chinese and Japanese came from India, and were\nfounded on the same principles and with similar rites. The word given to\nthe new Initiate was O-MI-TO Fo, in which we recognize the original name\nA.U.M., coupled at a much later time with that of Fo, the Indian Buddha,\nto show that he was the Great Deity Himself.\n\nThe equilateral triangle was one of their symbols; and so was the\nmystical Y; both alluding to the Triune God, and the latter being the\nineffable name of the Deity. A ring supported by two serpents was\nemblematical of the world, protected by the power and wisdom of the\nCreator; and that is the origin of the two parallel lines (into which\ntime has changed the two serpents), that support the circle in our\nLodges.\n\nAmong the Japanese, the term of probation for the highest Degree was\ntwenty years.\n\nThe main features of the Druidical Mysteries resembled those of the\nOrient.\n\nThe ceremonies commenced with a hymn to the sun. The candidates were\narranged in ranks of _threes_, _fives_, and _sevens_, according to their\nqualifications; and conducted nine times around the Sanctuary, from East\nto West. The candidate underwent many trials, one of which had direct\nreference to the legend of Osiris. He was placed in a boat, and sent out\nto sea alone, having to rely on his own skill and presence of mind to\nreach the opposite shore safety. The death of Hu was represented in his\nhearing, with external mark of sorrow, while he was in utter darkness.\nHe met with many obstacles, had to prove his courage, and expose his\nlife against armed enemies; represented various animals, and at last,\nattaining the permanent light, he was instructed by the Arch-Druid in\nregard to the Mysteries, and in the morality of the Order, incited to\nact bravely in war, taught the great truths of the immortality of the\nsoul and a future state, solemnly enjoined not to neglect the worship of\nthe Deity, nor the practice of rigid morality; and to avoid sloth,\ncontention, and folly.\n\nThe aspirant attained only the exoteric knowledge in the first two\nDegrees. The third was attained only by a few, and they persons of rank\nand consequence, and after long purification, and study of all the arts\nand sciences known to the Druids, in solitude, for nine months. This was\nthe symbolical death and burial of these Mysteries.\n\nThe dangerous voyage upon the actual open sea, in a small boat covered\nwith a skin, on the evening of the 29th of April, was the last trial,\nand closing scene, of initiation. If he declined this trial, he was\ndismissed with contempt. If he made it and succeeded, he was termed\nthrice-born, was eligible to all the dignities of the State, and\nreceived complete instruction in the philosophical and religious\ndoctrines of the Druids.\n\nThe Greeks also styled the [Greek: \u0395\u03c0\u03bf\u03c0\u03c4\u03b7\u03db, \u03a4\u03c1\u03b9\u03b3\u03bf\u03bd\u03bf\u03c2], thrice-born; and\nin India perfection was assigned to the Yogee who had accomplished many\nbirths.\n\nThe general features of the initiations among the Goths were the same as\nin all the Mysteries. A long probation, of fasting and mortification,\ncircular processions, representing the march of the celestial bodies,\nmany fearful tests and trials, a descent into the infernal regions, the\nkilling of the God _Balder_ by the Evil Principle, _Lok_, the placing of\nhis body in a boat and sending it abroad upon the waters; and, in short,\nthe Eastern Legend, under different names, and with some variations.\n\nThe Egyptian Anubis appeared there, as the dog guarding the gates of\ndeath. The candidate was immured in the representation of a tomb; and\nwhen released, goes in search of the body of Balder, and finds him, at\nlength, restored to life, and seated upon a throne. He was obligated\nupon a naked sword (as is still the custom in the _Rit Moderne_), and\n_sealed_ his obligation by drinking mead _out of a human skull_.\n\nThen all the ancient primitive truths were made known to him, so far as\nthey had survived the assaults of time: and he was informed as to the\ngeneration of the Gods, the creation of the world, the deluge, and the\nresurrection, of which that of Balder was a type.\n\nHe was marked with the sign of the cross, and a ring was given to him\nas a symbol of the Divine Protection; and also as an emblem of\nPerfection; from which comes the custom of giving a ring to the Aspirant\nin the 14th Degree.\n\nThe point within a Circle, and the Cube, emblem of Odin, were explained\nto him; and lastly, the nature of the Supreme God, \"the author of\neverything that existeth, the Eternal, the Ancient, the Living and Awful\nBeing, the Searcher into concealed things, the Being that never\nchangeth;\" with whom Odin the Conqueror was by the vulgar confounded:\nand the Triune God of the Indians was reproduced, as ODIN, the Almighty\nFATHER, FREA, (_Rhea_ or _Phre_), his wife (emblem of universal\n_matter_), and _Thor_ his son (the Mediator). Here we recognize _Osiris,\nIsis_, and _Hor_ or _Horus_. Around the head of Thor, as if to show his\neastern origin, twelve stars were arranged in a circle.\n\nHe was also taught the ultimate destruction of the world, and the rising\nof a new one, in which the brave and virtuous shall enjoy everlasting\nhappiness and delight: as the means of securing which happy fortune, he\nwas taught to practise the strictest morality and virtue.\n\nThe Initiate was prepared to receive the great lessons of all the\nMysteries, by long trials, or by abstinence and chastity. For many days\nhe was required to fast and be continent, and to drink liquids\ncalculated to diminish his passions and keep him chaste.\n\nAblutions were also required, symbolical of the purity necessary to\nenable the soul to escape from its bondage in matter. Sacred baths and\npreparatory baptisms were used, lustrations, immersions, lustral\nsprinklings, and purifications of every kind. At Athens they bathed in\nthe Ilissus, which thence became a sacred river; and before entering the\nTemple of Eleusis, all were required to wash their hands in a vase of\nlustral water placed near the entrance. Clean hands and a pure heart\nwere required of the candidates. Apuleius bathed seven times in the sea,\nsymbolical of the Seven Spheres through which the Soul must reascend:\nand the Hindus must bathe in the sacred river Ganges.\n\nClemens of Alexandria cites a passage of Menander, who speaks of a\npurification by sprinkling three times with salt and water. Sulphur,\nresin, and the laurel also served for purification, as did air, earth,\nwater, and fire. The Initiates at Heliopolis, in Syria, says Lucian,\nsacrificed the sacred lamb, symbol of Aries, then the sign of the Vernal\nEquinox; ate his flesh, as the Israelites did at the Passover; and then\ntouched his head and feet to theirs, and knelt upon the fleece. Then\nthey bathed in warm water, drank of the same, and slept upon the ground.\n\nThere was a distinction between the lesser and greater Mysteries. One\nmust have been for some years admitted to the former before he could\nreceive the latter, which were but a preparation for them, the Vestibule\nof the Temple, of which those of Eleusis were the Sanctuary. There, in\nthe lesser Mysteries, they were prepared to receive the holy truths\ntaught in the greater. The Initiates in the lesser were called simply\n_Mystes_, or Initiates; but those in the greater, _Epoptes_, or Seers.\nAn ancient poet says that the former were an imperfect shadow of the\nlatter, as sleep is of Death. After admission to the former, the\nInitiate was taught lessons of morality, and the rudiments of the sacred\nscience, the most sublime and secret part of which was reserved for the\nEpopt, who saw the Truth in its nakedness, while the Mystes only viewed\nit through a veil and under emblems fitter to excite than to satisfy his\ncuriosity.\n\nBefore communicating the first secrets and primary dogmas of initiation,\nthe priests required the candidate to take a fearful oath never to\ndivulge the secrets. Then he made his vows, prayers, and sacrifices to\nthe Gods. The skins of the victims consecrated to Jupiter were spread on\nthe ground, and he was made to set his feet upon them. He was then\ntaught some enigmatic formulas, as answers to questions, by which to\nmake himself known. He was then enthroned, invested with a purple\ncincture, and crowned with flowers, or branches of palm or olive.\n\nWe do not certainly know the time that was required to elapse between\nthe admission to the Lesser and Greater Mysteries of Eleusis. Most\nwriters fix it at five years. It was a singular mark of favor when\nDemetrius was made Mystes and Epopt in one and the same ceremony. When\nat length admitted to the Degree of Perfection, the Initiate was brought\nface to face with entire nature, and learned that the soul was the whole\nof man: that earth was but his place of exile; that Heaven was his\nnative country; that for the soul to be born is really to die; and that\ndeath was for it the return to a new life. Then he entered the\nsanctuary; but he did not receive the whole instruction at once. It\ncontinued through several years. There were, as it were, many\napartments, through which he advanced by degrees, and between which\nthick veils intervened. There were Statues and Paintings, says Proclus,\nin the inmost sanctuary, showing the forms assumed by the Gods, finally\nthe last veil fell, the sacred covering dropped from the image of the\nGoddess, and she stood revealed in all her splendor, surrounded by a\ndivine light, which, filling the whole sanctuary, dazzled the eyes and\npenetrated the soul of the Initiate. Thus is symbolized the final\nrevelation of the true doctrine as to the nature of Deity and of the\nsoul, and of the relations of each to matter.\n\nThis was preceded by frightful scenes, alternations of fear and joy, of\nlight and darkness; by glittering lightning and the crash of thunder,\nand apparitions of spectres, or magical illusions, impressing at once\nthe eyes and ears. This Claudian describes, in his poem on the rape of\nProserpine, where he alludes to what passed in her Mysteries. \"The\ntemple is shaken,\" he cries; \"fiercely gleams the lightning, by which\nthe Deity announces his presence. Earth trembles; and a terrible noise\nis heard in the midst of these terrors. The Temple of the Son of Cecrops\nresounds with long-continued roars; Eleusis uplifts her sacred torches;\nthe serpents of Triptolemus are heard to hiss; and fearful Hecate\nappears afar.\"\n\nThe celebration of the Greek Mysteries continued, according to the\nbetter opinion, for nine days.\n\nOn the first the Initiates met. It was the day of the full moon, of the\nmonth Bo\u00ebdromion; when the moon was full at the end of the sign Aries,\nnear the Pleiades and the place of her exaltation in Taurus.\n\nThe second day there was a procession to the sea, for purification by\nbathing.\n\nThe third was occupied with offerings, expiatory sacrifices, and other\nreligious rites, such as fasting, mourning, continence, etc. A mullet\nwas immolated, and offerings of grain and living animals made.\n\nOn the fourth they carried in procession the mystic wreath of flowers,\nrepresenting that which Proserpine dropped when seized by Pluto, and the\nCrown of Ariadne in the Heavens. It was borne on a triumphal car drawn\nby oxen; and women followed bearing mystic chests or boxes, wrapped with\npurple cloths, containing grains of sesame, pyramidal biscuits, salt,\npomegranates and the mysterious serpent, and perhaps the mystic phallus.\n\nOn the fifth was the superb procession of torches, commemorative of the\nsearch for Proserpine by Ceres; the Initiates marching by trios, and\neach bearing a torch; while at the head of the procession marched the\nDadoukos.\n\nThe sixth was consecrated to Iakchos, the young Light-God, son of Ceres,\nreared in the sanctuaries and bearing the torch of the Sun-God. The\nchorus in Aristophanes terms him the luminous star that lights the\nnocturnal initiation. He was brought from the sanctuary, his head\ncrowned with myrtle, and borne from the gate of the Ceramicus to\nEleusis, along the sacred way, amid dances, sacred songs, every mark of\njoy, and mystic cries of _Iakchos_.\n\nOn the seventh there were gymnastic exercises and combats, the victors\nin which were crowned and rewarded.\n\nOn the eighth was the feast of \u00c6sculapius.\n\nOn the ninth the famous libation was made for the souls of the departed.\nThe Priests, according to Athen\u00e6us, filled two vases, placed one in the\nEast and one in the West, toward the gates of day and night, and\noverturned them, pronouncing a formula of mysterious prayers. Thus they\ninvoked Light and Darkness, the two great principles of nature.\n\nDuring all these days no one could be arrested, nor any suit brought, on\npain of death, or at least a heavy fine: and no one was allowed, by the\ndisplay of unusual wealth or magnificence, to endeavor to rival this\nsacred pomp. Everything was for religion.\n\nSuch were the Mysteries; and such the Old Thought, as in scattered and\nwidely separated fragments it has come down to us. The human mind still\nspeculates upon the great mysteries of nature, and still finds its ideas\nanticipated by the ancients, whose profoundest thoughts are to be looked\nfor, not in their philosophies, but in their symbols, by which they\nendeavored to express the great ideas that vainly struggled for\nutterance in words, as they viewed the great circle of\nphenomena,--Birth, Life, Death, or Decomposition, and New Life out of\nDeath and Rottenness,--to them the greatest of mysteries. Remember,\nwhile you study their symbols, that they had a profounder sense of these\nwonders than we have. To them the transformations of the worm were a\ngreater wonder than the stars; and hence the poor dumb scarab\u00e6us or\nbeetle was sacred to them. Thus their faiths are condensed into symbols\nor expanded into allegories, which they understood, but were not always\nable to explain in language; for there are thoughts and ideas which no\nlanguage ever spoken by man has words to express.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nXXV.\n\nKNIGHT OF THE BRAZEN SERPENT.\n\n\nThis Degree is both philosophical and moral. While it teaches the\nnecessity of reformation as well as repentance, as a means of obtaining\nmercy and forgiveness, it is also devoted to an explanation of the\nsymbols of Masonry; and especially to those which are connected with\nthat ancient and universal legend, of which that of Khir-Om Abi is but a\nvariation; that legend which, representing a murder or a death, and a\nrestoration to life, by a drama in which figure Osiris, Isis and Horus,\nAtys and Cybele, Adonis and Venus, the Cabiri, Dionusos, and many\nanother representative of the active and passive Powers of Nature,\ntaught the Initiates in the Mysteries that the rule of Evil and Darkness\nis but temporary, and that of Light and Good will be eternal.\n\nMaimonides says: \"In the days of Enos, the son of Seth, men fell into\ngrievous errors, and even Enos himself partook of their infatuation.\nTheir language was, that since God has placed on high the heavenly\nbodies, and used them as His ministers, it was evidently His will that\nthey should receive from man the same veneration as the servants of a\ngreat prince justly claim from the subject multitude. Impressed with\nthis notion, they began to build temples to the Stars, to sacrifice to\nthem, and to worship them, in the vain expectation that they should thus\nplease the Creator of all things. At first, indeed, they did not suppose\nthe Stars to be the only Deities, but adored in conjunction with them\nthe Lord God Omnipotent. In process of time, however, that great and\nvenerable Name was totally forgotten, and the whole human race retained\nno other religion than the idolatrous worship of the Host of Heaven.\"\n\nThe first learning in the world consisted chiefly in symbols. The wisdom\nof the Chald\u00e6ans, Ph\u0153nicians, Egyptians, Jews; of Zoroaster,\nSanchoniathon, Pherecydes, Syrus, Pythagoras, Socrates, Plato, of all\nthe ancients, that is come to our hand, is symbolic. It was the mode,\nsays Serranus on Plato's Symposium, of the Ancient Philosophers, to\nrepresent truth by certain symbols and hidden images.\n\n\"All that can be said concerning the Gods,\" says Strabo, \"must be by the\nexposition of old opinions and fables; it being the custom of the\nancients to wrap up in enigma and allegory their thoughts and discourses\nconcerning Nature; which are therefore not easily explained.\"\n\nAs you learned in the 24th Degree, my Brother, the ancient Philosophers\nregarded the soul of man as having had its origin in Heaven. That was,\nMacrobius says, a settled opinion among them all; and they held it to be\nthe only true wisdom, for the soul, while united with the body, to look\never toward its source, and strive to return to the place whence it\ncame. Among the fixed stars it dwelt, until, seduced by the desire of\nanimating a body, it descended to be imprisoned in matter. Thenceforward\nit has no other resource than recollection, and is ever attracted toward\nits birth-place and home. The means of return are to be sought for in\nitself. To re-ascend to its source, it must do and suffer in the body.\n\nThus the Mysteries taught the great doctrine of the divine nature and\nlongings after immortality of the soul, of the nobility of its origin,\nthe grandeur of its destiny, its superiority over the animals who have\nno aspirations heavenward. If they struggled in vain to express its\n_nature_, by comparing it to Fire and Light,--if they erred as to its\noriginal place of abode, and the mode of its descent, and the path\nwhich, descending and ascending, it pursued among the stars and spheres,\nthese were the accessories of the Great Truth, and mere allegories\ndesigned to make the idea more impressive, and, as it were, tangible, to\nthe human mind.\n\nLet us, in order to understand this old Thought, first follow the soul\nin its descent. The sphere or Heaven of the fixed stars was that Holy\nRegion, and those Elysian Fields, that were the native domicile of\nsouls, and the place to which they re-ascended, when they had recovered\ntheir primitive purity and simplicity. From that luminous region the\nsoul set forth, when it journeyed toward the body; a destination which\nit did not reach until it had undergone three degradations, designated\nby the name of Deaths; and until it had passed through the several\nspheres and the elements. All souls remained in possession of Heaven and\nof happiness, so long as they were wise enough to avoid the contagion of\nthe body, and to keep themselves from any contact with matter. But those\nwho, from that lofty abode, where they were lapped in eternal light,\nhave looked longingly toward the body, and toward that which we here\nbelow call _life_, but which is to the soul a real _death_; and who have\nconceived for it a secret desire,--those souls, victims of their\nconcupiscence, are attracted by degrees toward the inferior regions of\nthe world, by the mere weight of thought and of that terrestrial desire.\nThe soul, perfectly incorporeal, does not at once invest itself with the\ngross envelope of the body, but little by little, by successive and\ninsensible alterations, and in proportion as it removes further and\nfurther from the simple and perfect substance in which it dwelt at\nfirst. It first surrounds itself with a body composed of the substance\nof the stars; and afterward, as it descends through the several spheres,\nwith ethereal matter more and more gross, thus by degrees descending to\nan earthly body; and its number of degradations or deaths being the same\nas that of the spheres which it traverses.\n\nThe Galaxy, Macrobius says, crosses the Zodiac in two opposite points,\nCancer and Capricorn, the tropical points in the sun's course,\nordinarily called the Gates of the Sun. These two tropics, before his\ntime, corresponded with those constellations, but in his day with Gemini\nand Sagittarius, in consequence of the precession of the equinoxes; but\nthe _signs_ of the Zodiac remained unchanged; and the Milky Way crossed\nat the _signs_ Cancer and Capricorn, though not at those\n_constellations_.\n\nThrough these _gates_ souls were supposed to descend to earth and\nre-ascend to Heaven. One, Macrobius says, in his dream of Scipio, was\nstyled the Gate of Men; and the other, the Gate of the Gods. Cancer was\nthe former, because souls descended by it to the earth; and Capricorn\nthe latter, because by it they re-ascended to their seats of\nimmortality, and became Gods. From the Milky Way, according to\nPythagoras, diverged the route to the dominions of Pluto. Until they\nleft the Galaxy, they were not deemed to have commenced to descend\ntoward the terrestrial bodies. From that they departed, and to that they\nreturned. Until they reached the sign Cancer, they had not left it, and\nwere still Gods. When they reached Leo, they commenced their\napprenticeship for their future condition; and when they were at\nAquarius, the sign opposite Leo, they were furthest removed from human\nlife.\n\nThe soul, descending from the celestial limits, where the Zodiac and\nGalaxy unite, loses its spherical shape, the shape of all Divine Nature,\nand is lengthened into a cone, as a point is lengthened into a line; and\nthen, an indivisible monad before, it divides itself and becomes a\nduad--that is, unity becomes division, disturbance, and conflict. Then\nit begins to experience the disorder which reigns in matter, to which it\nunites itself, becoming, as it were, intoxicated by draughts of grosser\nmatter: of which inebriation the cup of Bakchos, between Cancer and Leo,\nis a symbol. It is for them the cup of forgetfulness. They assemble,\nsays Plato, in the fields of oblivion, to drink there the water of the\nriver Ameles, which causes men to forget everything. This fiction is\nalso found in Virgil. \"If souls,\" says Macrobius, \"carried with them\ninto the bodies they occupy all the knowledge which they had acquired of\ndivine things, during their sojourn in the Heavens, men would not differ\nin opinion as to the Deity; but some of them forget more, and some less,\nof that which they had learned.\"\n\nWe smile at these notions of the ancients; but we must learn to look\nthrough these material images and allegories, to the ideas, struggling\nfor utterance, the great speechless thoughts which they envelop: and it\nis well for us to consider whether we ourselves have yet found out any\n_better_ way of representing to ourselves the soul's origin and its\nadvent into this body, so entirely foreign to it; if, indeed, we have\never thought about it at all; or have not ceased to think, in despair.\n\nThe highest and purest portion of matter, which nourishes and\nconstitutes divine existences, is what the poets term _nectar_, the\nbeverage of the Gods. The lower, more disturbed and grosser portion, is\nwhat intoxicates souls. The ancients symbolized it as the River Lethe,\ndark stream of oblivion. How do _we_ explain the soul's forgetfulness of\nits antecedents, or reconcile that utter absence of remembrance of its\nformer condition, with its essential immortality? In truth, we for the\nmost part dread and shrink from any attempt at explanation of it to\nourselves.\n\nDragged down by the heaviness produced by this inebriating draught, the\nsoul falls along the zodiac and the milky way to the lower spheres, and\nin its descent not only takes, in each sphere, a new envelope of the\nmaterial composing the luminous bodies of the planets, but receives\nthere the different faculties which it is to exercise while it inhabits\nthe body.\n\nIn Saturn, it acquires the power of reasoning and intelligence, or what\nis termed the logical and contemplative faculty. From Jupiter it\nreceives the power of action. Mars gives it valor, enterprise, and\nimpetuosity. From the Sun it receives the senses and imagination, which\nproduce sensation, perception, and thought. Venus inspires it with\ndesires. Mercury gives it the faculty of expressing and enunciating what\nit thinks and feels. And, on entering the sphere of the Moon, it\nacquires the force of generation and growth. This lunary sphere, lowest\nand basest to divine bodies, is first and highest to terrestrial bodies.\nAnd the lunary body there assumed by the soul, while, as it were, the\nsediment of celestial matter, is also the first substance of animal\nmatter.\n\nThe celestial bodies, Heaven, the Stars, and the other Divine elements,\never aspire to rise. The soul reaching the region which mortality\ninhabits, tends toward terrestrial bodies, and is deemed to die. Let no\none, says Macrobius, be surprised that we so frequently speak of the\n_death_ of this soul, which yet we call immortal. It is neither annulled\nnor destroyed by such death: but merely enfeebled for a time; and does\nnot thereby forfeit its prerogative of immortality; for afterward, freed\nfrom the body, when it has been purified from the vice-stains contracted\nduring that connection, it is re-established in all its privileges, and\nreturns to the luminous abode of its immortality.\n\nOn its return, it restores to each sphere through which it ascends, the\npassions and earthly faculties received from them: to the Moon, the\nfaculty of increase and diminution of the body; to Mercury, fraud, the\narchitect of evils; to Venus, the seductive love of pleasure; to the\nSun, the passion for greatness and empire; to Mars, audacity and\ntemerity; to Jupiter, avarice; and to Saturn, falsehood and deceit: and\nat last, relieved of all, it enters naked and pure into the eighth\nsphere or highest Heaven.\n\nAll this agrees with the doctrine of Plato, that the soul cannot\nre-enter into Heaven, until the revolutions of the Universe shall have\nrestored it to its primitive condition, and purified it from the effects\nof its contact with the four elements.\n\nThis opinion of the pre-existence of souls, as pure and celestial\nsubstances, before their union with our bodies, to put on and animate\nwhich they descend from Heaven, is one of great antiquity. A modern\nRabbi, Manasseh Ben Israel, says it was always the belief of the\nHebrews. It was that of most philosophers who admitted the immortality\nof the soul: and therefore it was taught in the Mysteries; for, as\nLactantius says, they could not see how it was possible that the soul\nshould exist _after_ the body, if it had not existed _before_ it, and if\nits nature was not independent of that of the body. The same doctrine\nwas adopted by the most learned of the Greek Fathers, and by many of the\nLatins: and it would probably prevail largely at the present day, if men\ntroubled themselves to think upon this subject at all, and to inquire\nwhether the soul's immortality involved its prior existence.\n\nSome philosophers held that the soul was incarcerated in the body, by\nway of punishment for sins committed by it in a prior state. How they\nreconciled this with the same soul's unconsciousness of any such prior\nstate, or of sin committed there, does not appear. Others held that God,\nof his mere will, sent the soul to inhabit the body. The Kabalists\nunited the two opinions. They held that there are four worlds, _Asiluth,\nBriarth, Jezirath_, and _Aziath_; the world of _emanation_, that of\n_creation_, that of _forms_, and the _material_ world; one above and\nmore perfect than the other, in that order, both as regards their own\nnature and that of the beings who inhabit them. All souls are originally\nin the world Aziluth, the Supreme Heaven, abode of God, and of pure and\nimmortal spirits. Those who descend from it without fault of their own,\nby God's order, are gifted with a divine fire, which preserves them from\nthe contagion of matter, and restores them to Heaven so soon as their\nmission is ended. Those who descend through their own fault, go from\nworld to world, insensibly losing their love of Divine things, and their\nself-contemplation; until they reach the world Aziath, falling by their\nown weight. This is a pure Platonism, clothed with the images and words\npeculiar to the Kabalists. It was the doctrine of the Essenes, who, says\nPorphyry, \"believe that souls descend from the most subtile ether,\nattracted to bodies by the seductions of matter.\" It was in substance\nthe doctrine of Origen; and it came from the Chald\u00e6ans, who largely\nstudied the theory of the Heavens, the spheres, and the influences of\nthe signs and constellations.\n\nThe Gnostics made souls ascend and descend through eight Heavens, in\neach of which were certain Powers that opposed their return, and often\ndrove them back to earth, when not sufficiently purified. The last of\nthese Powers, nearest the luminous abode of souls, was a serpent or\ndragon.\n\nIn the ancient doctrine, certain Genii were charged with the duty of\nconducting souls to the bodies destined to receive them, and of\nwithdrawing them from those bodies. According to Plutarch, these were\nthe functions of Proserpine and Mercury. In Plato, a familiar Genius\naccompanies man at his birth, follows and watches him all his life, and\nat death conducts him to the tribunal of the Great Judge. These Genii\nare the media of communication between man and the Gods; and the soul is\never in their presence. This doctrine is taught in the oracles of\nZoroaster: and these Genii were the Intelligences that resided in the\nplanets.\n\nThus the secret science and mysterious emblems of initiation were\nconnected with the Heavens, the Spheres, and the Constellations: and\nthis connection must be studied by whomsoever would understand the\nancient mind, and be enabled to interpret the allegories, and explore\nthe meaning of the symbols, in which the old sages endeavored to\ndelineate the ideas that struggled within them for utterance, and could\nbe but insufficiently and inadequately expressed by language, whose\nwords are images of those things alone that can be grasped by and are\nwithin the empire of the senses.\n\nIt is not possible for us thoroughly to appreciate the feelings with\nwhich the ancients regarded the Heavenly bodies, and the ideas to which\ntheir observation of the Heavens gave rise, because We cannot put\nourselves in their places, look at the stars with their eyes in the\nworld's youth, and divest ourselves of the knowledge which even the\ncommonest of us have, that makes us regard the Stars and Planets and all\nthe Universe of Suns and Worlds, as a mere inanimate machine and\naggregate of senseless orbs, no more astonishing, except in degree, than\na clock or an orrery. _We_ wonder and are amazed at the Power and Wisdom\n(to most men it seems only a kind of Infinite _Ingenuity_) of the MAKER:\nthey wondered at the _Work_, and endowed _it_ with Life and Force and\nmysterious Powers and mighty Influences.\n\nMemphis, in Egypt, was in Latitude 29\u02da 5' North, and in Longitude 30\u02da\n18' East. Theb\u00e6, in Upper Egypt, in Latitude 25\u02da 45' North, and\nLongitude 32\u02da 43' East. Babylon was in Latitude 32\u02da 30' North, and\nLongitude 44\u02da 23' East: while Saba, the ancient Sab\u00e6an capital of\nEthiopia, was about in Latitude 15\u02da North.\n\nThrough Egypt ran the great River Nile, coming from beyond Ethiopia, its\nsource in regions wholly unknown, in the abodes of heat and fire, and\nits course from South to North. Its inundations had formed the alluvial\nlands of Upper and Lower Egypt, which they continued to raise higher and\nhigher, and to fertilize by their deposits. At first, as in all\nnewly-settled countries, those inundations, occurring annually and\nalways at the same period of the year, were calamities: until, by means\nof levees and drains and artificial lakes for irrigation, they became\nblessings, and were looked for with joyful anticipation, as they had\nbefore been awaited with terror. Upon the deposit left by the Sacred\nRiver, as it withdrew into its banks, the husbandman sowed his seed; and\nthe rich soil and the genial sun insured him an abundant harvest.\n\nBabylon lay on the Euphrates, which ran from Southeast to Northwest,\nblessing, as all rivers in the Orient do, the arid country through which\nit flowed; but its rapid and uncertain overflows bringing terror and\ndisaster.\n\nTo the ancients, as yet inventors of no astronomical instruments, and\nlooking at the Heavens with the eyes of children, this earth was a level\nplain of unknown extent. About its boundaries there was speculation, but\nno knowledge. The inequalities of its surface were the irregularities of\na plane. That it was a globe, or that anything lived on its under\nsurface, or on what it rested, they had no idea. Every twenty-four hours\nthe sun came up from beyond the Eastern rim of the world, and travelled\nacross the sky, over the earth, always South of, but sometimes nearer\nand sometimes further from the point overhead; and sunk below the\nworld's Western rim. With him went light, and after him followed\ndarkness.\n\nAnd every twenty-four hours appeared in the Heavens another body,\nvisible chiefly at night, but sometimes even when the sun shone, which\nlikewise, as if following the sun at a greater or less distance,\ntravelled across the sky; sometimes as a thin crescent, and thence\nincreasing to a full orb resplendent with silver light; and sometimes\nmore and sometimes less to the Southward of the point overhead, within\nthe same limits as the Sun.\n\nMan, enveloped by the thick darkness of profoundest night, when\neverything around him has disappeared, and he seems alone with himself\nand the black shades that surround him, feels his existence a blank and\nnothingness, except so far as memory recalls to him the glories and\nsplendors of light. Everything is dead to him, and he, as it were, to\nNature. How crushing and overwhelming the thought, the fear, the dread,\nthat _perhaps_ that darkness may be eternal, and that day may possibly\nnever return; if it ever occurs to his mind, while the solid gloom\ncloses up against him like a wall! What then can restore him to like, to\nenergy, to activity, to fellowship and communion with the great world\nwhich God has spread around him, and which perhaps in the darkness may\nbe passing away? LIGHT restores him to himself and to nature which\nseemed lost to him. Naturally, therefore, the primitive men regarded\nlight as the principle of their real existence, without which life would\nbe but one continued weariness and despair. This necessity for light,\nand its actual creative energy, were felt by all men: and nothing was\nmore alarming to them than its absence. It became their first Divinity,\na single ray of which, flashing into the dark tumultuous bosom of chaos,\ncaused man and all the Universe to emerge from it. So all the poets sung\nwho imagined Cosmogonies; such was the first dogma of Orpheus, Moses,\nand the Theologians. Light was Ormuzd, adored by the Persians, and\nDarkness Ahriman, origin of all evils. Light was the life of the\nUniverse, the friend of man, the substance of the Gods and of the Soul.\n\nThe sky was to them a great, solid, concave arch; a hemisphere of\nunknown material, at an unknown distance above the flat level earth; and\nalong it journeyed in their courses the Sun, the Moon, the Planets, and\nthe Stars.\n\nThe Sun was to them a great globe of fire, of unknown dimensions, at an\nunknown distance. The Moon was a mass of softer light; the stars and\nplanets lucent bodies, armed with unknown and supernatural influences.\n\nIt could not fail to be soon observed, that at regular intervals the\ndays and nights were equal; and that two of these intervals measured the\nsame space of time as elapsed between the successive inundations, and\nbetween the returns of spring-time and harvest. Nor could it fail to be\nperceived that the changes of the moon occurred regularly; the same\nnumber of days always elapsing between the first appearance of her\nsilver crescent in the West at evening and that of her full orb rising\nin the East at the same hour; and the same again, between that and the\nnew appearance of the crescent in the West.\n\nIt was also soon observed that the Sun crossed the Heavens in a\ndifferent line each day, the days being longest and the nights shortest\nwhen the line of his passage was furthest North, and the days shortest\nand nights longest when that line was furthest South: that his progress\nNorth and South was perfectly regular, marking four periods that were\nalways the same,--those when the days and nights were equal, or the\nVernal and Autumnal Equinoxes; that when the days were longest, or the\nSummer Solstice; and that when they were shortest, or the Winter\nSolstice.\n\nWith the Vernal Equinox, or about the 25th of March of our Calendar,\nthey found that there unerringly came soft winds, the return of warmth,\ncaused by the Sun turning back to the Northward from the middle ground\nof his course, the vegetation of the new year, and the impulse to\namatory action on the part of the animal creation. Then the Bull and the\nRam, animals most valuable to the agriculturist, and symbols themselves\nof vigorous generative power, recovered their vigor, the birds mated and\nbuilded their nests, the seeds germinated, the grass grew, and the trees\nput forth leaves. With the Summer Solstice, when the Sun reached the\nextreme northern limit of his course, came great heat, and burning\nwinds, and lassitude and exhaustion; then vegetation withered, man\nlonged for the cool breezes of Spring and Autumn, and the cool water of\nthe wintry Nile or Euphrates, and the Lion sought for that element far\nfrom his home in the desert.\n\nWith the Autumnal Equinox came ripe harvests, and fruits of the tree and\nvine, and falling leaves, and cold evenings presaging wintry frosts; and\nthe Principle and Powers of Darkness, prevailing over those of Light,\ndrove the Sun further to the South, so that the nights grew longer than\nthe days. And at the Winter Solstice the earth was wrinkled with frost,\nthe trees were leafless, and the Sun, reaching the most Southern point\nin his career, seemed to hesitate whether to continue descending, to\nleave the world to darkness and despair, or to turn upon his steps and\nretrace his course to the Northward, bringing back seed-time and Spring,\nand green leaves and flowers, and all the delights of love.\n\nThus, naturally and necessarily, time was divided, first into days, and\nthen into moons or months, and years; and with these divisions and the\nmovements of the Heavenly bodies that marked them, were associated and\nconnected all men's physical enjoyments and privations. Wholly\nagricultural, and in their frail habitations greatly at the mercy of the\nelements and the changing seasons, the primitive people of the Orient\nwere most deeply interested in the recurrence of the periodical\nphenomena presented by the two great luminaries of Heaven, on whose\nregularity all their prosperity depended.\n\nAnd the attentive observer soon noticed that the smaller lights of\nHeaven were, apparently, even more regular than the Sun and Moon, and\nforetold with unerring certainty, by their risings and settings, the\nperiods of recurrence of the different phenomena and seasons on which\nthe physical well-being of all men depended. They soon felt the\nnecessity of distinguishing the individual stars, or groups of stars,\nand giving them names, that they might understand each other, when\nreferring to and designating them. Necessity produced designations at\nonce natural and artificial. Observing that, in the circle of the year,\nthe renewal and periodical appearance of the productions of the earth\nwere constantly associated, not only with the courses of the Sun, but\nalso with the rising and setting of certain Stars, and with their\nposition relatively to the Sun, the centre to which they referred the\nwhole starry host, the mind naturally connected the celestial and\nterrestrial objects that were _in fact_ connected: and they commenced by\ngiving to particular Stars or groups of Stars the names of those\nterrestrial objects which seemed connected with them; and for those\nwhich still remained unnamed by this nomenclature, they, to complete a\nsystem, assumed arbitrary and fanciful names.\n\nThus the Ethiopian of Thebes or Saba styled those Stars under which the\nNile commenced to overflow, Stars of Inundation, or that _poured out\nwater_ (AQUARIUS).\n\nThose Stars among which the Sun was, when he had reached the Northern\nTropic and began to _retreat_ Southward, were termed, from his\nretrograde motion, the Crab (CANCER).\n\nAs he approached, in Autumn, the middle point between the Northern and\nSouthern extremes of his journeying, the days and nights became equal;\nand the Stars among which he was then found were called Stars of the\nBalance (LIBRA).\n\nThose stars among which the Sun was, when the Lion, driven from the\nDesert by thirst, came to slake it at the Nile, were called Stars of the\nLion (LEO).\n\nThose among which the Sun was at harvest, were called those of the\nGleaning Virgin, holding a Sheaf of Wheat (VIRGO).\n\nThose among which he was found in February, when the Ewes brought forth\ntheir young, were called Stars of the Lamb (ARIES).\n\nThose in March, when it was time to plough, were called Stars of the Ox\n(TAURUS).\n\nThose under which hot and burning winds came from the desert, venomous\nlike poisonous reptiles, were called Stars of the Scorpion (SCORPIO).\n\nObserving that the annual return of the rising of the Nile was always\naccompanied by the appearance of a beautiful Star, which at that period\nshowed itself in the direction of the sources of that river, and seemed\nto warn the husbandman to be careful not to be surprised by the\ninundation, the Ethiopian compared this act of that Star to that of the\nAnimal which by barking gives warning of danger, and styled it the Dog\n(SIRIUS).\n\nThus commencing, and as astronomy came to be more studied, imaginary\nfigures were traced all over the Heavens, to which the different Stars\nwere assigned. Chief among them were those that lay along the path which\nthe Sun travelled as he climbed toward the North and descended to the\nSouth: lying within certain limits and extending to an equal distance on\neach side of the line of equal nights and days. This belt, curving like\na Serpent, was termed the Zodiac, and divided into twelve Signs.\n\nAt the Vernal Equinox, 2455 years before our Era, the Sun was entering\nthe sign and constellation Taurus, or the Bull; having passed through,\nsince he commenced, at the Winter Solstice, to ascend Northward, the\nSigns Aquarius, Pisces and Aries; on entering the first of which he\nreached the lowest limit of his journey Southward.\n\nFrom TAURUS, he passed through Gemini and Cancer, and reached LEO when\nhe arrived at the terminus of his journey Northward. Thence, through\nLeo, Virgo, and Libra, he entered SCORPIO at the Autumnal Equinox, and\njourneyed Southward through Scorpia, Sagittarius, and Capricornus to\nAQUARIUS, the terminus of his journey South.\n\nThe path by which he journeyed through these signs became the\n_Ecliptic_; and that which passes through the two equinoxes, the\n_Equator_.\n\nThey knew nothing of the immutable laws of nature; and whenever the Sun\ncommenced to tend Southward, they feared lest he might continue to do\nso, and by degrees disappear forever, leaving the earth to be ruled\nforever by darkness, storm, and cold.\n\nHence they rejoiced when he commenced to re-ascend after the Winter\nSolstice, struggling against the malign influences of Aquarius and\nPisces, and amicably received by the Lamb. And when at the Vernal\nEquinox he entered Taurus, they still more rejoiced at the assurance\nthat the days would again be longer than the nights, that the season of\nseed-time had come, and the Summer and harvest would follow.\n\nAnd they lamented when, after the Autumnal Equinox, the malign influence\nof the venomous Scorpion, and vindictive Archer, and the filthy and\nill-omened He-Goat dragged him down toward the Winter Solstice.\n\nArriving there, they said he had been slain, and had gone to the realm\nof darkness. Remaining there three days, he rose again, and again\nascended Northward in the heavens, to redeem the earth from the gloom\nand darkness of Winter, which soon became emblematical of sin, and evil,\nand suffering; as the Spring, Summer, and Autumn became emblems of\nhappiness and immortality.\n\nSoon they personified the Sun, and worshipped him under the name of\nOSIRIS, and transmuted the legend of his descent among the Winter Signs,\ninto a fable of his death, his descent into the infernal regions, and\nhis resurrection.\n\nThe Moon became Isis, the wife of Osiris; and Winter, as well as the\ndesert or the ocean into which the Sun descended, became TYPHON, the\nSpirit or Principle of Evil, warring against and destroying Osiris.\n\nFrom the journey of the Sun through the twelve signs came the legend of\nthe twelve labors of Hercules, and the incarnations of Vishnu and\nBuddha. Hence came the legend of the murder of Kh\u016br\u0169m, representative of\nthe Sun, by the three Fellow-crafts, symbols of the three Winter signs,\nCapricornus, Aquarius, and Pisces, who assailed him at the three gates\nof Heaven and slew him at the Winter Solstice. Hence the search for him\nby the nine Fellow-crafts, the other nine signs, his finding, burial,\nand resurrection.\n\nThe celestial Taurus, opening the new year, was the Creative Bull of the\nHindus and Japanese, breaking with his horn the egg out of which the\nworld is born, Hence the bull APIS was worshipped by the Egyptians, and\nreproduced as a golden calf by Aaron in the desert. Hence the cow was\nsacred to the Hind\u00fas. Hence, from the sacred and beneficent signs of\nTaurus and Leo, the human-headed winged lions and bulls in the palaces\nat Kouyounjik and Nimroud, like which were the Cherubim set by Solomon\nin his Temple: and hence the twelve brazen or bronze oxen, on which the\nlaver of brass was supported.\n\nThe Celestial Vulture or Eagle, rising and setting with the Scorpion,\nwas substituted in its place, in many cases, on account of the malign\ninfluences of the latter: and thus the four great periods of the year\nwere marked by the Bull, the Lion, the Man (Aquarius) and the Eagle;\nwhich were upon the respective standards of Ephraim, Judah, Reuben, and\nDan; and still appear on the shield of American Royal Arch Masonry.\n\nAfterward the Ram or Lamb became an object of adoration, when, in his\nturn, he opened the equinox, to deliver the world from the wintry reign\nof darkness and evil.\n\nAround the central and simple idea of the annual death and resurrection\nof the Sun a multitude of circumstantial details soon clustered. Some\nwere derived from other astronomical phenomena; while many were merely\npoetical ornaments and inventions.\n\nBesides the Sun and Moon, those ancients also saw a beautiful Star,\nshining, with a soft, silvery light, always following the Sun at no\ngreat distance when he set, or preceding him when he rose. Another of a\nred and angry color, and still another more kingly and brilliant than\nall, early attracted their attention, by their free movements among the\nfixed hosts of Heaven: and the latter by his unusual brilliancy, and the\nregularity with which he rose and set. These were Venus, Mars, and\nJupiter. Mercury and Saturn could scarcely have been noticed in the\nworld's infancy, or until astronomy began to assume the proportions of a\nscience.\n\nIn the projection of the celestial sphere by the astronomical priests,\nthe zodiac and constellations, arranged in a circle, presented their\nhalves in diametrical opposition; and the hemisphere of Winter was said\nto be adverse, opposed, contrary, to that of Summer. Over the angels of\nthe latter ruled a king (OSIRIS or ORMUZD), enlightened, intelligent,\ncreative, and beneficent. Over the fallen angels or evil genii of the\nformer, the demons or Devs of the subterranean empire of darkness and\nsorrow, and its stars, ruled also a chief. In Egypt the Scorpion first\nruled, the sign next the Balance, and long the chief of the Winter\nsigns; and then the Polar Bear or Ass, called Typhon, that is, _deluge_,\non account of the rains which inundated the earth while that\nconstellation domineered. In Persia, at a later day, it was the serpent,\nwhich, personified as Ahriman, was the Evil Principle of the religion of\nZoroaster.\n\nThe Sun does not arrive at the same moment in each year at the\nequinoctial point on the equator. The explanation of his anticipating\nthat point belongs to the science of astronomy; and to that we refer you\nfor it. The consequence is, what is termed the precession of the\nequinoxes, by means of which the Sun is constantly changing his place in\nthe zodiac, at each vernal equinox; so that now, the signs retaining the\nnames which they had 300 years before Christ, they and the\nconstellations do not correspond; the Sun being now in the constellation\nPisces, when he is in the sign Aries.\n\nThe annual amount of precession is 50 seconds and a little over [50\"\n1.]. The period of a complete Revolution of the Equinoxes, 25,856 years.\nThe precession amounts to 30\u00b0 or a sign, in 2155.6 years. So that, as\nthe sun now enters Pisces at the Vernal Equinox, he entered Aries at\nthat period, 300 years B.C., and Taurus 2455 B.C. And the division of\nthe Ecliptic, now _called_ Taurus, lies in the Constellation Aries;\nwhile the _sign_ Gemini is in the _Constellation_ Taurus. Four thousand\nsix hundred and ten years before Christ, the sun entered Gemini at the\nVernal Equinox.\n\nAt the two periods, 2455 and 300 years before Christ, and now, the\nentrances of the sun at the Equinoxes and Solstices into the signs, were\nand are as follows:--\n\n                        _B.C._ 2455.\n\n\nVern. Equinox, he entered Taurus         from Aries.\nSummer Solstice           Leo            from Cancer.\nAutumnal Equinox          Scorpio        from Libra.\nWinter Solstice           Aquarius       from Capricornus.\n\n                         _B.C._ 300.\n\nVern. Eq.                 Aries          from Pisces.\nSummer Sols.              Cancer         from Gemini.\nAutumn Eq.                Libra          from Virgo.\nWinter Sols.              Capricornus    from Sagittarius.\n\n                          1872.\n\nVern. Eq.                 Pisces         from Aquarius.\nSum. Sols.                Gemini         from Taurus.\nAut. Eq.                  Virgo          from Leo.\nWinter Sols.              Sagittarius    from Scorpio.\n\nFrom confounding _signs_ with _causes_ came the worship of the sun and\nstars. \"If,\" says Job, \"I beheld the sun when it shined, or the moon\nprogressive in brightness; and my heart hath been secretly enticed, or\nmy mouth hath kissed my hand, this were an iniquity to be punished by\nthe Judge; for I should have denied the God that is above.\"\n\nPerhaps we are not, on the whole, much wiser than those simple men of\nthe old time. For what do we know of _effect_ and _cause_, except that\none thing regularly or habitually _follows_ another?\n\nSo, because the heliacal rising of Sirius _preceded_ the rising of the\nNile, it was deemed to _cause_ it; and other stars were in like manner\nheld to _cause_ extreme heat, bitter cold, and watery storm.\n\nA religious reverence for the zodiacal Bull [TAURUS] appears, from a\nvery early period, to have been pretty general,--perhaps it was\nuniversal, throughout Asia; from that chain or region of Caucasus to\nwhich it gave name; and which is still known under the appellation of\nMount Taurus, to the Southern extremities of the Indian Peninsula;\nextending itself also into Europe, and through the Eastern parts of\nAfrica.\n\nThis evidently originated during those remote ages of the world, when\nthe colure of the vernal equinox passed across the stars in the head of\nthe sign Taurus [among which was Aldebar\u00e1n]; a period when, as the most\nancient monuments of all the oriental nations attest, the light of arts\nand letters first shone forth.\n\nThe Arabian word AL-DE-BAR\u00c1N, means the _foremost_, or _leading_, star:\nand it could only have been so named, when it did precede, or _lead_,\nall others. The year then opened with the sun in Taurus; and the\nmultitude of ancient sculptures, both in Assyria and Egypt, wherein the\nbull appears with lunette or crescent horns, and the disk of the sun\nbetween them, are direct allusions to the important festival of the\nfirst new moon of the year: and there was everywhere an annual\ncelebration of the festival of the first new moon, when the year opened\nwith Sol and Luna in Taurus.\n\nDavid sings: \"Blow the trumpet in _the New Moon_; in the time appointed;\non our solemn feast-day: for this is a statute unto Israel, and a law of\nthe God of Jacob. This he ordained to Joseph, for a testimony, when he\ncame out of the land of Egypt.\"\n\nThe reverence paid to Taurus continued long after, by the precession of\nthe Equinoxes, the colure of the vernal equinox had come to pass through\nAries. The Chinese still have a temple, called \"The Palace of the horned\nBull\"; and the same symbol is worshipped in Japan and all over\nHindostan. The Cimbrians carried a brazen bull with them, as the image\nof their God, when they overran Spain and Gaul; and the representation\nof the Creation, by the Deity in the shape of a bull, breaking the shell\nof an egg with his horns, meant Taurus, opening the year, and bursting\nthe symbolical shell of the annually-recurring orb of the new year.\n\nTheophilus says that the Osiris of Egypt was supposed to be dead or\nabsent fifty days in each year. Landseer thinks that this was because\nthe Sab\u00e6an priests were accustomed to see, in the lower latitudes of\nEgypt and Ethiopia, the first or chief stars of the Husbandman [BO\u00d6TES]\nsink achronically beneath the Western horizon; and then to begin their\nlamentations, or hold forth the signal for others to weep: and when his\nprolific virtues were supposed to be transferred to the vernal sun,\nbacchanalian revelry became devotion.\n\nBefore the colure of the Vernal Equinox had passed into Aries, and after\nit had left Aldebar\u00e1n and the Hyades, the Pleiades were, for seven or\neight centuries, the leading stars of the Sab\u00e6an year. And thus we see,\non the monuments, the disk and crescent, symbols of the sun and moon in\nconjunction, appear successively,--first on the head, and then on the\nneck and back of the Zodiacal Bull, and more recently on the forehead of\nthe Ram.\n\nThe diagrammatical character or symbol, still in use to denote Taurus,\n[Glyph], is this very crescent and disk: a symbol that has come down to\nus from those remote ages when this memorable conjunction in Taurus, by\nmarking the commencement, at once of the Sab\u00e6an year and of the cycle of\nthe Chaldean Saros, so pre-eminently distinguished that sign as to\nbecome its characteristic symbol. On a bronze bull from China, the\ncrescent is attached to the _back_ of the Bull, by means of a cloud, and\na curved groove is provided for the occasional introduction of the disk\nof the sun, when solar and lunar time were coincident and conjunctive,\nat the commencement of the year, and of the lunar cycle. When that was\nmade, the year did not open with the stars in the _head_ of the Bull,\nbut when the colure of the vernal equinox passed across the middle or\nlater degrees of the asterism Taurus, and the Pleiades were, in China,\nas in Canaan, the leading stars of the year.\n\nThe crescent and disk combined always represent the conjunctive Sun and\nMoon; and when placed on the head of the Zodiacal Bull, the commencement\nof the cycle termed SAROS by the Chaldeans, and Metonic by the Greeks;\nand supposed to be alluded to in Job, by the phrase, \"Mazzaroth in his\nseason\"; that is to say, when the first new Moon and new Sun of the year\nwere coincident, which happened once in eighteen years and a fraction.\n\nOn the sarcophagus of Alexander, the same symbol appears on the head of\na Ram, which, in the time of that monarch, was the leading sign. So too\nin the sculptured temples of the Upper Nile, the crescent and disk\nappear, not on the head of Taurus, but on the forehead of the Ram or the\nRam-headed God, whom the Grecian Mythologists called Jupiter Ammon,\nreally the Sun in Aries.\n\nIf we now look for a moment at the individual stars which composed and\nwere near to the respective constellations, we may find something that\nwill connect itself with the symbols of the Ancient Mysteries and of\nMasonry.\n\nIt is to be noticed that when the Sun is _in_ a particular\nconstellation, no part of that constellation will be seen, except just\nbefore sunrise and just after sunset; and then only the edge of it: but\nthe constellations _opposite_ to it will be visible. When the Sun is in\nTaurus, for example, that is, when Taurus _sets with_ the Sun, Scorpio\nrises as he sets, and continues visible throughout the night. And if\nTaurus rises and sets with the Sun to-day, he will, six months hence,\nrise at sunset and set at sunrise; for the stars thus gain on the Sun\ntwo hours a month.\n\nGoing back to the time when, watched by the Chaldean shepherds, and the\nhusbandmen of Ethiopia and Egypt,\n\n\"The milk-white Bull with golden horns\n Led on the new-born year,\"\n\nwe see in the neck of TAURUS, the Pleiades, and in his face the Hyades,\n\"which Grecia from their showering names,\" and of whom the brilliant\nAldebar\u00e1n is the chief; while to the southwestward is that most splendid\nof all the constellations, Orion, with Betelgueux in his right shoulder,\nBellatrix in his left shoulder, Rigel on the left foot, and in his belt\nthe three stars known as the Three Kings, and now as the Yard and Ell.\nOrion, ran the legend, persecuted the Pleiades; and to save them from\nhis fury, Jupiter placed them in the Heavens, where he still pursues\nthem, but in vain. They, with Arcturus and the Bands of Orion, are\nmentioned in the Book of Job. They are usually called the Seven Stars,\nand it is said there _were_ seven, before the fall of Troy; though now\nonly six are visible.\n\nThe Pleiades were so named from a Greek word signifying _to sail._ In\nall ages they have been observed for signs and seasons. Virgil says that\nthe sailors gave names to \"the Pleiades, Hyades, and the Northern Car:\n_Pleiadas, Hyadas, Claramque Lycaonis Arcton.\"_ And Palinurus, he\nsays,--\n\n_Arcturum, pluviasque Hyadas, Geminosque Triones,\nArmatumque auro circumspicit Oriona,--_\n\nstudied Arcturus and the rainy Hyades and the Twin Triones, and Orion\ncinctured with gold.\n\nTaurus was the prince and leader of the celestial host for more than two\nthousand years; and when his head set with the Sun about the last of\nMay, the Scorpion was seen to rise in the Southeast.\n\nThe Pleiades were sometimes called _Vergili\u0153,_ or the Virgins of Spring;\nbecause the Sun entered this cluster of stars in the season of blossoms.\nTheir Syrian name was _Succoth,_ or _Succothbeneth,_ derived from a\nChaldean word signifying to _speculate_ or _observe._\n\nThe _Hyades_ are five stars in the form of a V, 11\u00b0 southeast of the\nPleiades. The Greeks counted them as seven. When the Vernal Equinox was\nin Taurus, Aldebar\u00e1n led up the starry host; and as he rose in the East,\nAries was about 27\u00b0 high.\n\nWhen he was close upon the meridian, the Heavens presented their most\nmagnificent appearance. Capella was a little further from the meridian,\nto the north; and Orion still further from it to the southward. Procyon,\nSirius, Castor and Pollux had climbed about half-way from the horizon to\nthe meridian. Regulus had just risen upon the ecliptic. The Virgin still\nlingered below the horizon. Fomalhaut was half-way to the meridian in\nthe Southwest; and to the Northwest were the brilliant constellations,\nPerseus, Cepheus, Cassiopeia, and Andromeda; while the Pleiades had just\npassed the meridian.\n\nORION is visible to all the habitable world. The equinoctial line passes\nthrough the centre of it. When Aldebar\u00e1n rose in the East, the Three\nKings in Orion followed him; and as Taurus set, the Scorpion, by whose\nsting it was said Orion died, rose in the East.\n\nOrion rises at noon about the 9th of March. His rising was accompanied\nwith great rains and storms, and it became very terrible to mariners.\n\nIn Bo\u00f6tes, called by the ancient Greeks _Lycaon_, from _lukos,_ a wolf,\nand by the Hebrews, Caleb Anubach, the Barking Dog, is the Great Star\nARCTURUS, which, when Taurus opened the year, corresponded with a season\nremarkable for its great heat.\n\nNext comes GEMINI, the Twins, two human figures, in the heads of which\nare the bright Stars CASTOR and POLLUX, the Dioscuri, and the Cabiri of\nSamothrace, patrons of navigation; while South of Pollux are the\nbrilliant Stars SIRIUS and PROCYON, the greater and lesser Dog: and\nstill further South, Canopus, in the Ship Argo.\n\nSirius is apparently the largest and brightest Star in the Heavens. When\nthe Vernal Equinox was in Taurus, he rose heliacally, that is, just\nbefore the Sun, when, at the Summer Solstice, the Sun entered Leo, about\nthe 21st of June, fifteen days previous to the swelling of the Nile. The\nheliacal rising of Canopus was also a precursor of the rising of the\nNile. Procyon was the forerunner of Sirius, and rose before him.\n\nThere are no important Stars in CANCER. In the Zodiacs of Esne and\nDendera, and in most of the astrological remains of Egypt, the sign of\nthis constellation was a beetle (_Scarab\u0153us_), which thence became\nsacred, as an emblem of the gate through which souls descended from\nHeaven. In the crest of Cancer is a cluster of Stars formerly called\n_Pr\u0153sepe,_ the Manger, on each side of which is a small Star, the two of\nwhich were called _Aselli_ little asses.\n\nIn _Leo_ are the splendid Stars, REGULUS, directly on the ecliptic, and\nDENEBOLA in the Lion's tail. Southeast of Regulus is the fine Star COR\nHYDR\u00c6.\n\nThe combat of Hercules with the Nem\u00e6an lion was his first labor. It was\nthe first sign into which the Sun passed, after falling below the Summer\nSolstice; from which time he struggled to re-ascend.\n\nThe Nile overflowed in this sign. It stands first in the Zodiac of\nDendera, and is in all the Indian and Egyptian Zodiacs.\n\nIn the left hand of VIRGO (Isis or Ceres) is the beautiful Star SPICA\nVirginis, a little South of the ecliptic. VINDEMIATRIX, of less\nmagnitude, is in the right arm; and Northwest of Spica, in Bo\u00f6tes (the\nhusbandman, Osiris), is the splendid star ARCTURUS.\n\nThe division of the first Decan of the Virgin, Aben Ezra says,\nrepresents a beautiful Virgin with flowing hair, sitting in a chair,\nwith two ears of corn in her hand, and suckling an infant. In an Arabian\nMS. in the Royal Library at Paris, is a picture of the Twelve Signs.\nThat of Virgo is a young girl with an infant by her side. Virgo was\nIsis; and her representation, carrying a child (Horus) in her arms,\nexhibited in her temple, was accompanied by this inscription: \"I AM ALL\nTHAT IS, THAT WAS, AND THAT SHALL BE; and the fruit which I brought\nforth is the Sun.\"\n\nNine months after the Sun enters Virgo, he reaches the Twins. When\nScorpio begins to rise, Orion sets: when Scorpio comes to the meridian,\nLeo begins to set, Typhon reigns, Osiris is slain, and Isis (the Virgin)\nhis sister and wife, follows him to the tomb, weeping.\n\nThe Virgin and Bo\u00f6tes, setting heliacally at the Autumnal Equinox,\ndelivered the world to the wintry constellations, and introduced into it\nthe genius of Evil, represented by Ophiucus, the Serpent.\n\nAt the moment of the Winter Solstice, the Virgin rose heliacally (_with_\nthe Sun), having the Sun (Horus) in her bosom.\n\nIn LIBRA are four Stars of the second and third magnitude, which we\nshall mention hereafter. They are Zuben-es-Chamali, Zuben-el-Gemabi,\nZuben-hak-rabi, and Zuben-el-Gubi. Near the last of these is the\nbrilliant and malign Star, ANTARES in Scorpio.\n\nIn SCORPIO, ANTARES, of the 1st magnitude, and remarkably red, was one\nof the four great Stars, FOMALHAUT, in Cetus, ALDEBARAN in Taurus,\nREGULUS in Leo, and ANTARES, that formerly answered to the Solstitial\nand Equinoctial points, and were much noticed by astronomers. This sign\nwas sometimes represented by a Snake, and sometimes by a Crocodile, but\ngenerally by a Scorpion, which last is found on the Mithriac Monuments,\nand on the Zodiac of Dendera. It was considered a sign accursed, and the\nentrance of the Sun into it commenced the reign of Typhon.\n\nIn Sagittarius, Capricornus, and Aquarius there are no Stars of\nimportance.\n\nNear Pisces is the brilliant Star FOMALHAUT. No sign in the Zodiac is\nconsidered of more malignant influence than this. It was deemed\nindicative of _Violence_ and _Death._ Both the Syrians and Egyptians\nabstained from eating fish, out of dread and abhorhence; and when the\nlatter would represent anything as odious, or express hatred by\nHieroglyphics, they painted a fish.\n\nIn Auriga is the bright Star CAPELLA, which to the Egyptians never set.\n\nAnd, circling ever round the North Pole are Seven Stars, known as Ursa\nMajor, or the Great Bear, which have been an object of universal\nobservation in all ages of the world. They were venerated alike by the\nPriests of Bel, the Magi of Persia, the Shepherds of Chaldea, and the\nPh\u0153nician navigators, as well as by the astronomers of Egypt. Two of\nthem, MERAK and DUBHE, always point to the North Pole.\n\nThe Phoenicians and Egyptians, says Eusebius, were the first who\nascribed divinity to the Sun, Moon, and Stars, and regarded them as the\nsole causes of the production and destruction of all beings. From them\nwent abroad over all the world all known opinions as to the generation\nand descent of the Gods. Only the Hebrews looked beyond the visible\nworld to an invisible Creator. All the rest of the world regarded as\nGods those luminous bodies that blaze in the firmament, offered them\nsacrifices, bowed down before them, and raised neither their souls nor\ntheir worship above the visible heavens.\n\nThe Chaldeans, Canaanites, and Syrians, among whom Abraham lived, did\nthe same. The Canaanites consecrated horses and chariots to the Sun. The\ninhabitants of Emesa in Ph\u0153nicia adored him under the name of\nElagabalus; and the Sun, as Hercules, was the great Deity of the\nTyrians. The Syrians worshipped, with fear and dread, the Stars of the\nConstellation Pisces, and consecrated images of them in their temples.\nThe Sun as Adonis was worshipped in Byblos and about Mount Libanus.\nThere was a magnificent Temple of the Sun at Palmyra, which was pillaged\nby the soldiers of Aurelian, who rebuilt it and dedicated it anew. The\nPleiades, under the name of Succoth-Beneth, were worshipped by the\nBabylonian colonists who settled in the country of the Samaritans.\nSaturn, under the name of Remphan, was worshipped among the Copts. The\nplanet Jupiter was worshipped as Bel or Baal; Mars as Malec, Melech, or\nMoloch; Venus as Ashtaroth or Astarte, and Mercury as Nebo, among the\nSyrians, Assyrians, Ph\u0153nicians, and Canaanites.\n\nSanchoniathon says that the earliest Ph\u0153nicians adored the Sun, whom\nthey deemed sole Lord of the Heavens; and honored him, under the name of\nBEEL-SAMIN, signifying _King of Heaven._ They raised columns to the\nelements, fire, and air or wind, and worshipped them; and Sab\u00e6ism, or\nthe worship of the Stars, flourished everywhere in Babylonia. The Arabs,\nunder a sky always clear and serene, adored the Sun, Moon, and Stars.\nAbulfaragius so informs us, and that each of the twelve Arab Tribes\ninvoked a particular Star as its Patron. The Tribe Hamyar was\nconsecrated to the Sun, the Tribe Cennah to the Moon; the Tribe Misa was\nunder the protection of the beautiful Star in Taurus, Aldebar\u00e1n; the\nTribe Tai under that of Canopus; the Tribe Kais, of Sirius; the Tribes\nLachamus and Idamus, of Jupiter; the Tribe Asad, of Mercury; and so on.\n\nThe Saracens, in the time of Heraclius, worshipped Venus, whom they\ncalled CABAR, or The Great; and they swore by the Sun, Moon, and Stars.\nShahristan, an Arabic author, says that the Arabs and Indians before his\ntime had temples dedicated to the seven Planets. Abulfaragius says that\nthe seven great primitive nations, from whom all others descended, the\nPersians, Chald\u00e6ans, Greeks, Egyptians, Turks, Indians, and Chinese, all\noriginally were Sab\u00e6ists, and worshipped the Stars. They all, he says,\nlike the Chald\u00e6ans, prayed, turning toward the North Pole three times a\nday, at Sunrise, Noon, and Sunset, bowing themselves three times before\nthe Sun. They invoked the Stars and the Intelligences which inhabited\nthem, offered them sacrifices, and called the fixed stars and planets\ngods. Philo says that the Chald\u00e6ans regarded the stars as sovereign\narbiters of the order of the world, and did not look beyond the visible\ncauses to any invisible and intellectual being. They regarded NATURE as\nthe great divinity, that exercised its powers through the action of its\nparts the Sun, Moon, Planets, and Fixed Stars, the successive\nrevolutions of the seasons, and the combined action of Heaven and Earth.\nThe great feast of the Sab\u00e6ans was when the Sun reached the Vernal\nEquinox: and they had five other feasts, at the times when the five\nminor planets entered the signs in which they had their exaltation.\n\nDiodorus Siculus informs us that the Egyptians recognized two great\nDivinities, primary and eternal, the Sun and Moon, which they thought\ngoverned the world, and from which everything receives its nourishment\nand growth: that on them depended all the great work of generation, and\nthe perfection of all effects produced in nature. We know that the two\ngreat Divinities of Egypt were Osiris and Isis, the greatest agents of\nnature; according to some, the Sun and Moon, and according to others,\nHeaven and Earth, or the active and passive principles of generation.\n\nAnd we learn from Porphyry that Ch\u00e6remon, a learned priest of Egypt, and\nmany other learned men of that nation, said that the Egyptians\nrecognized as gods the stars composing the zodiac, and all those that by\ntheir rising or setting marked its divisions; the subdivisions of the\nsigns into decans, the horoscope and the stars that presided therein,\nand which were called Potent Chiefs of Heaven: that considering the Sun\nas the Great God, Architect, and Ruler of the World, they explained not\nonly the fable of Osiris and Isis, but generally all their sacred\nlegends, by the stars, by their appearance and disappearance, by their\nascension, by the phases of the moon, and the increase and diminution of\nher light; by the march of the sun, the division of time and the heavens\ninto two parts, one assigned to darkness and the other to light; by the\nNile and, in fine, by the whole round of physical causes.\n\nLucian tells us that the bull Apis, sacred to the Egyptians, was the\nimage of the celestial Bull, or Taurus; and that Jupiter Ammon, horned\nlike a ram, was an image of the constellation Aries. And Clemens of\nAlexandria assures us that the four principal sacred animals, carried\nin their processions, were emblems of the four signs or cardinal points\nwhich fixed the seasons at the equinoxes and solstices, and divided into\nfour parts the yearly march of the sun. They worshipped fire also, and\nwater, and the Nile, which river they styled Father, Preserver of Egypt,\nsacred emanation from the Great God Osiris; and in their hymns in which\nthey called it the god crowned with millet (which grain, represented by\nthe _pschent_, was part of the head-dress of their kings), bringing with\nhim abundance. The other elements were also revered by them: and the\nGreat Gods, whose names are found inscribed on an ancient column, are\nthe Air, Heaven, the Earth, the Sun, the Moon, Night, and Day. And, in\nfine, as Eusebius says, they regarded the Universe as a great Deity,\ncomposed of a great number of gods, the different parts of itself.\n\nThe same worship of the Heavenly Host extended into every part of\nEurope, into Asia Minor, and among the Turks, Scythians, and Tartars.\nThe ancient Persians adored the Sun as Mithras, and also the Moon,\nVenus, Fire, Earth, Air, and Water; and, having no statues or altars,\nthey sacrificed on high places to the Heavens and to the Sun. On seven\nancient _pyrea_ they burned incense to the Seven Planets, and considered\nthe elements to be divinities. In the Zend-Avesta we find invocations\naddressed to Mithras, the stars, the elements, trees, mountains, and\nevery part of nature. The Celestial Bull is invoked there, to which the\nMoon unites herself; and the four great stars, Taschter, Satevis,\nHaftorang, and Venant, the great Star Rapitan, and the other\nconstellations which watch over the different portions of the earth.\n\nThe Magi, like a multitude of ancient nations, worshipped fire, above\nall the other elements and powers of nature. In India, the Ganges and\nthe Indus were worshipped, and the Sun was the Great Divinity. They\nworshipped the Moon also, and kept up the sacred fire. In Ceylon, the\nSun, Moon, and other planets were worshipped: in Sumatra, the Sun,\ncalled Iri, and the Moon, called Handa. And the Chinese built Temples to\nHeaven, the Earth, and genii of the air, of the water, of the mountains,\nand of the stars, to the sea-dragon, and to the planet Mars.\n\nThe celebrated Labyrinth was built in honor of the Sun; and its twelve\npalaces, like the twelve superb columns of the Temple at Hieropolis,\ncovered with symbols relating to the twelve signs and the occult\nqualities of the elements, were consecrated to the twelve gods or\ntutelary genii of the signs of the Zodiac. The figure of the pyramid\nand that of the obelisk, resembling the shape of a flame, caused these\nmonuments to be consecrated to the Sun and to Fire. And Tim\u00e6us of Locria\nsays: \"The equilateral triangle enters into the composition of the\npyramid, which has four equal faces and equal angles, and which in this\nis like fire the most subtle and mobile of the elements.\" They and the\nobelisks were erected in honor of the Sun, termed in an inscription upon\none of the latter, translated by the Egyptian Hermapion and to be found\nin Ammianus Marcellinus, \"Apollo the strong, Son of God, He who made the\nworld, true Lord of the diadems, who possesses Egypt and fills it with\nHis glory.\"\n\nThe two most famous divisions of the Heavens, by seven, which is that of\nthe planets, and by twelve, which is that of the signs, are found on the\nreligious monuments of all the people of the ancient world. The twelve\nGreat Gods of Egypt are met with everywhere. They were adopted by the\nGreeks and Romans; and the latter assigned one of them to each sign of\nthe Zodiac. Their images were seen at Athens, where an altar was erected\nto each; and they were painted on the porticos. The People of the North\nhad their twelve _Azes_, or Senate of twelve great gods, of whom Odin\nwas chief. The Japanese had the same number, and like the Egyptians\ndivided them into classes, seven, who were the most ancient, and five,\nafterward added: both of which numbers are well known and consecrated in\nMasonry.\n\nThere is no more striking proof of the universal adoration paid the\nstars and constellations, than the arrangement of the Hebrew camp in the\nDesert, and the allegory in regard to the twelve Tribes of Israel,\nascribed in the Hebrew legends to Jacob. The Hebrew camp was a\nquadrilateral, in sixteen divisions, of which the central four were\noccupied by images of the four elements. The four divisions at the four\nangles of the quadrilateral exhibited the four signs that the\nastrologers called _fixed_, and which they regard as subject to the\ninfluence of the four great Royal Stars, Regulus in Leo, Aldebaran in\nTaurus, Antares in Scorpio, and Fomalhaut in the mouth of Pisces, on\nwhich falls the water poured out by Aquarius; of which constellations\nthe Scorpion was represented in the Hebrew blazonry by the Celestial\nVulture or Eagle, that rises at the same time with it and is its\nparanatellon. The other signs were arranged on the four faces of the\nquadilateral, and in the parallel and interior divisions.\n\nThere is an astonishing coincidence between the characteristics assigned\nby Jacob to his sons, and those of the signs of the Zodiac, or the\nplanets that have their domicile in those signs.\n\n_Reuben_ is compared to running water, unstable, and that cannot excel;\nand he answers to Aquarius, his ensign being a man. The water poured out\nby Aquarius flows toward the South Pole, and it is the first of the four\nRoyal Signs, ascending from the Winter Solstice.\n\nThe Lion (Leo) is the device of _Judah_; and Jacob compares him to that\nanimal, whose constellation in the Heavens is the domicile of the Sun;\nthe Lion of the Tribe of Judah; by whose grip, when that of apprentice\nand that of fellow-craft,--of Aquarius at the Winter Solstice and of\nCancer at the Vernal Equinox,--had not succeeded in raising him, Kh\u016br\u016bm\nwas lifted out of the grave.\n\n_Ephraim_, on whose ensign appears the Celestial Bull, Jacob compares to\nthe ox. _Dan_, bearing as his device a Scorpion, he compares to the\nCerastes or horned Serpent, synonymous in astrological language with the\nvulture or pouncing eagle; and which bird was often substituted on the\nflag of Dan, in place of the venomous scorpion, on account of the terror\nwhich that reptile inspired, as the symbol of Typhon and his malign\ninfluences; wherefore the Eagle, as its paranatellon, that is, rising\nand setting at the same time with it, was naturally used in its stead.\nHence the four famous figures in the sacred pictures of the Jews and\nChristians, and in Royal Arch Masonry, of the Lion, the Ox, the Man, and\nthe Eagle, the four creatures of the Apocalypse, copied there from\nEzekiel, in whose reveries and rhapsodies they are seen revolving around\nblazing circles.\n\nThe Ram, domicile of Mars, chief of the Celestial Soldiery and of the\ntwelve Signs, is the device of _Gad_, whom Jacob characterizes as a\nwarrior, chief of his army.\n\nCancer, in which are the stars termed _Aselli_, or little assess, is the\ndevice of the flag of _Issachar_, whom Jacob compares to an ass.\n\nCapricorn, of old represented with the tail of a fish, and called by\nastronomers the Son of Neptune, is the device of _Zebulon_, of whom\nJacob says that he dwells on the shore of the sea.\n\nSagittarius, chasing the Celestial Wolf, is the emblem of _Benjamin_,\nwhom Jacob compares to a hunter: and in that constellation the Romans\nplaced the domicile of Diana the huntress. Virgo, the domicile of\nMercury, is borne on the flag of _Naphtali_, whose eloquence and agility\nJacob magnifies, both of which are attributes of the Courier of the\nGods. And of _Simeon_ and _Levi_ he speaks as united, as are the two\nfishes that make the Constellation Pisces, which is their armorial\nemblem.\n\nPlato, in his Republic, followed the divisions of the Zodiac and the\nplanets. So also did Lycurgus at Sparta, and Cecrops in the Athenian\nCommonwealth. Chun, the Chinese legislator, divided China into twelve\nTcheou, and specially designated twelve mountains. The Etruscans divided\nthemselves into twelve Cantons. Romulus appointed twelve Lictors. There\nwere twelve tribes of Ishmael and twelve disciples of the Hebrew\nReformer. The New Jerusalem of the Apocalypse has twelve gates.\n\nThe Souciet, a Chinese book, speaks of a palace composed of four\nbuildings, whose gates looked toward the four corners of the world. That\non the East was dedicated to the new moons of the months of Spring; that\non the West to those of Autumn; that on the South to those of Summer;\nand that on the North to those of Winter: and in this, palace the\nEmperor and his grandees sacrificed a lamb, the animal that represented\nthe Sun at the Vernal Equinox.\n\nAmong the Greeks, the march of the Choruses in their theatres\nrepresented the movements of the Heavens and the planets, and the\nStrophe and Anti-Strophe imitated, Aristoxenes says, the movements of\nthe Stars. The number five was sacred among the Chinese, as that of the\nplanets other than the Sun and Moon. Astrology consecrated the numbers\ntwelve, seven, thirty, and three hundred and sixty; and everywhere\n_seven_, the number of the planets, was as sacred as twelve, that of the\nsigns, the months, the oriental cycles, and the sections of the horizon.\nWe shall speak more at large hereafter, in another Degree, as to these\nand other numbers, to which the ancients ascribed mysterious powers.\n\nThe Signs of the Zodiac and the Stars appeared on many of the ancient\ncoins and medals. On the public seal of the Locrians, Ozoles was\nHesperus, or the planet Venus. On the medals of Antioch on the Orontes\nwas the ram and crescent; and the Ram was the special Deity of Syria,\nassigned to it in the division of the earth among the twelve signs. On\nthe Cretan coins was the Equinoctial Bull; and he also appeared on those\nof the Mamertins and of Athens. Sagittarius appeared on those of the\nPersians. In India the twelve signs appeared upon the ancient coins.\nThe Scorpion was engraved on the medals of the Kings of Comagena, and\nCapricorn on those of Zeugma, Anazorba, and other cities. On the medals\nof Antoninus are found nearly all the signs of the Zodiac.\n\nAstrology was practised among all the ancient nations. In Egypt, the\nbook of Astrology was borne reverentially in the religious processions;\nin which the few sacred animals were also carried, as emblems of the\nequinoxes and solstices. The same science nourished among the Chaldeans,\nand over the whole of Asia and Africa. When Alexander invaded India, the\nastrologers of the Oxydraces came to him to disclose the secrets of\ntheir science of Heaven and the Stars. The Brahmins whom Apollonius\nconsulted, taught him the secrets of Astronomy, with the ceremonies and\nprayers whereby to appease the gods and learn the future from the stars.\nIn China, astrology taught the mode of governing the State and families.\nIn Arabia it was deemed the mother of the sciences; and old libraries\nare full of Arabic books on this pretended science. It flourished at\nRome. Constantine had his horoscope drawn by the astrologer Valens. It\nwas a science in the middle ages, and even to this day is neither\nforgotten nor unpractised. Catherine de Medici was fond of it. Louis\nXIV. consulted his horoscope, and the learned Casini commenced his\ncareer as an astrologer.\n\nThe ancient Sab\u00e6ans established feasts in honor of each planet, on the\nday, for each, when it entered its place of _exaltation_, or reached the\nparticular degree in the particular sign of the zodiac in which\nastrology had fixed the place of its exaltation; that is, the place in\nthe Heavens where its influence was supposed to be greatest, and where\nit acted on Nature with the greatest energy. The place of exaltation of\nthe Sun was in Aries, because, reaching that point, he awakens all\nNature, and warms into life all the germs of vegetation; and therefore\nhis most solemn feast among all nations, for many years before our Era,\nwas fixed at the time of his entrance into that sign. In Egypt, it was\ncalled the Feast of Fire and Light. It was the Passover, when the\nPaschal Lamb was slain and eaten, among the Jews, and Neurouz among the\nPersians. The Romans preferred the place of _domicile_ to that of\nexaltation; and celebrated the feasts of the planets under the signs\nthat were their _houses_. The Chaldeans, whom, and not the Egyptians,\nthe Sab\u00e6ans followed in this, preferred the places of exaltation.\n\nSaturn, from the length of time required for his apparent revolution,\nwas considered the most remote, and the Moon the nearest planet. After\nthe Moon came Mercury and Venus, then the Sun and then Mars, Jupiter,\nand Saturn.\n\nSo the risings and settings of the Fixed Stars, and their conjunctions\nwith the Sun, and their first appearance as they emerged from his rays,\nfixed the epochs for the feasts instituted in their honor; and the\nSacred Calendars of the ancients were regulated accordingly.\n\nIn the Roman games of the circus, celebrated in honor of the Sun and of\nentire Nature, the Sun, Moon, Planets, Zodiac, Elements, and the most\napparent parts and potent agents of Nature were personified and\nrepresented, and the courses of the Sun in the Heavens were imitated in\nthe Hippodrome; his chariot being drawn by four horses of different\ncolors, representing the four elements and seasons. The courses were\nfrom East to West, like the circuits round the Lodge, and seven in\nnumber, to correspond with the number of planets. The movements of the\nSeven Stars that revolve around the pole were also represented, as were\nthose of Capella, which by its heliacal rising at the moment when the\nSun reached the Pleiades, in Taurus, announced the commencement of the\nannual revolution of the Sun.\n\nThe intersection of the Zodiac by the colures at the Equinoctial and\nSolstitial points, fixed four periods, each of which has, by one or more\nnations, and in some cases by the same nation at different periods, been\ntaken for the commencement of the year. Some adopted the Vernal Equinox,\nbecause then day began to prevail over night, and light gained a victory\nover darkness. Sometimes the Summer Solstice was preferred; because then\nday attained its maximum of duration, and the acme of its glory and\nperfection. In Egypt, another reason was, that then the Nile began to\noverflow, at the heliacal rising of Sirius. Some preferred the Autumnal\nEquinox, because then the harvests were gathered, and the hopes of a new\ncrop were deposited in the bosom of the earth. And some preferred the\nWinter Solstice, because then, the shortest day having arrived, their\nlength commenced to increase, and Light began the career destined to end\nin victory at the Vernal Equinox.\n\nThe Sun was figuratively said to _die_ and be _born again_ at the Winter\nSolstice; the games of the Circus, in honor of the invincible God-Sun,\nwere then celebrated, and the Roman year, established or reformed by\nNuma, commenced. Many peoples of Italy commenced their year, Macrobius\nsays, at that time; and represented by the four ages of man the gradual\nsuccession of periodical increase and diminution of day, and the light\nof the Sun; likening him to an infant born at the Winter Solstice, a\nyoung man at the Vernal Equinox, a robust man at the Summer Solstice,\nand an old man at the Autumnal Equinox.\n\nThis idea was borrowed from the Egyptians, who adored the Sun at the\nWinter Solstice, under the figure of an infant.\n\nThe image of the Sign in which each of the four seasons commenced,\nbecame the form under which was figured the Sun of that particular\nseason. The Lion's skin was worn by Hercules; the horns of the Bull\nadorned the forehead of Bacchus; and the autumnal serpent wound its long\nfolds round the Statue of Serapis, 2500 years before our era; when those\nSigns corresponded with the commencement of the Seasons. When other\nconstellations replaced them at those points, by means of the precession\nof the Equinoxes, those attributes were changed. Then the Ram furnished\nthe horns for the head of the Sun, under the name of Jupiter Ammon. He\nwas no longer born exposed to the waters of Aquarius, like Bacchus, nor\nenclosed in an urn like the God Canopus; but in the Stables of Augeas or\nthe Celestial Goat. He then completed his triumph, mounted on an ass, in\nthe constellation Cancer, which then occupied the Solstitial point of\nSummer.\n\nOther attributes the images of the Sun borrowed from the constellations\nwhich, by their rising and setting, fixed the points of departure of the\nyear, and the commencements of its four principal divisions.\n\nFirst the Bull and afterward the Ram (called by the Persians the Lamb),\nwas regarded as the regenerator of Nature, through his union with the\nSun. Each, in his turn, was an emblem of the Sun overcoming the winter\ndarkness, and repairing the disorders of Nature, which every year was\nregenerated under these Signs, after the Scorpion and Serpent of Autumn\nhad brought upon it barrenness, disaster, and darkness. Mithras was\nrepresented sitting on a Bull; and that animal was an image of Osiris:\nwhile the Greek Bacchus armed his front with its horns, and was pictured\nwith its tail and feet.\n\nThe Constellations also became noteworthy to the husbandman, which by\ntheir rising or setting, at morning or evening, indicated the coming of\nthis period of renewed fruitfulness and new life. Capella, or the kid\nAmalthea, whose horn is called that of abundance, and whose place is\nover the equinoctial point, or Taurus; and the Pleiades, that long\nindicated the Seasons, and gave rise to a multitude of poetic fables,\nwere the most observed and most celebrated in antiquity.\n\nThe original Roman year commenced at the Vernal Equinox. July was\nformerly called _Quintilis_, the 5th month, and August _Sextilis_, the\n6th, as _September_ is still the 7th month, _October_ the 8th, and so\non. The Persians commenced their year at the same time, and celebrated\ntheir great feast of Neurouz when the Sun entered Aries and the\nConstellation Perseus rose,--Perseus, who first brought down to earth\nthe heavenly fire consecrated in their temples: and all the ceremonies\nthen practised reminded men of the renovation of Nature and the triumph\nof Ormuzd, the Light-God, over the powers of Darkness and Ahriman their\nChief.\n\nThe Legislator of the Jews fixed the commencement of their year in the\nmonth Nisan, at the Vernal Equinox, at which season the Israelites\nmarched out of Egypt and were relieved of their long bondage; in\ncommemoration of which Exodus, they ate the Paschal Lamb at that\nEquinox. And when Bacchus and his army had long marched in burning\ndeserts, they were led by a Lamb or Ram into beautiful meadows, and to\nthe Springs that watered the Temple of Jupiter Ammon. For, to the Arabs\nand Ethiopians, whose great Divinity Bacchus was, nothing was so perfect\na type of Elysium as a Country abounding in springs and rivulets.\n\nOrion, on the same meridian with the Stars of Taurus, died of the sting\nof the celestial Scorpion, that rises when he sets; as dies the Bull of\nMithras in Autumn: and in the Stars that correspond with the Autumnal\nEquinox we find those malevolent genii that ever war against the\nPrinciple of good, and that take from the Sun and the Heavens the\nfruit-producing power that they communicate to the earth.\n\nWith the Vernal Equinox, dear to the sailor as to the husbandman, came\nthe Stars that, with the Sun, open navigation, and rule the stormy Seas.\nThen the Twins plunge into the solar fires, or disappear at setting,\ngoing down with the Sun into the bosom of the waters. And these tutelary\nDivinities of mariners, the Dioscuri or Chief Cabiri of Samothrace,\nsailed with Jason to possess themselves of the golden-fleeced ram, or\nAries, whose rising in the morning announced the Sun's entry into\nTaurus, when the Serpent-bearer Jason rose in the evening, and, in\naspect with the Dioscuri, was deemed their brother. And Orion, son of\nNeptune, and most potent controller of the tempest-tortured ocean,\nannouncing sometimes calm and sometimes tempest, rose after Taurus,\nrejoicing in the forehead of the new year.\n\nThe Summer Solstice was not less an important point in the Sun's march\nthan the Vernal Equinox, especially to the Egyptians, to whom it not\nonly marked the end and term of the increasing length of the days and of\nthe domination of light, and the _maximum_ of the Sun's elevation; but\nalso the annual recurrence of that phenomenon peculiar to Egypt, the\nrising of the Nile, which, ever accompanying the Sun in his course,\nseemed to rise and fall as the days grew longer and shorter, being\nlowest at the Winter Solstice, and highest at that of Summer. Thus the\nSun seemed to regulate its swelling; and the time of his arrival at the\nsolstitial point being that of the first rising of the Nile, was\nselected by the Egyptians as the beginning of a year which they called\nthe Year of God, and of the Sothiac Period, or the period of Sothis, the\nDog-Star, who, rising in the morning, fixed that epoch, so important to\nthe people of Egypt. This year was also called the Heliac, that is the\nSolar year, and the Canicular year; and it consisted of three hundred\nand sixty-five days, without intercalation; so that at the end of four\nyears, or of four times three hundred and sixty-five days, making 1460\ndays, it needed to add a day, to make four complete revolutions of the\nSun. To correct this, some Nations made every fourth year consist, as we\ndo now, of 366 days: but the Egyptians preferred to add nothing to the\nyear of 365 days, which, at the end of 120 years, or of 30 times 4\nyears, was short 30 days or a month; that is to say, it required a month\nmore to complete the 120 revolutions of the Sun, though so many were\ncounted, that is, so many years. Of course the commencement of the 121st\nyear would not correspond with the Summer Solstice, but would precede it\nby a month: so that, when the Sun arrived at the Solstitial point whence\nhe at first set out, and whereto he must needs return, to make in\nreality 120 years, or 120 complete revolutions, the first month of the\n121st year would have ended.\n\nThus, if the commencement of the year went back 30 days every 120 years,\nthis commencement of the year, continuing to recede, would, at the end\nof 12 times 120 years, or of 1460 years get back to the Solstitial\npoint, or primitive point of departure of the period. The Sun would then\nhave made but 1459 revolutions though 1460 were counted; to make up\nwhich, a year more would need to be added. So that the Sun would not\nhave made his 1460 revolutions until the end of 1461 years of 365 days\neach,--each revolution being in reality not 365 days exactly, but\n365-l/4.\n\nThis period of 1461 years, each of 365 days, bringing back the\ncommencement of the Solar year to the Solstitial point, at the rising of\nSirius, after 1460 complete Solar revolutions, was called in Egypt the\n_Sothiac_ period, the point of departure whereof was the Summer\nSolstice, first occupied by the Lion and afterward by Cancer, under\nwhich sign is Sirius, which opened the period. It was, says Porphyry, at\nthis Solstitial New Moon, accompanied by the rising of Seth or the\nDog-Star, that the beginning of the year was fixed, and that of the\ngeneration of all things, or, as it were, the natal hour of the world.\n\nNot Sirius alone determined the period of the rising of the Nile.\nAquarius, his urn, and the stream flowing from it, in opposition to the\nsign of the Summer Solstice then occupied by the Sun, opened in the\nevening the march of Night, and received the full Moon in his cup. Above\nhim and with him rose the feet of Pegasus, struck wherewith the waters\nflow forth that the Muses drink. The Lion and the Dog, indicating, were\nsupposed to _cause_ the inundation, and so were worshipped. While the\nSun passed through Leo, the waters doubled their depth; and the sacred\nfountains poured their streams through the heads of lions. Hydra, rising\nbetween Sirius and Leo, extended under three signs. Its head rose with\nCancer, and its tail with the feet of the Virgin and the beginning of\nLibra; and the inundation continued while the Sun passed along its whole\nextent.\n\nThe successive contest of light and darkness for the possession of the\nlunar disk, each being by turns victor and vanquished, exactly resembled\nwhat passed upon the earth by the action of the Sun and his journeys\nfrom one Solstice to the other. The lunary revolution presented the same\nperiods of light and darkness as the year, and was the object of the\nsame religious fictions. Above the Moon, Pliny said, everything is pure,\nand filled with eternal light. There ends the cone of shadow which the\nearth projects, and which produces night; there ends the sojourn of\nnight and darkness; to it the air extends; but there we enter the pure\nsubstance.\n\nThe Egyptians assigned to the Moon the demiurgic or creative force of\nOsiris, who united himself to her in the spring, when the Sun\ncommunicated to her the principles of generation which she afterward\ndisseminated in the air and all the elements. The Persians considered\nthe Moon to have been impregnated by the Celestial Bull, first of the\nsigns of spring. In all ages, the Moon has been supposed to have great\ninfluence upon vegetation, and the birth and growth of animals; and the\nbelief is as widely entertained now as ever, and that influence regarded\nas a mysterious and inexplicable one. Not the astrologers alone, but\nNaturalists like Pliny, Philosophers like Plutarch and Cicero,\nTheologians like the Egyptian Priests, and Metaphysicians like Proclus,\nbelieved firmly in these lunar influences.\n\n\"The Egyptians,\" says Diodorus Siculus, \"acknowledged two great gods,\nthe Sun and Moon, or Osiris and Isis, who govern the world and regulate\nits administration by the dispensation of the seasons.... Such is the\nnature of these two great Divinities, that they impress an active and\nfecundating force, by which the generation of beings in effected; the\nSun, by heat and that spiritual principle that forms the breath of the\nwinds; the Moon by humidity and dryness; and both by the forces of the\nair which they share in common. By this beneficial influence everything\nis born, grows, and vegetates. Wherefore this whole huge body, in which\nnature resides, is maintained by the combined action of the Sun and\nMoon, and their five qualities,--the principles spiritual, fiery, dry,\nhumid, and airy.\"\n\nSo five primitive powers, elements, or elementary qualities, are united\nwith the Sun and Moon in the Indian theology,--air, spirit, fire, water,\nand earth: and the same five elements are recognized by the Chinese. The\nPhoenicians, like the Egyptians, regarded the Sun and Moon and Stars as\nsole causes of generation and destruction here below.\n\nThe Moon, like the Sun, changed continually the track in which she\ncrossed the Heavens, moving ever to and fro between the upper and lower\nlimits of the Zodiac; and her different places, phases, and aspects\nthere, and her relations with the Sun and the constellations, have been\na fruitful source of mythological fables.\n\nAll the planets had what astrology termed their _houses_, in the\nZodiac. The House of the Sun was in Leo, and that of the Moon in Cancer.\nEach other planet had two signs; Mercury had Gemini and Virgo; Venus,\nTaurus and Libra; Mars, Aries and Scorpio; Jupiter, Pisces and\nSagittarius; and Saturn, Aquarius and Capricornus. From this\ndistribution of the signs also came many mythological emblems and\nfables; as also many came from the places of exaltation of the planets.\nDiana of Ephesus, the Moon wore the image of a crab on her bosom,\nbecause in that sign was the Moon's domicile; and lions bore up the\nthrone of Horus, the Egyptian Apollo, the Sun personified, for a like\nreason: while the Egyptians consecrated the tauriform scarab\u00e6sus to the\nMoon, because she had her place of exaltation in Taurus; and for the\nsame reason Mercury is said to have presented Isis with a helmet like a\nbull's head.\n\nA further division of the Zodiac was of each sign into three parts of\n10\u00b0 each, called Decans, or, in the whole Zodiac, 36 parts, among which\nthe seven planets were apportioned anew, each planet having an equal\nnumber of Decans, except the first, which, opening and closing the\nseries of planets five times repeated, necessarily had one Decan more\nthan the others. This subdivision was not invented until after Aries\nopened the Vernal Equinox; and accordingly Mars, having his house in\nAries, opens the series of decans and closes it; the planets following\neach other, five times in succession, in the following order, Mars, the\nSun, Venus, Mercury, the Moon, Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, etc.; so that to\neach sign are assigned three planets, each occupying 10 degrees. To each\nDecan a God or Genius was assigned, making thirty-six in all, one of\nwhom, the Chaldeans said, came down upon earth every ten days, remained\nso many days, and re-ascended to Heaven. This division is found on the\nIndian sphere, the Persian, and that Barbaric one which Aben Ezra\ndescribes. Each genius of the Decans had a name and special\ncharacteristics. They concur and aid in the effects produced by the Sun,\nMoon, and other planets charged with the administration of the world:\nand the doctrine in regard to them, secret and august as it was held,\nwas considered of the gravest importance; and its principles, Firmicus\nsays, were not entrusted by the ancients, inspired as they were by the\nDeity, to any but the Initiates, and to them only with great reserve,\nand a kind of fear, and when cautiously enveloped with an obscure veil,\nthat they might not come to be known by the profane.\n\nWith these Decans were connected the _paranatellons_ or those stars\n_outside_ of the Zodiac, that rise and set at the same moment with the\nseveral divisions of 10\u00b0 of each sign. As there were anciently only\nforty-eight celestial figures or constellations, of which twelve were in\nthe Zodiac, it follows that there were, outside of the Zodiac,\nthirty-six other asterisms, paranatellons of the several thirty-six\nDecans. For example, as when Capricorn set, Sirius and Procyon, or Canis\nMajor and Canis Minor, rose, they were the Paranatellons of Capricorn,\nthough at a great distance from it in the heavens. The rising of Cancer\nwas known from the setting of Corona Borealis and the rising of the\nGreat and Little Dog, its three paranatellons.\n\nThe risings and settings of the Stars are always spoken of as connected\nwith the Sun. In that connection there are three kinds of them,\ncosmical, achronical, and heliacal, important to be distinguished by all\nwho would understand this ancient learning.\n\nWhen any Star rises or sets with the same degree of the same sign of the\nZodiac that the Sun occupies at the time, it rises and sets\nsimultaneously with the Sun, and this is termed rising or setting\n_cosmically_; but a star that so rises and sets can never be seen, on\naccount of the light that precedes, and is left behind by the Sun. It is\ntherefore necessary, in order to know his place in the Zodiac, to\nobserve stars that rise just before or set just after him.\n\nA Star that is in the East when night commences, and in the West when it\nends, is said to rise and set _achronically_. A Star so rising or\nsetting was in _opposition_ to the Sun, rising at the end of evening\ntwilight, and setting at the beginning of morning twilight, and this\nhappened to each Star but once a year, because the Sun moves from West\nto East, with reference to the Stars, one degree a day.\n\nWhen a Star rises as night ends in the morning, or sets as night\ncommences in the evening, it is said to rise or set _heliacally_,\nbecause the Sun (_Helios_) seems to touch it with his luminous\natmosphere. A Star thus re-appears after a disappearance, often, of\nseveral months, and thenceforward it rises an hour earlier each day,\ngradually emerging from the Sun's rays, until at the end of three months\nit precedes the Sun six hours, and rises at midnight. A Star sets\nheliacally, when no longer remaining visible above the Western horizon\nafter sunset, the day arrives when they cease to be seen setting in the\nWest. They so remain invisible, until the Sun passes so far to the\nEastward as not to eclipse them with his light; and then they re-appear,\nbut in the East, about an hour and a half before sunrise: and this is\ntheir _heliacal_ rising. In this interval, the cosmical rising and\nsetting take place.\n\nBesides the relations of the constellations and their paranatellons with\nthe houses and places of exaltation of the Planets, and with their\nplaces in the respective Signs and Decans, the Stars were supposed to\nproduce different effects according as they rose or set, and according\nas they did so either cosmically, achronically, or heliacally; and also\naccording to the different seasons of the year in which these phenomena\noccurred; and these differences were carefully marked on the old\nCalendars; and many things in the ancient allegories are referable to\nthem.\n\nAnother and most important division of the Stars was into good and bad,\nbeneficent and malevolent. With the Persians, the former, of the\nZodiacal Constellations, were from Aries to Virgo, inclusive; and the\nlatter from Libra to Pisces, inclusive. Hence the good Angels and Genii,\nand the bad Angels, Devs, Evil Genii, Devils, Fallen Angels, Titans, and\nGiants of the Mythology. The Other thirty-six Constellations were\nequally divided, eighteen on each side, or, with those of the Zodiac,\ntwenty-four.\n\nThus the symbolic Egg, that issued from the mouth of the invisible\nEgyptian God KNEPH; known in the Grecian Mysteries as the Orphic Egg;\nfrom which issued the God CHUMONG of the Coresians, and the Egyptian\nOSIRIS, and PHANES, God and Principle of Light; from which, broken by\nthe Sacred Bull of the Japanese, the world emerged; and which the Greeks\nplaced at the feet of BACCHUS TAURI-CORNUS; the Magian Egg of ORMUZD,\nfrom which came the Amshaspands and Devs; was divided into two halves,\nand equally apportioned between the Good and Evil Constellations and\nAngels. Those of Spring, as for example Aries and Taurus, Auriga and\nCapella, were the beneficent stars; and those of Autumn, as the Balance,\nScorpio, the Serpent of Ophiucus, and the Dragon of the Hesperides, were\ntypes and subjects of the Evil Principle, and regarded as malevolent\ncauses of the ill effects experienced in Autumn and Winter. Thus are\nexplained the mysteries of the journeyings of the human soul through the\nspheres, when it descends to the earth by the Sign of the Serpent, and\nreturns to the Empire of light by that or the Lamb or Bull.\n\nThe creative action of Heaven was manifested, and all its demiurgic\nenergy developed, most of all at the Vernal Equinox, to which refer all\nthe fables that typify the victory of Light over Darkness, by the\ntriumphs of Jupiter, Osiris, Ormuzd, and Apollo. Always the triumphant\ngod takes the form of the Bull, the Ram, or the Lamb. Then Jupiter\nwrests from Typhon his thunderbolts, of which that malignant Deity had\npossessed himself during the Winter. Then the God of Light overwhelms\nhis foe, pictured as a huge Serpent. Then Winter ends; the Sun, seated\non the Bull and accompanied by Orion, blazes in the Heavens. All nature\nrejoices at the victory; and Order and Harmony are everywhere\nre-established, in place of the dire confusion that reigned while gloomy\nTyphon domineered, and Ahriman prevailed against Ormuzd.\n\nThe universal Soul of the World, motive power of Heaven and of the\nSpheres, it was held, exercises its creative energy chiefly through the\nmedium of the Sun, during his revolution along the signs of the Zodiac,\nwith which signs unite the paranatellons that modify their influence,\nand concur in furnishing the symbolic attributes of the Great Luminary\nthat regulates Nature and is the depository of her greatest powers. The\naction of this Universal Soul of the World is displayed in the movements\nof the Spheres, and above all in that of the Sun, in the successions of\nthe risings and settings of the Stars, and in their periodical returns.\nBy these are explainable all the metamorphoses of that Soul, personified\nas Jupiter, as Bacchus, as Vishnu, or as Buddha, and all the various\nattributes ascribed to it; and also the worship of those animals that\nwere consecrated in the ancient Temples, representatives on earth of the\nCelestial Signs, and supposed to receive by transmission from them the\nrays and emanations which in them flow from the Universal Soul.\n\nAll the old Adorers of Nature, the Theologians, Astrologers, and Poets,\nas well as the most distinguished Philosophers, supposed that the Stars\nwere so many animated and intelligent beings, or eternal bodies, active\ncauses of effect here below, animated by a living principle, and\ndirected by an intelligence that was itself but an emanation from and a\npart of the life and universal intelligence of the world: and we find in\nthe hierarchical order and distribution of their eternal and divine\nIntelligences, known by the names of Gods, Angels, and Genii, the same\ndistributions and the same divisions as those by which the ancients\ndivided the visible Universe and distributed its parts. And the famous\ndivisions by seven and by twelve, appertaining to the planets and the\nsigns of the zodiac, is everywhere found in the hierarchical order of\nthe Gods, and Angels, and the other Ministers that are the depositaries\nof that Divine Force which moves and rules the world.\n\nThese, and the other Intelligences assigned to the other Stars have\nabsolute dominion over all parts of Nature; over the elements, the\nanimal and vegetable kingdoms, over man and all his actions, over his\nvirtues and vices, and over good and evil, which divide between them his\nlife. The passions of his soul and the maladies of his body,--these and\nthe entire man are dependent on the heavens and the genii that there\ninhabit, who preside at his birth, control his fortunes during life, and\nreceive his soul or active and intelligent part when it is to be\nre-united to the pure life of the lofty Stars. And all through the great\nbody of the world are disseminated portions of the universal Soul,\nimpressing movement on everything that seems to move of itself, giving\nlife to the plants and trees, directing by a regular and settled plan\nthe organization and development of their germs, imparting constant\nmobility to the running waters and maintaining their eternal motion,\nimpelling the winds and changing their direction or stilling them,\ncalming and arousing the ocean, unchaining the storms, pouring out the\nfires of volcanoes, or with earthquakes shaking the roots of huge\nmountains and the foundations of vast continents; by means of a force\nthat, belonging to Nature, is a mystery to man.\n\nAnd these invisible Intelligences, like the stars, are marshalled in two\ngreat divisions, under the banners of the two Principles of Good and\nEvil, Light and Darkness; under Ormuzd and Ahriman, Osiris and Typhon.\nThe Evil Principle was the motive power of brute matter; and it,\npersonified as Ahriman and Typhon, had its hosts and armies of Devs and\nGenii, Fallen Angels and Malevolent Spirits, who waged continual wage\nwith the Good Principle, the Principle of Empyreal Light and Splendor,\nOsiris, Ormuzd, Jupiter or Dionusos, with his bright hosts of\nAmshaspands, Izeds, Angels, and Archangels; a warfare that goes on from\nbirth until death, in the soul of every man that lives.\n\nWe have heretofore, in the 24th Degree, recited the principal incidents\nin the legend of Osiris and Isis, and it remains but to point out the\nastronomical phenomena which it has converted into mythological facts.\n\nThe Sun, at the Vernal Equinox, was the fruit-compelling star that by\nhis warmth provoked generation and poured upon the sublunary world all\nthe blessings of Heaven; the beneficent god, tutelary genius of\nuniversal vegetation, that communicates to the dull earth new activity,\nand stirs her great heart, long chilled by Winter and his frosts, until\nfrom her bosom burst all the greenness and perfume of spring, making her\nrejoice in leafy forests and grassy lawns and flower-enamelled meadows,\nand the promise of abundant crops of grain and fruits and purple grapes\nin their due season.\n\nHe was then called Osiris, Husband of Isis, God of Cultivation and\nBenefactor of Men, pouring on them and on the earth the choicest\nblessings within the gift of the Divinity. Opposed to him was Typhon,\nhis antagonist in the Egyptian mythology, as Ahriman was the foe of\nOrmuzd, the Good Principle, in the theology of the Persians.\n\nThe first inhabitants of Egypt and Ethiopia, as Diodorus Siculus informs\nus, saw in the Heavens two first eternal causes of things, or great\nDivinities, one the Sun, whom they called Osiris, and the other the\nMoon, whom they called Isis; and these they considered the causes of all\nthe generations of earth. This idea, we learn from Eusebius, was the\nsame as that of the Ph\u0153nicians. On these two great Divinities the\nadministration of the world depended. All sublunary bodies received from\nthem their nourishment and increase, during the annual revolution which\nthey controlled, and the different seasons into which it was divided.\n\nTo Osiris and Isis, it was held, were owing civilization, the discovery\nof agriculture, laws, arts of all kinds, religious worship, temples, the\ninvention of letters, astronomy, the gymnastic arts, and music; and thus\nthey were the universal benefactors. Osiris travelled to civilize the\ncountries which he passed through, and communicate to them his valuable\ndiscoveries. He built cities, and taught men to cultivate the earth.\nWheat and wine were his first presents to men. Europe, Asia, and Africa\npartook of the blessings which he communicated, and the most remote\nregions of India remembered him, and claimed him as one of their great\ngods.\n\nYou have learned how Typhon, his brother, slew him. His body was cut\ninto pieces, all of which were collected by Isis, except his organs of\ngeneration, which had been thrown into and devoured in the waters of the\nriver that every year fertilized Egypt. The other portions were buried\nby Isis, and over them she erected a tomb. Thereafter she remained\nsingle, loading her subjects with blessings. She cured the sick,\nrestored sight to the blind, made the paralytic whole, and even raised\nthe dead. From her Horus or Apollo learned divination and the science of\nmedicine.\n\nThus the Egyptians pictured the beneficent action of the two luminaries\nthat, from the bosom of the elements, produced all animals and men, and\nall bodies that are born, grow, and die in the eternal circle of\ngeneration and destruction here below.\n\nWhen the Celestial Bull opened the new year at the Vernal Equinox,\nOsiris, united with the Moon, communicated to her the seeds of\nfruitfulness which she poured upon the air, and therewith impregnated\nthe generative principles which gave activity to universal vegetation.\nApis, represented by a bull, was the living and sensible image of the\nSun or Osiris, when in union with Isis or the Moon at the Vernal\nEquinox, concurring with her in provoking everything that lives to\ngeneration. This conjunction of the Sun with the Moon at the Vernal\nEquinox, in the constellation Taurus, required the Bull Apis to have on\nhis shoulder a mark resembling the Crescent Moon. And the fecundating\ninfluence of these two luminaries was expressed by images that would now\nbe deemed gross and indecent, but which then were not misunderstood.\n\nEverything good in Nature comes from Osiris,--order, harmony, and the\nfavorable temperature of the seasons and celestial periods. From Typhon\ncome the stormy passions and irregular impulses that agitate the brute\nand material part of man; maladies of the body, and violent shocks that\ninjure the health and derange the system; inclement weather, derangement\nof the seasons, and eclipses. Osiris and Typhon were the Ormuzd and\nAhriman of the Persians; principles of good and evil, of light and\ndarkness, ever at war in the administration of the Universe.\n\nOsiris was the image of generative power. This was expressed by his\nsymbolic statues, and by the sign into which he entered at the Vernal\nEquinox. He especially dispensed the humid principle of Nature,\ngenerative element of all things; and the Nile and all moisture were\nregarded as emanations from him, without which there could be no\nvegetation.\n\nThat Osiris and Isis were the Sun and Moon, is attested by many ancient\nwriters; by Diogenes Laertius, Plutarch, Lucian, Suidas, Macrobius,\nMartianus Capella, and others. His power was symbolized by an Eye over a\nSceptre. The Sun was termed by the Greeks the Eye of Jupiter, and the\nEye of the World; and his is the All-Seeing Eye in our Lodges. The\noracle of Claros styled him King of the Stars and of the Eternal Fire,\nthat engenders the year and the seasons, dispenses rain and winds, and\nbrings about daybreak and night. And Osiris was invoked as the God that\nresides in the Sun and is enveloped by his rays, the invisible and\neternal force that modifies the sublunary world by means of the Sun.\n\nOsiris was the same God known as Bacchus, Dionusos, and Serapis. Serapis\nis the author of the regularity and harmony of the world. Bacchus,\njointly with Ceres (identified by Herodotus with Isis) presides over the\ndistribution of all our blessings; and from the two emanates everything\nbeautiful and good in Nature. One furnishes the germ and principle of\nevery good; the other receives and preserves it as a deposit; and the\nlatter is the function of the Moon in the theology of the Persians. In\neach theology, Persian and Egyptian, the Moon acts directly on the\nearth; but she is fecundated, in one by the Celestial Bull and in the\nother by Osiris, with whom she is united at the Vernal Equinox, in the\nsign Taurus, the place of her exaltation or greatest influence on the\nearth. The force of Osiris, says Plutarch, is exercised through the\nMoon. She is the passive cause relatively to him, and the active cause\nrelatively to the earth, to which she transmits the germs of\nfruitfulness received from him.\n\nIn Egypt the earliest movement in the waters of the Nile began to appear\nat the Vernal Equinox, when the new Moon occurred at the entrance of the\nSun into the constellation Taurus; and thus the Nile was held to receive\nits fertilizing power from the combined action of the equinoctial Sun\nand the new Moon, meeting in Taurus. Osiris was often confounded with\nthe Nile, and Isis with the earth; and Osiris was deemed to act on the\nearth, and to transmit to it his emanations, through both the Moon and\nthe Nile; whence the fable that his generative organs were thrown into\nthat river. Typhon, on the other hand, was the principle of aridity and\nbarrenness; and by his mutilation of Osiris was meant that drought which\ncaused the Nile to retire within his bed and shrink up in Autumn.\n\nElsewhere than in Egypt, Osiris was the symbol of the refreshing rains\nthat descend to fertilize the earth; and Typhon the burning winds of\nAutumn; the stormy rains that rot the flowers, the plants, and leaves;\nthe short, cold days; and everything injurious in Nature, and that\nproduces corruption and destruction.\n\nIn short, Typhon is the principle of corruption, of darkness, of the\nlower world from which come earthquakes, tumultuous commotions of the\nair, burning heat, lightning, and fiery meteors, and plague and\npestilence. Such too was the Ahriman of the Persians; and this revolt of\nthe Evil Principle against the Principle of Good and Light, has been\nrepresented in every cosmogony, under many varying forms. Osiris, on the\ncontrary, by the intermediation of Isis, fills the material world with\nhappiness, purity, and order, by which the harmony of Nature is\nmaintained. It was said that he died at the Autumnal Equinox, when\nTaurus or the Pleiades rose in the evening, and that he rose to life\nagain in the Spring, when vegetation was inspired with new activity.\n\nOf course the two signs of Taurus and Scorpio will figure most largely\nin the mythological history of Osiris, for they marked the two\nequinoxes, 2500 years before our Era; and next to them the other\nconstellations, near the equinoxes, that fixed the limits of the\nduration of the fertilizing action of the Sun; and it is also to be\nremarked that Venus, the Goddess of Generation, has her domicile in\nTaurus, as the Moon has there her place of exaltation.\n\nWhen the Sun was in Scorpio, Osiris lost his life, and that fruitfulness\nwhich, under the form of the Bull, he had communicated, through the\nMoon, to the Earth. Typhon, his hands and feet horrid with serpents, and\nwhose habitat in the Egyptian planisphere was under Scorpio, confined\nhim in a chest and flung him into the Nile, under the 17th degree of\nScorpio. Under that sign he lost his life and virility; and he recovered\nthem in the Spring, when he had connection with the Moon. When he\nentered Scorpio, his light diminished, Night reassumed her dominion, the\nNile shrunk within its banks, and the earth lost her verdure and the\ntrees their leaves. Therefore it is that on the Mithriac Monuments, the\nScorpion bites the testicles of the Equinoctial Bull, on which sits\nMithras, the Sun of Spring and God of Generation; and that, on the same\nmonuments, we see two trees, one covered with young leaves, and at its\nfoot a little bull and a torch burning; and the other loaded with\nfruit, and at its foot a Scorpion, and a torch reversed and\nextinguished.\n\nOrmuzd or Osiris, the beneficent Principle that gives the world light,\nwas personified by the Sun, apparent source of light. Darkness,\npersonified by Typhon or Ahriman, was his natural enemy. The Sages of\nEgypt described the necessary and eternal rivalry or opposition of these\nprinciples, ever pursuing one the other, and one dethroning the other in\nevery annual revolution, and at a particular period, one in the Spring\nunder the Bull, and the other in Autumn under the Scorpion, by the\nlegendary history of Osiris and Typhon, detailed to us by Diodorus and\nSynesius; in which history were also personified the Stars and\nconstellations Orion, Capella, the Twins, the Wolf, Sirius, and\nHercules, whose risings and settings noted the advent of one or the\nother equinox.\n\nPlutarch gives us the positions in the Heavens of the Sun and Moon, at\nthe moment when Osiris was murdered by Typhon. The Sun, he says, was in\nthe Sign of the Scorpion, which he then entered at the Autumnal Equinox.\nThe Moon was full, he adds; and consequently, as it rose at sunset, it\noccupied Taurus, which, opposite to Scorpio, rose as it and the Sun sank\ntogether, so that she was then found alone in the sign Taurus, where,\nsix months before, she had been in union or conjunction with Osiris, the\nSun, receiving from him those germs of universal fertilization which he\ncommunicated to her. It was the sign through which Osiris first ascended\ninto his empire of light and good. It rose with the Sun on the day of\nthe Vernal Equinox; it remained six months in the luminous hemisphere,\never preceding the Sun and above the horizon during the day; until in\nAutumn, the Sun arriving at Scorpio, Taurus was in complete opposition\nwith him, rose when he set, and completed its entire course above the\nhorizon during the night; presiding, by rising in the evening, over the\ncommencement of the long nights. Hence in the sad ceremonies\ncommemorating the death of Osiris, there was borne in procession a\ngolden bull covered with black crape, image of the darkness into which\nthe familiar sign of Osiris was entering, and which was to spread over\nthe Northern regions, while the Sun, prolonging the nights, was to be\nabsent, and each to remain under the dominion of Typhon, Principle of\nEvil and Darkness.\n\nSetting out from the sign Taurus, Isis, as the Moon, went seeking for\nOsiris through all the superior signs, in each of which she became full\nin the successive months from the Autumnal to the Vernal Equinox,\nwithout finding him in either. Let us follow her in her allegorical\nwanderings.\n\nOsiris was slain by Typhon his rival, with whom conspired a Queen of\nEthiopia, by whom, says Plutarch, were designated the winds. The\nparanatellons of Scorpio, the sign occupied by the Sun when Osiris was\nslain, were the Serpents, reptiles which supplied the attributes of the\nEvil Genii and of Typhon, who himself bore the form of a serpent in the\nEgyptian planisphere. And in the division of Scorpio is also found\nCassiopeia, Queen of Ethiopia, whose setting brings stormy winds.\n\nOsiris descended to the shades or infernal regions. There he took the\nname of Serapis, identical with Pluto, and assumed his nature. He was\nthen in conjunction with Serpentarius, identical with \u00c6sculapius, whose\nform he took in his passage to the lower signs, where he takes the names\nof Pluto and Ades.\n\nThen Isis wept for the death of Osiris, and the golden bull covered with\ncrape was carried in procession. Nature mourned the impending loss of\nher Summer glories, and the advent of the empire of night, the\nwithdrawing of the waters, made fruitful by the Bull in Spring, the\ncessation of the winds that brought rains to swell the Nile, the\nshortening of the days, and the despoiling of the earth. Then Taurus,\ndirectly opposite the Sun, entered into the cone of shadow which the\nearth projects, by which the Moon is eclipsed at full, and with which,\nmaking night, the Bull rises and descends as if covered with a veil,\nwhile he remains above our horizon.\n\nThe body of Osiris, enclosed in a chest or coffin, was cast into the\nNile. Pan and the Satyrs, near Chemmis, first discovered his death,\nannounced it by their cries, and everywhere created sorrow and alarm.\nTaurus, with the full Moon, then entered into the cone of shadow, and\nunder him was the Celestial River, most properly called the Nile, and\nbelow, Perseus, the God of Chemmis, and Auriga, leading a she-goat,\nhimself identical with Pan, whose wife Aiga the she-goat was styled.\n\nThen Isis went in search of the body. She first met certain children who\nhad seen it, received from them their information, and gave them in\nreturn the gift of divination. The second full Moon occurred in Gemini,\nthe Twins, who presided over the oracles of Didymus, and one of whom was\nApollo, the God of Divination.\n\nShe learned that Osiris had, through mistake, had connection with her\nsister Nephte, which she discovered by a crown of leaves of the melilot,\nwhich he had left behind him. Of this connection a child was born, whom\nIsis, aided by her dogs, sought for, found, reared, and attached to\nherself, by the name of Anubis, her faithful guardian. The third full\nMoon occurs in Cancer, domicile of the Moon. The paranatellons of that\nsign are, the crown of Ariadne or Proserpine, made of leaves of the\nmelilot, Procyon and Canis Major, one star of which was called the Star\nof Isis, while Sirius himself was honored in Egypt under the name of\nAnubis.\n\nIsis repaired to Byblos, and seated herself near a fountain, where she\nwas found by the women of the Court of a King. She was induced to visit\nhis Court, and became the nurse of his son. The fourth full Moon was in\nLeo, domicile of the Sun, or of Adonis, King of Byblos. The\nparanatellons of this sign are the flowing water of Aquarius, and\nCepheus, King of Ethiopia, called Regulus, or simply The King. Behind\nhim rise Cassiopeia his wife, Queen of Ethiopia, Andromeda his daughter,\nand Perseus his son-in-law, all paranatellons in part of this sign, and\nin part of Virgo.\n\nIsis suckled the child, not at her breast, but with the end of her\nfinger, at night. She burned all the mortal parts of its body, and then,\ntaking the shape of a swallow, she flew to the great column of the\npalace, made of the tamarisk-tree that grew up round the coffin\ncontaining the body of Osiris, and within which it was still enclosed.\nThe fifth full Moon occurred in Virgo, the true image of Isis, and which\nEratosthenes calls by that name. It pictured a woman suckling an infant,\nthe son of Isis, born near the Winter Solstice. This sign has for\nparanatellons the mast of the Celestial Ship, and the swallow-tailed\nfish or swallow above it, and a portion of Perseus, son-in-law of the\nKing of Ethiopia.\n\nIsis, having recovered the sacred coffer, sailed from Byblos in a vessel\nwith the eldest son of the King, toward Boutos, where Anubis was, having\ncharge of her son Horus; and in the morning dried up a river, whence\narose a strong wind. Landing, she hid the coffer in a forest. Typhon,\nhunting a wild boar by moonlight discovered it, recognized the body of\nhis rival, and cut it into fourteen pieces, the number of days between\nthe full and new Moon, and in every one of which days the Moon loses a\nportion of the light that at the commencement filled her whole disk. The\nsixth full Moon occurred in Libra, over the divisions separating which\nfrom Virgo are the Celestial Ship, Perseus, son of the King of Ethiopia\nand Bo\u00f6tes, said to have nursed Horus. The river of Orion that sets in\nthe morning is also a paranatellon of Libra, as are Ursa Major, the\nGreat Bear or Wild Boar of Erymanthus, and the Dragon of the North Pole,\nor the celebrated Python from which the attributes of Typhon were\nborrowed. All these surround the full Moon of Libra, last of the\nSuperior Signs, and the one that precedes the new Moon of Spring, about\nto be reproduced in Taurus, and there be once more in conjunction with\nthe Sun.\n\nIsis collects the scattered fragments of the body of Osiris, buries\nthem, and consecrates the phallus, carried in pomp at the _Pamylia_, or\nfeasts of the Vernal Equinox, at which time the congress of Osiris and\nthe Moon was celebrated. Then Osiris had returned from the shades, to\naid Horus his son and Isis his wife against the forces of Typhon. He\nthus reappeared, say some, under the form of a wolf, or, others say,\nunder that of a horse. The Moon, fourteen days after she is full in\nLibra, arrives at Taurus and unites herself to the Sun, whose fires she\nthereafter for fourteen days continues to accumulate on her disk from\nnew Moon to full. Then she unites with herself all the months in that\nsuperior portion of the world where light always reigns, with harmony\nand order, and she borrows from him the force which is to destroy the\ngerms of evil that Typhon had, during the winter, planted everywhere in\nnature. This passage of the Sun into Taurus, whose attributes he assumes\non his return from the lower hemisphere or the shades, is marked by the\nrising in the evening of the Wolf and the Centaur, and by the heliacal\nsetting of Orion, called the Star of Horus, and which thenceforward is\nin conjunction with the Sun of Spring, in his triumph over the darkness\nor Typhon.\n\nIsis, during the absence of Osiris, and after she had hidden the coffer\nin the place where Typhon found it, had rejoined that malignant enemy;\nindignant at which, Horus her son deprived her of her ancient diadem,\nwhen she rejoined Osiris as he was about to attack Typhon: but Mercury\ngave her in its place a helmet shaped like the head of a bull. Then\nHorus, as a mighty warrior, such as Orion was described, fought with and\ndefeated Typhon; who, in the shape of the Serpent or Dragon of the Pole,\nhad assailed his father. So, in Ovid, Apollo destroys the same Python,\nwhen Io, fascinated by Jupiter, is metamorphosed into a cow, and placed\nin the sign of the Celestial Bull, where she becomes Isis. The\nequinoctial year ends at the moment when the Sun and Moon, at the\nVernal Equinox, are united with Orion, the Star of Horus, placed in the\nHeavens under Taurus. The new Moon becomes young again in Taurus, and\nshows herself as a crescent, for the first time, in the next sign,\nGemini, the domicile of Mercury. Then Orion, in conjunction with the\nSun, with whom he rises, precipitates the Scorpion, his rival, into the\nshades of night, causing him to set whenever he himself re-appears on\nthe eastern horizon, with the Sun. Day lengthens and the germs of evil\nare by degrees eradicated: and Horus (from _Aur_, Light) reigns\ntriumphant, symbolizing, by his succession to the characteristics of\nOsiris, the eternal renewal of the Sun's youth and creative vigor at the\nVernal Equinox.\n\nSuch are the coincidences of astronomical phenomena with the legend of\nOsiris and Isis; sufficing to show the origin of the legend, overloaded\nas it became at length with all the ornamentation natural to the\npoetical and figurative genius of the Orient.\n\nNot only into this legend, but into those of all the ancient nations,\nenter the Bull, the Lamb, the Lion, and the Scorpion or the Serpent; and\ntraces of the worship of the Sun yet linger in all religions.\nEverywhere, even in our Order, survive the equinoctial and solstitial\nfeasts. Our ceilings still glitter with the greater and lesser\nluminaries of the Heavens, and our lights, in their number and\narrangement, have astronomical references. In all churches and chapels,\nas in all Pagan temples and pagodas, the altar is in the East; and the\nivy over the east windows of old churches is the Hedera Helix of\nBacchus. Even the cross had an astronomical origin; and our Lodges are\nfull of the ancient symbols.\n\nThe learned author of the Sab\u00e6an Researches, Landseer, advances another\ntheory in regard to the legend of Osiris; in which he makes the\nconstellation Bo\u00f6tes play a leading part. He observes that, as none of\nthe stars were visible at the same time with the Sun, his actual place\nin the Zodiac, at any given time, could only be, ascertained by the\nSab\u00e6san astronomers by their observations of the stars, and of their\nheliacal and achronical risings and settings. There were many solar\nfestivals among the Sab\u00e6ans, and part of them agricultural ones; and the\nconcomitant signs of those festivals were the risings and settings of\nthe stars of the Husbandman, Bear-driver, or Hunter, BO\u00d6TES. His stars\nwere, among the Hierophants, the established nocturnal indices or signs\nof the Sun's place in the ecliptic at different seasons of the year, and\nthe festivals were named, one, that of the _Aphanism_ or disappearance;\nanother, that of the _Zetesis,_ or search, etc., of Osiris or Adonis,\nthat is, of _Bo\u00f6tes._\n\nThe returns of certain stars, as connected with their concomitant\nseasons of spring (or seed-time) and harvest, seemed to the ancients,\nwho had not yet discovered that gradual change, resulting from the\napparent movement of the stars in longitude, which has been termed the\nprecession of the equinoxes, to be eternal and immutable; and those\nperiodical returns were to the initiated, even more than to the vulgar,\ncelestial oracles, announcing the approach of those important changes,\nupon which the prosperity, and even the very existence of man must ever\ndepend; and the oldest of the Sab\u00e6an constellations seem to have been,\nan astronomical _Priest,_ a _King,_ a _Queen,_ a _Husbandman,_ and a\n_Warrior_; and these more frequently recur on the Sab\u00e6an cylinders than\nany other constellations whatever. The _King_ was _Cepheus_ or\n_Chepheus_ of Ethiopia: the _Husbandman, Osiris, Bacchus, Sabazeus,\nNoah_ or _Bo\u00f6tes_. To the latter sign, the Egyptians were nationally,\ntraditionally and habitually grateful; for they conceived that from\nOsiris all the greatest of terrestrial enjoyments were derived. The\nstars of the Husbandman were the signal for those successive\nagricultural labors on which the annual produce of the soil depended;\nand they came in consequence to be considered and hailed, in Egypt and\nEthiopia, as the genial stars of terrestrial productiveness; to which\nthe oblations, prayers, and vows of the pious Sab\u00e6an were regularly\noffered up.\n\nLandseer says that the stars in Bo\u00f6tes, reckoning down to those of the\n5th magnitude inclusive, are _twenty-six,_ which, seeming achronically\nto disappear in succession, produced the fable of the cutting of Osiris\ninto twenty-six pieces by Typhon. There are more stars than this in the\nconstellation; but no more that the ancient votaries of Osiris, even in\nthe clear atmosphere of the Sab\u00e6an climates, could observe without\ntelescopes.\n\nPlutarch says Osiris was cut into _fourteen_ pieces: Diodorus, into\n_twenty-six_; in regard to which, and to the whole legend, Landseer's\nideas, varying from those commonly entertained, are as follows:\n\nTyphon, Landseer thinks, was the _ocean_, which the ancients fabled or\nbelieved surrounded the Earth, and into which all the stars in their\nturn appear successively to sink; [perhaps it was DARKNESS personified,\nwhich the ancients called TYPHON. He Was hunting by moonlight, says the\nold legend, when he met with Osiris].\n\nThe ancient Saba must have been near latitude 15\u00b0 north. Axoum is nearly\nin 14\u00b0, and the Western Saba or Mero\u00eb is to the north of that.\nForty-eight centuries ago, Aldebaran, the leading star of the year, had,\nat the Vernal Equinox, attained at daylight in the morning, an elevation\nof about 14 degrees, sufficient for him to have ceased to be _combust_,\nthat is, to have emerged from the Sun's rays, so as to be visible. The\nancients allowed _twelve_ days for a star of the first magnitude to\nemerge from the solar rays; and there is less twilight, the further\nSouth we go.\n\nAt the same period, too, Cynosura was not the pole-star, but Alpha\nDraconis was; and the stars rose and set with very different degrees of\nobliquity from those of their present risings and settings. By having a\nglobe constructed with circumvolving poles, capable of any adjustment\nwith regard to the colures, Mr. Landseer ascertained that, at that\nremote period, in lat. 15\u00b0 north, the 26 stars in Bootes, or 27,\nincluding Arcturus, did not set anchronically in succession; but several\nset simultaneously in couples, and six by threes simultaneously; so\nthat, in all, there were but _fourteen_ separate settings or\ndisappearances, corresponding with the fourteen pieces into which Osiris\nwas cut, according to Plutarch. Kappa, Iota, and Theta, in the uplifted\nwestern hand, disappeared together, and last of all. They really skirted\nthe horizon; but were invisible in that low latitude, for the three or\nfour days mentioned in some of the versions; while the _Zetesis_ or\nsearch was proceeding, and the women of Ph\u0153nicia and Jerusalem sat\nweeping for the Wonder, Thammuz; after which they immediately\nreappeared, below and to the eastward of _a_ Draconis.\n\nAnd, on the very morning after the achronical departure of the last star\nof the Husbandman, Aldebaran rose heliacally, and became visible in the\nEast in the morning before day.\n\nAnd precisely at the moment of the heliacal rising of Arcturus, also\nrose Spica Virginis. One is near the middle of the Husbandman, and the\nother near that of the Virgin; and Arcturus may have been the part of\nOsiris which Isis did not recover with the other pieces of the body.\n\nAt Dedan and Saba it was thirty-six days, from the beginning of the\n_aphanism_, i.e., the _disappearances_ of these stars, to the heliacal\nrising of Aldebaran. During these days, or forty at Medina, or a few\nmore at Babylon and Byblos, the stars of the Husbandman successively\nsank out of sight, during the _crepusculum_ or short-lived morning\ntwilight of those Southern climes. They disappear during the glancings\nof the dawn, the special season of ancient sidereal observation.\n\nThus the forty days of mourning for Osiris were measured out by the\nperiod of the departure of his Stars. When the last had sunken out of\nsight, the vernal season was ushered in; and the Sun arose with the\nsplendid Aldebaran, the Tauric leader of the Hosts of Heaven; and the\nwhole East rejoiced and kept holiday.\n\nWith the exception of the Stars \u03c7, \u03b5\u02db and \u03b4, Bo\u00f6tes did not begin to\nreappear in the Eastern quarter of the Heavens till after the lapse of\nabout four months. Then the Stars of Taurus had declined Westward, and\nVirgo was rising heliacally. In that latitude, also, the Stars of Ursa\nMajor [termed anciently the Ark of Osiris] set; and Benetnasch, the last\nof them, returned to the Eastern horizon, with those in the head of Leo,\na little before the Summer Solstice. In about a month, followed the\nStars of the Husbandman; the chief of them, Ras, Mirach, and Arcturus,\nbeing very nearly simultaneous in their heliacal rising.\n\nThus the Stars of Bo\u00f6tes rose in the East immediately after\nVindemiatrix, and as if under the genial influence of its rays; he had\nhis annual career of prosperity; he revelled orientally for a quarter of\na year, and attained his meridian altitude with Virgo; and then, as the\nStars of the Water-Urn rose, and Aquarius began to pour forth his annual\ndeluge, he declined Westward, preceded by the Ark of Osiris. In the\nEast, he was the sign of that happiness in which Nature, the great\nGoddess of passive production, rejoiced. Now, in the West, as he\ndeclines toward the Northwestern horizon, his generative vigor gradually\nabates; the Solar year grows old; and as his Stars descend beneath the\nWestern Wave, Osiris dies, and the world mourns.\n\nThe Ancient Astronomers saw all the great Symbols of Masonry in the\nStars. Sirius still glitters in our Lodges as the Blazing Star,\n(_l'\u00c9toile Flamboyante_). The Sun is still symbolized by the point\nwithin a Circle; and, with the Moon and Mercury or Anubis, in the three\nGreat Lights of the Lodge. Not only to these, but to the figures and\nnumbers exhibited by the Stars, were ascribed peculiar and divine\npowers. The veneration paid to numbers had its source there. The three\nKings in Orion are in a straight line, and equidistant from each other,\nthe two extreme Stars being 3\u00b0 apart, and each of the three distant from\nthe one nearest it 1\u00b0 30'. And as the number _three_ is peculiar to\napprentices, so the straight line is the first principle of Geometry,\nhaving length but no breadth, and being but the extension of a point,\nand an emblem of Unity, and thus of Good, as the divided or broken line\nis of Duality or Evil. Near these Stars are the Hyades, _five_ in\nnumber, appropriate to the Fellow-Craft; and close to them the Pleiades,\nof the master's number, _seven_; and thus these three sacred numbers,\nconsecrated in Masonry as they were in the Pythagorean philosophy,\nalways appear together in the Heavens, when the Bull, emblem of\nfertility and production, glitters among the Stars, and Aldebaran leads\nthe Hosts of Heaven (_Tsbauth_).\n\nAlgenib in Perseus and Almaach and Algol in Andromeda form a\nright-angled triangle, illustrate the 47th problem, and display the\nGrand Master's square upon the skies. Denebola in Leo, Arcturus in\nBo\u00f6tes, and Spica in Virgo form an equilateral triangle, universal\nemblem of Perfection, and the Deity with His Trinity of Infinite\nAttributes, Wisdom, Power, and Harmony; and that other, the generative,\npreserving, and destroying Powers. The Three Kings form, with Rigel in\nOrion, two triangles included in one: and Capella and Menkalina in\nAuriga, with Bellatrix and Betelgueux in Orion, form two isosceles\ntriangles with \u03b2 Tauri, that is equidistant from each pair; while the\nfirst four make a right-angled parallelogram,--the oblong square so\noften mentioned in our Degrees.\n\nJulius Firmicus, in his description of the Mysteries, says, \"But in\nthose funerals and lamentations which are annually celebrated in honor\nof Osiris, their defenders pretend a physical reason. They call the\nseeds of fruit, Osiris; the Earth, Isis; the natural heat, Typhon: and\nbecause the fruits are ripened by the natural heat, and collected for\nthe life of man, and are separated from their marriage to the earth, and\nare sown again when Winter approaches, this they would have to be the\ndeath of Osiris: but when the fruits, by the genial fostering of the\nearth, begin again to be generated by a new procreation, this is the\nfinding of Osiris.\"\n\nNo doubt the decay of vegetation and the falling of the leaves, emblems\nof dissolution and evidences of the action of that Power that changes\nLife into Death, in order to bring Life again out of Death, were\nregarded as signs of that Death that seemed coming upon all Nature; as\nthe springing of leaves and buds and flowers in the spring was a sign of\nrestoration to life: but these were all secondary, and referred to the\nSun as first cause. It was _his_ figurative death that was mourned, and\nnot theirs; and that with that death, as with his return to life, many\nof the stars were connected.\n\nWe have already alluded to the relations which the twelve signs of the\nZodiac bear to the legend of the Master's Degree. Some other\ncoincidences may have sufficient interest to warrant mention.\n\nKhir-Om was assailed at the East, West, and South Gates of the Temple.\nThe two equinoxes were called, we have seen, by all the Ancients, the\nGates of Heaven, and the Syrians and Egyptians considered the Fish (the\nConstellation near Aquarius, and one of the Stars whereof is Fomalhaut)\nto be indicative of violence and death.\n\nKhir-Om lay several days in the grave; and, at the Winter Solstice, for\nfive or six days, the length of the days did not perceptibly increase.\nThen, the Sun commencing again to climb Northward, as Osiris was said to\narise from the dead, so Khir-Om was raised, by the powerful attraction\nof the Lion (Leo), who waited for him at the Summer Solstice, and drew\nhim to himself.\n\nThe names of the three assassins may have been adopted from three Stars\nthat we have already named. We search in vain in the Hebrew or Arabic\nfor the names _Jubelo, Jubela_, and _Jubelum_. They embody an utter\nabsurdity, and are capable of no explanation in those languages. Nor are\nthe names _Gibs, Gravelot, Hobhen_, and the like, in the Ancient and\nAccepted Rite, any more plausible, or better referable to any ancient\nlanguage. But when, by the precession of the Equinoxes, the Sun was in\nLibra at the Autumnal Equinox, he met in that sign, where the reign of\nTyphon commenced, three Stars forming a triangle,--_Zuben-es Chamali_ in\nthe West, _Zuben-Hak-Rabi_ in the East, and _Zuben-El-Gubi_ in the\nSouth, the latter immediately below the Tropic of Capricorn, and so\nwithin the realm of Darkness. From these names, those of the murderers\nhave perhaps been corrupted. In Zuben-Hak-Rabi we may see the original\nof Jubelum Akirop; and in Zuben-El-Gubi, that of Jubelo Gibs: and time\nand ignorance may even have transmuted the words Es Chamali into one as\nlittle like them as Gravelot.\n\nIsis, the Moon personified, sorrowing sought for her husband. Nine or\ntwelve Fellow-Crafts (the Rites vary as to the number), in white aprons,\nwere sent to search for Khir-Om, in the Legend of the Master's Degree;\nor, in this Rite, the Nine Knights Elu. Along the path that the Moon\ntravels are nine conspicuous Stars, by which nautical men determine\ntheir longitude at Sea;--Arietis, Aldebaran, Pollux, Regulus, Spica\nVirginis, Antares, Altair, Fomalhaut, and Markab. These might well be\nsaid to accompany Isis in her search.\n\nIn the York Rite, _twelve_ Fellow-Crafts were sent to search for the\nbody of Khir-Om and the murderers. Their number corresponds with that of\nthe Pleiades and Hyades in Taurus, among which Stars the Sun was found\nwhen Light began to prevail over Darkness, and the Mysteries were held.\nThese Stars, we have shown, received early and particular attention from\nthe astronomers and poets. The Pleiades were the Stars of the ocean to\nthe benighted mariner; the Virgins of Spring, heralding the season of\nblossoms.\n\nAs six Pleiades only are now visible, the number twelve may have been\nobtained by them, with Aldebaran, and five far more brilliant Stars than\nany other of the Hyades, in the same region of the Heavens, and which\nwere always spoken of in connection with the Pleiades; the Three Kings\nin the belt of Orion, and Bellatrix and Betelgueux on his shoulders;\nbrightest of the flashing starry hosts.\n\n\"Canst thou,\" asks Job, \"bind the sweet influences of the Pleiades or\nloose the bands of Orion?\" And in the book of Amos we find these Stars\nconnected with the victory of Light over Darkness: \"Seek Him,\" says that\nSeer, \"that maketh the Seven Stars (the familiar name of the Pleiades),\nand Orion, AND TURNETH THE SHADOW OF DEATH INTO MORNING.\"\n\nAn old legend in Masonry says that a dog led the Nine Elus to the cavern\nwhere Abiram was hid. Bo\u00f6tes was anciently called Caleb Anubach, a\nBarking Dog; and was personified in Anubis, who bore the head of a dog,\nand aided Isis in her search. Arcturus, one of his Stars, fiery red, as\nif fervent and zealous, is also connected by Job with the Pleiades and\nOrion. When Taurus opened the year, Arcturus rose after the Sun, at the\ntime of the Winter Solstice, and seemed searching him through the\ndarkness, until, sixty days afterward, he rose at the same hour. Orion\nthen also, at the Winter Solstice, rose at noon, and at night seemed to\nbe in search of the Sun.\n\nSo, referring again to the time when the Sun entered the Autumnal\nEquinox, there are nine remarkable Stars that come to the meridian\nnearly at the same time, rising as Libra sets, and so seeming to chase\nthat Constellation. They are Capella and Menkalina in the Charioteer,\nAldebaran in Taurus, Bellatrix, Betelgueux, the Three Kings, and Rigel\nin Orion. Aldebaran passes the meridian first, indicating his right to\nhis peculiar title of _Leader_. Nowhere in the heavens are there, near\nthe same meridian, so many splendid Stars. And close behind them, but\nfurther South, follows Sirius, the Dog-Star, who showed the nine Elus\nthe way to the murderer's cave.\n\nBesides the division of the signs into the ascending and descending\nseries (referring to the upward and downward progress of the soul), the\nlatter from Cancer to Capricorn, and the former from Capricorn to\nCancer, there was another division of them not less important; that of\nthe six superior and six inferior signs; the former, 2455 years before\nour era, from Taurus to Scorpio, and 300 years before our era, from\nAries to Libra; and the latter, 2455 years B.C. from Scorpio to Taurus,\nand 300 years B.C. from Libra to Aries; of which we have already spoken,\nas the two Hemispheres, or Kingdoms of Good and Evil, Light and\nDarkness; of Ormuzd and Ahriman among the Persians, and Osiris and\nTyphon among the Egyptians.\n\nWith the Persians, the first six Genii, created by Ormuzd, presided over\nthe first six signs, Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo, and Virgo: and\nthe six evil Genii, or Devs, created by Ahriman, over the six others,\nLibra, Scorpio, Sagittarius, Capricornus, Aquarius, and Pisces. The soul\nwas fortunate and happy under the Empire of the first six; and began to\nbe sensible of evil, when it passed under the Balance or Libra, the\nseventh sign. Thus the soul entered the realm of Evil and Darkness when\nit passed into the Constellations that belong to and succeed the\nAutumnal Equinox; and it re-entered the realm of Good and Light, when it\narrived, returning, at those of the Vernal Equinox. It lost its felicity\nby means of the Balance, and regained it by means of the Lamb. This is a\nnecessary consequence of the premises; and it is confirmed by the\nauthorities and by emblems still extant.\n\nSallust the Philosopher, speaking of the Feasts of Rejoicing celebrated\nat the Vernal Equinox, and those of Mourning, in memory of the rape of\nProserpine, at the Autumnal Equinox, says that the former were\ncelebrated, because then is effected, as it were, the return of the soul\ntoward the Gods; that the time when the principle of Light recovered its\nsuperiority over that of Darkness, or day over night, was the most\nfavorable one for souls that tend to re-ascend to their Principle; and\nthat when Darkness and the Night again become victors, was most\nfavorable to the descent of souls toward the infernal regions.\n\nFor that reason, the old astrologers, as Firmicus states, fixed the\nlocality of the river Styx in the 8th degree of the Balance. And he\nthinks that by Styx was allegorically meant the earth.\n\nThe Emperor Julian gives the same explanation, but more fully developed.\nHe states, as a reason why the august Mysteries of Ceres and Proserpine\nwere celebrated at the Autumnal Equinox, that at that period of the year\nmen feared lest the impious and dark power of the Evil Principle, then\ncommencing to conquer, should do harm to their souls. They were a\nprecaution and means of safety, thought to be necessary at the moment\nwhen the God of Light was passing into the opposite or adverse region of\nthe world; while at the Vernal Equinox there was less to be feared,\nbecause then that God, present in one portion of the world, _recalled\nsouls to Him_, he says, _and showed Himself to be their Saviour_. He had\na little before developed that theological idea, of the attractive force\nwhich the Sun exercises over souls, drawing them to him and raising them\nto his luminous sphere. He attributes this effect to him at the feasts\nof Atys, dead and restored to life, or the feasts of Rejoicing, which at\nthe end of three days succeeded the mourning for that death; and he\ninquires why those Mysteries were celebrated at the Vernal Equinox. The\nreason, he says, is evident. As the sun, arriving at the equinoctial\npoint of Spring, drawing nearer to us, increases the length of the days,\nthat period seems most appropriate for those ceremonies. For, besides\nthat there is a great affinity between the substance of Light and the\nnature of the Gods, the Sun has that occult force of attraction, by\nwhich he draws matter toward himself, by means of his warmth, making\nplants to shoot and grow, etc.; and why can he not, by the same divine\nand pure action of his rays, attract and draw to him fortunate souls?\nThen, as light is analogous to the Divine Nature, and favorable to souls\nstruggling to return to their First Principle, and as that light so\nincreases at the Vernal Equinox, that the days prevail in duration over\nthe nights, and as the Sun has an attractive force, besides the visible\nenergy of his rays, it follows that souls are attracted toward the solar\nlight. He does not further pursue the explanation; because, he says, it\nbelongs to a mysterious doctrine, beyond the reach of the vulgar and\nknown only to those who understand the mode of action of Deity, like the\nChaldean author whom he cites, who had treated of the Mysteries of\nLight, or the God with seven rays.\n\nSouls, the Ancients held, having emanated from the Principle of Light,\npartaking of its destiny here below, cannot be indifferent to nor\nunaffected by these revolutions of the Great Luminary, alternately\nvictor and overcome during every Solar revolution.\n\nThis will be found to be confirmed by an examination of some of the\nSymbols used in the Mysteries. One of the most famous of these was THE\nSERPENT, the peculiar Symbol also of this Degree. The Cosmogony of the\nHebrews and that of the Gnostics designated this reptile as the author\nof the fate of Souls. It was consecrated in the Mysteries of Bacchus and\nin those of Eleusis. Pluto overcame the virtue of Proserpine under the\nform of a serpent; and, like the Egyptian God Serapis, was always\npictured seated on a serpent, or with that reptile entwined about him.\nIt is found on the Mithriac Monuments, and supplied with attributes of\nTyphon to the Egyptians, The sacred basilisc, in coil, with head and\nneck erect, was the royal ensign of the Pharaohs. Two of them were\nentwined around and hung suspended from the winged Globe on the Egyptian\nMonuments. On a tablet in one of the Tombs at Thebes, a God with a spear\npierces a serpent's head. On a tablet from the Temple of Osiris at Phil\u00e6\nis a tree, with a man on one side, and a woman on the other, and in\nfront of the woman an erect basilisc, with horns on its head and a disk\nbetween the horns. The head of Medusa was encircled by winged snakes,\nwhich, the head removed, left the Hierogram or Sacred Cypher of the\nOphites or Serpent-worshippers. And the Serpent, in connection with the\nGlobe or circle, is found upon the monuments of all the Ancient Nations.\n\nOver Libra, the sign through which souls were said to descend or fall,\nis found, on the Celestial Globe, the Serpent, grasped by Serpentarius,\nthe Serpent-bearer. The head of the reptile is under Corona Borealis,\nthe Northern Crown, called by Ovid, _Libera_, or _Proserpine_; and the\ntwo Constellations rise, with the Balance, after the Virgin (or Isis),\nwhose feet rest on the eastern horizon at Sunrise on the day of the\nequinox. As the Serpent extends over both signs, Libra and Scorpio, it\nhas been the gate through which souls descend, during the whole time\nthat those two signs in succession marked the Autumnal Equinox. To this\nalluded the Serpent, which, in the Mysteries of Bacchus Saba-Zeus, was\nflung into the bosom of the Initiate.\n\nAnd hence came the enigmatical expression, _the Serpent engenders the\nBull, and the Bull the Serpent_; alluding to the two adverse\nconstellations, answering to the two equinoxes, one of which rose as the\nother set, and which were at the two points of the heavens through which\nsouls passed, ascending and descending. By the Serpent of Autumn, souls\nfell; and they were regenerated again by the Bull on which Mithras sate,\nand whose attributes Bacchus-Zagreus and the Egyptian Osiris assumed, in\ntheir Mysteries, wherein were represented the fall and regeneration of\nsouls, by the Bull slain and restored to life.\n\nAfterward the regenerating Sun assumed the attributes of _Aries_ or the\nLamb; and in the Mysteries of Ammon, souls were regenerated by passing\nthrough that sign, after having fallen through the Serpent.\n\nThe Serpent-bearer, or Ophicus, was \u00c6sculapius, God of Healing. In the\nMysteries of Eleusis, that Constellation was placed in the eighth\nHeaven: and on the eighth day of those Mysteries, the feast of\n\u00c6sculapius was celebrated. It was also termed Epidaurus, or the feast of\nthe Serpent of Epidaurus. The Serpent was sacred to \u00c6sculapius; and was\nconnected in various ways with the mythological adventures of Ceres.\n\nSo the libations to Souls, by pouring wine on the ground, and looking\ntoward the two gates of Heaven, those of day and night, referred to the\nascent and descent of Souls.\n\nCeres and the Serpent, Jupiter Ammon and the Bull, all figured in the\nMysteries of Bacchus. Suppose Aries, or Jupiter Ammon occupied by the\nSun setting in the West;--Virgo (Ceres) will be on the Eastern horizon,\nand in her train the Crown, or Proserpine. Suppose Taurus setting;--then\nthe Serpent is in the East; and reciprocally; so that Jupiter Ammon, or\nthe Sun of Aries, causes the Crown to rise after the Virgin, in the\ntrain of which comes the Serpent. Place reciprocally the Sun at the\nother equinox, with the balance in the West, in conjunction with the\nSerpent under the Crown; and we shall see the Bull and the Pleiades rise\nin the East. Thus are explained all the fables as to the generation of\nthe Bull by the Serpent and of the Serpent by the Bull, the biting of\nthe testicles of the Bull by the Scorpion, on the Mithriac Monuments;\nand that Jupiter made Ceres with child by tossing into her bosom the\ntesticles of a Ram.\n\nIn the Mysteries of the bull-horned Bacchus, the officers held serpents\nin their hands, raised them above their heads, and cried aloud \"Eva!\"\nthe generic oriental name of the serpent, and the particular name of the\nconstellation in which the Persians placed Eve and the serpent. The\nArabians call it _Hevan_, Ophiucus himself, _Hawa_, and the brilliant\nstar in his head, _Ras-al-Hawa_. The use of this word _Eva_ or _Evo\u00eb_\ncaused Clemens of Alexandria to say that the priests in the Mysteries\ninvoked _Eve_, by whom evil was brought into the world.\n\nThe mystic winnowing-fan, encircled by Serpents, was used in the feasts\nof Bacchus. In the Isiac Mysteries a basilisc twined round the handle of\nthe mystic vase. The Ophites fed a serpent in a mysterious ark, from\nwhich they took him when they celebrated the Mysteries, and allowed him\nto glide among the sacred bread. The Romans kept serpents in the Temples\nof Bona Dea and \u00c6sculapius. In the Mysteries of Apollo, the pursuit of\nLatona by the serpent Python was represented. In the Egyptian Mysteries,\nthe dragon Typhon pursued Isis.\n\nAccording to Sanchoniathon, TAAUT, the interpreter of Heaven to men,\nattributed something divine to the nature of the dragon and serpents, in\nwhich the Ph\u0153nicians and Egyptians followed him. They have more\nvitality, more spiritual force, than any other creature; of a fiery\nnature, shown by the rapidity of their motions, without the limbs of\nother animals. They assume many shapes and attitudes, and dart with\nextraordinary quickness and force. When they have reached old age, they\nthrow off that age and are young again, and increase in size and\nstrength, for a certain period of years.\n\nThe Egyptian Priests fed the sacred serpents in the temple at Thebes.\nTaaut himself had in his writings discussed these mysteries in regard to\nthe serpent. Sanchoniathon said in another work, that the serpent was\nimmortal, and re-entered into himself; which, according to some ancient\ntheosophists, particularly those of India, was an attribute of the\nDeity. And he also said that the serpent never died, unless by a violent\ndeath.\n\nThe Ph\u0153nicians called the serpent _Agathodemon_ [the good spirit]; and\nKneph was the Serpent-God of the Egyptians.\n\nThe Egyptians, Sanchoniathon said, represented the serpent with the head\nof a hawk, on account of the swift flight of that bird: and the chief\nHierophant, the sacred interpreter, gave very mysterious explanations of\nthat symbol; saying that such a serpent was a very divine creature, and\nthat, opening his eyes, he lighted with their rays the whole of\nfirst-born space: when he closes them, it is darkness again. In reality,\nthe hawk-headed serpent, genius of light, or good genius, was the symbol\nof the Sun.\n\nIn the hieroglyphic characters, a snake was the letter T or DJ. It\noccurs many times on the Rosetta stone. The horned serpent was the\nhieroglyphic for a God.\n\nAccording to Eusebius, the Egyptians represented the world by a blue\ncircle, sprinkled with flames, within which was extended a serpent with\nthe head of a hawk. Proclus says they represented the four quarters of\nthe world by a cross, and the soul of the world, or Kneph, by a serpent\nsurrounding it in the form of a circle.\n\nWe read in Anaxagoras, that Orpheus said, that the water, and the vessel\nthat produced it, were the primitive principles of things, and together\ngave existence to an animated being, which was a serpent, with two\nheads, one of a lion and the other of a bull, between which was the\nfigure of a God whose name was Hercules or Kronos: that from Hercules\ncame the egg of the world, which produced Heaven and earth, by dividing\nitself into two hemispheres: and that the God Phanes, which issued from\nthat egg, was in the shape of a serpent.\n\nThe Egyptian Goddess _Ken_, represented standing naked on a lion, held\ntwo serpents in her hand. She is the same as the _Astarte_ or\n_Ashtaroth_ of the Assyrians. _Hera_, worshipped in the Great Temple at\nBabylon, held in her right hand a serpent by the head; and near _Khea_,\nalso worshipped there, were two large silver serpents.\n\nIn a sculpture from Kouyunjik, two serpents attached to poles are near a\nfire-altar, at which two eunuchs are standing. Upon it is the sacred\nfire, and a bearded figure leads a wild goat to the sacrifice.\n\nThe serpent of the Temple of Epidaurus was sacred to _\u00c6sculapius_, the\nGod of Medicine, and 462 years after the building of the city, was taken\nto Rome after a pestilence.\n\nThe Ph\u0153nicians represented the God _Nomu_ (_Kneph_ or _Amun-Kneph_) by a\nserpent. In Egypt, a Sun supported by two asps was the emblem of\n_Horhat_ the good genius; and the serpent with the winged globe was\nplaced over the doors and windows of the Temples as a tutelary God.\nAntipater of Sidon calls _Amun_ \"the renowned Serpent,\" and the Cerastes\nis often found embalmed in the Thebaid.\n\nOn ancient Tyrian coins and Indian medals, a serpent was represented,\ncoiled round the trunk of a tree. _Python_, the Serpent Deity, was\nesteemed oracular; and the tripod at Delphi was a triple-headed serpent\nof gold.\n\nThe portals of all the Egyptian Temples are decorated with the hierogram\nof the Circle and the Serpent. It is also found upon the Temple of\nNaki-Rustan in Persia; on the triumphal arch at Pechin, in China; over\nthe gates of the great Temple of Chaundi Teeva, in Java; upon the walls\nof Athens; and in the Temple of Minerva at Tegea. The Mexican hierogram\nwas formed by the intersecting of two great Serpents, which described\nthe circle with their bodies, and had each a human head in its mouth.\n\nAll the Buddhists crosses in Ireland had serpents carved upon them.\nWreaths of snakes are on the columns of the ancient Hindu Temple at\nBurwah-Sangor.\n\nAmong the Egyptians, it was a symbol of Divine Wisdom, when extended at\nlength; and, with its tail in its mouth, of Eternity.\n\nIn the ritual of Zoroaster, the Serpent was a symbol of the Universe. In\nChina, the ring between two Serpents was the symbol of the world\ngoverned by the power and wisdom of the Creator. The Bacchanals carried\nserpents in their hands or round their heads.\n\nThe Serpent entwined round an Egg, was a symbol common to the Indians,\nthe Egyptians, and the Druids. It referred to the creation of the\nUniverse. A Serpent with an egg in his mouth was a symbol of the\nUniverse containing within itself the germ of all things that the Sun\ndevelops.\n\nThe property possessed by the Serpent, of casting its skin, and\napparently renewing its youth, made it an emblem of eternity and\nimmortality. The Syrian women still employ it as a charm against\nbarrenness, as did the devotees of Mithras and Saba-Zeus. The\nEarth-born civilizers of the early world, Fohi, Cecrops, and Erechtheus,\nwere half-man, half-serpent. The snake was the guardian of the Athenian\nAcropolis. NAKHUSTAN, the brazen serpent of the wilderness, became\nnaturalized among the Hebrews as a token of healing power. \"Be ye,\" said\nChrist, \"wise as serpents, and harmless as doves.\"\n\nThe Serpent was as often a symbol of malevolence and enmity. It appears\namong the emblems of Siva-Roudra, the power of desolation and death: it\nis the bane of A\u00ebpytus, Idom, Archemorus, and Philoctetes: it gnaws the\nroots of the tree of life in the Eddas, and bites the heel of\nunfortunate Eurydice. In Hebrew writers it is generally a type of evil;\nand is particularly so in the Indian and Persian Mythologies. When the\nSea is churned by Mount Mandar rotating within the coils of the Cosmical\nSerpent Vasouki, to produce the Amrita or water of immortality, the\nserpent vomits a hideous poison, which spreads through and infects the\nUniverse, but which Vishnu renders harmless by swallowing it. Ahriman in\nserpent-form invades the realm of Ormuzd; and the Bull, emblem of life,\nis wounded by him and dies. It was therefore a religious obligation with\nevery devout follower of Zoroaster to exterminate reptiles, and other\nimpure animals, especially serpents. The moral and astronomical\nsignificance of the Serpent were connected. It became a maxim of the\nZend-Avesta, that Ahriman, the Principle of Evil, made the Great Serpent\nof Winter, who assaulted the creation of Ormuzd.\n\nA serpent-ring was a well-known symbol of time: and to express\ndramatically how time preys upon itself, the Egyptian priests fed vipers\nin a subterranean chamber, as it were in the sun's Winter abode on the\nfat of bulls, or the year's plenteousness. The dragon of Winter pursues\nAmmon, the golden ram, to Mount Casius. The Virgin of the zodiac is\nbitten in the heel by Serpens, who, with Scorpio, rises immediately\nbehind her; and as honey, the emblem of purity and salvation, was\nthought to be an antidote to the serpent's bite, so the bees of\nArist\u00e6us, the emblems of nature's abundance, are destroyed through the\nagency of the serpent, and regenerated within the entrails of the Vernal\nBull.\n\nThe Sun-God is finally victorious. Christina crushes the head of the\nserpent Calyia; Apollo destroys Python, and Hercules that Lern\u00e6an\nmonster whose poison festered in the foot of Philoctetes, of Mopsus, of\nChiron, or of Sagittarius. The infant Hercules destroys the pernicious\nsnakes detested of the gods, and ever, like St. George of England and\nMichael the Archangel, wars against hydras and dragons.\n\nThe eclipses of the sun and moon were believed by the orientals to be\ncaused by the assaults of a d\u00e6mon in dragon-form; and they endeavored to\nscare away the intruder by shouts and menaces. This was the original\nLeviathan or Crooked Serpent of old, transfixed in the olden time by the\npower of Jehovah, and suspended as a glittering trophy in the sky; yet\nalso the Power of Darkness supposed to be ever in pursuit of the Sun and\nMoon. When it finally overtakes them, it will entwine them in its folds,\nand prevent their shining. In the last Indian Avatara, as in the Eddas,\na serpent vomiting flames is expected to destroy the world. The serpent\npresides over the close of the year, where it guards the approach to the\ngolden fleece of Aries, and the three apples or seasons of the\nHesperides; presenting a formidable obstacle to the career of the\nSun-God. The Great Destroyer of snakes is occasionally married to them;\nHercules with the northern dragon begets the three ancestors of Scythia;\nfor the Sun seems at one time to rise victorious from the contest with\ndarkness, and at another to sink into its embraces. The northern\nconstellation Draco, whose sinuosities wind like a river through the\nwintry bear, was made the astronomical cincture of the Universe, as the\nserpent encircles the mundane egg in Egyptian hieroglyphics.\n\nThe Persian Ahriman was called \"The old serpent, the liar from the\nbeginning, the Prince of Darkness, and the rover up and down.\" The\nDragon was a well-known symbol of the waters and of great rivers; and it\nwas natural that by the pastoral Asiatic Tribes, the powerful nations of\nthe alluvial plains in their neighborhood who adored the dragon or Fish,\nshould themselves be symbolized under the form of dragons; and overcome\nby the superior might of the Hebrew God, as monstrous Leviathans maimed\nand destroyed by him. Ophioneus, in the old Greek Theology, warred\nagainst Kronos, and was overcome and cast into his proper element, the\nsea. There he is installed as the Sea-God Oannes or Dragon, the\nLeviathan of the watery, half of creation, the dragon who vomited a\nflood of water after the persecuted woman of the Apocalypse, the monster\nwho threatened to devour Hesione and Andromeda, and who for a time\nbecame the grave of Hercules and Jonah; and he corresponds with the\nobscure name of _Rahab_, whom Jehovah is said in Job to have transfixed\nand overcome.\n\nIn the Spring, the year or Sun-God appears as Mithras or Europa mounted\non the Bull; but in the opposite half of the Zodiac he rides the emblem\nof the waters, the winged horse of Nestor or Poseidon: and the Serpent,\nrising heliacally at the Autumnal Equinox, besetting with poisonous\ninfluence the cold constellation Sagittarius, is explained as the\nreptile in the path who \"bites the horse's heels, so that his rider\nfalls backward.\" The same serpent, the Oannes Aphrenos or Musaros of\nSyncellus, was the Midgard Serpent which Odin sunk beneath the sea, but\nwhich grew to such a size as to encircle the whole earth.\n\nFor these Asiatic symbols of the contest of the Sun-God with the Dragon\nof darkness and Winter were imported not only into the Zodiac, but into\nthe more homely circle of European legend; and both Thor and Odin fight\nwith dragons, as Apollo did with Python, the great scaly snake, Achilles\nwith the Scamander, and Bellerophon with the Chim\u00e6ra. In the apocryphal\nbook of Esther, dragons herald \"a day of darkness and obscurity\"; and\nSt. George of England, a problematic Cappadocian Prince, was originally\nonly a varying form of Mithras. Jehovah is said to have \"cut Rahab and\nwounded the dragon.\" The latter is not only the type of earthly\ndesolation, the dragon of the deep waters, but also the leader of the\nbanded conspirators of the sky, of the rebellious stars, which,\naccording to Enoch, \"came not at the right time\"; and his tail drew a\nthird part of the Host of Heaven, and cast them to the earth. Jehovah\n\"divided the sea by his strength, and broke the heads of the Dragons in\nthe waters.\" And according to the Jewish and Persian belief, the Dragon\nwould, in the latter days, the Winter of time, enjoy a short period of\nlicensed impunity, which would be a season of the greatest suffering to\nthe People of the earth; but he would finally be bound or destroyed in\nthe great battle of Messiah; or, as it seems intimated by the Rabbinical\nfigure of being eaten by the faithful, be, like Ahriman or Vasouki,\nultimately absorbed by and united with the Principle of good.\n\nNear the image of Rhea, in the Temple of Bel at Babylon, were two large\nserpents of silver, says Diodorus, each weighing thirty talents; and in\nthe same temple was an image of Juno, holding in her right hand the head\nof a serpent. The Greeks called Bel _Beliar_; and Hesychius interprets\nthat word to mean a dragon or great serpent. We learn from the book of\nBel and the Dragon that in Babylon was kept a great, live serpent, which\nthe people worshipped.\n\nThe Assyrians, the Emperors of Constantinople, the Parthians Scythians,\nSaxons, Chinese, and Danes all bore the serpent as a standard, and among\nthe spoils taken by Aurelian from Zenobia were such standards, _Persici\nDracones_. The Persians represented Ormuzd and Ahriman by two serpents,\ncontending for the mundane egg. Mithras is represented with a lion's\nhead and human body, encircled by a serpent. In the Sadder is this\nprecept: \"When you kill serpents, you will repeat the Zend-Avesta, and\nthence you will obtain great merit; for it is the same as if you had\nkilled so many devils.\"\n\nSerpents encircling rings and globes, and issuing from globes, are\ncommon in the Persian, Egyptian, Chinese, and Indian monuments. Vishnu\nis represented reposing on a coiled serpent, whose folds form a canopy\nover him. Mahadeva is represented with a snake around his neck, one\naround his hair, and armlets of serpents on both arms. Bhairava sits on\nthe coils of a serpent, whose head rises above his own. Parvati has\nsnakes about her neck and waist. Vishnu is the Preserving Spirit,\nMahadeva is Siva, the Evil Principle, Bhairava is his son, and Parvati\nhis consort. The King of Evil Demons was called in Hind\u016b Mythology,\n_Naga_, the King of Serpents, in which name we trace the Hebrew\n_Nachash_, serpent.\n\nIn Cashmere were seven hundred places where carved images of serpents\nwere worshipped; and in Thibet the great Chinese Dragon ornamented the\nTemples of the Grand Lama. In China, the dragon was the stamp and symbol\nof royalty, sculptured in all the Temples, blazoned on the furniture of\nthe houses, and interwoven with the vestments of the chief nobility. The\nEmperor bears it as his armorial device; it is engraved on his sceptre\nand diadem, and on all the vases of the imperial palace. The Chinese\nbelieve that there is a dragon of extraordinary strength and sovereign\npower, in Heaven, in the air, on the waters, and on the mountains. The\nGod Fohi is said to have had the form of a man, terminating in the tail\nof a snake, a combination to be more fully explained to you in a\nsubsequent Degree.\n\nThe dragon and serpent are the 5th and 6th signs of the Chinese Zodiac;\nand the Hindus and Chinese believe that, at every eclipse, the sun or\nmoon is seized by a huge serpent or dragon, the serpent _Asootee_ of the\nHindus, which enfolds the globe and the constellation Draco; to which\nalso refers \"the War in Heaven, when Michael and his Angels fought\nagainst the dragon.\"\n\nSanchoniathon says that Taaut was the author of the worship of serpents\namong the Ph\u0153nicians. He \"consecrated,\" he says, \"the species of dragons\nand serpents; and the Ph\u0153nicians and Egyptians followed him in this\nsuperstition.\" He was \"the first who made an image of C\u0153lus\"; that is,\nwho represented the Heavenly Hosts of Stars by visible symbols; and was\nprobably the same as the Egyptian Thoth. On the Tyrian coins of the age\nof Alexander, serpents are represented in many positions and attitudes,\ncoiled around trees, erect in front of altars, and crushed by the Syrian\nHercules.\n\nThe seventh letter of the Egyptian alphabet, called _Zeuta_ or _Life_,\nwas sacred to Thoth, and was expressed by a serpent standing on his\ntail; and that Deity, the God of healing, like \u00c6sculapius, to whom the\nserpent was consecrated, leans on a knotted stick around which coils a\nsnake. The Isiac tablet, describing the Mysteries of Isis, is charged\nwith serpents in every part, as her emblems. The _Asp_ was specially\ndedicated to her, and is seen on the heads of her statues, on the\nbonnets of her priests, and on the tiaras of the Kings of Egypt. Serapis\nwas sometimes represented with a human head and serpentine tail: and in\none engraving two minor Gods are represented with him, one by a serpent\nwith a bull's head, and the other by a serpent with the radiated head of\na lion.\n\nOn an ancient sacrificial vessel found in Denmark, having several\ncompartments, a serpent is represented attacking a kneeling boy,\npursuing him, retreating before him, appealed to beseechingly by him,\nand conversing with him. We are at once reminded of the Sun at the new\nyear represented by a child sitting on a lotus, and of the relations of\nthe Sun of Spring with the Autumnal Serpent, pursued by and pursuing\nhim, and in conjunction with him. Other figures on this vessel belong to\nthe Zodiac.\n\nThe base of the _tripod_ of the Pythian Priestess was a triple-headed\nserpent of brass, whose body, folded in circles growing wider and wider\ntoward the ground, formed a conical column, while the three heads,\ndisposed triangularly, upheld the _tripod_ of gold. A similar column\nwas placed on a pillar in the Hippodrome at Constantinople, by the\nfounder of that city; one of the heads of which is said to have been\nbroken off by Mahomet the Second, by a blow with his iron mace.\n\nThe British God Hu was called \"The Dragon--Ruler of the World,\" and his\ncar was drawn by serpents. His ministers were styled _adders_. A Druid\nin a poem of Taliessin says, \"I am a Druid, I am an _Architect_, I am a\nProphet, I am a _Serpent_ (Gnadi).\" The Car of the Goddess Ceridwen also\nwas drawn by serpents.\n\nIn the elegy of Uther Pendragon, this passage occurs in a description of\nthe religious rites of the Druids: \"While the Sanctuary is earnestly\ninvoking _The Gliding King_, before whom _the Fair One_ retreats, upon\nthe evil that covers the huge stones; whilst the Dragon moves round over\nthe places which contain vessels of drink-offering, whilst the\ndrink-offering is in _the Golden Horns_;\" in which we readily discover\nthe mystic and obscure allusion to the Autumnal Serpent pursuing the Sun\nalong the circle of the Zodiac, to the celestial cup or crater, and the\nGolden horns of Virgil's milk-white Bull; and, a line or two further on,\nwe find the Priest imploring the victorious _Beli_, the Sun-God of the\nBabylonians.\n\nWith the serpent, in the Ancient Monuments, is very often found\nassociated the Cross. The Serpent upon a Cross was an Egyptian Standard.\nIt occurs repeatedly upon the Grand Staircase of the Temple of Osiris at\nPhil\u00e6; and on the pyramid of Ghizeh are represented two kneeling figures\nerecting a Cross, on the top of which is a serpent erect. The _Crux\nAnsata_ was a Cross with a coiled Serpent above it; and it is perhaps\nthe most common of all emblems on the Egyptian Monuments, carried in the\nhand of almost every figure of a Deity or a Priest. It was, as we learn\nby the monuments, the form of the iron tether-pins, used for making fast\nto the ground the cords by which young animals were confined: and as\nused by shepherds, became a symbol of Royalty to the Shepherd Kings.\n\nA Cross like a Teutonic or Maltese one, formed by four curved lines\nwithin a circle, is also common on the Monuments, and represented the\nTropics and the Colures.\n\nThe Caduceus, borne by Hermes or Mercury, and also by Cybele, Minerva,\nAnubis, Hercules Ogmius the God of the Celts, and the personified\nConstellation Virgo, was a winged wand, entwined by two serpents. It\nwas originally a simple Cross, symbolizing the equator and equinoctial\nColure, and the four elements proceeding from a common centre. This\nCross, surmounted by a circle, and that by a crescent, became an emblem\nof the Supreme Deity--or of the active power of generation and the\npassive power of production conjoined,--and was appropriated to Thoth or\nMercury. It then assumed an improved form, the arms of the Cross being\nchanged into wings, and the circle and crescent being formed by two\nsnakes, springing from the wand, forming a circle by crossing each\nother, and their heads making the horns of the crescent; in which form\nit is seen in the hands of Anubis.\n\nThe triple Tau, in the centre of a circle and a triangle, typifies the\nSacred Name; and represents the Sacred Triad, the Creating, Preserving,\nand Destroying Powers; as well as the three great lights of Masonry. If\nto the Masonic point within a Circle, and the two parallel lines, we add\nthe single Tau Cross, we have the Ancient Egyptian Triple Tau.\n\nA column in the form of a cross, with a circle over it, was used by the\nEgyptians to measure the increase of the inundations of the Nile. The\nTau and Triple Tau are found in many Ancient Alphabets.\n\nWith the Tau or the Triple Tau may be connected, within two circles, the\ndouble cube, or perfection; or the perfect ashlar.\n\nThe _Crux Ansata_ is found on the sculptures of Khorsabad; on the\nivories from Nimroud, of the same age, carried by an Assyrian Monarch;\nand on cylinders of the later Assyrian period.\n\nAs the single Tau represents the one God, so, no doubt, the Triple Tau,\nthe origin of which cannot be traced, was meant to represent the Trinity\nof his attributes, the three Masonic pillars, WISDOM, STRENGTH, and\nHARMONY.\n\nThe Prophet Ezekiel, in the 4th verse of the 9th chapter, says: \"And the\nLord said unto him, 'Go through the midst of the city, through the midst\nof Jerusalem, and mark the letter TAU upon the foreheads of those that\nsigh and mourn for all the abominations that be done in the midst\nthereof.\" So the Latin Vulgate, and the probably most ancient copies of\nthe Septuagint translate the passage. This _Tau_ was in the form of the\ncross of this Degree, and it was the emblem of _life_ and _salvation_.\nThe Samaritan _Tau_ and the Ethiopic _Tavvi_ are the evident prototype\nof the Greek [Greek: \u03c4]; and we learn from Tertullian, Origen, and St.\nJerome, that the Hebrew _Tau_ was anciently written in the form of a\nCross.\n\nIn ancient times the mark _Tau_ was set on those who had been acquitted\nby their judges, as a symbol of innocence. The military commanders\nplaced it on soldiers who escaped unhurt from the field of battle, as a\nsign of their safety under the Divine Protection.\n\nIt was a sacred symbol among the Druids. Divesting a tree of part of its\nbranches, they left it in the shape of a Tau Cross, preserved it\ncarefully, and consecrated it with solemn ceremonies. On the tree they\ncut deeply the word THAU, by which they meant God. On the right arm of\nthe Cross, they inscribed the word HESULS, on the left BELEN or BELENUS,\nand on the middle of the trunk THARAMIS. This represented the sacred\n_Triad_.\n\nIt is certain that the Indians, Egyptians, and Arabians paid veneration\nto the sign of the Cross, thousands of years before the coming of\nChrist. Everywhere it was a sacred symbol. The Hindus and the Celtic\nDruids built many of their Temples in the form of a Cross, as the ruins\nstill remaining clearly show, and particularly the ancient Druidical\nTemple at Classerniss in the Island of Lewis in Scotland. The Circle is\nof 12 Stones. On each of the sides, east, west, and south, are three. In\nthe centre was the image of the Deity; and on the north an avenue of\ntwice nineteen stones, and one at the entrance. The Supernal Pagoda at\nBenares is in the form of a Cross; and the Druidical subterranean grotto\nat New Grange in Ireland.\n\nThe Statue of Osiris at Rome had the same emblem. Isis and Ceres also\nbore it; and the caverns of initiation were constructed in that shape\nwith a pyramid over the _Sacellum_.\n\nCrosses were cut in the stones of the Temple of Serapis in Alexandria;\nand many Tau Crosses are to be seen in the sculptures of Alabastion and\nEsn\u00e9, in Egypt. On coins, the symbol of the Egyptian God Kneph was a\nCross within a Circle.\n\nThe Crux Ansata was the particular emblem of Osiris, and his sceptre\nended with that figure. It was also the emblem of Hermes, and was\nconsidered a Sublime Hieroglyphic, possessing mysterious powers and\nvirtues, as a wonder-working amulet.\n\nThe Sacred Tau occurs in the hands of the mummy-shaped figures between\nthe forelegs of the row of Sphynxes, in the great avenue leading from\nLuxor to Karnac. By the Tau Cross the Cabalists expressed the number\n10, a perfect number, denoting Heaven, and the Pythagorean Tetractys, or\nincommunicable name of God. The Tau Cross is also found on the stones in\nfront of the door of the Temple of Amunoth III, at Thebes, who reigned\nabout the time when the Israelites took possession of Canaan: and the\nEgyptian Priests carried it in all the sacred processions.\n\nTertullian, who had been initiated, informs us that the Tau was\ninscribed on the forehead of every person who had been admitted into the\nMysteries of Mithras.\n\nAs the simple Tau represented Life, so, when the Circle, symbol of\nEternity, was added, it represented Eternal Life.\n\nAt the Initiation of a King, the Tau, as the emblem of life and key of\nthe Mysteries, was impressed upon his lips.\n\nIn the Indian Mysteries, the Tau Cross, under the name of _Tiluk_, was\nmarked upon the body of the candidate, as a sign that he was set apart\nfor the Sacred Mysteries.\n\nOn the upright tablet of the King, discovered at Nimroud, are the names\nof thirteen Great Gods (among which are YAV and BEL); and the left-hand\ncharacter of every one is a cross composed of two cuneiform characters.\n\nThe Cross appears upon an Ancient Ph\u0153nician medal found in the ruins of\nCitium; on the very ancient Buddhist Obelisk near Ferns in Ross-shire;\non the Buddhist Round Towers in Ireland, and upon the splendid obelisk\nof the same era at Forres in Scotland.\n\nUpon the facade of a temple at Kalabche in Nubia are three regal\nfigures, each holding a Crux Ansata.\n\nLike the Subterranean Mithriatic Temple at New Grange in Scotland, the\nPagodas of Benares and Mathura were in the form of a Cross. Magnificent\nBuddhist Crosses were erected, and are still standing, at Clonmacnoise,\nFinglas, and Kilcullen in Ireland. Wherever the monuments of Buddhism\nare found, in India, Ceylon, or Ireland, we find the Cross: for Buddha\nor Boudh was represented to have been crucified.\n\nAll the planets known to the Ancients were distinguished by the Mystic\nCross, in conjunction with the solar or lunar symbols; Saturn by a cross\nover a crescent, Jupiter by a cross under a crescent, Mars by a cross\nresting obliquely on a circle, Venus by a cross under a circle, and\nMercury by a cross surmounted by a circle and that by a crescent.\n\nThe Solstices, Cancer and Capricorn, the two Gates of Heaven are the two\npillars of Hercules, beyond which he, the Sun, never journeyed: and they\nstill appear in our Lodges, as the two great columns, Jachin and Boaz,\nand also as the two parallel lines that bound the circle, with a point\nin the centre, emblem of the Sun between the two tropics of Cancer and\nCapricorn.\n\nThe Blazing Star in our Lodges, we have already said, represents Sirius,\nAnubis, or Mercury, Guardian and Guide of Souls. Our Ancient English\nbrethren also considered it an emblem of the Sun. In the old Lectures\nthey said: \"The Blazing Star or Glory in the centre refers us to that\nGrand Luminary the Sun, which enlightens the Earth, and by its genial\ninfluence dispenses blessings to mankind.\" It is also said in those\nlectures to be an emblem of Prudence. The word _Prudentia_ means, in its\noriginal and fullest signification, _Foresight_: and accordingly the\nBlazing Star has been regarded as an emblem of Omniscience, or the\nAll-Seeing Eye, which to the Ancients was the Sun.\n\nEven the Dagger of the Elu of Nine is that used in the Mysteries of\nMithras; which, with its blade black and hilt white, was an emblem of\nthe two principles of Light and Darkness.\n\nIsis, the same as Ceres, was, as we learn from Eratosthenes, the\nConstellation Virgo, represented by a woman holding an ear of wheat. The\ndifferent emblems which accompany her in the description given by\nApuleius, a serpent on either side, a golden vase, with a serpent twined\nround the handle, and the animals that marched in procession, the bear,\nthe ape, and Pegasus, represented the Constellations that, rising with\nthe Virgin, when on the day of the Vernal Equinox she stood in the\nOriental gate of Heaven, brilliant with the rays of the full moon,\nseemed to march in her train.\n\nThe cup, consecrated in the Mysteries both of Isis and Eleusis, was the\nConstellation Crater or the Cup. The sacred vessel of the Isiac ceremony\nfinds its counterpart in the Heavens. The Olympic robe presented to the\nInitiate, a magnificent mantle, covered with figures of serpents and\nanimals, and under which were twelve other sacred robes, wherewith he\nwas clothed in the sanctuary, alluded to the starry Heaven and the\ntwelve signs: while the seven preparatory immersions in the sea alluded\nto the seven spheres, through which the soul plunged, to arrive here\nbelow and take up its abode in a body.\n\nThe Celestial Virgin, during the last three centuries that preceded the\nChristian era, occupied the horoscope or Oriental point, and that gate\nof Heaven through which the Sun and Moon ascended above the horizon at\nthe two equinoxes. Again it occupied it at midnight, at the Winter\nSolstice, the precise moment when the year commenced. Thus it was\nessentially connected with the march of times and seasons, of the Sun,\nthe Moon, and day and night, at the principal epochs of the year. At the\nequinoxes were celebrated the greater and lesser Mysteries of Ceres.\nWhen souls descended past the Balance, at the moment when the Sun\noccupied that point, the Virgin rose before him; she stood at the gates\nof day and opened them to him. Her brilliant Star, Spica Virginis, and\nArcturus, in Bo\u00f6tes, northwest of it, heralded his coming. When he had\nreturned to the Vernal Equinox, at the moment when souls were generated,\nagain it was the Celestial Virgin that led the march of the signs of\nnight; and in her stars came the beautiful full moon of that month.\nNight and day were in succession introduced by her, when they began to\ndiminish in length; and souls, before arriving at the gates of Hell,\nwere also led by her. In going through these signs, they passed the Styx\nin the 8th Degree of Libra. She was the famous Sibyl who initiated\nEneas, and opened to him the way to the infernal regions.\n\nThis peculiar situation of the Constellation Virgo, has caused it to\nenter into all the sacred fables in regard to nature, under different\nnames and the most varied forms. It often takes the name of Isis or the\nMoon, which, when at its full at the Vernal Equinox, was in union with\nit or beneath its feet. Mercury (or Anubis) having his domicile and\nexaltation in the sign Virgo, was, in all the sacred fables and\nSanctuaries, the inseparable companion of Isis, without whose counsels\nshe did nothing.\n\nThis relation between the emblems and mysterious recitals of the\ninitiations, and the Heavenly bodies and order of the world, was still\nmore clear in the Mysteries of Mithras, adored as the Sun in Asia Minor,\nCappadocia, Armenia, and Persia, and whose Mysteries went to Rome in the\ntime of Sylla. This is amply proved by the descriptions we have of the\nMithriac cave, in which were figured the two movements of the Heavens,\nthat of the fixed Stars and that of the Planets, the Constellations, the\neight mystic gates of the spheres, and the symbols of the elements. So\non a celebrated monument of that religion, found at Rome, were figured,\nthe Serpent or Hydra under Leo, as in the Heavens, the Celestial Dog,\nthe Bull, the Scorpion, the Seven Planets, represented by seven altars,\nthe Sun, Moon, and emblems relating to Light, to Darkness, and to their\nsuccession during the year, where each in turn triumphs for six months.\n\nThe Mysteries of Atys were celebrated when the Sun entered Aries; and\namong the emblems was a ram at the foot of a tree which was being cut\ndown.\n\nThus, if not the whole truth, it is yet a large part of it, that the\nHeathen Pantheon, in its infinite diversity of names and\npersonifications, was but a multitudinous, though in its origin\nunconscious allegory, of which physical phenomena, and principally the\nHeavenly Bodies, were the fundamental types. The glorious images of\nDivinity which formed Jehovah's Host, were the Divine Dynasty or real\ntheocracy which governed the early world; and the men of the golden age,\nwhose looks held commerce with the skies, and who watched the radiant\nrulers bringing Winter and Summer to mortals, might be said with poetic\ntruth to live in immediate communication with Heaven, and, like the\nHebrew Patriarchs, to see God face to face. Then the Gods introduced\ntheir own worship among mankind: then Oannes, Oe or Aquarius rose from\nthe Red Sea to impart science to the Babylonians; then the bright Bull\nlegislated for India and Crete; and the Lights of Heaven, personified as\nLiber and Ceres, hung the B\u0153otian hills with vineyards, and gave the\ngolden sheaf to Eleusis. The children of men were, in a sense, allied or\nmarried, to those sons of God who sang the jubilee of creation; and the\nencircling vault with its countless Stars, which to the excited\nimagination of the solitary Chaldean wanderer appeared as animated\nintelligences, might naturally be compared to a gigantic ladder, on\nwhich, in their rising and setting, the Angel luminaries appeared to be\nascending and descending between earth and Heaven. The original\nrevelation died out of men's memories; they worshipped the Creature\ninstead of the Creator; and holding all earthly things as connected by\neternal links of harmony and sympathy with the heavenly bodies, they\nunited in one view astronomy, astrology, and religion. Long wandering\nthus in error, they at length ceased to look upon the Stars and external\nnature as Gods; and by directing their attention to the microcosm or\nnarrower world of self, they again became acquainted with the True Ruler\nand Guide of the Universe, and used the old fables and superstitions as\nsymbols and allegories, by which to convey and under which to hide the\ngreat truths which had faded out of most men's remembrance.\n\nIn the Hebrew writings, the term \"Heavenly Hosts\" includes not only the\ncounsellors and emissaries of Jehovah, but also the celestial\nluminaries; and the stars, imagined in the East to be animated\nintelligences, presiding over human weal and woe, are identified with\nthe more distinctly impersonated messengers or angels, who execute the\nDivine decrees, and whose predominance in Heaven is in mysterious\ncorrespondence and relation with the powers and dominions of the earth.\nIn Job, the Morning Stars and the Sons of God are identified; they join\nin the same chorus of praise to the Almighty; they are both susceptible\nof joy; they walk in brightness, and are liable to impurity and\nimperfection in the sight of God. The Elohim originally included not\nonly foreign superstitious forms, but also all that host of Heaven which\nwas revealed in poetry to the shepherds of the desert, now as an\nencampment of warriors, now as careering in chariots of fire, and now as\nwinged messengers, ascending and descending the vault of Heaven, to\ncommunicate the will of God to mankind.\n\n\"The Eternal,\" says the Bereshith Rabba to Genesis, \"called forth\nAbraham and his posterity out of the dominion of the stars; by nature,\nthe Israelite was a servant to the stars, and born under their\ninfluence, as are the heathen; but by virtue of the law given on Mount\nSinai, he became liberated from this degrading servitude.\" The Arabs had\na similar legend. The Prophet Amos explicitly asserts that the\nIsraelites, in the desert, worshipped, not Jehovah, but Moloch, or a\nStar-God, equivalent to Saturn. The Gods El or Jehovah were not merely\nplanetary or solar. Their symbolism, like that of every other Deity, was\ncoextensive with nature, and with the mind of man. Yet the astrological\ncharacter is assigned even to Jehovah. He is described as seated on the\npinnacle of the Universe, leading forth the Hosts of Heaven, and telling\nthem unerringly by name and number. His stars are His sons and His eyes,\nwhich run through the whole world, keeping watch over men's deeds. The\nstars and planets were properly the angels. In Pharisaic tradition, as\nin the phraseology of the New Testament, the Heavenly Host appears as an\nAngelic Army, divided into regiments and brigades, under the command of\nimaginary chiefs, such as Massaloth, Legion, Kartor Gistra etc.--each\nGistra being captain of 365,000 myriads of stars. The Seven Spirits\nwhich stand before the throne, spoken of by several Jewish writers, and\ngenerally presumed to have been immediately derived from the Persian\nAmshaspands, were ultimately the seven planetary intelligences, the\noriginal model of the seven-branched golden candlestick exhibited to\nMoses on God's mountain. The stars were imagined to have fought in their\ncourses against Sisera. The heavens were spoken of as holding a\npredominance over earth, as governing it by signs and ordinances, and as\ncontaining the elements of that astrological wisdom, more especially\ncultivated by the Babylonians and Egyptians.\n\nEach nation was supposed by the Hebrews to have its own guardian angel,\nand its own provincial star. One of the chiefs of the Celestial Powers,\nat first Jehovah Himself in the character of the Sun, standing in the\nheight of Heaven, overlooking and governing all things, afterward one of\nthe angels or subordinate planetary genii of Babylonian or Persian\nmythology, was the patron and protector of their own nation, \"the Prince\nthat standeth for the children of thy people.\" The discords of earth\nwere accompanied by a warfare in the sky; and no people underwent the\nvisitation of the Almighty, without a corresponding chastisement being\ninflicted on its tutelary angel.\n\nThe fallen Angels were also fallen Stars; and the first allusion to a\nfeud among the spiritual powers in early Hebrew Mythology, where Rabab\nand his confederates are defeated, like the Titans in a battle against\nthe Gods, seems to identify the rebellious Spirits as part of the\nvisible Heavens, where the \"high ones on high\" are punished or chained,\nas a signal proof of God's power and justice. God, it is said--\n\n\"Stirs the sea with His might--by His understanding He smote Rahab--His\nbreath clears the face of Heaven--His hand pierced the crooked\nSerpent.... God withdraws not His anger; beneath Him bow the\nconfederates of Rahab.\"\n\nRahab always means a sea-monster: probably some such legendary monstrous\ndragon, as in almost all mythologies is the adversary of Heaven and\ndemon of eclipse, in whose belly, significantly called the belly of\nHell, Hercules, like Jonah, passed three days, ultimately escaping with\nthe loss of his hair or rays. Chesil, the rebellious giant Orion,\nrepresented in Job as riveted to the sky, was compared to Ninus or\nNimrod, the mythical founder of Nineveh (City of Fish) the mighty\nhunter, who slew lions and panthers before the Lord. Rahab's\nconfederates are probably the \"High ones on High,\" the Chesilim or\nconstellations in Isaiah, the Heavenly Host or Heavenly Powers, among\nwhose number were found folly and disobedience.\n\n\"I beheld,\" says Pseudo-Enoch, \"seven stars like great blazing\nmountains, and like Spirits, entreating me. And the angel said, This\nplace, until the consummation of Heaven and Earth, will be the prison of\nthe Stars and of the Host of Heaven. These are the Stars which\noverstepped God's command before their time arrived; and came not at\ntheir proper season; therefore was he offended with them, and bound\nthem, until the time of the consummation of their crimes in the secret\nyear.\" And again: \"These Seven Stars are those which have transgressed\nthe commandment of the Most High God, and which are here bound until the\nnumber of the days of their crimes be completed.\"\n\nThe Jewish and early Christian writers looked on the worship of the sun\nand the elements with comparative indulgence. Justin Martyr and Clemens\nof Alexandria admit that God had appointed the stars as legitimate\nobjects of heathen worship, in order to preserve throughout the world\nsome tolerable notions of natural religion. It seemed a middle point\nbetween Heathenism and Christianity; and to it certain emblems and\nordinances of that faith seemed to relate. The advent of Christ was\nannounced by a Star from the East; and His nativity was celebrated on\nthe shortest day of the Julian Calendar, the day when, in the physical\ncommemorations of Persia and Egypt, Mithras or Osiris was newly found.\nIt was then that the acclamations of the Host of Heaven, the unfailing\nattendants of the Sun, surrounded, as at the spring-dawn of creation,\nthe cradle of His birth-place, and that, in the words of Ignatius, \"a\nstar, with light inexpressible, shone forth in the Heavens, to destroy\nthe power of magic and the bonds of wickedness; for God Himself had\nappeared, in the form of man, for the renewal of eternal life.\"\n\nBut however infinite the variety of objects which helped to develop the\nnotion of Deity, and eventually assumed its place, substituting the\nworship of the creature for that of the creator; of Parts of the body,\nfor that of the soul, of the Universe, still the notion itself was\nessentially one of unity. The idea of one God, of a creative,\nproductive, governing unity, resided in the earliest exertion of\nthought: and this monotheism of the primitive ages, makes every\nsucceeding epoch, unless it be the present appear only as a stage in the\nprogress of degeneracy and aberration Everywhere in the old faiths we\nfind the idea of a supreme or presiding Deity. Amun or Osiris presides\namong the many gods of Egypt; Pan, with the music of his pipe, directs\nthe chorus of the constellations, as Zeus leads the solemn procession of\nthe celestial troops in the astronomical theology of the Pythagoreans.\n\"Amidst an infinite diversity of opinions on all other subjects,\" says\nMaximus Tyrius, \"the whole world is unanimous in the belief of one only\nalmighty King and Father of all.\"\n\nThere is always a Sovereign Power, a Zeus or Deus, Mahadeva or Adideva,\nto whom belongs the maintenance of the order of the Universe. Among the\nthousand gods of India, the doctrine of Divine Unity is never lost sight\nof; and the ethereal Jove, worshipped by the Persian in an age long\nbefore Xenophanes or Anaxagoras, appears as supremely comprehensive and\nindependent of planetary or elemental subdivisions, as the \"Vast One\" or\n\"Great Soul\" of the Vedas.\n\nBut the simplicity of belief of the patriarchs did not exclude the\nemployment of symbolical representations. The mind never rests satisfied\nwith a mere feeling. That feeling ever strives to assume precision and\ndurability as an idea, by some _outward_ delineation of its thought.\nEven the ideas that are above and beyond the senses, as all ideas of God\nare, require the aid of the senses for their expression and\ncommunication. Hence come the representative forms and symbols which\nconstitute the external investiture of every religion; attempts to\nexpress a religious sentiment that is essentially _one_, and that vainly\nstruggles for adequate external utterance, striving to tell to one man,\nto _paint_ to him, an idea existing in the mind of another, and\nessentially incapable of utterance or description, in a language all the\nwords of which have a sensuous meaning. Thus, the idea being perhaps the\nsame in all, its expressions and utterances are infinitely various, and\nbranch into an infinite diversity of creeds and sects.\n\nAll religious expression is symbolism; since we can describe only what\nwe see; and the true objects of religion are unseen. The earliest\ninstruments of education were symbols; and they and all other religious\nforms differed and still differ according to external circumstances and\nimagery, and according to differences of knowledge and mental\ncultivation. To present a visible symbol to the eye of another is not to\ninform him of the meaning which that symbol has to _you_. Hence the\nphilosopher soon superadded to these symbols, explanations addressed to\nthe ear, susceptible of more precision, but less effective, obvious, and\nimpressive than the painted or sculptured forms which he despised. Out\nof these explanations grew by degrees a variety of narratives, whose\ntrue object and meaning were gradually forgotten. And when these were\nabandoned, and philosophy resorted to definitions and formulas, its\nlanguage was but a more refined symbolism, grappling with and attempting\nto picture ideas impossible to be expressed. For the most abstract\nexpression for Deity which language can supply, is but a _sign_ or\n_symbol_ for an object unknown, and no more truthful and adequate than\nthe terms Osiris and Vishnu, except as being less sensuous and explicit.\nTo say that He is a _Spirit_, is but to say that He is not matter.\n_What_ spirit is, we can only define as the Ancients did, by resorting,\nas if in despair, to some sublimized species of matter, as Light, Fire,\nor Ether.\n\nNo symbol of Deity can be appropriate or durable except in a relative or\nmoral sense. We cannot exalt words that have only a sensuous meaning,\n_above_ sense. To call Him a _Power_ or a _Force_, or an _Intelligence_,\nis merely to deceive ourselves into the belief that we use words that\nhave a meaning to us, when they have none, or at least no more than the\nancient visible symbols had. To call Him _Sovereign, Father, Grand\nArchitect of the Universe, Extension, Time, Beginning, Middle, and End,\nwhose face is turned on all sides, the Source of life and death_, is but\nto present other men with symbols by which we vainly endeavor to\ncommunicate to them the same vague ideas which men in all ages have\nimpotently struggled to express. And it may be doubted whether we have\nsucceeded either in communicating, or in forming in our own minds, any\nmore distinct and definite and true and adequate idea of the Deity, with\nall our metaphysical conceits and logical subtleties, than the rude\nancients did, who endeavored to symbolize and so to express His\nattributes, by the Fire, the Light, the Sun and Stars, the Lotus and the\nScarab\u00e6us; all of them types of what, except by types, more or less\nsufficient, could not be expressed at all.\n\nThe primitive man recognized the Divine Presence under a variety of\nappearances, without losing his faith in this unity and Supremacy. The\ninvisible God, manifested and on one of His many sides visible, did not\ncease to be God to him. He recognized Him in the evening breeze of Eden,\nin the whirlwind of Sinai in the Stone of Beth-El: and identified Him\nwith the fire or thunder or the immovable rock adored in Ancient Arabia.\nTo him the image of the Deity was reflected in all that was pre-eminent\nin excellence. He saw Jehovah, like Osiris and Bel, in the Sun as well\nas in the Stars, which were His children, His eyes, \"which run through\nthe whole world, and watch over the Sacred Soil of Palestine, from the\nyear's commencement to its close.\" He was the sacred fire of Mount\nSinai, of the burning bush, of the Persians, those Puritans of Paganism.\n\nNaturally it followed that Symbolism soon became more complicated, and\nall the powers of Heaven were reproduced on earth, until a web of\nfiction and allegory was woven, which the wit of man, with his limited\nmeans of explanation, will never unravel. Hebrew Theism itself became\ninvolved in symbolism and image-worship, to which all religions ever\ntend. We have already seen what was the symbolism of the Tabernacle, the\nTemple, and the Ark. The Hebrew establishment tolerated not only the use\nof emblematic vessels, vestments, and cherubs, of Sacred Pillars and\nSeraphim, but symbolical representations of Jehovah Himself, not even\nconfined to poetical or illustrative language.\n\n\"Among the Adityas,\" says Chrishna, in the Bagvat Ghita, \"I am Vishnu,\nthe radiant Sun among the Stars; among the waters, I am ocean; among the\nmountains, the Himalaya; and among the mountain-tops, Meru.\" The Psalms\nand Isaiah are full of similar attempts to convey to the mind ideas of\nGod, by ascribing to Him sensual proportions. He rides on the clouds,\nand sits on the wings of the wind. Heaven is His pavilion, and out of\nHis mouth issue lightnings. Men cannot worship a mere abstraction. They\nrequire some outward form in which to clothe their conceptions, and\ninvest their sympathies. If they do not shape and carve or paint visible\nimages, they have invisible ones, perhaps quite as inadequate and\nunfaithful, within their own minds.\n\nThe incongruous and monstrous in the Oriental images came from the\ndesire to embody the Infinite, and to convey by multiplied, because\nindividually inadequate symbols, a notion of Divine Attributes to the\nunderstanding. Perhaps we should find that we mentally do the same\nthing, and make within ourselves images quite as incongruous, if judged\nof by our own limited conceptions, if we were to undertake to analyze\nand gain a clear idea of the mass of infinite attributes which we assign\nto the Deity: and even of His infinite Justice and infinite Mercy and\nLove.\n\nWe may well say, in the language of Maximus Tyrius: \"If, in the desire\nto obtain some faint conception of the Universal Father, the Nameless\nLawgiver, men had recourse to words or names, to silver or gold, to\nanimals or plants, to mountain-tops or flowing rivers, every one\ninscribing the most valued and most beautiful things with the name of\nDeity, and with the fondness of a lover clinging with rapture to each\ntrivial reminiscence of the Beloved, why should we seek to reduce this\nuniversal practice of symbolism, necessary, indeed, since the mind often\nneeds the excitement of the imagination to rouse it into activity, to\none monotonous standard of formal propriety? Only let the image duly\nperform its task, and bring the divine idea with vividness and truth\nbefore the mental eye; if this be effected, whether by the art of\nPhidias, the poetry of Homer, the Egyptian Hieroglyph, or the Persian\nelement, we need not cavil at external differences, or lament the\nseeming fertility of unfamiliar creeds, _so long as the great essential\nis attained_, THAT MEN ARE MADE TO REMEMBER, TO UNDERSTAND, AND TO\nLOVE.\"\n\nCertainly, when men regarded Light and Fire as something spiritual, and\nabove all the corruptions and exempt from all the decay of matter; when\nthey looked upon the Sun and Stars and Planets as composed of this finer\nelement, and as themselves great and mysterious Intelligences,\ninfinitely superior to man, living Existences, gifted with mighty powers\nand wielding vast influences, those elements and bodies conveyed to\nthem, when used as symbols of Deity, a far more adequate idea than they\ncan now do to us, or than we can comprehend, now that Fire and Light are\nfamiliar to us as air and water, and the Heavenly Luminaries are\nlifeless worlds like our own. Perhaps they gave them ideas as adequate\nas we obtain from the mere _words_ by which we endeavor to symbolize and\nshadow forth the ineffable mysteries and infinite attributes of God.\n\nThere are, it is true, dangers inseparable from symbolism, which\ncountervail its advantages, and afford an impressive lesson in regard to\nthe similar risks attendant on the use of language. The imagination,\ninvited to assist the reason, usurps its place, or leaves its ally\nhelplessly entangled in its web. Names which stand for things are\nconfounded with them; the means are mistaken for the end: the instrument\nof interpretation for the object; and thus symbols come to usurp an\nindependent character as truths and persons. Though perhaps a necessary\npath, they were a dangerous one by which to approach the Deity; in which\n\"many,\" says Plutarch, \"mistaking the sign for the thing signified, fell\ninto a ridiculous superstition; while others, in avoiding one extreme,\nplunged into the no less hideous gulf of irreligion and impiety.\"\n\nAll great Reformers have warred against this evil, deeply feeling the\nintellectual mischief arising out of a degraded idea of the Supreme\nBeing; and have claimed for their own God an existence or personality\ndistinct from the objects of ancient superstition; disowning in His name\nthe symbols and images that had profaned His Temple. But they have not\nseen that the utmost which can be effected by human effort, is to\nsubstitute impressions relatively correct, for others whose falsehood\nhas been detected, and to replace a gross symbolism by a purer one.\nEvery man, without being aware of it, worships a conception of his own\nmind; for all symbolism, as well as all language, shares the subjective\ncharacter of the ideas it represents. The epithets we apply to God only\nrecall either visible or intellectual symbols to the eye or mind. The\nmodes or forms of manifestation of the reverential feeling that\nconstitutes the religious sentiment, are incomplete and progressive;\neach term and symbol predicates a partial truth, remaining always\namenable to improvement or modification, and, in its turn, to be\nsuperseded by others more accurate and comprehensive.\n\nIdolatry consists in confounding the symbol with the thing signified,\nthe substitution of a material for a mental object of worship, after a\nhigher spiritualism has become possible; an ill-judged preference of the\ninferior to the superior symbol, an inadequate and sensual conception of\nthe Deity: and every religion and every conception of God is idolatrous,\nin so far as it is imperfect, and as it substitutes a feeble and\ntemporary idea in the shrine of that Undiscoverable Being who can be\nknown only in part, and who can therefore be honored, even by the most\nenlightened among His worshippers, only in proportion to their limited\npowers of understanding and imagining to themselves His perfections.\n\nLike the belief in a Deity, the belief in the soul's immortality is\nrather a natural feeling, an adjunct of self-consciousness, than a dogma\nbelonging to any particular age or country. It gives eternity to man's\nnature, and reconciles its seeming anomalies and contradictions; it\nmakes him strong in weakness and perfectable in imperfection; and it\nalone gives an adequate object for his hopes and energies, and value and\ndignity to his pursuits. It is concurrent with the belief in an\ninfinite, eternal Spirit, since it is chiefly through consciousness of\nthe dignity of the mind within us, that we learn to appreciate its\nevidences in the Universe.\n\nTo fortify, and as far as possible to impart this hope, was the great\naim of ancient wisdom, whether expressed in forms of poetry or\nphilosophy; as it was of the Mysteries, and as it is of Masonry. Life\nrising out of death was the great mystery, which symbolism delighted to\nrepresent under a thousand ingenious forms. Nature was ransacked for\nattestations to the grand truth which seems to transcend all other gifts\nof imagination, or rather to be their essence and consummation. Such\nevidences were easily discovered. They were found in the olive and the\nlotus, in the evergreen myrtle of the _Myst\u00e6_ and of the grave of\nPolydorus, in the deadly but self-renewing serpent, the wonderful moth\nemerging from the coffin of the worm, the phenomena of germination, the\nsettings and risings of the sun and stars, the darkening and growth of\nthe moon, and in sleep, \"the minor mystery of death.\"\n\nThe stories of the birth of Apollo from Latona, and of dead heroes, like\nGlaucus, resuscitated in caves, were allegories of the natural\nalternations of life and death in nature, changes that are but\nexpedients to preserve her virginity and purity inviolable in the\ngeneral sum of her operations, whose aggregate presents only a majestic\ncalm, rebuking alike man's presumption and his despair. The typical\ndeath of the Nature-God, Osiris, Atys, Adonis, Hiram, was a profound but\nconsolatory mystery: the healing charms of Orpheus were connected with\nhis destruction; and his bones, those valued pledges of fertility and\nvictory, were, by a beautiful contrivance, often buried within the\nsacred precincts of his immortal equivalent.\n\nIn their doctrines as to the immortality of the soul, the Greek\nPhilosophers merely stated with more precision ideas long before extant\nindependently among themselves, in the form of symbolical suggestion.\nEgypt and Ethiopia in these matters learned from India, where, as\neverywhere else, the origin of the doctrine was as remote and\nuntraceable as the origin of man himself. Its natural expression is\nfound in the language of Chrishna, in the Bagvat Ghita: \"I myself never\nwas non-existent, nor thou, nor these princes of the Earth; nor shall we\never hereafter cease to be ... The soul is not a thing of which a man\nmay say, it hath been, or is about to be, or is to be hereafter; for it\nis a thing without birth; it is pre-existent, changeless, eternal, and\nis not to be destroyed with this mortal frame.\"\n\nAccording to the dogma of antiquity, the thronging forms of life are a\nseries of purifying migrations, through which the divine principle\nre-ascends to the unity of its source. Inebriated in the bowl of\nDionusos, and dazzled in the mirror of existence, the souls, those\nfragments or sparks of the Universal Intelligence, forgot their native\ndignity, and passed into the terrestrial frames they coveted. The most\nusual type of the spirit's descent was suggested by the sinking of the\nSun and Stars from the upper to the lower hemisphere. When it arrived\nwithin the portals of the proper empire of Dionusos, the God of this\nWorld, the scene of delusion and change, its individuality became\nclothed in a material form; and as individual bodies were compared to a\ngarment, the world was the investiture of the Universal Spirit. Again,\nthe body was compared to a vase or urn, the soul's recipient; the world\nbeing the mighty bowl which received the descending Deity. In another\nimage, ancient as the Grottoes of the Magi and the denunciations of\nEzekiel, the world was as a dimly illuminated cavern, where shadows seem\nrealities, and where the soul becomes forgetful of its celestial origin\nin proportion to its proneness to material fascinations. By another, the\nperiod of the Soul's embodiment is as when exhalations are condensed,\nand the aerial element assumes the grosser form of water.\n\nBut if vapor falls in water, it was held, water is again the birth of\nvapors, which ascend and adorn the Heavens. If our mortal existence be\nthe death of the spirit, our death may be the renewal of its life; as\nphysical bodies are exalted from earth to water, from water to air, from\nair to fire, so the man may rise into the Hero, the Hero into the God.\nIn the course of Nature, the soul, to recover its lost estate, must pass\nthrough a series of trials and migrations. The scene of those trials is\nthe Grand Sanctuary of Initiations, the world: their primary agents are\nthe elements; and Dionusos, as Sovereign of Nature, or the sensuous\nworld personified, is official Arbiter of the Mysteries, and guide of\nthe soul, which he introduces into the body and dismisses from it. He is\nthe Sun, that liberator of the elements, and his spiritual mediation was\nsuggested by the same imagery which made the Zodiac the supposed path of\nthe spirits in their descent and their return, and Cancer and Capricorn\nthe gates through which they passed.\n\nHe was not only Creator of the World, but guardian, liberator, and\nSaviour of the Soul. Ushered into the world amidst lightning and\nthunder, he became the Liberator celebrated in the Mysteries of Thebes,\ndelivering earth from Winter's chain, conducting the nightly chorus of\nthe Stars and the celestial revolution of the year. His symbolism was\nthe inexhaustible imagery employed to fill up the stellar devices of the\nZodiac: he was the Vernal Bull, the Lion, the Ram, the Autumnal Goat,\nthe Serpent: in short, the varied Deity, the resulting manifestation\npersonified, the all in the many, the varied year, life passing into\ninnumerable forms; essentially inferior to none, yet changing with the\nseasons, and undergoing their periodical decay.\n\nHe mediates and intercedes for man, and reconciles the Universal Unseen\nMind with the individualized spirit of which he is emphatically the\nPerfecter; a consummation which he effects, first through the\nvicissitudes of the elemental ordeal, the alternate fire of Summer and\nthe showers of Winter, \"the trials or test of an immortal Nature\"; and\nsecondarily and symbolically through the Mysteries. He holds not only\nthe cup of generation, but also that of wisdom or initiation, whose\ninfluence is contrary to that of the former, causing the soul to abhor\nits material bonds, and to long for its return. The first was the Cup of\nForgetfulness; while the second is the Urn of Aquarius, quaffed by the\nreturning spirit, as by the returning Sun at the Winter Solstice, and\nemblematic of the exchange of wordly impressions for the recovered\nrecollections of the glorious sights and enjoyments of its\npre-existence. Water nourishes and purifies; and the urn from which it\nflows was thought worthy to be a symbol of Deity, as of the\nOsiris-Canobus who with living water irrigated the soil of Egypt; and\nalso an emblem of Hope that should cheer the dwellings of the dead.\n\nThe second birth of Dionusos, like the rising of Osiris and Atys from\nthe dead, and the raising of Khurum, is a type of the spiritual\nregeneration of man. Psyche (the Soul), like Ariadne, had two lovers,\nan earthly and an immortal one. The immortal suitor is Dionusos, the\nEros-Phanes of the Orphici, gradually exalted by the progress of\nthought, out of the symbol of Sensuality into the torch-bearer of the\nNuptials of the Gods; the Divine Influence which physically called the\nworld into being, and which, awakening the soul from its Stygian trance,\nrestores it from earth to Heaven.\n\nThus the scientific theories of the ancients, expounded in the\nMysteries, as to the origin of the soul, its descent, its sojourn here\nbelow, and its return, were not a mere barren contemplation of the\nnature of the world, and of the intelligent beings existing there. They\nwere not an idle speculation as to the order of the world, and about the\nsoul, but a study of the means for arriving at the great object\nproposed,--the perfecting of the soul; and, as a necessary consequence,\nthat of morals and society. This Earth, to them, was not the Soul's\nhome, but its place of exile. Heaven was its home, and there was its\nbirth-place. To it, it ought incessantly to turn its eyes. Man was not a\nterrestrial plant. His roots were in Heaven. The soul had lost its\nwings, clogged by the viscosity of matter. It would recover them when it\nextricated itself from matter and commenced its upward flight.\n\nMatter being, in their view, as it was in that of St. Paul, the\nprinciple of all the passions that trouble reason, mislead the\nintelligence, and stain the purity of the soul, the Mysteries taught man\nhow to enfeeble the action of matter on the soul, and to restore to the\nlatter its natural dominion. And lest the stains so contracted should\ncontinue after death, lustrations were used, fastings, expiations,\nmacerations, continence, and above all, initiations. Many of these\npractices were at first merely symbolical,--material signs indicating\nthe moral purity required of the Initiates; but they afterward came to\nbe regarded as actual productive causes of that purity.\n\nThe effect of initiation was meant to be the same as that of philosophy,\nto purify the soul of its passions, to weaken the empire of the body\nover the divine portion of man, and to give him here below a happiness\nanticipatory of the felicity to be one day enjoyed by him, and of the\nfuture vision by him of the Divine Beings. And therefore Proclus and the\nother Platonists taught \"that the Mysteries and initiations withdrew\nsouls from this mortal and material life, to re-unite them to the gods;\nand dissipated for the adepts the shades of ignorance by the splendors\nof the Deity.\" Such were the precious fruits of the last Degree of the\nMystic Science,--to see Nature in her springs and sources, and to become\nfamiliar with the causes of things and with real existences.\n\nCicero says that the soul must exercise itself in the practice of the\nvirtues, if it would speedily return to its place of origin. It should,\nwhile imprisoned in the body, free itself therefrom by the contemplation\nof superior beings, and in some sort be divorced from the body and the\nsenses. Those who remain enslaved, subjugated by their passions and\nviolating the sacred laws of religion and society, will re-ascend to\nHeaven, only after they shall have been purified through a long\nsuccession of ages.\n\nThe Initiate was required to emancipate himself from his passions, and\nto free himself from the hindrances of the senses and of matter, in\norder that he might rise to the contemplation of the Deity, or of that\nincorporeal and unchanging light in which live and subsist the causes of\ncreated natures. \"We must,\" says Porphyry, \"flee from everything\nsensual, that the soul may with ease re-unite itself with God, and live\nhappily with Him.\" \"This is the great work of initiation,\" says\nHierocles,--\"to recall the soul to what is truly good and beautiful, and\nmake it familiar therewith, and they its own; to deliver it from the\npains and ills it endures here below, enchained in matter as in a dark\nprison; to facilitate its return to the celestial splendors, and to\nestablish it in the Fortunate Isles, by restoring it to its first\nestate. Thereby, when the hour of death arrives, the soul, freed of its\nmortal garmenting, which it leaves behind it as a legacy to earth, will\nrise buoyantly to its home among the Stars, there to re-take its ancient\ncondition, and approach toward the Divine nature as far as man may do.\"\n\nPlutarch compares Isis to knowledge, and Typhon to ignorance, obscuring\nthe light of the sacred doctrine whose blaze lights the soul of the\nInitiate. No gift of the gods, he holds, is so precious as the knowledge\nof the Truth, and that of the Nature of the gods, so far as our limited\ncapacities allow us to rise toward them. The Valentinians termed\ninitiation LIGHT. The Initiate, says Psellus, becomes an Epopt, when\nadmitted to see THE DIVINE LIGHTS. Clemens of Alexandria, imitating the\nlanguage of an Initiate in the Mysteries of Bacchus, and inviting this\nInitiate, whom he terms blind like Tiresias, to come to see Christ, Who\nwill blaze upon his eyes with greater glory than the Sun, exclaims: \"Oh\nMysteries most truly holy! Oh pure Light! When the torch of the Dadoukos\ngleams, Heaven and the Deity are displayed to my eyes! I am initiated,\nand become holy!\" This was the true object of initiation; to be\nsanctified, and TO SEE, that is, to have just and faithful conceptions\nof the Deity, the knowledge of Whom was THE LIGHT of the Mysteries. It\nwas promised the Initiate at Samothrace, that he should become pure and\njust Clemens says that by baptism, souls are _illuminated_, and led to\n_the pure light_ with which mingles no darkness, nor anything material.\nThe Initiate, become an Epopt, was called A SEER. \"HAIL, NEW-BORN\nLIGHT!\" the Initiates cried in the Mysteries of Bacchus.\n\nSuch was held to be the effect of complete initiation. It lighted up the\nsoul with rays from the Divinity, and became for it, as it were, the eye\nwith which, according to the Pythagoreans, it contemplates the field of\nTruth; in its mystical abstractions, wherein it rises superior to the\nbody, whose action on it, it annuls for the time, to re-enter into\nitself, so as entirely to occupy itself with the view of the Divinity,\nand the means of coming to resemble Him.\n\nThus enfeebling the dominion of the senses and the passions over the\nsoul, and as it were freeing the latter from a sordid slavery, and by\nthe steady practice of all the virtues, active and contemplative, our\nancient brethren strove to fit themselves to return to the bosom of the\nDeity. Let not our objects as Masons fall below theirs. We use the\nsymbols which they used; and teach the same great cardinal doctrines\nthat they taught, of the existence of an intellectual God, and the\nimmortality of the soul of man. If the details of their doctrines as to\nthe soul seem to us to verge on absurdity, let us compare them with the\ncommon notions of our own day, and be silent. If it seems to us that\nthey regarded the symbol in some cases as the thing symbolized, and\nworshipped the sign as if it were itself Deity, let us reflect how\ninsufficient are our own ideas of Deity, and how we worship those ideas\nand images formed and fashioned in our own minds, and not the Deity\nHimself: and if we are inclined to smile at the importance they attached\nto lustrations and fasts, let us pause and inquire whether the same\nweakness of human nature does not exist to-day, causing rites and\nceremonies to be regarded as _actively_ efficient for the salvation of\nsouls.\n\nAnd let us ever remember the words of an old writer, with which we\nconclude this lecture: \"It is a pleasure to stand on the shore, and to\nsee ships tossed upon the sea: a pleasure to stand in the window of a\ncastle, and see a battle and the adventures thereof: but no pleasure is\ncomparable to the standing on the vantage-ground of TRUTH (a hill not to\nbe commanded, and where the air is always clear and serene), and to see\nthe errors and wanderings, and mists and tempests, in the vale below;\n_so always that this prospect be with pity, and not with swelling or\npride_. Certainly it is Heaven upon Earth to have a man's mind move in\ncharity, rest in Providence, AND TURN UPON THE POLES OF TRUTH.\"\n\n\n\n\nXXVI.\n\nPRINCE OF MERCY, OR SCOTTISH TRINITARIAN.\n\n\nWhile you were veiled in darkness, you heard repeated by the Voice of\nthe Great Past its most ancient doctrines. None has the right to object,\nif the Christian Mason sees foreshadowed in Chrishna and Sosiosch, in\nMithras and Osiris, the Divine WORD that, as he believes, became Man,\nand died upon the cross to redeem a fallen race. Nor can _he_ object if\nothers see reproduced, in the WORD of the beloved Disciple, that was in\nthe beginning with God, and that was God, and by Whom everything was\nmade, only the LOGOS of Plato, and the WORD or Uttered THOUGHT or first\nEmanation of LIGHT, or the Perfect REASON of the Great, Silent, Supreme,\nUncreated Deity, believed in and adored by all.\n\nWe do not undervalue the importance of any Truth. We utter no word that\ncan be deemed irreverent by any one of any faith. We do not tell the\nMoslem that it is only important for him to believe that there is but\none God, and wholly unessential whether Mahomet was His prophet. We do\nnot tell the Hebrew that the Messiah whom he expects was born in\nBethlehem nearly two thousand years ago; and that he is a heretic\nbecause he will not so believe. And as little do we tell the sincere\nChristian that Jesus of Nazareth was but a man like us, or His history\nbut the unreal revival of an older legend. To do either is beyond our\njurisdiction. Masonry, of no one age, belongs to all time; of no one\nreligion, it finds its great truths in all.\n\nTo every Mason, there is a GOD; ONE, Supreme, Infinite in Goodness,\nWisdom, Foresight, Justice, and Benevolence; Creator, Disposer, and\nPreserver of all things. How, or by what intermediates He creates and\nacts, and in what way He unfolds and manifests Himself, Masonry leaves\nto creeds and Religions to inquire.\n\nTo every Mason, the soul of man is immortal. Whether it emanates from\nand will return to God, and what its continued mode of existence\nhereafter, each judges for himself. Masonry was not made to settle that.\n\nTo every Mason, WISDOM or INTELLIGENCE, FORCE or STRENGTH, and HARMONY,\nor FITNESS and BEAUTY, are the Trinity of the attributes of God. With\nthe subtleties of Philosophy concerning them Masonry does not meddle,\nnor decide as to the reality of the supposed Existences which are their\nPersonifications: nor whether the Christian Trinity be such a\npersonification, or a Reality of the gravest import and significance.\n\nTo every Mason, the Infinite Justice and Benevolence of God give ample\nassurance that Evil will ultimately be dethroned, and the Good, the\nTrue, and the Beautiful reign triumphant and eternal. It teaches, as it\nfeels and knows, that Evil, and Pain, and Sorrow exist as part of a wise\nand beneficent plan, all the parts of which work together under God's\neye to a result which shall be perfection. Whether the existence of evil\nis rightly explained in this creed or in that, by Typhon the Great\nSerpent, by Ahriman and his Armies of Wicked Spirits, by the Giants and\nTitans that war against Heaven, by the two co-existent Principles of\nGood and Evil, by Satan's temptation and the fall of Man, by Lok and the\nSerpent Fenris, it is beyond the domain of Masonry to decide, nor does\nit need to inquire. Nor is it within its Province to determine how the\nultimate triumph of Light and Truth and Good, over Darkness and Error\nand Evil, is to be achieved; nor whether the Redeemer, looked and longed\nfor by all nations, hath appeared in Judea, or is yet to come.\n\nIt reverences all the great reformers. It sees in Moses, the Lawgiver of\nthe Jews, in Confucius and Zoroaster, in Jesus of Nazareth, and in the\nArabian Iconoclast, Great Teachers of Morality, and Eminent Reformers,\nif no more: and allows every brother of the Order to assign to each such\nhigher and even Divine Character as his Creed and Truth require.\n\nThus Masonry disbelieves no truth, and teaches unbelief in no creed,\nexcept so far as such creed may lower its lofty estimate of the Deity,\ndegrade Him to the level of the passions of humanity, deny the high\ndestiny of man, impugn the goodness and benevolence of the Supreme God,\nstrike at those great columns of Masonry, Faith, Hope, and Charity, or\ninculcate immorality, and disregard of the active duties of the Order.\n\nMasonry is a worship; but one in which all civilized men can unite; for\nit does not undertake to explain or dogmatically to settle those great\nmysteries, that are above the feeble comprehension of our human\nintellect. It trusts in God, and HOPES; it BELIEVES, like a child, and\nis humble. It draws no sword to compel others to adopt its belief, or to\nbe happy with its hopes And it WAITS with patience to understand the\nmysteries of Nature and Nature's God hereafter.\n\nThe greatest mysteries in the Universe are those which are ever going on\naround us; so trite and common to us that we never note them nor reflect\nupon them. Wise men tell us of the _laws_ that regulate the motions of\nthe spheres, which, flashing in huge circles and spinning on their axes,\nare also ever darting with inconceivable rapidity through the infinities\nof Space; while we atoms sit here, and dream that all was made for _us_.\nThey tell us learnedly of centripetal and centrifugal _forces_, gravity\nand attraction, and all the other sounding terms invented to hide a\n_want_ of meaning. There are other forces in the Universe than those\nthat are mechanical.\n\nHere are two minute seeds, not much unlike in appearance, and two of\nlarger size. Hand them to the learned Pundit, Chemistry, who tells us\nhow combustion goes on in the lungs, and plants are fed with phosphorus\nand carbon, and the alkalies and silex. Let her decompose them, analyze\nthem, torture them in all the ways she knows. The net result of each is\na little sugar, a little fibrin, a little water--carbon, potassium,\nsodium, and the like--one cares not to know what.\n\nWe hide them in the ground: and the slight rains moisten them, and the\nSun shines upon them, and little slender shoots spring up and grow;--and\nwhat a miracle is the mere growth!--the force, the power, the _capacity_\nby which the little feeble shoot, that a small worm can nip off with a\nsingle snap of its mandibles, extracts from the earth and air and water\nthe different elements, so learnedly catalogued, with which it increases\nin stature, and rises imperceptibly toward the sky.\n\n_One_ grows to be a slender, fragile, feeble stalk, soft of texture,\nlike an ordinary weed; another a strong bush, of woody fibre, armed with\nthorns, and sturdy enough to bid defiance to the winds: the third a\ntender tree, subject to be blighted by the frost, and looked down upon\nby all the forest; while another spreads its rugged arms abroad, and\ncares for neither frost nor ice, nor the snows that for months lie\naround its roots.\n\nBut lo! out of the brown foul earth, and colorless invisible air, and\nlimpid rain-water, the chemistry of the seeds has extracted\n_colors_--four different shades of green, that paint the leaves which\nput forth in the spring upon our plants, our shrubs, and our trees.\nLater still come the flowers--the vivid colors of the rose, the\nbeautiful brilliance of the carnation, the modest blush of the apple,\nand the splendid white of the orange. Whence come the _colors_ of the\nleaves and flowers? By what process of chemistry are _they_ extracted\nfrom the carbon, the phosphorus, and the lime? Is it any greater miracle\nto make something out of nothing?\n\nPluck the flowers. Inhale the delicious _perfumes_; each perfect, and\nall delicious. Whence have _they_ come? By what combination of acids and\nalkalies could the chemist's laboratory produce _them_?\n\nAnd now on two comes the fruit--the ruddy apple and the golden orange.\nPluck them--open them! The texture and fabric how totally different! The\n_taste_ how entirely dissimilar--the _perfume_ of each distinct from its\nflower and from the other. Whence the taste and this new perfume? The\nsame earth and air and water have been made to furnish a different taste\nto each fruit, a different perfume not only to each fruit, but to each\nfruit and its own flower.\n\nIs it any more a problem whence come thought and will and perception and\nall the phenomena of the mind, than this, whence come the colors, the\nperfumes, the taste, of the fruit and flower?\n\nAnd lo! in each fruit new seeds, each gifted with the same wondrous\npower of reproduction--each with the same wondrous _forces_ wrapped up\nin it to be again in turn evolved. Forces that had lived three thousand\nyears in the grain of wheat found in the wrappings of an Egyptian mummy;\nforces of which learning and science and wisdom know no more than they\ndo of the nature and laws of action of God. What can _we_ know of the\nnature, and how can _we_ understand the powers and mode of operation of\nthe human soul, when the glossy leaves, the pearl-white flower, and the\ngolden fruit of the orange are miracles wholly beyond our comprehension?\n\nWe but hide our ignorance in a cloud of words;--and the words too often\nare mere combinations of sounds without any meaning. What is the\ncentrifugal force? A _tendency_ to go in a particular direction! What\nexternal \"_force_,\" then, produces that tendency?\n\nWhat force draws the needle round to the north? What force moves the\nmuscle that raises the arm, when the will determines it shall rise?\nWhence comes the _will itself_? Is it spontaneous--a first cause, or an\neffect? These too are miracles; inexplicable as the creation, or the\nexistence and self-existence of God.\n\nWho will explain to us the passion, the peevishness, the anger, the\nmemory, and affections of the small canary-wren? the consciousness of\nidentity and the dreams of the dog? the reasoning powers of the\nelephant? the wondrous instincts, passions, government, and civil\npolicy, and modes of communication of ideas of the ant and bee?\n\nWho has yet made us to understand, with all his learned words, how heat\ncomes to us from the Sun, and light from the remote Stars, setting out\nupon its journey earth-ward from some, at the time the Chaldeans\ncommenced to build the Tower of Babel? Or how the image of an external\nobject comes to and fixes itself upon the retina of the eye; and when\nthere, how that mere empty, unsubstantial image becomes transmuted into\nthe wondrous thing that we call SIGHT? Or how the waves of the\natmosphere striking upon the tympanum of the ear--those thin, invisible\nwaves--produce the equally wondrous phenomenon of HEARING, and become\nthe roar of the tornado, the crash of the thunder, the mighty voice of\nthe ocean, the chirping of the cricket, the delicate sweet notes and\nexquisite trills and variations of the wren and mocking-bird, or the\nmagic melody of the instrument of Paganini?\n\nOur senses are mysteries to us, and we are mysteries to ourselves.\nPhilosophy has taught us nothing as to the _nature_ of our sensations,\nour perceptions, our cognizances, the origin of our thoughts and ideas,\nbut _words_. By no effort or degree of reflection, never so long\ncontinued, can man become conscious of a personal identity in himself,\nseparate and distinct from his body and his brain. We torture ourselves\nin the effort to gain an idea of ourselves, and weary with the exertion.\nWho has yet made us understand how, from the contact with a foreign\nbody, the image in the eye, the wave of air impinging on the ear,\nparticular particles entering the nostrils, and coining in contact with\nthe palate, come sensations in the nerves, and from that, perception in\nthe mind, of the animal or the man?\n\nWhat do we know of Substance? Men even doubt yet whether it exists.\nPhilosophers tell us that our senses make known to us only the\n_attributes_ of substance, extension, hardness, color, and the like; but\nnot _the thing itself_ that _is_ extended, solid, black or white; as we\nknow the _attributes_ of the Soul, its thoughts and its perceptions, and\nnot the Soul itself which perceives and thinks.\n\nWhat a wondrous mystery is there in heat and light, existing, we know\nnot how, within certain limits, narrow in comparison with infinity,\nbeyond which on every side stretch out infinite space and the blackness\nof unimaginable darkness, and the intensity of inconceivable cold! Think\nonly of the mighty Power required to maintain warmth and light in the\ncentral point of such an infinity, to whose darkness that of Midnight,\nto whose cold that of the last Arctic Island is nothing. And yet GOD is\neverywhere.\n\nAnd what a mystery are the effects of heat and cold upon the wondrous\nfluid that we call water! What a mystery lies hidden in every flake of\nsnow and in every crystal of ice, and in their final transformation into\nthe invisible vapor that rises from the ocean or the land, and floats\nabove the summits of the mountains!\n\nWhat a multitude of wonders, indeed, has chemistry unveiled to our eyes!\nThink only that if some single law enacted by God were at once repealed,\nthat of attraction or affinity or cohesion, for example, the whole\nmaterial world, with its solid granite and adamant, its veins of gold\nand silver, its trap and porphyry, its huge beds of coal, our own frames\nand the very ribs and bones of this apparently indestructible earth,\nwould instantaneously dissolve, with all Suns and Stars and Worlds\nthroughout all the Universe of God, into a thin invisible vapor of\ninfinitely minute particles or atoms, diffused throughout infinite\nspace; and with them light and heat would disappear; unless the Deity\nHimself be, as the Ancient Persians thought, the Eternal Light and the\nImmortal Fire.\n\nThe mysteries of the Great Universe of God! How _can_ we with our\nlimited mental vision expect to grasp and comprehend them! Infinite\nSPACE, stretching out from us every way, without limit: infinite TIME,\nwithout beginning or end; and WE, HERE, and NOW, in the centre of each!\nAn infinity of suns, the nearest of which only _diminish_ in size,\nviewed with the most powerful telescope: each with its retinue of\nworlds; infinite numbers of such suns, so remote from us that their\nlight would not reach us, journeying during an infinity of time, while\nthe light that _has_ reached us, from some that we _seem_ to see, has\nbeen upon its journey for fifty centuries: our world spinning upon its\naxis, and rushing ever in its circuit round the sun; and it, the sun,\nand all our system revolving round some great central point; and that,\nand suns, stars, and worlds evermore flashing onward with incredible\nrapidity through illimitable space: and then, in every drop of water\nthat we drink, in every morsel of much of our food, in the air, in the\nearth, in the sea, incredible multitudes of living creatures, invisible\nto the naked eye, of a minuteness beyond belief, yet organized, living,\nfeeding, _perhaps_ with consciousness of identity, and memory and\ninstinct.\n\nSuch are some of the mysteries of the great Universe of God. And yet we,\nwhose life and that of the world on which we live form but a point in\nthe centre of infinite Time: we, who nourish animalcul\u00e6 within, and on\nwhom vegetables grow without, would fain learn how God created this\nUniverse, would understand His Powers, His Attributes, His Emanations,\nHis Mode of Existence and of Action; would fain know the plan according\nto which all events proceed, that plan profound as God Himself; would\nknow the laws by which He controls His Universe; would fain _see_ and\n_talk_ to Him face to face, as man talks to man: and we try not to\nbelieve, because we do not _understand_.\n\nHe commands us to love one another, to love our neighbor as ourself; and\nwe dispute and wrangle, and hate and slay each other, because we cannot\nbe of one opinion as to the Essence of His Nature, as to His Attributes;\nwhether He became man born of a woman, and was crucified; whether the\nHoly Ghost is of the _same_ substance with the Father, or only of a\n_similar_ substance; whether a feeble old man is God's Vicegerent;\nwhether some are elected from all eternity to be saved, and others to be\ncondemned and punished; whether punishment of the wicked after death is\nto be eternal; whether this doctrine or the other be heresy or\ntruth;--drenching the world with blood, depopulating realms, and turning\nfertile lands into deserts; until, for religious war, persecution, and\nbloodshed, the Earth for many a century has rolled round the Sun, a\ncharnel-house, steaming and reeking with human gore, the blood of\nbrother slain by brother for opinion's sake, that has soaked into and\npolluted all her veins, and made her a horror to her sisters of the\nUniverse.\n\nAnd if men were all Masons, and obeyed with all their heart her mild\nand gentle teachings, that world would be a paradise; while intolerance\nand persecution make of it a hell. For this is the Masonic Creed:\nBELIEVE, in God's Infinite Benevolence, Wisdom, and Justice: HOPE, for\nthe final triumph of Good over Evil, and for Perfect Harmony as the\nfinal result of all the concords and discords of the Universe: and be\nCHARITABLE as God is, toward the unfaith, the errors, the follies, and\nthe faults of men: for all make one great brotherhood.\n\n\nINSTRUCTION.\n\n_Sen. W. Brother Junior Warden, are you a Prince of Mercy?\n\n_Jun. W. I have seen the Delta and the HOLY NAMES upon it, and am an\nAMETH like yourself, in the TRIPLE COVENANT, of which we bear the mark.\n\n_Qu_ What is the first Word upon the Delta?\n\n_Ans_ The Ineffable Name of Deity, the true mystery of which is known\nto the Ameth alone.\n\n_Qu_ What do the three sides of the Delta denote to us?\n\n_Ans_ To us, and to all Masons, the three Great Attributes or\nDevelopments of the Essence of the Deity; WISDOM, or the Reflective and\nDesigning Power, in which, when there was naught but God, the Plan and\nIdea of the Universe was shaped and formed: FORCE, or the Executing and\nCreating Power, which instantaneously acting, realized the Type and Idea\nframed by Wisdom; and the Universe, and all Stars and Worlds, and Light\nand Life, and Men and Angels and all living creatures WERE; and HARMONY,\nor the Preserving Power, Order, and Beauty, maintaining the Universe in\nits State, and constituting the law of Harmony, Motion, Proportion, and\nProgression:--WISDOM, which _thought_ the plan; STRENGTH, which\n_created_: HARMONY, which _upholds_ and _preserves_:--the Masonic\nTrinity, three Powers and one Essence: the three columns which support\nthe Universe, Physical, Intellectual, and Spiritual, of which every\nMasonic Lodge is a type and symbol:--while to the Christian Mason, they\nrepresent the Three that bear record in Heaven, the FATHER, the WORD,\nand the HOLY SPIRIT, which three are ONE.\n\n_Qu_ What do the three Greek letters upon the Delta, _\u0399 \u0397 \u03a3_\n[_Iota, Eta_, and _Sigma_] represent?\n\n_Ans_ Three of the Names of the Supreme Deity among the Syrians,\nPhoenicians, and Hebrews ... IHUH [Hebrew: \u05d9\u05d4\u05d4]; _Self-Existence_ ...\nAL [Hebrew: \u05d0]: _the Nature-God, or Soul of the Universe_ ... SHADAI\n[Hebrew: \u05e9\u05d3] _Supreme Power_. Also three of the Six Chief Attributes of\nGod, among the Kabbalists:--WISDOM [IEH], the _Intellect_, ([Greek:\n\u039d\u03bf\u03cd\u03c2]) of the Egyptians, the _Word_ ([Greek: \u039b\u03cc\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2]) of the Platonists,\nand the _Wisdom_ ([Greek: \u03a3\u03bf\u03c6\u03af\u03b1]) of the Gnostics: ... MAGNIFICENCE\n[AL], the Symbol of which was the Lion's Head: ... and VICTORY and GLORY\n[_Tsabaoth_], which are the two columns JACHIN and BOAZ, that stand in\nthe Portico of the Temple of Masonry. To the Christian Mason they are\nthe first three letters of the name of the Son of God, Who died upon the\ncross to redeem mankind.\n\n_Qu_ What is the first of the THREE COVENANTS, of which we bear the\nmark?\n\n_Ans_ That which God made with Noah; when He said, \"I will not again\ncurse the earth any more for man's sake, neither will I smite any more\neverything living as I have done. While the Earth remaineth, seed-time\nand harvest, and cold and heat, and Winter and Summer, and day and night\nshall not cease. I will establish My covenant with you, and with your\nseed after you, and with every living creature. All mankind shall no\nmore be cut off by the waters of a flood, nor shall there any more be a\nflood to destroy the earth. This is the token of My covenant: I do set\nMy bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between\nMe and the earth: an everlasting covenant between Me and every living\ncreature on the earth.\"\n\n_Qu_ What is the second of the Three Covenants?\n\n_Ans_ That which God made with Abraham; when He said, \"I am the\nAbsolute Uncreated God. I will make My covenant between Me and thee, and\nthou shalt be the Father of Many Nations, and Kings shall come from thy\nloins. I will establish My covenant between Me and thee, and thy\ndescendants after thee, to the remotest generations, for an everlasting\ncovenant; and I will be thy God and their God, and will give thee the\nland of Canaan for an everlasting possession.\"\n\n_Qu_ What is the third Covenant?\n\n_Ans_ That which God made with all men by His prophets; when He said:\n\"I will gather all nations and tongues, and they shall come and see My\nGlory. I will create new Heavens and a new earth; and the former shall\nnot be remembered, nor come into mind. The Sun shall no more shine by\nday, nor the Moon by night; but the Lord shall be an everlasting light\nand splendor. His Spirit and His Word shall remain with men forever.\nThe heavens shall vanish away like vapor, and the earth shall wax old\nlike a garment, and they that dwell therein shall die; but my salvation\nshall be forever, and my righteousness shall not end; and there shall be\nLight among the Gentiles, and salvation unto the ends of the earth. The\nredeemed of the Lord shall return, and everlasting joy be on their\nheads, and sorrow and mourning shall flee away.\"\n\n_Qu_ What is the symbol of the Triple Covenant?\n\n_Ans_ The Triple Triangle.\n\n_Qu_ Of what else is it the symbol to us?\n\n_Ans_ Of the Trinity of Attributes of the Deity; and of the triple\nessence of Man, the Principle of Life, the Intellectual Power, and the\nSoul or Immortal Emanation from the Deity.\n\n_Qu_ What is the first great Truth of the Sacred Mysteries?\n\n_Ans_ No man hath seen God at any time. He is One, Eternal,\nAll-Powerful, All-Wise, Infinitely Just, Merciful, Benevolent, and\nCompassionate, Creator and Preserver of all things, the Source of Light\nand Life, coextensive with Time and Space; Who thought, and with the\nThought created the Universe and all living things, and the souls of\nmen: THAT IS:--the PERMANENT; while everything beside is a perpetual\ngenesis.\n\n_Qu_ What is the second great Truth of the Sacred Mysteries?\n\n_Ans_ The Soul of Man is Immortal; not the result of organization, nor\nan aggregate of modes of action of matter, nor a succession of phenomena\nand perceptions; but an EXISTENCE, one and identical, a living spirit, a\nspark of the Great Central Light, that hath entered into and dwells in\nthe body; to be separated therefrom at death, and return to God who gave\nit: that doth not disperse nor vanish at death, like breath or a smoke,\nnor can be annihilated; but still exists and possesses activity and\nintelligence, even as it existed in God, before it was enveloped in the\nbody.\n\n_Qu_ What is the third great Truth in Masonry?\n\n_Ans_ The impulse which directs to right conduct, and deters from\ncrime, is not only older than the ages of nations and cities, but coeval\nwith that Divine Being Who sees and rules both Heaven and earth. Nor did\nTarquin less violate that Eternal Law, though in his reign there might\nhave been no written law at Rome against such violence; for the\nprinciple that impels us to right conduct, and warns us against guilt,\nsprings out of the nature of things. It did not begin to be law when it\nwas first _written_, nor was it _originated_; but it is coeval with the\nDivine Intelligence itself. The consequence of virtue is not to be made\nthe end thereof: and laudable performances must have deeper roots,\nmotives and instigations, to give them the stamp of virtues.\n\n_Qu_ What is the fourth great Truth in Masonry?\n\n_Ans_ The moral truths are as absolute as the metaphysical truths. Even\nthe Deity cannot make it that there should be effects without a cause,\nor phenomena without substance. As little could He make it to be sinful\nand evil to respect our pledged word, to love truth, to moderate our\npassions. The principles of Morality are axioms, like the principles of\nGeometry. The moral laws are the necessary relations that flow from the\nnature of things, and they are not created by, but have existed\neternally in God. Their continued existence does not depend upon the\nexercise of His WILL. Truth and Justice are of His ESSENCE. Not because\nwe are feeble and God omnipotent, is it our duty to obey His law. We may\nbe forced, but are not under obligation, to obey the stronger. God is\nthe principle of Morality, but not by His mere will, which, abstracted\nfrom all other of His attributes, would be neither just nor unjust. Good\nis the expression of His will, in so far as that will is itself the\nexpression of eternal, absolute, uncreated justice, which is _in_ God,\nwhich His will did not create; but which it executes and promulgates, as\n_our_ will proclaims and promulgates and executes the idea of the good\nwhich is in us. He has given us the law of Truth and Justice; but He has\nnot arbitrarily instituted that law. Justice is inherent in His will,\nbecause it is contained in His intelligence and wisdom, in His very\nnature and most intimate essence.\n\n_Qu_ What is the fifth great Truth in Masonry?\n\n_Ans_ There is an essential distinction between Good and Evil, what is\njust and what is unjust; and to this distinction is attached, for every\nintelligent and free creature, the absolute obligation of conforming to\nwhat is good and just. Man is an intelligent and free being,--free,\nbecause he is conscious that it is his duty, and because it is _made_\nhis duty, to obey the dictates of truth and justice, and therefore he\nmust necessarily have the power of doing so, which involves the power of\n_not_ doing so;--capable of comprehending the distinction between good\nand evil, justice and injustice, and the obligation which accompanies\nit, and of naturally adhering to that obligation, independently of any\ncontract or positive law; capable also of resisting the temptations\nwhich urge him toward evil and injustice, and of complying with the\nsacred law of eternal justice.\n\nThat man is not governed by a resistless Fate or inexorable Destiny; but\nis free to choose between the evil and the good: that Justice and Right,\nthe Good and Beautiful, are of the essence of the Divinity, like His\nInfinitude; and therefore they are laws to man: that we are conscious of\nour freedom to act, as we are conscious of our identity, and the\ncontinuance and connectedness of our existence; and have the same\nevidence of one as of the other; and if we can put _one_ in doubt, we\nhave no certainty of _either_, and everything is unreal: that we can\ndeny our free will and free agency, only upon the ground that they are\nin the nature of things impossible; which would be to deny the\nOmnipotence of God.\n\n_Qu_ What is the sixth great Truth of Masonry?\n\n_Ans_ The necessity of practising the moral truths, is _obligation_.\nThe moral truths, necessary in the eye of reason, are obligatory on the\nwill. The moral obligation, like the moral truth that is its foundation,\nis _absolute_. As the necessary truths are not more or less necessary,\nso the obligation is not more or less obligatory. There are degrees of\nimportance among different obligations; but none in the obligation\nitself. We are not _nearly_ obliged, _almost_ obliged. We are _wholly_\nso, or not at all. If there be any place of refuge to which we can\nescape from the obligation, it ceases to exist. If the obligation is\nabsolute, it is immutable and universal. For if that of to-day may not\nbe that of to-morrow, if what is obligatory on _me_ may not be\nobligatory on _you_, the obligation would differ from itself, and be\nvariable and contingent. This fact is the principle of all morality.\nThat every act contrary to right and justice, deserves to be repressed\nby force, and punished when committed, equally in the absence of any law\nor contract: that man naturally recognizes the distinction between the\nmerit and demerit of actions, as he does that between justice and\ninjustice, honesty and dishonesty; and feels, without being taught, and\nin the absence of law or contract, that it is wrong for vice to be\nrewarded or go unpunished, and for virtue to be punished or left\nunrewarded: and that, the Deity being infinitely just and good, it must\nfollow as a necessary and inflexible law that punishment shall be the\nresult of Sin, its inevitable and natural effect and corollary, and not\na mere arbitrary vengeance.\n\n_Qu_ What is the seventh great Truth in Masonry?\n\n_Ans_ The immutable law of God requires, that besides respecting the\nabsolute rights of others, and being merely just, we should do good, be\ncharitable, and obey the dictates of the generous and noble sentiments\nof the soul. Charity is a law, because our conscience is not satisfied\nnor at ease if we have not relieved the suffering, the distressed, and\nthe destitute. It is to _give_ that which he to whom you give has no\nright to _take_ or _demand_. To be charitable is obligatory on us. We\nare the Almoners of God's bounties. But the obligation is not so precise\nand inflexible as the obligation to be _just_. Charity knows neither\nrule nor limit. It goes beyond all obligation. Its beauty consists in\nits liberty. \"He that loveth not, knoweth not God; FOR GOD IS LOVE. If\nwe love one another, God dwelleth in us, and His love is perfected in\nus. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love, dwelleth in God, and God\nin him.\" To be kindly affectioned one to another with brotherly love; to\nrelieve the necessities of the needy, and be generous, liberal, and\nhospitable; to return to no man evil for evil; to rejoice at the good\nfortune of others, and sympathize with them in their sorrows and\nreverses; to live peaceably with all men, and repay injuries with\nbenefits and kindness; these are the sublime dictates of the Moral Law,\ntaught from the infancy of the world, by Masonry.\n\n_Qu_ What is the eighth great Truth in Masonry?\n\n_Ans_ That the laws which control and regulate the Universe of God, are\nthose of motion and harmony. We see only the isolated incidents of\nthings, and with our feeble and limited capacity and vision cannot\ndiscern their connection, nor the mighty chords that make the apparent\ndiscord perfect harmony. Evil is merely apparent, and all is in reality\ngood and perfect. For pain and sorrow, persecution and hardships,\naffliction and destitution, sickness and death are but the means, by\nwhich alone the noblest virtues could be developed. Without them, and\nwithout sin and error, and wrong and outrage, as there can be no effect\nwithout an adequate cause, there could be neither patience under\nsuffering and distress; nor prudence in difficulty; nor temperance to\navoid excess; nor courage to meet danger; nor truth, when to speak the\ntruth is hazardous; nor love, when it is met with ingratitude; nor\ncharity for the needy and destitute; nor forbearance and forgiveness of\ninjuries; nor toleration of erroneous opinions; nor charitable judgment\nand construction of men's motives and actions; nor patriotism, nor\nheroism, nor honor, nor self-denial, nor generosity. These and most\nother virtues and excellencies would have no existence, and even their\nnames be unknown; and the poor virtues that still existed, would scarce\ndeserve the name; for life would be one flat, dead, low level, above\nwhich none of the lofty elements of human nature would emerge; and man\nwould lie lapped in contented indolence and idleness, a mere worthless\nnegative, instead of the brave, strong soldier against the grim legions\nof Evil and rude Difficulty.\n\n_Qu_ What is the ninth great Truth in Masonry?\n\n_Ans_ The great leading doctrine of this Degree;--that the JUSTICE, the\nWISDOM, and the MERCY of God are alike infinite, alike perfect, and yet\ndo not in the least jar nor conflict one with the other; but form a\nGreat Perfect Trinity of Attributes, three and yet one: that, the\nprinciple of merit and demerit being absolute, and every good action\ndeserving to be rewarded, and every bad one to be punished, and God\nbeing as just as He is good; and yet the cases constantly recurring in\nthis world, in which crime and cruelty, oppression, tyranny, and\ninjustice are prosperous, happy, fortunate, and self-contented, and rule\nand reign, and enjoy all the blessings of God's beneficence, while the\nvirtuous and good are unfortunate, miserable, destitute, pining away in\ndungeons, perishing with cold, and famishing with hunger, slaves of\noppression, and instruments and victims of the miscreants that govern;\nso that this world, if there were no existence beyond it, would be one\ngreat theatre of wrong and injustice, proving God wholly disregardful of\nHis own necessary law of merit and demerit;--it follows that there must\nbe another life in which these apparent wrongs shall be repaired; That\nall the powers of man's soul tend to infinity; and his indomitable\ninstinct of immortality, and the universal hope of another life,\ntestified by all creeds, all poetry, all traditions, establish its\ncertainty; for man is not an orphan; but hath a Father near at hand: and\nthe day must come when Light and Truth, and the Just and Good shall be\nvictorious, and Darkness, Error, Wrong, and Evil be annihilated, and\nknown no more forever: That the Universe is one great Harmony, in which,\naccording to the faith of all nations, deep-rooted in all hearts in the\nprimitive ages, Light will ultimately prevail over Darkness, and the\nGood Principle over the Evil: and the myriad souls that have emanated\nfrom the Divinity, purified and ennobled by the struggle here below,\nwill again return to perfect bliss in the bosom of God to offend against\nWhose laws will then be no longer possible.\n\n_Qu_ What, then, is the one great lesson taught to us, as Masons, in\nthis Degree?\n\n_Ans_ That to that state and realm of Light and Truth and Perfection,\nwhich is absolutely certain, all the good men on earth are tending; and\nif there is a law from whose operation none are exempt, which inevitably\nconveys their bodies to darkness and to dust, there is another not less\ncertain nor less powerful, which conducts their spirits to that state of\nHappiness and Splendor and Perfection, the bosom of their Father and\ntheir God. The wheels of Nature are not made to roll backward.\nEverything presses on to Eternity. From the birth of Time an impetuous\ncurrent has set in, which bears all the sons of men toward that\ninterminable ocean. Meanwhile, Heaven is attracting to itself whatever\nis congenial to its nature, is enriching itself by the spoils of the\nEarth, and collecting within its capacious bosom whatever is pure,\npermanent, and divine, leaving nothing for the last fire to consume but\nthe gross matter that creates concupiscence; while everything fit for\nthat good fortune shall be gathered and selected from the ruins of the\nworld, to adorn that Eternal City.\n\nLet every Mason then obey the voice that calls him thither. Let us seek\nthe things that are above, and be not content with a world that must\nshortly perish, and which we must speedily quit, while we neglect to\nprepare for that in which we are invited to dwell forever. While\neverything within us and around us reminds us of the approach of death,\nand concurs to teach us that this is not our rest, let us hasten our\npreparations for another world, and earnestly implore that help and\nstrength from our Father, which alone can put an end to that fatal war\nwhich our desires have too long waged with our destiny. When these move\nin the same direction, and that which God's will renders unavoidable\nshall become our choice, all things will be ours; life will be divested\nof its vanity, and death disarmed of its terrors.\n\n_Qu_ What are the symbols of the purification necessary to make us\nperfect Masons?\n\n_Ans_ Lavation with pure water, or baptism; because to cleanse the body\nis emblematical of purifying the soul; and because it conduces to the\nbodily health, and virtue is the health of the soul, as sin and vice are\nits malady and sickness:--unction, or anointing with oil; because\nthereby we are set apart and dedicated to the service and priesthood of\nthe Beautiful, the True, and the Good:--and robes of white, emblems of\ncandor, purity, and truth.\n\n_Qu_ What is to us the chief symbol of man's ultimate redemption and\nregeneration?\n\n_Ans_ The fraternal supper, of bread which nourishes, and of wine which\nrefreshes and exhilarates, symbolical of the time which is to come, when\nall mankind shall be one great harmonious brotherhood; and teaching us\nthese great lessons: that as matter changes ever, but no single atom is\nannihilated, it is not rational to suppose that the far nobler soul does\nnot continue to exist beyond the grave: that many thousands who have\ndied before us might claim to be joint owners with ourselves of the\nparticles that compose our mortal bodies; for matter ever forms, new\ncombinations; and the bodies of the ancient dead, the patriarchs before\nand since the flood, the kings and common people of all ages, resolved\ninto their constituent elements, are carried upon the wind over all\ncontinents, and continually enter into and form part of the habitations\nof new souls, creating new bonds of sympathy and brotherhood between\neach man that lives and all his race. And thus, in the bread we eat, and\nin the wine we drink to-night _may_ enter into and form part of us the\nidentical particles of matter that once formed parts of the material\nbodies called Moses, Confucius, Plato, Socrates, or Jesus of Nazareth.\nIn the truest sense, we eat and drink the bodies of the dead; and cannot\nsay that there is a single atom of our blood or body, the ownership of\nwhich some other soul might not dispute with us. It teaches us also the\ninfinite beneficence of God who sends us seed-time and harvest, each in\nits season, and makes His showers to fall and His sun to shine alike\nupon the evil and the good: bestowing upon us unsolicited His\ninnumerable blessings, and asking no return. For there are no angels\nstationed upon the watch-towers of creation to call the world to prayer\nand sacrifice; but He bestows His benefits in silence, like a kind\nfriend who comes at night, and, leaving his gifts at the door, to be\nfound by us in the morning, goes quietly away and asks no thanks, nor\nceases his kind offices for our ingratitude. And thus the bread and wine\nteach us that our Mortal Body is no more WE than the house in which we\nlive, or the garments that we wear; but the Soul is I, the ONE,\nidentical, unchangeable, immortal emanation from the Deity, to return\nto God and be forever happy, in His good time; as our mortal bodies,\ndissolving, return to the elements from which they came, their particles\ncoming and going ever in perpetual genesis. To our Jewish Brethren, this\nsupper is symbolical of the Passover: to the Christian Mason, of that\neaten by Christ and His Disciples when, celebrating the Passover, He\nbroke bread and gave it to them, saying, \"Take! eat! this is My body;\"\nand giving them the cup, He said, \"Drink ye all of it! for this is My\nblood of the New Testament, which is shed for many for the remission of\nsins;\" thus symbolizing the perfect harmony and union between Himself\nand the faithful; and His death upon the cross for the salvation of man.\n\nThe history of Masonry is the history of Philosophy. Masons do not\npretend to set themselves up for instructors of the human race: but,\nthough Asia produced and preserved the Mysteries, Masonry has, in Europe\nand America, given regularity to their doctrines, spirit, and action,\nand developed the moral advantages which mankind may reap from them.\nMore consistent, and more simple in its mode of procedure, it has put an\nend to the vast allegorical pantheon of ancient mythologies, and itself\nbecome a science.\n\nNone can deny that Christ taught a lofty morality. \"Love one another:\nforgive those that despitefully use you and persecute you: be pure of\nheart, meek, humble, contented: lay not up riches on earth, but in\nHeaven: submit to the powers lawfully over you: become like these little\nchildren, or ye cannot be saved, for of such is the Kingdom of Heaven:\nforgive the repentant; and cast no stone at the sinner, if you too have\nsinned: do unto others as ye would have others do unto you:\" such, and\nnot abstruse questions of theology, were His simple and sublime\nteachings.\n\nThe early Christians followed in His footsteps. The first preachers of\nthe faith had no thought of domination. Entirely animated by His saying,\nthat he among them should be first, who should serve with the greatest\ndevotion, they were humble, modest, and charitable, and they knew how to\ncommunicate this spirit of the inner man to the churches under their\ndirection. These churches were at first but spontaneous meetings of all\nChristians inhabiting the same locality. A pure and severe morality,\nmingled with religious enthusiasm, was the characteristic of each, and\nexcited the admiration even of their persecutors. Everything was in\ncommon among them; their property, their joys, and their sorrows. In the\nsilence of night they met for instruction and to pray together. Their\nlove-feasts, or fraternal repasts, ended these reunions, in which all\ndifferences in social position and rank were effaced in the presence of\na paternal Divinity. Their sole object was to make men better, by\nbringing them back to a simple worship, of which universal morality was\nthe basis; and to end those numerous and cruel sacrifices which\neverywhere inundated with blood the altars of the gods. Thus did\nChristianity reform the world, and obey the teachings of its founder. It\ngave to woman her proper rank and influence; it regulated domestic life;\nand by admitting the slaves to the love-feasts, it by degrees raised\nthem above that oppression under which half of mankind had groaned for\nages.\n\nThis, in its purity, as taught by Christ Himself, was the true primitive\nreligion, as communicated by God to the Patriarchs. It was no new\nreligion, but the reproduction of the oldest of all; and its true and\nperfect morality is the morality of Masonry, as is the morality of every\ncreed of antiquity.\n\nIn the early days of Christianity, there was an initiation like those of\nthe pagans. Persons were admitted on special conditions only. To arrive\nat a complete knowledge of the doctrine, they had to pass three degrees\nof instruction. The initiates were consequently divided into three\nclasses; the first, _Auditors_, the second, _Catechumens_, and the\nthird, _the Faithful_. The Auditors were a sort of novices, who were\nprepared by certain ceremonies and certain instruction to receive the\ndogmas of Christianity. A portion of these dogmas was made known to the\nCatechumens; who, after particular purifications, received baptism, or\nthe initiation of the _theogenesis (divine generation)_; but in the\ngrand mysteries of that religion, the incarnation, nativity, passion,\nand resurrection of Christ, none were initiated but _the Faithful_.\nThese doctrines, and the celebration of the Holy Sacraments,\nparticularly the Eucharist, were kept with profound secrecy. These\nMysteries were divided into two parts; the first styled the Mass of the\nCatechumens; the second, the Mass of the Faithful. The celebration of\nthe Mysteries of Mithras was also styled _a mass_; and the ceremonies\nused were the same. There were found all the sacraments of the Catholic\nChurch, even the breath of confirmation. The Priest of Mithras promised\nthe Initiates deliverance from sin, by means of confession and baptism,\nand a future life of happiness or misery. He celebrated the oblation of\nbread, image of the resurrection. The baptism of newly-born children,\nextreme unction, confession of sins,--all belonged to the Mithriac\nrites. The candidate was purified by a species of baptism, a mark was\nimpressed upon his forehead, he offered bread and water, pronouncing\ncertain mysterious words.\n\nDuring the persecutions in the early ages of Christianity, the\nChristians took refuge in the vast catacombs which stretched for miles\nin every direction under the city of Rome, and are supposed to have been\nof Etruscan origin. There, amid labyrinthine windings, deep caverns,\nhidden chambers, chapels, and tombs, the persecuted fugitives found\nrefuge, and there they performed the ceremonies of the Mysteries.\n\nThe Basilideans, a sect of Christians that arose soon after the time of\nthe Apostles, practised the Mysteries, with the old Egyptian legend.\nThey symbolized Osiris by the Sun, Isis by the Moon, and Typhon by\nScorpio; and wore crystals bearing these emblems, as amulets or\ntalismans to protect them from danger; upon which were also a brilliant\nstar and the serpent. They were copied from the talismans of Persia and\nArabia, and given to every candidate at his initiation.\n\nIren\u00e6us tells us that the Simonians, one of the earliest sects of the\nGnostics, had a Priesthood of the Mysteries.\n\nTertullian tells us that the Valentinians, the most celebrated of all\nthe Gnostic schools, imitated, or rather perverted, the Mysteries of\nEleusis. Iren\u00e6us informs us, in several curious chapters, of the\nMysteries practised by the Marcosians; and Origen gives much information\nas to the Mysteries of the Ophites; and there is no doubt that all the\nGnostic sects had Mysteries and an initiation. They all claimed to\npossess a secret doctrine, coming to them directly from Jesus Christ,\ndifferent from that of the Gospels and Epistles, and superior to those\ncommunications, which in their eyes, were merely exoteric. This secret\ndoctrine they did not communicate to every one; and among the extensive\nsect of the Basilideans hardly one in a thousand knew it, as we learn\nfrom Iren\u00e6us. We know the name of only the highest class of their\nInitiates. They were styled _Elect_ or _Elus_ [[Greek: \u0388\u03ba\u03bb\u03b5\u03ba\u03c4\u03bf\u03af]], and\nStrangers to the World [[Greek: \u03be\u03ad\u03bd\u03bf\u03b9 \u03ad\u03bd \u03ba\u03cc\u03c3\u03bc\u03ce]]. They had at least\nthree Degrees--the _Material_, the _Intellectual_, and the _Spiritual_,\nand the lesser and greater Mysteries; and the number of those who\nattained the highest Degree was quite small.\n\nBaptism was one of their most important ceremonies; and the Basilideans\ncelebrated the 10th of January, as the anniversary of the day on which\nChrist was baptized in Jordan.\n\nThey had the ceremony of laying on of hands, by way of purification; and\nthat of the mystic banquet, emblem of that to which they believed the\nHeavenly Wisdom would one day admit them, in the fullness of things\n[[Greek: \u03a0\u03bb\u03ae\u03c1\u03c9\u03bc\u03b1]].\n\nTheir ceremonies were much more like those of the Christians than those\nof Greece; but they mingled with them much that was borrowed from the\nOrient and Egypt: and taught the primitive truths, mixed with a\nmultitude of fantastic errors and fictions.\n\nThe discipline of the secret was the concealment (_occultatio_) of\ncertain tenets and ceremonies. So says Clemens of Alexandria.\n\nTo avoid persecution, the early Christians were compelled to use great\nprecaution, and to hold meetings of the Faithful [_of the Household of\nFaith_] in private places, under concealment by darkness. They assembled\nin the night, and they guarded against the intrusion of false brethren\nand profane persons, spies who might cause their arrest. They conversed\ntogether figuratively, and by the use of symbols, lest cowans and\neavesdroppers might overhear: and there existed among them a favored\nclass, or Order, who were initiated into certain Mysteries which they\nwere bound by solemn promise not to disclose, or even converse about,\nexcept with such as had received them under the same sanction. They were\ncalled _Brethren, the Faithful, Stewards of the Mysteries,\nSuperintendents, Devotees of the Secret_, and ARCHITECTS.\n\nIn the _Hierarchi\u0153_, attributed to St. Dionysius the Areopagite, the\nfirst Bishop of Athens, the tradition of the sacrament is said to have\nbeen divided into three Degrees, or grades, _purification, initiation_,\nand _accomplishment_ or _perfection_; and it mentions also, as part of\nthe ceremony, _the bringing to sight_.\n\nThe Apostolic Constitutions, attributed to Clemens, Bishop of Rome,\ndescribe the early church, and say: \"These regulations must on no\naccount be communicated to all sorts of persons, because of the\nMysteries contained in them.\" They speak of the Deacon's duty to keep\nthe doors, that none uninitiated should enter at the oblation.\n_Ostiarii_, or doorkeepers, kept guard, and gave notice of the time of\nprayer and church-assemblies; and also by private signal, in times of\npersecution, gave notice to those within, to enable them to avoid\ndanger. The Mysteries were open to the _Fideles_ or _Faithful_ only; and\nno spectators were allowed at the communion.\n\nTertullian, who died about A.D. 216, says in his _Apology_: \"None are\nadmitted to the religious Mysteries without an oath of secrecy. We\nappeal to your Thracian and Eleusinian Mysteries; and we are especially\nbound to this caution, because if we prove faithless, we should not only\nprovoke Heaven, but draw upon our heads the utmost rigor of human\ndispleasure. And should strangers betray us? They know nothing but by\nreport and hearsay. Far hence, ye Profane! is the prohibition from all\nholy Mysteries.\"\n\nClemens, Bishop of Alexandria, born about A.D. 191, says, in his\n_Stromata_, that he cannot explain the Mysteries, because he should\nthereby, according to the old proverb, put a sword into the hands of a\nchild. He frequently compares the Discipline of the Secret with the\nheathen Mysteries, as to their internal and recondite wisdom.\n\nWhenever the early Christians happened to be in company with strangers,\nmore properly termed _the Profane_, they never spoke of their\nsacraments, but indicated to one another what they meant by means of\nsymbols and secret watchwords, disguisedly, and as by direct\ncommunication of mind with mind, and by enigmas.\n\nOrigen, born A.D. 134 or 135, answering Celsus, who had objected that\nthe Christians had a concealed doctrine said: \"Inasmuch as the essential\nand important doctrines and principles of Christianity are openly\ntaught, it is foolish to object that there are other things that are\nrecondite; for this is common to Christian discipline with that of those\nphilosophers in whose teaching some things were exoteric and some\nesoteric: and it is enough to say that it was so with some of the\ndisciples of Pythagoras.\"\n\nThe formula which the primitive church pronounced at the moment of\ncelebrating its Mysteries, was this: \"Depart, ye Profane! Let the\nCatechumens, and those who have not been admitted or initiated, go\nforth.\"\n\nArchelaus, Bishop of Cascara in Mesopotamia, who, in the year 278,\nconducted a controversy with the Manich\u00e6ans, said: \"These Mysteries the\nchurch now communicates to him who has passed through the introductory\nDegree. They are not explained to the Gentiles at all; nor are they\ntaught openly in the hearing of Catechumens: but much that is spoken is\nin disguised terms, that the Faithful ([Greek: \u03a0\u03b9\u03c3\u03c4\u03bf\u03af]), who possess\nthe knowledge, may be still more informed, and those who are not\nacquainted with it, may suffer no disadvantage.\"\n\nCyril, Bishop of Jerusalem, was born in the year 315, and died in 386,\nIn his _Catechesis_ he says; \"The Lord spake in parables to His hearers\nin general; but to His disciples He explained in private the parables\nand allegories which He spoke in public. The splendor of glory is for\nthose who are early enlightened: obscurity and darkness are the portion\nof the unbelievers and ignorant. Just so the church discovers its\nMysteries to those who have advanced beyond the class of Catechumens: we\nemploy obscure terms with others.\"\n\nSt. Basil, the Great Bishop of C\u00e6sarea, born in the year 326, and dying\nin the year 376, says: \"We receive the dogmas transmitted to us by\nwriting, and those which have descended to us from the Apostles, beneath\nthe mystery of oral tradition: for several things have been handed to us\nwithout writing, lest the vulgar, too familiar with our dogmas, should\nlose a due respect for them. ... This is what the uninitiated are not\npermitted to contemplate; and how should it ever be proper to write and\ncirculate among the people an account of them?\"\n\nSt. Gregory Nazianzen, Bishop of Constantinople, A.D. 379, says; \"You\nhave heard as much of the Mystery as we are allowed to speak openly in\nthe ears of all; the rest will be communicated to you in private; and\nthat you must retain within yourself.... Our Mysteries are not to be\nmade known to strangers.\"\n\nSt Ambrose, Archbishop of Milan, who was born in 340, and died in 393,\nsays in his work _De Mysteries_: \"All the Mystery should be kept\nconcealed, guarded by faithful silence, lest it should be inconsiderately\ndivulged to the ears of the Profane..... It is not given to all to\ncontemplate the depths of our Mysteries..... that they may not be seen\nby those who ought not to behold them; nor received by those who cannot\npreserve them.\" And in another work: \"He sins against God, who divulges\nto the unworthy the Mysteries confided to him. The danger is not merely\nin violating truth, but in telling truth, if he allow himself to give\nhints of them to those from whom they ought to be concealed.....Beware\nof casting pearls before swine!... Every Mystery ought to be kept\nsecret; as it were, to be covered over by silence, lest it should rashly\nbe divulged to the ears of the Profane. Take heed that you do not\nincautiously reveal the Mysteries!\"\n\nSt. Augustine, Bishop of Hippo, who was born in 347, and died in 430,\nsays in one of his discourses: \"Having dismissed the Catechumens, we\nhave retained you only to be our hearers; because besides those things\nwhich belong to all Christians in common, we are now to discourse to you\nof sublime Mysteries, which none are qualified to hear, but those who,\nby the Master's favor, are made partakers of them.....To have taught\nthem openly, would have been to betray them.\" And he refers to the Ark\nof the Covenant and says that it signified a Mystery, or secret of God,\nshadowed over by the cherubim of glory, and honored by being veiled.\n\nSt. Chrysostom and St. Augustine speak of initiation more than fifty\ntimes. St. Ambrose writes to those who are initiated; and initiation was\nnot merely baptism, or admission into the church, but it referred to\ninitiation into the Mysteries. To the baptized and initiated the\nMysteries of religion were unveiled; they were kept secret from the\nCatechumens; who were permitted to hear the Scriptures read and the\nordinary discourses delivered, in which the Mysteries, reserved for the\nFaithful, were never treated of. When the services and prayers were\nended, the Catechumens and spectators all withdrew.\n\nChrysostom, Bishop of Constantinople, was born in 354, and died in 417.\nHe says: \"I wish to speak openly: but I dare not, on account of those\nwho are not initiated. I shall therefore avail myself of disguised\nterms, discoursing in a shadowy manner..... Where the holy Mysteries are\ncelebrated, we drive away all uninitiated persons, and then close the\ndoors\" He mentions the acclamations of the initiated; \"which\", he says,\n\"I here pass over in silence; for it is forbidden to disclose such\nthings to the Profane\". Palladius, in his life of Chrysostom, records, as\na great outrage, that, a tumult having been excited against him by his\nenemies, they forced their way into the _penetralia_, where the\nuninitiated beheld what was not proper for them to see; and Chrysostom\nmentions the same circumstance in his epistle to Pope Innocent.\n\nSt. Cyril of Alexandria, who was made Bishop in 412, and died in 444,\nsays in his 7th Book against Julian: \"These Mysteries are so profound\nand so exalted, that they can be comprehended by those only who are\nenlightened. I shall not, therefore, attempt to speak of what is so\nadmirable in them, lest by discovering them to the uninitiated, I\nshould offend against the injunction not to give what is holy to the\nimpure, nor cast pearls before such as cannot estimate their worth.....I\nshould say much more, if I were not afraid of being heard by those who\nare uninitiated: because men are apt to deride what they do not\nunderstand. And the ignorant, not being aware of the weakness of their\nminds, condemn what they ought most to venerate.\"\n\nTheodoret, Bishop of Cyropolis in Syria, was born in 393, and made\nBishop in 420. In one of his three Dialogues, called the Immutable, he\nintroduces _Orthodoxus_, speaking thus: \"Answer me, if you please, in\nmystical or obscure terms: for perhaps there are some persons present\nwho are not initiated into the Mysteries.\" And in his preface to\nEzekiel, tracing up the secret discipline to the commencement of the\nChristian era, he says: \"These Mysteries are so august, that we ought to\nkeep them with the greatest caution.\"\n\nMinucius Felix, an eminent lawyer of Rome, who lived in 212, and wrote a\ndefence of Christianity, says: \"Many of them [the Christians] know each\nother by tokens and signs (_notis et insignibus_), and they form a\nfriendship for each other, almost before they become acquainted.\"\n\nThe Latin Word, _tessera_, originally meant a square piece of wood or\nstone, used in making tesselated pavements; afterward a tablet on which\nanything was written, and then a cube or die. Its most general use was\nto designate a piece of metal or wood, square in shape, on which the\nwatchword of an Army was inscribed; whence _tessera_ came to mean the\nwatchword itself. There was also a _tessera hospitalis_, which was a\npiece of wood cut into two parts, as a pledge of friendship. Each party\nkept one of the parts; and they swore mutual fidelity by Jupiter. To\nbreak the _tessera_ was considered a dissolution of the friendship. The\nearly Christians used it as a Mark, the watchword of friendship. With\nthem it was generally in the shape of a fish, and made of bone. On its\nface was inscribed the word [Greek: \u038a\u03c7\u03b8\u03cd\u03c2], a fish, the initials of\nwhich represented the Greek words, [Greek: \u0399\u03b7\u03c3\u03bf\u03cd\u03c2 \u03a7\u03c1\u03b9\u03c3\u03c4\u03cc\u03c2 \u03f4\u03b5\u03bf\u03cd \u03a5\u03af\u03cc\u03c2\n\u03a3\u03c9\u03c4\u03ae\u03c1]; _Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the Saviour_.\n\nSt. Augustine (_de Fide et Symbolis_) says: \"This is the faith which in\na few words is given to the Novices to be kept by a symbol; these few\nwords are known to all the Faithful; that by believing they may be\nsubmissive to God; by being thus submissive, they may live rightly; by\nliving rightly, they may purify their hearts and with a pure heart may\nunderstand what they believe.\"\n\nMaximus Taurinus says: \"The tessera is a symbol and sign by which to\ndistinguish between the Faithful and the Profane.\"\n\nThere are _three_ Degrees in Blue Masonry; and in addition to the two\nwords of two syllables each, embodying the binary, three of three\nsyllables each. There were three Grand Masters, the two Kings, and\nKhir-Om the Artificer. The candidate gains admission by three raps, and\nthree raps call up the Brethren. There are three principal officers of\nthe Lodge, three lights at the Altar, three gates of the Temple, all in\nthe East, West, and South. The three lights represent the Sun, the Moon,\nand Mercury; Osiris, Isis, and Horus; the Father, the Mother, and the\nChild; Wisdom, Strength, and Beauty; Hakamah, Binah, and Daath; Gedulah,\nGeburah, and Tepareth. The candidate makes three circuits of the Lodge:\nthere were three assassins of Khir-Om, and he was slain by three blows\nwhile seeking to escape by the three gates of the Temple. The\nejaculation at his grave was repeated three times. There are three\ndivisions of the Temple, and three, five, and seven Steps. A Master\nworks with Chalk, Charcoal, and a vessel of Clay; there are three\nmovable and three immovable jewels. The Triangle appears among the\nSymbols: the two parallel lines enclosing the circle are connected at\ntop, as are the Columns Jachin and Boaz, symbolizing the equilibrium\nwhich explains the great Mysteries of Nature.\n\nThis continual reproduction of the number three is not accidental, nor\nwithout a profound meaning: and we shall find the same repeated in all\nthe Ancient philosophies.\n\nThe Egyptian Gods formed Triads, the third member in each proceeding\nfrom the other two. Thus we have the Triad of Thebes, Amun, Maut, and\nKharso; that of Philae, Osiris, Isis, and Horus; that of Elephantin\u0113 and\nthe Cataracts, Neph, Sate, and Anouk\u0113.\n\nOsiris, Isis, and Horus were the Father, Mother, and Son; the latter\nbeing Light, the Soul of the World, the Son, the Protogonos or\nFirst-Begotten.\n\nSometimes this Triad was regarded as SPIRIT, or the _active_ Principle\nor Generative Power; MATTER, or the PASSIVE Principle or Productive\nCapacity; and the Universe, which proceeds from the two Principles.\n\nWe also find in Egypt this Triad or Trinity; Ammon-Ra, the Creator:\nOsiris-Ra, the Giver of Fruitfulness: Horus-Ra, the Queller of Light;\nsymbolized by the Summer, Autumn, and Spring Sun. For the Egyptians had\nbut three Seasons, the three gates of the Temple; and on account of the\ndifferent effects of the Sun on those three Seasons, the Deity appears\nin these three forms.\n\nThe Ph\u0153nician Trinity was Ulomos, Chusoros, and the Egg out of which the\nUniverse proceeded.\n\nThe Chaldean Triad consisted of Bel, [the Persian Zervana Akherana],\nOromasdes, and Ahriman; the Good and Evil Principle alike outflowing\nfrom the Father, by their equilibrium and alternating preponderance to\nproduce harmony. Each was to rule, in turn, for equal periods, until\nfinally the Evil Principle should itself become good.\n\nThe Chaldean and Persian oracles of Zoroaster give us the Triad, Fire,\nLight, and Ether.\n\nOrpheus celebrates the Triad of Phanes, Ouranos, and Kronos. Corry says\nthe Orphic Trinity consisted of Metis, Phanes, and Ericapaeus; Will,\nLight or Love, and Life. Acusilaus makes it consist of Metis, Eros, and\n\u00c6ther: Will, Love, and Ether. Phereycides of Syros, of Fire, Water, and\nAir or Spirit. In the two former we readily recognize Osiris and Isis,\nthe Sun and the Nile.\n\nThe first three of the Persian Amshaspands were BAHMAN, the Lord of\nLIGHT; Ardibehest, the Lord of FIRE; and Shariver, the Lord of SPLENDOR.\nThese at once lead us back to the Kabala.\n\nPlutarch says: \"The better and diviner nature consists of three; the\nIntelligible (_i.e._ that which exists within the Intellect only as\nyet), and Matter; [Greek: \u03c4\u03bf \u039d\u03bf\u03b7\u03c4\u03bf\u03c2] and [Greek: \u038e\u03bb\u03b7], and that which\nproceeds from these, which the Greeks call Kosmos: of which Plato calls\nthe Intelligible, the Idea, the Exemplar, the Father: Matter, the\nMother, the Nurse, and the receptacle and place of generation: and the\nissue of these two, the Offspring and Genesis.\"\n\nThe Pythagorean fragments say: \"Therefore, before the Heaven was made,\nthere existed Idea and Matter, and God the Demiourgos [workman or active\ninstrument], of the former. He made the world out of matter, perfect,\nonly-begotten, with a soul and intellect, and constituted it a\ndivinity.\"\n\nPlato gives us Thought, the Father; Primitive Matter, the Mother; and\nKOSMOS, the Son, the issue of the two Principles. Kosmos is the ensouled\nUniverse.\n\nWith the later Platonists, the Triad was Potence, Intellect, and Spirit,\nPhilo represents Sanchoniathon's as Fire, Light, and Flame, the three\nSons of Genos; but this is the Alexandrian, not the Ph\u0153nician idea.\n\nAurelius says the Demiourgos or Creator is triple, and the three\nIntellects are the three Kings: He who exists; He who possesses; He who\nbeholds. The first is that which exists by its essence; the second\nexists in the first, and contains or possesses in itself the Universal\nof things; all that afterward becomes: the third beholds this Universal,\nformed and fashioned intellectually, and so having a separate existence.\nThe Third exists in the Second, and the Second in the First.\n\nThe most ancient Trinitarian doctrine on record is that of the Brahmins.\nThe Eternal Supreme Essence, called PARABRAHMA, BRAHM, PARATMA, produced\nthe Universe by self-reflection, and first revealed himself as BRAHMA,\nthe _Creating_ Power, then as VISHNU, the Preserving Power, and lastly\nas SIVA, the _Destroying_ and _Renovating_ Power; the three Modes in\nwhich the Supreme Essence reveals himself in the material Universe; but\nwhich soon came to be regarded as three distinct Deities. These three\nDeities they styled the TRIMURTI, or TRIAD.\n\nThe Persians received from the Indians the doctrine of the three\nprinciples, and changed it to that of a principle of Life, which was\nindividualized by the Sun, and a principle of Death, which was\nsymbolized by cold and darkness; parallel of the moral world; and in\nwhich the continual and alternating struggle between light and darkness,\nlife and death, seemed but a phase of the great struggle between the\ngood and evil principles, embodied in the legend of ORMUZD and AHRIMAN.\nMITHRAS, a Median reformer, was deified after his death, and invested\nwith the attributes of the Sun; the different astronomical phenomena\nbeing figuratively detailed as actual incidents of his life; in the same\nmanner as the history of BUDDHA was invented among the Hind\u016bs.\n\nThe Trinity of the Hind\u016bs became among the Ethiopians and Abyssinians\nNEPH-AMON, PHTHA, and NEITH--the God CREATOR, whose emblem was a\nram--MATTER, or the primitive mud, symbolized by a globe or an egg, and\nTHOUGHT, or the LIGHT which contains the germ of everything; triple\nmanifestation of one and the same God (ATHOM), considered in three\naspects, as the _creative power, goodness_, and _wisdom_. Other Deities\nwere speedily invented; and among them OSIRIS, represented by the Sun,\nISIS, his wife, by the Moon or Earth, TYPHON, his Brother, the\nPrinciple of Evil and Darkness, who was the son of Osiris and Isis. And\nthe Trinity of OSIRIS, ISIS, and HORUS became subsequently the Chief\nGods and objects of worship of the Egyptians.\n\nThe ancient Etruscans (a race that emigrated from the Rh\u00e6tian Alps into\nItaly, along whose route evidences of their migration have been\ndiscovered, and whose language none have yet succeeded in reading)\nacknowledged only one Supreme God; but they had images for His different\nattributes, and temples to these images. Each town had one National\nTemple, dedicated to the three great attributes of God, STRENGTH,\nRICHES, and WISDOM, or _Tina, Talna_, and _Minerva_. The National Deity\nwas always a Triad under one roof; and it was the same in Egypt, where\none Supreme God alone was acknowledged, but was worshipped as a Triad,\nwith different names in each different home. Each city in Etruria might\nhave as many gods and gates and temples as it pleased; but three sacred\ngates, and one Temple to three Divine Attributes were obligatory,\nwherever the laws of Tages (or Taunt or Thoth) were received. The only\ngate that remains in Italy, of the olden time, undestroyed, is the Porta\ndel Circo at Volterra; and it has upon it the three heads of the three\nNational Divinities, one upon the keystone of its magnificent arch, and\none above each side-pillar.\n\nThe Buddhists hold that the God SAKYA of the Hind\u016bs, called in Ceylon,\nGAUTAMA, in India beyond the Ganges, SOMONAKODOM, and in China, CHY-KIA,\nor Fo, constituted a Trinity [TRIRATNA], of BUDDHA, DHARMA, and\nSANGA,--_Intelligence, Law_, and _Union_ or _Harmony_.\n\nThe Chinese Sab\u00e6ans represented the Supreme Deity as composed of\nCHANG-TI, the _Supreme Sovereign_; TIEN, the _Heavens_; and TAO, the\n_Universal Supreme Reason_ and _Principle of Faith_; and that from\nChaos, an immense silence, an immeasurable void without perceptible\nforms, alone, infinite, immutable, moving in a circle in illimitable\nspace, without change or alteration, when vivified by the Principle of\nTruth, issued all Beings, under the influence of TAO, Principle of\nFaith, who produced one, one produced two, two produced three, and three\nproduced all that is.\n\nThe Sclavono-Vendes typified the Trinity by the three heads of the God\nTRICLAV; and the Pruczi or Prussians by the Tri-une God PERKOUN,\nPIKOLLOS, and POTRIMPOS, the Deities of _Light_ and _Thunder_, of\n_Hell_ and the _Earth_, its fruits and animals: and the Scandinavians by\nODIN, FREA, and THOR.\n\nIn the KABALAH, or the Hebrew traditional philosophy, the Infinite\nDeity, beyond the reach of the Human Intellect, and without Name, Form,\nor Limitation, was represented as developing Himself, in order to\ncreate, and by self-limitation, in ten emanations or out-flowings,\ncalled SEPHIROTH, or _rays_. The first of these, in the world AZILUTH,\nthat is, within the Deity, was KETHER, or the _Crown_, by which we\nunderstand the Divine Will or Potency. Next came, as a pair, HAKEMAH and\nBAINAH, ordinarily translated \"Wisdom\" and \"Intelligence,\" the former\ntermed the FATHER, and the latter the MOTHER. HAKEMAH is the active\n_Power_ or _Energy_ of Deity, by which He produces within Himself\nIntellection or Thinking: and BAINAH, the passive _Capacity_, from\nwhich, acted on by the Power, the Intellection flows. This Intellection\nis called DAATH: and it is the \"WORD,\" of Plato and the Gnostics; the\n_unuttered_ word, _within_ the Deity. Here is the origin of the Trinity\nof the Father, the Mother or Holy Spirit, and the Son or Word.\n\nAnother Trinity was composed of the fourth Sephirah, GEDULAH or KHASED,\n_Benignity_ or _Mercy_, also termed FATHER (_Aba_); the fifth, GEBURAH,\n_Severity_ or Strict _Justice_, also termed the MOTHER (_Imma_); and the\nsixth, the SON or _Issue_ of these, TIPHARETH, _Beauty_ or _Harmony_.\n\"Everything,\" says the SOHAR, \"proceeds according to the Mystery of the\nBalance\"--that is, by the equilibrium of Opposites: and thus from the\nInfinite Mercy and the Infinite Justice, in equilibrium, flows the\nperfect Harmony of the Universe. Infinite POWER, which is Lawless, and\nInfinite WISDOM, in Equilibrium, also produce BEAUTY or HARMONY, as Son,\nIssue, or Result--the Word, or utterance of the Thought of God. Power\nand Justice or Severity are the _same_: Wisdom and Mercy or Benignity\nare the same;--in the Infinite Divine Nature.\n\nAccording to Philo of Alexandria, the Supreme Being, Primitive Light or\nArchetype of Light, uniting with WISDOM [\u03a3\u03bf\u03c8\u03b9\u03b1], the mother of Creation,\nforms in Himself the types of all things, and acts upon the Universe\nthrough the WORD [\u039b\u03bf\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2 ... Logos], who dwells in God, and in whom all\nHis powers and attributes develop themselves; a doctrine borrowed by him\nfrom Plato.\n\nSimon Magus and his disciples taught that the Supreme Being or Centre of\nLight produced first of all, three couples of united Existences, of\nboth sexes, [[Greek: \u03a3\u03c5\u03b6\u03c5\u03b3\u03af\u03b1\u03c2] ...Suzugias], which were the origins of\nall things: REASON and INVENTIVENESS; SPEECH and THOUGHT; CALCULATION\nand REFLECTION: [[Greek: \u039d\u03bf\u03cd\u03c2] and [Greek: \u0395\u03c0\u03af\u03bd\u03bf\u03b9a, \u03a6\u03c9\u03bd\u03ae] and [Greek:\n\u0395\u03bd\u03bd\u03bf\u03b9\u03b1, \u039b\u03bf\u03b3\u03b9\u03c3\u03bc\u03cc\u03c2] and [Greek: \u0395\u03bd\u03b8\u03cd\u03bc\u03b7\u03c3\u03b9\u03c2] ... N\u00f6us and Epinoia, Ph\u014dne and\nEnnoia, Logismos and Enthum\u0113sis]; of which Ennoia or WISDOM was the\nfirst produced, and Mother of all that exists.\n\nOther Disciples of Simon, and with them most of the Gnostics, adopting\nand modifying the doctrine, taught that the [Greek: \u03a0\u03bb\u03ae\u03c1\u03c9\u03bc\u03b1] .. Pler\u014dma,\nor PLENITUDE of Superior Intelligences, having the Supreme Being at\ntheir head, was composed of eight Eons [[Greek: \u0391\u03af\u03cc\u03bd\u03b7\u03c2] .. Ai\u014dnes] of\ndifferent sexes;.. PROFUNDITY and SILENCE; SPIRIT and TRUTH; the WORD\nand LIFE; MAN and the CHURCH: [[Greek: \u0392\u03c5\u03b8\u03cc\u03c2] and [Greek: \u03a3\u03b9\u03b3\u03ae; \u03a0\u03bd\u03b5\u03cb\u03bc\u03b1]\nand [Greek: \u0391\u03bb\u03ae\u03b8\u03b5\u03b9\u03b1; \u039b\u03cc\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2] and [Greek: \u0396\u03c9\u03ae; \u0391\u03bd\u03b8\u03c1\u03c9\u03c0\u03bf\u03c2] and [Greek:\n\u0388\u03ba\u03ba\u03bb\u03b7\u03c3\u03af\u03b1] ... Buthos and Sig\u0113; Pneuma and Aletheia; Logos and Z\u014de;\nAnthr\u014dpos and Ekkl\u0113sia].\n\nBardesanes, whose doctrines the Syrian Christians long embraced, taught\nthat the unknown Father, happy in the Plenitude of His Life and\nPerfections, first produced a Companion for Himself [[Greek: \u03a3\u03cd\u03b6\u03c5\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2]\n... Suzugos], whom He placed in the Celestial Paradise and who became,\nby Him, the Mother of CHRISTOS, Son of the Living God: _i.e._ (laying\naside the allegory), that the Eternal conceived, in the silence of His\ndecrees, the Thought of revealing Himself by a Being who should be His\nimage or His Son: that to the Son succeeded his Sister and Spouse, the\nHoly Spirit, and they produced four Spirits of the elements, male and\nfemale, Maio and Jabseho, Nouro and Rucho; then Seven Mystic Couples of\nSpirits, and Heaven and Earth, and all that is; then seven spirits\ngoverning the planets, twelve governing the Constellations of the\nZodiac, and thirty-six Starry Intelligences whom he called Deacons:\nwhile the Holy Spirit [_Sophia Achamoth_], being both the Holy\nIntelligence and the Soul of the physical world, went from the Pler\u014dma\ninto that material world and there mourned her degradation, until\nCHRISTOS, her former spouse, coming to her with his Divine Light and\nLove, guided her in the way to purification, and she again united\nherself with him as his primitive Companion.\n\nBasilides, the Christian Gnostic, taught that there were seven\nemanations from the Supreme Being: The First-born, Thought, the Word,\nReflection, Wisdom, Power, and Righteousness.\n\n[Greek: \u03a0\u03c1\u03c9\u03c4\u03bf\u03b3\u03bf\u03bd\u03bf\u03c2, \u039d\u03bf\u03c5\u03c2, \u039b\u03bf\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2, \u03a6\u03c1\u03bf\u03bd\u03c4\u03c3\u03b9\u03c2, \u03a3\u03bf\u03c8\u03b1, \u0394\u03c5\u03bd\u03b1\u03bc\u03b9\u03c2], and [Greek:\n\u0394\u03b9\u03ba\u03b1\u03b9\u03bf\u03c3\u03cd\u03bd\u03b7] Protogonos, Nous, Logos, Phronesis, Sophia, Dunamis, and\nDikarosun\u0113; from whom emanated other Intelligences in succession, to the\nnumber, in all, of three hundred and sixty-five; which were God\nmanifested, and composed the Plenitude of the Divine Emanations, or the\nGod Abraxas; of which the Thought [or Intellect, [Greek: Nou\u03c2] ... Nous]\nunited itself, by baptism in the river Jordan, with the man Jesus,\nservant [[Greek: \u03b4\u03b9\u03ac\u03ba\u03bf\u03bd\u03bf\u03c2]. Diakonos] of the human race; but did not\nsuffer with Him; and the disciples of Basilides taught that the [Greek:\n\u039d\u03bf\u03cb\u03c2], put on the appearance only of humanity, and that Simon of Cyrene\nwas crucified in His stead and ascended into Heaven.\n\nBasilides held that out of the unrevealed God, who is at the head of the\nworld of emanations, and exalted above all conception or designation\n[[Greek: \u038c \u03ac\u03b1\u03c4\u03bf\u03bd\u03cc\u03bc\u03b1\u03c3\u03c4\u03bf\u03c2, \u03ac\u03c1\u03c1\u03b7\u03c4\u03bf\u03c2]], were evolved seven living,\nself-subsistent, ever-active hyposatized powers:\n\n\nFIRST: THE INTELLECTUAL POWERS.\n\n1st. NOUS          [Greek: \u039d\u03bf\u03cb\u03c2]          The Mind.\n2d.  LOGOS         [Greek: \u039b\u03cc\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2]         The Reason.\n3d.  Phronesis     [Greek: \u03a6\u03c1\u03cc\u03bd\u03b7\u03c3\u03b9\u03c2]      The Thinking Power.\n4th. Sophia        [Greek: \u03a3\u03bf\u03c6\u03af\u03b1]         Wisdom.\n\n\nSECOND: THE ACTIVE OR OPERATIVE POWER.\n\n5th. Dunamis       [Greek: \u0394\u03c5\u03bd\u03b1\u03bc\u03b9\u03c2]       Might, accomplishing the\n                                          purposes of Wisdom.\n\nTHIRD: THE MORAL ATTRIBUTES.\n\n6th. Dikaiosun\u0113    [Greek: \u0394\u03b9\u03ba\u03b1\u03b9\u03bf\u03c3\u03cd\u03bd\u03b7]    Holiness or Moral Perfection.\n7th. Eir\u0113n\u0113        [Greek: \u0395\u03af\u03c1\u03ae\u03bd\u03b7]        Inward Tranquility.\n\nThese Seven Powers ([Greek: \u0394\u03c5\u03bd\u03ac\u03bc\u03b5\u03b9\u03c2].. Dunameis), with the Primal\nGround out of which they were evolved, constituted in his scheme the\n[Greek: \u03a0\u03c1\u03c9\u03c4\u03b7 \u038c\u03b3\u03b4\u03bf\u03ac\u03c2][Prote Ogdoas], or First Octave, the root of all\nExistence. From this point, the spiritual life proceeded to evolve out\nof itself continually many gradations of existence, each lower one being\nstill the impression, the _antetype_, of the immediate higher one. He\nsupposed there were 365 of these regions or gradations, expressed by the\nmystical word [Greek: \u0391\u03b2\u03c1\u03b1\u03be\u03b1\u03c2] [Abraxas].\n\nThe [Greek: \u03b1\u03b2\u03c1\u03b1\u03be\u03b1\u03c2] is thus interpreted, by the usual method of\nreckoning Greek letters numerically.... [Greek:\n\u03b1,1..\u03b2,2..\u03c1,100..a,l..\u03be] 60..[Greek: \u03b1,l..\u03c2], 200==365: which is the\nwhole Emanation-World, as the development of the Supreme Being.\n\nIn the system of Basilides, Light, Life, Soul, and Good were opposed to\nDarkness, Death, Matter, and Evil, throughout the whole course of the\nUniverse.\n\nAccording to the Gnostic view, God was represented as the immanent,\nincomprehensible and original source of all perfection; the unfathomable\nABYSS ([Greek: \u03b2\u03c5\u03b8\u03bf\u03c2].. buthos), according to Valentinus, exalted above\nall possibility of designation; of whom, properly speaking, nothing can\nbe predicated; the [Greek: \u03ac\u03ba\u03b1\u03c4\u03bf\u03bd\u03cc\u03bc\u03b1\u03c3\u03c4\u03c2] of Basilides, the [Greek: \u03ce\u03bd]\nof Philo. From this incomprehensible Essence of God, an _immediate_\ntransition to finite things is inconceivable. _Self-limitation_ is the\nfirst beginning of a communication of life on the part of God--the first\npassing of the hidden Deity into manifestation; and from this proceeds\nall further self-developing manifestation of the Divine Essence. From\nthis primal link in the chain of life there are evolved, in the first\nplace, the manifold powers or attributes inherent in the divine Essence,\nwhich, until that first self-comprehension, were all hidden in the Abyss\nof His Essence. Each of these attributes presents the whole divine\nEssence under one particular aspect; and to each, therefore, in this\nrespect, the title of God may appropriately be applied. These Divine\nPowers evolving themselves to self-subsistence, become thereupon the\ngerms and principles of all further developments of life. The life\ncontained in them unfolds and individualizes itself more and more, but\nin such a way that the successive grades of this evolution of life\ncontinually sink lower and lower; the spirits become feebler, the\nfurther they are removed from the first link in the series.\n\nThe first manifestation they termed [Greek: \u03c0\u03c1\u03ce\u03c4\u03b7 \u03ba\u03b1\u03c4\u03ac\u03bb\u03b7\u03c8\u03b9\u03c2 \u03ad\u03b1\u03c5\u03c4\u03bf\u03cd prot\u0113\nkatal\u0113psis heautou] or [Greek: \u03c0\u03c1\u03ce\u03c4\u03bf\u03bd \u03ba\u03b1\u03c4\u03b1\u03bb\u03b7\u03c0\u03c4\u03cc\u03bd \u03c4\u03bf\u03cd \u03b8\u03b5\u03bf\u03c5] [_proton\nKatal\u0113pton tou Theou_]; which was hypostatically represented in a\n[Greek: \u03bd\u03cc\u03cd\u03c2] or [Greek: \u03bb\u03cc\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2], [_Nous_ or _Logos_].\n\nIn the Alexandrian Gnosis, the Platonic notion of the [Greek: \u03cd\u03bb\u03b7]\n[Hul\u0113] predominates. This is the dead, the unsubstantial--the boundary\nthat limits from without the evolution of life in its gradually\nadvancing progression, whereby the Perfect is ever evolving itself into\nthe less Perfect. This [Greek: \u03cd\u03bb\u03b7] again, is represented under various\nimages;--at one time as the darkness that exists alongside of the light;\nat another, as the void [Greek: \u03ba\u03ad\u03bd\u03c9\u03bc\u03b1, \u03ba\u03b5\u03bd\u03cc\u03bd] ....Kenoma, Kenon, in\nopposition to the Fullness, [Greek: \u03a0\u03bb\u03ae\u03c1\u03c9\u03bc\u03b1 ...Pleroma] of the Divine\nLife; or as the shadow that accompanies the light; or as the chaos, or\nthe sluggish, stagnant, dark water. This matter, dead in itself,\npossesses by its own nature no inherent tendency; as life of every sort\nis foreign to it, itself makes no encroachment on the Divine. As,\nhowever, the evolutions of the Divine Life (the essences developing\nthemselves out of the progressive emanation) become feebler, the further\nthey are removed from the first link in the series; and as their\nconnection with the first becomes looser at each successive step, there\narises at the last step of the evolution, an imperfect, defective\nproduct, which, unable to retain its connection with the chain of Divine\nLife, sinks from the World of Eons into the material chaos: or,\naccording to the same notion, somewhat differently expressed [according\nto the Ophites and to Bardesanes], a drop from the fullness of the\nDivine life bubbles over into the bordering void. Hereupon the dead\nmatter, by commixture with the living principle, which it wanted, first\nof all receives animation. But, at the same time, also, the divine, the\nliving, becomes corrupted by mingling with the chaotic mass. Existence\nnow multiplies itself. There arises a subordinate, defective life; there\nis ground for a new world; a creation starts into being, beyond the\nconfines of the world of emanation. But on the other hand, since the\nchaotic principle of matter has acquired vitality, there now arises a\nmore distinct and more active opposition to the God-like--a barely\nnegative, blind, ungodly nature-power, which obstinately resists all\ninfluence of the Divine; hence, as products, of the spirit of the\n[Greek: \u03cd\u03bb\u03b7], (of the [Greek: \u03c0\u03bd\u03b5\u03cd\u03bc\u03b1 \u03cd\u03bb\u03b9\u03ba\u03bf\u03bd].. Pneuma Hulikon), are\nSatan, malignant spirits, wicked men, in none of whom is there any\nreasonable or moral principle, or any principle of a rational will; but\nblind passions alone have the ascendency. In them there is the same\nconflict, as the scheme of Platonism supposes, between the soul under\nthe guidance of Divine reason the [Greek: \u03bd\u03bf\u03cd\u03c2... Nous], and the soul\nblindly resisting reason--between the [Greek: \u03c0\u03c1\u03cc\u03bd\u03bf\u03b9\u03b1] [pronoia] and the\n[Greek: \u03b1\u03bd\u03b1\u03b3\u03b7] [anag\u0113], the Divine Principle and the natural.\n\nThe Syrian Gnosis assured the existence of an active, turbulent kingdom\nof evil, or of darkness, which, by its encroachments on the kingdom of\nlight, brought about a commixture of the light with the darkness, of the\nGod-like with the ungodlike.\n\nEven among the Platonists, some thought that along with an organized,\ninert matter, the substratum of the corporeal world, there existed from\nthe beginning a blind, lawless motive power, an ungodlike soul, as its\noriginal motive and active principle. As the inorganic matter was\norganized into a corporeal world, by the plastic power of the Deity, so,\nby the same power, law and reason were communicated to that turbulent,\nirrational soul. Thus the chaos of the [Greek: \u03cd\u03bb\u03b7] was transformed into\nan organized world, and that blind soul into a rational principle, a\nmundane soul, animating the Universe. As from the latter proceeds all\nrational, spiritual life in humanity, so from the former proceeds all\nthat is irrational, all that is under the blind sway of passion and\nappetite; and all malignant spirits are its progeny.\n\nIn one respect _all_ the Gnostics agreed: they _all_ held, that there\nwas a world purely emanating out of the vital development of God, a\ncreation evolved directly out of the Divine Essence, far exalted above\nany outward creation produced by God's plastic power, and conditioned by\npre-existing matter. They agreed in holding that the framer of _this\nlower world_ was not the Father of _that higher world_ of emanation; but\nthe Demiurge [[Greek: \u0394\u03b5\u03bc\u03b9\u03bf\u03c5\u03c1\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2]], a being of a kindred nature with the\nUniverse framed and governed by him, and far inferior to that higher\nsystem and the Father of it.\n\nBut some, setting out from ideas which had long prevailed among certain\nJews of Alexandria, supposed that the Supreme God created and governed\nthe world by His ministering spirits, by the angels. At the head of\nthese angels stood one who had the direction and control of all;\ntherefore called the Artificer and Governor of the World. This Demiurge\nthey compared with the plastic, animating mundane spirit of Plato and\nPlatonists, the [Greek: \u03b4\u03b5\u03cd\u03c4\u03b5\u03c1\u03bf\u03c2 \u03b8\u03b5\u03cc\u03c2].. Deuteros Theos; the [Greek:\n\u03b8\u03b5\u03cc\u03c2 \u03b3\u03b5\u03bd\u03b7\u03c4\u03cc\u03c2]..., Theos Genetos, who, moreover, according to the Tim\u00e6us\nof Plato, strives to represent the IDEA of the Divine Reason, in that\nwhich is _becoming_ (as contradistinguished from that which _is_) and\ntemporal. This angel is a representative of the Supreme God, on the\nlower stage of existence: he does not act independently, but merely\naccording to the ideas inspired in him by the Supreme God; just as the\nplastic, mundane soul of the Platonists creates all things after the\npattern of the ideas communicated by the Supreme Reason [[Greek: \u039d\u03bf\u03cd\u03c2]\n... Nous--the [Greek: \u03cc \u03ad\u03c3\u03c4\u03b9 \u03b6\u03ce\u03bf\u03bd].... ho esti z\u014don--the [Greek:\n\u03c0\u03b1\u03c1\u03ac\u03b4\u03b5\u03b9\u03b3\u03bc\u03b1]. paradeigma, of the Divine Reason hypostatized]. But these\nideas transcend his limited essence; he cannot understand them; he is\nmerely their unconscious organ; and therefore is unable himself to\ncomprehend the whole scope and meaning of the work which he performs. As\nan organ under the guidance of a higher inspiration, he reveals higher\ntruths than he himself can comprehend. The mass of the Jews, they held,\nrecognized not the angel, by whom, in all the Theophanies of the Old\nTestament, God _revealed_ Himself; they knew not the Demiurge in his\ntrue relation to the hidden Supreme God, _who never reveals Himself_ in\nthe sensible world. They confounded the type and the archetype, the\nsymbol and the idea. They rose no higher than the Demiurge; they took\nhim to be the Supreme God Himself. But the spiritual men among them, on\nthe contrary, clearly perceived, or at least _divined_, the ideas veiled\nunder Judaism; they rose beyond the Demiurge, to a knowledge of the\nSupreme God; and are therefore properly His worshippers [[Greek\n\u03b8\u03b5\u03c1\u03b1\u03c0\u03b5\u03c5\u03c4\u03b1\u03af].. Therapeutai].\n\nOther Gnostics, who had not been followers of the Mosaic religion, but\nwho had, at an earlier period, framed to themselves an oriental Gnosis,\nregarded the Demiurge as a being absolutely _hostile_ to the Supreme\nGod. He and his angels, notwithstanding their finite nature, wish to\nestablish their independence: they will tolerate no foreign rule within\ntheir realm. Whatever of a higher nature descends into their kingdom,\nthey seek to hold imprisoned there, lest it should raise itself above\ntheir narrow precincts. Probably, in this system, the kingdom of the\nDemiurgic Angels corresponded, for the most part, with that of the\ndeceitful Star-Spirits, who seek to rob man of his freedom, to beguile\nhim by various arts of deception, and who exercise a tyrannical sway\nover the things of this world. Accordingly, in the system of these\nSab\u00e6ans, the seven Planet-Spirits, and the twelve Star-Spirits of the\nzodiac, who sprang from an irregular connection between the cheated\nFetahil and the Spirit of Darkness, play an important part in everything\nthat is bad. The Demiurge is a limited and limiting being, proud,\njealous, and revengeful; and this his character betrays itself in the\nOld Testament, which, the Gnostics held, came from him. They transferred\nto the Demiurge himself, whatever in the idea of God, as presented by\nthe Old Testament, appeared to then defective. Against his will and rule\nthe [Greek: \u03c5\u03bd\u03b7] was continually rebelling, revolting without control\nagainst the dominion which he, the fashioner, would exercise over it,\ncasting off the yoke imposed on it, and destroying the work he had\nbegun. The same jealous being, limited in his power, ruling with\ndespotic sway, they imagined they saw in nature. He strives to check the\ngermination of the divine seeds of life which the Supreme God of\nHoliness and Love, who has no connection whatever with the sensible\nworld, has scattered among men. That perfect God was at most known and\nworshipped in Mysteries by a few spiritual men.\n\nThe Gospel of St. John is in great measure a polemic against the\nGnostics, whose different sects, to solve the great problems, the\ncreation of a material world by an immaterial Being, the fall of man,\nthe incarnation, the redemption and restoration of the spirits called\nmen, admitted a long series of intelligences, intervening in a series of\nspiritual operations; and which they designated by the names, _The\nBeginning, the Word, the Only-Begotten, Life, Light_, and _Spirit_\n[Ghost]: in Greek, [Greek: \u0386\u03c1\u03c7\u03ae, \u0394\u03cc\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2, \u039c\u03bf\u03bd\u03bf\u03b3\u03b5\u03bd\u03ae\u03c2, \u0396\u03c9\u03ae, \u03a6\u03ce\u03c2] and [Greek:\n\u03a0\u03bd\u03b5\u03cb\u03bc\u03b1], [Arch\u0113, Logos, Monogen\u0113s, Z\u014de, Ph\u014ds, and Pneuma]. St. John, at\nthe beginning of his Gospel, avers that it was Jesus Christ who existed\nin the Beginning; that He was the WORD of God by which everything was\nmade; that He was the Only-Begotten, the Life and the Light, and that He\ndiffuses among men the Holy Spirit [or Ghost], the Divine Life and\nLight.\n\nSo the Pl\u0113roma [[Greek: \u03a0\u03bb\u03ae\u03c1\u03c9\u03bc\u03b1]], Plenitude or Fullness, was a favorite\nterm with the Gnostics, and Truth and Grace were the Gnostic Eons; and\nthe Simonians, Dok\u0113t\u0113s, and other Gnostics held that the Eon Christ\nJesus was never really, but only apparently clothed with a human body:\nbut St. John replies that the Word did really become Flesh, and dwelt\namong us; and that in Him were the Pl\u0113roma and Truth and Grace.\n\nIn the doctrine of Valentinus, reared a Christian at Alexandria, God was\na perfect Being, an Abyss [[Greek: \u0392\u03c5\u03b8\u03cc\u03c2].. Buthos], which no\nintelligence could sound, because no eye could reach the invisible and\nineffable heights on which He dwelt, and no mind could comprehend the\nduration of His existence; He has always been; He is the Primitive\nFather and Beginning [the [Greek: \u03a0\u03c1\u03bf\u03c0\u03b1\u03c4\u03c9\u03c1] and [Greek: \u03c1\u03bf\u03b1\u03c1\u03c7\u03ae]..\nPropat\u014dr and Proarch\u0113]: He will BE always, and does not grow old. The\ndevelopment of His Perfections produced the intellectual world. After\nhaving passed infinite ages in repose and silence, He manifested Himself\nby His Thought, source of all His manifestations, and which received\nfrom Him the germ of His creations. Being of His Being, His Thought\n[[Greek: \u0388\u03bd\u03bd\u03bf\u03b9\u03b1].. Ennoia] is also termed [Greek: \u03a7\u03ac\u03c1\u03b9\u03c2] [Charis],\nGrace or Joy, and [Greek: \u03a3\u03b9\u03b3\u03ae], or [Greek: \u0386\u03c1\u03c1\u03b7\u03c4\u03bf\u03bd] [Sig\u0113 or Arr\u0113ton],\nSilence or the Ineffable. Its first manifestation was [Greek: \u039d\u03bf\u03c5\u03c2]\n[Nous], the Intelligence, first of the Eons, commencement of all things,\nfirst revelation of the Divinity, the [Greek: \u039c\u03bf\u03bd\u03bf\u03b3\u03b5\u03bd\u03ae\u03c2] [Monogen\u0113s], or\nOnly-Begotten: next, Truth [[Greek: \u0386\u03bb\u03ae\u03b8\u03b5\u03b9\u03b1] .. Al\u0113theia], his\ncompanion. Their manifestations were the Word [[Greek: \u039b\u03bf\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2].. Logos]\nand Life [[Greek: \u0396\u03bf\u03ae].. Zoe]; and theirs, Man and the Church [[Greek:\n\u0391\u03bd\u03b8\u03c1\u03bf\u03c0\u03bf\u03c2] and [Greek: \u0388\u03ba\u03ba\u03bb\u03b7\u03c3\u03af\u03b1].. Anthr\u014dpos and Ekkl\u0113sia]: and from\nthese, other twelve, six of whom were Hope, Faith, Charity,\nIntelligence, Happiness, and Wisdom; or, in the Hebrew, _Kesten, Kina,\nAmphe, Ouananim, Thaedes_, and _Oubina_. The harmony of the Eons,\nstruggling to know and be united to the Primitive God, was disturbed,\nand to redeem and restore them, the Intelligence [Greek: \u039d\u03bf\u03cd\u03c2] produced\nChrist and the Holy Spirit His companion; who restored them to their\nfirst estate of happiness and harmony; and thereupon they formed the Eon\nJesus, born of a Virgin, to whom the Christos united himself in baptism,\nand who, with his Companion Sophia-Achamoth, saved and redeemed the\nworld.\n\nThe Marcosians taught that the Supreme Deity produced by His words the\n[Greek: \u039b\u03bf\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2] [Logos] or Plenitude of Eons: His first utterance was a\nsyllable of four letters, each of which became a being; His second of\nfour, His third of ten, and His fourth of twelve: thirty in all, which\nconstituted the [Greek: \u03a0\u03bb\u03ae\u03c1\u03c9\u03bc\u03b1] [Pl\u0113roma].\n\nThe Valentinians, and others of the Gnostics, distinguished three orders\nof existences:--1st. The divine germs of life, exalted by their nature\nabove matter, and akin to the [Greek: \u03a3\u03bf\u03c6\u03af\u03b1] [Sophia], to the mundane\nsoul and to the Pl\u0113roma:--the spiritual natures, [Greek: \u03c6\u03cd\u03c3\u03b5\u03b9\u03c2\n\u03c0\u03bd\u03b5\u03bc\u03b1\u03c4\u03b9\u03ba\u03b1\u03af] [Phuseis Pneumatikai]: 2d. The natures originating in the\nlife, divided from the former by the mixture of the [Greek: \u03cd\u03bb\u03b7]--the\npsychical natures, [Greek: \u03c6\u03cd\u03c3\u03b5\u03b9\u03c2 \u03c8\u03c5\u03c7\u03b9\u03ba\u03b1\u03af] [Phuseis Psuchikai]; with\nwhich begins a perfectly new order of existence, an image of that higher\nmind and system, in a subordinate grade; and finally, 3d. The Ungodlike\nor Hylic Nature, which resists all amelioration, and whose tendency is\nonly to destroy--the nature of blind lust and passion.\n\nThe nature of the [Greek: \u03c0\u03bd\u03b5\u03c5\u03bc\u03b1\u03c4\u03b9\u03ba\u03cc\u03bd] [pneumatikon], the spiritual, is\nessential relationship with God (the [Greek: \u03cc\u03bc\u03bf\u03bf\u03cd\u03c3\u03b9\u03bf\u03bd \u03c4\u03ce \u03b8\u03b5\u03ce]..\nHomoousion t\u014d The\u014d): hence the life of Unity, the undivided, the\nabsolutely simple (\u03bf\u03cd\u03c3\u03af\u03b1 \u03ad\u03bd\u03b9\u03ba\u03ae, \u03bc\u03bf\u03bd\u03bf\u03b5\u03b9\u03b4\u03ae\u03c2.. Ousia henike, monoeides).\n\nThe essence of the \u03c8\u03c5\u03c7\u03b9\u03ba\u03bf\u03af [psuchikoi] is disruption into multiplicity,\nmanifoldness; which, however, is subordinate to a higher unity, by which\nit allows itself to be guided; first unconsciously, then consciously.\n\nThe essence of the \u03cd\u03bb\u03b9\u03ba\u03bf\u00ec [Hulikoi] (of whom Satan is the head), is the\ndirect opposite to all unity; disruption and disunion in itself, without\nthe least sympathy, without any point of coalescence whatever for unity;\ntogether with an effort to destroy all unity, to extend its own inherent\ndisunion to everything, and to rend everything asunder. This principle\nhas no power to posit anything; but only to negative: it is unable to\ncreate, to produce, to form, but only to destroy, to decompose.\n\nBy Marcus, the disciple of Valentinus, the idea of a \u039b\u03bf\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2 \u03c4\u03bf\u03c5 \u03bf\u03bd\u03c4\u03bf\u03c2\n[Logos Tou Ontos], of a WORD, manifesting the hidden Divine Essence, in\nthe Creation, was spun out into the most subtle details--the entire\ncreation being, in his view, a continuous _utterance_ of the Ineffable.\nThe way in which the germs of divine life [the \u03c3\u03c0\u03ad\u03c1\u03bc\u03b1\u03c4\u03b1 \u03c0\u03bd\u03b5\u03c5\u03bc\u03b1\u03c4\u03b9\u03ba\u03ac..\nspermata pneumatika], which lie shut up in the Eons, continually unfold\nand individualize themselves more and more, is represented as a\nspontaneous analysis of the several _names_ of the Ineffable, into their\nseveral _sounds_..An _echo_ of the Pl\u0113roma falls down into the \u03cd\u03bb\u03b7\n[Hule], and becomes the forming of a new but lower creation.\n\nOne formula of the pneumatical baptism among the Gnostics ran thus: \"In\nthe NAME which is hidden from all the Divinities and Powers\" [of the\nDemiurge], \"The Name of Truth\" [the \u0391\u03bb\u03ae\u03b8\u03b5\u03b9\u03b1 [Aletheia],\nself-manifestation of the Buthos], which Jesus of Nazareth has put on in\nthe light-zones of Christ, the living Christ, through the Holy Ghost,\nfor the redemption of the angels,--the Name by which all things attain\nto Perfection. The candidate then said: \"I am established and redeemed;\nI am redeemed in my soul from this world, and from all that belongs to\nit, by the name of \u05d9\u05d4\u05d5\u05d4, who has redeemed the Soul of Jesus by the\nliving Christ\". The assembly then said: \"Peace (or Salvation) to all on\nwhom this name rests!\"\n\nThe boy Dionusos, torn in pieces, according to the Bacchic Mysteries, by\nthe Titans, was considered by the Manicheans as simply representing the\nSoul, swallowed up by the powers of darkness,--the divine life rent\ninto fragments by matter:--that part of the luminous essence of the\nprimitive man [the [Greek: \u03c0\u03c1\u03ce\u03c4\u03bf\u03c2 \u03ac\u03bd\u03b8\u03c1\u03c9\u03c0\u03bf\u03c2] [Protos Anthropos] of Mani,\nthe [Greek: \u03c0\u03c1\u03ac\u03c9\u03bd \u03ac\u03bd\u03b8\u03c1\u03c9\u03c0\u03bf\u03c2] [Pra\u014dn Anthr\u014dpos] of the Valentinians, the\nAdam Kadmon of the Kabalah; and the Kaiomorts of the Zendavesta],\nswallowed up by the powers of darkness; the Mundane Soul, mixed with\nmatter--the seed of divine life, which had fallen into matter, and had\nthence to undergo a process of purification and development.\n\nThe [Greek: \u0393\u03bd\u03ce\u03c3\u03b9\u03c2] [Gnosis] of Carpocrates and his son Epiphanes\nconsisted in the knowledge of one Supreme Original being, the highest\nunity, from whom all existence has emanated, and to whom it strives to\nreturn. The finite spirits that rule over the several portions of the\nEarth, seek to counteract this universal tendency to unity; and from\ntheir influence, their laws, and arrangements, proceeds all that checks,\ndisturbs, or limits the original communion, which is the basis of\nnature, as the outward manifestation of that highest Unity. These\nspirits, moreover, seek to retain under their dominion the souls which,\nemanating from the highest Unity, and still partaking of its nature,\nhave lapsed into the corporeal world, and have there been imprisoned in\nbodies, in order, under their dominion, to be kept within the cycle of\nmigration. From these finite spirits, the popular religions of different\nnations derive their origin. But the souls which, from a reminiscence of\ntheir former condition, soar upward to the contemplation of that higher\nUnity, reach to such perfect freedom and repose, as nothing afterward\ncan disturb or limit, and rise superior to the popular deities and\nreligions. As examples of this sort, they named Pythagoras, Plato,\nAristotle, and Christ. They made no distinction between the latter and\nthe wise and good men of every nation. They taught that any other soul\nwhich could soar to the same height of contemplation, might be regarded\nas equal with Him.\n\nThe Ophites commenced their system with a Supreme Being, long unknown to\nthe Human race, and still so the greater number of men; the [Greek:\n\u0392\u03c5\u03b8\u03bf\u03c2] [Buthos], or Profundity, Source of Light, and of Adam-Kadmon, the\nPrimitive Man, made by the Demiourgos, but perfected by the Supreme God\nby the communication to him of the Spirit [[Greek: \u03a0\u03bd\u03b5\u03cd\u03bc\u03b1].. Pneuma].\nThe first emanation was the Thought of the Supreme Deity [the [Greek:\n\u0388\u03bd\u03bd\u03bf\u03b9\u03b1].. Ennoia], the conception of the Universe in the Thought of\nGod. This Thought, called also Silence ([Greek: \u03a3\u03b9\u03b3\u03b7].. Sig\u0113), produced\nthe Spirit [[Greek: \u03a0\u03bd\u03b5\u03c5\u03bc\u03b1].. Pneuma], Mother of the Living, and Wisdom\nof God. Together with this Primitive Existence, Matter existed also (the\nWaters, Darkness, Abyss, and Chaos), eternal like the Spiritual\nPrinciple. Buthos and His Thought, uniting with Wisdom, made her\nfruitful by the Divine Light, and she produced a perfect and an\nimperfect being, _Christos_, and a Second and inferior wisdom,\n_Sophia-Achamoth_, who falling into chaos remained entangled there,\nbecame enfeebled, and lost all knowledge of the Superior Wisdom that\ngave her birth. Communicating movement to Chaos, she produced\nIaldabaoth, the Demiourgos, Agent of Material Creation, and then\nascended toward her first place in the scale of creation. Ialdabaoth\nproduced an angel that was his image, and this a second, and so on in\nsuccession to the sixth after the Demiourgos: the seven being\n_reflections_ one of the other, yet different and inhabiting seven\ndistinct regions. The names of the six thus produced were IAO, SABAOTH,\nADONAI, ELOI, ORAI, and ASTAPHAI. Ialdabaoth, to become independent of\nhis mother, and to pass for the Supreme Being, made the world, and man,\nin his own image; and his mother caused the Spiritual principle to pass\nfrom him into man so made; and henceforward the contest between the\nDemiourgos and his mother, between light and darkness, good and evil,\nwas concentrated in man; and the image of Ialdabaoth, reflected upon\nmatter, became the Serpent-Spirit, Satan, the Evil Intelligence. Eve,\ncreated by Ialdabaoth, had by his Sons children that were angels like\nthemselves. The Spiritual light was withdrawn from man by Sophia, and\nthe world surrendered to the influence of evil; until the Spirit, urged\nby the entreaties of Wisdom, induced the Supreme Being to send Christos\nto redeem it. Compelled, despite himself, by his Mother, Ialdabaoth\ncaused the man Jesus to be born of a Virgin, and the Celestial Saviour,\nuniting with his Sister, Wisdom, descended through the regions of the\nseven angels, appeared in each under the form of its chief, concealed\nhis own, and entered with his sister into the man Jesus at the baptism\nin Jordan. Ialdabaoth, finding that Jesus was destroying his empire and\nabolishing his worship, caused the Jews to hate and crucify Him; before\nwhich happened, Christos and Wisdom had ascended to the celestial\nregions. They restored Jesus to life and gave Him an ethereal body, in\nwhich He remained eighteen mouths on earth, and receiving from Wisdom\nthe perfect knowledge [\u0393\u03bd\u03c9\u03c3\u03b9\u03c2.. Gnosis], communicated it to a small\nnumber of His apostles, and then arose to the intermediate region\ninhabited by Ialdabaoth, where, unknown to him, He sits at his right\nhand, taking from him the Souls of Light purified by Christos. When\nnothing of the Spiritual world shall remain subject to Ialdabaoth, the\nredemption will be accomplished, and the end of the world, the\ncompletion of the return of Light into the Plenitude, will occur.\n\nTatian adopted the theory of Emanation, of Eons, of the existence of a\nGod too sublime to allow Himself to be known, but displaying Himself by\nIntelligences emanating from His bosom. The first of these was His\nspirit [\u03a0\u03bd\u03b5\u03c5\u03bc\u03b1.. Pneuma], God Himself, God thinking, God conceiving the\nUniverse. The second was the Word [\u039b\u03bf\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2.. Logos], no longer merely the\nThought or Conception, but the Creative Utterance, manifestation of the\nDivinity, but emanating from the Thought or Spirit; the First-Begotten,\nauthor of the visible creation. This was the Trinity, composed of the\nFather, Spirit, and Word.\n\nThe Elxa\u00eftes adopted the Seven Spirits of the Gnostics; but named them\nHeaven, Water, Spirit, The Holy Angels of Prayer, Oil, Salt, and the\nEarth.\n\nThe opinion of the Doketes as to the human nature of Jesus Christ, was\nthat most generally received among the Gnostics. They deemed the\nintelligences of the Superior World too pure and too much the\nantagonists of matter, to be willing to unite with it: and held that\nChrist, an Intelligence of the first rank, in appearing upon the earth,\ndid not become confounded with matter, but took upon Himself only the\n_appearance_ of a body, or at the most used it only as an envelope.\n\nNo\u00ebtus termed the Son the first Utterance of the Father; the Word, not\nby Himself, as an Intelligence, and unconnected with the flesh, a real\nSon; but a Word, and a perfect Only-Begotten; light emanated from the\nLight; water flowing from its spring; a ray emanated from the Sun.\n\nPaul of Samosata taught that Jesus Christ was the Son of Joseph and\nMary; but that the Word, Wisdom, or Intelligence of God, the \u039d\u03bf\u03c5\u03c2 [Nous]\nof the Gnostics, had united itself with Him, so that He might be said to\nbe at once the Son of God, and God Himself.\n\nArius called the Saviour the first of creatures, non-emanated from God,\nbut really created, by the direct will of God, before time and the\nages. According to the Church, Christ was of the same nature as God;\naccording to some dissenters, of the same nature as man. Arius adopted\nthe theory of a nature analogous to both. When God resolved to create\nthe Human race, He made a Being which He called THE WORD, THE SON,\nWISDOM [\u039b\u03cc\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2, \u03a5\u03af\u00f2\u03c2, \u03a3\u03bf\u03c6\u00ed\u03b1.. Logos, Uios, Sophia], to the end that He\nmight give existence to men. This WORD is the Ormuzd of Zoroaster, the\nEnsoph of the Kabalah, the \u039d\u03bf\u03cd\u03c2 [Nous] of Platonism and Philonism, and\nthe \u03a3\u03bf\u03c6\u03b9\u03b1 or \u0394\u03b5\u03bc\u03b9\u03bf\u03c5\u03c1\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2 [Sophia or Demiourgos] of the Gnostics. He\ndistinguished the Inferior Wisdom, or the daughter, from the Superior\nWisdom; the latter being _in_ God, inherent in His nature, and incapable\nof communication to any creature: the second, by which the Son was made,\ncommunicated itself to Him, and therefore He Himself was entitled to be\ncalled the Word and the Son.\n\nManes, founder of the Sect of the Manicheans, who had lived and been\ndistinguished among the Persian Magi, profited by the doctrines of\nScythianus, a Kabalist or Judaizing Gnostic of the times of the\nApostles; and knowing those of Bardesanes and Harmonius, derived his\ndoctrines from Zoroasterism, Christianity, and Gnosticism. He claimed to\nbe the \u03a0\u03b1\u03c1\u03ac\u03ba\u03bb\u03b7\u03c4\u03bf\u03c2 [Parakl\u0113tos] or Comforter, in the Sense of a Teacher,\norgan of the Deity, but not in that of the Holy Spirit or Holy Ghost:\nand commenced his _Epistola Fundamenti_ in these words: \"Manes, Apostle\nof Jesus Christ, elect of God the Father; Behold the Words of Salvation,\nemanating from the living and eternal fountain.\" The dominant idea of\nhis doctrine was Pantheism, derived by him from its source in the\nregions of India and on the confines of China: that the cause of all\nthat exists is in God; and at last, God is all in all. All souls are\nequal--God is in all, in men, animals, and plants. There are two Gods,\none of Good and the other of Evil, each independent, eternal, chief of a\ndistinct Empire; necessarily, and of their very natures, hostile to one\nanother. The Evil God, Satan, is the Genius of matter alone. The God of\nGood is infinitely his Superior, the True God; while the other is but\nthe chief of all that is the Enemy of God, and must in the end succumb\nto His Power. The Empire of Light alone is eternal and true; and this\nEmpire is a great chain of Emanations, all connected with the Supreme\nBeing which they make manifest; all HIM, under different forms, chosen\nfor one end, the triumph of the Good. In each of His members lie hidden\nthousands of ineffable treasures. Excellent in His Glory,\nincomprehensible in His Greatness, the Father has joined to Himself\nthose fortunate and glorious Eons [\u0391\u03b9\u03c9\u03bd\u03b5\u03c2.. Aion\u0113s], whose Power and\nNumber it is impossible to determine. This is Spinoza's Infinity of\nInfinite Attributes of God. Twelve Chief Eons, at the head of all, were\nthe Genii of the twelve Constellations of the Zodiac, and called by\nManes Olamin. Satan, also, Lord of the Empire of Darkness, had an Army\nof Eons or Demons, emanating from his Essence, and reflecting more or\nless his image, but divided and inharmonious among themselves. A war\namong them brought them to the confines of the Realm of Light.\nDelighted, they sought to conquer it. But the Chief of the Celestial\nEmpire created a Power which he placed on the frontiers of Heaven to\nprotect his Eons, and destroy the Empire of Evil. This was the Mother of\nLife, the Soul of the World, an Emanation from the Supreme Being, too\npure to come in immediate contact with matter. It remained in the\nhighest region; but produced a Son, the first Man the _Kaiomorts_,\nAdam-Kadmon, \u03a0\u03c1\u03ce\u03c4\u03bf\u03c2 \u0391\u03bd\u03b8\u03c1\u03c9\u03c0\u03bf\u03c2 [Protos Anthropos,] and Hivil-Zivah; of the\nZend-Avesta, the Kabalah, the Gnosis, and Sabeism; who commenced the\ncontest with the Powers of Evil, but, losing part of his panoply, of his\nLight, his Son and many souls born of the Light, who were devoured by\nthe darkness, God sent to his assistance the living Spirit, or the Son\nof the First Man \u03a5\u03af\u03cc\u03c2 \u0386\u03bd\u03b8\u03c1\u03ce\u03c0\u03bf\u03c5 ... Uios Anthropou, or Jesus Christ. The\nMother of Life, general Principle of Divine Life, and the first Man,\nPrimitive Being that reveals the Divine Life, are too sublime to be\nconnected with the Empire of Darkness. The Son of Man or Soul of the\nWorld, enters into the Darkness, becomes its captive, to end by\ntempering and softening its savage nature. The Divine Spirit, after\nhaving brought back the Primitive Man to the Empire of Light, raises\nabove the world that part of the Celestial Soul that remained unaffected\nby being mingled with the Empire of Darkness. Placed in the region of\nthe Sun and Moon, this pure soul, the Son of Man, the Redeemer or\nChrist, labors to deliver and attract to Himself that part of the Light\nor of the Soul of the First Man diffused through matter; which done, the\nworld will cease to exist. To retain the rays of Light still remaining\namong his Eons, and ever tending to escape and return, by concentrating\nthem, the Prince of Darkness, with their consent, made Adam, whose soul\nwas of the Divine Light, contributed by the Eons, and his body of\nmatter, so that he belonged to both Empires, that of Light and that of\nDarkness. To prevent the light from escaping at once, the Demons forbade\nAdam to eat the fruit of \"knowledge of good and evil,\" by which he would\nhave known the Empire of Light and that of Darkness. He obeyed; an Angel\nof Light induced him to transgress, and gave him the means of victory;\nbut the Demons created Eve, who seduced him into an act of Sensualism,\nthat enfeebled him, and bound him anew in the bonds of matter. This is\nrepeated in the case of every man that lives.\n\nTo deliver the soul, captive in darkness, the Principle of Light, or\nGenius of the Sun, charged to redeem the Intellectual World, of which he\nis the type, came to manifest Himself among men. Light appeared in the\ndarkness, but the darkness comprehended it not; according to the words\nof St. John. The Light could not unite with the darkness. It but put on\nthe _appearance_ of a human body, and took the name of Christ in the\nMessiah, only to accommodate itself to the language of the Jews. The\nLight did its work, turning the Jews from the adoration of the Evil\nPrinciple, and the Pagans from the worship of Demons. But the Chief of\nthe Empire of Darkness caused Him to be crucified by the Jews. Still He\nsuffered in appearance only, and His death gave to all souls the symbol\nof their enfranchisement. The person of Jesus having disappeared, there\nwas seen in His place a cross of Light, over which a celestial voice\npronounced these words: \"The cross of Light is called The Word, Christ,\nThe Gate, Joy, The Bread, The Sun, The Resurrection, Jesus, The Father,\nThe Spirit, Life, Truth, and Grace.\"\n\nWith the Priscillianists there were two principles, one the Divinity,\nthe other, Primitive Matter and Darkness; each eternal. Satan is the son\nand lord of matter; and the secondary angels and demons, children of\nmatter. Satan created and governs the visible world. But the soul of man\nemanated from God, and is of the same substance with God. Seduced by the\nevil spirits, it passes through various bodies, until, purified and\nreformed, it rises to God and is strengthened by His light. These powers\nof evil hold mankind in pledge; and to redeem this pledge, the Saviour,\nChrist the Redeemer, came and died upon the cross of expiation, thus\ndischarging the written obligation. He, like all souls, was of the same\nsubstance with God, a manifestation of the Divinity, not forming a\nsecond person; unborn, like the Divinity, and nothing else than the\nDivinity under another form.\n\nIt is useless to trace these vagaries further; and we stop at the\nfrontiers of the realm of the three hundred and sixty-five thousand\nemanations of the Manda\u0131tes from the Primitive Light, Fira or Ferho\nand Yavar; and return contentedly to the simple and sublime creed of\nMasonry.\n\nSuch were some of the ancient notions concerning the Deity; and taken in\nconnection with what has been detailed in the preceding Degrees, this\nLecture affords you a true picture of the ancient speculations. From the\nbeginning until now, those who have undertaken to solve the great\nmystery of the creation of a material universe by an Immaterial Deity,\nhave interposed between the two, and between God and man, divers\nmanifestations of, or emanations from, or personified attributes or\nagents of, the Great Supreme God, who is coexistent with Time and\ncoextensive with Space.\n\nThe universal belief of the Orient was, that the Supreme Being did not\nHimself create either the earth or man. The fragment which commences the\nBook of Genesis, consisting of the first chapter and the three first\nverses of the second, assigns the creation or rather the _formation_ or\n_modelling_ of the world from matter already existing in confusion, not\nto IHUH, but to the ALHIM, well known as Subordinate Deities, Forces, or\nManifestations, among the Ph\u0153nicians. The second fragment imputes it to\nIHUH-ALHIM,[3] and St. John assigns the creation to the \u039b\u03bf\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2 or WORD;\nand asserts that CHRIST was that WORD, as well as LIGHT and LIFE, other\nemanations from the Great Primeval Deity, to which other faiths had\nassigned the work of creation.\n\n[Footnote 3: _The Substance_, or _Very Self_, of which the Alohayim are\nthe manifestations.]\n\nAn absolute existence, wholly immaterial, in no way within the reach of\nour senses; a cause, but not an effect, that never was not, but existed\nduring an infinity of eternities, before there was anything else except\nTime and Space, is wholly beyond the reach of our conceptions. The mind\nof man has wearied itself in speculations as to His nature, His essence,\nHis attributes; and ended in being no wiser than it began. In the\nimpossibility of conceiving of immateriality, we feel at sea and lost\nwhenever we go beyond the domain of matter. And yet we know that there\n_are_ Powers, Forces, Causes, that are themselves _not_ matter. We give\nthem names, but _what_ they really are, and what their essence, we are\nwholly ignorant.\n\nBut, fortunately, it does not follow that we may not _believe_, or even\n_know_, that which we cannot _explain_ to ourselves, or that which is\nbeyond the reach of our comprehension. If we believed only that which\nour intellect can grasp, measure, comprehend, and have distinct and\nclear ideas of, we sh+ ould believe scarce anything. The senses are not\nthe witnesses that bear testimony to us of the loftiest truths.\n\nOur greatest difficulty is, that language is not adequate to express our\nideas; because our words refer to _things_, and are images of what is\nsubstantial and material. If we use the word \"_emanation_,\" our mind\ninvoluntarily recurs to something material, _flowing out_ of some other\nthing that is material; and if we _reject_ this idea of materiality,\nnothing is left of the emanation but an unreality. The word \"thing\"\nitself suggests to us that which is material and within the cognizance\nand jurisdiction of the senses. If we cut away from it the idea of\nmateriality, it presents itself to us as _no_ thing, but an intangible\nunreality, which the mind vainly endeavors to grasp. _Existence_ and\n_Being_ are terms that have the same color of materiality; and when we\nspeak of a _Power_ or _Force_, the mind immediately images to itself one\nphysical and material thing acting upon another. Eliminate that idea;\nand the Power or Force, devoid of physical characteristics, seems as\nunreal as the shadow that dances on a wall, itself a mere _absence_ of\nlight; as spirit is to us merely that which is _not_ matter.\n\nInfinite space and infinite time are the two primary ideas. We formulize\nthem thus: add body to body and sphere to sphere, until the imagination\nwearies; and still there will remain beyond, a void, empty, unoccupied\nSPACE, limitless, because it _is_ void. Add event to event in continuous\nsuccession, forever and forever, and there will still remain, before and\nafter, a TIME in which there was and will be no event, and also endless\nbecause it too _is_ void.\n\nThus these two ideas of the boundlessness of space and the endlessness\nof time seem to _involve_ the ideas that matter and events are limited\nand finite. We cannot conceive of an _infinity_ of worlds or of events;\nbut only of an _indefinite_ number of each; for, as we struggle to\nconceive of their _infinity_, the thought ever occurs in despite of all\nour efforts--there must be _space_ in which there are _no_ worlds;\nthere must have been _time_ when there were no events.\n\nWe cannot conceive how, if this earth moves millions of millions of\nmiles a million times repeated, it is still _in the centre of space_;\nnor how, if we lived millions of millions of ages and centuries, we\nshould still be in the centre of eternity--with still as much _space_ on\none side as on the other; with still as much _time_ before us as behind;\nfor that seems to say that the world has not moved nor we lived at all.\n\nNor can we comprehend how an infinite series of worlds, added together,\nis no larger than an infinite series of atoms; or an infinite series of\ncenturies no longer than an infinite series of seconds; both being alike\ninfinite, and therefore one series containing no more nor fewer units\nthan the other.\n\nNor have we the capacity to form in ourselves any idea of that which is\n_immaterial_. We use the word, but it conveys to us only the idea of the\nabsence and negation of materiality; which vanishing, Space and Time\nalone, infinite and boundless, seem to us to be left.\n\nWe cannot form any conception of an effect without a cause. We cannot\nbut believe, indeed we know, that, how far soever we may have to run\nback along the chain of effects and causes, it cannot be _infinite_; but\nwe must come at last to _something_ which is not an effect, but the\nfirst cause: and yet the fact is literally beyond our comprehension. The\nmind refuses to grasp the idea of _self_-existence, of existence without\na beginning. As well expect the hair that grows upon our head to\nunderstand the nature and immortality of the soul.\n\nIt does not need to go so far in search of mysteries; nor have we any\nright to disbelieve or doubt the existence of a Great First Cause,\nitself no effect, because we cannot comprehend it; because the words we\nuse do not even express it to us adequately.\n\nWe rub a needle for a little while, on a dark, inert mass of iron ore,\nthat had lain idle in the earth for many centuries. Something is thereby\ncommunicated to the steel--we term it a _virtue_, a _power_, or a\n_quality_--and then we balance it upon a pivot; and, lo! drawn by some\ninvisible, mysterious Power, one pole of the needle turns to the North,\nand there the same Power keeps the same pole for days and years; will\nkeep it there, perhaps, as long as the world lasts, carry the needle\nwhere you will, and no matter what seas or mountains intervene between\nit and the North Pole of the world. And this Power, thus acting, and\nindicating to the mariner his course over the trackless ocean, when the\nstars shine not for many days, saves vessels from shipwreck, families\nfrom distress, and those from sudden death on whose lives the fate of\nnations and the peace of the world depend. But for it, Napoleon might\nnever have reached the ports of France on his return from Egypt, nor\nNelson lived to fight and win at Trafalgar. Men call this Power\n_Magnetism_, and then complacently think that they have explained it\nall; and yet they have but given a new _name_ to an unknown thing, to\n_hide_ their ignorance. What is this wonderful Power? It is a real,\nactual, _active_ Power: that we know and see. But what its _essence_ is,\nor how it acts, we do not know, any more than we know the essence or the\nmode of action of the Creative Thought and Word of God.\n\nAnd again, what is that which we term _galvanism_ and\n_electricity_,--which, evolved by the action of a little acid on two\nmetals, aided by a magnet, circles the earth in a second, sending from\nland to land the _Thoughts_ that govern the transactions of individuals\nand nations? The mind has formed no notion of matter, that will include\n_it_; and no name that we can give it, helps us to understand its\nessence and its being. It _is_ a Power, like Thought and the Will. We\nknow no more.\n\nWhat is this power of _gravitation_ that makes everything upon the earth\ntend to the centre? How does it reach out its invisible hands toward the\nerratic meteor-stones, arrest them in their swift course, and draw them\ndown to the earth's bosom? It _is_ a _power_. We know no more.\n\nWhat is that _heat_ which plays so wonderful a part in the world's\neconomy?--that _caloric_, latent everywhere, within us and without us,\nproduced by combustion, by intense pressure, and by swift motion? Is it\nsubstance, matter, spirit, or immaterial, a mere Force or State of\nMatter?\n\nAnd what is _light?_ A _substance_, say the books,--_matter_, that\ntravels to us from the sun and stars, each ray separable into seven, by\nthe prism, of distinct colors, and with distinct peculiar qualities and\nactions. And _if_ a substance, what is its essence, and what power is\ninherent in it, by which it journeys incalculable myriads of miles, and\nreaches us ten thousand years or more after it leaves the stars?\n\nAll power is equally a mystery. Apply intense cold to a drop of water\nin the centre of a globe of iron, and the globe is shattered as the\nwater freezes. Confine a little of the same limpid element in a cylinder\nwhich Enceladus or Typhon could not have riven asunder, and apply to it\nintense heat, and the vast power that couched latent in the water\nshivers the cylinder to atoms. A little shoot from a minute seed, a\nshoot so soft and tender that the least bruise would kill it, forces its\nway downward into the hard earth, to the depth of many feet, with an\nenergy wholly incomprehensible. What are these mighty forces, locked up\nin the small seed and the drop of water?\n\nNay, what is LIFE itself, with all its wondrous, mighty energies,--that\npower which maintains the heat within us, and prevents our bodies, that\ndecay so soon without it, from resolution into their original,\nelements--Life, that constant miracle, the nature and essence whereof\nhave eluded all the philosophers; and all their learned dissertations on\nit are a mere jargon of words?\n\nNo wonder the ancient Persians thought that Light and Life were\none,--both emanations from the Supreme Deity, the archetype of light. No\nwonder that in their ignorance they worshipped the Sun. God breathed\ninto man the spirit of life,--not matter, but an emanation from Himself;\nnot a creature _made_ by Him, nor a distinct existence; but a _Power_,\nlike His own Thought: and light, to those great-souled ancients, also\nseemed no creature, and no gross material substance, but a pure\nemanation from the Deity, immortal and indestructible like Himself.\n\nWhat, indeed, is REALITY? Our dreams are as real, while they last, as\nthe occurrences of the daytime. We see, hear, feel, act, experience\npleasure and suffer pain, as vividly and actually in a dream as when\nawake. The occurrences and transactions of a year are crowded into the\nlimits of a second: and the dream remembered is as real as the past\noccurrences of life.\n\nThe philosophers tell us that we have no cognizance of _substance_\nitself, but only of its _attributes_: that when we see that which we\ncall a block of marble, our perceptions give us information only of\nsomething extended, solid, colored, heavy, and the like; but not of the\nvery _thing_ itself, to which these attributes belong. And yet the\nattributes do not exist without the substance. They are not substances,\nbut adjectives. There is no such _thing_ or _existence_ as hardness,\nweight or color, by itself, detached from any subject, moving first\nhere, then there, and attaching itself to this and to the other subject.\nAnd yet, they say, the attributes are not the subject.\n\nSo Thought, Volition, and Perception are not the soul, but its\n_attributes_; and we have no cognizance of the soul _itself_, but only\nof _them_, its manifestations. Nor of God; but only of His Wisdom,\nPower, Magnificence, Truth, and other attributes.\n\nAnd yet we know that there is matter, a soul within our body, a God that\nlives in the Universe.\n\nTake, then, the attributes of the soul. I am conscious that I exist and\nam the same identical person that I was twenty years ago. I am conscious\nthat my body is not I,--that if my arms were lopped away, this _person_\nthat I call ME, would still remain, complete, entire, identical as\nbefore. But I cannot ascertain, by the most intense and long-continued\nreflection, what I am, nor where within my body I reside, nor whether I\nam a point, or an expanded substance. I have no power to examine and\ninspect. I exist, will, think, perceive. _That_ I know, and nothing\nmore. I think a noble and sublime Thought. What is that Thought? It is\nnot Matter, nor Spirit. It is not a Thing; but a _Power_ and _Force_. I\nmake upon a paper certain conventional marks, that _represent_ that\nThought. There is no Power or Virtue in the _marks_ I write, but only in\nthe Thought which they tell to others. I die, but the Thought still\nlives. It is a Power. It acts on men, excites them to enthusiasm,\ninspires patriotism, governs their conduct, controls their destinies,\ndisposes of life and death. The words I speak are but a certain\nsuccession of particular sounds, that by conventional arrangement\ncommunicate to others the Immaterial, Intangible, Eternal Thought. The\nfact that Thought continues to exist an instant, after it makes its\nappearance in the soul, proves it immortal: for there is nothing\nconceivable that can destroy it. The spoken words, being mere sounds,\nmay vanish into thin air, and the written ones, mere marks, be burned,\nerased, destroyed: but the THOUGHT itself lives still, and must live on\nforever.\n\nA Human Thought, then, is an actual EXISTENCE, and a FORCE and POWER,\ncapable of acting upon and controlling matter as well as mind. Is not\nthe existence of a God, who is the immaterial soul of the Universe, and\nwhose THOUGHT, embodied or not embodied in His WORD, is an Infinite\nPower, of Creation and production, destruction and preservation, quite\nas comprehensible as the existence of a Soul, of a Thought separated\nfrom the Soul, of the Power of that Thought to mould the fate and\ninfluence the Destinies of Humanity?\n\nAnd yet we know not when that Thought comes, nor what it is. It is not\nWE. We do not mould it, shape it, fashion it. It is neither our\nmechanism nor our invention. It appears spontaneously, flashing, as it\nwere, into the soul, making that soul the involuntary instrument of its\nutterance to the world. It comes to us, and seems a stranger to us,\nseeking a home.\n\nAs little can we explain the mighty power of the human WILL. Volition,\nlike Thought, seems spontaneous, an effect without a cause.\nCircumstances _provoke_ it, and serve as its _occasion_, but do not\n_produce_ it. It springs up in the soul, like Thought, as the waters\ngush, upward in a spring. Is it the manifestation of the soul, merely\nmaking apparent what passes _within_ the soul, or an emanation from it,\ngoing abroad and acting outwardly, itself a real Existence, as it is an\nadmitted Power? We can but own our ignorance. It is certain that it acts\non other souls, controls, directs them, shapes their action, legislates\nfor men and nations: and yet it is not material nor visible; and the\nlaws it writes merely inform one soul of what has passed within another.\n\nGod, therefore, is a mystery, only as everything that surrounds us, and\nas we ourselves, are mysteries. We know that there is and must be a\nFIRST CAUSE. His attributes, severed from Himself, are unrealities. As\ncolor and extension, weight and hardness, do not exist apart from matter\nas separate existences and substantives, spiritual or immaterial; so the\nGoodness, Wisdom, Justice, Mercy, and Benevolence of God are not\nindependent existences, personify them as men may, but _attributes_ of\nthe Deity, the _adjectives_ of One Great Substantive. But we know that\nHe must be Good, True, Wise, Just, Benevolent, Merciful: and in all\nthese, and all His other attributes, Perfect and Infinite; because we\nare conscious that these are laws imposed on us by the very nature of\nthings, necessary, and without which the Universe would be confusion and\nthe existence of a God incredible. They are of His _essence_, and\nnecessary, as His existence is.\n\nHe is the Living, Thinking, Intelligent SOUL of the Universe, the\nPERMANENT, the STATIONARY [\u0395\u03c3\u03c4\u03c9\u03c2.. Estos], of Simon Magus, the ONE that\nalways is [To \u039f\u03bd, To ON] of Plato, as contradistinguished from the\nperpetual flux and reflux, or _Genesis_, of _things_.\n\nAnd, as the Thought of the Soul, emanating _from_ the Soul, becomes\naudible and visible in Words, so did THE THOUGHT OF GOD, springing up\nwithin Himself, immortal _as_ Himself, when once conceived,--immortal\n_before_, because _in_ Himself, utter Itself in THE WORD, its\nmanifestation and mode of communication, and thus create the Material,\nMental, Spiritual Universe, which, like Him, never _began_ to exist.\n\nThis is the _real_ idea of the Ancient Nations: GOD, the Almighty\nFather, and Source of All; His THOUGHT, _conceiving_ the whole Universe,\nand _willing_ its creation: His WORD, _uttering_ that THOUGHT, and thus\nbecoming the Creator or Demiourgos, in whom was Life and Light, and that\nLight the Life of the Universe.\n\nNor did that Word _cease_ at the single act of Creation; and having set\ngoing the great machine, and enacted the laws of its motion and\nprogression, of birth and life, and change and death, cease to exist, or\nremain thereafter in inert idleness.\n\nFOR THE THOUGHT OF GOD LIVES AND IS IMMORTAL. Embodied in the WORD, is\nnot only _created_, but it _preserves_. It conducts and controls the\nUniverse, all spheres, all worlds, all actions of mankind, and of every\nanimate and inanimate creature. It speaks in the soul of every man who\nlives. The Stars, the Earth, the Trees, the Winds, the universal voice\nof Nature, tempest, and avalanche, the Sea's roar and the grave voice of\nthe waterfall, the hoarse thunder and the low whisper of the brook, the\nsong of birds, the voice of love, the speech of men, all are the\nalphabet in which it communicates itself to men, and informs them of the\nwill and law of God, the Soul of the Universe. And thus most truly _did_\n\"THE WORD BECOME FLESH AND DWELL AMONG MEN.\"\n\nGod, the unknown FATHER [\u03a0\u03b1\u03c4\u03ae\u03c1 \u0386\u03b3\u03bd\u03c9\u03c3\u03c4\u03bf\u03c2.. Pater Agn\u014dstos], known to us\nonly by His Attributes; the ABSOLUTE I AM:... The THOUGHT of God\n[\u0388\u03bd\u03bd\u03bd\u03bf\u03b9\u03b1. Ennoia], and the WORD [\u039b\u03cc\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2.... Logos], Manifestation and\nexpression of the Thought; .... Behold THE TRUE MASONIC TRINITY; the\nUNIVERSAL SOUL, the THOUGHT _in_ the Soul, the WORD, or Thought\nexpressed; the THREE IN ONE, of a Trinitarian Ecossais.\n\nHere Masonry pauses, and leaves its Initiates to carry out and develop\nthese great Truths in such manner as to each may seem most accordant\nwith reason, philosophy, truth, and his religious faith. It declines to\nact as Arbiter between them. It looks calmly on, while each multiplies\nthe intermediates between the Deity and Matter, and the personifications\nof God's manifestations and attributes, to whatever extent his reason,\nhis conviction, or his fancy dictates.\n\nWhile the Indian tells us that PARABRAHMA, BRAHM, and PARATMA were the\nfirst Triune God, revealing Himself as BRAHMA, VISHNU, and SIVA,\n_Creator, Preserver, and Destroyer_;....\n\nThe Egyptian, of AMUN-RE, NEITH, and PHTHA, _Creator, Matter, Thought_\nor _Light_; the Persian of _his_ Trinity of Three Powers in ORMUZD,\nSources of _Light, Fire_, and _Water_; the Buddhists of the God SAKYA, a\nTrinity composed of BUDDHA, DHARMA, and SANGA,--_Intelligence, Law_, and\n_Union_ or _Harmony_; the Chinese Sabeans of _their_ Trinity of\n_Chang-ti_, the Supreme Sovereign; _Tien_, the Heavens; and _Tao_, the\nUniversal Supreme Reason and Principle of all things; who produced the\nUnit; that, two; two, three; and three, all that is;....\n\nWhile the Sclavono-Vend typifies _his_ Trinity by the three heads of the\nGod _Triglav_; the Ancient Prussian points to _his_ Triune God,\n_Perkoun, Pikollos_, and _Potrimpos_, Deities of Light and Thunder, of\nHell and of the Earth; the Ancient Scandinavian to _Odin, Frea_, and\n_Thor_; and the old Etruscans to TINA, TALNA, and MINERVA, _Strength,\nAbundance_, and _Wisdom_;....\n\nWhile Plato tells us of the _Supreme Good_, the _Reason_ or _Intellect_,\nand the _Soul_ or _Spirit_; and Philo of the _Archetype of Light_,\n_Wisdom_ [\u03a3\u03bf\u03c8\u03b9\u03b1], and the _Word_ [\u039b\u03bf\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2]; the Kabalists, of the Triads\nof the Sephiroth;....\n\nWhile the disciples of Simon Magus, and the many sects of the Gnostics,\nconfuse us with their _Eons, Emanations, Powers, Wisdom Superior_ and\n_Inferior, Ialdabaoth, Adam-Kadmon_, even to the three hundred and\nsixty-five thousand emanations of the Malda\u00eftes; ....\n\nAnd while the pious Christian believes that the WORD dwelt in the Mortal\nBody of Jesus of Nazareth, and suffered upon the Cross; and that the\nHOLY GHOST was poured out upon the Apostles, and now inspires every\ntruly Christian Soul:....\n\nWhile all these faiths assert their claims to the exclusive possession\nof the Truth. Masonry inculcates its old doctrine, and no more:.... That\nGod is ONE; that His THOUGHT uttered in His WORD, created the Universe,\nand preserves it by those Eternal Laws which are the expression of that\nThought: that the Soul of Man, breathed into him by God, is immortal as\nHis Thoughts are; that he is free to do evil or to choose good,\nresponsible for his acts and punishable for his sins: that all evil and\nwrong and suffering are but temporary, the discords of one great\nHarmony, and that in His good time they will lead by infinite\nmodulations to the great, harmonic final chord and cadence of Truth,\nLove, Peace, and Happiness, that will ring forever and ever under the\nArches of Heaven, among all the Stars and Worlds, and in all souls of\nmen and Angels.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nXXVII.\n\nKNIGHT COMMANDER OF THE TEMPLE\n\n\nThis is the first of the really Chivalric Degrees of the Ancient and\nAccepted Scottish Rite. It occupies this place in the Calendar of the\nDegrees between the 26th and the last of the Philosophical Degrees, in\norder, by breaking the continuity of these, to relieve what might\notherwise become wearisome; and also to remind you that, while engaged\nwith the speculations and abstractions of philosophy and creeds, the\nMason is also to continue engaged in the active duties of this great\nwarfare of life. He is not only a Moralist and Philosopher, but a\nSoldier, the Successor of those Knights of the Middle Age, who, while\nthey wore the Cross, also wielded the Sword, and were the Soldiers of\nHonor, Loyalty, and Duty.\n\nTimes change, and circumstances; but Virtue and Duty remain the same.\nThe Evils to be warred against but take another shape, and are developed\nin a different form.\n\nThere is the same need now of truth and loyalty as in the days of\nFrederic Barbarossa.\n\nThe characters, religious and military, attention to the sick and\nwounded in the Hospital, and war against the Infidel in the field, are\nno longer blended; but the same duties, to be performed in another\nshape, continue to exist and to environ us all.\n\nThe innocent virgin is no longer at the mercy of the brutal Baron or\nlicentious man-at-arms; but purity and innocence still need protectors.\n\nWar is no longer the apparently natural State of Society; and for most\nmen it is an empty obligation to assume, that they will not recede\nbefore the enemy; but the same high duty and obligation still rest upon\nall men.\n\nTruth, in act, profession, and opinion, is rarer now than in the days of\nchivalry. Falsehood has become a current coin, and circulates with a\ncertain degree of respectability; because it has an actual value. It is\nindeed the great Vice of the Age--it, and its twin-sister, Dishonesty.\nMen, for political preferment, profess whatever principles are\nexpedient and profitable. At the bar, in the pulpit, and in the halls of\nlegislation, men argue against their own convictions, and, with what\nthey term _logic_, prove to the satisfaction of others that which they\ndo not themselves believe. Insincerity and duplicity are valuable to\ntheir possessors, like estates in stocks, that yield a certain revenue:\nand it is no longer the _truth_ of an opinion or a principle, but the\nnet _profit_ that may be realized from it, which is the measure of its\nvalue.\n\nThe Press is the great sower of falsehood. To slander a political\nantagonist, to misrepresent all that he says, and, if that be\nimpossible, to invent for him what he does _not_ say; to put in\ncirculation whatever baseless calumnies against him are necessary to\ndefeat him,--these are habits so common as to have ceased to excite\nnotice or comment, much less surprise or disgust.\n\nThere was a time when a Knight would die rather than utter a lie, or\nbreak his Knightly word. The Knight Commander of the Temple revives the\nold Knightly spirit; and devotes himself to the old Knightly worship of\nTruth. No profession of an opinion not his own, for expediency's sake or\nprofit, or through fear of the world's disfavor; no slander of even an\nenemy; no coloring or perversion of the sayings or acts of other men; no\ninsincere speech and argument for any purpose, or under any pretext,\nmust soil his fair escutcheon. Out of the Chapter, as well as in it, he\nmust speak the Truth, and _all_ the Truth, no more and no less; or else\nspeak not at all.\n\nTo purity and innocence everywhere, the Knight Commander owes\nprotection, as of old; against bold violence, or those, more guilty than\nmurderers, who by art and treachery seek to slay the soul; and against\nthat want and destitution that drive too many to sell their honor and\ninnocence for food.\n\nIn no age of the world has man had better opportunity than now to\ndisplay those lofty virtues and that noble heroism that so distinguished\nthe three great military and religious Orders, in their youth, before\nthey became corrupt and vitiated by prosperity and power.\n\nWhen a fearful epidemic ravages a city, and death is inhaled with the\nair men breathe; when the living scarcely suffice to bury the\ndead,--most men flee in abject terror, to return and live, respectable\nand influential, when the danger has passed away. But the old Knightly\nspirit of devotion and disinterestedness and contempt of death still\nlives, and is not extinct in the human heart. Everywhere a few are found\nto stand firmly and unflinchingly at their posts, to front and defy the\ndanger, not for money, or to be honored for it, or to protect their own\nhousehold; but from mere humanity, and to obey the unerring dictates of\nduty. They nurse the sick, breathing the pestilential atmosphere of the\nhospital. They explore the abodes of want and misery. With the\ngentleness of woman, they soften the pains of the dying, and feed the\nlamp of life in the convalescent. They perform the last sad offices to\nthe dead; and they seek no other reward than the approval of their own\nconsciences.\n\nThese are the true Knights of the present age: these, and the captain\nwho remains at his post on board his shattered ship until the last boat,\nloaded to the water's edge with passengers and crew, has parted from her\nside; and then goes calmly down with her into the mysterious depths of\nthe ocean:--the pilot who stands at the wheel while the swift flames\neddy round him and scorch away his life:--the fireman who ascends the\nblazing walls, and plunges amid the flames to save the property or lives\nof those who have upon him no claim by tie of blood, or friendship, or\neven of ordinary acquaintance:--these, and others like these:--all men,\nwho, set at the post of duty, stand there manfully; to die, if need be,\nbut not to desert their post: for these, too, are sworn not to recede\nbefore the enemy.\n\nTo the performance of duties and of acts of heroism like these, you have\ndevoted yourself, my Brother, by becoming a Knight Commander of the\nTemple. Soldier of the Truth and of Loyalty! Protector of Purity and\nInnocence! Defier of Plague and Pestilence! Nurser of the Sick and\nBurier of the Dead! Knight, preferring Death to abandonment of the Post\nof Duty! Welcome to the bosom of this Order!\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nXXVIII.\n\nKNIGHT OF THE SUN, OR PRINCE ADEPT.\n\n\nGod, is the author of everything that existeth; the Eternal, the\nSupreme, the Living, and Awful Being; from Whom nothing in the Universe\nis hidden. Make of Him no idols and visible images; but rather worship\nHim in the deep solitudes of sequestered forests; for He is invisible,\nand fills the Universe as its soul, and liveth not in any Temple!\n\nLight and Darkness are the World's Eternal ways. God is the principle of\neverything that exists, and the Father of all Beings. He is eternal,\nimmovable and Self-Existent. There are no bounds to His power. At one\nglance He sees the Past, the Present, and the Future; and the procession\nof the builders of the Pyramids, with us and our remotest Descendants,\nis now passing before Him. He reads our thoughts before they are known\nto ourselves. He rules the movements of the Universe and all events and\nrevolutions are the creatures of His will. For He is the infinite Mind\nand Supreme Intelligence.\n\nIn the beginning Man had the WORD, and that WORD was from God: and out\nof the living power which, in and by that WORD, was communicated to man,\ncame the LIGHT of his existence. Let no man speak the WORD, for by it\nTHE FATHER made light and darkness, the world and living creatures.\n\nThe Chaldean upon his plains worshipped me, and the sea-loving\nPh\u0153nician. They builded me temples and towers, and burned sacrifices to\nme upon a thousand altars. Light was divine to them, and they thought me\na God. But I am nothing--_nothing_; and LIGHT is the creature of the\nunseen GOD that taught the true religion to the Ancient Patriarchs:\nAWFUL, MYSTERIOUS, THE ABSOLUTE.\n\nMan was created pure; and God gave him TRUTH, as He gave him LIGHT. He\nhas lost the _truth_ and found _error_. He has wandered far into\ndarkness; and round him Sin and Shame hover evermore. The Soul that is\nimpure, and sinful, and defiled with earthly stains, cannot again unite\nwith God, until, by long trials and many purifications, it is finally\ndelivered from the old calamity; and Light overcomes Darkness and\ndethrones it, in the Soul.\n\nGod is the First; indestructible, eternal, UNCREATED, INDIVISIBLE.\n_Wisdom, Justice, Truth_, and _Mercy_, with _Harmony_ and _Love_, are of\nHis essence, and _Eternity_ and _Infinitude of Extension_. He is silent,\nand consents with MIND, and is known to Souls through MIND alone. In Him\nwere all things originally contained, and from Him all things were\nevolved. For out of His Divine SILENCE and REST, after an infinitude of\ntime, was unfolded the WORD, or the Divine POWER; and then in turn the\nMighty, ever-acting, measureless INTELLECT; and from the WORD were\nevolved the myriads of suns and systems that make the Universe; and\n_fire_, and _light_, and the electric HARMONY, which is the harmony of\nspheres and numbers: and from the INTELLECT all Souls and intellects of\nmen.\n\nIn the Beginning, the Universe was but ONE SOUL. HE was THE ALL, alone\nwith TIME and SPACE, and Infinite as they.\n\n--HE HAD THIS THOUGHT: \"I Create Worlds:\" and lo! _the Universe_, and\nthe laws of _harmony_ and _motion_ that rule it, the expression of a\nthought of God; and bird and beast, and every living thing but Man: and\nlight and air, and the mysterious currents, and the dominion of\nmysterious numbers!\n\n--HE HAD THIS THOUGHT: \"_I Create Man, whose Soul shall be my image,\nand he shall rule_.\" And lo! _Man_, with senses, instinct, and a\nreasoning mind!\n\n--And yet not MAN! but an _animal_ that breathed, and saw, and\nthought: until an immaterial spark from God's own Infinite Being\npenetrated the brain, and became the Soul: and lo, MAN THE IMMORTAL!\nThus, threefold, fruit of God's thought, is Man; that sees and hears and\nfeels; that thinks and reasons; that loves and is in harmony with the\nUniverse.\n\nBefore the world grew old, the primitive Truth faded out from men's\nSouls. Then man asked himself, \"_What am I? and how and whence am I? and\nwhither do I go?_\" And the Soul, looking inward upon itself, strove to\nlearn whether that \"I\" were mere matter; its thought and reason and its\npassions and affections mere results of material combination; or a\nmaterial Being enveloping an immaterial Spirit: ... and further it\nstrove, by self-examination, to learn whether that Spirit were an\nindividual essence, with a separate immortal existence, or an\ninfinitesimal portion of a Great First Principle, inter-penetrating the\nUniverse and the infinitude of space, and undulating like light and\nheat: ... and so they wandered further amid the mazes of error; and\nimagined vain philosophies; wallowing in the sloughs of materialism and\nsensualism, of beating their wings vainly in the vacuum of abstractions\nand idealities.\n\nWhile yet the first oaks still put forth their leaves, man lost the\nperfect knowledge of the One True God, the Ancient Absolute Existence,\nthe Infinite Mind and Supreme Intelligence; and floated helplessly out\nupon the shoreless ocean of conjecture. Then the soul vexed itself with\nseeking to learn whether the material Universe was a mere chance\ncombination of atoms, or the work of Infinite, Uncreated Wisdom:...\nwhether the Deity was a concentrated, and the Universe an extended\nimmateriality; or whether He was a personal existence, an Omnipotent,\nEternal, Supreme Essence, regulating matter at will; or subjecting it to\nunchangeable laws throughout eternity; and to Whom, Himself Infinite and\nEternal, Space and Time are unknown. With their finite limited vision\nthey sought to learn the source and explain the existence of Evil, and\nPain, and Sorrow; and so they wandered ever deeper into the darkness,\nand were lost; and there was for them no longer any God; but only a\ngreat, dumb, soulless Universe, full of mere emblems and symbols.\n\nYou have heretofore, in some of the Degrees through which you have\npassed, heard much of the ancient worship of the Sun, the Moon, and the\nother bright luminaries of Heaven, and of the Elements and Powers of\nUniversal Nature. You have been made, to some extent, familiar with\ntheir personifications as Heroes suffering or triumphant, or as personal\nGods or Goddesses, with human characteristics and passions, and with the\nmultitude of legends and fables that do but allegorically represent\ntheir risings and settings, their courses, their conjunctions and\noppositions, their domiciles and places of exaltation.\n\nPerhaps you have supposed that we, like many who have written on these\nsubjects, have intended to represent this worship to you as the most\nancient and original worship of the first men that lived. To undeceive\nyou, if such was your conclusion, we have caused the Personifications of\nthe Great Luminary of Heaven, under the names by which he was known to\nthe most ancient nations, to proclaim the old primitive truths that were\nknown to the Fathers of our race, before men came to worship the visible\nmanifestations of the Supreme Power and Magnificence and the Supposed\nAttributes of the Universal Deity in the Elements and in the glittering\narmies that Night regularly marshals and arrays upon the blue field of\nthe firmament.\n\nWe ask now your attention to a still further development of these\ntruths, after we shall have added something to what we have already said\nin regard to the Chief Luminary of Heaven, in explanation of the names\nand characteristics of the several imaginary Deities that represented\nhim among the ancient races of men.\n\nATHOM or ATHOM-RE, was the Chief and Oldest Supreme God of Upper Egypt,\nworshipped at Thebes; the same as the OM or AUM of the Hind\u016bs, whose\nname was unpronounceable, and who, like the BREHM of the latter People,\nwas \"The Being that was, and is, and is to come; the Great God, the\nGreat Omnipotent, Omniscient, and Omnipresent One, the Greatest in the\nUniverse, the Lord;\" whose emblem was a perfect sphere, showing that He\nwas first, last, midst, and without end; superior to all Nature-Gods,\nand all personifications of Powers, Elements, and Luminaries; symbolized\nby Light, the Principle of Life.\n\nAMUN was the Nature-God, or Spirit of Nature, called by that name or\nAMUN-RE, and worshipped at Memphis in Lower Egypt, and in Libya, as well\nas in Upper Egypt. He was the Libyan Jupiter, and represented the\nintelligent and organizing force that develops itself in Nature, when\nthe intellectual types or forms of bodies are revealed to the senses in\nthe world's order, by their union with matter, whereby the generation\nof bodies is effected. He was the same with Kneph, from whose mouth\nissued the Orphic egg out of which came the Universe.\n\nDIONUSOS was the Nature-God of the Greeks, as AMUN was of the Egyptians.\nIn the popular legend, Dionusos, as well as Hercules, was a Theban Hero,\nborn of a mortal mother. Both were sons of Zeus, both persecuted by\nHer\u00e9. But in Hercules the God is subordinate to the Hero; while\nDionusos, even in poetry, retains his divine character, and is identical\nwith Iacchus, the presiding genius of the Mysteries. Personification of\nthe Sun in Taurus, as his ox-hoofs showed, he delivered earth from the\nharsh dominion of Winter, conducted the mighty chorus of the Stars, and\nthe celestial revolution of the year, changed with the seasons, and\nunderwent their periodical decay. He was the Sun as invoked by the\nEleans, [Greek: \u03a0\u03c5\u03c1\u03b9\u03b3\u03b5\u03bd\u03b7\u03c2], ushered into the world amidst lightning and\nthunder, the Mighty Hunter of the Zodiac, Zagreus the Golden or\nruddy-faced. The Mysteries taught the doctrine of Divine Unity; and that\nPower whose Oneness is a seeming mystery, but really a truism, was\nDionusos, the God of Nature, or of that, moisture, which is the life of\nNature, who prepares in darkness, in Hades or Iasion, the return of life\nand vegetation, or is himself the light and change evolving their\nvarieties. In the Egean Islands he was Butes, Dardanus, Himeros or\nImbros; in Crete he appears as Iasius or even Zeus, whose orgiastic\nworship, remaining unveiled by the usual forms of mystery, betrayed to\nprofane curiosity the symbols which, if irreverently contemplated, were\nsure to be misunderstood.\n\nHe was the same with the dismembered Zagreus, the son of Persephone, an\nAncient Subterranean Dionusos, the horned progeny of Zeus in the\nConstellation of the Serpent, entrusted by his father with the\nthunderbolt, and encircled with the protecting dance of Curetes. Through\nthe envious artifices of Her\u00e9, the Titans eluded the vigilance of his\nguardians and tore him to pieces; but Pallas restored the still\npalpitating heart to his father, who commanded Apollo to bury the\ndismembered remains upon Parnassus.\n\nDionusos, as well as Apollo, was leader of the Muses; the tomb of one\naccompanied the worship of the other; they were the same, yet different,\ncontrasted, yet only as filling separate parts in the same drama; and\nthe mystic and heroic personifications, the God of Nature and of Art,\nseem, at some remote period, to have proceeded from a common source.\nTheir separation was one of form rather than of substance: and from the\ntime when Hercules obtained initiation from Triptolemus, or Pythagoras\nreceived Orphic tenets, the two conceptions were tending to re-combine.\nIt was said that Dionusos or Poseidon had preceded Apollo in the\nOracular office; and Dionusos continued to be esteemed in Greek Theology\nas Healer and Saviour, Author of Life and Immortality. The dispersed\nPythagoreans, \"Sons of Apollo,\" immediately betook themselves to the\nOrphic Service of Dionusos, and there are indications that there was\nalways something Dionysiac in the worship of Apollo.\n\nDionusos is the Sun, that liberator of the elements; and his spiritual\nmeditation was suggested by the same imagery which made the Zodiac the\nsupposed path of the Spirits in their descent and their return. His\nsecond birth, as offspring of the highest, is a type of the spiritual\nregeneration of man. He, as well as Apollo, was precentor of the Muses\nand source of inspiration. His rule prescribed no unnatural\nmortification: its yoke was easy, and its mirthful choruses, combining\nthe gay with the severe, did but commemorate that golden age when earth\nenjoyed eternal spring, and when fountains of honey, milk, and wine\nburst forth out of its bosom at the touch of the thyrsus. He is the\n\"Liberator.\" Like Osiris, he frees the soul, and guides it in its\nmigrations beyond the grave, preserving it from the risk of again\nfalling under the slavery of matter or of some inferior animal form. All\nsoul is part of the Universal Soul, whose totality is Dionusos; and he\nleads back the vagrant spirit to its home, and accompanies it through\nthe purifying processes, both real and symbolical, of its earthly\ntransit. He died and descended to the Shades; and his suffering was the\ngreat secret of the Mysteries, as death is the grand mystery of\nexistence. He is the immortal suitor of Psyche (the Soul), the Divine\ninfluence which physically called the world into being, and which,\nawakening the soul from its Stygian trance, restores it from earth to\nHeaven.\n\nOf HERMES, the Mercury of the Greeks, the Thoth of the Egyptians, and\nthe Taaut of the Ph\u0153nicians, we have heretofore spoken sufficiently at\nlength. He was the inventor of letters and of Oratory, the winged\nmessenger of the Gods, bearing the Caduceus wreathed with serpents; and\nin our Council he is represented by the ORATOR.\n\nThe _Hind\u016bs_ called the Sun SURYA; the _Persians_, MITHRAS; the\n_Egyptians_, OSIRIS; the _Assyrians_ and _Chald\u00e6ans_, BEL; the\n_Scythians_ and _Etruscans_ and the ancient _Pelasgi_, ARKALEUS or\nHERCULES; the _Ph\u0153nicians_, ADONAI or ADON; and the _Scandinavians_,\nODIN.\n\nFrom the name SURYA, given by the Hind\u016bs to the Sun, the Sect who paid\nhim particular adoration were called _Souras_. Their painters describe\nhis car as drawn by seven green horses. In the Temple of Visweswara, at\nBenares, there is an ancient piece of sculpture, well executed in stone,\nrepresenting him sitting in a car drawn by a horse with twelve heads.\nHis charioteer, by whom he is preceded, is ARUN [from [Hebrew: \u05d0\u05df\u05da], AUR\nthe _Crepusculum?_], or the Dawn; and among his many titles are twelve\nthat denote his distinct powers in each of the twelve months. Those\npowers are called Adityas, each of whom has a particular name. Surya is\nsupposed frequently to have descended upon earth, in a human shape, and\nto have left a race on earth, equally renowned in Indian story with the\nHeliades of Greece. He is often styled King of the Stars and Planets,\nand thus reminds us of the Adon-Tsbauth (Lord of the Starry Hosts) of\nthe Hebrew writings.\n\nMITHRAS was the Sun-God of the Persians; and was fabled to have been\nborn in a grotto or cave, at the Winter Solstice. His feasts were\ncelebrated at that period, at the moment when the sun commenced to\nreturn Northward, and to increase the length of the days. This was the\ngreat Feast of the Magian religion. The Roman Calendar, published in the\ntime of Constantine, at which period his worship began to gain ground in\nthe Occident, fixed his feast-day on the 25th of December. His statues\nand images were inscribed, _Deo-Soli invicto Mithr\u0153_--to the invincible\nSun-God Mithras. _Nomen invictum Sol Mithra ... Soli Omnipotenti\nMithr\u0153_. To him, gold, incense, and myrrh were consecrated. \"Thee,\" says\nMartianus Capella, in his hymn to the Sun, \"the dwellers on the Nile\nadore as Serapis, and Memphis worships as Osiris; in the sacred rites of\nPersia thou art Mithras, in Phrygia, Atys, and Libya bows down to thee\nas Ammon, and Ph\u0153nician Byblos as Adonis; and thus the whole world\nadores thee under different names.\"\n\nOSIRIS was the son of Helios (Phra), the \"divine offspring congenerate\nwith the dawn,\" and at the same time an incarnation of Kneph or\nAgathod\u00e6mon, the Good Spirit, including all his possible manifestations,\neither physical or moral. He represented in a familiar form the\nbeneficent aspect of all higher emanations and in him was developed the\nconception of a Being purely good, so that it became necessary to set up\nanother power as his adversary called Seth, Babys or Typhon, to account\nfor the injurious influences of Nature.\n\nWith the phenomena of agriculture, supposed to be the invention of\nOsiris, the Egyptians connected the highest truths of their religion.\nThe soul of man was as the seed hidden in the ground, and the mortal\nframework, similarly consigned to its dark resting-place, awaited its\nrestoration to life's unfailing source. Osiris was not only benefactor\nof the living; he was also Hades, Serapis, and Rhadamanthus, the monarch\nof the dead. Death, therefore, in Egyptian opinion, was only another\nname for _renovation_, since its God is the same power who incessantly\nrenews vitality in Nature. Every corpse duly embalmed was called\n\"Osiris,\" and in the grave was supposed to be united, or at least\nbrought into approximation, to the Divinity. For when God became\nincarnate for man's benefit, it was implied that, in analogy with His\nassumed character, He should submit to _all_ the conditions of visible\nexistence. In death, as in life, Isis and Osiris were patterns and\nprecursors of mankind; their sepulchres stood within the temples of the\nSuperior Gods; yet though their remains might be entombed at Memphis or\nAbydus, their divinity was unimpeached, and they either shone as\nluminaries in the heavens, or in the unseen world presided over the\nfuturity of the disembodied spirits whom death had brought nearer to\nthem.\n\nThe notion of a dying God, so frequent in Oriental legend, and of which\nwe have already said much in former Degrees, was the natural inference\nfrom a literal interpretation of nature-worship; since nature, which in\nthe vicissitudes of the seasons seems to undergo a dissolution, was to\nthe earliest religionists the express image of the Deity, and at a\nremote period one and the same with the \"varied God,\" whose attributes\nwere seen not only in its vitality, but in its changes. The unseen Mover\nof the Universe was rashly identified with its obvious fluctuations. The\nspeculative Deity suggested by the drama of nature, was worshipped with\nimitative and sympathetic rites. A period of mourning about the Autumnal\nEquinox, and of joy at the return of Spring, was almost universal.\nPhrygians and Paphlagonians, B\u0153otians, and even Athenians, were all more\nor less attached to such observances; the Syrian damsels sat weeping for\nThammuz or Adoni, mortally wounded by the tooth of Winter, symbolized\nby the boar, its very general emblem: and these rites, and those of Atys\nand Osiris, were evidently suggested by the arrest of vegetation, when\nthe Sun, descending from his altitude, seems deprived of his generating\npower.\n\nOsiris is a being analogous to the Syrian ADONI; and the fable of his\nhistory, which we need not here repeat, is a narrative form of the\npopular religion of Egypt, of which the Sun is the Hero, and the\nagricultural calendar the moral. The moist valley of the Nile, owing its\nfertility to the annual inundation, appeared, in contrast with the\nsurrounding desert, like life in the midst of death. The inundation was\nin evident dependence on the Sun, and Egypt, environed with arid\ndeserts, like a heart within a burning censer, was the female power,\ndependent on the influences personified in its God. Typhon his brother,\nthe type of darkness, drought, and sterility, threw his body into the\nNile; and thus Osiris, the \"good,\" the \"Saviour,\" perished, in the 28th\nyear of his life or reign, and on the 17th day of the month Athor, or\nthe 13th of November. He is also made to die during the heats of the\nearly Summer, when, from March to July, the earth was parched with\nintolerable heat, vegetation was scorched, and the languid Nile\nexhausted. From that death he rises when the Solstitial Sun brings the\ninundation, and Egypt is filled with mirth and acclamation anticipatory\nof the second harvest. From his Wintry death he rises with the early\nflowers of Spring, and then the joyful festival of Osiris found was\ncelebrated.\n\nSo the pride of Jemsheed, one of the Persian Sun-heroes, or the solar\nyear personified, was abruptly cut off by Zohak, the tyrant of the West.\nHe was sawn asunder by a fish-bone, and immediately the brightness of\nIran changed to gloom. Ganymede and Adonis, like Osiris, were hurried\noff in all their strength and beauty; the premature death of Linus, the\nburthen of the ancient lament of Greece, was like that of the Persian\nSiamek, the Bithynian Hylas, and the Egyptian Maneros, Son of Menes or\nthe Eternal. The elegy called Maneros was sung at Egyptian banquets, and\nan effigy enclosed within a diminutive Sarcophagus was handed round to\nremind the guests of their brief tenure of existence. The beautiful\nMemnon, also, perished in his prime; and Enoch, whose early death was\nlamented at Iconium, lived 365 years, the number of days of the solar\nyear; a brief space when compared with the longevity of his patriarchal\nkindred.\n\nThe story of Osiris is reflected in those of Orpheus and Dionusos\nZagreus, and perhaps in the legends of Absyrtus and Pelias, of \u00c6son,\nThyestes, Melicertes, Itys, and Pelops. Io is the disconsolate Isis or\nNiobe: and Rhea mourns her dismembered Lord Hyperion, and the death of\nher son Helios, drowned in the Eridanus; and if Apollo and Dionusos are\nimmortal, they had died under other names, as Orpheus, Linus, or\nHyacinthus. The sepulchre of Zeus was shown in Crete. Hippolytus was\nassociated in divine honors with Apollo, and after he had been torn to\npieces like Osiris, was restored to life by the P\u00e6onian herbs of Diana,\nand kept darkling in the secret grove of Egeria. Zeus deserted Olympus\nto visit the Ethiopians; Apollo underwent servitude to Admetus; Theseus,\nPeirithous, Hercules, and other heroes, descended for a time to Hades; a\ndying Nature-God was exhibited in the Mysteries, the Attic women fasted,\nsitting on the ground, during the Thesmophoria, and the B\u0153otians\nlamented the descent of Cora-Proserpine to the Shades.\n\nBut the death of the Deity, as understood by the Orientals, was not\ninconsistent with His immortality. The temporary decline of the Sons of\nLight is but an episode in their endless continuity; and as the day and\nyear are more convenient subdivisions of the Infinite, so the fiery\ndeaths of Pha\u00ebthon or Hercules are but breaks in the same Ph\u0153nix process\nof perpetual regeneration, by which the spirit of Osiris lives forever\nin the succession of the Memphian Apis. Every year witnesses the revival\nof Adonis; and the amber tears shed by the Heliades for the premature\ndeath of their brother, are the golden shower full of prolific hope, in\nwhich Zeus descends from the brazen vault of Heaven into the bosom of\nthe parched ground.\n\nBAL, representative or personification of the sun, was one of the Great\nGods of Syria, Assyria, and Chaldea, and his name is found upon the\nmonuments of Nimroud, and frequently occurs in the Hebrew writings. He\nwas the Great Nature-God of Babylonia, the Power of heat, life, and\ngeneration. His symbol was the Sun, and he was figured seated on a bull.\nAll the accessories of his great temple at Babylon, described by\nHerodotus, are repeated with singular fidelity, but on a smaller scale,\nin the Hebrew tabernacle and temple. The golden statue alone is wanted\nto complete the resemblance. The word _Bal_ or _Baal_, like the word\n_Adon_, signifies Lord and Master. He was also the Supreme Deity of the\nMoabites, Amonites, and Carthaginians, and of the Sabeans in general;\nthe Gauls worshipped the Sun under the name of Belin or Belinus: and\nBela is found among the Celtic Deities upon the ancient monuments.\n\nThe Northern ancestors of the Greeks maintained with hardier habits a\nmore manly style of religious symbolism than the effeminate enthusiasts\nof the South, and had embodied in their _Perseus_, HERCULES and MITHRAS,\nthe consummation of the qualities they esteemed and exercised.\n\nAlmost every nation will be found to have had a mythical being, whose\nstrength or weakness, virtues or defects, more or less nearly describe\nthe Sun's career through the seasons. There was a Celtic, a Teutonic, a\nScythian, an Etruscan, a Lydian Hercules, all whose legends became\ntributary to those of the Greek hero. The name of Hercules was found by\nHerodotus to have been long familiar in Egypt and the East, and to have\noriginally belonged to a much higher personage than the comparatively\nmodern hero known in Greece as the Son of Alcmena. The temple of the\nHercules of Tyre was reported to have been built 2300 years before the\ntime of Herodotus; and Hercules, whose Greek name has been sometimes\nsupposed to be of Ph\u0153nician origin, in the sense of Circuitor, _i.e._\n\"rover\" and \"perambulator\" of earth, as well as \"Hyperion\" of the sky,\nwas the patron and model of those famous navigators who spread his\naltars from coast to coast through the Mediterranean, to the extremities\nof the West, where \"ARKALEUS\" built the City of Gades, and where a\nperpetual fire burned in his service. He was the lineal descendant of\nPerseus, the luminous child of darkness, conceived within a subterranean\nvault of brass; and he a representation of the Persian Mithras, rearing\nhis emblematic lions above the gates of Mycen\u00e6, and bringing the sword\nof Jemsheed to battle against the Gorgons of the West. Mithras is\nsimilarly described in the Zend-Avesta as the \"mighty hero, the rapid\nrunner, whose piercing eye embraces all, whose arm bears the club for\nthe destruction of the Darood.\"\n\nHercules Ingeniculus, who, bending on one knee, uplifts his club and\ntramples on the Serpent's head, was, like Prometheus and Tantalus, one\nof the varying aspects of the struggling and declining Sun. The\nvictories of Hercules are but exhibitions of Solar power which have\never to be repeated. It was in the far North, among the Hyperboreans,\nthat, divested of his Lion's skin he lay down to sleep, and for a time\nlost the horses of his chariot. Henceforth that Northern region of\ngloom, called the \"place of the death and revival of Adonis,\" that\nCaucasus whose summit was so lofty, that, like the Indian Meru, it\nseemed to be both the goal and commencement of the Sun's career, became\nto Greek imaginations the final bourne of all things, the abode of\nWinter and desolation, the pinnacle of the arch connecting the upper and\nlower world, and consequently the appropriate place for the banishment\nof Prometheus. The daughters of Israel, weeping for Thammuz, mentioned\nby Ezekiel, sat looking to the North, and waiting for his return from\nthat region. It was while Cybele with the Sun-God was absent among the\nHyperboreans, that Phrygia, abandoned by her, suffered the horrors of\nfamine. Delos and Delphi awaited the return of Apollo from the\nHyperboreans, and Hercules brought thence to Olympia the olive. To all\nMasons, the North has immemorially been the place of darkness; and of\nthe great lights of the Lodge, none is in the North.\n\nMithras, the rock-born hero [Greek: \u03a0\u03b5\u03c4\u03c1\u03bf\u03b3\u03b5\u03bd\u03b7\u03c2], heralded the Sun's\nreturn in Spring, as Prometheus, chained in his cavern, betokened the\ncontinuance of Winter. The Persian beacon on the mountain-top\nrepresented the Rock-born Divinity enshrined in his worthiest temple;\nand the funeral conflagration of Hercules was the sun dying in glory\nbehind the Western hills. But though the transitory manifestation\nsuffers or dies, the abiding and eternal power liberates and saves. It\nwas an essential attribute of a Titan, that he should arise again after\nhis fall; for the revival of Nature is as certain as its decline, and\nits alternations are subject to the appointment of a power which\ncontrols them both.\n\n\"God\", says Maximus Tyrius, \"did not spare His own Son [Hercules], or\nexempt Him from the calamities incidental to humanity\". The Theban\nprogeny of Jove had his share of pain and trial. By vanquishing earthly\ndifficulties he proved his affinity with Heaven. His life was a\ncontinuous struggle. He fainted before Typhon in the desert; and in the\ncommencement of the Autumnal season (cum long\u00e6 redit hora noctis),\ndescended under the guidance of Minerva to Hades. He died; but first\napplied for initiation to Eumolpus, in order to foreshadow that state of\nreligious preparation which should precede the momentous change. Even in\nHades he rescued Theseus and removed the stone of Ascalaphus,\nreanimated the bloodless spirits, and dragged into the light of day the\nmonster Cerberus, justly reputed invincible because an emblem of Time\nitself; he burst the chains of the grave (for Busiris is the grave\npersonified), and triumphant at the close as in the dawn of his career,\nwas received after his labors into the repose of the heavenly mansions,\nliving forever with Zeus in the arms of Eternal Youth.\n\nODIN is said to have borne twelve names among the old Germans, and to\nhave had 114 names besides. He was the Apollo of the Scandinavians, and\nis represented in the Voluspa as destined to slay the monstrous snake.\nThen the Sun will be extinguished, the earth be dissolved in the ocean,\nthe stars lose their brightness, and all Nature be destroyed, in order\nthat it may be renewed again. From the bosom of the waters a new world\nwill emerge clad in verdure; harvests will be seen to ripen where no\nseed was sown, and evil will disappear.\n\nThe free fancy of the ancients, which wove the web of their myths and\nlegends, was consecrated by faith. It had not, like the modern mind, set\napart a petty sanctuary of borrowed beliefs, beyond which all the rest\nwas common and unclean. Imagination, reason, and religion circled round\nthe same symbol; and in all their symbols there was serious meaning, if\nwe could but find it out. They did not devise fictions in the same vapid\nspirit in which we, cramped by conventionalities, read them. In\nendeavoring to interpret creations of fancy, fancy as well as reason\nmust guide: and much of modern controversy arises out of heavy\nmisapprehensions of ancient symbolism.\n\nTo those ancient peoples, this earth was the centre of the Universe. To\nthem there were no other worlds, peopled with living beings, to divide\nthe care and attention of the Deity. To them the World was a great\nplain, of unknown, perhaps inconceivable limits, and the Sun, the Moon,\nand the Stars journeyed above it, to give them light. The worship of the\nSun became the basis of all the religions of antiquity. To them light\nand heat were mysteries; as indeed they still are to us. As the Sun\ncaused the day, and his absence the night; as, when he journeyed\nNorthward, Spring and Summer followed him; and when he again turned to\nthe South, Autumn and inclement Winter, and cold and long dark nights\nruled the earth; ... as his influence produced the leaves and flowers,\nand ripened the harvests, and brought regular inundation, he\nnecessarily became to them the most interesting object of the material\nUniverse. To them he was the innate fire of bodies, the fire of nature.\nAuthor of Life, heat, and ignition, he was to them the efficient cause\nof all generation, for without him there was no movement, no existence,\nno form. He was to them immense, indivisible, imperishable, and\neverywhere present. It was their need of light, and of his creative\nenergy, that was felt by all men; and nothing was more fearful to them\nthan his absence. His beneficent influences caused his identification\nwith the Principle of Good; and the BRAHMA of the Hindus, the MITHRAS of\nthe Persians, and ATHOM, AMUN, PHTHA, and OSIRIS, of the Egyptians, the\nBEL of the Chaldeans, the ADONAI of the Ph\u0153nicians, the ADONIS and\nAPOLLO of the Greeks became but personifications of the Sun, the\nregenerating Principle, image of that fecundity which perpetuates and\nrejuvenates the world's existence.\n\nSo too the struggle between the Good and Evil Principles was\npersonified, as was that between life and death, destruction and\nre-creation; in allegories and fables which poetically represented the\napparent course of the Sun; who, descending toward the Southern\nHemisphere, was figuratively said to be conquered and put to death by\ndarkness, or the genius of Evil; but, returning again toward the\nNorthern Hemisphere, he seemed to be victorious, and to arise from the\ntomb. This death and resurrection were also figurative of the succession\nof day and night, of death, which is a necessity of life, and of life\nwhich is born of death; and everywhere the ancients still saw the combat\nbetween the two Principles that ruled the world. Everywhere this contest\nwas embodied in allegories and fictitious histories: into which were\ningeniously woven all the astronomical phenomena that accompanied,\npreceded, or followed the different movements of the Sun, and the\nchanges of Seasons, the approach or withdrawal of inundation. And thus\ngrew into stature and strange proportions the histories of the contests\nbetween Typhon and Osiris, Hercules and Juno, the Titans and Jupiter,\nOrmuzd and Ahriman, the rebellious Angels and the Deity, the Evil Genii\nand the Good; and the other like fables, found not only in Asia, but in\nthe North of Europe, and even among the Mexicans and Peruvians of the\nNew World; carried thither, in all probability, by those Ph\u0153nician\nvoyagers who bore thither civilization and the arts. The Scythians\nlamented the death of Acmon, the Persians that of Zohak conquered by\nPheridoun, the Hind\u016bs that of Soura-Parama slain by Soupra-Muni, as the\nScandinavians did that of Balder, torn to pieces by the blind Hother.\n\nThe primitive idea of infinite space existed in the first men, as it\nexists in us. It and the idea of infinite time are the first two innate\nideas. Man cannot conceive how thing can be added to thing, or event\nfollow event, forever. The idea will ever return, that no matter how\nlong bulk is added to bulk, there must be, still beyond, an empty void\n_without_ limit; in which is _nothing_. In the same way the idea of time\nwithout beginning or end forces itself on him. _Time_, without events,\nis also a _void_, and _nothing_.\n\nIn that empty void space the primitive men knew there was no light nor\nwarmth. They _felt_, what we know scientifically, that there must be a\nthick darkness there, and an intensity of cold of which we have no\nconception. Into that void they thought the Sun, the Planets, and the\nStars went down when they set under the Western Horizon. Darkness was to\nthem an enemy, a harm, a vague dread and terror. It was the very\nembodiment of the evil principle; and out of it they said that he was\nformed. As the Sun bent Southward toward that void, they shuddered with\ndread: and when, at the Winter Solstice, he again commenced his\nNorthward march, they rejoiced and feasted; as they did at the Summer\nSolstice, when most he appeared to smile upon them in his pride of\nplace. These days have been celebrated by all civilized nations ever\nsince. The Christian has made them feast-days of the church, and\nappropriated them to the two Saints John; and Masonry has done the same.\n\nWe, to whom the vast Universe has become but a great _machine_, not\ninstinct with a great SOUL, but a _clockwork_ of proportions\nunimaginable, but still infinitely less than infinite; and part at least\nof which we with our orreries can imitate; we, who have measured the\ndistances and dimensions, and learned the specific gravity and\ndetermined the orbits of the moon and the planets; we, who know the\ndistance to the sun, and his size; have measured the orbits of the\nflashing comets, and the distances of the fixed stars; and know the\nlatter to be suns like our sun, each with his retinue of worlds, and all\ngoverned by the same unerring, mechanical laws and outwardly imposed\nforces, centripetal and centrifugal; we, who with our telescopes have\nseparated the galaxy and the nebulae into other stars and groups of\nstars; discovered new planets, by first discovering their disturbing\nforces upon those already known; and learned that they all, Jupiter,\nVenus, and the fiery Mars, and Saturn and the others, as well as the\nbright, mild, and ever-changing Moon, are mere dark, dull opaque clods\nlike our earth, and not living orbs of brilliant fire and heavenly\nlight; we, who have counted the mountains and chasms in the moon, with\nglasses that could distinctly reveal to us the temple of Solomon, if it\nstood there in its old original glory; we, who no longer imagine that\nthe stars control our destinies, and who can calculate the eclipses of\nthe sun and moon, backward and forward, for ten thousand years; we, with\nour vastly increased conceptions of the powers of the Grand Architect of\nthe Universe, but our wholly material and mechanical view of that\nUniverse itself; we cannot, even in the remotest degree, _feel_, though\nwe may partially and imperfectly _imagine_, how those great, primitive,\nsimple-hearted children of Nature felt in regard to the Starry Hosts,\nthere upon the slopes of the Himalayas, on the Chaldean plains, in the\nPersian and Median deserts, and upon the banks of that great, strange\nRiver, the Nile. To them the Universe was _alive_--instinct with forces\nand powers, mysterious and beyond their comprehension. To them it was no\nmachine, no great system of clockwork; but a great live creature, an\narmy of creatures, in sympathy with or inimical to man. To them, all was\na mystery and a miracle, and the stars flashing overhead spoke to their\nhearts almost in an audible language. Jupiter, with his kingly\nsplendors, was the Emperor of the starry legions. Venus looked lovingly\non the earth and blessed it; Mars, with his crimson fires, threatened\nwar and misfortune; and Saturn, cold and grave, chilled and repelled\nthem. The ever-changing Moon, faithful companion of the Sun, was a\nconstant miracle and wonder; the Sun himself the visible emblem of the\ncreative and generative power. To them the earth was a great plain, over\nwhich the sun, the moon, and the planets revolved, its servants, framed\nto give it light. Of the stars, some were beneficent existences that\nbrought with them Spring-time and fruits and flowers,--some, faithful\nsentinels, advising them of coming inundation, of the season of storm\nand of deadly winds; some heralds of evil, which, steadily foretelling,\nthey seemed to cause. To them the eclipses were portents of evil, and\ntheir causes hidden in mystery, and supernatural. The regular returns of\nthe stars, the comings of Arcturus, Orion, Sirius, the Pleiades, and\nAldebaran, and the journeyings of the Sun, were voluntary and not\nmechanical to them. What wonder that astronomy became to them the most\nimportant of sciences; that those who learned it became rulers; and that\nvast edifices, the Pyramids, the tower or temple of Bel, and other like\nerections everywhere in the East, were builded for astronomical\npurposes?--and what wonder that, in their great child-like simplicity,\nthey worshipped Light, the Sun, the Planets, and the Stars, and\npersonified them, and eagerly believed in the histories invented for\nthem; in that age when the capacity for belief was infinite; as indeed,\nif we but reflect, it still is and ever will be?\n\nIf we adhered to the literally historic sense, antiquity would be a mere\ninexplicable, hideous chaos, and all the Sages deranged: and so it would\nbe with Masonry and those who instituted it. But when these allegories\nare explained, they cease to be absurd fables, or facts purely local;\nand become lessons of wisdom for entire humanity. No one can doubt, who\nstudies them, that they all came from a common source.\n\nAnd he greatly errs who imagines that, because the mythological legends\nand fables of antiquity are referable to and have their foundation in\nthe phenomena of the Heavens, and all the Heathen Gods are but mere\nnames given to the Sun, the Stars, the Planets, the Zodiacal Signs, the\nElements, the Powers of Nature, and Universal Nature herself, therefore\nthe first men worshipped the Stars, and whatever things, animate and\ninanimate, seemed to them to possess and exercise a power or influence,\nevident or imagined, over human fortunes and human destiny.\n\nFor ever, in all the nations, ascending to the remotest antiquity to\nwhich the light of History or the glimmerings of tradition reach, we\nfind, seated above all the gods which represent the luminaries and the\nelements, and those which personify the innate Powers of universal\nnature, a still higher Deity, silent, undefined, incomprehensible, the\nSupreme, one God, from Whom all the rest flow or emanate, or by Him are\ncreated. Above the Time-God Horus, the Moon-Goddess or Earth-Goddess\nIsis, and the Sun-God Osiris, of the Egyptians, was Amun, the\nNature-God; and above him, again, the Infinite, Incomprehensible Deity,\nATHOM. BREHM, the silent, self-contemplative, one original God, was the\nSource, to the Hind\u016bs, of Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva. Above Zeus, or\nbefore him, were Kronos and Ouranos. Over the Alohayim was the great\nNature-God AL, and still beyond him, Abstract Existence, IHUH--He that\nIS, WAS, and SHALL BE. Above all the Persian Deities was the Unlimited\nTime, ZERUANE-AKHERENE; and over Odin and Thor was the Great\nScandinavian Deity ALFADIR.\n\nThe worship of Universal Nature as a God was too near akin to the\nworship of a Universal Soul, to have been the instinctive creed of any\nsavage people or rude race of men. To imagine all nature with all its\napparently independent parts, as forming one consistent whole, and as\nitself a unit, required an amount of experience and a faculty of\ngeneralization not possessed by the rude uncivilized mind, and is but a\nstep below the idea of a universal Soul.\n\nIn the beginning man had the WORD; and that WORD was from God; and out\nof the living POWER communicated to man in and by that WORD, came THE\nLIGHT of His Existence.\n\nGod made man in His own likeness. When, by a long succession of\ngeological changes, He had prepared the earth to be his habitation, He\ncreated him, and placed him in that part of Asia which all the old\nnations agreed in calling the cradle of the human race, and whence\nafterward the stream of human life flowed forth to India, China, Egypt,\nPersia, Arabia, and Ph\u0153nicia. HE communicated to him a knowledge of the\nnature of his Creator, and of the pure, primitive, undefiled religion.\nThe peculiar and distinctive excellence and real essence of the\nprimitive man, and his true nature and destiny, consisted in his\nlikeness to God. HE stamped His own image upon man's soul. That image\nhas been, in the breast of every individual man and of mankind in\ngeneral, greatly altered, impaired, and defaced; but its old,\nhalf-obliterated characters are still to be found on all the pages of\nprimitive history; and the impress, not entirely effaced, every\nreflecting mind may discover in its own interior.\n\nOf the original revelation to mankind, of the primitive WORD of Divine\nTRUTH, we find clear indications and scattered traces in the sacred\ntraditions of all the primitive Nations; traces which when separately\nexamined, appear like the broken remnants, the mysterious and\nhieroglyphic characters, of a mighty edifice that has been destroyed;\nand its fragments, like those of the old Temples and Palaces of Nimroud,\nwrought incongruously into edifices many centuries younger. And,\nalthough amid the ever-growing degeneracy of mankind, this primeval word\nof revelation was falsified by the admixture of various errors, and\noverlaid and obscured by numberless and manifold fictions, inextricably\nconfused, and disfigured almost beyond the power of recognition, still a\nprofound inquiry will discover in heathenism many luminous vestiges of\nprimitive Truth.\n\nFor the old Heathenism had everywhere a foundation in Truth; and if we\ncould separate that pure intuition into nature and into the simple\nsymbols of nature, that constituted the basis of all Heathenism, from\nthe alloy of error and the additions of fiction, those first\nhieroglyphic traits of the instinctive science of the first men, would\nbe found to agree with truth and a true knowledge of nature, and to\nafford an image of a free, pure, comprehensive, and finished philosophy\nof life.\n\nThe struggle, thenceforward to be eternal, between the Divine will and\nthe natural will in the souls of men, commenced immediately after the\ncreation. Cain slew his brother Abel, and went forth to people parts of\nthe earth with an impious race, forgetters and defiers of the true God.\nThe other Descendants of the Common Father of the race intermarried with\nthe daughters of Cain's Descendants: and all nations preserved the\nremembrance of that division of the human family into the righteous and\nimpious, in their distorted legends of the wars between the Gods, and\nthe Giants and Titans. When, afterward, another similar division\noccurred, the Descendants of Seth alone preserved the true primitive\nreligion and science, and transmitted them to posterity in the ancient\nsymbolical character, on monuments of stone: and many nations preserved\nin their legendary traditions the memory of the columns of Enoch and\nSeth.\n\nThen the world declined from its original happy condition and fortunate\nestate, into idolatry and barbarism: but all nations retained the memory\nof that old estate; and the poets, in those early days the only\nhistorians, commemorated the succession of the ages of gold, silver,\nbrass, and iron.\n\nIn the lapse of those ages, the sacred tradition followed various\ncourses among each of the most ancient nations; and from its original\nsource, as from a common centre, its various streams flowed downward;\nsome diffusing through favored regions of the world fertility and life;\nbut others soon losing themselves, and being dried up in the sterile\nsands of human error.\n\nAfter the internal and Divine WORD originally communicated by God to\nman, had become obscured; after man's connection with his Creator had\nbeen broken, even outward language necessarily fell into disorder and\nconfusion. The simple and Divine Truth was overlaid with various and\nsensual fictions, buried under illusive symbols, and at last perverted\ninto horrible phantoms.\n\nFor in the progress of idolatry it needs came to pass, that what was\noriginally revered as the symbol of a higher principle, became gradually\nconfounded or identified with the object itself, and was worshipped;\nuntil this error led to a more degraded form of idolatry. The early\nnations received much from the primeval source of sacred tradition; but\nthat haughty pride which seems an inherent part of human nature led each\nto represent these fragmentary relics of original truth as a possession\npeculiar to themselves; thus exaggerating their value, and their own\nimportance, as peculiar favorites of the Deity, who had chosen them as\nthe favored people to whom to commit these truths. To make these\nfragments, as far as possible, their private property, they reproduced\nthem under peculiar forms, wrapped them up in symbols, concealed them in\nallegories, and invented fables to account for their own special\npossession of them. So that, instead of preserving in their primitive\nsimplicity and purity these blessings of original revelation, they\noverlaid them with poetical ornament; and the whole wears a fabulous\naspect, until by close and severe examination we discover the truth\nwhich the apparent fable contains.\n\nThese being the conflicting elements in the breast of man; the old\ninheritance or original dowry of truth, imparted to him by God in the\nprimitive revelation; and error, or the foundation for error, in his\ndegraded sense and spirit now turned from God to nature, false faiths\neasily sprung up and grew rank and luxuriant, when the Divine Truth was\nno longer guarded with jealous care, nor preserved in its pristine\npurity. This soon happened among most Eastern nations, and especially\nthe Indians, the Chaldeans, the Arabians, the Persians, and the\nEgyptians; with whom imagination, and a very deep but still sensual\nfeeling for nature, were very predominant. The Northern firmament,\nvisible to their eyes, possesses by far the largest and most brilliant\nconstellations; and they were more alive to the impressions made by such\nobjects, than are the men of the present day.\n\nWith the Chinese, a patriarchal, simple, and secluded people, idolatry\nlong made but little progress. They invented writing within three or\nfour generations after the flood; and they long preserved the memory of\nmuch of the primitive revelation; less overlaid with fiction than those\nfragments which other nations have remembered. They were among those who\nstood nearest to the source of sacred tradition; and many passages in\ntheir old writings contain remarkable vestiges of eternal truth, and of\nthe WORD of primitive revelation, the heritage of old thought, which\nattest to us their original eminence.\n\nBut among the other early nations, a wild enthusiasm and a sensual\nidolatry of nature soon superseded the simple worship of the Almighty\nGod, and set aside or disfigured the pure belief in the Eternal\nUncreated Spirit. The great powers and elements of nature, and the vital\nprinciple of production and procreation through all generations; then\nthe celestial spirits or heavenly Host, the luminous armies of the\nStars, and the great Sun, and mysterious, ever-changing Moon (all of\nwhich the whole ancient world regarded not as mere globes of light or\nbodies of fire, but as animated living substances, potent over man's\nfate and destinies); next the genii and tutelar spirits, and even the\nsouls of the dead, received divine worship. The animals, representing\nthe starry constellations, first reverenced as symbols merely, came to\nbe worshipped as gods; the heavens, earth, and the operations of nature\nwere personified; and fictitious personages invented to account for the\nintroduction of science and arts, and the fragments of the old religious\ntruths; and the good and bad principles personified, became also objects\nof worship; while, through all, still shone the silver threads of the\nold primitive revelation.\n\nIncreasing familiarity with early oriental records seems more and more\nto confirm the probability that they all originally emanated from one\nsource. The eastern and southern slopes of the Paropismus, or\nHindukusch, appear to have been inhabited by kindred Iranian races,\nsimilar in habits, language, and religion. The earliest Indian and\nPersian Deities are for the most part symbols of celestial light, their\nagency being regarded as an eternal warfare with the powers of Winter,\nstorm, and darkness. The religion of both was originally a worship of\noutward nature, especially the manifestations of fire and light; the\ncoincidences being too marked to be merely accidental. Deva, God, is\nderived from the root _div_, to shine. Indra, like Ormuzd or\nAhura-Mazda, is the bright firmament; Sura or Surya, the Heavenly, a\nname of the Sun, recurs in the Zend word Huare, the Sun, whence Khur and\nKhorshid or Corasch. Uschas and Mitra are Medic as well as Zend Deities\nand the Amschaspands or \"immortal Holy Ones\" of the Zend-Avesta may be\ncompared with the seven Rishis or Vedic Star-God, of the constellation\nof the Bear. Zoroastrianism, like Buddhism, was an innovation in regard\nto an older religion; and between the Parsee and Brahmin may be found\ntraces of disruption as well as of coincidence. The original\nNature-worship, in which were combined the conceptions both of a\nUniversal Presence and perpetuity of action, took different directions\nof development, according to the difference between the Indian and\nPersian mind.\n\nThe early shepherds of the Punjaub, then called the country of the Seven\nRivers, to whose intuitional or inspired wisdom (Veda) we owe what are\nperhaps the most ancient religious effusions extant in any language,\napostrophized as living beings the physical objects of their worship.\nFirst in this order of Deities stands Indra, the God of the \"blue\" or\n\"glittering\" firmament, called Devaspiti, Father of the Devas or\nElemental Powers, who measured out the circle of the sky, and made fast\nthe foundations of the Earth; the ideal domain of Varouna, \"the\nAll-encompasser,\" is almost equally extensive, including air, water,\nnight, the expanse between Heaven and Earth; Agni, who lives on the fire\nof the sacrifice, on the domestic hearth, and in the lightnings of the\nsky, is the great Mediator between God and Man; Uschas, or the Dawn,\nleads forth the Gods in the morning to make their daily repast in the\nintoxicating Soma of Nature's offertory, of which the Priest could only\ncompound, from simples a symbolical imitation. Then came the various\nSun-Gods, Adityas or Solar Attributes, Surya the Heavenly, Savitri the\nProgenitor, Pashan the Nourisher, Bagha the Felicitous, and Mitra the\nFriend.\n\nThe coming forth of the Eternal Being to the work of creation was\nrepresented as a marriage, his first emanation being a universal mother,\nsupposed to have potentially existed with him from Eternity, or, in\nmetaphorical language, to have been \"his sister and his spouse.\" She\nbecame eventually promoted to be the Mother of the Indian Trinity, of\nthe Deity under His three Attributes, of Creation, Preservation, and\nChange or Regeneration.\n\nThe most popular forms or manifestations of Vishnu the Preserver, were\nhis successive avataras or historic impersonations, which represented\nthe Deity coming forth out of the incomprehensible mystery of His\nnature, and revealing Himself at those critical epochs which either in\nthe physical or moral world seemed to mark a new commencement of\nprosperity and order. Combating the power of Evil in the various\ndepartments of Nature, and in successive periods of time, the Divinity,\nthough varying in form, is ever in reality the same, whether seen in\nuseful agricultural or social inventions, in traditional victories over\nrival creeds, or in physical changes faintly discovered through\ntradition, or suggested by cosmogonical theory. As Rama, the Epic hero\narmed with sword, club, and arrows, the prototype of Hercules and\nMithras, he wrestles like the Hebrew Patriarch with the Powers of\nDarkness; as Chrishna-Govinda, the Divine Shepherd, he is the Messenger\nof Peace, overmastering the world by music and love. Under the human\nform he never ceases to be the Supreme Being. \"The foolish\" (he says, in\nBhagavad Ghita), \"unacquainted with my Supreme Nature, despise me in\nthis human form, while men of great minds, enlightened by the Divine\nprinciple within them, acknowledge me as incorruptible and before all\nthings, and serve me with undivided hearts.\" \"I am not recognized by\nall,\" he says again, \"because concealed by the supernatural power which\nis in me; yet to me are known all things past, present, and to come; I\nexisted before Vaivaswata and Menou. I am the Most High God, the Creator\nof the World, the Eternal Poorooscha (Man-World or Genius of the World).\nAnd although in my own nature I am exempt from liability to birth or\ndeath, and am Lord of all created things, yet as often as in the world\nvirtue is enfeebled, and vice and injustice prevail, so often do I\nbecome manifest and am revealed from age to age, to save the just, to\ndestroy the guilty, and to reassure the faltering steps of virtue. He\nwho acknowledgeth me as even so, doth not on quitting this mortal frame\nenter into another, for he entereth into me; and many who have trusted\nin me have already entered into me, being purified by the power of\nwisdom. I help those who walk in my path, even as they serve me.\"\n\nBrahma, the creating agent, sacrificed himself, when, by descending into\nmaterial forms, he became incorporated with his work; and his\nmythological history was interwoven with that of the Universe. Thus,\nalthough spiritually allied to the Supreme, and Lord of all creatures\n(Prajapati), he shared the imperfection and corruption of an inferior\nnature, and, steeped in manifold and perishable forms, might be said,\nlike the Greek Uranus, to be mutilated and fallen. He thus combined two\ncharacters, formless form, immortal and mortal, being and non-being,\nmotion and rest. As Incarnate Intelligence, or THE WORD, he communicated\nto man what had been revealed to himself by the Eternal, since he is\ncreation's Soul as well as Body, within which the Divine Word is written\nin those living letters which it is the prerogative of the\nself-conscious spirit to interpret.\n\nThe fundamental principles of the religion of the Hind\u016bs consisted in\nthe belief in the existence of One Being only, of the immortality of the\nsoul, and of a future state of rewards and punishments. Their precepts\nof morality inculcate the practice of virtue as necessary for procuring\nhappiness even in this transient life; and their religious doctrines\nmake their felicity in a future state to depend upon it.\n\nBesides their doctrine of the transmigration of souls, their dogmas may\nbe epitomized under the following heads: 1st. The existence of one God,\nfrom Whom all things proceed, and to Whom all must return. To him they\nconstantly apply these expressions--The Universal and Eternal Essence;\nthat which has ever been and will ever continue; that which vivifies and\npervades all things; He who is everywhere present, and causes the\ncelestial bodies to revolve in the course He has prescribed to them. 2d.\nA tripartite division of the Good Principle, for the purposes of\nCreation, Preservation, and Renovation by change and death. 3d. The\nnecessary existence of an Evil Principle, occupied in counteracting the\nbenevolent purposes of the first, in their execution by the Devata or\nSubordinate Genii, to whom is entrusted the control over the various\noperations of nature.\n\nAnd this was part of their doctrine: \"One great and incomprehensible\nBeing has alone existed from all Eternity. Everything we behold and we\nourselves are portions of Him. The soul, mind or intellect, of gods and\nmen, and of all sentient creatures, are detached portions of the\nUniversal Soul, to which at stated periods they are destined to return.\nBut the mind of finite beings is impressed by one uninterrupted series\nof illusions, which they consider as real, until again united to the\ngreat fountain of truth. Of these illusions, the first and most\nessential is individuality. By its influence, when detached from its\nsource, the soul becomes ignorant of its own nature, origin, and\ndestiny. It considers itself as a separate existence, and no longer a\nspark of the Divinity, a link of one immeasurable chain, an infinitely\nsmall but indispensable portion of one great whole.\"\n\nTheir love of imagery caused them to personify what they conceived to be\nsome of the attributes of God, perhaps in order to present things in a\nway better adapted to the comprehensions of the vulgar, than the\nabstruse idea of an indescribable, invisible God; and hence the\ninvention of a Brahma, a Vishnu, and a Siva or Iswara. These were\nrepresented under various forms; but no emblem or visible sign of Brihm\nor Brehm, the Omnipotent, is to be found. They considered the great\nmystery of the existence of the Supreme Ruler of the Universe, as beyond\nhuman comprehension. Every creature endowed with the faculty of\nthinking, they held, must be conscious of the existence of a God, a\nfirst cause; but the attempt to explain the nature of that Being, or in\nany way to assimilate it with our own, they considered not only a proof\nof folly, but of extreme impiety.\n\nThe following extracts from their books will serve to show what were the\nreal tenets of their creed:\n\n\"By one Supreme Ruler is this Universe pervaded; even every world in the\nwhole circle of nature.... There is one Supreme Spirit, which nothing\ncan shake, more swift than the thought of man. That Supreme Spirit moves\nat pleasure, but in itself is immovable; it is distant from us, yet near\nus; it pervades this whole system of worlds; yet it is infinitely beyond\nit. That man who considers all beings as existing even in the Supreme\nSpirit, and the Supreme Spirit as pervading all beings, henceforth views\nno creature with contempt.... All spiritual beings are the same in kind\nwith the Supreme Spirit.... The pure enlightened soul assumes a luminous\nform, with no gross body, with no perforation, with no veins or tendons,\nunblemished, untainted by sin; itself being a ray from the Infinite\nSpirit, which knows the Past and the Future, which pervades all, which\nexisted with no cause but itself, which created all things as they are,\nin ages most remote. That all-pervading Spirit which gives light to the\nvisible Sun, even the same in _kind_ am I, though infinitely distant in\n_degree_. Let my soul return to the immortal Spirit of God, and then let\nmy body, which ends in ashes, return to dust! O Spirit, who pervadest\nfire, lead us in a straight path to the riches of beatitude. Thou, O\nGod, possessest all the treasures of knowledge! Remove each foul taint\nfrom our souls!\n\n\"From what root springs mortal man, when felled by the hand of death?\nWho can make him spring again to birth? God, who is perfect wisdom,\nperfect happiness. He is the final refuge of the man who has liberally\nbestowed his wealth, who has been firm in virtue, who knows and adores\nthat Great One.... Let us adore the supremacy of that Divine Sun, the\nGodhead who illuminates all, who re-creates all, from whom all proceed,\nto whom all must return, whom we invoke to direct our understandings\naright, in our progress toward his holy seat.... What the Sun and Light\nare to this visible world, such is truth to the intellectual and visible\nUniverse.... Our souls acquire certain knowledge, by meditating on the\nlight of Truth, which emanates from the Being of Beings.... That Being,\nwithout eyes sees, without ears hears all; he knows whatever can be\nknown, but there is none who knows him; him the wise call the Great,\nSupreme, Pervading Spirit.... Perfect Truth, Perfect Happiness, without\nequal, immortal; absolute unity, whom neither speech can describe, nor\nmind comprehend: all-pervading, all-transcending, delighted with his own\nboundless intelligence, nor limited by space or time; without feet,\nrunning swiftly; without hands, grasping all worlds; without eyes,\nall-surveying; without ears, all-hearing; without an intelligent guide,\nunderstanding all; without cause, the first of all causes; all-ruling,\nall-powerful, the Creator, Preserver, Transformer of all things: such is\nthe Great One; this the Vedas declare.\n\n\"May that soul of mine, which mounts aloft in my waking hours as an\nethereal spark, and which, even in my slumber, has a like ascent,\nsoaring to a great distance, as an emanation from the Light of Lights,\nbe united by devout meditation with the Spirit supremely blest, and\nsupremely intelligent!.... May that soul of mine, which was itself the\nprimeval oblation placed within all creatures.... which is a ray of\nperfect wisdom, which is the inextinguishable light fixed within created\nbodies, without which no good act is performed.... in which as an\nimmortal essence may be comprised whatever has passed, is present, or\nwill be hereafter.... be united by devout meditation with the Spirit\nsupremely blest and supremely intelligent!\n\n\"The Being of Beings is the Only God, eternal and everywhere present,\nWho comprises everything. There is no God but He.... The Supreme Being\nis invisible, incomprehensible, immovable, without figure or shape. No\none has ever seen Him; time never comprised Him; His essence pervades\neverything; all was derived from Him.\n\n\"The duty of a good man, even in the moment of his destruction, consists\nnot only in forgiving, but even in a desire of benefiting his destroyer;\nas the sandal-tree, in the instant of its overthrow, sheds perfume on\nthe axe which fells it.\"\n\nThe Vedanta and Nyaya philosophers acknowledge a Supreme Eternal Being,\nand the immortality of the soul: though, like the Greeks, they differ in\ntheir ideas of those subjects. They speak of the Supreme Being as an\neternal essence that pervades space, and gives life or existence. Of\nthat universal and eternal pervading spirit, the Vedanti suppose four\nmodifications; but as these do not change its nature, and as it would be\nerroneous to ascribe to each of them a distinct essence, so it is\nequally erroneous, they say, to imagine that the various modifications\nby which the All-pervading Being exists, or displays His power, are\nindividual existences. Creation is not considered as the instant\nproduction of things, but only as the manifestation of that which exists\neternally in the one Universal Being. The Nyaya philosophers believe\nthat spirit and matter are eternal; but they do not suppose that the\nworld in its present form has existed from eternity, but only the\nprimary matter from which it sprang when operated on by the almighty\nWord of God, the Intelligent Cause and Supreme Being, Who produced the\ncombinations or aggregations which compose the material Universe. Though\nthey believe that soul is an emanation from the Supreme Being, they\ndistinguish it from that Being, in its individual existence. Truth and\nIntelligence are the eternal attributes of God, not, they say, of the\nindividual soul, which is susceptible both of knowledge and ignorance,\nof pleasure and pain; and therefore God and it are distinct. Even when\nit returns to the Eternal, and attains supreme bliss, it undoubtedly\ndoes not cease. Though _united_ to the Supreme Being, it is not\n_absorbed_ in it, but still retains the abstract nature of definite or\nvisible existence.\n\n\"The dissolution of the world,\" they say, \"consists in the destruction\nof the visible forms and qualities of things; but their material essence\nremains, and from it new worlds are formed by the creative energy of\nGod; and thus the Universe is dissolved and renewed in endless\nsuccession.\"\n\nThe Jainas, a sect at Mysore and elsewhere, say that the ancient\nreligion of India and of the whole world consisted in the belief in one\nGod, a pure Spirit, indivisible, omniscient and all-powerful; that God,\nhaving given to all things their appointed order and course of action,\nand to man a sufficient portion of reason, or understanding, to guide\nhim in his conduct, leaves him to the operation of free will, without\nthe entire exercise of which he could not be held answerable for his\nconduct.\n\nMenou, the Hind\u016b lawgiver, adored, not the visible, material Sun, but\n\"that divine and incomparably greater light,\" to use the words of the\nmost venerable text in the Indian Scripture, \"which illumines all,\ndelights all, from which all proceed, to which all must return, and\nwhich alone can irradiate our intellects.\" He thus commences his\nInstitutes:\n\n\"Be it heard!\n\n\"This Universe existed only in the first divine idea yet unexpanded, as\nif involved in darkness, imperceptible, undefinable, undiscoverable by\nreason, and undiscovered by revelation, as if it were wholly immersed in\nsleep:\n\n\"Then the Sole Self-existing Power, Himself undiscovered, but making\nthis world discernible, with five elements, and other principles of\nnature, appeared with undiminished glory, _expanding His idea_, or\ndispelling the gloom.\n\n\"He Whom the mind alone can perceive, whose essence eludes the eternal\norgans, who has no visible parts, who exists from Eternity, even He, the\nsoul of all beings, Whom no being can comprehend, shone forth.\n\n\"He, having willed to produce various beings from His own divine\nSubstance, first with a thought created the waters ... From that which\nis [precisely the Hebrew \u05d9\u05d4\u05d5\u05d4], the first cause, not the object of\nsense, existing everywhere in substance, not existing to our perception,\nwithout beginning or end\" [the A and \u03a9, or the I A \u03a9], \"was\nproduced the divine male famed in all worlds under the appellation of\nBrahma.\"\n\nThen recapitulating the different things created by Brahma, he adds:\n\"He,\" meaning Brahma [the \u039b\u03bf\u03b3\u03bf\u03c2, the WORD], \"whose powers are\nincomprehensible, having thus created this Universe, was again absorbed\nin the Supreme Spirit, changing the time of energy for the time of\nrepose.\"\n\nThe _Antareya A'ran'ya_, one of the Vedas, gives this primitive idea of\nthe creation: \"In the beginning, the Universe was but a Soul: nothing\nelse, active or inactive, existed. Then HE had this thought, _I will\ncreate worlds_; and thus HE created these different worlds; air, the\nlight, mortal beings, and the waters.\n\n\"HE had this thought: _Behold the worlds; I will create guardians for\nthe worlds._ So HE took of the water and fashioned a being clothed with\nthe human form. He looked upon him, and of that being so contemplated,\nthe mouth opened like an egg, and speech came forth, and from the speech\nfire. The nostrils opened, and through them went the breath of\nrespiration, and by it the air was propagated. The eyes opened; from\nthen came a luminous ray, and from it was produced the sun. The ears\ndilated; from them came hearing, and from hearing space:\" ... and, after\nthe body of man, with the senses, was formed;--\"HE, the Universal Soul,\nthus reflected: _How can this body exist without Me?_ He examined\nthrough what extremity He could penetrate it. He said to Himself: If,\n_without Me, the World is articulated, breath exhales, and sight sees;\nif hearing hears, the skin feels, and the mind reflects, deglutition\nswallows, and the generative organ fulfills its functions, what then am\nI?_ And separating the suture of the cranium, He penetrated into man.\"\n\nBehold the great fundamental primitive truths! God, an infinite Eternal\nSoul or Spirit. Matter, not eternal nor self-existent, but\ncreated--created by a thought of God. After matter, and worlds, then\nman, by a like thought: and finally, after endowing him with the senses\nand a thinking mind, a portion, a spark, of God Himself penetrates the\nman, and becomes a living spirit within him.\n\nThe Vedas thus detail the creation of the world:\n\n\"In the beginning there was a single God, existing of Himself; Who,\nafter having passed an eternity absorbed in the contemplation of His own\nbeing, desired to manifest His perfections outwardly of Himself; and\ncreated the matter of the world. The four elements being thus produced,\nbut still mingled in confusion, He breathed upon the waters, which\nswelled up into an immense ball in the shape of an egg, and, developing\nthemselves, became the vault and orb of Heaven which encircles the\nearth. Having made the earth and the bodies of animal beings, this God,\nthe essence of movement, gave to them, to animate them, a portion of His\nown being. Thus, the soul of everything that breathes being a fraction\nof the universal soul, none perishes; but each soul merely changes its\nmould and form, by passing successively into different bodies. Of all\nforms, that which most pleases the Divine Being is Man, as nearest\napproaching His own perfections. When a man, absolutely disengaging\nhimself from his senses, absorbs himself in self-contemplation, he comes\nto discern the Divinity, and becomes part of Him.\"\n\nThe Ancient Persians in many respects resembled the Hind\u016bs,--in their\nlanguage, their poetry, and their poetic legends. Their conquests\nbrought them in contact with China; and they subdued Egypt and Judea.\nTheir views of God and religion more resembled those of the Hebrews than\nthose of any other nation; and indeed the latter people borrowed from\nthem some prominent doctrines, that we are in the habit of regarding as\nan essential part of the original Hebrew creed.\n\nOf the King of Heaven and Father of Eternal Light, of the pure World of\nLIGHT, of the Eternal WORD by which all things were created, of the\nSeven Mighty Spirits that stand next to the Throne of Light and\nOmnipotence, and of the glory of those Heavenly Hosts that encompass\nthat Throne, of the Origin of Evil, and the Prince of Darkness, Monarch\nof the rebellious spirits, enemies of all good, they entertained tenets\nvery similar to those of the Hebrews. Toward Egyptian idolatry they felt\nthe strongest abhorrence, and under Cambyses pursued a regular plan for\nits utter extirpation. Xerxes, when he invaded Greece, destroyed the\nTemples and erected fire-chapels along the whole course of his march.\nTheir religion was eminently spiritual, and the earthly fire and earthly\nsacrifice were but the signs and emblems of another devotion and a\nhigher power.\n\nThus the fundamental doctrine of the ancient religion of India and\nPersia was at first nothing more than a simple veneration of nature, its\npure elements and its primary energies, the sacred fire, and above all,\nLight,--the air, not the lower atmospheric air, but the purer and\nbrighter air of Heaven, the breath that animates and pervades the breath\nof mortal life. This pure and simple veneration of nature is, perhaps\nthe most ancient, and was by far the most generally prevalent in the\nprimitive and patriarchal world. It was not originally a deification of\nnature, or a denial of the sovereignty of God. Those pure elements and\nprimitive essences of created nature offered to the first men, still in\na close communication with the Deity, not a likeness of resemblance,\nnor a mere fanciful image or a poetical figure, but a natural and true\nsymbol of Divine power. Everywhere in the Hebrew writings the pure light\nor sacred fire is employed as an image of the all-prevading and\nall-consuming power and omnipresence of the Divinity. His breath was the\nsource of life; and the faint whisper of the breeze announced to the\nprophet His immediate presence.\n\n\"All things are the progeny of one fire. The Father perfected all\nthings, and delivered them over to the Second Mind, whom all nations of\nmen call the First. Natural works co-exist with the intellectual light\nof the Father; for it is the Soul which adorns the great Heaven, and\nwhich adorns it after the Father. The Soul, being a bright fire, by the\npower of the Father, remains immortal, and is mistress of life, and\nfills up the recesses of the world. For the fire which is first beyond,\ndid not shut up his power in matter by works, but by mind, for the\nframer of the fiery world is the mind of mind, who first sprang from\nmind, clothing fire with fire. Father-begotten Light! for He alone,\nhaving from the Father's power received the essence of intellect, is\nenabled to understand the mind of the Father; and to instill into all\nsources and principles the capacity of understanding, and of ever\ncontinuing in ceaseless revolving motion.\" Such was the language of\nZoroaster, embodying the old Persian ideas.\n\nAnd the same ancient sage thus spoke of the Sun and Stars: The Father\nmade the whole Universe of fire and water and earth, and all-nourishing\nether. He fixed a great multitude of moveless stars, that stand still\nforever, not by compulsion and unwillingly, but without desire to\nwander, fire acting upon fire. He congregated the seven firmaments of\nthe world, and so surrounded the earth with the convexity of the\nHeavens; and therein set seven living existences, arranging their\napparent disorder in regular orbits, six of them planets, and the Sun,\nplaced in the centre, the seventh;--in that centre from which all lines,\ndiverging which way soever, are equal; and the swift sun himself,\nrevolving around a principal centre, and ever striving to reach the\ncentral and all-pervading light, bearing with him the bright Moon.\n\nAnd yet Zoroaster added: \"Measure not the journeyings of the Sun, nor\nattempt to reduce them to rule; for he is carried by the eternal will of\nthe Father, not for your sake. Do not endeavor to understand the\nimpetuous course of the Moon; for she runs evermore under the impulse\nof necessity; and the progression of the Stars was not generated to\nserve any purpose of yours.\"\n\nOrmuzd says to Zoroaster, in the Boundehesch: \"I am he who holds the\nStar-Spangled Heaven in ethereal space; who makes this sphere, which\nonce was buried in darkness, a flood of light. Through me the Earth\nbecame a world firm and lasting--the earth on which walks the Lord of\nthe world. I am he who makes the light of Sun, Moon, and Stars pierce\nthe clouds. I make the corn seed, which perishing in the ground sprouts\nanew.... I created man, whose eye is light, whose life is the breath of\nhis nostrils. I placed within him life's unextinguishable power.\"\n\nOrmuzd or Ahura-Mazda himself represented the primal light, distinct\nfrom the heavenly bodies, yet necessary to their existence, and the\nsource of their splendor. The Amschaspands (Ameschaspenta, \"immortal\nHoly Ones\"), each presided over a special department of nature. Earth\nand Heaven, fire and water, the Sun and Moon, the rivers, trees, and\nmountains, even the artificial divisions of the day and year were\naddressed in prayer as tenanted by Divine beings, each separately ruling\nwithin his several sphere. Fire, in particular, that \"most energetic of\nimmortal powers,\" the visible representative of the primal light, was\ninvoked as \"Son of Ormuzd.\" The Sun, the Archimagus, that noblest and\nmost powerful agent of divine power, who \"steps forth as a Conqueror\nfrom the top of the terrible Alborj to rule over the world which he\nenlightens from the throne of Ormuzd,\" was worshipped among other\nsymbols by the name of MITHRAS, a beneficent and friendly genius, who,\nin the hymn addressed to him in the Zend-Avesta, bears the names given\nhim by the Greeks, as the \"Invincible\" and the \"Mediator\"; the former,\nbecause in his daily strife with darkness he is the most active\nconfederate of Ormuzd; the latter, as being the medium through which\nHeaven's choicest blessings are communicated to men. He is called \"the\neye of Ormuzd, the effulgent Hero, pursuing his course triumphantly,\nfertilizer of deserts, most exalted of the Izeds or Yezatas, the\nnever-sleeping, the protector of the land.\" \"When the dragon foe\ndevastates my provinces,\" says Ormuzd, \"and afflicts them with famine,\nthen is he struck down by the strong arm of Mithras, together with the\nDevs of Mazanderan. With his lance and his immortal club, the Sleepless\nChief hurls down the Devs into the dust, when as Mediator he interposes\nto guard the City from evil.\"\n\nAhriman was by some Parsee sects considered older than Ormuzd, as\ndarkness is older than light; he is imagined to have been unknown as a\nMalevolent Being in the early ages of the world, and the fall of man is\nattributed in the Boundehesch to an apostate worship of him, from which\nmen were converted by a succession of prophets terminating with\nZoroaster.\n\nMithras is not only light, but intelligence; that luminary which, though\nborn in obscurity, will not only dispel darkness but conquer death. The\nwarfare through which this consummation is to be reached, is mainly\ncarried on through the instrumentality of the \"Word,\" that \"ever-living\nemanation of the Deity, by virtue of which the world exists,\" and of\nwhich the revealed formulas incessently repeated in the liturgies of the\nMagi are but the expression. \"What shall I do,\" cried Zoroaster, \"O\nOrmuzd, steeped in brightness, in order to battle with Daroodj-Ahriman,\nfather of the Evil Law; how shall I make men pure and holy?\" Ormuzd\nanswered and said: \"Invoke, O Zoroaster, the pure law of the Servants of\nOrmuzd; invoke the Amschaspands who shed abundance throughout the seven\nKeshwars; invoke the Heaven, Zeruana-Akarana, the birds travailing on\nhigh, the swift wind, the Earth; invoke my Spirit, me who am\nAhura-Mazda, the purest, strongest, wisest, best of beings; me who have\nthe most majestic body, who through purity am Supreme, whose Soul is the\nExcellent Word; and ye, all people, invoke me as I have commanded\nZoroaster.\"\n\nAhura-Mazda himself is the living WORD; he is called \"First-born of all\nthings, express image of the Eternal, very light of very light, the\nCreator, who by power of the Word which he never ceases to pronounce,\nmade in 365 days the Heaven and the Earth.\" The Word is said in the\nYashna to have existed before all, and to be itself a Yazata, a\npersonified object of prayer. It was revealed in Serosch, in Homa, and\nagain, under Gushtasp, was manifested in Zoroaster.\n\nBetween life and death, between sunshine and shade, Mithras is the\npresent exemplification of the Primal Unity from which all things arose,\nand into which, through his mediation, all contrarieties will ultimately\nbe absorbed. His annual sacrifice is the passover of the Magi, a\nsymbolical atonement or pledge of moral and physical regeneration. He\ncreated the world in the beginning; and as at the close of each\nsuccessive year he sets free the current of life to invigorate a fresh\ncircle of being, so in the end of all things he will bring the weary\nsum of ages as a hecatomb before God, releasing by a final sacrifice the\nSoul of Nature from her perishable frame, to commence a brighter and\npurer existence.\n\nIamblichus (_De Mys_. viii. 4) says: \"The Egyptians are far from\nascribing all things to physical causes; life and intellect they\ndistinguish from physical being, both in man and in the Universe. They\nplace intellect and reason first as self-existent, and from these they\nderive the created world. As Parent of generated things they constitute\na Demiurge, and acknowledge a vital force both in the Heavens and before\nthe Heavens. They place Pure Intellect above and beyond the Universe,\nand another (that is, Mind revealed in the Material World), consisting\nof one continuous mind pervading the Universe, and apportioned to all\nits parts and spheres.\" The Egyptian idea, then, was that of all\ntranscendental philosophy--that of a Deity both immanent and\ntranscendent--spirit passing into its manifestations, but not exhausted\nby so doing.\n\nThe wisdom recorded in the canonical rolls of Hermes quickly attained in\nthis transcendental lore, all that human curiosity can ever discover.\nThebes especially is said to have acknowledged a being without beginning\nor end, called Amun or Amun-Kneph, the all-prevading Spirit or Breath of\nNature, or perhaps even some still more lofty object of reverential\nreflection, whom it was forbidden even to name. Such a being would in\ntheory stand at the head of the three orders of Gods mentioned by\nHerodotus, these being regarded as arbitrary classifications of similar\nor equal beings, arranged in successive emanations, according to an\nestimate of their comparative dignity. The Eight Great Gods, or primary\nclass, were probably manifestations of the emanated God in the several\nparts and powers of the Universe, each potentially comprising the whole\nGodhead.\n\nIn the ancient Hermetic books, as quoted by Iamblichus, occurred the\nfollowing passage in regard to the Supreme Being:\n\n\"Before all the things that actually exist, and before all beginnings,\nthere is one God, prior even to the first God and King, remaining\nunmoved in the singleness of his own Unity: for neither is anything\nconceived by intellect inwoven with him, nor anything else; but he is\nestablished as the exemplar of the God who is good, who is his own\nfather, self-begotten, and has only Parent. For he is something greater\nand prior to, and the fountain of all things, and the foundation of\nthings conceived by the intellect, which are the first species. And from\nthis ONE, the self-originated God caused himself to shine forth; for\nwhich reason he is his own father, and self-originated. For he is both a\nbeginning and God of Gods, a Monad from the One, prior to substance and\nthe beginning of substance; for from him is substantiality and\nsubstance, whence also he is called the beginning of things conceived by\nthe intellect. These then are the most ancient beginnings of all things,\nwhich Hermes places before the ethereal and empyrean and celestial\nGods.\"\n\n\"CHANG-TI, or the Supreme Lord or Being,\" said the old Chinese creed,\n\"is the principle of everything that exists, and Father of all living.\nHe is eternal, immovable, and independent: His power knows no bounds:\nHis sight equally comprehends the Past, the Present, and the Future, and\npenetrates even to the inmost recesses of the heart. Heaven and earth\nare under his government: all events, all revolutions, are the\nconsequences of his dispensation and will. He is pure, holy, and\nimpartial; wickedness offends his sight; but he beholds with an eye of\ncomplacency the virtuous actions of men. Severe, yet just, he punishes\nvice in an exemplary manner, even in Princes and Rulers; and often casts\ndown the guilty, to crown with honor the man who walks after his own\nheart, and whom he raises from obscurity. Good, merciful, and full of\npity, he forgives the wicked upon their repentance: and public\ncalamities and the irregularity of the seasons are but salutary\nwarnings, which his fatherly goodness gives to men, to induce them to\nreform and amend.\"\n\nControlled by reason infinitely more than by the imagination, that\npeople, occupying the extreme East of Asia, did not fall into idolatry\nuntil after the time of Confucius, and within two centuries of the birth\nof Christ; when the religion of BUDDHA or FO was carried thither from\nIndia. Their system was long regulated by the pure worship of God, and\nthe foundation of their moral and political existence laid in a sound,\nupright reason, conformable to true ideas of the Deity. They had no\nfalse gods or images, and their third Emperor _Hoam-ti_ erected a\nTemple, the first probably ever erected, to the Great Architect of the\nUniverse. And though they offered sacrifices to divers tutelary angels,\nyet they honored them infinitely less than XAM-TI or CHANG-TI, the\nSovereign Lord of the World.\n\nConfucius forbade making images or representations of the Deity. He\nattached no idea of personality to Him; but considered Him as a Power or\nPrinciple, pervading all Nature. And the Chinese designated the Divinity\nby the name of THE DIVINE REASON.\n\nThe Japanese believe in a Supreme Invisible Being, not to be represented\nby images or worshipped in Temples. They styled him AMIDA or OMITH; and\nsay that he is without beginning or end; that he came on earth, where he\nremained a thousand years, and became the Redeemer of our fallen race:\nthat he is to judge all men; and the good are to live forever, while the\nbad are to be condemned to Hell.\n\n\"The Chang-ti is represented,\" said Confucius, \"under the general emblem\nof the visible firmament, as well as under the particular symbols of the\nSun, the Moon, and the Earth, because by their means we enjoy the gifts\nof the Chang-ti. The Sun is the source of life and light: the Moon\nilluminates the world by night. By observing the course of these\nluminaries, mankind are enabled to distinguish times and seasons. The\nAncients, with the view of connecting the act with its object, when they\nestablished the practice of sacrificing to the Chang-ti, fixed the day\nof the Winter Solstice, because the Sun, after having passed through the\ntwelve places assigned apparently by the Chang-ti as its annual\nresidence, began its career anew, to distribute blessings throughout the\nEarth.\"\n\nHe said: \"The TEEN is the universal principle and prolific source of all\nthings.... The Chang-ti is the universal principle of existence.\"\n\nThe Arabians never possessed a poetical, high-wrought, and\nscientifically arranged system of Polytheism. Their historical\ntraditions had much analogy with those of the Hebrews, and coincided\nwith them in a variety of points. The tradition of a purer faith and the\nsimple Patriarchal worship of the Deity appear never to have been\ntotally extinguished among them; nor did idolatry gain much foothold\nuntil near the time of Mahomet; who, adopting the old primeval faith,\ntaught again the doctrine of one God, adding to it that he was His\nProphet.\n\nTo the mass of Hebrews, as well as to other nations, seem to have come\nfragments only of the primitive revelation: nor do they seem, until\nafter their captivity among the Persians, to have concerned themselves\nabout metaphysical speculations in regard to the Divine Nature and\nessence; although it is evident, from the Psalms of David, that a select\nbody among them preserved a knowledge, in regard to the Deity, which was\nwholly unknown to the mass of the people; and those chosen few were made\nthe medium of transition for certain truths, to later ages.\n\nAmong the Greeks, the scholars of the Egyptians, all the higher ideas\nand severer doctrines on the Divinity, his Sovereign Nature and Infinite\nMight, the Eternal Wisdom and Providence that conducts and directs all\nthings to their proper end, the Infinite Mind and Supreme Intelligence\nthat created all things, and is raised far above external nature,--all\nthese loftier ideas and nobler doctrines were expounded more or less\nperfectly by Pythagoras, Anaxagoras, and Socrates, and developed in the\nmost beautiful and luminous manner by Plato, and the philosophers that\nsucceeded him. And even in the popular religion of the Greeks are many\nthings capable of a deeper import and more spiritual signification;\nthough they seem only rare vestiges of ancient truth, vague\npresentiments, fugitive tones, and momentary flashes, revealing a belief\nin a Supreme Being, Almighty Creator of the Universe, and Common Father\nof Mankind.\n\nMuch of the primitive Truth was taught to Pythagoras by Zoroaster, who\nhimself received it from the Indians. His disciples rejected the use of\nTemples, of Altars, and of Statues; and smiled at the folly of those\nnations who imagined that the Deity sprang from or had any affinity with\nhuman nature. The tops of the highest mountains were the places chosen\nfor sacrifices. Hymns and prayers were their principal worship. The\nSupreme God, who fills the wide circle of Heaven, was the object to Whom\nthey were addressed. Such is the testimony of Herodotus. Light they\nconsidered not so much as an object of worship, as rather the most pure\nand lively emblem of, and first emanation from, the Eternal God; and\nthought that man required something visible or tangible to exalt his\nmind to that degree of adoration which is due to the Divine Being.\n\nThere was a surprising similarity between the Temples, Priests,\ndoctrines, and worship of the Persian Magi and the British Druids. The\nlatter did not worship idols in the human shape, because they held that\nthe Divinity, being invisible, ought to be adored without being seen.\nThey asserted the Unity of the Godhead. Their invocations were made to\nthe One All-preserving Power; and they argued that, as this power was\nnot matter, it must necessarily be the Deity; and the secret symbol used\nto express his name was O.I.W. They believed that the earth had\nsustained one general destruction by water; and would again be destroyed\nby fire. They admitted the doctrines of the immortality of the soul, a\nfuture state, and a day of judgment, which would be conducted on the\nprinciple of man's responsibility. They even retained some idea of the\nredemption of mankind through the death of a Mediator. They retained a\ntradition of the Deluge, perverted and localized. But, around these\nfragments of primitive truth they wove a web of idolatry, worshipped two\nSubordinate Deities under the names of HU and CERIDWEN, male and female\n(doubtless the same as Osiris and Isis), and held the doctrine of\ntransmigration.\n\nThe early inhabitants of Scandinavia believed in a God who was \"the\nAuthor of everything that existeth; the Eternal, the Ancient, the Living\nand Awful Being, the Searcher into concealed things, the Being that\nnever changeth.\" Idols and visible representations of the Deity were\noriginally forbidden, and He was directed to be worshipped in the lonely\nsolitude of sequestered forests, where He was said to dwell, invisible,\nand in perfect silence.\n\nThe Druids, like their Eastern ancestors, paid the most sacred regard to\nthe odd numbers, which, traced backward, ended in Unity or Deity, while\nthe even numbers ended in nothing. 3 was particularly reverenced.\n19(7+3+3\u00b2): 30 (7x3+3x3): and 21 (7x3) were numbers observed in the\nerection of their temples, constantly appearing in their dimensions, and\nthe number and distances of the huge stones.\n\nThey were the sole interpreters of religion. They superintended all\nsacrifices; for no private person could offer one without their\npermission. They exercised the power of excommunication; and without\ntheir concurrence war could not be declared nor peace made: and they\neven had the power of inflicting the punishment of death. They professed\nto possess a knowledge of magic, and practised augury for the public\nservice.\n\nThey cultivated many of the liberal sciences, and particularly\nastronomy, the favorite science of the Orient; in which they attained\nconsiderable proficiency. They considered day as the offspring of night,\nand therefore made their computations by nights instead of days; and we,\nfrom them, still use the words fortnight and sen'night. They knew the\ndivision of the heavens into constellations; and finally, they practised\nthe strictest morality, having particularly the most sacred regard for\nthat peculiarly Masonic virtue, Truth.\n\nIn the Icelandic Prose Edda is the following dialogue:\n\n\"Who is the first or eldest of the Gods?\n\n\"In our language he is called ALFADIR (All-Father, or the Father of\nAll); but in the old Asgard he had twelve names.\n\n\"Where is this God? What is his power? and what hath he done to display\nhis glory?\n\n\"He liveth from all ages, he governeth all realms, and swayeth all\nthings both great and small.\n\n\"He hath formed Heaven and earth, and the air, and all things thereunto\nbelonging.\n\n\"He hath made man and given him a soul which shall live and never\nperish, though the body shall have mouldered away or have been burnt to\nashes. And all that are righteous shall dwell with him in the place\ncalled _Gimli_ or _Vingolf_; but the wicked shall go to _Hel_ and thence\nto _Niflhel_ which is below, in the ninth world.\"\n\nAlmost every heathen nation, so far as we have any knowledge of their\nmythology, believed in one Supreme Overruling God, whose name it was not\nlawful to utter.\n\n\"When we ascend\", says M\u00dcLLER, \"to the most distant heights of Greek\nhistory, the idea of God as the Supreme Being stands before us as a\nsimple fact. Next to this adoration of One God, the Father of Heaven,\nthe Father of men, we find in Greece a Worship of Nature.\" The original\n\u0396\u03b5\u03cd\u03c2 was the God or Gods, called by the Greeks the Son of Time, meaning\nthat there was no God before Him, but He was Eternal. \"Zeus,\" says the\nOrphic line, \"is the Beginning, Zeus the Middle; out of Zeus all things\nhave been made\". And the Peleides of Dodona said, \"Zeus was, Zeus is,\nZeus will be; O great Zeus!\" \u0396\u03b5\u03cd\u03c2 \u03bd\u03ae, \u0396\u03b5\u03cd\u03c2 \u03ad\u03c3\u03c4\u03af\u03bd, \u0396\u03b5\u03cd\u03c2 \u1f10\u03c3\u03c3\u03b5\u03c4\u03b1\u03b9 \u03ce \u03bc\u03b5\u03b3\u03ac\u03bb\u03b7\n\u0396\u03b5\u03cd: and he was \u0396\u03b5\u03cd\u03c2, \u03ba\u03cd\u03b4\u03b9\u03c3\u03c4\u03bf\u03c2, \u03bc\u03ad\u03b3\u03b9\u03c3\u03c4\u03bf\u03c2, \u0396\u03b5us, Best and Greatest.\n\nThe Parsees, retaining the old religion taught by Zaradisht, say in\ntheir catechism: \"We believe in only one God, and do not believe in any\nbeside Him; Who created the Heavens, the Earth the Angels.... Our God\nhas neither face nor form, color nor shape, nor fixed place. There is no\nother like Him, nor can our mind comprehend Him.\"\n\nThe Tetragrammaton, or _some other word covered by it_, was forbidden to\nbe pronounced. But that its pronunciation might not be lost among the\nLevites, the High-Priest uttered it in the Temple once a year, on the\n10th day of the Month Tisri, the day of the great feast of expiation.\nDuring this ceremony, the people were directed to make a great noise,\nthat the Sacred Word might not be heard by any who had not a right to\nit; for every other, said the Jews, would be incontinently stricken\ndead.\n\nThe Great Egyptian Initiates, before the time of the Jews, did the same\nthing in regard to the word Isis; which they regarded as sacred and\nincommunicable.\n\nOrigen says: \"There are names which have a natural potency. Such as\nthose which the Sages used among the Egyptians, the Magi in Persia, the\nBrahmins in India. What is called Magic is not a vain and chimerical\nact, as the Stoics and Epicureans pretend. The names SABAOTH and ADONAI\nwere not made for created beings; but they belong to a mysterious\ntheology, which goes back to the Creator. From Him comes the virtue of\nthese names, when they are arranged and pronounced according to the\nrules.\"\n\nThe Hind\u016b word AUM represented the three Powers combined in their Deity:\nBrahma, Vishnu, and Siva; or the Creating, Preserving, and Destroying\nPowers: A, the first; U or \u014e-\u014e, the second; and M, the third. This word\ncould not be pronounced, except by the letters: for its pronunciation as\none word was said to make Earth tremble, and even the Angels of Heaven\nto quake for fear.\n\nThe word AUM, says the Ramayan, represents \"The Being of Beings, One\nSubstance in three forms; without mode, without quality, without\npassion: Immense, Incomprehensible, Infinite, Indivisible, Immutable,\nIncorporeal, Irresistible.\"\n\nAn old passage in the Purana says: \"All the rites ordained in the Vedas,\nthe sacrifices to the fire, and all other solemn purifications, shall\npass away; but that which shall never pass away is the word A-\u014e-\u014e-M\nfor it is the symbol of the Lord of all things.\"\n\nHerodotus says that the Ancient Pelasgi built no temples and worshipped\nno idols, and had a sacred name of Deity, which it was not permissible\nto pronounce.\n\nThe Clarian Oracle, which was of unknown antiquity, being asked which of\nthe Deities was named IA\u03a9, answered in these remarkable words: \"The\nInitiated are bound to conceal the mysterious secrets. Learn, then, that\nIA\u03a9 is the Great God Supreme, that ruleth over all.\"\n\nThe Jews consider the True Name of God to be irrecoverably lost by\ndisuse, and regard its pronunciation as one of the Mysteries that will\nbe revealed at the coming of their Messiah. And they attribute its loss\nto the illegality of applying the Masoretic points to so sacred a Name,\nby which a knowledge of the proper vowels is forgotten. It is even said,\nin the Gemara of Abodah Zara, that God permitted a celebrated Hebrew\nScholar to be burned by a Roman Emperor, because he had been heard to\npronounce the Sacred Name with points.\n\nThe Jews feared that the Heathen would get possession of the Name: and\ntherefore, in their copies of the Scriptures, they wrote it in the\nSamaritan character, instead of the Hebrew or Chaldaic, that the\nadversary might not make an improper use of it: for they believed it\ncapable of working miracles; and held that the wonders in Egypt were\nperformed by Moses, in virtue of this name being engraved on his rod:\nand that any person who knew the true pronunciation would be able to do\nas much as he did.\n\nJosephus says it was unknown until God communicated it to Moses in the\nwilderness: and that it was lost through the wickedness of man.\n\nThe followers of Mahomet have a tradition that there is a secret name of\nthe Deity which possesses wonderful properties; and that the only method\nof becoming acquainted with it, is by being initiated into the Mysteries\nof the _Ism Abla_.\n\nH O M  was the first framer of the new religion among the Persians, and\nHis Name was Ineffable.\n\nAMUN, among the Egyptians, was a name pronounceable by none save the\nPriests.\n\nThe old Germans adored God with profund reverence, without daring to\nname Him, or to worship Him in Temples. The Druids expressed the name\nof Deity by the letters O-I-W.\n\nAmong all the nations of primitive antiquity, the doctrine of the\nimmortality of the soul was not a mere probable hypothesis, needing\nlaborious researches and diffuse argumentation to produce conviction of\nits truth. Nor can we hardly give it the name of _Faith_; for it was a\nlively _certainty_, like the feeling of one's own existence and\nidentity, and of what is actually present; exerting its influence on all\nsublunary affairs, and the motive of mightier deeds and enterprises than\nany mere earthly interest could inspire.\n\nEven the doctrine of transmigration of souls, universal among the\nAncient Hind\u016bs and Egyptians, rested on a basis of the old primitive\nreligion, and was connected with a sentiment purely religious. It\ninvolved this noble element of truth: That since man had gone astray,\nand wandered far from God, he must needs make many efforts, and undergo\na long and painful pilgrimage, before he could rejoin the Source of all\nPerfection: and the firm conviction and positive certainty, that nothing\ndefective, impure, or defiled with earthy stains, could enter the pure\nregion of perfect spirits, or be eternally united to God; wherefore the\nsoul had to pass through long trials and many purifications before it\ncould attain that blissful end. And the end and aim of all these systems\nof philosophy was the final deliverance of the soul from the old\ncalamity, the dreaded fate and frightful lot of being compelled to\nwander through the dark regions of nature and the various forms of the\nbrute creation, ever changing its terrestrial shape, and its union with\nGod, which they held to be the lofty destiny of the wise and virtuous\nsoul.\n\nPythagoras gave to the doctrine of the transmigration of souls that\nmeaning which the wise Egyptians gave to it in their Mysteries: He never\ntaught the doctrine in that literal sense in which it was understood by\nthe people. Of that literal doctrine not the least vestige is to be\nfound in such of his symbols as remain, nor in his precepts collected by\nhis disciple Lysias. He held that men always remain, in their essence,\nsuch as they were created; and can degrade themselves only by vice, and\nennoble themselves only by virtue.\n\nHierocles, one of his most zealous and celebrated disciples, expressly\nsays that he who believes that the soul of man, after his death, will\nenter the body of a beast, for his vices, or become a plant for his\nstupidity, is deceived; and is absolutely ignorant of the eternal form\nof the soul, which can never change; for, always remaining man, it is\nsaid to become God or beast, through virtue or vice, though it can\nbecome neither one nor the other by nature, but solely by resemblance of\nits inclinations to theirs.\n\nAnd Tim\u00e6us of Locria, another disciple, says that to alarm men and\nprevent them from committing crimes, they menaced them with strange\nhumiliations and punishments; even declaring that their souls would pass\ninto new bodies,--that of a coward into the body of a deer; that of a\nravisher into the body of a wolf; that of a murderer into the body of\nsome still more ferocious animal; and that of an impure sensualist into\nthe body of a hog.\n\nSo, too, the doctrine is explained in the Ph\u00e6do. And Lysias says, that\nafter the soul, purified of its crimes, has left the body and returned\nto Heaven, it is no longer subject to change or death, but enjoys an\neternal felicity. According to the Indians, it returned to, and became a\npart of, the universal soul which animates everything.\n\nThe Hind\u016bs held that Buddha descended on earth to raise all human beings\nup to the perfect state. He will ultimately succeed, and all, himself\nincluded, be merged in Unity.\n\nVishnu is to judge the world at the last day. It is to be consumed by\nfire: The Sun and Moon are to lose their light; the Stars to fall; and a\nNew Heaven and Earth to be created.\n\nThe legend of the fall of the Spirits, obscured and distorted, is\npreserved in the Hind\u016b Mythology. And their traditions acknowledged, and\nthey revered, the succession of the first ancestors of mankind, or the\nHoly Patriarchs of the primitive world, under the name of the Seven\nGreat RISHIS, or Sages of hoary antiquity; though they invested their\nhistory with a cloud of fictions.\n\nThe Egyptians held that the soul was immortal; and that Osiris was to\njudge the world.\n\nAnd thus reads the Persian legend:\n\n\"After Ahriman shall have ruled the world until the end of time,\nSOSIOSCH, the promised Redeemer, will come and annihilate the power of\nthe DEVS (or Evil Spirits), awaken the dead, and sit in final judgment\nupon spirits and men. After that the comet _Gurzsher_ will be thrown\ndown, and a general conflagration take place, which will consume the\nwhole world. The remains of the earth will then sink down into\n_Duzakh_, and become for three periods a place of punishment for the\nwicked. Then, by degrees all will be pardoned, even _Ahriman_ and the\n_Devs_, and admitted to the regions of bliss, and thus there will be a\nnew Heaven and a new earth.\"\n\nIn the doctrines of Lamaism also, we find, obscured, and partly\nconcealed in fiction, fragments of the primitive truth. For according to\nthat faith, \"There is to be a final judgment before ESLIK KHAN: The good\nare to be admitted to Paradise, the bad to be banished to hell, where\nthere are eight regions burning hot and eight freezing cold.\"\n\nIn the Mysteries, wherever they were practised, was taught that truth of\nthe primitive revelation, the existence of One Great Being, Infinite and\npervading the Universe, Who was there worshipped without superstition;\nand His marvellous nature, essence, and attributes taught to the\nInitiates; while the vulgar attributed His works to Secondary Gods,\npersonified, and isolated from Him in fabulous independence.\n\nThese truths were covered from the common people as with a veil; and the\nMysteries were carried into every country, that, without disturbing the\npopular beliefs, truth, the arts, and the sciences might be known to\nthose who were capable of understanding them, and maintaining the true\ndoctrine incorrupt; which the people, prone to superstition and\nidolatry, have in no age been able to do; nor, as many strange\naberrations and superstitions of the present day prove, any more now\nthan heretofore. For we need but point to the doctrines of so many sects\nthat degrade the Creator to the rank, and assign to Him the passions of\nhumanity, to prove that now, as always, the old truths must be committed\nto a few, or they will be overlaid with fiction and error, and\nirretrievably lost.\n\nThough Masonry is identical with the Ancient Mysteries, it is so in this\nqualified sense; that it presents but an imperfect image of their\nbrilliancy; the ruins only of their grandeur, and a system that has\nexperienced progressive alterations, the fruits of social events and\npolitical circumstances. Upon leaving Egypt, the Mysteries were modified\nby the habits of the different nations among whom they were introduced.\nThough originally more moral and political than religious, they soon\nbecame the heritage, as it were, of the priests, and essentially\nreligious, though in reality limiting the sacerdotal power, by teaching\nthe intelligent laity the folly and absurdity of the creeds of the\npopulace. They were therefore necessarily changed by the religious\nsystems of the countries into which they were transplanted. In Greece,\nthey were the Mysteries of Ceres; in Rome, of _Bona Dea_, the Good\nGoddess; in Gaul, the School of Mars; in Sicily, the Academy of the\nSciences; among the Hebrews, they partook of the rites and ceremonies of\na religion which placed all the powers of government, and all the\nknowledge, in the hands of the Priests and Levites. The pagodas of\nIndia, the retreats of the Magi of Persia and Chaldea, and the pyramids\nof Egypt, were no longer the sources at which men drank in knowledge.\nEach people, at all informed, had its Mysteries. After a time the\nTemples of Greece and the School of Pythagoras lost their reputation,\nand Freemasonry took their place.\n\nMasonry, when properly expounded, is at once the interpretation of the\ngreat book of nature, the recital of physical and astronomical\nphenomena, the purest philosophy, and the place of deposit, where, as in\na Treasury, are kept in safety all the great truths of the primitive\nrevelation, that form the basis of all religions. In the modern Degrees\nthree things are to be recognized: The image of primeval times, the\ntableau of the efficient causes of the Universe, and the book in which\nare written the morality of all peoples, and the code by which they must\ngovern themselves if they would be prosperous.\n\nThe Kabalistic doctrine was long the religion of the Sage and the\nSavant; because, like Freemasonry, it incessantly tends toward spiritual\nperfection, and the fusion of the creeds and Nationalities of Mankind.\nIn the eyes of the Kabalist, all men are his brothers; and their\nrelative ignorance is, to him, but a reason for instructing them. There\nwere illustrious Kabalists among the Egyptians and Greeks, whose\ndoctrines the Orthodox Church has accepted; and among the Arabs were\nmany, whose wisdom was not slighted by the Medi\u00e6val Church.\n\nThe Sages proudly wore the name of Kabalists. The Kabalah embodied a\nnoble philosophy, pure, not mysterious, but symbolic. It taught the\ndoctrine of the Unity of God, the art of knowing and explaining the\nessence and operations of the Supreme Being, of spiritual powers and\nnatural forces, and of determining their action by symbolic figures; by\nthe arrangement of the alphabet, the combinations of numbers, the\ninversion of letters in writing and the concealed meanings which they\nclaimed to discover therein. The Kabalah is the key of the occult\nsciences; and the Gnostics, were born of the Kabalists.\n\nThe science of numbers represented not only arithmetical qualities, but\nalso all grandeur, all proportion. By it we necessarily arrive at the\ndiscovery of the Principle or First Cause of things, called at the\npresent day THE ABSOLUTE.\n\nOr UNITY,--that loftiest term to which all philosophy directs itself;\nthat imperious necessity of the human mind, that pivot round which it is\ncompelled to group the aggregate of its ideas: Unity, this source, this\ncentre of all systematic order, this principle of existence, this\ncentral point, unknown in its essence, but manifest in its effects;\nUnity, that sublime centre to which the chain of causes necessarily\nascends, was the august Idea toward which all the ideas of Pythagoras\nconverged. He refused the title of _Sage_, which means _one who knows_.\nHe invented, and applied to himself that of _Philosopher_, signifying\none who _is fond of_ or _studies things secret and occult_. The\nastronomy which he mysteriously taught, was _astrology_: his science of\nnumbers was based on Kabalistical principles.\n\nThe Ancients, and Pythagoras himself, whose real principles have not\nbeen always understood, never meant to ascribe to numbers, that is to\nsay, to abstract signs, any special virtue. But the Sages of Antiquity\nconcurred in recognizing a ONE FIRST CAUSE (material or spiritual) of\nthe existence of the Universe. Thence UNITY became the symbol of the\nSupreme Deity. It was made to express, to represent God; but without\nattributing to _the mere number_ ONE any divine or supernatural virtue.\n\nThe Pythagorean ideas as to particular numbers are partially expressed\nin the following:\n\nLECTURE OF THE KABALISTS.\n\n_Qu_ Why did you seek to be received a Knight of the Kabalah?\n\n_Ans_ To know, by means of numbers, the admirable harmony which there\nis between nature and religion.\n\n_Qu_ How were you announced?\n\n_Ans_ By twelve raps.\n\n_Qu_ What do they signify?\n\n_Ans_ The twelve bases of our temporal and spiritual happiness.\n\n_Qu_ What is a Kabalist?\n\n_Ans_ A man who has learned, by tradition, the Sacerdotal Art and the\nRoyal Art.\n\n_Qu_ What means the device, _Omnia in numeris sita sunt_?\n\n_Ans_ That everything lies veiled in numbers.\n\n_Qu_ Explain me that.\n\n_Ans_ I will do so, as far as the number 12. Your sagacity will discern\nthe rest.\n\n_Qu_ What signifies the _unit_ in the number 10?\n\n_Ans_ GOD, creating and animating matter, expressed by 0, which, alone,\nis of no value.\n\n_Qu_ What does the unit _mean_?\n\n_Ans_ In the moral order, a Word incarnate in the bosom of a virgin--or\nreligion.... In the physical, a spirit embodied in the virgin earth--or\nnature.\n\n_Qu_ What do you mean by the number _two_?\n\n_Ans_ In the moral order, _man_ and _woman_.... In the physical, the\n_active_ and the _passive_.\n\n_Qu_ What do you mean by the number 3?\n\n_Ans_ In the moral order, the three theological virtues.... In the\nphysical, the three principles of bodies.\n\n_Qu_ What do you mean by the number 4?\n\n_Ans_ The four cardinal virtues.... The four elementary qualities.\n\n_Qu_ What do you mean by the number 5?\n\n_Ans_ The quintessence of religion.... The quintessence of matter.\n\n_Qu_ What do you mean by the number 6?\n\n_Ans_ The theological cube.... The physical cube.\n\n_Qu_ What do you mean by the number 7?\n\n_Ans_ The seven sacraments.... The seven planets.\n\n_Qu_ What do you mean by the number 8?\n\n_Ans_ The small number of Elus.... The small number of wise men.\n\n_Qu_ What do you mean by the number 9?\n\n_Ans_ The exaltation of religion.... The exaltation of matter.\n\n_Qu_ What do you mean by the number 10?\n\n_Ans_ The ten commandments.... The ten precepts of nature.\n\n_Qu_ What do you mean by the number 11?\n\n_Ans_ The multiplication of religion.... The multiplication of nature.\n\n_Qu_ What do you mean by the number 12?\n\n_Ans_ The twelve Articles of Faith; the twelve Apostles, foundation of\nthe Holy City, who preached throughout the whole world, for our\nhappiness and spiritual joy.... The twelve operations of nature: The\ntwelve signs of the Zodiac, foundation of the _Primum Mobile_, extending\nit throughout the Universe for our temporal felicity.\n\n[The Rabbi (President of the Sanhedrim) adds: From all that you have\nsaid, it results that the unit develops itself in 2, is completed in\nthree internally, and so produces 4 externally; whence, through 6, 7, 8,\n9, it arrives at 5, half of the spherical number 10, to ascend, passing\nthrough 11, to 12, and to raise itself, by the number 4 times 10, to the\nnumber 6 times 12, the final term and summit of our eternal happiness.]\n\n_Qu_ What is the generative number?\n\n_Ans_ In the Divinity, it is the unit; in created things, the number 2:\nBecause the Divinity, 1, engenders 2, and in created things 2 engenders\n1.\n\n_Qu_ What is the most majestic number?\n\n_Ans_ 3, because it denotes the triple divine essence.\n\n_Qu_ What is the most mysterious number?\n\n_Ans_ 4, because it contains all the mysteries of nature.\n\n_Qu_ What is the most occult number?\n\n_Ans_ 5, because it is inclosed in the centre of the series.\n\n_Qu_ What is the most salutary number?\n\n_Ans_ 6, because it contains the source of our spiritual and corporeal\nhappiness.\n\n_Qu_ What is the most fortunate number?\n\n_Ans_ 7, because it leads us to the decade, the perfect number.\n\n_Qu_ Which is the number most to be desired?\n\n_Ans_ 8, because he who possesses it, is of the number of the Elus and\nSages.\n\n_Qu_ Which is the most sublime number?\n\n_Ans_ 9, because by it religion and nature are exalted.\n\n_Qu_ Which is the most perfect number?\n\n_Ans_ 10, because it includes unity, which created everything, and\nzero, symbol of matter and chaos, whence everything emerged. In its\nfigures it comprehends the created and uncreated, the commencement and\nthe end, power and force, life and annihilation. By the study of this\nnumber, we find the relations of all things; the power of the Creator,\nthe faculties of the creature, the Alpha and Omega of divine knowledge.\n\n_Qu_ Which is the most multiplying number?\n\n_Ans_ 11, because with the possession of two units, we arrive at the\nmultiplication of things.\n\n_Qu_ Which is the most solid number?\n\n_Ans_ 12, because it is the foundation of our spiritual and temporal\nhappiness.\n\n_Qu_ Which is the favorite number of religion and nature?\n\n_Ans_ 4 times 10, because it enables us, rejecting everything impure,\neternally to enjoy the number 6 times 12, term and summit of our\nfelicity.\n\n_Qu_ What is the meaning of the square?\n\n_Ans_ It is the symbol of the four elements contained in the triangle,\nor the emblem of the three chemical principles: these things united form\nabsolute unity in the primal matter.\n\n_Qu_ What is the meaning of the centre of the circumference?\n\n_Ans_ It signifies the universal spirit, vivifying centre of nature.\n\n_Qu_ What do you mean by the quadrature of the circle?\n\n_Ans_ The investigation of the quadrature of the circle indicates the\nknowledge of the four vulgar elements, which are themselves composed of\nelementary spirits or chief principles; as the circle, though round, is\ncomposed of lines, which escape the sight, and are seen only by the\nmind.\n\n_Qu_ What is the profoundest meaning of the figure 3?\n\n_Ans_ The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. From the action of\nthese three results the triangle within the square; and from the seven\nangles, the decade or perfect number.\n\n_Qu_ Which is the most confused figure?\n\n_Ans_ Zero,--the emblem of chaos, formless mixture of the elements.\n\n_Qu_ What do the four devices of the Degree signify?\n\n_Ans_ That we are to hear, see, be silent, and enjoy our happiness.\n\nThe _unit_ is the symbol of identity, equality, existence, conservation,\nand general harmony; the Central Fire, the Point within the Circle.\n\n_Two_, or the _duad_, is the symbol of diversity, inequality, division,\nseparation, and vicissitudes.\n\nThe figure 1 signifies the living man [a body standing upright]; man\nbeing the only living being possessed of this faculty. Adding to it a\nhead, we have the letter P, the sign of Paternity, Creative Power; and\nwith a further addition, R, signifying man in motion, going, _Iens_,\n_Iturus_.\n\nThe Duad is the origin of contrasts. It is the imperfect condition into\nwhich, according to the Pythagoreans, a being falls, when he detaches\nhimself from the Monad, or God. Spiritual beings, emanating from God,\nare enveloped in the duad, and therefore receive only illusory\nimpressions.\n\nAs formerly the number ONE designated harmony, order, or the Good\nPrinciple (the ONE and ONLY GOD, expressed in Latin by _Solus_, whence\nthe words _Sol_, _Soleil_, symbol of this God), the number Two expressed\nthe contrary idea. There commenced the fatal knowledge of good and evil.\nEverything double, false, opposed to the single and sole reality, was\nexpressed by the Binary number. It expressed also that state of\ncontrariety in which nature exists, where everything is double; night\nand day, light and darkness, cold and heat, wet and dry, health and\nsickness, error and truth, one and the other sex, etc. Hence the Romans\ndedicated the second month in the year to Pluto, the God of Hell, and\nthe second day of that month to the _man\u00e8s_ of the dead.\n\nThe number _One_, with the Chinese, signified unity, harmony, order, the\nGood Principle, or God; _Two_, disorder, duplicity, falsehood. That\npeople, in the earliest ages, based their whole philosophical system on\nthe two primary figures or lines, one straight and unbroken, and the\nother broken or divided into two; doubling which, by placing one under\nthe other, and trebling by placing three under each other, they made the\nfour symbols and eight _Koua_; which referred to the natural elements,\nand the primary principles of all things, and served symbolically or\nscientifically to express them. Plato terms unity and duality the\noriginal elements of nature, and first principles of all existence: and\nthe oldest sacred book of the Chinese says: \"The Great First Principle\nhas produced two equations and differences, or primary rules of\nexistence; but the two primary rules or two oppositions, namely YN and\nYANG, or repose and motion, have produced four signs or symbols, and\nthe four symbols have produced the eight KOUA or further combinations.\"\n\nThe interpretation of the Hermetic fables shows, among every ancient\npeople, in their principal gods, first, 1, the Creating Monad, then 3,\nthen 3 times 3, 3 times 9, and 3 times 27. This triple progression has\nfor its foundation the three ages of Nature, the Past, the Present, and\nthe Future; or the three degrees of universal generation ... Birth,\nLife, Death ... Beginning, middle, end.\n\nThe Monad was male, because its action produces no change _in_ itself,\nbut only _out_ of itself. It represented the creative principle.\n\nThe Duad, for a contrary reason, was female, ever changing by addition,\nsubtraction, or multiplication. It represents matter capable of form.\n\nThe union of the Monad and Duad produces the Triad, signifying the world\nformed by the creative principle out of matter. Pythagoras represented\nthe world by the right-angled triangle, in which the squares of the two\nshortest sides are equal, added together, to the square of the longest\none; as the world, as formed, is equal to the creative cause, and matter\nclothed with form.\n\nThe ternary is the first of the unequal numbers. The Triad, mysterious\nnumber, which plays so great a part in the traditions of Asia and the\nphilosophy of Plato, image of the Supreme Being, includes in itself the\nproperties of the first two numbers. It was, to the Philosophers, the\nmost excellent and favorite number: a mysterious type, revered by all\nantiquity, and consecrated in the Mysteries; wherefore there are but\nthree essential Degrees among Masons; who venerate, in the triangle, the\nmost august mystery, that of the Sacred Triad, object of their homage\nand study.\n\nIn geometry, a line cannot represent a body absolutely perfect. As\nlittle do two lines constitute a figure demonstratively perfect. But\nthree lines form, by their junction, the TRIANGLE, or the first figure\nregularly perfect; and this is why it has served and still serves to\ncharacterize The Eternal; Who, infinitely perfect in His nature, is, as\nUniversal Creator, the first Being, and consequently the first\nPerfection.\n\nThe Quadrangle or Square, perfect as it appears, being but the second\nperfection, can in no wise represent God; Who is the first. It is to be\nnoted that the name of God in Latin and French (Deus, Dieu), has for its\ninitial the Delta or Greek Triangle. Such is the reason, among ancients\nand moderns, for the consecration of the Triangle, whose three sides\nare emblems of the three Kingdoms, or Nature, or God. In the centre is\nthe Hebrew JOD (initial of \u05d9\u05d4\u05d5\u05d4), the Animating Spirit of Fire, the\ngenerative principle, represented by the letter G., initial of the name\nof Deity in the languages of the North, and the meaning whereof is\nGeneration.\n\nThe first side of the Triangle, offered to the study of the Apprentice,\nis the mineral kingdom, symbolized by Tub \u00a4.\n\nThe second side, the subject of the meditations of the Fellow Craft, is\nthe vegetable kingdom, symbolized by Schib (an ear of corn). In this\nreign begins the Generation of bodies; and this is why the letter G., in\nits radiance, is presented to the eyes of the adept.\n\nThe third side, the study whereof is devoted to the animal kingdom, and\ncompletes the instruction of the Master, is symbolized by Mach (Son of\nputrefaction).\n\nThe figure 3 symbolizes the Earth. It is a figure of the terrestrial\nbodies. The 2, upper half of 3, symbolizes the vegetable world, the\nlower half being hidden from our sight.\n\nThree also referred to harmony, friendship, peace, concord, and\ntemperance; and was so highly esteemed among the Pythagoreans that they\ncalled it perfect harmony.\n\nThree, four, ten, and twelve were sacred numbers among the Etrurians, as\nthey were among the Jews, Egyptians, and Hind\u016bs.\n\nThe name of Deity, in many Nations, consisted of three letters: among\nthe Greeks, \u0399.\u0391.\u03a9.; among the Persians, H.O.M.; among the Hind\u016bs, AUM;\namong the Scandinavians, I.O.W. On the upright Tablet of the King,\ndiscovered at Nimroud, no less than five of the thirteen names of the\nGreat Gods consist of three letters each,--ANU, SAN, YAV, BAR, and BEL.\n\nThe quaternary is the most perfect number, and the root of other\nnumbers, and of all things. The tetrad expresses the first mathematical\npower. Four represents also the generative power, from which all\ncombinations are derived. The Initiates considered it the emblem of\nMovement and the Infinite, representing everything that is neither\ncorporeal nor sensible. Pythagoras communicated it to his disciples as a\nsymbol of the Eternal and Creative Principle, under the name of\nQuaternary, the Ineffable Name of God, which signifies Source of\neverything that has received existence: and which, in Hebrew, is\ncomposed of four letters.\n\nIn the Quaternary we find the first solid figure, the universal symbol\nof immortality, the pyramid. The Gnostics claimed that the whole edifice\nof their science rested on a square whose angles were ... \u03a3\u03b9\u03b3\u03ae,\n_Silence_: \u0392\u03c5\u03b8\u03bf\u03c2, _Profundity_: \u039d\u03bf\u03bf\u03c2, _Intelligence_: and \u0391\u03bb\u03b7\u03b8\u03b5\u03b9\u03b1,\n_Truth_. For if the Triangle, figured by the number 3, forms the\ntriangular base of the pyramid, it is unity which forms its point or\nsummit.\n\nLysias and Tim\u00e6us of Locria said that not a single thing could be named,\nwhich did not depend on the quaternary as its root.\n\nThere is, according to the Pythagoreans, a connection between the gods\nand numbers, which constitutes the kind of Divination called\nArithmomancy. The soul is a number: it is moved of itself: it contains\nin itself the quaternary number.\n\nMatter being represented by the number 9, or 3 times 3, and the Immortal\nSpirit having for its essential hieroglyphic the quaternary or the\nnumber 4, the Sages said that Man, having gone astray and become\nentangled in an inextricable labyrinth, in going from _four_ to _nine_,\nthe only way which he could take to emerge from these deceitful paths,\nthese disastrous detours, and the abyss of evil into which he had\nplunged, was to retrace his steps, and go from _nine_ to _four_.\n\nThe ingenious and mystical idea which caused the Triangle to be\nvenerated, was applied to the figure 4 (4). It was said that it\nexpressed a living being, I, bearer of the Triangle \u0394, the emblem of\nGod; _i.e._, man bearing with himself a Divine principle.\n\nFour was a divine number; it referred to the Deity, and many Ancient\nNations gave God a name of four letters; as the Hebrews \u05d9\u05d4\u05d5\u05d4, the\nEgyptians AMUN, the Persians SURA, the Greeks \u0398\u0395\u039f\u03a3, and the Latins DEUS.\nThis was the Tetragrammaton of the Hebrews, and the Pythagoreans called\nit Tetractys, and swore their most solemn oath by it. So too ODIN among\nthe Scandinavians, \u0396\u0395\u03a5\u03a3 among the Greeks, PHTA among the Egyptians,\nTHOTH among the Phoenicians, and AS-UR and NEBO among the Assyrians. The\nlist might be indefinitely extended.\n\nThe number 5 was considered as mysterious, because it was compounded of\nthe Binary, Symbol of the False and Double, and the Ternary, so\ninteresting in its results. It thus energetically expresses the state of\nimperfection, of order and disorder, of happiness and misfortune, of\nlife and death, which we see upon the earth. To the Mysterious Societies\nit offered the fearful image of the Bad Principle, bringing trouble\ninto the inferior order,--in a word, the Binary acting in the Ternary.\n\nUnder another aspect it was the emblem of marriage; because it is\ncomposed of 2, the first equal number, and of 3, the first unequal\nnumber. Wherefore Juno, the Goddess of Marriage, had for her\nhieroglyphic the number 5.\n\nMoreover, it has one of the properties of the number 9, that of\nreproducing itself, when multiplied by itself: there being always a 5 on\nthe right hand of the product; a result which led to its use as a symbol\nof material changes.\n\nThe ancients represented the world by the number 5. A reason for it,\ngiven by Diodorus, is, that it represents earth, water, air, fire, and\nether or spirit. Thence the origin of \u03c0\u03b5\u03bd\u03c4\u03b5 (5) and \u03a0\u03b1\u03bd the Universe, as\nthe whole.\n\nThe number 5 designated the universal quintessence, and symbolized, by\nits form \u03c2, the vital essence, the animating spirit, which flows\n[_serpentat_] through all nature. In fact, this ingenious figure is the\nunion of the two Greek accents, placed over those vowels which ought\nto be or ought not to be aspirated. The first sign [?] bears the name of\npotent spirit; and signifies the Superior Spirit, the Spirit of God\naspirated (_spiratus_), respired by man. The second sign is styled\nmild spirit, and represents the secondary spirit, the spirit purely\nhuman.\n\nThe triple triangle, a figure of five lines uniting in five points, was\namong the Pythagoreans an emblem of Health.\n\nIt is the Pentalpha of Pythagoras, or Pentangle of Solomon; has five\nlines and five angles; and is, among Masons, the outline or origin of\nthe five-pointed Star, and an emblem of Fellowship.\n\nThe number 6 was, in the Ancient Mysteries, a striking emblem of nature;\nas presenting the six dimensions of all bodies; the six lines which make\nup their form, viz., the four lines of direction, toward the North,\nSouth, East, and West; with the two lines of height and depth,\nresponding to the zenith and nadir. The sages applied the senary to the\nphysical man; while the septenary was, for them, the symbol of his\nimmortal spirit.\n\nThe hieroglyphical senary (the double equilateral triangle) is the\nsymbol of Deity.\n\nSix is also an emblem of health, and the symbol of justice; because it\nis the first perfect number; that is, the first whose aliquot parts\n(1/2, 1/3, 1/6, or 3, 2, and 1), added together, make itself.\n\nOrmuzd created six good spirits, and Ahriman six evil ones. These typify\nthe six Summer and the six Winter months.\n\nNo number has ever been so universally in repute as the septenary. Its\ncelebrity is due, no doubt, to the planets being _seven_ in number. It\nbelongs also to sacred things. The Pythagoreans regarded it as formed of\nthe numbers 3 and 4; the first whereof was, in their eyes, the image of\nthe three material elements, and the second the principle of everything\nthat is neither corporeal nor sensible. It presented them, from that\npoint of view, the emblem of everything that is perfect.\n\nConsidered as composed of 6 and unity, it serves to designate the\ninvisible centre or soul of everything; because no body exists, of which\nsix lines do not constitute the form, nor without a seventh interior\npoint, as the centre and reality of the body, whereof the external\ndimensions give only the appearance.\n\nThe numerous applications of the septenary confirmed the ancient sages\nin the use of this symbol. Moreover, they exalted the properties of the\nnumber 7, as having, in a subordinate manner, the perfection of the\nunit: for if the unit is uncreated, if no number produces it, the seven\nis also not engendered by any number contained in the interval between 1\nand 10. The number 4 occupies an arithmetical middle-ground between the\nunit and 7, inasmuch as it is as much over 1, as it is under 7, the\ndifference each way being 3.\n\nThe number 7, among the Egyptians, symbolized life; and this is why the\nletter Z of the Greeks was the initial of the verb \u0396\u03ac\u03c9, I live; and\n\u0396\u03b5\u03cd\u03c2 (Jupiter), Father of Life.\n\nThe number 8, or the octary, is composed of the sacred numbers 3 and 5.\nOf the heavens, of the seven planets, and of the sphere of the fixed\nstars, or of the eternal unity and the mysterious number 7, is composed\nthe ogdoade, the number 8, the first cube of equal numbers, regarded as\nsacred in the arithmetical philosophy.\n\nThe Gnostic ogdoade had eight stars, which represented the eight Cabiri\nof Samothrace, the eight Egyptian and Ph\u0153nician principles, the eight\ngods of Xenocrates, the eight angles of the cubic stone.\n\nThe number eight symbolizes perfection: and its figure, 8 or \u221e indicates\nthe perpetual and regular course of the Universe.\n\nIt is the first cube (2 X 2 X 2), and signifies friendship, prudence,\ncounsel, and justice. It was a symbol of the primeval law which regarded\nall men as equal.\n\nThe novary, or triple ternary. If the number three was celebrated among\nthe ancient sages, that of three times three had no less celebrity;\nbecause, according to them, each of the three elements which constitute\nour bodies is ternary: the water containing earth and fire; the earth\ncontaining igneous and aqueous particles; and the fire being tempered by\nglobules of water and terrestrial corpuscles which serve to feed it. No\none of the three elements being entirely separated from the others, all\nmaterial beings composed of these three elements, whereof each is\ntriple, may be designated by the figurative number of three times three,\nwhich has become the symbol of all formations of bodies. Hence the name\nof ninth envelope, given to matter. Every material extension, every\ncircular line, has for representative sign the number nine, among the\nPythagoreans; who had observed the property which this number possesses,\nof reproducing itself incessantly and entire, in every multiplication;\nthus offering to the mind a very striking emblem of matter which is\nincessantly composed before our eyes, after having undergone a thousand\ndecompositions.\n\nThe number nine was consecrated to the Spheres and the Muses. It is the\nsign of every circumference; because a circle of 360 degrees is equal to\n9, that is to say, 3+6+0=9. Nevertheless, the ancients regarded this\nnumber with a sort of terror: they considered it a bad presage; as the\nsymbol of versatility, of change, and the emblem of the frailty of human\naffairs. Wherefore they avoided all numbers where nine appears, and\nchiefly 81, the product of 9 multiplied by itself, and the addition\nwhereof, 8+1, again presents the number 9.\n\nAs the figure of the number 6 was the symbol of the terrestrial globe,\nanimated by a divine spirit, the figure of the number 9 symbolized the\nearth, under the influence of the Evil Principle; and thence the terror\nit inspired. Nevertheless, according to the Kabalists, the figure 9\nsymbolizes the generative egg, or the image of a little globular being,\nfrom whose lower side seems to flow its spirit of life.\n\nThe E_n_nead, signifying an aggregate of 9 things or persons, is the\nfirst square of unequal numbers.\n\nEvery one is aware of the singular properties of the number 9, which,\nmultiplied by itself or any other number whatever, gives a result whose\nfinal sum is always 9, or always divisible by 9.\n\nNine, multiplied by each of the ordinary numbers, produces an\narithmetical progression, each member whereof, composed of two figures,\npresents a remarkable fact; for example:\n\n1...2...3...4...5...6...7...8...9..10\n9..18..27..36..45..54..63..72..81..90\n\nThe first line of figures gives the regular series, from 1 to 10.\n\nThe second reproduces this line doubly; first ascending, from the first\nfigure of 18, and then returning from the second figure of 81.\n\nIt follows, from the curious fact, that the half of the numbers which\ncompose this progression represents, in inverse order, the figures of\nthe second half:\n\n9...18..27..36..45 = 135 = 9.._and_ 1 + 3 + 5 = 45 = 9\n90..81..72..63..54 = 360 = 9.\n--  --  --  --  --   ---   --\n99  99  99  99  99   495 = 18 = 9.\n\n\nSo 9\u00b2 = 81 ...81\u00b2 = 6561 = 19 = 9 ...9x2 = 18 ...18\u00b2 = 324 = 9.\n\n9x3=27 ...27\u00b2 = 729 = 18 = 9. 9x4 = 36 ...36\u00b2 = 1296 = 18 = 9.\n\n_And so with every multiple of_ 9--_say_ 45, 54, 63, 72, etc.\n\nThus 9x8 = 72 ...72\u00b2 = 5184 = 18 = 9.\n\nAnd further:\n\n 18             27             36            72\n 18             27             36            72\n---            ---            ---           ---\n144      = 9   189 = 18 = 9   216 =  9      144 =  9\n18       = 9   54  = 9   =   108  =  9     504  =  9\n\n324 = 9...18 = 9 729 = 18= 9 1296 = 18 = 9 5184 = 18 = 9\n 108\n 108\n----\n 864 = 18\n108  = 9\n-----\n11664 = 18 = 9.\n\n_And so the cubes:_\n\n27\u00b2=729x729=18=9 18\u00b2=324=9   9\u00b2=81 81\u00b2=6561=18=9\n         729           324                 6561\n        ----          ----                 ----\n        6561=18=9     1296=18=9            6561=18=9\n       1458 =18=9     648 =18=9          39366 =27=9\n      5103  =9       972  =18=9         32805  =18=9\n                                       39366   =27=9\n      ------          ------          ------\n      531441=18=9   104976=27=9      43,046,721=27=9.\n\nThe number 10, or the Denary, is the measure of everything; and reduces\nmultiplied numbers to unity. Containing all the numerical and harmonic\nrelations, and all the properties of the numbers which precede it, it\nconcludes the Abacus or Table of Pythagoras. To the Mysterious\nSocieties, this number typified the assemblage of all the wonders of the\nUniverse. They wrote it thus \u0398[Greek: THETA], that is to say, Unity in\nthe middle of Zero, as the centre of a circle, or symbol of Deity. They\nsaw in this figure everything that should lead to reflection: the\ncentre, the ray, and the circumference, represented to them God, Man,\nand the Universe.\n\nThis number was, among the Sages, a sign of concord, love, and peace. To\nMasons it is a sign of union and good faith; because it is expressed by\njoining two hands, or the Master's grip, when the number of fingers\ngives 10: and it was represented by the Tetractys of Pythagoras.\n\nThe number 12, like the number 7, is celebrated in the worship of\nnature. The two most famous divisions of the heavens, that by 7, which\nis that of the planets, and that by 12, which is that of the Signs of\nthe Zodiac, are found upon the religious monuments of all the peoples of\nthe Ancient World, even to the remote extremes of the East. Although\nPythagoras does not speak of the number 12, it is none the less a sacred\nnumber. It is the image of the Zodiac; and consequently that of the Sun,\nwhich rules over it.\n\nSuch are the ancient ideas in regard to those numbers which so often\nappear in Masonry; and rightly understood, as the old Sages understood\nthem, they contain many a pregnant lesson.\n\nBefore we enter upon the final lesson of Masonic Philosophy, we will\ndelay a few moments to repeat to you the Christian interpretations of\nthe Blue Degrees.\n\nIn the First Degree, they said, there are three symbols to be applied.\n\n1st. Man, after the fall, was left naked and defenceless against the\njust anger of the Deity. Prone to evil, the human race staggered blindly\nonward into the thick darkness of unbelief, bound fast by the strong\ncable-tow of the natural and sinful will. Moral corruption was followed\nby physical misery. Want and destitution invaded the earth. War and\nFamine and Pestilence filled up the measure of evil, and over the sharp\nflints of misfortune and wretchedness man toiled with naked and bleeding\nfeet. This condition of blindness, destitution, misery, and bondage,\nfrom which to save the world the Redeemer came, is symbolized by the\ncondition of the candidate, when he is brought up for the first time to\nthe door of the Lodge.\n\n2d. Notwithstanding the death of the Redeemer, man can be saved only by\nfaith, repentance, and reformation. To repent, he must feel the sharp\nsting of conscience and remorse, like a sword piercing his bosom. His\nconfidence in his guide, whom he is told to follow and fear no danger;\nhis trust in God, which he is caused to profess; and the point of the\nsword that is pressed against his naked left breast over the heart, are\nsymbolical of the faith, repentance and reformation necessary to bring\nhim to the light of a life in Christ the Crucified.\n\n3d. Having repented and reformed, and bound himself to the service of\nGod by a firm promise and obligation, the light of Christian hope shines\ndown into the darkness of the heart of the humble penitent, and blazes\nupon his pathway to Heaven. And this is symbolized by the candidate's\nbeing brought to light, after he is obligated, by the Worshipful Master,\nwho in that is a symbol of the Redeemer, and so brings him to light,\nwith the help of the brethren, as He taught the Word with the aid of the\nApostles.\n\nIn the Second Degree there are two symbols:\n\n4th. The Christian assumes new duties toward God and his fellows. Toward\nGod, of love, gratitude, and veneration, and an anxious desire to serve\nand glorify Him; toward his fellows, of kindness, sympathy, and justice.\nAnd this assumption of duty, this entering upon good works, is\nsymbolized by the Fellow-Craft's obligation; by which, bound as an\napprentice to secrecy merely, and set in the Northeast corner of the\nLodge, he descends as a Fellow-Craft into the body of the brethren, and\nassumes the active duties of a good Mason.\n\n5th. The Christian, reconciled to God, sees the world in a new light.\nThis great Universe is no longer a mere machine, wound up and set going\nsix thousand or sixty millions years ago, and left to run on afterward\nforever, by virtue of a law of mechanics created at the beginning,\nwithout further care or consideration on the part of the Deity; but it\nhas now become to him a great emanation from God, the product of His\nthought, not a mere dead machine, but a thing of life, over which God\nwatches continually, and every movement of which is immediately produced\nby His present action, the law of harmony being the essence of the\nDeity, re-enacted every instant. And this is symbolized by the imperfect\ninstruction given in the Fellow-Craft's Degree, in the sciences, and\nparticularly geometry, connected as the latter is with God Himself in\nthe mind of a Mason, because the same letter, suspended in the East,\nrepresents both; and astronomy, or the knowledge of the laws of motion\nand harmony that govern the spheres, is but a portion of the wider\nscience of geometry. It is so symbolized, because it is here, in the\nSecond Degree, that the candidate first receives an other than moral\ninstruction.\n\nThere are also two symbols in the Third Degree, which, with the 3 in the\nfirst, and 2 in the second, make the 7.\n\n6th. The candidate, after passing through the first part of the\nceremony, imagines himself a Master; and is surprised to be informed\nthat as yet he is not, and that it is uncertain whether he ever will be.\nHe is told of a difficult and dangerous path yet to be travelled, and is\nadvised that upon that journey it depends whether he will become a\nMaster. This is symbolical of that which our Saviour said to Nicodemus,\nthat, notwithstanding his morals might be beyond reproach, he could not\nenter the Kingdom of Heaven unless he were born again; symbolically\ndying, and again entering the world regenerate, like a spotless infant.\n\n7th. The murder of Hiram, his burial, and his being raised again by the\nMaster, are symbols, both of the death, burial, and resurrection of the\nRedeemer; and of the death and burial in sins of the natural man, and\nhis being raised again to a new life or born again, by the direct action\nof the Redeemer; after Morality (symbolized by the Entered Apprentice's\ngrip), and Philosophy (symbolized by the grip of the Fellow-Craft), had\nfailed to raise him. That of the Lion of the House of Judah is the\nstrong grip, never to be broken, with which Christ, of the royal line of\nthat House, has clasped to Himself the whole human race, and embraces\nthem in His wide arms as closely and affectionately as brethren embrace\neach other on the five points of fellowship.\n\nAs Entered Apprentices and Fellow-Crafts, Masons are taught to imitate\nthe laudable example of those Masons who labored at the building of King\nSolomon's Temple; and to plant firmly and deep in their hearts those\nfoundation-stones of principle, truth, justice, temperance, fortitude,\nprudence, and charity, on which to erect that Christian character which\nall the storms of misfortune and all the powers and temptations of Hell\nshall not prevail against; those feelings and noble affections which are\nthe most proper homage that can be paid to the Grand Architect and Great\nFather of the Universe, and which make the heart a living temple builded\nto Him: when the unruly passions are made to submit to rule and\nmeasurement, and their excesses are struck off with the gavel of\nself-restraint; and when every action and every principle is accurately\ncorrected and adjusted by the square of wisdom, the level of humility,\nand the plumb of justice.\n\nThe two columns, Jachin and Boaz, are the symbols of that profound faith\nand implicit trust in God and the Redeemer that are the Christian's\n_strength_; and of those good works by which alone that faith can be\n_established_ and made operative and effectual to salvation.\n\nThe three pillars that support the Lodge are symbols of a Christian's\nHOPE in a future state of happiness; FAITH in the promises and the\ndivine character and mission of the Redeemer; and CHARITABLE JUDGMENT of\nother men.\n\nThe three murderers of Khir-Om symbolize Pontius Pilate, Caiaphas the\nHigh-Priest, and Judas Iscariot: and the three blows given him are the\nbetrayal by the last, the refusal of Roman protection by Pilate, and the\ncondemnation by the High-Priest. They also symbolize the blow on the\near, the scourging, and the crown of thorns. The twelve fellow-crafts\nsent in search of the body are the twelve disciples, in doubt whether to\nbelieve that the Redeemer would rise from the dead.\n\nThe Master's word, supposed to be lost, symbolizes the Christian faith\nand religion, supposed to have been crushed and destroyed when the\nSaviour was crucified, after Iscariot had betrayed Him, and Peter\ndeserted Him, and when the other disciples doubted whether He would\narise from the dead; but which rose from His tomb and flowed rapidly\nover the civilized world; and so that which was supposed to be _lost_\nwas _found_. It symbolizes also the Saviour Himself; the WORD that was\nin the beginning--that was _with_ God, and that _was_ God; the Word of\nlife, that was made flesh and dwelt among us, and was supposed to be\nlost, while He lay in the tomb, for three days, and His disciples \"as\nyet knew not the scripture that He must rise again from the dead,\" and\ndoubted when they heard of it, and were amazed and frightened and still\ndoubted when He appeared among them.\n\nThe bush of acacia placed at the head of the grave of Khir-Om is an\nemblem of resurrection and immortality.\n\nSuch are the explanations of our Christian brethren; entitled, like\nthose of all other Masons, to a respectful consideration.\n\n\nCLOSING INSTRUCTION,\n\nThere is no pretence to infallibility in Masonry. It is not for us to\ndictate to any man what he shall believe. We have hitherto, in the\ninstruction of the several Degrees, confined ourselves to laying before\nyou the great thoughts that have found expression in the different ages\nof the world, leaving you to decide for yourself as to the orthodoxy or\nheterodoxy of each, and what proportion of truth, if any, each\ncontained. We shall pursue no other course in this closing Philosophical\ninstruction; in which we propose to deal with the highest questions that\nhave ever exercised the human mind,--with the existence and the nature\nof a God, with the existence and the nature of the human soul, and with\nthe relations of the divine and human spirit with the merely material\nUniverse. There can be no questions more important to an intelligent\nbeing, none that have for him a more direct and personal interest; and\nto this last word of Scottish Masonry we invite your serious and\nattentive consideration. And, as what we shall now say will be but the\ncompletion and rounding-off of what we have already said in several of\nthe preceding Degrees, in regard to the Old Thought and the Ancient\nPhilosophies, we hope that you have noted and not forgotten our previous\nlessons, without which this would seem imperfect and fragmentary.\n\nIn its idea of rewarding a faithful and intelligent workman by\nconferring upon him a knowledge of the True Word, Masonry has\nperpetuated a very great truth, because it involves the proposition that\nthe idea which a man forms of God is always the most important element\nin his speculative theory of the Universe, and in his particular\npractical plan of action for the Church, the State, the Community, the\nFamily, and his own individual life. It will ever make a vast difference\nin the conduct of a people in war or peace, whether they believe the\nSupreme God to be a cruel Deity, delighting in sacrifice and blood, or a\nGod of Love; and an individual's speculative theory as to the mode and\nextent of God's government, and as to the nature and reality of his own\nfree-will and consequent responsibility, will needs have great influence\nin shaping the course of his life and conversation.\n\nWe see every day the vast influence of the popular idea of God. All the\ngreat historical civilizations of the race have grown out of the\nnational ideas which were formed of God; or have been intimately\nconnected with those ideas. The popular Theology, which at first is only\nan abstract idea in the heads of philosophers, by and by shows itself in\nthe laws, and in the punishments for crime, in the churches, the\nceremonies and the sacraments, the festivals and the fasts, the\nweddings, the baptisms and the funerals, in the hospitals, the colleges,\nthe schools, and all the social charities, in the relations of husband\nand wife, parent and child, in the daily work and the daily prayer of\nevery man.\n\nAs the world grows in its development, it necessarily _out_grows its\nancient ideas of God, which were only temporary and provisional. A man\nwho has a higher conception of God than those about him, and who denies\nthat their conception _is_ God, is very likely to be called an Atheist\nby men who are really far less believers in a God than he. Thus the\nChristians, who said the Heathen idols were no Gods, were accounted\nAtheists by the People, and accordingly put to death; and Jesus of\nNazareth was crucified as an unbelieving blasphemer, by the Jews.\n\nThere is a mere formal Atheism, which is a denial of God in _terms_, but\nnot in _reality_. A man says, There is no God; that is, no God that is\nself-originated, or that never originated, but always WAS and HAD BEEN,\nwho is the cause of existence, who is the Mind and the Providence of the\nUniverse; and so the order, beauty, and harmony of the world of matter\nand mind do not indicate any plan or purpose of Deity. But, he says,\nNATURE,--meaning by that the whole sum-total of existence,--_that_ is\npowerful, active, wise, and good; _Nature_ is self-originated, or\nalways was and had been, the cause of its own existence, the mind of the\nUniverse and the Providence of itself. There is obviously a plan and\npurpose whereby order, beauty, and harmony are brought about; but all\nthat is the plan and purpose of nature.\n\nIn such cases, the absolute denial of God is only formal and not real.\nThe _qualities_ of God are admitted, and affirmed to be real; and it is\na mere change of name to call the possessor of those qualities,\n_Nature_, and not _God_. The real question is, whether such Qualities\nexist, as we call God; and not, by what particular name we shall\ndesignate the Qualities. One man may call the sum total of these\nQualities, Nature; another, Heaven; a third, Universe, a fourth, Matter;\na fifth, Spirit; a sixth, God, Theos, Zeus, Alfadir, Allah, or what he\npleases. All admit the existence of the Being, Power, or ENS, thus\ndiversely named. The name is of the smallest consequence.\n\n_Real_ Atheism is the denial of the existence of _any_ God, of the\nactuality of all possible ideas of God. It denies that there is _any_\nMind, Intelligence, or ENS, that is the Cause and Providence of the\nUniverse, and of any Thing or any Existence, Soul, Spirit, or Being,\nthat _intentionally_ or _intelligently_ produces the Order, Beauty, and\nHarmony thereof, and the constant and regular modes of operation\ntherein. It must necessarily deny that there is any law, order, or\nharmony in existence, or any constant mode of operation in the world;\nfor it is utterly impossible for any human creature to conceive, however\nmuch he may _pretend_ to do so, of either of these, except as a\nconsequence of the action of Intelligence; which is, indeed, that\notherwise unknown thing, the existence of which these alone prove;\notherwise than as the cause of these, not a thing at all; a mere _name_\nfor the wholly uncognizable cause of these.\n\nThe _real_ atheist must deny the existence of the Qualities of God, deny\nthat there is any mind of or in the Universe, any self-conscious\nProvidence, any Providence at all. He must deny that there is any Being\nor Cause of Finite things, that is self-consciously powerful, wise,\njust, loving, and faithful to itself and its own nature. He must deny\nthat there is any _plan_ in the Universe or any part of it. He must\nhold, either that matter is eternal, or that it originated itself, which\nis absurd, or that it was originated by an Intelligence, or at least by\na Cause; and then he admits a God. No doubt it is beyond the reach of\nour faculties to imagine _how_ matter originated,--how it began to _be_,\nin space where before was nothing, or God only. But it is equally beyond\nthe reach of our faculties to imagine it eternal and _un_originated. To\nhold it to be eternal, without thought or will; that the specific forms\nof it, the seed, the rock, the tree, the man, the solar system, all came\nwith no forethought planning or producing them, by \"chance\" or \"the\nfortuitous concourse of atoms\" of matter that has no thought or will;\nand that they indicate no mind, no plan, no purpose, no providence, is\nabsurd. It is not to deny the _existence_ of what we understand by mind,\nplan, purpose, Providence; but to insist that these words shall have\nsome other meaning than that which the human race has ever attached to\nthem: shall mean some unknown thing, for which the human race has no\n_name_, because it has of such a thing no possible idea. Either there\nnever was any such thing as a \"plan,\" and the word is nonsense, or the\nUniverse exists in conformity to a plan. The _word_ never meant, and\nnever can mean, any other _thing_ than that which the Universe exhibits.\nSo with the word \"_purpose_;\" so with the word \"_Providence_.\" They mean\nnothing, or else only what the Universe proves.\n\nIt was soon found that the denial of a Conscious Power, the cause of man\nand of his life, of a Providence, or a Mind and Intelligence arranging\nman in reference to the world, and the world in reference to man, would\nnot satisfy the instinctive desires of _human_ nature, or account for\nthe facts of _material_ nature. It did not long answer to say, if it\never _was_ said, that the Universe was drifting in the void inane, and\nneither it, nor any mind within or without it, knew of its whence, its\nwhither, or its whereabouts; that man was drifting in the Universe,\nknowing little of his whereabouts, nothing of his whence or whither;\nthat there was no Mind, no Providence, no Power, that knew any better;\nnothing that guided and directed man in his drifting, or the Universe in\nthe weltering waste of Time. To say to man and woman, \"your heroism,\nyour bravery, your self-denial all comes to nothing: your nobleness will\ndo you no good: you will die, and your nobleness will do mankind no\nservice; for there is no plan or order in all these things; everything\ncomes and goes by the fortuitous concourse of atoms;\" did not, nor ever\nwill, long satisfy the human mind.\n\nTrue, the theory of Atheism has been uttered. It has been said, \"Death\nis the end: this is a world without a God: you are a body without a\nsoul: there is a Here, but no Hereafter for you; an Earth, but no\nHeaven. Die, and return to your dust. Man is bones, blood, bowels, and\nbrain; mind is matter: there is no soul in the brain, nothing but\nnerves. We can see all the way to a little star in the nebula of Orion's\nbelt; so distant that it will take light a thousand millions of years to\ncome from it to the earth, journeying at the rate of twelve millions of\nmiles a minute. There is no Heaven this side of that: you see all the\nway through: there is not a speck of Heaven; and do you think there is\nany beyond it; and if so, when would you reach it? There is no\nProvidence. Nature is a fortuitous concourse of atoms; thought is a\nfortuitous function of matter, a fortuitous result of a fortuitous\nresult, a chance-shot from the great wind-gun of the Universe,\naccidentally loaded, pointed at random, and fired off by chance. Things\n_happen_; they are not _arranged_. There is luck, and there is ill-luck;\nbut there is no Providence. Die you into dust!\" Does all this satisfy\nthe human instinct of immortality, that makes us ever long, with\nunutterable longing, to join ourselves again to our dear ones who have\ngone away before us, and to mankind, for eternal life? Does it satisfy\nour mighty hungering and thirst for immortality, our anxious longing to\ncome nearer to, and to know more of, the Eternal Cause of all things?\n\nMen never could be content to believe that there was no mind that\nthought for man, no conscience to enact eternal laws, no heart to love\nthose whom nothing of earth loves or cares for, no will of the Universe\nto marshal the nations in the way of wisdom, justice, and love. History\nis not--thank God! we _know_ it is not,--the fortuitous concourse of\nevents, or Nature that of atoms. We cannot believe that there is no plan\nnor purpose in Nature, to guide our going out and coming in: that there\nis a mighty going, but it goes nowhere; that all beauty, wisdom,\naffection, justice, morality in the world, is an accident, and may end\nto-morrow.\n\nAll over the world there is heroism unrequited, or paid with misery;\nvice on thrones, corruption in high places, nobleness in poverty or even\nin chains, the gentle devotion of woman rewarded by brutal neglect or\nmore brutal abuse and violence; everywhere want, misery, over-work, and\nunder-wages. Add to these the Atheist's creed,--a body without a soul,\nan earth without a Heaven, a world without a God; and what a\nPandemonium would we make of this world!\n\nThe intellect of the Atheist would find matter everywhere; but no\nCausing and Providing Mind: his moral sense would find no Equitable\nWill, no Beauty of Moral Excellence, no Conscience enacting justice into\nthe unchanging law of right, no spiritual Order or spiritual Providence,\nbut only material Fate and Chance. His affections would find only finite\nthings to love; and to them the dead who _were_ loved and who died\nyesterday, are like the rainbow that yesterday evening lived a moment\nand then passed away. His soul, flying through the vast Inane, and\nfeeling the darkness with its wings, seeking the Soul of all, which at\nonce is Reason, Conscience, and the Heart of all that is, would find no\nGod, but a Universe all disorder; no Infinite, no Reason, no Conscience,\nno Heart, no Soul of things; nothing to reverence, to esteem, to love,\nto worship, to trust in; but only an Ugly Force, alien and foreign to\nus, that strikes down those we love, and makes us mere worms on the hot\nsand of the world. No voice would speak from the Earth to comfort him.\nIt is a cruel mother, that great Earth, that devours her young,--a Force\nand nothing more. Out of the sky would smile no kind Providence, in all\nits thousand starry eyes; and in storms a malignant violence, with its\nlightning-sword, would stab into the darkness, seeking for men to\nmurder.\n\nNo man ever was or ever can be content with that. The evidence of God\nhas been ploughed into Nature so deeply, and so deeply woven into the\ntexture of the human soul, that Atheism has never become a faith, though\nit has sometimes assumed the shape of theory. Religion is natural to\nman. Instinctively he turns to God and reverences and relies on Him. In\nthe Mathematics of the Heavens, written in gorgeous diagrams of fire, he\nsees law, order, beauty, harmony without end: in the ethics of the\nlittle nations that inhabit the ant-hills he sees the same; in all\nNature, animate and inanimate, he sees the evidences of a Design, a\nWill, an Intelligence, and a God,--of a God beneficent and loving as\nwell as wise, and merciful and indulgent as well as powerful.\n\nTo man, surrounded by the material Universe, and conscious of the\ninfluence that his material environments exercised upon his fortunes and\nhis present destiny;--to man, ever confronted with the splendors of the\nstarry heavens, the regular march of the seasons, the phenomena of\nsunrise and moonrise, and all the evidences of intelligence and design\nthat everywhere pressed upon and overwhelmed him, all imaginable\nquestions as to the nature and cause of these phenomena constantly\nrecurred, demanding to be solved, and refusing to be sent away\nunanswered. And still, after the lapse of ages, press upon the human\nmind and demand solution, the same great questions--perhaps still\ndemanding it in vain.\n\nAdvancing to the period when man had ceased to look upon the separate\nparts and individual forces of the Universe as gods,--when he had come\nto look upon it as a whole, this question, among the earliest, occurred\nto him, and insisted on being answered: \"Is this material Universe\nself-existent, or was it created? Is it eternal, or did it originate?\"\n\nAnd then in succession came crowding on the human mind these other\nquestions:\n\n\"Is this material Universe a mere aggregate of fortuitous combinations\nof matter, or is it the result and work of intelligence, acting upon a\nplan?\n\n\"If there _be_ such an Intelligence, what and where is it? Is the\nmaterial Universe _itself_ an Intelligent being? Is it like man, a body\nand a soul? Does Nature act upon itself, or is there a Cause beyond it\nthat acts upon it?\n\n\"If there is a _personal_ God, _separate from_ the material Universe,\nthat created all things, Himself uncreated, is He corporeal or\nincorporeal, material or spiritual, the soul of the Universe or wholly\napart from it? and if He be Spirit, what then is spirit?\n\n\"Was that Supreme Deity active or quiescent before the creation; and if\nquiescent during a previous eternity, what necessity of His nature moved\nHim at last to create a world; or was it a mere whim that had no motive?\n\n\"Was matter co-existent with Him, or absolutely created by him out of\nnothing? Did He _create_ it, or only _mould_ and _shape_ and _fashion_ a\nchaos already existing, co-existent with Himself?\n\n\"Did the Deity _directly_ create matter, or was creation the work of\ninferior deities, emanations from Himself?\n\n\"If He be good and just, whence comes it that, foreknowing everything,\nHe has allowed sorrow and evil to exist; and how to reconcile with His\nbenevolence and wisdom the prosperity of vice and the misfortunes of\nvirtue in this world?\" And then, as to man himself, recurred these\nother questions, as they continue to recur to all of us:\n\n\"What is it in us that thinks? Is Thought the mere result of material\norganization; or is there in us a _soul_ that thinks, separate from and\nresident in the body? If the latter, is it eternal and uncreated; and if\nnot, how created? Is it distinct from God, or an emanation from Him? Is\nit _inherently_ immortal, or only so by destination, because God has\nwilled it? Is it to return to and be merged in Him, or ever to exist,\nseparately from Him, with its present identity?\n\n\"If God has fore-seen and fore-arranged all that occurs, how has man any\nreal free-will, or the least control over circumstances? How can\nanything be done _against_ the will of Infinite Omnipotence; and if all\nis done _according_ to that will, how is there any wrong or evil, in\nwhat Infinite Wisdom and Infinite Power does not choose to prevent?\n\n\"What is the foundation of the moral law? Did God enact it of His own\nmere pleasure; and if so, can He not, when He pleases, repeal it? Who\nshall assure us He will not repeal it, and make right wrong, and virtue\nvice? Or is the moral law a necessity of His nature; and if so, who\nenacted it; and does not that assert a power, like the old Necessity,\nsuperior to Deity?\"\n\nAnd, close-following after these, came the great question of HEREAFTER,\nof another Life, of the soul's Destiny; and the thousand other\ncollateral and subordinate questions, as to matter, spirit, futurity,\nand God, that have produced all the systems of philosophy, all\nmetaphysics, and all theology, since the world began.\n\nWhat the old philosophic mind thought upon these great questions, we\nhave already, to some extent, developed. With the Emanation-doctrine of\nthe Gnostics and the Orient, we have endeavored to make you familiar. We\nhave brought you face to face with the Kabalists, the Essenes, and Philo\nthe Jew. We have shown that, and how, much of the old mythology was\nderived from the daily and yearly recurring phenomena of the heavens. We\nhave exhibited to you the ancient notions by which they endeavored to\nexplain to themselves the existence and prevalence of evil; and we have\nin some degree made known to you their metaphysical ideas as to the\nnature of the Deity. Much more remains to be done than it is within our\npower to do. We stand upon the sounding shore of the great ocean of\nTime. In front of us stretches out the heaving waste of the illimitable\nPast; and its waves, as they roll up to our feet along the sparkling\nslope of the yellow sands, bring to us, now and then, from the depths of\nthat boundless ocean, a shell, a few specimens of alg\u00e6 torn rudely from\ntheir stems, a rounded pebble; and that is all; of all the vast\ntreasures of ancient thought that lie buried there, with the mighty\nanthem of the boundless ocean thundering over them forever and forever.\n\nLet us once more, and for the last time, along the shore of that great\nocean, gather a few more relics of the Past, and listen to its mighty\nvoices, as they come, in fragmentary music, in broken and interrupted\nrhythm, whispering to us from the great bosom of the Past.\n\nRites, creeds, and legends express, directly or symbolically, some\nleading idea, according to which the Mysteries of Being are supposed to\nbe, explained in Deity. The intricacies of mythical genealogies are a\npractical acknowledgment of the mysterious nature of the Omnipotent\nDeity; displaying in their beautiful but ineffectual imagery the first\nefforts of the mind to communicate with nature: the flowers which fancy\nstrewed before the youthful steps of Psyche, when she first set out in\npursuit of the immortal object of her love. Theories and notions, in all\ntheir varieties of truth and falsehood, are a machinery more or less\nefficacious, directed to the same end. Every religion was, in its\norigin, an embryo philosophy, or an attempt to interpret the unknown by\nmind; and it was only when philosophy, which is essentially progress,\noutgrew its first acquisitions, that religion became a thing apart,\ncherishing as unalterable dogmas the notions which philosophy had\nabandoned. Separated from philosophy, it became arrogant and\nfantastical, professing to have already attained what its more authentic\nrepresentative was ever pursuing in vain; and discovering, through its\ninitiations and Mysteries, all that to its contracted view seemed\nwanting to restore the well-being of mankind, the means of purification\nand expiation, remedies for disease, expedients to cure the disorders of\nthe soul, and to propitiate the gods.\n\nWhy should we attempt to confine the idea of the Supreme Mind within an\narbitrary barrier, or exclude from the limits of veracity any conception\nof the Deity, which, if imperfect and inadequate, may be only a little\nmore so than our own? \"The name of God,\" says Hobbes, \"is used not to\nmake us _conceive_ Him, for He is inconceivable, but that we may _honor_\nHim.\" \"Believe in God, and adore Him,\" said the Greek Poet, \"but\ninvestigate Him not; the inquiry is fruitless, seek not to discover who\nGod is; for, by the desire to know, you offend Him who chooses to remain\nunknown.\" \"When we attempt,\" says Philo, \"to investigate the essence of\nthe Absolute Being, we fall into an abyss of perplexity; and the only\nbenefit to be derived from such researches is the conviction of their\nabsurdity.\"\n\nYet man, though ignorant of the constitution of the dust on which he\ntreads, has ventured, and still ventures, to speculate on the nature of\nGod, and to define dogmatically in creeds the subject least within the\ncompass of his faculties; and even to hate and persecute those who will\nnot accept his views as true.\n\nBut though a knowledge of the Divine Essence is impossible, the\nconceptions formed respecting it are interesting, as indications of\nintellectual development. The history of religion is the history of the\nhuman mind; and the conception formed by it of Deity is always in exact\nrelation to its moral and intellectual attainments. The one is the index\nand the measure of the other.\n\nThe _negative_ notion of God, which consists in abstracting the inferior\nand finite, is, according to Philo, the only way in which it is possible\nfor man worthily to apprehend the nature of God. After exhausting the\nvarieties of symbolism, we contrast the Divine Greatness with human\nlittleness, and employ expressions apparently affirmative, such as\n\"Infinite,\" \"Almighty,\" \"All-wise,\" \"Omnipotent,\" \"Eternal,\" and the\nlike; which in reality amount only to denying, in regard to God, those\nlimits which confine the faculties of man; and thus we remain content\nwith a name which is a mere conventional sign and confession of our\nignorance.\n\nThe Hebrew \u05d9\u05d4\u05d5\u05d4 and the Greek _To ON_ expressed abstract existence,\nwithout outward manifestation or development. Of the same nature are the\ndefinitions, \"God is a sphere whose centre is everywhere, and whose\ncircumference nowhere;\" \"God is He who sees all, Himself unseen:\" and\nfinally, that of Proclus and Hegel--\"the _To_ \u03bc\u03b7 \u03bf\u03bd--that which has no\noutward and positive existence.\" Most of the so-called ideas or\ndefinitions of the \"Absolute\" are only a collection of negations; from\nwhich, as they affirm nothing, nothing is learned.\n\nGod was first recognized in the heavenly bodies and in the elements.\nWhen man's consciousness of his own intellectuality was matured, and he\nbecame convinced that the internal faculty of thought was something more\nsubtle than even the most subtle elements, he transferred that new\nconception to the object of his worship, and deified a mental principle\ninstead of a physical one. He in every case makes God after his own\nimage; for do what we will, the highest efforts of human thought can\nconceive nothing higher than the supremacy of intellect; and so he ever\ncomes back to some familiar type of exalted humanity. He at first\ndeifies nature, and afterward himself.\n\nThe eternal aspiration of the religious sentiment in man is to become\nunited with God. In his earliest development, the wish and its\nfulfillment were simultaneous, through unquestioning belief. In\nproportion as the conception of Deity was exalted, the notion of His\nterrestrial presence or proximity was abandoned; and the difficulty of\ncomprehending the Divine Government, together with the glaring\nsuperstitious evils arising out of its misinterpretation, endangered the\nbelief in it altogether.\n\nEven the lights of Heaven, which, as \"bright potentates of the sky,\"\nwere formerly the vigilant directors of the economy of earth, now shine\ndim and distant, and Uriel no more descends upon a sunbeam. But the real\nchange has been in the progressive ascent of man's own faculties, and\nnot in the Divine Nature; as the Stars are no more distant now than when\nthey were supposed to rest on the shoulders of Atlas. And yet a little\nsense of disappointment and humiliation attended the first awakening of\nthe soul, when reason, looking upward toward the Deity, was impressed\nwith a dizzy sense of having fallen.\n\nBut hope revives in despondency; and every nation that ever advanced\nbeyond the most elementary conceptions, felt the necessity of an attempt\nto fill the chasm, real or imaginary, separating man from God. To do\nthis was the great task of poetry, philosophy, and religion. Hence the\npersonifications of God's attributes, developments, and manifestations,\nas \"Powers,\" \"Intelligences,\" \"Angels,\" \"Emanations;\" through which and\nthe oracular faculty in himself, man could place himself in communion\nwith God.\n\nThe various ranks and orders of mythical beings imagined by Persians,\nIndians, Egyptians, or Etrurians, to preside over the various\ndepartments of nature, had each his share in a scheme to bring man into\ncloser approximation to the Deity; they eventually gave way only before\nan analogous though less picturesque symbolism; and the Deities and\nD\u00e6mons of Greece and Rome were perpetuated with only a change of names,\nwhen their offices were transferred to Saints and Martyrs. The attempts\nby which reason had sometimes endeavored to span the unknown by a bridge\nof metaphysics, such as the idealistic systems of Zoroaster, Pythagoras,\nor Plato, were only a more refined form of the poetical illusions which\nsatisfied the vulgar; and man still looked back with longing to the lost\ngolden age, when his ancestors communed face to face with the Gods; and\nhoped that, by propitiating Heaven, he might accelerate the renewal of\nit in the islands of the Far West, under the sceptre of Kronos, or in a\ncentralization of political power at Jerusalem. His eager hope overcame\neven the terrors of the grave; for the Divine power was as infinite as\nhuman expectation, and the Egyptian, duly ensepulchred in the Lybian\nCatacombs, was supposed to be already on his way to the Fortunate Abodes\nunder the guidance of Hermes, there to obtain a perfect association and\nreunion with his God.\n\nRemembering what we have already said elsewhere in regard to the old\nideas concerning the Deity, and repeating it as little as possible, let\nus once more put ourselves in communion with the Ancient poetic and\nphilosophic mind, and endeavor to learn of it what it thought, and how\nit solved the great problems that have ever tortured the human\nintellect.\n\nThe division of the First and Supreme Cause into two parts, one Active\nand the other Passive, the Universe Agent and Patient, or the\nhermaphroditic God-World, is one of the most ancient and widespread\ndogmas of philosophy or natural theology. Almost every ancient people\ngave it a place in their worship, their mysteries, and their ceremonies.\n\nOcellus Lucanus, who seems to have lived shortly after Pythagoras opened\nhis School in Italy, five or six hundred years before our era, and in\nthe time of Solon, Thales, and the other Sages who had studied in the\nSchools of Egypt, not only recognizes the eternity of the Universe, and\nits divine character as an unproduced and indestructible being, but also\nthe distinction of Active and Passive causes in what he terms the Grand\nWhole, or the single hermaphroditic Being that comprehends all\nexistences, as well causes as effects; and which is a system regularly\nordered, perfect and complete, of all Natures. He well apprehended the\ndividing-line that separates existence eternally the same, from that\nwhich eternally changes; the nature of celestial from that of\nterrestrial bodies, that of causes from that of effects, that which is\nfrom that which only BECOMES,--a distinction that naturally struck every\nthinking man.\n\nWe shall not quote his language at full length. The heavenly bodies, he\nthought, are first and most noble; they move of themselves, and ever\nrevolve, without change of form or essence. Fire, water, earth, and air\nchange incessantly and continually, not place, but form. Then, as in the\nUniverse there are generation and cause of generation,--as generation is\nwhere there are change and displacement of parts, and cause where there\nis stability of nature, evidently it belongs to what is the cause of\ngeneration, to move and to act, and to the recipient, to be made and\nmoved. In his view, everything above the Moon was the habitation of the\ngods; all below, that of Nature and discord; _this_ operates dissolution\nof things made; _that_, production of those that are being made. As the\nworld is unproduced and indestructible, as it had no beginning, and will\nhave no end, necessarily the principle that operates generation in\nanother than itself, and that which operates it _in_ itself, have\nco-existed.\n\nThe former is all above the moon, and especially the sun: the latter is\nthe sublunary world. Of these two parts, one active, the other\npassive--one divine and always the same, the other mortal and ever\nchanging, all that we call the \"world\" or \"universe\" is composed.\n\nThese accorded with the principles of the Egyptian philosophy, which\nheld that man and the animals had always existed together with the\nworld; that they were its effects, eternal like itself. The chief\ndivisions of nature into active and passive causes, its system of\ngeneration and destruction, and the concurrence of the two great\nprinciples, Heaven and earth, uniting to form all things, will,\naccording to Ocellus, always continue to exist. \"Enough,\" he concludes,\n\"as to the Universe, the generations and destructions effected in it,\nthe mode in which it now exists, the mode in which it will ever exist,\nby the eternal qualities of the two principles, one always moving, the\nother always moved; one always _governing_, the other always\n_governed_.\"\n\nSuch is a brief summary of the doctrine of this philosopher, whose work\nis one of the most ancient that has survived to us. The subject on which\nhe treated occupied in his time all men's minds: the poets sang of\ncosmogonies and theogonies, and the philosophers wrote treatises on the\nbirth of the world and the elements of its composition. The cosmogony of\nthe Hebrews, attributed to Moses; that of the Ph\u0153nicians, ascribed to\nSanchoniathon; that of the Greeks, composed by Hesiod; that of the\nEgyptians, the Atlantes, and the Cretans, preserved by Diodorus Siculus;\nthe fragments of the theology of Orpheus, divided among different\nwriters; the books of the Persians, or their Boundehesh; those of the\nHind\u016bs; the traditions of the Chinese and the people of Macassar; the\ncosmogonic chants which Virgil puts in the mouth of Iopas at Carthage;\nand those of the old Silenus, the first book of the Metamorphoses of\nOvid; all testify to the antiquity and universality of these fictions as\nto the origin of the world and its causes.\n\nAt the head of the causes of nature, Heaven and earth were placed; and\nthe most apparent parts of each, the sun, the moon, the fixed stars and\nplanets, and, above all, the zodiac, among the _active_ causes of\ngeneration; and among the _passive_, the several elements. These causes\nwere not only classed in the progressive order of their energy, Heaven\nand earth heading the respective lists, but distinct sexes were in some\nsort assigned to them, and characteristics analogous to the mode in\nwhich they concur in universal generation.\n\nThe doctrine of Ocellus was the general doctrine everywhere, it\nnaturally occurring to all to make the same distinction. The Egyptians\ndid so, in selecting those animals in which they recognized these\nemblematic qualities, in order to symbolize the double sex of the\nUniverse. Their God KNEPH, out of whose mouth issued the Orphic egg,\nwhence the author of the Clementine Recognitions makes a hermaphroditic\nfigure to emerge, uniting in itself the two principles whereof Heaven\nand the earth are forms, and which enter into the organization of all\nbeings which the heavens and the earth engender by their concourse,\nfurnishes another emblem of the double power, active and passive, which\nthe ancients saw in the Universe, and which they symbolized by the egg.\nOrpheus, who studied in Egypt, borrowed from the theologians of that\ncountry the mysterious forms under which the science of nature was\nveiled, and carried into Greece the symbolic egg, with its division\ninto two parts or causes figured by the hermaphroditic being that issued\nfrom it, and whereof Heaven and earth are composed.\n\nThe Brahmins of India expressed the same cosmogonic idea by a statue,\nrepresentative of the Universe, uniting in itself both sexes. The male\nsex offered an image of the sun, centre of the active principle, and the\nfemale sex that of the moon, at the sphere whereof, proceeding downward,\nthe passive portion of nature begins. The Lingam, unto the present day\nrevered in the Indian temples, being but the conjunction of the organs\nof generation of the two sexes, was an emblem of the same. The Hind\u016bs\nhave ever had the greatest veneration for this symbol of\never-reproductive nature. The Greeks consecrated the same symbols of\nuniversal fruitfulness in their Mysteries; and they were exhibited in\nthe sanctuaries of Eleusis. They appear among the sculptured ornaments\nof all the Indian temples. Tertullian accuses the Valentinians of having\nadopted the custom of venerating them; a custom, he says, introduced by\nMelampus from Egypt into Greece. The Egyptians consecrated the Phallus\nin the Mysteries of Osiris and Isis, as we learn from Plutarch and\nDiodorus Siculus; and the latter assures us that these emblems were not\nconsecrated by the Egyptians alone, but by every people. They certainly\nwere so among the Persians and Assyrians; and they were regarded\neverywhere as symbolic of the generative and productive powers of all\nanimated beings. In those early ages, the works of Nature and all her\nagents were sacred like herself.\n\nFor the union of Nature with herself is a chaste marriage, of which the\nunion of man and woman was a natural image, and their organs were an\nexpressive emblem of the double energy which manifests itself in Heaven,\nand Earth uniting together to produce all beings. \"The Heavens,\" says\nPlutarch, \"seemed to men to fulfill the functions of father, and the\nEarth of mother. The former impregnated the earth with its fertilizing\nrains, and the earth, receiving them, became fruitful and brought\nforth.\" Heaven, which covers and embraces the earth everywhere, is her\npotent spouse, uniting himself to her to make her fruitful, without\nwhich she would languish in everlasting sterility, buried in the shades\nof chaos and of night. Their union is their marriage; their productions\nor parts are their children. The skies are our Father, and Nature the\ngreat Mother of us all.\n\nThis idea was not the dogma of a single sect, but the general opinion of\nall the Sages. \"Nature was divided,\" says Cicero, \"into two parts, one\nactive, and the other that submitted itself to this action, which it\nreceived, and which modified it. The former was deemed to be a Force,\nand the latter the material on which that Force exerted itself.\"\nMacrobius repeated almost literally the doctrine of Ocellus. Aristotle\ntermed the earth the fruitful mother, environed on all sides by the air.\nAbove it was Heaven, the dwelling-place of the gods and the divine\nstars, its substance ether, or a fire incessantly moving in circles,\ndivine and incorruptible, and subject to no change. Below it, nature,\nand the elements, mutable and acted on, corruptible and mortal.\n\nSynesius said that generations were effected in the portions of the\nUniverse which we inhabit; while the cause of generations resided in the\nportions above us, whence descend to us the germs of the effects\nproduced here below. Proclus and Simplicius deemed Heaven the Active\nCause and Father, relatively to the earth. The former says that the\nWorld or the Whole is a single Animal; what is done _in_ it, is done\n_by_ it; the same World _acts_, and _acts upon itself_. He divides it\ninto \"Heaven\" and \"Generation.\" In the former, he says, are placed and\narranged the conservative causes of generation, superintended by the\nGenii and Gods. The Earth, or Rhea, associated ever with Saturn in\nproduction, is mother of the effects of which Heaven is Father; the womb\nor bosom that receives the fertilizing energy of the God that engenders\nages. The great work of generation is operated, he says, primarily by\nthe action of the Sun, and secondarily by that of the Moon, so that the\nSun is the primitive source of this energy, as father and chief of the\nmale gods that form his court. He follows the action of the male and\nfemale principles through all the portions and divisions of nature,\nattributing to the former the origin of stability and identity, to the\nlatter, that of diversity and mobility. Heaven is to the earth, he says,\nas the male to the female. It is the movement of the heavens that, by\ntheir revolutions, furnished the seminal incitements and forces, whose\nemanations received by the earth, make it fruitful, and cause it to\nproduce animals and plants of every kind.\n\nPhilo says that Moses recognized this doctrine of two causes, active and\npassive; but made the former to reside in the Mind or Intelligence\nexternal to matter.\n\nThe ancient astrologers divided the twelve signs of the Zodiac into six\nmale and six female, and assigned them to six male and six female Great\nGods. Heaven and Earth, or Ouranos and Gh\u00ea, were among most ancient\nnations, the first and most ancient Divinities. We find them in the\nPh\u0153enician history of Sanchoniathon, and in the Grecian Genealogy of the\nGods given by Hesiod. Everywhere they marry, and by their union produce\nthe later Gods. \"In the beginning,\" says Apollodorus, \"Ouranos or the\nHeavens was Lord of all the Universe: he took to wife Gh\u00ea or the earth,\nand had by her many children.\" They were the first Gods of the Cretans,\nand under other names, of the Armenians, as we learn from Berosus, and\nof Panchaia, an island South of Arabia, as we learn from Euhemerus.\nOrpheus made the Divinity, or the \"Great Whole,\" male and female,\nbecause, he said, it could produce nothing, unless it united in itself\nthe productive force of both sexes. He called Heaven PANGENETOR, the\nFather of all things, most ancient of Beings, beginning and end of all,\ncontaining in Himself the incorruptible and unwearying force of\nNecessity.\n\nThe same idea obtained in the rude North of Europe. The Scythians made\nthe earth to be the wife of Jupiter; and the Germans adored her under\nthe name of HERTA. The Celts worshipped the Heavens and the Earth, and\nsaid that without the former the latter would be sterile, and that their\nmarriage produced all things. The Scandinavians acknowledged B\u00d6R or the\nHeavens, and gave FURTUR, his son, the Earth as his wife. Olaus Rudbeck\nadds, that their ancestors were persuaded that Heaven intermarried with\nthe Earth, and thus uniting his forces with hers, produced animals and\nplants. This marriage of Heaven and Earth produced the AZES, Genii\nfamous in the theology of the North. In the theology of the Phrygians\nand Lydians, the ASII were born of the marriage of the Supreme God with\nthe Earth, and Firmicus informs us that the Phrygians attributed to the\nEarth supremacy over the other elements, and considered her the Great\nMother of all things.\n\nVirgil sings the impregnation of the joyous earth, by the Ether, its\nspouse, that descends upon its bosom, fertilizing it with rains.\nColumella sings the loves of Nature and her marriage with Heaven\nannually consummated at the sweet Spring-time. He describes the Spirit\nof Life, the soul that animates the world, fired with the passion of\nLove, uniting with Nature and itself, itself a part of Nature, and\nfilling its own bosom with new productions. This union of the Universe\nwith itself, this mutual action of two sexes, he terms \"the great\nSecrets of Nature,\" \"the Mysteries of the Union of Heaven with Earth,\nimaged in the Sacred Mysteries of Atys and Bacchus.\"\n\nVarro tells us that the great Divinities adored at Samothrace were the\nHeavens and the Earth, considered as First Causes or Primal Gods, and as\nmale and female agents, one bearing to the other the relations that the\nSoul and Principle of Movement bear to the body or the matter that\nreceives them. These were the gods revered in the Mysteries of that\nIsland, as they were in the orgies of Ph\u0153nicia.\n\nEverywhere the sacred body of Nature was covered with the veil of\nallegory, which concealed it from the profane, and allowed it to be seen\nonly by the sage who thought it worthy to be the object of his study and\ninvestigation. She showed herself to those only who loved her in spirit\nand in truth, and she abandoned the indifferent and careless to error\nand to ignorance. \"The Sages of Greece,\" says Pausanias, \"never wrote\notherwise than in an enigmatical manner, never naturally and directly.\"\n\"Nature,\" says Sallust the Philosopher, \"should be sung only in a\nlanguage that imitates the secrecy of her processes and operations. She\nis herself an enigma. We see only bodies in movement; the forces and\nsprings that move them are hidden from us.\" The poets inspired by the\nDivinity, the wisest philosophers, all the theologians, the chiefs of\nthe initiations and Mysteries, even the gods uttering their oracles,\nhave borrowed the figurative language of allegory. \"The Egyptians,\" says\nProclus, \"preferred that mode of teaching, and spoke of the great\nsecrets of Nature, only in mythological enigmas.\" The Gymnosophists of\nIndia and the Druids of Gaul lent to science the same enigmatic\nlanguage, and in the same style wrote the Hierophants of Ph\u0153nicia.\n\nThe division of things into the active and the passive cause leads to\nthat of the two Principles of Light and Darkness, connected with and\ncorresponding with it. For Light comes from the ethereal substance that\ncomposes the active cause, and darkness from earth or the gross matter\nwhich composes the passive cause. In Hesiod, the Earth, by its union\nwith Tartarus, engenders Typhon, Chief of the Powers or Genii of\nDarkness. But it unites itself with the Ether or Ouranos, when it\nengenders the Gods of Olympus, or the Stars, children of Starry Ouranos.\n\nLight was the first Divinity worshipped by men. To it they owed the\nbrilliant spectacle of Nature. It seems an emanation from the Creator of\nall things, making known to our senses the Universe which darkness hides\nfrom our eyes, and, as it were, giving it existence. Darkness, as it\nwere, reduces all nature again to nothingness, and almost entirely\nannihilates man.\n\nNaturally, therefore, two substances of opposite natures were imagined,\nto each of which the world was in turn subjected, one contributing to\nits felicity and the other to its misfortune. Light multiplied its\nenjoyments; Darkness despoiled it of them: the former was its friend,\nthe latter its enemy. To one all good was attributed; to the other all\nevil; and thus the words \"Light\" and \"Good\" became synonymous, and the\nwords \"Darkness\" and \"Evil.\" It seeming that Good and Evil could not\nflow from one and the same source, any more than could Light and\nDarkness, men naturally imagined two Causes or Principles, of different\nnatures and opposite in their effects, one of which shed Light and Good,\nand the other Darkness and Evil, on the Universe.\n\nThis distinction of the two Principles was admitted in all the\nTheologies, and formed one of the principal bases of all religions. It\nentered as a primary element into the sacred fables, the cosmogonies and\nthe Mysteries of antiquity. \"We are not to suppose,\" says Plutarch,\n\"that the Principles of the Universe are inanimate bodies, as Democritus\nand Epicurus thought; nor that a matter devoid of qualities is organized\nand arranged by a single Reason or Providence, Sovereign over all\nthings, as the Stoics held; for it is not possible that a single Being,\ngood or evil, is the cause of all, inasmuch as God can in nowise be the\ncause of any evil. The harmony of the Universe is a combination of\ncontraries, like the strings of a lyre, or that of a bow, which\nalternately is stretched and relaxed.\" \"The good,\" says Euripides, \"is\nnever separated from the Evil. The two must mingle, that all may go\nwell.\" And this opinion as to the two principles, continues Plutarch,\n\"is that of all antiquity. From the Theologians and Legislators it\npassed to the Poets and Philosophers. Its author is unknown; but the\nopinion itself is established by the traditions of the whole human race,\nand consecrated in the mysteries and sacrifices both of the Greeks and\nBarbarians, wherein was recognized the dogma of opposing principles in\nnature, which, by their contrariety, produce the mixture of good and\nevil. We must admit two contrary causes, two opposing powers, which\nlead, one to the right and the other to the left, and thus control our\nlife, as they do the sublunary world, which is therefore subject to so\nmany changes and irregularities of every kind. For if there can be no\neffect without a cause, and if the Good cannot be the cause of the Evil,\nit is absolutely necessary that there should be a cause for the Evil, as\nthere is one for the Good.\" This doctrine, he adds, has been generally\nreceived among most nations, and especially by those who have had the\ngreatest reputation for wisdom. All have admitted two gods, with\ndifferent occupations, one making the good and the other the evil found\nin nature. The former has been styled \"God,\" the latter \"Demon.\" The\nPersians, or Zoroaster, named the former Ormuzd and the latter Ahriman;\nof whom they said one was of the nature of Light, the other of that of\nDarkness. The Egyptians called the former Osiris, and the latter Typhon,\nhis eternal enemy.\n\nThe Hebrews, at least after their return from the Persian captivity, had\ntheir good Deity, and the Devil, a bad and malicious Spirit, ever\nopposing God, and Chief of the Angels of Darkness, as God was of those\nof Light. The word \"Satan\" means, in Hebrew, simply, \"The Adversary.\"\n\nThe Chaldeans, Plutarch says, had their good and evil stars. The Greeks\nhad their Jupiter and Pluto, and their Giants and Titans, to whom were\nassigned the attributes of the Serpent with which Pluto or Serapis was\nencircled, and the shape whereof was assumed by Typhon, Ahriman, and the\nSatan of the Hebrews. Every people had something equivalent to this.\n\nThe People of Pegu believe in two Principles, one author of Good and the\nother of Evil, and strive to propitiate the latter, while they think it\nneedless to worship the former, as he is incapable of doing evil. The\npeople of Java, of the Moluccas, of the Gold Coast, the Hottentots, the\npeople of Teneriffe and Madagascar, and the Savage Tribes of America,\nall worship and strive to avert the anger and propitiate the good-will\nof the Evil Spirit.\n\nBut among the Greeks, Egyptians, Chaldeans, Persians, and Assyrians, the\ndoctrine of the two Principles formed a complete and regularly arranged\ntheological system. It was the basis of the religion of the Magi and of\nEgypt. The author of an ancient work, attributed to Origen, says that\nPythagoras learned from Zarastha, a Magus at Babylon (the same, perhaps,\nas Zerdusht or Zoroaster), that there are two principles of all things,\nwhereof one is the _father_ and the other the _mother_; the former,\nLight, and the latter, Darkness. Pythagoras thought that the\nDependencies on Light were warmth, dryness, lightness, swiftness; and\nthose of Darkness, cold, wet, weight, and slowness; and that the world\nderived its existence from these two principles, as from the male and\nthe female. According to Porphyry, he conceived two opposing powers, one\ngood, which he termed Unity, the Light, Right, the Equal, the Stable,\nthe Straight; the other evil, which he termed Binary, Darkness, the\nLeft, the Unequal, the Unstable, the Crooked. These ideas he received\nfrom the Orientals, for he dwelt twelve years at Babylon, studying with\nthe Magi. Varro says he recognized two Principles of all things,--the\nFinite and the Infinite, Good and Evil, Life and Death, Day and Night.\nWhite he thought was of the nature of the Good Principle, and Black of\nthat of the Evil; that Light and Darkness, Heat and Cold, the Dry and\nthe Wet, mingled in equal proportions; that Summer was the triumph of\nheat, and Winter of cold; that their equal combination produced Spring\nand Autumn, the former producing verdure and favorable to health, and\nthe latter, deteriorating everything, giving birth to maladies. He\napplied the same idea to the rising and setting of the sun; and, like\nthe Magi, held that God or Ormuzd in the body resembled light, and in\nthe soul, truth.\n\nAristotle, like Plato, admitted a principle of Evil, resident in matter\nand in its eternal imperfection.\n\nThe Persians said that Ormuzd, born of the pure Light, and Ahriman, born\nof darkness, were ever at war. Ormuzd produced six Gods, Beneficence,\nTruth, Good Order, Wisdom, Riches, and Virtuous Joy. These were so many\nemanations from the Good Principle, so many blessings bestowed by it on\nmen. Ahriman, in his turn, produced six Devs, opponents of the six\nemanations from Ormuzd. Then Ormuzd made himself three times as great as\nbefore, ascended as far above the sun as the sun is above the earth, and\nadorned the heavens with stars, of which he made Sirius the sentinel or\nadvance-guard: that he then created twenty-four other Deities, and\nplaced them in an egg, where Ahriman also placed twenty-four others,\ncreated by him, who broke the egg; and so intermingled Good and Evil.\nTheopompus adds that, according to the Magi, for two terms of three\nthousand years, each of the two Principles is to be by turns victor and\nthe other vanquished; then for three thousand more for each they are to\ncontend with each other, each destroying reciprocally the works of the\nother; after which Ahriman is to perish, and men, wearing transparent\nbodies, to enjoy unutterable happiness.\n\nThe twelve great Deities of the Persians, the six Amshaspands and six\nDevs, marshalled, the former under the banner of Light, and the latter\nunder that of Darkness, are the twelve Zodiacal Signs or Months; the six\nsupreme signs, or those of Light, or of Spring and Summer, commencing\nwith Aries, and the six inferior, of Darkness, or of Autumn and Winter,\ncommencing with Libra. Limited Time, as contradistinguished from Time\nwithout limits, or Eternity, is Time created and measured by the\ncelestial revolutions. It is comprehended in a period divided into\ntwelve parts, each subdivided into a thousand parts, which the Persians\ntermed years. Thus the circle annually traversed by the Sun was divided\ninto 12,000 parts, or each sign into 3,000: and thus, each year, the\nPrinciple of Light and Good triumphed for 3,000 years, that of Evil and\nDarkness for 3,000, and they mutually destroyed each other's labors for\n6,000, or 3,000 for each: so that the Zodiac was equally divided between\nthem. And accordingly Ocellus Lucanus, the Disciple of Pythagoras, held\nthat the principal cause of all sublunary effects resided in the Zodiac,\nand that from it flowed the good or bad influences of the planets that\nrevolved therein.\n\nThe twenty-four good and twenty-four evil Deities, enclosed in the Egg,\nare the forty-eight constellations of the ancient sphere, equally\ndivided between the realms of Light and Darkness, on the concavity of\nthe celestial sphere which was apportioned among them; and which,\nenclosing the world and planets, was the mystic and sacred egg of the\nMagi, the Indians, and the Egyptians,--the egg that issued from the\nmouth of the God Kneph, that figured as the Orphic Egg in the Mysteries\nof Greece, that issued from the God Chumong of the Coresians, and from\nthe Egyptian Osiris and the God Phanes of the Modern Orphics, Principle\nof Light,--the egg crushed by the Sacred Bull of the Japanese, and from\nwhich the world emerged; that placed by the Greeks at the feet of\nBacchus the bull-horned God, and from which Aristophanes makes Love\nemerge, who with Night organizes Chaos.\n\nThus the Balance, the Scorpion, the Serpent of Ophiucus, and the Dragon\nof the Hesperides became malevolent Signs and Evil Genii; and entire\nnature was divided between the two principles, and between the agents or\npartial causes subordinate to them. Hence Michael and his Archangels,\nand Satan and his fallen compeers. Hence the wars of Jupiter and the\nGiants, in which the Gods of Olympus fought on the side of the\nLight-God, against the dark progeny of earth and Chaos; a war which\nProclus regarded as symbolizing the resistance opposed by dark and\nchaotic matter to the active and beneficent force which gives it\norganization; an idea which in part appears in the old theory of two\nPrinciples, one innate in the active and luminous substance of Heaven,\nand the other in the inert and dark substance of matter that resists the\norder and the good that Heaven communicates to it.\n\nOsiris conquers Typhon, and Ormuzd, Ahriman, when, at the Vernal\nEquinox, the creative action of Heaven and its demiourgic energy is most\nstrongly manifested. Then the principle of Light and Good overcomes that\nof Darkness and Evil, and the world rejoices, redeemed from cold and\nwintry darkness by the beneficent Sign into which the Sun then enters\ntriumphant and rejoicing, after his resurrection.\n\nFrom the doctrine of the two Principles, Active and Passive, grew that\nof the Universe, animated by a Principle of Eternal Life, and by a\nUniversal Soul, from which every isolated and temporary being received\nat its birth an emanation, which, at the death of such being, returned\nto its source. The life of matter as much belonged to nature as did\nmatter itself; and as life is manifested by movement, the sources of\nlife must needs seem to be placed in those luminous and eternal bodies,\nand above all in the Heaven in which they revolve, and which whirls them\nalong with itself in that rapid course that is swifter than all other\nmovement. And fire and heat have so great an analogy with life, that\ncold, like absence of movement, seemed the distinctive characteristic of\ndeath. Accordingly, the vital fire that blazes in the Sun and produces\nthe heat that vivifies everything, was regarded as the principle of\norganization and life of all sublunary beings.\n\nAccording to this doctrine, the Universe is not to be regarded, in its\ncreative and eternal action, merely as an immense machine, moved by\npowerful springs and forced into a continual movement, which, emanating\nfrom the circumference, extends to the centre, acts and re-acts in\nevery possible direction, and re-produces in succession all the varied\nforms which matter receives. So to regard it would be to recognize a\ncold and purely mechanical action, the energy of which could never\nproduce life.\n\nOn the contrary, it was thought, the Universe should be deemed an\nimmense Being, always living, always moved and always moving in an\neternal activity inherent in itself, and which, subordinate to no\nforeign cause, is communicated to all its parts, connects them together,\nand makes of the world of things a complete and perfect whole. The order\nand harmony which reign therein seem to belong to and be a part of it,\nand the design of the various plans of construction of organized beings\nwould seem to be graven in its Supreme Intelligence, source of all the\nother Intelligences which it communicates together with life to man.\nNothing existing out of it, it must be regarded as the principle and\nterm of all things.\n\nCh\u00e6remon had no reason for saying that the Ancient Egyptians, inventors\nof the sacred fables, and adorers of the Sun and the other luminaries,\nsaw in the Universe only a machine, without life and without\nintelligence, either in its whole or in its parts; and that their\ncosmogony was a pure Epicureanism, which required only matter and\nmovement to organize its world and govern it. Such an opinion would\nnecessarily exclude all religious worship. Wherever we suppose a\nworship, there we must suppose intelligent Deities who receive it, and\nare sensible to the homage of their adorers; and no other people were so\nreligious as the Egyptians.\n\nOn the contrary, with them the immense, immutable, and Eternal Being,\ntermed \"God\" or \"the Universe,\" had eminently, and in all their\nplenitude, that life and intelligence which sublunary beings, each an\ninfinitely small and temporary portion of itself, possess in a far\ninferior degree and infinitely less quantity. It was to them, in some\nsort, like the Ocean, whence the springs, brooks, and rivers have risen\nby evaporation, and to the bosom whereof they return by a larger or\nshorter course, and after a longer or shorter separation from the\nimmense mass of its waters. The machine of the Universe was, in their\nview, like that of man, moved by a Principle of Life which kept it in\neternal activity, and circulated in all its parts. The Universe was a\nliving and animated being, like man and the other animals; or rather\nthey were so only because the Universe was essentially so, and for a few\nmoments communicated to each an infinitely minute portion of its\neternal life, breathed by it into the inert and gross matter of\nsublunary bodies. That withdrawn, man or the animal died; and the\nUniverse alone, living and circulating around the wrecks of their\nbodies, by its eternal movement, organized and animated new bodies,\nreturning to them the eternal fire and subtle substance which vivifies\nitself, and which, incorporated in its immense mass, was its universal\nsoul.\n\nThese were the ancient ideas as to this Great GOD, Father of all the\ngods, or of the World; of this BEING, Principle of all things, and of\nwhich nothing other than itself is Principle,--the Universal cause that\nwas termed God. Soul of the Universe, eternal like it, immense like it,\nsupremely active and potent in its varied operations, penetrating all\nparts of this vast body, impressing a regular and symmetrical movement\non the spheres, making the elements instinct with activity and order,\nmingling with everything, organizing everything, vivifying and\npreserving everything,--this was the UNIVERSE-GOD which the ancients\nadored as Supreme Cause and God of Gods.\n\nAnchises, in the \u00c6neid, taught \u00c6neas this doctrine of Pythagoras,\nlearned by him from his Masters, the Egyptians, in regard to the Soul\nand Intelligence of the Universe, from which _our_ souls and\nintelligences, as well as our life and that of the animals, emanate,\nHeaven, Earth, the Sea, the Moon and the Stars, he said, are moved by a\nprinciple of internal life which perpetuates their existence; a great\nintelligent soul, that penetrates every part of the vast body of the\nUniverse, and, mingling with everything, agitates it by an eternal\nmovement. It is the source of life in all living things. The force which\nanimates all, emanates from the eternal fire that burns in Heaven. In\nthe Georgics, Virgil repeats the same doctrine; and that, at the death\nof every animal, the life that animated it, part of the universal life,\nreturns to its Principle and to the source of life that circulates in\nthe sphere of the Stars.\n\nServius makes God the active Cause that organizes the elements into\nbodies, the vivifying breath or spirit, that, spreading through matter\nor the elements, produces and engenders all things. The elements compose\nthe substance of our bodies: God composes the souls that vivify these\nbodies. From it come the instincts of animals, from it their life, he\nsays: and when they die, that life returns to and re-enters into the\nUniversal Soul, and their bodies into Universal Matter.\n\nTim\u00e6us of Locria and Plato his Commentator wrote of the Soul of the\nWorld, developing the doctrine of Pythagoras, who thought, says Cicero,\nthat God is the Universal Soul, resident everywhere in nature, and of\nwhich our Souls are but emanations. \"_God is one_,\" says Pythagoras, as\ncited by Justin Martyr: \"He is not, as some think, _without_ the world,\nbut within it, and entire in its entirety. He sees all that _becomes_,\nforms all immortal beings, is the author of their powers and\nperformances, the origin of all things, the Light of Heaven, the\n_Father_, the _Intelligence_, the _Soul_ of all beings, the Mover of all\nspheres.\"\n\nGod, in the view of Pythagoras, was ONE, a single substance, whose\ncontinuous parts extended through all the Universe, without separation,\ndifference, or inequality, like the soul in the human body. He denied\nthe doctrine of the spiritualists, who had severed the Divinity from the\nUniverse, making Him exist apart from the Universe, which thus became no\nmore than a material work, on which acted the Abstract Cause, a God,\nisolated from it. The Ancient Theology did not so separate God from the\nUniverse. This Eusebius attests, in saying that but a small number of\nwise men, like Moses, had sought for God or the Cause of all, outside of\nthat ALL; while the Philosophers of Egypt and Ph\u0153nicia, real authors of\nall the old Cosmogonies, had placed the Supreme Cause _in_ the Universe\nitself, and in its parts, so that, in their view, the world and all its\nparts are _in_ God.\n\nThe World or Universe was thus compared to man: the Principle of Life\nthat moves it, to that which moves man; the Soul of the World to that of\nman. Therefore Pythagoras called man a _microcosm_, or little world, as\npossessing in miniature all the qualities found on a great scale in the\nUniverse; by his reason and intelligence partaking of the Divine Nature:\nand by his faculty of changing aliments into other substances, of\ngrowing, and reproducing himself, partaking of elementary Nature. Thus\nhe made the Universe a great intelligent Being, like man--an immense\nDeity, having in itself, what man has in himself, movement, life, and\nintelligence, and besides, a perpetuity of existence, which man has not;\nand, as having in itself perpetuity of movement and life, therefore the\nSupreme Cause of all.\n\nEverywhere extended, this Universal Soul does not, in the view of\nPythagoras, act everywhere equally nor in the same manner. The highest\nportion of the Universe, being as it were its head, seemed to him its\nprincipal seat, and there was the guiding power of the rest of the\nworld. In the seven concentric spheres is resident an eternal order,\nfruit of the intelligence, the Universal Soul that moves, by a constant\nand regular progression, the immortal bodies that form the harmonious\nsystem of the heavens.\n\nManilius says: \"I sing the invisible and potent Soul of Nature; that\nDivine Substance which, everywhere inherent in Heaven, Earth, and the\nWaters of the Ocean, forms the bond that holds together and makes one\nall the parts of the vast body of the Universe. It, balancing all\nForces, and harmoniously arranging the varied relations of the many\nmembers of the world, maintains in it the life and regular movement that\nagitate it, as a result of the action of the living breath or single\nspirit that dwells in all its parts, circulates in all the channels of\nuniversal nature, flashes with rapidity to all its points, and gives to\nanimated bodies the configurations appropriate to the organization of\neach.... This eternal Law, this Divine Force, that maintains the harmony\nof the world, makes use of the Celestial Signs to organize and guide the\nanimated creatures that breathe upon the earth; and gives to each of\nthem the character and habits most appropriate. By the action of this\nForce Heaven rules the condition of the Earth and of its fields\ncultivated by the husbandman: it gives us or takes from us vegetation\nand harvests: it makes the great ocean overpass its limits at the flow,\nand retire within them again at the ebbing, of the tide.\"\n\nThus it is no longer by means of a poetic fiction only that the heavens\nand the earth become animated and personified, and are deemed living\nexistences, from which other existences proceed. For now they live, with\ntheir own life, a life eternal like their bodies, each gifted with a\nlife and perhaps a soul, like those of man, a portion of the universal\nlife and universal soul; and the other bodies that they form, and which\nthey contain in their bosoms, live only through them and with their\nlife, as the embryo lives in the bosom of its mother, in consequence and\nby means of the life communicated to it, and which the mother ever\nmaintains by the active power of her own life. Such is the universal\nlife of the world, reproduced in all the beings which its superior\nportion creates in its inferior portion, that is as it were the _matrix_\nof the world, or of the beings that the heavens engender in its bosom.\n\n\"The soul of the world,\" says Macrobius, \"is nature itself\" [as the\nsoul of man is man himself], \"always acting through the celestial\nspheres which it moves, and which but follow the irresistible impulse it\nimpresses on them. The heavens, the sun, great seat of generative power,\nthe signs, the stars, and the planets act only with the activity of the\nsoul of the Universe. From that soul, through them, come all the\nvariations and changes of sublunary nature, of which the heavens and\ncelestial bodies are but the secondary causes. The zodiac, with its\nsigns, is an existence, immortal and divine, organized by the universal\nsoul, and producing, or gathering in itself, all the varied emanations\nof the different powers that make up the nature of the Divinity.\"\n\nThis doctrine, that gave to the heavens and the spheres living souls,\neach a portion of the universal soul, was of extreme antiquity. It was\nheld by the old Sabr\u00e6ns. It was taught by Tim\u00e6sus, Plato, Speusippus,\nIamblichus, Macrobius, Marcus Aurelius, and Pythagoras. When once men\nhad assigned a soul to the Universe, containing in itself the plenitude\nof the animal life of particular beings, and even of the stars, they\nsoon supposed that soul to be essentially intelligent, and the source of\nintelligence of all intelligent beings. Then the Universe became to them\nnot only animated but intelligent, and of that intelligence the\ndifferent parts of nature partook. Each soul was the vehicle, and, as it\nwere, the envelope of the intelligence that attached itself to it, and\ncould repose nowhere else. Without a soul there could be no\nintelligence; and as there was a universal soul, source of all souls,\nthe universal soul was gifted with a universal intelligence, source of\nall particular intelligences. So the soul of the world contained in\nitself the intelligence of the world. All the agents of nature into\nwhich the universal soul entered, received also a portion of its\nintelligence, and the Universe, in its totality and in its parts, was\nfilled with intelligences, that might be regarded as so many emanations\nfrom the sovereign and universal intelligence. Wherever the divine soul\nacted as a cause, there also was intelligence; and thus Heaven, the\nstars, the elements, and all parts of the Universe, became the seats of\nso many divine intelligences. Every minutest portion of the great soul\nbecame a partial intelligence, and the more it was disengaged from gross\nmatter, the more active and intelligent it was. And all the old adorers\nof nature, the theologians, astrologers, and poets, and the most\ndistinguished philosophers, supposed that the stars were so many\nanimated and intelligent beings, or eternal bodies, active causes of\neffects here below, whom a principle of life animated, and whom an\nintelligence directed, which was but an emanation from, and a portion\nof, the universal life and intelligence of the world.\n\nThe Universe itself was regarded as a supremely intelligent being. Such\nwas the doctrine of Tim\u00e6us of Locria. The soul of man was part of the\nintelligent soul of the Universe, and therefore itself intelligent. His\nopinion was that of many other philosophers. Cleanthes, a disciple of\nZENO, regarded the Universe as God, or as the unproduced and universal\ncause of all effects produced. He ascribed a soul and intelligence to\nuniversal nature, and to this intelligent soul, in his view, divinity\nbelonged. From it the intelligence of man was an emanation, and shared\nits divinity. Chrysippus, the most subtle of the Stoics, placed in the\nuniversal reason that forms the soul and intelligence of nature, that\ndivine force or essence of the Divinity which he assigned to the world\nmoved by the universal soul that pervades its every part.\n\nAn interlocutor in Cicero's work, _De Natura Deorum_, formally argues\nthat the Universe is necessarily intelligent and wise, because man, an\ninfinitely small portion of it, is so. Cicero makes the same argument in\nhis oration for Milo. The physicists came to the same conclusion as the\nphilosophers. They supposed that movement essentially belonged to the\nsoul, and the direction of regular and ordered movements to the\nintelligence. And, as both movement and order exist in the Universe,\ntherefore, they held, there must be in it a soul and an intelligence\nthat rule it, and are not to be distinguished from itself; because the\nidea of the Universe is but the aggregate of all the particular ideas of\nall things that exist.\n\nThe argument was, that the Heavens, and the Stars which make part of\nthem, are _animated_, because they possess a portion of the Universal\nSoul: they are _intelligent_ beings, because that Universal Soul, part\nwhereof they possess, is supremely intelligent; and they share\n_Divinity_ with Universal Nature, because Divinity resides in the\nUniversal Soul and Intelligence which move and rule the world, and of\neach of which they hold a share. By this process of logic, the\ninterlocutor in Cicero assigned Divinity to the Stars, as animated\nbeings gifted with sensibility and intelligence, and composed of the\nnoblest and purest portions of the ethereal substance, unmixed with\nmatter of an alien nature, and essentially containing light and heat.\nHence he concluded them to be so many gods, of an intelligence superior\nto that of other existences, corresponding to the lofty height in which\nthey moved with such perfect regularity and admirable harmony, with a\nmovement spontaneous and free. Hence he made them \"Gods,\" active,\neternal, and intelligent \"Causes\"; and peopled the realm of Heaven with\na host of Eternal Intelligences, celestial Genii or Angels, sharing the\nuniversal Divinity, and associated with it in the administration of the\nUniverse, and the dominion exercised over sublunary nature and man.\n\n_We_ make the motive-force of the planets to be a mechanical law, which\nwe explain by the combination of two forces, the centripetal and\ncentrifugal, whose _origin_ we cannot demonstrate, but whose _force_ we\ncan calculate. The ancients regarded them as moved by an intelligent\nforce that had its origin in the first and universal Intelligence. Is it\nso certain, after all, that we are any nearer the truth than they were;\nor that we know what our \"centripetal and centrifugal forces\" _mean_;\nfor what _is_ a _force?_ With us, the entire Deity acts upon and moves\neach planet, as He does the sap that circulates in the little blade of\ngrass, and in the particles of blood in the tiny veins of the invisible\nrotifer. With the Ancients, the Deity of each Star was but a portion of\nthe Universal God, the Soul of Nature. Each Star and Planet, with them,\nwas moved of _itself_, and directed by _its own_ special intelligence.\nAnd this opinion of Achilles Tatius, Diodorus, Chrysippus, Aristotle,\nPlato, Heraclides of Pontus, Theophrastus, Simplicius, Macrobius, and\nProclus, that in each Star there is an immortal Soul and\nIntelligence,--part of the Universal Soul and Intelligence of the\nWhole,--this opinion of Orpheus, Plotinus, and the Stoics, was in\nreality, that of many Christian philosophers. For Origen held the same\nopinion; and Augustin held that every visible thing in the world was\nsuperintended by an Angelic Power: and Cosma the Monk, believed that\nevery Star was under the guidance of an Angel; and the author of the\nOctateuch, written in the time of the Emperor Justin, says that they are\nmoved by the impulse communicated to them by Angels stationed above the\nfirmament. Whether the stars were animated beings, was a question that\nChristian antiquity did not decide. Many of the Christian doctors\nbelieved they were. Saint Augustin hesitates, Saint Jerome doubts, if\nSolomon did not assign souls to the Stars. Saint Ambrose does not doubt\nthey _have_ souls; and Pamphilus says that many of the Church believe\nthey are reasonable beings, while many think otherwise, but that neither\none nor the other opinion is heretical.\n\nThus the Ancient Thought, earnest and sincere, wrought out the idea of a\nSoul _inherent_ in the Universe and in its several parts. The next step\nwas to _separate_ that Soul from the Universe, and give to it an\nexternal and independent existence and personality; still omnipresent,\nin every inch of space and in every particle of matter, and yet not a\npart of Nature, but its Cause and its Creator. This is the middle ground\nbetween the two doctrines, of Pantheism (or that all is God, and God is\n_in_ all and is all), on the one side, and Atheism (or that all is\nnature, and there is no other God), on the other; which doctrines, after\nall, when reduced to their simplest terms, seem to be the same.\n\nWe complacently congratulate ourselves on our recognition of a\n_personal_ God, as being the conception most suited to human sympathies,\nand exempt from the mystifications of Pantheism. But the Divinity\nremains still a mystery, notwithstanding all the devices which\nsymbolism, either from the organic or inorganic creation, can supply;\nand personification is itself a symbol, liable to misapprehension as\nmuch as, if not more so than, any other, since it is apt to degenerate\ninto a mere reflection of our own infirmities; and hence _any_\naffirmative idea or conception that we can, in our own minds, picture of\nthe Deity, must needs be infinitely inadequate.\n\nThe spirit of the Vedas (or sacred Indian Books, of great antiquity), as\nunderstood by their earliest as well as most recent expositors, is\ndecidedly a pantheistic monotheism--one God, and He all in all; the many\ndivinities, numerous as the prayers addressed to them, being resolvable\ninto the titles and attributes of a few, and ultimately into THE ONE.\nThe machinery of personification was understood to have been\nunconsciously assumed as a mere expedient to supply the deficiencies of\nlanguage; and the Mimansa justly considered itself as only interpreting\nthe true meaning of the Mantras, when it proclaimed that, in the\nbeginning, \"Nothing was but Mind, the Creative Thought of Him which\nexisted alone from the beginning, and breathed without afflation.\" The\nidea suggested in the Mantras is dogmatically asserted and developed in\nthe Upanischadas. The Vedanta philosophy, assuming the mystery of the\n\"ONE IN MANY\" as the fundamental article of faith, maintained not only\nthe Divine Unity, but the identity of matter and spirit. The unity which\nit advocates is that of mind. Mind is the Universal Element, the One\nGod, the Great Soul, Mahaatma. He is the material as well as efficient\ncause, and the world is a texture of which he is both the web and the\nweaver. He is the Macrocosmos, the universal organism called Pooroosha,\nof which Fire, Air, and Sun are only the chief members. His head is\nlight, his eyes the sun and moon, his breath the wind, his voice the\nopened Vedas. All proceeds from Brahm, like the web from the spider and\nthe grass from the earth.\n\nYet it is only the impossibility of expressing in language the\norigination of matter from spirit, which gives to Hind\u016b philosophy the\nappearance of materialism. Formless Himself, the Deity is present in all\nforms. His glory is displayed in the Universe as the image of the sun in\nwater, which is, yet is not, the luminary itself. All maternal agency\nand appearance, the subjective world, are to a great extent phantasms,\nthe notional representations of ignorance. They occupy, however, a\nmiddle ground between reality and non-reality; they are unreal, because\nnothing exists but Brahm; yet in some degree real, inasmuch as they\nconstitute an outward manifestation of him. They are a self-induced\nhypostasis of the Deity, under which He _presents to Himself_ the whole\nof animate and inanimate Nature, the actuality of the moment, the\ndiversified _appearances_ which successively invest the one Pantheistic\nSpirit.\n\nThe great aim of reason is to generalize; to discover unity in\nmultiplicity, order in apparent confusion; to separate from the\naccidental and the transitory, the stable and universal. In the\ncontemplation of Nature, and the vague, but almost intuitive perception\nof a general uniformity of plan among endless varieties of operation and\nform, arise those solemn and reverential feelings, which, if accompanied\nby intellectual activity, may eventually ripen into philosophy.\n\nConsciousness of self and of personal identity is co-existent with our\nexistence. We cannot conceive of mental existence without it. It is not\nthe work of reflection nor of logic, nor the result of observation,\nexperiment, and experience. It is a gift from God, like instinct; and\nthat consciousness of a thinking soul which is really the person that\nwe are, and other than our body, is the best and most solid proof of the\nsoul's existence. We have the same consciousness of a Power on which we\nare dependent; which we can _define_ and form an idea or picture of, as\nlittle as we can of the soul, and yet which we _feel_, and therefore\nknow, exists. True and correct ideas of that Power, of the Absolute\nExistence from which all proceeds, we cannot trace; if by true and\ncorrect we mean _adequate_ ideas; for of such we are not, with our\nlimited faculties, capable. And ideas of His nature, so far correct as\nwe are capable of entertaining, can only be attained either by direct\ninspiration or by the investigations of philosophy.\n\nThe idea of the universal preceded the recognition of any system for its\nexplanation. It was _felt_ rather than understood; and it was long\nbefore the grand conception on which all philosophy rests received\nthrough deliberate investigation that analytical development which might\nproperly entitle it to the name. The sentiment, when first observed by\nthe self-conscious mind, was, says Plato, \"a Divine gift, communicated\nto mankind by some Prometheus, or by those ancients who lived nearer to\nthe gods than our degenerate selves.\" The mind deduced from its first\nexperiences the notion of a general Cause or Antecedent, to which it\nshortly gave a name and personified it. This was the statement of a\ntheorem, obscure in proportion to its generality. _It explained all\nthings but itself_. It was _a true_ cause, but an _incomprehensible_\none. Ages had to pass before the nature of the theorem could be rightly\nappreciated, and before men, acknowledging the First Cause to be an\nobject of faith rather than science, were contented to confine their\nresearches to those nearer relations of existence and succession, which\nare really within the reach of their faculties. At first, and for a long\ntime, the intellect deserted the real for a hastily-formed ideal world,\nand the imagination usurped the place of reason, in attempting to put a\nconstruction on the most general and inadequate of conceptions, by\ntransmuting its symbols into realities, and by substantializing it under\na thousand arbitrary forms.\n\nIn poetry, the idea of Divine unity became, as in Nature, obscured by a\nmultifarious symbolism; and the notionalities of transcendental\nphilosophy reposed on views of nature scarcely more profound than those\nof the earliest symbolists. Yet the idea of unity was rather obscured\nthan extinguished; and Xenophanes appeared as an enemy of Homer, only\nbecause he more emphatically insisted on the monotheistic element,\nwhich, in poetry, has been comparatively overlooked. The first\nphilosophy reasserted the unity which poetry had lost; but being unequal\nto investigate its nature, it again resigned it to the world of\napproximate sensations, and became bewildered in materialism,\nconsidering the conceptional whole or First Element as some refinement\nof matter, unchangeable in its essence, though subject to mutations of\nquality and form in an eternal succession of seeming decay and\nregeneration; comparing it to water, air, or fire, as each endeavored to\nrefine on the doctrine of his predecessor, or was influenced by a\ndifferent class of theological traditions.\n\nIn the philosophical systems, the Divine Activity, divided by the poets\nand by popular belief among a race of personifications, in whom the idea\nof descent replaced that of cause, or of pantheistic evolution, was\nrestored, without subdivision or reservation, to nature as a whole; at\nfirst as a mechanical _force_ or _life_; afterward as an all-pervading\n_soul_ or inherent _thought_; and lastly as an external directing\n_Intelligence_.\n\nThe Ionian revival of pantheism was materialistic. The Moving Force was\ninseparable from a material element, a subtle yet visible ingredient.\nUnder the form of _air_ or _fire_, the principle of life was associated\nwith the most obvious material machinery of nature. Everything, it was\nsaid, is alive and full of gods. The wonders of the volcano, the magnet,\nthe ebb and flow of the tide, were vital indications, the breathing or\nmoving of the Great World-Animal. The imperceptible ether of Anaximenes\nhad no _positive_ quality beyond the atmospheric air with which it was\neasily confused: and even the \"Infinite\" of Anaximander, though free of\nthe conditions of quality or quantity, was only an ideal chaos, relieved\nof its coarseness by negations. It was the illimitable storehouse or\nPleroma, out of which is evolved the endless circle of phenomenal\nchange. A moving Force was recognized _in_, but not clearly\ndistinguished _from_, the material. Space, Time, Figure, and Number, and\nother common forms or properties, which exist only as _attributes_, were\ntreated as _substances_, or at least as making a substantial connection\nbetween the objects to which they belong: and all the conditions of\nmaterial existence were supposed to have been evolved out of the\nPythagorean Monad.\n\nThe Eleatic philosophers treated conceptions not only as entities, but\nas the only entities, alone possessing the stability and certainty and\nreality vainly sought among phenomena. The only reality was Thought.\n\"All _real_ existence,\" they said, \"is _mental_ existence;\nnon-existence, being inconceivable, is therefore impossible; existence\nfills up the whole range of thought, and is inseparable from its\nexercise; thought and its object are one.\"\n\nXenophanes used ambiguous language, applicable to the material as well\nas to the mental, and exclusively appropriate to neither. In other\nwords, he availed himself of material imagery to illustrate an\nindefinite meaning. In announcing the universal being, he appealed to\nthe heavens as the visible manifestation, calling it _spherical_; a term\nborrowed from the material world. He said that God was neither moved nor\nunmoved, limited nor unlimited. He did not even attempt to express\nclearly, what cannot be conceived clearly; admitting, says Simplicius,\nthat such speculations were above physics. Parmenides employed similar\nexpedients, comparing his metaphysical Deity to a sphere, or to heat, an\naggregate or a continuity, and so involuntarily withdrawing its nominal\nattributes.\n\nThe Atomic school, dividing the All into Matter and Force, deemed matter\nunchangeable in its ultimate constitution, though infinitely variable in\nits resultant forms. They made all variety proceed from the varied\ncombinations of atoms; but they required no mover nor director of the\natoms external to themselves; no universal Reason; but a Mechanical\nEternal _Necessity_, like that of the Poets. Still it is doubtful\nwhether there ever was a time when reason could be said to be entirely\nasleep, a stranger to its own existence, notwithstanding this apparent\nmaterialism. The earliest contemplation of the external world, which\nbrings it into an imagined association with ourselves, assigns, either\nto its whole or its parts, the sensation and volition which belong to\nour own souls.\n\nAnaxagoras admitted the existence of ultimate elementary particles, as\nEmpedocles did, from the combinations whereof all material phenomena\nresulted. But he asserted the Moving Force to be Mind; and yet, though\nhe clearly saw the impossibility of advancing by illustration or\ndefinition beyond a reasonable faith, or a simple negation of\nmateriality, yet he could not wholly desist from the endeavor to\nillustrate the nature of this non-matter or mind, by symbols drawn from\nthose physical considerations which decided him in placing it in a\nseparate category. Whether as human reason, or as the regulating\nPrinciple in nature, he held it different from all other things in\ncharacter and effect, and that therefore it must necessarily differ in\nits essential constitution. It was neither Matter, nor a Force conjoined\nwith matter, or homogeneous with it, but independent and generically\ndistinct, especially in this, that, being the source of all motion,\nseparation, and cognition, it is something entirely unique, pure, and\nunmixed; and so, being unhindered by any interfering influence limiting\nits independence of individual action, it has Supreme Empire over all\nthings, over the vortex of worlds as well as over all that live in them.\nIt is most penetrating and powerful, mixing with other things, though no\nother thing mixes with it; exercises universal control and cognition,\nand includes the _Necessity_ of the Poets, as well as the independent\npower of thought which we exercise within ourselves. In short, it is the\nself-conscious power of thought extended to the Universe, and exalted\ninto the Supreme External Mind which sees, knows, and directs all\nthings.\n\nThus Pantheism and Materialism were both avoided; and matter, though as\ninfinitely varied as the senses represent it, was held in a bond of\nunity transferred to a ruling power apart from it. That Power could not\nbe Prime Mover, if it were itself moved; nor All-Governing, if not apart\nfrom the things it governs. If the arranging Principle were _inherent_\nin matter, it would have been impossible to account for the existence of\na chaos: if something _external_, then the old Ionian doctrine of a\n\"beginning\" became more easily conceivable, as being the epoch at which\nthe Arranging Intelligence commenced its operations.\n\nBut this grand idea of an all-governing independent mind involved\ndifficulties which proved insuperable; because it gave to matter, in the\nform of chaos, an independent and eternal self-existence, and so\nintroduced a dualism of mind and matter. In the Mind or Intelligence,\nAnaxagoras included not only life and motion, but the moral principles\nof the noble and good; and probably used the term on account of the\npopular misapplication of the word \"God,\" and as being less liable to\nmisconstruction, and more specifically marking his idea. His\n\"Intelligence\" principle remained practically liable to many of the same\ndefects as the \"Necessity\" of the poets. It was the presentiment of a\ngreat idea, which it was for the time impossible to explain or follow\nout. It was not yet intelligible, nor was even the road opened through\nwhich it might be approached.\n\nMind cannot advance in metaphysics beyond self-deification. In\nattempting to go further, it only enacts the apotheosis of its own\nsubtle conceptions, and so sinks below the simpler ground already taken.\nThe realities which Plato could not recognize in phenomena, he\ndiscovered within his own mind, and as unhesitatingly as the old\nTheosophists installed its creations among the gods. He, like most\nphilosophers after Anaxagoras, made the Supreme Being to be\nIntelligence; but in other respects left His nature undefined, or rather\nindefinite through the variety of definitions, a conception vaguely\nfloating between Theism and Pantheism. Though deprecating the\ndemoralizing tendencies of poetry, he was too wise to attempt to replace\nthem by other representations of a positive kind. He justly says, that\nspiritual things can be made intelligible only through figures; and the\nforms of allegorical expression which, in a rude age, had been adopted\nunconsciously, were designedly chosen by the philosopher as the most\nappropriate vehicles for theological ideas.\n\nAs the devices of symbolism were gradually stripped away, in order, if\npossible, to reach the fundamental conception, the religious feeling\nhabitually connected with it seemed to evaporate under the process. And\nyet the advocates of Monotheism, Xenophanes and Heraclitus, declaimed\nonly against the making of gods in human form. They did not attempt to\nstrip nature of its divinity, but rather to recall religious\ncontemplation from an exploded symbolism to a purer one. They continued\nthe veneration which, in the background of poetry, has been maintained\nfor Sun and Stars, the Fire or Ether. Socrates prostrated himself before\nthe rising luminary; and the eternal spheres, which seem to have shared\nthe religious homage of Xenophanes, retained a secondary and qualified\nDivinity in the Schools of the Peripatetics and Stoics.\n\nThe unseen being or beings revealed only to the Intellect became the\ntheme of philosophy; and their more ancient symbols, if not openly\ndiscredited, were passed over with evasive generality, as beings\nrespecting whose problematical existence we must be \"content with what\nhas been reported by those ancients, who, assuming to be their\ndescendants, must therefore be supposed to have been well acquainted\nwith their own ancestors and family connections.\" And the Theism of\nAnaxagoras was still more decidedly subversive, not only of Mythology,\nbut of the whole religion of outward nature; it being an appeal from the\nworld without, to the consciousness of spiritual dignity within man.\n\nIn the doctrines of Aristotle, the world moves on uninterruptedly,\nalways changing, yet ever the same, like Time, the Eternal Now, knowing\nneither repose nor death. There is a principle which makes good the\nfailure of _identity_, by multiplying _resemblances_; the destruction of\nthe _individual_ by an eternal renewal of the _form_ in which matter is\nmanifested. This regular eternal _movement_ implies an Eternal Mover;\nnot an inert Eternity, such as the Platonic _Eidos_, but one always\n_acting_, His _essence_ being _to act_, for otherwise he might _never_\nhave acted, and the existence of the world would be an accident; for\nwhat should have, in that case, decided Him to act, after long\ninactivity? Nor can He be partly _in act_ and partly _potential_, that\nis, quiescent and undetermined to act or not to act, for even in that\ncase motion would not be eternal, but contingent and precarious. He is\ntherefore _wholly in act_, a pure, untiring activity, and for the same\nreasons wholly immaterial. Thus Aristotle avoided the idea that God was\ninactive and self-contemplative for an eternity, and then for some\nunknown reason, or by some unknown motive, commenced to act outwardly\nand produce; but he incurred the opposite hazard, of making the result\nof His action, matter and the Universe, be co-existent with Himself; or,\nin other words, of denying that there was any time when His outward\naction _commenced_.\n\nThe First Cause, he said, unmoved, moves all. _Act_ was _first_, and the\nUniverse has existed forever; one persistent cause directing its\ncontinuity. The _unity_ of the First Mover follows from His\nimmateriality. If He were not Himself unmoved, the series of motions and\ncauses of motion would be infinite. Unmoved, therefore, and unchangeable\nHimself, all movement, even that in space, is caused by Him: He is\nnecessary: He cannot be otherwise than as He is; and it is only through\nthe necessity of His being that we can account for those necessary\neternal relations which make a science of Being possible. Thus Aristotle\nleaned to a seemingly personal God; not a Being of parts and passions,\nlike the God of the Hebrews, or that of the mass even of educated men in\nour own day, but a Substantial Head of all the categories of being, an\nIndividuality of Intelligence, the dogma of Anaxagoras revived out of a\nmore elaborate and profound analysis of Nature; something like that\nliving unambiguous Principle which the old poets, in advance of the\nmaterialistic cosmogonists from Night and Chaos, had discovered in\nOuranos or Zeus. Soon, however, the vision of personality is withdrawn,\nand we reach that culminating point of thought where the real blends\nwith the ideal; where moral action and objective thought (that is,\nthought exercised as to anything outside of itself), as well as the\nmaterial body, are excluded; and where the divine action in the world\nretains its veil of impenetrable mystery, and to the utmost ingenuity of\nresearch presents but a contradiction. At this extreme, the series of\nefficient causes resolves itself into the Final Cause. That which moves,\nitself _un_moved, can only be the immobility of Thought or Form. God is\nboth formal, efficient, and final cause; the One Form comprising all\nforms, the one good including all good, the goal of the longing of the\nUniversity, moving the world as the object of love or rational desire\nmoves the individual. He is the internal or self-realized Final Cause,\nhaving no end beyond Himself. He is no moral agent; for if He were, He\nwould be but an instrument for producing something still higher and\ngreater. One sort of act only, activity of mind or thought, can be\nassigned to Him who is at once all act yet all repose. What we call our\nhighest pleasure, which distinguishes wakefulness and sensation, and\nwhich gives a reflected charm to hope and memory, is with Him perpetual.\nHis existence is unbroken enjoyment of that which is most excellent but\nonly temporary with us. The divine quality of active and yet tranquil\nself-contemplation characterizing intelligence, is pre-eminently\npossessed by the divine mind; His thought, which is His existence,\nbeing, unlike ours, unconditional and wholly _act_. If He can receive\nany gratification or enjoyment from that which exists beyond Himself, He\ncan also be displeased and pained with it, and then He would be an\nimperfect being. To suppose pleasure experienced by Him from anything\noutward, supposes an insufficient _prior_ enjoyment and happiness, and a\nsort of dependency. Man's Good is beyond himself; not so God's. The\neternal act which produces the world's life is the eternal desire of\ngood. The object of the Absolute Thought is the Absolute Good. Nature is\nall movement, and Thought all repose. In contemplating that absolute\ngood, the Finality can contemplate only itself; and thus, all material\ninterference being excluded, the distinction of subject and object\nvanishes in complete identification, and the Divine Thought is \"the\nthinking of thought\". The energy of mind is life, and God is that energy\nin its purity and perfection. He is therefore life itself, eternal and\nperfect; and this sums up all that is meant by the term \"God\". And yet,\nafter all this transcendentalism, the very essence of thought consists\nin its mobility and power of transference from object to object; and we\ncan conceive of no thought, without an object beyond itself, about which\nto think, or of any activity in mere self-contemplation, without outward\nact, movement, or manifestation.\n\nPlato endeavors to show how the Divine Principle of Good becomes\nrealized in Nature: Aristotle's system is a vast analogical induction to\nprove how all Nature tends toward a final good. Plato considered Soul as\na principle of movement, and made his Deity realize, that is, turn into\nrealities, his ideas as a free, intelligent Force. Aristotle, for whom\nSoul is the motionless centre from which motion radiates, and to which\nit converges, conceives a correspondingly unmoved God. The Deity of\nPlato creates, superintends, and rejoices in the universal joy of, His\ncreatures. That of Aristotle is the perfection of man's intellectual\nactivity extended to the Universe. When he makes the Deity to be an\neternal act of self-contemplation, the world is not excluded from His\ncognizance, for He contemplates it within Himself. Apart from and beyond\nthe world, He yet mysteriously intermingles with it. He is universal as\nwell as individual; His agency is necessary and general, yet also makes\nthe real and the good of the particular.\n\nWhen Plato had given to the unformed world the animal life of the\nIonians, and added to that the Anaxagorean Intelligence, overruling the\nwild principle of Necessity; and when to Intelligence was added\nBeneficence; and the dread Wardours, Force and Strength, were made\nsubordinate to Mildness and Goodness, it seemed as if a further advance\nwere impossible, and that the Deity could not be more than The Wise and\nThe Good.\n\nBut the contemplation of the Good implies that of its opposite, Evil.\nWhen God is held to be \"The Good,\" it is not because Evil is unknown,\nbut because it is designedly excluded from His attributes. But if Evil\nbe a separate and independent existence, how would it fare with His\nprerogative of Unity and Supremacy? To meet this dilemma, it remained\nonly to fall back on something more or less akin to the vagueness of\nantiquity; to make a virtual confession of ignorance, to deny the\nultimate reality of evil, like Plato and Aristotle, or, with Speusippus,\nthe eternity of its antithetical existence, to surmise that it is only\none of those notions which are indeed provisionally indispensable in a\ncondition of finite knowledge, but of which so many have been already\ndiscredited by the advance of philosophy; to revert, in short, to the\noriginal conception of \"The Absolute,\" or of a single Being, in whom all\nmysteries are explained, and before whom the disturbing principle is\nreduced to a mere turbid spot on the ocean of Eternity, which to the eye\nof faith may be said no longer to exist.\n\nBut the absolute is nearly allied to the non-existent. Matter and evil\nobtruded themselves too constantly and convincingly to be confuted or\ncancelled by subtleties of Logic. It is in vain to attempt to merge the\nworld in God, while the world of experience exhibits contrariety,\nimperfection, and mutability, instead of the immutability of its source.\nPhilosophy was but another name for uncertainty; and after the mind had\nsuccessively deified Nature and its own conceptions, without any\npractical result but toilsome occupation; when the reality it sought,\nwithout or within, seemed ever to elude its grasp, the intellect,\nbaffled in its higher flights, sought advantage and repose in aiming at\ntruth of a lower but more applicable kind.\n\nThe Deity of Plato is a Being proportioned to human sympathies; the\nFather of the World, as well as its Creator; the author of good only,\nnot of evil. \"Envy,\" he says, \"is far removed from celestial beings, and\nman, if willing, and braced for the effort, is permitted to aspire to a\ncommunion with the solemn troops and sweet societies of Heaven. God is\nthe Idea or Essence of Goodness, the Good itself [\u03c4\u03cc \u03ac\u03b3\u03b1\u03b8\u03cc\u03bd]: in\ngoodness, He created the World, and gave to it the greatest perfection\nof which it was susceptible; making it, as far as possible, an image of\nHimself. The sublime type of all excellence is an object not only of\nveneration but love.\" The Sages of old had already intimated in enigmas\nthat God is the Author of Good; that like the Sun in Heaven, or\n\u00c6sculapius on earth, He is \"Healer,\" \"Saviour,\" and \"Redeemer,\" the\ndestroyer and averter of Evil, ever healing the mischiefs inflicted by\nHer\u00e8, the wanton or irrational power of nature.\n\nPlato only asserts with more distinctness the dogma of antiquity when he\nrecognizes LOVE as the highest and most beneficent of gods, who gives to\nnature the invigorating energy restored by the art of medicine to the\nbody; since Love is emphatically the physician of the Universe, the\n\u00c6sculapius to whom Socrates wished to sacrifice in the hour of his\ndeath.\n\nA figurative idea, adopted from familiar imagery, gave that endearing\naspect to the divine connection with the Universe which had commanded\nthe earliest assent of the sentiments, until, rising in refinement with\nthe progress of mental cultivation, it ultimately established itself as\nfirmly in the deliberate approbation of the understanding, as it had\never responded to the sympathies. Even the rude Scythians, Bithynians,\nand Scandinavians, called God their \"Father\"; all nations traced their\nancestry more or less directly to Heaven. The Hyperborean Olen, one of\nthe oldest symbols of the religious antiquity of Greece, made Love the\nFirst-born of Nature. Who will venture to pronounce at what time God was\nfirst worthily and truly honored, or when man first began to feel aright\nthe mute eloquence of nature? In the obscure physics of the mystical\nTheologers who preceded Greek philosophy, Love was the Great First Cause\nand Parent of the Universe. \"Zeus,\" says Proclus, \"when entering upon\nthe work of creation, changed Himself into the form of Love: and He\nbrought forward Aphrodite, the principle of Unity and Universal Harmony,\nto display her light to all. In the depths of His mysterious being, He\ncontains the principle of love within Himself; in Him creative wisdom\nand blessed love are united.\"\n\n                       \"From the first\n    Of Days on these his love divine be fixed,\n    His admiration; till in time complete\n    What he admired and loved, his vital smile\n    Unfolded into being.\"\n\nThe speculators of the venerable East, who had conceived the idea of an\nEternal Being superior to all affection and change, in his own\nsufficiency enjoying a plenitude of serene and independent bliss, were\nled to inquire into the apparently inconsistent fact of the creation of\nthe world. Why, they asked, did He, who required nothing external to\nHimself to complete His already-existing Perfection, come forth out of\nHis unrevealed and perfect existence, and become incorporated in the\nvicissitudes of nature? The solution of the difficulty was Love. The\nGreat Being beheld the beauty of His own conception, which dwelt with\nHim alone from the beginning, Maia, or Nature's loveliness, at once the\ngerm of passion and the source of worlds. Love became the universal\nparent, when the Deity, before remote and inscrutable, became ideally\nseparated into the loving and the beloved.\n\nAnd here again recurs the ancient difficulty; that, at whatever early\nperiod this creation occurred, an eternity had previously elapsed,\nduring which God, dwelling alone in His unimpeached unity, had no object\nfor His love; and that the very word implies to us an existing object\ntoward which the love is directed; so that we cannot conceive of love in\nthe absence of any object to be loved; and therefore we again return to\nthis point, that if love is of God's essence, and He is unchangeable,\nthe same necessity of His nature, supposed to have caused creation, must\never have made His existence without an object to love impossible: and\nso that the Universe must have been co-existent with Himself.\n\nThe questions how and why evil exists in the Universe: how its existence\nis to be reconciled with the admitted wisdom and goodness and\nomnipotence of God; and how far man is a free agent, or controlled by an\ninexorable necessity or destiny, have two sides. On one, they are\nquestions as to the qualities and attributes of God; for we must infer\nHis moral nature from His mode of governing the Universe, and they ever\nenter into any consideration of His intellectual nature: and on the\nother, they directly concern the moral responsibility, and therefore the\ndestiny, of man. All-important, therefore, in both points of view, they\nhave been much discussed in all ages of the world, and have no doubt\nurged men, more than all other questions have, to endeavor to fathom the\nprofound mysteries of the Nature and the mode of Existence and action of\nan incomprehensible God.\n\nAnd, with these, still another question also presents itself: whether\nthe Deity governs the Universe by fixed and unalterable laws, or by\nspecial Providences and interferences, so that He may be induced to\nchange His course and the results of human or material action, by prayer\nand supplication.\n\nGod alone is all-powerful; but the human soul has in all ages asserted\nits claim to be considered as part of the Divine. \"The purity of the\nspirit,\" says Van Helmont, \"is shown through energy and efficaciousness\nof will. God, by the agency of an infinite will, created the Universe,\nand the same sort of power in an inferior degree, limited more or less\nby external hindrances, exists in all spiritual beings.\" The higher we\nascend in antiquity, the more does prayer take the form of incantation;\nand that form it still in a great degree retains, since the rites of\npublic worship are generally considered not merely as an expression of\ntrust or reverence, as real spiritual acts, the effect of which is\nlooked for only within the mind of the worshipper, but as acts from\nwhich some direct outward result is anticipated, the attainment of some\ndesired object, of health or wealth, of supernatural gifts for body or\nsoul, of exemption from danger, or vengeance upon enemies. Prayer was\nable to change the purposes of Heaven, and to make the Devs tremble\nunder the abyss. It exercised a compulsory influence over the gods. It\npromoted the magnetic sympathy of spirit with spirit; and the Hind\u016b and\nPersian liturgies, addressed not only to the Deity Himself, but to His\ndiversified manifestations, were considered wholesome and necessary\niterations of the living or creative Word which at first effectuated the\ndivine will, and which from instant to instant supports the universal\nframe by its eternal repetition.\n\nIn the narrative of the Fall, we have the Hebrew mode of explaining the\ngreat moral mystery, the origin of evil and the apparent estrangement\nfrom Heaven; and a similar idea, variously modified, obtained in all the\nancient creeds. Everywhere, man had at the beginning been innocent and\nhappy, and had lapsed, by temptation and his own weakness, from his\nfirst estate. Thus was accounted for the presumed connection of increase\nof knowledge with increase of misery, and, in particular, the great\npenalty of death was reconciled with Divine Justice. Subordinate to\nthese greater points were the questions, Why is the earth covered with\nthorns and weeds? whence the origin of clothing, of sexual shame and\npassion? whence the infliction of labor, and how to justify the degraded\ncondition of woman in the East, or account for the loathing so generally\nfelt toward the Serpent Tribe?\n\nThe hypothesis of a fall, required under some of its modifications in\nall systems, to account for the apparent imperfection in the work of a\nPerfect Being, was, in Eastern philosophy, the unavoidable accompaniment\nand condition of limited or individual existence; since the Soul,\nconsidered as a fragment of the Universal Mind, might be said to have\nlapsed from its pre-eminence when parted from its source, and ceasing to\nform part of integral perfection. The theory of its reunion was\ncorrespondent to the assumed cause of its degradation. To reach its\nprior condition, its individuality must cease; it must be emancipated\nby re-absorption into the Infinite, the consummation of all things in\nGod, to be promoted by human effort in spiritual meditation or\nself-mortification, and completed in the magical transformation of\ndeath.\n\nAnd as man had fallen, so it was held that the Angels of Evil had, from\ntheir first estate, to which, like men, they were, in God's good time,\nto be restored, and the reign of evil was then to cease forever. To this\ngreat result all the Ancient-Theologies point; and thus they all\nendeavored to reconcile the existence of Sin and Evil with the perfect\nand undeniable wisdom and beneficence of God.\n\nWith man's exercise of thought are inseparably connected freedom and\nresponsibility. Man assumes his proper rank as a moral agent, when with\na sense of the limitations of his nature arise the consciousness of\nfreedom, and of the obligations accompanying its exercise, the sense of\nduty and of the capacity to perform it. To suppose that man ever\nimagined himself not to be a free agent until he had argued himself into\nthat belief, would be to suppose that he was in that below the brutes;\nfor he, like them, is _conscious_ of his freedom to act. Experience\nalone teaches him that this freedom of action is limited and controlled;\nand when what is outward to him restrains and limits this freedom of\naction, he instinctively rebels against it as a wrong. The rule cf duty\nand the materials of experience are derived from an acquaintance with\nthe conditions of the external world, in which the faculties are\nexerted; and thus the problem of man involves those of Nature and God.\nOur freedom, we learn by experience, is determined by an agency external\nto us; our happiness is intimately dependent on the relations of the\noutward World, and on the moral character of its Ruler.\n\nThen at once arises this problem: The God of Nature must be One, and His\ncharacter cannot be suspected to be other than good. Whence, then, came\nthe evil, the consciousness of which must invariably have preceded or\naccompanied man's moral development? On this subject human opinion has\nebbed and flowed between two contradictory extremes, one of which seems\ninconsistent with God's Omnipotence, and the other with His beneficence.\nIf God, it was said, is perfectly wise and good, evil must arise from\nsome _independent_ and _hostile_ principle: if, on, the other hand, all\nagencies are subordinate to One, it is difficult, if evil does indeed\nexist, if there is any such thing as Evil, to avoid the impiety of\nmaking God the Author of it.\n\nThe recognition of a moral and physical dualism in nature was adverse to\nthe doctrine of Divine Unity. Many of the Ancients thought it absurd to\nimagine one Supreme Being, like Homer's Jove, distributing good and evil\nout of two urns. They therefore substituted, as we have seen, the\ndoctrine of two distinct and eternal principles; some making the cause\nof evil to be the inherent imperfection of matter and the flesh, without\nexplaining how God was not the cause of that; while others personified\nthe required agency, and fancifully invented an Evil Principle, the\nquestion of whose origin indeed involved all the difficulty of the\noriginal problem, but whose existence, if once taken for granted, was\nsufficient as a popular solution of the mystery; the difficulty being\nsupposed no longer to exist when pushed a step further off, as the\ndifficulty of conceiving the world upheld by an elephant was supposed to\nbe got rid of when it was said that the elephant was supported by a\ntortoise.\n\nThe simpler, and probably the older, notion, treated the one only God as\nthe Author of all things. \"I form the light,\" says Jehovah, \"and create\ndarkness; I cause prosperity and create evil; I, the Lord, do all these\nthings.\" \"All mankind,\" says Maximus Tyrius, \"are agreed that there\nexists one only Universal King and Father, and that the many gods are\nHis Children.\" There is nothing improbable in the supposition that the\nprimitive idea was that there was but one God. A vague sense of Nature's\nUnity, blended with a dim perception of an all-pervading Spiritual\nEssence, has been remarked among the earliest manifestations of the\nHuman Mind. Everywhere it was the dim remembrance, uncertain and\nindefinite, of the original truth taught by God to the first men.\n\nThe Deity of the Old Testament is everywhere represented as the direct\nauthor of Evil, commissioning evil and lying spirits to men, hardening\nthe heart of Pharaoh, and visiting the iniquity of the individual sinner\non the whole people. The rude conception of sternness predominating over\nmercy in the Deity, can alone account for the human sacrifices,\npurposed, if not executed, by Abraham and Jephthah. It has not been\nuncommon, in any age or country of the world, for men to recognize the\nexistence of one God, without forming any becoming estimate of His\ndignity. The causes of both good and ill are referred to a mysterious\ncentre, to which each assigns such attributes as correspond with his own\nintellect and advance in civilization. Hence the assignment to the Deity\nof the feelings of envy and jealousy. Hence the provocation given by the\nhealing skill of \u00c6sculapius and the humane theft of fire by Prometheus.\nThe very spirit of Nature, personified in Orpheus, Tantalus, or Phineus\nwas supposed to have been killed, confined, or blinded, for having too\nfreely divulged the Divine Mysteries to mankind. This Divine Envy still\nexists in a modified form, and varies according to circumstances. In\nHesiod it appears in the lowest type of human malignity. In the God of\nMoses, it is jealousy of the infringement of the autocratic power, the\ncheck to political treason; and even the penalties denounced for\nworshipping other gods often seem dictated rather by a jealous regard\nfor His own greatness in Deity, than by the immorality and degraded\nnature of the worship itself. In Herodotus and other writers it assumes\na more philosophical shape, as a strict adherence to a moral equilibrium\nin the government of the world, in the punishment of pride, arrogance,\nand insolent pretension.\n\nGod acts providentially in Nature by regular and universal laws, by\nconstant modes of operation; and so takes care of material things\nwithout violating their constitution, acting always according to the\nnature of the things which He has made. It is a fact of observation\nthat, in the material and unconscious world, He works _by_ its\nmateriality and unconsciousness, not against them; in the animal world,\n_by_ its animality and partial consciousness, not against them. So in\nthe providential government of the world, He acts by regular and\nuniversal laws, and constant modes of operation; and so takes care of\nhuman things without violating their constitution, acting always\naccording to the human nature of man, not against if, working in the\nhuman world by means of man's consciousness and partial freedom, not\nagainst them.\n\nGod acts by general laws for general purposes. The attraction of\ngravitation is a good thing, for it keeps the world together; and if the\ntower of Siloam, thereby falling to the ground, slays eighteen men of\nJerusalem, that number is too small to think of, considering the myriad\nmillions who are upheld by the same law. It could not well be repealed\nfor _their_ sake, and to hold up that tower; nor could it remain in\nforce, and the tower stand.\n\nIt is difficult to conceive of a Perfect _Will_ without confounding it\nwith something like mechanism; since language has no name for that\ncombination of the Inexorable with the Moral, which the old poets\npersonified separately in Ananke or Eimarmene and Zeus. How combine\nunderstandingly the Perfect Freedom of the Supreme and All-Sovereign\nWill of God with the inflexible necessity, as part of His Essence, that\nHe should and must continue to be, in all His great attributes, of\njustice and mercy for example, what He is now and always has been, and\nwith the impossibility of His changing His nature and becoming unjust,\nmerciless, cruel, fickle, or of His repealing the great moral laws which\nmake crime wrong and the practice of virtue right?\n\nFor all that we familiarly know of Free-Will is that capricious exercise\nof it which we experience in ourselves and other men; and therefore the\nnotion of Supreme Will, still guided by Infallible Law, even if that law\nbe self-imposed, is always in danger of being either stripped of the\nessential quality of Freedom, or degraded under the ill-name of\nNecessity to something of even less moral and intellectual dignity than\nthe fluctuating course of human operations.\n\nIt is not until we elevate the idea of law above that of partiality or\ntyranny, that we discover that the self-imposed limitations of the\nSupreme Cause, constituting an array of certain alternatives, regulating\nmoral choice, are the very sources and safeguards of human freedom; and\nthe doubt recurs, whether we do not set a law above God Himself; or\nwhether laws self-imposed may not be self-repealed: and if not, what\npower prevents it.\n\nThe Zeus of Homer, like that of Hesiod, is an array of antitheses,\ncombining strength with weakness, wisdom with folly, universal parentage\nwith narrow family limitation, omnipotent control over events with\nsubmission to a superior destiny;--DESTINY, a name by means of which the\ntheological problem was cast back into the original obscurity out of\nwhich the powers of the human mind have proved themselves as incapable\nof rescuing it, as the efforts of a fly caught in a spider's web to do\nmore than increase its entanglement.\n\nThe oldest notion of Deity was rather indefinite than repulsive. The\npositive degradation was of later growth. The God of nature reflects the\nchangeful character of the seasons, varying from dark to bright.\nAlternately angry and serene, and lavishing abundance which she again\nwithdraws, nature seems inexplicably capricious, and though capable of\nresponding to the highest requirements of the moral sentiment through a\ngeneral comprehension of her mysteries, more liable, by a partial or\nhasty view to become darkened into a Siva, a Saturn, or a Mexitli, a\npatron of fierce orgies or blood-stained altars. All the older poetical\npersonifications exhibit traces of this ambiguity. They are neither\nwholly immoral nor purely beneficent.\n\nNo people have ever deliberately made their Deity a malevolent or guilty\nBeing. The simple piety which ascribed the origin of all things to God,\ntook all in good part, trusting and hoping all things. The Supreme Ruler\nwas at first looked up to with unquestioning reverence. No startling\ndiscords or contradictions had yet raised a doubt as to His beneficence,\nor made men dissatisfied with His government. Fear might cause anxiety,\nbut could not banish hope, still less inspire aversion. It was only\nlater, when abstract notions began to assume the semblance of realities,\nand when new or more distinct ideas suggested new words for their\nexpression, that it became necessary to fix a definite barrier between\nEvil and Good.\n\nTo account for moral evil, it became necessary to devise some new\nexpedient suited both to the piety and self-complacency of the inventor,\nsuch as the perversity of woman, or an agent distinct from God, a Typhon\nor Ahriman, obtained either by dividing the Gods into two classes, or by\ndethroning the Ancient Divinity, and changing him into a Dev or D\u00e6mon.\nThrough a similar want, the Orientals devised the inherent corruption of\nthe fleshy and material; the Hebrew transferred to Satan everything\nillegal and immoral; and the Greek reflection, occasionally adopting the\nolder and truer view, retorted upon man the obloquy cast on these\ncreatures of his imagination, and showed how he has to thank himself\nalone for his calamities, while his good things are the voluntary\n_gifts_, not the _plunder_ of Heaven. Homer had already made Zeus\nexclaim, in the Assembly of Olympus, \"Grievous it is to hear these\nmortals accuse the Gods; they pretend that evils come from us; but they\nthemselves occasion them gratuitously by their own wanton folly.\" \"It is\nthe fault of man,\" said Solon, in reference to the social evils of his\nday, \"not of God, that destruction comes;\" and Euripides, after a formal\ndiscussion of the origin of evil, comes to the conclusion that men act\nwrongly, not from want of natural good sense and feeling, but because\nknowing what is good, they yet for various reasons neglect to practise\nit.\n\nAnd at last reaching the highest truth, Pindar, Hesiod, \u00c6schylus, \u00c6sop,\nand Horace said, \"All virtue is a struggle; life is not a scene of\nrepose, but of energetic action. Suffering is but another name for the\nteaching of experience, appointed by Zeus himself, the giver of all\nunderstanding, to be the parent of instruction, the schoolmaster of\nlife. He indeed put an end to the golden age; he gave venom to serpents\nand predacity to wolves; he shook the honey from the leaf, and stopped\nthe flow of wine in the rivulets; he concealed the element of fire, and\nmade the means of life scanty and precarious. But in all this his object\nwas beneficent; it was not to destroy life, but to improve it. It was a\nblessing to man, not a curse, to be sentenced to earn his bread by the\nsweat of his brow; for nothing great or excellent is attainable without\nexertion; safe and easy virtues are prized neither by gods nor men; and\nthe parsimoniousness of nature is justified by its powerful effect in\nrousing the dormant faculties, and forcing on mankind the invention of\nuseful arts by means of meditation and thought.\"\n\nAncient religious reformers pronounced the worship of \"idols\" to be the\nroot of all evil; and there have been many iconoclasts in different ages\nof the world. The maxim still holds good; for the worship of idols, that\nis, of fanciful conceits, if not the source of _all_ evil, is still the\ncause of much; and it prevails as extensively now as it ever did. Men\nare ever engaged in worshipping the picturesque fancies of their own\nimaginations.\n\nHuman wisdom must always be limited and incorrect; and even right\nopinion is only a something intermediate between ignorance and\nknowledge. The normal condition of man is that of progress. Philosophy\nis a kind of journey, ever learning, yet never arriving at the ideal\nperfection of truth. A Mason should, like the wise Socrates, assume the\nmodest title of a \"lover of wisdom\"; for he must ever long after\nsomething more excellent than he possesses, something still beyond his\nreach, which he desires to make eternally his own.\n\nThus the philosophic sentiment came to be associated with the poetical\nand the religious, under the comprehensive name of Love. Before the\nbirth of Philosophy, Love had received but scanty and inadequate homage.\nThis mightiest and most ancient of gods, coeval with the existence of\nreligion and of the world, had been indeed unconsciously felt, but had\nneither been worthily honored nor directly celebrated in hymn or p\u00e6an.\nIn the old days of ignorance it could scarcely have been recognized. In\norder that it might exercise its proper influence over religion and\nphilosophy, it was necessary that the God of Nature should cease to be a\nGod of terrors, a personification of mere Power or arbitrary Will, a\npure and stern Intelligence, an inflictor of evil, and an unrelenting\nJudge. The philosophy of Plato, in which this charge became forever\nestablished, was emphatically a mediation of Love. With him, the\ninspiration of Love first kindled the light of arts and imparted them to\nmankind; and not only the arts of mere existence, but the heavenly art\nof wisdom, which supports the Universe. It inspires high and generous\ndeeds and noble self-devotion. Without it, neither State nor individual\ncould do anything beautiful or great. Love is our best pilot,\nconfederate, supporter, and saviour; the ornament and governor of all\nthings human and divine; and he with divine harmony forever soothes the\nminds of men and gods.\n\nMan is capable of a higher Love, which, marrying mind with mind and with\nthe Universe, brings forth all that is noblest in his faculties, and\nlifts him beyond himself. This higher love is neither mortal nor\nimmortal, but a power intermediate between the human and the Divine,\nfilling up the mighty interval, and binding the Universe together. He is\nchief of those celestial emissaries who carry to the gods the prayers of\nmen, and bring down to men the gifts of the gods. \"He is forever poor,\nand far from being beautiful as mankind imagine, for he is squalid and\nwithered; he flies low along the ground, is homeless and unsandalled;\nsleeping without covering before the doors and in the unsheltered\nstreets, and possessing so far his mother's nature as being ever the\ncompanion of want. Yet, sharing also that of his father, he is forever\nscheming to obtain things good and beautiful; he is fearless, vehement,\nand strong; always devising some new contrivance; strictly cautious and\nfull of inventive resource; a philosopher through his whole existence, a\npowerful enchanter, and a subtle sophist.\"\n\nThe ideal consummation of Platonic science is the arrival at the\ncontemplation of that of which earth exhibits no express image or\nadequate similitude, the Supreme Prototype of all beauty, pure and\nuncontaminated with human intermixture of flesh or color, the Divine\nOriginal itself. To one so qualified is given the prerogative of\nbringing forth not mere images and shadows of virtue, but virtue itself,\nas having been conversant not with shadows, but with the truth; and\nhaving so brought forth and nurtured a progeny of virtue, he becomes the\nfriend of God, and, so far as such a privilege can belong to any human\nbeing, immortal.\n\nSocrates believed, like Heraclitus, in a Universal Reason pervading all\nthings and all minds, and consequently revealing itself in ideas. He\ntherefore sought truth in general opinion, and perceived in the\ncommunication of mind with mind one of the greatest prerogatives of\nwisdom and the most powerful means of advancement. He believed true\nwisdom to be an attainable idea, and that the moral convictions of the\nmind, those eternal instincts of temperance, conscientiousness, and\njustice, implanted in it by the gods, could not deceive, if rightly\ninterpreted.\n\nThis metaphysical direction given to philosophy ended in visionary\nextravagance. Having assumed truth to be discoverable in thought, it\nproceeded to treat thoughts as truths. It thus became an idolatry of\nnotions, which it considered either as phantoms exhaled from objects, or\nas portions of the divine pre-existent thought; thus creating a\nmythology of its own, and escaping from one thraldom only to enslave\nitself afresh. Theories and notions indiscriminately formed and defended\nare the false gods or \"idols\" of philosophy. For the word _idolon_ means\n_image_, and a false _mind_-picture of God is as much an idol as a false\n_wooden_ image of Him. Fearlessly launching into the problem of\nuniversal being, the first philosophy attempted to supply a compendious\nand decisive solution of every doubt. To do this, it was obliged to make\nthe most sweeping assumptions; and as poetry had already filled the vast\nvoid between the human and the divine, by personifying its Deity as man,\nso philosophy bowed down before the supposed reflection of the divine\nimage in the mind of the inquirer, who, in worshipping his own notions,\nhad unconsciously deified himself. Nature thus was enslaved to common\nnotions, and notions very often to words.\n\nBy the clashing of incompatible opinions, philosophy was gradually\nreduced to the ignominious confession of utter incapacity, and found its\ncheck or intellectual fall in skepticism. Xenophanes and Heraclitus\nmournfully acknowledged the unsatisfactory result of all the struggles\nof philosophy, in the admission of a universality of doubt; and the\nmemorable effort of Socrates to rally the discomfited champions of\ntruth, ended in a similar confession.\n\nThe worship of abstractions continued the error which personified Evil\nor deified Fortune; and when mystical philosophy resigned its place to\nmystical religion, it changed not its nature, but only its name. The\ngreat task remained unperformed, of reducing the outward world and its\nprinciples to the dominion of the intellect, and of reconciling the\nconception of the supreme unalterable power asserted by reason, with the\nrequisitions of human sympathies.\n\nA general idea of purpose and regularity in nature had been suggested by\ncommon appearances to the earliest reflection. The ancients perceived a\nnatural order, a divine legislation, from which human institutions were\nsupposed to be derived, laws emblazoned in Heaven, and thence revealed\nto earth. But the divine law was little more than an analogical\ninference from human law, taken in the vulgar sense of arbitrary will or\npartial covenant. It was surmised rather than discovered, and remained\nunmoral because unintelligible. It mattered little, under the\ncircumstances, whether the Universe were said to be governed by chance\nor by reason, since the latter, if misunderstood, was virtually one with\nthe former. \"Better far,\" said Epicurus, \"acquiesce in the fables of\ntradition, than acknowledge the oppressive necessity of the physicists\";\nand Menander speaks of God, Chance, and Intelligence as\nundistinguishable. Law unacknowledged goes under the name of _Chance_:\nperceived, but not understood, it becomes _Necessity_. The wisdom of the\nStoic was a dogged submission to the arbitrary behests of one; that of\nthe Epicurean an advantage snatched by more or less dexterous management\nfrom the equal tyranny of the other.\n\nIgnorance sees nothing necessary, and is self abandoned to a power\ntyrannical because defined by no rule, and paradoxical because\npermitting evil, while itself assumed to be unlimited, all-powerful, and\nperfectly good. A little knowledge, presuming the identification of the\nSupreme Cause with the inevitable certainty of perfect reason, but\nomitting the analysis or interpretation of it, leaves the mind\nchain-bound in the ascetic fatalism of the Stoic. Free-will, coupled\nwith the universal rule of Chance; or Fatalism and Necessity, coupled\nwith Omniscience and fixed and unalterable Law,--these are the\nalternatives, between which the human mind has eternally vacillated.\nThe Supernaturalists, contemplating a Being acting through impulse,\nthough with superhuman wisdom, and considering the best courtier to be\nthe most favored subject, combines contradictory expedients,\ninconsistently mixing the assertion of free action with the enervating\nservice of petition; while he admits, in the words of a learned\narchbishop, that \"if the production of the things we ask for depend on\nantecedent, natural, and necessary causes, our desires will be answered\nno less by the omission than the offering of prayers, which, therefore,\nare a vain thing.\"\n\nThe last stage is that in which the religion of action is made\nlegitimate through comprehension of its proper objects and conditions.\nMan becomes morally free only when both notions, that of Chance and that\nof incomprehensible Necessity, are displaced by that of Law. Law, as\napplied to the Universe, means that universal, providential\npre-arrangement, whose conditions can be discerned and discretionally\nacted on by human intelligence. The sense of freedom arises when the\nindividual independence develops itself according to its own laws,\nwithout external collisions or hindrance; that of constraint, where it\nis thwarted or confined by other Natures, or where, by combination of\nexternal forces, the individual force is compelled into a new direction.\nMoral choice would not exist safely, or even at all, unless it were\nbounded by conditions determining its preferences. Duty supposes a rule\nboth intelligible and certain, since an uncertain rule would be\nunintelligible, and if unintelligible, there could be no responsibility.\nNo law that is unknown can be obligatory; and that Roman Emperor was\njustly execrated, who pretended to promulgate his penal laws, by putting\nthem up at such a height that none could read them.\n\nMan commands results, only by selecting among the contingent the\npre-ordained results most suited to his purposes. In regard to absolute\nor divine morality, meaning the final cause or purpose of those\ncomprehensive laws which often seem harsh to the individual, because\ninflexibly just and impartial to the universal, speculation must take\nrefuge in faith; the immediate and obvious purpose often bearing so\nsmall a proportion to a wider and unknown one as to be relatively\nabsorbed or lost. The rain that, unseasonable to me, ruins my hopes of\nan abundant crop, does so because it could not otherwise have blessed\nand prospered the crops of another kind of a whole neighboring district\nof country. The obvious purpose of a sudden storm of snow, or an\nunexpected change of wind, exposed to which I lose my life, bears small\nproportion to the great results which are to flow from that storm or\nwind over a whole continent. So always, of the good and ill which at\nfirst seemed irreconcilable and capriciously distributed, the one holds\nits ground, the other diminishes by being explained. In a world of a\nmultitude of individuals, a world of action and exertion, a world\naffording, by the conflict of interests and the clashing of passions,\nany scope for the exercise of the manly and generous virtues, even\nOmnipotence cannot make it, that the comfort and convenience of one man\nalone shall always be consulted.\n\nThus the educated mind soon begins to appreciate the moral superiority\nof a system of law over one of capricious interference; and as the\njumble of means and ends is brought into more intelligible perspective,\npartial or seeming good is cheerfully resigned for the disinterested and\nuniversal. Self-restraint is found not to imply self-sacrifice. The true\nmeaning of what appeared to be Necessity is found to be, not arbitrary\nPower, but Strength and Force enlisted in the service of Intelligence.\nGod having made us men, and placed us in a world of change and eternal\nrenovation, with ample capacity and abundant means for rational\nenjoyment, we learn that it is folly to repine because we are not\nangels, inhabiting a world in which change and the clashing of interests\nand the conflicts of passion are unknown.\n\nThe mystery of the world remains, but is sufficiently cleared up to\ninspire confidence. We are constrained to admit that if every man would\nbut do the best in his power to do, and that which he knows he ought to\ndo, we should need no better world than this. Man, surrounded by\nnecessity, is free, not in a dogged determination of isolated will,\nbecause, though inevitably complying with nature's laws, he is able,\nproportionately to his knowledge, to modify, in regard to himself, the\nconditions of their action, and so to preserve an average uniformity\nbetween their forces and his own.\n\nSuch are some of the conflicting opinions of antiquity; and we have to\nsome extent presented to you a picture of the Ancient Thought. Faithful,\nas far as it goes, it exhibits to us Man's Intellect ever struggling to\npass beyond the narrow bounds of the circle in which its limited powers\nand its short vision confine it; and ever we find it travelling round\nthe circle, like one lost in a wood, to meet the same unavoidable and\ninsoluble difficulties. Science with her many instruments, Astronomy,\nparticularly, with her telescope, Physics with the microscope, and\nChemistry with its analyses and combinations, have greatly enlarged our\nideas of the Deity, by discovering to us the vast extent of the Universe\nin both directions, its star-systems and its invisible swarms of\nminutest animal life; by acquainting us with the new and wonderful Force\nor Substance we call Electricity, apparently a link between Matter and\nSpirit: and still the Deity only becomes more incomprehensible to us\nthan ever, and we find that in our speculations we but reproduce over\nand over again the Ancient Thought.\n\nWhere, then, amid all these conflicting opinions, is the True Word of a\nMason?\n\nMy Brother, most of the questions which have thus tortured men's minds,\nit is not within the reach and grasp of the Human Intellect to\nunderstand; but without understanding, as we have explained to you\nheretofore, we may and must _believe_.\n\nThe True Word of a Mason is to be found in the concealed and profound\nmeaning of the Ineffable Name of Deity, communicated by God to Moses;\nand which meaning was long lost by the very precautions taken to conceal\nit. The true pronunciation of that name was in truth a secret, in which,\nhowever, was involved the far more profound secret of its meaning. In\nthat meaning is included all the truth than can be known by us, in\nregard to the nature of God.\n\nLong known as AL, AL SCHADAI, ALOHAYIM, and ADONAI; as the Chief or\nCommander of the Heavenly Armies; as the aggregate of the Forces\n[ALOHAYIM] of Nature; as the Mighty, the Victorious, the Rival of Bal\nand Osiris; as the Soul of Nature, Nature itself, a God that was but Man\npersonified, a God with human passions, the God of the Heathen with but\na mere change of name, He assumes, in His communications to Moses, the\nname \u05d9\u05d4\u05d5\u05d4 [IHUH], and says to Him, \u05d0\u05d4\u05d9\u05d4 \u05d0\u05e9\u05e8 \u05d0\u05d4\u05d9\u05d4 [AHIH ASHR AHIH], I AM\nWHAT I AM. Let us examine the esoteric or inner meaning of this\nIneffable Name.\n\n\u05d4\u05d9\u05d4 [HIH] is the imperfect tense of the verb To BE, of which \u05d9\u05d4\u05d9\u05d4 [HIHI]\nis the present; \u05d0\u05d4\u05d9 [AHI--\u05d0 being the personal pronoun \"I\" affixed] the\nfirst person, by apocope; and \u05d9\u05d4\u05d9 [IHI] the third. The verb has the\nfollowing forms: ... Preterite, 3d person, masculine singular, \u05d4\u05d9\u05d4\n[HIH], did exist, was; 3d person com. plural, \u05d4\u05d9\u05d5 [HIU] ... Present, 3d\npers. masc. sing. \u05d9\u05d4\u05d9\u05d4 [IHIH], once \u05d9\u05d4\u05d5\u05d0 [IHUA], by apocope \u05d9\u05d4\u05d9,\u05d0\u05d4\u05d9\n[AHI, IHI].. Infinitive, \u05d4\u05d9\u05d4, \u05d4\u05d9\u05d5 [HIH, HIU] ... Imperative, 2d pers.\nmasc. sing., \u05d4\u05d9\u05d4 [HIH], fem. \u05d4\u05d5\u05d9 [HUI] ... Participle, masc. sing., \u05d4\u05d5\u05d4\n[HUH], ENS--EXISTING .. EXISTENCE.\n\nThe verb is never used, as the mere logical copula or connecting word,\n_is, was_, etc., is used with the Greeks, Latins, and ourselves. It\nalways implies _existence, actuality_. The _present_ form also includes\nthe _future_ sense,... _shall_ or _may_ be or exist. And \u05d4\u05d5\u05d4 and \u05d4\u05d5\u05d0 [HUH\nand HUA] Chaldaic forms of the imperfect tense of the verb, are the same\nas the Hebrew \u05d4\u05d9\u05d4 and \u05d4\u05d5\u05d4 [HUH and HIH], and mean _was, existed,\nbecame_.\n\nNow \u05d4\u05d5\u05d0 and \u05d4\u05d9\u05d0 [HUA and HIA] are the Personal Pronoun [Masculine and\nFeminine], HE, SHE. Thus in Gen. iv. 20 we have the phrase, \u05d4\u05d5\u05d0 \u05d4\u05d9\u05d4 [HUA\nHIH], HE WAS: and in Lev. xxi. 9, \u05d0\u05d4 \u05d0\u05d1\u05d9\u05d4 \u05d4\u05d9\u05d0 [ATH ABIH HIA], HER\nFather. This feminine pronoun, however, is often written \u05d4\u05d5\u05d0 [HUA], and\n\u05d4\u05d9\u05d0 [HiA] occurs only eleven times in the Pentateuch. Sometimes the\nfeminine form means IT; but _that_ pronoun is generally in the masculine\nform.\n\nWhen either \u05d4,\u05d5,\u05d9, or \u05d0 [Yod, Vav, He, or Aleph] terminates a word, and\nhas no vowel either immediately preceding or following it, it is often\nrejected; as in \u05e0\u05d9 [GI], for \u05e0\u05d9\u05d0 [GIA], a valley.\n\nSo \u05d4\u05d5\u05d0-\u05d4\u05d9\u05d0 [HUA-HIA], He-She, could properly be written \u05d4\u05d5-\u05d4\u05d9 [Hu-HI];\nor by transposition of the letters, common with the Talmudists, \u05d9\u05d4-\u05d5\u05d4\n[IH-UH], which is the Tetragrammaton or Ineffable Name.\n\nIn Gen. i. 27, it is said, \"So the ALHIM created man in His image: _in\nthe image_ of ALHIM created He him: MALE and FEMALE created He them.\"\n\nSometimes the word was thus expressed; triangularly:\n\n\u05d4 \u05d5 \u05d4 \u05d4 \u05d9 \u05d4 \u05d9 \u05d4 \u05d5 \u05d4\n\nAnd we learn that this designation of the Ineffable Name was, among the\nHebrews, a symbol of Creation. The mysterious union _of God with His\ncreatures_ was in the letter \u05d4, which they considered to be the Agent of\nAlmighty Power; and to enable the possessor of the Name to work\nmiracles.\n\nThe Personal Pronoun \u05d4\u05d5\u05d0 [HuA], HE, is often used _by itself_, to\nexpress the Deity, Lee says that in such cases, IHUH, IH, or ALHIM, or\nsome other name of God, is _understood_; but there is no necessity for\nthat. It means in such cases the Male, Generative, or Creative Principle\nor Power.\n\nIt was a common practice with the Talmudists to conceal secret meanings\nand sounds of words by transposing the letters.\n\nThe reversal of the letters of words was, indeed, anciently common\neverywhere. Thus from _Neitha_, the name of an Egyptian Goddess, the\nGreeks, writing backward, formed _Athen\u00e8_, the name of Minerva. In\nArabic we have _Nahid_, a name of the planet Venus, which, reversed,\ngives _Dihan_, Greek, in Persian, _Nihad_, Nature; which Sir William\nJones writes also Nahid. Strabo informs us that the Armenian name of\nVenus was _Anaitis_.\n\n_Tien_, Heaven, in Chinese, reversed, is _Neit_, or _Neith_, worshipped\nat _Sais_ in Egypt. Reverse Neitha, drop the _i_, and add an _e_, and\nwe, as before said, _Athen\u00e8. Mitra_ was the name of Venus among the\nancient Persians. Herodotus, who tells us this, also informs us that her\nname, among the Scythians, was _Artim pasa. Artim_ is _Mitra_, reversed.\nSo, by reversing it, the Greeks formed Artemis, Diana.\n\nOne of the meanings of _Rama_, in Sanscrit, is _Kama_, the Deity of\n_Love_. Reverse this, and we have _Amar_, and by changing _a_ into _o,\nAmor_, the Latin word for _Love_. Probably, as the verb is _Amare_, the\noldest reading was _Amar_ and not _Amor_. So _Dipaka_, in Sanscrit, one\nof the meanings whereof is _love_, is often written _Dipuc_. Reverse\nthis, and we have, adding _o_, the Latin word _Cupido_.\n\nIn Arabic, the radical letters _rhm_, pronounced _rahm_, signify the\n_trunk, compassion, mercy_; this reversed, we have _mhr_, in Persic,\n_love_ and the _Sun_. In Hebrew we have _Lab_, the _heart_; and in\nChaldee, _Bal_, the _heart_; the radical letters of both being _b_ and\n_l_.\n\nThe Persic word for _head_ is _Sar_. Reversed, this becomes _Ras_ in\nArabic and Hebrew, Raish in Chaldee, Rash in Samaritan, and Ryas in\nEthiopic; all meaning _head, chief_, etc. In Arabic we have _Kid_, in\nthe sense of _rule_, regulation, article of agreement, obligation;\nwhich, reversed, becomes, adding _e_, the Greek _dik\u00e8_ justice. In\nCoptic we have _Chlom_, a crown. Reversed, we have in Hebrew, _Moloch_\nor _Malec_, a King, or he who wears a crown.\n\nIn the Kou-onen, or oldest Chinese writing, by Hieroglyphics, [Glyph]\n_Ge_ [_Hi_ or _Khi_, with the initial letter modified], was the Sun: in\nPersic. _Gaw:_ and in Turkish _Giun. Yue_, was the Moon; in\nSanscrit _Uh_, and in Turkish _Ai_. It will be remembered that, in Egypt\nand elsewhere, the Sun was originally feminine, and the Moon masculine.\nIn Egypt, _Ioh_ was the moon; and in the feasts of Bacchus they cried\nincessantly, _Euo\u00ef Sabvi! Euo\u00ef Bakh\u00e8! Io Bakhe! lo Bakhe!_\n\nBunsen gives the following personal pronouns for _he_ and _she_;\n\n                        _He      She_\n\nChristian Aramtic          H\u00fb       H\u00ee\n\nJewish Aramaic             H\u00fb       H\u00ee\n\nHebrew                     H\u00fb\u1fbf       H\u00ee\u1fbf\n\nArabic                     Huwa     Hiya\n\nThus the Ineffable Name not only embodies the Great Philosophical Idea,\nthat the Deity is the ENS, the TO ON, the Absolute Existence, that of\nwhich the Essence is To Exist, the only Substance of Spinoza, the BEING,\nthat never could _not_ have existed, as contradistinguished from that\nwhich only _becomes_, not Nature or the Soul of Nature, but that which\ncreated Nature; but also the idea of the Male and Female Principles, in\nits highest and most profound sense; to wit, that God originally\ncomprehended in Himself all that is: that matter was not co-existent\nwith Him, or independent of Him; that He did not merely fashion and\nshape a pre-existing chaos into a Universe; but that His Thought\nmanifested itself outwardly in that Universe, which so _became_, and\nbefore _was not_, except as comprehended in Him: that the Generative\nPower or Spirit, and Productive Matter, ever among the ancients deemed\nthe Female, originally were in God; and that He Was and Is all that Was,\nthat Is, and that Shall be: _in_ Whom all else lives, moves, and has its\nbeing.\n\nThis was the great Mystery of the Ineffable Name; and this true\narrangement of its letters, and of course its true pronunciation and its\nmeaning, soon became lost to all except the select few to whom it was\nconfided; it being concealed from the common people, because the Deity\nthus metaphysically named was not that personal and capricious, and as\nit were tangible God in whom they believed, and who alone was within the\nreach of their rude capacities.\n\nDiodorus says that the name given by Moses to God was \u0399\u0391\u03a9. Theodoras\nsays that the Samaritans termed God _IABE_, but the Jews \u0399\u0391\u03a9. Philo\nByblius gives the form \u0399\u0395\u03a5\u03a9; and Clemens of Alexandria \u0399\u0391\u039f\u03a5. Macrobius\nsays that it was an admitted axiom among the Heathen, that the\ntriliteral \u0399\u0391\u03a9 was the sacred name of the Supreme God. And the Clarian\noracle said: \"Learn thou that \u0399\u0391\u03a9 is the great God Supreme, that ruleth\nover all.\" The letter \u0399 signified Unity. \u0391 and \u03a9 are the first and last\nletters of the Greek Alphabet.\n\nHence the frequent expression: \"I am the First, and I am the Last; and\nbesides Me there is no other God. I am A and \u03a9, the First and the Last.\nI am A and \u03a9, the Beginning and the Ending, which Is, and Was, and Is to\ncome: the Omnipotent.\" For in this we see shadowed forth the same great\ntruth; that God is all in all--the Cause and the Effect--the beginning,\nor Impulse, or Generative Power: and the Ending, or Result, or that\nwhich is produced: that He is in reality all that is, all that ever was,\nand all that ever will be; in this sense, that nothing besides Himself\nhas existed eternally, and co-eternally with Him, independent of Him,\nand self-existent, or self-originated.\n\nAnd thus the meaning of the expression, ALOHAYIM, a _plural_ noun, used,\nin the account of the Creation with which Genesis commences, with a\nsingular verb, and of the name or title IHUH-ALHIM, used for the first\ntime in the 4th verse of the 2d chapter of the same book, becomes clear.\nThe ALHIM is the aggregate unity of the manifested Creative Forces or\nPowers of Deity, His Emanations; and IHUH-ALHIM is the ABSOLUTE\nExistence, or Essence of these Powers and Forces, of which they are\nActive Manifestations and Emanations.\n\nThis was the profound truth hidden in the ancient allegory and covered\nfrom the general view with a double veil. This was the esoteric meaning\nof the generation and production of the Indian, Chaldean, and Ph\u0153nician\ncosmogonies; and the Active and Passive Powers, of the Male and Female\nPrinciples; of Heaven and its Luminaries generating, and the Earth\nproducing; all hiding from vulgar view, as above its comprehension, the\ndoctrine that matter is not eternal, but that God was the only original\nExistence, the ABSOLUTE, from Whom everything has proceeded, and to Whom\nall returns: and that all moral law springs not from the relation of\nthings, but from His Wisdom and Essential Justice, as the Omnipotent\nLegislator. And this TRUE WORD is with entire accuracy said to have been\n_lost_; because its _meaning_ was lost, even among the Hebrews, although\nwe still find the name (its real meaning unsuspected), in the Hu of the\nDruids and the Fo-Hi of the Chinese.\n\nWhen we conceive of the Absolute Truth, Beauty, or Good, we cannot stop\nshort at the abstraction of either. We are forced to refer each to some\nliving and substantial Being, in which they have their foundations, some\nbeing that is the first and last principle of each.\n\nMoral Truth, like every other universal and necessary truth, cannot\nremain a mere abstraction. Abstractions are unrealities. In ourselves,\nmoral truth is merely conceived of. There must be _somewhere_ a Being\nthat not only _conceives_ of, but _constitutes_ it. It has this\ncharacteristic; that it is not only, to the eyes of our intelligence, an\nuniversal and necessary truth, but one obligatory on our will. It is A\nLAW. _We_ do not establish that law _ourselves_. It is imposed on us\n_despite_ ourselves: its principle must be _without_ us. It supposes a\nlegislator. He cannot be the being to whom the law applies; but must be\none that possesses in the highest degree all the characteristics of\nmoral truth. The moral law, universal and necessary, necessarily has as\nits author a necessary being--composed of justice and charity, its\nauthor must be a being possessing the plenitude of both.\n\nAs all _beautiful_ and all _true_ things refer themselves, _these_ to a\nUnity which is absolute TRUTH, and those to a Unity which is absolute\nBEAUTY, so all the _moral_ principles centre in a single principle,\nwhich is THE GOOD. Thus we arrive at the conception of THE GOOD _in\nitself_, the ABSOLUTE Good, superior to all _particular_ duties, and\ndeterminate in those duties. This Absolute _Good_ must necessarily be an\nattribute of the Absolute BEING. There cannot be _several_ Absolute\nBeings; the one in whom are realized Absolute Truth and Absolute Beauty\nbeing different from the one in whom is realized Absolute Good. The\nAbsolute necessarily implies absolute Unity. The True, the Beautiful,\nand the Good are not three distinct essences: but they are one and the\nsame essence, considered in its fundamental attributes: the different\nphases which, in our eyes, the Absolute and Infinite Perfection assumes.\nManifested in the World of the Finite and Relative, these three\nattributes separate from each other, and are distinguished by our minds,\nwhich can comprehend nothing except by division. But in the Being from\nWhom they emanate, they are indivisibly united; and this Being, at once\ntriple and one, Who sums up in Himself perfect _Beauty_, perfect\n_Truth_, and the perfect _Good_, is GOD.\n\nGod is necessarily the principle of Moral Truth, and of personal\nmorality. Man is a moral person, that is to say, one endowed with reason\nand liberty. He is capable of Virtue: and Virtue has with him two\nprincipal forms, respect for others and love of others,--_justice_ and\n_charity_.\n\nThe _creature_ can possess no real and essential attribute which the\n_Creator_ does not possess. The _effect_ can draw its reality and\nexistence only from its _cause_. The _cause_ contains in itself, at\nleast, what is essential in the _effect_. The characteristic of the\neffect is inferiority, short-coming, imperfection. Dependent and\nderivate, it bears in itself the marks and conditions of dependence; and\nits imperfection proves the perfection of the cause; or else there would\nbe in the effect something immanent, without a cause.\n\nGod is not a logical Being, whose Nature may be explained by deduction,\nand by means of algebraic equations. When, setting out with a primary\nattribute, the attributes of God are deduced one from the other, after\nthe manner of the Geometricians and Scholastics, we have nothing but\nabstractions. We must emerge from this empty dialetic, to arrive at a\ntrue and living God. The first notion which we have of God, that of an\n_Infinite_ Being, is not given us _\u00e0 priori_, independently of all\nexperience. It is our consciousness of ourself, as at once a Being and a\nlimited Being, that immediately raises us to the conception of a Being,\nthe principle of _our_ being, and Himself without limits. If the\nexistence that we possess forces us to recur to a cause possessing the\nsame existence in an infinite degree, all the substantial attributes of\nexistence that we possess equally require each an infinite cause. God,\nthen, is no longer the Infinite, Abstract, Indeterminate Being, of which\nreason and the heart cannot lay hold, but a real Being, determinate like\nourselves, a moral person like ourself; and the study of our own souls\nwill conduct us, without resort to hypothesis, to a conception of God,\nboth sublime and having a connection with ourselves.\n\nIf man be free, God must be so. It would be strange if, while the\ncreature has that marvellous power of disposing of himself, of choosing\nand willing freely, the Being that has made him should be subject to a\nnecessary development, the cause of which, though in Himself, is a sort\nof abstract, mechanical, or metaphysical power, inferior to the\npersonal, voluntary cause which we are, and of which we have the\nclearest consciousness. God is free _because_ we are: but he is not free\nas we are. He is at once _everything_ that we are, and _nothing_ that we\nare. He possesses the same attributes as we, but extended to infinity.\nHe possesses, then, an infinite liberty, united to an infinite\nintelligence; and as His intelligence is infallible, exempt from the\nuncertainty of deliberation, and perceiving at a glance where the Good\nis, so His liberty accomplishes it spontaneously and without effort.\n\nAs we assign to God that liberty which is the basis of our existence, so\nalso we transfer to His character, from our own, justice and charity. In\nman they are virtues: in God, His attributes. What is in us the\nlaborious conquest of liberty, is in Him His very nature. The idea of\nthe right, and the respect paid to the right, are signs of the dignity\nof our existence. If respect of rights is the very essence of justice,\nthe Perfect Being must know and respect the rights of the lowest of His\ncreatures; for He assigned them those rights. In God resides a sovereign\njustice, that renders to every one what is due him, not according to\ndeceitful appearances, but according to the truth of things. And if man,\na limited being, has the power to go out of himself, to forget his own\nperson, to love another like himself, and devote himself to his\nhappiness, dignity, and perfection, the Perfect Being must have, in an\ninfinite degree, that disinterested tenderness, that Charity, the\nSupreme Virtue of the human person. There is in God an infinite\ntenderness for His creatures, manifested in His giving us existence,\nwhich He might have withheld; and every day it appears in innumerable\nmarks of His Divine Providence.\n\nPlato well understood that love of God, and expresses it in these great\nwords: \"Let us speak of the cause which led the Supreme Arranger of the\nUniverse to produce and regulate that Universe. He was good; and he who\nis good has no kind of ill-will. Exempt from that, He willed that\ncreated things should be, as far as possible, like Himself.\" And\nChristianity in its turn said, \"_God has so loved men that He has given\nthem His only Son_.\"\n\nIt is not correct to affirm, as is often done, that Christianity has in\nsome sort _discovered_ this noble sentiment. We must not lower human\nnature, to raise Christianity. Antiquity knew, described, and practised\ncharity; the first feature of which, so touching, and thank God! so\ncommon, is goodness, as its loftiest one is heroism. Charity is devotion\nto another; and it is ridiculously senseless to pretend that there ever\nwas an age of the world, when the human soul was deprived of that part\nof its heritage, the power of devotion. But it is certain that\nChristianity has diffused and popularized this virtue, and that, before\nChrist, these words were never spoken: \"LOVE ONE ANOTHER; FOR THAT IS\nTHE WHOLE LAW.\" _Charity_ presupposes _Justice_. He who truly loves his\nbrother respects the rights of his brother; but he does more, he forgets\nhis own. Egoism _sells_ or _takes_. Love delights in _giving_. In God,\nlove is what it is in us; but in an infinite degree. God is\ninexhaustible in His charity, as He is inexhaustible in His essence.\nThat Infinite Omnipotence and Infinite Charity, which, by an admirable\ngood-will, draws from the bosom of its immense love the favors which it\nincessantly bestows on the world and on humanity, teaches us that the\nmore we give, the more we possess.\n\nGod being all just and all good, He can will nothing but what is good\nand just. Being Omnipotent, whatever He wills He can do, and\nconsequently does. The world is the work of God: it is therefore\nperfectly made.\n\nYet there is disorder in the world, that seems to impugn the justice and\ngoodness of God.\n\nA principle indissolubly connected with the very idea of good, tells us\nthat every moral agent deserves reward when he does well, and punishment\nwhen he does ill. This principle is universal and necessary. It is\nabsolute. If it does not apply in this world, it is false, or the world\nis badly ordered.\n\nBut good actions are not always followed by happiness, nor evil ones by\nmisery. Though often this fact is more apparent than real; though\nvirtue, a war against the passions, full of dignity but full of sorrow\nand pain, has the latter as its condition, yet the pains that follow\nvice are greater; and virtue conduces most to health, strength, and long\nlife;--though the peaceful conscience that accompanies virtue creates\ninternal happiness; though public opinion generally decides correctly on\nmen's characters, and rewards virtue with esteem and consideration, and\nvice with contempt and infamy; and though, after all, justice reigns in\nthe world, and the surest road to happiness is still that of virtue, yet\nthere are exceptions. Virtue is not always rewarded, nor vice punished,\nin this life.\n\nThe data of this problem are these: 1st. The principle of merit and\ndemerit within us is absolute: every good action _ought_ to be rewarded,\nevery bad one punished: 2d. God is just as He is all-powerful: 3d. There\nare in this world particular cases, contradicting the necessary and\nuniversal law of merit and demerit. What is the result?\n\nTo reject the two principles, that God is just, and the law of merit and\ndemerit absolute, is to raze to the foundations the whole edifice of\nhuman faith.\n\nTo maintain them, is to admit that the present life is to be terminated\nor continued elsewhere. The moral person who acts well or ill, and\nawaits reward or punishment, is connected with a body, lives with it,\nmakes use of it, depends upon it in a measure, but is not _it_. The\n_body_ is composed of parts. It diminishes or increases, it is divisible\neven to infinity. But this _something_ which has a consciousness of\nitself, and says \"I, ME\"; that feels itself free and responsible, feels\ntoo that it is incapable of division, that it is a being _one_ and\n_simple_; that the ME cannot be halved, that if a limb is cut off and\nthrown away, no part of the ME goes with it: that it remains identical\nwith itself under the variety of phenomena which successively manifest\nit. This identity, indivisibility, and absolute unity of the person, are\nits _spirituality_, the very essence of the person. It is not in the\nleast an hypothesis to affirm that the soul differs essentially from the\nbody. By the soul we mean _the person_, not separated from the\nconsciousness of the attributes which constitute it,--_thought_ and\n_will_. The Existence without consciousness is an abstract being, and\nnot a person. It is _the person_, that is _identical, one, simple_. Its\nattributes, developing it, do not divide it. Indivisible, it is\nindissoluble, and, may be immortal. If absolute justice requires this\nimmortality, it does not require what is impossible. The spirituality of\nthe soul is the condition and necessary foundation of immortality: the\nlaw of merit and demerit the direct demonstration of it. The first is\nthe metaphysical, the second the moral proof. Add to these the tendency\nof all the powers of the soul toward the Infinite, and the principle of\nfinal causes, and the proof of the immortality of the soul is complete.\n\nGod, therefore, in the Masonic creed, is INFINITE TRUTH, INFINITE\nBEAUTY, INFINITE GOODNESS. He is the Holy of Holies, as Author of the\nMoral Law, as the PRINCIPLE of Liberty, of Justice, and of Charity,\nDispenser of Reward and Punishment. Such a God is not an abstract God;\nbut an intelligent and free _person_, Who has made us in His image, from\nWhom we receive the law that presides over our destiny, and Whose\njudgment we await. It is His love that inspires us in _our_ acts of\ncharity: it is His justice that governs _our_ justice, and that of\nsociety and the laws. We continually remind ourselves that He is\ninfinite; because otherwise we should degrade His nature: but He would\nbe for us as if He were not, if His infinite nature had not forms\ninherent in ourselves, the forms of our own reason and soul.\n\nWhen we love Truth, Justice, and Nobility of Soul, we should know that\nit is God we love underneath these special forms, and should unite them\nall into one great act of total piety. We should feel that we go in and\nout continually in the midst of the vast forces of the Universe, which\nare only the Forces of God; that in our studies, when we attain a truth,\nwe confront the thought of God; when we learn the right, we learn the\nwill of God laid down as a rule of conduct for the Universe; and when we\nfeel disinterested love, we should know that we partake the feeling of\nthe Infinite God. Then, when we reverence the mighty cosmic force, it\nwill not be a blind Fate in an Atheistic or Pantheistic world, but the\nInfinite God, that we shall confront and feel and know. Then we shall be\nmindful of the mind of God, conscious of God's conscience, sensible of\nHis sentiments, and our own existence will be in the infinite being of\nGod.\n\nThe world is a whole, which has its harmony; for a God who is One, could\nmake none but a complete and harmonious work. The harmony of the\nUniverse responds to the unity of God, as the indefinite quantity is the\ndefective sign of the infinitude of God. To say that the Universe is\nGod, is to admit the world only, and deny God. Give it what name you\nplease, it is atheism at bottom. On the other hand, to suppose that the\nUniverse is void of God, and that He is wholly apart from it, is an\ninsupportable and almost impossible abstraction. To distinguish is not\nto separate. I distinguish, but do not separate myself from my qualities\nand effects. So God is not the Universe, although He is everywhere\npresent in spirit and in truth.\n\nTo us, as to Plato, absolute truth is in God. It is God Himself under\none of His phases. In God, as their original, are the immutable\nprinciples of reality and cognizance. In Him things receive at once\ntheir existence and their intelligibility. It is by participating in the\nDivine reason that our own reason possesses something of the Absolute.\nEvery judgment of reason envelopes a necessary truth, and every\nnecessary truth supposes the necessary Existence.\n\nThus, from every direction,--from metaphysics, aesthetics, and morality\nabove all, we rise to the same Principle, the common centre, and\nultimate foundation of all truth, all beauty, all good. The True, the\nBeautiful, the Good, are but diverse revelations of one and the same\nBeing. Thus we reach the threshold of religion, and are in communion\nwith the great philosophies which all proclaim a God; and at the same\ntime with the religions which cover the earth, and all repose on the\nsacred foundation of natural religion; of that religion which reveals to\nus the natural light given to all men, without the aid of a particular\nrevelation. So long as philosophy does not arrive at religion, it is\nbelow all worships, even the most imperfect; for they at least give man\na Father, a Witness, a Consoler, a Judge. By religion, philosophy\nconnects itself with humanity, which, from one end of the world to the\nother, aspires to God, believes in God, hopes in God. Philosophy\ncontains in itself the common basis of all religious beliefs; it, as it\nwere, borrows from them their principle, and returns it to them\nsurrounded with light, elevated above uncertainty, secure against all\nattack.\n\nFrom the necessity of His Nature, the Infinite Being must create and\npreserve the Finite, and to the Finite must, in its forms, give and\ncommunicate of His own kind. We cannot conceive of any finite thing\nexisting without God, the Infinite basis and ground thereof; nor of God\nexisting without something. God is the necessary logical condition of a\nworld, its necessitating cause; a world, the necessary logical condition\nof God, His necessitated consequence. It is according to His Infinite\nPerfection to create, and then to preserve and bless whatever He\ncreates. That is the conclusion of modern metaphysical science. The\nstream of philosophy runs down from Aristotle to Hegel, and breaks off\nwith this conclusion: and then again recurs the ancient difficulty. If\nit be of His nature to create,--if we cannot conceive of His existing\n_alone_, without creating, without _having_ created, then what He\ncreated was co-existent with Himself. If He could exist an instant\nwithout creating, He could as well do so for a myriad of eternities.\nAnd so again comes round to us the old doctrine of a God, the Soul of\nthe Universe, and co-existent with it. For what He created had a\n_beginning_; and however long since that creation occurred, an eternity\nhad before elapsed. The difference between _a_ beginning and _no_\nbeginning is infinite.\n\nBut of some things we can be certain. We are conscious of ourselves--of\nourselves if not as substances, at least as Powers to be, to do, to\nsuffer. We are conscious of ourselves not as self-originated at all or\nas self-sustained alone; but only as dependent, first for existence,\never since for support.\n\nAmong the primary ideas of consciousness, that are inseparable from it,\nthe atoms of self-consciousness, we find the idea of God. Carefully\nexamined by the scrutizing intellect, it is the idea of God as infinite,\nperfectly powerful, wise, just, loving, holy; absolute being with no\nlimitation. This made us, made all, sustains us, sustains all; made our\nbody, not by a single act, but by a series of acts extending over a vast\nsuccession of years,--for man's body is the resultant of all created\nthings,--made our spirit, our mind, conscience, affections, soul, will,\nappointed for each its natural mode of action, set each at its several\naim. Thus self-consciousness leads us to consciousness of God, and at\nlast to consciousness of an infinite God. That is the highest evidence\nof our own existence, and it is the highest evidence of His.\n\nIf there is a God at all, He must be omnipresent in space. Beyond the\nlast Stars He must be, as He is here. There can be no mote that peoples\nthe sunbeams, no little cell of life that the microscope discovers in\nthe seed-sporule of a moss, but He is there.\n\nHe must also be omnipresent in time. There was no second of time before\nthe Stars began to burn, but God was in that second. In the most distant\nnebulous spot in Orion's belt, and in every one of the millions that\npeople a square inch of limestone, God is alike present. He is in the\nsmallest imaginable or even unimaginable portion of time, and in every\nsecond of its most vast and unimaginable volume; His Here conterminous\nwith the All of Space, His Now coeval with the All of Time.\n\nThrough all this Space, in all this Time, His Being extends, spreads\nundivided, operates unspent; God in all His infinity, perfectly\npowerful, wise, just, loving, and holy. His being is an infinite\nactivity, a creating, and so a giving of Himself to the World. The\nWorld's being is a _becoming_, a being created and continued. It is so\nnow, and was so, incalculable and unimaginable millions of ages ago.\n\nAll this is philosophy, the unavoidable conclusion of the human mind. It\nis not the _opinion_ of Coleridge and Kant, but their _science_; not\nwhat they _guess_, but what they _know_.\n\nIn virtue of this in-dwelling of God in matter, we say that the world is\na revelation of Him, its existence a show of His. He is _in_ His work.\nThe manifold action of the Universe is only His mode of operation, and\nall material things are in communion with Him. All grow and move and\nlive in Him, and by means of Him, and only so. Let Him withdraw from the\nspace occupied by anything, and it ceases to be. Let Him withdraw any\nquality of His nature from anything, and it ceases to be. All must\npartake of Him, He dwelling in each, and yet transcending all.\n\nThe failure of fanciful religion to become philosophy, does not preclude\nphilosophy from coinciding with true religion. Philosophy, or rather its\nobject, the divine order of the Universe, is the intellectual guide\nwhich the religious sentiment needs; while exploring the real relations\nof the finite, it obtains a constantly improving and self-correcting\nmeasure of the perfect law of the Gospel of Love and Liberty, and a\nmeans of carrying into effect the spiritualism of revealed religion. It\nestablishes law, by ascertaining its terms; it guides the spirit to see\nits way to the amelioration of life and the increase of happiness. While\nreligion was stationary, science could not walk alone; when both are\nadmitted to be progressive, their interests and aims become identified.\nAristotle began to show how religion may be founded on an intellectual\nbasis; but the basis he laid was too narrow. Bacon, by giving to\nphilosophy a definite aim and method, gave it at the same time a safer\nand self-enlarging basis. Our position is that of intellectual beings\nsurrounded by limitations; and the latter being constant, have to\nintelligence the practical value of laws, in whose investigation and\napplication consists that seemingly endless career of intellectual and\nmoral progress which the sentiment of religion inspires and ennobles.\nThe title of Saint has commonly been claimed for those whose boast it\nhas been to despise philosophy yet faith will stumble and sentiment\nmislead, unless knowledge be present, in amount and quality sufficient\nto purify the one and to give beneficial direction to the other.\n\nScience consists of those matured inferences from experience which all\nother experience confirms. It is no fixed system superior to revision,\nbut that progressive mediation between ignorance and wisdom in part\nconceived by Plato, whose immediate object is happiness, and its impulse\nthe highest kind of love. Science realizes and unites all that was truly\nvaluable in both the old schemes of mediation; the heroic, or system of\naction and effort; and the mystical theory of spiritual, contemplative\ncommunion. \"Listen to me,\" says Galen, \"as to the voice of the\nEleusinian Hierophant, and believe that the study of nature is a mystery\nno less important than theirs, nor less adapted to display the wisdom\nand power of the Great Creator. Their lessons and demonstrations were\nobscure, but ours are clear and unmistakable.\"\n\nTo science we owe it that no man is any longer entitled to consider\nhimself the central point around which the whole Universe of life and\nmotion revolves--the immensely important individual for whose\nconvenience and even luxurious ease and indulgence the whole Universe\nwas made. On one side it has shown us an infinite Universe of stars and\nsuns and worlds at incalculable distances from each other, in whose\nmajestic and awful presence we sink and even our world sinks into\ninsignificance; while, on the other side, the microscope has placed us\nin communication with new worlds of organized livings beings, gifted\nwith senses, nerves, appetites, and instincts, in every tear and in\nevery drop of putrid water.\n\nThus science teaches us that we are but an infinitesimal portion of a\ngreat whole, that stretches out on every side of us, and above and below\nus, infinite in its complications, and which infinite wisdom alone can\ncomprehend. Infinite wisdom has arranged the infinite succession of\nbeings, involving the necessity of birth, decay, and death, and made the\nloftiest virtues possible by providing those conflicts, reverses,\ntrials, and hardships, without which even their names could never have\nbeen invented.\n\nKnowledge is convertible into power, and axioms into rules of utility\nand duty. Modern science is social and communicative. It is moral as\nwell as intellectual; powerful, yet pacific and disinterested; binding\nman to man as well as to the Universe; filling up the details of\nobligation, and cherishing impulses of virtue, and, by affording clear\nproof of the consistency and identity of all interests, substituting\nco-operation for rivalry, liberality for jealousy, and tending far more\npowerfully than any other means to realize the spirit of religion, by\nhealing those inveterate disorders which, traced to their real origin,\nwill be found rooted in an ignorant assumption as to the penurious\nseverity of Providence, and the consequent greed of selfish men to\nconfine what seemed as if extorted from it to themselves, or to steal\nfrom each other rather than quietly to enjoy their own.\n\nWe shall probably never reach those higher forms containing the true\ndifferences of things, involving the full discovery and correct\nexpression of their very self or essence. We shall ever fall short of\nthe most general and most simple nature, the ultimate or most\ncomprehensive law. Our widest axioms explain many phenomena, but so too\nin a degree did the principles or elements of the old philosophers, and\nthe cycles and epicycles of ancient astronomy. We cannot in any case of\ncausation assign the whole of the conditions, nor though we may\nreproduce them in practice, can we mentally distinguish them all,\nwithout knowing the essences of the things including them; and we\ntherefore must not unconsciously ascribe that absolute certainty to\naxioms, which the ancient religionists did to creeds, nor allow the\nmind, which ever strives to insulate itself and its acquisitions, to\nforget the nature of the process by which it substituted scientific for\ncommon notions, and so with one as with the other lay the basis of\nself-deception by a pedantic and superstitious employment of them.\n\nDoubt, the essential preliminary of all improvement and discovery, must\naccompany all the stages of man's onward progress. His intellectual life\nis a perpetual beginning, a preparation for a birth. The faculty of\ndoubting and questioning, without which those of comparison and judgment\nwould be useless, is itself a divine prerogative of the reason.\nKnowledge is always imperfect, or complete only in a prospectively\nboundless career, in which discovery multiplies doubt, and doubt leads\non to new discovery. The boast of science is not so much its manifested\nresults, as its admitted imperfection and capacity of unlimited\nprogress. The true religious philosophy of an imperfect being is not a\nsystem of creed, but, as Socrates thought, an infinite search or\napproximation. Finality is but another name for bewilderment or defeat.\nScience gratifies the religious feeling without arresting it, and opens\nout the unfathomable mystery of the One Supreme into more explicit and\nmanageable Forms, which express not indeed His Essence, which is wholly\nbeyond our reach and higher than our faculties can climb, but His Will,\nand so feeds an endless enthusiasm by accumulating forever new objects\nof pursuit. We have long experienced that knowledge is profitable, we\nare beginning to find out that it is moral, and we shall at last\ndiscover it to be religious.\n\nGod and truth are inseparable; a knowledge of God is possession of the\nsaving oracles of truth. In proportion as the thought and purpose of the\nindividual are trained to conformity with the rule of right prescribed\nby Supreme Intelligence, so far is his happiness promoted, and the\npurpose of his existence fulfilled. In this way a new life arises in\nhim; he is no longer isolated, but is a part of the eternal harmonies\naround him. His erring will is directed by the influence of a higher\nwill, informing and moulding it in the path of his true happiness.\n\nMan's power of apprehending outward truth is a qualified privilege; the\nmental like the physical inspiration passing through a diluted medium;\nand yet, even when truth, imparted, as it were, by intuition, has been\nspecious, or at least imperfect, the intoxication of sudden discovery\nhas ever claimed it as full, infallible, and divine. And while human\nweakness needed ever to recur to the pure and perfect source, the\nrevelations once popularly accepted and valued assumed an independent\nsubstantiality, perpetuating not themselves only, but the whole mass of\nderivitive forms accidentally connected with them, and legalized in\ntheir names. The mists of error thickened under the shadows of\nprescription, until the free light again broke in upon the night of\nages, redeeming the genuine treasure from the superstition which\nobstinately doted on its accessories.\n\nEven to the Barbarian, Nature reveals a mighty power and a wondrous\nwisdom, and continually points to God. It is no wonder that men\nworshipped the several things of the world. The world of matter is a\nrevelation of fear to the savage in Northern climes; he trembles at his\ndeity throned in ice and snow. The lightning, the storm, the earthquake\nstartle the rude man, and he sees the divine in the extraordinary.\n\nThe grand objects of Nature perpetually constrain men to think of their\nAuthor. The Alps are the great altar of Europe; the nocturnal sky has\nbeen to mankind the dome of a temple, starred all over with admonitions\nto reverence, trust, and love. The Scriptures for the human race are\nwrit in earth and Heaven. No organ or miserere touches the heart like\nthe sonorous swell of the sea or the ocean-wave's immeasurable laugh.\nEvery year the old world puts on new bridal beauty, and celebrates its\nWhit-Sunday, when in the sweet Spring each bush and tree dons reverently\nits new glories. Autumn is a long All-Saints' day; and the harvest is\nHallowmass to Mankind. Before the human race marched down from the\nslopes of the Himalayas to take possession of Asia, Chaldea, and Egypt,\nmen marked each annual crisis, the solstices and the equinoxes, and\ncelebrated religious festivals therein; and even then, and ever since,\nthe material was and has been the element of communion between man and\nGod.\n\nNature is full of religious lessons to a thoughtful man. He dissolves\nthe matter of the Universe, leaving only its forces; he dissolves away\nthe phenomena of human history, leaving only immortal spirit; he studies\nthe law, the mode of action of these forces and this spirit, which make\nup the material and the human world, and cannot fail to be filled with\nreverence, with trust, with boundless love of the Infinite God, who\ndevised these laws of matter and of mind, and thereby bears up this\nmarvellous Universe of things and men. Science has its New Testament;\nand the beatitudes of Philosophy are profoundly touching. An undevout\nastronomer is mad. Familiarity with the grass and the trees teaches us\ndeeper lessons of love and trust than we can glean from the writings of\nF\u00e9n\u00e9lon and Augustine. The great Bible of God is ever open before\nmankind. The eternal flowers of Heaven seem to shed sweet influence on\nthe perishable blossoms of the earth. The great sermon of Jesus was\npreached on a mountain, which preached to Him as He did to the people,\nand His figures of speech were first natural figures of fact.\n\nIf to-morrow I am to perish utterly, then I shall only take counsel for\nto-day, and ask for qualities which last no longer. My fathers will be\nto me only as the ground out of which my bread-corn is grown; dead, they\nare but the rotten mould of earth, their memory of small concern to me.\nPosterity!--I shall care nothing for the future generations of mankind!\nI am one atom in the trunk of a tree, and care nothing for the roots\nbelow, or the branch above, I shall sow such seed only as will bear\nharvest to-day. Passion may enact my statutes to-day, and ambition\nrepeal them to-morrow. I will know no other legislators. Morality will\nvanish, and expediency take its place. Heroism will be gone; and instead\nof it there will be the savage ferocity of the he-wolf, the brute\ncunning of the she-fox, the rapacity of the vulture, and the headlong\ndaring of the wild bull; but no longer the cool, calm courage that, for\ntruth's sake, and for love's sake, looks death firmly in the face, and\nthen wheels into line ready to be slain. Affection, friendship,\nphilanthropy, will be but the wild fancies of the monomaniac, fit\nsubjects for smiles or laughter or for pity.\n\nBut knowing that we shall live forever, and that the Infinite God loves\nall of us, we can look on all the evils of the world, and see that it is\nonly the hour before sunrise, and that the light is coming; and so we\nalso, even we, may light a little taper, to illuminate the darkness\nwhile it lasts, and help until the day-spring come. Eternal morning\nfollows the night: a rainbow scarfs the shoulders of every cloud that\nweeps its rain away to be flowers on land and pearls at sea: Life rises\nout of the grave, the soul cannot be held by fettering flesh. No dawn is\nhopeless; and disaster is only the threshold of delight.\n\nBeautifully, above the great wide chaos of human errors, shines the\ncalm, clear light of natural human religion, revealing to us God as the\nInfinite Parent of all, perfectly powerful, wise, just, loving, and\nperfectly holy too. Beautiful around stretches off every way the\nUniverse, the Great Bible of God. Material nature is its Old Testament,\nmillions of years old, thick with eternal truths under our feet,\nglittering with everlasting glories over our heads; and Human Nature is\nthe New Testament from the Infinite God, every day revealing a new page\nas Time turns over the leaves. Immortality stands waiting to give a\nrecompense for every virtue not rewarded, for every tear not wiped away,\nfor every sorrow undeserved, for every prayer, for every pure intention\nand emotion of the heart. And over the whole, over Nature, Material and\nHuman, over this Mortal Life and over the eternal Past and Future, the\ninfinite Loving-kindness of God the Father comes enfolding all and\nblessing everything that ever was, that is, that ever shall be.\n\nEverything is a thought of the Infinite God. Nature is His prose, and\nman His Poetry. There is no Chance, no Fate; but God's Great Providence,\nenfolding the whole Universe in its bosom, and feeding it with\neverlasting life. In times past there has been evil which we cannot\nunderstand; now there are evils which we cannot solve, nor make square\nwith God's perfect goodness by any theory our feeble intellect enables\nus to frame. There are sufferings, follies, and sins for all mankind,\nfor every nation, for every man and every woman. They were all foreseen\nby the infinite wisdom of God, all provided for by His infinite power\nand justice, and all are consistent with His infinite love. To believe\notherwise would be to believe that He made the world, to amuse His idle\nhours with the follies and agonies of mankind, as Domitian was wont to\ndo with the wrigglings and contortions of insect agonies. Then indeed we\nmight despairingly unite in that horrible utterance of Heine: \"Alas,\nGod's Satire weighs heavily on me! The Great Author of the Universe, the\nAristophanes of Heaven, is bent on demonstrating, with crushing force,\nto me, the little, earthly, German Aristophanes, how my wittiest\nsarcasms are only pitiful attempts at jesting, in comparison with His,\nand how miserably I am beneath Him, in humor, in colossal mockery.\"\n\nNo, no! God is not thus amused with and prodigal of human suffering. The\nworld is neither a Here without a Hereafter, a body without a soul, a\nchaos with no God; nor a body blasted by a soul, a Here with a worse\nHereafter, a world with a God that hates more than half the creatures He\nhas made. There is no Savage, Revengeful, and Evil God: but there is an\nInfinite God, seen everywhere as Perfect Cause, everywhere as Perfect\nProvidence, transcending all, yet in-dwelling everywhere, with perfect\npower, wisdom, justice, holiness, and love, providing for the future\nwelfare of each and all, foreseeing and forecaring for every bubble that\nbreaks on the great stream of human life and human history.\n\nThe end of man and the object of existence in this world, being not only\nhappiness, but happiness in virtue and through virtue, virtue in this\nworld is the condition of happiness in another life, and the condition\nof virtue in this world is suffering, more or less frequent, briefer or\nlonger continued, more or less intense. Take away suffering, and there\nis no longer any resignation or humanity, no more self-sacrifice, no\nmore devotedness, no more heroic virtues, no more sublime morality. We\nare subjected to suffering, both because we are sensible, and because we\nought to be virtuous. If there were no physical evil, there would be no\npossible virtue, and the world would be badly adapted to the destiny of\nman. The apparent disorders of the physical world, and the evils that\nresult from them, are not disorders and evils that occur despite the\npower and goodness of God. God not only allows, but wills them. It is\nHis will that there shall be in the physical world causes enough of pain\nfor man, to afford him occasions for resignation and courage.\n\nWhatever is favorable to virtue, whatever gives the moral liberty more\nenergy, whatever can serve the greater moral development of the human\nrace, is good. Suffering is not the worst condition of man on earth. The\nworst condition is the moral brutalization which the absence of physical\nevil would engender.\n\nExternal or internal physical evil connects itself with the object of\nexistence, which is to accomplish the moral law here below, whatever the\nconsequences, with the firm hope that virtue unfortunate will not fail\nto be rewarded in another life. The moral law has its sanction and its\nreason in itself. It owes nothing to that law of merit and demerit that\naccompanies it, but is not its basis. But, though the principle of merit\nand demerit ought not to be the determining principle of virtuous\naction, it powerfully concurs with the moral law, because it offers\nvirtue a legitimate ground of consolation and hope.\n\nMorality is the recognition of duty, as duty, and its accomplishment,\nwhatever the consequences.\n\nReligion is the recognition of duty in its necessary harmony with\ngoodness; a harmony that must have its realization in another life,\nthrough the justice and omnipotence of God.\n\nReligion is as true as morality; for once morality is admitted, its\nconsequences must be admitted.\n\nThe whole moral existence is included in these two words, harmonious\nwith each other: DUTY and HOPE.\n\nMasonry teaches that God is infinitely good. What motive, what reason,\nand, morally speaking, what possibility can there be to Infinite Power\nand Infinite Wisdom, to be anything but good? Our very sorrows,\nproclaiming the loss of objects inexpressibly dear to us, demonstrate\nHis Goodness. The Being that made us intelligent cannot Himself be\nwithout intelligence; and He Who has made us so to love and to sorrow\nfor what we love, must number love for the creatures He has made, among\nHis infinite attributes. Amid all our sorrows, we take refuge in the\nassurance that He loves us; that He does not capriciously, or through\nindifference, and still less in mere anger, grieve and afflict us; that\nHe chastens us, in order that by His chastisements, which are by His\nuniversal law only the consequences of our acts, we may be profited; and\nthat He could not show so much love for His creatures, by leaving them\nunchastened, untried, undisciplined. We have faith in the Infinite;\nfaith in God's Infinite Love; and it is that faith that must save us.\n\nNo dispensations of God's Providence, no suffering or bereavement is a\nmessenger of wrath: none of its circumstances are indications of God's\nAnger. He is incapable of Anger; higher above any such feelings than the\ndistant stars are above the earth. Bad men do not die because God hates\nthem. They die because it is best for them that they should do so; and,\nbad as they are, it is better for them to be in the hands of the\ninfinitely good God, than anywhere else.\n\nDarkness and gloom lie upon the paths of men. They stumble at\ndifficulties, are ensnared by temptations, and perplexed by trouble.\nThey are anxious, and troubled, and fearful. Pain and affliction and\nsorrow often gather around the steps of their earthly pilgrimage. All\nthis is written indelibly upon the tablets of the human heart. It is not\nto be erased; but Masonry sees and reads it in a new light. It does not\nexpect these ills and trials and sufferings to be removed from life; but\nthat the great truth will at some time be believed by all men, that they\nare the means, selected by infinite wisdom, to purify the heart, and to\ninvigorate the soul whose inheritance is immortality, and the world its\nschool.\n\nMasonry propagates no creed except its own most simple and Sublime One;\nthat universal religion, taught by Nature and by Reason. Its Lodges are\nneither Jewish, Moslem, nor Christian Temples. It reiterates the\nprecepts of morality of all religions. It venerates the character and\ncommends the teachings of the great and good of all ages and of all\ncountries. It extracts the good and not the evil, the truth, and not the\nerror, from all creeds; and acknowledges that there is much which is\ngood and true in all.\n\nAbove all the other great teachers of morality and virtue, it reveres\nthe character of the Great Master Who, submissive to the will of His and\nour Father, died upon the Cross. All must admit, that if the world were\nfilled with beings like Him, the great ills of society would be at once\nrelieved. For all coercion, injury, selfishness, and revenge, and all\nthe wrongs and the greatest sufferings of life, would disappear at\nonce. These human years would be happy; and the eternal ages would roll\non in brightness and beauty; and the still, sad music of Humanity, that\nsounds through the world, now in the accents of grief, and now in\npensive melancholy, would change to anthems, sounding to the March of\nTime, and bursting out from the heart of the world.\n\nIf every man were a perfect imitator of that Great, Wise, Good Teacher,\nclothed with all His faith and all His virtues, how the circle of Life's\nills and trials would be narrowed! The sensual passions would assail the\nheart in vain. Want would no longer successfully tempt men to act\nwrongly, nor curiosity to do rashly. Ambition, spreading before men its\nKingdoms and its Thrones, and offices and honors, would cause none to\nswerve from their great allegiance. Injury and insult would be shamed by\nforgiveness. \"Father,\" men would say, \"forgive them; for they know not\nwhat they do.\" None would seek to be enriched at another's loss or\nexpense. Every man would feel that the whole human race were his\nbrothers. All sorrow and pain and anguish would be soothed by a perfect\nfaith and an entire trust in the Infinite Goodness of God. The world\naround us would be new, and the Heavens above us; for here, and there,\nand everywhere, through all the ample glories and splendors of the\nUniverse, all men would recognize and feel the presence and the\nbeneficent care of a loving Father.\n\nHowever the Mason may believe as to creeds, and churches, and miracles,\nand missions from Heaven, he must admit that the Life and character of\nHim who taught in Galilee, and fragments of Whose teachings have come\ndown to us, are worthy of all imitation. That Life is an undenied and\nundeniable Gospel. Its teachings cannot be passed by and discarded. All\nmust admit that it would be happiness to follow and perfection to\nimitate Him. None ever felt for Him a sincere emotion of contempt, nor\nin anger accused Him of sophistry, nor saw immorality lurking in His\ndoctrines; however they may judge of those who succeeded Him, and\nclaimed to be His apostles. Divine or human, inspired or only a\nreforming Essene, it must be agreed that His teachings are far nobler,\nfar purer, far less alloyed with error and imperfection, far less of the\nearth earthly, than those of Socrates, Plato, Seneca, or Mahomet, or any\nother of the great moralists and Reformers of the world.\n\nIf our aims went as completely as His beyond personal care and selfish\ngratification; if our thoughts and words and actions were as entirely\nemployed upon the great work of benefiting our kind--the true work which\nwe have been placed here to do--as His were; if our nature were as\ngentle and as tender as His; and if society, country, kindred,\nfriendship, and home were as dear to us as they were to Him, we should\nbe at once relieved of more than half the difficulties and the diseased\nand painful affections of our lives. Simple obedience to rectitude,\ninstead of self-interest; simple self-culture and self-improvement,\ninstead of constant cultivation of the good opinion of others;\nsingle-hearted aims and purposes, instead of improper objects, sought\nand approached by devious and crooked ways, would free our meditations\nof many disturbing and irritating questions.\n\nNot to renounce the nobler and better affections of our natures, nor\nhappiness, nor our just dues of love and honor from men; not to vilify\nourselves, nor to renounce our self-respect, nor a just and reasonable\nsense of our merits and deserts, nor our own righteousness of virtue,\ndoes Masonry require, nor would our imitation of Him require; but to\nrenounce our vices, our faults, our passions, our self-flattering\ndelusions; to forego all outward advantages, which are to be gained only\nthrough a sacrifice of our inward integrity, or by anxious and petty\ncontrivances and appliances; to choose and keep the better part; to\nsecure that, and let the worst take care of itself; to keep a good\nconscience, and let opinion come and go as it will; to retain a lofty\nself-respect, and let low self-indulgence go; to keep inward happiness,\nand let outward advantages hold a subordinate place; to renounce our\nselfishness, and that eternal anxiety as to what we are to have, and\nwhat men think of us; and be content with the plenitude of God's great\nmercies, and so to be happy. For it is the inordinate devotion to self,\nand consideration of self, that is ever a stumbling-block in the way;\nthat spreads questions, snares, and difficulties around us, darkens the\nway of Providence, and makes the world a far less happy one to us than\nit might be.\n\nAs He taught, so Masonry teaches, affection to our kindred, tenderness\nto our friends, gentleness and forbearance toward our inferiors, pity\nfor the suffering, forgiveness of our enemies; and to wear an\naffectionate nature and gentle disposition as the garment of our life,\ninvesting pain, and toil, and agony, and even death, with a serene and\nholy beauty. It does not teach us to wrap ourselves in the garments of\nreserve and pride, to care nothing for the world because it cares\nnothing for us, to withdraw our thoughts from society because it does us\nnot justice, and see how patiently we can live within the confines of\nour own bosoms, or in quiet communion, through books, with the mighty\ndead. No man ever found peace or light in that way. Every relation, of\nhate, scorn, or neglect, to mankind, is full of vexation and torment.\nThere is nothing to do with men but to love them, to admire their\nvirtues, pity and bear with their faults, and forgive their injuries. To\nhate your adversary will not help you; to kill him will help you still\nless: nothing within the compass of the Universe will help you, but to\npity, forgive, and love him.\n\nIf we possessed His gentle and affectionate disposition, His love and\ncompassion for all that err and all that offend, how many difficulties,\nboth within and without us, would they relieve! How many depressed minds\nshould we console! How many troubles in society should we compose! How\nmany enmities soften! How many a knot of mystery and misunderstanding\nwould be untied by a single word, spoken in simple and confiding truth!\nHow many a rough path would be made smooth, and how many a crooked path\nbe made straight! Very many places, now solitary, would be made glad;\nvery many dark places be filled with light.\n\nMorality has its axioms, like the other sciences; and these axioms are,\nin all languages, justly termed moral truths. Moral truths, considered\nin themselves, are equally as certain as mathematical truths. Given the\nidea of a deposit, the idea of keeping it faithfully is attached to it\nas necessarily, as to the idea of a triangle is attached the idea that\nits three angles are equal to two right angles. You may violate a\ndeposit; but in doing so, do not imagine that you change the nature of\nthings, or make what is in itself a deposit become your own property.\nThe two ideas exclude each other. You have but a false semblance of\nproperty: and all the efforts of the passions, all the sophisms of\ninterest, will not overturn essential differences. Therefore it is that\na moral truth is so imperious; because, like all truth, it is what it\nis, and shapes itself to please no caprice. Always the same, and always\npresent, little as we may like it, it inexorably condemns, with a voice\nalways heard, but not always regarded, the insensate and guilty will\nwhich thinks to prevent its existing, by denying, or rather by\npretending to deny, its existence.\n\nThe moral truths are distinguished from other truths by this singular\ncharacteristic: so soon as we perceive them, they appear to us as the\nrule of our conduct. If it is true that a deposit is made in order to be\nreturned to its legitimate possessor, it _must_ be returned. To the\nnecessity of _believing_ the truth, the necessity of _practising_ it is\nadded.\n\nThe necessity of practising the moral truths is obligation. The moral\ntruths, necessary to the eye of reason, are obligatory on the will. The\nmoral obligation, like the moral truth which is its basis, is absolute.\nAs necessary truths are not _more_ or _less_ necessary, so obligation is\nnot more or less _obligatory_. There are degrees of importance among\ndifferent obligations; but there are no degrees in _the obligation\nitself_. One is not nearly obliged, _almost_ obliged; but _wholly_ so,\nor _not at all_. If there be any place of refuge against the obligation,\nit ceases to exist.\n\nIf the obligation is absolute, it is _immutable_ and _universal_. For if\nwhat is obligation to-day may not be so _to-morrow_, if what is\nobligatory for _me_ may not be so for you, the obligation differing from\nitself, it would be relative and contingent. This fact of absolute,\nimmutable, universal obligation is certain and manifest. _The good_ is\nthe foundation of obligation. If it be not, obligation has _no_\nfoundation; and that is impossible. If one act ought to be done, and\nanother ought not, it must be because evidently there is an essential\ndifference between the two acts. If one be not good and the other bad,\nthe obligation imposed on us is arbitrary.\n\nTo make the Good a _consequence_, of anything whatever, is to annihilate\nit. It is the first, or it is nothing. When we ask an honest man why,\ndespite his urgent necessities, he has respected the sanctity of a\ndeposit, he answers, because it was _his duty_. Asked why it was his\nduty, he answers, because it was _right_, was _just_, was _good_. Beyond\nthat there is no answer to be made, but there is also no question to be\nasked. No one permits a duty to be imposed on him without giving himself\na reason for it: but when it is admitted that the duty is commanded by\njustice, the mind is satisfied; for it has arrived at a principle beyond\nwhich there is nothing to seek, justice being its own principle. The\nprimary truths include their own reason: and justice, the essential\ndistinction between good and evil, is the first truth of morality.\n\nJustice is not a _consequence_; because we cannot ascend to any\nprinciple above it. Moral truth _forces itself_ on man, and does not\n_emanate from him_. It no more becomes subjective, by appearing to us\nobligatory, than truth does by appearing to us necessary. It is in the\nvery nature of the true and the good that we must seek for the reason of\nnecessity and obligation. Obligation is founded on the necessary\ndistinction between the good and the evil; and it is itself the\nfoundation of liberty. If man has his duties to perform, he must have\nthe faculty of accomplishing them, of resisting desire, passion, and\ninterest, in order to obey the law. He must be free; therefore he is so,\nor human nature is in contradiction with itself. The certainty of the\n_obligation_ involves the corresponding certainty of _free will_.\n\nIt is the _will_ that is free: though sometimes that will may be\nineffectual. The power _to do_ must not be confounded with the power _to\nwill_. The former may be _limited_: the latter is _sovereign_. The\n_external effects_ may be prevented: _the resolution_ itself cannot. Of\nthis sovereign power of the will we are conscious. We feel in ourselves,\nbefore it becomes determinate, the force which can determine itself in\none way or another. At the same time when I will this or that, I am\nequally conscious that I _can_ will the contrary. I am conscious that I\nam the master of my resolution: that I may check it, continue it, retake\nit. When _the act_ has ceased, the consciousness of _the power_ which\nproduced it has not. That consciousness and the power remain, superior\nto all the manifestations of the power. Wherefore free-will is the\nessential and ever-subsisting attribute of the will itself.\n\nAt the same time that we judge that a free agent has done a good or a\nbad act, we form another judgment, as necessary as the first; that if he\nhas done well, he deserves compensation; if ill, punishment. That\njudgment may be expressed in a manner more or less vivid, according as\nit is mingled with sentiments more or less ardent. Sometimes it will be\na merely kind feeling toward a virtuous agent, and moderately hostile to\na guilty one; sometimes enthusiasm or indignation. The judgment of merit\nand demerit is intimately connected with the judgment of good and evil.\nMerit is the natural right which we have to be rewarded; demerit the\nnatural right which others have to punish us. But whether the reward is\nreceived, or the punishment undergone, or not, the merit or demerit\nequally subsists. Punishment and reward are the satisfaction of merit\nand demerit, but do not constitute them. Take away the former, and the\nlatter continue. Take away the latter, and there are no longer real\nrewards or punishments. When a base man encompasses our merited honors,\nhe has obtained but the mere appearance of a reward; a mere material\nadvantage. The reward is essentially moral; and its value is independent\nof its form. One of those simple crowns of oak with which the early\nRomans rewarded heroism, was of more real value than all the wealth of\nthe world, when it was the sign of the gratitude and admiration of a\npeople. Reward accorded to merit is a debt; without merit it is an alms\nor a theft.\n\nThe Good is good in itself, and to be accomplished, whatever the\nconsequences. The results of the Good cannot but be fortunate.\nHappiness, separated from the Good, is but a fact to which no moral idea\nis attached. As an effect of the Good, it enters into the moral order,\ncompletes and crowns it.\n\nVirtue without happiness, and crime without misery, is a contradiction\nand disorder. If virtue suppose sacrifice (that is, suffering), eternal\njustice requires that sacrifice generously accepted and courageously\nborne, shall have for its reward the same happiness that was sacrificed:\nand it also requires that crime shall be punished with unhappiness, for\nthe guilty happiness which it attempted to procure.\n\nThis law that attaches pleasure and sorrow to the good and the evil, is,\nin general, accomplished even here below. For order rules in the world;\nbecause the world lasts. Is that order sometimes disturbed? Are\nhappiness and sorrow not always distributed in legitimate proportion to\ncrime and virtue? The absolute judgment of the Good, the absolute\njudgment of obligation, the absolute judgment of merit and demerit,\ncontinue to subsist, inviolable and imprescriptible; and we cannot help\nbut believe that He Who has implanted in us the sentiment and idea of\norder, cannot therein Himself be wanting; and that He will, sooner or\nlater, reestablish the holy harmony of virtue and happiness, by means\nbelonging to Himself.\n\nThe Judgment of the Good, the decision that such a thing is good, and\nthat such another is not,--this is the primitive fact, and reposes on\nitself. By its intimate resemblances to the judgment of the true and the\nbeautiful, it shows us the secret affinities of morality, metaphysics,\nand aesthetics. The good, so especially united to the true, is\ndistinguished from it, only because it is truth put in practice. The\ngood is obligatory. These are two indivisible but not identical ideas.\nThe idea of obligation reposes on the idea of the Good. In this intimate\nalliance, the former borrows from the latter its universal and absolute\ncharacter.\n\nThe obligatory good is the moral law. That is the foundation of all\nmorality. By it we separate ourselves from the morality of interest and\nthe morality of sentiment. We admit the existence of those facts, and\ntheir influence; but we do not assign them the same rank.\n\nTo the moral law, in the reason of man, corresponds liberty in action.\nLiberty is deduced from obligation, and is a fact irresistibly evident.\nMan, as free, and subject to obligation, is a moral person; and that\ninvolves the idea of rights. To these ideas is added that of merit and\ndemerit; which supposes the distinction between good and evil,\nobligation and liberty; and creates the idea of reward and punishment.\n\nThe sentiments play no unimportant part in morality. All the moral\njudgments are accompanied by sentiments that respond to them. From the\nsecret sources of enthusiasm the human will draws the mysterious virtue\nthat makes heroes. Truth enlightens and illumines. Sentiment warms and\ninclines to action. Interest also bears its part; and the hope of\nhappiness is the work of God, and one of the motive powers of human\naction.\n\nSuch is the admirable economy of the moral constitution of man. His\nSupreme Object, the Good: his law, Virtue, which often imposes upon him\nsuffering, thus making him to excel all other created beings known to\nus. But this law is harsh, and in contradiction with the instinctive\ndesire for happiness. Wherefore the Beneficent Author of his being has\nplaced in his soul, by the side of the severe law of duty, the sweet,\ndelightful force of sentiment. Generally he attaches happiness to\nvirtue; and for the exceptions, for such there are, he has placed Hope\nat the end of the journey to be travelled.\n\nThus there is a side on which morality touches religion. It is a sublime\nnecessity of Humanity to see in God the Legislator supremely wise, the\nWitness always present, the infallible Judge of virtue. The human mind,\never climbing up to God, would deem the foundations of morality too\nunstable, if it did not place in God the first principle of the moral\nlaw. Wishing to give to the moral law a _religious_ character, we run\nthe risk of taking from it its _moral_ character. We may refer it so\nentirely to God as to make His will an arbitrary degree. But the will of\nGod, whence we deduce morality, in order to give it authority, itself\nhas no moral authority, except as it is just. The Good comes from the\nwill of God alone; but from His will, in so far as it is the expression\nof His wisdom and justice. The Eternal Justice of God is the sole\nfoundation of Justice, such as Humanity perceives and practises it. The\nGood, duty, merit and demerit, are referred to God, as everything is\nreferred to Him; but they have none the less a proper evidence and\nauthority. Religion is the crown of Morality, not its base. The base of\nMorality is in itself.\n\nThe Moral Code of Masonry is still more extensive than that developed by\nphilosophy. To the requisitions of the law of Nature and the law of God,\nit adds the imperative obligation of a contract. Upon entering the\nOrder, the Initiate binds to himself every Mason in the world. Once\nenrolled among the children of Light, every Mason on earth becomes his\nbrother, and owes him the duties, the kindnesses, and the sympathies of\na brother. On every one he may call for assistance in need, protection\nagainst danger, sympathy in sorrow, attention in sickness, and decent\nburial after death. There is not a Mason in the world who is not bound\nto go to his relief, when he is in danger, if there be a greater\nprobability of saving his life than of losing his own. No Mason can\nwrong him to the value of anything, knowingly, himself, nor suffer it to\nbe done by others, if it be in his power to prevent it. No Mason can\nspeak evil of him, to his face or behind his back. Every Mason must keep\nhis lawful secrets, and aid him in his business, defend his character\nwhen unjustly assailed, and protect, counsel, and assist his widow and\nhis orphans. What so many thousands owe to him, he owes to each of them.\nHe has solemnly bound himself to be ever ready to discharge this sacred\ndebt. If he fails to do it he is dishonest and forsworn; and it is an\nunparalleled meanness in him to obtain good offices by false pretences,\nto receive kindness and service, rendered him under the confident\nexpectation that he will in his turn render the same, and then to\ndisappoint, without ample reason, that just expectation.\n\nMasonry holds him also, by his solemn promise, to a purer life, a nobler\ngenerosity, a more perfect charity of opinion and action; to be\ntolerant, catholic in his love for his race, ardent in his zeal for the\ninterest of mankind, the advancement and progress of humanity.\n\nSuch are, we think, the Philosophy and the Morality, such the TRUE WORD\nof a Master Mason.\n\nThe world, the ancients believed, was governed by Seven Secondary\nCauses; and these were the universal forces, known to the Hebrews by the\nplural name ELOHIM. These forces, analogous and contrary one to the\nother, produce equilibrium by their contrasts, and regulate the\nmovements of the spheres. The Hebrews called them the Seven great\nArchangels, and gave them names, each of which, being a combination of\nanother word with AL, the first Ph\u0153nician Nature-God, considered as the\nPrinciple of Light, represented them as His manifestations. Other\npeoples assigned to these Spirits the government of the Seven Planets\nthen known, and gave them the names of their great divinities.\n\nSo, in the Kabala, the last Seven Sephiroth constituted ATIK YOMIN, the\nAncient of Days; and these, as well as the Seven planets, correspond\nwith the Seven colors separated by the prism, and the Seven notes of the\nmusical octave.\n\nSeven is the sacred number in all theogonies and all symbols, because it\nis composed of 3 and 4. It represents the magical power in its full\nforce. It is the Spirit assisted by all the Elementary Powers, the Soul\nserved by Nature, the Holy Empire spoken of in the clavicules of\nSolomon, symbolized by a warrior, crowned, bearing a triangle on his\ncuirass, and standing on a cube, to which are harnessed two Sphinxes,\none white and the other black, pulling contrary ways, and turning the\nhead to look backward.\n\nThe vices are Seven, like the virtues; and the latter were anciently\nsymbolized by the Seven Celestial bodies then known as planets. FAITH,\nas the converse of arrogant Confidence, was represented by the Sun;\nHOPE, enemy of Avarice, by the _Moon_; CHARITY, opposed to Luxury, by\n_Venus_; FORCE, stronger than Rage, by _Mars_; PRUDENCE, the opposite of\nIndolence, by _Mercury_; TEMPERANCE, the antipodes of Gluttony, by\nSaturn; and JUSTICE, the opposite of Envy, by _Jupiter_.\n\nThe Kabalistic book of the Apocalypse is represented as closed with\nSeven Seals. In it we find the Seven genii of the Ancient Mythologies;\nand the doctrine concealed under its emblems is the pure Kabala, already\nlost by the Pharisees at the advent of the Saviour. The pictures that\nfollow in this wondrous epic are so many pantacles, of which the\nnumbers 3, 4, 7, and 12 are the keys.\n\nThe Cherub, or symbolic bull, which Moses places at the gate of the\nEdenic world, holding a blazing sword, is a Sphinx, with the body of a\nbull and a human head; the old Assyrian Sphinx whereof the combat and\nvictory of Mithras were the hieroglyphic analysis. This armed Sphinx\nrepresents the law of the Mystery, which keeps watch at the door of\ninitiation, to repulse the Profane. It also represents the grand Magical\nMystery, all the elements whereof the number 7 expresses, still without\ngiving its last word. This \"unspeakable word\" of the Sages of the school\nof Alexandria, this word, which the Hebrew Kabalists wrote \u05d9\u05d4\u05d5\u05d4 [IHUH],\nand translated by \u05d0\u05e8\u05d0\u05e8\u05d9\u05d4\u05d0, [ARARITA,] so expressing the threefoldness of\nthe Secondary Principle, the dualism of the middle ones, and the Unity\nas well of the first Principle as of the end; and also the junction of\nthe number 3 with the number 4 in a word composed of four letters, but\nformed of seven by one triplicate and two repeated,--this word is\npronounced _Ararita_.\n\nThe vowels in the Greek language are also _Seven_ in number, and were\nused to designate the Seven planets.\n\nTsadok or Sydyc was the Supreme God in Ph\u0153nicia. His Seven Sons were\nprobably the Seven Cabiri; and he was the Heptaktis, the God of Seven\nRays.\n\nKronos, the Greek Saturn, Philo makes Sanchoniathon say, had six sons,\nand by Astarte Seven daughters, the Titanides. The Persians adored Ahura\nMasda or Ormuzd and the Six Amshaspands, the first three of whom were\nLords of the Empires of Light, Fire, and Splendor; the Babylonians, Bal\nand the Gods; the Chinese, Shangti, and the Six Chief Spirits; and the\nGreeks, Kronos, and the Six great Male Gods, his progeny, Zeus,\nPoseidon, Apollo, Ar\u0113s, H\u0113phaistos, and Hermes; while the female deities\nwere also Seven: Rhea, wife of Kronos, H\u0113r\u0113, Ath\u0113n\u0113, Artemis, Aphrodite,\nHestia, and D\u0113m\u0113t\u0113i. In the Orphic Theogony, Gaia produced the fourteen\nTitans, Seven male and Seven female, Kronos being the most potent of the\nmales; and as the number _Seven_ appears in these, nine by threes, or\nthe triple triangle, is found in the three M\u0153ra\u00ea or Fates, the three\nCentiman\u0113s, and the three Cyclop\u0113s, offspring of Ouranos and Gaia, or\nHeaven and Earth.\n\nThe metals, like the colors, were deemed to be Seven in number, and a\nmetal and color were assigned to each planet. Of the metals, gold was\nassigned to the Sun and silver to the Moon.\n\nThe palace of Deioces in Echatana had Seven circular walls of different\ncolors, the two innermost having their battlements covered respectively\nwith silvering and gilding.\n\nAnd the Seven Spheres of Borsippa were represented by the Seven Stories,\neach of a different color, of the tower or truncated pyramid of Bel at\nBabylon.\n\nPharaoh saw in his dream, which Joseph interpreted, _Seven_ ears of\nwheat on one stalk, full and good, and after them _Seven_ ears,\nwithered, thin, and blasted with the East wind; and the Seven thin ears\ndevoured the Seven good ears; and Joseph interpreted these to mean Seven\nyears of plenty succeeded by Seven years of famine.\n\nConnected with this Ebn Hesham relates that a flood of rain laid bare to\nview a sepulchre in Yemen, in which lay a woman having on her neck\n_Seven_ collars of _pearls_, and on her hands and feet bracelets and\nankle-rings and armlets, Seven on each, with an inscription on a tablet\nshowing that, after attempting in vain to purchase grain of Joseph, she,\nTajah, daughter of Dzu Shefar, and her people, died of famine.\n\nHear again the words of an adept, who had profoundly studied the\nmysteries of science, and wrote, as the Ancient Oracles spoke, in\nenigmas; but who knew that the theory of mechanical forces and of the\nmateriality of the most potent agents of Divinity, explains nothing, and\nought to satisfy no one!\n\nThrough the veil of all the hieratic and mystic allegories of the\nancient dogmas, under the seal of all the sacred writings, in the ruins\nof Nineveh or Thebes, on the worn stones of the ancient temples, and on\nthe blackened face of the sphinx of Assyria or Egypt, in the monstrous\nor marvellous pictures which the sacred pages of the Vedas translate for\nthe believers of India, in the strange emblems of our old books of\nalchemy, in the ceremonies of reception practised by all the mysterious\nSocieties, we find the traces of a doctrine, everywhere the same, and\neverywhere carefully concealed. The occult philosophy seems to have been\nthe nurse or the godmother of all religions, the secret lever of all the\nintellectual forces, the key of all divine obscurities, and the absolute\nQueen of Society, in the ages when it was exclusively reserved for the\neducation of the Priests and Kings.\n\nIt had reigned in Persia with the Magi, who perished one day, as the\nmasters of the world had perished, for having abused their power. It had\nendowed India with the most marvellous traditions, and an incredible\nluxury of poetry, grace, and terror in its emblems: it had civilized\nGreece by the sounds of the lyre of Orpheus: it hid the principles of\nall the sciences, and of the whole progression of the human spirit, in\nthe audacious calculations of Pythagoras: fable teemed with its\nmiracles; and history, when it undertook to judge of this unknown power,\nconfounded itself with fable: it shook or enfeebled empires by its\noracles; made tyrants turn pale on their thrones, and ruled over all\nminds by means of curiosity or fear. To this science, said the crowd,\nnothing is impossible; it commands the elements, knows the language of\nthe planets, and controls the movements of the stars; the moon, at its\nvoice, falls, reeking with blood, from Heaven; the dead rise upright on\ntheir graves, and shape into fatal words the wind that breathes through\ntheir skulls. Controller of Love or Hate, this science can at pleasure\nconfer on human hearts Paradise or Hell: it disposes at will of all\nforms, and distributes beauty or deformity as it pleases: it changes in\nturn, with the rod of Circe, men into brutes and animals into men: it\neven disposes of Life or of Death, and can bestow on its adepts riches\nby the transmutation of metals, and immortality by its quintessence and\nelixir, compounded of gold and light.\n\nThis is what magic had been, from Zoroaster to Manes, from Orpheus to\nApollonius Thyaneus; when positive Christianity, triumphing over the\nsplendid dreams and gigantic aspirations of the school of Alexandria,\npublicly crushed this philosophy with its anathemas, and compelled it to\nbecome more occult and more mysterious than ever.\n\nAt the bottom of magic, nevertheless, was science, as at the bottom of\nChristianity there was love; and in the Evangelic Symbols we see the\nincarnate WORD adored in its infancy by three magi whom a star guides\n(the ternary and the sign of the microcosm), and receiving from them\ngold, frankincense, and myrrh; another mysterious ternary, under the\nemblem whereof are allegorically contained the highest secrets of the\nKabala.\n\nChristianity should not have hated magic; but human ignorance always\nfears the unknown. Science was obliged to conceal itself, to avoid the\nimpassioned aggressions of a blind love. It enveloped itself in new\nhieroglyphs, concealed its efforts, disguised its hopes. Then was\ncreated the jargon of alchemy, a continual deception for the vulgar\nherd, greedy of gold, and a living language for the true disciples of\nHermes alone.\n\nResorting to Masonry, the alchemists there invented Degrees, and partly\nunveiled their doctrine to their Initiates; not by the language of their\nreceptions, but by oral instruction afterward; for their rituals, to one\nwho has not the key, are but incomprehensible and absurd jargon.\n\nAmong the sacred books of the Christians are two works which the\ninfallible church does not pretend to understand, and never attempts to\nexplain,--the prophecy of Ezekiel and the Apocalypse; two cabalistic\nclavicules, reserved, no doubt, in Heaven, for the exposition of the\nMagian kings; closed with Seven seals for all faithful believers; and\nperfectly clear to the unbeliever initiated in the occult sciences.\n\nFor Christians, and in their opinion, the scientific and magical\nclavicules of Solomon are lost. Nevertheless, it is certain that, in the\ndomain of intelligence governed by the WORD, nothing that is written is\nlost. Only those things which men cease to understand no longer exist\nfor them, at least as WORD; then they enter into the domain of enigmas\nand mystery.\n\nThe mysterious founder of the Christian Church was saluted in His cradle\nby the three Magi, that is to say by the hieratic ambassadors from the\nthree parts of the known world, and from the three analogical worlds of\nthe occult philosophy.\n\nIn the school of Alexandria, Magic and Christianity almost take each\nother by the hand under the auspices of Ammonius Saccos and Plato. The\ndogma of Hermes is found almost entire in the writings attributed to\nDionysius the Areopagite. Synesius traces the plan of a treatise on\ndreams, which was subsequently to be commented on by Cardan, and\ncomposes hymns which might serve for the liturgy of the Church of\nSwedenborg, if a church of illuminati could have a liturgy.\n\nTo this epoch of ardent abstractions and impassioned logomachies belongs\nthe philosophical reign of Julian, an illuminatus and Initiate of the\nfirst order, who believed in the unity of God and the universal Dogma of\nthe Trinity, and regretted the loss of nothing of the old world but its\nmagnificent symbols and too graceful images. He was no Pagan, but a\nGnostic, infected with the allegories of Grecian polytheism, and whose\nmisfortune it was to find the name of Jesus Christ less sonorous than\nthat of Orpheus.\n\nWe may be sure that so soon as Religion and Philosophy become distinct\ndepartments, the mental activity of the age is in advance of its Faith;\nand that, though habit may sustain the latter for a time, its vitality\nis gone.\n\nThe dunces who led primitive Christianity astray, by substituting faith\nfor science, reverie for experience, the fantastic for the reality; and\nthe inquisitors who for so many ages waged against Magism a war of\nextermination, have succeeded in shrouding in darkness the ancient\ndiscoveries of the human mind; so that we now grope in the dark to find\nagain the key of the phenomena of nature. But all natural phenomena\ndepend on a single and immutable law, represented by the philosophal\nstone and its symbolic form, which is that of a cube. This law,\nexpressed in the Kabala by the number 4, furnished the Hebrews with all\nthe mysteries of their divine Tetragram.\n\nEverything is contained in that word of four letters. It is the _Asot_\nof the Alchemists, the _Thot_ of the Bohemians, the _Taro_ of the\nKabalists. It supplies to the Adept the last word of the human Sciences,\nand the Key of the Divine Power: but he alone understands how to avail\nhimself of it who comprehends the necessity of never revealing it. If\n\u0152dipus, in place of _slaying_ the Sphynx, had _conquered_ it, and driven\nit into Thebes harnessed to his chariot, he would have been King,\nwithout incest, calamities, or exile. If Psyche, by submission and\ncaresses, had persuaded Love to reveal himself, she would never have\nlost him. Love is one of the mythological images of the grand secret and\nthe grand agent, because it expresses at once an action and a passion, a\nvoid and a plenitude, an arrow and a wound. The Initiates ought to\nunderstand this, and, lest the profane should overhear, Masonry never\nsays too much.\n\nWhen Science had been overcome in Alexandria by the fanaticism of the\nmurderers of Hypalia, it became Christian, or, rather, it concealed\nitself under Christian disguises, with Ammonius, Synosius, and the\nauthor of the books of Dionysius the Areopagite. Then it was necessary\nto win the pardon of miracles by the appearances of superstition, and of\nscience by a language unintelligible. Hieroglyphic writing was revived,\nand pantacles and characters were invented, that summed up a whole\ndoctrine in a sign, a whole series of tendencies and revelations in a\nword. What was the object of the aspirants to knowledge? They sought for\nthe secret of the great work, or the Philosophal Stone, or the perpetual\nmotion, or the squaring of the circle, or the universal medicine;\nformulas which often saved them from persecution and general ill-will,\nby exposing them to the charge of folly; and each of which expressed one\nof the forces of the grand magical secret. This lasted until the time of\nthe Roman de la Rose, which also expresses the mysterious and magical\nmeaning of the poem of Dante, borrowed from the High Kabalah, that\nimmense and concealed source of the universal philosophy.\n\nIt is not strange that man knows but little of the powers of the human\nwill, and imperfectly appreciates them; since he knows nothing as to the\nnature of the will and its mode of operation. That his own will can move\nhis arm, or compel another to obey him; that his thoughts, symbolically\nexpressed by the signs of writing, can influence and lead other men, are\nmysteries as incomprehensible to him, as that the will of Deity could\neffect the creation of a Universe.\n\nThe powers of the will are as yet chiefly indefinite and unknown.\nWhether a multitude of well-established phenomena are to be ascribed to\nthe power of the will alone, or to magnetism or some other natural\nagent, is a point as yet unsettled; but it is agreed by all that a\nconcentrated effort of the will is in every case necessary to success.\n\nThat the phenomena are real is not to be doubted, unless credit is no\nlonger to be given to human testimony; and if they are real, there is no\nreason for doubting the exercise heretofore, by many adepts, of the\npowers that were then termed magical. Nothing is better vouched for than\nthe extraordinary performances of the Brahmins. No religion is supported\nby stronger testimony; nor has any one ever even attempted to explain\nwhat may well be termed their miracles.\n\nHow far, in this life, the mind and soul can act without and\nindependently of the body, no one as yet knows. That the will can act at\nall without bodily contact, and the phenomena of dreams, are mysteries\nthat confound the wisest and most learned, whose explanations are but a\nBabel of words.\n\nMan as yet knows little of the forces of nature. Surrounded,\ncontrolled, and governed by them, while he vainly thinks himself\nindependent, not only of his race, but the universal nature and her\ninfinite manifold forces, he is the slave of these forces, unless he\nbecomes their master. He can neither ignore their existence nor be\nsimply their neighbor.\n\nThere is in nature one most potent force, by means whereof a single man,\nwho could possess himself of it, and should know how to direct it, could\nrevolutionize and change the face of the world.\n\nThis force was known to the ancients. It is a universal agent, whose\nSupreme law is equilibrium; and whereby, if science can but learn how to\ncontrol it, it will be possible to change the order of the Seasons, to\nproduce in night the phenomena of day, to send a thought in an instant\nround the world, to heal or slay at a distance, to give our words\nuniversal success, and make them reverberate everywhere.\n\nThis agent, partially revealed by the blind guesses of the disciples of\nMesmer, is precisely what the Adepts of the middle ages called the\nelementary matter of the great work. The Gnostics held that it composed\nthe igneous body of the Holy Spirit; and it was adored in the secret\nrites of the Sabbat or the Temple, under the hieroglyphic figure of\nBaphomet or the hermaphroditic goat of Mendes.\n\nThere is a Life-Principle of the world, a universal agent, wherein are\ntwo natures and a double current, of love and wrath. This ambient fluid\npenetrates everything. It is a ray detached from the glory of the Sun,\nand fixed by the weight of the atmosphere and the central attraction. It\nis the body of the Holy Spirit, the universal Agent, the Serpent\ndevouring his own tail. With this electro-magnetic ether, this vital and\nluminous caloric, the ancients and the alchemists were familiar. Of this\nagent, that phase of modern ignorance termed physical science talks\nincoherently, knowing naught of it save its effects; and theology might\napply to it all its pretended definitions of spirit. Quiescent, it is\nappreciable by no human sense; disturbed or in movement, none can\nexplain its mode of action; and to term it a \"fluid,\" and speak of its\n\"currents,\" is but to veil a profound ignorance under a cloud of words.\n\nForce attracts force, life attracts life, health attracts health. It is\na law of nature.\n\nIf two children live together, and still more if they sleep together,\nand one is feeble and the other strong, the strong will absorb the\nfeeble, and the latter will perish.\n\nIn schools, some pupils absorb the intellect of the others, and in every\ncircle of men some one individual is soon found, who possesses himself\nof the wills of the others.\n\nEnthralments by currents is very common; and one is carried away by the\ncrowd, in morals as in physics. The human will has an almost absolute\npower in determining one's acts; and every external demonstration of a\nwill has an influence on external things.\n\nTissot ascribed most maladies to disorders of the will, or the perverse\ninfluences of the wills of others. We become subject to the wills of\nothers by the analogies of our inclinations, and still more by those of\nour defects. To caress the weaknesses of an individual, is to possess\nourself of him, and make of him an instrument in the order of the same\nerrors or depravations. But when two natures, analogical in defects, are\nsubordinated one to the other, there is effected a kind of substitution\nof the stronger instead of the weaker, and a genuine imprisonment of one\nmind by the other. Often the weaker struggles, and would fain revolt;\nand then falls lower than ever in servitude.\n\nWe each have some dominant defect, by which the enemy can grasp us. In\nsome it is vanity, in others indolence, in most egotism. Let a cunning\nand evil spirit possess himself of this, and you are lost. Then you\nbecome, not foolish, nor an idiot, but positively a lunatic, the slave\nof an impulse from without. You have an instinctive horror for\neverything that could restore you to reason, and will not even listen to\nrepresentations that contravene your insanity.\n\nMiracles are the natural effects of exceptional causes.\n\nThe immediate action of the human will on bodies, or at least this\naction exercised without visible means, constitutes a miracle in the\nphysical order.\n\nThe influence exercised on wills or intellects, suddenly or within a\ngiven time, and capable of taking captive the thoughts, changing the\nfirmest resolutions, paralyzing the most violent passions, constitutes a\nmiracle in the moral order.\n\nThe common error in relation to miracles is, to regard them as effects\nwithout causes; as contradictions of nature; as sudden fictions of the\nDivine imagination; and men do not reflect that a single miracle of\nthis sort would break the universal harmony and re-plunge the Universe\ninto Chaos.\n\nThere are miracles impossible to God Himself: absurd miracles are so. If\nGod could be absurd for a single instant, neither He nor the Universe\nwould exist an instant afterward. To expect of the Divine Free-Will an\neffect whose cause is unacknowledged or does not exist, is what is\ntermed tempting God. It is to precipitate one's self into the void.\n\nGod acts by His works: in Heaven, by angels; on earth, by men.\n\nIn the heaven of human conceptions, it is humanity that creates God; and\nmen think that God has made them in His image, because they make Him in\ntheirs.\n\nThe domain of man is all corporeal nature, visible on earth; and if he\ndoes not rule the planets or the stars, he can at least calculate their\nmovement, measure their distances, and identify his will with their\ninfluence: he can modify the atmosphere, act to a certain point on the\nseasons, cure and afflict with sickness other men, preserve life and\ncause death.\n\nThe absolute in reason and will is the greatest power which it is given\nto men to attain; and it is by means of this power that what the\nmultitude admires under the name of miracles, are effected.\n\nPOWER is the wise use of the will, which makes Fatality itself serve to\naccomplish the purposes of Sages.\n\nOmnipotence is the most absolute Liberty; and absolute Liberty cannot\nexist without a perfect equilibrium; and the columns JACHIN and BOAZ are\nalso the unlimited POWER and SPLENDOR OF PERFECTION of the Deity, the\nseventh and eighth SEPHIROTH of the Kabalah, from whose equilibrium\nresult the eternal permanence and Stability of His plans and works, and\nof that perfect Success and undivided, unlimited Dominion, which are the\nninth and tenth SEPHIROTH, and of which the Temple of Solomon, in its\nstately symmetry, erected without the sound of any tool of metal being\nheard, is to us a symbol. \"For Thine,\" says the Most Perfect of Prayers,\n\"is the DOMINION, the POWER, and the GLORY, during all the ages! Amen!\"\n\nThe ABSOLUTE is the very _necessity_ of BEING, the immutable law of\nReason and of Truth. It is THAT WHICH IS. BUT THAT WHICH IS is in some\nsort before HE WHO IS. God Himself is not without a _reason of\nexistence_. He does not exist _accidentally_. He could not _not_ have\nbeen. His Existence, then, is _necessitated_ is _necessary_. He _can_\nexist only in virtue of a Supreme and inevitable REASON. That REASON,\nthen, is THE ABSOLUTE; for it is in IT we must believe, if we would that\nour faith should have a reasonable and solid basis. It has been said in\nour times, that God is a Hypothesis; but Absolute Reason is not one: it\nis essential to Existence.\n\nSaint Thomas said, \"_A thing is not just because God wills it_, BUT GOD\nWILLS IT BECAUSE IT IS JUST.\" If he had deduced all the consequences of\nthis fine thought, he would have discovered the true Philosopher's\nStone; the magical elixir, to convert all the trials of the world into\ngolden mercies. Precisely as it is a necessity for God to BE, so it is a\nnecessity for Him to be just, loving, and merciful. He cannot be unjust,\ncruel, merciless. He cannot repeal the law of right and wrong, of merit\nand demerit; for the moral laws are as absolute as the physical laws.\nThere are impossible things, As it is impossible to make two and two be\nfive and not four; as it is impossible to make a thing be and not be at\nthe same time; so it is impossible for the Deity to make crime a merit,\nand love and gratitude crimes. So, too, it was impossible to make Man\nperfect, with his bodily senses and appetites, as it was to make his\nnerves susceptible of pleasure and not also of pain.\n\nTherefore, according to the idea of Saint Thomas, the moral laws are the\n_enactments_ of the Divine WILL, only because they are the _decisions_\nof the Absolute WISDOM and REASON, and the _Revelations_ of the Divine\nNATURE. In this alone consists the _right_ of Deity to enact them; and\nthus only do we attain the certainty in Faith that the Universe is one\nHarmony.\n\nTo believe in the Reason of God, and in the God of Reason, is to make\nAtheism impossible. It is the Idolaters who have made the Atheists.\n\nAnalogy gives the Sage all the forces of Nature. It is the key of the\nGrand Arcanum, the root of the Tree of Life, the science of Good and\nEvil.\n\nThe Absolute, is REASON. Reason IS, by means of Itself. It IS BECAUSE IT\nIS, and not because we suppose it. IT IS, where nothing _exists_; but\nnothing could possibly exist without IT. Reason is Necessity, Law, the\nRule of all Liberty, and the direction of every Initiative. If God IS,\nHE IS by Reason. The conception of an Absolute Deity, outside of, or\nindependent of, Reason, is the IDOL of Black Magic, the PHANTOM of the\nD\u00e6mon.\n\nThe Supreme Intelligence is necessarily _rational_. God, in philosophy,\ncan be no more than a Hypothesis; but a Hypothesis imposed by good sense\non Human Reason. To personify the Absolute Reason, is to determine the\nDivine Ideal.\n\nNECESSITY, LIBERTY, and REASON! Behold the great and Supreme Triangle of\nthe Kabalists!\n\nFATALITY, WILL, and POWER! Such is the magical ternary which, in human\nthings, corresponds with the Divine Triangle.\n\nFATALITY is the inevitable linking together, in succession, of effects\nand causes, in a given order.\n\nWILL is the faculty that directs the forces of the Intellect, so as to\nreconcile the liberty of persons with the necessity of things.\n\nThe argument from these premises must be made by yourself. Each one of\nus does that. \"Seek,\" say the Holy Writings, \"and ye shall find.\" Yet\ndiscussion is not forbidden; and without doubt the subject will be fully\ntreated of in your hearing hereafter. Affirmation, negation,\ndiscussion,--it is by these the truth is attained.\n\nTo explore the great Mysteries of the Universe and seek to solve its\nmanifold enigmas, is the chief use of Thought, and constitutes the\nprincipal distinction between Man and the animals. Accordingly, in all\nages the Intellect has labored to understand and explain to itself the\nNature of the Supreme Deity.\n\nThat one Reason and one Will created and governed the Universe was too\nevident not to be at once admitted by the _philosophers_ of all ages. It\nwas the ancient _religions_ that sought to multiply gods. The _Nature_\nof the One Deity, and the mode in which the Universe had its beginning,\nare questions that have always been the racks in which the human\nintellect has been tortured: and it is chiefly with these that the\nKabalists have dealt.\n\nIt is true that, in one sense, we can have no actual knowledge of the\nAbsolute Itself, the _very_ Deity. Our means of obtaining what is\ncommonly termed _actual_ knowledge, are our senses only. If to _see_ and\n_feel_ be _knowledge_, we have none of our own Soul, of electricity, of\nmagnetism. We see and feel and taste an acid or an alkali, and know\nsomething of the _qualities_ of each; but it is only when we use them in\ncombination with other substances, and learn their _effects_, that we\nreally begin to know their _nature_. It is the combination and\nexperiments of Chemistry that give us a knowledge of the nature and\npowers of most animal and vegetable substances. As these are cognizable\nby inspection by our senses, we may partially know them by that alone:\nbut the Soul, either of ourself or of another, being beyond that\ncognizance, can only be known by the acts and words which are its\neffects. Magnetism and electricity, when at rest, are equally beyond the\njurisdiction of the senses; and when they are in action, we see, feel,\nhear, taste, and smell only their effects. We do not know what they\n_are_, but only what they _do_. We can know the attributes of Deity only\nthrough His manifestations. To ask anything more, is to ask, not\n_knowledge_, but something else, for which we have no name. God is a\nPower; and we know nothing of any Power _itself_, but only its effects,\nresults, and action, and what Reason teaches us by analogy.\n\nIn these later days, in laboring to escape from all _material_ ideas in\nregard to Deity, we have so refined away our notions of GOD, as to have\nno idea of Him at all. In struggling to regard Him as a pure immaterial\nSpirit, we have made the word _Spirit_ synonymous with _nothing_, and\ncan only say that He is a _Somewhat_, with certain attributes, such as\nPower, Wisdom, and Intelligence. To compare Him to LIGHT, would now be\ndeemed not only unphilosophical, but the equivalent of Atheism; and we\nfind it necessary to excuse and pity the ancients for their inadequate\nand gross ideas of Deity, expressed in considering Him as the\nLight-Principle, the invisible essence or substance from which visible\nLight flows.\n\nYet our own holy writings continually speak of Him as Light; and\ntherefore the Tsabeans and the Kabala may well be pardoned for doing the\nsame; especially since they did not regard Him as the _visible_ Light\nknown to us, but as the Primordial Ether-Ocean from which light flows.\n\nBefore the creation, did the Deity dwell alone in the Darkness, or in\nthe Light? Did the Light co-exist with Him, or was it created, after an\neternity of darkness? and if it co-existed, was it an effluence from\nHim, filling all space as He also filled it, He and the Light at the\nsame time filling the same place and every place?\n\nMILTON says, expressing the Hebraic doctrine:\n\n         Hail, Holy Light, offspring of Heaven first-born,\n         Or of th' Eternal, co-eternal beam!\n         May I express thee unblamed, _since God is Light_.\n\n         And never but in unapproached Light\n         Dwelt from Eternity; dwelt then in Thee,\n         _Bright effluence of bright Essence uncreate_.\n\n\"The LIGHT,\" says the Book _Omschim_, or Introduction to the Kabala,\n\"Supremest of all things, and most Lofty, and Limitless, and styled\nINFINITE, can be attained unto by no cogitation or speculation; and its\nVERY SELF is evidently withdrawn and removed beyond all intellection. It\nWAS, before all things whatever, produced, created, formed, and made by\nEmanation; and in it was neither Time, Head, or Beginning; since it\nalways existed, and remains forever, without commencement or end.\"\n\n\"Before the Emanations flowed forth, and created things were created,\nthe Supreme Light was infinitely extended, and filled the whole WHERE;\nso that with reference to Light no vacuum could be affirmed, nor any\nunoccupied space; but the ALL was filled with that Light of the\nInfinite, thus extended, whereto in every regard was no end, inasmuch as\nnothing was, except that extended Light, which, with a certain single\nand simple equality, was everywhere like unto itself.\"\n\nAINSOPH is called _Light_, says the Introduction to the Sohar, because\nit is impossible to express it by any other word.\n\nTo conceive of God as an actuality, and not as a mere non-substance or\nname, which involved non-_existence_, the Kabala, like the Egyptians,\nimagined Him to be \"a most occult Light,\" AUR; not our material and\nvisible Light, but the Substance out of which Light flows, the _fire_,\nas relative to its heat and flame. Of this Light or Ether, the Sun was\nto the Tsabeans the only manifestation or out-shining, and as such it\nwas worshipped, and not as the type of dominion and power. God was the\n_Ph\u014ds No\u0113ton_, the Light cognisable only by the Intellect, the\nLight-Principle, the Light-Ether, from which souls emanate, and to which\nthey return.\n\nLight, Fire, and Flame, with the Ph\u0153nicians, were the sons of Kronos.\nThey are the Trinity in the Chald\u00e6an Oracles, the AOR of the Deity,\nmanifested in _flame_, that issues out of the invisible _Fire_.\n\nIn the first three Persian Amshaspands, Lords of LIGHT, FIRE, and\nSPLENDOR, we recognize the AOR, ZOHAR, and ZAYO, _Light, Splendor_, and\n_Brightness_, of the Kabalah. The first of these is termed AOR MUPALA,\n_Wonderful_ or _Hidden_ Light, unrevealed, undisplayed--which is KETHER,\nthe first Emanation or _Sephirah_, the _Will_ of Deity: the second is\nNESTAR, _Concealed_--which is HAKEMAH, the second _Sephirah_, or the\nIntellectual Potence of the Deity: and the third is METANOTSATS,\n_coruscating_--which is BINAH, the third _Sephirah_, or the intellectual\n_producing_ capacity. In other words, they are THE VERY SUBSTANCE of\nlight, _in_ the Deity: _Fire_, which is that light, limited and\nfurnished with attributes, so that it _can_ be revealed, but yet remains\nunrevealed, and its _splendor_ or out-shining, or the _light_ that goes\nout from the fire.\n\nMasonry is a search after Light. That search leads us directly back, as\nyou see, to the Kabalah. In that ancient and little understood medley of\nabsurdity and philosophy, the Initiate will find the source of many\ndoctrines; and may in time come to understand the Hermetic philosophers,\nthe Alchemists, all the Anti-papal Thinkers of the Middle Ages, and\nEmanuel Swedenborg.\n\nThe Hansavati Rich, a celebrated Sanscrit Stanza, says: \"He is Hansa\n(the Sun), dwelling in light; Vasu, the atmosphere dwelling in the\nfirmament; the invoker of the gods (Agni), dwelling on the altar\n(_i.e._, the altar fire); the guest (of the worshipper), dwelling in the\nhouse (the domestic fire); the dweller amongst men (as consciousness);\nthe dweller in the most excellent orb, (the Sun); the dweller in truth;\nthe dweller in the sky (the air); born in the waters, in the rays of\nlight, in the verity (of manifestation), in the Eastern mountains; the\nTruth (itself).\"\n\n\"In the beginning,\" says a Sanscrit hymn, \"arose the Source of golden\nlight. _He was the only born Lord of all that is_. He established the\nearth and the sky. Who is the God to Whom we shall offer our sacrifice?\"\n\n\"He who gives life, He who gives strength; Whose blessing all the bright\ngods desire; _Whose shadow is immortality; Whose shadow is death_; Who\nis the God, etc?\"\n\n\"He through Whom the sky is bright and the earth for us; He through Whom\nthe Heaven was established, nay, the highest Heaven; He who measured out\nthe light in the air; Who is the God, etc?\"\n\n\"He to Whom the Heaven and earth, standing firm by His will, look up\ntrembling inwardly; He over Whom the rising sun shines forth; Who is the\nGod, etc?\"\n\n\"Wherever the mighty water-clouds went, where they placed the seed and\nlit the fire, thence arose He Who is the only life of the bright gods;\nWho is the God, etc?\"\n\nThe WORD of God, said the Indian philosophy, is the universal and\ninvisible Light, cognizable by the senses, that emits its blaze in the\nSun, Moon, Planets, and other Stars. Philo calls it the \"Universal\nLight,\" which loses a portion of its purity and splendor in descending\nfrom the intellectual to the sensible world, manifesting itself\noutwardly from, the Deity; and the Kabalah represents that only so much\nof the Infinite Light flowed into the circular void prepared for\ncreation within the Infinite Light and Wisdom, as could pass by a canal\nlike a line or thread. The Sephiroth, emanating from the Deity, were the\nrays of His splendor.\n\nThe Chald\u00e6an Oracles said: \"The intellect of the Generator, stirred to\naction, out-spoke, forming within itself, by intellection, universals of\nevery possible form and fashion, which issued out, flowing forth from\nthe One Source ... For Deity, impersonated as Dominion, before\nfabricating the manifold Universe, posited an intellected and\nunchangeable universal, the impression of the form whereof goes forth\nthrough the Universe; and that Universe, formed and fashioned\naccordingly, becomes visibly beautified in infinitely varying types and\nforms, the Source and fountain whereof is one.... Intellectual\nconceptions and forms from the Generative source, succeeding each other,\nconsidered in relation to ever-progressing Time, and intimately\npartaking of THE PRIMAL ETHER or FIRE; but yet all these Universals and\nPrimal Types and Ideas flowed forth from, and are part of, the first\nSource of the Generative Power, perfect in itself.\"\n\nThe Chaldeans termed the Supreme Deity ARAOR, Father of Light. From Him\nwas supposed to flow the light above the world, which illuminates the\nheavenly regions. This Light or Fire was considered as the Symbol of the\nDivine Essence, extending itself to inferior spiritual natures. Hence\nthe Chaldean oracles say: \"The Father took from Himself, and did not\nconfine His proper fire within His intellectual potency:\" ... \"All\nthings are begotten from one Fire.\"\n\nThe Tsabeans-held that all inferior spiritual beings were emanations\nfrom the Supreme Deity; and therefore Proclus says: \"The progression of\nthe gods is one and continuous, proceeding downward from the\nintelligible and latent unities, and terminating in the last partition\nof the Divine cause.\"\n\nIt is impossible to speak clearly of the Divinity. Whoever attempts to\nexpress His attributes by the help of abstractions, confines himself to\nnegatives, and at once loses sight of his ideas, in wandering through a\nwilderness of words. To heap Superlatives on Superlatives, and call Him\n_best, wisest, greatest_, is but to exaggerate qualities which are found\nin man. That there exists one only God, and that He is a Perfect and\nBeneficent Being, Reason legitimately teaches us; but of the Divine\n_Nature_, of the _Substance_ of the Deity, of the manner of His\nExistence, or of the mode of creation of His Universe, the human mind is\ninadequate to form any just conception. We can affix no clear ideas to\nOmnipotence, Omniscience, Infinity or Eternity; and we have no more\nright to attribute intelligence to Him, than any other mental quality of\nourselves, extended indefinitely; or than we have to attribute our\nsenses to Him, and our bodily organs, as the Hebrew writings do.\n\nWe satisfy ourselves with negativing in the Deity everything that\nconstitutes existence, so far as we are capable of conceiving of\nexistence. Thus He becomes to us logically nothing, _Non-Ens_. The\nAncients saw no difference between that and Atheism, and sought to\nconceive of Him as something real. It is a necessity of Human Nature.\nThe theological idea, or rather non-idea, of the Deity, is not shared or\nappreciated by the unlearned. To them God will always be The Father Who\nis in Heaven, a Monarch on His Throne, a Being with human feelings and\nhuman sympathies, angry at their misdeeds, lenient if they repent,\naccessible to their supplications. It is the Humanity, far more than the\nDivinity, of Christ, that makes the mass of Christians worship Him, far\nmore than they do the Father.\n\n\"The Light of the Substance of The Infinite,\" is the Kabalistic\nexpression. Christ was, according to Saint John, \"the Light that\nlighteth every man that cometh into the world\"; and \"that Light was the\nlife of men.\" \"The Light shone in the darkness, and the darkness\ncomprehended it not.\"\n\nThe ancient ideas in respect to Light were perhaps quite as correct as\nour own. It does not appear that they ascribed to Light any of the\nqualities of matter. But modern Science defines it to be a flood of\nparticles of _matter_, flowing or shot out from the Sun and Stars, and\nmoving through space to come to us. On the theories of mechanism and\nforce, what force of attraction here or repulsion at the Sun or at the\nmost distant Star could draw or drive these impalpable, weightless,\ninfinitely minute particles, appreciably by the Sense of Sight alone, so\nfar through space? What has become of the immense aggregate of particles\nthat have reached the earth since the creation? Have they increased its\nbulk? Why cannot chemistry detect and analyze them? If matter, why can\nthey travel only in right lines?\n\nNo characteristic of matter belongs to Light, or Heat, or flame, or to\nGalvanism, Electricity, and Magnetism. The electric spark is light, and\nso is that produced by the flint, when it cuts off particles of steel.\nIron, melted or heated, radiates light; and insects, infusoria, and\ndecayed wood emit it. Heat is produced by friction and by pressure; to\nexplain which, Science tells us of _latent_ Caloric, thus representing\nit to us as existing without its only known distinctive quality. What\nquality of matter enables lightning, blazing from the Heavens, to rend\nthe oak? What quality of matter enables it to make the circuit of the\nearth in a score of seconds?\n\nProfoundly ignorant of the nature of these mighty agents of Divine\nPower, we conceal our ignorance by words that have no meaning; and we\nmight well be asked _why_ Light may not be an effluence from the Deity,\nas has been agreed by all the religions of all the Ages of the World.\n\nAll truly dogmatic religions have issued from the Kabalah and return to\nit: everything scientific and grand in the religious dreams of all the\nilluminati, Jacob B\u0153hme, Swedenborg, Saint-Martin, and others, is\nborrowed from the Kabalah; all the Masonic associations owe to it their\nSecrets and their Symbols.\n\nThe Kabalah alone consecrates the alliance of the Universal Reason and\nthe Divine Word; it establishes, by the counterpoises of two forces\napparently opposite, the eternal balance of being; it alone reconciles\nReason with Faith, Power with Liberty, Science with Mystery; it has the\nkeys of the Present, the Past, and the Future.\n\nThe Bible, with all the allegories it contains, expresses, in an\nincomplete and veiled manner only, the religious science of the Hebrews.\nThe doctrine of Moses and the Prophets, identical at bottom with that of\nthe ancient Egyptians, also had its outward meaning and its veils. The\nHebrew books were written only to recall to memory the traditions; and\nthey were written in Symbols unintelligible to the Profane. The\nPentateuch and the prophetic poems were merely elementary books of\ndoctrine, morals, or liturgy; and the true secret and traditional\nphilosophy was only written afterward, under veils still less\ntransparent. Thus was a second Bible born, unknown to, or rather\nuncomprehended by, the Christians; a collection, _they_ say, of\nmonstrous absurdities; a monument, the adept says, wherein is everything\nthat the genius of philosophy and that of religion have ever formed or\nimagined of the sublime; a treasure surrounded by thorns; a diamond\nconcealed in a rough dark stone.\n\nOne is filled with admiration, on penetrating into the Sanctuary of the\nKabalah, at seeing a doctrine so logical, so simple, and at the same\ntime so absolute. The necessary union of ideas and signs, the\nconsecration of the most fundamental realities by the primitive\ncharacters; the Trinity of Words, Letters, and Numbers; a philosophy\nsimple as the alphabet, profound and infinite as the Word; theorems more\ncomplete and luminous than those of Pythagoras; a theology summed up by\ncounting on one's fingers; an Infinite which can be held in the hollow\nof an infant's hand; ten ciphers, and twenty-two letters, a triangle, a\nsquare, and a circle,--these are all the elements of the Kabalah. These\nare the elementary principles of the written Word, reflection of that\nspoken Word that created the world!\n\nThis is the doctrine of the Kabalah, with which you will no doubt seek\nto make yourself acquainted, as to the Creation.\n\nThe Absolute Deity, with the Kabalists, has no name. The terms applied\nto Him are \u05d0\u05d5\u05e8 \u05e4\u05e9\u05d5, AOR PASOT, the Most Simple [or Pure] Light, \"called\n\u05d0\u05d5\u05e8 \u05e1\u05d5\u05e3\u05bc, AYEN SOPI, or INFINITE, before any Emanation. For then there\nwas no space or vacant place, but all was infinite Light.\"\n\nBefore the Deity created any Ideal, any limited and intelligible Nature,\nor any form whatever, He was alone, and without form or similitude, and\nthere could be no cognition or comprehension of Him in any wise. He was\nwithout Idea or Figure, and it is forbidden to form any Idea or Figure\nof Him, neither by the letter He (\u05d4), nor by the letter Y\u014dd (\u05d9), though\nthese are contained in the Holy Name; nor by any other letter or point\nin the world.\n\nBut after He created this Idea [this limited and\nexisting-in-intellection Nature, which the ten Numerations, SEPHIROTH\nor Rays are], of the Medium, the First Man ADAM KADMON, He descended\ntherein, that, by means of this Idea, He might be called by the name\nTETRAGRAMMATON; that created things might have cognition of Him, in His\nown likeness.\n\nWhen the Infinite God willed to emit what were to flow forth, He\ncontracted Himself in the centre of His light, in such manner that most\nintense light should recede to a certain circumference, and on all sides\nupon itself. And this is the first contraction, and termed \u05e6\u05de\u05e6\u05dd,\n_Tsemsum_.\n\n\u05d0\u05d3\u05dd \u05e7\u05d3\u05de\u05d5\u05df, ADAM KADMON, the Primal or First Man, is the first Aziluthic\nemanant from the Infinite Light, immitted into the evacuated Space, and\nfrom which, afterward, all the other degrees and systems had their\nbeginnings. It is called the Adam prior to all the first. In it are\nimparted ten spherical numerations; and thereafter issued forth the\nrectilinear figure of a man in his sephirothic decade, as it were the\ndiameter of the said circles; as it were the axis of these spheres,\nreaching from their highest point to their lowest; and from it depend\nall the systems.\n\nBut now, as the Infinite Light would be too excellent and great to be\nborne and endured, except through the medium of this Adam Kadmon, its\nmost Secret Nature preventing this, its illuminating light had again to\nemanate in streams out of itself, by certain apertures, as it were, like\nwindows, and which are termed the ears, eyes, nostrils, and mouth.\n\nThe light proceeding from this Adam Kadmon is indeed but one; but in\nproportion to its remoteness from the place of out-flowing, and to the\ngrades of its descent, it is more dense.\n\nFrom the word \u05d0\u05e6\u05dc, ATSIL, to emanate or flow forth, comes the word\n\u05d0\u05e6\u05d9\u05dc\u05d5\u05d7, ATSILOTH or Aziluth, Emanation, or the System of Emanants. When\nthe primal space was evacuated, the surrounding Light of the Infinite,\nand the Light immitted into the void, did not touch each other; but the\nLight of the Infinite flowed into that void through a line or certain\nslender canal; and that Light is the Emanative and emitting Principle,\nor the out-flow and origin of Emanation: but the Light within the void\nis the emanant subordinate; and the two cohere only by means of the\naforesaid line.\n\nAziluth means specifically and principally the first system of the four\nOlamoth [\u05e2\u05dc\u05de\u05d5\u05ea], worlds or systems; which is thence called the Aziluthic\nWorld.\n\nThe ten Sephiroth of the general Aziluthic system are ten Nekudoth or\nPoints.\n\n\u05d0\u05d9\u05df\u05d5\u05ea, AINSOPH, AENSOPH, or AYENSOPH, is the title of the Cause of\nCauses, its meaning being \"_endless_\" because there is no limit to Its\nloftiness, and nothing can comprehend it. Sometimes, also, the name is\napplied to KETHER, or the CROWN, the first emanation, because that is\nthe Throne of the Infinite, that is, its first and highest Seat, than\nwhich none is higher, and because Ainsoph resides and is concealed\ntherein: hence it rejoices in the same name.\n\nBefore that anything was, says the _Emech Hammelech_, He, of His mere\nwill, proposed to Himself to make worlds ... but at that time there was\nno vacant space for worlds; but all space was filled with the light of\nHis Substance, which He had with fixed limits placed in the centre of\nHimself, and of the parts whereof, and wherein, He was thereafter to\neffect a folding together.\n\nWhat then did the Lord of the Will, that most perfectly free Agent, do?\nBy His own estimation, He measured off within His own Substance the\nwidth and length of a circular space to be made vacant, and wherein\nmight be posited the worlds aforesaid; and of that Light which was\nincluded within the circle so measured, He compressed and folded over a\ncertain portion ... and that Light He lifted higher up, and so a place\nwas left unoccupied by the Primal Light.\n\nBut yet was not this space left altogether empty of that Light; for the\nvestiges of the Primal Light still remained in the place where Itself\nhad been; and they did not recede therefrom.\n\nBefore the Emanations out-flowed, and created things were created, the\nSupreme Light was infinitely extended, and filled the whole _Where_:\nnothing _was_, except that extended light, called AOR H' AINSOPH, the\nLight of the non-finite.\n\nWhen it came into the mind of the Extended to will to make worlds, and\nby forth-flowing to utter Emanations, and to emit as Light the\nperfection of His active powers, and of His aspects and attributes,\nwhich was the impelling cause of the creation of worlds; then that\nLight, in some measure compressed, receded in every direction from a\nparticular central point, and on all sides of it drew back, and so a\ncertain vacuum was left, called void space, its circumference everywhere\nequidistant from that point which was exactly in the centre of the\nspace ... a certain void place and space left in Mid-Infinite: a certain\n_Where_ was thereby constituted wherein Emanations might BE, and the\nCreated, the Fashioned and the Fabricated.\n\nThis world of the _garmenting_,--this circular vacant space, with the\nvestiges of the withdrawn light of the Infinite yet remaining, is the\ninmost garment, nearest to His substance; and to it belongs the name AOR\nPENAI-AL, _Light of the Countenance of God_.\n\nAn interspace surrounds this great circle, established _between_ the\nlight of the _very_ substance, surrounding the circle on its outside,\nand the substance contained _within_ the circle. This is called SPLENDOR\nEXCELSES, in contradistinction to Simple Splendor.\n\nThis light \"of the vestige of the garment,\" is said to be, relatively to\nthat of the vestige of the substance, like a point in the centre of a\ncircle. This light, a point in the centre of the Great Light, is called\nAuir, Ether, or Space.\n\nThis Ether is somewhat more gross than the Light--not so Subtle--_though\nnot perceptible by the Senses_--is termed the Primal Ether--extends\neverywhere; Philosophers call it _the Soul of the World._\n\nThe Light so _forth-shown_ from the Deity, cannot be said to be\n_severed_ or _diverse_ from Him. \"It is flashed forth from Him, and yet\nall continues to be perfect unity...\" The Sephiroth, sometimes called\nthe _Persons_ of the Deity, _are His rays_, by which He is enabled most\nperfectly to manifest Himself.\n\nThe Introduction to the Book SOHAR says:\n\nThe first compression was effected, in order that the Primal Light might\nbe upraised, and a space become vacant. The second compression occurred\nwhen the vestiges of the removed Light remaining were compressed into\npoints; and that compression was effected by means of the emotion of\njoy; the Deity rejoicing, it had already been said, on account of His\nHoly People, thereafter to come into being; and that joy being vehement,\nand a commotion and exhilaration in the Deity being caused by it, so\nthat He flowed forth in His delight; and of this commotion an abstract\npower of judgment being generated, which is a collection of the letters\ngenerated by the points of the vestiges of Light left within the circle.\n_For He writes the finite expressions, or limited manifestations of\nHimself upon the Book, in single letters_.\n\nLike as when water or fire, it had been said, is blown upon by the wind,\nit is wont to be greatly moved, and with flashes like lightning to\nsmite the eyes, and gleam and coruscate hither and thither, even so The\nInfinite was moved within Himself, and shone and coruscated in that\ncircle, from the centre outward and again to the centre: and that\ncommotion we term exhilaration; and from that exhilaration, variously\ndivided within Himself, was generated the potency of determining the\nfashioning of the letters.\n\nOf that exhilaration, it had also been said, was generated the\ndetermination of _forms_, by which determination the Infinite determined\nthem within Himself, as if by saying: \"Let this Sphere be the appointed\nplace, wherein let all worlds be created!\"\n\nHe, by radiating and coruscating, effected the points, so that their\nsparkling should smite the eyes like lightning. Then He combined\ndiversely the single points, until _letters_ were fashioned thereof, in\nthe similitude and image of those wherewith THE BLESSED had set forth\nthe decrees of His Wisdom.\n\nIt is not possible to attain to an understanding of the creation of man,\nexcept by the mystery of letters; and in these worlds of The Infinite is\nnothing, except the letters of the Alphabet and their combinations. All\nthe worlds are Letters and Names; but He Who is the Author of all, has\nno name.\n\nThis world of the covering [or _garment--vestimenti_], [that is, the\ncircular vacant space, with the vestiges of the removed Light of The\nInfinite still remaining after the first contraction and compression],\nis the _inmost_ covering, _nearest_ to His substance; and to this\ncovering belongs the general name AUR PENIAL, _Light of the Countenance\nof God_: by which we are to understand the Light of The Substance.\n\nAnd after this covering was effected, He contracted it, so as to lift up\nthe lower moiety; ... and this is the _third_ contraction; and in this\nmanner He made vacant a space for the worlds, which had not the capacity\nto use the great Light of the covering, the end whereof was lucid and\nexcellent as its beginning. And so [by drawing up the lower half and\nhalf the letters], are made the _Male_ and _Female_, that is, the\nanterior and posterior adhering mutually to one another.\n\nThe vacant space effected by this retraction is called AUIR KADMON, the\nPRIMAL SPACE: for it was the first of all Spaces; nor was it allowable\nto call it _covering_, which is AUR PENI-BAL, the Light of the\nCountenance of God.\n\nThe vestiges of the Light of the Garment still remained there. And this\nworld of the garment has a name _that includes all things_, which is the\nname IHUH. Before the world of the vacant space was created, HE was, and\nHis Name, and they alone; that is, AINSOPH and His garmenting.\n\nThe EMECH HAMMELECH says again:\n\nThe lower half of the garment [by the third retraction], was left empty\nof the light of the garment. But the vestiges of that light remained in\nthe place so vacated ... and _this_ garment is called SHEKINAH, God\nin-dwelling; that is, the place where \u05d9\u05d4 Y\u00f6d He, of the anterior [or\nmale], and \u05d5\u05d4 Vav He, of the posterior [or female], combinations of\nletters dwelt.\n\nThis vacant space was square, and is called the _Primal Space_; and in\nKabalah it is called _Auira Kadmah_, or _Rasimu Ailah_, The Primal\nSpace, or The Sublime Vestige. It is the vestige of the Light of the\nGarment, with which is intermingled somewhat of the vestige of the Very\nSubstance. It is called _Primal Ether_, but not void Space ... The Light\nof the Vestige still remains in the place it occupied, and adheres\nthere, like somewhat spiritual, of extreme tenuity.\n\nIn this Ether are two Lights; that is, the Light of the SUBSTANCE, which\nwas taken away, and that of the Garment. There is a vast difference\nbetween the two; for that of the Vestige of the Garment is, relatively\nto that of the Vestige of the Substance, _like a point in the centre of\na circle_. And as the only appropriate name for the Light of the Vestige\nof Ainsoph is AUR, _Light_, therefore the Light of the Vestige of the\nGarment could not be called by _that_ name; and so we term it a point,\nthat is, Y\u014dd [' or \u05d9], which is that point in the centre of Light ...\nand _this_ Light, a point in the centre of the Great Light, is called\n_Auir_, Ether, or Space.\n\nThis Ether is somewhat more gross than The Light ... not so subtle,\nthough not perceptible by the senses ... is termed the Primal Ether ...\nextends everywhere; whence the Philosophers call it The Soul of the\nWorld ... Light is visible, though not perceptible. _This Ether is\nneither perceptible nor visible_.\n\nThe Introduction to the Book Sohar continues, in the Section of the\nLetter Y\u014dd, etc:\n\nWorlds could not be framed in this Primal Ether, on account of its\nextreme tenuity and the excess of Light; and also, because in it\nremained the vital Spirit of the Vestige of the Light Ainsoph, and that\nof the Vestige of the Light of the Garment; whereby such manifestation\nwas prevented.\n\nWherefore HE directed the letter Y\u014dd, since it was not so brilliant as\nthe Primal Ether, to descend, and take to itself the light remaining in\nthe Primal Ether, and return above, with that Vestige which so impeded\nthe manifestation; which Y\u014dd did.\n\nIt descended below five times, to remove the vital Spirit of the Vestige\nof the Light Ainsoph; and the Vestige of the Light and vital Spirit of\nthe Garment from the Sphere of Splendor, so as to make of it ADAM,\ncalled KADMON. And by its return, manifestation is effected in the space\nbelow, and a Vestige of the Sublime Brilliance yet remains there,\nexisting as a Spherical Shape, and termed in the Sohar simply _Tehiru_,\nthat is, Splendor; and it is styled The First Matter ... it being, as it\nwere, vapor, and, as it were, smoke. And as smoke is formless, not\ncomprehended under any fixed definite form, so this Sphere is a formless\nsomewhat, since it seems to be somewhat that is spherical, and yet is\nnot limited.\n\nThe letter Y\u014dd, while adhering to the Shekinah, had adhering, to himself\nthe Light of the Shekinah, though his light was not so great as that of\nthe Shekinah. But when he descended, he left that light of his own\nbelow, and the Splendor consisted of it. After which there was left in\nY\u014dd only a vestige of that light, inasmuch as he could not re-ascend to\nthe Shekinah and adhere to it. Wherefore The Holy and Blessed directed\nthe letter He [Hebrew: \u05d4], the female letter, to communicate to Y\u014dd of\nher Light; and sent him forth, to descend and share with _that_ light in\nthe Splendor aforesaid ... and when he re-descended into the Sphere of\nSplendor, he diffused abroad in it the Light communicated to him by the\nletter He.\n\nAnd when he again ascended he left behind him the productive light of\nthe letter He, and thereof was constituted another Sphere, _within_ the\nSphere of Splendor; which _lesser_ Sphere is termed in the Sohar KETHER\nAILAH, CORONA SUMMA, _The Supreme Crown_, and also ATIKA DE ATIKIM,\n_Antiquus Antiquum, The Ancient of Ancients_, and even AIUT H' AIUT,\n_Causa Causarum, the Cause of Causes_. But the Crown is very far smaller\nthan the Sphere of Splendor, so that within the latter an immense\nunoccupied place and space is still left.\n\nThe BETH ALOHIM says:\n\nBefore the Infinite God, the Supreme and First Good, formed objectively\nwithin Himself a particular conception, definite, limited, and the\nobject of intellection, and gave form and shape to an intellectual\nconception and image. HE was alone, companionless, without form or\nsimilitude, utterly without Ideal or Figure ... It is forbidden to make\nof Him any figure whatever, by any image in the world, neither by the\nletter He nor by the letter Y\u014dd, nor by any other letter or point in the\nworld.\n\nBut after He had formed this Idea, the particular conception, limited\nand intelligible, which the Ten Numerations are, of the medium of\ntransmission, Adam Kadmon, the Primal or Supreme Man, He by that medium\ndescended, and may, through that Idea, be called by the name IHUH, and\nso created things have cognizance of Him, by means of His proper\nlikeness.\n\nWoe unto him who makes God to be like unto any mode or attribute\nwhatever, even were it to one of His own; and still more if he make Him\nlike unto the Sons of Men, whose elements are earthly, and so are\nconsumed and perish!\n\nThere can be no conception had of Him, except in so far as He manifests\nHimself, in exercising dominion by and through some attribute ...\nAbstracted from this, there can be no attribute, conception, or ideal of\nHim. He is comparable only to the Sea, filling some great reservoir, its\nbed in the earth, for example; wherein it fashions for itself a certain\nconcavity, so that thereby we may begin to compute the dimensions of the\nSea itself.\n\nFor example, the Spring and Source of the Ocean is a somewhat, which is\n_one_. If from this Source or Spring there issues forth a certain\nfountain, proportioned to the space occupied by the Sea in that\nhemispherical reservoir, such as is the letter Y\u014dd, there the Source of\nSpring is the first somewhat, and the fountain that flows forth from it\nis the second. Then let there be made a great reservoir, as by\nexcavation, and let this be called the Ocean, and we have the third\nthing, a vessel [_Vas_]. Now let this great reservoir be divided into\nseven beds of rivers, that is, into seven oblong reservoirs, so that\nfrom this ocean the waters may flow forth in seven rivers; and the\nSource, Fountain, and Ocean thus make _ten_ in all.\n\nThe Cause of Causes made ten Numerations, and called the Source of\nSpring KETHER, _Corona_, the Crown, in which the idea of circularity is\ninvolved, for there is no _end_ to the out-flow of Light; and therefore\nHe called this, like Himself, _endless_; for this also, like Him, has no\nsimilitude or configuration, nor hath it any vessel or receptacle\nwherein it may be contained, or by means whereof any possible cognizance\ncan be had of it.\n\nAfter thus forming the Crown, He constituted a certain smaller\nreceptacle, the letter Y\u014dd, and filled it from that source; and this is\ncalled \"The Fountain gushing with Wisdom,\" and, manifested in this, He\ncalled Himself WISE, and the vessel He called HAKEMAH, _Wisdom,\nSapientia_.\n\nThen He also constituted a great reservoir, which He called the Ocean;\nand to it He gave the name of BINAH, Understanding, _Intelligentia_. In\nthis He characterized Himself as Intelligent or _Conceiver_. HE is\nindeed the Absolutely Wise and Intelligent, but Hakemah is not Absolute\nWisdom of itself, _but is wise by means of Binah_, who fills Himself\nfrom it, and if this supply were taken from it, would be dry and\nunintelligent.\n\nAnd thereupon seven precious vessels become, to which are given the\nfollowing names: GEDULAH, _Magnificence_ or _Benignity_ [or KHASED,\n_Mercy_]; GEBURAH, _Austerity, Rigor_ or _Severity_; TEPHARETH;\n_Beauty_; NETSAKH, _Victory_; H\u014cD, _Glory_; YESOD, _Foundation_ or\n_Basis_; and MALAKOTH, _Rule, Reign, Royalty, Dominion_ or _Power_. And\nin GEDULAH He took the character of _Great_ and _Benignant_; in GEBURAH,\nof _Severe_; in TEPHARETH, of _Beautiful_; in NETSAKH, of _Overcoming_;\nin H\u014cD, of OUR GLORIOUS AUTHOR; in YESOD, of _Just_, by Yesod all\nvessels and worlds being upheld; and in MALAKOTH He applied to Himself\nthe title of _King_.\n\nThese numerations or Sephiroths are held in the Kabala to have been\noriginally contained in each other; that is, Kether contained the nine\nothers, Hakemah contained Binah, and Binah contained the last seven.\n\nFor all things, says the commentary of Rabbi _Jizchak Lorja_, in a\ncertain most abstruse manner, consist or reside and are contained in\nBinah, and it projects them, and sends them downward, species by\nspecies, into the several worlds of Emanation, Creation, Formation, and\nFabrication; all whereof are derived from what are above them, and are\ntermed their out-flowings; for, from the potency which was their state\nthere, they descend into actuality.\n\nThe INTRODUCTION says:\n\nIt is said in many places in the Sohar, that all things that emanate or\nare created have their root above. Hence also the Ten Sephiroth have\ntheir root above, in the world of the garment, with the very Substance\nof HIM. And AINSOPH had full consciousness and appreciation, prior to\ntheir actual existence, of all the Grades and Impersonations contained\nunmanifested within Himself, with regard to the essence of each, and its\ndomination then in potency ... When He came to the Sephirah of the\nImpersonation Malakoth, which He then contained hidden within Himself,\nHe concluded within Himself that therein worlds should be framed; since\nthe scale of the first nine Sephiroths was so constituted, that it was\nneither fit nor necessary for worlds to be framed from _them_; for all\nthe attributes of these nine Superior Sephiroth could be assigned to\nHimself, even if He should never operate outwardly; but Malakoth, which\nis Empire or Dominion, could not be attributed to Him, unless He ruled\nover other Existences; whence from the point Malakoth He produced all\nthe worlds into actuality.\n\nThese circles are ten in number. Originated by points, they expanded in\ncircular shape. Ten Circles, under the mystery of the ten Sephiroth, and\nbetween them ten Spaces; whence it appears that the sphere of Splendor\nis in the centre of the space Malakoth of the First Occult Adam.\n\nThe First Adam, _in the ten circles above the Splendor_, is called the\nFirst _occult_ Adam; and in each of these spaces are formed many\nthousand worlds. The first Adam is _involved_ in the Primal Ether, and\nis the analogue of the world Binah.\n\nAgain the Introduction repeats the first and second descent of Y\u014dd into\nthe vacated space, to make the light there less great and subtile; the\nconstitution of the _Tehiru_, Splendor, from the light left behind there\nby him; the communication of Light to him by the female letter He; the\nemission by him of that Light, within the sphere of Splendor, and the\nformation thereof, within the sphere \"of a certain sphere called the\nSupreme Crown,\" _Corona Summa_, KETHER, \"wherein were contained, in\npotence, all the remaining Numerations, so that they were not\ndistinguishable from it. Precisely as in man exist the four elements, in\npotence specifically undistinguishable, so in this Corona were in\npotence all the ten Numerations, specifically undistinguishable.\" This\nCrown, it is added, was called, after the restoration, The Cause of\nCauses, and the Ancient of the Ancients.\n\nThe point, Kether, adds the Introduction, was the aggregate of all the\nTen ... when it first emanated, it consisted of all the Ten; and the\nLight which extended from the Emanative Principle simultaneously flowed\ninto _it_; and beheld the two _Universals_ [that is, the Unities out of\nwhich manifoldness flows; as, for example, the _idea_, within the Deity,\nof Humanity as a Unit, out of which the individuals were to flow], the\nVessel or Receptacle containing this immitted Light, and the Light\nItself within it. And _this Light is the Substance of the point Kether;\nfor the WILL, of God is the Soul of all things that are_.\n\nThe Ainsophic Light, it had said, was infinite in every direction, and\nwithout end or limit. To prevent it from flowing into and re-filling the\nquasi-vacant space, occupied by an infinitely less Splendor, a partition\nbetween the greater and lesser Splendor was necessary; and this\npartition, the boundary of the sphere of Splendor, and a like one\nbounding the sphere Kether, were called _Vessels_ or _Receptacles,\ncontaining_, including, and enclosing within themselves the light of the\nsphere. Imagine a sea of pellucid water, and in the centre of it a\nspherical mass of denser and darker water. The outer surface of this\nsphere, or its limits every way, is the vessel containing it. The\nKabalah regards the vessels \"as by their nature somewhat opaque, and not\nso splendid as the light they enclose.\"\n\nThe contained Light is the Soul of the vessels, and is active in them,\nlike the Human Soul in the human body. The Light of the Emanative\nPrinciple [Ainsoph] _inheres_ in the vessels, as their _Life_, internal\n_Light_, and _Soul_ ... Kether emanated, with its Very Substance, at the\nsame time as Substance and Vessel, in like manner as the flame is\nannexed to the live coal, and as the Soul pervades, and is within, the\nbody. All the Numerations were potentially contained in it.\n\nAnd this potentiality is thus explained: When a woman conceives, a Soul\nis immediately sent into the embryo which is to become the infant, in\nwhich Soul are then, potentially, all the members and veins of the body,\nwhich afterward, from that potency of the Soul, _become_ in the human\nbody of the child to be born.\n\nThen the wisdom of God commanded that these Numerations potentially in\nKether, should be produced from potentiality into actuality, in order\nthat worlds might consist; and HE directed Y\u014dd again to descend, and to\nenter into and shine within Kether, and then to re-ascend: which was so\ndone. From which illumination and re-ascension, all the other\nnumerations, potentially in Kether, were manifested and disclosed; but\nthey continued still compacted together, remaining within Kether in a\ncircle.\n\nWhen God willed to produce the other emanations or numerations from\nKether, it is added, HE sent Y\u014dd down again, to the upper part of\nKether, one-half of him to remain without and one-half to penetrate\nwithin the sphere of Kether. Then He sent the letter Vav into the\nSplendor, to pour out its light on Y\u014dd: and thus,--\n\nY\u014dd received light from Vav, and thereby so directed his countenance\nthat it should illuminate and confer exceeding great energy on Hakemah,\nwhich yet remained in Kether; so giving it the faculty to proceed forth\ntherefrom; and that it might collect and contain within itself, and\nthere reveal, all the other eight numerations, until that time in\nKether.\n\nThe sphere of Kether opened, and thereout issued Hakemah, to remain\nbelow Kether, containing in itself all the other numerations.\n\nBy a similar process, Binah, illuminated within Hakemah by a second Y\u014dd,\n\"issued forth out of Hakemah, having within itself the Seven lower\nNumerations.\"\n\nAnd since the vessel of Binah was excellent, and coruscated with rays of\nthe color of sapphire, and was so nearly of the same color as the vessel\nof Hakemah that there was scarcely any difference between them, hence it\nwould not quietly remain below Hakemah, but rose, and placed itself on\nhis left side.\n\nAnd because the light from above profusely flowed into and accumulated\nin the vessel of Hakemah, to so great an extent that it overflowed, and\nescaped, coruscating, outside of that vessel, and, flowing off to the\nleft, communicated potency and increase to the vessel of Binah.... For\nBinah is _female_....\n\nBinah, therefore, by means of this energy that flowed into it from the\nleft side of Hakemah, by virtue of the second Y\u014dd, came to possess such\nvirtue and potency, as to project beyond itself the Seven remaining\nvessels contained within itself, and so emitted them all, continuously,\none after the other ... all connected and linked one with the other,\nlike the links of a chain.\n\nThree points first emanated, one under the other; Kether, Hakemah, and\nBinah; and, so far, there was no copulation. But afterward the positions\nof Hakemah and Binah changed, so that they were side by side, Kether\nremaining above them; and then conjunction of the Male and Female, ABA\nand IMMA, _Father_ and _Mother_, as points.\n\nHe, from Whom all emanated, created Adam Kadmon, consisting of all the\nworlds, so that in him should be somewhat from those above, and somewhat\nfrom those below. Hence in Him was NEPHESCH [PSYCHE, _anima infima_, the\nlowest spiritual part of man, _Soul_], from the world ASIAH, which is\none letter _He_ of the Tetragrammaton; _RUACH_ [SPIRITUS, _anima media_,\nthe next higher spiritual part, or _Spirit_], from the world YEZIRAH,\nwhich is the _Vav_ of the Tetragrammaton; NESCHAMAH [the highest\nspiritual part, _mens_ or _anima superior_], from the world BRIAH, which\nis the other letter _He_; and NESCHAMAH LENESCHAMAH, from the world\nATSILUTH, which is the Y\u014cD of the Tetragrammaton.\n\nAnd these letters [the Sephiroth] were changed from the spherical form\ninto the form of a person, the symbol of which person is the BALANCE, it\nbeing _Male_ and _Female_ ... Hakemah on one side, Binah on the other,\nand Kether over them: and so Gedulah on one side, Geburah on the other,\nand Tephareth under them.\n\nThe Book _Omschim_ says: Some hold that the ten Sephiroth succeeded one\nanother in ten degrees, one above the other, in regular gradation, one\nconnected with the other in a direct line, from the highest to the\nlowest. Others hold that they issued forth in three lines, parallel with\neach other, one on the right hand, one on the left, and one in the\nmiddle; so that, beginning with the highest and going clown to the\nlowest, Hakemah, Khased [or Gedulah], and Netsach are one over the\nother, in a perpendicular line, on the right hand; Binah, Geburah, and\nH\u014dd on the left; and Kether, Tephareth, Yesod, and Malakoth in the\nmiddle: and many hold that all the ten subsist in circles, one within\nthe other, and all homocentric.\n\nIt is also to be noted, that the Sephirothic tables contain still\nanother numeration, sometimes called also a Sephirah, which is called\nDaath, cognition. It is in the middle, below Hakemah and Binah, and is\nthe result of the conjunction of these two.\n\nTo Adam Kadmon, the Idea of the Universe, the Kabalah assigns a human\nform. In this, Kether is the cranium, Hakemah and Binah the two lobes\nof the brain, Gedulah and Geburah the two arms, Tephareth the trunk,\nNetsach and H\u014dd the thighs, Yesod the male organ, and Malkuth the female\norgan, of generation.\n\nY\u014dd is Hakemah, and He Binah; Vav is Tephareth, and the last He,\nMalkuth.\n\nThe whole, say the Books _Mysterii_ or of _Occultation_, is thus summed\nup: The intention of God The Blessed was to form Impersonations, in\norder to diminish the Light. Wherefore HE constituted, in\nMacroprosopos, Adam Kadmon, or Arik Anpin; three Heads. The first is\ncalled, \"The Head whereof is no cognition\"; the second, \"The Head of\nthat which is non-existent\"; and the third, \"The Very Head of\nMacroprosopos\"; and these three are _Corona, Sapientia_, and\n_Informatio_, Kether, Hakemah, and Binah, existent in the Corona of the\nWorld of Emanation, or in Macroprosopos; and these three are called in\nthe Sohar ATIKA KADISCHA, _Senex Sanctissimus_, The Most Holy Ancient.\nBut the Seven inferior Royalties of the first Adam are called \"The\nAncient of Days\"; and this Ancient of Days is the internal part, or\nSoul, of Macroprosopos.\n\nThe human mind has never struggled harder to understand and explain to\nitself the process of creation, and of Divine manifestation, _and at the\nsame time to conceal its thoughts from all but the initiated_, than in\nthe Kabalah. Hence, much of it seems at first like jargon. Macroprosopos\nor Adam Kadmon is, we have said, the idea or intellectual aggregate of\nthe whole Universe, included and contained unevolved in the manifested\nDeity, Himself yet contained unmanifested in the Absolute. The Head,\nKether, \"whereof is no cognition,\" is the _Will_ of the Deity, or the\nDeity _as_ Will. Hakemah, the head \"of that which is non-existent,\" is\nthe Generative Power of begetting or producing Thought; yet _in_ the\nDeity, not in action, and therefore non-existent. Binah, \"the very or\nactual head\" of Macroprosopos, is the productive intellectual capacity,\nwhich, impregnated by Hakemah, is to _produce_ the Thought. This Thought\nis Daath; or rather, the result is Intellection, Thinking; the Unity, of\nwhich Thoughts are the manifold outflowings.\n\nThis may be illustrated by a comparison. Pain, in the human being, is a\nfeeling or sensation. It must be _produced_. To produce it, there must\nbe, not only the _capacity_ to _produce_ it, in the nerves, but also the\n_power_ of _generating_ it by means of that capacity. This generative\nPower, the Passive Capacity which produces, and the pain produced, are\nlike Hakemah, Binah, and Daath.\n\nThe four Worlds or Universals, Aziluth, Briah, Yetzirah, and Asiah, of\nEmanation, Creation, Formation, and Fabrication, are another enigma of\nthe Kabalah. The first three are wholly _within_ the Deity. The first is\nthe Universe, as it exists potentially in the Deity, determined and\nimagined, but as yet wholly formless and undeveloped, except so far as\nit is contained in His Emanations. The second is the Universe in idea,\ndistinct within the Deity, but not invested with forms; a simple unity.\nThe third is the same Universe in potence in the Deity, unmanifested,\nbut invested with forms,--the idea developed into manifoldness and\nindividuality, and succession of species and individuals; and the fourth\nis the potentiality become the Actuality, the Universe fabricated, and\nexisting as it exists for us.\n\nThe Sephiroth, says the _Porta C\u0153lorum_, by the virtue of their Infinite\nEmanator, who uses them as a workman uses his tools, and who operates\nwith and through them, are the cause of existence of everything created,\nformed, and fashioned, employing in their production certain _media_.\nBut these same _Sephiroth, Persons_ and _Lights_, are not creatures _per\nse_, but _ideas_, and _Rays_ of THE INFINITE, which, by different\ngradations, so descended from the Supreme Source as still not to be\nsevered from It; but It, through them, is extended to the production and\ngovernment of all Entities, and is the Single and Perfect Universal\nCause of All, though becoming determinate for this or the other\noperation, through this or that Sephiroth or MODE.\n\nGod produced all things by His Intellect and Will and free\nDetermination. He willed to produce them by the mediation of His\nSephiroth, and Persons ... by which He is enabled most perfectly to\nmanifest Himself; and that the _more_ perfectly, by producing the causes\nthemselves, and the Causes of Causes, and not merely the viler effects.\n\nGod produced, in the first Originate, all the remaining causates. For,\nas He Himself is most simply One, and from One Simple Being One only can\n_im_mediately proceed, hence it results that from the First Supreme\nInfinite Unity flowed forth at the same time All and One. One, that is,\nin so far as flowing from the Most Simple Unity, and being like unto It;\nbut also All, in so far as, departing from that perfect Singleness which\ncan be measured by no other Singleness, it became, to a certain extent,\nmanifold, though still Absolute and Perfect.\n\nEmanation, says the same, is the Resulting displayed from the\nUnresulting, the Finite from the Infinite, the Manifold and Composite\nfrom the Perfect Single and Simple, Potentiality from that which is\nInfinite Power _and_ Act, the mobile from that which is perennially\npermanent; and therefore in a more imperfect and diminished mode than\nHis Infinite Perfection is. As the First Cause is all things, in an\nunresulting and Infinite mode, so the Entities that flow from Him are\nthe First Causes, in a resulting and finite mode.\n\nTHE NECESSARY ENTITY, subsisting of Itself, as It cannot be dissevered\ninto the manifold, yet becomes, as it were, multiplied in the Causates,\nin respect of their Nature, or of the Subsistences, Vessels, and\nopenings assigned to them; whereby the Single and Infinite Essence,\nbeing inclosed or comprehended in these limits, bounds, or\nexternalnesses, takes on Itself Definiteness of dimension, and becomes\nItself manifold, by the manifoldness of these envelopes.\n\nAs man [the unit of Humanity] is a microcosm, so Adam Kadmon is a\nmacrocosm, containing all the Causates of the First Cause ... as the\nMaterial Man is the end and completion of all creation, so in the Divine\nMan is the beginning thereof. As the inferior Adam _receives_ all things\n_from_ all, so the superior Adam _supplies_ all things _to_ all. As the\nformer is the principle of _reflected_ light, so the latter is of\n_Direct_ Light. The former is the terminus of the Light, descending; the\nlatter its terminus, ascending. As the Inferior man ascends from the\nlowest matter even to the First Cause, so the Superior Adam descends\nfrom the Simple and Infinite Act, even to the lowest and most attenuated\nPotence.\n\nThe Ternary is the bringing back of duality to unity.\n\nThe Ternary is the Principle of Number, because, bringing back the\nbinary to unity, it restores to it the same quantity whereby it had\ndeparted from unity. It is the first odd number, containing in itself\nthe first even number and the unit, which are the Father and Mother of\nall Numbers; and it has in itself the beginning, middle, and end.\n\nNow, Adam Kadmon emanated from the Absolute Unity, and so is himself a\nunit; but he also descends and flows downward into his own Nature, and\nso is duality. Again, he returns to the Unity, which he hath in himself,\nand to The Highest, and so is the Ternary and Quaternary.\n\nAnd this is why the Essential Name has four letters,--three different\nones, and one of them once repeated; since the first He is the wife of\nthe Y\u014dd, and the second He is the wife of the Vav.\n\nThose _media_ which manifest the First Cause, in Himself profoundly\nhidden, are the Sephiroth, which emanate immediately from that First\nCause, and by Its Nature have produced and do control all the rest.\n\nThese Sephiroth were put forth from the One First and Simple,\nmanifesting His Infinite Goodness. They are the mirrors of His Truth,\nand the analogues of His Supremest Essence, the Ideas of His Wisdom, and\nthe representations of His will; the receptacles of His Potency, and the\ninstruments with which He operates; the Treasury of His Felicity, the\ndispensers of His Benignity, the Judges of His Kingdom, and reveal His\nLaw; and finally, the Denominations, Attributes, and Names of Him Who is\nabove all and the Cause of all ... the ten categories, wherein all\nthings are contained; the universal genera, which in themselves include\nall things, and utter them outwardly ... the Second Causes, whereby the\nFirst Cause effects, preserves, and governs all things; the rays of the\nDivinity, whereby all things are illumined and manifested; the Forms and\nIdeas and Species, out whereof all things issue forth; the Souls and\nPotencies, whereby essence, life, and movement are given to all things;\nthe Standard of times, whereby all things are measured; the incorporeal\nSpaces which, in themselves, hold and inclose the Universe; the Supernal\nMonads to which all manifolds are referred, and through them to The One\nand Simple; and finally the Formal Perfections, flowing forth from and\nstill connected with the One Eminent Limitless Perfection, are the\nCauses of all dependent Perfections, and so illuminate the elementary\nIntelligences, not adjoined to matter, and the intellectual Souls, and\nthe Celestial, Elemental and Element-produced bodies.\n\nThe IDRA SUTA says:\n\nHE, the Most Holy Hidden Eldest, separates Himself, and is ever more and\nmore separated from all that are; nor yet does HE in very deed separate\nHimself; because all things cohere with Him and HE with All. HE is All\nthat is, the Most Holy Eldest of All, the Occult by all possible\noccultations.\n\nWhen HE takes shape, HE produces nine Lights, which shine forth from\nHim, from His outforming. And those Lights outshine from Him and emit\nflames, and go forth and spread out on every side; as from one elevated\nLamp the Rays are poured forth in every direction, and these Rays thus\ndiverging, are found to be, when one approaching has cognizance of them,\nbut a single Lamp.\n\nThe Space in which to create is fixed by THE MOST HOLY ANCIENT, and\nilluminated by His inflowing, which is the Light of Wisdom, and the\nBeginning from which manifestation flows.\n\nAnd HE is conformed in three Heads, which are but one Head; and these\nthree are extended into Microprosopos, and from them shines out all that\nis.\n\nThen this Wisdom instituted investiture with form, whereby the\nunmanifested and informous became manifested, putting on form; and\nproduced a certain outflow.\n\nWhen this Wisdom is thus expanded by flowing forth, then it is called\n\"Father of Fathers,\" the whole Universe of Things being contained and\ncomprehended in it. This Wisdom is the principle of all things, and in\nit beginning and end are found.\n\nThe Book of the Abstruse, says the _Siphra de Zeniutha_, is that which\ndescribes the equilibrium of the Balance. Before the Balance was, face\ndid not look toward face.\n\nAnd the _Commentary_ on it says: The Scales of the Balance are\ndesignated as Male and Female. In the Spiritual world Evil and Good are\n_in equilibrio_, and it will be restored, when of the Evil Good becomes,\nuntil all is Good. Also this other world is called the World of the\nBalance. For, as in the Balance are two scales, one on either side and\nthe beam and needle between them, so too in this world of restoration,\nthe Numerations are arranged as distinct persons. For Hakemah is on the\nright hand, on the side of Gedulah, and Binah on the left, on the side\nof Geburah; and Kether is the beam of the Balance above them in the\nmiddle. So Gedulah or Khased is on one hand, and Geburah on the other,\nand under these Tephareth; and Netsach is on one side, and H\u014dd on the\nother, and under these Yes\u014dd.\n\nThe Supreme Crown, which is the Ancient Most Holy, the most Hidden of\nthe Hidden, is fashioned, _within_ the occult Wisdom, of both sexes,\nMale and Female.\n\nHakemah, and Binah, the Mother, whom it impregnates, are quantitatively\nequal. Wisdom and the Mother of Intellection go forth at once and dwell\ntogether; for when the Intellectual Power emanates, the productive\n_Source_ of intellection is included in Him.\n\nBefore Adam Kadmon was fashioned into Male and Female, and the state of\nequilibrium introduced, the Father and Mother did not look each other in\nthe face; for the Father denotes most perfect Love, and the Mother most\nperfect Rigor; and she averted her face.\n\nThere is no _left_ [female], says the _Idra Rabba_, in the Ancient and\nHidden One; but His totality is Right [male]. The totality of things is\nHUA, HE, and HE is hidden on every side.\n\nMacroprosopos [Adam Kadmon] is not so near unto us as to speak to us in\nthe first person; but is designated in the third person, HUA, HE.\n\nOf the letters it says:\n\nY\u014dd is male, He is female, Vav is both.\n\nIn Y\u014dd [\u05d9] are three Y\u014dds, the upper and the lower apex, and Vav in the\nmiddle. By the upper apex is denoted the Supreme Kether; by Vav in the\nmiddle, Hakemah; and by the lower apex, Binah.\n\nThe IDRA SUTA says:\n\nThe Universe was out-formed in the form of Male and Female. Wisdom,\npregnant with all that is, when it flowed and shone forth, shone\naltogether under the form of male and female. Hakemah is the Father, and\nBinah is the Mother; and so the two are in equilibrium as male and\nfemale, and for this reason, all things whatsoever are constituted in\nthe form of male and female; _and if it were not_ so _they would not\nexist_.\n\nThis Principle, Hakemah, is the Generator of all things; and He and\nBinah conjoin, and she shines within Him. When they thus conjoin, she\nconceives, and the out-flow is Truth.\n\nY\u014dd impregnates the letter He and begets a son; and she, thus pregnant,\nbrings forth. The Principle called Father [the Male or Generative\nPrinciple] is comprehended in Y\u014dd, which itself flows downward from the\nenergy of the Absolute Holy One.\n\nY\u014dd is the beginning and the end of all things that are. The stream that\nflows forth is the Universe of things, which always _becomes_, having no\ncessation. And this _becoming_ world is created by Y\u014dd: for Y\u014dd includes\ntwo letters. All things are included in Y\u014dd; wherefore it is called the\nFather of all.\n\nAll Categories whatever go forth from Hakemah; and in it are contained\nall things, unmanifested; and the aggregate of all things, or the Unity\n_in_ which the many _are_, and _out_ of which all flow, is the Sacred\nName IHUH.\n\nIn the view of the Kabalists, all individuals are _contained_ in\nspecies, and all species in genera, and all particulars in a Universal,\nwhich is an idea, abstracted from all consideration of individuals; not\nan _aggregate_ of individuals; but, as it were, an _Ens_, Entity or\nBeing, ideal or intellectual, but none the less real; prior to _any_\nindividual, _containing_ them all, and out of which they are all in\nsuccession evolved.\n\nIf this discontents you, reflect that, supposing the theory correct,\nthat _all_ was originally in the Deity, and that the Universe has\nproceeded forth from Him, and not been _created_ by Him out of nothing,\nthe _idea_ of the Universe, existing in the Deity before its out-flow,\nmust have been as real as the Deity Himself. The whole Human race, or\nHumanity, for example, then existed in the Deity, not distinguished into\nindividuals, but as a Unit, out of which the Manifold was to flow.\n\nEverything _actual_ must also first have been _possible_, before having\nactual existence; and this possibility or potentiality was to the\nKabalists a real Ens. Before the evolvement of the Universe, it had to\nexist _potentially_, the whole of it, with all its individuals, included\nin a single Unity. This was the Idea or Plan of the Universe; and this\nhad to be _formed_. It had to emanate from the Infinite Deity, and be\n_of_ Himself, though not His Very Self.\n\nGeburah, Severity, the Sephirah opposite to and conjoined sexually with\nGedulah, to produce Tephareth, Harmony and Beauty, is also called in the\nKabalah \"_Judgment_,\" in which term are included the ideas of\n_limitation_ and _conditioning_, which often seems, indeed, to be its\nprincipal sense; while Benignity is as often styled _Infinite_. Thus it\nis obscurely taught that in everything that is, not only the _Finite_\nbut also the _Infinite_ is present; and that the rigor of the stern law\nof limitation, by which everything below or beside the Infinite Absolute\nis limited, bounded, and conditioned, is tempered and modified by the\n_grace_, which so relaxes it that the Infinite, Unlimited,\nUnconditioned, is also everywhere present; and that it is thus the\nSpiritual and Material Natures are _in equilibrio_, Good everywhere\ncounterbalancing Evil, Light everywhere in equilibrium with Darkness:\nfrom which again results the Universal Harmony of things. In the vacant\nspace effected for creation, there at last remained a faint vestige or\ntrace of Ainsophic Light, of the Light of the Substance of the Infinite.\nMan is thus both human and divine: and the _apparent_ antagonisms in his\nNature are a real equilibrium, _if he wills it shall be so_; from which\nresults the Harmony, not only of Life and Action, but of Virtue and\nPerfection.\n\nTo understand the Kabalistic idea of the Sephiroth, it must be borne in\nmind that they were assigned, not only to the world of Emanation,\nAziluth, but also to each of the other worlds, Briah, Jezirah, and\nAsiah. They were not only attributes of the Unmanifested Deity, not only\nHimself in limitation, but His actual manifestations, or His qualities\nmade apparent as modes; and they were also qualities of the Universal\nNature--Spiritual, Mental, and Material, produced and made existent by\nthe outflow of Himself.\n\nIn the view of the Kabalah, God and the Universe were One, and in the\nOne General, as the type or source, were included and involved, and from\nit have been evolved and issued forth, the manifold and all particulars.\nWhere, indeed, does individuality begin? Is it the Hidden Source and\nSpring alone that is the individual, the Unit, or is it the flowing\nfountain that fills the ocean, or the ocean itself, or its waves, or the\ndrops, or the vaporous particles, that are the individuals? The Sea and\nthe River--these are each One; but the drops of each are many. The tree\nis one; but its leaves are a multitude: they drop with the frosts, and\nfall upon his roots; but the tree still continues to grow, and new\nleaves come again in the Spring. Is the Human Race not the Tree, and are\nnot individual men the leaves? How else explain the force of will and\nsympathy, and the dependence of one man at every instant of his life on\nothers, except by the oneness of the race? The links that bind all\ncreated things together are the links of a single Unity, and the whole\nUniverse is One, developing itself into the manifold.\n\nObtuse commentators have said that the Kabalah assigns sexual\ncharacteristics to the very Deity. There is no warrant for such an\nassertion, anywhere in the Sohar or in any commentary upon it. On the\ncontrary, the whole doctrine of the Kabalah is based on the fundamental\nproposition, that the Very Deity is Infinite, everywhere extended,\nwithout limitation or determination, and therefore without any\nconformation whatever. In order to commence the process of creation, it\nwas necessary for Him, first of all, to effect a vacant space within\nHimself. To this end the Deity, whose Nature is approximately expressed\nby describing Him as Light filling all space, formless, limitless,\ncontracts Himself on all sides from a point within Himself, and thus\neffects a quasi-vacant space, in which only a vestige of His Light\nremains; and into this circular or spherical space He immits His\nEmanations, portions of His Light or Nature; and to some of these,\nsexual characteristics are symbolically assigned.\n\nThe Infinite first limits Himself by flowing forth in the shape of\n_Will_, of determination to act. This _Will_ of the Deity, or the Deity\n_as_ will, is _Kether_, or the _Crown_, the first Sephirah. In it are\n_included_ all other Emanations. This is a philosophical necessity. The\nInfinite does not _first_ will, and _then_, as a sequence to, or\nconsequence of, that determination, _subsequently_ perform. To will and\nto act must be, with Him, not only simultaneous, but in reality _the\nsame_ ... Nor does He, by His Omniscience, _learn_ that a particular\naction will be wise, and then, in consequence of being so convinced,\nfirst _determine_ to do the act, and _then_ do it. His Wisdom and His\nWill, also, act simultaneously; and, with Him, to decide that it was\nwise to create, _was_ to create. Thus His will contains in itself all\nthe Sephiroth. This will, determining Him to the exercise of\nintellection, to thought, to frame the Idea of the Universe, caused the\nPower in Him to excite the intellectual Faculty to exercise, and _was_\nthat Power. Its SELF, which had flowed forth from Ainsoph as Will, now\nflows forth as the Generative Power to beget intellectual action in the\nIntellectual Faculty, or Intelligence, Binah. The _Act_ itself, the\nThought, the Intellection, producing the Idea, is _Daath_; and as the\ntext of the _Siphra de Zeniutha_ says, The Power and Faculty, the\nGenerative and Productive, the Active and Passive, the Will and\nCapacity, which unite to produce that Act of reflection or Thought or\nIntellection, are _always_ in conjunction. As is elsewhere said in the\nKabalah, both of them are _contained_ and essentially _involved_ in the\nresult. And the Will, _as_ Wisdom or Intellectual Power, and the\nCapacity or Faculty, are really the Father and Mother of all that is;\nfor to the creation of _anything_, it was absolutely necessary that The\nInfinite should form for Himself and _in_ Himself, an idea of what HE\nwilled to produce or create: and, as there is no Time with Him, to _will\nwas_ to _create_, to _plan_ was to _will_ and to _create_; and in the\nIdea, the Universe in potence, the universal succession or things was\nincluded. Thenceforward all was merely evolution and development.\n\nNetsach and H\u014dd, the Seventh and Eighth Sephiroth, are usually called in\nthe Kabalah, Victory and Glory. Netsach is the perfect _Success_, which,\nwith the Deity, to Whom the Future is present, _attends_, and to His\ncreatures is to _result_, from the plan of Equilibrium everywhere\nadopted by Him. It is the reconciliation of Light and Darkness, Good and\nEvil, Free-will and Necessity, God's omnipotence and Man's liberty; and\nthe harmonious issue and result of all, without which the Universe would\nbe a failure. It is the inherent Perfection of the Deity, manifested in\nHis Idea of the Universe, and in all the departments or worlds,\nspiritual, mental, or material, of that Universe; but it is that\nPerfection regarded as the successful _result_, which it both causes or\nproduces and _is_; the _perfection_ of the plan _being_ its _success_.\nIt is the prevailing of Wisdom over Accident; and it, in turn, both\nproduces and _is_ the Glory and Laudation of the Great Infinite\nContriver, whose plan is thus Successful and Victorious.\n\nFrom these two, which are one,--from the excellence and perfection of\nthe Divine Nature and Wisdom, considered as Success and Glory, as the\nopposites of Failure and Mortification, results what the Kabalah,\nstyling it Yesod, Foundation or Basis, characterizes as the Generative\nmember of the Symbolical human figure by which the ten Sephiroth are\nrepresented, and from this flows Malakoth, Empire, Dominion, or Rule.\nYesod is the Stability and Permanence, which would, in ordinary\nlanguage, be said to _result_ from the perfection of the Idea or\nIntellectual Universal, out of which all particulars are evolved; from\nthe _success_ of that scheme, and the consequent _Glory_ or\nSelf-Satisfaction of the Deity; but which Stability and Permanence that\nPerfection, Success, and Glory really Is; since the Deity, infinitely\nWise, and to Whom the Past, Present, and Future were and always will be\none Now, and all space one HERE, had not to await the operation and\nevolution of His plan, as men do the result of an experiment, in order\nto see if it would succeed, and so to determine whether it should stand,\nand be stable and permanent, or fall and be temporary. Its _Perfection_\nwas its _Success_; His _Glory_, its _permanence_ and _stability_: and\nthe Attributes of Permanence and Stability belong, like the others, to\nthe Universe, material, mental, spiritual, and real, _because_ and _as_\nthey belong to the Infinite Himself.\n\nThis Stability and Permanence causes continuance and generates\nsuccession. It _is_ Perpetuity, and continuity without solution; and by\nthis continuous succession, whereby out of Death comes new Life, out of\ndissolution and resolution comes reconstruction, Necessity and Fatality\nresult as a consequence: that is to say, the absolute control and\ndominion (Malakoth) of The Infinite Deity over all that He produces, and\nover chance and accident; and the absolute non-existence in the\nUniverse, in Time and in Space, of any other powers or influences than\nthose which, proceeding from Him, are and cannot _not_ be perfectly\nsubmissive to His will. This _results_, humanly speaking; but in\nreality, the Perfection of the plan, which is its _success_, His\n_glory_, and its _stability_, IS also His Absolute Autocracy, and the\nutter absence of Chance, Accident, or Antagonism. And, as the Infinite\nWisdom or Absolute Reason rules in the Divine Nature itself, so also it\ndoes in its Emanations, and in the worlds or systems of Spirit, Soul,\nand Matter; in each of which there is as little Chance or Accident or\nUnreasoning Fate, as in the Divine Nature unmanifested.\n\nThis is the Kabalistic theory as to each of the four worlds;--1st, of\nthe Divine Nature, or Divinity itself, quantitatively limited and\ndetermined, but not manifested into Entities, which is the world of\n_Emanation_; 2d, of the first Entities, that is, of Spirits and Angels,\nwhich is the world of _Creation_; 3d, of the first _forms_; souls, or\npsychical natures, which is the world of _Formation_ or _Fashioning_;\nand, 4th, of Matter and Bodies, which is the world of _Fabrication_, or,\nas it were, of manufacture. In each of these the Deity is _present, as,\nin_, and _through_ the Ten Sephiroth. First of these, in each, is\nKether, the Crown, ring, or circlet, the HEAD. Next, _in_ that Head, as\nthe two Hemispheres of the Brain, are Hakemah and Binah, and their\nresult and progeny, Daath. These three are found also in the Spiritual\nworld, and are universals in the psychical and material world, producing\nthe lower Sephiroth. Then follow, in perfect Equilibrium, Law and\nEquity, Justice and Mercy, the Divine Infinite Nature and the Human\nFinite Nature, Good and Evil, Light and Darkness, Benignity and\nSeverity, the Male and the Female again, as Hakerrah and Binah are,\nmutually tempering each other, and by their intimate union producing the\nother Sephiroth.\n\nThe whole Universe, and all the succession of entities and events were\npresent to The Infinite, before any act of creation; and His Benignity\nand Leniency, tempering and qualifying the law of rigorous Justice and\ninflexible Retribution, enabled Him to create: because, but for it, and\nif He could not but have administered the strict and stern law of\njustice, that would have compelled Him to destroy, immediately after its\ninception, the Universe He purposed to create, and so would have\n_prevented_ its creation. This Leniency, therefore, was, as it were, the\nvery essence and quintessence of the Permanence and Stability of the\nplan of Creation, and part of the Very Nature of the Deity. The Kabalah,\ntherefore, designates it as _Light_ and _Whiteness_, by which the Very\nSubstance of Deity is symbolized. With this agree Paul's ideas as to Law\nand Grace; for Paul had studied the Kabalah at the feet of Gamaliel the\nRabbi.\n\nWith this Benignity, the Autocracy of the dominion and control of the\nDeity is imbued and interpenetrated. The former, _poured_, as it were,\ninto the latter, is an integral and essential _part_ of it, and causes\nit to give birth to the succession and continuance of the Universe. For\nMalakoth, in the Kabalah, is _female_, and the matrix or womb out of\nwhich all creation is born.\n\n\u00a4_The Sephiroth may be arranged as on page 770._\n\nThe Kabalah is the primitive tradition, and its entirety rests on the\nsingle dogma of Magism, \"the visible is for us the proportional measure\nof the invisible.\" The Ancients, observing that equilibrium is in\nphysics the universal law, and that it results from the apparent\nopposition of two forces, concluded from the physical to the\nmetaphysical equilibrium, and thought that in God, that is to say, in\nthe first living and active cause, two properties necessary to each\nother, should be recognized; stability and movement, necessity and\nliberty, order dictated by reason and the self-rule of Supreme Will,\nJustice, and Love, and consequently Severity and Grace, Mercy or\nBenignity.\n\nThe idea of equilibrium among all the impersonations; of the male on one\nside, and the female on the other, with the Supreme Will, which _is_\nalso the Absolute Reason, above each two, holding the balance, is,\naccording to the Kabalah, the foundation of all religions and all\nsciences, the primary and immutable idea of things. The Sephiroth are a\ntriple triangle and a circle, the idea of the Ternary explained by the\nbalance and multiplied by itself in the\n\n                           \u00a4 \u05db\u05ea\u05e8: Kether: Crown\n                                      Will.\n                            /\\\n                           /  \\\n                          /    \\\n                         /      \\\n  Binah: \u00a4 \u05d7\u05db\u05de\u05d7 \u00a4       /        \\    \u05db\u05d9\u05e0\u05d7: Hakemah:\n Passive capacity      <\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500> Active Potency\nof being impregnated    \\        /  of begetting intellection\n   and producing         \\      /\n   intellection.          \\    /\n                           \\  /\n                            \\/ \u00a4 \u05d3\u05e2\u05ea: Daath: Intellection.\n                            /\\\n                           /  \\\n                          /    \\\n                         /      \\\n                        /        \\ \u00a4 \u05d2\u05d3\u05d5\u05dc\u05d4 Gedulah: Benignity\n  Geburah: \u00a4 \u05d2\u05d1\u05d5\u05e8\u05d4     <\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500>  or     or      or\n  Severity or rigid     \\        / \u00a4 \u05d4\u05dd\u05d3  Khased:   Mercy.\n    Justice              \\      /\n                          \\    /\n                           \\  /\n                            \\/ \u05ea\u05e4\u05d0\u05e8\u05d4: T\u0115phareth: Beauty:\n                            /\\         the Universal Harmony.\n                           /  \\\n                          /    \\\n                         /      \\\n                        <\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500>\n       Hod: \u00a4 \u05e0\u05e6\u05d4 \u00a4      \\      /  \u05d4\u05d5\u05d3: Netsach: Victory\n           Glory          \\    /            or Success.\n                           \\  /\n                            \\/\n                             | \u00a4 \u05d9\u05dd\u05d5\u05d1 Yes\u016bd: Foundation:\n                             | _i.e._, Stability and\n                             |     Permanency of things.\n                             |\n                             |\n                             \u00a4  \u05de\u05dc\u05db\u05d5\u05ea: Malakoth: Dominion:\n      Supremacy and absolute control of the Divine Will in all things,\ndomain of the Ideal; then the realization of this Idea in forms.\n\nUnity can only be manifested by the Binary. Unity itself and the idea of\nUnity are already two.\n\nThe human unity is made complete by the right and left. The primitive\nman was of both sexes.\n\nThe Divinity, one in its essence, has two essential conditions as\nfundamental bases of its existence--Necessity and Liberty.\n\nThe laws of the Supreme Reason necessitate and regulate liberty in God,\nWho is necessarily reasonable and wise.\n\nKnowledge supposes the binary. An object known is indispensable to the\nbeing that knows.\n\nThe binary is the generator of Society and the law. It is also the\nnumber of the _gnosis_, a word adopted in lieu of _Science_, and\nexpressing only the idea of cognizance by intuition. It is Unity,\nmultiplying itself by itself to create; and therefore it is that the\nSacred Symbols make Eve issue from the very chest of Adam.\n\nAdam is the human Tetragram, which is summed up in the mysterious Y\u014dd of\nthe Kabalah, image of the Kabalistic Phallus. Add to this Y\u014dd [\u05d9], the\nternary name of Eve, and you form the name of Jehova, the _Divine_\nTetragram, the transcendent Kabalistic and magical word:\n\n\u05d9\u05d4\u05d5\u05d4\n\nThus it is that Unity, complete in the fecundity of the Ternary, forms,\nwith it, the Quaternary, which is the key of all numbers, movements, and\nforms.\n\nThe Square, turning upon itself, produces the circle equal to itself,\nand the circular movement of four equal angles turning around one point,\nis the quadrature of the circle.\n\nThe Binary serves as a measure for Unity; and the relation of equality\nbetween the Above and the Below, forms with them the Ternary.\n\nTo us, Creation is Mechanism: to the Ancients it was Generation. The\nworld-producing egg figures in all cosmogonies; and modern science has\ndiscovered that all animal production is oviparous. From this idea of\ngeneration came the reverence everywhere paid the image of generative\npower, which formed the Stauros of the Gnostics, and the philosophical\nCross of the Masons.\n\n_Aleph_ is the man; _Beth_ is the woman. _One_ is the Principle; _two_\nis the Word. A. is the Active; B. is the Passive. Unity is Boaz, and the\nBinary is Jachin.\n\nThe two columns, Boaz and Jachin, explain in the Kabalah all the\nmysteries of natural, political, and religious antagonism.\n\nWoman is man's creation; and universal creation is the female of the\nFirst Principle. When the Principle of Existence made Himself Creator,\nHe produced by emanation an ideal Y\u014dd; and to make room for it in the\nplenitude of the uncreated Light, He had to hollow out a pit of shadow,\nequal to the dimension determined by His creative desire; and attributed\nby Him to the ideal Y\u014dd of radiating Light.\n\nThe nature of the Active Principle is to diffuse: of the Passive\nPrinciple, to collect and make fruitful.\n\nCreation is the habitation of the Creator-Word. To create, the\nGenerative Power and Productive Capacity must unite, the Binary become\nUnity again by the conjunction. The WORD is the First-BEGOTTEN, not the\nfirst _created_ Son of God.\n\nSANCTA SANCTIS, we repeat again; the Holy things to the Holy, and to him\nwho is so, the mysteries of the Kabalah will be holy. Seek and ye shall\nfind, say the Scriptures: knock and it shall be opened unto you. If you\ndesire to find and to gain admission to the Sanctuary, we have said\nenough to show you the way. If you do not, it is useless for us to say\nmore, as it has been useless to say so much.\n\nThe Hermetic philosophers also drew their doctrines from the Kabalah;\nand more particularly from the Treatise _Beth Alohim_ or _Domus Dei_,\nknown as the _Pneumatica Kabalistica_, of Rabbi Abraham Cohen Irira, and\nthe Treatise _De Revolutionibus Animarum_ of Rabbi Jitz-chak Lorja.\n\nThis philosophy was concealed by the Alchemists under their Symbols, and\nin the jargon of a rude Chemistry,--a jargon incomprehensible and absurd\nexcept to the Initiates; but the key to which is within your reach; and\nthe philosophy, it may be, worth studying. The labors of the human\nintellect are always interesting and instructive.\n\nTo be always rich, always young, and never to die: such has been in all\ntimes the dream of the Alchemists.\n\nTo change into gold, lead, mercury, and all the other metals; to possess\nthe universal medicine and elixir of life; such is the problem to be\nresolved, in order to accomplish this desire and realize this dream.\n\nLike all the Mysteries of Magism, the Secrets of \"the Great Work\" have a\nthreefold signification; they are religious, philosophical, and natural.\n\nThe philosophal gold, in religion, is the Absolute and Supreme Reason:\nin philosophy, it is the Truth; in visible nature, the Sun; in the\nsubterranean and mineral world, the most perfect and pure gold.\n\nIt is for this that the pursuit of the Great Work is called the Search\nfor the Absolute; and the work itself, the work of the Sun.\n\nAll the masters of the Science admit that it is impossible to attain the\nmaterial results, unless there are found in the two higher Degrees all\nthe analogies of the universal medicine and of the philosophal stone.\n\nThen, they say, the work is simple, easy, and inexpensive; otherwise, it\nconsumes fruitlessly the fortune and lives of the seekers.\n\nThe universal medicine for the Soul is the Supreme Reason and Absolute\nJustice; for the mind, mathematical and practical Truth; for the body,\nthe Quintessence, a combination of light and gold.\n\nThe prima materia of the Great Work, in the Superior World, is\nenthusiasm and activity; in the intermediate world, intelligence and\nindustry; in the lower world, labor: and, in Science, it is the Sulphur,\nMercury, and Salt, which by turns volatilized and fixed, compose the\nAZOTH of the Sages.\n\nThe Sulphur corresponds with the elementary form of the Fire; Mercury\nwith the Air and Water; and Salt with the Earth.\n\nThe Great Work is, above all things, the creation of man by himself;\nthat is to say, the full and entire conquest which he effects of his\nfaculties and his future. It is, above all, the perfect emancipation of\nhis will, which assures him the universal empire of Azoth, and the\ndomain of magnetism, that is, complete power over the universal Magical\nagent.\n\nThis Magical agent, which the Ancient Hermetic philosophers disguised\nunder the name of \"_Prima Materia_,\" determines the forms of the\nmodifiable Substance; and the Alchemists said that by means of it they\ncould attain the transmutation of metals and the universal medicine.\n\nThere are two Hermetic operations, one spiritual, the other material,\ndependent the one on the other.\n\nThe whole Hermetic Science is contained in the dogma of Hermes, engraven\noriginally, it is said, on a tablet of emerald. Its sentences that\nrelate to operating the Great Work are as follows:\n\n\"Thou shalt separate the earth from the fire, the subtile from the\ngross, gently, with much industry.\n\n\"It ascends from earth to Heaven, and again descends to earth, and\nreceives the force of things above and below.\n\n\"Thou shalt by this means possess the glory of the whole world, and\ntherefore all obscurity shall flee away from thee.\n\n\"This is the potent force of all force, for it will overcome everything\nsubtile, and penetrate everything solid.\n\n\"So the world was created.\"\n\nAll the Masters in Alchemy who have written of the Great Work, have\nemployed symbolic and figurative expressions; being constrained to do\nso, as well to repel the profane from a work that would be dangerous for\nthem, as to be well understood by Adepts, in revealing to them the whole\nworld of analogies governed by the single and sovereign dogma of Hermes.\n\nSo, in their language, gold and silver are the King and Queen, or the\nSun and Moon; Sulphur, the flying Eagle; Mercury, the Man-woman, winged,\nbearded, mounted on a cube, and crowned with flames; Matter or Salt, the\nwinged Dragon; the Metals in ebullition, Lions of different colors; and,\nfinally, the entire work has for its symbols the Pelican and the Ph\u0153nix.\n\nThe Hermetic Art is, therefore, at the same time a religion, a\nphilosophy, and a natural science. As a religion, it is that of the\nAncient Magi and the Initiates of all ages; as a philosophy, we may find\nits principles in the school of Alexandria and the theories of\nPythagoras; as a science, we must inquire for its processes of\nParacelsus, Nicholas Flamel, and Raymond Lulle.\n\nThe Science is a real one only for those who admit and understand the\nphilosophy and the religion; and its process will succeed only for the\nAdept who has attained the sovereignty of will, and so become the King\nof the elementary world: for the grand agent of the operation of the\nSun, is that force described in the Symbol of Hermes, of the table of\nemerald; it is the universal magical power; the spiritual, fiery, motive\npower; it is the Od, according to the Hebrews, and the Astral light,\naccording to others.\n\nTherein is the secret fire, living and philosophical, of which all the\nHermetic philosophers speak with the most mysterious reserve: the\nUniversal Seed, the secret whereof they kept, and which they represented\nonly under the figure of the Caduceus of Hermes.\n\nThis is the grand Hermetic arcanum. What the Adepts call dead matter are\nbodies as found in nature; living matters are substances assimilated and\nmagnetized by the science and will of the operator.\n\nSo that the Great Work is more than a chemical operation; it is a real\ncreation of the human word initiated into the power of the Word of God.\n\nThe creation of gold in the Great Work is effected by transmutation and\nmultiplication.\n\nRaymond Lulle says, that to make gold, one must have gold and mercury;\nand to make silver, silver and mercury. And he adds: \"I mean by mercury,\nthat mineral spirit so fine and pure that it gilds even the seed of\ngold, and silvers that of silver.\" He meant by this, either electricity,\nor Od, the astral light.\n\nThe Salt and Sulphur serve in the work only to prepare the mercury, and\nit is to the mercury especially that we must assimilate, and, as it\nwere, incorporate with it, the magnetic agent. Paracelsus, Lulle, and\nFlamel alone seem to have perfectly known this mystery.\n\nThe Great Work of Hermes is, therefore, an operation essentially\nmagical, and the highest of all, for it supposes the Absolute in Science\nand in Will. There is light in gold, gold in light, and light in all\nthings.\n\nThe disciples of Hermes, before promising their adepts the elixir of\nlong life or the powder of projection, advised them to seek for the\nPhilosophal _Stone_.\n\nThe Ancients adored the _Sun_, under the form of a black Stone, called\nElagabalus, or Heliogabalus. The faithful are promised, in the\nApocalypse, a white Stone.\n\nThis Stone, says the Masters in Alchemy, is the true _Salt_ of the\nphilosophers, which enters as one-third into the composition of Azoth.\nBut Azoth is, as we know, the name of the grand Hermetic Agent, and the\ntrue philosophical Agent: wherefore they represent their Salt under the\nform of a cubical Stone.\n\nThe Philosophal Stone is the foundation of the Absolute philosophy, the\nSupreme and unalterable Reason. Before thinking of the Metallic work,\nwe must be firmly fixed on the Absolute principles of Wisdom; we must be\nin possession of this Reason, which is the touchstone of Truth. A man\nwho is the slave of prejudices will never become the King of Nature and\nthe Master of transmutations. The Philosophal Stone, therefore, is\nnecessary above all things. How shall it be found? Hermes tells us, in\nhis \"Table of Emerald,\" we must separate the subtile from the fixed,\nwith great care and extreme attention. So we ought to separate our\ncertainties from our beliefs, and make perfectly distinct the respective\ndomains of science and faith; and to comprehend that we do not know the\nthings we believe, nor believe anything that we come to know; and that\nthus the essence of the things of Faith are the unknown and indefinite,\nwhile it is precisely the contrary with the things of Science. Whence we\nshall conclude, that Science rests on reason and experience, and Faith\nhas for its bases sentiment and reason.\n\nThe Sun and Moon of the Alchemists concur in perfecting and giving\nstability to the Philosophal Stone. They correspond to the two columns\nof the Temple, Jachin and Boaz. The Sun is the hieroglyphical sign of\nTruth, because it is the source of Light; and the rough Stone is the\nsymbol of Stability. Hence the Medi\u00e6val Alchemists indicated the\nPhilosophal Stone as the first means of making the philosophical gold,\nthat is to say, of transforming all the vital powers figured by the six\nmetals into Sun, that is, into Truth and Light; which is the first and\nindispensable operation of the Great Work, which leads to the secondary\nadaptation, and enables the creators of the spiritual and living gold,\nthe possessors of the true philosophical Salt, Mercury, and Sulphur, to\ndiscover, by the analogies of Nature, the natural and palpable gold.\n\nTo find the Philosophal Stone, is to have discovered the Absolute, as\nall the Masters say. But the Absolute is that which admits of no errors,\nis the Fixed from the Volatile, is the Law of the Imagination, is the\nvery necessity of Being, is the immutable Law of Reason and Truth. The\nAbsolute is that which IS.\n\nTo find the Absolute in the Infinite, in the Indefinite, and in the\nFinite, this is the Magnum Opus, the Great Work of the Sages, which\nHermes called the Work of the Sun.\n\nTo find the immovable bases of true religious Faith, of Philosophical\nTruth, and of Metallic transmutation, this is the secret of Hermes in\nits entirety, the Philosophal Stone.\n\nThis stone is one and manifold; it is decomposed by Analysis, and\nre-compounded by Synthesis. In Analysis, it is a powder, the powder of\nprojection of the Alchemists; before Analysis, and in Synthesis, it is a\nstone.\n\nThe Philosophal Stone, say the Masters, must not be exposed to the\natmosphere, nor to the gaze of the Profane; but it must be kept\nconcealed and carefully preserved in the most secret place of the\nlaboratory, and the possessor must always carry on his person the key of\nthe place where it is kept.\n\nHe who possesses the Grand Arcanum is a genuine King, and more than a\nking, for he is inaccessible to all fear and all empty hopes. In all\nmaladies of soul and body, a single particle from the precious stone, a\nsingle grain of the divine powder, is more than sufficient to cure him.\n\"Let him hear, who hath ears to hear!\" the Master said.\n\nThe Salt, Sulphur, and Mercury are but the accessorial elements and\npassive instruments of the Great Work. All depends, as we have said, on\nthe internal Magnet of Paracelsus. The entire work consists in\n_projection_: and the projection is perfectly accomplished by the\neffective and realizable understanding of a single word.\n\nThere is but a single important operation in the work; this consists in\n_Sublimation,_ which is nothing else, according to Geber than the\nelevation of dry matter, by means of fire, with adhesion to its proper\nvessel.\n\nHe who desires to attain to the understanding of the Grand Word and the\npossession of the Great Secret, ought carefully to read the Hermetic\nphilosophers, and will undoubtedly attain initiation, as others have\ndone; but he must take, for the key of their allegories, the single\ndogma of Hermes, contained in his table of Emerald, and follow, to class\nhis acquisitions of knowledge and direct the operation, the order\nindicated in the Kabalistic alphabet of the Tarot.\n\nRaymond Lulle has said that, to make gold, we must first have gold.\nNothing is made out of nothing; we do not absolutely _create_ wealth; we\nincrease and multiply it. Let aspirants to science well understand,\nthen, that neither the juggler's tricks nor miracles are to be asked of\nthe adept. The Hermetic science, like all the _real_ sciences, is\nmathematically demonstrable. Its results, even material, are as rigorous\nas that of a correct equation.\n\nThe Hermetic Gold is not only a true dogma, a light without Shadow, a\nTruth without alloy of falsehood; it is also a material gold, real,\npure, the most precious that can be found in the mines of the earth.\n\nBut the living gold, the living sulphur, or the true fire of the\nphilosophers, is to be sought for in the house of Mercury. This fire is\nfed by the air: to express its attractive and expansive power, no better\ncomparison can be used than that of the lightning, which is at first\nonly a dry and earthly exhalation, united to the moist vapor, but which,\nby self-exhalation, takes a fiery nature, acts on the humidity inherent\nin it, which it attracts to itself and transmutes in its nature; after\nwhich it precipitates itself rapidly toward the earth, whither it is\nattracted by a fixed nature like unto its own.\n\nThese words, in form enigmatic, but clear at bottom, distinctly express\nwhat the philosophers mean by their Mercury, fecundated by Sulphur, and\nwhich becomes the Master and regenerator of the Salt. It is the AZOTH,\nthe universal magnetic force, the grand magical agent, the Astral light,\nthe light of life, fecundated by the mental force, the intellectual\nenergy, which they compare to sulphur, on account of its affinities with\nthe Divine fire.\n\nAs to the Salt, it is Absolute Matter. Whatever is matter contains salt;\nand all salt [nitre] may be converted into pure gold by the combined\naction of Sulphur and Mercury, which sometimes act so rapidly, that the\ntransmutation may be effected in an instant, in an hour, without fatigue\nto the operator, and almost without expense. At other times, and\naccording to the more refractory temper of the atmospheric _media,_ the\noperation requires several days, several months, and sometimes even\nseveral years.\n\nTwo primary laws exist in nature, two essential laws, which produce, by\ncounterbalancing each other, the universal equilibrium of things. These\nare fixedness and movement, analogous, in philosophy, to Truth and\nFiction, and, in Absolute Conception, to Necessity and Liberty, which\nare the very essence of Deity. The Hermetic philosophers gave the name\n_fixed_ to everything ponderable, to everything that tends by its\nnatural to central repose and immobility; they term _volatile_\neverything that more naturally and more readily obeys the law of\nmovement; and they form their stone by analysis, that is to say, by the\nvolatilization of the Fixed, and then by synthesis, that is, by fixing\nthe volatile, which they effect by applying to the fixed, which they\ncall their salt, the sulphurated Mercury, or the light of life, directed\nand made omnipotent by a Sovereign Will. Thus they master entire Nature,\nand their stone is found wherever there is salt, which is the reason for\nsaying that no substance is foreign to the Great Work, and that even the\nmost despicable and apparently vile matters may be changed into gold,\nwhich is true in this sense, that they all contain the original\nsalt-principle, represented in our emblems by the cubical stone.\n\nTo know how to extract from all matter the pure salt concealed in it, is\nto have the Secret of the Stone. Wherefore this is a Saline stone, which\nthe Od or universal astral light decomposes or re-compounds: it is\nsingle and manifold; for it may be dissolved like ordinary salt, and\nincorporated with other substances. Obtained by analysis, we might term\nit _the Universal Sublimate:_ found by way of synthesis, it is the true\n_panacea_ of the ancients, for it cures all maladies of soul and body,\nand has been styled, _par-excellence_, the medicine of all nature. When\none, by absolute initiation, comes to control the forces of the\nuniversal agent, he always has this stone at his disposal, for its\nextraction is then a simple and easy operation, very distinct from the\nmetallic projection or realization. This stone, when in a state of\nsublimation, must not be exposed to contact with the atmospheric air,\nwhich might partially dissolve it and deprive it of its virtue; nor\ncould its emanations be inhaled without danger. The Sage prefers to\npreserve it in its natural envelopes, assured as he is of extracting it\nby a single effort of his will, and a single application of the\nUniversal Agent to the envelopes, which the Kabalists call _cortices_,\nthe shells, bark, or integuments.\n\nHieroglyphically to express this law of prudence, they gave their\nMercury, personified in Egypt as Hermanubis, a dog's head; and to their\nSulphur, represented by the Baphomet of the Temple, that goat's head\nwhich brought into such disrepute the occult Medi\u00e6val associations.\n\nLet us listen for a few moments to the Alchemists themselves, and\nendeavor to learn the hidden meaning of their mysterious words.\n\nThe RITUAL of the Degree of Scottish Elder MASTER, and Knight of Saint\nAndrew, being the fourth Degree of Ramsay, it is said upon the\ntitle-page, or of the Reformed or Rectified Rite of Dresden, has these\npassages:\n\n\"O how great and glorious is the _presence_ of the Almighty God which\ngloriously _shines_ from between the Cherubim!\n\n\"How adorable and astonishing are the _rays_ of that glorious _Light_,\nthat sends forth its bright and brilliant beams from the Holy Ark of\nAlliance and Covenant!\n\n\"Let us with the deepest veneration and devotion adore the great Source\nof Life, that Glorious Spirit Who is the Most Merciful and Beneficent\nRuler of the Universe and of all the creatures it contains!\n\n\"The secret knowledge of the Grand Scottish Master relates to the\ncombination and transmutation of different substances; whereof that you\nmay obtain a clear idea and proper understanding, you are to know that\nall matter and all material substances are composed of combinations of\nthree several substances, extracted from the four elements, which three\nsubstances in combination are, _Salt, Sulphur_, and _Spirit_. The first\nof these produces _Solidity_, the second _Softness_, and the third the\n_Spiritual_, vaporous particles. These three compound substances work\npotently together; and therein consists the true process for the\ntransmutation of metals.\n\n\"To these three substances allude the three golden basins, in the first\nof which was engraved the letter M. in the second, the letter G. and\nin the third nothing. The first, M. is the initial letter of the Hebrew\nword _Malakh_, which signifies _Salt_; and the second, G. of the Hebrew\nword _Geparaith_, which signifies _Sulphur_; and as there is no word in\nHebrew to express the vaporous and intangible _Spirit_, there is no\nletter in the third basin.\n\n\"With these three principal substances you may effect the transmutation\nof metals, which must be done by means of the five points or rules of\nthe Scottish Mastership.\n\n\"The first Master's point shows us the Brazen Sea, wherein must always\nbe rain-water; and out of this rain-water the Scottish Masters extract\nthe first substance, which is Salt; which salt must afterward undergo a\n_seven-fold_ manipulation and purification, before it will be properly\nprepared. This seven-fold purification is symbolized by the Seven Steps\nof Solomon's Temple, which symbol is furnished us by the first point or\nrule of the Scottish Masters.\n\n\"After preparing the first substance, you are to extract the second,\nSulphur, out of the purest gold, to which must then be added the\npurified or celestial Salt. They are to be mixed as the Art directs, and\nthen placed in a vessel in the form of a SHIP, in which it is to remain,\nas the Ark of Noah was afloat, one hundred and fifty days, being brought\nto the first damp, warm degree of fire, that it may putrefy and produce\nthe mineral fermentation. This is the second point or rule of the\nScottish Masters.\"\n\nIf you reflect, my Brother, that it was impossible for any one to\nimagine that either common salt or nitre could be extracted from\nrain-water, or sulphur from pure gold, you will no doubt suspect that\nsome secret meaning was concealed in these words.\n\nThe Kabalah considers the immaterial part of man as threefold,\nconsisting of NEPHESCH, RUACH, and NESCHAMAH, _Psyche, Spiritus_, and\n_Mens_, or _Soul, Spirit_, and _Intellect_. There are Seven Holy\nPalaces, Seven Heavens and Seven Thrones; and Souls are purified by\nascending through Seven Spheres. A _Ship_, in Hebrew, is _Ani_; and the\nsame word means _I, Me_, or _Myself_.\n\nThe RITUAL continues:\n\n\"Multiplying the substance thus obtained, is the third operation, which\nis done by adding to them the animate, volatile _Spirit_; which is done\nby means of the water of the Celestial Salt, as well as by the Salt,\nwhich must daily be added to it very carefully, and strictly observing\nto put neither too much nor too little; inasmuch as, if you add too\nmuch, you will destroy that growing and multiplying substance; and if\ntoo little, it will be self-consumed and destroyed, and shrink away, not\nhaving sufficient substantiality for its preservation. This third point\nor rule of the Scottish Masters gives us the emblem of the building of\nthe Tower of Babel, used by our Scottish Masters, because by\nirregularity and want of due proportion and harmony that work was\nstopped; and the workmen could proceed no further.\n\n\"Next comes the fourth operation, represented by the Cubical Stone,\nwhose faces and angles are all equal. As soon as the work is brought to\nthe necessary point of multiplication, it is to be submitted to the\nthird Degree of Fire, wherein it will receive the due proportion of the\nstrength and substance of the metallic particles of the Cubical Stone;\nand this is the fourth point or rule of the Scottish Masters.\n\n\"Finally, we come to the fifth and last operation, indicated to us by\nthe Flaming Star. After the work has become a duly-proportioned\nsubstance, it is to be subjected to the fourth and strongest Degree of\nfire, wherein it must remain three times twenty-seven hours; until it is\nthoroughly glowing, by which means it becomes a bright and shining\ntincture, wherewith the lighter metals may be changed, by the use of one\npart to a thousand of the metal. Wherefore this Flaming Star shows us\nthe fifth and last point of the Scottish Masters.\n\n\"You should pass practically through the five points or rules of the\nMaster, and by the use of one part to a thousand, transmute and ennoble\nmetals. You may then in reality say that your age is a thousand years.\"\n\nIn the oration of the Degree, the following hints are given as to its\ntrue meaning:\n\n\"The three divisions of the Temple, the Outer Court, Sanctuary, and Holy\nof Holies, signify the three Principles of our Holy Order, which direct\nto the knowledge of morality, and teach those most practical virtues\nthat ought to be practised by mankind. Therefore the Seven Steps which\nlead up to the Outer Court of the Temple, are the emblem of the\nSeven-fold Light which we need to possess, before we can arrive at the\nheight of knowledge, in which consist the ultimate limits of our order.\n\n\"In the Brazen Sea we are symbolically to purify ourselves from all\npollutions, all faults and wrongful actions, as well those committed\nthrough error of judgment and mistaken opinion, as those intentionally\ndone; inasmuch as they equally prevent us from arriving at the knowledge\nof True Wisdom. We must thoroughly cleanse and purify our hearts to\ntheir inmost recesses, before we can of right contemplate that _Flaming\nStar_, which is the emblem of the Divine and Glorious Shekinah, or\npresence of God; before we may dare approach the Throne of Supreme\nWisdom.\"\n\nIn the Degree of The True Mason [_Le Vrai Ma\u00e7on_], styled in the\ntitle-page of its Ritual the 23d Degree of Masonry, or the 12th of the\n5th class, the Tracing-board displays a luminous Triangle, with a great\nY\u014dd in the centre.\n\n\"The Triangle,\" says the Ritual, \"represents one God in three Persons;\nand the great Y\u014dd is the initial letter of the last word.\n\n\"The Dark Circle represents the Chaos, which in the beginning God\ncreated.\n\n\"The Cross within the Circle, the Light by means whereof He developed\nthe Chaos.\n\n\"The Square, the four Elements into which it was resolved.\n\n\"The Triangle, again, the three _Principles_ [Salt, Sulphur, and\nMercury], which the intermingling of the elements produced.\n\n\"God _creates_; Nature _produces_; Art _multiplies_. God created Chaos;\nNature produced it; God, Nature, and Art, have perfected it.\n\n\"The Altar of Perfumes indicates the _Fire_ that is to be applied to\nNature. The two _towers_ are the two furnaces, moist and dry, in which\nit is to be worked. The bowl is the mould of oak that is to inclose the\nphilosophal egg.\n\n\"The two figures surmounted by a Cross are the two vases, Nature and\nArt, in which is to be consummated the double marriage of the white\nwoman with the red Servitor, from which marriage will spring a most\nPotent King.\n\n\"Chaos means universal matter, formless, but susceptible of all forms.\nForm is the Light inclosed in the seeds of all species; and its home is\nin the Universal Spirit.\n\n\"To work on universal matter, use the internal and external fire: the\nfour elements result, the _Principia Principiorum_ and _Inmediata_;\nFire, Air, Water, Earth. There are four qualities of these elements--the\nwarm and dry, the cold and moist. Two appertain to each element: The dry\nand cold, to the Earth; the cold and moist, to Water; the moist and\nwarm, to the Air; and the warm and dry, to Fire: whereby the Fire\nconnects with the Earth; all the elements, as Hermes said, moving in\ncircles.\n\n\"From the mixture of the four Elements and of their four qualities,\nresult the three Principles,--Mercury, Sulphur, and Salt. These are the\nphilosophical, not the vulgar.\n\n\"The philosophical Mercury is a _Water_ and SPIRIT, which dissolves and\nsublimates the Sun; the philosophical _Sulphur_, a _fire_ and a Soul,\nwhich mollifies and colors it; the philosophical Salt, an _Earth_ and a\nBODY, which coagulates and fixes it; and the whole is done in the bosom\nof the _Air_.\n\n\"From these three Principles result the four Elements duplicated, or the\nGrand Elements, _Mercury, Sulphur, Salt_, and _Glass_; two of which are\nvolatile,--the Water [Mercury] and the Air [Sulphur], which is oil; for\nall substances liquid in their nature avoid fire, which takes from the\none [water] and burns the other [oil]; but the other two are dry and\nsolid, to wit, the Salt, wherein Fire is contained, and the pure\n_Earth_, which is the Glass; on both of which the Fire has no other\naction than to melt and refine them, unless one makes use of the liquid\nalkali; for, just as each element consists of two qualities, so these\ngreat duplicated Elements partake, each of two of the simple elements,\nor, more properly speaking, of all the four, according to the greater or\nless degree of each,--the Mercury partaking more of the Water, to which\nit is assigned; the Oil or Sulphur, more of the Air; the Salt, of the\nFire; and the Glass, of the Earth; which is found, pure and clear, in\nthe centre of all the elementary composites, and is the last to\ndisengage itself from the others.\n\n\"The four Elements and three Principles reside in all the Compounds,\nAnimal, Vegetable, and Mineral; but more potently in some than in\nothers.\n\n\"The Fire gives them Movement; the Air, Sensation; the Water, Nutriment;\nand the Earth, Subsistence.\n\n\"The four duplicated Elements engender THE STONE, if one is careful\nenough to supply them with the proper quantity of fire, and to combine\nthem according to their natural weight. Ten parts of Air make one of\nWater; ten of Water, one of Earth; and ten of Earth, one of Fire; the\nwhole by the Active Symbol of the one, and the Passive Symbol of the\nother, whereby the conversion of the Elements is effected.\"\n\nThe Allusion of the Ritual, here, is obviously to the four Worlds of the\nKabalah. The ten Sephiroth of the world Briah proceed from Malakoth, the\nlast of the ten Emanations of the world Aziluth; the ten Sephiroth of\nthe world Yezirah, from Malakoth of Briah; and the ten of the world\nAsian, from Malakoth of Yezirah. The Pass-word of the Degree is given as\n_Metralon_, which is a corruption of METATRON, the Cherub, who and\nSandalphon are in the Kabalah the Chief of the Angels. The Active and\nPassive Symbols are the Male and Female.\n\nThe Ritual continues:\n\n\"It is thereby evident that, in the Great Work, we must employ ten parts\nof philosophical Mercury to one of Sun or Moon.\n\n\"This is attained by _Solution_ and _Coagulation_. These words mean that\nwe must dissolve the body and coagulate the spirit; which operations are\neffected by the moist and dry bath.\n\n\"Of colors, _black_ is the Earth; _white_, the Water; _blue_, the Air;\nand _red_, the Fire; wherein also are involved very great secrets and\nmysteries.\n\n\"The apparatus employed in 'The Great Work' consists of the Moist bath,\nthe Dry bath, the Vases of Nature and Art, the bowl of oak, _lutum\nsapienti\u0153_, the Seal of Hermes, the tube, the physical lamp, and the\niron rod.\n\n\"The work is perfected in seventeen philosophical months, according to\nthe mixture of ingredients. The benefits reaped from it are of two\nkinds--one affecting the soul, and the other the body. _The former\nconsist in knowing God, Nature, and ourself_; and those to the body are\nwealth and health.\n\n\"The Initiate traverses Heaven and Earth. Heaven is the World manifest\nto the Intelligence, subdivided into Paradise and Hell; Earth is the\nWorld manifest to the Senses, also subdivided into the Celestial and\nthat of the Elements.\n\n\"There are Sciences specially connected with each of these. _The one is\nordinary and common; the other, mystic and secret_. The World cognizable\nby the Intellect has the Hermetic Theology and the Kabalah; the\nCelestial Astrology; and that of the Elements, Chemistry, which by its\ndecompositions and separations, effected by fire, reveals all the most\nhidden secrets of Nature, in the three kinds of Compound Substances.\nThis last science is styled 'Hermetic,' or 'The operating of the Great\nWork.'\"\n\nThe Ritual of the Degree of Kabalistic and Hermetic Rose, has these\npassages:\n\n\"The true Philosophy, known and practised by Solomon, is the basis on\nwhich Masonry is founded.\n\n\"Our Ancient Masons have concealed from us the most important point of\nthis Divine Art, under hieroglyphical characters, which are but enigmas\nand parables, to all the Senseless, the Wicked, and the Ambitious.\n\n\"He will be supremely fortunate, who shall, by arduous labor, discover\nthis sacred place of deposite, wherein all naked the sublime Truth is\nhidden; for he may be assured that he has found the True Light, the True\nFelicity, the True Heavenly Good. Then may it truly be said that he is\none of the True Elect; for it _is the only real and most Sublime Science\nof all those to which a mortal can aspire_: his days will be prolonged,\nand his soul freed of all vices and corruption; into which\" (it is\nadded, to mislead, as if from fear too much would be disclosed), \"_the\nhuman race is often led by indigence_.\"\n\nAs the symbolism of the Hall and the language of the ritual mutually\nexplain each other, it should be noted here, that in this Degree the\ncolumns of the hall, 12 in number, are white variegated with black and\nred. The hangings are black, and over that crimson.\n\nOver the throne is a great Eagle, in gold, on a black ground. In the\ncentre of the Canopy the Blazing Star in gold, with the letter Y\u014dd in\nits centre. On the right and left of the throne are the Sun in gold and\nthe Moon in silver. The throne is ascended to by _three_ Steps. The hall\nand ante-room are each lighted by _ten_ lights, and a single one at the\nentrance. The colors, black, white, and crimson appear in the clothing;\nand the Key and Balance are among the symbols.\n\nThe duty of the Second Grand Prior, says the Ritual, is \"to see if the\nChapter is hermetically sealed; whether the materials are ready, and the\nelements; whether the Black gives place to the White, and the White to\nthe Red.\"\n\n\"Be laborious,\" it says, \"like the Star, and procure the light of the\nSages, and hide yourself from the Stupid Profane and the Ambitious, and\nbe like the Owl, which sees only by night, and hides itself from\ntreacherous curiosity.\"\n\n\"The Sun, on entering each of his houses, should be received there by\nthe four elements, which you must be careful to invite to accompany you,\nthat they may aid you in your undertaking; for without them the House\nwould be melancholy: wherefore you will give him to feast upon the four\nelements.\n\n\"When he shall have visited his twelve houses, and seen you attentive\nthere to receive him, you will become one of his chiefest favorites, and\nhe will allow you to share all his gifts. Matter will then no longer\nhave power over you; you will, so to say, be no longer a dweller on the\nearth; but after certain periods you will give back to it a body which\nis its own, to take in its stead one altogether Spiritual. Matter is\nthen deemed to be dead to the world.\n\n\"Therefore it must be re-vivified, and made to be born again from its\nashes, which you will effect by virtue of the vegetation of the Tree of\nLife, represented to us by the branch of acacia. Whoever shall learn to\ncomprehend and execute this great work, will know great things, say the\nSages of the work; but whenever you depart from the centre of the Square\nand the Compass you will no longer be able to work with success.\n\n\"Another Jewel is necessary for you, and in certain undertakings cannot\nbe dispensed with. It is what is termed the Kabalistic pantacle ... This\ncarries with it the power of commanding the spirits of the elements. It\nis necessary for you to know how to use it, and that you will learn by\nperseverance if you are a lover of the science of our predecessors the\nSages.\n\n\"A great Black Eagle, the King of Birds. He alone it is that can fire\nthe Sun, material in its nature, that has no form, and yet by its form\ndevelops color. The black is a complete harbinger of the work: it\nchanges color and assumes a natural form, out whereof will emerge a\nbrilliant Sun.\n\n\"The birth of the Sun is always announced by its Star, represented by\nthe Blazing Star, which you will know by its fiery color; and it is\nfollowed in its course by the silvery lustre of the Moon.\n\n\"A rough Ashlar is the shapeless stone which is to be prepared in order\nto commence the philosophical work; and to be developed, in order to\nchange its form from triangular to cubic, after the separation from it\nof its Salt, Sulphur, and Mercury, by the aid of the Square, Level,\nPlumb, and Balance, and all the other Masonic implements _which we use\nsymbolically_.\n\n\"Here me put them to philosophical use, to constitute a\nwell-proportioned edifice, through which you are to make pass the crude\nmaterial, analogous to a candidate commencing his initiation into our\nMysteries. When we build we must observe all the rules and proportions;\nfor otherwise the Spirit of Life cannot lodge therein. So you will build\nthe great tower, in which is to burn the fire of the Sages, or, in other\nwords, the fire of Heaven; as also the Sea of the Sages, in which the\nSun and Moon are to bathe. That is the basin of Purification, in which\nwill be the water of Celestial Grace, water that doth not soil the\nhands, but purifies all leprous bodies.\n\n\"Let us labor to instruct our Brother, to the end that by his toils he\nmay succeed in discovering the principle of life contained in the\nprofundity of matter, and known by the name of _Alkahest_.\n\n\"The most potent of the names of Deity is ADONAI. Its power is to put\nthe Universe in movement; and the Knights who shall be fortunate enough\nto possess it, with weight and measure, shall have at their disposition\nall the potences that inhabit it, the Elements, and the cognizance of\nall the virtues and sciences that man is capable of knowing. By its\npower they would succeed in discovering the primary metal of the Sun,\nwhich holds within itself the Principle of the germ, and wherewith we\ncan put in alliance and six other metals, each of which contains the\nprinciples and primitive seed of the grand philosophical work.\n\n\"The six other metals are Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Venus, Mercury, and\nLuna; vulgarly known as Lead, Tin, Iron, Copper, Quicksilver, and\nSilver. Gold is not included; because it is not in its nature a metal.\nIt is all Spirit and incorruptible; wherefore it is the emblem of the\nSun, which presides over the Light.\n\n\"The vivifying Spirit, called Alkahest, has in itself the generative\nvirtue of producing the triangular Cubical Stone, and contains in itself\nall the virtues to render men happy in this world and in that to come.\nTo arrive at the composition of that Alkahest, we begin by laboring at\nthe science of the union of the four Elements which are to be educed\nfrom the three Kingdoms of Nature, Mineral, Vegetable, and Animal; the\nrule, measure, weight, and equipoise whereof have each their key. We\nthen employ in one work the animals, vegetables, and minerals, each in\nhis season, which make the space of the Houses of the Sun, where they\nhave all the virtues required.\n\n\"Something from each of the three Kingdoms of Nature is assigned to each\nCelestial House, to the end that everything may be done in accordance\nwith sound philosophical rules; and that everything may be thoroughly\npurified in its proper time and place in order to be presented at the\nwedding-table of the Spouse and the six virgins who hold the mystic\nshovel, without a common fire, but with an elementary fire, that comes\nprimarily by _attraction_, and by digestion in the philosophical bed\nlighted by the four elements.\n\n\"At the banquet of the Spouses, the viands, being thoroughly, purified,\nare served in Salt, Sulphur, Spirit, and Oil; a sufficient quantity\nthereof is taken every month, and therewith is compounded, by means of\nthe Balance of Solomon, the Alkahest, to serve the Spouses, when they\nare laid on the nuptial bed, there to engender their embryo, producing\nfor the human race immense treasures, that will last as long as the\nworld endures.\n\n\"Few are capable of engaging in this great work. Only the true\nFree-Masons may of right aspire to it; and even of them, very few are\nworthy to attain it, because most of them are ignorant of the Clavicules\nand their contents, and of the Pantacle of Solomon, which teaches how to\nlabor at the great work.\n\n\"The weight raised by Solomon with his balance was 1, 2, 3, 4, 5; which\ncontains 25 times unity, 2 multiplied by 2; 3 multiplied by 3; 4\nmultiplied by 4; 5 multiplied by 5, and once 9; these numbers thus\ninvolving the squares of 5 and 2, the cube of 2, the square of the\nsquare of 2, and the square of 3.\"\n\nThus far the Ritual, in the numbers mentioned by it, is an allusion to\nthe 47th problem of Euclid, a symbol of Blue Masonry, entirely out of\nplace there, and its meaning unknown. The base of the right-angled\ntriangle being 3, and the perpendicular 4, the hypothenuse is 5, by the\nrule that the sum of the squares of the two former equals the square of\nthe latter,--3X3 being 9; and 4X4, 16; and 9+16 being 25, the square of\n5. The triangle contains in its sides the numbers 1, 2, and 3. The\nPerpendicular is the Male; the Base, the Female; the Hypothenuse, the\nproduct of the two.\n\n[Illustration:]\n\nTo fix the volatile, in the Hermetic language, means to materialize the\nspirit; to volatilize the fixed is to spiritualize matter. To separate\nthe subtile from the gross, in the first operation, which is wholly\ninternal, is to free our soul from all prejudice and all vice. This is\neffected by the use of the philosophical SALT, that is to say, of\nWISDOM; of MERCURY, that is to say, of personal aptitude and labor; and\nof SULPHUR, which represents the vital energy, and the ardor of the\nwill. Thus we succeed in changing into spiritual gold such things even\nas are of least value, and even the foul things of the earth.\n\nIt is in this sense we are to understand the parables of the Hermetic\nphilosophers and the prophets of Alchemy; but in their works, as in the\nGreat Work, we must skillfully separate the subtile from the gross, the\nmystic from the positive, allegory from theory. If you would read them\nwith pleasure and understandingly, you must first understand them\nallegorically in their entirety and then descend from allegories to\nrealities by way of the correspondences or analogies indicated in the\nsingle dogma:\n\n\"What is above is like what is below; and what is below is like what is\nabove.\"\n\nThe treatise \"_Minerva Mundi_,\" attributed to Hermes Trismegistus,\ncontains, under the most poetical and profound allegories, the dogma of\nthe self-creation of beings, or of the law of creation that results from\nthe accord of two forces, these which the Alchemists called the Fixed\nand the Volatile, and which are, in the Absolute, Necessity and Liberty.\n\nWhen the Masters in Alchemy say that it needs but little time and\nexpense to accomplish the works of Science, when they affirm, above all,\nthat but a single vessel is necessary, when they speak of the Great and\nSingle furnace, which all can use, which is within the reach of all the\nworld, and which men possess without knowing it, they allude to the\nphilosophical and moral Alchemy. In fact, a strong and determined will\ncan, in a little while, attain complete independence; and we all possess\nthat chemical instrument, the great and single athanor or furnace, which\nserves to separate the subtile from the gross, and the fixed from the\nvolatile. This instrument, complete as the world, and accurate as the\nmathematics themselves, is designated by the Sages under the emblem of\nthe Pentagram or Star with five points, the absolute sign of human\nintelligence.\n\nThe end and perfection of the Great Work is expressed, in alchemy, by a\ntriangle surmounted by a cross: and the letter Tau, \u05ea, the last of the\nSacred alphabet, has the same meaning.\n\nThe \"elementary fire,\" that comes primarily by attraction, is evidently\nElectricity or the Electric Force, primarily developed as magnetism, and\nin which is perhaps the secret of life or the vital force.\n\nParacelsus, the great Reformer in medicine, discovered magnetism long\nbefore Mesmer, and pushed to its last consequences this luminous\ndiscovery, or rather this initiation into the magic of the ancients, who\nunderstood the grand magical agent better than we do, and did not regard\nthe Astral Light, Azoth, the universal magnetism of the Sages, as an\nanimal and particular fluid, emanating only from certain special beings.\n\nThe four Elements, the four symbolic animals, and the re-duplicated\nPrinciples correspond with each other, and are thus arranged by the\nHermetic Masons:\n\n[Illustration]\n\nThe Air and Earth represent the _Male_ Principle; and the Fire and Water\nbelong to the _Female_ Principle.\n\nTo these four forms correspond the four following philosophical ideas.\n\nSpirit: Matter: Movement: Repose.\n\nAlchemy reduces these four things to three:\n\nThe Absolute: the Fixed: the Volatile.\n\nReason: Necessity; Liberty: are the synonyms of these three words.\n\nAs all the great Mysteries of God and the Universe are thus hidden in\nthe Ternary, it everywhere appears in Masonry and in the Hermetic\nPhilosophy under its mask of Alchemy. It even appears where Masons do\nnot suspect it; to teach the doctrine of the equilibrium of Contraries,\nand the resultant Harmony.\n\nThe double triangle of Solomon is explained by Saint John in a\nremarkable manner: There are, he says, three witnesses in Heaven,--the\nFather, the Word, and the Holy Spirit; and three witnesses on\nearth,--the breath, water, and blood. He thus agrees with the Masters of\nthe Hermetic Philosophy, who give to their Sulphur the name of Ether, to\ntheir Mercury the name of philosophical water, to their Salt that of\nblood of the dragon, or menstruum of the earth. The blood, or Salt,\ncorresponds by opposition with the Father; the Azothic, or Mercurial\nwater, with the Word, or Logos; and the breath, with the Holy Spirit.\nBut the things of High Symbolism can be well understood only by the true\nchildren of Science.\n\nAlchemy has its Symbolic Triad of Salt, Sulphur, and Mercury,--man\nconsisting, according to the Hermetic philosophers, of Body, Soul, and\nSpirit. The Dove, the Raven, and the Ph\u0153nix are striking Symbols of Good\nand Evil, Light and Darkness, and the Beauty resulting from the\nequilibrium of the two.\n\nIf you would understand the true secrets of Alchemy, you must study the\nworks of the Masters with patience and assiduity. Every word is often an\nenigma; and to him who reads in haste, the whole will seem absurd. Even\nwhen they seem to teach that the Great Work is the purification of the\nSoul, and so to deal only with morals, they most conceal their meaning,\nand deceive all but the Initiates.\n\nY\u014dd [[Hebrew] or \u05d9] is termed in the Kabalah the _opifex_, _workman_ of\nthe Deity. It is, says the _Porta C\u0153lorum_, single and primal, like\n_one_, which is the first among numbers; and like a _point_, the first\nbefore all bodies. Moved lengthwise, it produces a _line_, which is Vau,\nand this moved sidewise produces a _superficies_, which is Daleth. Thus\nVau [\u05d5] becomes Daleth [\u05d3]; for movement tends from right to left; and\nall communication is from above to below. The _plenitude_ of Y\u014dd, that\nis, the _name_ of this letter, spelled, is \u05d9\u05d5\u05d3, Y-O-D. Vau [which\nrepresents 6] and Daleth [4] are 10; like Y\u014dd, their principle.\n\nY\u014dd, says the _Siphra de Zeniutha_, is the Symbol of Wisdom and of the\nFather.\n\nThe Principle called Father, says the _Idra Suta_, is comprehended in\nY\u014dd, which flows downward from the Holy influence, wherefore Y\u014dd is the\nmost occult of all the letters; for he is the beginning and end of all\nthings. The Supernal Wisdom is Y\u014dd; and all things are included in Y\u014dd,\nwho is therefore called Father of Fathers, or the Generator of the\nUniversal. The Principle of all things is called the House of all\nthings: wherefore Y\u014dd is the beginning and end of all things; as it is\nwritten: \"_Thou hast made all things in Wisdom_.\" For The All is termed\nWisdom; and in it The All is contained; and the summary of all things is\nthe Holy Name.\n\nY\u014dd, says the _Siphra de Zeniutha_, signifying the Father, approaches\nthe letter He, which is the Mother; and by the combination of these two\nis denoted that luminous influence wherewith Binah is imbued by the\nSupernal Wisdom.\n\nIn the name [Hebrew: \u05d9\u05d4\u05d5], says the same, are included the Father,\nMother, and Microprosopos, their issue. He, impregnated by Vau, produced\nMicroprosopos, or Seir Anpin.\n\nWisdom, Hakemah, is the Principle of all things: it is the Father of\nFathers, and in it are the beginning and end of all things.\nMicroprosopos, the second Universal, is the issue of Wisdom, the Father,\nand Binah, the Mother, and is composed of the six Numerations, Geburah,\nGedulah, and Tephareth, Netsach, Hod, and Yesod; is represented under\nthe form of a man, and said to have at first occupied the place\nafterward filled by the world Briah [of Creation], but afterward to have\nbeen raised to the Aziluthic sphere, and received Wisdom, Intelligence,\nand Cognition [Daath] from the Supernal Wisdom and Intellectuality.\n\nVau, in the tri-literal word, denotes these six members of\nMicroprosopos. For this latter is formed after the fashion of\nMacroprosopos, but without Kether, the will, which remains in the first\nprototype or Universal; though invested with a portion of the Divine\nIntellectual Power and Capacity. The first Universal does not use the\nfirst person, and is called in the third person, [Hebrew: \u05d4\u05d5\u05d0,] HUA, HE:\nbut the second Universal speaks in the first person, using the word\n[Hebrew: \u05d0\u05e0\u05d9,] ANI, I.\n\nThe IDRA RABBA, or Synodus Magna, one of the books of the Sohar, says:\n\nThe Eldest of the Eldest [the Absolute Deity] is in Microprosopos. All\nthings are one: all was, all is, all will be: there neither will be, nor\nis, nor has been, mutation.\n\nBut He conformed Himself, by the formings, into a form that contains all\nforms, in a form which comprehends all genera. This form is in the\nlikeness of His form; and is not that form but its analogue: wherefore\nthe human form is the form of all above and below, which are included in\nit: and because it embraces all above and below. The Most Holy so took\nform, and so Microprosopos was configured. All things are equally one,\nin each of the two Universals; but in the second His ways are divided,\nand judgment is on our side, and on the side that looks toward us, also,\nthey differ.\n\nThese Secrets are made known only to the reapers in the Holy Field.\n\nThe Most Holy Ancient is not called ATHAH, Thou, but HUA, He: but in\nMicroprosopos, where is the beginning of things, He has the name ATHAH,\nand also AB, Father. From Him is the beginning, and He is called Thou,\nand is the Father of Fathers. He issues from the Non-Ens; and therefore\nis beyond cognition.\n\nWisdom is the Principle of the Universe, and from it thirty-two ways\ndiverge: and in them the law is contained, in twenty-two letters and ten\nwords. Wisdom is the Father of Fathers, and in this Wisdom is found the\nBeginning and the End: wherefore there is a wisdom in each Universal,\none above, the other below.\n\nThe _Commentary_ of _Rabbi Chajun Vital_, on the _Siphra de Zeniutha_,\nsays: At the beginning of emanation, Microprosopos issued from the\nFather, and was intermingled with the Mother, under the mysteries of the\nletter [Hebrew: \u05d4]; [He], resolved in [Hebrew: \u05d3\u05d5] that is, Daleth and\nVau; by which Vau is denoted Microprosopos: because Vau is six, and he\nis constituted of the six parts that follow Hakemah and Binah. And,\naccording to this conception, the Father is called Father of Fathers,\nbecause from Him these Fathers proceed, Benignity, Severity, and Beauty.\nMicroprosopos was then like the letter Vau in the letter He, because He\nhad no head; but when He was now born, three brains were constituted for\nHim, by the flow of Divine Light from above.\n\nAnd as the world of restitution [after the vessels of the Sephiroth\nbelow Binah had been broken, that from the fragments evil might be\ncreated] is instituted after the fashion of the Balance, so also is it\nformed throughout in the human form. But Malakoth, Regnum, is a complete\nand separate person, behind Microprosopos, and in conjunction with him,\nand the two are called man.\n\nThe first world [of Inanity] could not continue and did not subsist,\nbecause it had no human conformation nor the system of the Balance, the\nSephiroth being points, one below the other. The first Adam\n[Microprosopos, as distinguished from Macroprosopos, the first _Occult_\nAdam] was the beginning, wherein the ten Numerations proceeded forth\nfrom potence into act.\n\nMicroprosopos is the second garment or interposed medium, with respect\nto the Elder Most Holy, who is the name Tetragrammaton; and he is called\nAlohim; because the former is Absolute Commiseration; while in\nMacroprosopos his lights have the nature of Severities, with respect to\nthe elder Universal; though they are Commiseration, with respect to the\nlights of Malakoth and the three lower worlds.\n\nAll the conformations of Macroprosopos come from the first Adam; who, to\ninterpose a second covering, caused a single spark to issue from the\nsphere of Severity, of whose five letters is generated the name Alohim.\nWith this issued from the brain a most subtle air, which takes its place\non the right hand, while the spark of fire is on the left. Thus the\nwhite and red do not intermix, that is, the Air and Fire, which are\nMercy and Judgment.\n\nMicroprosopos is the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, his\nSeverities being the Evil.\n\nREGNUM, to which is given the name of Word of The Lord, superinvests\nHeaven, as the six members of the Degree Tephareth are called, and these\nbecome and are constituted by that superior vestiture. For every\nconformation and constitution is effected by means of veiling, because\noccultation here is the same as manifestation, the excess of light being\nveiled, so that, diminished in intensity and degree, it may be received\nby those below. Those six members conceived of as contained in Binah,\nare said to be in the World of Creation; as in Tephareth, in that of\nFormation; and as in Malakoth, in that of Fabrication.\n\nBefore the institution of equilibrium, face was not toward face:\nMicroprosopos and his wife issuing forth back to back, and yet cohering.\nSo above; before the prior Adam was conformed into male and female, and\nthe state of equilibrium established, the Father and Mother were not\nface to face. For the Father denotes the most perfect Love; and the\nMother the most perfect Rigor. And the seven supernal sons who proceeded\nfrom her, from Binah, who brought forth seven, were all most perfect\nrigors, having no connection with a root in the Most Holy Ancient; that\nis, they were all _dead_, destroyed, shattered; but they were placed in\nequilibrium, in the equipoise of the Occult Wisdom, when it was\nconformed into male and female, Rigor and Love, and they were then\nrestored, and there was given them a root above.\n\nThe Father is Love and Mercy, and with a pure and subtle Aur or\nBenignity impregnates the Mother, who is Rigor and Severity of\nJudgments; and the product is the brain of Microprosopos.\n\nIt was determined, says the _Introduction_ to the Book _Sohar_, by the\nDeity, to create Good and Evil in the world, according to what is said\nin Isaiah, \"_who makes the Light and creates the Evil_.\" But the Evil\nwas at first occult, and could not be generated and brought forth,\nexcept by the sinning of the First Adam. Wherefore He determined that\nthe numerations first emanated, from Benignity downward, should be\ndestroyed and shattered by the excessive influx of His Light; His\nintention being to create of them the worlds of Evils. But the first\nthree were to remain and subsist, that among the fragments should be\nneither Will, Intellectual, Power, nor the Capacity of Intellection of\nthe Divinity. The last seven numerations were _points_, like the first\nthree, each subsisting independently, unsustained by companionship;\nwhich was the cause of their dying and being shattered.\n\nThere was then no Love between them, but only a two-fold Fear; Wisdom,\nfor example, fearing lest it should ascend again to its Source in\nKether; and also lest it should descend into Binah. Hence there was no\nunion between any two, except Hakemah and Binah, and this imperfect,\nwith averted faces. This is the meaning of the saying, that the world\nwas created by Judgment, which is fear. And so that world could not\nsubsist, and the Seven Kings were dethroned, until the attribute of\nCompassion was adjoined to it, and then restoration took place. Thence\ncame Love and Union, and six of the parts were united into one person;\nfor Love is the attribute of Compassion or Mercy.\n\nBinah produced the Seven Kings, not successively, but all together. The\nSeventh is Regnum, called a stone, the corner-stone, because on it are\nbuilded the palaces of the three lower worlds.\n\nThe first six were shattered into fragments; but Regnum was crushed into\na formless mass, lest the malignant demons created from the fragments of\nthe others should receive bodies from it, since from it came bodies and\nvitality [Nephesch].\n\nFrom the fragments of the vessels came all Evils; judgments, turbid\nwaters, impurities, the Serpent, and Adam Belial [Baal]. But their\ninternal light re-ascended to Binah, and then flowed down again into the\nworlds Briah and Yezirah, there to form vestiges of the Seven\nNumerations. The Sparks of the great Influence of the shattered vases\ndescending into the four spiritual elements, Fire, Air, Water, and\nEarth, and thence into the inanimate, vegetable, living, and speaking\nkingdoms, became Souls.\n\nSelecting the suitable from the unsuitable lights, and separating the\ngood from the evil, the Deity first restored the universality of the\nSeven Kings of the World Aziluth, and afterward the three other Worlds.\n\nAnd though in them were, both good and evil, still this evil did not\ndevelop itself in act, since the Severities remained, though mitigated;\nsome portion of them being necessary to prevent the fragments of the\ninteguments from ascending. These were also left, because connection of\ntwo is necessary to generation. And this necessity for the existence of\nSeverity is the mystery of the pleasure and warmth of the generative\nappetite; and thence Love between husband and wife.\n\nIf the Deity, says the _Introduction_, had not created worlds and then\ndestroyed them, there could have been no evil in the world, but all\nthings must have been good. There would have been neither reward nor\npunishment in the world. There would have been no merit in\nrighteousness, for the Good is known by the evil, nor would there have\nbeen fruitfulness or multiplication in the world. If all carnal\nconcupiscence were enchained for three days in the mouth of the great\nabyss, the egg of one of the days would be wanting to the sick man. In\ntime to come it will be called Laban [Hebrew: \u05dc\u05d1\u05df--_white_], because it\nwill be whitened of its impurity, and will return to the realm Israel,\nand they will pray the Lord to give them the appetite of carnal\nconcupiscence, for the begetting of children.\n\nThe intention of God was, when He created the world, that His creatures\nshould recognize His existence. Therefore He created evils, to afflict\nthem withal when they should sin, and Light and Blessing to reward the\njust. And therefore man necessarily has free-will and election, since\nGood and Evil are in the World.\n\nAnd these kings died, says the _Commentary_, because the condition of\nequilibrium did not yet exist, nor was Adam Kadmon formed male and\nfemale. They were not in contact with what was alive: nor had any root\nin Adam Kadmon; nor was Wisdom which outflowed from Him, their root, nor\ndid they connect with it. For all these were pure mercies and most\nsimple Love; but those were rigorous judgments. Whence face looked not\ntoward face; nor the Father toward the Mother, because from her\nproceeded judgments. Nor Macroprosopos toward Microprosopos. And Regnum,\nthe last numeration, was empty and inane. It has nothing of itself; and,\nas it were, was nothing, receiving nothing from them. Its need was, to\nreceive Love from the Male; for it is mere rigor and judgment; and the\nLove and Rigor must temper each other, to produce creation, and its\nmultitudes above and below. For it was made to be inhabited; and when\nrigorous judgments rule in it, it is inane because its processes cannot\nbe carried on.\n\nWherefore the Balance must needs be instituted, that there might be a\nroot above, so that judgments might be restored and tempered, and live\nand not again die. And Seven Conformations descend; and all things\nbecome in equilibrium, and the needle of the Balance is the root above.\n\nIn the world Yezirah, says the _Pneumatica Kabalistica_, [Hebrew: \u05d9]\ndenotes Kether; [Hebrew: \u05d9\u05d4], Hakemah and Binah; and [Hebrew: \u05d9\u05d4\u05d5],\nGedulah, Geburah, and Tephareth; and thus Vau is Beauty and Harmony. The\n_Man_ is Hakemah; the _Eagle_, Binah; the _Lion_, Gedulah; and the _Ox_,\nGeburah. And the mysterious circle is thus formed by the Sohar and all\nthe Kabalists: Michael and the face of the Lion are on the South, and\nthe right hand, with the letter [Hebrew: \u05d9], Yod, and Water; Gabriel and\nthe face of the Ox, on the North, and left hand, with the first [Hebrew:\n\u05d4] of the Tetragrammaton and Fire; Uriel and the face of the Eagle, on\nthe East and forward, with [\u05d5] and Air; and Raphael and the face of the\nMan, on the West, and backward with the last [Hebrew: \u05d4], and Earth. In\nthe same order, the four letters represent the four worlds.\n\nRabbi Schimeon Ben Jochai says that the four animals of the Mysterious\nChariot, whose wheels are Netsach and H\u014dd, are Gedulah, whose face is\nthe Lion's; Geburah, with that of the Ox; Tephareth, with that of the\nEagle; and Malakoth, with that of the Man.\n\nThe Seven lower Sephiroth, says the _\u00c6sch Mezareph_, will represent\nSeven Metals; Gedulah and Geburah, Silver and Gold; Tephareth, Iron;\nNetsach and Hod, Tin and Copper; Yesod, Lead; and Malakoth will be the\nmetallic Woman and Morn of the Sages, the field wherein are to be sowed\nthe Seeds of the Secret Minerals, to wit, the Water of Gold; but in\nthese such mysteries are concealed as no tongue can utter.\n\nThe word [Hebrew: \u05d0\u05de\u05e9], Amas, is composed of the initials of the three\nHebrew words that signify Air, Water, and Fire; by which, say the\nKabalists, are denoted Benignity, Judicial Rigor, and Mercy or\nCompassion mediating between them.\n\nMalakoth, says the _Apparatus_, is called _Haikal_, Temple or Palace,\nbecause it is the Palace of the Degree Tephareth, which is concealed and\ncontained in it, and Haikal denotes the place in which all things are\ncontained.\n\nFor the better understanding of the Kabalah, remember that Kether, or\nthe Crown, is treated of as a person, composed of the ten Numerations,\nand as such termed Arik Anpin, or Macroprosopos:\n\nThat Hakemah is a person, and termed _Abba_, or _Father_:\n\nThat Binah is a person, and termed _Mother, Imma_:\n\nThat Tephareth, including all the Nurnerations from Khased or Gedulah to\nYesod, is a person, called Seir Anpin, or Microprosopos. These\nNumerations are six in number, and are represented by the interlaced\ntriangle, or the Seal of Solomon.\n\nAnd Malakoth is a person, and called the wife of Microprosopos. Vau\nrepresents the Beauty or Harmony, consisting of the six parts which\nconstitute Seir Anpin.\n\nThe wife, Malakoth, is said to be _behind_ the husband, Seir, and to\nhave no other cognition of him. And this is thus explained: That every\ncognizable object is to be known in two ways: _\u00e0 priori_, which is when\nit is known by means of its cause, or of itself; or, _\u00e0 posteriori_ when\nit is known by its effects. The most nearly perfect mode of cognition\nis, when the intellect knows the thing itself, in itself, and through\nitself. But if it knows the thing by its similitude or idea, or species\nseparate from it, or by its effects and operations, the cognition is\nmuch feebler and more imperfect. And it is thus only that Regnum, the\nwife of Seir, knows her husband, until face is turned to face, when they\nunite, and she has the more nearly perfect knowledge. For then the\nDeity, as limited and manifested in Seir and the Universe are one.\n\nVau is Tephareth, considered as the Unity in which are the six members,\nof which itself is one. Tephareth, Beauty, is the column which supports\nthe world, symbolized by the column of the junior Warden in the Blue\nLodges. The world was first created by judgment: and as it could not so\nsubsist, Mercy was conjoined with Judgment, and the Divine Mercies\nsustain the Universe.\n\nGod, says the _Idra Suta_, formed all things in the form of male and\nfemale, since otherwise the continuance of things was impossible. The\nAll-embracing Wisdom, issuing and shining from the Most Holy Ancient,\nshines not otherwise than as male and female. Wisdom as the Father,\nIntelligence the Mother, are in equilibrium as male and female, and they\nare conjoined, and one shines in the other. Then they generate, and are\nexpanded in the Truth. Then the two are the Perfection of all things,\nwhen they are coupled; and when the Son is in them, the summary of all\nthings is in one.\n\nThese things are intrusted only to the Holy Superiors, who have entered\nand gone out and known the ways of the Most Holy God, so as not to err\nin them, to the right hand or to the left. For these things are hidden;\nand the lofty Holinesses shine in them, as light flows from the splendor\nof a lamp.\n\nThese things are committed only to those who have entered and not\nwithdrawn; for he who has not done so had better never have been born.\n\nAll things are comprehended in the letters Vau and He; and all are one\nsystem; and these are the letters, [Hebrew: \u05ea\u05d1\u05d5\u05e0\u05d4], Tabunah,\nIntelligence.\n\n[Illustration: of letter 'X']\n\n\n\n\nXXIX.\n\nGRAND SCOTTISH KNIGHT OF ST. ANDREW.\n\n\nA miraculous tradition, something like that connected with the _labarum_\nof Constantine, hallows the Ancient Cross of St. Andrew. Hungus, who in\nthe ninth century reigned over the Picts in Scotland, is said to have\nseen in a vision, on the night before a battle, the Apostle Saint\nAndrew, who promised him the victory; and for an assured token thereof,\nhe told him that there should appear over the Pictish host, in the air,\nsuch a fashioned cross as he had suffered upon. Hungus, awakened,\nlooking up at the sky, saw the promised cross, as did all of both\narmies; and Hungus and the Picts, after rendering thanks to the Apostle\nfor their victory, and making their offerings with humble devotion,\nvowed that from thenceforth, as well they as their posterity, in time of\nwar, would wear a cross of St. Andrew for their badge and cognizance.\n\nJohn Leslie, Bishop of Ross, says that this cross appeared to Achaius,\nKing of the Scots, and Hungus, King of the Picts, the night before the\nbattle was fought betwixt them and Athelstane, King of England, as they\nwere on their knees at prayer.\n\nEvery cross of Knighthood is a symbol of the nine qualities of a Knight\nof St. Andrew of Scotland; for every order of chivalry required of its\nvotaries the same virtues and the same excellencies.\n\nHumility, Patience, and Self-denial are the three essential qualities of\na Knight of St. Andrew of Scotland. The Cross, sanctified by the blood\nof the holy ones who have died upon it; the Cross, which Jesus of\nNazareth bore, fainting, along the streets of Jerusalem and up to\nCalvary, upon which He cried, \"Not My will, O Father! but Thine be\ndone,\" is an unmistakable and eloquent symbol of these three virtues. He\nsuffered upon it, because He consorted with and taught the poor and\nlowly, and found His disciples among the fishermen of Galilee and the\ndespised publicans. His life was one of Humility, Patience, and\nSelf-denial.\n\nThe Hospitallers and Templars took upon themselves vows of obedience,\npoverty, and chastity. The Lamb, which became the device of the Seal of\nthe Order of the Poor Fellow Soldiery of the Temple of Solomon, conveyed\nthe same lessons of humility and self-denial as the original device of\ntwo Knights riding a single horse. The Grand Commander warned every\ncandidate not to be induced to enter the Order by a vain hope of\nenjoying earthly pomp and splendor. He told him that he would have to\nendure many things, sorely against his inclinations; and that he would\nbe compelled to give up his own will, and submit entirely to that of his\nsuperiors.\n\nThe religious Houses of the Hospitallers, despoiled by Henry the\nEighth's worthy daughter, Elizabeth, because they would not take the\noath to maintain her supremacy, had been Alms-houses, and Dispensaries,\nand Foundling-asyla, relieving the State of many orphan and outcast\nchildren, and ministering to their necessities, God's ravens in the\nwilderness, bread and flesh in the morning, bread and flesh in the\nevening. They had been Inns to the wayfaring man, who heard from afar\nthe sound of the Vesper-bell, inviting him to repose and devotion at\nonce, and who might sing his matins with the Morning Star, and go on his\nway rejoicing. And the Knights were no less distinguished by bravery in\nbattle, than by tenderness and zeal in their ministrations to the sick\nand dying.\n\nThe Knights of St. Andrew vowed to defend all orphans, maidens, and\nwidows of good family, and wherever they heard of murderers, robbers, or\nmasterful thieves who oppressed the people, to bring them to the laws,\nto the best of their power.\n\n\"If fortune fail you,\" so ran the vows of Rouge-Croix, \"in divers lands\nor countries wherever you go or ride that you find any gentleman of name\nand arms, which hath lost goods, in worship and Knighthood, in the\nKing's service, or in any other place of worship, and is fallen into\npoverty, you shall aid, and support, and succor him, in that you may;\nand he ask of you your goods to his sustenance, you shall give him part\nof such goods as God hath sent you to your power, and as you may bear.\"\n\nThus CHARITY and GENEROSITY are even _more_ essential qualities of a\ntrue and gentle Knight, and have been so in all ages; and so also hath\nCLEMENCY. It is a mark of a noble nature to spare the conquered. Valor\nis then best tempered, when it can turn out a stern fortitude into the\nmild strains of pity, which never shines more brightly than when she is\nclad in steel. A martial man, compassionate, shall conquer both in peace\nand war; and by a twofold way, get victory with honor. The most famed\nmen in the world have had in them both courage and compassion. An enemy\nreconciled hath a greater value than the long train of captives of a\nRoman triumph.\n\nVIRTUE, TRUTH, and HONOR are the three MOST essential qualities of a\nKnight of St. Andrew. \"Ye shall love God above all things, and be\nsteadfast in the Faith,\" it was said to the Knights, in their charge,\n\"and ye shall be true unto your Sovereign Lord, and true to your word\nand promise. Also, ye shall sit in no place where that any judgment\nshould be given wrongfully against any body, to your knowledge.\"\n\nThe law hath not power to strike the virtuous, nor can fortune subvert\nthe wise. Virtue and Wisdom, only, perfect and defend man. Virtue's\ngarment is a sanctuary so sacred, that even Princes dare not strike the\nman that is thus robed. It is the livery of the King of Heaven. It\nprotects us when we are unarmed; and is an armor that we cannot lose,\nunless we be false to ourselves. It is the tenure by which we hold of\nHeaven, without which we are but outlaws, that cannot claim protection.\nNor is there wisdom without virtue, but only a cunning way of procuring\nour own undoing.\n\n                  Peace is nigh\n    Where Wisdom's voice has found a listening heart.\n    Amid the howl of more than winter storms,\n    The halcyon hears the voice of vernal hours,\n    Already on the wing.\n\nSir Launcelot thought no chivalry equal to that of Virtue. This word\nmeans not continence only, but chiefly manliness, and so includes what\nin the old English was called _souffrance_, that patient endurance which\nis like the emerald, ever green and flowering; and also that other\nvirtue, _droicture_, uprightness, a virtue so strong and so puissant,\nthat by means of it all earthly things almost attain to be unchangeable.\nEven our swords are formed to remind us of the Cross, and you and any\nother of us may live to show how much men bear and do not die; for this\nworld is a place of sorrow and tears, of great evils and a constant\ncalamity, and if we would win true honor in it, we must permit no virtue\nof a Knight to become unfamiliar to us, as men's friends, coldly\nentreated and not greatly valued, become mere ordinary acquaintances.\n\nWe must not view with impatience or anger those who injure us; for it is\nvery inconsistent with philosophy, and particularly with the Divine\nWisdom that should govern every Prince Adept, to betray any great\nconcern about the evils which the world, which the vulgar, whether in\nrobes or tatters, can inflict upon the brave. The favor of God and the\nlove of our Brethren rest upon a basis which the strength of malice\ncannot overthrow; and with these and a generous temper and noble\nequanimity, we have everything. To be consistent with our professions as\nMasons, to retain the dignity of our nature, the consciousness of our\nown honor, the spirit of the high chivalry that is our boast, we must\ndisdain the evils that are only material and bodily, and therefore can\nbe no bigger than a blow or a cozenage, than a wound or a dream.\n\nLook to the ancient days, Sir E..., for excellent examples of VIRTUE,\nTRUTH, and HONOR, and imitate with a noble emulation the Ancient\nKnights, the first Hospitallers and Templars, and Bayard, and Sydney,\nand Saint Louis; in the words of Pliny to his friend Maximus, Revere the\nancient glory, and that old age which in man is venerable, in cities\nsacred. Honor antiquity and great deeds, and detract nothing from the\ndignity and liberty of any one. If those who now pretend to be the great\nand mighty, the learned and wise of the world, shall agree in condemning\nthe memory of the heroic Knights of former ages, and in charging with\nfolly us who think that they should be held in eternal remembrance, and\nthat we should defend them from an evil hearing, do you remember that if\nthese who now claim to rule and teach the world should condemn or scorn\nyour poor tribute of fidelity, still it is for you to bear therewith\nmodestly, and yet not to be ashamed, since a day will come when these\nwho now scorn those who were of infinitely higher and finer natures than\nthey are, will be pronounced to have lived poor and pitiful lives, and\nthe world will make haste to forget them.\n\nBut neither must you believe that, even in this very different age, of\ncommerce and trade, of the vast riches of many, and the poverty of\nthousands, of thriving towns and tenement houses swarming with paupers,\nof churches with rented pews, and theatres, opera-houses, custom-houses,\nand banks, of steam and telegraph, of shops and commercial palaces, of\nmanufactories and trades-unions, the Gold-room and the Stock Exchange,\nof newspapers, elections, Congresses, and Legislatures, of the frightful\nstruggle for wealth and the constant wrangle for place and power, of the\nworship paid to the children of mammon, and covetousness of official\nstation, there are no men of the antique stamp for you to revere, no\nheroic and knightly souls, that preserve their nobleness and equanimity\nin the chaos of conflicting passions, of ambition and baseness that\nwelters around them.\n\nIt is quite true that Government tends always to become a conspiracy\nagainst liberty; or, where votes give place, to fall habitually into\nsuch hands that little which is noble or chivalric is found among those\nwho rule and lead the people. It is true that men, in this present age,\nbecome distinguished for other things, and may have name and fame, and\nflatterers and lacqueys, and the oblation of flattery, who would, in a\nknightly age, have been despised for the want in them of all true\ngentility and courage; and that such men are as likely as any to be\nvoted for by the multitude, who rarely love or discern or receive truth;\nwho run after fortune, hating what is oppressed, and ready to worship\nthe prosperous; who love accusation and hate apologies; and who are\nalways glad to hear and ready to believe evil of those who care not for\ntheir favor and seek not their applause.\n\nBut no country can ever be wholly without men of the old heroic strain\nand stamp, whose word no man will dare to doubt, whose virtue shines\nresplendent in all calamities and reverses and amid all temptations, and\nwhose honor scintillates and glitters as purely and perfectly as the\ndiamond--men who are not wholly the slaves of the material occupations\nand pleasures of life, wholly engrossed in trade, in the breeding of\ncattle, in the framing and enforcing of revenue regulations, in the\nchicanery of the law, the objects of political envy, in the base trade\nof the lower literature, or in the heartless, hollow vanities of an\neternal dissipation. Every generation, in every country, will bequeath\nto those who succeed it splendid examples and great images of the dead,\nto be admired and imitated; there were such among the Romans, under the\nbasest Emperors; such in England when the Long Parliament ruled; such in\nFrance during its Saturnalia of irreligion and murder, and some such\nhave made the annals of America illustrious.\n\nWhen things tend to that state and condition in which, in any country\nunder the sun, the management of its affairs and the customs of its\npeople shall require men to entertain a disbelief in the virtue and\nhonor of those who make and those who are charged to execute the laws;\nwhen there shall be everywhere a spirit of suspicion and scorn of all\nwho hold or seek office, or have amassed wealth; when falsehood shall no\nlonger dishonor a man, and oaths give no assurance of true testimony,\nand one man hardly expect another to keep faith with him, or to utter\nhis real sentiments, or to be true to any party or to any cause when\nanother approaches him with a bribe; when no one shall expect what he\nsays to be printed without additions, perversions, and\nmisrepresentations; when public misfortunes shall be turned to private\nprofit, the press pander to licentiousness, the pulpit ring with\npolitical harangues, long prayers to God, eloquently delivered to\nadmiring auditors, be written out for publication, like poems and\npolitical speeches; when the uprightness of judges shall be doubted, and\nthe honesty of legislators be a standing jest; then men may come to\ndoubt whether the old days were not better than the new, the Monastery\nthan the Opera Bouffe, the little chapel than the drinking-saloon, the\nConvents than the buildings as large as they, without their antiquity,\nwithout their beauty, without their holiness, true Acherusian Temples,\nwhere the passer-by hears from within the never-ceasing din and clang\nand clashing of machinery, and where, when the bell rings, it is to call\nwretches to their work and not to their prayers; where, says an animated\nwriter, they keep up a perennial laudation of the Devil, before furnaces\nwhich are never suffered to cool.\n\nIt has been well said, that whatever withdraws us from the power of our\nsenses, whatever makes the Past, the Distant, or the Future, predominate\nover the Present, advances us in the dignity of thinking beings. The\nmodern rivals of the German Spa, with their flaunting pretences and\ncheap finery, their follies and frivolities, their chronicles of dances\nand inelegant feasts, and their bulletins of women's names and dresses,\nare poor substitutes for the Monastery and Church which our ancestors\nwould have built in the deep sequestered valleys, shut up between rugged\nmountains and forests of sombre pine; and a man of meditative temper,\nlearned, and of poetic feeling, would be glad if he could exchange the\nshowy hotel, amid the roar and tumult of the city, or the pretentious\ntavern of the country-town, for one old humble Monastery by the wayside,\nwhere he could refresh himself and his horse without having to fear\neither pride, impertinence, or knavery, or to pay for pomp, glitter, and\ngaudy ornamentation; then where he could make his orisons in a church\nwhich resounded with divine harmony, and there were no pews for wealth\nto isolate itself within; where he could behold the poor happy and\nedified and strengthened with the thoughts of Heaven; where he could\nthen converse with learned and holy and gentle men, and before he took\nhis departure could exalt and calm his spirits by hearing the evening\nsong.\n\nEven Free-Masonry has so multiplied its members that its obligations are\nless regarded than the simple promises which men make to one another\nupon the streets and in the markets. It clamors for public notice and\ncourts notoriety by scores of injudicious journals; it wrangles in\nthese, or, incorporated by law, carries its controversies into the\nCourts. Its elections are, in some Orients, conducted with all the heat\nand eagerness, the office-seeking and management of political struggles\nfor place. And an empty pomp, with semi-military dress and drill, of\npeaceful citizens, glittering with painted banners, plumes, and jewels,\ngaudy and ostentatious, commends to the public favor and female\nadmiration an Order that challenges comparison with the noble Knights,\nthe heroic soldiery encased in steel and mail, stern despisers of danger\nand death, who made themselves immortal memories, and won Jerusalem from\nthe infidels and fought at Acre and Ascalon, and were the bulwark of\nChristendom against the Saracenic legions that swarmed after the green\nbanner of the Prophet Mohammed.\n\nIf you, Sir E..., would be respectable as a Knight, and not a mere\ntinselled pretender and Knight of straw, you must practise, and be\ndiligent and ardent in the practice of, the virtues you have professed\nin this Degree. How can a Mason vow to be tolerant, and straightway\ndenounce another for his political opinions? How vow to be zealous and\nconstant in the service of the Order, and be as useless to it as if he\nwere dead and buried? What does the symbolism of the Compass and Square\nprofit him, if his sensual appetites and baser passions are not governed\nby, but domineer over his moral sense and reason, the animal over the\ndivine, the earthly over the spiritual, both points of the compass\n_remaining_ below the Square? What a hideous mockery to call one\n\"Brother,\" whom he maligns to the Profane, lends money unto at usury,\ndefrauds in trade, or plunders at law by chicanery?\n\nVIRTUE, TRUTH, HONOR!--possessing these and never proving false to your\nvows, you will be worthy to call yourself a Knight, to whom Sir John\nChandos might, if living, give his hand, and whom St. Louis and\nFalkland, Tancred and Baldassar Castiglione would recognise as worthy of\ntheir friendship.\n\nChivalry, a noble Spaniard said, is a religious Order, and there are\nKnights in the fraternity of Saints in Heaven. Therefore do you here,\nand for all time to come, lay aside all uncharitable and repining\nfeeling; be proof henceforward against the suggestions of undisciplined\npassion and inhuman zeal; learn to hate the vices and not the vicious;\nbe content with the discharge of the duties which your Masonic and\nKnightly professions require; be governed by the old principles of honor\nand chivalry, and reverence with constancy that Truth which is as sacred\nand immutable as God Himself. And above all, remember always, that\njealousy is not our life, nor disputation our end, nor disunion our\nhealth, nor revenge our happiness; but loving-kindness is all these,\ngreater than Hope, greater than Faith, which can remove mountains,\nproperly the only thing which God requires of us, and in the possession\nof which lies the fulfillment of all our duties.\n\n[_By Ill. Bro. Rev. W.W. Lord_, 32\u00b0.]\n\nWe are constrained to confess it to be true, that men, in this Age of\nIron, worship gods of wood and iron and brass, the work of their own\nhands. The Steam-Engine is the pre-eminent god of the nineteenth\ncentury, whose idolaters are everywhere, and those, who wield its\ntremendous power securely account themselves gods, everywhere in the\ncivilized world.\n\nOthers confess it everywhere, and we must confess here, how reluctantly\nsoever, that the age which we represent is narrowed and not enlarged by\nits discoveries, and has lost a larger world than it has gained. If we\ncannot go as far as the satirist who says that our self-adored century\n\n    --its broad clown's back turns broadly on the glory of the stars,\n\nwe can go with him when he adds,\n\nWe are gods by our own reckoning, and may as well shut up our temples\nAnd wield on amidst the incense-steam, the thunder of our cars:\nFor we throw out acclamations of self-thanking, self-admiring,\nWith, at every step, \"Run faster, O the wondrous, wondrous age!\"\nLittle heeding if our souls are wrought as nobly as our iron,\nOr if angels will commend us at the goal of pilgrimage.\n\nDeceived by their increased but still very imperfect knowledge and\nlimited mastery of the brute forces of nature, men imagine that they\nhave discovered the secrets of Divine Wisdom, and do not hesitate, in\ntheir own thoughts, to put human prudence in the place of the Divine.\nDestruction was denounced by the Prophets against Tyre and Sidon,\nBabylon, and Damascus, and Jerusalem, as a consequence of the sins of\ntheir people; but if fire now consumes or earthquake shatters or the\ntornado crushes a great city, those are scoffed at as fanatics and\nsneered at for indulging in cant, or rebuked for Pharisaic\nuncharitableness, who venture to believe and say that there are divine\nretributions and God's judgment in the ruin wrought by His mighty\nagencies.\n\nScience, wandering in error, struggles to remove God's Providence to a\ndistance from us and the material Universe, and to substitute for its\nsupervision and care and constant overseeing, what it calls\nForces--Forces of Nature--Forces of Matter. It will not see that the\nForces of Nature are the varied actions of God. Hence it becomes\nantagonistic to all Religion, and to all the old Faith that has from the\nbeginning illuminated human souls and constituted their consciousness of\ntheir own dignity, their divine origin, and their immortality; that\nFaith which is the _Light_ by which the human soul is enabled, as it\nwere, to see itself.\n\nIt is not one religion only, but the basis of all religions, the _Truth_\nthat is in all religions, even the religious creed of Masonry, that is\nin danger. For all religions have owed all of life that they have had,\nand their very being, to the foundation on which they were reared; the\nproposition, deemed undeniable and an axiom, that the Providence of God\nrules directly in all the affairs and changes of material things. The\nScience of the age has its hands upon the pillars of the Temple, and\nrocks it to its foundation. As yet its destructive efforts have but torn\nfrom the ancient structure the worm-eaten fret-work of superstition, and\nshaken down some incoherent additions--owl-inhabited turrets of\nignorance, and massive props that supported nothing. The structure\nitself will be overthrown, when, in the vivid language of a living\nwriter, \"Human reason leaps into the throne of God and waves her torch\nover the ruins of the Universe.\"\n\nScience deals only with phenomena, and is but charlatanism when it\nbabbles about the powers or causes that produce these, or what the\nthings are, in essence, of which it gives us merely the names. It no\nmore knows what Light or Sound or Perfume _is_, than the Aryan\ncattle-herders did, when they counted the Dawn and Fire, Flame and Light\nand Heat as gods. And that Atheistic Science is not even half-science,\nwhich ascribes the Universe and its powers and forces to a system of\nnatural laws or to an inherent energy of Nature, or to causes unknown,\nexisting and operating independently of a Divine and Supra-natural\npower.\n\nThat theory would be greatly fortified, if science were always capable\nof protecting life and property, and, with anything like the _certainty_\nof which it boasts, securing human interests even against the\ndestructive agencies that man himself develops in his endeavors to\nsubserve them. Fire, the fourth element, as the old philosophers deemed\nit, is his most useful and abject servant. Why cannot man prevent his\never breaking that ancient indenture, old as Prometheus, old as Adam?\nWhy can he not be certain that at any moment his terrible subject may\nnot break forth and tower up into his master, tyrant, destroyer? It is\nbecause it also is a power of nature; which, in ultimate trial of\nforces, is always superior to man. It is also because, in a different\nsense from that in which it is the servant of man, it is the servant of\nHim Who makes His ministers a flame of fire, and Who is over nature, as\nnature is over man.\n\nThere are powers of nature which man does not even attempt to check or\ncontrol. Naples does nothing against Vesuvius. Valparaiso only trembles\nwith the trembling earth before the coming earthquake. The sixty\nthousand people who went down alive into the grave when Lisbon buried\nher population under both earth and sea had no knowledge of the causes,\nand no possible control over the power, that effected their\ndestruction.\n\nBut here the servant, and, in a sense, the creature of man, the drudge\nof kitchen and factory, the humble slave of the lamp, engaged in his\nmost servile employment, appearing as a little point of flame, or\nperhaps a feeble spark, suddenly snaps his brittle chain, breaks from\nhis prison, and leaps with destructive fury, as if from the very bosom\nof Hell, upon the doomed dwellings of fifty thousand human beings, each\nof whom, but a moment before, conceived himself his master. And those\ndaring fire-brigades, with their water-artillery, his conquerors, it\nseemed, upon so many midnight fields, stand paralyzed in the presence of\ntheir conqueror.\n\nIn other matters relative to human safety and interests we have observed\nhow confident science becomes upon the strength of some slight success\nin the war of man with nature, and how much inclined to put itself in\nthe place of Providence, which, by the very force of the term, is the\nonly absolute science. Near the beginning of this century, for instance,\nmedical and sanitary science had made, in the course of a few years,\ngreat and wonderful progress. The great plague which wasted Europe in\nthe fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, and reappeared in the\nseventeenth, had been identified with a disease which yields to\nenlightened treatment, and its ancient virulence was attributed to\nignorance of hygiene, and the filthy habits of a former age. Another\nfatal and disfiguring scourge had to a great extent been checked by the\ndiscovery of vaccination. From Sangrado to Sydenham, from Paracelsus to\nJenner, the healing art had indeed taken a long stride. The Faculty\nmight be excused had it then said, \"Man is mortal, disease will be often\nfatal; but there shall be no more unresisted and unnecessary slaughter\nby infectious disease, no more general carnage, no more carnivals of\nterror and high festivals of death.\"\n\nThe conceited boast would hardly have died upon the lip, when, from the\nmysterious depths of remotest India a spectre stalked forth, or rather a\nmonster crept, more fearful than human eye had ever yet beheld. And not\nwith surer instinct does the tiger of the jungles, where this terrible\npestilence was born, catch the scent of blood upon the air, than did\nthis invisible Destroyer, this fearful agent of Almighty Power, this\ntremendous Consequence of some Sufficient Cause, scent the tainted\natmosphere of Europe and turn Westward his devastating march. The\nmillions of dead left in his path through Asia proved nothing. They were\nunarmed, ignorant, defenceless, unaided by science, undefended by art.\nThe cholera was to them inscrutable and irresistible as Azrael, the\nAngel of Death.\n\nBut it came to Europe and swept the halls of science as it had swept the\nIndian village and the Persian khan. It leaped as noiselessly and\ndescended as destructively upon the population of many a high-towered,\nwide-paved, purified, and disinfected city of the West as upon the\nPariahs of Tanjore and the filthy streets of Stamboul. In Vienna, Paris,\nLondon, the scenes of the great plague were re-enacted.\n\n    The sick man started in his bed,\n      The watcher leaped upon the floor,\n    At the cry, Bring out your dead,\n      The cart is at the door!\n\nWas _this_ the judgment of Almighty God? He would be bold who should say\nthat it was; he would be bolder who should say it was not. To Paris, at\nleast, that European Babylon, how often have the further words of the\nprophet to the daughter of the Chald\u00e6ans, the lady of kingdoms, been\nfulfilled? \"Thy wisdom and thy knowledge have perverted thee, and thou\nhast said in thy heart I am and none else beside me. Therefore shall\nevil come upon thee; thou shalt not know whence it riseth; and mischief\nshall fall upon thee; thou shalt not be able to put it off; desolation\nshall come upon thee suddenly.\"\n\nAnd as to London--it looked like judgment, if it be true that the\nAsiatic cholera had its origin in English avarice and cruelty, as they\nsuppose who trace it to the tax which Warren Hastings, when\nGovernor-General of India, imposed on salt, thus cutting off its use\nfrom millions of the vegetable-eating races of the East: just as that\ndisease whose spectral shadow lies always upon America's threshold,\noriginated in the avarice and cruelty of the slave-trade, translating\nthe African coast fever to the congenial climate of the West Indies and\nSouthern America--the yellow fever of the former, and the _vomito negro_\nof the latter.\n\nBut we should be slow to make inferences from our petty human logic to\nthe ethics of the Almighty. Whatever the cruelty of the slave-trade, or\nthe severity of slavery on the continents or islands of America, we\nshould still, in regard to its supposed consequences, be wiser, perhaps,\nto say with that great and simple Casuist Who gave the world the\nChristian religion: \"Suppose ye that these Galileans were sinners above\nall the Galileans because they suffered such things? or those eighteen\nupon whom the tower of Siloam fell and slew them, think ye that they\nwere sinners above all the men that dwelt in Jerusalem?\"\n\nRetribution bars retaliation, even in words. A city shattered, burned,\ndestroyed, desolate, a land wasted, humiliated, made a desert and a\nwilderness, or wearing the thorny crown of humiliation and subjugation,\nis invested with the sacred prerogatives and immunities of the dead. The\nbase human revenge of exultation at its fall and ruin should shrink back\nabashed in the presence of the infinite Divine chastisement.\n\"Forgiveness is wiser than revenge,\" our Freemasonry teaches us, \"and it\nis better to love than to hate.\" Let him who sees in great calamities\nthe hand of God, be silent, and fear His judgments.\n\nMen are great or small in stature as it pleases God. But their nature is\ngreat or small as it pleases themselves. Men are not born, some with\ngreat souls and some with little souls. One by taking thought cannot add\nto his stature, but he can enlarge his soul. By an act of the will he\ncan make himself a moral giant, or dwarf himself to a pigmy.\n\nThere are two natures in man, the higher and the lower, the great and\nthe mean, the noble and the ignoble; and he can and must, by his own\nvoluntary act, identify himself with the one or with the other.\nFreemasonry is continual effort to exalt the nobler nature over the\nignoble, the spiritual over the material, the divine in man over the\nhuman. In this great effort and purpose the chivalric Degrees concur and\nco-operate with those that teach the magnificent lessons of morality and\nphilosophy. Magnanimity, mercy, clemency, a forgiving temper, are\nvirtues indispensable to the character of a perfect Knight. When the low\nand evil principle in our nature says, \"Do not give; reserve your\nbeneficence for impoverished friends, or at least unobjectionable\nstrangers, Do not bestow it on successful enemies,--friends only in\nvirtue, of our misfortunes,\" the diviner principle whose voice spake by\nthe despised Galilean says, \"Do good to them that hate you, for if ye\nlove them (only) who love you, what reward have you? Do not publicans\nand sinners the same\"--that is, the tax-gathers and wicked oppressors,\narmed Romans and renegade Jews, whom ye count your enemies?\n\n[Illustration: two banners]\n\n\n\n\nXXX.\n\nKNIGHT KADOSH.\n\n\nWe often profit more by our enemies than by our friends. _\"We support\nourselves only on that which resists,\"_ and owe our success to\nopposition. The best friends of Masonry in America were the Anti-Masons\nof 1826, and at the same time they were its worst enemies. Men are but\nthe automata of Providence, and it uses the demagogue, the fanatic, and\nthe knave, a common trinity in Republics, as its tools and instruments\nto effect that of which they do not dream, and which they imagine\nthemselves commissioned to prevent.\n\nThe Anti-Masons, traitors and perjurers some, and some mere political\nknaves, purified Masonry by persecution, and so proved to be its\nbenefactors; for that which is persecuted, grows. To them its present\npopularity is due, the cheapening of its Degrees, the invasion of its\nLodges, that are no longer Sanctuaries, by the multitude; its pomp and\npageantry and overdone display.\n\nAn hundred years ago it had become known that the [Hebrew: \u05e7\u05d3\u05e9] were the\nTemplars under a veil, and therefore the Degree was proscribed, and,\nceasing to be worked, became a mere brief and formal ceremony, under\nanother name. Now, from the tomb in which after his murders he rotted,\nClement the Fifth howls against the successors of his victims, in the\nAllocution of Pio Nono against the Free-Masons. The ghosts of the dead\nTemplars haunt the Vatican and disturb the slumbers of the paralyzed\nPapacy, which, dreading the dead, shrieks out its excommunications and\nimpotent anathemas against the living. It is a declaration of war, and\nwas needed to arouse apathy and inertness to action.\n\nAn enemy of the Templars shall tell us the secret of this Papal\nhostility against an Order that has existed for centuries in despite of\nits anathemas, and has its Sanctuaries and Asyla even in Rome.\n\nIt will be easy, as we read, to separate the false from the true, the\naudacious conjectures from the simple facts.\n\n\"A power that ruled without antagonism and without concurrence, and\nconsequently without control, proved fatal to the Sacerdotal Royalties;\nwhile the Republics, on the other hand, had perished by the conflict of\nliberties and franchises, which, in the absence of all duty\nhierarchically sanctioned and enforced, had soon become mere tyrannies,\nrivals one of the other. To find a stable medium between these two\nabysses, the idea of the Christian Hierophants was to create a society\ndevoted to abnegation by solemn vows, protected by severe regulations;\nwhich should be recruited by initiation, and which, sole depositary of\nthe great religious and social secrets, should make Kings and Pontiffs,\nwithout exposing it to the corruptions of Power. In that was the secret\nof that kingdom of Jesus Christ, which, without being of this world,\nwould govern all its grandeurs.\n\n\"This idea presided at the foundation of the great religious orders, so\noften at war with the secular authorities, ecclesiastical or civil. Its\nrealization was also the dream of the dissident sects of Gnostics or\nIlluminati who pretended to connect their faith with the primitive\ntradition of the Christianity of Saint John. It at length became a\nmenace for the Church and Society, when a rich and dissolute Order,\ninitiated in the mysterious doctrines of the Kabalah, seemed disposed to\nturn against legitimate authority the conservative principle of\nHierarchy, and threatened the entire world with an immense revolution.\n\n\"The Templars, whose history is so imperfectly known, were those\nterrible conspirators. In 1118, nine Knights Crusaders in the East,\namong whom were Geoffroi de Saint-Omer and Hugues de Payens, consecrated\nthemselves to religion, and took an oath between the hands of the\nPatriarch of Constantinople, a See always secretly or openly hostile to\nthat of Rome from the time of Photius. The avowed object of the Templars\nwas to protect the Christians who came to visit the Holy Places: their\nsecret object was the re-building of the Temple of Solomon on the model\nprophesied by Ezekiel.\n\n\"This re-building, formally predicted by the Juda\u00efzing Mystics of the\nearlier ages, had become the secret dream of the Patriarchs of the\nOrient. The Temple of Solomon, re-built and consecrated to the Catholic\nworship would become, in effect, the Metropolis of the Universe; the\nEast would prevail over the West, and the Patriarchs of Constantinople\nwould possess themselves of the Papal power.\n\n\"The Templars, or _Poor Fellow-Soldiery of the Holy House of the Temple_\nintended to be re-built, took as their models, in the Bible, the\nWarrior-Masons of Zorobabel, who worked, holding the sword in one hand\nand the trowel in the other. Therefore it was that the Sword and the\nTrowel were the insignia of the Templars, who subsequently, as will be\nseen, concealed themselves under the name of _Brethren Masons_. [This\nname, _Fr\u00e8res Ma\u00e7ons_ in the French, adopted by way of secret reference\nto the Builders of the Second Temple, was corrupted in English into\n_Free_-Masons, as _Pythagore de Crotone_ was into Peter _Gower_ of\n_Groton_ in England. _Khair\u016bm_ or _Kh\u016br-\u016bm_, (a name mis-rendered into\n_Hiram_) from an artificer in brass and other metals, became the Chief\nBuilder of the _Haikal Kadosh_, the Holy House, of the Temple, the \u038a\u03b5\u03c1\u03bf\u03c2\n\u0394\u03bf\u03bc\u03bf\u03c2; and the words _Bonai_ and _Banaim_ yet appear in the Masonic\nDegrees, meaning Builder and Builders.]\n\n\"The trowel of the Templars is quadruple, and the triangular plates of\nit are arranged in the form of a cross, making the Kabalistic pantacle\nknown by the name of the Cross of the East. The Knight of the East, and\nthe Knight of the East and West, have in their titles secret allusions\nto the Templars of whom they were at first the successors.\n\n\"The secret thought of Hugues de Payens, in founding his Order, was not\nexactly to serve the ambition of the Patriarchs of Constantinople. There\nexisted at that period in the East a Sect of Johannite Christians, who\nclaimed to be the only true Initiates into the real mysteries of the\nreligion of the Saviour. They pretended to know the real history of\nYESUS the ANOINTED, and, adopting in part the Jewish traditions and the\ntales of the Talmud, they held that the facts recounted in the Evangels\nare but allegories, the key of which Saint John gives, in saying that\nthe world might be filled with the books that could be written upon the\nwords and deeds of Jesus Christ; words which, they thought, would be\nonly a ridiculous exaggeration, if he were not speaking of an allegory\nand a legend, that might be varied and prolonged to infinity.\n\n\"The Johannites ascribed to Saint John the foundation of their Secret\nChurch, and the Grand Pontiffs of the Sect assumed the title of\n_Christos_, _Anointed_, or _Consecrated_, and claimed to have succeeded\none another from Saint John by an uninterrupted succession of pontifical\npowers. He who, at the period of the foundation of the Order of the\nTemple, claimed these imaginary prerogatives, was named THEOCLET; he\nknew HUGUES DE PAYENS, he initiated him into the Mysteries and hopes of\nhis pretended church, he seduced him by the notions of Sovereign\nPriesthood and Supreme royalty, and finally designated him as his\nsuccessor.\n\n\"Thus the Order of Knights of the Temple was at its very origin devoted\nto the cause of opposition to the tiara of Rome and the crowns of Kings,\nand the Apostolate of Kabalistic Gnosticism was vested in its chiefs.\nFor Saint John himself was the Father of the Gnostics, and the current\ntranslation of his polemic against the heretical of his Sect and the\npagans who denied that Christ was the Word, is throughout a\nmisrepresentation, or misunderstanding at least, of the whole Spirit of\nthat Evangel.\n\n\"The tendencies and tenets of the Order were enveloped in profound\nmystery, and it externally professed the most perfect orthodoxy. The\nChiefs alone knew the aim of the Order: the Subalterns followed them\nwithout distrust.\n\n\"To acquire influence and wealth, then to intrigue, and at need to\nfight, to establish the Johannite or Gnostic and Kabalistic dogma, were\nthe object and means proposed to the initiated Brethren. The Papacy and\nthe rival monarchies, they said to them, are sold and bought in these\ndays, become corrupt, and to-morrow, perhaps, will destroy each other.\nAll that will become the heritage of the Temple: the World will soon\ncome to us for its Sovereigns and Pontiffs. We shall constitute the\nequilibrium of the Universe, and be rulers over the Masters of the\nWorld.\n\n\"The Templars, like all other Secret Orders and Associations, had two\ndoctrines, one concealed and reserved for the Masters, which was\nJohannism; the other public, which was the _Roman Catholic_. Thus they\ndeceived the adversaries whom they sought to supplant. Hence\nFree-Masonry, vulgarly imagined to have begun with the Dionysian\nArchitects or the German Stone-workers, adopted Saint John the\nEvangelist as one of its patrons, associating with him, in order not to\narouse the suspicions of Rome, Saint John the Baptist, and thus covertly\nproclaiming itself the child of the Kabalah and Essenism together.\"\n\nFor the Johannism of the Adepts was the Kabalah of the earlier Gnostics,\ndegenerating afterward into those heretical forms which Gnosticism\ndeveloped, so that even Manes had his followers among them. Many adopted\nhis doctrines of the two Principles, the recollection of which is\nperpetuated by the handle of the dagger and the tesselated pavement or\nfloor of the Lodge, stupidly called \"_the Indented Tessel_,\" and\nrepresented by great hanging tassels, when it really means a\n_tesserated_ floor (from the Latin _tessera_) of white and black\nlozenges, with a necessarily _denticulated_ or _indented_ border or\nedging. And wherever, in the higher Degrees, the two colors white and\nblack, are in juxtaposition, the two Principles of Zoroaster and Manes\nare alluded to. With others the doctrine became a mystic Pantheism,\ndescended from that of the Brahmins, and even pushed to an idolatry of\nNature and hatred of every revealed dogma.\n\n[To all this the absurd reading of the established Church, taking\nliterally the figurative, allegorical, and mythical language of a\ncollection of Oriental books of different ages, directly and inevitably\nled. The same result long after followed the folly of regarding the\nHebrew books as if they had been written by the unimaginative, hard,\npractical intellect of the England of James the First and the bigoted\nstolidity of Scottish Presbyterianism.]\n\n\"The better to succeed and win partisans, the Templars sympathized with\nregrets for dethroned creeds and encouraged the hopes of new worships,\npromising to all liberty of conscience and a new orthodoxy that should\nbe the synthesis of all the persecuted creeds.\"\n\nIt is absurd to suppose that men of intellect adored a monstrous idol\ncalled Baphomet, or recognized Mahomet as an inspired prophet. Their\nsymbolism, invented ages before, to conceal what it was dangerous to\navow, was of course misunderstood by those who were not adepts, and to\ntheir enemies seemed to be pantheistic. The calf of gold, made by Aaron\nfor the Israelites, was but one of the oxen under the laver of bronze,\nand the Karobim on the Propitiatory, misunderstood. The symbols of the\nwise always become the idols of the ignorant multitude. What the Chiefs\nof the Order really believed and taught, is indicated to the Adepts by\nthe hints contained in the high Degrees of Free-Masonry, and by the\nsymbols which only the Adepts understand.\n\n[The Blue Degrees are but the outer court or portico of the Temple. Part\nof the symbols are displayed there to the Initiate, but he is\nintentionally misled by false interpretations. It is not intended that\nhe shall understand them; but it is intended that he shall imagine he\nunderstands them. Their true explication is reserved for the Adepts, the\nPrinces of Masonry. The whole body of the Royal and Sacerdotal Art was\nhidden so carefully, centuries since, in the High Degrees, as that it is\neven yet impossible to solve many of the enigmas which they contain. It\nis well enough for the mass of those called Masons, to imagine that all\nis contained in the Blue Degrees; and whose attempts to undeceive them\nwill labor in vain, and without any true reward violate his obligations\nas an Adept. Masonry is the veritable Sphinx, buried to the head in the\nsands heaped round it by the ages.]\n\n\"The seeds of decay were sown in the Order of the Temple at its origin.\nHypocrisy is a mortal disease. It had conceived a great work which it\nwas incapable of executing, because it knew neither humility nor\npersonal abnegation, because Rome was then invincible, and because the\nlater Chiefs of the Order did not comprehend its mission. Moreover, the\nTemplars were in general uneducated, and capable only of wielding the\nsword, with no qualifications for governing, and at need enchaining,\nthat queen of the world called Opinion.\" [The doctrines of the Chiefs\nwould, if expounded to the masses, have seemed to them the babblings of\nfolly. The symbols of the wise are the idols of the vulgar, or else as\nmeaningless as the hieroglyphics of Egypt to the nomadic Arabs. There\nmust always be a common-place interpretation for the mass of Initiates,\nof the symbols that are eloquent to the Adepts.]\n\n\"Hugues de Payens himself had not that keen and far-sighted intellect\nnor that grandeur of purpose which afterward distinguished the military\nfounder of another soldiery that became formidable to kings. The\nTemplars were unintelligent and therefore unsuccessful Jesuits.\n\n\"Their watchword was, to become wealthy, in order to buy the world. They\nbecame so, and in 1312 they possessed in Europe alone more than nine\nthousand seignories. Riches were the shoal on which they were wrecked.\nThey became insolent, and unwisely showed their contempt for the\nreligious and social institutions which they aimed to overthrow. Their\nambition was fatal to them. Their projects were divined and prevented.\n[Rome, more intolerant of heresy than of vice and crime, came to fear\nthe Order, and fear is always cruel. It has always deemed philosophical\ntruth the most dangerous of heresies, and has never been at a loss for a\nfalse accusation, by means of which to crush free thought.] Pope Clement\nV. and King Philip le Bel gave the signal to Europe, and the Templars,\ntaken as it were in an immense net, were arrested, disarmed, and cast\ninto prison. Never was a _Coup d'\u00c9tat_ accomplished with a more\nformidable concert of action. The whole world was struck with stupor,\nand eagerly waited for the strange revelations of a process that was to\necho through so many ages.\n\n\"It was impossible to unfold to the people the conspiracy of the\nTemplars against the Thrones and the Tiara. It was impossible to expose\nto them the doctrines of the Chiefs of the Order. [This would have been\nto initiate the multitude into the secrets of the Masters, and to have\nuplifted the veil of Isis. Recourse was therefore had to the charge of\nmagic, and denouncers and false witnesses were easily found. When the\ntemporal and spiritual tyrannies unite to crush a victim they never want\nfor serviceable instruments.] The Templars were gravely accused of\nspitting upon Christ and denying God at their receptions, of gross\nobscenities, conversations with female devils, and the worship of a\nmonstrous idol.\n\n\"The end of the drama is well known, and how Jacques de Molai and his\nfellows perished in the flames. But before his execution, the Chief of\nthe doomed Order organized and instituted what afterward came to be\ncalled the Occult, Hermetic, or Scottish Masonry. In the gloom of his\nprison, the Grand Master created four Metropolitan Lodges, at Naples for\nthe East, at Edinburg for the West, at Stockholm for the North, and at\nParis for the South.\" [The initials of his name, J.'. B.'. M.'. found in\nthe same order in the first three Degrees, are but one of the many\ninternal and cogent proofs that such was the origin of modern\nFree-Masonry. The legend of Osiris was revived and adopted, to symbolize\nthe destruction of the Order, and the resurrection of Kh\u016br\u016bm, slain in\nthe body of the Temple, of KH\u016aR\u016aM ABAI, the Master, as the martyr of\nfidelity to obligation, of Truth and Conscience, prophesied the\nrestoration to life of the buried association.]\n\n\"The Pope and the King soon after perished in a strange and sudden\nmanner. Squin de Florian, the chief denouncer of the Order, died\nassassinated. In breaking the sword of the Templars, they made of it a\nponiard; and their proscribed trowels thenceforward built only tombs.\"\n\n[The Order disappeared at once. Its estates and wealth were confiscated,\nand it seemed to have ceased to exist. Nevertheless it lived, under\nother names and governed by unknown Chiefs, revealing itself only to\nthose, who, in passing through a series of Degrees, had proven\nthemselves worthy to be entrusted with the dangerous Secret. The modern\nOrders that style themselves Templars have assumed a name to which they\nhave not the shadow of a title.]\n\n\"The Successors of the Ancient Adepts Rose-Croix, abandoning by degrees\nthe austere and hierarchial Science of their Ancestors in initiation,\nbecame a Mystic Sect, united with many of the Templars, the dogmas of\nthe two intermingling, and believed themselves to be the sole\ndepositaries of the secrets of the Gospel of St. John, seeing in its\nrecitals an allegorical series of rites proper to complete the\ninitiation.\n\n\"The Initiates, in fact, thought in the eighteenth century that their\ntime had arrived, some to found a new Hierarchy, others to overturn all\nauthority, and to press down all the summits of the Social Order under\nthe level of Equality.\"\n\nThe mystical meanings of the Rose as a Symbol are to be looked for in\nthe Kabalistic Commentaries on the Canticles.\n\nThe Rose was for the Initiates the living and blooming symbol of the\nrevelation of the harmonies of being. It was the emblem of beauty, life,\nlove, and pleasure. Flamel, or the Book of the Jew Abraham, made it the\nhieroglyphical sign of the accomplishment of the great Work. Such is the\nkey of the Roman de la Rose. The Conquest of the Rose was the problem\npropounded to Science by Initiation, while Religion was laboring to\nprepare and establish the universal triumph, exclusive and definitive,\nof the Cross.\n\nTo unite the Rose to the Cross, was the problem proposed by the High\nInitiation; and in fact the Occult philosophy being the Universal\nSynthesis, ought to explain all the phenomena of Being. Religion,\nconsidered solely as a physiological fact, is the revelation and\nsatisfaction of a necessity of souls. Its existence is a scientific\nfact; to deny it, would be to deny humanity itself.\n\nThe Rose-Croix Adepts respected the dominant, hierarchical, and revealed\nreligion. Consequently they could no more be the enemies of the Papacy\nthan of legitimate Monarchy; and if they conspired against the Popes and\nKings, it was because they considered them personally as apostates from\nduty and supreme favorers of anarchy.\n\nWhat, in fact, is a despot, spiritual or temporal, but a crowned\nanarchist?\n\nOne of the magnificent pantacles that express the esoteric and\nunutterable part of Science, is a Rose of Light, in the centre of which\na human form extends its arms in the form of a cross.\n\nCommentaries and studies have been multiplied upon the _Divine Comedy_,\nthe work of DANTE, and yet no one, so far as we know, has pointed out\nits especial character. The work of the great Ghibellin is a declaration\nof war against the Papacy, by bold revelations of the Mysteries. The\nEpic of Dante is Johannite and Gnostic, an audacious application, like\nthat of the Apocalypse, of the figures and numbers of the Kabalah to the\nChristian dogmas, and a secret negation of every thing absolute in these\ndogmas. His Journey through the supernatural worlds is accomplished like\nthe initiation into the Mysteries of Eleusis and Thebes. He escapes from\nthat gulf of Hell over the gate of which the sentence of despair was\nwritten, _by reversing the positions of his head and feet_, that is to\nsay, _by accepting the direct opposite of the Catholic dogma:_ and then\nhe reascends to the light, by using the Devil himself as a monstrous\nladder. Faust ascends to Heaven, by stepping on the head of the\nvanquished Mephistopheles. Hell is impassable for those only who know\nnot how to turn back from it. We free ourselves from its bondage by\naudacity.\n\nHis Hell is but a negative Purgatory. His Heaven is composed of a series\nof Kabalistic circles, divided by a cross, like the Pantacle of Ezekiel.\nIn the centre of this cross blooms a rose, and we see the symbol of the\nAdepts of the Rose-Croix for the first time publicly expounded and\nalmost categorically explained.\n\nFor the first time, because Guillaume de Lorris, who died in 1260, five\nyears before the birth of Alighieri, had not completed his _Roman de la\nRose_, which was continued by Chopinel, a half century afterward. One is\nastonished to discover that the Roman de la Rose and the Divina Commedia\nare two opposite forms of one and the same work, initiation into\nindependence of spirit, a satire on all contemporary institutions, and\nthe allegorical formula of the great Secrets of the Society of the\nRoses-Croix.\n\nThe important manifestations of Occultism coincide with the period of\nthe fall of the Templars; since Jean de Meung or Chopinel, contemporary\nof the old age of Dante, flourished during the best years of his life at\nthe Court of Philippe le Bel. The Roman de la Rose is the Epic of old\nFrance. It is a profound book, under the form of levity, a revelation as\nlearned as that of Apuleius, of the Mysteries of Occultism. The Rose of\nFlamel, that of Jean de Meung, and that of Dante, grew on the same stem.\n\nSwedenborg's system was nothing else than the Kabalah, minus the\nprinciple of the Hierarchy. It is the Temple, without the keystone and\nthe foundation.\n\nCagliostro was the Agent of the Templars, and therefore wrote to the\nFree-Masons of London that the time had come to begin the work of\nre-building the Temple of the Eternal. He had introduced into Masonry a\nnew Rite called the _Egyptian_, and endeavored to resuscitate the\nmysterious worship of Isis. The three letters L. P. D. on his seal, were\nthe initials of the words _\"Lilia pedibus destrue;\" tread under foot the\nLilies_ [of France], and a Masonic medal of the sixteenth or seventeenth\ncentury has upon it a sword cutting off the stalk of a lily, and the\nwords \"_talem dabit ultio messem_,\" such harvest revenge will give.\n\nA Lodge inaugurated under the auspices of Rousseau, the fanatic of\nGeneva, became the centre of the revolutionary movement in France, and a\nPrince of the blood-royal went thither to swear the destruction of the\nsuccessors of Philippe le Bel on the tomb of Jacques de Molai. The\nregisters of the Order of Templars attest that the Regent, the Duc d'\nOrleans, was Grand Master of that formidable Secret Society, and that\nhis successors were the Duc de Maine, the Prince of Bourbon-Cond\u00e9, and\nthe Duc de Coss\u00e9-Brissac.\n\nThe Templars compromitted the King; they saved him from the rage of the\nPeople, to exasperate that rage and bring on the catastrophe prepared\nfor centuries; it was a scaffold that the vengeance of the Templars\ndemanded. The secret movers of the French Revolution had sworn to\noverturn the Throne and the Altar upon the Tomb of Jacques de Molai.\nWhen Louis XVI. was executed, half the work was done; and thenceforward\nthe Army of the Temple was to direct all its efforts against the Pope.\n\nJacques de Molai and his companions were perhaps martyrs, but their\navengers dishonored their memory. Royalty was regenerated on the\nscaffold of Louis XVI., the Church triumphed in the captivity of Pius\nVI., carried a prisoner to Valence, and dying of fatigue and sorrow, but\nthe successors of the Ancient Knights of the Temple perished,\noverwhelmed in their fatal victory.\n\n\n\n\nMORALS AND DOGMA.\n\nCONSISTORY.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nXXXI.\n\nGRAND INSPECTOR INQUISITOR COMMANDER.\n\n[Inspector Inquisitor.]\n\n\nTo hear patiently, to weigh deliberately and dispassionately, and to\ndecide impartially;--these are the chief duties of a Judge. After the\nlessons you have received, I need not further enlarge upon them. You\nwill be ever eloquently reminded of them by the furniture upon our\nAltar, and the decorations of the Tribunal.\n\nThe Holy Bible will remind you of your obligation; and that as you judge\nhere below, so you will be yourself judged hereafter, by One who has not\nto submit, like an earthly judge, to the sad necessity of inferring the\nmotives, intentions, and purposes of men [of which all crime essentially\nconsists] from the uncertain and often unsafe testimony of their acts\nand words; as men in thick darkness grope their way, with hands\noutstretched before them: but before Whom every thought, feeling,\nimpulse, and intention of every soul that now is, or ever was, or ever\nwill be on earth, is, and ever will be through the whole infinite\nduration of eternity, present and visible.\n\nThe Square and Compass, the Plumb and Level, are well known to you as a\nMason. Upon you as a Judge, they peculiarly inculcate uprightness,\nimpartiality, careful consideration of facts and circumstances, accuracy\nin judgment, and uniformity in decision. As a Judge, too, you are to\nbring up square work and square work only. Like a temple erected by the\nplumb, you are to lean neither to one side nor the other. Like a\nbuilding well squared and levelled, you are to be firm and steadfast in\nyour convictions of right and justice. Like the circle swept with the\ncompasses, you are to be true. In the scales of justice you are to weigh\nthe facts and the law alone, nor place in either scale personal\nfriendship or personal dislike, neither fear nor favor: and when\nreformation is no longer to be hoped for, you are to smite relentlessly\nwith the sword of justice.\n\nThe peculiar and principal symbol of this Degree is the Tetractys of\nPythagoras, suspended in the East, where ordinarily the sacred word or\nletter glitters, like it, representing the Deity. Its nine external\npoints form the triangle, the chief symbol in Masonry, with many of the\nmeanings of which you are familiar.\n\nTo us, its three sides represent the three principal attributes of the\nDeity, which created, and now, as ever, support, uphold, and guide the\nUniverse in its eternal movement; the three supports of the Masonic\nTemple, itself an emblem of the Universe:--Wisdom, or the Infinite\nDivine Intelligence; Strength, or Power, the Infinite Divine Will; and\nBeauty, or the Infinite Divine Harmony, the Eternal Law, by virtue of\nwhich the infinite myriads of suns and worlds flash ever onward in their\nceaseless revolutions, without clash or conflict, in the Infinite of\nspace, and change and movement are the law of all created existences.\n\nTo us, as Masonic Judges, the triangle figures forth the Pyramids,\nwhich, planted firmly as the everlasting hills, and accurately adjusted\nto the four cardinal points, defiant of all assaults of men and time,\nteach us to stand firm and unshaken as they, when our feet are planted\nupon the solid truth.\n\nIt includes a multitude of geometrical figures, all having a deep\nsignificance to Masons. The triple triangle is peculiarly sacred, having\never been among all nations a symbol of the Deity. Prolonging all the\nexternal lines of the Hexagon, which also it includes, we have six\nsmaller triangles, whose bases cut each other in the central point of\nthe Tetractys, itself always the symbol of the generative power of the\nUniverse, the Sun, Brahma, Osiris, Apollo, Bel, and the Deity Himself.\nThus, too, we form twelve still smaller triangles, three times three of\nwhich compose the Tetractys itself.\n\nI refrain from enumerating all the figures that you may trace within it:\nbut one may not be passed unnoticed. The Hexagon itself faintly images\nto us a cube, not visible at the first glance, and therefore the fit\nemblem of that faith in things invisible, most essential to salvation.\nThe first perfect solid, and reminding you of the cubical stone that\nsweated blood, and of that deposited by Enoch, it teaches justice,\naccuracy, and consistency.\n\nThe infinite divisibility of the triangle teaches the infinity of the\nUniverse, of time, of space, and of the Deity, as do the lines that,\ndiverging from the common centre, ever increase their distance from each\nother as they are infinitely prolonged. As they may be infinite in\nnumber, so are the attributes of Deity infinite; and as they emanate\nfrom one centre and are projected into space, so the whole Universe has\nemanated from God.\n\nRemember also, my Brother, that you have other duties to perform than\nthose of a judge. You are to inquire into and scrutinize carefully the\nwork of the subordinate Bodies in Masonry. You are to see that\nrecipients of the higher Degrees are not unnecessarily multiplied; that\nimproper persons are carefully excluded from membership, and that in\ntheir life and conversation Masons bear testimony to the excellence of\nour doctrines and the incalculable value of the institution itself. You\nare to inquire also into your own heart and conduct, and keep careful\nwatch over yourself, that you go not astray. If you harbor ill-will and\njealousy, if you are hospitable to intolerance and bigotry, and churlish\nto gentleness and kind affections, opening wide your heart to one and\nclosing its portals to the other, it is time for you to set in order\nyour own temple, or else you wear in vain the name and insignia of a\nMason, while yet uninvested with the Masonic nature.\n\nEverywhere in the world there is a natural law, that is, a constant mode\nof action, which seems to belong to the nature of things, to the\nconstitution of the Universe. This fact is universal. In different\ndepartments we call this mode of action by different names, as the law\nof Matter, the law of Mind, the law of Morals, and the like. We mean by\nthis, a certain mode of action which belongs to the material, mental, or\nmoral forces, the mode in which commonly they are found to act, and in\nwhich it is their ideal to act always. The ideal laws of matter we know\nonly from the fact that they are always obeyed. To us the actual\n_obedience_ is the only evidence of the ideal rule; for in respect to\nthe conduct of the material world, the _ideal_ and the _actual_ are the\nsame.\n\nThe laws of matter we learn only by observation and experience. Before\nexperience of the fact, no man could foretell that a body, falling\ntoward the earth, would descend sixteen feet the first second, twice\nthat the next, four times the third, and sixteen times the fourth. No\nmode of action in our consciousness anticipates this rule of action in\nthe outer world. The same is true of all the laws of matter. The ideal\nlaw is known because it is a fact. The law is imperative. It must be\nobeyed without hesitation. Laws of crystallization, laws of proportion\nin chemical combination,--neither in these nor in any other law of\nNature is there any margin left for oscillation of disobedience. Only\nthe primal will of God works in the material world, and no secondary\nfinite will.\n\nThere are no exceptions to the great general law of Attraction, which\nbinds atom to atom in the body of a rotifier visible only by aid of a\nmicroscope, orb to orb, system to system; gives unity to the world of\nthings, and rounds these worlds of systems to a Universe. At first there\nseem to be exceptions to this law, as in growth and decomposition, in\nthe repulsions of electricity; but at length all these are found to be\nspecial cases of the one great law of attraction acting in various\nmodes.\n\nThe variety of effect of this law at first surprises the senses; but in\nthe end the unity of cause astonishes the cultivated mind. Looked at in\nreference to this globe, an earthquake is no more than a chink that\nopens in a garden-walk of a dry day in Summer. A sponge is porous,\nhaving small spaces between the solid parts: the solar system is only\n_more_ porous, having larger room between the several orbs: the Universe\nyet more so, with spaces between the systems, as small, compared with\n_infinite_ space, as those between the atoms that compose the bulk of\nthe smallest invisible animalcule, of which millions swim in a drop of\nsalt-water. The same attraction holds together the animalcule, the\nsponge, the system, and the Universe. Every particle of matter in that\nUniverse is related to each and all the other particles; and attraction\nis their common bond.\n\nIn the spiritual world, the world of human consciousness, there is also\na law, an ideal mode of action for the spiritual forces of man. The law\nof Justice is as universal an one as the law of Attraction; though we\nare very far from being able to reconcile all the phenomena of Nature\nwith it. The lark has the same right, in our view, to live, to sing, to\ndart at pleasure through the ambient atmosphere, as the hawk has to ply\nhis strong wings in the Summer sunshine: and yet the hawk pounces on and\ndevours the harmless lark, as _it_ devours the worm, and as the worm\ndevours the animalcule; and, so far as we know, there is nowhere, in any\nfuture state of animal existence, any compensation for this apparent\ninjustice. Among the bees, one rules, while the others obey--some work,\nwhile others are idle. With the small ants, the soldiers feed on the\nproceeds of the workmen's labor. The lion lies in wait for and devours\nthe antelope that has apparently as good a right to life as he. Among\nmen, some govern and others serve, capital commands and labor obeys, and\none race, superior in intellect, avails itself of the strong muscles of\nanother that is inferior; and yet, for all this, no one impeaches the\njustice of God.\n\nNo doubt all these varied phenomena are consistent with one great law of\njustice; and the only difficulty is that we do not, and no doubt we\ncannot, understand that law. It is very easy for some dreaming and\nvisionary theorist to say that it is most evidently unjust for the lion\nto devour the deer, and for the eagle to tear and eat the wren; but the\ntrouble is, that we know of no other way, according to the frame, the\nconstitution, and the organs which God has given them, in which the lion\nand the eagle could manage to live at all. Our little measure of justice\nis not God's measure. His justice does not require us to relieve the\nhard-working millions of all labor, to emancipate the serf or slave,\nunfitted to be free, from all control.\n\nNo doubt, underneath all the little bubbles, which are the lives, the\nwishes, the wills, and the plans of the two thousand millions or more of\nhuman beings on this earth (for bubbles they are, judging by the space\nand time they occupy in this great and age-out-lasting sea of\nhuman-kind),--no doubt, underneath them all resides one and the same\neternal force, which they shape into this or the other special form; and\nover all the same paternal Providence presides, keeping eternal watch\nover the little and the great, and producing variety of effect from\nUnity of Force.\n\nIt is entirely true to say that justice is the constitution or\nfundamental law of the moral Universe, the law of right, a rule of\nconduct for man (as it is for every other living creature), in all his\nmoral relations. No doubt all human affairs (like all other affairs),\nmust be subject to that as the law paramount; and what is _right_ agrees\ntherewith and stands, while what is _wrong_ conflicts with it and falls.\nThe difficulty is that we ever erect _our_ notions of what is right and\njust into the _law_ of justice, and insist that God shall adopt that as\nHis law; instead of striving to learn by observation and reflection what\nHis law _is_, and then believing that law to be consistent with _His_\ninfinite justice, whether it corresponds with _our_ limited notion of\njustice, or does not so correspond. We are too wise in our own conceit,\nand ever strive to enact our own little notions into the Universal Laws\nof God.\n\nIt might be difficult for man to prove, even to his own satisfaction,\nhow it is right or just for him to subjugate the horse and ox to his\nservice, giving them in return only their daily food, which God has\nspread out for them on all the green meadows and savannas of the world:\nor how it is just that we should slay and eat the harmless deer that\nonly crops the green herbage, the buds, and the young leaves, and drinks\nthe free-running water that God made common to all; or the gentle dove,\nthe innocent kid, the many other living things that so confidently trust\nto our protection;--quite as difficult, perhaps, as to prove it just for\none man's intellect or even his wealth to make another's strong arms his\nservants, for daily wages or for a bare subsistence.\n\nTo find out this universal law of justice is one thing--to undertake to\nmeasure off something with our own little tape-line, and call _that_\nGod's law of justice, is another. The great general plan and system, and\nthe great general laws enacted by God, continually produce what to our\nlimited notions is wrong and injustice, which hitherto men have been\nable to explain to their own satisfaction only by the hypothesis of\nanother existence in which all inequalities and injustices in this life\nwill be remedied and compensated for. To our ideas of justice, it is\nvery unjust that the child is made miserable for life by deformity or\norganic disease, in consequence of the vices of its father; and yet that\nis part of the universal law. The ancients said that the child was\n_punished_ for the sins of its father. _We_ say that this its deformity\nor disease is the _consequence_ of its father's vices; but so far as\nconcerns the question of justice or injustice, that is merely the change\nof a word.\n\nIt is very easy to lay down a broad, general principle, embodying our\nown idea of what is absolute justice, and to insist that everything\nshall conform to that: to say, \"all human affairs must be subject to\nthat as the law paramount; what is right agrees therewith and stands,\nwhat is wrong conflicts and falls. Private cohesions of self-love, of\nfriendship, or of patriotism, must all be subordinate to this universal\ngravitation toward the eternal right.\" The difficulty is that this\nUniverse of necessities God-created, of sequences of cause and effect,\nand of life evolved from death, this interminable succession and\naggregate of cruelties, will not conform to any such absolute principle\nor arbitrary theory, no matter in what sounding words and glittering\nphrases it may be embodied.\n\nImpracticable rules in morals are always injurious; for as all men fall\nshort of compliance with them, they turn real virtues into imaginary\noffences against a forged law. Justice as between man and man and as\nbetween man and the animals below him, is that which, under and\naccording to the God-created relations existing between them, and the\nwhole aggregate of circumstances surrounding them, is fit and right and\nproper to be done, with a view to the general as well as to the\nindividual interest. It is not a theoretical principle by which the very\nrelations that God has created and imposed on us are to be tried, and\napproved or condemned.\n\nGod has made this great system of the Universe, and enacted general laws\nfor its government. Those laws environ everything that lives with a\nmighty network of necessity. He chose to create the tiger with such\norgans that he cannot crop the grass, but must eat other flesh or\nstarve. He has made man carnivorous also; and some of the smallest birds\nare as much so as the tiger. In every step we take, in every breath we\ndraw, is involved the destruction of a multitude of animate existences,\neach, no matter how minute, as much a living creature as ourself. He has\nmade necessary among mankind a division of labor, intellectual and\nmoral. He has made necessary the varied relations of society and\ndependence, of obedience and control.\n\nWhat is thus made necessary cannot be unjust; for if it be, then God the\ngreat Lawgiver is Himself unjust. The evil to be avoided is, the\nlegalization of injustice and wrong under the _false_ plea of necessity.\nOut of all the relations of life grow duties,--as naturally grow and as\nundeniably, as the leaves grow upon the trees. If we have the right,\ncreated by God's law of necessity, to slay the lamb that we may eat and\nlive, we have no right to torture it in doing so, because that is in no\nwise necessary. We have the right to live, if we fairly can, by the\nlegitimate exercise of our intellect, and hire or buy the labor of the\nstrong arms of others, to till our grounds, to dig in our mines, to toil\nin our manufactories; but we have no right to overwork or underpay them.\n\nIt is not only true that we may learn the moral law of justice, the law\nof right, by experience and observation; but that God has given us a\nmoral faculty, our conscience, which is able to perceive this law\ndirectly and immediately, by intuitive perception of it; and it is true\nthat man has in his nature a rule of conduct higher than what he has\never yet come up to,--an ideal of nature that shames his actual of\nhistory: because man has ever been prone to make necessity, his own\nnecessity, the necessities of society, a plea for injustice. But this\nnotion must not be pushed too far--for if we substitute this ideality\nfor actuality, then it is equally true that we have within us an ideal\nrule of right and wrong, to which God Himself in His government of the\nworld has never come, and against which He (we say it reverentially)\nevery day offends. We detest the tiger and the wolf for the rapacity and\nlove of blood which are their nature; we revolt against the law by which\nthe crooked limbs and diseased organism of the child are the fruits of\nthe father's vices; we even think that a God Omnipotent and Omniscient\nought to have permitted no pain, no poverty, no servitude; our ideal of\njustice is more lofty than the actualities of God. It is well, as all\nelse is well. He has given us that moral sense for wise and beneficent\npurposes. We accept it as a significant proof of the inherent loftiness\nof human nature, that it can entertain an ideal so exalted; and should\nstrive to attain it, as far as we can do so consistently with the\nrelations which He has created, and the circumstances which surround us\nand hold us captive.\n\nIf we faithfully use this faculty of conscience; if, applying it to the\nexisting relations and circumstances, we develop it and all its kindred\npowers, and so deduce the duties that out of these relations and those\ncircumstances, and limited and qualified by them, arise and become\nobligatory upon us, then we learn justice, the law of right, the divine\nrule of conduct for human life. But if we undertake to define and settle\n\"the mode of action that belongs to the infinitely perfect nature of\nGod,\" and so set up any ideal rule, beyond all human reach, we soon come\nto judge and condemn His work and the relations which it has pleased Him\nin His infinite wisdom to create.\n\nA sense of justice belongs to human nature, and is a part of it. Men\nfind a deep, permanent, and instinctive delight in justice, not only in\nthe outward effects, but in the inward cause, and by their nature love\nthis law of right, this reasonable rule of conduct, this justice, with a\ndeep and abiding love. Justice is the object of the conscience, and fits\nit as light fits the eye and truth the mind.\n\nJustice keeps just relations between men. It holds the balance between\nnation and nation, between a man and his family, tribe, nation, and\nrace, so that his _absolute_ rights and theirs do not interfere, nor\ntheir _ultimate_ interests ever clash, nor the eternal interests of the\none prove antagonistic to those of all or of any other one. This we must\nbelieve, if we believe that God is just. We must do justice to all, and\ndemand it of all; it is a universal human debt, a universal human claim.\nBut we may err greatly in defining what that justice is. The _temporary_\ninterests, and what to human view are the rights, of men, do often\ninterfere and clash. The life-interests of the individual often conflict\nwith the permanent interests and welfare of society; and what may seem\nto be the natural rights of one class or race, with those of another.\n\nIt is not true to say that \"one man, however little, must not be\nsacrificed to another, however great, to a majority, or to all men.\"\nThat is not only a fallacy, but a most dangerous one. Often one man and\nmany men must be sacrificed, in the ordinary sense of the term, to the\ninterest of the many. It is a comfortable fallacy to the selfish; for if\nthey cannot, by the law of justice, be sacrificed for the common good,\nthen their country has no right to demand of them _self_-sacrifice; and\nhe is a fool who lays down his life, or sacrifices his estate, or even\nhis luxuries, to insure the safety or prosperity of his country.\nAccording to that doctrine, Curtius was a fool, and Leonidas an idiot;\nand to die for one's country is no longer beautiful and glorious, but a\nmere absurdity. Then it is no longer to be asked that the common soldier\nshall receive in his bosom the sword or bayonet-thrust which otherwise\nwould let out the life of the great commander on whose fate hang the\nliberties of his country, and the welfare of millions yet unborn.\n\nOn the contrary, it is certain that necessity rules in all the affairs\nof men, and that the interest and even the life of one man must often be\nsacrificed to the interest and welfare of his country. Some must ever\nlead the forlorn hope: the missionary must go among savages, bearing his\nlife in his hand; the physician must expose himself to pestilence for\nthe sake of others; the sailor, in the frail boat upon the wide ocean,\nescaped from the foundering or burning ship, must step calmly into the\nhungry waters, if the lives of the passengers can be saved only by the\nsacrifice of his own; the pilot must stand firm at the wheel, and let\nthe flames scorch away his own life to insure the common safety of those\nwhom the doomed vessel bears.\n\nThe mass of men are always looking for what is just. All the vast\nmachinery which makes up a State, a world of States, is, on the part of\nthe people, an attempt to organize, not that ideal justice which finds\nfault with God's ordinances, but that practical justice which may be\nattained in the actual organization of the world. The minute and\nwide-extending civil machinery which makes up the law and the courts,\nwith all their officers and implements, on the part of mankind, is\nchiefly an effort to reduce to practice the theory of right.\nConstitutions are made to establish justice; the decisions of courts are\nreported to help us judge more wisely in time to come. The nation aims\nto get together the most nearly just men in the State, that they may\nincorporate into statutes their aggregate sense of what is right. The\npeople wish law to be embodied justice, administered without passion.\nEven in the wildest ages there has been a wild popular justice, but\nalways mixed with passion and administered in hate; for justice takes a\nrude form with rude men, and becomes less mixed with hate and passion in\nmore civilized communities. Every progressive State revises its statutes\nand revolutionizes its constitution from time to time, seeking to come\ncloser to the utmost possible practical justice and right; and\nsometimes, following theorists and dreamers in their adoration for the\nideal, by erecting into law positive principles of theoretical right,\nworks practical injustice, and then has to retrace its steps.\n\nIn literature men always look for practical justice, and desire that\nvirtue should have its own reward, and vice its appropriate punishment.\nThey are ever on the side of justice and humanity; and the majority of\nthem have an ideal justice, better than the things about them, juster\nthan the law: for the law is ever imperfect, not attaining even to the\nutmost _practicable_ degree of perfection; and no man is as just as his\nown idea of possible and practicable justice. His passions and his\nnecessities ever cause him to sink below his own ideal. The ideal\njustice which men ever look up to and strive to rise toward, is true;\nbut it will not be realized in this world. Yet we must approach as near\nto it as practicable, as we should do toward that ideal democracy that\n\"now floats before the eyes of earnest and religious men,--fairer than\nthe Republic of Plato, or More's Utopia, or the Golden Age of fabled\nmemory,\" only taking care that we do not, in striving to reach and\nascend to the impossible ideal, neglect to seize upon and hold fast to\nthe possible actual. To aim at the best, but be content with the best\npossible, is the only true wisdom. To insist on the absolute right, and\nthrow out of the calculation the important and all-controlling element\nof necessity, is the folly of a mere dreamer.\n\nIn a world inhabited by men with bodies, and necessarily with bodily\nwants and animal passions, the time will never come when there will be\nno want, no oppression, nor servitude, no fear of man, no fear of God,\nbut only Love. That can never be while there are inferior intellect,\nindulgence in low vice, improvidence, indolence, awful visitations of\npestilence and war and famine, earthquake and volcano, that must of\nnecessity cause men to want, and serve, and suffer, and fear.\n\nBut still the ploughshare of justice is ever drawn through and through\nthe field of the world, uprooting the savage plants. Ever we see a\ncontinual and progressive triumph of the right. The injustice of England\nlost her America, the fairest jewel of her crown. The injustice of\nNapoleon bore him to the ground more than the snows of Russia did, and\nexiled him to a barren rock, there to pine away and die, his life a\nwarning to bid mankind be just.\n\nWe intuitively understand what justice is, better than we can depict it.\nWhat it is in a given case depends so much on circumstances, that\ndefinitions of it are wholly deceitful. Often it would be unjust to\nsociety to do what would, in the absence of that consideration, be\npronounced just to the individual. General propositions of man's right\nto this or that are ever fallacious: and not infrequently it would be\nmost unjust to the individual himself to do for him what the theorist,\nas a general proposition, would say was right and his due.\n\nWe should ever do unto others what, under the same circumstances, we\n_ought_ to wish, and should have _the right_ to wish they should do unto\nus. There are many cases, cases constantly occurring, where one man must\ntake care of himself, in preference to another, as where two struggle\nfor the possession of a plank that will save one, but cannot uphold\nboth; or where, assailed, he can save his own life only by slaying his\nadversary. So one must prefer the safety of his country to the lives of\nher enemies; and sometimes, to insure it, to those of her own innocent\ncitizens. The retreating general may cut away a bridge behind him, to\ndelay pursuit and save the main body of his army, though he thereby\nsurrenders a detachment, a battalion, or even a corps of his own force\nto certain destruction.\n\nThese are not departures from justice; though, like other instances\nwhere the injury or death of the individual is the safety of the many,\nwhere the interest of one individual, class, or race is postponed to\nthat of the public, or of the superior race, they may infringe some\ndreamer's ideal rule of justice. But every departure from real,\npractical justice is no doubt attended with loss to the unjust man,\nthough the loss is not reported to the public. Injustice, public or\nprivate, like every other sin and wrong, is inevitably followed by its\nconsequences. The selfish, the grasping, the inhuman, the fraudulently\nunjust, the ungenerous employer, and the cruel master, are detested by\nthe great popular heart; while the kind master, the liberal employer,\nthe generous, the humane, and the just have the good opinion of all men,\nand even envy is a tribute to their virtues. Men honor all who stand up\nfor truth and right, and never shrink. The world builds monuments to its\npatriots. Four great statesmen, organizers of the right, embalmed in\nstone, look down upon the lawgivers of France as they pass to their hall\nof legislation, silent orators to tell how nations love the just. How we\nrevere the marble lineaments of those just judges, Jay and Marshall,\nthat look so calmly toward the living Bench of the Supreme Court of the\nUnited States! What a monument Washington has built in the heart of\nAmerica and all the world, not because he dreamed of an impracticable\nideal justice, but by his constant effort to be practically just!\n\nBut necessity alone, and the greatest good of the greatest number, can\nlegitimately interfere with the dominion of absolute and ideal justice.\nGovernment should not foster the strong at the expense of the weak, nor\nprotect the capitalist and tax the laborer. The powerful should not seek\na monopoly of development and enjoyment; not prudence only and the\nexpedient for to-day should be appealed to by statesmen, but conscience\nand the right: justice should not be forgotten in looking at interest,\nnor political morality neglected for political economy: we should not\nhave national housekeeping instead of national organization on the basis\nof right.\n\nWe may well differ as to the abstract right of many things; for every\nsuch question has many sides, and few men look at all of them, many only\nat one. But we all readily recognize cruelty, unfairness, inhumanity,\npartiality, over-reaching, hard-dealing, by their ugly and familiar\nlineaments, and in order to know and to hate and despise _them_, we do\nnot need to sit as a Court of Errors and Appeals to revise and reverse\nGod's Providences.\n\nThere are certainly great evils of civilization at this day, and many\nquestions of humanity long adjourned and put off. The hideous aspect of\npauperism, the debasement and vice in our cities, tell us by their\neloquent silence or in inarticulate mutterings, that the rich and the\npowerful and the intellectual do not do their duty by the poor, the\nfeeble, and the ignorant; and every wretched woman who lives, Heaven\nscarce knows how, by making shirts at sixpence each, attests the\ninjustice and inhumanity of man. There are cruelties to slaves, and\nworse cruelties to animals, each disgraceful to their perpetrators, and\nequally unwarranted by the lawful relation of control and dependence\nwhich it has pleased God to create.\n\nA sentence is written against all that is unjust, written by God in the\nnature of man and in the nature of the Universe, because it is in the\nnature of the Infinite God. Fidelity to your faculties, trust in their\nconvictions, that is justice to yourself; a life in obedience thereto,\nthat is justice toward men. No wrong is really successful. The gain of\ninjustice is a loss, its pleasure suffering. Iniquity often seems to\nprosper, but its success is its defeat and shame. After a long while,\nthe day of reckoning ever comes, to nation as to individual. The knave\ndeceives himself. The miser, starving his brother's body, starves also\nhis own soul, and at death shall creep out of his great estate of\ninjustice, poor and naked and miserable. Whoso escapes a duty avoids a\ngain. Outward judgment often fails, inward justice never. Let a man try\nto love the wrong and to do the wrong, it is eating stones and not\nbread, the swift feet of justice are upon him, following with woolen\ntread, and her iron hands are round his neck. No man can escape from\nthis, any more than from himself. Justice is the angel of God that flies\nfrom East to West; and where she stoops her broad wings, it is to bring\nthe counsel of God, and feed mankind with angel's bread.\n\nWe cannot understand the moral Universe. The arc is a long one, and our\neyes reach but a little way; we cannot calculate the curve and complete\nthe figure by the experience of sight; but we can divine it by\nconscience, and we surely know that it bends toward justice. Justice\nwill not fail, though wickedness appears strong, and has on its side the\narmies and thrones of power, the riches and the glory of the world, and\nthough poor men crouch down in despair. Justice will not fail and perish\nout from the world of men, nor will what is really wrong and contrary to\nGod's real law of justice continually endure. The Power, the Wisdom, and\nthe Justice of God are on the side of every just thought, and it cannot\nfail, any more than God Himself can perish.\n\nIn human affairs, the justice of God must work by human means. Men are\nthe instruments of God's principles; our morality is the instrument of\nHis justice, which, incomprehensible to us, seems to our short vision\noften to work injustice, but will at some time still the oppressor's\nbrutal laugh. Justice is the rule of conduct written in the nature of\nmankind. We may, in our daily life, in house or field or shop, in the\noffice or in the court, help to prepare the way for the commonwealth of\njustice which is slowly, but, we would fain hope, surely approaching.\nAll the justice we mature will bless us here and hereafter, and at our\ndeath we shall leave it added to the common store of human-kind. And\nevery Mason who, content to do that which is possible and practicable,\ndoes and enforces justice, may help deepen the channel of human morality\nin which God's justice runs; and so the wrecks of evil that now check\nand obstruct the stream may the sooner be swept out and borne away by\nthe resistless tide of Omnipotent Right. Let us, my Brother, in this, as\nin all else, endeavor always to perform the duties of a good Mason and a\ngood man.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nXXXII.\n\nSUBLIME PRINCE OF THE ROYAL SECRET.\n\n[Master of Royal Secret.]\n\n\nThe Occult Science of the Ancient Magi was concealed under the shadows\nof the Ancient Mysteries: it was imperfectly revealed or rather\ndisfigured by the Gnostics: it is guessed at under the obscurities that\ncover the pretended crimes of the Templars; and it is found enveloped in\nenigmas that seem impenetrable, in the Rites of the Highest Masonry.\n\nMagism was the Science of Abraham and Orpheus, of Confucius and\nZoroaster. It was the dogmas of this Science that were engraven on the\ntables of stone by Hanoch and Trismegistus. Moses purified and\nre-_veiled_ them, for that is the meaning of the word _reveal_. He\ncovered them with a new veil, when he made of the Holy Kabalah the\nexclusive heritage of the people of Israel, and the inviolable Secret\nof its priests. The Mysteries of Thebes and Eleusis preserved among the\nnations some symbols of it, already altered, and the mysterious key\nwhereof was lost among the instruments of an ever-growing superstition.\nJerusalem, the murderess of her prophets, and so often prostituted to\nthe false gods of the Syrians and Babylonians, had at length in its turn\nlost the Holy Word, when a Prophet announced to the Magi by the\nconsecrated Star of Initiation, came to rend asunder the worn veil of\nthe old Temple, in order to give the Church a new tissue of legends and\nsymbols, that still and ever conceals from the Profane, and ever\npreserves to the Elect the same truths.\n\nIt was the remembrance of this scientific and religious Absolute, of\nthis doctrine that is summed up in a word, of this Word, in fine,\nalternately lost and found again, that was transmitted to the Elect of\nall the Ancient Initiations: it was this same remembrance, preserved, or\nperhaps profaned in the celebrated Order of the Templars, that became\nfor all the secret associations, of the Rose-Croix, of the Illuminati,\nand of the Hermetic Freemasons, the reason of their strange rites, of\ntheir signs more or less conventional, and, above all, of their mutual\ndevotedness and of their power.\n\nThe Gnostics caused the Gnosis to be proscribed by the Christians, and\nthe official Sanctuary was closed against the high initiation. Thus the\nHierarchy of Knowledge was compromitted by the violences of usurping\nignorance, and the disorders of the Sanctuary are reproduced in the\nState; for always, willingly or unwillingly, the King is sustained by\nthe Priest, and it is from the eternal Sanctuary of the Divine\ninstruction that the Powers of the Earth, to insure themselves\ndurability, must receive their consecration and their force.\n\nThe Hermetic Science of the early Christian ages, cultivated also by\nGeber, Alfarabius, and others of the Arabs, studied by the Chiefs of the\nTemplars, and embodied in certain symbols of the higher Degrees of\nFreemasonry, may be accurately defined as the Kabalah in active\nrealization, or the Magic of Works. It has three analogous Degrees,\nreligious, philosophical, and physical realization.\n\nIts religious realization is the durable foundation of the true Empire\nand the true Priesthood that rule in the realm of human intellect: its\nphilosophical realization is the establishment of an absolute Doctrine,\nknown in all times as the \"HOLY DOCTRINE,\" and of which PLUTARCH, in\nthe Treatise \"_de Iside et Osiride_,\" speaks at large but mysteriously;\nand of a Hierarchical instruction to secure the uninterrupted succession\nof Adepts among the Initiates: its physical realization is the discovery\nand application, in the Microcosm, or Little World, of the creative law\nthat incessantly peoples the great Universe.\n\nMeasure a corner of the Creation, and multiply that space in\nproportional progression, and the entire Infinite will multiply its\ncircles filled with universes, which will pass in proportional segments\nbetween the ideal and elongating branches of your Compass. Now suppose\nthat from any point whatever of the Infinite above you a hand holds\nanother Compass or a Square, the lines of the Celestial triangle will\nnecessarily meet those of the Compass of Science, to form the Mysterious\nStar of Solomon.\n\nAll hypotheses scientifically probable are the last gleams of the\ntwilight of knowledge, or its last shadows. Faith begins where Reason\nsinks exhausted. Beyond the human Reason is the Divine Reason, to our\nfeebleness the great Absurdity, the Infinite Absurd, which confounds us\nand which we believe. For the Master, the Compass of Faith is _above_\nthe Square of Reason; but _both_ rest upon the Holy Scriptures and\ncombine to form the Blazing Star of Truth.\n\nAll eyes do not see alike. Even the visible creation is not, for all who\nlook upon it, of one form and one color. Our brain is a book printed\nwithin and without, and the two writings are, with all men, more or less\nconfused.\n\nThe primary tradition of the single revelation has been preserved under\nthe name of the \"Kabalah,\" by the Priesthood of Israel. The Kabalistic\ndoctrine, which was also the dogma of the Magi and of Hermes, is\ncontained in the Sepher Yetsairah, the Sohar, and the Talmud. According\nto that doctrine, the Absolute is the Being, in which The Word Is, the\nWord that is the utterance and expression of being and life.\n\nMagic is that which it is; it is by itself, like the mathematics; for it\nis the exact and absolute science of Nature and its laws.\n\nMagic is the science of the Ancient Magi: and the Christian religion,\nwhich has imposed silence on the lying oracles, and put an end to the\nprestiges of the false Gods, itself reveres those Magi who came from the\nEast, guided by a Star, to adore the Saviour of the world in His\ncradle.\n\nTradition also gives these Magi the title of \"Kings;\" because initiation\ninto Magism constitutes a genuine royalty; and because the grand art of\nthe Magi is styled by all the Adepts, \"_The Royal Art_,\" or the _Holy\nRealm_ or _Empire, Sanctum Regnum_.\n\nThe Star which guided them is that same Blazing Star, the image whereof\nwe find in all initiations. To the Alchemists it is the sign of the\nQuintessence; to the Magists, the Grand Arcanum; to the Kabalists, the\nSacred Pentagram. The study of this Pentagram could not but lead the\nMagi to the knowledge of the New Name which was about to raise itself\nabove all names, and cause all creatures capable of adoration to bend\nthe knee.\n\nMagic unites in one and the same science, whatsoever Philosophy can\npossess that is most certain, and Religion of the Infallible and the\nEternal. It perfectly and incontestably reconciles these two terms that\nat first blush seem so opposed to each other; faith and reason, science\nand creed, authority and liberty.\n\nIt supplies the human mind with an instrument of philosophical and\nreligious certainty, exact as the mathematics, and accounting for the\ninfallibility of the mathematics themselves.\n\nThus there is an Absolute, in the matters of the Intelligence and of\nFaith. The Supreme Reason has not left the gleams of the human\nunderstanding to vacillate at hazard. There is an incontestable verity,\nthere is an infallible method of knowing this verity, and by the\nknowledge of it, those who accept it as a rule may give their will a\nsovereign power that will make them the masters of all inferior things\nand of all errant spirits; that is to say, will make them the Arbiters\nand Kings of the World.\n\nScience has its nights and its dawns, because it gives the intellectual\nworld a life which has its regulated movements and its progressive\nphases. It is with Truths, as with the luminous rays: nothing of what is\nconcealed is lost; but also, nothing of what is discovered is absolutely\nnew. God has been pleased to give to Science, which is the reflection of\nHis Glory, the Seal of His Eternity.\n\nIt is not in the books of the Philosophers, but in the religious\nsymbolism of the Ancients, that we must look for the footprints of\nScience, and re-discover the Mysteries of Knowledge. The Priests of\nEgypt knew, better than we do, the laws of movement and of life. They\nknew how to temper or, intensify action by reaction; and readily foresaw\nthe realization of these effects, the causes of which they had\ndetermined. The Columns of Seth, Enoch, Solomon, and Hercules have\nsymbolized in the Magian traditions this universal law of the\nEquilibrium; and the Science of the Equilibrium or balancing of Forces\nhad led the Initiates to that of the universal gravitation around the\ncentres of Life, Heat, and Light.\n\nThales and Pythagoras learned in the Sanctuaries of Egypt that the Earth\nrevolved around the Sun; but they did not attempt to make this generally\nknown, because to do so it would have been necessary to reveal one of\nthe great Secrets of the Temple, that double law of attraction and\nradiation or of sympathy and antipathy, of fixedness and movement, which\nis the principle of Creation, and the perpetual cause of life. This\nTruth was ridiculed by the Christian Lactantius, as it was long after\nsought to be proven a falsehood by persecution, by Papal Rome.\n\nSo the philosophers reasoned, while the Priests, without replying to\nthem or even smiling at their errors, wrote, in those Hieroglyphics that\ncreated all dogmas and all poetry, the Secrets of the Truth.\n\nWhen Truth comes into the world, the Star of Knowledge advises the Magi\nof it, and they hasten to adore the Infant who creates the Future. It is\nby means of the Intelligence of the Hierarchy and the practice of\nobedience, that one obtains Initiation. If the Rulers have the Divine\nRight to govern, the true Initiate will cheerfully obey.\n\nThe orthodox traditions were carried from Chaldea by Abraham. They\nreigned in Egypt in the time of Joseph, together with the knowledge of\nthe True God. Moses carried Orthodoxy out of Egypt, and in the Secret\nTraditions of the Kabalah we find a Theology entire, perfect, unique,\nlike that which in Christianity is most grand and best explained by the\nFathers and the Doctors, the whole with a consistency and a\nharmoniousness which it is not as yet given to the world to comprehend.\nThe Sohar, which is the Key of the Holy Books, opens also all the depths\nand lights, all the obscurities of the Ancient Mythologies and of the\nSciences originally concealed in the Sanctuaries. It is true that the\nSecret of this Key must be known, to enable one to make use of it, and\nthat for even the most penetrating intellects, not initiated in this\nSecret, the Sohar is absolutely incomprehensible and almost illegible.\n\nThe Secret of the Occult Sciences is that of Nature itself, the Secret\nof the generation of the Angels and Worlds, that of the Omnipotence of\nGod.\n\n\"_Ye shall be like the Elohim, knowing good and evil_,\" had the Serpent\nof Genesis said, and the Tree of Knowledge became the Tree of Death.\n\nFor six thousand years the Martyrs of Knowledge toil and die at the foot\nof this tree, that it may again become the Tree of Life.\n\nThe Absolute sought for unsuccessfully by the insensate and found by the\nSages, is the TRUTH, the REALITY, and the REASON of the universal\nequilibrium!\n\nEquilibrium is the Harmony that results from the analogy of Contraries.\n\nUntil now, Humanity has been endeavoring to stand on one foot; sometimes\non one, sometimes on the other.\n\nCivilizations have risen and perished, either by the anarchical insanity\nof Despotism, or by the despotic anarchy of Revolt.\n\nTo organize Anarchy, is the problem which the revolutionists have and\nwill eternally have to resolve. It is the rock of Sisyphus that will\nalways fall back upon them. To exist a single instant, they are and\nalways will be by fatality reduced to improvise a despotism without\nother reason of existence than necessity, and which, consequently, is\nviolent and blind as Necessity. We escape from the harmonious monarchy\nof Reason, only to fall under the irregular dictatorship of Folly.\n\nSometimes superstitious enthusiasms, sometimes the miserable\ncalculations of the materialist instinct have led astray the nations,\nand God at last urges the world on toward believing Reason and\nreasonable Beliefs.\n\nWe have had prophets enough without philosophy, and philosophers without\nreligion; the blind believers and the skeptics resemble each other, and\nare as far the one as the other from the eternal salvation.\n\nIn the chaos of universal doubt and of the conflicts of Reason and\nFaith, the great men and Seers have been but infirm and morbid artists,\nseeking the beau-ideal at the risk and peril of their reason and life.\n\nLiving only in the hope to be crowned, they are the first to do what\nPythagoras in so touching a manner prohibits in his admirable Symbols;\nthey rend crowns, and tread them under foot.\n\nLight is the equilibrium of Shadow and Lucidity.\n\nMovement is the equilibrium of Inertia and Activity.\n\nAuthority is the equilibrium of Liberty and Power.\n\nWisdom is equilibrium in the Thoughts, which are the scintillations and\nrays of the Intellect.\n\nVirtue is equilibrium in the Affections: Beauty is harmonious proportion\nin Forms.\n\nThe beautiful lives are the accurate ones, and the magnificences of\nNature are an algebra of graces and splendors.\n\nEverything just is beautiful; everything beautiful ought to be just.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThere is, in fact, no Nothing, no void Emptiness, in the Universe. From\nthe upper or outer surface of our atmosphere to that of the Sun, and to\nthose of the Planets and remote Stars, in different directions, Science\nhas for hundreds of centuries imagined that there was simple, void,\nempty Space. Comparing finite knowledge with the Infinite, the\nPhilosophers know little more than the apes! In all that \"void\" space\nare the Infinite Forces of God, acting in an infinite variety of\ndirections, back and forth, and never for an instant inactive. In all of\nit, active through the whole of its Infinity, is the Light that is the\nVisible Manifestation of God. The earth and every other planet and\nsphere that is not a Centre of Light, carries its cone of shadow with it\nas it flies and flashes round in its orbit; but the darkness has no\n_home_ in the Universe. To illuminate the sphere on one side, is to\nproject a cone of darkness on the other; and Error also is the Shadow of\nthe Truth with which God illuminates the Soul.\n\nIn all that \"Void,\" also, is the Mysterious and ever Active Electricity,\nand Heat, and the Omnipresent Ether. At the will of God the Invisible\nbecomes Visible. Two invisible gases, combined by the action of a Force\nof God, and compressed, become and remain the water that fills the great\nbasins of the seas, flows in the rivers and rivulets, leaps forth from\nthe rocks or springs, drops upon the earth in rains, or whitens it with\nsnows, and bridges the Danubes with ice, or gathers in vast reservoirs\nin the earth's bosom. God manifested fills all the extension that we\nfoolishly call Empty Space and the Void.\n\nAnd everywhere in the Universe, what we call Life and Movement results\nfrom a continual conflict of Forces or Impulses. Whenever that active\nantagonism ceases, the immobility and inertia, which are Death, result.\n\nIf, says the Kabalah, the Justice of God, which is Severity or the\nFemale, alone reigned, creation of imperfect beings such as man would\nfrom the beginning have been impossible, because Sin being congenital\nwith Humanity, the Infinite Justice, measuring the Sin by the Infinity\nof the God offended against, must have annihilated Humanity at the\ninstant of its creation; and not only Humanity but the Angels, since\nthese also, like all created by God and less than perfect, are sinful.\nNothing imperfect would have been possible. If, on the other hand, the\nMercy or Benignity of God, the Male, were in no wise counteracted, Sin\nwould go unpunished, and the Universe fall into a chaos of corruption.\n\nLet God but repeal a single principle or law of chemical attraction or\nsympathy, and the antagonistic forces equilibrated in matter, released\nfrom constraint, would instantaneously expand all that we term matter\ninto impalpable and invisible gases, such as water or steam is, when,\nconfined in a cylinder and subjected to an immense degree of that\nmysterious force of the Deity which we call \"heat,\" it is by its\nexpansion released.\n\nIncessantly the great currents and rivers of air flow and rush and roll\nfrom the equator to the frozen polar regions, and back from these to the\ntorrid equatorial realms. Necessarily incident to these great, immense,\nequilibrated and beneficent movements, caused by the antagonism of\nequatorial heat and polar cold, are the typhoons, tornadoes, and\ncyclones that result from conflicts between the rushing currents. These\nand the benign trade-winds result from the same great law. God is\nomnipotent; but effects without causes are impossible, and these effects\ncannot but sometimes be evil. The fire would not warm, if it could not\nalso burn, the human flesh. The most virulent poisons are the most\nsovereign remedies, when given in due proportion. The Evil is the shadow\nof the Good, and inseparable from it.\n\nThe Divine Wisdom limits by equipoise the Omnipotence of the Divine Will\nor Power, and the result is Beauty or Harmony. The arch rests not on a\nsingle column, but springs from one on either side. So is it also with\nthe Divine Justice and Mercy, and with the Human Reason and Human Faith.\n\nThat purely scholastic Theology, issue of the Categories of Aristotle\nand of the Sentences of Peter Lombard, that logic of the syllogism which\nargues instead of reasoning, and finds a response to every thing by\nsubtilizing on terms, wholly ignored the Kabalastic dogma and wandered\noff into the drear vacuity of darkness. It was less a philosophy or a\nwisdom than a philosophical automaton, replying by means of springs, and\nuncoiling its theses like a wheeled movement. It was not the human verb\nbut the monotonous cry of a machine, the inanimate speech of an Andro\u00efd.\nIt was the fatal precision of mechanism, instead of a free application\nof rational necessities. ST. THOMAS AQUINAS crushed with a single blow\nall this scaffolding of words built one upon the other, by proclaiming\nthe eternal Empire of Reason, in that magnificent sentence, \"_A thing is\nnot just because_ GOD _wills it; but_ GOD _wills it because it is\njust_.\" The proximate consequence of this proposition, arguing from the\ngreater to the less, was this: \"_A thing is not true because_ ARISTOTLE\n_has said it; but_ ARISTOTLE _could not reasonably say it unless it was\ntrue. Seek then, first of all, the_ TRUTH _and_ JUSTICE, _and the\nScience of_ ARISTOTLE _will be given you in addition_.\"\n\nIt is the fine dream of the greatest of the Poets, that Hell, become\nuseless, is to be closed at length, by the aggrandizement of Heaven;\nthat the problem of Evil is to receive its final solution, and Good\nalone, necessary and triumphant, is to reign in Eternity. So the Persian\ndogma taught that AHRIMAN and his subordinate ministers of Evil were at\nlast, by means of a Redeemer and Mediator, to be reconciled with Deity,\nand all Evil to end. But unfortunately, the philosopher forgets all the\nlaws of equilibrium, and seeks to absorb the Light in a splendor without\nshadow, and movement in an absolute repose that would be the cessation\nof life. So long as there shall be a visible light, there will be a\nshadow proportional to this Light, and whatever is illuminated will cast\nits cone of shadow. Repose will never be happiness, if it is not\nbalanced by an analogous and contrary movement. This is the immutable\nlaw of Nature, the Eternal Will of the JUSTICE which is GOD.\n\nThe same reason necessitates Evil and Sorrow in Humanity, which renders\nindispensable the bitterness of the waters of the seas. Here also,\nHarmony can result only from the analogy of contraries, and what is\nabove exists by reason of what is below. It is the depth that determines\nthe height; and if the valleys are filled up, the mountains disappear:\nso, if the shadows are effaced, the Light is annulled, which is only\nvisible by the graduated contrast of gloom and splendor, and universal\nobscurity will be produced by an immense dazzling. Even the colors in\nthe Light only exist by the presence of the shadow: it is the threefold\nalliance of the day and night, the luminous image of the dogma, the\nLight made Shadow, as the Saviour is the Logos made man: and all this\nreposes on the same law, the primary law of creation, the single and\nabsolute law of Nature, that of the distinction and harmonious\nponderation of the contrary forces in the universal equipoise.\n\nThe two great columns of the Temple that symbolizes the Universe are\nNecessity, or the omnipotent Will of God, which nothing can disobey, and\nLiberty, or the free-will of His creatures. Apparently and to our human\nreason antagonistic, the same Reason is not incapable of comprehending\nhow they can be in equipoise. The Infinite Power and Wisdom could so\nplan the Universe and the Infinite Succession of things as to leave man\nfree to act, and, foreseeing what each would at every instant think and\ndo, to make of the free-will and free-action of each an instrument to\naid in effecting its general purpose. For even a man, foreseeing that\nanother will do a certain act, and in nowise controlling or even\ninfluencing him may use that action as an instrument to effect his own\npurposes.\n\nThe Infinite Wisdom of God foresees what each will do, and uses it as an\ninstrument, by the exertion of His Infinite Power, which yet does not\ncontrol the Human action so as to annihilate its freedom. The result is\nHarmony, the third column that upholds the Lodge. The same Harmony\nresults from the equipoise of Necessity and Liberty. The will of God is\nnot for an instant defeated nor thwarted, and this is the Divine\nVictory; and yet He does not tempt nor constrain men to do Evil, and\nthus His Infinite Glory is unimpaired. The result is Stability,\nCohesion, and Permanence in the Universe, and undivided Dominion and\nAutocracy in the Deity. And these, Victory, Glory, Stability, and\nDominion, are the last four Sephiroth of the Kabalah.\n\nI AM, God said to Moses, that which Is, Was and Shall forever Be. But\nthe Very God, in His unmanifested Essence, conceived of as not yet\nhaving created and as Alone, has no Name. Such was the doctrine of all\nthe ancient Sages, and it is so expressly declared in the Kabalah.\n[Hebrew: \u05d9\u05d4\u05d5\u05d4] is the Name of the Deity manifested in a single act, that\nof Creation, and containing within Himself, in idea and actuality, the\nwhole Universe, to be invested with form and be materially developed\nduring the eternal succession of ages. As God never WAS NOT, so He never\nTHOUGHT not, and the Universe has no more had a beginning than the\nDivine Thought of which it is the utterance,--no more than the Deity\nHimself. The duration of the Universe is but a point halfway upon the\ninfinite line of eternity; and God was not inert and uncreative during\nthe eternity that stretches behind that point. The Archetype of the\nUniverse did never not exist in the Divine Mind. The Word was in the\nBEGINNING with God, and WAS God. And the Ineffable NAME is that, not of\nthe Very Essence but of the Absolute, manifested as Being or Existence.\nFor Existence or Being, said the Philosophers, is limitation; and the\nVery Deity is not limited nor defined, but is all that _may possibly\nbe_, besides all that is, was, and shall be.\n\nReversing the letters of the Ineffable Name, and dividing it, it becomes\nbi-sexual, as the word [Hebrew: \u05d9\u05d4], _Yud-He_ or JAH is, and discloses\nthe meaning of much of the obscure language of the Kabalah, and is The\nHighest of which the Columns Jachin and Boaz are the symbol. \"In the\nimage of Deity,\" we are told, \"God created the Man; Male and Female\ncreated He _them_:\" and the writer, symbolizing the Divine by the Human,\nthen tells us that the woman, at first contained in the man, was taken\nfrom his side. So Minerva, Goddess of Wisdom, was born, a woman and in\narmor, of the brain of Jove; Isis was the sister before she was the wife\nof Osiris, and within BRAHM, the Source of all, the Very God, without\nsex or name, was developed MAYA, the Mother of all that is. The WORD is\nthe First and Only-begotten of the Father; and the awe with which the\nHighest Mysteries were regarded has imposed silence in respect to the\nNature of the Holy Spirit. The Word is Light, and the Life of Humanity.\n\nIt is for the Adepts to understand the meaning of the Symbols.\n\nReturn now, with us, to the Degrees of the Blue Masonry, and for your\nlast lesson, receive the explanation of one of their Symbols.\n\nYou see upon the altar of those Degrees the SQUARE and the COMPASS, and\nyou remember how they lay upon the altar in each Degree.\n\nThe SQUARE is an instrument adapted for plane surfaces only, and\ntherefore appropriate to Geometry, or measurement of the Earth, which\nappears to be, and was by the Ancients supposed to be, a plane. The\nCOMPASS is an instrument that has relation to spheres and spherical\nsurfaces, and is adapted to spherical trigonometry, or that branch of\nmathematics which deals with the Heavens and the orbits of the planetary\nbodies.\n\nThe SQUARE, therefore, is a natural and appropriate Symbol of this Earth\nand the things that belong to it, are of it, or concern it. The Compass\nis an equally natural and appropriate Symbol of the Heavens, and of all\ncelestial things and celestial natures.\n\nYou see at the beginning of this reading, an old Hermetic Symbol, copied\nfrom the \"MATERIA PRIMA\" of Valentinus, printed at Franckfurt, in 1613,\nwith a treatise entitled \"AZOTH.\" Upon it you see a Triangle upon a\nSquare, both of these contained in a circle; and above this, standing\nupon a dragon, a human body, with two arms only, but two heads, one male\nand the other female. By the side of the male head is the Sun, and by\nthat of the female head, the Moon, the crescent within the circle of the\nfull moon. And the hand on the _male_ side holds a _Compass_, and that\non the _female_ side, a _Square_.\n\nThe Heavens and the Earth were personified as Deities, even among the\nAryan Ancestors of the European nations of the Hindus, Zends, Bactrians,\nand Persians; and the Rig Veda Sanhita contains hymns addressed to them\nas gods. They were deified also among the Ph\u0153nicians; and among the\nGreeks OURANOS and GEA, Heaven and Earth, were sung as the most ancient\nof the Deities, by Hesiod.\n\nIt is the great, fertile, beautiful MOTHER, Earth, that produces, with\nlimitless profusion of beneficence, everything that ministers to the\nneeds, to the comfort, and to the luxury of man. From her teeming and\ninexhaustible bosom come, the fruits, the grain, the flowers, in their\nseason. From it comes all that feeds the animals which serve man as\nlaborers and for food. She, in the fair Springtime, is green with\nabundant grass, and the trees spring from her soil, and from her teeming\nvitality take their wealth of green leaves. In her womb are found the\nuseful and valuable minerals; hers are the seas the swarm with life;\nhers the rivers that furnish food and irrigation, and the mountains that\nsend down the streams which swell into these rivers; hers the forests\nthat feed the sacred fires for the sacrifices, and blaze upon the\ndomestic hearths. The EARTH, therefore, the great PRODUCER, was always\nrepresented as a _female_, as the MOTHER,--Great, Bounteous, Beneficent\nMother Earth.\n\nOn the other hand, it is the light and heat of the Sun in the Heavens,\nand the rains that seem to come from them, that in the Springtime make\nfruitful this bountifully-producing Earth, that restore life and warmth\nto her veins, chilled by Winter, set running free her streams, and\n_beget_, as it were, that greenness and that abundance of which she is\nso prolific. As the procreative and generative agents, the Heavens and\nthe Sun have always been regarded as _male_; as the generators that\nfructify the Earth and cause it to produce.\n\nThe Hermaphroditic figure is the Symbol of the double nature anciently\nassigned to the Deity, as Generator and Producer, as BRAHM and MAYA\namong the Aryans, Osiris and Isis among the Egyptians. As the Sun was\nmale, so the Moon was female; and Isis was both the sister and the wife\nof Osiris. The Compass, therefore, is the Hermetic Symbol of the\nCreative Deity, and the Square of the productive Earth or Universe.\n\nFrom the Heavens come the spiritual and immortal portion of man; from\nthe Earth his material and mortal portion. The Hebrew Genesis says that\nYEHOUAH formed man of the dust of the Earth, and breathed into his\nnostrils the breath of life. Through the seven planetary spheres,\nrepresented by the Mystic Ladder of the Mithriac Initiations, and it by\nthat which Jacob saw in his dream (not with _three_, but with _seven_\nsteps), the Souls, emanating from the Deity, descended, to be united to\ntheir human bodies; and through those seven spheres they must re-ascend,\nto return to their origin and home in the bosom of the Deity.\n\nThe COMPASS, therefore, as the Symbol of the _Heavens_, represents the\nspiritual, intellectual, and moral portion of this double nature of\nHumanity; and the SQUARE, as the Symbol of the _Earth_, its material,\nsensual, and baser portion.\n\n\"Truth and Intelligence,\" said one of the Ancient Indian Sects of\nPhilosophers, \"are the Eternal attributes of God, not of the individual\nSoul, which is susceptible both of knowledge and ignorance, of pleasure\nand pain; therefore God and the individual Soul are distinct:\" and this\nexpression of the ancient Nyaya Philosophers, in regard to Truth, has\nbeen handed down to us through the long succession of ages, in the\nlessons of Freemasonry, wherein we read, that \"Truth is a Divine\nAttribute, and the foundation of every virtue.\"\n\n\"While embodied in matter,\" they said, \"the Soul is in a state of\nimprisonment, and is under the influence of evil passions; but having,\nby intense study, arrived at the knowledge of the elements and\nprinciples of Nature, it attains unto the place of THE ETERNAL; in which\nstate of happiness, its individuality does not cease.\"\n\nThe vitality which animates the mortal frame, the Breath of Life of the\nHebrew Genesis, the Hindu Philosophers in general held, perishes with\nit; but the Soul is divine, an emanation of the Spirit of God, but not a\n_portion_ of that Spirit. For they compared it to the heat and light\nsent forth from the Sun, or to a _ray_ of that light, which neither\nlessens nor divides its own essence.\n\nHowever created, or invested with separate existence, the Soul, which is\nbut the creature of the Deity, cannot know the mode of its creation, nor\ncomprehend its own individuality. It cannot even comprehend how the\nbeing which it and the body constitute, can feel pain, or see, or hear.\nIt has pleased the Universal Creator to set bounds to the scope of our\nhuman and finite reason, beyond which it cannot reach; and if we are\ncapable of comprehending the mode and manner of the creation or\ngeneration of the Universe of things, He has been pleased to conceal it\nfrom us by an impenetrable veil, while the words used to express the act\nhave no other definite meaning than that He caused that Universe to\ncommence to exist.\n\nIt is enough for us to know, what Masonry teaches, that we are not all\nmortal; that the Soul or Spirit, the intellectual and reasoning portion\nof ourself, is our Very Self, is not subject to decay and dissolution,\nbut is simple and immaterial, survives the death of the body, and is\n_capable_ of immortality; that it is also capable of improvement and\nadvancement, of increase of knowledge of the things that are divine, of\nbecoming wiser and better, and more and more worthy of immortality; and\nthat to become so, and to help to improve and benefit others and all our\nrace, is the noblest ambition and highest glory that we can entertain\nand attain unto, in this momentary and imperfect life.\n\nIn every human being the Divine and the Human are intermingled. In every\none there are the Reason and the Moral sense, the passions that prompt\nto evil, and the sensual appetites. \"If ye live after the flesh, ye\nshall die,\" said Paul, writing to the Christians at Rome, \"but if ye\nthrough the spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live. For\nas many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.\" \"The\nflesh lusteth against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh,\" he\nsaid, writing to the Christians of Galatia, \"and these are contrary the\none to the other, so that ye cannot do the things that ye would.\" \"That\nwhich I do, I do not willingly do,\" he wrote to the Romans, \"for what I\nwish to do, that I do not do, but that which I hate I do. It is no more\nI that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. To will, is present with me;\nbut how to perform that which is good, I find not. For, I do not do the\ngood that I desire to do; and the evil that I do not wish to do, that I\ndo. I find then a _law_, that when I desire to do good, evil is present\nwith me; for I delight in the law of God after the inward man, but I see\nanother law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and\nbringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members ...\nSo then, with the mind I myself serve the law of God, but with the flesh\nthe law of sin.\"\n\nLife is a battle, and to fight that battle heroically and well is the\ngreat purpose of every man's existence, who is worthy and fit to live at\nall. To stem the strong currents of adversity, to advance in despite of\nall obstacles, to snatch victory from the jealous grasp of fortune, to\nbecome a chief and a leader among men, to rise to rank and power by\neloquence, courage, perseverance, study, energy, activity, discouraged\nby no reverses, impatient of no delays, deterred by no hazards; to win\nwealth, to subjugate men by our intellect, the very elements by our\naudacity, to succeed, to prosper, to thrive;--thus it is, according to\nthe general understanding, that one fights well the battle of life. Even\nto succeed in business by that boldness which halts for no risks, that\naudacity which stakes all upon hazardous chances; by the shrewdness of\nthe close dealer, the boldness of the unscrupulous operator, even by\nthe knaveries of the stock-board and the gold-room; to crawl up into\nplace by disreputable means or the votes of brutal ignorance,--these\nalso are deemed to be among the great successes of life.\n\nBut that which is the greatest battle, and in which the truest honor and\nmost real success are to be won, is that which our intellect and reason\nand moral sense, our spiritual natures, fight against our sensual\nappetites and evil passions, our earthly and material or animal nature.\nTherein only are the true glories of heroism to be won, there only the\nsuccesses that entitle us to triumphs.\n\nIn every human life that battle is fought; and those who win elsewhere,\noften suffer ignominious defeat and disastrous rout, and discomfiture\nand shameful downfall in this encounter.\n\nYou have heard more than one definition of Freemasonry. The truest and\nthe most significant you have yet to hear. It is taught to the entered\nApprentice, the Fellow-Craft, and the Master, and it is taught in every\nDegree through which you have advanced to this. It is a definition of\nwhat Freemasonry is, of what its purposes and its very essence and\nspirit are; and it has for every one of us the force and sanctity of a\ndivine law, and imposes on every one of us a solemn obligation.\n\n_It is symbolized and taught, to the Apprentice as well as to you, by\nthe_ COMPASS _and the_ SQUARE; upon which, as well as upon the Book of\nyour Religion and the Book of the law of the Scottish Freemasonry, you\nhave taken so many obligations. As a Knight, you have been taught it by\nthe Swords, the symbols of HONOR and DUTY, on which you have taken your\nvows: it was taught you by the BALANCE, the symbol of all Equilibrium,\nand by the CROSS, the symbol of devotedness and self-sacrifice; but all\nthat these teach and contain is taught and contained, for Entered\nApprentice, Knight, and Prince alike, by the Compass and the Square.\n\nFor the Apprentice, the points of the Compass are beneath the Square.\nFor the Fellow-Craft, one is above and one beneath. For the Master, both\nare dominant, and have rule, control, and empire over the symbol of the\nearthly and the material.\n\nFREEMASONRY _is the subjugation of the Human that is in man by the\nDivine; the Conquest of the Appetites and Passions by the Moral Sense\nand the Reason; a continual effort, struggle, and warfare of the\nSpiritual against the Material and Sensual._ That victory, when it has\nbeen achieved and secured, and the conqueror may rest upon his shield\nand wear the well-earned laurels, is the true HOLY EMPIRE.\n\nTo achieve it, the Mason must first attain a solid conviction, founded\nupon reason, that he hath within him a spiritual nature, a soul that is\nnot to die when the body is dissolved, but is to continue to exist and\nto advance toward perfection through all the ages of eternity, and to\nsee more and more clearly, as it draws nearer unto God, the Light of the\nDivine Presence. This the Philosophy of the Ancient and Accepted Rite\nteaches him; and it encourages him to persevere by helping him to\nbelieve that his free will is entirely consistent with God's Omnipotence\nand Omniscience; that He is not only infinite in power, and of infinite\nwisdom, but of infinite mercy, and an infinitely tender pity and love\nfor the frail and imperfect creatures that He has made.\n\nEvery Degree of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite, from the first\nto the thirty-second, teaches by its ceremonial as well as by its\ninstruction, that the noblest purpose of life and the highest duty of a\nman are to strive incessantly and vigorously to win the mastery of\neverything, of that which in him is spiritual and divine, over that\nwhich is material and sensual; so that in him also, as in the Universe\nwhich God governs, Harmony and Beauty may be the result of a just\nequilibrium.\n\nYou have been taught this in those Degrees, conferred in the Lodge of\nPerfection, which inculcate particularly the practical morality of\nFreemasonry. To be true, under whatever temptation to be false; to be\nhonest in all your dealings, even if great losses should be the\nconsequence; to be charitable, when selfishness would prompt you to\nclose your hand, and deprivation of luxury or comfort must follow the\ncharitable act; to judge justly and impartially, even in your own case,\nwhen baser impulses prompt you to do an injustice in order that you may\nbe benefited or justified; to be tolerant, when passion prompts to\nintolerance and persecution; to do that which is right, when the wrong\nseems to promise larger profit; and to wrong no man of anything that is\nhis, however easy it may seem so to enrich yourself;--in all these\nthings and others which you promised in those Degrees, your spiritual\nnature is taught and encouraged to assert its rightful dominion over\nyour appetites and passions.\n\nThe philosophical Degrees have taught you the value of knowledge, the\nexcellence of truth, the superiority of intellectual labor, the dignity\nand value of your soul, the worth of great and noble thoughts; and thus\nendeavored to assist you to rise above the level of the animal appetites\nand passions, the pursuits of greed and the miserable struggles of\nambition, and to find purer pleasure and nobler prizes and rewards in\nthe acquisition of knowledge, the enlargement of the intellect, the\ninterpretation of the sacred writing of God upon the great pages of the\nBook of Nature.\n\nAnd the Chivalric Degrees have led you on the same path, by showing you\nthe excellence of generosity, clemency, forgiveness of injuries,\nmagnanimity, contempt of danger, and the paramount obligations of Duty\nand Honor. They have taught you to overcome the fear of death, to devote\nyourself to the great cause of civil and religious Liberty, to be the\nSoldier of all that is just, right, and true; in the midst of pestilence\nto deserve your title of Knight Commander of the Temple, and neither\nthere nor elsewhere to desert your post and flee dastard-like from the\nfoe. In all this, you assert the superiority and right to dominion of\nthat in you which is spiritual and divine. No base fear of danger or\ndeath, no sordid ambitions or pitiful greeds or base considerations can\ntempt a true Scottish Knight to dishonor, and so make his intellect, his\nreason, his soul, the bond-slave of his appetites, of his passions, of\nthat which is material and animal, selfish and brutish in his nature.\n\nIt is not possible to create a true and genuine Brotherhood upon any\ntheory of the baseness of human nature: nor by a community of belief in\nabstract propositions as to the nature of the Deity, the number of His\npersons, or other theorems of religious faith: nor by the establishment\nof a system of association simply for mutual relief, and by which, in\nconsideration of certain payments regularly made, each becomes entitled\nto a certain stipend in case of sickness, to attention then, and to the\nceremonies of burial after death.\n\nThere can be no genuine Brotherhood without mutual regard, good opinion\nand esteem, mutual charity, and mutual allowance for faults and\nfailings. It is those only who learn habitually to think better of each\nother, to look habitually for the good that is in each other, and\nexpect, allow for, and overlook, the evil, who can be Brethren one of\nthe other, in any true sense of the word. Those who gloat over the\nfailings of one another, who think each other to be naturally base and\nlow, of a nature in which the Evil predominates and excellence is not to\nbe looked for, cannot be even friends, and much less Brethren.\n\nNo one can have a right to think meanly of his race, unless he also\nthinks meanly of himself. If, from a single fault or error, he judges of\nthe character of another, and takes the single act as evidence of the\nwhole nature of the man and of the whole course of his life, he ought to\nconsent to be judged by the same rule, and to admit it to be right that\nothers should thus uncharitably condemn himself. But such judgments will\nbecome impossible when he incessantly reminds himself that in every man\nwho lives there is an immortal Soul endeavoring to do that which is\nright and just; a Ray, however small, and almost inappreciable, from the\nGreat Source of Light and Intelligence, which ever struggles upward amid\nall the impediments of sense and the obstructions of the passions; and\nthat in every man this ray continually wages war against his evil\npassions and his unruly appetites, or, if it has succumbed, is never\nwholly extinguished and annihilated. For he will then see that it is not\nvictory, but the struggle that deserves honor; since in this as in all\nelse no man can always command success. Amid a cloud of errors, of\nfailure, and shortcomings, he will look for the struggling Soul, for\nthat which is good in every one amid the evil, and, believing that each\nis better than from his acts and omissions he seems to be, and that God\ncares for him still, and pities him and loves him, he will feel that\neven the erring sinner is still his brother, still entitled to his\nsympathy, and bound to him by the indissoluble ties of fellowship.\n\nIf there be nothing of the divine in man, what is he, after all, but a\nmore intelligent animal? He hath no fault nor vice which some beast hath\nnot; and therefore in his vices he is but a beast of a higher order; and\nhe hath hardly any moral excellence, perhaps none, which some animal\nhath not in as great a degree,--even the more excellent of these, such\nas generosity, fidelity, and magnanimity.\n\nBardesan, the Syrian Christian, in his Book of the Laws of Countries,\nsays, of men, that \"in the things belonging to their bodies, they\nmaintain their nature like animals, and in the things which belong to\ntheir minds, they do that which they wish, as being free and with power,\nand as the likeness of God\"; and Meliton, Bishop of Sardis, in his\nOration to Antoninus C\u00e6sar, says, \"Let Him, the ever-living God, be\nalways present in thy mind; for thy mind itself is His likeness, for it,\ntoo, is invisible and impalpable, and without form.... As He exists\nforever, so thou also, when thou shalt have put off this which is\nvisible and corruptible, shalt stand before Him forever, living and\nendowed with knowledge.\"\n\nAs a matter far above our comprehension, and in the Hebrew Genesis the\nwords that are used to express the origin of things are of uncertain\nmeaning, and with equal propriety may be translated by the word\n\"generated,\" \"produced,\" \"made,\" or \"created,\" we need not dispute nor\ndebate whether the Soul or Spirit of man be a ray that has emanated or\nflowed forth from the Supreme Intelligence, or whether the Infinite\nPower hath called each into existence from nothing, by a mere exertion\nof Its will, and endowed it with immortality, and with intelligence like\nunto the Divine Intelligence: for, in either case it may be said that in\nman the Divine is united to the Human. Of this union the equilateral\nTriangle inscribed within the Square is a Symbol.\n\nWe see the Soul, Plato said, as men see the statue of Glaucus, recovered\nfrom the sea wherein it had lain many years--which viewing, it was not\neasy, if possible, to discern what was its original nature, its limbs\nhaving been partly broken and partly worn and by defacement changed, by\nthe action of the waves, and shells, weeds, and pebbles adhering to it,\nso that it more resembled some strange monster than that which it was\nwhen it left its Divine Source. Even so, he said, we see the Soul,\ndeformed by innumerable things that have done it harm, have mutilated\nand defaced it. But the Mason who hath the ROYAL SECRET can also with\nhim argue, from beholding its love of wisdom, its tendency toward\nassociation with what is divine and immortal, its larger aspirations,\nits struggles, though they may have ended in defeat, with the\nimpediments and enthralments of the senses and the passions, that when\nit shall have been rescued from the material environments that now prove\ntoo strong for it, and be freed from the deforming and disfiguring\naccretions that here adhere to it, it will again be seen in its true\nnature, and by degrees ascend by the mystic ladder of the Spheres, to\nits first home and place of origin.\n\nThe ROYAL SECRET, of which you are Prince, if you are a true Adept, if\nknowledge seems to you advisable, and Philosophy is, for you, radiant\nwith a divine beauty, is that which the Sohar terms _The Mystery of\nthe_ BALANCE. It is the Secret of the UNIVERSAL EQUILIBRIUM:--\n\n--Of that Equilibrium in the Deity, between the Infinite Divine WISDOM\nand the Infinite Divine POWER, from which result the Stability of the\nUniverse, the unchangeableness of the Divine Law, and the Principles of\nTruth, Justice, and Right which are a part of it; and the Supreme\nObligation of the Divine Law upon all men, as superior to all other law,\nand forming a part of all the laws of men and nations.\n\n--Of that Equilibrium also, between the Infinite Divine JUSTICE and the\nInfinite Divine MERCY, the result of which is the Infinite Divine\nEQUITY, and the Moral Harmony or Beauty of the Universe. By it the\nendurance of created and imperfect natures in the presence of a Perfect\nDeity is made possible; and for Him, also, as for us, to love is better\nthan to hate, and Forgiveness is wiser than Revenge or Punishment.\n\n--Of that Equilibrium between NECESSITY and LIBERTY, between the action\nof the DIVINE Omnipotence and the Free-will of man, by which vices and\nbase actions, and ungenerous thoughts and words are crimes and wrongs,\njustly punished by the law of cause and consequence, though nothing in\nthe Universe can happen or be done contrary to the will of God; and\nwithout which co-existence of Liberty and Necessity, of Free-will in the\ncreature and Omnipotence in the Creator, there could be no religion, nor\nany law of right and wrong, or merit and demerit, nor any justice in\nhuman punishments or penal laws.\n\n--Of that Equilibrium between Good and Evil, and Light and Darkness in\nthe world, which assures us that all is the work of the Infinite Wisdom\nand of an Infinite Love; and that there is no rebellious demon of Evil,\nor Principle of Darkness co-existent and in eternal controversy with\nGod, or the Principle of Light and of Good: by attaining to the\nknowledge of which equilibrium we can, through Faith, see that the\nexistence of Evil, Sin, Suffering, and Sorrow in the world, is\nconsistent with the Infinite Goodness as well as with the Infinite\nWisdom of the Almighty.\n\nSympathy and Antipathy, Attraction and Repulsion, each a Force of\nnature, are contraries, in the souls of men and in the Universe of\nspheres and worlds; and from the action and opposition of each against\nthe other, result Harmony, and that movement which is the Life of the\nUniverse and the Soul alike. They are not antagonists of each other.\nThe force that repels a Planet from the Sun is no more an _evil_ force,\nthan that which attracts the Planet toward the central Luminary; for\neach is created and exerted by the Deity, and the result is the\nharmonious movement of the obedient Planets in their elliptic orbits,\nand the mathematical accuracy and unvarying regularity of their\nmovements.\n\n--Of that Equilibrium between Authority and Individual Action which\nconstitutes Free Government, by settling on immutable foundations\nLiberty with Obedience to Law, Equality with Subjection to Authority,\nand Fraternity with Subordination to the Wisest and the Best: and of\nthat Equilibrium between the _Active_ Energy of the Will of the Present,\nexpressed by the Vote of the People, and the Passive Stability and\nPermanence of the Will of the Past, expressed in constitutions of\ngovernment, written or unwritten, and in the laws and customs, gray with\nage and sanctified by time, as precedents and authority; which is\nrepresented by the arch resting on the two columns, Jachin and Boaz,\nthat stand at the portals of the Temple builded by Wisdom, on one of\nwhich Masonry sets the celestial Globe, symbol of the spiritual part of\nour composite nature, and on the other the terrestrial Globe, symbol of\nthe material part.\n\n--And, finally, of that Equilibrium, possible in ourselves, and which\nMasonry incessantly labors to accomplish in its Initiates, and demands\nof its Adepts and Princes (else unworthy of their titles), between the\nSpiritual and Divine and the Material and Human in man; between the\nIntellect, Reason, and Moral Sense on one side, and the Appetites and\nPassions on the other, from which result the Harmony and Beauty of a\nwell-regulated life.\n\nWhich possible Equilibrium proves to us that our Appetites and Senses\nalso are Forces given unto us by God, for purposes of good, and not the\nfruits of the malignancy of a Devil, to be detested, mortified, and, if\npossible, rendered inert and dead: that they are given us to be the\nmeans by which we shall be strengthened and incited to great and good\ndeeds, and are to be wisely used, and not abused; to be controlled and\nkept within due bounds by the Reason and the Moral Sense; to be made\nuseful instruments and servants, and not permitted to become the\nmanagers and masters, using our intellect and reason as base instruments\nfor their gratification.\n\nAnd this Equilibrium teaches us, above all, to reverence ourselves as\nimmortal souls, and to have respect and charity for others, who are even\nsuch as we are, partakers with us of the Divine Nature, lighted by a ray\nof the Divine Intelligence, struggling, like us, toward the light;\ncapable, like us, of progress upward toward perfection, and deserving to\nbe loved and pitied, but never to be hated nor despised; to be aided and\nencouraged in this life-struggle, and not to be abandoned nor left to\nwander in the darkness alone, still less to be trampled upon in our own\nefforts to ascend.\n\nFrom the mutual action and re-action of each of these pairs of opposites\nand contraries results that which with them forms the Triangle, to all\nthe Ancient Sages the expressive symbol of the Deity; as from Osiris and\nIsis, Har-oeri, the Master of Light and Life, and the Creative Word. At\nthe angles of one stand, symbolically, the three columns that support\nthe Lodge, itself a symbol of the Universe, Wisdom, Power, and Harmony\nor Beauty. One of these symbols, found on the Tracing-Board of the\nApprentice's Degree, teaches this last lesson of Freemasonry. It is the\nright-angled Triangle, representing man, as a union of the spiritual and\nmaterial, of the divine and human. The base, measured by the number 3,\nthe number of the Triangle, represents the Deity and the Divine; the\nperpendicular, measured by the number 4, the number of the Square,\nrepresents the Earth, the Material, and the Human; and the hypothenuse,\nmeasured by 5, represents that nature which is produced by the union of\nthe Divine and Human, the Soul and the Body; the squares, 9 and 16, of\nthe base and perpendicular, added together, producing 25, the square\nroot whereof is 5, the measure of the hypothenuse.\n\nAnd as in each Triangle of Perfection, one is three and three are one,\nso man is one, though of a double nature; and he attains the purposes of\nhis being only when the two natures that are in him are in just\nequilibrium; and his life is a success only when it too is a harmony,\nand beautiful, like the great Harmonies of God and the Universe.\n\nSuch, my Brother, is the TRUE WORD of a Master Mason; such the true\nROYAL SECRET, which makes possible, and shall at length make real, the\nHOLY EMPIRE of true Masonic Brotherhood.\n\nGLORIA DEI EST CELARE VERBUM. AMEN.\n\n\n\n\nDIGEST--INDEX\nOF\n\"MORALS AND DOGMA,\"\n\nOF\n\nALBERT PIKE 33\u00b0\n\nBY\n\nT.W. HUGO, G.C.C.H.\n\n\n\nPublished by\n\nThe Supreme Council, 33\u00b0\n\nA. & A.S.R. for the\n\nSouthern Jurisdiction, U. S. A.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nWASHINGTON. D.C.\n\nEntered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1909, by\n\nT.W. HUGO,\n\nIn the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington.\n\n\nL.H. JENKINS, INC.\nRICHMOND, VIRGINIA\n\n\n\n\nPREFACE.\n\n\nThe following Digest of the contents of Brother Albert Pike's monumental\nwork, \"Morals and Dogma,\" the text book of the Ancient and Accepted\nScottish Rite for the southern jurisdiction, issued by the Supreme\nCouncil, grew out of the desire of the writer to have an index of the\ncontents for his own personal use as the presiding officer, for twenty\nyears, of each of the Scottish Rite Bodies in Duluth, Minnesota, and it\ncan be imagined that in that time, dating from the first organization,\nmany questions have been propounded which could only be properly\nanswered by reference to that epitome of Scottish Rite Free Masonry; the\nbook referred to.\n\nFrom the very nature of \"Morals and Dogma,\" different subjects are hard\nto find; the book is very naturally divided under the headings of\nDegrees; there are no sub-headings; and as most of the important\nsubjects are touched on, to a greater or lesser extent, in all the\nDegrees it meant a perusal of the entire book if all the information on\nany of those subjects was desired.\n\nThe writer started to compile an Index (in the ordinary acceptation of\nthe term), giving the pages where such and such words would be found,\nbut he had not progressed very far before it became evident that was\nonly half a solution of the problem; so many references were found that\nit would have been necessary to spend a great length of time looking up\nthe several pages to see if that particular reference was to what the\nsearcher was after; the procedure was entirely changed and it was\ndecided, although it would consume very much more time, and entail more\narduous labor, to digest the contents and then Index that, so that when\na person wanted to find out what, for instance, the Egyptians understood\nby \"The Universe,\" it was not necessary to look in \"Morals and Dogma,\"\nat all the pages on which \"Universe\" was mentioned but by following down\nthe column, under the heading \"Universe,\" come to \"Universe of the\nEgyptians a living, animated being like man, page 665-l;\" if that is not\nenough in detail turn to page 665, and in the lower third of the page\nwill be found the paragraph of which the line just quoted is the boiled\ndown meaning; most of the time it will not be necessary to consult the\n\"Morals and Dogma\" at all.\n\nWhen the Digest (so called for want of a better name) was completed, a\nmeeting of the Duluth Brethren was called to secure the assistance of\nsome of them in making a few copies on the typewriter, but they decided\nthat each of them wanted a copy and the only thing to do was to print;\nhence the book.\n\nIn the opinion of the writer no one who has not carefully studied\n\"Morals and Dogma,\" or the several subjects of which it is the epitome,\nis or can be a Master of the Royal Secret in the true meaning of the\nterm, no matter how many patents he may have, nor how completely they\nare countersigned by distinguished Masons of the Thirty-third Degree,\nand it is for those who do not wish to sail along under false colors and\nassume titles of which they know not the meaning that this volume is\nprepared, believing it will assist them to acquire an interest in the\nsubject which they otherwise would be much slower in gaining, if not\ndeterred altogether by the apparent difficulty in following up the\nseveral subjects.\n\nHonored with the personal friendship and confidence of the author of\n\"Morals and Dogma,\" receiving the highest honors at his hands and\ncherishing a lively recollection of his many splendid qualities of mind\nand heart, the writer can conceive of no higher ambition than that of\nshewing by deeds that he has appreciated the privileges of that\nfriendship and has absorbed some of the inspiration which personal\nintercourse with Brother Pike made possible therefore.\n\n     This volume is dedicated in grateful memory of the Prince Adept,\n     Albert Pike, 33\u00b0, Mystic, Poet, Scholar, who through his researches\n     and his study of the Symbolism of Free Masonry has raised that\n     Institution far above the commonplace and enthroned it on the lofty\n     plane of a sublime system of Philosophy, embracing the accumulated\n     Wisdom of the ages fitted to make men wiser, happier, better.\n\nNo attempts have been made to standardize the spelling of some words,\nnor make any changes in phraseology; for instance, \"Cabala,\" \"Kabalah,\"\n\"Kabala,\" are different spellings of the one word; \"Deity\" and \"God\" are\nused indiscriminately, etc., etc.; this volume is a Digest of \"Morals\nand Dogma\" as it is, and nothing else.\n\nT.W. HUGO.\n\nDuluth, Minn., October 1st, 1909.\n\n\n\n\nEXPLANATION.\n\n\nIn explanation of the characters used in the Index; the letters \"u,\"\n\"m,\" \"l\" after a number signifies that the subject mentioned will be\nfound on the page represented by the number and in the upper, middle, or\nlower thirds of that page, respectively; thus \"Unity of God taught in\nthe Kabalah, 625-l,\" means that on the lower third of page 625 will be\nfound the paragraph of which the notation in question is a shortened\nstatement.\n\nWhere no final letter is given it means that the notation refers to the\nentire page, as \"Universe, questions concerning the creation or self\nexistence of, 648,\" means that all of page 648 refers to that notation\njust quoted.\n\nWhere a dash (--) appears at the end of the words, it means that for the\ncompletion of the sentence reference must be made to the page whose\nnumber follows; for instance, \"Universe must have been co-existent with\nDeity because--, 684-u,\" means that the reader must consult page 684-u,\nand complete the sentence, as it is of such a nature that it could not\nbe boiled down very well and preserve the true sense.\n\nWhere a dash (--) appears between two numbers of pages it means that\nboth of those pages and the intervening ones refer to the subject matter\nof the notation opposite those numbers.\n\n\n\n\nDIGEST OF \"MORALS AND DOGMA\"\n\n\n\nA\n\nAaron made an image of a false god while Moses received the Law, 206-m.\nAaron restored the worship of Apis when he made the golden calf, 369-m.\nAaron's golden calf was one of the oxen under the laver of bronze, 818-l.\nAb, Father, as well as Athah, the name of the Ancient in Microprosopos,\n  794-u.\nAba and Imma, Father and Mother, 757-u.\nAbacus, the Table of Pythagoras, concluded by the number ten, 638-m.\nAblutions, baths, baptisms before initiation, explanation of, 431-m.\nAbove exists by reason of what is below, 848-u.\nAbraham carried the orthodox traditions from Chaldea, 843-l.\nAbraham, Isaac and Jacob, Jehovah the peculiar God of, 206-l.\nAbraham; Magism was the science of, 839-l.\nAbraxas, the plentitude of the Divine Emanations, a Gnostic idea, 554.\nAbsolute conceived by reference to some substantial things, 702-u.\n\"Absolute\" defined is but a collection of negations, 651-l.\nAbsolute Deity is in Microprosopos, 793-l.\nAbsolute discovered by the science of numbers, 626-u.\nAbsolute existence embodied in the Ineffable Name, 700-m.\nAbsolute existence is Ihuh-Alhim, 701-m.\nAbsolute existence, the essence of the creative forces of Deity, 701-m.\nAbsolute in matters of Intelligence and Faith, 842-m.\nAbsolute is the Being in which the Word Is, according to the Kabalah,\n  841-l.\nAbsolute is the fixed from the volatile; is that which is, 776-l.\nAbsolute is the immutable Law of Reason and Truth, 776-l.\nAbsolute is the Truth, Reality, Reason, of the universal equilibrium,\n  844-u.\nAbsolute manifested as Being or Existence forms the Ineffable Name,\n  849-m.\nAbsolute necessarily implies absolute Unity, 702-l.\n\"Absolute\" no longer explains the problem of Good and Evil, 682-u.\nAbsolute sought in the Infinite, Indefinite; the Finite is the \"Great\n  Work\", 776-l.\nAbsolute summed up in the Word alternately lost and found, 840-m.\nAbsolute summed up in the Word transmitted in Initiations, 840-m.\nAbsolute, the Fixed, the Volatile, are synonymous with Reason,\n  Necessity, Liberty, 791-l.\nAbsolute, the Principle or First Cause of all Things, 626-u.\nAbsolute; the pursuit of the \"Great Work\" is the Search for the, 773-u.\nAbsolute, the very necessity of Being; That which Is; Reason, 736-l.\nAbsolute Truth, Beauty, Good, emanates from God, 702-l.\nAbsurd, Infinite, which confounds and which we believe is the Divine\n  Reason, 841-m.\nAbury, all the cycles reproduced at the Druidic Temple at, 235-l.\nAbyss; God, according to Valentinus, was an unfathomable, 559-l.\nAbyss, the Gnostics represented God as an unfathomable, 555-u.\nAbyssinians changed the Hindu Trinity to Creator, Matter, Thought, 550-l.\nAcacia, a sacred tree of the Arabs, the idol Al-Uzza, 82-m.\nAcacia branch represents the Tree of Life to the Hermetic Rose Croix,\n  786-l.\nAcacia is an emblem of resurrection and immortality, 642-u.\nAcacia, made into the \"crown of thorns\", 82-m.\nAcacia, origin of the idea of the sprig of, 376-l.\nAcacia, the thorny tamarisk, grew around Osiris, 82-m.\nAcacia, type of immortality, 82-m.\nAchaius, King of the Scots, saw the St. Andrew's Cross the night before\n  a battle, 801-l.\nAchilles fights with Scamander, 499-m.\nAcmon's death lamented by the Scythians, 594-l.\nAcorn planted before the Norman conquest grows into importance, 317-l.\nAchronically; when Stars rise or set in opposition to the Sun, 471-m.\nActs, unknown secret, 131-l.\nAction an essential part of Masonry; work required, 152-l.\nAction greater than writing, 350-u.\nActions, importance of small, 173-m.\nActions, in ordinary spheres are opportunities for the noblest, 350-m.\nActions, more apparent than real, are the criticised rewards of Good or\n  Evil, 705-l.\nAction and opposition of contrary forces bring Harmony, 859-l.\nActive and Passive; Great First Cause divided into the, 653-l.\nActive and Passive Principles gave birth to the Universal Soul idea,\n  664-m.\nActive and Passive Principles, Light and Darkness symbols of, 404-l.\nActive and Passive Principles symbolized by generative parts, 401-l.\nActive and Passive principles symbolized by Jachin and Boaz, 860-m.\nActive and Passive Symbols; the Male and Female, 784-m.\nActive energy of the Will of the Present expressed by vote of People,\n  860-u.\nActive life has spiritual ends, 243-m.\nActive Principle diffuses; Passive, collects and makes fruitful by\n  nature, 772-u.\nActive principle represented by Light, 305-l.\nActive principle resides in the mind, external to matter, 657-l.\nAdam belonged to both the Empire of Light and that of Darkness, 567-u.\nAdam conformed into male and female and a state of equilibrium\n  established, 795-l.\nAdam forbidden to eat of the fruit so he would not know--, 567-u.\nAdam is the human Tetragram, summed up in the Yod, 771-m.\nAdam Kadmon assisted by the living Spirit, Jesus Christ, 566-m.\nAdam Kadmon commenced the contest with the powers of evil, 566-m.\nAdam Kadmon, containing all the Causates of the First Cause, is a\n  Macrocosm, 760-m.\nAdam Kadmon created after the Vestiges of the Lights had been removed by\n  God, 751-u.\nAdam Kadmon emanated from Absolute Unit and so is himself a unit, 760-l.\nAdam Kadmon fashioned into Male and Female when equilibrium was\n  introduced, 763-u.\nAdam Kadmon flows downward into his own nature and so is duality, 760-l.\nAdam Kadmon had in him Nephesek, Ruach, Neschamah, Neschamah\n  Leneschamah, 757-u.\nAdam Kadmon is designated in the third person, Hua, He, 763-u.\nAdam Kadmon is the Idea of the Universe unevolved in the manifested\n  Deity, 758-m.\nAdam Kadmon made up as to limbs by the nine Sephiroth, 757-l.\nAdam Kadmon, Primitive Man, made by the Demiourgos, 562-l.\nAdam Kadmon returns to the Unity and to the Highest and so is ternary\n  and quaternary, 760-u.\nAdam Kadmon, the First Born, the Primitive Man, 267-m.\nAdam Kadmon, the Idea of the Universe, assigned a human form, 757-l.\nAdam Kadmon, the Logos, man-type, primitive man, 251-m.\nAdam Kadmon, the Primal Man, emitted into the evacuated Space, 746-u.\nAdam Kadmon was not formed male and female when the Kings died, 797-l.\nAdam, the first, was Microprosopos; Macroprosopos first Occult Adam,\n  795-u.\nAdept, the 28th Degree, Knight of the Sun or Prince, 581.\nAdepts bound to Ancient Mysteries, 50-u.\nAdityas, or Solar Attributes, a Vedic Sun God, 602-l.\nAdityas, the distinct powers of Surya, each with a name, 587-m.\nAdonai, applied to Deity, represents, 208-m.\nAdonai, meaning of; substituted for True Name, 201-l.\nAdonai, Son, Kabalah ascribes redemption to, 104-m.\nAdonai, the most potent of the names of Deity; moves the Universe, 787-l.\nAdonai, one of the seven Reflections of the Ophites, 563-m.\nAdonai of the Phoenicians is a personification of the Sun, 594-u.\nAdonai or Adon, the Phoenician name for the Sun God, 587-u.\nAdoniram, Joabert, Satolkin, the three Masters, represent, 210-u.\nAdonis and Apollo of the Greeks are personifications of the Sun, 594-u.\nAdonis and Proserpine in wanderings represent--, 404-m.\nAdonis or Thammuz, death and resurrection in Mysteries, 406-m.\nAdonis, symbol of the Sun, 77-m.\nAdonis, the Sun, as adored by the Phoenician Byblos, 587-l.\nAdonis wounded in private parts by boar; emblem of, 412-l.\nAdon signifies Lord and Master, 591-l.\nAdoration of Deity requires something tangible to exalt the mind, 617-l.\nAdvancement in the Rite, depends on, 136-m.\nAdvancement in the Rite, those entitled to, 136-m.\nAdversity, blessings and advantages of, 145-m.\nAeschylus accused of representing the Mysteries on the stage, 384-l.\nAeschylus and others declare life is not a scene of repose, 691-u.\nAesop and others declare the object of suffering is beneficial, 691-u.\nAesch Mezareph says the seven lower Sephiroth represent seven metals,\n  798-l.\nAffliction, a loneliness in, 189-m.\nAffliction, words go but little way into the depths of, 189-m.\nAgathodaemon, or Kneph, represented by Osiris, 587-l.\nAge we represent is not enlarged by our discoveries, 808-l.\nAges of the Sun represented by the four ages of man, 465-u.\nAges passed before reason was preferred to imagination, 674-m.\nAgla, Hieroglyphics of, indicate the Triple Secret of the Great Work,\n  104-l.\nAgni lives on the fire of the sacrifice, on the hearth, of the sky,\n  602-m.\nAgni, the Mediator between God and man, 602-m.\nAgricultural phenomena connected with Egyptian religion, 588-u.\nAgricultural, primitive people of Orient were wholly, 445-m.\nAhih Ashr Ahih, I am what I am, the meaning of the name assumed by\n  Deity, 697-l.\nAhriman and ministers of Evil to be reconciled to Deity and Evil end,\n  847-l.\nAhriman called \"the old serpent, Prince of Darkness,\" etc., by Persians,\n  498-m.\nAhriman concurred with Ormuzd in the creation of Man, 258-u.\nAhriman condemned to dwell in darkness 12,000 years, 257-l.\nAhriman considered older than Ormuzd by some Parsee sects, 613-u.\nAhriman destroyed the pure principle of Man, 258-u.\nAhriman not a malevolent being in the early ages of the world, 613-u.\nAhriman origin of all evils, represented Darkness, 443-l.\nAhriman produces Deos and Deities to equal those of Ormuzd, 662-l.\nAhriman, second born of the Primitive Light, ambitious, 257-m.\nAhriman, the Persian demon of Evil, of the nature of darkness, 661-m.\nAhriman the evil principle of the religion of Zoroaster, 449-u.\nAhriman to be triumphant during three latter periods, 258-m.\nAhriman to rule the world till the end of time, 623-l.\nAhriman's worship considered as the cause of the Fall of man, 613-u.\nAhura Mazda, by the power of the Word, made the Heaven and Earth, 613-l.\nAhura Mazda claims to have created the Universe and man, 612-u.\nAhura Mazda, Indra, Ormuzd is the bright firmament, 601-l.\nAhura Mazda is called the First Born of all things, very light of--,\n  613-l.\nAhura Mazda represented the primal light, 612-u.\nAhura Mazda, Supreme, whose Soul is the Excellent Word, 613-m.\nAinsoph and His garmenting were alone before the world of the vacant\n  space, 750-u.\nAinsoph called Light because it is impossible to express it by any other\n  word, 740-m.\nAinsoph is the title of the Cause of Causes, its meaning being\n  \"endless\", 747-u.\nAinsoph, King of the Sephiroth Theology; Being Supreme and Absolute,\n  99-m.\nAinsoph of the Kabalah corresponds to the Word, 271-l.\nAinsoph sometimes applied to the first emanation, Kether, the Crown,\n  747-u.\nAions of the Gnostics correspond to the 28 Izeds, 257-u.\nAions of the Gnostics corresponded to the Ferouers of Zoroaster, 256-u.\nAir and Fire, white and red, Mercy and Judgment do not intermix, 795-m.\nAir gives the elements and principles of compound sensation, 784-m.\nAir, one of the symbols of spiritual regeneration in the Mysteries,\n  357-l.\nAir used as a test to represent the possible purification of the soul,\n  397-u.\nAir, Water, Fire, denote Benignity, Judicial Rigor; Mercy as mediator,\n  799-u.\nAl, a name of Deity, represents, 208-m.\nAl, Al Schadai, Alohayim, Adonai, long known names of Deity, 697-l.\nAl Shadai, applied to Deity, represents, 208-m.\nAl, Soul of the Universe, one of the names of Deity on the Delta, 532-u.\nAl, the first Phoenician Nature God, the Principle of Light, 727-u.\nAlchemical Azot corresponds to the Hebrew Tetragram, 732-m.\nAlchemical jargon created to deceive the vulgar herd, 731-u.\nAlchemical or Hermetic philosophical doctrine, 772-792.\nAlchemical philosophy receives some explanation in the Kabala, 741-u.\nAlchemical teachings conceal their meaning in many cases, 792-m.\nAlchemists claimed the Magical Agent determined the form of the\n  modifiable Substance, 773-l.\nAlchemists dream of being always young, rich, never die, 772-l.\nAlchemists resorted to Masonry and invented Degrees, 731-u.\nAlchemists, salt, sulphur, mercury, great symbols of the, 57-l.\nAlchemists writing of the Great Work use symbolic and figurative\n  expressions, 774-m.\nAlchemy reduces the four ideas to the Absolute; the Fixed; the Volatile,\n  791-l.\nAlchemy, the mask of the Hermetic Philosophy, 791-l.\nAldebaran, the leader, preceded the Sun in the sign of the Bull, 451-u.\nAleph is the Man; Beth, the Woman; One the Principle; Two, the Word,\n  771-l.\nAlfader over the Scandinavian Deities, Thor and Odin, 598-u.\nAlfadir, the Icelandic name for God, but he has twelve names in Asgard,\n  619-u.\nAlfarabius, an Arab, cultivated the Hermetic science, 840-l.\nAlexander of Macedon said, \"Nothing is nobler than work.\", 40-l.\nAlexander, result of wars of, 247-m.\nAlexander, results of work of Faust and Luther exceeded that of, 43-u.\nAlexandria, teachings of the Jewish-Greek school of, 250-m.\nAlexandrian school brought Magic and Christianity almost together, 731-l.\nAlexandrian School, Doctrine taught in, 170-u.\nAlcibiades accused of the crime of divulging secrets of the Mysteries,\n  384-l.\nAlhim assigned to the modeling of the Universe in Genesis, 568-m.\nAlhim, the aggregate unity of manifested Creative Forces of Deity, 701-m.\nAlhim were subordinate Deities among the Phoenicians, 568-m.\nAlkahest's composition described, 788-m.\nAlkahest has the generative virtue of producing the Triangular Cubical\n  Stone, 787-m.\nAlkahest is the principle of life in the profundity of matter, 787-l.\n\"All\" is termed Wisdom, and in it The All is contained, 793-u.\nAll things summed in One when the Son is in Wisdom and Intelligence,\n  800-u.\nAll was, is, will be; there neither will be, is, nor has been, mutation,\n  793-l.\nAllegories breed errors by being literally accepted, 205-m.\nAllegories of Masonry become lessons of wisdom when understood, 597-m.\nAllegories of Scriptures contain profound truths, 250-l.\nAllegories of the Hermeticists explained by their single dogma, 777-l.\nAllegories, Truth hidden under a succession of, 246-l.\nAllegorical analogies represented metaphysical ideas of the Mysteries,\n  385-u.\nAllegorical expression chosen by philosophers to express theological\n  ideas, 678-u.\nAllegory and symbol efficacious instruments of instruction, 355-m.\nAllegory invites research and rewards the inquirer, 355-l.\nAllegory of the loss of the True Word represents, 205-l.\nAllegory, the simplest facts of the Old Testament are an, 266-u.\nAllegory used by the Sages to conceal the operations of Nature, 659-m.\nAlohayim, with Tsabaoth, symbolism of, 104-m.\nAlohim, a name for Microprosopos, 795-u.\nAlohim, applied to Deity, represents, 208-m.\nAlohim; the five letters of the name of the spark from Severity give the\n  name, 795-m.\nAlpha and Omega are the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet,\n  701-u.\nAlpha and Omega, Zoroaster's definition of Deity, 273-m.\nAlps, the great altar of Europe; Autumn a long All Saint's Day, 713-l.\nAltar in the East has an astronomical reference, 483-m.\nAltar of Perfumes indicates the Fire that is to be applied to Nature,\n  783-u.\nAlternatives between which the human mind has vacillated, 694-l.\nAlva-butcheries in Netherlands, 49-l.\nAmas composed of the initials of the words that signify Air, Water,\n  Fire, 799-u.\nAmbition, highest object of human, 74-l.\nAmbrose and Augustine, Saints, division of their day, 115-u.\nAmbrose, Archbishop of Milan, speaks of the Christian Mysteries, 545-l.\nAmbrose, the Saint, held the Stars have souls, 672-u.\nAmeth, duties of a Prince, 176-u.\nAmida became the Redeemer; will judge and sentence men, 616-u.\nAmida, or Omith, the name of the Japanese Supreme Being, 616-u.\nAmmon, the Sun, as adored in Phrygia, Atys, Libya, 587-l.\nAmmonius concealed Science under Christian disguises, 732-l.\nAmmomus Saccos and Plato brought Christianity and Magic close together,\n  731-l.\nAmos accuses the Hebrews of the worship of false gods, 206-m.\nAmshaspands are six of the Zodiacal signs under the banner of Light,\n  663-u.\nAmshaspands correspond to the Aor, Zohar, Zayo, of the Kabalah, 740-l.\nAmshaspands, names of the, 257-u.\nAmshaspands of the Persians, Light, Fire, Splendor, 740-l.\nAmshaspands, or Genii, six created by Ormuzd after his own image, 256-l.\nAmshaspands recognized in the Kabalah by Light, Splendor, Brightness,\n  740-l.\nAmschaspands of the Zend Avesta compared with the seven Rishis, 602-u.\nAmschaspands presided over special departments of nature, 612-u.\nAmun, a concealed God, the Supreme Being of the Egyptians, 281-l.\nAmun, Athom, Phtha, Osiris, of the Egyptians, are personifications of\n  the Sun, 594-u.\nAmun created nothing, but everything emanated from him, 254-u.\nAmun or Amun Kneph, the Spirit or Breath of Nature, 614-m.\nAmun-Re, the Libyan Jupiter, represented intelligent forces of Nature,\n  584-l.\nAmun-Re, the same, with Kneph from whose mouth issued the egg, 585-u.\nAmun styled \"who sheds light on hidden things\", 253-l.\nAmun, symbol of the Sun, 77-m.\nAmun, the creation by the Thought issuing as the Word caused by, 254-u.\nAmun, the Ram lying on the book in the 17th Degree, the symbol of, 254-u.\nAmun, the Supreme God, at first that of Lower Egypt, 253-l.\nAmun was the Nature God worshipped at Memphis, Lower Egypt, 584-l.\nAmun's name pronounceable only by the Egyptian Priests, 621-l.\nAnalogy gives the Sage the forces of Nature; it is the science of Good\n  and Evil, 737-l.\nAnarchy given no countenance by Masonry, 153-l.\nAnaxagoras admitted the existence of ultimate elementary particles,\n  676-l.\nAnaxagoras expounded the higher Greek religious ideas, 617-m.\nAnaxagoras gives an account of the origin of things, 495-m.\nAnaxagoras includes in Mind moral principles as well as life and motion,\n  677-l.\nAnaxagoras' \"Intelligence\" principle possessed the defects of\n  \"Necessity\", 677-l.\nAnaxagoras' Theism subversive of Mythology and outward religion, 679-u.\nAnchises, in the Aenid, taught Aeneas the doctrine of Universal Soul,\n  666-m.\nAncient Hidden One contains no female; His totality is male; Hua, He,\n  763-u.\nAncient Knightly virtues and deeds to be revered, 804-l.\nAncient, Most Holy, called Hua, He; not Athah, Thou, 794-u.\nAncient, Most Holy, Hidden of the Hidden, is the Supreme Crown, 762-l.\nAncient of Days, Atik Yomin, constituted by the seven Sephiroth, 727-m.\nAncient of Days is the internal part, or Soul, of Macroprosopos, 758-u.\nAncient of days, title given to the Creator in the Kabalah, 266-l.\nAncient opinions concerning earth and heaven, 442--.\nAncient poetic and philosophic solution of the great problems, 653-m.\nAncient religion based on the pure and simple veneration of Nature,\n  610-l.\nAncient religious effusions of the Veda, 602-m.\nAncient thought reproduced in the speculations of today, 697-u.\nAncients believed the planet's motive force was an intelligent one,\n  671-m.\nAndocides accused of the crime of divulging secrets of the Mysteries,\n  384-l.\nAndrew's Cross; Hungus, in the ninth century, saw in the sky St, 801-m.\nAngels, called Reflections, proceeded from Ialdabaoth, 563-m.\nAngels commissioned to aid man to exercise his liberty, 252-u.\nAngels, fallen stars are, in Hebrew Mythology, fallen, 510-l.\nAngels of Evil fell, as men did; to be restored, then reign of evil\n  ends, 686-u.\nAngels of the Jews corresponded to the Ferouers of Zoroaster, 256-u.\nAngelic Army composed of Heavenly Host, 509-l.\nAnger not responsible for God's dispensations of suffering, 718-u.\nAnger, results of, 123-l.\nAnimal and spiritual natures of mankind, 857-l.\nAnimal Kingdom symbolized by Mach, studied by the Master Mason, 632-u.\nAnnals, under the Caesars there is the Author of the, 48-u.\nAnointing, a symbol of dedication to the True and Good, 538-l.\nAnointing, Intelligence the source of the oil of, 267-l.\nAntareya A'ran'ya, one of the Vedas, gives an account of creation, 609-u.\nAnthropopathism of Jewish Scriptures opposed by Alexandrians, 285-u.\nAntiquity of the doctrine that gave living souls to the heavens, etc,\n  669-m.\nAntagonisms of man's nature may be in equilibrium, if he will it so,\n  765-u.\nAnti-Masons caused the cheapening of Masonry; its pomp, its display,\n  814-m.\nAnti-Masons of 1826, in America, the best friends and worst enemies of\n  Masonry, 814-m.\nAnti-Masons purified Masonry by persecution, 814-m.\nAntipathy and Sympathy, inaction and opposition result in Harmony, 859-l.\nAnubis in the shape of a dog aided Isis in her search and represents--,\n  376-l.\nAoom, the symbol of the Lord of all things, 621-m.\nAor Mupala, Wonderful or Hidden Light undisplayed, the Will of Deity,\n  740-l.\nAor of the Deity manifested in flame issuing out of the invisible fire,\n  740-l.\nAor Pasot, \"Most simple light\"; Ayen Soph, Infinite before Emanation,\n  745-l.\nAor Penai-Al, Light of the countenance of God, 748-u.\nApartment, Fourth, 18th Degree, represents freedom from Evil, 289-u.\nApartment, Fourth, 18th Degree, typifies the rule of Masonry, 289-m.\nApartment, Second, 18th Degree, represents reign of Evil, 288-m.\nApartment, Second, 18th Degree, represents various scenes, 288-l.\nApartment, Third, 18th Degree, represents materialized consequences,\n  289-u.\nApartment, Third, 18th Degree, represents the consequences of sin, 288-l.\nApartments in Mysteries passed by degrees, 432-l.\nApathy and faithlessness great obstacles to Masonic success, 237-m.\nAphanison or the disappearance was the nailing of Osiris in the chest,\n  377-u.\nAphanison represented disappearance of the Sun at Winter Solstice, 377-u.\nAphanison, the disappearance of Osiris, Bootes, Adonis, 484-u.\nAphrodite, the Principle of Unity and Universal Harmony, 683-m.\nApis, Aaron made an image of the Egyptian god, 206-m.\nApis reproduced by Aaron in the desert as the Golden Calf, 448-u.\nApocalypse, a Kabalistic book, sealed by seven seals, 727-l.\nApocalypse, a Kabalistic summary of the occult figures, divides--, 321-u.\nApocalypse, a wonderful epic explained by numbers as the Key, 728-u.\nApocalypse as obscure as the Sohar; appeals to the Initiate, 321-m.\nApocalypse, cabalistic clavicule not explained by Christians, 731-u.\nApocalypse completes the Science of Abraham and Solomon, 321-l.\nApocalypse, derivation of the four creatures of the, 461-l.\nApocalypse's doctrine, the pure Kabala, lost by the Parisees, 727-l.\nApocalypse embodies Occultism; not written for the many, 321-m.\nApocalypse paints the struggle between Good and Evil, 272-l.\nApocalyptic pictures are pantacles with numbers as the Key, 727-l.\nApocalypse shows Kabalistic meaning of the Temple, 235-m.\nApocalypse, the Apotheosis of that Sublime Faith which--, 321-u.\nApollo and Dionusos, Nature and Art, from one common source, 585-l.\nApollo, at Delphi the tomb held the body of, 407-m.\nApollo fights with Python, the scaly snake, 499-m.\nApollo, symbol of the Sun, 77-m.\nApollo triumphs over Python on March 25th, 407-m.\nAppollonius of Tyana says God must be expressed by the spirit, 282-l.\nApollos of Alexandria, reference to the baptism of John, 262-u.\nApostles, early Christians deemed incomplete the writings of the, 248-u.\nApostles of Christ, secret meaning of the number of the, 233-m.\nApostolic Constitutions speak of the Christian Mysteries, 543-l.\nApparatus states that Malakoth is called Haikal, 799-u.\nApparatus used in the Great Work, 785-u.\nAppetites and Senses are Forces given us for Good, 860-l.\nApprentice Degree, declaration that Masonry is worship in the, 219-u.\nApprentice, 1st Degree, 1-m.\nApprentice, meaning of preparation, tests, purifications in Degree of,\n  253-u.\nApprentice studies the mineral Kingdom symbolized by Tub, 632-u.\nApprentices' Compass has both points under the Square, 854-l.\nApprentice's Grip, Morality, fails to raise the candidate, 640-l.\nApron of white sheepskin, origin of, 407-l.\nApulesius represents Lucius initiated into the Mysteries, 387-390.\nApulius describes an effigy of the Supreme Deity, 412-l.\nAquarius, the first of the four royal signs, characterizes Reuben, 461-u.\nArab wisdom not slighted by the Mediaeval Church, 625-l\nArabian traditions much in common with those of the Hebrews, 616-l.\nArabians never possessed a finely wrought system of Polytheism, 616-l.\nArabians taught the primeval faith of one God by Mahomet, 616-l.\nAramtic forms of the personal pronouns, He-She, 700-u.\nArabs embraced many Kabalists, 625-l.\nArabs, such as Geber and Alfarabius, cultivated the Hermetic science,\n  840-l.\nAramtic forms of the personal pronouns, He-She, 700-u.\nAraor, the Chaldean Supreme Deity, Father of Light, 742-l.\nAreanum; to the Magists the Blazing Star symbolized the Grand, 842-u.\nArch rests on a column on either side, 846-l.\nArchangels numbered seven, 233-m.\nArchelaus, Bishop of Mesopotamia, speaks of early Christian secrecy,\n  544-l.\nArchetype of the Universe did never not exist in the Divine Mind, 849-m.\nArchetype of things united with the Infinite by the Divine Ray, 267-u.\nArchimagus, the Sun, the noblest agent of Divine power, 612-m.\nArchitect of the Universe; Chinese Emperor erected a Temple to the,\n  615-l.\n\"Architects\" among names of Gnostic initiates into their Mysteries,\n  543-m.\nArchitects, or Masons of the 12th to the 14th Degrees; duties of the,\n  332-u.\nArchitects, symbolism in 12th Degree of the Chief of the, 202-l.\nArchitectonica, Symbola, found on ancient edifices, 235-m.\nArchitecture, symbolism of the five orders of, 202-u.\nArgonautic expedition; Orpheus received Mysteries of Samothrace on,\n  427-u.\nArgument not equally convincing to different men, 166-m.\nArian theory of Creation of the Human race, 565-u.\nArik Aupin, one of the appellations of Adam Kadmon, Macroprosopos, 758-u.\nArik Aupin or Macroprosopos; Seir Aupin or Microprosopos, 799-m.\nAristobulus, a Jew, of the school of Alexandria, 250-m.\nAristobulus, declaration concerning Jewish Scriptures, 250-l.\nAristotle accused of impiety for a breach of laws of worship of Ceres,\n  384-l.\nAristotle held that each Star was a portion of the Universal Soul, 671-m.\nAristotle, opinion of, concerning the Mysteries, 379-m.\nAristotle, sayings of, regarding the nature of God, 283-m.\nAristotle showed how religion may be founded on an intellectual basis,\n  710-l.\nAristotle seemingly leaned towards an Intelligent Personal God, 679-l.\nAristides claimed the Initiation brought consolation and hope, 379-l.\nAristotle's Act was first, the Universe has existed forever, 679-l.\nAristotle's doctrine implies an eternal mover wholly in act, 679-u.\nAristotle's system tends to prove that Nature makes toward final good,\n  681-m.\nArithmomancy, a species of Divination of the Pythagoreans, 633-u.\nArius declared the Saviour of a nature analogous to God and Man, 565-u.\nArius declared the Saviour was really created, 564-l.\nArius, the Word made by God according to, 279-l.\nArk; image of organs of generation contained in Isaac, 412-l.\nArk or chest containing genitals of youngest Cabiri in Mysteries, 427-m.\nArkaleus or Hercules, the Scythian, Etruscan, name for the Sun God,\n  587-u.\nArtemis Proserpina, the saviour who leads spirits to Heaven, 395-u.\nArtemis represents the principle of the destruction of the seed, 395-u.\nArtificer, the Demiurge, was the Governor of the world and the, 557-m.\nArtist or author merely portrays what man should be or do, 349-l.\nAryan emigration from the slopes of the Himalayas, 714-u.\nAshlar, perfect, connected with the double cube of Perfection, 503-m.\nAshlar, perfect, typifies the State, 5-m.\nAshlar, rough, changed in form from triangular to cubic, 787-m.\nAshlar, rough, to be prepared for the work, is a shapeless stone, 787-m.\nAshlar, rough, typifies People rude and unorganized, 5-m.\nAsp, dedicated to Isis, worn on her head and on others', 501-m.\nAss, Christians accused of worshipping an; origin of, 103-u.\nAssassins, fate of, foreshadows that of the enemies of liberty, 148-m.\nAssassins, Hindu Word formed by the three final syllables of names of,\n  82-m.\nAssassins, names of Good and Evil Deities contain the names of the, 82-m.\nAssassins of Khurum, names and relations to Stars, 488-l.\nAssassins of Khurum, symbols of foes of liberty, 148-m.\nAssistance of the humble worker in life's progress, 158-m.\nAstarte had a Temple built to her at Tyre by Hiram, 410-l.\nAstral light is the grand agent of the Hermetic operations of the Sun,\n  774-l.\nAstrology fixed the place of exaltation of the planets, 463-l.\nAstrology practiced among all nations; mother of sciences, 463-u.\nAstaphal, one of the seven Reflections of the Ophites, 563-m.\nAstronomy of Pythagoras was Astrology, 626-m.\nAstronomy studied by the Druids, computations made by nights, 619-u.\nAstronomy the most important of Sciences to the ancients, 597-u.\nAssyrian name for the Sun God was Bel, 587-u.\nAthanasius admonishes not to take sacred writ literally, 266-m.\nAthah, Thou, was not applied to the Most Holy Ancient, but Hua, He,\n  794-u.\nAthelstane, King of England, saw the St. Andrew's Cross while praying,\n  801-l.\nAtheist may be applied to a man having a higher conception, 643-l.\nAtheism and Pantheism, reduced to simplest terms, seem the same, 672-u.\nAtheism at bottom to say the Universe is God, 707-l.\nAtheism impossible with a belief in the Reason of God, 737-l.\nAtheism is formal which denies God in terms, but not in reality, 643-l.\nAtheism, or all is nature and there is no other God, 672-u.\nAtheism, really, is the denial of the actuality of any ideas of God,\n  644-m.\nAtheist's belief or unbelief to be real, 644-647.\nAtheists' Creed would make a Pandemonium of this world, 646-l.\nAtheistic conception would not content man, 647.\nAtheistic theory stated, does not satisfy human longing, 646-u.\nAthom, Amun, Phtha, Osiris of the Egyptians, are personifications of the\n  Sun, 594-u.\nAthom-Re was superior to all Nature Gods, was symbolized by Light, 584-l.\nAthom, the Being that was, is and is to come, the Great God, 584-l.\nAthom, the Supreme God of the Egyptians, above Amun, 597-l.\nAthom, the Supreme God of Upper Egypt, same as Om and Brehm, 584-l.\nAtik Yomin, the Ancient of Days of the Kabala, 727-m.\nAtika Kadischa, the name for the three heads of Adam Kadmon in the\n  Sohar, 758-u.\nAtomic school made variety proceed from combinations of atoms, 676-m.\nAttributes do not exist without substance, 572-l.\nAttributes, God only revealed by his, 267-l.\nAttributes of Deity personified, 271-m.\nAttributes of Deity symbolized in order to give an idea of God, 513-l.\nAttributes of God are man's virtues, 704-u.\nAttributes of God are the Adjectives of One Great Substantive, 574-l.\nAttributes of God presents the whole Divine Essence under one aspect,\n  555-m.\nAttributes of God presents the whole Divine Essence of one aspect, 555-m.\nAttributes of One God become separate divinities, 672-l.\nAttributes of the Soul, or God, are not God or the Soul, 573-u.\nAttributes, the title of God may be applied to each, 555-m.\nAtys and his priests mutilated, symbol of, 412-l.\nAtys, mutilated, dies and is restored to life in Mysteries, 422-l.\nAtys, the Sun God of Phrygia in Mysteries of Cybele, 407-u.\nAuditors, the first of the degrees of the Christian Mysteries, 541-l.\nAuditors were novices being prepared to receive Christian Dogma, 541-l.\nAugustin held that every visible thing was superintended by Angelic\n  power, 671-l.\nAugustine, Bishop of Hippo, speaks of the sublime mysteries of\n  Christianity, 546-u.\nAugustine, St., on the Christian religion before Christ, 262-m.\nAugustine, the Saint, defines the faith given to Novices, 547-l.\nAuir Kadmon, the Primal Space, effected by retraction, 749-l.\nA.U.M., the three-lettered name of Deity among the Hindus, 632-l.\nAum, if pronounced, would make the earth tremble and Angels quake, 620-m.\nAum, meaning of the Hindu sacred word, 82-m.\nAum of the Hindoos, whose name was unpronounceable, 584-l.\nAum only pronounced by its letters; meaning of the word, 620-m.\nAum, represented by mystic character, 82-m.\nAum represented the three Powers combined in the Deity of Hindus, 620-m.\nAum, the Indian Sacred Name of the One Deity; manifested as, 205-u.\nAupin, Arik, or Macroprosopos; Aupin Seir, or Microprosopos, 799-m.\nAur, Light, the name of the light of the Vestige of Ainsoph, 750-m.\n\"Aur,\" the Substance out of which Light flows; the fire relative to\n  heat, 740-m.\nAurelius, Marcus, taught that the heavens and spheres were part of the\n  Universal Soul, 669-m.\nAuthority is the equilibrium of Liberty and Power, 845-u.\nAutumnal Equinox a period of general mourning because of--, 588-l.\nAutumnal Equinox brought harvest and falling leaves, 444-l.\nAutumnal Equinox, reason for celebrating Mysteries at the, 404-l.\nAutumnal Equinox, reasons for celebrating Mysteries at the, 491-m.\nAyen Soph, Infinite before any emanation, a Kabalistie term for Deity,\n  745-l.\nAzes, Genii from the marriage of Heaven and Earth, 658-m.\nAziluth; Deity first restored the universality of the seven Kings of the\n  World, 797-u.\nAziluth, emanation or the system of emanants, from Atsil, 746-l.\nAziluth means specifically the first system of the four worlds or\n  systems, 746-l.\nAziluth, the Divine World of the Sephiroth Theology, 99-m.\nAziluth, the world within the Deity, 552-u.\nAzoth composed of Sulphur, Mercury, Salt, 773-l.\nAzoth, fecundated by intellectual energy, Master of Absolute Matter,\n  778-m.\nAzoth, the Astral Light, magnetism understood by the ancients, 791-u.\nAzoth, the universal magnetic force, the light of life, the magical\n  agent, 778-m.\nAzot, of the Alchemists, corresponds to the Hebrew Tetragram, 732-m.\n\"Azoth,\" a treatise in the Materia Prima of Valentinus, 1613, 850-m.\n\nB\n\nB is the passive, A the active; Unity is Boaz; the Binary is Jachin,\n  772-u.\nBaal or Bal signifies Lord and Master, 591-u.\nBabylon, a great, live serpent worshipped by the people of, 500-u.\nBabylon, images of serpents at Temple of Bel in, 499-l.\nBacchus led by a Lamb, or Ram, to Springs, etc, 466-m.\nBacon gave philosophy a definite aim and method, 710-l.\nBactria, the doctrines of Zoroaster came originally from, 258-l.\nBad Principle represented by the number five, 630-u.\nBabylonish God, Bal, the Power of heat, life, generation, 590-l.\nBabys, a power set up as an adversary of Osiris, 588-u.\nBagha, the Felicitous, a Vedic Sun God, 602-l.\nBainah and Hakemah, Intelligence, Wisdom, the second Sephiroth, 552-u.\nBainah, Mother, the passive capacity from which the Intelligence flows,\n  552-m.\nBakchic initiation, emblems of generation principal symbol at the, 421-m.\nBakchic initiation, raw flesh ate by the initiate at a, 421-u.\nBakchos, at initiation, sufferings, death, resurrection, represented,\n  421-u.\nBakchos' cup between Cancer and Leo, a symbol, 438-m.\nBakehos, or Bacchus, the Sun, adored in Thrace as Saba Zeus, 410-l.\nBakchos, slain by Titans, went to Hell; restored to life, 406-l.\nBal, one of the Gods of Syria, Assyria, Chaldea, etc, 590-l.\nBal or Bala, applied to Deity, represents, 208-m.\nBal, seated on a Bull, with the Sun for symbol, was the Power of Life,\n  590-l.\nBal, the Supreme Deity of the Moabites, Amonites, Carthagenians, 591-u.\nBalance and the human form the pattern of the world of restitution,\n  794-l.\nBalance, equilibrium the mystery of the, 305-u.\nBalance, everything in the Universe proceeds by the mystery of the,\n  305-u.\nBalance, explanation of the Soul losing its felicity by means of the, 490-l.\nBalance had Gedulah on one side, Geburah on the other, Tepharet over, 757-m.\nBalance had Hakemah on one side, Binah on the other, Kether over, 757-m.\nBalance has the Sephiroth arranged around it, 762-l.\nBalance held by Absolute Reason, above the male and female on each side,\n  is the primary idea of things, 769-l.\nBalance instituted that judgments might be restored and not die, 798-m.\nBalance, symbol of all Equilibrium, taught the definition of Masonry,\n  854-m.\nBalance, the symbol of the male and female person, 757-m.\nBalance, the symbol of the person into whose form the Sephiroth were\nchanged, 757-m.\nBalance; the root above is represented by the needle of the, 798-m.\nBalance; the Royal Secret is what the Sohar calls the Mystery of the,\n  858-l.\nBalance used to explain the Ternary, 769-l.\nBalder killed by Lok, Evil Principle, in the Mysteries of the Druids,\n  430-m.\nBalder, torn to pieces by Hother, lamented by the Scandinavians, 595-u.\nBalder's body placed in a boat by Lok and set adrift on the water, 430-m.\nBallot for membership, objection sufficient to exclude, 121-m.\nBanners of Royal Arch Degree represent Constellations, 409-l.\nBaphomet adored as an idol by the Templars is an absurdity, 818-l.\nBaphomet of the Temple, representing Sulphur, or a goat's head, 779-l.\nBaphomet, the hieroglyphic figure representing the universal agent,\n  734-m.\nBaptist, religious systems approximating in the time of John the, 247-m,\nBaptism, a symbol of purification, 538-l.\nBaptism among the Gnostics refers to the Name Hidden, 561-l.\nBaptism as a sacred rite applied for by Christ, 262-u.\nBaptism, Christos united to the Eon Jesus by, 560-m.\nBaptism is a preparatory symbol preceding death, 392-l.\nBaptism of John the original rite, 263-u.\nBaptism, one of the important Gnostic ceremonies, 542-l.\nBardesanes doctrines explained, 553-m.\nBardesanes, the Syrian Christians embraced the doctrines of, 553-m.\nBardesanes, the Syrian Christian, quoting from his \"Book of the Laws\",\n  857-l.\nBarruel, Abbe, Memoirs for the History of Jacobinism, 49-l.\nBase habit to defame a worthy man, 337-m.\nBasilidean ceremonies were varied and somewhat fantastic, 543-u.\nBasilideans, a Christian sect, practiced Mysteries, 542-m.\nBasilideans celebrated Jan. 10, date of Christ's baptism in the Jordan,\n  543-u.\nBasilideans gave talismans to every candidate, 542-m.\nBasilides, conception of God by, 271-u.\nBasilides doctrines embraced 365 emanations, 554-u.\nBasilides, personified attributes of God in the theory of, 271-m.\nBasilides, the Christian Gnostic, taught the seven emanation idea, 553-l.\nBasilik, the royal ensign of the Pharaohs, 413-u.\nBasil, Bishop of Caesarea, speaks of the secrecy of the early Christian\n  Mysteries, 545-m.\nBase of a right angle triangle represents Deity and the Divine, 861-m.\nBase of the right angle triangle is Female, 789-m.\nBases of true religious faith, of philosophical truth, metallic\n  transmutation, 776-l.\nBasic ideas at the foundation of the great Religious Orders, 815-m.\nBasis of true Brotherhood; its duties and obligations, 856-l--857-m.\nBattery of 8th Degree, allusion to, 137-u.\nBathing seven times in the sea, symbolism of, 431-l.\nBattle between our spiritual and material natures the greatest, 854-u.\nBattle of life; greatest glory won in the conflict between our own\n  natures in the, 854-u.\nBeacon on the mountain top represented the Persian divinity, 592-m.\nBeauty and Harmony represented by Vau, 799-m.\nBeauty is harmonious proportions in forms, 845-u.\nBeauty of natural phenomena, 244-l.\nBeauty, or the Divine Harmony, the Eternal Law, a side of the Masonic\n  triangle, 826-m.\nBeauty or Harmony produced by the equilibrium of Justice and Mercy,\n  859-m.\nBeauty or Harmony the result of the Divine Will limited by the Divine\n  Wisdom, 846-l.\nBeauty represented by the Junior Warden of a Lodge, 7-l.\nBeauty represented in the Kabalah by green and yellow, 267-l.\nBeauty results from the equilibrium of Good and Evil, 782-m.\nBeauty, Severity, Benignity are Fathers proceeding from the Father\n  of Fathers, 794-l.\nBeauty, the column which supports the world; that of Junior Warden,\n  800-u.\nBeautiful, in the Absolute, emanates from God, 702-l.\nBeautiful lives are the accurate ones, 845-u.\nBeautiful should be just; everything just is beautiful, 845-u.\nBeautiful things refer themselves to Absolute Beauty, 702-m.\nBeethos and His Thought made Wisdom fruitful by Divine Light, 563-u.\nBeethos Profundity, Source of Light and Adam-Kadmon, 562-l.\nBeginning of things was a single God who created matter, 609-l.\nBeginning, the Word is, was, will be in the, 323-l.\nBeing and Existence, modes of, balance each other, 98-u.\nBeing, Existence, is by itself; reason of Being is Being itself, 97-l.\nBeing from whom emanates the True, Beautiful, Good, is triple and one,\n  702-l.\nBeing; how the mind may receive intuition of the Absolute, 285-u.\nBeing is Being the first Principle, 322-u.\nBeing, Philosophy of, 98-m.\nBeing: Vedanta and Nyaya philosophers acknowledge a Supreme, 607-u.\nBeing's phenomena ought to be explained by Occult Philosophy, 822-u.\nBel of the Chaldeans is a personification of the Sun, 594-u.\nBel, symbol of the Sun, 77-m.\nBel, the Assyrian and Chaldean name for the Sun God, 587-u.\nBela, one of the Celtic deities upon the ancient monuments, 591-u.\nBelief concerning spiritual and material existence, 232-u.\nBelief, essential, of a Perfect Elu, 233-u\nBelief in a future existence from a desire to remedy injustices of this,\n  830-l.\nBelief in Deity and Immortality a natural feeling, 517-u.\nBelief in Divinity in danger because of misinterpretation, 652-m.\nBelief in God's benevolence, wisdom, justice, a part of Masonic Creed,\n  531-u.\nBelief in Nature as all sufficient not real Atheism, 644-u.\nBelief in the Father of All, Masonry wisely requires a; why, 166-l.\nBelief of a Mason regarding pain and suffering, 228--229-u.\nBelief of Masonry, 220-l.\nBelief of the Patriarchs did not exclude symbolic representations, 512-m.\nBelief, result of rejection of moral and religious, 197-m.\nBelief without understanding applied to the Word of a Master, 697-m.\nBeliefs of the Templar Chiefs indicated by hints and symbols of\n  Masonic degrees, 819-u.\nBeliefs must be separated from our certainties, 776-u.\nBellerophon fights with the Chimera, 499-m.\nBelin or Belinus: Gauls worshipped the Sun under the name of, 591-u.\nBenares temple represents Surya drawn by a horse with twelve heads,\n  587-u.\nBenedict, the Fourteenth Pope, renewed Bull of Clement the Twelfth, 50-m.\nBenefits of the Great Work to the Soul and to the Body, 785-u.\nBenefactor must look for apathy in those he benefits, 317-u.\nBenefactors enjoy reward hereafter, 172-u.\nBenefactors, to do all, be hindred, have others reap reward the lot of,\n  238-u.\nBeneficent operations are slow; those destructive are rapid, 317-m.\nBenignity or Mercy of God, the Male, 846-u.\nBenignity poured into the Autocracy of Deity determines the continuance\n  of the Universe, 769-m\nBenignity tempering Justice enabled Deity to create, 769-u\nBerne, Masons in 1743 proscribed by the council of, 50-m\nBeth Alohim states that before God formed a conception he was alone,\n  752-u.\nBeth is the woman; Aleph, the man; One the Principle; two the Word,\n  771-l.\nBible added to a point within a circle, vapid interpretation of the,\n  105-m.\nBible, doctrines of, clothed in language fitting the understanding of\n  the rude, 224-l.\nBible expresses incompletely the religious science of the Hebrews, 744-l.\nBible, Holy, one of Great Lights; part of the furniture of the Lodge,\n  11-m.\nBible speaks of Deity as Light; also the Isabeans and Kabalists, 739-l.\nBinah and Hakemah denoted by He, Yod, 798-m.\nBinah and Hakemah, the two lobes of the brain of Adam Kadmon, 758-m.\nBinah, by Hakemah's energy and the second Yod, projected the\n  seven Sephiroth, 756-l.\nBinah conjoins with Hakemah and shines within Him, 763-l.\nBinah, female, placed itself on the left side of Hakemah, 756-l.\nBinah, illuminated within Hakemah by a second Yod, issued forth, 756-m.\nBinah in conjunction with Hakemah conceives and the outflow is Truth,\n  763-l.\nBinah, In formatio, existent in the Corona of the World of Emanation,\n  758-u.\nBinah is a person and termed Mother, Imma, 799-m.\nBinah is imbued by Wisdom with a luminous influence, 793-u.\nBinah is the lower apex of the three Yods composing the Yod, 763-m.\nBinah is the productive intellectual capacity which is to produce\n  the Thought, Daath, 758-m.\nBinah, Kabalistic meaning of, 202-l.\nBinah produced the seven Kings all together, 796-l.\nBinah represents or is, the Eagle, 798-m.\nBinah, the Mother, Hakemah, the Father, in equilibrium as male\n  and female, 763-m.\nBinah, the Mother, quantitatively equal to Hakemah, 763-u.\nBinah, Understanding, sends all things into the worlds of--, 753.\nBinah's seven sons were perfect rigors not connected with a root\n  in the Holy, 795-l.\nBinah's sons placed in equilibrium when Wisdom was conformed\n  Male and Female, 796-u.\nBinary, a measure of Unity, 771-l.\nBinary become Unity by conjunction of Generative Power and\n  Productive Capacity, 772-m.\nBinary is Jachin; Unity is Boaz, 772-u.\nBinary is Unity multiplying itself by itself to create, 771-m.\nBinary manifests Unity; Unity itself and the idea of Unity are two,\n  771-u.\nBinary number stands for everything false, double, 630-m.\nBinary number, two, expresses the contraries in nature, 630-m.\nBinary, the generator of Society and law, the number of the Gnosis,\n  771-m.\nBirth of Mithras celebrated on Dec. 25th, 406-l.\nBlack Eagle, the King of Birds, can fire the Sun, 787-u.\nBlack of the nature of the Evil Principle, or Darkness, 662-m.\nBlazing Star a symbol of Sirius, 486-l.\nBlazing Star an emblem of Prudence, Omniscience, All Seeing Eye, 506-u.\nBlazing Star an emblem of the Sun to our ancient English brethren, 506-u.\nBlazing Star (an Ornament of a Lodge), symbolism of the, 15.\nBlazing Star announces the birth of the Sun, 787-u.\nBlazing Star, emblem of the Divine Truth, 136-m.\nBlazing Star of Truth formed by Faith above Reason resting on Revelation,\n  841-m.\nBlazing Star or an image thereof found in every initiation, 842-u.\nBlazing Star, or Horus, offspring of Sun and Moon, 14-u.\nBlazing Star the sign of the Grand Arcanum to the Magists, 842-u.\nBlazing Star the sign of the Quintessence to the Alchemists, 842-u.\nBlazing Star the sign of the Sacred Pentagram to the Kabalists, 842-u.\nBlessing, notwithstanding its evils, life is a, 142-l.\nBlessings of trials, pain, sorrow, will be understood, 240-l.\nBlindness, misery, bondage, symbolized by the condition of candidate,\n  639-u.\nBlows symbolize Christ's betrayal, refusal of protection, condemnation,\n  641-l.\nBlucher, guided by peasant boy, saves Wellington from rout, 42-m.\nBlue Masonry, mistaken explanation of symbol of the weeping virgin in,\n  379-u.\nBoaz and Jachin explain the mysteries of natural antagonisms, 772-u.\nBoaz and Jachin, parallel lines, point in circle, represent Solstices,\n  506-u.\nBoaz and Jachin, symbols of the bi-sexuality of the Ineffable Name,\n  849-m.\nBoaz has set on it the terrestrial globe, a symbol of our material part,\n  860-m.\nBoaz is Unity; the Binary is Jachin, 772-u.\nBoaz, name of the column at the left of the entrance; meaning of, 9-l.\nBoaz, one column of the Temple of Wisdom, represents the Passive, 860-m.\nBoaz, referred to symbolically, 202-l.\nBoaz represents Glory, one of the Sephiroth of the Kabalah, 267-l.\nBoaz, the eighth Sephiroth, is Splendor or Perfection of the Deity,\n  736-l.\nBodies animated by a portion of God's own being, 609-l.\nBodies return to the elements--a perpetual Genesis, 540-u.\nBody: Doketes believed that Christ took upon Himself only the\n  appearance of a, 564-m.\nBody, Soul and Spirit the Hermetic Triad, 792-m.\nBody's universal medicine is the Quintessence, a combination of\n  light and gold, 773-m.\nBohemian \"Thot\" corresponds to the Hebrew Tetragram, 732-m.\nBolingbroke, Lord, activity and usefulness in retirement, 39-l.\nBootes is the great Star, Arcturus, 454-m.\nBootes plays a leading part in Landseer's Osirian legend, 483-487.\nBona Dea, the name of the Mysteries of Rome, 625-u.\nBorder around the columns of the lodge, symbolism of the, 209-m.\nBorsippa, seven stages of the pyramid of, 233-m.\nBorsippa: the pyramid of Bel at Babylon contained seven spheres of,\n  729-u.\nBounds set to the scope of our human reason by Deity, 852-m.\nBoundehesch, an ancient sacred writing concerning Zoroastrianism 612-u.\nBourbon dynasty runs out with Bomba, 49-u.\nBrahm, Source of all, Very God, without sex or name, 849-l.\nBrahma, as incarnate Intelligence, communicated knowledge to man, 604-u.\nBrahma, having created the Universe, was absorbed in the Supreme Spirit,\n  608-l.\nBrahma of the Hindus, a personification of the Sun, 594-u.\nBrahma shared the corruption of an inferior nature, 603-l.\nBrahma, the creating agent of the Veda, interwoven with the Universe,\n  603-l.\nBrahma, the creating power of the Hindu Trinity, 550-m.\nBrahma, the divine male, produced from that which is, 608-l.\nBrahmins expressed the Active and Passive idea, by a statue, of\n  both sexes, 656-u.\nBrahmins' Trinity the oldest, Brahma, Vishnu, Siva, 550-m.\nBrain of Microprosopos produced by Love impregnating Rigor, 796-u.\nBramah, symbol of Sun, 77-m.\nBramah, Vishnu, Seeva, manifestations of the One Deity, 205-u.\nBrazen Sea, a symbol of purification before we can contemplate the\n  Flaming Star, 782-m.\nBrazen sea, description and symbolism, 410-l.\nBrazen Serpent, Nakhustan, a token of healing power, 497-u.\nBreath of Life, vitality, perishes with the mortal frame, 852-m.\nBrehm, similar to Athom and Aum, was the Supreme God, 584-l.\nBrehm, the Hindu Supreme God, above Brahma, Vishnu, Siva, 597-l.\nBriah, the World of Creation of the Sephiroth Theology, 99-m.\nBrihim or Brehm given no emblem or visible sign, 605-u.\n\"Brother\" a mockery when we malign one another, or defraud them, 808-u.\n\"Brother,\" characteristics necessary to be a true, 122-l.\nBrother discovered by the Mason in the flame and smoke of battle, 57-m.\nBrother, erring, to be spoken kindly to, 134-u.\nBrother, praise a; refrain from disparagement, 120-l.\nBrotherhood of man a tendency of Kabalistic philosophy, 625-l.\nBrotherhood of Masonry made possible by the Royal Secret, 861-l.\nBrotherhood possible only among those who have mutual regard and--,\n  856-l.\nBuddha comprehended the essence of the Trimurti, 82-u.\nBuddha, meaning of the names of, 82-u.\nBuddha or Fo religion introduced idolatry into China, 615-l.\nBuddha represented to have been crucified, 505-l.\nBuddha, the first Masonic legislator, doctrines of, 277-l.\nBuddha, the Gymnosophists came from the religion of, 278-u.\nBuddha to raise all men up to the perfect state, 623-m.\nBuddhist Crosses and ruins in Ireland and Scotland, 505-l.\nBuddhist idea was matter subjugating the intelligence, 258-l.\nBuddhist Trinity of Buddha, Dharma, Sanga, signifies--, 551-m.\nBuddhists hold that Sakya of the Hindus constituted a Trinity, 551-m.\nBuddhists supposed to have reached Ireland, 278-u.\nBuddhism, an innovation on an older religion, 602-u.\nBuddhistic doctrines exterminated by Brahmaism, 278-u.\nBuilding is slow; destruction swift--example, 320-m.\nBull and afterwards the Ram regarded as the regenerator of Nature, 465-l.\nBull carried into Spain and Gaul by the Cimbrians, 451-m.\nBull held sacred by Hindus, Japanese, Egyptians, because--, 448-u.\nBull; in the ceremonies, covered with black crape, was a golden, 479-l.\nBull of Pope Clement against Masons, title and penalties, 50-m.\nBull of Mithras dies from sting of Scorpion in Autumn, 466-l.\nBull, opening the new year, breaks with his horn the egg out of\n  which the world is born, 448-u.\nBull, or Taurus, religious reverence for Zodiacal Bull, 450-l.\nBull, the symbol of Apis, 254-l.\nBull; the symbols of the Sun and Moon appear on the head, neck,\n  back of the, 451-l.\nBulls, symbolism of, 404-410.\nBurning bush of the Scriptures, 286-u.\nBurdens of Government borne by those who reap the benefits, 176-u.\nBurials, eulogies at, 187-m.\nBurke, members of Commons left when he rose to speak, 37-l.\nButhos and His Thought made Wisdom fruitful by Divine Light, 563-u.\n\nC\n\nCabala, composition of immaterial man, according to the, 57-l.\nCabala, Tetractys composed of letters of the name of Deity in the, 60-l.\nCabalistic clavicules, Ezekiel and the Apocalypse, have occult\n  explanations, 731-u.\nCabalists expressed Heaven, the Tetractys, the name of God, by number\n  ten, 505-u.\nCabalists expressed the perfect number ten by a Tau cross, 505-u.\nCabiric, Divinities worshipped at Samothrace, names of, 426-l.\nCabiri, in Samothrace were celebrated the Mysteries of, 407-u.\nCabiri, the seven sons of Tsadok, the Supreme God of Phoenicia, 728-m.\nCable-tow of man's natural and sinful will, 639-u.\nCaduceus borne by Hermes, Mercury, Cybele, Ogmius the Celt, 502-l.\nCaduceus of Hermes represents the Universal Seed, kept a secret, 775-u.\nCaduceus originally symbolized the equator and equinoctial Colure, 503-u.\nCaduceus was a winged wand entwined by two serpents, 502-l.\nCaesar, Julius, reigns because the ablest, 49-u.\nCaesars follow period of convulsion, 30-l.\nCaesars, no insurrection, but the exile of Syene under the, 48-u.\nCagliostro introduced the Egyptian Rite of Masonry, 823-m.\nCagliostro was the agent of the Templars and wrote to London Masons,\n  823-m.\nCagliostro's seal had three letters on it, L.P.D., 823-m.\nCaiaphas, as bishop, to be opposed by Masonry, 20-l.\nCain slew Abel and peopled the earth with the impious, 599-m.\nCalamity, in Providence is sought the solution of, 189-m.\nCalendars regulated by rising, setting, conjunction of the Fixed Stars,\n  464-u.\nCalf, Aaron reproduced the Bull, Apis, in the Golden, 448-u.\nCaligula, horrors of despotism under, 47-l, 27-u.\nCaligula made his horse a Consul, 49-m.\nCall of honor or virtue responded to by the basest and lowest, 201-u.\nCama or Sita, slain by Iswara, put in the waters in a chest, 428-u.\nCancer and Capricorn, the Gates of the Sun were the tropical points of,\n  437-l.\nCancer includes the stars Aselli, little asses, device of Issachar,\n  461-l.\nCancer, the Crab, named because Sun began to retreat southward, 440-u.\nCandelabrum, golden, ID Temple; seven lamps, 10-m.\nCandidate first brought to the door in a condition of blindness, 639-u.\nCandidate for baptism among Gnostics repeats formula, 561-l.\nCandidate in India listened to an apostrophe to the God of Nature, 361-l.\nCandidate in India, neither barefoot nor shod, made three circuits,\n  362-u.\nCandidate in India, required to make a vow, was sprinkled with water,\n  362-u.\nCandidate in Indian Mysteries clothed in a linen garment, 361-l.\nCandidate in Indian Mysteries received name, cross, level and Word,\n  428-m.\nCandidate in Indian Mysteries sanctified by the sign of the cross, 361-l.\nCandidate in Indian Mysteries slain and raised, 428-u.\nCandidate in Indian Mysteries takes three steps at right angles, 428-u.\nCandidate in Mysteries after initiation became free, 421-l.\nCandidate in Mysteries confined in dark cell three days and nights,\n  421-m.\nCandidate in Mysteries died, raised, witnessed search and discovery,\n  421-m.\nCandidate, nothing inconsistent to feelings of a gentleman required of,\n  328-u.\nCandidate obliged to wait for years between the lesser and greater\n  Mysteries, 385-l.\nCandidates for Initiation were required to undergo severe trials, 385-m.\nCandlestick represented twelve signs through which seven planets run,\n  409-m.\nCandlestick with seven branches, meaning and symbolism, 410-m.\nCapability for better things than we know, 192-u.\nCapacity to possess adequate ideas of Deity limited by our faculties,\n  674-u.\nCapella announces the commencement of annual revolution of Sun, 464-m.\nCapella, Martianus, in his hymn to the Sun, gives many names, 587-l.\nCapella never sets to the Egyptians, 456-m.\nCapet dynasty dwindles out, 49-u.\nCapricorn represented by the tail of a fish, Son of Neptune, device\n  of Zebulon, 461-l.\nCaracalla, horrors of despotism under, 47-l, 27-u.\nCaracallas succeed the Julius Caesars, 49-u.\nCarpocrates enunciated a doctrine of existence, 562-u.\nCashmere people worshipped serpents, 500-l.\nCatacombs under Rome supposed to have been of Etruscan origin, 542-u.\nCatechumens Mass, the first of the two of the Christian Mysteries, 541-l.\nCatechumens, the second degree of the Christian Mysteries, 541-l.\nCatechumens were baptized and were instructed in some of the Dogma,\n  541-l.\nCatholic Church sacraments found in Mysteries of Mithras, 541-l.\nCatholic Temples, meaning of the serpent surrounding the Terrestrial\n  Globe in, 376-m.\nCause contains in itself what is essential in the effect, 703-u.\nCause, inconceivability of a Great First, 570-l.\nCause of All divided into the Active and Passive, 653-l.\nCause of all given a name and personified, 674-m.\nCause of all is the Universe, an intelligent Being, 667-l.\nCause of all that exists is a Ray of Light from Deity, 267-u.\nCause of all things and the Causes which flow from Him compared, 760-u.\nCause of the Universe recognized in Modern Degrees, 625-m.\nCause, the Universal First, divided into the Active and Passive\n  Causes, 401-m.\nCauses of all created things were two--Active and Passive, 657.\nCauses of nature, the elements as Passive principles, 655-m.\nCauses of nature, the heavenly bodies as Active principles, 655-m.\nCauses of nature were assigned sexes, 655-m.\nCauses, the Active and the Passive, were two great Divinities, 401-m.\nCave and the most ancient Temples symbolize the Universe, 234-l.\nCave used in Mysteries for the reception of candidates, 413-m.\nCebes, allegorical picture of, 101-m.\nCeiling of lodge, symbolism of starred, 209-m.\nCelebration of Greek Mysteries continued nine days, 433-m.\nCelsus objected to the concealed doctrines of the Christians, 544-m.\nCensure upon men's acts often undeserved, 335-m.\nCensure of a man often falls heaviest on his family, 336-u.\nCenter of the circumference signifies the Universal Spirit, 629-m.\nCenter of the Square and Compass governs successful work, 786-l.\nCenters of Life, Heat, Light, points around which gravitation acts,\n  843-u.\nCentralization, free states tend to, 51-l.\nCeremonies of initiation into the Mysteries of Mithra, 425.\nCeremonies of Masonry have more than one meaning, 148-l.\nCeremonies of the Mysteries conducted in caverns dimly lighted, 383-l.\nCeres, at Autumnal Equinox was celebrated the Mysteries of, 491-m.\nCeres isolated by Jupiter, 494-u.\nCeres the name of the religious Mysteries of Greece, 625-u.\nChaermon not warranted in stating that Egyptians were Epicureans, 665-m.\nChain of life from the Hidden Deity, 555-m.\nChaldea; Abraham carried the orthodox traditions from, 843-l.\nChaldean name for the Sun God was Bel, 587-u.\nChaldean Triad, Bel, Orosmades, Ahriman, 549-u.\nChaldean Universals part of the perfect Generative Power, 742-m.\nChaldeans considered Light divine and thought it a god, 582-u.\nChalk, charcoal and a vessel of clay materials for the work of a Master,\n  548-m.\nChance and Necessity giving way to Law permits man to be morally free,\n  695-m.\nChance, coupled with Free Will, or Necessity coupled with Law, 694-l.\nChance, God, Intelligence, undistinguishable by Menander, 694-m.\nChance is Law unacknowledged, 691-m.\nChance or accident absent in the plan of the Universe, 768-m.\nChandos, Sir John, might give his hand to a true Knight, 808-u.\nChanges in nations and the earth proceed slowly and continuously, 90-m.\nChang-ti, the name of the Hindu God, Sakya, given by the Chinese, 551-m.\nChang-ti is the Universal Principle of Existence, 616-m.\nChang-ti, or Xam-ti, the Chinese Sovereign Lord of the World, 616-u.\nChang-ti represented by the firmament, Sun, Moon, Earth, 616-m.\nChang-ti, the Supreme Lord or Being of the old Chinese creed, 615-u.\nChaos means universal matter, formless, but susceptible of forms, 783-m.\nChaos, moved by Sophia-Aohamoth, who produced the Demiourgos, 563-m.\nChaos perfected by God, nature, art, 783-u.\nChaos represented by a dark circle, 782-l.\nCharacter, moral and mental, is the habit of our minds, 216-u.\nCharacteristic of a Mason, sympathy is the great distinguishing, 176-m.\nCharacteristics, prototype found in lower animals of man's moral, 76-u.\nChariot whose wheels are Netsach and Hod, is described, 798-l.\nCharlemagne reigns because the ablest, 49-u.\nCharity, a great moral Force, makes united effort possible, 91-m.\nCharity, channel through which God passes his mercy, 147-l.\nCharity, Clemency, Generosity, essential qualities of a Knight, 803-u.\nCharity for others like ourselves lighted by a ray of Divine\n  Intelligence, 861-u.\nCharity in its broadest sense an obligation, seventh Truth of Masonry,\n  536-u.\nCharity known, described, practiced by antiquity, 704-l.\nCharity, opposed to luxury, represented by Venus, 727-l.\nCharity presupposes Justice, 705-u.\nCharity, the supreme virtue of man, must be possessed by God, 704-m.\nCharity towards the faults of men a part of the Masonic Creed, 531-u.\nCharity's first feature is goodness; its loftiest one is heroism, 705-u.\nCharles the Sixth, the lunatic, follows the Charlemagnes, 49-u.\nChastisements by God are for our profit, 718-u.\nChemistry analyses the constituents, but can not explain life, 526-527.\nCherub-Metatron one of the Chiefs of the Angels in the Kabalah, 784-l.\nCherub, or Bull, at the Edenic gate is a Sphinx; symbolism of the, 728-u.\nCherubim represents the two hemispheres, etc., symbolism, 409-l.\nCherubim set by Solomon represented the Celestial Bull, 448-u.\nChest or Ark, the body of Osiris placed by Typhon in a, 377-l.\nChief of the Tabernacle, first one of the degrees of the Mysteries,\n  moral lesson of, 370-u.\nChief of the Tabernacle, 23d Degree, 352-u.\nChildren of tender years received into the Mysteries of Samothrace,\n  427-m.\nChina, the Dragon was the stamp and symbol of royalty in, 500-l.\nChinese based their philosophy on one and two lines, 630-l.\nChinese built Temples to Heaven and Earth, genii, dragon, etc, 459-l.\nChinese contribution to Gnosticism; saying of Lao-Tseu, 259-u.\nChinese, controlled by reason, did not become idolaters until after\n  Confucius, 615-l.\nChinese creed declares Chang-ti is the principle of everything that\n  exists, 615-u.\nChinese Emperor sacrificed a Lamb in the palace of four buildings, 462-m\nChinese Ethics twenty-four centuries ago, 169-l.\nChinese Fo-Hi contains the True name of Deity, 702-u.\nChinese had no false gods, but observed a pure worship of God, 615-l.\nChinese have a Temple called the \"Palace of the Horned Bull\", 450-m.\nChinese invented writing within four generations after the flood, 601-u.\nChinese Mysteries came from India, similar rites, 429-m.\nChinese palace whose four gates looked towards the four corners, 462-m.\nChinese preserved the primitive revelation longer than other nations,\n  600-l.\nChinese Sabeans represented the Supreme Deity as composed of three,\n  551-l.\nChinese sacred book says the Great Principle produced Yn and Yang, 630-l.\nChinese symbolized the world by a ring between two serpents, 496-l.\nChinese Trinity, Chang-ti, Tien, Tao; explanation of creation, 551-l.\nChinese, under their third emperor, erected a Temple to the Great\n  Architect of the Universe, 615-l.\nChinese were not idolaters until within two centuries of Christ, 615-l.\nChivalric degrees co-operate with those that teach lessons of morality,\n  813-l.\nChivalric degrees represented by--, 202-u.\nChivalric Degrees urge the victory of the spiritual over the material,\n  856-m.\nChivalric principles, as in former days the world needs the exercise of,\n  578-m.\nChivalry, a Spaniard said, is a religious Order, and there are Knights\n  in Heaven, 808-m.\nChochmah, Kabalistic meaning of, 202-l.\nChopinel, or Jean de Meung, flourished at the court of Philip Le Bel,\n  823-u.\nChrishna assumes human form, still is Divine, 603-m.\nChrishna declares the soul never was non-existent, 518-u.\nChrishna-Govinda, the Divine Shepherd, Messenger of Peace, 603-m.\nChrishna manifest from age to age as vice prevails over virtue, 603-m.\nChrist a manifestation of Divinity; Divinity under another form, 568-u.\nChrist an object of gratitude and veneration to all, 308-l.\nChrist and the Holy Spirit produced by Intelligence, 560-u.\nChrist applied for baptism as a sacred rite, 262-u.\nChrist baptized in the river Jordan on Jany. 10th, 543-u.\nChrist, condition of the world at the coming of, 308-l.\nChrist, doings and acts of, 309-l.\nChrist, great similarity between doctrines of the Essenes and those of,\n  260-l.\nChrist is the expounder of the new Law of Love, 309-m.\nChrist, John, Paul, spoke in enigmatical language, 249-u.\nChrist, Masonry enforces the sublime lessons of, 221-m.\nChrist not unfortunate by being nailed to the cross, 316-l.\nChrist of the Apocalypse likened to Ormuzd, 273-m.\nChrist proclaims a new Gospel, a new God's Word, 309-u.\nChrist saluted first by the three Magi; meaning of the act, 731-m.\nChrist sealed the Gospel of Love with His life, 310-m.\nChrist taught a lofty morality, simple truths--no abstruse theology,\n  540-m.\nChrist taught by symbols and parables, 372-m.\nChrist teaches Liberty, Equality, Fraternity, 309-u.\nChrist teaches the old Primitive Truth uttered once again, 309-u.\nChrist, the Gnostic Eon, never really clothed with a human body, 559-l.\nChrist, the life of Chrishna similar to that of, 277-m.\nChrist the Word, Only Begotten, the Life, the Light, 559-m.\nChrist was not crucified according to the Basilideans, 554-u.\nChrist was \"The Light that lighteth every man that cometh into\n  the World\", 748-l.\nChrist's advent announced by a Star in the East, 511-m.\nChrist's birthplace resounded with acclamations of the Hosts, 511-l.\nChrist's commandment to love one another, 310-u.\nChrist's for inhabitants would relieve the world of the ills of life,\n  719-m.\nChrist's name less sonorous to some Gnostics than Orpheus, 732-u.\nChrist's nativity celebrated on the day Mithras or Osiris were found,\n  511-m.\nChrist's religious teachings the same as that of the Patriarchs, 541-m.\nChrist's teachings bequeathed to man included in our Masonry, 310-m.\nChrist's teachings in the light of the Rose Croix Degree, 308-m.\nChrist's teachings nobler and purer than those of any other moralist,\n  719-720-l.\nChrist's unselfish acts should be our emulation and example, 720.\nChristian antiquity did not decide whether the stars were animated\n  beings, 671-l.\nChristian Basilideans practiced Mysteries of Egyptian origin, 542-u.\nChristian Fathers quote Orphic hymn teaching Unity of God, 415-u.\nChristian Initiates divided into Auditors, Catechumens, Faithful, 541-l.\nChristian interpretation of the Blue Degrees, 639-u.\nChristian Lodge must have Christian Bible, 11-m.\nChristian Mysteries conferred three degrees on Initiates, 541-l.\nChristian philosophers held that each star contains a part of the\n  Universal Soul, 671-m.\nChristian Trinity, origin of the, 552-m.\nChrishna's life and doings similar to that of Christ, 277-m.\nChristianity and Philosophy mingled under the spirit of toleration,\n  247-l.\nChristianity at the bottom was love, 730-l.\nChristianity begins from the burning of the false gods by the people\n  themselves, 40-u.\nChristianity crushed out the occult philosophy, 730-l.\nChristianity did not discover the love of God, 704-l.\nChristianity in its early days taught in Mysteries, 541-m.\nChristianity led astray by substitution of faith for science, 732-u.\nChristianity reveres the Magi who came to adore the Saviour, 841-l.\nChristianity teaches Fraternity but not political equality, 23-m.\nChristians called Atheists and put to death as such, 643-l.\nChristians, contentions among early, 263-m.\nChristians do not explain Ezekiel or the Apocalypse, 731-u.\nChristians have made the Solstices feast days of St. John, 595-m.\nChristians held their Mysteries in the Catacombs, 542-u.\nChristians, in Masonic degrees appear some of the teachings of the\n  early, 369-l.\nChristians; Jewish traditions, Talmud and pretended history claimed\n  by the Johannite, 816-l.\nChristians of Syria embraced the doctrines of Bardesanes, 553-m.\nChristians, peculiarities and characteristics of the early, 540-l.\nChristians, teachings of the early, 369-l.\nChristians, the primitive truths of the Egyptians were taught by early,\n  369-l.\nChristians, the simple and sublime teachings of Christ were practiced\n  by the early, 540-l.\nChristians took refuge in the Catacombs when persecuted, 542-u.\nChristians worship Christ more for his Humanity than for his Divinity,\n  743-m.\nChristos and Wisdom ascended to Heaven before Jesus was crucified, 563-l.\nChristos, the title assumed by the Johannite Pontiffs, 817-u.\nChristos united to the Eon Jesus by baptism, 560-m.\nChristos with Sophia-Achamoth redeemed the world, 560-m.\nChurch and Throne mutually sustain each other, 33-u.\nChurch of Rome, pretensions and doings of the, 74-m.\nChurch received new set of symbols to conceal from the profane\n  the Truth, 840-u.\nChurches not needed but for expressing religious homage, 211-l.\nChrysippus, a subtile Stoic, moved the world by the Universal Soul,\n  670-u.\nChrysostom, Bishop of Constantinople, speaks of secrecy of Mysteries,\n  546-m.\nCicero claimed that Initiation made life agreeable and death hopeful,\n  379-l.\nCicero declares Pythagoras thought God is the Universal Soul, 667-u.\nCicero held that we expiate below the crimes committed in a prior\n  life, 399-m.\nCicero states that the Soul must exercise itself in the practice of\n  virtue, 521-u.\nCicero writes and argues for the intelligence of the Universe, 670-m.\nCiceronian period referred to, 48-m.\nCiceros in a period of convulsion, 30-l.\nCimbrians carried brazen bull with them into Spain and Gaul, 450-m.\nCircle a symbol in the Druidical mysteries, 367-m.\nCircle and Serpents found in Persia, China, Java, Athens, Mexico, 496-m.\nCircle between two parallel lines connecting them a symbol of--, 548-m.\nCircle between two serpents a symbol of the World with the Chinese,\n  496-l.\nCircle enclosing a point between parallel lines, a Kabalistic figure,\n  105-m.\nCircle enclosing a point between two parallel lines; Bible added, 105-m.\nCircle enclosing a point, parallel lines, columns, represent the\n  Solstices 506-u.\nCircle enclosing a point, two parallel lines and single Tau gives\n  Triple Tau, 503-m.\nCircle equal to the Square which turns on itself, 771-l.\nCircle formed of Michael, Gabriel, Uriel, Raphael, different faces\n  and letters, 798-m.\nCircle or ring, supported by two serpents; explanation of, 429-m.\nCircle representing the Universe bounded by two parallel lines, 252-l.\nCircle, the Sohar and the Kabalists form the mysterious, 798-m.\nCircle the special symbol of the first Sephiroth, 267-l.\nCircles of the Kabalah divided by a rose cross compose Dante's\n  Heaven, 822-l.\nCircles, ten, under the mystery of the ten Sephiroth, 754-m.\nCircuits, explanation of the meaning of the three, 427-l.\nCircuits in 8th Degree allude to points of fellowship, 137-u.\nCircular form of the Temple at Thrace, image of the Sun in the\n  Sanctuary, 410-l.\nCircular movement of four equal angles around one point; the\n  quadrature of the circle, 771-l.\nCircumstances, men bring different results from same, 192-l.\nCitizenship, Masonry tends to create a new, 220-m.\nCity a scene of moral action, 243-l.\nCivilization's evils long tolerated, 837-m.\nCivilizations have risen and perished by despotism or anarchy, 844-m.\nCivilization of Ethiopia preceded that of Egypt; had a theocratic\n  government, 362-m.\nCivilizations, Masonry prospers on the decay of ancient, 315-m.\nClarian Oracle declared that Iao is the Great God Supreme, 621-u.\nClaudius, Caracalla, Commodus, Caesar, 3-u.\nClavicules of Solomon are lost for Christians, 731-m.\nClemens and Philo hold views on symbolism of Cherubim, 409-l.\nClemens descants on light and baptism, 521-l-522-u.\nClemens of Alexandria in his Stromata speaks of the Mysteries, 544-u.\nClemens of Alexandria refers to the seven lamps of the candelabrum, 10-m.\nClemens of Alexandria says of the Mysteries, \"Here ends all\n  instruction\", 373-u.\nClemens refers to the early church and Mysteries, 543.\nClemens refers to the emblems and symbols of the Temple, 408-l.\nClement the Fifth howls at the Templars through later excommunications,\n  814-l.\nClement, 12th Pope, issued a Bull against Masonry in 1738, 50-m.\nCleanthes, a disciple of Zeno, regarded the Universe as the Great Cause,\n  670-u.\nCo-existence of the principle of generation in another and in itself,\n  654-m.\nCognition, a priori and a posteriori explained by Malakoth behind\n  Seir Aupin, 799-l.\nCoins, medals and seals contained the Zodiac and signs, 462-l.\nCold, like absence of motion, characteristic of death, 664-l.\nColors, analogy in the moral and intellectual world of the, 322-m.\nColors and symbolism of the furniture and vestments of the Temple, 409.\nColors in the Light only exist by the presence of the shadow, 848-u.\nColors of rainbow, three principal, seven by mixture, 57-l.\nColumn, broken, 17-u.\nColumn in form of a cross with circle over it measured the waters\n  of the Nile, 503-m.\nColumn of the Junior Warden symbolizes Tephareth, 800-u.\nColumns at entrance to the Temple, explanation of the meaning of, 305-m.\nColumns at entrance to the Temple, material, names, meaning, 304-l.\nColumns at entrance to the Temple of Solomon were symbolic, 304-l.\nColumns, Boaz and Jachin, explain all the mysteries of antagonism, 772-u.\nColumns, Jachin and Boaz, are symbols of the bi-sexuality of the\n  name, 849-m.\nColumns, Jachin and Boaz, at the entrance to the Temple, 202-l.\nColumns, Jachin and Boaz, represent angels of fire and water, 270-l.\nColumns, Jachin and Boaz, represent two of the Sephiroth, 267-l.\nColumns, Jachin and Boaz, symbolize the equilibrium of Nature, 548-m.\nColumns, Jachin and Boaz, symbols of faith and trust, 641-m.\nColumns, meaning of Strength and Wisdom, our two, 252-l.\nColumns of Seth, Enoch, Solomon, Hercules, symbolize the law of\n  Equilibrium, 843-u.\nColumns of 17th Degree represent Spirits of Fire, 270-l.\nColumns of the Temple at Tyre consecrated to the winds and fire, 410-l.\nColumns of the Temple, Jachin and Boaz, Sun and Moon, 776-m.\nColumns of the Temple that symbolize the Universe, 848-m.\nColumns, or lights of a Lodge, indicate angles of a right angle\n  triangle, 861-m.\nColumns that support the Lodge are Wisdom, Power, Harmony or\n  Beauty, 861-m.\nColumns that support the Lodge stand at the three angles of a\n  triangle, 61-m.\nColumns, two, customarily surmounted by globes, 9-m.\nColumns, two, imitations of those at Temple of Malkarth, 9-m.\nColumns, two, in the porch of the Temple, 8-l.\nColumns, two, size, description, names, 8-l.\nCommentary of the Rabbi Chajun Vital, the Siphra de Zeniutha, 794-m.\nCommentary states that the Kings died because equilibrium did not\n  yet exist, 797-l.\nCommodus, horrors of despotism under, 47-l, 27-u.\nCommon people, must learn thoughts of, 44-u.\nCommunion with Deity the great desire of man, 652-653.\n\"Companion\" originated from Mithraic Mysteries, 425-l.\nCompass a symbol of the Heavens and celestial things, 850-m.\nCompass, an instrument adapted to spherical trigonometry, 850-u.\nCompass and Square rest on the Scriptures and form the Star of\n  Truth, 841-m.\nCompass and Square teaches all that is contained in other symbols, 854-l.\nCompass, deals with spherical trigonometry, 11-l.\nCompass, emblem of what concerns the heavens and the soul, 11-l.\nCompass held in the hand on the female side of the Hermetic figure,\n  850-m.\nCompass is the Hermetic symbol of the Creative Deity, 851-m.\nCompass of Faith is above the Square of Reason, 841-m.\nCompass of Science in connection with the Celestial Triangle forms\n  Solomon's Star, 841-u.\nCompass points beneath the Square for the Apprentice, 854-l.\nCompass points for the Fellow Craft, one above, one below, 854-l.\nCompass points, for the Master, both dominant, 854-l.\nCompass, points of, under Square; symbolism of, 12-u.\nCompass represents the spiritual, intellectual, moral nature of the\n  double Humanity, 851-l.\nCompass surmounted by a crown signifies--, 291-m.\nCompensation for seeing injustices hard to reconcile, 829-u.\nComposite order of architecture is emblematic of--, 202-u.\nCompounds have movement, sensation, nutriment, subsistence, 784-m.\nComprehension of the consistency and harmoniousness of the Kabalah,\n  843-l.\nCompression of the removed Primal Light into Points, 748-l.\nCompressions in their relation to Creation, 748-l.\nConcealed doctrine, common to all, found in the ancient dogmas, 729-l.\nConception of the base of philosophy long in development, 674-m.\nConception of Deity corresponds to man's moral and intellectual\n  attainments, 650-m.\nConception of God arrived at by a study of our own souls, 703-l.\nConception of God impossible except as He manifests Himself, 752-m.\nConception of infinity impossible; or of immateriality, 570.\nConception of ourselves as a limited Being leads to God as a limitless\n  one, 703-l.\nConception precedes the entering of the Soul into the embryo, 755-l.\nConceptions of God are idolatrous in so far as they are imperfect, 516-l.\nCondorcet, through the ages will ring the words of, 43-u.\nConflagration of the funeral of Hercules the setting of the Sun in\n  glory, 592-m.\nConflict between Good and Evil, 660-664.\nConflict between Good and Evil continual in Soul of Man, 474-l.\nConflict between the Divine Principles and the natural, 556-l.\nConfidence gives the loftiest character to business, 141-l.\nConformation and constitution effected by means of veiling, 795-l.\nConformations, seven, descend and all things become in equilibrium,\n  798-m.\nConfucius, best doctrines Chinese were fitted to receive were those of,\n  38-u.\nConfucius defines Chang-ti and the Teen, 616-m.\nConfucius drew his doctrines from the Mysteries, 373-u.\nConfucius forbade making images or representations of the Deity, 616-u.\nConfucius, Magism was the science of, 839-l.\nConfucius, Masonry reiterates the maxims of, 221-m.\nConfucius, maxims of, 169-l.\nConfucius possessed true Knowledge of Deity, 207-l.\nConfucianism did not include idolatry, 615-l.\nConfused figure is Zero, the emblem of chaos, 629-l.\nConjunction of the Generative Power and Productive Capacity\n  necessary for Creation, 772-m.\nConjunction of heaven and earth engender all beings, 655-l.\nConjunction of male and female when Hakemah and Binah were\n  side by side, 757-u.\nConjunction of the Will and capacity to produce the Act of Thought,\n  766-l.\nConscience, a moral faculty, which enables us to perceive the moral\n  law of justice, 832-u.\nConscience, a rule of conduct higher than what we have ever attained,\n  832-u.\nConscience faithfully used and developed enables us to learn justice,\n  832-l.\nConscience the voice of Deity, 226-u.\nConsciousness of a thinking soul other than our body a proof of the\n  soul's own existence, 673-m.\nConsciousness of God the highest evidence of His existence and\n  our existence, 709-l.\nConsciousness of many things in us, 189-l.\nConsciousness of mystery beneath the commonplace, 190-m.\nConsciousness of self a gift like instinct, 673-l.\nConsciousness of self coexistent with our existence, 673-l.\nConsciousness of the individual reveals itself alone, 222-m.\nConsciousness the only real proof of the verity of certain things, 301-l.\nConstantinople See hostile to that of Rome from the time of Photius,\n  815-l.\nConstantine's Cross, 292-u.\nConstellations and divisions of Zodiac Stars, 409.\nConstellations, Capella, Pleiades and others celebrated, 466-u.\nConstellations figured on Mithraic monument at Rome, 507-l.\nConstitution, what kind of, will guarantee liberty, 211-m.\nConstitutions of government express the Passive Stability of the\n  Will of the Past. 860-u.\nConstraint sensed when independence is confined by other natures, 695-m.\nContented spirit a remedy for all the evils in the world, 144-m.\nContentedness of Mason must not be mere contented selfishness, 147-m.\nContest between good and evil concentrated in the breast of man, 563-m.\nContest between Good and Evil typified by the course of the Sun, 594-m.\nContraction of Deity within Himself effects a quasi-vacant space, 766-u.\nContraction of God at the emanation process termed Tsemsum, 746-u.\nContractions in relation to Creation, 748-750.\nContraries in combination causes the harmony of the Universe, 660-l.\nContraries in equilibrium and resultant Harmony taught by the\n  Ternary, 792-U.\nContraries in nature represented by the Binary number, 630-m.\nContraries, philosophical meaning of the doctrine of, 305-m.\nContraries, the second principle of the Kabalah deals with, 305-u.\nContraries, the solution of the most difficult problems given by the\n  analogy of, 306-u.\nContrary forces in the universal equipoise, 818-u.\nCoral insects, formation of Continents by the slow work of the, 318-l.\nCorinthian order of architecture is emblematic of--, 202-u.\nCornerstone, a name of the seventh King produced by Binah, 796-l.\nCorona, Crown, contained in potence the ten numerations, 754-l.\nCorona, Kether, \"The Head whereof is no cognition,\" applied to\n  Adam Kadmon, 758-u.\nCorpses of Egyptians duly embalmed were called \"Osiris\", 588-m.\nCorrect ideas of Deity only obtained by inspiration or philosophy, 674-u.\nCortices, the envelopes of the Philosophers' Stone, 779-m.\nCorruption, degeneracy, falseness of public and private life, 806-m.\nCosma, the Monk, held that every star was under the guidance of\n  an Angel, 671-l.\nCosmic force: God felt and known when we reverence the mighty, 707-m.\nCosmically, when a star rises or sets simultaneously with the Sun, 471-m.\nCosmogonic chants of the Ancients testify to the ideas of the origin\n  of the world, 655-u.\nCosmogonies of ancient nations preserved by different writers, 655-u.\nCountry, beauty and glory of, enhanced by--, 156-l.\nCountry, honor of a true Mason identified with that of his, 156-m.\nCountry, human speech must be free in a free, 56-m.\nCountry in its dotage when the--, 56-m.\nCountry populous and wealthy, great problems of, 178-179.\nCountry's safety to be preferred to the lives of her enemies, 836-u.\nCourse of circuits in Lodge, chariots in games, from East to West, 464-m.\nCovenant, the Triple Triangle, the symbol of the Triple, 533-u.\nCovenants, explanation of the Three, 532.\nCradle of Gnosticism in Syria or Palestine, 249-m.\nCreated things born of Malakoth, designated in the Kabalah as\n  female, 769-m.\nCreation a result of the animation of matter by Divine Life, 556-m.\nCreation according to the Emech Hammelech, 747-748-750.\nCreation according to the Sohar and other Kabalistic works, 748.\nCreation according to Zoroaster, 611-l.\nCreation as detailed in the Vedas, 609-l.\nCreation begins with the Divine Man, and ends with the Material Man,\n  760-m.\nCreation, categorical questions concerning, 648.\nCreation claimed by Ormuzd, or Ahura Mazda, 612-u.\nCreation conceived and willed by God's Thought, 575-u.\nCreation directly out of the Divine Essence through the Demiurge, 557-m.\nCreation, forms of, change, but the Universe is eternal, 303-u.\nCreation implies the conjunction of Generative Power and Productive\n  capacity, 772-m.\nCreation, inscrutable; mysteries of, 215-m.\nCreation is Mechanism to us; to the Ancients it was Generation, 771-l.\nCreation is the habitation of the Creator-Word, 772-m.\nCreation not by God directly, 269-l.\nCreation not only accomplished, but preserved, 575-m.\nCreation not the instant production of things, 607-m.\nCreation of a material Universe by an immaterial Deity through\n  agents, 568-u.\nCreation of Man concurred in by Ormuzd and Ahriman, 258-u.\nCreation of man impossible if God's justice alone had reigned, 846-u.\nCreation of Male and Female, 749-l.\nCreation of Power to protect the Realm of Light from Satan's Eons, 566-u.\nCreation of the Universe ascribed to the Word, by St. John, 568-m.\nCreation of the world by Judgment explained to mean by fear, 796-l.\nCreation of Universe assigned to Ihuh-Alhim by a fragment of Genesis,\n  568-m.\nCreation of the World by Ormuzd and Ahriman concurrently, 258-u.\nCreation of Worlds according to the Kabalah, 286-l.\nCreation, process of, 251.\nCreation, real idea of the Ancient Nations concerning, 575-u.\nCreation, reason advanced to account for the, 683-l.\nCreation required the Infinite to form in Himself an idea of what\n  He willed, 766-l.\nCreation represented as a marriage in Veda, 602-l.\nCreation represented by a triangle because it is the first perfect\n  figure, 631-l.\nCreation symbolized by the Tetragrammaton expressed triangularly, 698-l.\nCreation that results from the accord of two forces, 790-m.\nCreation, the first Entities of Spirits and Angels, the world of, 768-l.\nCreation the result of the accord of Necessity and Liberty, 790-m.\nCreation the result of the accord of the Fixed and the Volatile, 790-m.\nCreation, theories concerning, 270-u.\nCreation through the agency of an intermediary, 269-l.\nCreation, universal, is the female of the First Principle, 772-u.\nCreation's act gave Deity a name, 849-u.\nCreation's first step was providing a vacant space within Deity, 766-u.\nCreation's idea was followed by development and evolution, 767-u.\nCreation's mode concealed by an impenetrable veil, 852-m.\nCreation's primary law, the equipoise of contrary forces, 848-u.\nCreation's principle, the double law of attraction and radiation,\n  or of--, 843-u.\nCreation's process sought to be explained in the Kabala, 758-m.\nCreation's World embraces the six members contained in Binah, 795-l.\nCreative Agency of Heaven developed most fully at the Vernal\n  Equinox, 473-u.\nCreative Agency revealed as the ten emanations or attributes, 267-m.\nCreative Deity symbolized by the Compass, 851-m.\nCreative energy of the Soul of the World exercised through the\n  medium of the Sun, 473-m.\nCreative Power through Thought produced the Universe with its Word,\n  254-m.\nCreative principle the meaning of the personal pronoun \"He\", 699-u.\nCreative process according to Menou, the Hindu law given, 608.\nCreative process according to the Sohar; section of the letter Yod,\n  750-751.\nCreative process according to the Vedas, 609-u.\nCreative space illuminated by the Light of Wisdom, 762-u.\nCreative Thoughts of God, Worlds and Man the result of the, 582-l.\nCreator becomes so through utterance of God's Thought by the Word, 575-u.\nCreator degraded by sects which lower him to the level of humanity,\n  624-m.\nCreator hollowed out a pit of shadow, 772-u.\nCreator in triple, according to Aurelius; explanation, 550-u.\nCreator made room for Yod in the plentitude of uncreated Light, 772-u.\nCreator possesses all the essential attributes of the creature, 703-u.\nCreator produced by emanation an ideal Yod, 772-u.\nCreator, the Principle of Existence Himself, 772-u.\nCreator, the Word is the, 251.\nCreator-Word habits Creation, 772-m.\nCreature possesses no essential attribute not possessed by Creator,\n  703-u.\nCreature worshipped instead of the Creator, 508-l.\nCreed, no Sage believed the popular, 302-m.\nCreed of Masonry a simple and sublime one, a universal religion, 718-l.\nCreed of Masonry, Belief, Hope, Charity, 531-u.\nCreed, religious, political, masonic, little influence on conduct, 35-l.\nCreed, Sages in Chaldea, Egypt, India, China, had esoteric, 302-m.\nCreeds express an idea calculated to explain the Mysteries of Being, 650-m.\nCrescent and Disc symbols of the Sun and Moon in conjunction, 452-u.\nCrete, Dionusos appears as Iasius or even Zeus in, 585-m.\nCrete, Jupiter Ammon, the Sun in Arius, had an initiation at, 407-l.\nCrimes of men, in judgment God may consider the temptations, 134-l.\nCromwell reigns because the ablest, 49-u.\nCromwells follow period of convulsion, 30-l.\nCross a symbol of Humility, patience, Self-denial, 801-l.\nCross appropriated to Thoth or Mercury in its simple form, 503-u.\nCross associated with the serpent on ancient monuments, 502.\nCross assumed an improved form, the arms became wings, etc, 503-u.\nCross, Druids built Temples in the shape of a, 367-m.\nCross formed of a column with a circle over it measured the Nile, 503-m.\nCross has an astronomical origin, 483-m.\nCross having a rose in its center dividing circles representing Heaven,\n  822-l.\nCross, in building the Temples of India they imitated the shape of a,\n  361-l.\nCross in the shape of the capital letter T called the Tau cross, 503-m.\nCross in various forms, 502-505.\nCross, initiate in Druidical Mysteries marked with a, 430-l.\nCross like Teutonic or Maltese represented the Tropics and Colures, 502-l.\nCross marked on forehead of initiate into Indian Mysteries, 428-m.\nCross of Light, a celestial voice was heard over the, 567-m.\nCross of Light appeared in place of Jesus crucified, 567-m.\n\"Cross of Light is called the Word, Christ,\" etc., spoken by a celestial\n  voice, 567-m.\nCross of St. Andrew seen by several kings the night before a battle\n  was fought, 801-l.\nCross of St. Andrew seen in the sky before battle by Hungus, 801-m.\nCross of St. Andrew worn by the Picts in war time for their badge, 801-m.\nCross of the East the Kabalistic pantacle adopted by the Templars, 816-m.\nCross of the philosophers an image of generative power, for Masons, 771-l.\nCross surmounted by a circle and crescent an emblem of Deity, 503-u.\nCross surmounting a triangle symbolizes the end of the Great Work, 790-l.\nCross surmounting two vases, nature and art, 783-u.\nCross, symbol of devotedness and self sacrifice, taught Masonry--, 854-m.\nCross, symbolism of the, 290-l.\nCross, symbolism of the, 291-l.\nCross symbolized the active and passive power of production, 503-u.\nCross united to the Rose the problem proposed by High Initiation, 821-l.\nCross, various forms and meaning of the, 292-u.\nCross venerated thousands of years before Christ, 504-m.\nCross with a serpent on it was an Egyptian Standard, 502-m.\nCross within the circle represents the light antecedent to Chaos, 782-l.\nCrown called the Cause of Causes, the Ancient of the Ancients, 755-u.\nCrown, Kether, involves the idea of circularity and is endless, 753-u.\nCrown, Kether, termed Arik Aupin, Macroprosopos, 799-m.\nCrown, Male and Female, within the occult Wisdom, is fashioned\n  the Supreme, 762-l.\nCrown of Kings opposed by the Templars at their origin, 817-m.\nCrucifixion of the Light Principle enfranchised all souls, 567-m.\nCrux Ansata, a Tau cross with a circle over it, means life-giving, 290-u.\nCrux Ansata found at Khorsabad and the Assyrian monuments, 503-m.\nCrux Ansata the form of tether pins for young animals, 502-m.\nCrux Ansata the peculiar emblem of Osiris, 504-l.\nCrux Ansata the symbol of Royalty to the Shepherd Kings, 502-l.\nCrux Ansata was a Cross with a coiled serpent above it, 502-m.\nCube a symbol of faith in things invisible essential to salvation, 827-u.\nCube, faces and lines include the sacred numbers, 5-l.\nCube of agate supporting triangular plate of gold teaches--, 209-u.\nCube of Perfection connected with Taus within two circles, 503-m.\nCube on a plane surface delineated, 5-m.\nCube represents the form of the philosophal stone, 732-u.\nCube, symbol of the Force of the People, expressed as a Law of the\n  State, 5-l.\nCube, symbol of perfection, 5-l.\nCube, the emblem of Odin, 431-u.\nCube, the first perfect solid, teaches justice, accuracy, consistency,\n  827-u.\nCube, theological and physical, represented by the number six, 627-l.\nCubical Stone a symbol of the Grand Scottish Master's Degree, 781-l.\nCubical stone represents the Hermetic symbol of their Salt, 775-l.\nCubical stone that sweated blood, 827-u.\nCup, or waters of forgetfulness; symbolism of the, 438-m.\nCup used in the Mysteries represents the Constellation Crater, 506-l.\nCuretes encircled Zagreus in the Constellation Serpent, 585-l.\nCuriosity of this candidate excited by suspense and obstacles, 385-m.\nCybele, Atys represented the Sun God in the Phrygian Mysteries of, 407-u.\nCybele with the Phrygian Sun God goes to the Hyperboreans, 592-u.\nCybele worshipped in Syria under the name of Rhea, 423-u.\nCyril, Bishop of Jerusalem, speaks of the secrecy of the Christians,\n  545-u.\nCyril of Alexandria speaks of the secrecy of the Mysteries, 546-l.\n\nD\n\nDaath is the Act, the Thought, the Intellection producing the idea, 766-l.\nDaath, the Intellect flowing from Hakemah and Binah, 552-m.\nDaath, the result of the conjunction of Hakemah and Binah, 757-l.\nDaath, the Word of Plato and the Gnostics, 552-m.\nDagger, with hilt black and white, an emblem of light and darkness, 506-m.\nDagon or Oannes, the Sea God, the Leviathan overcome by Jehovah, 498-l.\nDamascus, Bishop exhibited a Testament at the battle of, 53-m.\nDan has for device a Scorpion changed to an Eagle or Vulture, 461-m.\nDante Alighieri, the Ghibellin, born in 1265, 822-l.\nDante applied figures and numbers of the Kabalah to Christian Dogma, 822-m.\nDante, Divine Comedy of, sketched in Plato's time, 101-m.\nDante publicly expounded the symbol of the Rose Croix Adepts, 822-l.\nDante reascends to light by using the Devil as a ladder, 822-m.\nDante's Divine Comedy is a declaration of war against the Papacy, 822-m.\nDante's journey resembles initiation into the Mysteries of Eleusis, 822-m.\nDante's work boldly reveals the mysteries; is Johannite Gnostic, 822-m.\nDarkness a source of fear and dread to the ancients, 443-m.\nDarkness an enemy, a dread, to the ancients, 595-m.\nDarkness, Sun driven further to the south by the Powers of, 445-u.\nDarkness and Light features of the Mysteries of Eleusis, 403-u.\nDarkness and Light prominent features of the Mysteries of Isis, 404-u.\nDarkness comes from the gross matter which composes the passive cause,\n  659-l.\nDarkness considered older than light by some Parsee sects, 613-u.\nDarkness has no home in the Universe, 845-m.\nDarkness hides the Universe and reduces all nature to nothingness, 660-u.\nDarkness on one side consequent on illumination on the other, 845-m.\nDarkness synonymous with Evil, 660-m.\nDarkness the embodiment of the Evil principle, 595-m.\nDaun, as Arun, the charioteer, precedes Surya, 587-u.\nDeacons in early Christian Mysteries kept the door, 543-l.\nDead govern, the Living obey, 315-u.\nDeath, but one question, \"Has he lived well,\" after, 184-u.\nDeath caused by the inertia or immobility of Forces on Impulses, 846-u.\nDeath completes the transformation necessary for soul's reabsorption,\n  686-u.\nDeath, for the Egyptians, but renovation and union, 588.\nDeath is the Great Teacher, 183-l.\nDeath is the true initiation; sleep the introductory mystery, 392-m.\nDeath, like absence of motion, distinctively characteristic of cold, 664-l.\nDeath, mysteries of, to be sought in Life itself, 101-u.\nDeath, no evil, but that which life has made, 184-u.\nDeath of deities not inconsistent with their Immortality, 590-m.\nDeath of seed to give birth to the new plant a symbol in all religions,\n   395-u.\nDeath, the grand mystery of existence, the secret of the Mysteries, 586-l.\nDeath, the great mystery of existence, precedes the second birth, 393-m.\nDeath, the shadow of God: whose shadow is immortality, 741-l.\nDecalogue, Masonic, 17-l.\nDecan, a God or Genius, assigned to each, 470-m.\nDecay of Templars due to their ambition, lack of education, haughtiness,\n  819-m.\nDecember the 25th, the date of the Great Feast of Mithras, 587-m.\nDecember 25th celebrated at Tsur and Rome, 78-l.\nDecorations of the degrees dispensed with if thought expensive, 329-u.\nDeeds are nobler and greater than words, 341-m.\nDeeds, great results from humble, 230.\nDefinitions of Deity, 651-l.\nDefinition of Freemasonry, its purposes, its essence, its spirit, 854-m.\nDegeneration of Nations by opulence and luxury, 348-l.\nDegradation of popular notions of Deity of later growth, 689-l.\nDegeneration of the families of wealth, 347-l.\nDegree, a step toward Perfection is each Masonic, 136-l.\nDegree, Apprentice, the 1st, 1-m.\nDegree, Fellowcraft, the 2nd, 22-u.\nDegree, Master, the 3rd, 62-u.\nDegree of contribution not so important as the purpose, 231-u.\nDegree of Perfection, doctrines taught in the, 432-l.\nDegree, the development of a particular Duty in each Masonic, 136-l.\nDegree which is closed against any religious faith is not Masonic, 290-m.\nDegrees, Allegories from old religions, mysteries used in revision of,\n  328-m.\nDegrees; excellency of the virtues of Honor and Duty taught by\n  the Chivalric, 856-u.\nDegrees, 4th to 14th, the ineffable degrees, 202-u.\nDegrees have three essential features, 625-m.\nDegrees of Hermeticism are three, religious, philosophical, physical, 840-l.\nDegrees, in the Indian Mysteries were several, 428-l.\nDegrees, in the Mithraic Mysteries were several, 425-l.\nDegrees invented by Alchemists within Masonry, 731-u.\nDegrees misunderstood, corrupted and disfigured, 106-m.\nDegrees, 19th to 32nd, philosophical, 202-u.\nDegrees of Blue Lodge given a Christian interpretation, 639-u.\nDegrees of Lodge Perfection teach the practical morality of Masonry, 855-l.\nDegrees of Masonry contain hints and symbols of real beliefs of\n  Templar Chiefs, 819-u.\nDegrees of Perfection urge the subjugation of the appetites by the\n  spiritual nature, 855-l.\nDegrees of Pythagoras contain heiratic intelligence, 97-m.\nDegrees of the Blue Lodge but the outer court of the Temple, 819-u.\nDegrees of the Christian Mysteries three in number, 541-l.\nDegrees of the Druidical Mysteries were three in number, 367-l.\nDegrees of the Gnostics, Material, Intellectual, Spiritual, 542-l.\nDegrees of the Sacrament referred to by St. Dionysius, 543-l.\nDegrees of the Scottish Rite teach the necessity of the mastery of\n  the spiritual in man over the material, 855-m.\nDegrees, only those qualified to discuss philosophy should receive\n  the, 332-l.\nDegrees, primitive masonry represented by the first three, 202-u..\nDegrees, 17th and 18th, New Law, 202-u.\nDegrees, symbolic, contain some Platonic ideas, 250-u.\nDegrees teach more than morals, 148-u.\nDegrees, the 15th and 16th, Second Temple, 202-u.\nDegrees; the value of knowledge, the excellence of truth taught by\n  the philosophers, 855-l.\nDeification of a mental principle instead of a physical one, 652-u.\nDeification of Fortune through error continued by the worship of\n  abstractions, 694-u.\nDeified, Heroditus speaks of the reason why animals were, 380-m.\nDeioces, a palace in Ecbatana having seven differently colored walls, 729-u.\nDeities enclosed in the egg are the forty-eight constellations, 663-l.\nDeities, names of Good and Evil, contained in names of Assassins, 82-m.\nDeities of India and Persia mostly symbols of celestial light, 601-l.\nDeities of Ormuzd placed in an egg broken by Deities of Ahriman, 662-l.\nDeities, prominent, of the Mysteries represented the Sun and Moon, 377-u.\nDeities, prominent, of the Mysteries were Male and Female, 377-u.\nDeities, to explain the existence of Good and Evil the Persians\n  assumed two, 300-m.\nDeity, a symbol or representative hieroglyphic was the name of, 208-u.\nDeity abstractly expressed is but a symbol of an object unknown, 513-m.\nDeity, according to Aristotle and Plato, in relation to Good, 681-m.\nDeity acts by general laws for general purposes, 688-l.\nDeity acts by universal laws and constant modes of operation, 688-m.\nDeity, after creating the idea, might be called by the name of\n  Tetragrammaton, 746-u.\nDeity, among the fundamental teachings of Gnosticism were emanations\n  from, 248-l.\nDeity as manifested in Seir and the Universe are one when Regnum\n  turns to her husband, 799-l.\nDeity as incomprehensible as ever, notwithstanding advances, 697-u.\nDeity at first looked up to with unquestioning reverence, 690-u.\nDeity, before He created any Ideal, was alone, without form, 745-l.\nDeity beyond human intellect, without name, form, limitation, 552-u.\nDeity causing good; demon causing evil, 661-u.\nDeity changed Himself into the form of Love in the work of Creation, 683-l.\nDeity; chief object of Masonry is the perpetuation of the character\n  and attributes of, 137-u.\nDeity comprehended in Himself all that is, 700-m.\nDeity comprehended the generative Spirit and productive matter, 700-m.\nDeity conformed himself into a form that contains all forms, 793-l.\nDeity, Conscience the voice of, 226-u.\nDeity considered as a Principle pervading all nature by the Confucians,\n  616-u.\nDeity contained within Himself the whole Universe to be developed, 849-u.\nDeity contains all that moves, lives, exists or has being, 700-m.\nDeity contains the incorruptible and unwearying force of necessity, 658-m.\nDeity contracted Himself on all sides from a point within Himself, 766-u.\nDeity created Nature, 700-m.\nDeity defined by the Hindu Vedas, 279-m.\nDeity defined today no clearer than in the definition of the ancients,\n  513-m.\nDeity dethroned and changed into a Dev to account for moral evil, 690-m.\nDeity developed Himself in order to create in ten Saphiroth, 552-u.\nDeity did not create the Universe directly, but through agents, 568-m.\nDeity divided into two classes to account for moral evil, 690-m.\nDeity emits His emanations into the quasi-vacant space of contraction,\n  766-u.\nDeity enacts moral laws because they are Revelations and decisions\n  of the Divine, 737-m.\nDeity, everywhere in the old faiths is the idea of a Supreme, 512-u.\nDeity first recognized in the heavenly bodies and the elements, 652-u.\nDeity first restored the universality of the seven Kings of the World,\n  Aziluth, then the others, 797-u.\nDeity forbidden to be represented by Idea, figure or letters He or Yod,\n  745-l.\nDeity forbidden to be represented by the early Scandinavians, 618-m.\nDeity formed all things in the form of male and female, 800-u.\nDeity in his revelations adopted the use of material images, 372-m.\nDeity, in Isiac Mysteries was carried an effigy of the Supreme, 412-l.\nDeity in its entirety actuates the planet and the rotifer, 671-m.\nDeity incapable of being defined or expressed, 513-m.\nDeity; instances of the envy, jealousy and malignity of, 688-u.\nDeity invested with human attributes, 515-u.\nDeity is all in all; the cause and effect, 701-u.\nDeity is imbued with Benignity, 769-m.\nDeity is Infinite, without limitation, without conformation, 765-l.\nDeity is the Absolute Existence and the Male and Female Principle, 700-m.\nDeity is the impulse and the result; the beginning, the ending, 701-u.\nDeity long known as Al Schadai, Alohayim, Adonai, etc, 697-l.\nDeity long known as Nature, a man personified, with human passions, 697-l.\nDeity made after man's own image, 652-u.\nDeity, manifestations of the Supreme, 13.\nDeity, Masonry teaches the nature and existence of one Supreme, 221-m.\nDeity most perfectly manifests Himself by His Rays, the Sephiroth, 748-m.\nDeity, Mysteries taught true ideas of, 208-m.\nDeity neither moved nor unmoved, limited nor unlimited, 676-u.\nDeity never could not have existed, 700-m.\nDeity never Thought not nor never was not, 849-u.\nDeity not an object of perception but--, 222-m.\nDeity not the author of vice, sin and suffering, but his ministers, 416-u.\nDeity not only infinite in power and wisdom, but in mercy and pity, 855-u.\nDeity not the cause of evil; there must be another cause, 660-m.\nDeity of Aristotle the perfection of man's intellectual activity in the\n  Universe, 681-m.\nDeity of Chaldeans, Father of Light, was termed Araor, 742-l.\nDeity of each star a portion of the Universal Deity; Soul of Nature, 671-m.\nDeity of Nature reflects the changeful character of the seasons, 689-l.\nDeity of our Northern ancestors was triune, 13-l.\nDeity of Plato, a Being proportioned to human sympathies; Father, 682-l.\nDeity of Plato could not be more than the Wise and the Good, 681-m.\nDeity of Plato creates, superintends, rejoices, 681-m.\nDeity of Plato, the Author of Good only; the Good itself, 682-u.\nDeity of the Universe likened to the Ocean by the Egyptians, 665-m.\nDeity often expressed by the personal pronoun \"He\", 698-l.\nDeity only apprehended by negative notions, says Philo, 651-m.\nDeity originally contained All, 764-m.\nDeity; Ormuzd, in the body, resembled light; in the soul, truth, 662-m.\nDeity present in each of four worlds as in and through the Sephiroth,\n  768-l.\nDeity produces nine lights which shine forth from His outforming, 762-u.\nDeity, questions in reference to, 648.\nDeity supposed to possess the feelings of envy and jealousy, 688-u.\nDeity, Supreme, above all Gods, author of everything, 13-l.\nDeity, Supreme, was the same to the intellectual of all nations, 208-u.\nDeity symbolized by the hieroglyphical senary, 634-l.\nDeity symbolized by the One, or Unity, 625-m.\nDeity symbolized by the triangle in all ages, 861-u.\nDeity symbolized by the Urn, 519-l.\nDeity, tangible and personal, only one comprehended generally, 700-l.\nDeity, the first three Universals, or Worlds, are wholly within the, 759-u.\nDeity, \"The Good,\" because Evil is excluded from his attributes, 681-l.\nDeity the incorporeal light in which live causes of created natures, 521-m.\nDeity, the Light of the Divine Presence, seen more clearly by the soul,\n  855-m.\nDeity, the One, Sacred Name of the Indian, 205-u.\nDeity, the Universe, having perpetuity of movement and life, Supreme\n  Cause 667-l.\nDeity, through the Sophiroth, is extended to the production of all, 759-m.\nDeity, Trinity of; creates, preserves, destroys, 57-l.\nDeity uses the Sephiroth as a workman uses his tools, 759-m.\nDeity was and is all that was, that is and that shall be, 700-m.\nDeity, when separated ideally into the loving and beloved, 684-u.\nDeity with the Kabalists has no name, but terms are applied, 745-l.\nDeity worshipped in lonely forests by the early Scandinavians, 618-m.\nDeity's attributes personified that man could commune with God, 652-l.\nDeity's bosom the origin and home of human souls, 851-l.\nDeity's essence, Necessity and Liberty, counterbalanced, produce\n  equilibrium, 778-l.\nDeity's first utterance was a syllable of four letters; each became\n  a being, 560-m.\nDeity's first utterance was Logos, or Plenitude of Eons, 560-l.\nDeity's habitation above the Moon, according to Lucanus, 654-m.\nDeity's intellectual nature affected by the question of Evil, 684-m.\nDeity's intention was that His creatures should recognize his existence,\n  797-l.\nDeity's manifested creative powers united are the Alhim, 701-m.\nDeity's name consists of four letters among many nations, 633-l.\nDeity's name consists of three letters among many nations, 632-l.\nDeity's names according to Diodorus, Philo, Clemens, Clarian, etc, 700-l.\nDeity's nature expressed by describing Him as Light filling all space,\n  766-u.\nDeity's nature included in the meaning of the True Word of a Mason, 697-m.\nDeity's oldest notions were rather indefinite than repulsive, 689-l.\nDeity's Omnipotence and Beneficence and the existence of Evil\n  contradictory, 686-l.\nDeity's proximity more remote as man's conception became exalted, 652-m.\nDeity's self-imposed limitations the safeguards of human freedom, 689-m.\nDeity's Thought outwardly manifested in the Universe which so became,\n  700-m.\nDeity's union with his creatures expressed by the Hebrew letter \"He\",\n  698-l.\nDeity's Unity and Supremacy and the separate existence of Evil, 681-l.\nDeity's wisdom and beneficence reconciled with the existence of Evil,\n  686-u.\nDelaulnaye on the symbolism of the Sun and the Moon, 13-l.\nDelphi and Delos awaited the return of Apollo from the north, 592-m.\nDelphi, a triple-headed serpent of gold was the tripod at, 496-u.\nDelta, the initial of the Latin or French word for God, 631-l.\nDelta, signification of the three Greek letters on the, 531-l.\nDelta, signification of the three sides of the, 531-m.\nDeluge, the number Seven in connection with a, 233-m.\nDemagog the predecessor of the Despot, 48-m.\nDemerit, the natural right which others have to punish us, 723-l.\nDemetrius received the Lesser and Greater Mysteries at the same time,\n  432-l.\nDemiourgos and his mother contest in man, 563.\nDemiourgos of the Gnostics corresponds to The Word, 271-l.\nDemiourgos, or laldaboth, of the Ophites, produced an angel, 563-m.\nDemiourgos, the Agent of Material Creation, produced by Chaos, 563-m.\nDemiurge, the Artificer and Governor of the World, 557-l.\nDemiurge, the framer of this lower world, 557-l.\nDemiurge regarded as hostile to God by some Gnostics, 558-m.\nDemiurgic energy most fully developed at the Vernal Equinox, 473-u.\nDemiurgic ideas of some Gnostics not of the Mosaic religion, 558-m.\nDemiurgical Intelligence descends into matter and returns, 415-m.\nDemocracy and Despotism favorable to the prevalence of falsehood\n  and deceit, 66-u.\nDemons, or Eons of Satan, involved in war, arrived at Realm of Light,\n  566-u.\nDemons of the Greeks correspond to the Ferouers of Zoroaster, 256-u.\nDemosthenes, methods of, 174-m.\nDenmark, serpent, boy and signs on sacrificial vessels of, 501-l.\nDenary, the number ten, the measure of everything, 638-m.\nDepths determined by height; valleys filled, mountains disappear, 848-u.\nDesign of organized beings graven in the Intelligence of the Universe,\n  665-u.\nDesirable number is eight, because of the Elus and Sages, 628-l.\nDesires should be measured by fortune and conditions, 146-m.\nDespot, spiritual or temporal, is a crowned anarchist, 822-u.\nDespots, aids to thinkers, 48-u.\nDespots will be cherished at home if people do not--, 177-l.\nDespotism, horrors of, 27-u-m.\nDespotism, progress of free people towards, 32-m.\nDestiny, a name by which the theological problem was cast back, 689-l.\nDestiny of Man, to attain the Truth and serve others, 109-u.\nDeus, the four-lettered name of the Latin Deity, 633-l.\nDeva, God, is derived from the root, \"div,\" to shine, 601-l.\nDevas, the elemental Powers, progeny of Indra, 602-m.\nDevelopment symbolized by the use of the Mallet and Chisel, 30-l.\nDevil not a person but a Force misdirected, 102-l.\nDevil, or evil force, personified by--, 102-l.\nDevil, Personification of Atheism or Idolatry, 102-l.\nDevil used as a ladder by Dante to reascend to light, 822-m.\nDevice of Masonry is--, 220-m.\nDevotion to duty and acts of heroism distinguished the Knight, 580-l.\nDevs and Archdevs opposed to the good spirits of Ormuzd, 257-l.\nDevs are six of the Zodiacal signs under the banner of darkness, 663-u.\nDiagoras accused of divulging the Secret of the Mysteries, 384-l.\nDialectic and Ethic harmoniously blended evolve perfect discipline, 35-u.\nDiana the Mistress in the Constellation Sagittarius, 461-l.\nDiodonis gives lao as the name given by Moses to Deity, 700-l.\nDiodorus held that each star was a part of the Universal Soul, 671-m.\nDiodorus Siculus states the Egyptians recognized two great Divinities,\n  458-m.\nDiodorus speaks of the columns near the tombs of Osiris and Isis, 378-m.\nDionusos and Apollo, representing Nature and Art, from one common\n  source, 585-l.\nDionusos, born of a mortal mother, a son of God, 585-u.\nDionusos, Creator, guardian, liberator, Saviour of the Soul, 519.\nDionusos esteemed as Healer, Saviour, Author of Life and Immortality,\n  586-u.\nDionusos, identical with lacchus, presiding genius of the Mysteries,\n  585-u.\nDionusos in his second birth a type of spiritual regeneration, 519-l.\nDionusos is the totality of the Universal Soul, 393-m.\nDionusos, or Bacchus, Author of Light and Life and Truth, 13-l.\nDionusos-Orpheus descended to the Shades to secure the perpetuity\n  of Nature, 394-u.\nDionusos, Orpheus said to have founded the Mysteries of, 357-u.\nDionusos, personification of the senuous world, guide of the soul, 518-l.\nDionusos, symbols of the second birth of man were the death and\n  passion of, 393-l.\nDionusos, the earth is rent asunder at the death of, 393-l.\nDionusos, the God of Nature, one with heroes of other Mysteries, 357-u.\nDionusos the leader of the Muses, the God of Nature and of Art, 585-l.\nDionusos, the Liberator, like Osiris, frees the soul and--, 393-u.\nDionusos, the \"Liberator,\" the Totality of the \"Universal Soul\"; he\n  dies and rises, 586.\nDionusos, the Nature God of the Greeks, as Amun was to the Egyptians,\n  585-u.\nDionusos the personification of the Sun in Taurus, 585-u.\nDionusos the same as the dismembered Zagreus, 585-l.\nDionusos, the spiritual regeneration of man typified by the second\n  birth of, 357-m.\nDionusos, the Sun, suggested the spiritual mediator, 519-u.\nDionusos torn in pieces by the Titans represented the Soul mixed\n  with matter, 561-l.\nDionusos was Creator, guardian, liberator, saviour of the soul, 357-m.\nDionysius, or author of his books, concealed science under the disguise\n  of Christianity, 732-l.\nDionysius, the Areopagite; Dogma of Hermes found in writings of, 731-l.\nDionysius, the Areopagite, the first Bishop of Athens, 543-l.\nDionysius, the Younger, written to by Pluto, on the First Principle, 99-u.\nDioscuri patrons of sailors and navigation, 427-u.\nDioscuri sailed with Jason for the golden fleeced Ram, the Sun, 466-l.\nDioscuri, the Tunis Castor and Pollux, deities of Samothrace, 426-l.\nDirectors of the Work or Masons of the 9th to 11th degrees; duties\n  of the, 331-l.\nDisagree in matters of opinion and both be sane and honest, 166-u.\nDisc and Crescent denote Taurus; used as our Orators' sign, 452-u.\nDisc and Crescent on the head of the Bull represents--, 452-m.\nDisc and Crescent on Ram instead of Bull represent the Sun in Aries, 452-l.\nDisc and Crescent symbols of the Sun and Moon in conjunction, 452-u.\nDisciples first called Christians at Antioch, 262-l.\nDisciples of Christ, secret meaning to the number of the, 233-m.\nDiscipline of the Secret compared to the Heathen Mysteries, 544-u.\nDiscipline of the Secret was the concealment of certain tenets, 543-m.\nDiscords, wrong, evil, suffering, are--, 577-u.\nDiscovery of the sacred place in which Truth is hidden reveals the\n  True Light, 785-l.\nDiscovery of Truth the most Sublime Science to which a mortal\n  can aspire, 785-l.\nDivine and human relations received dramatic form in ancient views, 372-n.\nDivine and human united symbolized by an equilateral triangle, 858-m.\nDivine and the Human intermingled in every human being, 853-u.\nDivine attributes contrasted with human littleness, 651-m.\nDivine Dynasty which governed the early world, 508-m.\nDivine Essence symbolized by Light or Fire, 742-l.\nDivine in man makes him more than an intelligent animal, 857-l.\nDivine Intellect as an Idea, the Universe invested with form after\n  being in the, 323-m.\nDivine Intellect evolved all Souls and intellects of men, 582-m.\nDivine law an analogical inference from human law, 694-m.\nDivine Life animates dead matter, creation begins, 556-m.\nDivine Life by evolution approaches dead matter, 556-m.\nDivine mingles with human in all affairs, 12-u.\nDivine Nature, a theme on which man is not entitled to dogmatize, 222-m.\nDivine Nature, Power and Justice the same, Wisdom and Mercy the\n  same in the, 552-m.\nDivine not encroached on by dead matter, 556-u.\nDivine Original; the consummation of Plato's science is the contemplation\n  of the, 692-l.\nDivine perfection nearest approached by Man, 610-u.\nDivine Power, or Word, unfolded the Intellect, 582-m.\n\"Divine right to govern\" vested in the ablest, wisest, best, 203-l.\nDivine Soul, acting as a cause, produced intelligence, 669-l.\nDivine symbolized by the Human in the creation of woman, 849-l.\nDivine Tetragram, Jehova, formed by adding Yod to the ternary\n  name of Eve. 771-m.\nDivine Triangle, Fatality, Will and Power; the magical ternary. 738-u.\nDivine Will enacts the moral laws. 737-m.\nDivine Will or Power limited by the Divine Wisdom; the result,\n  Beauty, Harmony. 846-l.\nDivine will struggles with the natural will in the souls of men, 599-m.\nDivine Word allied with Universal Reason in the Kabalah, 744-l.\nDivinity ascribed to Heavenly bodies by Phoenicians and Egyptians, 456-l.\nDivinity ascribed to the stars by the logic of Cicero, 670-l.\nDivinity belonged to the soul of nature, 670-u.\nDivinity designated by the Chinese by the name of the Divine\n  Reason, 616-u..\nDivinity held to be invisible by Druids, hence could not worship\n  idols, 618-u.\nDivinity, numbers expressed the utterances of, 209-u.\nDivinity severed from the Universe by the Spiritualists, 667-m.\nDivinity, the \"Great Whole,\" was male and female, 658-u.\nDivision of the Heavens by seven, planets and twelve signs, 460-m.\nDoctrine enveloped with symbols by Pythagoras, 97-m.\nDoctrine of Lucanus one of the most ancient and widely accepted, 654-l.\nDoctrine of Masonry in reference to religious Truths, 576-l.\nDoctrine of the Decans regarded as important, secret, august, 470-l.\nDoctrine secret and superior to that of the Gospels, 542-l.\nDoctrine; through all the ancient dogmas is found a common concealed,\n  729-l.\nDoctrine, to unite man with the World and Deity the object of the, 415-m.\nDoctrines of Druids taught--, 168-m.\nDoctrines of Odin, 168-m.\nDoctrines of the degrees of the Indian Mysteries, 428-l.\nDoctrines of the Greeks, 250-u.\nDoctrines of the Templars misunderstood by the mass of them, 819-m.\nDoctrines of Zoroaster taught--, 167-l.\nDoctrines, to but few did intellectual Hebrews teach the esoteric, 207-l.\nDog leads nine Elus to the cavern; significance and origin, 489-l.\nDog Star, Sirius, 490-u.\nDog supposed to have aided Isis in her search for Osiris represents, 376-l.\nDog's head given to Mercury to express prudence, 779-l.\nDogma, a belief in the existence of God, the basis of its, 220-m.\nDogma of Orpheus, Moses and the Theologians, 443-l.\nDogma of widespread application was the division of the First Cause\n  into the Active and Passive, 653-l.\nDogmas of ancient religions and mysterious societies have a doctrine\n  in common, 729-l.\nDogmas of the Hindus, 604-m.\nDogmatism of man on subjects beyond his comprehension, 651-u.\nDoketes held that Christ only took the appearance of a body, 564-m.\nDominion of the spiritual nature over the material urged in the\n  Degrees, 855.\nDominion, one of the last four Sephiroth of the Kabalah, 848-l\nDomitian, horrors of despotism under, 27-u.\nDomitian, reference to the reign of, 47-l, 3-u.\nDomitian, \"that most savage monster\", 49-m.\nDoric order of architecture represents the ineffable degrees, 202-u.\nDouble nature of man, though he is one, 861-l.\nDoubt and question must accompany man's onward progress, 712-l.\nDoubt, who shall decide in honest, 166-u.\nDove, Raven, Phoenix, are symbols of Light, Darkness and Beauty, 792-m.\nDraco made the astronomical cincture of the Universe, 498-m.\nDraco or Jefferies as Judge to be opposed by Masonry, 20-l.\nDragon finally absorbed by and united with the Principle of Good, 499-l.\nDragon foe struck down by Mithras, 612-l.\nDragon the image of Ahriman, 257-l.\nDragon, winged, a symbol of Matter or Salt, 774-m.\nDragons and Serpents, something divine in the nature of, 494-l.\nDragons figure in other than astronomical legends, 499-m.\nDrama of Hiram and the Mysteries teach the victory of Good over\n  Evil, 435-l.\nDream phenomena are mysteries little understood, 733-l.\nDreams are realities while they last, 166-u.\nDresden Reformed or Rectified Rite, that of Ramsay, 779-l.\nDruidic Temples and Chapters, 235-l.\nDruidic Temples recording the meteoric cycles, 236-u.\nDruidical ceremonies came from India; originally Buddhists, 367-u.\nDruidical Hu contains the True name of Deity, 702-u.\nDruidical initiate called thrice born when ceremony completed, 430-m.\nDruidical Mysteries conform to those of other nations, 367.\nDruidical Mysteries explained the primitive truths, 430-l.\nDruidical Mysteries, initiate placed in a tomb in the, 430-l.\nDruidical Mysteries, Initiations performed at midnight in the, 367-l.\nDruidical Mysteries, periods of the festivals of the, 367-l.\nDruidical Mysteries resembled those of the Orient; description of, 429-m.\nDruidical religion's idea and doctrines, 618-u.\nDruidical rites refer to astronomical phenomena, 502-u.\nDruidical sacred Triad inscribed on a cruciform tree, 504-u.\nDruidical subterranean grotto at New Grange in Ireland, 504-m.\nDruidical Temple in the Island of Lewis, Scotland, 504-m.\nDruids admitted immortality, judgment, man's responsibility, 618-u.\nDruids asserted the Unity of the God-head and invoked One Power, 618-u.\nDruids considered the cross a sacred symbol, 504-u.\nDruids cut a tree in the shape of a Tau cross and inscribed it, 504-u.\nDruids did not worship idols, holding Divinity to be invisible, 618-u.\nDruids' doctrines taught--, 168-m.\nDruids exercised considerable secular as well as religious power, 618-l.\nDruids expressed Deity by the symbol O.I.W, 618-u.\nDruids expressed the name of Deity by the letters O.I.W, 622-u.\nDruids, first, children of the Magi; initiation from Egypt and Chaldea,\n  103-l.\nDruids had sacred regard for the odd numbers, 618-m.\nDruids had some idea of redemption and a Redeemer, 618-u.\nDruids held the doctrine of transmigration, 618-u.\nDruids imparted secrets without the use of audible language, 372-m.\nDruids of Britain similar to the Magi of the Persians, 617-l.\nDruids studied astronomy and practiced the Masonic virtue, Truth, 619-u.\nDruids, uniformity between the Persian Magi and the, 367-u.\nDruids, worship of; their dogma and symbolism, 103-l.\nDruids worshipped Hu and Ceridwen, male and female, 618-u.\nDuad, a figure of the cube, 5-l.\nDuad, the origin of contrasts, the imperfect condition, 630-u.\nDuad, the symbol of diversity, inequality, division, vicissitudes, 630-u.\nDuad was female and represented matter capable of form, 631-u.\nDual Sovereignty of the Universe acknowledged by philosophers, 660-m.\nDualism, belief in two adverse principles or, 272-275.\nDualism of Good and Evil adverse to the doctrine of Unity, 687-u.\nDualism of mind and matter the result of the idea of an independent\n  mind, 677-l.\nDu Barry governing in the name of Louis the 15th, 49-m.\nDuties grow out of all the relations of life, naturally, undeniably,\n  832-u.\nDuties of a Mason are--, 219-l.\nDuties of a Master of the Symbolic Lodge, 325-333.\nDuties of life more than life, 151-l.\nDuties of life still remain to be done and errors combated, 163-l.\nDuties of Mason not confined to Masons alone, 176-185.\nDuties of 9th Degree, 159-u.\nDuties of a Prince of Jerusalem the same as of old in substance, 241-m.\nDuties of the Knight Royal Axe, 351-u.\nDuty escaped is a gain avoided, 837-l.\nDuty, even if there be no reward, a Mason's obligation, 119-m.\nDuty forbids us to be idle, 343-m.\nDuty of a Knight Commander of the Temple, 578-580.\nDuty of a Mason in reference to our activities, 342-m.\nDuty of a Mason, not the result or the reward to be considered, 239-u.\nDuty of a Mason when he hears of a fallen man, 335-l.\nDuty of a Mason with his superiors, his equals, his inferiors, 336-m.\nDuty of Masonry, eternal, persistent, 18-21.\nDuty, not Heaven or bliss, to be toiled for, 229-l.\nDuty practiced because it is right and just, is good, 722-l.\nDuty recognized by morality and religion, 717-m.\nDuty supposes a rule both intelligible and certain, 695-m.\nDuty to press forward in the search for Truth, 223-u.\nDuty written on the volume of Masonic life, 350-l.\nDying Nature Gods in every country, 590-u.\nDynasties speedily decay and run out, 49-u.\n\nE\n\nEagle flying, a Hermetic symbol of Sulphur, 774-m.\nEagle or Vulture sometimes substituted for the Scorpion, 448-m.\nEagle or Vulture substituted for Serpent on account of its malign\n  influence, 461-m.\nEagle, the symbol of Egyptian God, Mendes, 291-m.\nEagle, the symbol of Mendes, 254-l.\nEarth and heaven composed of the two Causes, the Active and Passive,\n  656-u.\nEarth and Heavens personified as Deities even among the Aryans, 850-l.\nEarth, by its union with Ouranos, engenders Gods, the power of light,\n  660-u.\nEarth caused by the Sun to beget and be prolific; to fructify, 851-u.\nEarth considered by the Phrygians as the mother of all things, 658-l.\nEarth gives the elements and principles of Compounds subsistence, 784-m.\nEarth, opinion of the ancients regarding the shape of the, 442-l.\nEarth, or Rhea, the Mother of the effects of which Heaven is the\n  father. 657.\nEarth regarded as one of the two first Divinities, Heaven the other,\n  401-m.\nEarth rent asunder at the death of Dionusos, 393-l.\nEarth revolving around the Sun known to Thales and Pythagoras, 343-u.\nEarth symbolized by the figure three, 632-m.\nEarth the center of the Universe to the ancients, 593-l.\nEarth to the Initiate is the World manifest to the senses, 785-u.\nEarth, by its union with Tartarus, engenders Typhon, the power of\n  darkness, 659-l.\nEarth, the matrix of the world; of beings engendered by the heavens,\n  668-l.\nEarth, the Mother, impregnated by Heaven, becomes fruitful, 656-l.\nEarth, the Producer, the Mother, a female; Mother Earth, 851-u.\nEarth the Soul's place of exile; not its home, 520-m.\nEarth, the wife of heaven, a part of the ancient mythologies, 658-m.\nEarthly nature subjugated by the spiritual symbolized by the Master's\n  Compass, 854-l.\nEast, faith of people of the West connected with the faith of the, 247-l.\nEastern nations early substituted Nature worship for the primitive\n  faith, 600-l.\nEast, the place of Light, because the name of Deity is displayed, 287-m.\nEast, the seat of Mithras in the sacred cave, 413-m.\nEast would prevail over the West if the Templars rebuilt the Temple,\n  816-u.\nEcbatana, seven different colors in the enclosures of, 233-m.\nEcbatana, the site of the palace of Deioces with seven circular walls,\n  729-u.\nEclipses of the Sun and Moon caused by a dragon, 498-501-u.\nEcliptic, the path of the Sun through the Constellations, 447-u.\nEdda of Icelanders in a dialog defines God, 619-u.\nEdenic river divided into four streams, 58-u.\nEdifice of good proportions built by philosophical use of Masonic tools,\n  787-l.\nEducated mind appreciates the superiority of law, 696-m.\nEducation and enlightenment opposed to--, 160-l.\nEducation may quicken the intellect, but leave the heart hollow, 39-l.\nEducation one of the chief missions of Masonry, 153-u.\nEdward the Second, election of officers in statutes of, 34-u.\nEgean Islands, Dionusos was Butes, Dardanus, Imbros in the, 585-m.\nEgg a symbol of the Greeks, Coresians, Egyptians, Japanese, Magi, etc,\n  472-m.\nEgg and a serpent a common symbol, 496-l.\nEgg at feet of Bacchus gives up Love, who, with Night, organized Chaos,\n  663-l.\nEgg borrowed from the Egyptians and carried to Greece, 655-l.\nEgg divided between the good and evil Constellations and Angels, 472-l.\nEgg, Good and Evil, Light and Darkness, symbolized by the, 402-l.\nEgg issued from the mouth of the Egyptian God, Kneph, 472-m.\nEgg made use of as a symbol by disciples of Zoroaster and Mithra, 403-u.\nEgg of generation symbolized by the figure nine, 636-l.\nEgg of philosophy enclosed in a mould of oak, 783-u.\nEgg, Phanes, the luminous God, issues from the Sacred, 404-m.\nEgg, Phtha, image of the Supreme Intelligence in the World, comes from\n  an, 254-m.\nEgg producing worlds figures in all cosmogonies, 771-l.\nEgg represented the concavity of the celestial sphere enclosing all\n  things, 663-l.\nEgg represented the world and its spherical envelope; symbolism, 400.\nEgg, symbol of the Universe, issues from the mouth of Kneph, 254-m.\nEgg symbolizes the double power, the active and the passive, 655-l.\nEgg symbolizes the two Unities, the Soul and the Intelligence, 415-u.\nEgg: various references to the sacred, 663-l.\nEgypt, judgment on the dead in, 187-m.\nEgypt; orthodoxy carried by Moses out of, 843-l.\nEgypt; orthodox traditions reigned in the time of Joseph in, 843-l.\nEgyptian conception of Deity and the creation of things, 281-m.\nEgyptian entombed considered as on his way to a reunion with his Deity,\n  653-u.\nEgyptian god, Apis, made by Aaron, 206-m.\nEgyptian God, Kneph, the egg issued from the mouth of the, 472-m.\nEgyptian Gods, Horus, Isis, Osiris, Amun, subordinate to Athom, 597-l.\nEgyptian great Divinities, the Sun and the Moon, Osiris, Isis, 458-m.\nEgyptian idolatry abhorred by Persians, who sought to extirpate it, 610-m.\nEgyptian method of dealing with the day short each year, 467-m.\nEgyptian Mysteries, summary of the legend of the, 375-380.\nEgyptian Mysteries, teachings of, 369-m.\nEgyptian new year fixed by the Dog Star or Sothiac Period, 467-m.\nEgyptian or Oriental elements not incorporated by Philo, 253-u.\nEgyptian Priests knew how to temper action by action, 842-l\nEgyptian sanctuaries taught that the earth revolved around the Sun, 843-u.\nEgyptian Supreme Being; all other gods manifestations of the, 281-m.\nEgyptian priests studied abstract sciences, cultivated the fine arts,\n  362-l.\nEgyptian Temples decorated at portals with circle and serpents, 496-m.\nEgyptian Tetractys borrowed by Pythagoras and the Hebrews, 88-m.\nEgyptian Triad, Osiris, Isis, Horus, principles of the, 87-m.\nEgyptians a religious people; their views of the Universe, 665-m.\nEgyptians adored the Sun as an infant at the Winter Solstice, 465-u.\nEgyptians deemed the name Isis sacred and incommunicable, 620-u.\nEgyptians, God conceived the Universe before he created it, according\n  to the, 369-m.\nEgyptians had but three seasons, 549-u.\nEgyptians held the soul immortal and Osiris was to judge the world 623-l.\nEgyptians paint a fish to express hatred, 456-m.\nEgyptians place intellect and reason first as self existent, 614-u.\nEgyptians recognized more than one Triad, 548-l.\nEgyptians recognized as gods the stars of the Zodiac, 458-l.\nEgyptians regarded the Universe as a great Deity composed of a.\n  number of Gods, 459-u.\nEgyptians, seed vessel of the lotus a sacred symbol to the, 9-u.\nEgyptians taught reverence for One Supreme God 1,500 years before\n  Moses, 364-l.\nEgyptians the tutors of the Greeks in religious dogma, 617-u.\nEgyptians worshipped fire, the river Nile and other elements, 459-u.\nEight stars of the Gnostic ogdoade represent the angles of the cube,\n  635-l.\nEight symbolizes perfection, 635-l.\nEight, the first cube, and represents friendship, justice, 635-l.\nEight, the first cube, that of two, 60-l.\nEight, the octary, composed of the sacred numbers, three and five, 635-l.\nEighteenth Degree, Prince (Knight) Rose Croix, 276-u.\nEighteenth Degree replaces the three old pillars with others, 287-l.\nEighteenth Degree teaches three things--, 287-l.\nEighth day of Greek Mysteries, the feast of Aesculapius, 434-m.\nEighth Degree: Intendant of the Building, 136-u.\nEighth Degree, teaching of the, 137-u.\nEleatic philosophers treated conceptions as entities, 675-l.\nElect (Elu) of the Nine, 9th Degree, lessons and purposes, 149-u.\nElect; when the searcher discovers the place in which Truth is\n  hidden he is a True, 785-l.\nElements and essences a natural and true symbol of Divine Power, 611-u.\nElements, animals, principles of the Hermetic Masons described, 791-m.\nElements, four, and Principles, three, reside in all compounds, 784-u.\nElements, four, engender the Stone in proper combination and weight,\n  784-m.\nElements, when first created, were in confusion, but God brought order,\n  609-l.\nElephanta, Initiations consummated in the Temple of, 361-u.\nEleusiniae, the Greater, celebrated in the month of seed time, 394-m.\nEleusiniae, the Greater, ceremonies of initiation into the, 394-m.\nEleusinian Mysteries in honor of Ceres celebrated at Athens, 352-m.\nEleusinian Mysteries of two kinds, the great and the small, 352-m.\nEleusinian Mysteries, officers, description, symbolism, 411-412.\nEleusinian Mysteries preserved some symbols of Magism, 840-u.\nEleusinian Mysteries presided over by an officer called King, 354-l.\nEleusinian Mysteries, the lesser, a preparation for the greater, 352-l.\nEleusis, description of the ceremonies of initiation, 403-m.\nEleusis, representation of Sun, Moon and Mercury, in the Temple of, 13-l.\nEleusis, Temple of, regarded as the common sanctuary, 379-m.\nEleusis, Universe represented by the Temple of, 13-l.\nEleventh Degree, Sublime Elu of the Twelve, duties of, 176-u.\nElizabeth and Cromwell protectors of Protestants, 70-u.\nElohim not only winged messengers of God, but the Starry Host, 509-m.\nElohim, the Hebrew name for the universal forces governing the world,\n  727-u.\nEloi, one of the seven Reflections of the Ophites, 563-m.\nEloquence a Force, 91-u.\nEloquence the faculty of making other hearts respond, 201-u.\nElu of the Fifteen should lead in enlightening, 171-l.\nElu, Perfect, 14th Degree, 218-u.\nElu, Perfect; when a Mason is entitled to be called a, 228-l.\nElus, or Elect, the name of the Initiates of highest class of Gnostics,\n  542-l.\nElxaites adopted the seven spirits of the Gnostics and named them--,\n  564-m.\nElysium depicted in Eleusinian Mysteries, 403-l.\nEmanation, at the beginning, gave forth from the Father Microprosopos,\n  794-l.\nEmanation; Divinity limited, but not manifested into entities;\n  world of, 768-l.\nEmanation doctrine fundamental among Gnostics, 248-l.\nEmanation is a more imperfect, diminished mode than His Perfection, 760-u.\nEmanation of a ray of light the cause and principle of everything, 286-l.\nEmanation, the Thought of the Supreme Deity the first, 562-l.\nEmanation theory of the Kabalahists takes the form of Sephiroth, 552-u.\nEmanations are all included in the First Sephiroth; Deity as Will, 766-u.\nEmanations are portions of God's Light or nature, 766-u.\nEmanations designate God as manifested, but not the Supreme, 271-m.\nEmanations from the Universal Intelligence filled the Universe, 669-m.\nEmanations, Gnostic expression for the 365, 271-m.\nEmanations, God reveals Himself only by His, 267-u.\nEmanations, names of ten, 267-m.\nEmanations, names of the Basilidean or Gnostic, 554.\nEmanations not beings, but sources of life, types of creation, 267-u.\nEmanations of Deity are his manifested Creative Forces, 701-m.\nEmanations of Deity symbolized by lights, 202-l.\nEmanations of the Empire of Light make the Deity manifest, 565-l.\nEmanations of the Kabalah or Sephiroth, 267-m.\nEmanations of the powers that make up Divinity in Zodiacal existence,\n  669-u.\nEmanations or Sephiroth are attributes of God, 267-m.\nEmanations produced from Kether by the descent of Yod, 756-u.\nEmanations, sexual characteristics are symbolically assigned to some,\n  766-u.\nEmanations, ten in number, three of one class, seven of another, 233-m.\nEmanations, theory of the Basilidean or Gnostic, 554.\nEmblems a part of the language of Masonry, 241-l.\nEmblems and names of Deity met in all Degrees, 137-u.\nEmblems are veils that cover the Truth; are often misunderstood, 331-m.\nEmbryo receives the Soul immediately after conception, 755-l.\nEmerald tablet of Hermes describes the grand agent, the force, 774-m.\nEmpedocles asserted the moving force to be Mind, 676-l.\nEmpire of Light, a chain of emanations making manifest the Deity, 565-l.\nEmpire of Light alone is eternal and true, 565-l.\nEmployed and employer, teachings of Scottish Rite in regard to, 330-m.\nEndeavor, Human, likened to the effects of evaporation, 320-u.\nEndeavor, success and happiness come from thorough--, 195-u.\nEnemies often bring us more profit than our friends, 814-m.\nEnergy, Wisdom is the Intellectual Generative, 305-m.\nEnigmas of Masonry hide the dogmas of Magism, 839-l.\nEnigmas of the Sphynx, 8-l.\nEnigmatical language used in speaking of the secrets of Nature, 659-m.\nEnnead, an aggregate of nine things or persons, 636-l.\nEns, of the Kabalists, was possibility of potentiality before existence,\n  764-m.\nEnvy of Deity instanced in the healing skill of Aesculapius, 688-u.\nEnoch, age, and meaning of the name of, 210-m.\nEnoch deposited a cubical stone, teaching justice, accuracy,\n  consistency, 827-u.\nEnoch engraved on stone the dogmas of the science of Magism, 839-l.\nEnoch invented books and writings; was the same as Hermes, 363-m.\nEnoch, Manetho from certain pillars in Egypt extracted the history of,\n  363-l.\nEnoch, near Thebes in a winding apartment underground were found\n  the pillars of, 363-l.\nEnoch, symbolism of the columns of, 210-m.\nEnoch, Thoth, or the first Mercury, or Hermes, made inscriptions on\n  the pillars of, 363-l.\nEon Christ Jesus never really clothed with a human body, 559-l.\nEon, Intelligence, commencement, first revelation of Divinity, the\n  first, 560-u.\nEon Jesus, born of a virgin, united to Christos, with Sophia, redeemed\n  the world, 560-m.\nEons, or Demons of Satan, sought to conquer the Realms of Light, 566-u.\nEons struggling to be united with God were restored to happiness, 560-m.\nEons, Truth and Grace were the Gnostic, 559-l.\nEphraim compared to an Ox, his device the Celestial Bull, 461-m.\nEpicureans' wisdom and advantage--, 694-m.\nEpicurus prefers the fables of tradition to the necessity of physicists,\n  694-m.\nEpopt becomes a Seer after initiation, 522-u.\nEquality of all men in the eye of God proclaimed by Christ, 309-u.\nEquality of the relation between Above and Below forms the ternary,\n  771-l.\nEquality, the concession which each makes to all, 43-l.\nEquality with subjection to Authority a foundation of Free Government,\n  860-u.\nEquator, the path between the equinoxes, 447-u.\nEquilateral triangle enters into the composition of the Pyramids, 460-u.\nEquilateral triangle, formation of the onmific letter in the center\n  of the, 14-u.\nEquilateral triangle formed by stars, 487-m.\nEquilateral triangle inscribed within a Square a symbol of the Divine\n  and Human, 858-m.\nEquilateral triangle of the Pyramid symbolizes fire, 460-u.\nEquilibrium, a universal law, symbolized by columns, 843-u.\nEquilibrium adopted by Deity will be attended with perfect success,\n  767-u.\nEquilibrium, between Authority and individual Action, 860-u.\nEquilibrium between Divine Omnipotence and Free Will, 859-m.\nEquilibrium between Good and Evil, Light and Darkness, 859-m.\nEquilibrium between Necessity and Liberty, 859-m.\nEquilibrium between our Passions and Moral Sense gives a well\n  regulated life, 860-l.\nEquilibrium did not exist when the seven Kings died, 797-l.\nEquilibrium exists between Evil and Good in the Spiritual World, 782-l.\nEquilibrium, in Deity, of apparently opposing properties, 769-l.\nEquilibrium in ourselves between the Spiritual and Human in man, 860-l.\nEquilibrium in the Deity between Infinite Justice and Infinite Mercy,\n  859-u.\nEquilibrium in the Deity between Infinite Wisdom and Infinite Power,\n  859-u.\nEquilibrium is in physics the universal law, 769-l.\nEquilibrium is the Harmony that results from the analogy of contraries,\n  844-u.\nEquilibrium led the Initiates to the law of gravitation, 843-u.\nEquilibrium necessary for absolute liberty, 736-l.\nEquilibrium of contraries and resultant harmony taught by the ternary,\n  792-u.\nEquilibrium of contraries produces Light, Wisdom, Virtue, 845-u.\nEquilibrium of infinite wisdom and force, Harmony the result of the, 8-u.\nEquilibrium of Jachin and Boaz brings eternal permanence and stability,\n  736-l.\nEquilibrium of Law and Equity; Divine Infinite Nature and the\n  Human Finite, 768-l.\nEquilibrium of Light and Darkness brings resultant Beauty, 792-m.\nEquilibrium of Mercy and Justice produce the Harmony of the Universe,\n  552-m.\nEquilibrium of opposites exemplified in the Kabalist Trinity, 552-m.\nEquilibrium of Power and Wisdom produce Harmony, as the Son, the Word,\n  552-m.\nEquilibrium of spiritual and material to produce Harmony and Beauty,\n  855-m.\nEquilibrium of the apparent antagonism in man's nature, 765-u.\nEquilibrium of the Balance referred to in the Siphra de Zeniuta, 762-m.\nEquilibrium of the Sephiroth or Divine Emanations, 305-u.\nEquilibrium of the seventh and eighth Sephiroth brings Success and\n  Dominion, 736-l.\nEquilibrium of the Spiritual and Material natures, Good and Evil, 764-l.\nEquilibrium of things produced by the counterbalancing of fixedness\n  and movement, 778-l.\nEquilibrium of Wisdom and Intelligence, as male and female, 800-u.\nEquilibrium preceded the turning of face to face by the Father and\n  Mother, 795-l.\nEquilibrium produced by the contrasts of the universal forces, 727-u.\nEquilibrium restored upon the descent of the seven Conformations, 788-m.\nEquilibrium results from the apparent opposition of two forces, 769-l.\nEquilibrium; the balancing of Forces, or the science of, 843-u.\nEquilibrium, the mystery of \"the Balance\" in the Sohar, 305-u.\nEquilibrium, the supreme law of a Force which, if controlled, is\n  infinite power, 734-u.\nEquilibrium which explains the Mysteries of Nature symbolized by--,\n  548-m.\nEquilibrium, with the Supreme Will holding the balance is the\n  foundation of religion and science, 769-l.\nEquilibrium's laws forgotten in the plans for the end of Evil, 847-l.\nEquinox, season for celebrating the Mysteries of the Autumnal, 404-l.\nEquinoxes, reference to the struggle between Light and Darkness\n  in the, 404-l.\nEquinoxes, tables giving entrances of the Sun at the, 450-u.\nEquinoxes, the ancient initiations connected with the, 404-l.\nEquinoxes the gates through which souls passed to and fro, 413-l.\nEquinoxes, 25,856 years constitutes a revolution of the, 449-l.\nEquipoise; distinction and harmonious ponderation of contrary\n  forces in the universal, 848-u.\nEquipoise, exemplification three times of the universal law of, 322-l.\nEquipoise of Necessity and Liberty can not be understood by Reason,\n  848-l.\nEquity and Justice characteristics of a Prince of Jerusalem, 241-m.\nEquity the result of the equilibrium of Infinite Justice and Mercy,\n  859-u.\nErring brother to be spoken kindly to, 134-u.\nErring, wisdom taught by the consequences of, 181-u.\nError is the Shadow of Truth with which God illumines the Soul, 845-m.\nErrors and prejudices, Truth to be substituted in public opinion for,\n  218-m.\nErrors have seemed to be truths at times in public opinion, 218-l.\nEslik Khan the final judge in the doctrine of Lhamaism, 624-u.\nEsoteric and exoteric doctrines, a distinction purely Masonic, 250-u.\nEsoteric and exoteric doctrine, difference between, 248-u.\nEsoteric meaning of the Ineffable Name, 697-l.\nEsoteric meaning of the generation and production ideas, 701-l.\nEssence of God includes Wisdom, Justice, Truth, Mercy and--, 582-m.\nEssence: the Truth, Beauty, the Good, but one, 702-l.\nEssenes adopted the doctrines of John the Baptist, 262-u.\nEssenes, abstinence and maceration practiced by the, 260-u.\nEssenes, belief and practices of the, 265-u.\nEssenes believed in the esoteric as well as the exoteric meanings, 265-l.\nEssenes believed in the resurrection of the soul alone, 265-m.\nEssenes connected by the Tetractys with Pythagoreans, 264-l.\nEssenes, Forms, ceremonies, Orders and principles of the, 263-l.\nEssenes, in their devotions, turned towards the rising Sun, 264-l.\nEssenes, mysticism and allegories found in the writings of the, 265-l.\nEssenes not mentioned by Christ; doctrines nearly similar, 260-m.\nEssenes observed the festivals of the Solstices, 265-l.\nEssenes, Persian and Pythagorean opinions intermingled by the, 259-l.\nEssenes required the tests of several degrees before admittance, 386-u.\nEssenes resided in Palestine in the vicinity of the Dead Sea, 260-u.\nEssenes spoken of by Josephus, Eusebius and Pliny as an ancient sect,\n  264-m.\nEssenes, tenets of Confucius and Zoroaster resembled those of the, 264-l.\nEssenes, the Eclectic Sect of Philosophers, esteemed Plato, 265-m.\nEssenes, the faith of John, so nearly Christianity was that of the, 263-m.\nEssenes, the 17th Degree, particularly concerned with the, 259-l.\nEssenes were distinguished by simplicity and moral practices, 259-l.\nEssenes, Zend Avesta prescribes observances similar to those of the,\n  260-u.\nEssenes, Zoroastrian principles prevailed in the moral practices of\n  the, 260-u.\nEssential laws of fixedness and movement, counterbalanced, produce\n  equilibrium, 778-l.\nEstablishment, for the Christian Mason, represented by Boaz. 641-m.\nEternal Laws which preserve the Universe the expression of God's\n  Thought, 577-u.\nEternal life represented by a Tan cross with a circle over it. 505-u.\nEternal Mover, wholly in act, implied by Aristotle, 679-u.\nEternity enthroned amid Heaven's starry heights, 190-l.\nEternity, openings in the curtains of Time give glimpses of, 199-m.\nEternity symbolized by a serpent with its tail in its mouth, 496-m.\nEther, Electricity, Heat, fill and permeate the Universe, 845-l.\nEther extends everywhere, called the Soul of the World, 748-m.\nEthics of Confucius and the Chinese, 169-l.\nEthiopians changed Hindu Trinity to Creative Power, Goodness, Wisdom,\n  550-l.\nEtruscan gate at Volterra has three heads on it, upon keystone and\n  over side pillars, 551-m.\nEtruscan name for the Sun God was Arkaleus or Hercules, 587-u.\nEtruscans, a race from the Rhaetian Alps, acknowledged one God, 551-u.\nEtruscans had images for the One God's attributes, 551-u.\nEucharist and other Holy Sacraments kept in secrecy, 541-l.\nEuclid's forty-seventh, proposition in diagram and described, 789-m.\nEuphrates, a stream of the Edenic river, 58-u.\nEuresis, or the finding, was the recovery of the body of Osiris by Isis,\n  377-u.\nEuripides concludes that men act wrongly through neglect, 690-l.\nEusebius asserts that God is not separate from the Universe, 667-m.\nEusebius gives names of principal officers of Eleusis, 411-m.\nEusebius' statements concerning Therapeutae and Gospels, 265-m.\n\"Eva,\" the generic Oriental name of the Serpent, 494-u.\nEvangelic symbols depict the Magi guided by a Star and bearing gift,\n  730-l.\nEvaporation, mighty effects of the slow, invisible process of, 319-m.\nEve, created by Ialdaboth, had children, evil angels, 563-m.\nEve, created by the Demons, seduced Adam and bound him to matter, 567-u.\nEve issues from the chest of Adam, 771-m.\nEve signifies a serpent and life circulating through all Nature, 376-m.\nEve's ternary name, added to Yod, gives Jehovah, Divine Tetragram, 771-m.\nEven numbers traced backwards ended in nothing, 618-l.\nEvidence of the Templar origin of modern Free Masonry, 820-l.\nEvil, a Principle of Evil assumed to account for the existence of, 277-u.\nEvil affects Deity's intellectual nature and man's moral responsibility,\n  684-m.\nEvil, all in the world is not, 214-u.\nEvil and Darkness synonymous because Darkness despoils man of\n  enjoyments, 660-m.\nEvil and Good, as independent existences, explained by theories, 682.\nEvil and Good, categorical questions concerning, 648.\nEvil and Good, coexisting, not explained, but staved off by theories,\n  687-u.\nEvil and prosperity; light and darkness caused by Jehovah, 687-m.\nEvil and Sorrow necessary in Humanity, 847-l.\nEvil at first occult and could not be brought forth till Adam sinned,\n  796-m.\nEvil created by Deity, according to the Sohar and Isaiah, 796-m.\nEvil created from the fragments of the broken vessels of the Sephiroth,\n  794-l.\nEvil coexistent with the wisdom, goodness, omnipotence of Deity, 684-m.\nEvil demon in eternal controversy with God does not exist, 859-l.\nEvil did not include the three numerations first emanated, 796-m.\nEvil Force, or Devil, personified by--, 102-l.\nEvil Genii and Signs were the Balance, Scorpion, Serpent, Dragon, 664-u.\nEvil; God does not tempt or constrain men to do, 848-l.\nEvil implied by the contemplation of the Good, 681-l.\nEvil is temporary and for beneficent purposes, 274-u.\nEvil is the shadow of the Good, and inseparable from it, 846-l.\nEvil; laws of equilibrium forgotten in the dreams of the end of, 847-l.\nEvil, matter at feud with the spirit from Deity is the Genius of, 281-l.\nEvil must have preceded man's moral development, 680-m.\nEvil, overthrow of, by a Redeemer taught in the 18th Degree, 287-l.\nEvil, Persians imagined two Principles to explain the existence of\n  Good and, 300-m.\nEvil personified by error continued by the worship of abstractions, 694-u.\nEvil principle a necessary existence, a Hindu dogma, 604-m.\nEvil principle itself becomes Good, according to the Chaldeans, 549-u.\nEvil principle formed from the darkness, 595-m.\nEvil principle the motive power of brute matter, 474-l.\nEvil principle to be overcome by a Redeemer or Mediator, 277-m.\nEvil principle triumphant represented by Second Apartment, 288-m.\nEvil principle urges men towards--, 221-m.\nEvil results from idol worship, 691-m.\nEvil sought to be explained by the Hebrew \"Fall\" of man, 685-m.\nEvil spirits at war with the Pure Intelligences, 286-l.\nEvil spirits seduced Man and caused his Fall, 286-l.\nEvil symbolized by Winter and Typhon, 447-l.\nEvil, the serpent held to be the symbol of malevolence and all, 497-u.\nEvil to end and Good reign in eternity but a poet's dream, 847-l.\nEvil will be overthrown by an emanation from God, 274-u.\nEvil will disappear when Odin kills the great snake, 593-u.\nEvil with an independent existence creates a dilemma, 681-l.\nEvil would not have been if Deity had not created worlds and then\n  destroyed them, 797-m.\nEvil, wrong, suffering, but temporary discords in a great Harmony, 577-u.\nEvils came from the fragments of the vessels, the Kings from Binah,\n  797-u.\nEvils created by Deity to afflict men when they sin; blessing to\n  reward the just, 797-l.\nEvils foreseen by God are provided for and consistent with his love,\n  716-u.\nEvils occur because God wills them to afford occasion for resignation,\n  717-u.\nEvils to be warred against now as in former days, 578-m.\nEvil's worlds created from the shattered numerations from Benignity,\n  796-m.\nEvolution and development followed the Idea of Creation in Deity, 767-u.\nExamples are the most lasting lectures, 181-l.\nExceptions to the rule that virtue is rewarded and vice punished, 705-l.\nExcommunication of Church of Rome, 74-m.\n\"Exhalation,\" definition of term in astrology, 463-l.\n\"Exhalation\" of planets made the occasion of a feast, 463-l.\nExistence of God known through the Power communicated to man\n  by the Word, 598-u.\nExistence, the Gnostics distinguished three orders of, 560-l.\nExistence, the Supreme Being the only Real, 266-l.\nExistence without a beginning, self-existence, inconceivable, 570-m.\nExistence without consciousness is an abstract being, 706-m.\nExistences and Superior Intelligence the basis of doctrines, 553-u.\nExultation at deserved fall shrinks abashed at God's chastisement, 813-u.\nEzekiel directs a Tau cross placed on the people of Jerusalem who--,\n  503-l.\nEzekiel, symbolism of the number four in the vision of, 58-u.\nEzekiel's prophecy not explained by Christians, 731-u.\nEzekiel's visions are mysterious expressions, 321-l.\n\nF\n\nFabrication, matter and bodies, as it were of manufacture, the world\n  of, 768-l.\nFabrications, World, embraces the six members contained in Malakoth,\n  795-l.\nFaith, a great moral Force, is the only true Wisdom, 91-m.\nFaith, a necessity, 28-l.\nFaith and Reason, domain of each, 28-m.\nFaith begins where Reason sinks exhausted, 841-m.\nFaith, blind, sets Reason at defiance and leads to--, 304-m.\nFaith enables us to see that Evil is consistent with Infinite Goodness\n  and Mercy, 859-l.\nFaith has for its bases sentiment and reason, 776-u.\nFaith, Hope, Charity, replace the three pillars of the old Temple, 287-u.\nFaith, Hope, Charity, the old pillars under new names, 288-u.\nFaith, man only responsible for the uprightness of his, 166-u.\nFaith must have a foundation in Reason or consciousness, 301-m.\nFaith necessary for guidance of man, 197-u.\nFaith reared on the foundations of God's justice and the law of merit,\n  706-u.\nFaith, the converse of arrogant confidence, represented by the Sun,\n  727-l.\nFaith, the Light by which the human soul is enabled to see itself, 809-l.\nFaith will stumble and sentiment mislead unless knowledge directs, 710-l.\nFaithful held meetings in private places at night to avoid persecution,\n  543-m.\nFaithful instructed in the grand mysteries of Christianity, 541-l.\nFaithful only were admitted to the Christian Mysteries, 544-u.\nFaithful, the second Mass of the Christian Mysteries called that of the,\n  541-l.\nFaithful, the third degree of the Christian mysteries, 541-l.\nFaithfulness to family, friends, country, 112-m.\nFaithfulness to Masonic vows and pledges, 112-u.\nFaiths, excellent moral precepts in all, 167-l.\nFall of Man, cause and remedy for the, 281-m.\nFall of Man, Jewish origin of the, 376-m.\n\"Fall\" of Man necessary to account for the imperfections of work of\n  a Perfect Being, 685-l.\nFall of Man, process of redemption, 287-u.\nFall of Man symbolizes a universal allegory of science, 100-l.\nFall of Man, symbolism and meaning of the, 305-l.\n\"Fall\" of Man, the Hebrew mode of explaining the great moral mystery,\n  685-m.\nFallacy of general propositions of man's right to this or that, 835-l.\nFalsehood a part of campaigns and controversies, 337-m.\nFalsehood and Dishonesty, vices of the age, 578-l.\nFalsehood is crime in words; Injustice the essence of, 100-l.\nFalsehood sowed by the Press, 579-u.\nFan, purification of air and water symbolized by vase and winnowing,\n  412-m.\nFasting an indication of moral purity, 520-l.\nFatality is the linking together of effects and causes in a given order,\n  738-u.\n\"Father,\" a name for Deity even amongst the rudest nations, 683-u.\nFather and Mother were face to face after the state of equilibrium\n  was established, 795-l.\nFather as Wisdom, the Mother as Intelligence, are in equilibrium, 800-u.\nFather, Hakemah, denoting perfect Love, did not look Binah in the face,\n  763-u.\nFather is Love and Mercy who impregnates the Mother with Benignity,\n  796-u.\nFather of All, the world unanimous in the belief of one King and, 512-u.\nFather Principle (the Male or Generative) comprehended in Yod, 763-l.\nFather, the Spirit, active principle or generating power, 87-m.\nFathers Benignity, Severity, Beauty, proceed from the Father of Fathers,\n  794-l.\nFather's First and Only begotten is the Word, 849-l.\nFaust ascends to Heaven by stepping on the head of Mephistopheles, 822-l.\nFaust, John, influence of printing, the invention of, 314-u.\nFaust with his types worked great results, 43-u.\nFavors must not be forgotten, 123-u.\nFear is always cruel, and Rome feared the heresy of the Templars, 820-m.\nFear of Wisdom that it would ascend to Kether or descend into Binah,\n  796-m.\nFeast Day of Mithras, according to the Roman Calendar, Dec. 25th, 587-m.\nFeasts established in honor of each planet at \"exhaltation\", 463-m.\nFeasts fixed by risings, settings, conjunction of the fixed stars, 464-u.\nFeasts marked the annual crises, the solstices and equinoxes, 714-u.\nFeasts of Passover, Neuroz, of Fire and Light, when Sun was in Aries,\n  463-l.\nFellow-Craft compass has one point above and one below the Square, 854-l.\nFellow-Craft Degree, the 2nd, 22-u.\nFellow-Craft, Reason, Love, Faith, must guide the studies of a, 28-m.\nFellow-Craft studies the vegetable kingdom, symbolized by Schib, 632-u.\nFellow-Craft taught not to become wise in his own conceit, 38-l.\nFellow-Craft's grip, Philosophy, fails to raise the candidate, 640-l.\nFellow-Crafts in search of assassins, number, reference to Stars, 489.\nFellow-Crafts in search of the body represent the twelve Apostles, 641-l.\nFellowship, points of, first among the ordinances of Masonry, 137-u.\nFellowship symbolized by the five-pointed star or Pentangle, 634-m.\nFemale and male coupled are the Perfection of all things, 800-u.\nFemale characteristics given to Malakoth, in the Kabalah, 769-m.\nFemale is He, is left; male is Yod, is right; Vav is male and female,\n  763-m.\nFemale principle in Alchemy represented by Fire and Water, 791-l.\nFemale represented by the base of a right angle triangle, 789-m.\nFemale side of Hermetic figure has a Moon; a hand holding a Square,\n  850-m.\nFerouer, a pre-existing soul, the Idea of Plato, 256-l.\nFerouers, the third order of spirits, Thoughts of Ormuzd, 257-m.\nFestival of the Winter Solstice, the Yuletide, became our Christmas,\n  368-u.\nFestivals of the Druidical and Gothic Mysteries, 367-368.\nFidelity of man, everything that exists around us centers upon the,\n  199-m.\nFidelity to obligation a leading lesson in the 15th Degree, 237-u.\nFifteenth Degree an allegory based on historical truth, 237-u.\nFifth day of Greek Mysteries, procession of torches, 433-l.\nFifth Degree, Perfect Master, 114-u.\nFigurative and allegorical language in Oriental books, 818-m.\nFigurative language used by the ancients to describe secrets of nature,\n  659-m.\nFinite beings impressed by illusions according to Hindu dogma, 604-l.\nFinite man desires to see and talk to Infinity, 530-m.\nFinite minds comprehend only by division, 702-l.\nFinite minds conceive Truth, Beauty and Good as three essences, 702-l.\nFinite minds, God can not infuse infinite conceptions into, 222-u.\nFinite, no correct idea of the Infinite can be formed by the, 222-u.\nFire and heat have an analogy with life, 664-l.\nFire and light according to the old Persian idea, 611-m.\nFire and light represent attributes of Divinity in Hebrew writings,\n  611-u.\nFire animates the stars and circulates in nature and includes all souls,\n  399-l.\nFire gives the elements and principles of compound movement, 784-m.\nFire invoked as \"Son of Ormuzd\", 612-m.\nFire, its splendor, light, their relative effects and relations, 741-u.\nFire of the Hermetics, secret, living, philosophical, spoken of\n  reservedly, 775-u.\nFire of the Sun the principle of organization and life of things, 644-l.\nFire, one of the symbols of spiritual regeneration in the Mysteries,\n  357-l.\nFire, Ptha, the principal agent of the creative and productive, 254-m.\nFire, sacred, representing the soul returned to its origin when--, 385-u.\nFire, soul of the world and universal principle likened to the\n  celestial, 417-m.\nFire the Primal Ether, according to the Chaldean Oracles, 742-m.\nFire used as a test to represent the possible purification of the soul,\n  397-u.\nFire would not warm if it could not also burn human flesh, 846-l.\nFirst Begotten Son of God was the Word, not the first created, 772-m.\nFirst Born, the Creative Agent emanated from Male and Female Force,\n  267-m.\nFirst Born, the Primitive Man, Adam Kadmon, Light of Lights, 267-m.\nFirst Cause a necessity; the Intelligent Soul of the Universe, 574-m.\nFirst Causes which flow from the First Cause are resulting and finite.\n  in mode, 760-u.\nFirst day of Greek Mysteries the initiates assemble; time, 433-m.\nFirst Degree, Apprentice, 1-m.\nFirst principles of all existences are unity and duality, 630-l.\nFirst Principle, Plato on the nature of, 99-u.\nFish: early Christian mark shaped like a, 547-l.\nFish painted on monuments to express hatred by Egyptians, 456-m.\nFive a mysterious number, compounded of Binary and Ternary, 633-l.\nFive circuits in 8th Degree allude to points of fellowship, 137-u.\nFive expressed by five-pointed or blazing star, 58-m.\nFire expresses the state of imperfection we see on earth, 633-l.\nFive is the Duad added to the Triad; symbolism of numbers, 58-m.\nFive, measures the hypothenuse, obtained from the three and four, 861-m.\nFive offers the image of the Bad principle, bringing trouble, 633-l.\nFive points, or rules, observed by the Scottish Masters, 782-u.\nFive primitive powers, elements, recognised by Indians and Chinese,\n  469-l.\nFive, the emblem of marriage; Juno's hieroglyph was five, 634-u.\nFive, the number of the Fellow-Craft Degree, from the Hyades, 487-u.\nFixed, applied to everything that tends to central repose and\n  immobility, 778-l.\nFlamel made the Rose the sign of accomplishment of the Great Work, 821-l.\nFlamel, Nicholas, treats of Hermetic Science, 774-l.\nFlamel, the Book of the Jew, Abraham, 821-l.\nFlaming Star, a symbol of the Ramsay Degree of Grand Scottish\n  Master, 782-u.\nFlaming Star the emblem of the Shekinah or presence of God, 782-l.\nFlood, the number seven in connection with accounts of the, 233-m.\nFo, the Chinese name for the Hindu God, Sakya, 551-m.\nFo, the Indian Buddha, the Great Deity himself, 429-m.\nFollies of the Alchemists to save them from persecution, 733-u.\nFolly to repine because we are not angels, 696-m.\nFomalhaut near Pisces, malignant influence of Sign, 456-m.\nForce and strength subordinate to mildness and goodness, 681-l.\nForce described in the Hermetic tablets of emerald is the grand\n  agent of the operations, 774-l.\nForce, harmony of the world maintained by the Soul of Nature; Divine,\n  668-m.\nForce, Harmony, Wisdom, the Great Attributes of the Essence of Deity,\n  531-m.\nForce, if possessed, enables man to revolutionize the world, 734-u.\nForce, Intellect, must regulate the people's blind, 1-m.\nForce of God exerted on two invisible gases forms water, 845-l.\nForce of the people must be limited, restrained, 4-l.\nForce of the people symbolized by the gavel, 5-u.\nForce, stronger than rage, represented by Mars, 727-l.\nForce, unregulated or ill-regulated, a menace, 1-m.\nForce which animates all emanates from the Heavenly eternal fire, 666-l.\nForce, the Executing and Creating Power, 531-m.\nForce which repels a Planet from the Sun no more evil than the other,\n  860-u.\nForces analogous and contrary the one to the other produce equilibrium,\n  727-u.\nForces at man's disposal, his Working Tools, 88-92.\nForces: Faith, Hope, Charity, the greatest moral, 91-m.\nForces, First Born, emanated from generative and conceptive, 267-m.\nForces in action and opposition result in Harmony and movement, 859-l.\nForces mechanical and materiality of agents of Divinity explain\n  nothing, 729-m.\nForces of Divinity, Light, Spirit and Life, Primitive, 267-m.\nForces of nature man's slaves or masters, 734-u.\nForces of the Universe the forces of God, 707-m.\nForces opposing one another in action are not necessarily antagonistic,\n  860-u.\nForces or Impulses in continual conflict cause Life and Movement, 846-u.\nForces, or \"Working Tools\"; importance of appreciating the value of, 91-l.\nForces, the centrifugal and centripetal, 671-m.\nForces, the science of the equilibrium or the balancing of, 843-u.\nForgiveness is wiser than Revenge or punishment, 859-u.\nForgiveness more noble than revenge, 76-u.\nForm into which Deity conformed himself the likeness of His form, 794-u.\nForm is the Light inclosed in the seeds of all species, 783-m.\nForm of the human is the form of all above and below and includes it,\n  794-u.\nFormation, the first forms, souls or physical natures, is the world of,\n  768-l.\nFormations, World, embraces the six members contained in Tephareth, 795-l.\nFormless Deity present in all forms an idea of the Hindu philosophy,\n  673-m.\nFormula of baptism among the Gnostics, 561-l.\nFortune deified by error continued by the worship of abstraction, 694-u.\nFortunate number is seven; leads to the perfect number, 628-l.\nForty days of mourning for Osiris, then the Vernal Equinox, 486-u.\nForty-seventh Proposition, explanation and numbers of, 87-u.\nForty-seventh Proposition of the first book of Euclid in diagram, 789-m.\nForty-seventh Proposition stated, 86-l.\nFoundation of all religions and sciences, the primary and immutable\n  idea of things is--, 769-l.\nFour a divine number, the number of letters in the name of Deity, 633-l.\nFour devices of the Degree; hear, see, silence, enjoyment, 629-l.\nFour expressed by the square; symbolism of the number, 58-u.\nFour horses of different colors drew the chariot of the Sun at the\n  games, 464-m.\nFour, in the Kabalah, expresses the law of natural phenomena, 732-u.\nFour letters in the Hebrew Ineffable name, 632-l.\nFour letters of the Tetragram contain everything, 732-m.\nFour represented Nature, 209-u.\nFour represents the generative power, an emblem of the Infinite, 632-l.\nFour symbolizes a man bearing with himself a Divine principle, 633-m.\nFour, the number of the Square, the measure of the perpendicular, 861-m.\nFourteenth Degree, Grand Elect Perfect and Sublime Mason, 218-u.\nFourteenth Degree, Perfect Elu, 218-u.\nFourth day of Greek Mysteries, mystic wreath of flowers in procession,\n  433-l.\nFourth Degree, Secret Master, 106-u.\nFraternity, Christ proclaimed a universal, 309-u.\nFraternity fruitful of good works preserved by Masonry, 137-l.\nFraternity, the protection of each by all, 43-l.\nFraternity with subordination to the Wisest and Best a foundation\n  of Free Government, 860-u.\nFrea, Odin, Thor, the Scandinavian Trinity, 552-u.\nFrea, wife of Odin, one of the Northern triune Deity, 13-l.\nFree agency and our will are forces, 6-l.\nFree agency of man, or is he controlled by necessity, 684-m.\nFree agency of man to do evil or choose good, 577-u.\nFree government by people themselves a hard problem, 33-m.\nFree government can not long endure when--, 203-u.\nFree government constituted by equilibrium between Authority and\n  Individual Action, 860-u.\nFree government grows slowly, 33-m.\nFree Government requires foundations of Liberty. Equality, Fraternity,\n  860-u.\nFree governments promoted by disciplines of war, monarchy, priesthood,\n  92-l.\nFree popular power only known in hour of adversity, 33-l.\nFree, to be, the same thing as to be--, 180-m.\nFree will and election a necessity since good and evil are in the world,\n  797-l.\nFree will and inexorable Law difficult of comprehension, 689-u.\nFree Will and Omnipotence in equilibrium gives the Law of right and\n  wrong, 859-m.\nFree will, categorical questions concerning man's, 649-u.\nFree will consistent with God's Omnipotence and Omniscience, 855-u.\nFree will coupled with Chance, or Fatalism coupled With Omniscience,\n  694-l.\nFree will of God can not formulate an effect without a cause, 736-u.\nFree will of man influences his life and conversation, 643-u.\nFree will the essential attribute of the will itself, 723-m.\nFreedom, civil and religious, must go hand in hand, 33-u.\nFreedom determined by an agency external to us, 686-m.\nFreedom, great need for guides who will not seek to be tyrants, 95-u.\nFreedom, human, symbolized by Khurum, the Master, 211-u.\nFreedom morally comes when Chance and Necessity give place to law, 695-m.\nFreedom of man connected with his freedom of thought, 686-m.\nFreedom of man lies in his reason, 94-m.\nFreedom sensed when the individual independence develops itself\n  according to its own laws, 695-m.\nFreemasonry is the subjugation of the Human that is in man by the\n  Divine, 854-l.\nFreres Macons, Brethren Masons, corrupted into Free Masons, 816-m.\nFriends and Home more than offset sufferings and desolations, 141-u.\nFriendship and sympathy, a Force, 88-l.\nFruit will come in the due season if we plant the seed, 317-u.\nFruit of \"Knowledge of good and evil\"; Adam forbidden to eat of the,\n  567-u.\nFurniture of a Lodge, 11-m.\nFuture, a scene for speculation, 139-m.\nFuture, best preparation for, make best use of Present, 139-l.\nFuture existence in which injustices will be remedied, 830-l.\nFuture life and rewards and punishments there taught in the\n  Mysteries, 392-u.\nFuture life, doctrine of a, clothed in the pomp of mysterious ceremony,\n  385-u.\nFuture, light let in on the present by the contemplation of the, 232-l.\nFuture punishments described in the Mysteries to impose the lesson--,\n  395-l.\nFuture punishments in Tartarus depicted, 396-m.\nFuture punishments were real to the Profane, though allegorical\n  to the Initiate, 396-m.\nFuture reward and punishments a fundamental principle of the\n  Hindu religion, 604-m.\n\nG\n\n\"G\" in the Fellow-Craft Degree represents God and Geometry, 640-m.\n\"G,\" represents the Hebrew Jod or Yod, the generative principle, 632-u.\n\"G\" said to signify Geometry, 40-m.\n\"G,\" initial letter of the Hebrew word Geparaith, signifying Sulphur,\n  780-m.\nGabriel, the face of the Ox, on north and left hand, with He, and Fire,\n  798-m.\nGad, as a warrior, has for device the Ram, domicile of Mars, 461-l.\nGain, necessity of shaking off the love of; effects of, 40-u.\nGalen states that differing schools of study were equally important,\n  711-u.\nGamaliel, the Rabbi, taught Paul the Kabalah, 769-u.\nGames of the circus in honor of the Sun, Nature, Planets, Elements,\n  461-u.\nGarment is an interposed medium, 795-u.\nGarment nearest His substance is the vacant space of creative acts,\n  748-u.\nGate of Men through which souls descended was called Cancer, 438-u.\nGate of the Gods through which souls reascended was called Capricorn,\n  438-u.\nGates at the steps of the ladder, names, material, symbolism, 414-u.\nGates of the Sun, Souls descended from Heaven to earth through the,\n  438-u.\nGates through which souls descended and reascended used in Mysteries,\n  412-413.\nGautama, the Hindu God, Sakya, so called by the Ceylonese, 551-m.\nGavel, hieroglyphic picture of a Master's, 80-l.\nGea and Ouranos, Grecian Deities of Earth and Heaven, 850-l.\nGeburah, in the Kabalah, is called Judgment, which includes limitation,\n  764-l.\nGeburah, Mother, Severity or Strict Justice, the fifth Sephiroth, 552-m.\nGeburah, one of the Sephiroth; Austerity, Rigor or Severity, 753-m.\nGeburah represents, or is, the Ox, 798-m.\nGeburah, the Sephiroth, conjoined sexually with Gedulah to produce\n  Tepareth, 764-l.\nGaber, an Arab, cultivated the Hermetic Science, 840-l.\nGedulah and Geburah, the two arms of Adam Kadmon, 758-u.\nGedulah, Geburah, Tepareth denoted by Yod, He, Vau, 798-m.\nGedulah, one of the Sephiroth; magnificence or Benignity, 753-m.\nGedulah or Khased, Father, Benignity or Mercy, the fourth Sephiroth,\n  552-m.\nGedulah represents or is the Lion, 798-m.\nGemini, Castor and Pollux, the Dioscuri, the Cabiri, 454-m.\nGeneration begins with the vegetable kingdom, hence \"G\" is displayed,\n  632-u.\nGeneration constituted the process of Creation, to the ancients, 771-l.\nGeneration is the meaning of the letter G, or Jod or Yod, in triangle,\n  632-u.\nGeneration of Angels and Worlds the secret of the Occult Sciences, 844-u.\nGeneration primarily by the action of the Sun, secondarily by the Moon,\n  657.\nGeneration solely caused by the Sun, Moon and Stars, 469-l.\nGeneration symbolized by Gemini, the Twins, at remote period, 401-l.\nGeneration the effect of the union of the Active and Passive, 657.\nGeneration, the Power of, 305-m.\nGenerative and Productive are always in conjunction, 766-l.\nGenerative number, the Unit, and two, 628-m.\nGenerative organs carried in procession; mutilation of, 412-l.\nGenerative organs venerated by all ancient people as symbols, 656-m.\nGenerative Power or Spirit and Matter originally in Deity, 700-m.\nGenerative power seated in the Sun, 669-u.\nGenerative power symbolized by the Stauros and the Cross, 771-l.\nGenerative Power to beget intellectual action in Binah, the Intellectual\n  Faculty, 766-m.\nGenerative principle represented by the letter G, initial of the name\n  of Deity, 632-u.\nGenerous Mason regrets dissensions and disputes, 123-m.\nGenesis assigns the formation of the world to the Alhim, 568-m.\nGenesis in a second fragment ascribes; creation to Ihuh-Alhim, 568-m.\nGenii dispensed the Good and the Evil, six on each side, 416-u.\nGenii intermediaries between Gods and men, the Universal Providence,\n  416-u.\nGenii of Decans had names, characteristics; aid in effects produced,\n  470-m.\nGenii of the Gnostics, 271-l.\nGenii or Angels differed in character; some good, some evil, 416-u.\nGenii, six, created by Ormuzd, prototypes of Archangels, 256-l.\nGenii the media of communication between man and the Gods, 441-m.\nGenii were the Intelligences that reside in the planets, 441-m.\nGenii were the powers and faculties of nature, part of the science\n  of initiation, 415-l.\nGenitals of the Vernal Bull bitten by the Scorpion represents--, 412-l.\nGenius gets Power, its lieutenants are Force and Wisdom, 30-m.\nGenius, the strenuous application of commonplace faculties, 174-m.\nGeometry does not sufficiently express the science of numbers, 34-m.\nGermans adored God without daring to name Him, 621-l.\nGhe, the Earth, one of the first divinities, the wife of Ouranos, 658-u.\nGihon, a stream of the Edenic river, 58-u.\nGimli or Vingolf, the Heaven of the Icelanders, 619-m.\nGlobe, ancients had no idea the earth was a, 442-l.\nGlobes, celestial and terrestrial, on columns, 17-m.\nGloria Dei est celare verbum. Amen, 861-l.\nGlory and ambition in the highest degree is to strive to benefit\n  others, 853-u.\nGlory: God does not tempt or constrain men to do evil, and that\n  is the Infinite, 848-l.\nGlory is one of the last four Sephiroth of the Kabalah, 848-l.\nGlory of Deity displayed in the Universe as a reflection, 673-m.\nGnosis expresses the idea of cognizance by intuition, 771-m.\nGnosis of Carpocrates consists of one Deity and spirits ruling Earth,\n  562-m.\nGnosis proscribed by Christians; Sanctuary closed against initiation,\n  840-m.\nGnostic doctrine, rise and explanation of, 248-256.\nGnostic Julian infected with the allegories of Grecian Polytheism, 732-u.\nGnostic Mysteries made known to the heads of the Templars, 817-m.\nGnostic seals and abraxae adopted by Templars, 235-m.\nGnostic sects had Mysteries and an initiation, 542-l.\nGnostic seven Spirits adopted by the Elxaites, 564-m.\nGnostic science rested on a square whose angles were--, 633-u.\nGnostic Simonians had a Priesthood of the Mysteries, 542-m.\nGnostic Stauros an image of generative power, 771-l.\nGnostic theories and ideas of Deity, 554-567.\nGnostic Valentinians imitated the Mysteries of Eleusis, 542-l.\nGnosticism developed into heretical forms, 818-u.\nGnosticism imperfectly revealed the disfigured occult science of\n  the Magi, 839-m.\nGnosticism, Jews of Syria and Judea the direct precursors of, 255-m.\nGnostics all agreed on a creation directly out of the Divine Essence,\n  557-m.\nGnostics agreed that the Demiurge was the framer of this lower world,\n  557-m.\nGnostics all agreed that the Father was not the framer of this lower\n  world, 557-m.\nGnostics, analogy between the doctrines of Alexandria and those of the,\n  249-m.\nGnostics and Disciples of Christ held the doctrine of the transmigration\n  of souls, 399-l.\nGnostics and Philo, the Supreme Being was the Light to the, 280-l.\nGnostics born of the Kabalah, 626-u.\nGnostics connected their faith with the Christianity of St. John, 815-m.\nGnostics, derivation of their leading doctrines and ideas, 248-m.\nGnostics, doctrines of Zoroaster borrowed by the, 258-l.\nGnostics, fundamental doctrines of, 248-m.\nGnostics held the universal agent composed the body of the Holy Spirit,\n  734-m.\nGnostics introduced theosophical speculations, 248-m.\nGnostics made Souls ascend and descend through eight Heavens, 441-u.\nGnostics may have received something from the Chinese; saying\n  of Lao-Tseu, 259-u.\nGnostics received from Platonists the idea that--, 255-m.\nGoat's head given to Sulphur by the Hermeticists, 779-l.\nGod, a Mason's conception of and belief in, 224-l.\nGod a mystery, as everything surrounding us is, 574-m.\nGod, a perfect being, an Abyss, the Primitive Father, always has been,\n  559-l.\nGod a Perfect Cause, everywhere as Perfect Providence, 716-m.\nGod, a pure spirit, indivisible, omniscient, all powerful, one, 608-u.\nGod, a Somewhat with Power, Wisdom, Intelligence, 739-m.\nGod. According to capacities, so vary the conceptions of, 206-l.\nGod, afflictions and calamities lead the mind to, 189-m.\nGod, all names are contained in the Kabalistic name for the Idea of,\n  98-m.\nGod an hypothesis imposed by good sense on Human Reason, 738-u.\nGod, an infinite, eternal Soul or Spirit, 609-m.\nGod, an undiscoverable Being known only in proportion to the\n  understanding, 516-l.\nGod and Light before creation; the coexistence of, 739-l.\nGod and the individual Soul are distinct, 852-u.\nGod and the Universe were one according to the Kabalistic view, 765-m.\nGod and Truth are inseparable, 713-u.\nGod as a mind picture may be as much of an idol as a wooden one, 693-m.\nGod as an actuality imagined to be a most occult light by the\n  Kabalists, \"Aur\", 740-m.\nGod as an Infinite Being comes to us from our consciousness of--, 703-m.\nGod, as infinite justice, must respect the rights of man, 704-m.\nGod, as the world develops it outgrows its ancient idea of, 643-m.\nGod, attributes and ideas of the nature of, 279-286.\nGod beyond human comprehension, 605-u.\nGod called Alfadir in the Edda; is the Creator, 619-m.\nGod can do whatever he wills, being Omnipotent, 705-m.\nGod can not be known in His work but in his mode of manifesting Himself,\n  267-l.\nGod can not do impossibilities, 737-m.\nGod can will nothing but what is good and just, 705-m.\nGod, categorical questions concerning, 648.\nGod caused Himself to shine forth; is his own father; is prior to\n  substance, 615-u.\nGod, Chance and Intelligence undistinguishable by Menander, 694-m.\nGod, conception of, varies with man's mental cultivation and powers,\n  223-l.\nGod confronted, felt, known when we reverence mighty cosmic force, 707-m.\nGod confounded with the Demiurge by the mass of the Jews, 558-u.\nGod created man in the image of Deity, Male and Female, 849-l.\nGod created the ideal world only, Logos the material, 251-l.\nGod defined in the Icelandic prose Edda, in a dialog, 619-u.\nGod defined in Sanscrit stanzas, 741-m.\nGod does not tempt nor constrain men to do evil, 848-l.\nGod dying, an inference from a literal interpretation of nature-worship,\n  588-m.\nGod, 18th Degree taught the unity of, 287-l.\nGod embraces tho principles of reality and cognizance, 707-l.\nGod, existing of Himself, alone, desired to manifest his perfections,\n  609-l.\nGod first created a Being he called the Word, 565-u.\nGod gives things their existence and their intelligibility, 708-u.\nGod governs by wise and inexorable laws, 228-u.\nGod has an infinite tenderness for his creatures, 704-m.\nGod has created things visible through the Logos, 251-m.\nGod, Hindu dogma of the existence of one, 604-m.\nGod, Idea of, grandest, most holy, most useful, 98-u.\nGod in communion with all material things, 710-u.\nGod in His manifested essence and as Alone has no name, 849-u.\nGod, in Latin and French, has for an initial the Delta or Greek\n  triangle, 631-l.\nGod in men, animals, plants, 565-l.\nGod, in the Masonic creed, is Truth, Beauty, Goodness in Infinity, 706-l.\nGod incapable of anger, 718-u.\nGod, incarnate, submits to all conditions of visible existence, 588-m.\nGod indwelling in matter makes the world a revelation of Him, 710-u.\nGod is a Father in Heaven, a Monarch, a Human Being to the unlearned,\n  743-m.\nGod is a hypothesis; Absolute Reason is not one, 737-u.\nGod is a Paternal Being as taught by Masonry, 239-u.\nGod is Good and what he does is right, 240-u.\nGod is Good, the belief in a Devil proceeds from a conviction that,\n  324-u.\nGod Is, if a self-existent Force and its Intelligence are admitted,\n  100-m.\nGod is Illimitable Time in the Zend-Avesta, 256-l.\nGod is inconceivable; to investigate Him is but to perplex ourselves,\n  650-u.\nGod is life itself, eternal and perfect, 681-u.\nGod is not the Universe, though everywhere present in spirit and truth,\n  707-l.\nGod is Omnipotent, but effects without causes are impossible, 846-m.\nGod is one, a part of the Masonic old doctrine, 876-l.\nGod is One, extending through all the Universe; a single substance,\n  667-m.\nGod is our Father and we are brethren, 227-l.\nGod is silent, consents with Mind and is known to Souls through Mind,\n  582-m.\nGod is the reflected image of man as conceived by man himself, 223-m.\nGod Is, the studies which convince a man that, 226-l.\nGod keeps watch over the little and the great, producing variety\n  from Unity of Force, 829.\nGod known only through his attributes, 555-m.\nGod known to us only by his Attributes, 575-l.\nGod, laws of, 8-u.\nGod loves his creatures, 717-l.\nGod loves us all, so we can look complacently on evils, 715-u.\nGod made the world and, of necessity, it is good and perfect, 705-m.\nGod manifested Himself by His Thought; source of His manifestations,\n  559-l.\nGod manifested in Binah characterized himself Intelligent, 753-u.\nGod manifested in the several Sephiroth displayed their characteristics,\n  753-m.\nGod manifested in Yod called himself Wise; the vessel of Hakemah, 753-u.\nGod may be called Ihuh after the conception of Creation, 752-u.\nGod must be free, if man is, possessing infinite liberty, 703-l.\nGod must be omnipresent in space and time, 709-l.\nGod, nature of the Supreme; references to Egyptian Gods, 431-u.\nGod never reveals himself in the sensible world but through the\n  Demiurge, 558-u.\nGod not a logical being to be explained by deductions, 703-m.\nGod not able to perform some miracles, 736-u.\nGod not an abstract God, but an intelligent, free person, 707-u.\nGod not an Abstraction, but a real Being, a moral person, 703-l.\nGod not inert and uncreative during the eternity behind the Universe,\n  849-u.\nGod not separated from the Universe, attested by Eusebius, 667-m.\nGod not to be made into any mode or like to the Sons of Men, 752-u.\nGod not to be represented by any figure or image or letters He or\n  Yod, 752-u.\nGod not yet having created, and as alone, has no name, 848-l.\nGod, nothing can be imagined more excellent than, 224-u.\nGod now compared to Light deemed unphilosophical, if not Atheistic,\n  739-m.\nGod of Good and a God of Evil, each independent, eternal, 565-l.\nGod of Good must in the end overcome the God of Evil, 565-l.\nGod of many Christians but the old heathen gods, 296-u.\nGod of the New Platonists was one simple Original Essence, 284-l.\nGod only Wise, Man's wisdom but a reflection, 251-l.\nGod penetrates the man and becomes a living spirit within him, 609-m.\nGod perfect and infinite in his attributes, 574-l.\nGod preordained suffering and calamity, 228-l.\nGod, philosophers taught to but few the true knowledge of, 207-l.\nGod possesses a secondary Intelligence which descends to matter, 415-m.\nGod possesses Charity, the supreme virtue of man, 704-m.\nGod possesses infinite intelligence and infinite liberty, 704-u.\nGod, prayer to, 6-l.\nGod, prior even to the first God and King, conceived things by his\n  intellect 614-l.\nGod produced all things by His Intellect, Will, Free Determination,\n  759-l.\nGod, Pythagoras' definition of, 285-l.\nGod regarded as that from which Light flows by the Sabeans,\n  Kabalists, 739-l.\nGod regarded by the Masons as a Moral Governor, as well as an\n  Original Creator, 224-l.\nGod, relations of a Mason to, 227-l.\nGod, religious requisite of a Mason is a belief in one True, 164-u.\nGod represented by the Demiurge on the lower stage of existence, 557-l.\nGod represented by the Gnostics as an unfathomable Abyss, 555-n.\nGod represented by the hieroglyphic of a horned serpent, 495-u.\nGod, result of a low conception of, 223-l.\nGod revealed in the True, the Beautiful, the Good, 708-u.\nGod reveals Himself by His attributes, 267-l.\nGod reveals Himself in our convictions, conscience, instinct, 324-u.\nGod reveals Himself to us by His uttered Word, 324-u.\nGod said to Moses: \"I am that which Is, Was and Shall Be\", 848-l.\nGod, single Tau represent one, 503-l.\nGod, Spirits of, ascent and descend on the ladder, 10-l.\nGod sums up in himself perfect Beauty, Truth and Good, 703-u.\nGod Supreme, from whom all other gods emanate or are by Him\n  created, 597-l.\nGod, Temple of 7-l.\nGod, that the mass shall lack work and food seems to be a law of,\n  179-180.\nGod the Almighty Father and Source of All, 575-u.\nGod, the author of everything, the Eternal, the Supreme, the Living,\n  581-m.\nGod, the believing Mason conscious of being a co-operator with, 228-l.\nGod, the capacity of the mind to receive positive truth limits man's\n  view of, 221-l.\nGod, the Cause, by whatever qualities known, 644.\nGod, the earliest exertion of thought resulted in the idea of, 511-l.\nGod, the first emanation, was Light, then Ormuzd, 256-l.\nGod, the First Supreme, Infinite Unity; All and One flowed forth\n  from, 759-l.\nGod, the formal, efficient and final cause, 680.\nGod, the highest view we can form is the nearest to a true conception\n  of, 223-l.\nGod, the Holy of Holies, as author of the moral law, 706-l.\nGod, the individual good of the Mason is considered by, 228-l.\nGod, the Infinite Parent, revealed by natural human religion, 715-m.\nGod, the Light principle from which souls emanate and return, 740-l.\nGod the Living Soul of the Universe, 574-l.\nGod, the Logos, dwells in, 251-u.\nGod, the Master Mason's Word is a knowledge of, 209-u.\nGod the necessary logical condition of a world; its necessitating\n  cause, 708-l.\nGod, the Omnipotent Legislator, the source of the moral law, 701-l.\nGod the only original Existence, the Absolute, Author of all, 701-l.\nGod the Principle of Liberty, Justice, Charity, 706-l.\nGod the Principle of Moral Truth and of personal morality, 703-u.\nGod. The protest of Masonry against belief in a cruel God is\n  Trust in, 196-l.\nGod, the sole, Self-existing Power, expanded his idea and appeared,\n  608-m.\nGod, the Soul of the Universe and coexistent with it, 709-u.\nGod, to Ancients, manifested by the Sun, 13-u.\nGod to be loved under the forms of Truth, Justice, Nobility of Soul,\n  707-u.\nGod too sublime to be known; displayed by Intelligences, 564-u.\nGod united to Wisdom communicated the germ of Creation, 251-l.\nGod was alone, formless, before he formed a conception of Creation,\n  752-u.\nGod was the Phos-Nocton, the Light cognizable only by the Intellect,\n  740-l.\nGod willed to produce beings, and from that which is produced\n  Brahma, 608-l.\nGod wills a thing because it is just; it is a necessity for Him to do\n  so, 737-u.\nGod wills a thing because it is just; it is not just because God wills\n  it, 847-u.\nGod: Zoroastrians addressed hymns and prayers to the Supreme, 017-l.\nGoddesses holding serpents are figures in Egypt and Assyria, 495-l.\nGod's actualities seem less lofty than our ideal of justice, 832-m.\nGods and Idols of Gods were symbols of truth to the ancient Sages, 302-l.\nGod's attention imagined to be continually centered on man, 302-l.\nGod's attributes are man's virtues, 704-u.\nGod's attributes are not God, 573-u.\nGod's attributes known only through their manifestations, 739-u.\nGods, Astronomical details and operations of Nature in histories of,\n  375-m.\nGod's character makes a difference in the conduct of people, 043-u.\nGods composing the Trinities of the Ancient religions, 576-m.\nGods created by personification of Stars and phenomena were worshipped,\n  508-m.\nGod's creations coexisting with Himself, 708-l.\nGod's Essence includes Wisdom, Justice, Truth, Harmony, Love,\n  Eternity, 582-m.\nGod's existence and nature one of the highest questions, 642-m.\nGod's existence as comprehensible as the existence of a Soul, 573-l.\nGod's existence, every thinking creature must be conscious of, 605-u.\nGod's existence evidenced by our consciousness of the fact, 709-u.\nGod's existence ploughed deeply into Nature, 647-l.\nGod's existence taught by Reason, 743-u.\nGod's goodness seems to be impugned by disorder in the world, 705-m.\nGod's goodness the foundation of Truth, 142-l.\nGod's justice and the law of merit and demerit the foundations of\n  faith, 706-u.\nGod's Justice, which is Severity, the Female, 846-u.\nGod's law consistent with His justice whether it corresponds with our\n  notions or not, 830-u.\nGod's law of justice can not be measured by our standards, 830-l.\nGod's love governs our acts of charity; His justice governs our\n  justice, 707-u.\nGod's love not inconsistent with the evils of existence, 718-u.\nGod's love takes care of all to the end, 240-m.\nGod's love the same as that in man, but in an infinite degree, 705-u.\nGod's Mercy, or Benignity, alone reigning, sin would go unpunished,\n  846-u.\nGod's mode of action a conception beyond our reach, 832-l.\nGod's modes of operation are the action of the Universe, 710-u.\nGod's nature and attributes, 680.\nGod's nature and attributes in the Zend-Avesta, 258-l.\nGod's nature, attributes, essence, wholly beyond us, 568-l.\nGod's nature is not conceivable by the human mind, 743-u.\nGod's nature, it is impious to assume or explain, 605-u.\nGods of the Veda, their origin and signification, 602-612.\nGod's Omnipotence the secret of Occult Sciences, 844-n.\nGods, one of the bases of initiation was the providence and\n  superintendence of the, 415-l.\nGod's Perfections produced the intellectual world by development, 559-l.\nGods personified, of secondary rank, falsely credited with Creator's\n  work, 624-u.\nGod's poetry is man; his prose is nature, 715-l.\nGod's power provided for all the evils of existence, 716-u.\nGod's relations to a Mason, 227-l.\nGod's Thought conceiving the Universe and willing its creation, 575-u.\nGod's thought confronted when we, in our studies, attain a truth, 707-m.\nGod's Thought manifested and expressed in the Word, 575-l.\nGod's Thought uttered in His word created the Universe, 577-u.\nGod's Universe a mystery incomprehensible by man, 530-m.\nGod's varied actions are the Forces of Nature, 809-m.\nGods were mortal men who deserved to have their souls elevated\n  after death, 398-m.\nGod's will controls every happening in the Universe, 859-m.\nGod's will has no moral authority except as it is just, 726-u.\nGod's will learned when we learn the right, 707-m.\nGod's wisdom foresaw all the evils of existence, 716-u.\nGod's Wisdom foresees what each will do and uses it as an instrument,\n  848-l.\nGod's Wisdom the mother of Creation, 251-l.\nGod's Word uttering His Thought becomes the Creator, 575-u.\nGod's work, in heaven, is done by angels; on earth, by men, 736-u.\nGold assigned to the Sun, 729-u.\nGold is all Spirit and incorruptible; the emblem of the Sun which\n  presides over light, 788-u.\nGold of the Hermeticists is a true dogma, light, truth, but also material\n  gold, 778-u.\nGold produced from Salt under the combined action of Sulphur and\n  Mercury, 778-m.\nGold, to the eyes of the Initiate is Light condensed, 103-u.\nGolden Age longed for when man communed with Deity, 653-u.\nGolden calf of Aaron was one of the oxen under the bronze laver, 818-l.\nGolden Fleece of Aries guarded by a serpent, 498-m.\n\"Golden Numbers,\" \"golden verse,\" \"golden Ass\", 103-u.\nGolden Rule should have the words \"under the same circumstances\"\n  added, 836-u.\nGood actions not always followed by happiness nor evil ones by\n  misery, 705-l.\nGood and Evil, belief concerning, 272-u.\nGood and Evil, categorical questions concerning, 648.\nGood and Evil coexisting, more active question than all others, 684-m.\nGood and Evil coexisting, only staved off by inventions of theories,\n  687-u.\nGood and Evil contests personified by the course of the Sun, 594-m.\nGood and evil deities among Chaldeans, Greeks, etc, 661-m.\nGood and Evil in the world necessitates Free will and election, 797-m.\nGood and evil influences of the planets flowed from the Zodiac, 663-m.\nGood and Evil principles by their equilibrium produce harmony, 549-u.\nGood and Evil principles, ancient thought regarding, 221-m.\nGood and Evil problems not solved by a Redeemer who shall end Evil, 847-l.\nGood and Evil reconciled or the Universe would be a failure, 767-m.\nGood and Evil, Revelations depict the struggle between, 272-l.\nGood and Evil, Stars divided into the, 472-m.\nGood and Evil symbolized by the contest between Ialdaboth and\n  his mother, 563-m.\nGood and Evil, the invisible Intelligences divided into the, 474-l.\nGood and Light synonymous because Light multiplied man's enjoyments, 660-m.\nGood, belief in a Devil an attempt to explain the existence of Evil\n  and, 324-u.\nGood can not cause Evil; it must have had another cause, 661-u.\nGood counterbalances Evil; Light in equilibrium with Darkness, 764-l.\nGood has as an inseparable shadow the Evil, 846-l.\nGood implies its opposite, Evil, 681-l.\nGood, in the Absolute, an attribute of the Absolute Being, 702-l.\nGood, in the Absolute, is Good itself, superior to all particular\n  duties, 702-l.\nGood is beyond man himself; not so God's Good, 680-l.\nGood is known by the evil, 797-m.\nGood is not a consequence; it is first or nothing, 722-l.\nGood men are tending to the realm of Perfection, 538-u.\nGood men of every nation superior to popular deities, 562-l.\nGood never separated from the evil; the two must mingle, 660-l.\nGood, period of the final triumph of, 258-m.\nGood principle divided into Creation, Preservation, Renovation, 604-m.\nGood Principle identified with the Sun, 594-u.\nGood principle represented by Masonry, 221-m.\nGood principle urged men towards--, 221-m.\nGood realized in nature, according to Plato, 681-m.\nGood resigned for the disinterested and universal, 696-m.\nGood, the foundation of obligation, 722-m.\nGood, the great speculations of antiquity forecast the victory of, 274-m.\nGood, the object of the Absolute Thought is the Absolute, 680-l.\nGood, the single principle in which centers all moral principles, 702-m.\nGood the ultimate end of Nature, according to Aristotle, 681-m.\nGood to reign in eternity and Evil to cease is but a poet's dream, 847-l.\nGood will prevail and Evil be overthrown by a Redeemer, 274-m.\nGoodness the first feature of Charity, 705-u.\nGospel of John, a passage from an older work begins the, 280-u.\nGospel of John, explanation and objects of the, 280-m.\nGospel of St. John a Polemic against, the Gnostics, 559-m.\nGospel of St. John the basis of rites proper to complete the\n  initiation, 821-m.\nGothic Festival of the Winter Solstice, Yuletide, became Christmas, 368-u.\nGothic Mysteries, festivals, initiations, symbols, 368-u.\nGothic Mysteries introduced from the East by Odin, 367-l.\nGothic Mysteries similar to others; description of, 430-m.\nGothic Mysteries taught the destruction of the world and the rising\n  of a new one, 431-m.\nGovern In ablest, wisest, best is vested the Divine right to, 203-u.\nGovernment by incapables or merely respectables comes to nought, 31-m.\nGovernment, defects in a Democratic form of, 44-m.\nGovernment, Democratic, and Imperial Rome compared, 47-l.\nGovernment, Free, cannot long endure, when--, 203-u.\nGovernment, free, depends on the virtue and intelligence of common\n  people, 177-u.\nGovernmental machinery and laws in the interest of justice, 834-m.\nGovernment, Masonry not hostile to civil, 153-m.\nGovernment tends to become a conspiracy against liberty, 805-m.\nGovernment, those who reap the benefits should bear the burdens of, 176-u.\nGracchi replaced by aroused indignation, 48-u.\nGrand Arcanum confers great power on the Adept, 101-m.\nGrand Master Architect, 12th Degree, duties of, 189-u.\nGrand Pontiff, the 19th Degree, 312-u.\nGravitation around the centers of Life, Heat and Light, 843-u.\nGreat Lights symbolize the Sun, Moon and Mercury, 486-l.\n\"Great Work\" a creation of the human word initiated into the power\n  of the Word of God, 775-u.\n\"Great Work\" assures man of the empire of Azoth and power over\n  the Magical Agent, 773-l.\nGreat Work benefits the Body by bringing health and wealth, 785-u.\nGreat Work benefits the Soul by causing it to know God, Nature,\n  ourself, 785-u.\nGreat Work comprehended and executed brings great knowledge, 786-l.\n\"Great Work\" depends chiefly on the internal Magnet of Paracelsus, 777-m.\nGreat Work in perfection expressed by a cross over a triangle in\n  alchemy, 790-l.\n\"Great Work\" is the conquest of man over his faculties and future, 773-l.\n\"Great Work\" itself is the work of the Sun, 773-u.\n\"Great Work\" of Hermes is magical and supposes the Absolute in\nScience and Will, 775-l.\n\"Great Work\" secrets have a threefold significance, 773-u.\n\"Great Work\" symbolized by the Rose in Flamel's book, 821-l.\nGreat Work, the purification of the Soul has a hidden meaning, 792-m.\nGreat Work, the universal agent is the elementary matter of the, 734-m.\nGreater Mysteries, five years' probation between the Lesser and the,\n  432-l.\nGreatest good of greatest number can legitimately affect ideal justice,\n  836-l.\nGrecian Choruses, the Strophe and Ante-Strophe connected with the\n  Stars, 462-m.\nGrecian philosopher, saying of Socrates, the, 170-u.\nGrecian Temples destroyed by Persians under Xerxes and fire\n  chapels erected, 610-m.\nGreed, commercial, deadens the nerves of sympathy, 298-l.\nGreek history shows the One God and then a worship of Nature, 619-l.\nGreek name of Deity consists of three letters, I, A, O, 632-l.\nGreek Philosophers expounded the loftier ideas and nobler doctrines,\n  617-m.\nGreek Philosophy embraced a belief in an Infinite and--, 617-m.\nGreek philosophy preceded by the Mystic Theologers, 683-m.\nGreeks consecrated the generative organs as symbols of fruitfulness,\n  656-m.\nGreeks, the scholars of the Egyptians, showed vestiges of an old\n  faith, 617-u.\nGregory Nazianzen, Bishop of Constantinople, speaks of the Christian\n  Mysteries, 545-m.\nGrip, hieroglyphic picture of the Lion's, 80-l.\nGrip of the Lion of the House of Judah clasps the human race, 641-u.\nGrip of the Lion raised Khurum after that of Aquarius and Cancer\n  failed, 461-u.\nGrip of a Master raises the candidate, 640-l.\nGrip of a Master represented by the figure ten, 638-m.\nGurzsher, the Persian comet, consumes the world, 623-l.\nGymnosophist Priests came from the Euphrates to Ethiopia, 362-m.\nGymnosophists, at the Temple of Amun were celebrated the Mysteries\n  of the, 362-m.\n\nH\n\nHabit is a Force, a second nature, 90-l.\nHades, Hercules under the guidance of Minerva descended to, 592-l.\nHaikal denotes the place in which all things are contained, 799-u.\nHaikal, Temple or Palace; the name of Malakoth, 799-u.\nHaikal, the Palace of the degree Tephareth, which is concealed in it,\n  799-u.\nHair of the women at the festival of Isis was flowing; the men\n  shaven and bald, 387-l.\nHakemah and Binah denoted by Yod, He, 798-m.\nHakemah and Binah imperfectly joined with averted faces, 796-l.\nHakemah and Binah in the Head as the two hemispheres of the brain, 768-l.\nHakemah and Binah, the two lobes of the brain of Adam Kadmon, 757-l.\nHakemah and Binah, whom it impregnates, quantitatively equal, 763-u.\nHakemah and Bainah, Wisdom and Intelligence, the second Sephiroth, 552-u.\nHakemah, Binah and Daath illustrated by comparison with pain, 758-l.\nHakemah communicated potency and increase to Binah, 756-l.\nHakemah is a person and termed Abba, or Father, 799-m.\nHakemah is Father, Binah is Mother, the two in equilibrium as\n  male and female. 763-m.\nHakemah is the generative power of producing Thought, yet in\n  Deity, 758-m.\nHakemah is the Generator of all things; he and Binah conjoin, 763-l.\nHakemah proceeded from Kether through the energy of Yod, 756-m.\nHakemah represents, or is, the Man, 798-m.\nHakemah Sapientia, existent in the Corona of the World of Emanation,\n  758-u.\nHakemah, the Father, the active power or energy of the Deity, 552-m.\nHakemah, Wisdom, Sapientia; wise by means of Binah, 753-u.\nHand open pouring milk from vessel in shape of heart, symbolism, 412-m.\nHand, the left, open and expanded, symbolic meaning of the, 388-u.\nHannibal, results of Faust and Luther's work excelled that of, 43-u.\nHansa (the Sun) dwelling in light; the Truth, 741-m.\nHansavati Rich, a Sanscrit stanza says, \"He is Hansa\" (the Sun), 741-m.\nHappiness and satisfaction greater as ends in view are lofty and\n  noble, 349-u.\nHappiness, as an effect of the Good, completes and crowns moral\n  order, 724-u.\nHappiness dependent on the relations of the outer world, 686-m.\nHappiness in virtue the object of existence in man, 716-l.\nHappiness promoted by thought and purpose being in conformity\n  with Divine rule, 713-u.\nHappiness will not result from repose unless balanced by a contrary\n  movement, 847-l.\nHarmonies of Heaven correspond to those of Earth, 101-l.\nHarmony and Beauty should be the result of the equilibrium in\n  man of the--, 855-m.\nHarmony and movement the Life of the Universe and Soul alike, 859-l.\nHarmony as represented by the three among the Pythagoreans, 632-m.\nHarmony consisting of the six parts of Seir Aupin represented by\n  Vau, 799-l.\nHarmony finally led up to and it will reign forever, 577-u.\nHarmony necessary in Government and natural laws, 306-l.\nHarmony of life and action; of virtue and perfection, 765-u.\nHarmony of the Universe, 209-l.\nHarmony of the Universe, a combination of contraries, 660-m.\nHarmony of the Universe belongs to and is a part of it, 665-u.\nHarmony of the Universe broken by a single effect without a cause, 735-l.\nHarmony of the Universe responds to the unity of God, 707-l.\nHarmony of the world maintained by a Divine Force, can Soul\n  of Nature, 668-u.\nHarmony only from the analogy of contraries. 848-u.\nHarmony or Beauty, the eternal law, a side of the Masonic triangle,\n  826-m.\nHarmony, Power of Deity in equilibrium with his Wisdom, 2-u.\nHarmony result of equilibrium of Justice and Mercy of God, 17-u.\nHarmony result of equilibrium of the sympathy and opposite action\n  of contraries, Wisdom holding the scales, 8-m.\nHarmony resulting from equilibrium of Contraries taught by\n  Ternary, 792-u.\nHarmony resulting from the equilibrium of the Spiritual and Material\n  natures, 764-l.\nHarmony the result of the equilibrium of contrary forces, 306-u.\nHarmony the result of the equipoise of Necessity and Liberty, 848-l.\nHarmony, Wisdom, Force, the Great Attributes of the Essence of\n  Deity, 531-m.\nHarmony which upholds and preserves, 531-m.\nHarmony with Wisdom and Power, one Masonic Triad, 8-u.\nHar-oeri, the Creative Word, from the action and reaction of Osiris\n  and Isis, 861-m.\nHar-oeri, Son of Osiris and Isis; throne supported by lions, 79-m.\nHar-oeris, the elder Horus, Egyptian Sun God, festival of, 79-u.\nHava Maal, The sublime Book of Odin; maxims from, 168-m.\nHawk the symbol of Ra or Phre, 254-l.\nHe and Yod represent the female and male principles in equilibrium, 323-m.\nHe, approached by Yod, becomes imbued with a luminous influence, 793-u.\n\"He\" considered to be the agent of Almighty Power, 698-l.\nHe of the Tetragrammaton in Adam Kadmon as Neschamah, 757-u.\nHe, impregnated by Vau, produced Microprosopos, or Seir Aupin, 793-u.\nHe, impregnated by Yod, begets a son, and thus pregnant brings\n  forth, 763-m.\nHe is Binah and the other He is Malkuth, 758-u.\nHe, is female and He, is hidden on every side, 763-u.\nHe is impregnated by Yod and begets a son which she brings forth, 763-l.\nHe is the wife of Yod, the second He is the wife of Vav, 761-u.\nHe, the female letter, communicates to Yod her light, 751-m.\n\"He,\" the letter expressing the union of Deity with his creatures, 698-l.\nHe-She, the meaning of the masculine-feminine Hua and Hia, 698-m.\nHe-She, in Aramtic, Hebrew, Arabic, 700-u.\nHead, Kether, the Crown, ring or circlet, first Sephiroth, 768-l.\nHeads of Macroprosopos, Adam Kadmon, explained, 758-u.\nHealth symbolized by the triple triangle, 634-m.\nHeathenism had a foundation in Truth, 599-u.\nHeaven and Earth, as Divinities, regarded as being male and female,\n  401-m.\nHeaven and earth composed of the two principles, Active and Passive,\n  656-u.\nHeaven and earth gifted with a life and soul, 668-l.\nHeaven and Earth, regarded as Divinities, were worshipped, 401-m.\nHeaven and Earth the first and most ancient divinities, 658-u\nHeaven exists in the perception and thought of a glorious mind, 201-l.\nHeaven, none for those who desire to go thither alone, 152-u.\nHeaven of Dante composed of a series of Kabalistic circles, 822-l.\nHeaven rules the condition of the earth by the action of Divine Force,\n  668-m.\nHeaven the birthplace of the Soul; its home, to which it looks, 520-m.\nHeaven to the Initiate is the World manifest to the Intelligences, 785-u.\nHeaven will, at last, aggrandize Hell is but a poet's dream, 847-l.\nHeavenly bodies act only with the activity of the Soul of the\n  Universe, 671-m.\nHeavenly Bodies and the ceremonies of initiation closely connected,\n  507-l.\nHeavenly Bodies worshipped by different peoples, 457-l.\nHeavenly Hosts and Stars imprisoned for disobedience, 511-u.\nHeavenly Host appears as an organized Angelic Army, 509-l.\nHeavenly Hosts include not only emissaries of Jehovah, but Stars, 509-u.\nHeavenly Host worshipped by Turks, Scythians, Tartars, Persians, 459-m.\nHeavens a living existence from which, through earth, existences\n  proceed, 668-m.\nHeavens and the Earth personified as Deities even among the Aryans,\n  850-l.\nHeavens and the Sun as Procreative and Generative agents; male, 851-u.\nHeavens divided by seven planets and twelve signs, 460-m.\nHeavens, the Father, impregnating the earth with its rains, 656-l.\nHebraic doctrine of God and Light expressed by Milton, 739-l.\nHebraic ideas favorable to physical pleasures, 260-u.\nHebrew belief concerning the pre-existence of souls, 440-u.\nHebrew books written in symbols unintelligible to the Profane, 744-l.\nHebrew camp in the desert arranged from Stars, etc, 460-l.\nHebrew conceptions of God varied, 206-m.\nHebrew form of Tetractys, 88-m.\nHebrew forms of the personal pronouns He-She, 700-u.\nHebrew God, Ihuh, superior to Al or the Alohayim, 598-u.\nHebrew God overcomes monstrous Leviathans, 498-l.\nHebrew Law, maxims from, 169-l.\nHebrew Mythology alludes to a feud among the spiritual powers, 510-l.\nHebrew popular notions of Deity, 207-m.\nHebrew religion imbued with Star worship, 509-511.\nHebrew religion placed the government and all knowledge with Priests,\n  625-u.\nHebrew Theism involved in symbolism and image worship, 514-m.\nHebrew Tribes, characteristics of signs of the Zodiac compared with\n  those of the, 461.\nHebrew writings use light and fire as emblems of the attributes\n  of Divinity, 611-u.\nHebrew word in the East in 12th Degree is Adonai; meaning of, 201-l.\nHebrew word, pronunciation of, not known from its character before--,\n  205-m.\nHebrews, belief in the existence of One God not accepted by early, 206-u.\nHebrews borrowed from the Persians some religious doctrines, 610-u.\nHebrews devout worshippers of false gods, 206-m.\nHebrews, esoteric knowledge communicated to but few, 207-l.\nHebrews had their good Deity and the Devil, an angel of Darkness, 661-m.\nHebrews held each nation had its own guardian angel and Star, 510-u.\nHebrews held Nakhustan, brazen serpent, as a token of healing\n  power, 497-u.\nHebrews, intellectual, possessed true knowledge of God, 207-m.\nHebrews, Jehovah the national God of the, 206-u.\nHebrews transferred to Satan everything immoral to account for\n  moral evil, 690-m.\nHebrews, True nature of God and His name unknown to the, 206-u.\nHel, the place to which the wicked go first, then to Nifthel, 619-m.\nHeliacally, Star seems to be touched by the Sun when it rises or sets,\n  471-l.\nHeliogabalus, reference to the reign of, 471-l--3-u.\nHell, become useless, will be closed by the aggrandizement of Heaven,\n  847-l.\nHell is impassable for those only who know not how to turn back, 822-l.\nHell of Dante is but a negative Purgatory, 822-l.\nHeptakis, Phoenician God of the seven rays, 58-l.\nHeptaktis, God of seven rays, the Supreme God of Phoenecia, Tsadok,\n  728-m.\nHeracles or Arkaleus, the Etruscan, Scythian, Pelasgian name for\n  the Sun God, 587-u.\nHeraclitus advocated monotheism, 678-m.\nHeraclitus acknowledged the unsatisfactory result of philosophy, 693-l.\nHeraclitus believed in a Universal Reason pervading all things, 693-u.\nHeraclitus of Pontus held that each Star was a portion of the\n  Universal Soul, 671-m.\nHercules, a descendant of Perseus, the luminous child of darkness, 591-m.\nHercules and Juno, antagonism of good and evil typified by the\n  contest between, 594-l.\nHercules as a God to the Celts, Teutons, Scythians, Etruscans,\n  Lydians, 591-m.\nHercules begets with the Dragon the three ancestors of Scythia, 498-m.\nHercules died, raised from the grave, and is received in heaven, 592-l.\nHercules, Har-acles, worshipped at Tsur, 79-u.\nHercules Ingeniculus, one of the varieties of the declining Sun, 591-l.\nHercules, journey of the Sun the origin of the twelve labors of, 448-u.\nHercules obtained initiation from Triptolemus, 586-u.\nHercules performs his first labor with Nemean lion, 455-m.\nHercules suffered the ills of humanity, according to Maximus Tyrius,\n  592-l.\nHercules' Temple at Tyre built 2,300 years before Heroditus, 591-m.\nHercules, the patron of navigators, who spread his altars from coast\n  to coast, 591-m.\nHercules well known in Egypt and the East, 591-m.\nHere persecuted Dionusos and helped the Titans to kill him, 585-l.\nHere, the wanton or irrational power of nature, 682-l.\nHereafter, as we are pure here so we will be just as happy, 216-u.\nHeresy of philosophical truth considered the most dangerous by Rome,\n  820-u.\nHermaphroditic Being, which comprehends all existence, 653-l.\nHermaphroditic figure a symbol of Deity as Generator and Producer, 851-m.\nHermaphroditic figure emerges from the Orphic egg, symbolizing\n  the two causes, 655-l.\nHermaphroditic figure of Valentinus a symbol of the double nature, 851-m.\nHermaphroditic God-World, ancient dogma of philosophy and theology, 653-l.\nHermaphroditistic conceptions from the idea of the Active and\n  Passive principles, 655-l.\nHermes' canonical rolls contain transcendental lore, 614-m.\nHermes communicated secrets in alchemy, astrology, magism, 365-u.\nHermes, in writings of Dionysius is found the dogma of, 731-l.\nHermes instituted hieroglyphics, taught the sciences and arts,\n  revered One God, 364-l.\nHermes, inventor of letters, winged messenger bearing the Caduceus, 586-l.\nHermes represented in our Bodies by the Orator, 586-l.\nHermes taught men arts, science, and ascended to Heaven, 255-u.\nHermes taught the priests and they studied the Hermetic science, 362-l.\nHermes, the creed of the old Buddhists contained in the dying words of,\n  364-l.\nHermes, the Egyptian Hierophant, summarizes the ancient doctrines, 324-m.\nHermes, the first, was the Intelligence or Word of God, 254-l.\nHermes, the Mercury of the Greeks, Thoth of the Egyptians, Taaut\n  of the Phoenecians, 586-l.\nHermes, the Sacredotal Art was the name given to the secrets of, 365-u.\nHermes the same as Enoch, 363-m.\nHermes, Thoth, the incarnation or repetition of the first, 255-u.\nHermes Trismegistus, a Greek name for the Egyptian Thoth; doings of, 364.\nHermetic Agent is the magical power, spiritual power, Astral Light, 774-l.\nHermetic and Kabalistic Rose Croix, 785-l.\nHermetic Arcanum, 775-u.\nHermetic Art is a religion, a philosophy, a natural science, 774-l.\nHermetic books discuss the Supreme Being, 614-l.\nHermetic disciples used jargon as a living language, 731-u.\nHermetic dogma engraven on a tablet of Emerald, 774-u.\nHermetic Dogma, \"What is above is like what is below,\" etc, 790-m.\nHermetic fables show, in their interpretation, the principal Gods of\n  the ancients, 631-u.\nHermetic operations, spiritual and material, dependent on one another,\n  774-u.\nHermetic or Alchemical philosophical doctrine, 772-792.\nHermetic Philosophers drew their doctrines from the Kabalah, 772-l.\nHermetic philosophy concealed by the Alchemists under symbols, 772-l.\nHermetic philosophy given consideration in the Kabalah, 741-u.\nHermetic philosophy, that of the schools of Alexandria and Pythagoras,\n  774-l.\nHermetic Philosophy under the mask of Alchemy, 792-l.\nHermetic religion is that of the Magi and the ancient initiates, 774-l.\nHermetic Science applied to the operating of the Great Work, 785-m.\nHermetic Science cultivated by Arabs and studied by Chief Templars,\n  840-l.\nHermetic science, like all real science, is mathematically demonstrable,\n  777-l.\nHermetic science real only for those who understand its religion and\n  philosophy, 774-l.\nHermetic secret is to find the bases of faith, truth, transmutation,\n  776-l.\nHermetic Symbol from the \"Materia Prima\" of Valentinus, 850-m.\nHermetic tablet of Emerald contains the Key to their allegories, 777-l.\nHermetic tablet of emerald explained, 776-u.\nHermetic universal medicine for soul, mind, body, 773-m.\nHermetic work symbolized by the Pelican and Phoenix, 774-m.\nHermeticism is the Kabalah in active realization; the Magic of Works,\n  840-l.\nHermetics speak with reserve of secret fire, living and philosophical,\n  775-u.\nHero, less noble to describe than be a, 349-l.\nHeroditus described Bal's temple at Babylon, 590-l.\nHeroditus excuses himself for reticence concerning the Mysteries, 380-m.\nHeroditus testifies concerning the doctrines of Zoroaster, 617-l.\nHerodotus speaks reservedly of the Mysteries of Isis, 405-m.\nHieroglyphics believed to have been taught the Priests by the deities,\n  359-l.\nHeroic acts performed by the basest and lowest, 201-u.\nHeroism the loftiest feature of Charity, 705-u.\nHerta, the German name for the earth; adored by them, 658-m.\nHesiod and others declare all virtue is a struggle, 691-u.\nHesiod sings of Heaven and Earth as Ouranus and Gea, 850-l.\nHexagon images a cube, not visible at the first glance, 827-u.\nHia, the feminine form, sometimes means It, 698-m.\nHiddekel, a stream of the Edenic river, 58-u.\nHildebrand referred to, 31-u.\nHierarchical Order, intelligence, figures, 97-m.\nHierocles defines the great work of initiation, 521-m.\nHierocles, one of the zealous disciples of Pythagoras, 622-l.\nHieroglyphic picture of Lion's grip and Master's gavel, 80-l.\nHieroglyphics, Hermes gave the Key to the, 365-u.\nHieroglyphics in one degree had a different meaning in another, 374-u.\nHieroglyphics, meaning of, so carefully guarded that meaning became\n  lost, 374-u.\nHieroglyphics preceded by symbols of Indians, Persians, and Chaldeans,\n  372-l.\nHierophant of Eleusis, Motive God of nature, veiled on throne, 411-l.\nHierophants in concealing knowledge multiplied symbols, 321-l.\nHierophants of the Gothic Mysteries ruled over the celebrations, 367-l.\nHierophants sought by every means to impress the candidates, 383-m.\nHigh Places, idolaters sacrificed to foreign gods on, 234-u.\nHigh Priest uttered the Tetragrammaton on the 10th of Tisri, 620-u.\nHigh Priest's vestments and furniture described, symbolism, 409-u.\nHillel, the Pharisee, gives summary of the law of Moses, 170-u.\nHindoo divinities, the attributes of the One God, 672-l.\nHindu creed from extracts from their books, 605-m--606.\nHindu deities, Brahma, Vishnu, Siva, subordinate to Brehm, 597-l.\nHindu Kusch, or Paropismus; Iranian races on Eastern and Southern\n  slopes of the, 601-l.\nHindu Mythology abounds in images of serpents, 500-m.\nHindu Mythology preserves the legend of the fall of Spirits, 623-l.\nHindu name of Deity consists of three letters, A, U, M, 632-l.\nHindu religious dogmas epitomized, 604-m.\nHindu religion embodied as fundamental principles--, 604-u.\nHindus have veneration for the Lingham, a symbol of everproductive\n  nature, 656-u.\nHindus lamented the death of Soura-Parama, slain by Soupra-Muni, 595-u.\nHindus, seed vessels of lotus a sacred symbol to the, 9-u.\nHindus' Trinity became three distinct Deities, 550-m.\nHiram, a type of humanity in its highest phase, 225-m.\nHiram said by Josephus to have built a Temple to Astarte, 410-l.\nHiramic legend represents a murder, restoration, and teaches--, 435-l.\nHiram's murder, burial, etc., symbols of the Redeemer, 640-l.\nHistory not a fortuitous concourse of events, 646-l.\nHoam-ti, third Chinese Emperor, erected a Temple to the Great\n  Architect of the Universe, 615-l.\nHobbes says God is inconceivable, 651-u.\nHod and Netsach, the thighs of Adam Kadmon, 758-u.\nHod, one of the Sephiroth; Glory, 753-m.\nHod, with Netsach, is the Perfection of Deity manifested in his Idea\n  of the Universe, 767-m.\nHolland, Masonry in 1735 prescribed by the states of, 50-m.\n\"Holy Doctrine,\" the absolute Doctrine of the Hermetics, 840-l.\nHoly Empire, Holy Realm, Sanctum Regnum, names for Magism, 842-u.\nHoly Empire is the victory of the spiritual over the human in man, 855-u.\nHoly Empire of Masonic Brotherhood made possible by the Royal Secret,\n  861-l.\nHoly Empire spoken of in the clavicules of Solomon and symbolized, 727-m.\nHoly Ghost of the Christians corresponds to the Wisdom of the Kabalah,\n  267-l.\nHoly House of the Temple, Haikal Kadosh, 816-m.\nHoly of Holies formed a cube; symbolic meaning, 209-u.\nHoly Spirit composed of the universal agent, 734-m.\nHoly Spirit enveloped in silence from the awe of the Mysteries, 849-l.\nHoly Spirit, the companion of Christ, produced by the Intelligence,\n  560-m.\nH, O, M, the three-lettered Persian name of Deity, 632-l.\nH, O, M, the framer of a new Persian religion; his name was Ineffable,\n  621-l.\nHomer makes Zeus resent the accusation that evil comes from the Gods,\n  690-l.\nHomer's Zeus an array of antitheses, like that of Hesiod, 689-l.\nHonor and Duty, a Force; the Polestars of a Mason, 89-l.\nHonor given to those who stand up for truth and right, 836-m.\nHonor of a Mason's country identified with his own, 156-m.\nHope, a great moral Force, is Strength which ensures success, 91-m.\nHope, enemy of avarice, represented by the Moon, 727-l.\nHope, for the exceptions to the law that attaches happiness to virtue,\n  725-l.\nHope for the triumph of Good over evil a part of the Masonic creed,\n  531-u.\nHope, no man can struggle and conquer without, 196-l.\nHope of a Mason, that all men shall form one family, 233-u.\nHope of immortality the aim of ancient wisdom, Mysteries, Masonry, 517-m.\nHope of man overcame the terrors of the grave, 653-u.\nHope of success, not hope of reward, our stimulus, 229-l.\nHorace and others declare Zeus ordained evil for beneficent purposes,\n  691-u.\nHorus, buried three days, regenerated, 81-l.\nHorus, Master of Life, 13-u.\nHorus, one of the Egyptian Triad, was the Son, the Light, 548-l.\nHorus, son of Isis, died and was restored to life, 406-m.\nHorus, son of Isis, slew Typhon, aided by Isis, 376-u.\nHorus, the God of Time, pours ambrosia on the hair of Isis, 379-m.\nHorus, the younger, the point in a circle, the hieroglyphic of, 79-u.\nHospitallers and Templars vowed obedience, poverty, chastity, 802-u.\nHospitallers' Houses despoiled by Elizabeth, Queen of England, 802-m.\nHospitallers' Houses were Almshouses, Dispensaries, Inns, 802-m.\nHouse of all things the name for the Principle of all things, 793-u.\nHouse of God may be found everywhere, 241-m.\nHouses of the Planets, mythological emblems and fables, 470-u.\nHu, in Druidical mysteries was represented the death of, 429-l.\nHu, the British God, called the Dragon; his car drawn by serpents, 502-u.\nHua and Hia, the personal pronoun He, She, masculine and feminine, 698-m.\nHua, He, the designating personal pronoun of the Most Holy Ancient,\n  794-m.\nHua, He, the totality of all things; the totality of the Ancient is\n  male, 763-u.\nHua means the Male, Creative Principle or Power, 699-u.\nHua often used by itself to express Deity, \"He\", 698-l.\nHu-Hi proper for Hua-Hia by omitting the \"a\", 698-m.\nHu-Hi transposed into Ih-Uh, 698-m.\nHule limits the progression towards Perfection, 555-l.\nHule represented as darkness, a void, shadow, 555-l.\nHuman action foreseen, but not controlled, 848-l.\nHuman action not controlled so as to annihilate its freedom, 848-l.\nHuman and Divine intermingled in every Human being, 853-u.\nHuman body with male and female heads standing on a dragon, 850-m.\nHuman Deity an incarnate divinity, 222-l.\nHuman existence, permanent conditions of; result of, 93-l.\nHuman form but the analog of the form taken by Deity, 791-u.\nHuman form is the form of all above and below, 791-u.\nHuman frailty can not bear to suffer for nought, 199-u.\nHuman heart beats for beggar and prince alike, 245-u.\nHuman intellect imposes its own limitations on the Illimitable, 222-l.\nHuman life is a great and solemn dispensation, 199-m.\nHuman Light but a reflection of a ray of the Infinite Light, 246-l.\nHuman mind has no conception of God's nature or modes, 743-u.\nHuman nature not satisfied with a denial of God, 645-l.\nHuman nature possesses an inherent loftiness of ideal, 832-l.\nHuman power, affliction or pain can not be kept out by, 180-l.\nHuman race one great family, 176-m.\nHuman Tetragram is Adam; it is Yod of the Kabalah, image of\n  Phallus, 771-u.\nHuman Thought, Speech, Action, combined, irresistible in results, 320-u.\nHuman understanding does not vacillate at hazard, 842-m.\nHuman Unity made complete by the right and left; primitive man\n  of both sexes, 771-u.\nHuman wisdom intermediate between ignorance and knowledge, 691-l.\nHumanity, a beauty and glory in, 214-l.\nHumanity afflicted by prosperity, 307-l.\nHumanity, as a Unit, existed in Deity, 764-m.\nHumanity aspires to God, believes in God, hopes in God, 708-m.\nHumanity, duties of a Mason towards, 176-l.\nHumanity exalted the highest conception of human thought, 652-u.\nHumanity has had but one religion and one worship, 102-u.\nHumanity in its highest phase typified by Hiram, 225-m.\nHumanity, in the humblest abodes are worked out the problems of, 245-u.\nHumanity, no one above the trials and frailties of, 180-l.\nHumanity of Christ, more than his Divinity, which brings him worship,\n  743-m.\nHumanity, slow is the advance of, 93-m.\nHumanity's material, sensual, baser portion represented by the Square,\n  851-l.\nHumanity's spiritual, intellectual, moral nature represented by the\n  Compass, 851-l.\nHumility, patience, self-denial, symbolized by the Cross of Christ,\n  801-l.\nHungus reigned over the Picts in the ninth century; saw St. Andrew's\n  Cross, 801-m.\nHyades are five stars in the form of a V, 435-l.\nHyperborean regions visited by the Sun Gods, 592-m.\nHypocrisy, the homage paid by vice and wrong to virtue and justice, 73-m.\nHypothenuse of a right angle triangle represents the nature produced\n  by union, 861-m.\nHypothenuse of the right angle triangle is product of Male and\n  Female, 789-m.\nHypothenuse represents that nature which is produced by the union\n  of the Divine and Human, 861-m.\nHypotheses scientifically are the last shadows of knowledge, 841-m.\n\nI\n\nI, A, O, the three-lettered Greek name of Deity, 632-l.\nI am alpha and omega, the omnipotent, 701-u.\nI signified unity, 701-u.\nIahaveh, Father, Kabalah ascribes Creation to, 104-m.\nIaldaboth caused the Jews to hate and crucify Jesus, 563-l.\nIaldaboth made the world and man in his own image, 563-m.\nIaldaboth of the Ophites, the Demiourgos, produced an angel, 563-m.\nIaldaboth's Sons, by Eve, had children, angels like themselves, 563-m.\nIamblichus defines the Egyptian idea of existence, 614-u.\nIamblichus taught that the heavens and spheres were part of the\n  Universal Soul, 669-m.\nIao, name of one of the Reflections of the Ophites, 563-m.\nIao, the sacred name of the Supreme Deity, 700-u.\nIcelandic Prose Edda, has a dialogue concerning God, 619-m.\nIdea of Ancient Art is--, 164-u.\nIdea in Deity was the Universe in potence; the sequence was involved,\n  767-u.\nIdea of infinity and spirituality eludes us, 222-u.\nIdea of the Universe existing in Deity as real as Deity himself, 764-m.\nIdeal justice which men look up to is true, but is not of this world,\n  835-u.\nIdeal world, at first, preferred to the real, 674-m.\nIdeas of Plato correspond to the Ferouers of Zoroaster, 256-u.\nIdleness is perpetual Despair, 342-u.\nIdlers and drones not respected by Masonry, 14-u.\nIdol made of a mind picture same as one of wood, 693-m.\nIdol of black magic is an Absolute Deity outside of Reason, 737-l.\nIdol worship the root of all evil, according to the iconoclasts, 691-m.\nIdolaters make Atheism possible, 737-l.\nIdolatry did not gain much foothold among the Arabians till--, 616-l.\nIdolatry forbidden by the early Scandinavians, 618-m.\nIdolatry grew out of the confounding of the symbol with the object\n  symbolized, 600-u.\nIdolatry not practiced by Chinese till after Confucius, 615-l.\nIdolon means \"image\", 693-m.\nIdra Rabba, Synodus Magna, a book of the Sohar, says the Deity is\n  in Microprosopos, 793-l.\nIdra Rabla contains the statement that the left is female; the right,\n  male, 763-u.\nIdra Suta contains the statements that God coheres with all and\n  all with Him, 761-l.\nIdra Suta says the continuance of things depended on their being\n  male and female, 800-u.\nIdra Suta states that the Principle called Father is comprehended\n  in Yod, 792-l.\nIgnorance is Darkness, 107-m.\nIgnorance of the causes of phenomena of daily occurrence, 526-530.\nIgnorance of the essence of Magnetism, heat, light, etc, 570-571.\nIgnorance self-abandoned to a power tyrannical, 694-l.\nI, H, U, H designates the generative and conceptive Forces, 267-u.\nI, H, U, H, The First Born, the Creative Agent, emanated from, 267-u.\nIhuh, Abstract Existence above the Alohayim or Al, for the Hebrews,\n  598-u.\nIhuh-Alhim is the Absolute Existence, 701-m.\nIhuh-Alhim: the Substance or Very Self, Alohayim, are manifestations,\n  568-l.\nIhuh, as applied to Deity, represents--, 208-m.\nIh-Uh obtained from Hu-Hi by transposition, 698-m.\nIhuh, Self-existence, one of the names of Deity on the Delta, 531-l.\nIhuh, the name assumed by Deity in his communication with Moses, 697-l.\nIhuh, the name that includes all things, the name of the world of.\n  the garment, 750-u.\nIh-Uh, the Tetragrammaton or Ineffable Name, 698-m.\nIhuh, the Unity in which the many are and out of which all flow, 764-u.\nIlls of society would be relieved if the world was peopled with\n  Christs, 718-l.\nIlluminati; The Absolute became the reason for the rites of the, 840-m.\nIllumination carries its cone of shadow, 847-l.\nIllusions satisfying the vulgar were coarse forms of--, 653-u.\nIllustrious Elect (Elu) of the Fifteen, 10th Degree, 160-l.\nImage successful if it conveys the idea vividly and truthfully, 515-m.\nImagery of Orientals a desire to express the Infinite by symbols, 514-l.\nImma and Aba; Mother and Father, 757-u.\nImmortality a natural feeling, an adjunct of self-consciousness, 517-u.\nImmortality admitted by the Druids; also man's responsibility, 618-u.\nImmortality and happiness symbolized by Spring, Summer, 447-l.\nImmortality: categorical questions concerning, 649-m.\nImmortality concurrent with a belief in an infinite Spirit, 517-u.\nImmortality demonstrated by the law of merit and demerit, 706-l.\nImmortality exists in the perception and thought of a mind, 201-l.\nImmortality; nature full of phenomena used as evidences of, 517-m.\nImmortality not impossible if required by absolute justice, 706-l.\nImmortality of the Soul taught in the 18th Degree, 287-l.\nImmortality of the Soul a fundamental principle of the Hindu religion,\n  604-m.\nImmortality of the Soul acknowledged by the Vedanta and Myaya\n  philosophers, 607-u.\nImmortality of the soul based on the necessary foundation of its\n  spirituality, 706-l.\nImmortality of the Soul taught in the 18th Degree, 287-l.\nImmortality of the Soul the second Truth of the Sacred Mysteries, 533-m.\nImmortality proven by the tendency of the powers of the soul\n  toward the Infinite, etc, 706-l.\nImmortality symbolized by a serpent, 496-l.\nImmortality symbolized by the sprig of Acacia, 642-u.\nImmortality the shadow of God, whose shadow is death, 741-l.\nImperfection not possible if God's Justice alone reigned, 846-u.\nImpossibilities can not be done by God, 737-m.\nImposture commonly rules in Republics, 45-l.\nImpulse which directs to right conduct the third Truth of Masonry, 533-l.\nIncantation developed out of prayer, 685-u.\nIncarnations of Vishnu and Buddha represents the journey of the Sun,\n  448-u.\nIndented tessel, should be tessera, or indented border, 818-m.\nIndia claimed Osiris as one of their great gods, 475-l.\nIndia gave Zoroaster much of the Primitive Truth, 617-l.\nIndia, the Patriarchal religion originally practiced by the people of,\n  360-l.\nIndian books, maxims from the, 169-m.\nIndian Mysteries, ceremonies and description of the, 428.\nIndian or Great Plague claimed to have originated from the English\n  tax on salt, 812-m.\nIndian philosophy gave birth to the Egyptian Mysteries, 372-l.\nIndian philosophy spread through Persia and Chaldea to Egypt, 372-l.\nIndian Sacred Name of the One Deity manifested as--, 205-u.\nIndividual comfort and convenience can not be consulted, 696-u.\nIndividuality an illusion according to the Hindu dogma, 604-l.\nIndra, Ormuzd, Ahura-Mazda is the bright firmament, 601-l.\nIndra, the God of the glittering firmament, Father of the Devas or\n  Powers, 602-m.\nIndustry never wholly unfruitful, 152-m.\nInertia and immobility of Forces or Impulses cause Death, 846-u.\nIneffable Name, by reversion and division, becomes bi-sexual, 849-m.\nIneffable name embodies the idea of the Absolute Existence, 700-m.\nIneffable name embodies the idea of the Male and Female principle, 700-m.\nIneffable Name given its esoteric or inner meaning, 697-l.\nIneffable Name is not that of the Very Essence, but of the Absolute,\n  849-m.\nIneffable Name is that of the Absolute manifested as Existence, 849-m.\nIneffable name of Deity represented by the symbol Y, 429-m.\nIneffable Name of Deity upon the Delta known to the Ameth alone, 531-m.\nIneffable Name of God given to the initiate into the Mithraic\n  Mysteries, 425-u.\nIneffable Name or Tetragrammaton is IH-UH, 698-m.\nIneffable name of the manifested Deity, Yod and Ho, two letters of\n  the, 323-m.\nIneffable Name, signifying source of all things, has four letters, 632-l.\nInfinite, a change in conditions of our being necessary to conceive\n  the, 222-U.\nInfinite as well as Finite present in everything, 764-l.\nInfinite Being must of necessity create and preserve the Finite, 708-l.\nInfinite combined the points until letters were formed, 749-u.\nInfinite divisibility of the triangle teaches the infinity of Deity,\n  827-m.\nInfinite first limits Himself by flowing forth in the shape of Will,\n  766-u.\nInfinite, limitations to man's knowledge of the, 222--.\n\"Infinite\" of Anaximander an ideal chaos, 675-m.\nInfinite Power and Wisdom can harmonize Necessity and Liberty, 848-m.\nInfinite space and infinite time are two primary ideas, 569-l.\nInfinite, the living principle of a living Universe must be, 222-m.\nInfinite time and space inconceivable; ends in nothing, 595-u.\nInfinite Time, Infinite Space, uncomprehendable to us, 529-l.\nInfinite, we are unfolded by the, 190-l.\nInfinite was moved within Himself during Creation, 749-u.\nInfinity not comprehensible, only indefiniteness, 569-l.\nInfinity of God the first Truth of the Sacred Mysteries, 533-m.\nInfinity of Space and Time known, but the idea eludes us, 222-u.\nInfluence and works live after us, 108-u.\nInfluence of mind over mind; man over man, 31-u.\nInfluence of the great dead on the present, 312-315.\nInfluences live and the great Future will obey, 316-m.\nInformatio, Binah, \"The very Head of Macroprosopos,\" as applied\n  to Adam Kadmon, 758-u.\nIniquity seems to prosper, but its success is its defeat and shame,\n  837-l.\nInitiate after a year prepared for initiation into the Greater\n  Mysteries, 389-l.\nInitiate after instruction forbidden to eat animal food or drink wine,\n  388-l.\nInitiate after ten days was led to the Sanctuary, approached the\n  abode of death and--, 389-m.\nInitiate after three days participated in a consummation of ceremonies,\n  389-m.\nInitiate bathed, the Priests implored forgiveness, sprinkled him, 388-l.\nInitiate clothed, crowned, and celebrated the next day as his birthday,\n  389-m.\nInitiate invited to see Christ who will shine with greater glory, etc,\n  521-l.\nInitiate of Bakchic Mysteries purified his soul of passion, 420-l.\nInitiate of Mithraic Mysteries crowned, purified by fire and water,\n  425-u.\nInitiate of Mithraic Mysteries received on point of sword at left\n  breast, 424-l.\nInitiate presented with thirteen robes representing the Heavens, etc,\n  506-l.\nInitiate regarded as the favorite of the Gods, 386-u.\nInitiate required to be free from stain, 390-l.\nInitiate taught his place in the Universe and dignified him in his\n  own eyes, 416-u.\nInitiate to the degree of Scottish Master traverses Heaven and Earth,\n  785-u.\nInitiated, great philosophers and legislators were, 372-l.\nInitiates, admonition of Philo, the Greek Jew, to the, 311.\nInitiates, after Cambyses, dispersed to Greece and taught enigmatically,\n  365-l.\nInitiates, apostrophe of Euripides and Aristophanes to the, 357-l.\nInitiates clothed in linen robes, 387-l.\nInitiates of Bakchic Mysteries followed rules of Pythagoras, 420-m.\nInitiates of Bakchic Mysteries practiced contemplation and peace, 420-l.\nInitiates of Christian Mysteries received three degrees, 541-l.\nInitiates of Druidical Mysteries arranged in threes, fives, sevens,\n 429-l.\nInitiates of Druidical Mysteries placed in a boat, referring to Osiris,\n 430-l.\nInitiates of Eleusis believed the Sun blazed with splendor for them,\n 386-m.\nInitiates of Mysteries invested with cord of three times three; our\n  cable tow, 361-u.\nInitiates of Mysteries regarded as fortunate men, 353-m.\nInitiates of Orpheus were considered as released from evil, 386-m.\nInitiates of the Mysteries, ecstatic condition of the, 358-u.\nInitiates required to be pure as indicated by fasting, continence, etc,\n  520-l.\nInitiates supposed to be favored by storms and evils, 386-u.\nInitiates taught the nature and objects of the Mysteries and--, 421-l.\nInitiates, \"Teach me to respect Justice and the Gods\" the great\n  lesson taught the, 381-m.\nInitiates were given few explanations, but left to make inferences,\n  355-m.\nInitiates wrote mysteriously concerning the Mysteries, 365-l.\nInitiate's soul lighted by the blaze of the sacred doctrine, 521-l.\nInitiation a serious matter; qualifications for, 388-m.\nInitiation, according to Clemens, was a real physiology, 401-u.\nInitiation an indication of moral purity; intended to effect the same\n  as philosophy, 520-l.\nInitiation but introductory to the great change of death, 392-l.\nInitiation ceremonies and Heavenly Bodies closely connected, 507-l.\nInitiation ceremonies became complicated, pompous, secret, 358-l.\nInitiation, ceremonies of the Indian, 361-m.\nInitiation changed fellow citizens to brothers closely bound, 386-u.\nInitiation compelled the performance of duties and the rules of justice,\n  391-m.\nInitiation dissipated errors and gave hopes at death, 386-l.\nInitiation, effects of, requirements, results, 520-522.\nInitiation: Hercules applied to Eumolpos for, 592-l.\nInitiation: Hierocles defines the great work of, 521-m.\nInitiation in Mysteries represents the death and resurrection of the\n  Sun, 408-u.\nInitiation into Mysteries at dead of night with appalling ceremonies,\n359-l.\nInitiation into the Mysteries of Eleusis, 403-m.\nInitiation into the Mysteries as necessary as--, 353-m.\nInitiation lights up the Soul with rays of Divinity, 522-m.\nInitiation probably took place in pyramids, labyrinths, etc, 359-l.\nInitiation propounded to science the problem of the Conquest of the\n  Rose, 821-l.\nInitiation, signs, tokens, degrees, developed from the original, 359-u.\nInitiation, Socrates and Aristides state benefits of, 386-l.\nInitiation termed Light, 521-l.\nInitiation, the Epopt said to be regenerated after the ceremonies of,\n  373-l.\nInitiation, the first principles of life learned through, 353-l.\nInitiation, the increase and decrease of the moon regulated the\n  periods of the, 361-m.\nInitiation the Knowledge of Deity who was the Light of the Mysteries,\n  522-u.\nInitiation was a school in which were taught the truths of--, 372-l.\nInitiation was, as it were, to suffer death and be born again, 388-m.\nInitiation was considered to be a mystical death, 373-l.\nInitiations, ancient, objects of the; tended to perfection, 397-l.\nInitiations consummated in Temples of Elephanta and Salsette, 361-u.\nInitiations into the Mysteries took place generally at night, 383-l.\nInitiations, Souls tried in the Sanctuary of, 518-l.\nInitiations, the Equinoxes were connected with ancient, 404-l.\nInitiations withdrew souls from mortal life and reunited them to the\n  Gods, 520-l.\nInjunction to Masons, \"Judge not,\" etc, 135-m.\nInjustice, loss results from the gain of, 73-u.\nInjustice of England lost her America, 835-m.\nInjustice, two kinds of, 127-u.\nInjustices and inequalities of this life compensated for in a future\n  one, 830-l.\nInjustices, difficulty in finding compensations for seeming, 829-u.\nInquisition, references to the tortures of the, 49-l.\nInquisitorial duties of a member of the 31st Degree, 827-m.\nInri, various meanings of, 291-m.\nInspector Inquisitor, Grand Inspector, Inquisitor Commander, 825.\nInspector Inquisitor, the 31st Degree, 825.\nInspiration given to every faithful child of God, 226-u.\nInspiration not limited by race, or sect; still exists, 225-l.\nInspiration of one age or creed; Philo and Plato inspired, 321-u.\nInspired minds ordered by God, 225-u.\nInstinct of animals compared with the Reason of man, 303-l.\nInstinct is inspiration, either the animal itself or God in the animal,\n  304-u.\nInstincts and life of animals come from the Universal Soul, 666-l.\nInstructors, attempt to reach understanding through the eye by early,\n  355-m.\nInstructors or Masons from the 4th to the 8th Degrees; duties of, 331-m.\nInstructors to perfect, explain, expound to the younger Masons, 331-m.\nInstrument of the Hermetics to separate the gross from the volatile;\n  Intelligence, 790-l.\nIntendant of the Building, 8th Degree, lesson of, 136-u.\nIntellect ever struggling to pass the bounds of its limitations, 696-l.\nIntellect has always sought to explain the nature of Deity, 738-m.\nIntellect, only sure mode of perpetuating Freedom is the franchise of,\n  31-l.\nIntellect placed above and beyond the Universe by the Egyptians, 614-u.\nIntellectual force of some persons absorbed by others, 735-u.\nIntelligence active as the soul became disengaged from gross matter,\n  669-l.\nIntelligence and Life communicated to man by Supreme Intelligence, 665-u.\nIntelligence and Wisdom conjoined and one shines in the other, 800-u.\nIntelligence: categorical questions concerning, 648.\nIntelligence complete as the world and accurate as mathematics, 790-l.\nIntelligence corresponds to the Holy Ghost of the Christian Faith, 267-l.\nIntelligent Deities necessary for worship, 665-m.\nIntelligence directing Strength and Force is true meaning of necessity,\n 696-m.\nIntelligence enveloped in the soul in which it reposed, 669-m.\nIntelligence existed wherever the Divine soul acted as a cause, 669-m.\nIntelligence filled the Universe, emanations from the Universal, 669-m.\nIntelligence, God, Chance, undistinguishable, according to Menander,\n  694-m.\nIntelligence great as the soul directs the movements of the Universe,\n  415-u.\nIntelligence impossible without a soul, 669-m.\nIntelligence of God perceives where the Good is and his liberty\n  accomplishes it, 704-u.\nIntelligence of man an emanation from the soul of nature, 670-u.\nIntelligence overruling the principle of necessity, 681-l.\nIntelligence produced Christ and the Spirit to restore the Eons\n  to--,560-m.\nIntelligence source of the oil of anointing, 267-l.\nIntelligence supreme is necessarily rational, 733-u.\nIntelligence, Supreme, type of that manifested in man, 254-m.\nIntelligence symbolized by the Pentagram or five-pointed Star, 790-l.\nIntelligence, Tabunah, represented by the Hebrew letters, 800-m.\nIntelligence, the commencement, revelation cf Divinity, the first Eon,\n  560-u.\nIntelligence the Supreme Being of Plato, 678-u.\nIntelligences emanated from a Primary Intelligence, 249-u.\nIntelligences: God displays Himself by, 564-u.\nIntelligences: God's Spirit emanating from His bosom the first of\n  the, 564-u.\nIntelligences, like the Stars, divided into the Good and the Evil, 474-l.\nIntelligences: Logos, the Word, Creative Utterances, the second of\n  the, 564-u.\nIntelligences of the Stars have dominion over all Nature, 474-u.\nIntendant of the Building, 8th Degree, lessons of the, 136-u.\nInterests, all men have common, 221-u.\nInterests conflict and passions clash in a world of action, 696-U.\nInterests of the many requiring the sacrifice of others may be just,\n  833-l.\nIntermediary powers between Gods and men accorded to Genii or\n  angels, 416-m.\nIntimate Secretary, 6th Degree, special duties of, 119-u.\nIntolerance of religious belief, a great evil; effect of--, 166-l.\nInundation of the Nile affected by Aquarius as well as Sirius, 468-m.\nInventions to account for moral evil, 690-m.\nInvisible becomes the Visible at the will of God, 845-l.\nInvisible God, visible in Eden, Sinai, Burning Bush, no incongruity,\n  514-u.\nInvisible measured by the visible, 222-u.\nInvisible only cognizable through the visible, 267-l.\nInvocation to Ormuzd to combat Evil and make men pure and holy, 613-m.\nI, O, W, the three-lettered Scandinavian name of Deity, 632-l.\nIonic order of architecture represents degrees of the Second Temple,\n  202-u.\nIranian objects of worship those of nature, especially fire and light,\n  601-l.\nIranian races seem to have originated nature worship, 601-l.\nIreland and Scotland; Cross on ancient Buddhist ruins of, 505-m.\nIreland, serpents carved on Buddhist crosses in, 496-m.\nIreland, the Buddhists supposed to have erected the round towers of,\n  278-u.\nIrira, Abraham Cohen, author of Pneumatica Kabalistica, or Beth\n  Alohim, 772-l.\nIsaiah quoted in reference to the creation of evil by God, 796-m.\nIsiac Mysteries required tomb, pillars, and lake, 405-m.\nIsiac tablet is charged with serpents, 501-m.\n\"Iside et Osiride,\" by Plutarch, speaks mysteriously of the Holy\n  Doctrines, 841-u.\nIsin Abla, a Mohammedan Mystery teaching the name of God, 621-l.\nIsis accompanied on her journey by animals representing Constellations,\n  506-m.\nIsis addressed by Lucius according to Apuleius, 387-u.\nIsis addresses Lucius and promises her favor, 387-m.\nIsis aided in her search for Osiris by Anubis in the shape of a dog,\n  376-l.\nIsis and Osiris gave civilization, laws, etc., to men, 475-l.\nIsis appears to Lucius as a beautiful female with graceful ringlets,\n  387-u.\nIsis, as the Moon, seeks Osiris; her allegorical wanderings, 480-483.\nIsis collected all parts of the body of Osiris except generative organs,\n  475-l.\nIsis compared to Knowledge by Plutarch, 521-l.\nIsis, declaration concerning herself on columns at Nysa in Arabia, 378-m.\nIsis; description of a procession of the initiates of, 412-u.\nIsis, doctrines of the Mysteries judged by the prayer to, 389-l.\nIsis extracted the body of Osiris from a column of the palace, 379-u.\nIsis found the body of Osiris at Byblos marked by a shrub of tamarisk,\n  376-l.\nIsis in her search had with her Anubis and Nepthe, sisters of Osiris,\n  378-l.\nIsis in the procession was attended by women combing her hair, 387-l.\nIsis is Nature, the Queen, 279-u.\nIsis of Gaul, called Hertha or Wertha, Virgin to bear a child, 104-u.\nIsis, sister before she was the wife, of Osiris, 849-l.\nIsis: the Egyptians deemed it unlawful to utter the name, 620-u.\nIsis the Goddess of Sais, the Feast of Lights in her honor celebrated\n  there, 380-u.\nIsis, the personification of the Moon, 447-l.\nIsis, was engaged as nurse to the child of Queen Astarte, 379-u.\nIsis was the daughter of Saturn, the most ancient of Gods, 378-m.\nIsis, weeping at a fountain, dressed the hair of the women of the\n  court, 378-l.\nIsrael, allegory of Jacob concerning the twelve Tribes of, 460-l.\nIraelite, by nature a servant to the Stars, relieved by Law, 509-l.\nIsraelites in Desert worshipped a Star God, according to Amos, 509-l.\nIsrael's daughters looked to the north for the return of Thammuz, 592-u.\nIssachar, compared to an ass, has for a device Cancer, 461-l.\nIvy over East window of old churches is the Hedera Helix of Bakchos,\n  483-m.\nIzeds, created by Ormuzd, offices of the twenty-eight, 257-u.\n\nJ\n\nJachin and Boaz explain the mysteries of political and religious\n  antagonisms, 772-u.\nJachin and Boaz, parallel lines, point in circle, represent Solstices,\n  506-u.\nJachin and Boaz symbols of the bi-sexuality of the Ineffable Name, 849-m.\nJachin has set on it the celestial globe symbol of the spiritual part\n  of man, 860-m.\nJachin is Binary; Boaz is Unity, 772-u.\nJachin, name of the column on the right of the entrance; meaning of, 9-l.\nJachin, one of the columns of the Temple of Wisdom, represents\n  the Active Principle, 860-m.\nJachin referred to symbolically, 202-l.\nJachin represents Victory, one of the Sephiroth, 267-l.\nJachin, the seventh Sephiroth, is unlimited Power, 736-l.\nJacob saw the souls descending a seven-stepped ladder, 851-l.\nJacob's dream, the ladder in, 234-u.\nJainas, a sect in India, say the ancient religion consisted in a belief\n  in--, 608-u.\nJames the Second, silly song helped to unseat, 43-u.\nJargon of a rude chemistry utilized by the Alchemists to conceal\n  their philosophy, 772-l.\nJargon of alchemy created to deceive the vulgar herd, 731-u.\nJapanese believe in a Supreme Invisible Being not to be represented\n  by images or--, 616-u.\nJapanese had seven ancient gods and five added, 460-m.\nJapanese Mysteries; twenty years probation for highest degree, 429-m.\nJapanese Supreme Being styled Amida or Omith, 616-u.\nJay and Marshall revered for their justice as judges, 836-l.\nJealousy of Deity instanced, 688-u.\nJefferies, as Judge, to be opposed by Masonry, 20-l.\nJefferies, reference to trials before, 49-l.\nJehovah, anthropomorphism of, 207-u.\nJehovah at the outset in the character of the Sun, 510-m.\nJehovah conquers the Dragons, 499-m.\nJehovah had a distinct astrological character, 509-l.\nJehovah leads forth the Hosts of Heaven, naming them, 509-l.\nJehovah more powerful than the Gods of other nations, 206-l.\n\"Jehovah\" of the Hebrews expresses abstract existence, 651-l.\nJehovah the Author of all things, prosperity and evil, 687-u.\nJehovah, the direct author of evil, commissions evil spirits, 687-l.\nJehovah, the Divine Tetragram, formed by adding the ternary name\n  of Eve to Yod, 771-m.\nJehovah, the name by which all things are redeemed, 561-l.\nJehovah the national God of the Hebrews, 206-l.\nJehovah transfixes the Crooked Serpent, 498-u.\nJehovah's jealousy against the infringement of autocratic laws, 688-u.\nJemsheed, one of the Persian Sun Heroes, cut off by Zohak, 589-m.\nJemsheed sawn asunder by a fish bone, 589-l.\nJericho, Rose of, grows in Arabian desert; propagation of, 96-m.\nJerusalem often prostituted to the gods of Syria and Babylon, 840-u.\nJerusalem, prophesy by Isaiah concerning, 13-m.\nJerusalem, the 16th Degree; emblems of the Prince of, 241-m.\nJesus caused to be born of a Virgin by Ialdaboth, 563-l.\nJesus Christ, the living Spirit, assists Adam Kadmon against the\n  Evil Principle, 566-m.\nJesus Christ, the Son of God, the Saviour, inscribed on Christian\n  Mark, 547-l.\nJesus, born of a virgin, united to Christos, with Sophia redeemed\n  the world, 560-m.\nJesus, in person, having disappeared, a cross of Light appeared in\n  His place, 567-m.\nJesus received from Wisdom the perfect knowledge, Gnosis, 563-l.\nJesus restored to life and given an etherial body by Christos and\n  Wisdom, 563-l.\nJesus, son of Joseph and Mary, to whom the Wisdom of God had\n  united itself, 564-l.\nJesus takes from Ialdaboth the Souls of Light, 564-u.\nJewel of the Kabalistic pantacle commands the spirits of the elements,\n  787-u.\nJewels of the Order, six in number, movable and immovable, 16-u.\nJewish intimate relations with the Oriental doctrines, 255-m.\nJewish Scriptures allegories concealing profound meanings, 250-l.\nJewish Teachers of Alexandria; writings of, 253-u.\nJews borrowed the idea of God in the form of fire from the Persians,\n  424-m.\nJews confounded Satan with Ahriman and the Dragon, 258-u.\nJews considered the True Name of God lost and its pronunciation\n  a mystery, 621-m.\nJews enunciated the policy of exclusion, but yielded to the Greeks,\n  247-l.\nJews familiar with the doctrine of Zoroaster, 256-l.\nJews fixed the New Year in the month Nisan, Vernon Equinox, 466-m.\nJews, great many remained in Babylon, established school, 256-u.\nJews influenced by long residence in Assyria and Persia, 255-m.\nJews lost the Holy Word, the veil of the Temple rent asunder, 840-u.\nJews of Egypt, difference between the Jews of Palestine and the, 260-m.\nJews of Egypt jealous of those of Palestine, 253-u.\nJews of Egypt made doctrines harmonize with the traditions of Greece,\n  260-m.\nJews of Palestine imbibed the Oriental doctrines, 260-m.\nJews, reason of Lodges for the exclusion of, 11-m.\nJezirah and Sohar, our knowledge of the Kabalistic doctrines in the\n  books of, 266-l.\nJizchak Lorja says all things consist in Binah, 753-l.\nJoab strikes Abner under the fifth rib; application, 36-u.\nJod, or Yod, as an initial of Yod, He, is placed in center of a\n  triangle, 632-u.\nJohannism of the Adepts, the Kabalah of the earlier Gnostics, 818-u.\nJohannite Christians claimed to be the only true initiates, 816-l.\nJohannite Pontiffs assumed the title Christos, Anointed, Consecrated,\n  817-u.\nJohannites claimed uninterrupted succession of pontifical powers, 816-u.\nJohn declares concerning the Gnostic doctrines, 559-m.\nJohn gives the key to the allegories of the Evangel, 816-l.\nJohn, Solstices appropriated to the Two Saints, 595-m.\nJohn the Baptist, 261.\nJohn the Baptist adopted by Masonry to avoid the suspicions of Rome,\n  818-u.\nJohn the Baptist; parents of; teachings of, 260-l.\nJohn the Baptist preached in the desert near where the Essenes lived,\n  201-u.\nJohn the Baptist, religious systems approximating each other in the\n  time of, 247-m.\nJohn the Baptist, religious thought at the time of, 259-m.\nJohn the Baptist taught some creed older than Christianity, 261-l.\nJohn's declaration concerning Christ, the Word, 559-m.\nJoseph and Mary, parents of Jesus, to whom Wisdom had united itself,\n  564-l.\nJoseph initiated into the Egyptian Mysteries, 368-m.\nJoseph interpreted Pharaoh's dream of the seven ears of corn, 729-u.\nJosephus describes the vestments of the High Priest, etc, 409-u.\nJournalism, slander and calumny of modern, 334-m.\nJournalistic spying is dishonorable, 336-l.\nJudah has Leo for a device whose grip after others failed raised Khurum,\n  461-u.\nJudas Iscariot, \"Brother,\" playing the part of, 36-u.\nJudge, a member of the 31st Degree alluded to as a, 825-l.\nJudge cautiously and charitably, 132-u.\nJudge's duties are to hear patiently, weigh deliberately, decide\n  impartially, 825-m.\nJudgment hereafter as you judge here below, 825-m.\nJudgment of God infallible, because all things and motives are known,\n  825-l.\nJudgment of God seen in the Indian plague, 812-m.\nJudgment of the world by Vishnu, Osiris, Sosiosch, 623.\nJudgment on the acts, faults or crimes of others, 130-135.\nJudgment proceeded from the Mother towards whom the Father did\n  not turn, 793-u.\nJudgments too rigorous prevent the process of creation from being\n  carried on, 798-u.\nJulian an Illuminatus and initiate of the first order, 731-l.\nJulian believed in one God and the Trinity; was no Pagan, but a Gnostic,\n  731-l.\nJulian, Emperor, discovery during the rebuilding of the Temple by, 280-m.\nJulian gives reasons why the Mysteries were celebrated in the Autumn,\n  491-u.\nJulian; why Mysteries were celebrated at the Equinox, opinion of, 404-l.\nJunior Warden's column represents Tephareth, Beauty, 800-u.\nJuno holds in her right hand the head of a serpent, 499-l.\nJupiter Ammon represents the Sun in Aries, 452-l.\nJupiter, meaning and emblem of, 202-m.\nJupiter represents Justice, 727-l.\nJupiter, the name of the third gate of the ladder, material, brass, 414-u.\nJurors, attitude and duty of, 126-m.\nJuror, position to be taken by a Masonic, 155-u.\nJust things are beautiful; everything beautiful ought to be just, 845-u.\nJust thoughts have on their side Power, Wisdom and Justice of God, 838-m.\nJustice a universal human debt, a universal human claim, 833-m.\nJustice and equity characteristics of a Prince of Jerusalem, 241-l.\nJustice and Love in equilibrium in Deity, 769-l.\nJustice and Mercy in equilibrium give Infinite Equity or Harmony, 859-u.\nJustice as between man and man is that which it is right to do, 831-m.\nJustice as the law paramount; all affairs must be subject to, 830-u.\nJustice divorced from sympathy is selfish indifference, 70-71-l.\nJustice has a law as universal as that of attraction, 829-u.\nJustice, ideal and absolute, may be affected for the greater good\n  of the greatest number, 836-l.\nJustice indispensable to nations, 72-l.\nJustice instinctively understood better than it can be depicted, 835-l.\nJustice is the Angel of God flying from East to West, 838-u.\nJustice is the constitution or fundamental law of the moral Universe,\n  829-l.\nJustice is the object of the conscience, 833-u.\nJustice keeps just relations between men, 833-u.\nJustice, Masonry seeks to enforce the laws of, 127-m.\nJustice may require self sacrifice, 833-l.\nJustice not a consequence; there is no principle above it, 723-u.\nJustice not departed from though an ideal rule of justice may be, 836-m.\nJustice of a thing decides whether or not God wills it, 847-u.\nJustice of God alone reigning the creation of man would have been\n  impossible, 846-u.\nJustice of God and the law of merit and demerit the foundations\n  of human faith, 706-u.\nJustice of God, in human affairs, must work by human hands, 838-m.\nJustice of God not to be impeached because we do not understand, 829-m.\nJustice of God not to be measured by our standard of justice, 829-m.\nJustice, Power and Wisdom of God are on the side of every just thought,\n  838-m.\nJustice, the opposite of envy, represented by Jupiter, 727-l.\nJustice the rule of right, a rule of conduct for man in his moral\n  relations, 830-u.\nJustice, the well informed Mason is a votary of, 156-u.\nJustice; to human nature, and a part of it, belongs a sense of, 833-u.\nJustice to oneself is fidelity to our faculties and trust in their\n  convictions, 837-l.\nJustice toward men is a life in obedience to our faculties and their\n  convictions, 837-l.\nJustice, uncertainty of human, 131-m.\nJustice, which is God, 847-l.\nJustice will not fail, though wickedness seems strong, 838-u.\nJustin Martyr quotes Pythagoras as declaring \"God is One\", 667-u\nJuvenal held no office, 47-l.\nJuvenal under the Caesars, 48-u.\n\n\nK\n\nKabala consecrates the alliance of the Universal Reason and Divine Word,\n  744-l.\nKabala contains a doctrine logical, simple, absolute, 745-u.\nKabala contains a source of many doctrines, 741-u.\nKabala establishes by the counterpoises of opposite forces the balance\n  of being, 744-l.\nKabala furnished the material for the Roman de la Rose, 733-u.\nKabala gives to Masonry secrets and symbols, 744-n.\nKabala struggles hard to understand and explain process of creation,\n  758-n.\nKabalah, an entire, perfect, unique Theology in the Secret Traditions\n  of the, 843-l.\nKabalah; Creation effected by the omnific letter of the, 14-u.\nKabalah designates Leniency as Light and Whiteness, 769-u.\nKabalah, doctrines of Persians, Gnostics, and in the Zend Avesta,\n  similar to the, 266-l.\nKabalah, doctrines of the, 267-269.\nKabalah ignored by the scholastic theology of Aristotle and Lombard,\n  847-u.\nKabalah in active realization, the Magic of Works, is Hermeticism, 840-l.\nKabalah is the primitive tradition and rests on a dogma of Magism, 759-l.\nKabalah minus the principle of the Hierarch forms Swedenborgianism,\n  823-m.\nKabalah, origin and development of the Holy (See also Cabala), 97-m.\nKabalah, representation of the mysterious pantacles of the, 104-m.\nKabalah states, in reference to the Justice and Mercy or Benignity\n  of God--, 846-u.\nKabalah, study of, aided by the Tetractys, 88-m.\nKabalah, symbolism of lights according to the, 202-l.\nKabalah taught the unity of God and embodied a pure philosophy, 625-l.\nKalabah teaches the emanation of all from Infinite Light, 266-l.\nKabalah, the Ancient of Days existed before everything in the, 266-l.\nKabalah, the Hebrew traditional philosophy, 552-u.\nKabalah the heritage of Israel and the secret of its priests, 839-l.\nKabalah the key of the occult sciences and gave birth to the Gnostics,\n  626-u.\nKabalah, the primary tradition of the single revelation, 841-l.\nKabalah, the Supreme Being is the \"Unknown Father\" in the, 266-l.\nKabalah, visions of Ezekiel veiled by enigmatic dogmas of the, 321-l.\nKabalist doctrines known to the Templars, 815-m.\nKabalist is a man who has learned the Sacredotal and Royal Art, 627-u.\nKabalist pantacle, the Cross of the East, made by the plates of the.\n  Templar trowel, 816-m.\nKabalistic alphabet in the Tarot indicates the order to be followed,\n  777-l\nKabalistic and Hermetic Rose Croix, 785-l.\nKabalistic book of the Apocalypse closed by seven seals, 727-l.\nKabalistic books furnished the doctrines of the Hermetic Philosophers,\n  772-l.\nKabalistic Commentaries contain the meaning of the Rose Symbol, 821-l.\nKabalistic doctrine based on Deity without limitation or conformation,\n  765-l.\nKabalistic doctrine concealed under its emblems in the Apocalypse, 727-l.\nKabalistic Doctrine contained in the Sepher Yetsairah, Sohar, Talmud,\n  841-l.\nKabalistic doctrine, like Masonry, tends toward spiritual perfection,\n  625-l\nKabalistic doctrine lost by the Pharisees at the advent of Christ, 727-l.\nKabalistic Doctrine, the dogma of the Magi and Hermes, 841-l.\nKabalistic doctrine the religion of the Sage and Savant, 625-l.\nKabalistic doctrines of emanations, the origin of the Christian Trinity,\n  552-u.\nKabalistic doctrines; sources of our knowledge of the, 266-l.\nKabalistic four Worlds alluded to in the four elements of the Ritual,\n  784-m.\nKabalistic Gnosticism: in the chiefs of the Templars was vested\n  the Apostolate of, 817-m.\nKabalistic idea of the Infinite Deity and His emanations, 552-u.\nKabalistic ideas concerning the Sephiroth, 765-u.\nKabalistic interpretation of the Seven Sephiroth is Atik Yomin, 727-m.\nKabalistic number four furnished the mysteries of the Tetragram\n  of the Hebrews, 732-u.\nKabalistic process of creation, 766-769\nKabalistic secrets contained in the ternarys of the Evangelic Symbols,\n  730-l.\nKabalistic significance of Yod, type of the human Tetragram, 771-m.\nKabalistic statement in regard to the Infinite Light, 742-u.\nKabalistic \"Taro\" corresponds to the Hebrew Tetragram, 732-m.\nKabalistic theory of the four worlds, Emanation, Creation, Formation,\n  Fabrication, 768-l.\nKabalistic triangle. Necessity, Liberty, Reason, 738-u.\nKabalists consider God as the Intelligent, Animating, Living, Infinite,\n  97-l.\nKabalists have chiefly studied the questions of the Nature of Deity\n  and the beginning of the Universe, 738-l.\nKabalists' opinion concerning Souls is Platonism and came from the\n  Chaldeans, 440-l.\nKabalists regarded Deity as the Primordial Ether-Ocean from which\n  light flows, 739-l.\nKabalists wrote the \"unspeakable word, Ihuh,\" translated by Ararita,\n  728-u.\nKarobim on the Propitiatory was misunderstood, 818-l.\nKether Ailah synonymous with the Supreme Crown; Cause of Causes, 751-l.\nKether, Corona, existent in the Corona of the World of Emanation, 758-u.\nKether, Crown, has no configuration nor can there be any cognizance\n  of it, 753-u.\nKether denoted by Yod, according to the Pneumatica Kabalistica, 798-m.\nKether is the Will of Deity, or Deity as Will, 758-m.\nKether, Kabalistic meaning of, 202-l.\nKether, the cranium of Adam Kadmon, 757-l.\nKether, the Crown, is treated of as a person composed of the ten\n  numerations, 799-m.\nKether, the Crown, the Divine Will or Potency, the first Sephiroth, 552-u.\nKether, the will, remains in Macroprosopos, the first Universal, 793-l.\nKether was the aggregate of the ten Sephiroth, 755-u.\nKether's sphere opened and thereout proceeded Hakemah, 756-m.\nKey of the Holy Books is the Sohar which opens all the depths and\n  lights, 843-l.\nKey to the pantacles of the Apocalypse are three, four, seven, twelve,\n  728-u.\nKhairum, or Khur-um, misrendered into Hiram, 816-m.\nKhaled, \"The sword of God,\" at the battle of Damascus, exhorts\n  soldiers, 53-m.\nKhur, correspondence to Egyptian Har, 78-m.\nKhur from the Zend word, Huare, the Sun, 602-u.\nKhur-om Abi, meaning of, 81-m.\nKhur-om, personification of Light and the Sun, Saviour, 79-l.\nKhur-om, Phoenician artificer, meaning of the name of, 81-u.\nKhur-om, similarity in the Mysteries to the death of the Master, 405-m.\nKhurum assailed at the three gates by Capricornus, Aquarius, Pices, 448-u.\nKhurum assaulted at the East, West and South Gates, 488-u.\nKhurum, improperly called Hiram, is Khur-om, 79-l.\nKhur-um, King of Tsur, first performed annual ceremony, 25th Dec, 78-l.\nKhurum laid several days in the grave and was raised by the powerful\n  attraction of Leo, 488-m.\nKhurum legend connected with more ancient ones; variants of them, 435-m.\nKhurum, name of Evil God, Bal, found in name of each murderer of, 80-u.\nKhurum obtained true ideas of Deity in the Mysteries, 208-m.\nKhurum, or Khairum, derivation and meaning of, 78-u.\nKhurum raised by the Lion's grip after that of Aquarius and Cancer\n  had failed, 461-u.\nKhurum represents the Sun killed by the three Winter Signs, 448-u.\nKhurum, The Master, received no wages not his due, 114-u.\nKhurum, the Master, the symbol of human freedom, 211-u.\nKhurum, the Tyrian artist of the columns Jachin and Boaz, 9-m.\nKhurum's assassins, origin of names, relation to Stars, 488-u.\nKhurum's body searched for by the other nine signs of the Zodiac, 448-u.\nKingdom of Christ, which, though not of this world, would govern\n  all its grandeurs, 815-m.\nKings: not successively, but altogether, Binah produced the seven, 796-l.\nKings; shattered into fragments were the first six, 796-l.\nKings of the World are those knowing the incontestable verity, 842-m.\nKings, when they died, had no root in Adam Kadmon, nor was\n  Wisdom their root, 798-u.\nKneph or Agathodaemon, the Good Spirit, represented by Osiris, 587-l.\nKneph, the Serpent God of the Egyptians, 495-u.\nKnight Commander of the Temple, first Chivalric Degree, 578-u.\nKnight Commander of the Temple, the 27th Degree, 578-u.\nKnight Kadosh Degree, the 30th, 814.\nKnight must be ardent in the practice of the virtues he has professed,\n  807-l.\nKnight of the Brazen Serpent, the 25th Degree, 435.\nKnight of the Brazen Serpent, the 25th Degree, explains symbols, 435-m.\nKnight of the East and West, 17th Degree, philosophical, 246-l.\nKnight of the East or of the Sword, 15th Degree, lessons of, 237-u.\nKnight of the Royal Axe, Prince of Libanus, the 22nd Degree, 340-u.\nKnight of the Sun, or Prince Adept, the 28th Degree, 581.\nKnight Templarism originated in the East in 1118, 815-l.\nKnight worthy of being called so if true to vows and possessing\n  Virtue, Truth, Honor, 808-u.\nKnighthood's crosses are symbols of the nine qualities of a Knight\n  of St. Andrew, 801-l.\nKnightly attributes and qualities found in men in those days, 805-u.\nKnightly character requires mercy, clemency, a forgiving temper, 813-l.\nKnightly plumage, dress, gaudy habiliments incompatible with Order,\n  807-m.\nKnightly professions and duties, 808-m.\nKnightly qualities of Generosity, Clemency, Charity, are more essential,\n  803-u.\nKnightly qualities of Humility, Patience, Self-denial, essential\n  qualities, 801-l.\nKnightly qualities of Virtue, Truth, Honor, are most essential\n  qualities, 803-m.\nKnightly spirit revived by the 27th Degree, 579-m.\nKnights Crusaders, nine in number, consecrated themselves Templars,\n  815-l.\nKnights incited to imitate the old Knights and Bayard, Sydney,\n  S. Louis, 804-l.\nKnights incited to look to the ancient days for examples of Virtue,\n  Truth, Honor, 804-l.\nKnights of St. Andrew vowed to defend the innocent and bring\n  the oppressors to justice, 802-l.\nKnights of the East and of the East and West successors of Templars,\n  816-m.\nKnights of the East and West so called because--, 275-m.\nKnights of the 15th and 16th Degrees, duties of the, 332-u.\nKnight's boast to be consistent with our profession as Masons;\n  retain our dignity and--, 804-m.\nKnowledge alone not sufficient to fit men to be free, 26-m.\nKnowledge convertible into power, 25-l.\nKnowledge convertible into power and axioms into rules of utility\n  and duty, 711-l.\nKnowledge imparted to initiates of Mithraic Mysteries, 425-m.\nKnowledge: in the Ancient Symbolism may be rediscovered the\n  Mysteries of, 842-l.\nKnowledge is Light, the development of the soul, 107-l.\nKnowledge is profitable, moral, and will be religious, 713-u.\nKnowledge of Deity and Soul because we feel their existence, 674-u.\nKnowledge of God's existence through the Power communicated to\n  man by the Word, 598.\nKnowledge of good and evil commenced, 630-m.\nKnowledge of Life limited to its developments, 572-m.\nKnowledge, Masonic, little use unless it adds to our Wisdom and Charity,\n  26-u.\nKnowledge of natural things through our senses, 738-l.\nKnowledge of the Absolute itself possible only through his\n  manifestations, 738-l.\nKnowledge of the effects of things, the attributes, possible, 570-571-572.\nKnowledge of the essence of things impossible, 570-571-572.\nKnowledge of Truth and of the Nature of the Gods the most precious gift,\n  521-l.\nKnowledge of the value of many things comes when we lose them, 190-u.\nKnowledge, the forerunner of liberty and toleration, 171-m.\nKosmos, a word signifying Beauty and Order; Universe, 87-l.\nKrishna, called Heri, Shepherd and Saviour, 81-l.\nKrishna, Hindu Sun God, 78-u.\nKronos and Ouranos were above Zeus, 597-l.\n\nL\n\nL, P, D on Cagliostro's seal were the initials of \"Tread under\n  foot the Lilies\", 823-m.\nLabor a blessing, not a curse, 691-u.\nLabor has produced all that is glorious in the world, 346-m.\nLabor is a more beneficent ministration than man admits, 344-m.\nLabor is Heaven's great ordinance for human improvement, 343-l.\nLabor is man's great function, distinction, privilege, 344-l.\nLabor is noble and ennobling, not a disgrace nor a misfortune, 242-m.\nLabor necessary to develop the energies, 243-u.\nLabor not a curse or a doom, but a blessing, 342-l.\nLabor, the lessons of the 22d Degree inculcate respect for, 340-u.\nLabor, three kinds of, manual, in arms, intellectual, 331-u.\nLabor, wide as Earth, has its summit in Heaven, 342-l.\nLabor yet to be the King of Earth is the noblest emblem of God, 341-m.\nLaborers alone survive in the solitudes of Time, 343-u.\nLaboring man, condition of the, 179.\nLabors of Hercules depict the varying fortunes of the Solar Power, 591-l.\nLabors of Hercules, Peter the Great, Cromwell, Napoleon, 341-l.\nLabyrinth built in honor of the Sun, its twelve palaces consecrated\n  to--, 459-l.\nLactantius believed soul existed before the body, 440-m.\nLactantius ridiculed the earth's revolution around the Sun, 843-u.\nLadder, Faith, Hope, Charity, the three principal rounds of the, 10-u.\nLadder in Jacob's dream; translation of the word, 234-u.\nLadder, nine rounds, 10-u.\nLadder of seven steps a symbol of the passage of souls through Stars,\n  414-u.\nLadder of the Mithraic Initiations, with its seven steps, a symbol, 851-l.\nLadder reached from Heaven to Earth, each step had a gate, 414-u.\nLadder, seven rounds; symbolism, 10-u.\nLadder, symbolism of Mithraic, 233-l.\nLadder, theological, which Jacob saw, 10-u.\nLamaism teaches final judgment before Eslik Khan and punishment, 624-u.\nLamb, and two Knights on one horse taught humility and self-denial, 802-l.\nLamb eaten by Israelites at Vernal Equinox, 466-m.\nLamb or Ram adored when he opened the Equinox, 448-m.\nLamb of Vernal Equinox marks defeat of Serpent, 407-m.\nLamb sacrificed by initiates of Heliopolis and its flesh eaten, 431-l.\nLamb used instead of Ram by Persians, 465-m.\nLandseer's theory concerning the legend of Osiris, 483-487.\nLanguage fell into confusion after man's connection with the\n  Creator ceased, 600-u.\nLanguage inadequate to express idea of Deity, hence personification,\n  672-l.\nLanguage inadequate to express the origination of matter from spirit,\n  673-m.\nLanguage not adequate to express our ideas, 569-u.\nLatitude and Longitude of Egyptian cities, 442-u.\nLaurel wreaths for the Greek and Romans who fought for the\n  love of Liberty, 157-m.\nLaw as applied to the Universe means--, 695-m.\nLaw displacing Chance and Necessity permits man to be morally free,\n  695-m.\nLaw Eternal by which all the operations of Nature proceed without clash,\n  826-m.\nLaw, fundamental, the keystone of the Temple of Liberty, 211-u.\nLaw, obedience to, 110--.\nLaw of attraction and radiation, the principle of Creation and cause\n  of Life, 843-u.\nLaw of Attraction has no exceptions; attraction is the common bond,\n  828-m.\nLaw of God a part of the law of Harmony dictated by Infinite Wisdom,\n  240-u.\nLaw of God relating to our conduct, 240-u.\nLaw of justice claimed to be our notions of right adopted by God, 830-u.\nLaw of matter, law of mind, law of morals, the mode in which those\n  forces act, 827-l.\nLaw of matter, learned only by experience, is imperative, 828-u.\nLaw of natural phenomena expressed in the Kabala by the number four,\n  732-u.\nLaw of natural phenomena furnished the Hebrews with the mysteries\n  of the Tetragram, 732-u.\nLaw or principle of chemical attraction; destruction would follow\n  the repeal of the, 846-m.\nLaw of Retribution, 216-217.\nLaw of sympathy and harmony inflexible as the law of gravitation, 244-u.\nLaw of the Divine an analogical inference of human law, 694-m.\nLaw perceived, but not understood, becomes Necessity, 694-m.\nLaw superior over capricious interference, 696-m.\nLaw, that mind gives character to all is one impartial, 192-m.\nLaw unacknowledged goes under the name of Chance, 694-m.\nLaw unknown is not obligatory, 695-m.\nLaws and Constitution in a free government above incapables, 49-l.\nLaws and principles as a spiritual being, 197-m.\nLaws governing the Universe by necessity, 831-l.\nLaws governing the Universe changed by prayer questionable, 684-l.\nLaws of God obligatory on us because they express His infinite\n  Wisdom, 8-u.\nLaws of God produce wrong and injustice according to our standards, 830-l.\nLaws of movement and life known to the priests of Egypt, 842-l.\nLaws of nature not known to ancients to be immutable, 447-m.\nLaw of natural phenomena represented by a cube, 732-u.\nLaws of our own nature unchangeable, 239-l.\nLaws of Solon, the best his countrymen were capable of receiving, 37-u.\nLaws, the Mason should not attempt to change God's inflexible, 338-l.\nLaws, the Universe preserved by eternal, 577-u.\nLaws which seem harsh may be beneficial if looked on from a\n  broader view, 695-l.\nLe Verrier, painstaking methods of, 174-m.\nLeaders of men, not the acutest thinkers, 55-l.\nLegislators should be thinkers, not gabblers, 55-m.\nLegend of Hiram Abif but a variant of an universal one, 435-m.\nLegend of the Master, Khurom, differently interpreted, 267-m.\nLegend of the Mysteries practically the same in all countries, 377-u.\nLegends of the Degrees considered as allegories, not taught as truths,\n  329-m.\nLegislators whose laws we obey now long dead, 313-u.\nLeniency designated as Light and Whiteness, the Substance of Deity\n  symbolized, 769-u.\nLeniency of the Kabalah coincides with Paul's ideas as to Law\n  and Grace, 769-u.\nLeniency the essence of the Stability of Creation and part of the\n  nature of Deity, 769-u.\nLeo named because the Lion came to the Nile athirst, 446-m.\nLeo the device of Judah by whose grip Khurum was raised, 461-u.\nLeo the first sign into which the Sun passed below the Summer\n  Solstice, 455-m.\nLeo the Third, Kabalistic pantacle contained in the Enchiridion of,\n  104-m.\nLeslie, John, Bishop of Ross, tells of those who saw St. Andrew's\n  Cross, 801-l.\nLesser Mysteries a preparation for the Greater, 432-u.\nLessons learned in the school of life, 182-l.\nLetter He, resolved into Daleth and Vau, 794-l.\nLetters and names constitute the worlds, 749-m.\nLetters fashioned from points by the Infinite at Creation, 749-m.\nLetters (the Sephiroth) changed from the spherical form into the\n  form of a person, 757-m.\nLetters Yod, He, Vav-He, dwelt in the Shekinah, 750-u.\nLevel inverted marked on the breast of the Indian initiate, 428-m.\nLevy and Simeon had for device the two fishes of Pisces, 462-u.\nLiberality teaches that possibly a contrary opinion may be true, 160-m.\nLiberties of the people guaranteed by--, 211-m.\nLiberty a curse to the ignorant and brutal, 26-m.\nLiberty and Necessity apparently antagonistic, 848-m.\nLiberty and Necessity, the columns of the Universe, symbolized\n  by the Temple, 848-m.\nLiberty and Necessity, the essence of Deity, counterbalanced,\n  produce equilibrium, 778-l.\nLiberty, Angels commissioned to aid man to exercise his, 252-m.\nLiberty can not exist without perfect equilibrium, 736-l.\nLiberty, chief foes of human, 148-m.\nLiberty, Equality, Fraternity, foundations of Free Government, 860-u.\nLiberty, imagined, may be the worst of slavery, when--, 177-m.\nLiberty of the people must not be entrusted to any one man, 211-u.\nLiberty of Thought proclaimed by Christ, 309-u.\nLiberty, or the free will of God's creatures, 848-m.\nLiberty, the basis of our existence, we assign to God as His nature,\n  704-u..\nLiberty, the keystone of the Arch of the Temple of, is--, 211-u.\nLiberty; the sovereignty of one's self over one's self is called, 43-l.\nLiberty, the wise Mason is a votary of, 156-u.\nLiberty with obedience to Law an immutable foundation of Free\n  Government, 860-u.\nLibra named because of the balance of the length of day and night, 446-u.\nLife, a social state ordained by God, 197-l.\nLife, an imploring call for revelation from visible, 191-l.\nLife analogous to fire and heat, 664-l.\nLife and Light abiding in the First Born or Creative Agency, 267-m.\nLife and Light considered by the Persians as one, 572-m.\nLife and Light in the Creator or Demiourgos, 575-u.\nLife and movement result from a continual conflict of Forces or\n  Impulses, 846-u.\nLife, as air and fire, was associated with the material machinery, 675-m.\nLife belongs to nature as much as matter does, 664-l.\nLife comes from Death; reconstruction out of dissolution, 768-u.\nLife given for moral and spiritual training, 182-u.\nLife, Heat, Light, centers of gravitation, 843-u.\nLife in its relationships is like--, 198-m.\nLife is a battle, to fight which well is the purpose of man's existence,\n  853-l.\nLife is a blessing, 142-l.\nLife is a school; comparison to a school, 182-u.\nLife is real and full of duties to be performed, 231-m.\nLife is the beginning of immortality, 231-m.\nLife, Light, Soul, from the inherent Light of the Emanative principle,\n  755-l.\nLife made worthy and glorious by--, 143-l.\nLife, more than life are the duties of, 151-l.\nLife of a community depends on--, 197-l.\nLife of Humanity is the Word, the Light, 849-l.\nLife of the embryo maintained by the activity of the mother's life,\n  668-l.\nLife of the Universe and Soul alike the result of Harmony and movement,\n  859-l.\nLife of things from the vital fire that blazes in the Sun, 664-l..\nLife perpetually caused by the double law of fixedness and movement,\n  843-u.\nLife principle familiar to the ancients and Alchemists, 734-l.\nLife principle is the universal agent, 734-l.\nLife-principle of the world a universal agent, two natures, a double\n  current, 734-l.\nLife principle penetrates everything; a ray detached from the Sun, 734-l.\nLife Principle that moves the world, compared to that which moves Man,\n  667-l.\nLife proceeding from the hidden Deity, 555-m.\nLife represented by a simple Tau; eternal life when circle was added,\n  505-u.\nLife rises out of the grave; the soul can not be held by the fettering\n  flesh, 714-m.\nLife rising out of death an important doctrine of the Mysteries, 395-m.\nLife, teachings of the dread realities of, 199-l.\nLife, the blessings of life proceed often from the trials of, 307-l.\nLife, the creation of God, 143-l.\nLife well regulated results from the equilibrium between our appetites\n  and Moral Sense, 860-l.\nLife what we make it by character and adaptation, 193.\nLife's length measured by what we have done for others,158-l.\nLight, a name applied to Ainsoph, because unable to express it by\n  any other, 740-m.\nLight a pure emblem of and first emanation from the Etenal God, 617-l.\nLight a symbol of Hope to the candidate, 639-m.\nLight, Ahriman second born of the Primitive, 257-m.\nLight, all things caused by an emanation of a ray of, 286-u.\nLight an example of the emanation doctrine of the Gnostics, 248-l.\nLight, ancient symbols of, meaning, 77-m.\nLight and Darkness a marked feature of the Eleusinian Mysteries, 403-m.\nLight and Darkness, a prominent feature in the Mysteries, 402-l.\nLight and Darkness are the world's eternal ways, 581-m.\nLight and Darkness contesting for possession of the lunar disk, 468-l.\nLight and Darkness proceed from the idea of the Active and Passive,\n  659-l.\nLight and Darkness, the basis of Ancient Theology according to Plutarch,\n  402-l.\nLight and Fire; references to, 285-l.\nLight and Life emanations from Deity, the archetype of light, 572-m.\nLight and Whiteness a designation of Leniency, 769-u.\nLight as applied to Deity is the Substance from which Light flows, 740-m.\nLight became the first Divinity of the ancients, 443-l.\nLight coexistent with God; questions concerning, 739-l.\nLight comes from the etherial substances that compose the active\n  cause, 659-l.\nLight defined in the book, Omschim, or Introduction to the Kabala, 740-u.\nLight, Fire, Flame, the Aor of the Deity, manifested in flame, out\n  of the fire, 740-l.\nLight, Pire, Flame, the sons of the Phoenician Kronos, 740-l.\nLight, Pire, Flame, the Trinity of the Chaldean oracles, 740-l.\nLight, Fire not a pure, 251-u.\nLight for which all Masonic journeys are a search, 252-l.\nLight forthshone from Deity not severed or diverse from Him, 748-m.\nLight from above constituted three brains for Microprosopos when\n  the letter He was born, 794-l.\nLight from the shattered vessels reascended to Binah then flowed\n  down, 797-u.\nLight has no characteristics of matter, 744-u.\nLight, Human but a reflection of a ray of the Divine Light, 246-l.\nLight in excess, being veiled, may be received by those below, 795-l.\nLight inclosed in the seeds of species has its home in Universal\n  Spirit, 783-m.\nLight initiates in Bacchian Mysteries cry Hail new-born, 522-u.\nLight is the creative power of Deity, 267-l.\nLight is the equilibrium of Shadow and Lucidity, 845-u.\nLight is the Father and Mother of all, 267-u.\nLight, modern and ancient conception of, 76-l.\nLight not Spirit, but the instrument of the Spirit, 98-l.\nLight not the body of the Protoplastes, but first physical\n  manifestation, 98-l.\nLight of Ainsoph inheres in the Vessel as their Life, Light, Soul, 755-l.\nLight of Fire the symbol of the Divine Essence, 742-l.\nLight of the Countenance of God, the inmost Covering, Aur Penial, 749-m.\nLight of the Lodge a symbol of--, 240-l.\nLight of the Substance and that of the Garment in the Primal Ether,\n  750-m.\nLight of the Substance of the Infinite a Kabalistic expression, 743-l.\nLight of the Sun at midnight revealed to the Initiate, 389-m.\nLight of the Vessels is the Soul of the vessel and is active in them,\n  755-m.\nLight of the vestige of garment different from that of the Substance,\n  750-m.\nLight of the vestige of the Garment termed a point, Yod, a point in\n the center of Light, 750-m.\nLight (or knowledge) of God's existence came from the Power communicated\n  to man by the Word, 598-u.\nLight, Ormuzd existed in the beginning in the primitive, 256-l.\nLight, perception of, is the Dawn of the Eternal Life, in Being, 100-l.\nLight, period of termination of the struggle between Darkness and, 257-l.\nLight Principle did its work, but the Evil Principle caused Him to\n  be crucified, 567-m.\nLight-principle one of the ancient conceptions of Deity, 739-m.\nLight Principle put on the appearance of a human body, 567-m.\nLight Principle suffered in appearance only, 567-m.\nLight Principle took the name of Christ in the Messiah, 567-m.\nLight referred to in the Kabalah, 286-u.\nLight represented Ormuzd or Ahura Mazda, 612-u.\nLight seems an emanation from the Creator unfolding all things, 660-u.\nLight Substance in the Deity, 741-l.\nLight, symbol of truth and knowledge, 76-m.\nLight, symbolism of being brought to, 252-l.\nLight synonymous with Good, 660-m.\nLight that is the visible manifestation of God active throughout the\n  Universe, 845-m.\nLight, the cause and principle of all that exists is a Divine Ray of,\n  267-u.\nLight the creature of the Unseen God who taught the True religion, 582-u.\nLight, the final revelation in the Eleusinean Mysteries was, 394-l.\nLight, the first divinity worshipped because it made known the\n  Universe, 660-u.\nLight, the head of the universal organism, called Pooroosha, 673-u.\nLight the Life of the Universe, 575-u.\nLight, the object of Masonic search, brings us to the Kabala, 741-u.\nLight the principle of the real existence of primitive men, 443-m.\nLight the reason of being of the Shadow, 307-l.\nLight the symbol of most of the Indian and Persian Deities, 601-l.\nLight, to the Ancients, was the cause of life; flowed from God, 13-u.\nLight towards which all Masons travel, 256-l.\nLight, visible, is attended by a shadow proportional to that light,\n  847-l.\nLight wanted by the candidate wandering in darkness, 361-u.\nLight was divine to the Chaldeans and Phoenicians, 582-u.\nLight was the life of men, said St. John, 743-l.\nLight was the Life of the Universe, the substance of God and the Soul,\n  443-l.\nLight will return into the Plenitude when redemption is accomplished,\n  564-u.\nLight worshipped by Sabaeans, 13-u.\nLighting and lights of Temples, meaning and reference, 411-u.\nLights, Great, 11-m.\nLights, Lesser, 12-u.\nLights not seen in the North of a Lodge room because--, 592-u.\nLights represent Sun, Moon and Mercury, 411-u.\nLights, symbols in 12th Degree of the three great, 202-l.\nLights: the initiate became an Epopt when admitted to the see the\n  Divine, 521-l.\nLights, the three great, represent in the lodge--, 210-u.\nLily, a Masonic medal had upon it a sword cutting off the stalk of a,\n  823-m.\nLimitation modified by grace, which relaxes it, 764-l.\nLine being but the extension of a point, an emblem of Unity, 487-u.\nLine, duality or evil represented by the broken or divided, 487-u.\nLine, the first principle of Geometry is the straight line, 487-u.\nLingham revered in Indian Temples; an emblem of the sexes, 656-u.\nLingham, the union of Active and Passive principles, 401-l.\nLion holding key in his mouth represents--, 210-m.\nLion of the House of Judah furnishes the strong grip, 641-u.\nLion, the symbol of Athom-Re, God of Upper Egypt, 254-l.\nLions of different colors a symbol of metals in ebullition, 774-m.\nLips of a King impressed by a Tau cross at initiation, 505-u.\nLiteral reading of Oriental writings leads into gross errors, 818-m.\nLive, not all of life to, 191-l.\nLodge, a symbolic Temple modeled from the Universe, 7-u.\nLodge ceiling, border, brazen sea, symbolism of, 209-m.\nLodge, Christian, must have Christian bible, 11-m.\nLodge, definition of a, 7-m.\nLodge, dimensions of a, 9-l.\nLodge, East of American and English, 15-m.\nLodge, Hebrew letter Yod in triangle in the East of a; symbolism, 15-m.\nLodge, Hebrew, must have Pentateuch, 11-m.\nLodge inaugurated by Rousseau became the revolutionary center, 823-l.\nLodge, Mohammedan, must have Koran, 11-m.\nLodge represents the Universe, 209-l.\nLodge supported by three great columns, 7-l.\nLodge supported by Wisdom, Strength and Beauty, 7-l.\nLodge, symbolism of lights of the, 209-l.\nLodge, symbolism of the triangle in the, 209-l.\nLodges extend to Heaven from practice of having Temples without roofs,\n  366-l.\nLogic of Cicero proving the divinity of the Stars, 670-l.\nLogos, a name for the Wisdom of the Kabalah, 267-l.\nLogos dwells in God; is the vehicle by which God acts, 251-u.\nLogos may be compared to the speech of man, 251-u.\nLogos personified by Simon Magus and Gnostics, 323-m.\nLogos produced by the words of the Supreme Deity, 560-m.\nLogos, the material world created by the, 251-l.\nLogos; the powers and attributes of God act through the, 251-l.\nLogos, the word; Mysteries taught incarnation, death, etc., of, 415-u.\nLogos, the Word through which God acts upon the Universe, 552-l.\nLogos, the World of ideas; Chief of Intelligence; Adam Kadmon, 251-m.\nLong Parliament, in periods of convulsion, 30-l.\nLord, Rev. W.W., writes concerning present-day materialism, 808-813.\nLorja, Jitz-chak, author of the Treatise De Revolutionibus Animarum,\n  772-l.\nLorris, Guillaume de, did not complete the Roman de Rose, 822-l.\nLost meaning of the name of Deity the True Word of a Mason, 697-m.\nLoss of the meaning of the True Word considered loss of the Word itself,\n  701-l.\nLouis the Fifteenth, condition of society under, 27-m.\nLouis the Fifteenth forbade Masonic Lodges in 1737, 50-m.\nLove, a mythologic image of the grand secret and the grand agent, 732-m.\nLove a power between the human and the divine, 692-m.\nLove and Mercy impregnating Rigor and Severity by Benignity, 796-u.\nLove and Rigor must temper each other to produce creation, 798-l.\nLove at the bottom of Christianity, 730-l.\nLove became the universal parent when--, 684-u.\nLove carries to the gods the prayers of men and brings down the gifts,\n  692-m.\nLove, Christ the expounder of the new Law of, 309-m.\nLove emerging from the Bacchic egg, with Night, organizes Chaos, 663-l.\nLove, interest in the virtue of those we, 198-m.\nLove is the attribute of Compassion or Mercy, 796-l.\nLove of God according to Plato and Christianity, 704-l.\nLove one another the whole law enunciated by Christianity, 705-u.\nLove, perfect, denoted by the Father, male, 795-l.\nLove received scanty homage before the birth of philosophy, 691-l.\nLove scarcely recognized in the old days of ignorance, 692-u.\nLove the best pilot, supporter, saviour of all things, 692-u.\nLove, the highest and most beneficent of the Gods, according to Plato,\n  682-l.\nLove, the physician of the Universe, the first born of Nature, 683-u.\nLove the solution of the problems of the contradictions of existence,\n  683-l.\nLoving better than hating, even by Deity Himself, 859-u.\nLoving Kindness is greater than Hope or Faith; the only thing God\n  requires, 808-m.\nLoving kindness of the Father enfolds and blesses everything, 715-l.\nLowly and uninfluential, importance of the work of the; instances, 41-m.\nLoyola referred to, 31-u.\nLucanus, Ocellus, after Pythagoras, opened a school in Italy, 653-l.\nLucanus recognized the eternity of the Universe and the Active and\n  Passive, 653-l.\nLucifer, the Evil Force or Devil represented by the false, 102-l.\nLucifer, the Lightbearer, Son of the Morning, Spirit of Darkness, 321-u.\nLukewarmness to be anathematized, 138-m.\nLulle defines mercury, meaning either electricity or astral light, 775-m.\nLulle, Raymond, says to make gold must first have gold, 777-l.\nLulle, Raymond, treats on Hermetic Science, 774-l.\nLuther referred to, 31-u.\nLuther with his sermons worked great results, 43-u.\nLuxury, extravagance, ostentation, the peril of nations and men, 348-m.\n\nM\n\nMacrobius in the Sacred Fables explains theory of the Two Principles,\n  404-l.\nMacrobious taught that the heavens and spheres were part of the\n  Universal Soul, 669-m.\nMacrocosmos, the universal organism called Pooroosha, 673-u.\nMacroprosopos, Arik Aupin, a person composed of ten Numerations, 799-m.\nMacroprosopos is called in the third person, Hua, He, 793-l.\nMacroprosopos is the Idea of the Universe when yet Deity was unmanifested\n  in the Absolute, 758-m.\nMacroprosopos, or Adam Kadmon, constituted with three heads, 758-u.\nMacroprosopos, the first prototype or Universal, 793-l.\nMagdol, the sacred Babylonian tower, description of, 234-m.\nMagi advised by Star of Knowledge when Truth comes into the World, 843-m.\nMagi came from the East, guided by a Star, to adore the Saviour, 841-l.\nMagi, Daniel the Chief of the College of the, 255-l.\nMagi guided to Jerusalem by the Star; the Blazing Star, 842-u.\nMagi led to a knowledge of the New Name by a study of the Pentagram,\n  842-u.\nMagi, many ideas of the Jewish sects were obtained from the, 256-u.\nMagi: Mysteries concealed the occult science of the, 839-m.\nMagi of Babylon were expounders, astronomers, divines, 256-u.\nMagi of the Persians similar to the Druids of Britain, 617-l.\nMagi received the title of Kings, and Magism is called the \"Royal Art\",\n  842-u.\nMagi saluted Christ in his cradle as hierartic ambassadors, 731-m.\nMagian dogma the basis of the Kabalah, or primitive tradition, 769-l.\nMagian Mysteries have a religious, philosophical and natural\n  signification, 773-u.\nMagian traditions symbolized the law of the equilibrium by Columns,\n  843-u.\nMagic: an Absolute Deity independent of Reason is the Idol of Black,\n  737-l.\nMagic and occult philosophy of the ancients synonymous, 730-l.\nMagic at the base was science, 730-l.\nMagic, High, in Egypt, Greece and Rome, 98-l.\nMagic, High, styled the \"Sacredotal\" and the \"Royal\" Art, 98-l.\nMagic is that which it is; it is by itself, like the mathematics, 841-l.\nMagic is the exact and absolute science of nature and its laws, 841-l.\nMagic is the science of the Ancient Magi, 841-l.\nMagic, or Magism, reconciles faith and reason, authority and liberty,\n  842-m.\nMagic reconciles what are seemingly opposed to each other, 842-m.\nMagic unites in one science what of Philosophy and Religion is certain,\n  842-m.\nMagical agent makes possible the transmutation of metals and the\n  universal medicine, 773-l.\nMagical Agent of the Hermetics disguised under the name of \"Prima\n  Materia\", 773-l.\nMagical ternary which, in human things, corresponds with the Divine\n  Triangle, 738-u.\nMagism known as the Holy Empire, Realm, or Sanctum Regnum, 842-u.\nMagism, the science of Abraham, Orpheus, Confucius, Zoroaster, Moses,\n  839-l.\nMagism under a new veil in the Holy Kabalah, 839-l.\nMagnet of Paracelsus the chief dependence of the Great Work, 777-m.\nMagnum-Opus, the Great Work of the Sages, to find the Absolute, 776-l.\nMahaatma, the Great Soul; One God; Universal Element; Mind, 673-u.\nMahomet adopted the primeval faith and taught the one God idea, 616-l.\nMahomet not recognized as an inspired prophet by the Templars, 818-l.\nMahomet still governs one-fourth of the human race, 313-l.\nMahomet the Second broke a triple-headed serpent of brass at\n  Constantinople, 502-u.\nMahometan, in the Orient, more trustworthy than the Christian, 35-l.\nMaia, Nature's loveliness, the germ of passion, source of worlds, 683-l.\nMaimonides explains the origin of the worship of Stars, 435-l.\nMajestic number is Three, denoting the triple divine essence, 628-m.\nMajority of men have an ideal justice, juster than the law, 834-l.\nMalakoth gives ten Sephiroth to each of the four Worlds, 784-l.\nMalakoth is a person, the wife of Microprosopos, 799-l.\nMalakoth is female and the matrix out of which all creation is born,\n  769-m.\nMalakoth is Perpetuity and Continuity without solution, 768-u.\nMalakoth, one of the Sephiroth; Rule, Reign, Royalty, Dominion, Power,\n  753-m.\nMalakoth, Regnum, a separate person behind and in conjunction\n  with Microprosopos, 794-l.\nMalakoth represents the field wherein are to be sown the seeds of\n  the Secret Minerals, 799-u.\nMalakoth represents the metallic woman and Morn of the Sages, 799-u.\nMalakoth (says the Apparatus) is called Haikal, Temple or Palace, 799-u.\nMalakoth unites with her husband, Microprosopos, when face is\n  turned to face, 799-l.\nMale agents: Heavens and Sun have been regarded as the, 851-m.\nMale and Female; all things are constituted, 763-m.\nMale and Female are in equilibrium as Hakemah and Binah, 763-m.\nMale and Female are the Active and the Passive symbols, 784-l.\nMale and Female created he them, 698-l.\nMale and Female created He them; in the image of Deity, 849-l.\nMale and Female formed; the anterior and posterior adhering to\n  one another, 749-l.\nMale and Female Force designated by I.H.U.H.; First Born of--, 267-u.\nMale and female God created things that they might continue, 800-u.\nMale and Female mutually tempering each other are Benignity and\n  Severity, 768-l.\nMale and Female principles; most profound idea of the, 700-m.\nMale and Female was the form of the Universe, 763-m.\nMale and female was the person into the form of which the Circles\n  were changed, 757-m.\nMale and female were the prominent Deities of the Mysteries, 377-u.\nMale and Female, within the occult Wisdom the Supreme Crown is\n  fashioned, 762-l.\nMale, in the Idra Rabla, is right; female is left, 763-u.\nMale is Yod, He is female, Vav is both, 763-m.\nMale on one side, female on the other; the Supreme Will holding\n  the Balance, 769-l.\nMale principle of the Alchemists represented by Air and the Earth, 791-l.\nMale represented by the perpendicular of a right angle triangle, 789-m.\nMale side of Hermetic figure has a Sun; the hand holding a Compass,\n  850-m.\nMalkarth, symbol of the Sun, 77-m.\nMalkarth, Temple of, in the city of Tyre, 9-m.\nMalkuth, the female organ of generation of Adam Kadmon, 758-m.\nMan, a free agent, responsible and punishable for his sins, 577-u.\nMan, a thing to be thankful for is to be a, 140-m.\nMan an effect of the world and eternal like it, 654-l.\nMan an intelligent and free being, the fifth Truth of Masonry, 534-l.\nMan and the World created in the image of Ialdaboth, 563-m.\nMan assumes his rank as a moral agent with consciousness of freedom,\n  668-m.\nMan attains the purposes of his being when his two natures are in\n  equilibrium, 861-l.\nMan becomes a part of God when disengaged from his senses, 610-u.\nMan becomes immortal in the influences that survive him, 312-m.\nMan but an animal until God's immaterial spark penetrated his brain,\n  582-l.\nMan but an intelligent animal if there he nothing Divine in him, 857-l.\nMan by taking thought can enlarge his soul, 813-m.\nMan called a \"macrocosm\" because possessing in miniature the qualities\n  of the Universe, 667-l.\nMan can bend circumstances to the purposes of his nature, 192-l.\nMan can not always find work and food, 179.\nMan capable of a higher Love which lifts him beyond himself, 692-m.\nMan capable of respect and love for others: justice and charity, 703-u.\nMan: categorical questions concerning, 649-u.\nMan: characteristics of a generous, 121-l.\nMan communing with God, his vision eternity, abode infinity, 245-u.\nMan compared to the World or Universe; called a \"microcosm\", 667-l.\nMan created by God, Male and Female created he them, 849-l.\nMan created for the sake of man, 120-m.\nMan creates God in the heaven of human conceptions, 736-u.\nMan created in the image of Alhim, Male and Female, 698-l.\nMan created pure and received Truth and Light from God, 582-u.\nMan dependent on the heavens and the genii that there inhabit, 474-u.\nMan descended from the elemental forces or Titans commemorates--, 393-l.\nMan disappointed when he realizes he has fallen, 652-l.\nMan disputes with and kills his neighbor in matters of opinion, 530-m.\nMan distinguished from animals by the use of Thought, 738-m.\nMan, effects of generosity in a, 122-u.\nMan, evil thoughts and occasions come to the corrupt, 194-m.\nMan formed of the dust of the earth by Yehouah, who breathed the\n  breath of life into his nostrils, 851-l.\nMan, free and subject to obligation, is a moral person with rights,\n  725-m.\nMan had the Word in the beginning, and the Word was from God, 581-l.\nMan has a noble work to perform in himself, 349-m.\nMan has fallen; may be raised by following the directions of Wisdom,\n  252-u.\nMan has natural empire over all institutions, 23-l.\nMan has power to commune with God, 199-m.\nMan in the 17th Degree, symbolism of, 256-l.\nMan is a moral person, one endowed with reason and liberty, 703-u.\nMan is both human and divine, the antagonisms of his nature are--, 765-u.\nMan is one, though of a double nature, 861-l.\nMan is Free because he can modify nature's laws in regard to himself,\n  696-m.\nMan is by nature cruel, like the tigers, 49-m.\nMan lost a knowledge of God, the Absolute Existence, 583-m.\nMan made in the image of God and placed in Asia, cradle of the race,\n  598-m.\nMan makes Deity in his own image, 652-u.\nMan makes God in his own image and thinks God created them in His, 736-u.\nMan must be a worker; the Earth and Air his laboratory, 344-l.\nMan most dogmatizes on the inconceivable, 222-l.\nMan most nearly approaches the Divine perfections, 610-u.\nMan not a spiritual, but a composite being, 232-u.\nMan not a terrestrial plant; his roots are in Heaven, 520-m.\nMan not the central point of the Universe, 711-m.\nMan, on earth, performs God's work, 736-u.\nMan or the animal dying the Universe withdraws its eternal spirit, 666-u.\nMan partakes of the Divine nature as well as elementary nature, 667-l.\nMan, relative unimportance of; effect on the Soul, 303-m.\nMan requires something tangible to exalt his mind to a due conception\n  of Deity, 617-l.\nMan sees evidences of design and God in Nature, 647-l.\nMan should not be angry at animal characteristics in men, 76-u.\nMan struggles to place himself in communion with Deity, 652-653.\nMan successively under the influence of the Stars, Sun and Moon, 255-m.\nMan, the Divine, is the beginning of all creation, 760-m.\nMan, the Divine, is the principle of Direct Light, 760-m.\nMan, the Divine, supplies all things to all, 760-m.\nMan, the Material, is the end and completion of all creation, 760-m.\nMan, the Material, is the principle of reflected light, 760-m.\nMan, the Material, receives all things from all, 760-m.\nMan, the name for Malakoth, Regnum and Microprosopos jointly, 794-l.\nMan, the present condition not the same as that of primitive, 252-u.\nMan the result of the Creative Thought of God, 582-l.\nMan, the unit of Humanity, is a microcosm, 760-m.\nMan, though insignificant, seeks to know God and His methods, 530-m.\nMan unites the Divine and the Human, 858-m.\nMan venerable or formidable but to a small part of his fellow creatures,\n  120-u.\nMan-Woman, crowned with flames, on a cube, winged, bearded symbol\n  of Mercury, 774-m.\nMan, worldly, covetous, sensual, must change before being a good Mason,\n  122-m.\nMan's desire to do something that will live after him, 312-u.\nMan's destruction comes not from the Gods, but from himself, 690-l.\nMan's domain is corporeal nature, visible on earth, 736-m.\nMan's existence in the infinite being of God, 707-m.\nMan's faculties change not the Divine nature, 652-m.\nMan's life a success when it is a harmony and beautiful, 861-l.\nMan's life should be like the Great Harmony of God and the Universe,\n  861-l.\nMan's material and mortal portion comes from the earth, 851-l.\nMan's moral responsibility affected by the question of Evil 684-m.\nMan's morality is the instrument of God's justice, 838-m.\nMan's normal condition is progress, 691-l.\nMan's soul a part of the intelligent Soul of the Universe, therefore\n  intelligent, 670-u.\nMan's Soul breathed into him by God is immortal as God's Thoughts are,\n  577-u.\nMan's soul is immortal, but its mode of existence Masonry does\n  not settle, 525-u.\nMan's soul is man himself, 668-l.\nMan's spiritual and immortal portion comes from the Heavens, 851-l.\nMan's supreme object, the Good; his law, Virtue, 725-l.\nMan's true unhappiness is that he can not get his destiny fulfilled,\n  341-u.\nMan's union with Deity the aspiration of the religious sentiment, 652-m.\nMan's Very Self is his Soul, which is not subject to decay, 852-l.\nMan's virtues are God's attributes, 704-u.\nMandaites recognized 365,000 emanations, 568-u.\nManes claimed to be the Parakletos or Comforter, organ of the Deity,\n  565-m.\nManes derived his doctrine from Zoroasterism, Christianity, Gnosticism,\n  565-m.\nManes' dominant idea was Pantheism from India and China, 565-m.\nManes, founder of the Manicheans, lived among the Persian Magi, 565-m.\nManes, two Principles symbolized by white and black in juxtaposition,\n  818-m.\nManifestation is the same as occultation, 795-l.\nManifestation theory of the Gnostics, 555-l.\nManifestations of God as Father, Son, Holy Ghost, how considered, 270-m.\nManifestations of God fill all so-called empty space and void, 845-l.\nManifestations of God received the germ of His creations, 559-l.\nManifestations of Man and the Church were twelve, 560-u.\nManifestations of the Eons were the Word and Life, 560-u.\nManifestations of the numerations potentially in Kether, 756-u.\nManifestations of the Word and Life were Man and the Church, 560-u.\nManifold and particulars evolved from the One General source, 765-m.\nManilius sings of the invisible and potent Soul of Nature, 668-u.\nMankind flowed into India, China, Persia, Arabia, Phoenicia, 598-m.\nMankind held in pledge by the principle of Evil until ransomed, 567-l.\nMantras' idea asserted and developed in the Upanischadas, 672-l.\nMarats in period of convulsion, 30-l.\nMarcion, the Gnostic, says concerning the Soul--, 287-m.\nMarcosians taught that Deity produced by His words the Logos, 560-m.\nMarcus, the disciple of Valentinus, spun the idea of a Word into\n  subtile details, 56l-m.\nMarius in period of convulsion, 30-l.\nMark, in the shape of a fish, used by early Christians as a pledge\n  of friendship, 547-l.\nMarriage of heaven and earth sung by Virgil and Columella, 658-l.\nMarriage of man and woman an image of the union of Nature with herself,\n  656-l.\nMarriage represented by the number five, which reproduces itself, 634-u.\nMars gives the Soul valor, enterprise, impetuosity, as it passes\n  through--, 439-m.\nMars represents Force, 727-l.\nMars the name of the fifth gate of the ladder; material, copper, 414-m.\nMars: the religious Mysteries of the Gauls were called the School of,\n  625-u.\n\"Marseillaise,\" value of, to revolutionary France, 92-m.\nMartin Luther: anti-papal doctrines written previous to, 95-l.\nMary and Joseph, parents of Jesus, to whom the Word had united itself,\n  564-l.\nMasaniello's fall referred to, 33-m.\nMason a votary of Liberty and Justice, 156-u.\nMason at first entrance assumes new duties, 176-l.\nMason deceived who thinks there is nothing to be done in Masonry, 185-l.\nMason, definition of, 219-l.\nMason, duties of, 219-l.\nMason, duties of, if he wishes to imitate the Master Khurum, 116-m.\nMason entitled to be called a perfect Elu; when--, 228-l.\nMason, good, does good naturally and because he longs to, 163-m.\nMason has not lived in vain, when--, 155-m.\nMason held by his promises to a purer life, to toleration, charity,\n  generosity, 726-l.\nMason, honest business dealings of a, 116-118.\nMason, moral courage of a, fostered and encouraged, 154-u.\nMason must be convinced that he has a soul capable of progressive\n  development, 855-u.\nMason not only a moralist and philosopher, but a soldier, 578-u.\nMason of nobler mould reaches a reward through pain and work, 229-m.\nMason, precepts to be followed by, 185-m.\nMason required to kneel only in prayer or to receive Knighthood, 326-l.\nMason should assume the title of a \"lover of wisdom\", 691-l.\nMason should be--, 113-m.\nMason should be humble and modest before God, 338-u.\nMason should be satisfied there is a real God, infinitely wise, 338-l.\nMason should have no alliance with impractical theorists, 338-m.\nMason should live while he lives and enjoy life, 345-l.\nMason should steer away from vain philosophies, 338-u.\nMason should treat his brother who goes astray with charity, 133-m.\nMason, sympathy is the great distinguishing characteristic of a, 176-m.\nMason, that all men shall form one family is the hope of the, 233-u.\nMason: the only good Mason is--, 162-u.\nMason, the true, 27-l.\nMason, the True, is a Philosopher; his aims as such, 325-u.\nMason, thoughtful, looks on fallen beings and offenses as solemn things,\n  132-m.\nMason to look beyond calamity to the end that rises bright, 181-m.\nMason, to sow that others may reap is the true office of a, 317-m.\nMasonic belief in--, 220-l.\nMasonic beliefs, effects of, 195-l.\nMasonic Brotherhood made possible by the Royal Secret, 861-l.\nMasonic burial, eulogies at, 187-m.\nMasonic citizenship creates a new bond, 220-m.\nMasonic Creed, Believe, Hope, be Charitable, 531-u.\nMasonic culture, to find sublime devotion a part of, 192-u.\nMasonic Degrees cheapened, overdone pomp and display due to Anti-Masons,\n  814-m.\nMasonic doctrine in religious Truths, 576-l.\nMasonic doctrine that God is One; that His Thought--, 576-l.\nMasonic duties, first of, 137-u.\nMasonic idea of God and his creations and acts, 524-l.\nMasonic ideas in some measure analogous to those of Plato and the\n  Gnostics, 250-m.\nMasonic implements used symbolically, 787-m.\nMasonic juror, position to be taken by the, 135-u.\nMasonic Knight must devote himself to the worship of Truth, 579-m.\nMasonic Light, meaning of, 287-m.\nMasonic Lodge should resemble a bee hive, 138-m.\nMasonic lodge, teachings inculcated in a, 213-l.\nMasonic Lodge, what it can do, 173-m.\nMasonic Lodges, ceremonies explained in, 186-m.\nMasonic Lodges, great problems and useful instruction in, 186-m.\nMasonic lodges should be temples of knowledge, 170-l.\nMasonic moral code more extensive than that developed by philosophy,\n  726-m.\nMasonic morality that of the primitive religions, 541-m.\nMasonic obligations a contract with every other brother, 726-m.\nMasonic obligations; mature and effect of, 726-m.\nMasonic obligations taken upon the Compass, Square, Books, 854-m.\nMasonic Order, name of, titles and degrees, not known in the past, 207-l.\nMasonic philosophical Cross an image of generative power, 771-l.\nMasonic philosophy and morality; the True Word of a Master, 727-u.\nMasonic secret manifests itself without speech, 218-l.\nMasonic secret partially revealed in Apprentice Degree, 219-u.\nMasonic sense, religious tendency in the, 212-l.\nMasonic studies, true objects of, 25-u.\nMasonic symbolism of the three great lights, 202-u.\nMasonic symbols become lessons of wisdom when understood, 597-m.\nMasonic teachings concerning a life of action, 243-m.\nMasonic Titles, qualified to enlighten should be the wearers of, 186-l.\nMasonic Trinity: the Universal Soul; Thought in the Soul; the Word,\n  575-l.\nMasonic True Word finds a meaning in the ineffable name of Deity, 697-m.\nMasonic unbeliefs, effects of, 196-u.\nMasonic work along charitable and educational lines, 186-u.\nMasonic work yet to be done, 187-l.\nMasonry, a Sphinx nearly buried in the sands, 819-m.\nMasonry a struggle toward the Light of Virtue, Manliness, Liberty,\n  Intelligence, 32-u.\nMasonry, a succession of allegories and lessons in morality and\n  philosophy, 106-u.\nMasonry acknowledges the good and true in all creeds, 718-l.\nMasonry adopted St. John, the Evangelist, and John the Baptist, 818-u.\nMasonry an imperfect image of the Ancient Mysteries, 624-l.\nMasonry and Hermetic philosophy contain the Ternary, 791-l.\nMasonry and philosophy have the same object, 325-u.\nMasonry and the French Revolution, 24-m.\nMasonry apart from all sects and creeds, same everywhere, 153-m.\nMasonry approves or disapproves of--, 161.\nMasonry assumes the mask of Stone Masonry, 24-m.\nMasonry believes Evil will be overcome finally, but does not determine\n  how, 525-m.\nMasonry believes that ills and suffering are means to purify the heart,\n  718-m.\nMasonry believes the Truth in every creed, 525-l.\nMasonry belongs to no one creed or school, 311-l.\nMasonry, Blue, as at present, not traceable earlier than 1700 A.D, 208-u.\nMasonry but qualifiedly identical with the Mysteries, 624-l.\nMasonry can do much if each Mason does his share, 175-m.\nMasonry can not cease laboring for social progress, 188-u.\nMasonry, chief object of, 137-u.\nMasonry, chief obstacles to the success of, 237-m.\nMasonry constantly warring against the evil principle, 221-m.\nMasonry: De Molai said to have instituted an occult, Hermetic,\n  Scottish, 820-l.\nMasonry declines to dogmatize in the details of faith or religion, 576-u.\nMasonry, degeneration of; simplicity of former organization, 325-m.\nMasonry defined; its purposes, essence, spirit, stated, 854-m.\nMasonry denies the right of any man to assume the prerogative of Deity,\n  161-u.\nMasonry, device of; motto of, 220-l.\nMasonry, devotees of all religions accepted by, 226-u.\nMasonry does not exist where there is strife and hatred, 124-u.\nMasonry does not meddle with the subtleties of philosophy, 525-u.\nMasonry, dogma of, 220-l.\nMasonry enforces the lessons of Him who died on the Cross, 221-m.\nMasonry engaged in a crusade against--, 237-m.\nMasonry forced by despotism and superstition to invent symbols, 221-l.\nMasonry, forms, as at present not the same as in past ages of, 207-l.\nMasonry, foundation and superstructure, 23-m.\nMasonry founded on the philosophy known and practiced by Solomon, 785-l.\nMasonry gathers the Truths of the old religions and philosophies, 275.\nMasonry, Great Apostle of Peace, Harmony, Good Will, Liberty,.\n  Equality, Fraternity, 112-l.\nMasonry grows through the wreck of empires, 315-l.\nMasonry has appropriated the Solstices and Sts. John, 595-m.\nMasonry has become a science, 540-m.\nMasonry has developed the advantages to be reaped from Mysteries, 540-m.\nMasonry has eternal duties, 20-l.\nMasonry has helped cast down some idols from their pedestals, 95-l.\nMasonry has her mission to perform, 311-l.\nMasonry has preserved the Divine Truth given to the first men, 136-m.\nMasonry hopes and longs for the elevation of mankind, 154-m.\nMasonry in England \"purged\" from revolutionary ideas, 50-u.\nMasonry in France gave as its secret Equality and Liberty, 50-u.\nMasonry in heart traceable centuries previous to Solomon, 208-u.\nMasonry, in the higher degrees, contains the Hermetic science, in.\n  certain symbols, 840-l.\nMasonry, inactivity and superficiality of, 150--.\nMasonry invites all men of all religions to war against wrong, 311-l.\nMasonry is a continual struggle toward the light, 223-u.\nMasonry is a Worship in which all civilized men may unite, 526-u.\nMasonry is continual effort to exalt the nobler nature over the ignoble,\n  813-m.\nMasonry is not a religion, 161-m.\nMasonry is philanthropic, 221-u.\nMasonry is philosophical because--, 221-m.\nMasonry is the apotheosis of Work, 340-u.\nMasonry is the great Peace Society of the world, 124-m.\nMasonry is the subjugation of the Human that is in Man by the Divine,\n  854-l.\nMasonry is the universal morality suitable to every man, 161-l.\nMasonry is work and the laboring man the peer of any, 242-m.\nMasonry is Worship; declaration in Apprentice Degree, 219-u.\nMasonry, labors of, that excite zeal, 138-m.\nMasonry labors to equilibrate in us the Human and the Divine, 860-l.\nMasonry labors to improve the social order by--, 219-u.\nMasonry leaves each to the practice of his own religion, 226-m.\nMasonry leaves to others the inquiry into methods and creeds, 524-525.\nMasonry: Man is an intelligent and free being, the fifth Truth of, 534-l.\nMasonry marches on towards the day when Evil is overcome, 287-l.\nMasonry, morality and virtue the bases of, 185-u.\nMasonry, multiplication of Degrees and additional ceremonials in, 326-u.\nMasonry must do all in its power to inform and protect the people, 180-m.\nMasonry, need for activity in its labors, 93-m.\nMasonry neither a political nor a religious sect, 220-l.\nMasonry not a cold metaphysical proposition, 331-u\nMasonry not for cold souls and narrow minds, 138-m.\nMasonry not infallible; should not dictate what others should believe,\n  642-m.\nMasonry not \"speculative,\" but experimental, 149-m.\nMasonry now retains its ancient symbols, 221-l.\nMasonry, object of, 220-l.\nMasonry: Occult science of the Magi found in the enigmas of the\n  high degrees of, 839-m.\nMasonry, or Free or Frank-Masonry, 207-l.\nMasonry ordained to bestow manhood, science, philosophy, 25-u.\nMasonry, orders of architecture representing divisions of, 202-u.\nMasonry perpetuates a Truth in imparting the True Word, 642-l.\nMasonry philanthropic, philosophical, progressive, 220-l.\nMasonry prescribed, dates, and by whom, 50-m.\nMasonry properly expounded is the interpretation of nature, philosophy\n  and--, 625-m.\nMasonry, questions concerning doings in, 185-l.\nMasonry recognizes the important position of necessity, 154-u.\nMasonry reiterates the maxims of the philosophers, 221-m.\nMasonry reiterates the moral precepts of all religions, 718-l.\nMasonry rejects no religious belief; is of no one religion, 524.\nMasonry, religion and philosophy of, 275.\nMasonry represents the Good principle and its prototypes, 221-m.\nMasonry requires every man to do something, 173-u.\nMasonry requires nothing impracticable, 172-l.\nMasonry resorted to by the Alchemists who invented Degrees, 731-u.\nMasonry reverences all reformers, but does not define their Divinity,\n  525-l.\nMasonry reveres the character of the Great Master, 718-721.\nMasonry same today as at the birth of the race, 153-m.\nMasonry seeks to be the beneficent guide in the Progress towards.\n  Freedom, 95-m.\nMasonry seeks to ennoble common life, 350-l.\nMasonry stands for the nobility of Labor, 343-l.\nMasonry, study and reflection necessary for an understanding of, 107-m.\nMasonry, successor of the Mysteries, teaches by symbols, 22-l.\nMasonry symbolized and taught by the Compass and Square, 854-m.\nMasonry, sympathies of, are with a people striving to be free, 154-m.\nMasonry sympathises and inculcates respect for labor, 340-u.\nMasonry taught by the Balance, the symbol of all Equilibrium, 854-m.\nMasonry taught by the Cross, symbol of devotedness and self-sacrifice,\n  854-m.\nMasonry taught to the Knight by the Swords, symbols of Honor and Duty,\n  854-m.\nMasonry, traditions and symbols of, antedates Egypt, 311-l.\nMasonry, teachings of, eminently practical, 138-l.\nMasonry, teachings of; where learned, 316-u.\nMasonry teaches Liberty, Equality, Fraternity, 23-m.\nMasonry teaches that all actions are foreseen by God, 239-m.\nMasonry teaches that all Power is delegated for the good of the people,\n  155-l.\nMasonry teaches that every idler should engage in some labor, 343-l.\nMasonry teaches that God is a Paternal Being, 239-u.\nMasonry teaches that God is, of necessity, good, 717-l.\nMasonry teaches that it is better to love than to hate, 813-u.\nMasonry teaches that the Present is our scene of action, 139-m.\nMasonry teaches that the pursuits of this life tend to--, 211-l.\nMasonry teaches that the soul of man is an emanation, 239-l.\nMasonry teaches the old primitive Truths, 161-l.\nMasonry teaches the rights, duties and interests of men, 25-u.\nMasonry teaches the soul of man is made for virtue, 239-l.\nMasonry teaches the wisdom of Plato and Socrates, 221-m.\nMasonry teaches Toleration and rebukes abuse of power, 74-l.\nMasonry teaches truths written by the finger of God on the heart, 139-u.\nMasonry teaches us to appreciate this life and world, 142-u.\nMasonry teaches we are not all mortal; that the Spirit is our Very Self,\n  852-l.\nMasonry: that good men are tending to the realm of Perfection\n  is the one great Truth of, 538-u.\nMasonry: that the Justice, Wisdom and Mercy of God are infinite\n  is the ninth Truth of, 537-u.\nMasonry: that the laws of the Universe are those of motion, etc.,\n  is the eighth Truth of, 536-m.\nMasonry: the absoluteness of moral truth, the fourth Truth of, 534-u.\nMasonry the actual Worker, the Toiler, 346-l.\nMasonry the child of the Kabalah and Essenism together, 818-u.\nMasonry: the history of Philosophy is the history of, 540-m.\nMasonry: the impulse which directs to right conduct, third Truth of,\n  533-m.\nMasonry the interpreter of the true knowledge of God, 209-u.\nMasonry the lineal descendant of the higher science of Egypt, 253-l.\nMasonry: the necessity of practicing the moral truths, the sixth Truth\n  of, 535-m.\nMasonry, the practical object of, 218-m.\nMasonry, the primitive Christianity organized into, 325-l.\nMasonry, the universal character of, 276-l.\nMasonry the universal, eternal, immutable religion, 219-m.\nMasonry: to be charitable in the broadest sense, the seventh Truth of,\n  536-u.\nMasonry to exert itself in the cause of humanity, 27-l.\nMasonry, to live happily we must embrace the great truths of, 196-m.\nMasonry took the place of the school of Pythagoras, 625-u.\nMasonry Trusts, Believes, Waits, 526-u.\nMasonry under the banner of Charity preserves religious feeling, 138-u.\nMasonry, usefulness of, 113-u.\nMasonry, what constitutes, 207-l.\nMasonry within must be Morality without, 162-l.\nMasonry, work and mission, 152-155.\nMasonry, work is the duty of 185-l.\nMasonry writes on its banners its principles displayed in every country,\n  221-l.\nMasonry's best friends and worst enemies were the Anti-Masons, 814-m.\nMasonry's creed that taught by nature and reason, 718-l.\nMasonry's examples and teachings neglected outside the Lodge, 151-m.\nMasonry's obligations little regarded; political elections; empty pomp,\n  807-m.\nMasons accept the views of religion and duty that are--, 226-m.\nMasons and Masonry true to their mission bring great results, 175-l.\nMason's belief tends to the highest eminence in virtue, 228-l.\nMason's belief that his individual good is in God's consideration, 228-l.\nMason's belief that pain is ordained for his chastening, 228-m.\nMasons' belief that sorrows are the result of the operation of laws,\n  228-m.\nMasons believe in great minds in all ages speaking by inspiration, 225-u.\nMasons believe that God has arranged this world with a plan, 225-m.\nMason's business is to read the book of Nature, 216-u.\nMason's conception and belief in God, 224-l.\nMasons form uncharitable opinions of Masons, 186-u.\nMasons ignorant of the Clavicles and their contents and the Pantacle\n  of Solomon, 789-u.\nMasons, in all religions and countries are found good, 162-l.\nMasons, knowledge made known to Perfect, 207-l.\nMasons may help deepen the channel in which God's justice runs, 838-l.\nMasons may lawfully and earnestly desire a fortune when--, 346-u.\nMasons-Militant of Zorobabel the model of the Templars, 816-m.\nMasons, not tolerant of religious and political opinions of Masons, 186-u.\nMasons of old concealed important points of their Art under hieroglyphic\n  characters, 785-l.\nMasons' relations to God, 227-l.\nMason's rule is to speak of the virtues and be silent as to the vices,\n  337-l.\nMasons should do what is possible and practicable and enforce justice,\n  838-l.\nMasons still go to Law, unnecessarily, with Masons, 185-l.\nMasons taught square of wisdom, level of humility, plumb of justice, 641-l.\nMasons taught to--, 221-u.\nMasons venerate in the triangle, the mystery of the Sacred Triad, 631-m.\nMasons who comprehend it are ministers of the universal religion, 219-m.\nMason's Word, the true knowledge of God, 209-u.\nMasoretic points invented after beginning of our era, 205-m.\nMass of the Catechumens and that of the Faithful parts of Christian\n  Mysteries, 541-l.\nMass: the celebration of the Mysteries of Mithras, 541-l.\nMaster a symbol of the Redeemer when bringing candidate to light, 639-m.\nMaster, Masonry reveres the character of the Great, 718-721.\nMaster Mason studies the animal kingdom, symbolized by Maeh, 632-u.\n\"Master of Life,\" to the ancients, was the Supreme Deity, 13-u.\nMaster of Light and Life, Sun and Moon, symbols of, 13-m.\nMaster of the Lodge and Wardens, duty of, 13-m.\nMaster of the Lodge substituted for Mercury as one of the Lights, 411-u.\nMaster of the Royal Secret, Sublime Prince of the Royal Secret,\n  32d Degree, 839.\nMaster of the Symbolic Lodge, 20th Degree, duty of a, 325-333.\nMaster, place of Light where the name of Deity hangs over the, 287-l.\nMaster, Third Degree, 62-u.\nMaster works with Chalk, Charcoal and a vessel of Clay, 548-m.\nMaster's Compass has both the points above; symbolizing the\n  rule of the spiritual, 854-l.\n\"Materia Prima\" of Valentinus contains an Hermetic symbol, 850-m.\nMaternal agency, the subjective world, generally a phantasm, 673-m.\nMaterial and Spiritual natures in equilibrium; Light and Darkness, 764-l.\nMaterial existence evolved from the Pythagorean Monad, 675-l.\nMaterial, result of seeking the mere, 12-m.\nMaterial the element of communion between man and God, 714-u.\nMaterialism and Pantheism avoided by an independent mind, 677-m.\nMatter and mind dual from the idea of an independent mind, 677-l.\nMatter and Spirit originally were in Deity, 700-m.\nMatter: categorical questions concerning, 648.\nMatter created by God by a thought; after matter, worlds and man, 609-m.\nMatter dead to the world revivified by vegetation of the Tree of\n  Life, 786-l.\nMatter deemed the female amongst the ancients, 700-m.\nMatter existed eternal like the Spiritual Principle, 563-u.\nMatter is not eternal; God the only original Existence, 701-l.\nMatter makes no encroachment on the Divine Life, 556-u\nMatter not coexistent with Deity, 700-m\nMatter: one of the two eternal principles is Darkness and Primitive,\n  567-l.\nMatter opposed to the beneficent force which gives it organization,\n  664-u.\nMatter possesses virtues, qualities and powers, 414-l.\nMatter represented by nine, or three times three; symbolism of nine\n  to four, 633-m.\nMatter, the Mother, the receptacle and place of generation, one of a\n  Triad, 548-l.\nMatter the origin of Satan and his demons, 567-l.\nMatter, the passive principle, reproductive power, one of the Egyptian\n  Triads, 548-l.\nMatter, the principle of all the passions, etc, 520-m.\nMatter, when operated on by the Word, became the Universe, 607-l.\nMaximin, horrors of despotism under, 27-u.\nMaxims of ancient philosophers and religions, 167-170.\nMaximus Taurinus defines the tessera as a sign and symbol, 548-u.\nMaya, Mother of All, sprung from Brahm, the Source of All, 849-l.\nMeaning and pronunciation of Ineffable Name lost to all but a few, 700-l.\nMeaning of the Active and Passive powers of male and female\n  principles, 701-l.\nMeaning of the True Word of a Mason involves its proper pronunciation,\n  697-m.\nMedia which manifest the First Cause are the Sephiroth, 761-u.\nMediaeval occult associations brought into disrepute by the symbol\n  of Baphomet, 779-l.\nMediator, a name given by the Persians to the Sun, Archimagus, 612-m.\nMedical science has made great strides, but plague and pestilence\n  destroy yet, 811..\nMelampus introduced the veneration of the generative organs from\n  Egypt, 656-m.\nMeliton, Bishop of Sardis, says that the mind is God's likeness, 857-l.\nMen are ever on the side of justice and humanity, 834-l.\nMen are the instruments of God's principles, 838-m.\nMen, as a mass, are looking for what is just, 834-u.\nMen converted from the worship of Ahriman by prophets, 613-u.\nMen, different effects of the business of the world on, 194-l.\nMen do not perceive the worth of their minds, 200-m.\nMen, good in general, but bad in particular, 151-l.\nMen, good, prone to pass by fallen brother with lofty step, 133-u.\nMen, greatest, not acceptable to the mass of mankind, 37-m.\nMen in every country of the old heroic strain and stamp, 805-l.\nMen, in literature, look for practical justice, 834-l.\nMen often gloat and exult over the faults of neighbors, 133-m.\nMen, Temples not built with hands the meeting place of primitive, 277-u.\nMen tend to become distinguished for other than heroic, knightly\n  deeds, 805-m.\nMen, the automata of Providence, used to effect that they do not\n  dream of, 814-m.\nMen, the great works of man due to individual, 238-u.\nMen's difference in faculty of communication, 200-m.\nMen's respect for themselves, measure of, 200-m.\nMenander speaks of God, Chance, Intelligence, as undistinguishable,\n  694-m.\nMendes: the universal agent represented by hermaphroditic goat of, 734-u.\nMenou, the Hindu lawgiver, adored the divine light and, 609-m.\nMental principle instead of a physical one deified by man, 652-u.\nMercury fecundated by Sulphur becoming the Master and regenerator\n  of Salt, explained, 778-u.\nMercury gives the Soul the faculty of expressing and enunciating, 439-m.\nMercury in philosophy represents personal aptitude and labor, 790-u.\nMercury, one of the great symbols of the Alchemists, 57-u.\nMercury, personified as Hermanubis in Egypt, given a dog's head, 779-l.\nMercury represents Prudence, 727-l.\nMercury, Salt, Sulphur, but accessories of the Great Work, 777-m.\nMercury the constant companion and counsellor of Isis or Virgo, 507-m.\nMercury, the name of the fourth gate of the ladder; material iron, 414-m.\nMercury, with the Hermetics, corresponds with the Air and Water, 773-l.\nMercy conjoined with Judgment and the Divine Mercies sustain\n  the Universe, 800-u.\nMercy or Compassion mediating between Benignity and Judicial Rigor, 799-u.\nMerit and demerit law absolute, 706-u.\nMerit is the natural right which we have to be rewarded, 723-l.\nMeru, pyramids and artificial hills were imitations of the mountain, 234-u.\nMesmer's partial guess at the great force known to the ancients, 734-u.\nMetals were deemed to be seven in number and assigned to a planet, 728-l.\nMetals which contain the principles of the great work are six, 788-u.\nMetaphysical ideas of the Mysteries represented by symbols, 385-u.\nMetaphysical name of Deity not understood by common people, 700-l.\nMetatron, the Cherub, one of the Chiefs of the Kabalistic Angels, 784-l.\nMeung, Jean de, completed Lorris' Roman de Rose, 823-u.\nMexican legends probably carried by the Phoenician voyagers, 594-l.\nMichael and his Angels fought against the Dragon, 501-u.\nMichael, the face of the Lion, on the South and right hand with\n  Yod and Water, 798-m.\nMicrocosm, a little world, a Pythagorean name for man, 667-l.\nMicroprosopos afterwards raised to the Aziluthic sphere, 793-m.\nMicroprosopos and Malakoth, Regnum, are jointly called man, 794-l.\nMicroprosopos composed of the six Numerations, 793-m.\nMicroprosopos configured in the form of the Most Holy, 794-u.\nMicroprosopos first occupied the place afterwards filled by the\n  world, Briah, 793-m.\nMicroprosopos formed like Macroprosopos, but without Kether, the\n  will, 793-l.\nMicroprosopos given three brains by Light from above when the\n  letter He was born, 794-l.\nMicroprosopos has for wife Malakoth, who is behind him; explanation,\n  799-l.\nMicroprosopos invested with a portion of the Divine Intellectual Power,\n  793-l.\nMicroprosopos is called Alohim, 795-u.\nMicroprosopos is second garment with respect to the Elder Most Holy,\n  795-u.\nMicroprosopos issued forth back to back and yet cohering, 795-l.\nMicroprosopos issued from the Father and was intermingled with the\n  Mother, 794-l.\nMicroprosopos, like the letter Vau in the letter He; without a head,\n  794-l.\nMicroprosopos, or Seir Aupin, produced by conjunction of Vau and He,\n  793-u.\nMicroprosopos represented under the form of man, 793-m.\nMicroprosopos, the second Universal, speaks in the first person, Ani, I,\n  793-l.\nMicroprosopos was the beginning, the numerations proceeding to act,\n  795-u.\nMiddle ground between Atheism and Pantheism, 672-u.\nMidgard Serpent sunk beneath the sea by Odin, 499-u.\nMilitary power, independent of the Rule, an armed tyranny, 3-l.\nMilky Way or Galaxy crosses the Zodiac at tropics of Cancer and\n  Capricorn, 437-l.\nMilky Way, the pathway of souls, passes near the Equinoxes, 413-l.\nMilton expresses the Hebraic doctrine concerning Light and God, 739-l.\nMimansa interprets the meaning of the Manthras, 672-l.\nMimansa proclaims \"Nothing was but Mind\", 672-l.\nMind: all things directed, known, seen by the Supreme External, 677-u.\nMind and matter dual from the idea of an independent mind, 677-l.\nMind early conceived the Unity of Nature and a pervading Spiritual\n  Essence, 687-m.\nMind happy in proportion to its fidelity and wisdom, 195-u.\nMind has supreme empire over all things, 677-u.\nMind, in metaphysics, can not advance beyond self-deification, 678-u.\nMind is all which man permanently is, 200-u.\nMind is God's likeness, according to Meliton, 857-l.\nMind may believe and know that which is unexplainable, 569-u.\nMind picture of God, if false, as much an idol as a wooden one, 693-m.\nMind the Macrocosmos, the Universal Organism, Pooroosha, 673-u.\nMind the material as well as the efficient cause, 673-u.\nMind the self conscious power of thought extended to the Universe, 677-u.\nMind the Universal Element; One God; Great Soul; Mahaatma, 673-u.\nMind the web and the weaver of the world, 673-u.\nMind, Virtue, Heaven, Immortality, exist in the thought of a, 201-l.\nMind's misery principally its own fault, 195-u.\nMind's universal medicine is mathematical and practical Truth, 773-m.\nMineral Kingdom symbolized by Tub, studied by the Apprentice, 632-u.\nMinerva, a woman in armor, born of the brain of Jove, 849-l.\n\"Minerva Munde,\" attributed to Hermes' Trismegistus, 790-m.\nMinerva of the Greeks was the Isis of Egypt, 380-m.\nMinucius Felix, a lawyer of Rome, defends the secrecy of Christianity,\n  547-m.\nMiracles are the natural effects of exceptional causes, 735-l.\nMiracles effected by the absolute in reason and will, 736-m.\nMiracles in the phenomena of the Universe, 526-527.\nMiracles of Moses performed in virtue of the name engraved on his rod,\n  621-m.\nMiracles wrongly regarded as effects without causes, 735-l.\nMisery, principle of, not an evil one, 181-u.\nMithraic cave displayed the Zodiacal and other constellations and--,\n  413-l.\nMithraic feast day the 25th of December, 587-m.\nMithraic initiations practiced in caves; a ladder erected, 233-l.\nMithraic initiations required the death of a human victim, 424-u.\nMithraic Initiations used a seven-step ladder, 851-l.\nMithraic ladder, Faber's opinion of the, 234-l.\nMithraic Mysteries, 10-m.\nMithraic Mysteries belonged to Persia; description, 424-u.\nMithraic Mysteries connected with the Heavenly Bodies, 507-l.\nMithraic Mysteries flourished in the Roman Empire, 424-u.\nMithraic Mysteries, gates marked at points of the Zodiac, 10-l.\nMithraic Mysteries, ladder in the ceremony of initiation, 11-u.\nMithras a symbol of the Sun, the Archimagus, 612-m.\nMithras, a Tau cross inscribed on the forehead of the initiate of, 505-u.\nMithras adored under different names by different peoples, 587-l.\nMithras bearing a sword, seated on a Bull presides over the Equinoxes,\n  413-l.\nMithras by reason of his death and sufferings secured salvation, 406-l.\nMithras: celebration and ceremonies of the Mysteries of, 541-l.\nMithras created and at the end will bring all before God as a sacrifice,\n  613-l.\nMithras dispels darkness and conquers death, 613-u.\nMithras, Mystic Egg appears in the Mysteries of, 403-u.\nMithras not only light, but intelligence, 613-u.\nMithras, on 25th December was celebrated the birth of, 406-l.\nMithras, symbol of the Sun, 77-m.\nMithras, the \"eye of Ormuzd,\" strikes down the dragon foe, 612-l.\nMithras, the rock-born hero, heralded the Sun's return in Spring, 592-m.\nMithras, the Sun God, eclipsed Ormuzd himself, 257-m.\nMithras, the Sun God of the Persians, born in a cave at Winter, 587-m.\nMithras, the Sun of Spring and God of Generation, seated on the Bull,\n  478-l.\nMitra and Uschas are Medic as well as Zend Deities, 602-u.\nMitra, the Friend, a Vedic Sun God, 602-l.\nMohammed, doctrines of, the best the Arabs were fitted to receive, 38-u.\nMohammedans believe in a secret name of Deity, 621-l.\nMolai, de, said to have created four Metropolitan Lodges, 820-l.\nMolai, de, said to have organized an occult, Hermetic, Scottish Masonry,\n  820-l.\nMolai, Jacques de, the last Grand Master of the Templars, burned, 820-l.\nMoral rules to be beneficial must be practical, 830-m.\nMoloch or Malek, as applied to Deity, represents--, 208-m.\nMoloch, significance of passing children, through the fires of, 205-l.\nMonad or unit, a figure of the cube, 5-l.\nMonad of Pythagoras the source of material existence, 675-l.\nMonad was male and represented the creative energy, 631-u.\nMonastery, fraternity and equality, but no liberty in a, 23-m.\nMonotheism declaims; against the making of gods in human form, 678-m.\nMonotheism with Pantheistic tendencies the spirit of the Indian\n  Vedas, 672-l.\nMonuments built to the world's patriots, 836-m.\nMoon a mass of softer light than the Sun, 444-u.\nMoon, ancients observed the regularity of the, 444-u.\nMoon and Sun emblems of the two Divine sexes, 305-l.\nMoon and Sun impress a fecundating force, 469-m.\nMoon appeared in Heavens principally visible at night, 443-u.\nMoon becomes Isis, the wife of Osiris, 447-l.\nMoon believed to have fertilized the Nile by reason of her communication\n  with the Sun, 477-l.\nMoon communicates the force of generation and growth, 439-m.\nMoon considered to have great influence on vegetation and animals, 469-u.\nMoon, Egyptians assigned the demiourgic or creative force to the, 469-u.\nMoon gave activity to universal vegetation, 476-m.\nMoon originally masculine and the Sun feminine, 700-u.\nMoon, once in 18 years and a fraction the new Sun coincides with\n  the first New, 453-m.\nMoon represents Hope, 727-l.\nMoon, symbolism of the, 13-u.\nMoon, the cone of shadow which produces night ends above the, 468-l.\nMoon the name of the sixth gate of the ladder; material, silver, 414-m.\nMoon the passive cause relatively with Osiris; the active with earth,\n  477-m.\nMoon, the passive portion of nature, offered by the female, 656-u.\nMoon united with Osiris in the spring and received the principle of\n  generation, 469-u.\nMoon when Sun and Moon opened the year in Taurus, the Festival\n  of the New, 451-u.\nMoon with its silvery lustre follows the Sun, 787-u.\nMoral, all the relations of life are, 243-l.\nMoral and Inexorable, combined, personified separately in Zeus, 689-u.\nMoral bonds, result to society of severing, 196-l.\nMoral choice would not exist unless its preferences were determined,\n  695-m.\nMoral convictions of the mind could not deceive if rightly interpreted,\n  693-u.\nMoral existence included in the words; Duty and Hope, 717-m.\nMoral law: categorical questions concerning the, 649-m.\nMoral law has God for its first principle, 725-l.\nMoral law is the obligatory good, 725-u.\nMoral law is universal and necessary, 702-m.\nMoral law of necessity has as an author a being composed of justice\n  and charity, 702-m.\nMoral law springs from God's Wisdom and Essential Justice, 701-l.\nMoral laws are the decisions of Absolute Wisdom and Reason, 737-m.\nMoral laws are the decisions of Wisdom and the Revelations of the\n  Divine, 737-m.\nMoral laws are the enactments of the Divine Will, 737-m.\nMoral maladies of man and society, treatment of, 218-l.\nMoral principles center in a single principle, which is the Good, 702-m.\nMoral sense given as for wise and beneficent purposes, 832-l.\nMoral truth supposes a Being that conceives and constitutes it, 702-u.\nMoral truths necessary to be practiced, the sixth Truth of Masonry,\n  535-m.\nMoral truths are absolute; the fourth Truth of Masonry, 534-u.\nMoral truths as certain as mathematical truths, 721-l.\nMoral truths, as soon as perceived, appear to us the rule of our\n  conduct, 722-u.\nMoral Universe not understandable, 838-u.\nMoral will, new faculty in the development of a child, 192-l.\nMorality a Force; the magnetic attraction of the heart pointing\n  towards Truth and Virtue, 89-m.\nMorality, absolute or divine, comprehended by faith rather than\n  speculation, 695-l.\nMorality as a basis of all religions, 311-l.\nMorality influenced by Sentiment which warms and incites to action,\n  725-m.\nMorality is the recognition of duty, as duty, 717-m.\nMorality of all peoples appear in modern Degrees, 625-m.\nMorality of Masonry similar to that of every pure creed of antiquity,\n  541-m.\nMorality, the Apprentice's grip, fails to raise the candidate, 640-l.\nMorality touches religion, 725-l.\nMordecai Prime Minister at Babylon, 256-u.\nMorning Star, name and emblematic meaning of, 202-m.\nMoses an initiate in the mysteries of Egypt, 253-m.\nMoses assisted in shaping the destinies of the World, 313-u.\nMoses carried Orthodoxy out of Egypt, 843-m.\nMoses closely imitated Egyptian Institutions among the Hebrews, 369-m.\nMoses, effects of the Egyptian education on, 253-l.\nMoses heard God revealed as I Am that which Is, Was, Shall Be, 848-l.\nMoses initiated in the Egyptian Mysteries, 368-l.\nMoses obtained true ideas of Deity in the Mysteries, 208-m.\nMoses purified and re-veiled the dogmas of Magism, 839-l.\nMoses received the name of Deity from God, Ihuh, 697-l.\nMoses received the Name of God in the wilderness; lost through\n  wickedness 621-m.\nMoses received the Law while Aaron made false gods, 206-m.\nMoses recognized the Active and Passive, the Active residing in the\n  Mind 657-l.\nMoses sought for the Cause of All outside that All, 667-m.\nMoses the adopted son of the daughter of Sesostris-Rameses, 253-m.\nMoses, the first dogma of, 443-l.\nMother, Binah, denoting perfect Rigor, averted her face from Hakemah,\n  763-u.\nMother is rigor and severity, impregnated by the Father, produces\n  the brain of Microprosopos, 796-u.\nMother, Matter, passive principle, conceptive power, 87-m.\nMother-night, name given by Goths to Festival of the Winter Solstice,\n  368-u.\nMother: the first emanation of the Eternal Being was a Universal, 602-l\nMotives the special jurisdiction of morality, 244-u.\nMotto of Masonry is--, 220-l.\nMountain of Meru with three peaks a symbol of the Trimurti, 234-m.\nMountain tops chosen as places for sacrifices, 617-l.\nMourning for Osiris extends over forty days, 486-u.\nMovement and Harmony the life of the Universe and Soul alike, 859-l.\nMovement in absolute repose would be a cessation of life, 847-l.\nMovement is the equilibrium of Inertia and Activity, 845-u.\nMultiplying number is eleven because of the possession of two units,\n  629-u.\nMurderers of Khir-Om symbolizes Pilate, Caiaphas, Judas, 641-l.\nMusic of the spheres the image of the harmony of creation, 250-u.\n\"Music of the Spheres,\" understanding of meaning aided by Tetractys,\n  88-m.\nMusical notes of the octave correspond to the seven Sephiroth, 727-m.\nMysteries a Sacred Drama, subjects of, 64-m.\nMysteries a series of symbols, 371-l.\nMysteries, aids of gloom, secrecy, mystery taken advantage of in the,\n  383-m.\nMysteries, all persons were initiated into the lesser, 359-m.\nMysteries, Aristotle, Socrates and others accused of violations of\n  laws of the, 384-l.\nMysteries at first moral and political, but became more religious, 624-l.\nMysteries, beneficent modification in religion due to the, 373-u.\nMysteries carried to every country; non-interference with local beliefs,\n  624-m.\nMysteries celebrated at Autumnal Equinox, why, 404-l.\nMysteries celebrated at the Temple of Osiris at Philae, on the Nile,\n  360-u.\nMysteries celebrated in the Spring, Vernal Equinox, 419-m.\nMysteries change from religious to moral and political, 354-m.\nMysteries changed by the religious systems of the several countries,\n  625-u.\nMysteries civilized savage hordes; was greatest of benefits, 380-l.\nMysteries closed against Nero and Constantine for grave crimes, 397-m.\nMysteries connected with astronomy and physics, 414-l.\nMysteries contained lessons calculated to elevate and improve. 355-l.\nMysteries continued pure for ages, but ultimately became degraded, 358-l.\nMysteries, decline of the Roman Empire attributed to a neglect of\n  the, 360-m.\nMysteries degenerated owing to the arrogance of the Priests, 360-m.\nMysteries develop the origin of the Soul, condition, destination, fate,\n  418-u.\nMysteries, development and growth of the, 354-m.\nMysteries, Dionusos one with Hermes and heroes of other, 357-u.\nMysteries, distinction between Greater and Lesser, 432-u.\nMysteries, doctrine of One God, theory of death and eternity, etc.,\n  taught in the, 359-m.\nMysteries, doctrines and representations of the, 374-m.\nMysteries, doctrines of immortality and retribution taught in the, 392-u.\nMysteries, Egyptian, depicted Osiris, Good, and Typhon, Evil, in\n  conflict, 375-m.\nMysteries, esoteric were the teachings of the Greater, 207-l.\nMysteries explain the descent of Intelligence into matter and return,\n  415-m.\nMysteries forbidden to bastards, slaves, materialists and--, 390-m.\nMysteries, from the Egyptians the Hebrews received their knowledge\n  of the, 375-u.\nMysteries gave Egyptian priests much of their influence, 374-m.\nMysteries' great object was a grand and truly politic one, 382-m.\nMysteries, Grecian, originated by Orpheus, brought from Egypt, 400-m.\nMysteries have same general features and show Egyptian origin, 418.\nMysteries, Heroditus gives reasons for reticence concerning the, 380-m.\nMysteries in many cases derived from the Egyptians, 352-u.\nMysteries in symbolic forms exhibited the One, 357-m.\nMysteries in the lapse of time degenerated and the symbols were\n  misunderstood, 382-l.\nMysteries inculcated a great moral truth veiled with fable, 395-l.\nMysteries, instructions in morals and as to future life given in the,\n  382-u.\nMysteries kept man from lapsing into barbarism, 373-u.\nMysteries, knowledge of hieroglyphics and other information only\n  obtained in the Greater, 359-m.\nMysteries, like Socrates, seek to awaken the ideas already in the\n  mind, 356-m.\nMysteries, like the Symbols of Masonry, are eloquent analogies of\n  Nature, 356-l.\nMysteries, life to the Greeks would be insupportable if deprived of\n  the, 373-m.\nMysteries, male and female were the prominent Deities in the, 377-u.\nMysteries meant to strengthen religion and console men in their\n  sorrows, 378-u.\nMysteries, mode of death varied with the nationality of the different,\n  375-u.\nMysteries modified after leaving Egypt by the habits of the different\n  nations, 624-l.\nMysteries modified by habits of the different nations, 23-u.\nMysteries, morals, sciences, traditions, taught in the, 373-u.\nMysteries, names of the prominent Deities in the different, 377-m.\nMysteries, nature-gods were the Powers revered in the, 354-l.\nMysteries, Nero, after murdering his mother, dared not be present at,\n  353-m.\nMysteries, no arrests, no suits brought, no rival displays during the,\n  434-m.\nMysteries, object of, 382-l.\nMysteries, objects of, were to lead men to piety and--, 381-l.\nMysteries of Apollo celebrated at Delos, provided with a lake, 405-m.\nMysteries of Bakchos described, 420-421.\nMysteries of Bakchos of Oriental origin; worshipped in India, 419-l.\nMysteries of Ceres and Proserpine celebrated at Autumn, 491-m.\nMysteries of Dionusos proscribed impurity, 381-u.\nMysteries of Dionusos taught the Doctrine of Divine Unity, and--, 585-m.\nMysteries of Eleusis, description, officers, symbolism, 411-412.\nMysteries of Eleusis established at Athens in 1423 B.C., 418-u.\nMysteries of Eleusis exhibited the generative organs as symbols, 656-m.\nMysteries of Eleusis, spread of and opinions concerning the, 352-m.\nMysteries of Eleusis swallowed most of the others, 352-m.\nMysteries of God and the Universe are hidden in the Ternary, 791-l.\nMysteries of Greece established by Pythagoras with three degrees, 366-u.\nMysteries of Greece taught that matter existed from all eternity,\n  and--, 400-l.\nMysteries of Isis, processions, description, symbolism, 412.\nMysteries of Isis, similarity to the death of Khur-om, 405-m.\nMysteries of India were divided into four degrees, 361-m.\nMysteries of Ism Abla instruct in the secret name of Deity, 621-l.\nMysteries of Magism have a religious, philosophical and natural\n  signification, 773-u.\nMysteries of Mithra, a cave represented the arrangement of the\n  World, 413-m.\nMysteries of Mithras, a corpse restored to life a part of the ceremony\n  of the, 406-l.\nMysteries of Mithras celebrated in Greece under the name of Bakchos,\n  406-l.\nMysteries of Osiris sought by the most eminent men, 363-u.\nMysteries of Samothrace adored heaven and earth as male and female, 659-u.\nMysteries of the Ancients concealed the occult science of the Ancient\n  Magi, 839-m.\nMysteries of the Christian Gnostics; their secret doctrine, 542-l.\nMysteries of the Christians, 541-547.\nMysteries of the Divine nature are beyond finite comprehension, 306-u.\nMysteries of the Druids conform to those of other nations, 367-u.\nMysteries of the early Christians divided into two Masses, 541-l.\nMysteries of the Goths carried North from the East by Odin, 367-l.\nMysteries of the Indians celebrated in caves and grottos, 361-u.\nMysteries of the Kabala open to those who seek, 772-m.\nMysteries of the Universe are all around us and common, 526-u.\nMysteries, opinions of Cicero and Aristophanes in respect to the, 353-m.\nMysteries, opinions of Pausanias and Aristotle concerning the, 379-m.\nMysteries, opinions of Plato and Epictetus as to the objects of the,\n  353-u.\nMysteries, origin unknown; suppositions concerning, 353-l.\nMysteries originally the beginning of a new life of reason and virtue,\n  359-m.\nMysteries, penalties for violations of the laws and usages of the, 374-l.\nMysteries, pain and sorrow as consequences of sin shadowed forth in,\n  397-u.\nMysteries, Phallus and Cteis as emblems of generation appear in the,\n  401-l.\nMysteries, Plato into philosophy translated the language of the symbols\n  of the, 398-m.\nMysteries possessed a language known only to the initiates, 373-l.\nMysteries practiced in all ancient nations; many claim invention, 353-l.\nMysteries practiced in Athens until the 8th century; in Wales to the\n  12th century, 360-l.\nMysteries, prescription of those not initiated into the, 359-m.\nMysteries preserved their purity up to the time of Cicero, 374-l.\nMysteries, privileges and advantages of Initiates into the, 352-l.\nMysteries probably originated in India teaching primitive Truths, 360-l.\nMysteries, purposes of the ceremonies of the, 383-m.\nMysteries represented by symbols the invisible forces of the Universe,\n  414-l.\nMysteries required purity and elevation of soul in its Initiates, 353-u.\nMysteries revealed by Dante in the Divine Comedy, 822-m.\nMysteries, statements of Cicero, Socrates, Aristides, regarding the,\n  379-l.\nMysteries taught a division of the Universal Cause into an Active\n  and a Passive, 401-m.\nMysteries taught candidates in Druidical initiations, 429-l.\nMysteries taught concerning the Universe and--, 352-l.\nMysteries taught doctrine of the nature of the soul and its longings\n  to return, 436-l.\nMysteries taught how to enfeeble the action of matter on the Soul, 520-l.\nMysteries taught initiates in Indian ceremonies, 428-429.\nMysteries taught the existence of One Great Being, 624-m.\nMysteries taught the incarnation, death, resurrection, etc., of Logos,\n  415-u.\nMysteries taught the study of the perfection of the soul, 520-u.\nMysteries taught true ideas in respect to Deity, 208-m.\nMysteries, teachings and essence of the, 354-l.\nMysteries, the first magistrate of Athens superintended the, 380-u.\nMysteries, the Greater of Eleusinia, ceremonies of initiation into the,\n  394-m.\nMysteries: the invisibility, oneness, infinity of God, the first Truth\n  of the, 533-m.\nMysteries, the legend of the Master's degree a form of that of the, 375-u.\nMysteries, the mythical person uniting the Divine and Human found\n  in all, 356-l.\nMysteries: the Soul of Man is immortal, the second Truth of the, 533-m.\nMysteries, the true spirit and secret doctrines were hidden in Greater,\n  359-m.\nMysteries, those who came short of their duties as men were excluded\n  from the, 391-l.\nMysteries, to inspire men and console them in their misery the object\n  of the, 379-l.\nMysteries, to prove his innocence Antony sought Initiation into the,\n  353-m.\nMysteries treated of God, Man and Nature; Ancient Theosophy, 357-u.\nMysteries, true knowledge of Deity taught by the Greater, 207-l.\nMysteries used by the Priests to extend their power, 360-u.\nMysteries went from Egypt to Phoenicia, thence elsewhere, 363-m.\nMysteries were a Sacred Drama exhibiting--, 355-m.\nMysteries were funereal in character, celebrating the death, etc., of\n  some hero, 375-u.\nMysteries were not closed in the year 364, notwithstanding a law\n  to that effect, 360-u.\nMysteries were the private worships of ancient nations, 352-u.\nMysteries, while slight offenses could be expiated, grave crimes were\n  mortal sins in the, 397-m.\nMysteries widely disseminated; names of some, 352-u.\nMysterii or books of occultation sum up the Sephiroth, 758-u.\nMysterious number is four; it contains the mysteries of nature, 628-m.\nMystery and secrecy used to attract and impress the people, 384-u.\nMystery, Demetrius Phalereus gives definition of the word, 383-l.\nMystery of the Balance, the equilibrium of opposites, 552-m.\nMystery of the Ineffable Name and arrangement of its letters, 700-l.\nMystery of the phenomena of nature are unexplainable to us, 526-530.\nMystery of the world remains, but sufficiently cleared up to inspire\n  confidence, 696-m.\nMythical beings presiding over nature developed into Saints, etc, 653-u.\nMystical religion succeeded mystical philosophy, but in name only, 694-u.\nMythological references to the number seven, 728-l.\nMythologies: Sohar clears up the obscurities of the Ancient, 843-l.\n\nN\n\nName, all ancient nations held the sanctity of the Sacred, 204-l.\nName, Divine, or Creative Word, 204-l.\nName, in exorcising priests the Jews used the Sacred, 262-l.\nName not applied to the Very God in His unmanifested Essence, 849-u.\nName of Deity a sign and confession of our ignorance, 651-l.\nName of Deity communicated by God to Moses, 697-m.\nName of Deity conceals the True Word of a Mason, 697-m.\nName of Deity contained a meaning which was lost, 697-m.\nName of Deity engraven on the triangular plate on the cube teaches--,\n  209-u.\nName of Deity has four letters, three different ones, 761-u.\nName of Deity, Tetractys in the Cabala composed of the letters of the,\n  60-l.\nName of God and God alone existed before the world of vacant space,\n  750-u.\nName of God forgotten when--, 205-l.\nName of God, in the Kabalah, only expresses the human ideal of his\n  divinity, 97-l.\nName of God lost when--, 205-l.\nName of God written in Samaritan characters in Hebrew books, 621-m.\nName of Great God not to be uttered, an article of general belief,\n  619-621-l.\nName of Jehovah given credit for the redemption of the souls, 561-l.\nName of the Kabalists' Idea of God contains all others and all things,\n  98-m.\n\"Name of Truth\" appears in the formula of pneumatical baptism, 561-l.\nName of Yod, He, Vau, He, applied to Deity as manifested in the\n  act of Creation, 849-u.\nName, signification and meaning of the Ineffable, 104-m.\nName: study of the Pentagram led the Magi to a knowledge of the New,\n  842-u.\nName, the summary of all things is the Holy, 793-u.\nName, two Hebrew words appended to the Ineffable, 104-m.\nNames have a natural potency and sanctity according to origin, 620-m.\nNames of Deity met with in all Degrees, 137-u.\nNames of Deity on the Delta are Syrian, Phoenician, Hebrew, 531-l.\nNames of the Hebrew and Greek Deity express abstract existence, 651-l.\nNapoleon reigns because the ablest, 49-u.\nNapoleons follow period of convulsion, 30-l.\nNapoleon's influence on the destinies of France, 313-m.\nNapoleon's injustice exiled him to a rock, a warning to bid men be just,\n  835-m.\nNapthali, the eloquent and agile, has for device Virgo in the domicile\n  of Mercury, 462-u.\nNational Gods' history describes the Sun's career through the seasons,\n  591-m.\nNationalizing of creeds and peoples a tendency of Masonry, 625-l.\nNations, commercialism and territorial aggrandizement of, 69.\nNations, luxury, extravagance, ostentation, the peril of, 348-m.\nNations, sanctity of the Name held by the ancient, 204-l.\nNatural Forces in action and opposition result in movement and Harmony,\n  859-l.\nNatural law, a constant mode of action, seems to belong to the\n  nature of things, 827-l.\nNatural objects surrounded the initiate in the Mysteries, 414-l.\nNatural phenomena and things appeal to men, 714-u.\nNatural phenomena depends on a single immutable law, 732-u.\nNatural religion reveals to us God as the Infinite parent of all, 714-m.\nNature and discord dwelt below the Moon, according to Lucanus, 654-m.\nNature as free from dogmatism as from tyranny, 355-u.\nNature divided between the Good and Evil principles, 664-u.\nNature enslaved to common notions and notions to words, 693-l.\nNature gives evidences of immortality, found everywhere, 517-m.\nNature God's prose; man his poetry, 715-l.\nNature Gods represented by Amun, worshipped in Egypt, 584-l.\nNature Gods secondary to a higher Deity, incomprehensible, supreme,\n  597-l.\nNature in its pure and simple forms the foundation of the Persian\n  religion, 610-l.\nNature is all movement, and Thought all repose, 680-l.\nNature itself is the soul of the world which acts through the spheres,\n  668-l.\nNature itself the secret of the Occult Sciences, 844-u.\nNature mastered by applying to matter the light of life, 779-u.\nNature not a fortuitous concourse of atoms, 646-l.\nNature not deified in the primitive religion, 610-l.\nNature of Deity and the beginning of the Universe are questions\n  Man has always studied, 738-l.\nNature of man is double, though he is one, 861-l.\nNature possessed a soul and intelligence and divinity belonged to\n  this soul, 670-u.\nNature reveals a mighty wisdom and points to God, 713-l.\nNature revives as surely as it declines, 592-m.\nNature, the mythologies a leaf in the book of, 216-u.\nNature the Revelation of God; symbolism of, 64-m.\nNature, visible on earth, is man's domain, 736-m.\nNature worship akin to that of a universal Soul, but not instinctive,\n  598-u.\nNature worship combining conceptions of a Universal Presence and action,\n  602-u.\nNature worship usurped that of God, 600-m-601-m.\nNature's Forces little known; man controlled and governed by them, 733-l.\nNature's great book interpreted in the doctrines of Masonry, 625-m.\nNature's immutable Law, the Eternal Will of the Justice which is God,\n  847-l.\nNature's magnificences are an algebra of graces and splendors, 845-u.\nNature's problems unanswered; the problems unsolved, 647-l.\nNature's regularity suggested by common appearances very early, 699-m.\nNature's single and absolute law, the equipoise of contrary forces,\n  848-u.\nNature's Soul released at the end for a brighter existence, 614-u.\nNaya philosophers declare the individual Soul and God are distinct,\n  852-u.\nNecessity and Chance giving way to Law permits the moral Freedom of Man,\n  695-m.\nNecessity and Fatality a consequence of Stability and Permanence, 768-u.\nNecessity and Liberty possible for Infinite Power and Wisdom, 848-m.\nNecessity and Liberty seemingly antagonistic, 848-m.\nNecessity and Liberty, the essence of Deity, counterbalanced, produce\n  equilibrium, 778-l.\nNecessity and Liberty the two columns of the Universe, 848-m.\nNecessity can not be unjust, or the Great lawgiver would be unjust,\n  831-l.\nNecessity: Deity contains the incorruptible and unwearying force of,\n  658-m.\nNecessity environs the laws that govern the Universe, 831-l.\nNecessity in its true meaning is not arbitrary Power, 696-m.\nNecessity in its true meaning is Strength and Force in the service\n  of Intelligence, 696-m.\nNecessity is Law perceived, but not understood, 691-m.\nNecessity neglected in striving for the right is the folly of a dreamer,\n  835-u.\nNecessity of man, his own necessity, made often a plea for injustice,\n  832-u.\nNecessity of the physicists more oppressive than fables of tradition,\n  691-m.\nNecessity, or the omnipotent Will of God, which nothing can disobey,\n  818-m.\nNecessity rules in all the affairs of men, requiring the sacrifice of\n  life, 833-l.\nNecessity, the Director of the atoms, external to themselves, 676-m.\nNegative notion of God the only way to apprehend him, 651-m.\nNephesch, from the world Asiah, one letter, He, of the Tetragrammaton,\n  757-u.\nNephesch, Psyche, the lowest spiritual part of man, Soul, 757-u.\nNero, reference to the reign of, 47-l.\nNeschamah, from the world Briah, the other letter He, 757-u.\nNescamah, Leneschamah, from the world Atsiluth, the Yod of the\n  Tetragrammaton, 757-u.\nNeschamah, the highest spiritual part, anima superior, 757-u.\nNetsach and Hod, the thighs of Adam Kadmon, 758-u.\nNetsakh, one of the Sephiroth; Victory, 753-m.\nNetsach, the seventh Sephiroth, is perfect Success, same as Hod, 767-u.\nNeuroz, a Persian Feast, celebrated when the Sun was in Aries, 463-l.\nNew Heaven and Earth after the burning of the present Universe, 623.\nNew Year's Day fixed on one of four periods; reason--, 464-468.\nNewton, painstaking methods of, 174-m.\nNifthel, which is below in the ninth world, the final place for the\n  wicked, 619-m.\nNight the time fixed for the celebration of the Mysteries, 383-l.\nNile held to be fertilized from the connection of the Sun and Moon\n  in Taurus, 477-l.\nNile overflows in the sign of Leo, 455-m.\nNile, Sirius deemed to cause the rising of the waters of the, 450-m.\nNile, Sirius heralded the inundation of the, 15-u.\nNile, source, inundations, formation of land, 442-m.\nNile waters experienced its earliest movement at the Vernal Equinox\n  when--, 477-l.\nNile waters measured by the representation of a cross with a circle\n  over it, 503-m.\nNile's annual inundation the cause of the fertility of Egypt, 589-u.\nNine, consecrated to the Spheres and the Muses, 636-m.\nNine considered by the ancients as a bad presage, 636-l.\nNine external points of the Tetractys form the Masonic triangle, 826-m\nNine found in the three Fates, Centimanes, Cyclopes, 728-l.\nNine: singular properties of the number, 637-l.\nNine, square of three, represented by the triple triangle, 60-l.\nNine symbolized the earth under the influence of the Evil principle,\n  636-l.\nNine symbolizes the generative egg, 636-l.\nNine, the first square of unequal numbers, the Ennead, 636-l.\nNineteenth Degree, Grand Pontiff, 312-u.\nNinth day of Greek Mysteries, the libation for departed souls, 434-m.\nNinth Degree, Elu of the Nine, purpose and lessons of the, 149-u.\nNinth Degree is devoted to--, 159-u.\nNinth envelope, a term given to matter, 636-u.\nNisan, at the Vernal Equinox, the beginning of the year, 466-m.\nNoachite or Prussian Knight, the 21st Degree, lessons of the, 334-u.\nNoble actions, in ordinary paths of life are occasions for, 245-m.\nNoetius termed the Son of the first Utterance of the Father, light.\n  from the Light, 564-m.\nNorth of a Lodge devoid of Lights because--, 592-u.\nNorth Pole: Merak and Dubhe always point to the, 456-m.\nNorth Pole: the Great Bear or Seven Stars, circle around the, 456-m.\nNorth Star represents the point in the circle; symbol of duty and faith,\n  202-m.\nNorth the goal and commencement of the Sun's career, 592-u.\nNorth the region of gloom and darkness, 592-u.\nNorthern Gods more virile than the effeminate Southern ones, 591-u.\nNorthern nation had a Senate of twelve gods, Odin the chief, 460-m.\nNous of Platonism corresponds to The Word, 271-l.\nNous synonymous with Logos, representing a manifestation, 555-l.\nNovary, or triple ternary, celebrated amongst the ancient sages, 636-u.\nNumber sacred in all theologies is Seven, 727-m.\nNumbers an example of the Gnostic emanation doctrine, 249-u.\nNumbers an important part of Pythagorean science, 34-l.\nNumbers contained in the Primitive Word, 249-u.\nNumbers had significance to the Druids in a religious sense, 618-l.\nNumbers having reference to Deity especially employed, 208-l.\nNumbers held sacred among the Etruscans, Jews, Egyptians, Hindus, 632-m.\nNumbers, many philosophies and religions preserve the doctrine of, 235-m.\nNumbers, Mysteries connected with the system of, 208-l.\nNumbers of Stars possessed peculiar and divine powers, 487-u.\nNumbers of the degrees had their origin in the Stars, 487-u.\nNumbers of the Pythagoreans, signification and meaning, 626-638.\nNumbers regarded as sacred being expressions of--, 209-u.\nNumbers represent all grandeur, all proportions, the Absolute, 626-u.\nNumbers symbolic, 87-l, 88-m, 618-m.\n  One, 5-l, 87-l, 88-m, 789, 861.\n  Two, 5-l, 57-l, 87-l, 88, 410, 429, 632-m, 664-m, 789, 860.\n  Three, 5-l, 10-u, 57-l, 87-l, 88, 97-l, 209, 233-m, 234-m, 321-u, 322-m.\n    361-u, 364-m, 409-m, 410, 429, 431, 448-u, 487-u, 489-m, 548-554,\n    631-u, 632, 728-u, 728-l, 780-m, 782-m, 786, 788, 789, 796, 861.\n  Four, 57-l, 87-l, 88, 209-u, 322-m, 409-m, 410, 462-m, 560-m, 632-m,\n    728-u, 732-m, 783-m, 786, 788, 789, 861.\n  Five, 5-l, 87-l, 88, 429, 462-m, 487-u, 782-u, 789, 790, 861.\n  Six, 5-l, 87-l, 409-m, 489-u, 611-l, 786-u, 796.\n  Seven, 5-l, 10-m, 11-u, 58-l, 87-l, 88-m, 233-m, 234-m, 257-l, 321-u,\n    322, 364-l, 409-m, 410, 429, 431, 460-m, 462-m, 474-u, 487-u, 489-m,\n    506-l, 563, 602-u, 611-l, 668-u, 727-9, 728-u, 752-l, 780-l, 781-m,\n    782-m, 797, 798.\n  Eight, 5-l, 60-l, 87-l, 507-l.\n  Nine, 5-l, 10-u, 60-l, 87-l, 88-m, 209-u, 429, 448-u, 489-u, 631-u,\n    728-l, 789, 861.\n  Ten, 60-l, 87-l, 88-m, 233-m, 506-u, 560-m, 632-m, 752-l, 786.\n  Eleven, 87-l.\n  Twelve, 5-l, 58-l, 60-l, 209-m, 233-m, 235-l, 409-m, 410-m, 448-u, 459-l,\n    460-m, 462-u, 462-m, 474-u, 485-u, 489-u, 506-l, 560-m, 566-u, 619-u,\n    632-m, 728-u, 786.\n  Fourteen, 484-l, 485-m.\n  Sixteen, 861.\n  Twenty-five, 789, 861.\n  Twenty-six, 484-l, 485-m.\n  Twenty-seven, 631-u.\n  Thirty, 257-u, 462-m, 560-m.\n  Thirty-six, 486-u.\n  Forty, 486-u.\n  Three hundred and sixty, 462-m.\n  Three hundred and sixty-five, 354, 613-l.\nNumbers: the Pythagoreans held a connection between the gods and, 633-u.\nNumbers, the Septenary is the Crown of, 321-l.\nNumbers, three, four, seven, twelve, unlock the Apocalypse, 728-u.\nNumerations from Khased or Gedulah to Yesod included in Tephareth, 799-m.\nNumerations, or six members of Microprosopos, denoted by Vau, 793-l.\nNumerations proceed from potence into act with the first Adam, 795-u.\nNumerations, six, are Geburah; Gedulah; Tephareth; Netsach; Hod; Yesod,\n  793-m.\nNumerations, six, represented by interlaced triangle, Seal of Solomon,\n  799-m.\nNumerations, ten, compose the person termed Arik Aupin, 799-m.\nNyaya and Vedanta philosophy regarding God and the Soul, 607-m.\nNyaya philosophers differ in some matters from the Vedantic, 607-m.\n\nO\n\nO, I, W expressed the Druids' name of Deity, 622-u.\nO, I. W, the Druidic symbol of Deity, 618-u.\nOath of Secrecy a requisite to admission to the Christian Mysteries,\n  544-u.\nOath of the original nine Templars taken between the hands of\n  the Patriarch, 815-l.\nOaths of Pythagoreans sworn on the Tetractys. 633-l.\nObedience to law, 111-m.\nObelisk at the tomb of the buried deity as a symbol of resurrection,\n  393-l.\nObelisks and Pyramids erected to the Sun and Fire. 460-u.\nObject of the ceremonies of the ancient Mysteries. 407-l.\nObject of Masonry is--, 218-m.\nObject of Masonry is--, 220-l.\nObject, our inspiring thought should not be ourselves, but our, 229-l.\nObject symbolized mistaken for the symbol and idolatry followed, 600-u.\nObjection sufficient to exclude man from society of Masons, 121-m.\nObligation founded on the Good, 722-m.\nObligation of morals are absolute, 722-u.\nObligation taken on a naked sword and sealed by drinking from a\n  skull, 430-l.\nObligation taken on the sacred books of the religion of the candidate,\n  11-m.\nObligation the foundation of liberty: involves free will, 723-u.\nObligations and vows to be well considered and kept, 111-l.\nOblong square formed by Stars, 487-m.\nOccult manifestations coincide with period of the Fall of the Templars,\n  823-u.\nOccult Mysteries revealed under the form of levity by the Roman\n  de la Rose, 823-u.\nOccult number is five, enclosed in the center of the series, 628-m.\nOccult philosophy controlled nations, ruled the minds, knows everything,\n  730-u.\nOccult philosophy reigned in Persia with the Magi, 730-u.\nOccult philosophy synonymous with Magic, 730.\nOccult philosophy the godmother of religions, the key of obscurities,\n  729-l.\nOccult philosophy, the Universal Synthesis, ought to explain the\n  phenomena of being, 821-l.\nOccult science of the Magi found in the Mysteries and doctrines of\n  the Templars and Masonry, 839-m.\nOccult science of the Magi imperfectly revealed by the Gnostics, 839-m.\nOccult sciences explain the cabalistic clavicles, Ezekiel and the\n  Apocalypse, 731-u.\nOccult sciences explained by the Kabalah, 626-u.\nOccupation the same as manifestation, 795-l.\nOccultism embodied in Sephar Yezirah, Sohar, Apocalypse, 321-m.\nOcean a symbol of Deity or the Universe for the Egyptians, 665-m.\nOcean as a conception of God, called Binah, Understanding, 752-m.\nOctateuch, a book written in the time of the Emperor Justin, 671-l.\nOd, according to the Hebrews, the grand agent of Hermetic science, 774-l.\nOdd numbers traced backward ended in Unity or Deity, 618-l.\nOdin destined to kill the snake when all nature will be destroyed, 593-u.\nOdin, Frea, Thor, the Scandinavian Trinity, 552-u.\nOdin, maxims from the Hava Maal, the Sublime Book of, 168-m.\nOdin sunk the Midgard Serpent beneath the sea, encircling the earth,\n  499-u.\nOdin, the Almighty Father, one of the Northern Triune Deity, 13-l.\nOdin, the Scandinavian name for the Sun God, 587-u.\nOdin was the Apollo of the Scandinavians, 593-u.\nOffice, Mason not over-anxious for, 39-u.\nOfficers of Isiac Mysteries practically the same as the Eleusinian.\nOfficial mediocrity, development of, 66-75.\nOfficials of the Mysteries of Eleusis, functions and clothing, 411-412.\nOlen: one of the earliest symbols of Grecian religion was the\n  Hyperborean, 683-u.\nOlive brought by Hercules from the Hyperboreans to Olympia, 592-m.\nOm, in India it was forbidden to pronounce the Sacred Name, 205-u.\nOm, the Sacred Name of the One Deity, manifested as--, 205-u.\nOmega and Alpha are the last and first letters of the Greek alphabet,\n  701-u.\nOmith, or Amida, the Japanese God, without beginning or ending, 616-u.\nOmnific letter of the Kabalah: Creation effected by the, 14-u.\nOmnipotence is the most absolute liberty, 736-l.\nOmniscience symbolized by the Blazing Star and All Seeing Eye, 506-u.\nOmschim, a book giving the arrangements of the Sephiroth, 757-m.\nOmschim, the Kabalistic book, meaning \"Introduction to the Kabalah\", 740-u.\nOne Absolute Being embodying Truth, Beauty, Good, 702-l.\nOne Being only, a fundamental principle of the Hindu religion, 604-m.\nOne designated Harmony, the Good Principle, 630-m.\nOne Father: the many gods are His Children, says Tyrius, 687-m.\nOne First Cause of the existence of the Universe, 626-m.\nOne God the primitive idea, 687-m.\n\"One in Many,\" a mystery of the Vedanta philosophy, 673-u.\nOne is the Principle, Two is the Word, 771-l.\nOne is three and three are one in each triangle of Perfection, 861-l.\nOne signifies the living man standing upright, 630-u.\nOne Supreme God whose name it was unlawful to utter a general belief,\n  619-l.\nOne: though of a double nature, man is, 861-l.\nOne True God, and a moral and virtuous life the only religious\n  requisite, 164-u.\nOne, with the Chinese, signified unity, harmony, God, 630-l.\nOnias, the High Priest, erected the sanctuary at Leontopolis, 253-u.\nOphites, a Gnostic sect, Spirits of the, 271-l.\nOphites: development of the system of the, 552-l-553.\nOphites' system predicated an unknown Supreme Being, 552-l.\nOpinion, difficulty in obtaining agreement in matters of mere, 38-m.\nOpinions of ancients concerning the earth and heavens, 442.\nOpinion, public, rarely right on any point, 218-m.\nOpposing principles in nature, by their contrariety, produce good\n  and evil, 661-u.\nOrai, name of one of the seven Reflections of the Ophites, 563-m.\nOral tradition transmitted by generations of initiates, 259-l.\nOrator in our Bodies represents Hermes, 586-l.\nOrators of the Bodies, qualifications and duties of, 332-m.\nOrders of Chivalry displayed lofty virtues and noble heroism, 579-m.\nOrgans of generation symbols of the generative and productive powers,\n  656-m.\nOrigin, all men are of the same, 221-u.\nOrigen declares some names have a natural sanctity and potency, 620-m.\nOrigen defends the Christian concealed doctrine, 544.\nOrigen gives information concerning the Mysteries of the Ophites, 542-l.\nOrigen held that in each Star was an immortal Soul, 671-m.\nOrigen held that the Gospels were not to be taken literally, 266-m.\nOrigin of things according to Anaxagoras, 495-m.\nOrigin of the Truth taught by Deity to the first men, 687-l.\nOrigination of matter from spirit incapable of expression, 673-m.\nOrion killed by the sting of the Scorpion, 454-m.\nOrmuzd and Ahriman: antagonism of Good and Evil typified by\n  the contest between, 594-l.\nOrmuzd and Ahriman each created twenty-four Deities, 662-l.\nOrmuzd and Ahriman each gave six emanations, 662-l.\nOrmuzd and Ahriman ever at war; Light and Darkness contest, 662-l.\nOrmuzd and Ahriman represented by two serpents contending for\n  the mundane egg, 500-u.\nOrmuzd conceived thoughts before creating things, 257-m.\nOrmuzd concurred with Ahriman in the creation of Man, 258-u.\nOrmuzd created Spirits, Genii, Izeds, 257-u.\nOrmuzd created the World pure by the \"Word\", 256-l.\nOrmuzd eclipsed by Mithras, 257-m.\nOrmuzd, final triumph and reign of, 258-m.\nOrmuzd, King of Light from Light, the first emanation, 256-l.\nOrmuzd, nature and attributes of; the \"Word\" of Masonry, 256-l.\nOrmuzd, or Ahura Mazda, claims to have created all things, 612-u.\nOrmuzd or Osiris the beneficent principle personified by the Sun, 479-u.\nOrmuzd placed in Man a pure principle from the Supreme Being, 258-u.\nOrmuzd represented the primal light, 612-u.\nOrmuzd, the Persian God of Good, of the nature of light, 661-m.\nOrmuzd, the Persian Light God, to conquer Darkness and--, 466-u.\nOrmuzd was Light adored by the Persians, 443-l.\nOrnaments of a Lodge, 14-u.\nOrpheus founded the Grecian Mysteries bringing them from Egypt, 400-l.\nOrpheus in his hymn taught the Unity of God, 415-u.\nOrpheus initiated in the Egyptian Theology and Physics; carried the\n  fables into Greece, 365.\nOrpheus: Magism was the science of, 839-l.\nOrpheus received Mysteries of Samothrace while visiting there, 427-u.\nOrpheus studied in Egypt and borrowed ideas regarding nature, 655-l.\nOrpheus: the first dogma of, 443-l.\nOrphic Triads, 549-m.\nOrthodox Church accepted the doctrines of the Egyptians and Greeks,\n  625-l.\nOrthodox traditions carried from Chaldea by Abraham, 843-l.\nOrthodoxy carried out of Egypt by Moses, 843-l.\nOsirian fable of his history the basis of Egyptian religion, 589-m.\nOsirian legend adopted to symbolize the destruction of the Templars,\n  820-l.\nOsirian legend advanced by Landseer in his Sabean Researches, 483-487.\nOsiris as Hades, Serapis, Rhadamanthus, the Monarch of the Dead, 588-u.\nOsiris and Isis gave civilization, law, arts, to men, 475-l.\nOsiris and Isis:    Har-oeri, Master of Light and Life, from, 861-u.\nOsiris and Isis, inscriptions on the columns at Nysa, near the tombs of,\n  378-u.\nOsiris and Typhon: antagonism of Good and Evil typified by the\n  contest between, 594-l.\nOsiris' body went ashore sixty miles above Tsur, at Byblos, 80-u.\nOsiris, Christians adopted as a sign the staff of, 292-m.\nOsiris claimed by India as one of their great gods, 475-l.\nOsiris conquers Typhon at the Vernal Equinox, 664-m.\nOsiris cut into fourteen pieces according to Plutarch, 484-l--485-m.\nOsiris cut into twenty-six pieces, the number of visible stars in\n  Bootes, 484-l.\nOsiris, declaration of Osiris concerning himself, 378-m.\nOsiris died at the Autumnal Equinox and rose in the Spring, 478-u.\nOsiris: everything good in nature comes from, 476-m.\nOsiris, in figurative style is depicted the annual journey of the Sun\n  in the history of, 375-l.\nOsiris is the personification of the Sun, 447-l.\nOsiris, killed by Typhon, found by Isis in a coffin and buried at\n  Philae, 375-l.\nOsiris killed by Typhon when the Sun was in the Constellation Scorpion,\n  479-m.\nOsiris known as Bacchus, Dionusos, Seraphis, 477-m.\nOsiris, legend concerning the body of, 80-m.\nOsiris married his sister, Isis, and labored with her for the public\n  benefit, 377-l.\nOsiris mutilated by Typhon and parts thrown into the River Nile, 412-l.\nOsiris mutilated by Typhon signified that drouth caused the Nile to\n  retire, 477-l.\nOsiris: Mysteries of Isis included a statue, tomb and a representation\n  of the sufferings of, 405-l.\nOsiris, Mysteries of, the model of all subsequent Initiations, 377-m.\nOsiris; Night and Day were two Gods adored in the Mysteries of, 404-m.\nOsiris put to death by Typhon, restored to life, 405-m.\nOsiris, representative of the Sun, becomes Adonai, Dionusos, Bacchus,\n  363-m.\nOsiris resurrected when the Solstitial Sun brings the inundation, 589-m.\nOsiris said to be the inventor of agriculture, 588-u.\nOsiris: Seth, Babys, Typhon, powers set up as adversaries of, 588-u.\nOsiris slain by Typhon sought by Isis; story of the search, 480-483.\nOsiris supposed to be dead or absent fifty days each year, 451-l.\nOsiris, symbol of the Sun, 77-m.\nOsiris: the conception of a Being purely good developed in, 588-u.\nOsiris, the Egyptian name for the Sun God, 587-u.\nOsiris the image of generative power, 476-l.\nOsiris, the image of the Supreme Being; Source of Good, 281-l.\nOsiris, the name of the Sun, gives earthly blessings, 475-m.\nOsiris the name of the Sun to his adorers at Memphis, 587-l.\nOsiris, the Saviour, perished in the twenty-eighth year of his life,\n  589-m.\nOsiris, the son of Helios (Phra), an incarnation of the Good Spirit,\n  587-l.\nOsiris, the Sun, communicated generative principles to the Moon, 476-m.\nOsiris to judge the world, according to the Egyptians, 623-l.\nOsiris was the eldest son of Saturn, his substance the same nature\n  as that which composes light, 378-m.\nOuranos and Gea sung as Deities by Hesiod, 850-l.\nOuranos and Ghi by their union had many children, the later Deities,\n  658-u.\nOuranos and Kronos were before Zeus, 597-l.\nOuranos, or Heaven, one of the first divinities, the husband of Ghi,\n  658-u.\nOviparous the type of all animal production, 771-l.\nOx a symbol of purification by earth, 412-m.\n\nP\n\nPagodas of Tanjore and Deogur, construction of the, 234-m.\nPain and suffering a part of the scheme of the Universe, 229-m.\nPain used to illustrate the relation of Hakemah, Binah, Daath, 758-l.\nPalestine and the ancient empires are wrecks, but Masonry survives,\n  315-l.\nPan represented by the horned form of the Evil Force or Devil, 102-l.\nPangenitor, the Father of all things, a name given to Heaven, 658-m.\nPantacle expressing the esoteric part of Science is a Rose of light,\n  822-m.\nPantacle of the Kabalists commands the spirits of the elements, 787-u.\nPantacle of the Kabalists formed by the triangular plates of the Templar\n  trowel, 816-m.\nPantacles invented to disguise the meanings of magical science, 732-l.\nPantheism and Atheism reduced to simplest terms seem the same, 672-u.\nPantheism and Materialism avoided by a separate ruling power, 677-m.\nPantheism, or that all is God, and God is all and in all, 672-u.\nPantheism teaches that God is in all and all in God, 565-m.\nPantheism, the dominant idea of the doctrine of Manes, 565-m.\nPantheism under the Ionian revival was materialistic, 675-m.\nPantheistic monotheism marks the spirit of the Indian Vedas, 672-l.\nPantheon an allegory of phenomena and Heavenly Bodies, 508-u.\nPapal hostility against the Templars which flourished in spite of it,\n  815-u.\nParacelsus advocated strongly the initiation into the magic of the\n  ancients, 791-u.\nParcelsus discovered magnetism before Mesmer, 791-u.\nParcelsus treats of Hermetic Science, 774-l.\nParallel lines enclosing a circle a symbol of the equilibrium of nature,\n  548-m.\nParallel lines, point in a circle, two columns represent the Solstices,\n  506-u.\nParallel lines supporting the circle in our Lodges; origin of, 429-m.\nParanatellons or stars outside of Zodiac, 471-u.\nParakletos, the Comforter, claimed by Manes, 565-m.\nParmenides compared Deity to a sphere, heat, a continuity, an aggregate,\n  676-u.\nParopismus or Hindukusch inhabited by Irania races, 601-l.\nParsees' definition of God in their catechism, 620-u.\nPashan, the Nourisher, a Vedic Sun God, 602-l.\nPassions clash and interests conflict in a world of action, 696-u.\nPassion's germ in Maia, Nature's loveliness, 683-l.\nPassive Principle analogous to Darkness or Shadow, 305-l.\nPassive Principle, by nature, collects and makes fruitful; the Active\n  diffuses, 772-u.\nPassive Stability of the Will of the Past expressed in constitutions\n  of government, 860-u.\nPassover celebrated when the Sun was in Aries, 463-l.\nPassover of the Magi, the annual sacrifice of Mithras, 613-l.\nPaternalism, in free States there is a tendency towards, 51-53.\nPatient, Good Knight and True enjoined to work and be, 320-l.\nPatriarch of Constantinople administered the first Templar oath, 815-l.\nPatriarchal worship of Deity common to Arabians and Hebrews, 616-l.\nPatriarchs, primitive religion as taught by the, 540-l.\nPatriarchs taught the true religion by God, 582-u.\nPatriotism a Force, 91-u.\nPatrons of Masonry are St. John the Evangelist and St. John the Baptist,\n  818-u.\nPaul of Samosata taught that Jesus was the son of Joseph and Mary, 564-l.\nPaul, St., similarity of the doctrines of Philo to the Epistles of,\n  252-m.\nPaul's idea of Law and Grace agrees with Kabalistic idea of Leniency,\n  769-u.\nPaul's opinion on the second coming of Christ, 263-l.\nPauperism and misery in the world, 297-u.\nPausanias claimed that those showing contempt for the Mysteries.\n  were punished, 381-l.\nPausanias' opinion concerning the Mysteries, 379-m.\nPavement, description and symbolism of the Mosaic, 14-u.\nPayens, Hugh de, one of the founders of the Templars, 816-l.\nPeace, campaign of, 177.\nPedestal, symbolism of the luminous, 210-u.\nPelican an emblem of the beneficence of Nature, 291-u.\nPelican and Phoenix symbols of the Great work, 774-m.\nPelasgi, ancient Grecians, settled Samothrace, 407-m.\nPelasgi had a Deity whose name it was not permitted to pronounce, 621-u.\nPelasgian name for the Sun God was Arkaleus or Hercules, 587-u.\nPen and printing press a power against the Demagogue and Tyrant, 47-l.\nPendragon. Uther, serpents referred to in elegy of, 592-u.\nPentagram or Star with five points symbolizes human intelligence, 790-l.\nPentagram: the Blazing Star symbolized, to the Kabalists, the Sacred,\n  842-u.\nPentalpha of Pythagoras, the origin cf the five-pointed star, 634-m.\nPentangle of Solomon, the emblem of Fellowship, 634-m.\nPeople in error who think it a wise policy to--, 178-u.\nPeople to be governed for the common weal, a striking feature of\n  the will of the, 141-l.\nPerfect Elu, essential belief of a, 233-u.\nPerfect Master, 5th Degree; virtues belonging to the, 114-u.\nPerfect number is ten because it includes Unity and--, 628-l.\nPerfection Degrees urge the subjugation of our material nature, 855-l.\nPerfection of all things is Wisdom and Intelligence coupled, 800-u.\nPerfection of God implies creation, and the preservation of the created,\n  708-l.\nPerfection of the Soul and knowledge of its origin and destiny\n  objects of the Mysteries, 415-l.\nPerfection, step by step is advancement made toward, 136-l.\nPerfection symbolized by the number eight, 635-l.\nPerfections of God produced the intellectual world, 559-l.\nPeripatetic School retained a secondary divinity in the eternal Spheres,\n  678-m.\nPerkoun, Pikollos, Potrimpos, the Trinity of the Pruczi, or Prussians,\n  551-l.\nPerpendicular of a right angle triangle represents Earth, the Human,\n  861-m.\nPerpendicular of the right angle triangle is Male, 789-m.\nPersecute, for his belief no man has a right to, 166-m.\nPersecution, better any error or any opinion than, 161-u.\nPersecutions for religion's sake, 164--.\nPersecutions warded from the early scientists by alleged folly, 733-u.\nPerseus brought down fire consecrated in Persian Temple, taught--, 466-u.\nPersian conquests familiarized them with China, Egypt, Judae, 610-u.\nPersian deities subordinate to Zeruane-Akherene, 598-u.\nPersian ideas of God and Religion resembled that of the Hebrews, 610-u.\nPersian legend concerning the end of the World, 623-l.\nPersian name for the Sun God was Mithras, 586-l.\nPersian name of Deity consists of three letters, H, O, M, 632-l.\nPersian philosopher, sayings of Zoroaster, the, 170-u.\nPersian religion framed by H, O, M, 621-l.\nPersian religion spiritual, fire and sacrifice being emblems, 610-m.\nPersian religious ideas and doctrines, 610-613.\nPersian Supreme Being is Time without limit, 281-l.\nPersian triad, the Lords of Light, of Fire, of Splendor, 549-m.\nPersian triad was Bahman, Ardibehest, Shariver, 549-m.\nPersians abhorred Egyptian idolatry and sought to extirpate it, 610-m.\nPersians among earliest emigrants from Northern India, 204-l.\nPersians began the new year when the Constellation Perseus rose, 466-u.\nPersians built no temples, but worshipped on hills in stone enclosures,\n  424-m.\nPersians burned incense to the seven Planets on Pyrea, 459-m.\nPersians changed Hindu doctrines to a struggle between the Good\n  and the Evil, 550-m.\nPersians held that the utterance of Hom created the Word, 205-u.\nPersians lamented the death of Zohak, conquered by the Pheridoun, 594-l.\nPersians regard the Sun as the Soul of the Universe and adore Fire,\n  424-u.\nPersians resembled the Hindus in language and poetic legends, 610-u.\nPersians under Xerxes destroyed Grecian Temples and erected fire\n  chapels, 610-m.\nPersians worshipped the Sun as Mithras; also the Moon, etc, 459-m.\nPersians worshipped the Heavenly Host, 459-m.\nPerson, none so debased but they have something of sacredness, 191-m.\nPersonal Divinity remains a mystery; personification but a symbol, 672-m.\nPersonal God seemingly leaned to by Aristotle, 679-l.\nPersonal God suited to human sympathies and free from mystifications,\n  672-m.\nPersonification assumed to supply deficiencies of language, 672-l.\nPersonification of Absolute Reason determines the Divine Ideal, 738-u.\nPersonification of the attributes of God, 270-m.\nPersonification of Deity infinitely inadequate, 672-m.\nPersonification of Evil through error continued by the worship of\n  abstractions, 694-u.\nPersonification of God's attributes that man might commune with Him,\n  652-l.\nPersonification of Man long recognized as Deity, 697-l.\nPersonification of Stars into gods brought worship of them, 508-m.\nPersonification of the attributes of God by the Hindus, 605-u.\nPersonification of the great Cause, 674-m.\nPersonification of the operations of nature worshipped, 601-m.\nPeruvians: old-world legends of the Sun found among the, 594-l.\nPeter, the Hermit, held no office, but accomplished much, 43-m.\nPeter, the Hermit, referred to, 31-u.\nPhallic symbols, consisting of stone pillars, at Mysteries of Isis, 405-m.\nPhallus and Cteis conveyed no idea of indecency, 401-l.\nPhallus and Cteis symbolized the Active and Passive Principles of\n  the Universe, 401-l.\nPhallus and Cteis worn by innocent and virtuous women, 402-m.\nPhallus appears on monuments a symbol of life-giving power, 427-m.\nPhallus consecrated in the Mysteries of Osiris and Isis in Egypt, 656-m.\nPhallus of the Kabalah represented by Yod, type of human Tetragram, 771-m.\nPhallus, probable origin of the symbol of the, 402-l.\nPhallus, the symbol of the creative and generative Power, 402-u.\nPharaoh's dream, interpreted by Joseph, referred to the number seven,\n  729-u.\nPharisaic Jews, doctrines of Zoroaster borrowed by the, 258-l.\nPharisee, Hillel, gives summary of the law of Moses, 170-m.\nPharisees' belief, system, costumes, were all foreign, 259-l.\nPharisees' doctrine similar to that of the Persians, 259-m.\nPharisees lost the doctrine of the Kabalah at the advent of Christ, 727-l.\nPharisees styled themselves Interpreters of the Holy Writings, 259-m.\nPharisees the dominant Jewish system after the captivity, 259-u.\nPhenomena connected with the will little understood, 733-m.\nPhenomena of nature are unexplained mysteries to us, 526-530.\nPhenomena of nature, beauty and sublimity of the, 244-l.\nPhenomena of nature but symbols of greater things, 244-l.\nPhenomena perpetually folded back on themselves, 42-u.\nPhenomena of the physical and astronomical nature explained in Masonry,\n  625-m.\nPhilanthropic, Masonry is, 221-u.\nPhilip le Bel and Pope Clement the Fifth destroyers of Templarism, 820-m.\nPhilo, a Jew, one of the chiefs of the School of Alexandria, 250-m.\nPhilo, Apostle Saint John read the language of, 100-u.\nPhilo, declarations of, concerning the Hebrew writings, 250-l.\nPhilo, doctrines of, 252-l.\nPhilo Judaeus on the symbolism of the seven lamps, 10-m.\nPhilo of Alexandria borrows his doctrine from Plato, 552-l.\nPhilo the contemporary of Christ; doctrines similar to Epistles, 252-m.\nPhilo, the Greek Jew, admonition to Initiates, 311.\nPhilo, the Greek Jew, initiated in the Mysteries; sayings of, 311.\nPhilo's conception of the Supreme Being, 251-u.\nPhilosophal gold, in philosophy, is Truth, 773-u.\nPhilosophal gold, in religion, is the Absolute and Supreme Reason, 773-u.\nPhilosophal gold, in visible nature, is the Sun; in the subterranean\n  world, pure gold, 773-u.\nPhilosophal Stone found indicates the discovery of the Absolute, 776-l.\nPhilosophal Stone must be concealed; the key carried on the person, 777-u.\nPhilosophal stone symbolized by a cube, 732-u.\nPhilosopher, work of, 7-m.\nPhilosophers chose allegory as vehicles for theological ideas, 678-u.\nPhilosophers, maxims of ancient, 167-170.\nPhilosophers of Egypt and Phoenicia the authors of\n  old cosmogonies, 667-m.\nPhilosophers of Greece, except the Epicureans favored Platonism, 247-l.\nPhilosophers, true knowledge of Deity possessed by the ancient, 207-l.\nPhilosophic sentiment under the name of Love, 691-l.\nPhilosophical Degrees urge the dominion of our spiritual nature, 856-u.\nPhilosophical false gods or \"idols\" are theories and notions.\n  indiscriminately formed, 693-u.\nPhilosophical ideas in Alchemy reduced to the Absolute; the Fixed;\n  the Volatile, 791-l.\nPhilosophical, Masonry is, 221-u.\nPhilosophical realization of Hermeticism is the establishment of the\n  Holy Doctrine, 840-l.\nPhilosophical truth considered most dangerous of heresies by Rome, 820-m.\nPhilosophies, the Mason should avoid vain, 388-u.\nPhilosophy, a journey never arriving at the ideal of truth, 691-l.\nPhilosophy acknowledged its utter incapacity through Xenophanes,\n  Heraclitus, Socrates, 693-l.\nPhilosophy becomes Religion when--, 20-l.\nPhilosophy bowed down before a reflection of the Divine in inquirer's\n  mind, 693-l.\nPhilosophy coincides with true religion, 710-m.\nPhilosophy compared to Initiation by Seneca, 384-l.\nPhilosophy connected with humanity by religion, 708-m.\nPhilosophy contains the basis of all religious beliefs, 708-m.\nPhilosophy, Death is the consummation of all, 393-u.\nPhilosophy, definition of, 25-u.\nPhilosophy directed by metaphysics ends in visionary extravagance, 693-m.\nPhilosophy, end of, 23-l.\nPhilosophy from Aristotle to Hegel ends with a difficulty, 708-l.\nPhilosophy given a definite aim and method by Bacon, 710-l.\nPhilosophy in its purest forms expounded in the doctrines of Masonry,\n  625-m.\nPhilosophy of Lucanus regarding the Grand Whole, 653-l-654.\nPhilosophy of Plato changed the nature of Deity, 692-u.\nPhilosophy of St. John, Philo and Plato from the same source, 99-l.\nPhilosophy of the Hermetics that of the schools of Alexandria and\n  the theories of Pythagoras, 774-l.\nPhilosophy of the Hindus materialistic only in appearance, 673-m.\nPhilosophy of the Indians gave birth to the Egyptian Mysteries, 372-l.\nPhilosophy of the Kabala simple, profound, infinite as the Word, 745-m.\nPhilosophy of the occult crushed by the anathemas of Christianity, 730-l.\nPhilosophy of the occult godmother of religions; the key of obscurities,\n  729-l.\nPhilosophy of the Rite, Light and Truth sit enthroned on the\n  heights of the, 136-l.\nPhilosophy of the Rite, when prepared to receive its instructions, 136-l.\nPhilosophy reasserted the Unity which poetry had lost, 675-u.\nPhilosophy: religion became arrogant and fantastical when separated\n  from, 650-m.\nPhilosophy restored the Divine Activity as an external Intelligence, 675-m.\nPhilosophy, Templars connected with the Oriental, 235-m.\nPhilosophy that is certain and religion of the infallible united in\n  Magic, 842-m.\nPhilosophy, the analogy of contraries solves problems of modern, 306-u.\nPhilosophy, the grip of a Fellowcraft, fails to raise the candidate, 640-l.\nPhilosophy's object is the divine order of the Universe, 710-m.\nPhilosophy's task was to fill the chasm separating Deity from man, 652-l.\nPhoenecian Cosmogony of interest to Masons, 278-m.\nPhoenician creed, principles and doctrines, 268-m.\nPhoenician Deity called Heptakis, God of seven rays, 58-l.\nPhoenician faith, emanation from the worship of the Stars, 268-m.\nPhoenician Mysteries in honor of death and resurrection of Adonis, 406-m.\nPhoenician Mysteries passed into Greece, 406-m.\nPhoenician name for the Sun God was Adonai or Adon, 587-u.\nPhoenician Nature-God, the principle of Light, called Al, 727-u.\nPhoenician Trinity was Ulomos, Chusoros and the Egg of the Universe, 549-u.\nPhoenicians considered Light divine, and thought it a God, 582-u.\nPhoenicians held that Light, Fire, Flame, were the sons of Kronos, 740-l.\nPhoenicians probably carried Sun legends to the New World, 594-l.\nPhoenicians regarded Sun, Moon and Stars as the cause of generation, 469-l.\nPhoenix and Pelican symbols of the Great Work, 774-m.\nPhoenix, Dove, Raven, are symbols of Good, Evil and Beauty, 792-m.\nPhosphor, or Light Bearer, represents the Evil Force or Devil, 102-l.\nPhrygia suffered famine while Sun God was with the Hyperboreans, 592-u.\nPhysical realization of Hermeticism is the discovery of the creative\n  law, 841-u.\nPices, a malignant sign; Syrians abstained from eating fish, 456-m.\nPillars of a Lodge for a Christian symbolize Faith, Hope, Charity, 641-l.\nPillars of temples, mystical; representative of--, 235-l.\nPillars, Triple Tau represents the three Masonic, 503-l.\nPindar and others declare sufferings proceed from a beneficent object,\n  691-u.\nPisces the device of Simeon and Levy, 462-u.\nPison, a stream of the Edenic river, 58-u.\nPlague from remote India sweeps over Asia and Europe unchecked, 811-812.\nPlan of the Universe emanated from Deity, was of Himself, though\n  not His Very Self, 764-m.\nPlanetary motive force a mechanical law, so considered now, 671-m.\nPlanetary spheres represented by the seven steps of the Mystic Ladder,\n  851-l.\nPlanets distinguished by a cross and solar or lunar symbols, 505-l.\nPlanets, numbers and motions of the, 233-m.\nPlanets, seven, 10-m.\nPlato, commentator of Timaeus, wrote of the Soul of the World, 667-u.\nPlato's Deity the essence of Goodness, \"The Good\" itself, 682-l.\nPlato declares absolute truth is in God; it is God under one of His\n  phases, 707-l.\nPlato developed beautifully the higher Greek religious ideas, 617-m.\nPlato discourses on the disfigurement of the Soul, 858-m.\nPlato drew his doctrines from the East and the Mysteries, 398-m.\nPlato expresses his idea of the love of God, 704-l.\nPlato, greatest of human Revealers, 100-u.\nPlato, in part, conceived the progressive mediation between ignorance\n  and wisdom, 711-u.\nPlato in the Alexandrian School helps bring Christianity and Magic\n  together, 731-l.\nPlato installed the creations of his own mind among the gods, 678-u.\nPlato, Masonry revives the Academy of, 221-m.\nPlato on the nature of the First Principle, 99-u.\nPlato recognizes Love as the highest and most beneficent of the Gods,\n  682-l.\nPlato taught the distinction between the initiated and profane, 249-l.\nPlato terms unity and duality the first principles of all existence,\n  630-l.\nPlatonic doctrine of Hule recognized by Alexandrian Gnostics, 555-l.\nPlatonic doctrines favored by philosophers of Greece, 247-l.\nPlatonic triads, Thought, Matter, Kosmos, 549-l.\nPlatonism, doctrines of, 249-l.\nPlatonism, in Gnosticism were found the doctrines of, 249-l.\nPlatonism, in Symbolic degrees are found the doctrines of, 250-u.\nPlatonists borrowed the idea from Egypt or Persia that--, 255-m.\nPlatonists, the Absolute substituted for the Supreme Essence by the\n  new, 284-u.\nPlato's doctrine concerning the return of the Soul to Heaven, 440-u.\nPlato's observation on the origin of the conception of a general\n  Cause, 674-m.\nPlato's philosophy a mediation of Love, 692-u.\nPlato's science consummated in the contemplation of the Divine, 692-l.\nPlato's theory concerning Deity, Soul, Force, Good, 681-m.\nPleiades signifies to sail; names of stars, 453-m.\nPleiades were for eight centuries the leading stars of the Sabean year,\n  451-l.\nPlenitude of Yod, the name of the letter spelled is Yod, Vau, Daleth,\n  792-l.\nPleroma, Plenitude, Fullness, a favorite term of the Gnostics, 559-l.\nPleroma, the storehouse of the endless circle of phenomenal change,\n  675-l.\nPliny advises his friend Maximus, to revere the ancient glory and\n  old age, 804-l.\nPliny's character of Domitian, 47-l.\nPlutarch admits the Two Principles as the basis of the Mysteries, 404-m.\nPlutarch claims the Mysteries were established to--, 378-u.\nPlutarch says \"the better and diviner nature consists of three\", 549-m.\nPlutarch speaks mysteriously of Holy Doctrines in \"Iside et Osiride\",\n  841-u.\nPneumatica Kabalistica, the Beth Alohim or Domus Dei, a Kabalistic\n  book, 772-l.\nPneumatica Kabalistica states that in the world Yezirah Yod denotes\n  Kether, 798-m.\nPoetical personifications of Deity neither wholly moral or purely\n  beneficent, 690-u.\nPoetry continued a veneration for Sun, Stars, Fire, or Ether, 678-u.\nPoetry obscured by symbolism the idea of Divine unity, 674-l.\nPoetry personified Deity as man, 693-m.\nPoetry's task was to fill the chasm separating man from Deity, 652-l.\nPoint in a circle parallel lines, two columns, represent the Solstices,\n  506-m.\nPoint in the center of a circle a symbol of a point in the center of\n  the Great Light, 748-u.\nPoint in the center of a circle represents the Light of the Vestige of\n  the Garment, Yod, 750-m.\nPoint in the center of the Great Light is called Auir, Ether, Space,\n  750-m.\nPoint within a circle expresses the union of the two great Causes, 401-l.\nPoint within a circle a symbol of the Sun, 486-l.\nPoint within a Circle; symbolism of the, 14-l.\nPoint within a circle, two parallel lines and single Tau Cross gives\n  the Triple Tau, 503-m.\nPoint within a circle symbolizes the union of the Active and Passive\n  Principles, 401-l.\nPoint within the circle represented by Unity, 629-l.\nPoint within the circle, symbolism of the, 401-l.\nPoints of the Scottish Master's Degree relating to the transmutation\n  of metals, 780-782.\nPoisons are sovereign remedies given in due proportions, 846-l.\nPole star in Egyptian times was Alpha Draconis, not Cynosura, 485-m.\nPolitical degeneration, 66-75.\nPolitical point of view, but a single principle of Liberty, 43-l.\nPolitical science, 51-56.\nPolitical theories, state brutalized by false and slavish, 50-l.\nPompadour reigns in the name of Louis the Fifteenth, 49-m.\nPontiff of the Johannites initiated de Payens into Gnostic Mysteries,\n  817-l.\nPoor man, school of life teaches lessons to the, 182-l.\nPoor men, almost all the noblest things have been achieved by, 347-m.\nPooroosha, the universal organism; Fire, Air, Sun, the chief members,\n  673-u.\nPope Clement the Fifth and Philip le Bel the accusers of the Templars,\n  820-m.\nPopulace has two Stepmothers, Ignorance and Misery, 2-l.\nPopular heart detests the greedy, the selfish, the cruel, even if\n  successful, 838-m.\nPorta Coelorum, a book which gives information concerning the Sephiroth,\n  759-m.\nPorta Coelorum defines Yod as the first among numbers and before\n  all bodies, 792-l.\nPorphyry says the ancients represented God by images, 283-l.\nPorphyry says the soul must flee from sensuality to live with God, 521-m.\nPorphyry states Egyptians recognize as Gods the Stars of the Zodiac,\n  458-m.\nPossibility of the actual not to be neglected for the impossible ideal,\n  835-u.\nPotentiality of the Universe had to exist before it was evolved, 704-m.\nPower begotten by Genius, 30-m.\nPower delegated for the good of the people, 155-l.\nPower, never satisfied is the thirst for; examples of, 74-m.\nPower of God has no bounds, 581-m.\nPower, the wise use of the will which makes fatality its servant, 736-m.\nPowers of Nature, in the Mysteries were personified the Active and\n  Passive, 435-l.\nPowers proceeding from Deity are perfectly submissive to His will, 768-u.\nPracticability of a moral rule necessary to its being beneficial, 831-m.\nPrayer an essential part of our ceremonies, 6-m.\nPrayer as a means of changing the laws of the Universe, 684-l.\nPrayer is a Force; is sublime, 6-l.\nPrayer promotes the magnetic sympathy of spirit with spirit, 685-u.\nPrayer seeks some outward beneficial result, 685-u.\nPrayer takes the form of incantation as we ascend in antiquity, 684-l.\nPrayer, the aspiration of the Soul toward the Infinite Intelligence, 6-m.\nPrayers are vain things, according to a learned archbishop, 695-u.\nPrecession of the Equinoxes, a little over fifty seconds, 449-l.\nPrecession of the Equinoxes is 30\u00b0, or a Sign, in 2,155.6 years, 499-l.\nPreparation to receive the lessons of the Mysteries, 431-m.\nPresent my only care if I am to perish utterly, 714-l.\nPresent, our scene of action, a part of immortality, 139-m.\nPress is a sower of falsehood, 579-u.\nPreston, explanations and improvements of, 105-m.\nPride not the heritage of man, 39-u.\nPriesthood and Royalty, naturally identical are the interests of, 98-l.\nPriesthood, the King of Egypt often exercised the functions of the,\n  380-u.\nPriests change the altar to a throne where they seek to reign, 360-u.\nPriests honest and sincere before the time of Christianity, 102-m.\nPriests in the festival of Isis were clothed in white linen and bore--,\n  388-u.\nPriests invented display of rites and exhibitions, 22-m.\nPriests not willing to invest common people with philosophical Truth,\n  23-u.\nPriests, powers of government and all knowledge in hands of Hebrew,\n  625-u.\nPrima Materia of the Great Work defined, 773-l.\n\"Prima Materia,\" the magical agent of the Hermetic philosophers, 773-l.\nPrimal Ether extends everywhere, but is not perceptible to the senses,\n  750-l.\nPrimal Ether of the Chaldean Oracles was Fire, 742-m.\nPrimeval times recognized in modern Degrees, 625-m.\nPrimitive happy condition remembered and preserved by the poets\n  and legends, 599-l.\nPrimitive Man, Adam Kadmon, perfected by the Supreme God, 562-l.\nPrimitive man received the pure religion from God, 598-m\nPrimitive man recognized the Deity under a variety of appearances, 513-l.\nPrimitive man recognized the invisible God without losing faith, 514-u.\nPrimitive people feared the non-return of the Sun when--, 447-m.\nPrimitive people lamented when Sun seemed to be dragged down, 447-m.\nPrimitive people personified the Moon as Isis, 447-l.\nPrimitive people personified the Sun as Osiris, 447-l.\nPrimitive people personified Winter as Typhon, 447-l.\nPrimitive people rejoiced when the Sun reascended--, 447-m.\nPrimitive philosophy of the Indians the basis of that of Pythagoras, 372-l.\nPrimitive religion a veneration, pure and simple, of nature, 610-l.\nPrimitive religion as taught by Christ and the Patriarchs, 540-l.\nPrimitive religion not a deification of nature or denial of the sovereignty\n  of God, 610-l.\nPrimitive Religion the glorious images of Divinity, 508-m.\nPrimitive revelation of God gives place to nature worship among--, 600-m.\nPrimitive revelation seen through the idolatry of nature worship, 601-m.\nPrimitive simplicity of revelation overlaid with poetic ornament, 600-m.\nPrimitive Truth faded from men's Souls as time went on, 583-u.\nPrimitive Truth falsified and confused during the ages, 599-u.\nPrimitive Truths passed from the Egyptians to the Jews, preserved\n  by the Essenes, 369-l.\nPrimitive Truth taught Pythagoras by Zoroaster, 617-l.\nPrince of Jerusalem, 16th Degree; characteristics of, 241-u.\nPrince of Libanus, Knight of the Royal Axe, 22d Degree, 340-u.\nPrince of Mercy or Scottish Trinitarian, the 26th Degree, 524.\nPrince of the Tabernacle, 24th Degree, 371-u.\nPrinciple called Father is comprehended in Yod, according to the\n  Idra Suta, 792-l.\nPrinciple is One; the Word is Two, 772-u.\nPrinciple, man is possessed of an irrational principle origin, 252-u.\nPrinciple of Active and Passive very important in ancient philosophy,\n  653-664.\nPrinciple of all things is called the House of all things, 793-u.\nPrinciple of Existence made Himself Creator, 772-u.\nPrinciple of Light manifested himself in Man to deliver the Soul, 567-m.\nPrinciples, adherence to political, 85-l.\nPrinciples and attributes personified, 270.\nPrinciples and laws fixed for man as a spiritual being, 197-m.\nPrinciples, Being is Being; Being is Real; Being is Logic were the\n  three, 322-u.\nPrinciples, but One are the Three Absolute, 322-u.\nPrinciples, Father, Son or Word, Holy Spirit, are the three, 322-u.\nPrinciples in Alchemy represented by Air, Earth, Fire, Water, 791-l.\nPrinciples, Mercury, Salt, Sulphur, given a philosophical meaning, 783-l.\nPrinciples of Divinity and of Primitive Matter and Darkness each\n  eternal, 567-l.\nPrinciples of generation, Active and Passive, basis of the Mysteries,\n  404-m.\nPrinciples of Good and Evil each triumphed for three thousand years,\n  663-m.\nPrinciples of Light and Darkness proceed from the Active and Passive,\n  659-l.\nPrinciples of Male and Female in highest and most profound sense, 700-m.\nPrinciples of Manes adopted by the Gnostics in some numbers, 818-u.\nPrinciples of the justness of God and the law of merit and demerit\n  necessary to faith, 706-u.\nPrinciples of the Universe; organs of generation symbols of\n  the Active and Passive, 401-l.\nPrinciples of the Universe, the Active and Passive symbolized by--, 401-l.\nPrinciples, the generative parts of man and woman symbolized the, 401-l.\nPrinciples, three result from the four qualities of the four Elements,\n  783-l.\nPrinting, power and art of, 54-m.\nPriscillianists believed in two principles, Divinity and Matter and\n  Darkness, 567-l.\nPrismatic separation of seven colors correspond to the Sephiroth, 727-m.\nProblem of the Hermetics to transmute metals and possess the elixir\n  of life, 772-l.\nProblems, most important, are social, 180-u.\nProblems of populous and wealthy country, 178-179.\nProblems solved by the ancient poetic and philosophic mind, 653-m.\nProclus held that each Star contained an immortal Soul and Intelligence,\n  671-m.\nProclus states Deity changed himself into the form of Love in the\n  work of creation, 683-m.\nProduction, capacity of, 305-m.\nProductive capacity of the Letter He left behind when Yod reascended,\n  751-l.\nProfane applied to strangers to the early Christians, 544-m.\nProgress of man must be accompanied by doubt, 712-l.\nProgress the normal condition of man, 691-l.\nProjection accomplished by the understanding of a single word, 777-m.\nPrometheus chained in his cavern betokened the continuance of Winter,\n  592-m.\nPronunciation and meaning of Ineffable Name lost to all but a few, 700-l.\nPronunciation of the name of Deity involves the secret of its meaning,\n  697-m.\nProphet of the Jews announced to the Magi by the Star of Initiation,\n  840-u.\nProposition, Forty-seventh, 85-l.\nProserpina represents the seed decaying and destroyed, 395-u.\nProserpine and Adonis in wanderings represent--, 404-m.\nProserpine overcome by Pluto in the form of a Serpent, 492-m.\nProvidence of God enfolds the whole Universe, 715-l.\nProvidence of God rules directly in all the affairs and changes of\n  material things, 809-l.\nProvidence: several Mysteries taught the administration of the Universe\n  by Intermediaries of, 416-l.\nProvost and Judge, 7th Degree; lessons inculcated, 126-u.\nPruczi, or Prussians, typified the Trinity by the tri-une God, 551-l.\nPrudence symbolized by the Blazing Star, 506-u.\nPrudence, the opposite of indolence, represented by Mercury, 727-l.\nPrussian Knight or Noachite, the 21st Degree, lessons of the, 334-u.\nPsalms of David indicate a loftier knowledge of Deity than the common,\n  617-u.\nPsyche represented the Soul; her suitor was Dionusos, who awakened her,\n  586-l.\nPsyche, representing the Soul, had an earthly and an immortal lover,\n  519-l.\nPublic not a vague abstraction, 198-u.\nPublic Opinion a Force; in free governments omnipotent, 90-l.\nPublic service only justly entered through door of merit, 47-u.\nPunishment and reward are the satisfaction of demerit and merit, 724-u.\nPunishment for sins a part of the Masonic Doctrine, 577-u.\nPunishment of Vice in this life, 101-u.\nPunishment of wrongdoers without anger or revenge, 75-m.\nPunishment the occurrence of an effect, 127-m.\nPurity of heart security for purity of life, 227-m.\nPurity of no religion continues long after it casts off simplicity,\n  360-u.\nPurity of the Initiate indicated by fasting, continence, initiation,\n  520-l.\nPurification by air, water and earth; symbols of, 412-m.\nPurification preparatory to initiation, 431-l.\nPyramid, no Hebrew word to designate a, 234-u.\nPyramid of Borsippa, near Babylon; seven stages of the, 11-u.\nPyramid, the universal symbol of immortality, 633-u.\nPyramids and Obelisks consecrated to the Sun and Fire, 460-u.\nPyramids built to the four cardinal points, 366-l.\nPyramids, firm and unshaken, figured to Masonic judges by a triangle,\n  826-l.\nPyramids of Bal had seven stages of different colors, 234-m.\nPyramids represented metaphysics founded on a knowledge of nature, 321-l.\nPythagoras a pupil of Zoroaster, 424-l.\nPythagoras attached importance to the Science of Numbers, 34-l.\nPythagoras became an Egyptian initiate, 365-m.\nPythagoras borrowed the Tetractys, 88-m.\nPythagoras chose philosopher as a title rather than sage, 626-m.\nPythagoras, conception of God by, 285-u.\nPythagoras declares \"God is One,\" the Soul of all Beings, the Father,\n  667-u.\nPythagoras, definitions of, 97-u.\nPythagoras did not ascribe to numbers any special virtue, 626-l.\nPythagoras dwelt twelve years at Babylon studying with the Magi, 662-u.\nPythagoras enveloped doctrine with symbols, 97-m.\nPythagoras established the Grecian Mysteries with three degrees, 366-u.\nPythagoras explained the transmigration of Souls, 622-l.\nPythagoras expounded the higher Greek religious ideas, 617-m.\nPythagoras, Fellowcraft Degree a reproduction of the teachings of, 366-l.\nPythagoras, 47th proposition older than, 86-l.\nPythagoras: Heirocles and Timaeus of Loeri disciples of, 623-u.\nPythagoras' idea regarding numbers, 88-m.\nPythagoras journeyed to learn the secrets of ancient Initiations, 96-l.\nPythagoras learned from a Magus at Babylon the two principles, 662-u.\nPythagoras learned from the Egyptians the idea of the Universal Soul,\n  666-m.\nPythagoras learned from Zoroaster, who was taught in India, 617-m.\nPythagoras learned in Egypt that the earth revolved around the Sun,\n  843-u.\nPythagoras learned much from the Egyptian priests, 362-l.\nPythagoras made the Universe an intelligent Being, 667-l.\nPythagoras, Masonry reiterates the maxims of, 221-m.\nPythagoras, mysterious Pentalpha of, 58-l.\nPythagoras, mystic numbers of, 233-m.\nPythagoras nor Thales made generally known the revolution of earth,\n  843-u.\nPythagoras obtained true knowledge of Deity in the Mysteries, 208-m.\nPythagoras, Plato, Aristotle, mentioned with Christ, 562-l.\nPythagoras, Plato developed the philosophy of, 366-l.\nPythagoras recognized two principles of all things, in equal proportion,\n  662-u.\nPythagoras represented the world by the right angled triangle, 631-m.\nPythagoras taught the esoteric doctrine, 249-m.\nPythagoras taught the transmigration of souls as an allegory, 398-m.\nPythagoras, teachings of, 366-m.\nPythagoras tried by Egyptian Priests before communicating secrets, 385-l.\nPythagore de Crotone corrupted into Peter Gower of Groton in England,\n  816-m.\nPythagorean doctrine of numbers preserved by--, 235-m.\nPythagorean ideas as to particular numbers, 626-630.\nPythagorean ideas on Unity, 626-m.\nPythagorean opinions in the creeds of the Essenes and Therapeuts, 259-l.\nPythagorean \"Sons of Apollo\" took up the service of Dionusos\n  when dispersed, 586-u.\nPythagorean symbol of Tetractys revered by the Essenes, 264-l.\nPythagorean triad was Idea, Matter and the Demiourgos, 549-l.\nPython the Serpent Deity esteemed oracular, 496-m.\n\nQ\n\nQuadrature of the circle indicates the knowledge of the four vulgar\n  elements, 629-m.\nQuadrature of the circle produced by movements of four equal angles,\n  771-l.\nQualities we call God, not the name of the sum total is the essential,\n  644-u.\nQuarternary formed by the Ternary acting with Unity, 771-m.\nQuarternary, the Key of all numbers, movements, forms, 771-m.\nQuaternary a symbol of the Eternal and Creative Principle, 632-l.\nQuaternary the first solid figure, the pyramid, a symbol of immortality,\n  633-u.\nQuaternary the most perfect number and the root of all things, 632-l.\nQuestions concerning God, the Universe, Man, his destiny, 648-649.\nQuestions which are presumed to be solved by the \"Fall\" of man, 685-l.\nQuestions which have produced all the religions, philosophy, 649-l.\nQuintessence, a combination of light and gold, in Alchemical work, 773-m.\nQuintessence symbolized to the Alchemists by the Blazing Star, 842-u.\nQuintessence: the number five designated the universal, 634-u.\nQuintessence, the universal medicine of the Hermetic for the body, 773-m.\n\nR\n\nRab Banaim, Chief of the Architects in 12th Degree, 202-l.\nRahab means a sea monster; smitten by God, 510-l.\nRainbow, three principal, seven by mixture, are the colors of the, 57-l.\nRaising of Khurum a symbol of the spiritual regeneration of man, 519-l.\nRaising of Khurum symbolical of the attraction of the constellation Leo,\n  488-m.\nRam, device of Gad, characterized by Jacob as a warrior, 461-l.\nRama, one of the impersonations of Vishnu, the Epic Hero, 603-m.\nRamayan defines what the word Aum represents, 620-l.\nRamsay's fourth Degree, Scottish Elder Master Knight of St. Andrew,\n  779-l.\nRaphael, the face of a Man on the West and backward, with He and Earth,\n  798-m.\nRaven, Dove, Phoenix, are symbols of Good, Evil and Beauty, 792-m.\nRe, the son of Phtha, and his wife, Tiphe, the celestial firmament,\n  254-m.\nRe, the Sun, whose symbol was the point within the circle, 254-m.\nReabsorbtion of the Soul into the Infinite, 686-u.\nReal and unreal relative terms, 673-m.\nReality, what is; reality of dreams while they last, 572-l.\nReason and experience the bases of Science, 776-u.\nReason and sentiment the bases of Faith, 776-u.\nReason and the Moral Sense keep appetites and passions for our benefit,\n  860-l.\nReason at fault when it deals with the infinite, 28-m.\nReason, Infinite, the Soul of Nature, immortal, 280-u.\nReason is because it is; reason is by means of itself, 737-l.\nReason is necessity, Law, the direction of every initiative, 737-l.\nReason is powerless before Authority, 315-m.\nReason is the Absolute; it is not an hypothesis; it is essential to\n  existence, 737-u.\nReason is where nothing exists; nothing could exist without it, 737-l.\nReason leads us away from Truth under certain conditions--, 301-l.\n\"Reason leaps into the throne of God and waves her torch over the\n  ruins of the Universe\", 810-u.\nReason, light of; symbolized by--, 210-u.\nReason must have company of loving kindness in morals or political\n  science, 29-l.\nReason: Necessity, Liberty, are synonyms of the Absolute; the\n  Fixed; the Volatile, 791-l.\nReason of man compared with the Instinct of animals, 304-u.\nReason of man possesses something of the Absolute by participation\n  in the Divine reason, 708-u.\nReason proves the existence and attributes of God, 226-l.\nReason reconciled with Faith in the Kabala, 744-l.\nReason sinking exhausted gives place to Faith, 841-m.\nReason: Socrates believed in a Universal, 693-u.\nReason Supreme and Absolute Justice, the Hermetic universal\n  medicine for the soul, 773-m.\nReason, Supreme and unalterable, is the Philosophal Stone of the\n  Hermetics, 775-l.\nReason, the designation of the Supreme Being, by Lao-Tseu, 278-l.\nReason: the Divine Reason is beyond the human, 841-m.\nReason: the great Absurdity to our feebleness is the Divine, 841-m.\nReason, unalterable, the touchstone of Truth, 776-u.\nReason's great aim is to generalize, to discover unity in multiplicity,\n  673-m.\nReasoning principle comes from God through the Word, 252-u.\nRebuilding of the Temple of the Eternal advocated by Cagliostro\n  to Masons, 823-m.\nReconciliation of faith and reason, science and creed by Magic, 842-m.\nReconciliation of Good and Evil through the plan of Equilibrium, 767-u.\nReconciliation of Light and Darkness; Free Will and Necessity and\n  the harmonious result of all, 767-m.\nRedeemer placed in the region of the Sun and Moon to attract\n  the Light or Soul, 566-l.\nRedeemer, theory of and necessity for a, 274-m.\nRedeemer to end the reign of evil is The Word, 274-m.\nRedeemer to overcome the Principle of Evil; names of the, 277-m.\nRedemption of mankind through the death of a Mediator believed\n  by the Druids, 618-u.\nRedemption will be accomplished, and end of the world occur when--,\n  564-u.\nReflections inhabited seven different regions and were named--, 563-m.\nReflections: the Angels proceeding from Ialdaboth were called, 563-m.\nReformation, a monk wrote anti-papal doctrines previous to the, 95-l.\nReformation and repentance necessary to obtain forgiveness, 435-m.\nReformers who are impatient generally fail to reclaim the erring, 133-l.\nRegeneration, air, fire, water, the symbols of, 357-l.\nRegnum has more nearly perfect knowledge when she turns face to face,\n  799.\nRegnum is given the name of the Word of the Lord and superinvests\n  Heaven, 795-m.\nRegnum, or Malakoth, the wife of Seir Aupin, Microprosopos, 799-l.\nRegnum, the cornerstone, crushed into a formless mass, 796-l.\nRegnum, the last Numeration, was empty and inane; needed Love, 798-u.\nRegnum, the seventh King, produced by Binah, is called a stone, 796-l.\nReign of Evil ends when Fallen Angels are restored to God, 686-u.\nReligion and duty, which are accepted by Masons, 226-m.\nReligion and science, when progressive, are identical in aims, 710-m.\nReligion, as a physiological fact, is the revelation of a necessity\n  of souls, 822-u.\nReligion, connected with philosophy was the ancient Oriental, 22-u.\nReligion connects philosophy with humanity, 708-m.\nReligion, every Masonic lodge a temple of, 213-l.\nReligion for the mass of mankind must contain some errors, 224-u.\nReligion gives man a Father, a Witness, a Consoler, a Judge, 708-m.\nReligion, humanity has but one, 102-u.\nReligion in Egypt and the East more or less a mystery, 354-u.\nReligion is a recognition of duty in harmony with goodness, 717-m.\nReligion labored to establish the universal triumph of the Cross, 821-l.\nReligion, Masonry is the universal, eternal, 219-m.\nReligion may be founded on an intellectual basis, 710-l.\nReligion: men figuratively saw God face to face in the Primitive, 508-m.\nReligion natural to man; he turns to God instinctively, 647-l.\nReligion not in inaction, but in activity and exertion, 342-m.\nReligion of Christianity imposed silence on lying oracles, 841-l.\nReligion of Christianity put an end to the prestiges of the false Gods,\n  841-l.\nReligion of each age suited to its capacity, 105-u.\nReligion of Love a Religion of Hate for seventeen centuries, 294-m.\nReligion of Moses borrowed from all creeds with which it came in\n  contact, 247-m.\nReligion of the ancient Orientals was more or less a Mystery, 22-u.\nReligion of the Ancient Patriarchs taught by God, 582-u.\nReligion of the Hermetics that of the Magi and ancient Initiates, 774-l.\nReligion of the infallible and the certainty of Philosophy united in\n  Magic, 842-m.\nReligion of the Patriarchs as practiced by the early Christians, 540-l.\nReligion of toil, Masonry, society, 212-213.\nReligion originally an attempt to interpret the unknown by mind, 650-m.\nReligion revealed by God to the primitive man, 598-m.\nReligion revealed to the patriarchs taught by Masonry, 214-u.\nReligion separated from philosophy became arrogant and fantastical, 650-m.\nReligion, sole purpose an Ethic, 35-u.\nReligion, the crown of Morality, 726-u.\nReligion, the truest, would not be comprehended by the ignorant, 224-m.\nReligions, a basis of Truth and Morality in all, 311-l.\nReligions, ancient, which once ruled the minds of men, 247-u.\nReligions and Faiths antagonized by Science, 809-l.\nReligions and sciences based on the idea of equilibrium, 769-l.\nReligions based on the doctrine of the two Principles, 661-l.\nReligion's existence is a scientific fact, 822-u.\nReligion's history that of the human mind, 651-m.\nReligions, maxims of ancient, 167-170.\nReligions, Mysteries arose from the insufficiency of the ancient, 354-u.\nReligions of antiquity all based on the worship of the Sun, 593-l.\nReligions of the North partook of the manly character of the people,\n  591-u.\nReligions owe their life to the proposition of the direct Providence\n  of God, 809-l.\nReligion's task is to fill the chasm separating man from Deity, 652-l.\nReligious belief a matter of birth, place and education, 165-m.\nReligious belief not acceptable to all men on same evidence, 165-l.\nReligious belief, sure foundation for, 226-l.\nReligious belief, the deductions of intellect and convictions of the\n  heart furnish a foundation for, 226-l.\nReligious conceptions concerning the Trinity by the Ancients, 576-m.\nReligious convictions as a result of the study of--, 226-l.\nReligious doctrine of India and Persia at first a veneration of\n  Nature, 610-l.\nReligious dramas exhibited to the initiates as initiations, 383-m.\nReligious expression is symbolism; objects of religion unseen, 512-l.\nReligious Faiths of ancients could not have been believed if they\n  knew as we do, 302-u.\nReligious feeling evaporated with the stripping away of symbolism, 678-m.\nReligious history that of the human mind, 651-m.\nReligious ideas may be the same, but their expressions are various, 512-l.\nReligious lessons taught to a thoughtful man by nature, 714-m.\nReligious metaphysics discussed by Hebrews after Persian captivity, 617-u.\nReligious Orders desired to make Kings and Pontiffs, 815-m.\nReligious realization of Hermeticism is the foundation of the true\n  Empire and--, 840-l.\nReligious requisites are--, 164-u.\nReligious systems approximating towards each other; when--, 247-m.\nReligious teachings conveyed through \"exhibition\", 355-m.\nReligious Truths inculcated by Masonry, 576-l.\nRepining because we are not angels in a world of no changes is folly,\n  696-m.\nRepose unbalanced by an analogous movement will not be happiness, 847-l.\nRepublic, danger of government by party, 83-u.\nRepublic, for services to be rendered in the future is one entitled\n  to office in a, 81-u.\nRepublic governed by agitators, 82-l.\nRepublic, hollow, heartless and shallow politicians in a, 84-l.\nRepublic, only in consideration of public services is one entitled to\n  office in a, 83-l.\nRepublic saved by principle, \"The tools to the workmen\", 47-m.\nRepublic, the world but one; each nation a family, 220-m.\nRepublic, those competent to serve refuse to enter into struggle, 85-u.\nRepublic will be immortal, when--, 21-l.\nRepublics, decay of, 86-m.\nRepublics of old perished by the conflicts of liberties and franchises,\n  815-m.\nRepublics, rule of Speech and Imposture, 45-l.\nRepublics, to the unworthy often go offices in, 46-m.\nRequisites, religious, are--, 164-u.\nResignation more noble in proportion as it is less passive, 39-m.\nResponsibility of Man for his acts a part of the Masonic Doctrine, 577-u.\nResults, an aggregate of many exertions produces great, 175-u.\nResults commanded by selection, 695-l.\nResults, great, if Masonry and Masons are true to their missions, 175-l.\nResults of the actions of certain women on their country, 312-l.\nResults of universal law may be beneficial, though limitedly\n  prejudicial, 695-l.\nResults, the product of constant assiduity, 174-m.\nResurrected; after being held by the chains of the grave, Hercules was,\n  593-u.\nResurrection, death, passion of Bakchos at Thrace, 411-u.\nResurrection of a God who associates Souls with Him, 408-m.\nResurrection or revival of the Sun Gods continuous, 590-m.\nRetirement, morbid selfishness, 39-m.\nRetribution bars retaliation, even in words, 813-u.\nRetribution, law of, 216-217.\nReuben answers, to Aquarius, his ensign a man, 461-u.\nRevelation of God by his attributes, 267-m.\nRevelation: Infinite Being worshipped without superstition by\n  primitive, 624-m.\nRevelation of primitive times forms the basis of all religions\n  and Masonry, 625-m.\nRevelation of the Creative Agency in the ten emanations or\n  Sephiroth, 267-m.\nRevelation of the primitive religion made to the Hebrews in fragments,\n  616-l.\nRevelation of the Primitive Word of Divine Truth to mankind, 598-m.\nRevelations and Inspirations in traditions, 321-u.\nRevelations, Doctrines of all creeds found in the book of, 272-l.\nRevelations: men united astronomy and religion, forgetting the\n  Original, 508-l.\nRevelations paints the struggle between Good and Evil, 272-l.\nReverence for ourselves as immortal Souls, 861-u.\nReverence for the organs of generation came from the ancient idea, 771-l.\nReversion of letters of a word to form a new name was common, 699-m.\nRevision of the thirty degrees by the Supreme Council, So. Jur, 328-m.\nRevivification of dead matter from its ashes the great work, 786-l.\nRevolutionibus Animarum, of Rabbi Jitz-chak Lorja, a Kabalistic\n  book, 772-l.\nRevolutions have long roots in the past, 90-u.\nReward and assistance of humble workers in life's progress, 158-m.\nReward comes rarely to those who prepare the way, 230-u.\nReward, for eminent services ingratitude is often the only, 316-m.\nReward for good work rarely obtained in lifetime, 316-m.\nReward of those who assail hoary abuses or vested wrongs, 157-m.\nReward, who entitled in the future to, 172-m.\nRewards and punishment, merit of righteousness follow from the\n  presence of evil, 797-m.\nRig Veda Sanhita contains Hymns addressed to the Heavens and\n  Earth, 850-l.\nRight agrees with justice and stands, 830-u.\nRight and left completes human Unity; primitive man of both sexes, 771-u.\nRight angle triangle has its angles indicated by the columns, 861-m.\nRight angle triangle in diagram and described, 789-m.\nRight angle triangle represents man as a union of the spiritual\n  and material, 861-m.\nRight angled triangle of Pythagoras represented the world, 631-m.\nRight angled triangle, the G. Master's square; the 47th problem,\n  in the Stars, 487-m.\nRight doing better than right thinking, 35-m.\nRight has a continual and progressive march of triumph, 835-l.\nRight to be done because it is right, 219-l.\nRight to dictate what shall be believed belongs to no man or men, 29-m.\n\"Right to govern\" vested in the ablest, wisest, best, 203-l.\nRight, under Necessity, to slay; no right to torture, because not\n  necessary, 832-u.\nRighteous shall dwell in Gimli or Vingolf with God, according to\n  the Edda, 619-m.\nRightfulness of many actions difficult to prove from our standpoint,\n  830-m.\nRights, inalienable, 24-u.\nRights of man must be respected by God, the essence of justice, 704-m.\nRigor impregnated by Love through Benignity produced the brain\n  of Microprosopos, 796-u.\nRigor, perfect, denoted by the Mother, female. 795-l.\nRing given as a symbol of Divine protection and an emblem of\n  Perfection. 431-u.\nRings and Globes encircled by serpents common on ancient monuments, 500-m.\nRishis: Patriarchs of the primitive world known as the seven great, 623-l.\nRites and ceremonies of Mysteries invented by the Priests, 354-m.\nRobe; candidate in the Indian Mysteries invested in a white, 428-m.\nRobes of white are symbols of candor, purity, truth, 539-u.\nRobes presented to candidates alluded to the Heavens and starry\n  signs, 506-l.\nRobes, the initiates were clothed in linen, 387-l.\nRobespierres in period of convulsion, 30-l.\nRod of Bakchos cast on the ground becomes a serpent, 422-u.\nRod of Bakchos divided the waters of rivers and he crossed dry, 422-u.\nRoman de la Rose and Dante's Commedia are two opposite forms\n  of the one work, 823-u.\nRoman de la Rose borrowed from the High Kabalah, 733-u.\nRoman de la Rose completed by Chopinel, begun by de Lorris, 823-u.\nRoman de la Rose expresses the mysterious meaning of Dante's\n  poem, 733-u.\nRoman de la Rose is the Epic of Old France; a profound book, 823-u.\nRoman de la Rose: the accomplishment of the Great Work the\n  Key of the, 821-l.\nRoman Games represented the course of the Sun, from East to\n  West, seven of them, 464-m.\nRoman, words of the great, 171-l.\nRoman year began at the Vernal Equinox; also that of the Persians, 466-u.\nRome: early Christians fled from persecution to the Catacombs of, 542-u.\nRome more intolerant of heresy than of vice and crime, 820-m.\nRoot above is represented by the needle of the Balance, 798-m.\nRose anciently sacred to Aurora and the Sun, symbol of Dawn, 291-u.\nRose, as a symbol, explained in Kabalistic Commentaries on the\n  Canticles, 821-l.\nRose conquered by Science; the Cross established by Religion, 821-l.\nRose Croix Adepts respected the dominant and revealed religion, 822-u.\nRose Croix Adepts united with Templars and founded a Mystic Sect, 821-m.\nRose Croix associations; the Absolute became the reason for the\n  rites of the, 840-m.\nRose Croix Degree, meaning of the symbols of the, 308-u.\nRose Croix Degree not closed to any good man of any faith, 290-u.\nRose Croix Degree, opinion of Christ as propounded in the, 308-m.\nRose Croix Degree symbolizes the triumph of good over evil, 307-l.\nRose Croix Degree teaches belief in no particular creed, 308-m.\nRose Croix Degree teaches that notwithstanding Evil all is right, 307-l.\nRose Croix Degree, the 18th; application of the symbols of the, 276-m.\nRose Croix, lamentations and doubts expressed in the Degree of, 292-299.\nRose Croix, obligations, rules, philosophy of the ancient, 289-m.\nRose Croix, of no importance are differences of opinion regarding\n  the Degree of, 290-u.\nRose Croix of the Hermetics and Kabalists, 785-790.\nRose Croix, only those instructed in Symbolic Degrees admitted to\n  the Degree of, 290-u.\nRose Croix secrets in allegory in the Roman de la Rose and Divine\n  Commedia, 823-u.\nRose Croix symbol first publicly expounded by Dante, 822-l.\nRose Croix, symbolism of the Degree of, 290-292.\nRose Croix, various interpretations, and ceremonies of the degree of,\n  289-l.\nRose Cross established by Science and Religion, 821-l.\nRose of Flamel, that of Jean de Meung, that of Dante, grew on\n  the same stem, 823-u.\nRose of Jericho, propagation of the, 96-m.\nRose of light in the center of which a human form extends its arm\n  in the form of a cross, 822-m.\nRose, the emblem of beauty, life, love, pleasure; the sign of the\n  accomplishment of the Great Work, 821-l.\nRose, the living symbol of the revelation of the harmonies of being,\n  821-l.\nRose united to the Cross the problem proposed by High Initiation, 821-l.\nRouge-Croix vows demanded giving aid, support, succor, 802-l.\nRough Ashlar prepared by aid of the Square, Level, Plumb, Balance, 787-m.\nRousseau, through the ages will ring the words of, 43-u.\nRoyal Arch Degree, symbolism of veils, colors, banners of the, 409-l.\nRoyal Arch figures, Lion, Ox, Man, Eagle; origin of, 461-m.\nRoyal Arch Masonry, explanation of the figures on the banner of, 448-m.\nRoyal Arch of Solomon, 13th Degree, allegory or history of, 204-u.\n\"Royal Art,\" a name given by the Adapts to Magism, 842-u.\nRoyal Secret makes possible the Holy Empire of Masonic Brotherhood, 861-l.\nRuach, from the world Yezirah, the Vav of the Tetragrammaton, 757-u.\nRuach, the next higher spiritual part, or Spirit, 757-U.\nRule, Law and Order symbolized by the 24-inch, 5-u.\nRuler of the Universe found by attention to the world of self, 508-l.\n\nS\n\nSabaoth, one of the seven Reflections of the Ophites, 563-m.\nSabbat, brother of the Serpent, represents the Evil Force or Devil,\n  102-l.\nSabean Researches by Landseer suggests an Osirian theory, 483-487.\nSabeans recognized the Sun as the outshining, but not as the type\n  of power, 740-l.\nSabeans taught that the heavens and spheres were part of the\n  Universal soul, 669-m.\nSabeans, worshippers of Stars, held a great feast at the Vernal\n  Equinox, 458-u.\nSaduceeism arose from opposition to foreign teachings of the\n  Pharisees, 259-l.\nSacrament of three Degrees, purification, initiation, perfection, 543-l.\nSacramental observances commemorate--, 393-l.\nSacraments of the Catholic church found in Mysteries of Mithra, 541-l.\nSacred Name, Hebrews forbidden to pronounce; substitute, 201-m.\nSacred name represented by the triple tau with circle and triangle,\n  503-m.\nSacred Name, true pronunciation of the, 204-m.\nSacred number three called the perfect number, 5-l.\nSacred Numbers always appear together in the Heavens, 487-u.\nSacred numbers among the Etruscans, Jews, Egyptians, Hindus, 632-m.\nSacred numbers contained in the nine Sephiroth, 323-m.\nSacred numbers included in the faces and lines of a cube, 5-l.\nSacred traditions flowed through the most ancient nations, 599-l.\nSacred Triad represented by the triple tau with circle and triangle,\n  503-m.\nSacrifice of self may be an act of justice, 833-l.\nSacrifice of self not implied by self restraint, 696-m.\nSacrifices accounted for by preponderance of God's sternness over\n  mercy, 687-l.\nSacrifices made, skins of victims trampled on, 432-m.\nSage, work of the, 7-m.\nSages, barbarian and Greek, conveyed their meanings in visible\n  symbols, 371-m.\nSages of Alexandria had an \"unspeakable word\" pronounced Ararita, 728-u.\nSagitarius chasing the Wolf, the emblem of Benjamin, the hunter, 461-l.\nSaint Bartholomew, Eve of, 49-l.\nSaint John, Apostle, read the language of Philo, 100-u.\nSaint John said Christ was the Light that was the life of men, 743-l.\nSaint John the father of the Gnostics, 817-m.\nSaint Thomas declares in reference to the moral laws, 737-m.\nSaints and martyrs developed out of previous mythical beings, 653-u.\nSakya of the Hindus called Gautama, Somonkodom, Chy-Kia or Fo, 551-m.\nSalam, meaning of word; similarity to Salaa, a rock, 234-u.\nSallust defines and explains the objects of the Mysteries, 415-l.\nSallust, the philosopher, remarks on the relation of the soul to\n  the Mysteries, 404-l.\nSalsette, Initiations consummated in the three hundred apartments\n  of, 361-u.\nSalt and Sulphur serve in Hermetic work only to prepare the\n  mercury, 775-m.\nSalt and water used for purification, 431-l.\nSalt expressed by the letter M, the initial letter of the Hebrew\n  word, Malakh, 780-m.\nSalt of Philosophy is Wisdom, 790-u.\nSalt, one of the great symbols of the Alchemists, 57-l.\nSalt, Sulphur, Mercury, separated from the rough Ashlar by\n  Masonic implements, 787-m.\nSalt, Sulphur, Spirit, produce Solidity; Softness, spiritual, vaporous\n  particles, 780-u.\nSalt represented by the Hermetics under the form of a cubical stone,\n  775-l.\nSalt represents to Hermeticists Absolute Matter, regenerated by Azoth,\n  778-m.\nSalt, with the Hermetics, corresponds with the Earth, 773-l.\nSalutary number is six, contains the source of our happiness, 628-m.\nSamaneans, a Society of Buddhist Prophets, belief of, 277-l.\nSamaritan invented the accusation of Christians worshipping an ass,\n  103-u.\nSamothrace, Mysteries of Cabiri celebrated at, 407-u.\nSamothrace settled by ancient Pelasgi, Asiatic Colonists, 426-u.\nSamothrace the location of celebrated Mysteries, 426-427.\nSandalphon, one of the Chiefs of the Kabalistic Angels, 784-l.\nSanscrit stanzas in reference to the nature of God, 741-m.\nSapientia, Hakemah, \"The Head of that which is non-existent\" as\n  applied to Kadmon, 758-u.\nSatan, by consent, made Adam, his soul of Divine Light, his body\n  of matter, 567-u.\nSatan confounded by the Jews with Ahriman and the Dragon, 258-u.\nSatan created and governs the visible world, 567-l.\nSatan means in Hebrew simply \"The Adversity\", 661-m.\nSatan of Gnosticism confounded with Matter, 255-u.\nSatan, the Evil God, the Genius of matter alone, 565-l.\nSatan, the negation of God; true name of, Yahveh, reversed, 102-l.\nSatan the result of the reflection of Ialdaboth on matter, 563-m.\nSatan, the son and lord of matter; demons the children of matter, 567-l.\nSatan, Yahveh reversed the true name of, 102-l.\nSatan's Eons, or Demons, were divided among themselves, 566-u.\nSaturn gives the Soul the logical and contemplative faculty as it\n  passes through, 439-m.\nSaturn represents Temperance, 727-l.\nSaturn, the name of the first gate of the ladder; material, lead, 414-m.\nSaviour died upon the cross of expiation to redeem man in pledge, 567-l.\nSaviour is the Logos made man, 848-u.\nSaviour of the Soul represented by Dionusos, 519-u.\nSaviour symbolized by the Word of a Master, 642-u.\nSaviour, the first of creatures, created by the direct will of God,\n  564-l.\nSaviour united with his Sister, Wisdom, descended through the\n  regions of the seven angels, 563-l.\nSaviour with Wisdom entered into Jesus at his baptism, 563-l.\nSavitri, the Progenitor, a Vedic Sun God, 602-l.\nScandinavian deities, Thor and Odin, subordinate to Alfader, 598-u.\nScandinavian name for the Sun was Arkaleus or Hercules, 587-u.\nScandinavian three-lettered name of Deity, I, O, W, 632-l.\nScandinavians believed in the Author of everything that existed, 618-m.\nScandinavians lamented the death of Balder torn in pieces, 595-u.\nScandinavians typified the Trinity by Odin, Frea, Thor, 552-u.\nSchimeon Ben Jochai, Rabbi, describes the mysterious chariot, 798-l.\nSchool of life, hard lessons in; be faithful in, 184-u.\nScience a progressive mediation between ignorance and wisdom with\n  happiness as the object, 711-u.\nScience and Religion, when progressive, are identical in interests\n  and aims, 710-m.\nScience at the bottom of Magic, 730-l.\nScience became concealed under Christian disguises after Hypatia, 732-l.\nScience concealed itself to avoid the aggressions of a blind love, 730-l.\nScience consists of--, 25-m.\nScience consists of matured inferences from confirmed experience, 711-u.\nScience deals only with phenomena and does not know what light\n  or sound is, 810-u.\nScience has its New Testament and Philosophy its beatitudes, 714-m.\nScience is moral as well as intellectual, 711-l.\nScience, Masonry the lineal descendant of the higher, 253-l.\nScience, Moses, High Priests, Solomon, Prophets, in possession of\n  the higher, 253-l.\nScience, object of political, 26-l.\nScience of Magism engraved on stone by Enoch and Trismegistus, 839-l.\nScience of the discovery of Truth the most sublime to which\n  mortal can aspire, 785-l.\nScience of the Hermetics given by Paracelsus, Flamel, Raymond\n  Lulle, 774-l.\nScience overcome in Alexandria by the fanaticism of Christians, 732-l.\nScience powerless against the forces of nature, 810-812.\nScience rests on reason and experience, 776-u.\nScience substitutes Forces for God's supervision of the Universe, 809-m.\nScience teaches the magnitude of the Universe, 711-m.\nScience teaches that man is not the central point of the Universe, 711-m.\nScience, the higher, known as the Knowledge of the Word, 253-l.\nScience, which is the reflection of God's glory, receives the Seal\n  of His Eternity, 842-l.\nSciences: Astrology generally practiced and deemed the mother of, 463-u.\nSciences originally concealed in Sanctuaries opened up by the Sohar,\n  843-l.\nScientific footprints discovered in the Symbolism of the Ancients, 842-l.\nSclavono-Vendes typified the Trinity by the three heads of Trigtav, 551-l.\nScorpio named because hot winds were venomous like reptiles, 446-m.\nScorpio, Osiris loses his life and virility under the sign, 478-l.\nScorpio: red Antares, one of the Stars marking Solstitial points, etc,\n  456-u.\nScorpio, the reign of Typhon began when the Sun entered, 456-u.\nScorpion bites the Equinoxial Bull on which sits Mithras, 478-l.\nScorpion or Serpent stings the Bull and Orion at Autumnal Equinox, 466-l.\nScorpion represented by a Snake, generally, a Scorpion, a sign\n  accursed, 456-u.\nScottish Elder Master and Knight of St. Andrew, the 4th Degree\n  of Ramsay, 779-l.\nScottish Knight of St. Andrew, the 29th Degree, 801.\nScottish Rite a teacher of great Truths, 328-l.\nScottish Rite Degrees, meanings of pompous titles, 327-u.\nScottish Rite Degrees were insignificant and merely communicated, 326-m.\nScottish Rite, in any country, under any opinion, are conferred the\n  degrees of the, 329-l.\nScottish Rite intended to be a Teacher of Mankind, 332-l.\nScottish Rite philosophy, teachings in reference to the soul and\n  Deity, 855-u.\nScottish Rite teaches humanity where domestic slavery exists, 330-u.\nScottish Rite teaches to its initiates in all its degrees--, 329-l.\nScottish Rite teachings concerning the employed and employer, 330-m.\nScottish Rite, the five principal divisions of the, 202-u.\nScottish Rite the Preacher of Liberty, Equality, Fraternity, 329-l.\nScriptures, first written by God on the Earth and Heavens, 25-l.\nScriptures have an inner and an outer meaning, 266-u.\nScriptures, the Essenes believed in the Esoteric and Exoteric meaning\n  of the, 265-l.\nScriptures, the literal meaning for the vulgar only, 250-l.\nScythia: Hercules begets with a Dragon the three ancestors of, 498-m.\nScythian name for the Sun was Arcaleus or Hercules, 587-u.\nScythians lamented the death of Acmon, 594-l.\nScythians made the earth the wife of Jupiter, 658-m.\nSeal of the Templars, originally two Knights on a single horse,\n  changed to the device of a Lamb, 802-u.\nSeals, coins, medals impressed with Zodiac and signs, 462-l.\nSecond day of Greek Mysteries initiates were purified in the sea, 433-m.\nSecond day of the second month dedicated to the manes of the dead, 630-m.\nSecond Degree, Fellow-Craft, 22-u.\nSecond month in the year dedicated to Pluto, God of Hell, 630-m.\nSecrecy enjoined on the Initiates very strict; penalties for violation,\n384-u.\nSecrecy indispensable in a Mason of whatever Degree, 109-m.\nSecrecy of the Christian Mysteries, 544-547.\nSecrecy required to be pledged before giving dogmas, 432-m.\nSecret Discipline traced to the commencement of the Christian Era, 547-u.\nSecret Doctrine superior to that of the Gospels claimed by the\n  Gnostics, 542-l.\nSecret knowledge of the Grand Scottish Master relates to the\n  transmutation of substances, 780-u.\nSecret, Masonic, revealed as Degrees are taken, 219-u.\nSecret Master, 4th Degree, 106-u.\nSecret of Masonry discovered in its symbols and work, 218-.u\nSecret of the Grand Arcanum, Royalty of Sages, Crown of Initiate, 101-l.\nSecret of the great work sought by the aspirants, 733-u.\nSecret of the Occult Sciences is that of Nature itself, 844-u.\nSecret of the Sohar necessary to enable one to make use of it, 843-l.\nSecret of the Stone is the extraction of salt from all matter, 779-u.\nSecret of the Universal Equilibrium is the Royal Secret, 859-u.\nSecret Orders and Associations had two doctrines, one concealed, 817-l.\nSecret: the Mystery of the Balance is the Royal, 858-l.\nSecret traditions of the Kabalah contain a perfect Theology, 843-l.\nSecret, Triple, of the Great Work represented by--, 104-l.\nSecrets of a brother to be kept if Law warrants, 109-l.\nSecrets of Ancient Masons concealed under enigmas and parables, 785-l.\nSecrets of Masonry; Religions, Mysteries, Hermeticism, concealed, 104-l.\nSecrets of the Kabala contained in the ternarys of the Evangelic\n  Symbols, 730-l.\nSecrets of the Temple, the revolution of the earth around the Sun\n  one of the, 843-u.\nSect, Masonry neither a political nor a religious, 220-l.\nSects, Masonry embraces all parties and sects to form--, 220-l.\nSeers living in the hope of being crowned, rend crowns and tread\n  on them, 844-l.\nSeeva, with Bramah and Vishnu, manifestations of the One Deity, 205-u.\nSeir Aupin or Microprosopos, Arik Aupin, or Macroprosopos, 799-m.\nSelf consciousness leads to consciousness of God, 709-m.\nSelf-denial, patience, humility, essential qualities of a Knight of St.\n  Andrew, 801-l.\nSelf limitation the first passing of a hidden Deity to manifestation,\n  555-m.\nSelf preservation may, in cases, be the just and right thing to do,\n  836-u.\nSelf restraint does not imply self sacrifice, 696-m.\nSelfishness the great stumbling block in the way of doing good, 720.\nSenary applied to the physical man; the septenary to his spirit, 634-l.\nSeneca compared Philosophy to Initiation, 384-l.\nSenses and appetites incite to great deeds, give strength, are useful\n  servants, 860-l.\nSenses are mysteries to us, 528.\nSenses are not the witnesses that bear testimony to the loftiest\n  Truths, 569-u.\nSentence written against the unjust in the nature of the Universe, 837-l.\nSentiment, deficiencies and inefficiency of mere, 148-149.\nSentiment warms and inclines to action; truth enlightens and illumines,\n  725-m.\nSentiments play an important part in morality, 725-m.\nSephar Yezirah, one of the completest embodiments of Occultism, 321-m.\nSephiroth, according to the Kabalistic idea, 765-u.\nSephiroth are a triple triangle and a circle, 769-l.\nSephiroth are Attributes of God by which He reveals Himself, 267-l.\nSephiroth are Ideas and Rays of the Infinite not separated from It,\n  759-m.\nSephiroth are the cause of existence of everything through certain\n  media, 759-m.\nSephiroth arranged in three columns according to the book Omschim, 757-m.\nSephiroth changed from the spherical form to the form of a person, 757-m.\nSephiroth described and their modes and actions explained, 761-m.\nSephiroth diagrammatically arranged, 770.\nSephiroth emanate from the First Cause, and are the media which\n  manifest It, 761-u.\nSephiroth emanating from Deity were the rays of His Splendor, 742-u.\nSephiroth, explanation of the last nine, 323-m.\nSephiroth figured as constituting a human form, 322-l.\nSephiroth from whose equilibrium results eternal permanency and\n  Stability, 736-l.\nSephiroth of the Kabala constituted the Ancient of Days, 727-m.\nSephiroth of the Kabalah, significance and numbers of the, 322-323.\nSephiroth or Emanations, names of the ten, 267-m.\nSephiroth or Emanations of Deity symbolized by lights, 202-l.\nSephiroth or rays the emanations or outflowings of Deity, names, 552-m.\nSephiroth: seven metals represented by the seven lower, 798-l.\nSephiroth so constituted that it was not necessary to frame worlds\n  from the first nine of them, 754-u.\nSephiroth, sometimes called the Persons of the Deity, are His Rays,\n  748-m.\nSephiroth: Splendor or Perfection of Deity represented by the\n  eighth, 736-l.\nSephiroth, ten, proceed from Malakoth of the several worlds, 784-l.\nSephiroth, the means through which Deity is the Single Cause of All,\n  759-m.\nSephiroth, Theology of the, 99-m.\nSephiroth: unlimited Power represented by the seventh, 736-l.\nSephiroth: Victory, Glory, Stability, Dominion, are the last four, 848-l.\nSephirothic tables contain a numeration called Daath, cognition, 757-l.\nSephiroths, seven and eight, in equilibrium, cause the ninth and.\n  tenth, 736-l.\nSeptenaries, there is silence in Heaven after each of the, 321-u.\nSeptenary philosophy of Initiation may be summed up as--, 322-u.\nSeptenary unites the triangle of Idea to the square of Form, becoming\n  the Crown, 321-l.\nSeptenary universally in repute, 635-u.\nSerapis represented with a human head and serpentine tail, 500-m.\nSerapis, the name of the Sun to his adorers on the Nile, 587-l.\nSerpent an emblem of eternity and immortality, 496-l.\nSerpents and Dragons have something divine in their nature, 494-m.\nSerpent and the bull used as symbols in Bakchian Mysteries, 420-u.\nSerpent, brazen, erected by Moses, a good genius, 278-l.\nSerpent called Agathodemon, the good Spirit, 495-u.\nSerpent, considered a good genius; symbolism of the, 278-l.\nSerpent devouring its own tail a symbol of the Life principle, 734-m.\nSerpent engenders the Bull and the Bull the Serpent; explanation,\n  493-494-u.\nSerpents entwined around and suspended from winged Globe, 492-m.\nSerpents fed in Temples and were immortal, 494-m.\nSerpents figure in Mysteries and at Feasts, 494-m.\nSerpent form assumed by Typhon, Ahriman, Satan, 661-l.\nSerpents held by goddesses in Egypt and Assyria, 495-l.\nSerpent in connection with astronomical observations, 492-l.\nSerpent known to Orientals under generic name of \"Eva\", 494-u.\nSerpent legends and references, general, 492-502.\nSerpent represents Typhon; it is also a symbol of winter, 376-m.\nSerpent the author of the fate of Souls; Hebrews and Gnostics, 492-m.\nSerpent the peculiar symbol of the 25th Degree, 492-m.\nSerpent was Oesculapius, God of Healing; Feast of--, 493-m--496.\nSerpent with a globe or circle found on all ancients' monuments, 492-l.\nServius states that when beings die life returns to the Universal Soul,\n  666-l.\nSeth, a power set up as an adversary of Osiris, 588-u.\nSeth's descendants preserved the primitive religion, 599-m.\nSeven a peculiarly sacred number; symbolism of, 58-l.\nSeven Archangels assigned to the government of the Seven Planets, 727-u.\nSeven as a symbolic number in the Kabalah, 322.\nSeven as composed of three and four in a word of four letters, symbolic\n  meaning of, 728-m.\nSeven circular walls of the palace of Deioces in Ecbatana, each\n  colored, 729-u.\nSeven composed of six and unity, 635-u.\nSeven composed of three and four; the magical power in full force, 727-m.\nSeven concentric spheres the residence of the Universal Soul, 668-u.\nSeven connected with the number of the Planets, 635-u.\nSeven ears of wheat in Pharaoh's dream interpreted by Joseph, 729-u.\nSeven expresses all the elements of the Magical Mystery symbolized\n  by the Sphinx, 728-u.\nSeven Genii of the Ancient Mythologies, 727-l.\nSeven golden candlesticks, symbol in Revelations, 53-l.\nSeven great nations prayed three times a day turning toward the\n  North Pole, 457-l.\nSeven immersions alluded to the seven spheres a soul plunged\n  through, 506-l.\nSeven jewels on neck and limbs of woman who died during famine, 729-m.\nSeven metals, one each assigned to the planets; Gold to the Sun,\n  Silver to the Moon, 728-l.\nSeven, mysteries, difficulties, trumpets, cups in the Apocalypse, 321-u.\nSeven notes in the musical octave corresponded with the Sephiroth, 727-m.\nSeven planets designated by the seven vowels of the Greek language, 728-m.\nSeven, references to the number, 233-m.\nSeven rivers of the Punjaub gave the Veda, 602-m.\nSeven seals on the Kabalistic book of the Apocalypse, 727-l.\nSeven Secondary Causes governed the World; the universal forces, 727-u.\nSeven Sephiroth constituted Atik Yomin and corresponded with the\n  seven colors, 727-m.\nSeven Sephiroth projected from Binah by the energy of Hakemah, 756-l.\nSeven spheres of Borsippa or pyramid of Bel, at Babylon, each\n  colored, 729-u.\nSeven stages of the Babylonish pyramid represents--, 234-m.\nSeven stars, symbol in Revelations, 53-l.\n\"Seven Stars\" the familiar name of the Pleiades, connected with\n  Orion, 489-l.\nSeven Stars the prison of the disobedient Stars and Heavenly Host, 511-u.\nSeven Stars, Ursa Major, Great Bear, circle around the North Pole, 456-m.\nSeven steps of Solomon's Temple symbolize the sevenfold purification\nof the Masters, 780-l.\nSeven steps of the Mithraic ladder, 233-l.\nSeven symbolized life for the Egyptians, 635-m.\nSeven, the Holy Empire of the clavicules of Solomon, 727-m.\nSeven, the number of the Master's Degree, from the Pleiades, 487-u.\nSeven, the sacred number in all theogonies and symbols, 727-m.\nSeven, the Spirit assisted by the elemental powers, 727-m.\nSeven, the Soul served by Nature, 727-m.\nSeven vices and seven virtues, 727-l.\nSeven virtues symbolized by the then known planets, 727-l.\nSeven vowels in the Greek language designated the seven planets, 728-m.\nSeven Wonders of the World; seven lines that composed the Pyramids;\n  seven gates of Thebes, 322-u.\nSevenfold light symbolized by the seven steps leading to the Outer\n  Court of the Temple, 782-m.\nSevenfold manipulation and purification in the transmutation of\n  metals, 780-l.\nSeven-stepped ladder represents the seven planetary spheres, 851-l.\nSeventeenth Degree, doctrines and teachings of the, 274-l.\nSeventeenth Degree, Knight of the East and West, first of the\n  Philosophical Degrees, 246-l.\nSeventh day of Greek Mysteries gymnastic exercises, etc, 434-u.\nSeventh letter of the Egyptian alphabet, a serpent standing on its\n  tail, 500-m.\nSeverities of Microprosopos are the Evil, 795-m.\nSeverity the mystery of pleasure and warmth of generative appetite,\n  797-m.\nSex form of primitive man was that of both; \"right and left\" refers\n  to it, 771-u.\nSexes assigned to the causes of nature, 655-m.\nSexual characteristics are not assigned to Deity by the Kabalah, 765-m.\nSexual characteristics symbolically assigned to some of the Emanations,\n  766-u.\nSexual: meaning of obscure language of the Kabalah, revealed by\n  the Name being bi-, 849-m.\nShadai, Supreme Power, one of the names of Deity on the Delta, 532-u.\nShadow carried with every planet or sphere not a center of Light, 845-m.\nShadow follows from visible light in direct proportion, 847-l.\nShadow of God is immortality: \"Whose shadow is death,\" Sanscrit\n  stanza, 741-m.\nShadow, the absence of Divine Light in a soul causes the awful, 300-u.\nShadow which accompanies the light representing Hule, 556-u.\nShadow, without Light there can be no, 307-l.\nShadows effaced the Light is annulled, 848-u.\nShe and He in Aramtic, Hebrew and Arabic, 700-u.\nShekinah, God in-dwelling, the place where Yod He, Vav-He, dwelt, 750-u.\nShekinah, the garment which by the third retraction was left empty\n  of the light, 750-u.\nShepherd Kings had Crux Ansata for a symbol of royalty, 502-l.\nShew Bread, the twelve months represented by the 12 loaves of, 409-m.\nShip, in Hebrew, is Ani; the same word means I, Me or Myself, 781-m.\nShip: in the transmutation of metals a vessel is used having the\n  form of a, 781-u.\nSicilian Mysteries known as the Academy of Sciences, 625-u.\nSicilian Vespers referred to, 49-l.\nSign of the 8th Degree expressive of--, 137-m.\nSignificance of words not known till things are taken away, 190-u.\nSigns, symbols, watchwords used by early Christians, 544-m.\nSilence regarding the Holy Spirit due to the awe of the Highest\n  Mysteries, 849-l.\nSilence, otherwise the Thought of God, produced the Spirit, 563-u.\nSilenus, \"The preceptor of the Soul,\" a characteristic Bacchic Sage,\n  392-l.\nSilver assigned to the Moon, 729-u.\nSimeon and Levy had for device the two fishes of Pices, 462-u.\nSimon Magus advanced the theory of Existences to solve the origin\n  of things, 553-u.\nSimon Magus, founder of the Gnostics, on the manifestations of God,\n  270-m.\nSimon Magus taught that the Supreme Being produced three couples\n  of--, 552-l.\nSimon of Cyrene crucified instead of Christ, 554-u.\nSimple life of our ancestors preferable to the showy, loud, of today,\n  806-l.\nSimplicius held that in each Star there is an immortal Soul, 671-m.\nSin and evil reconciled with the wisdom and beneficence of God, 686-u.\nSin being congenital with Humanity, God's Justice would have\n  annihilated man, 846-u.\nSiphra de Zeniutha contains reference to the Book of the Abstruse, 762-m.\nSiphra de Zeniutha states that Yod is the symbol of Wisdom, 792-l.\nSiphra de Zeniutha, the Commentary of Rabbi Chajun Vital, 794-m.\nSipra de Zeniutha states that the Active and Passive are always in\n  conjunction, 766-l.\nSirius made sentinel of the heavens by Ormuzd, 662-l.\nSirius or the Dog Star, the friend of Osiris was--, 376-l.\nSirius rose before the Sun previous to the swelling of the Nile, 454-l.\nSirius, the Dog Star, named because it gave warning of the overflow,\n  446-m.\nSisyphus, Pausanias claimed that contempt for the Mysteries caused\n  the punishment of, 381-l.\nSiva, the Destroying or Renovating power of the Hindu Trinity, 550-m.\nSix a symbol of the terrestrial globe animated by a divine spirit, 636-l.\nSix, an emblem of nature, presenting the six dimensions, 634-l.\nSix chief Spirits the progeny of the Supreme God in many theogonys,\n  728-l.\nSix good and six evil spirits typify the months, 635-u.\nSix superior and six inferior signs, references to Stars, 490-m.\nSix the first perfect number and a symbol of justice, 634-l.\nSixteenth Degree, Prince of Jerusalem; characteristics of the, 241-u.\nSixth day of Greek Mysteries, procession of lakchos, 434-u.\nSixth Degree, Intimate Secretary (Confidential Secretary), 119-u.\nSkull, initiate in Druidical Mysteries seals obligation by drinking\n  out of a, 430-l.\nSky a solid, concave arch, along which journeyed the Sun, etc., 443-l.\nSlander and calumny of modern journalism, 334.\nSlavery, domestic, considered by the Scottish Rite, 330-u.\nSnake; a new world will emerge from the waters when Odin kills\n  the great, 593-u.\nSocial problems, most important of all, 180-u.\nSocial state, God has ordained that life shall be a, 197-l.\nSocieties and ancient theogonies have a common concealed doctrine, 729-l.\nSociety a creation of Heaven, 196-l.\nSociety and social state, teachings of, 183-m.\nSociety, minuteness of regulation required by refined, 44-l.\nSociety, religion of, 213-u.\nSociety, the unobserved and invisible the most beautiful in, 141-m.\nSocrates accused of Atheism, 384-l.\nSocrates assumed the title of a \"lover of truth\", 691-l.\nSocrates believed in a Universal Reason pervading all things, 693-u.\nSocrates claimed that the Initiates had glorious hopes of eternity,\n  379-l.\nSocrates confessed to the failure of philosophy, 693-l.\nSocrates expounded the higher Greek religious ideas, 617-m.\nSocrates, Masonry revives the wise teachings of, 221-m.\nSocrates prostrated himself before the rising Sun, 678-m.\nSocrates, the Grecian philosopher, saying of, 170-u.\nSocrates writes: \"The initiated will attain the company of the Gods\",\n  373-m.\nSohar and Jezirah, knowledge of the Kabalistic doctrines in the\n  books, 266-l.\nSohar declares the mystery of the \"Balance\" or Equilibrium, 305-u.\nSohar expresses Ainsoph as Light because unable to express it by\n  any other word, 740-m.\nSohar incomprehensible and almost illegible without the Secret Key,\n  843-l.\nSohar's Introduction states that Deity determined to create Good\n  and Evil, 796-u.\nSohar one of the completest embodiments of Occultism, 321-m.\nSohar, references concerning Creation in the Introduction to the, 748-l.\nSohar says \"Everything proceeds according to the Mystery of the\n  Balance\", 552-m.\nSohar says the Ten Sephiroth have their root with the Substance\n  of Him, 754-u.\nSohar terms the Royal Secret the Mystery of the Balance, 858-l.\nSohar, the Key of the Holy Books, opens up the Sciences of the\n  Sanctuary, 843-l.\nSol derived from Solus, the One, Only God, 630-m.\nSolid number is twelve; the foundation of our happiness, 629-u.\nSolomon, Lodge represents the Temple of King, 7-m.\nSolomon represented by a Lion, 210-m.\nSolomon's clavicules refer to the Holy Empire; symbolized, 727-m.\nSolomon's double triangle explained by St. John, 792-u.\nSolomon's philosophy the basis on which Masonry is founded, 785-l.\nSolomon's Star formed by the meeting of the lines of the Compass\n  of Science with those of the triangle, 841-u.\nSolomon's Temple a symbol of the ninth and tenth Sephiroth, 736-l.\nSolomon's Temple, after the model of Ezekiel, to be rebuilt by the\n  Templars, 816-u.\nSolomon's Temple, ground floor of, 14-u.\nSolomon's Temple rebuilt, the secret dream of Patriarchs of the\n  Orient, 816-u.\nSolomon's Temple rebuilt would give Constantinople the Romish\n  power, 816-u.\nSolomon's throne like that of the Egyptian Har-oeri, 79-m.\nSolon declares man's destruction comes from himself, 690-l.\nSolon quoted, 37-u.\nSolstice, Winter, Mother-night, the longest night in the year, festival\n  of the, 368-u.\nSolstices, Cancer and Capricorn, the Pillars of Hercules, in a Lodge,\n  506-u.\nSolstices celebrated by all civilized nations, 595-m.\nSolstices represented by Jachin, Boaz, parallel lines, point in a\n  circle, 506-u.\nSolstices: tables giving entrances of the Sun into the Solstices, 450-u.\nSolstices, the Essenes observed the festivals of the, 265-l.\nSoma of nature's offertory imitated by the Priests from simples, 602-m.\nSon, Issue or products; Universe proceeding from the two principles,\n  87-m.\nSon of Man, Soul of the World, enters into darkness and softens its\n  savage nature, 566-m.\nSon: the first Utterance of the Father, a perfect Only begotten, 564-m.\nSons of God and the Stars are identified in Job, 509-m.\nSophia-Achamoth an inferior wisdom, produces Ialdaboth, 563-m.\nSophia-Achamoth caused the Spiritual Principle to pass into man, 563-m.\nSophia-Achamoth communicated movements to Chaos, 563-u.\nSophia-Achamoth in contest with Ialdaboth, 563-m.\nSophia-Achamoth the companion of Christos, 560-m.\nSophia or Demiourgos of the Gnostics corresponds to The Word, 271-l.\nSorrow, no tongue utters thoughts that come in, 189-m.\nSorrow, Sin, Evil, Suffering, is consistent with Infinite Goodness and\n  Wisdom, 859-l.\nSorrow, the dog of the shepherd who guides the flock of men, 101-m.\nSosiosch, the Persian Redeemer, to annihilate evil and judge the.\n  world, 623-l.\nSosiosch, the principal of the Three Prophets, to regenerate the.\n  earth, 258-m.\nSothis, the Dog Star, fixed the beginning of the Egyptian New Year,\n  467-m.\nSouciet, a Chinese book, describes palace; Emperor sacrifices a lamb,\n  462-m.\nSoul a fragment of the Universal Mind, lapse and reunion, 685-l.\nSoul a number containing the quaternary, 633-u.\nSoul, a ray of perfect wisdom, the inextinguishable light, 606-l.\nSoul, a simple substance struggling to return to the Great Soul, 417-m.\nSoul, all, is part of the Universal Soul whose totality is Dionusos,\n  393-m.\nSoul alone gives value to the things of this world, 201-m.\nSoul an emanation from the Supreme Being, but distinguished from\n  Him, 607-l.\nSoul an external and independent existence, yet omnipresent, 672-u.\nSoul, an immaterial spark of God's Infinite Being, 582-l.\nSoul and God are distinct, according to the Naya philosophers, 852-u.\nSoul ascends to its Infinite Source through seven spheres, 10-m.\nSoul attaining unto the place of the Eternal retains its individuality,\n  852-l.\nSoul, being imperfect, must be purified before rejoining its source,\n  622-m.\nSoul, by comparison with Fire and Light the ancients explained the\n  nature of the, 65-u.\nSoul, by study, attains unto the place of the Eternal, 852-u.\nSoul can not know its creation nor comprehend its own individuality,\n  852-m.\nSoul can reascend only after purification and freedom from the\n  body, 521-u.\nSoul capable of improvements, of becoming wiser and better, 852-l.\nSoul capable of seeing more clearly as it draws nearer to Deity, the\n  Light, 855-l.\nSoul; categorical questions concerning the, 649-u.\nSoul claimed to be considered a part of the Divine, 684-l.\nSoul compared to Heat and Light, which neither lessens nor divides\n  its own essence, 852-m.\nSoul considered by Plato as a principle of movement, 681-m.\nSoul contains, potentially, that which becomes the body of the child,\n  755-l.\nSoul descends to matter, by doing and suffering it frees itself and\n  reascends, 417-l.\nSoul desiring to animate a body, descended and was imprisoned in\n  matter, 436-m.\nSoul differs essentially from the body, 706-m.\nSoul does not lose the sense of the Eternal and Infinite, 190-l.\nSoul, doubts and despair torture the human, 292-299.\nSoul emancipated by reabsorbtion into the infinite, 686-u.\nSoul exiled on earth; birthplace in Heaven, 520-m.\nSoul, fired by Love, uniting with Nature and itself engendering new\n  productions, 658-l.\nSoul forgetful of celestial origin in material fascinations, 518-m.\nSoul freed from its debasements will be seen again in its true glory,\n  858-l.\nSoul freed from the body by deeds and suffering reascends to source,\n  439-l.\nSoul gives back to each sphere through which it passes in returning--,\n  440-u.\nSoul had its origin in Heaven, according to the Ancient Philosophers,\n  436-m.\nSoul, human, is itself God within the mind, 393-m.\nSoul illumined by Truth, the shadow of which is Error, 845-m.\nSoul in descent receives new material and faculties from each sphere,\n  439-m.\nSoul in nature, yet not a part of it, but its Cause and Creator, 672-u.\nSoul in progress changes from monad to duad; results, 438-m.\nSoul in the beginning had a thought to create and the worlds were\n  created, 609-u.\nSoul incessantly turns its eyes to Heaven and longs to return, 520-m.\nSoul inherent in the Universe thought out by the ancients, 672-u.\nSoul, interest in speculations concerning the fate of the soul, 232-m.\nSoul is capable of remorse, 199-u.\nSoul is divine, an emanation of the Spirit of God, but not a portion\n  of that Spirit, 852-m.\nSoul is of Divine nature; emanation from Deity, 76-l.\nSoul is the image of God and existed before the body, 252-l.\nSoul is the One emanation from Deity to return to Him, 539-l.\nSoul likened to exhalations or vapor, 518-l.\nSoul loses its felicity by means of the Balance; regains it by the\n  Lamb, 490-m.\nSoul, Masonry teaches the existence and immortality of the, 221-m.\nSoul must pass through a series of trials and migrations, 518-l.\nSoul, no obsequies for the lost, 200-u.\nSoul not a mere abstraction, but a reality including in itself life\n  and thought, 397-l.\nSoul not condemned to eternal banishment because imprisoned in\n  the body, 392-l.\nSoul of everything that breathes a fraction of the universal soul, 610-u.\nSoul or Intelligence pre-existing given by God to the Body, 251-l.\nSoul of Macroprosopos, the internal part, is the Ancient of Days, 758-u.\nSoul of man an emanation from God's spirit, 239-l.\nSoul of man, breathed into him by God, is immortal as God's\n  Thoughts are, 577-u.\nSoul of man compared to the Soul of the World, 667-l.\nSoul of man emanated from God, of the same substance with God, 567-l.\nSoul of man immortal, according to the Edda, 619-m.\nSoul of Nature everywhere inherent in the Universe, 668-u.\nSoul of nature possessed intelligence and to this soul divinity\n  belonged, 670-u.\nSoul of the Universe does not act equally or in the same manner, 667-l.\nSoul of the Universe entered man through a separation of the suture\n  of the cranium, 609-m.\nSoul of the Universe idea sprung from the two Principles doctrine, 664-m.\nSoul of the Universe supposed to be intelligent; source of intelligence,\n  669-m.\nSoul of the Universe, the Supreme Being is the, 251-u.\nSoul of the World exercises its creative energy through the medium\n  of the Sun, 473-m.\nSoul of the World produced the first man, Adam Kadmon, 566-m.\nSoul of the World, the Primal Ether, 748-m.\nSoul only existed in the beginning, 609-u.\nSoul, opinions concerning pre-existence, descent and return of\n  the, 438-441.\nSoul, or Spirit, in different degrees contained in Adam Kadmon, 757-u.\nSoul, origin, fall of and return to place of its origin taught by\n  mysterious  ceremonies, 385-u.\nSoul part of the Universal Soul whose totality is Dionusos, 586-m.\nSoul parted from its source lapsed from its preeminence, 685-l.\nSoul passes through various states till, purified, it rises to God,\n  567-l.\nSoul pervades and is within the body, 755-l.\nSoul plunges through seven spheres to take up its abode in the body,\n  506-l.\nSoul recollects its source and longs to return, but must do and suffer,\n  436-l.\nSoul, relations of the march of light and darkness to the, 404-l.\nSoul represented by Psyche had an earthly and an immortal lover, 519-l.\nSoul, represented by Psyche, of whom Dionusos was the suitor, 586-l.\nSoul sent into the embryo, which is to become an infant, at conception,\n  755-l.\nSoul separated from the Universe the next step in philosophy, 672-u.\nSoul, Spirit, Intellect, the immaterial threefold part of man, 781-m.\nSoul survives the body and is capable of immortality, 852-l.\nSoul that is impure can not reunite with God until purified, 582-u.\nSoul the envelope of the intelligence that attached itself to it, 669-m.\nSoul: the minds or intellect of all are portions of the Universal, 604-l.\nSoul the motionless center from which motion radiates, 681-m.\nSoul to advance towards perfection and see Deity more clearly, 855-u.\nSoul to attain its prior condition, its individuality must cease, 686-u.\nSoul, to disengage itself from the body is the object of the earthly\n  life of the, 252-l.\nSoul to return to the Supreme Soul the body of the dust, 605-l.\nSoul, to satisfy itself of its immortality is a characteristic of a,\n  301-u.\nSoul vexed itself with spiritual problems, 583-m.\nSouls which contemplate the Higher Unity superior to deities and\n  religions, 562-l.\nSoul, while embodied in matter, is in a state of imprisonment, etc,\n  852-u.\nSoul will ascend to Heaven whenever purified, 253-u.\nSoul will rise from the material through the seven spheres, 858-l.\nSoul would reascend when extricated from matter, 520-m.\nSouls and nature of men are great or small as it pleases themselves,\n  813-m.\nSouls are all equal, 565-l.\nSouls are the sparks of the Influence of the shattered vases descending\n  through the elements and--, 797-u.\nSouls at death return to the Universal Soul, 664-m.\nSouls at their birth receive an emanation from the Universal Soul, 664-m\nSoul's attributes not the Soul, 573-u.\nSouls: by fire, water, air was accomplished the purification of; symbolism\n  of, 400-u.\nSouls change their forms by passing successively into different\n  bodies, 610-u.\nSoul's disfigurement commented on by Plato, 858-m.\nSouls emanate from the Light principle and return to it, 740-l.\nSouls emanating from God descended a ladder to their bodies, 851-l.\nSoul's emancipation completed by the transformation of death, 686-u.\nSoul's existence and nature one of the highest questions, 642-m..\nSoul's existence proved by our consciousness of being a thinking\n  soul, 674-u.\nSouls, fragments or sparks of the Universal Intelligence, 518-m.\nSoul's immortality a doctrine considered certain among old nations,\n  622--?\nSoul's immortality defined by Chrishna as never being non-existent,\n  518-u.\nSoul's immortality proven, 706-l.\nSoul's immortality the essence and consummation of all imagination,\n  517-m.\nSouls influenced by the Sun, 492-u.\nSouls, intelligence, life, emanate from the Universal Soul, 666-m.\nSouls know God only through Mind, 582-m.\nSoul's life the result of Harmony and movement, 859-l.\nSouls, men-accepted literally Pythagoras' allegory of the transmigration\n  of, 398-m.\nSouls must reascend through the seven planetary spheres to God, 851-l.\nSouls of men formed from a substance divine, active, luminous, 398-u.\nSoul's origin and home the bosom of Deity, 851-l.\nSouls pass into terrestrial frames; process; reascension, 518-m.\nSouls passed into animals, plants, other human bodies, the Sun, 399-l.\nSoul's perfection necessitated perfection of morals and society, 520-m.\nSoul's perfection the object of the Mysteries, 520-m.\nSoul's personification as Jupiter, Bakchos, etc., explainable by the--,\n  473-m.\nSouls pre-existed in eternal fire from whence they emanated, 399-l.\nSoul's progress from Heaven to association with an earthly body, 437.\nSouls purified by ascending through Seven Spheres, 781-m.\nSouls reascend after purification in forms of life, 518-m.\nSoul's relations with the rest of nature the chief object of Mysteries,\n  400-u.\nSouls: Religion is the revelation of a necessity of, 822-u.\nSoul's spirituality the necessary foundation of immortality, 706-l.\nSoul's striving for Light and Knowledge of itself, 583-u.\nSouls, the Supreme Being the Source of the rays which illuminate, 251-u.\nSouls, ultimate disposition of, 252-m.\nSoul's universal medicine is the Supreme Reason and Absolute\n  Justice, 773-m.\nSouls, when purified, become a part of the Universal Soul, 623-m.\nSoura-Parama slain by Soupra-Muni, lamented by the Hindus, 595-u.\nSouras, the particular devotees of Surya, 587-u.\nSource of the Spring called Kether, Corona, Crown, 752-l.\nSource of worlds in Maia, Nature's loveliness, 683-l.\nSovereign Power to whom belongs the maintenance of the order of\n  the Universe, 512-m.\nSpace formed for Worlds by the recession of the Primal Light, 747-750.\nSpace in which worlds were created surrounded by an interspace, 748-u.\nSpace made for the creation of worlds called Aor Penai-Al, 747.\nSpain, ambitions and attempts of, 74-m.\nSpark of fire, on the left hand, issued from the sphere of Severity,\n  795-m.\nSparks of the great Influence of the shattered vases eventually\n  became Souls, 797-u.\nSpecial Providences as a result of prayer, 684-l.\nSpeculations of Philosophers, etc.; object of teaching the, 329-m.\nSpeculations of today reproduce the ancient thought, 697-u.\nSpeech enchained is speech terrible, 48-u.\nSpeech, shallowness of much; abused in Republics, 45-m.\nSpeusippus taught that the heavens and spheres were part of the\n  Universal Soul, 669-m.\nSphere constituted by the productive light of the letter He, called\n  Kether Ailah, 751-l.\nSphere constituted within the sphere of Splendor by the light of\n  the letter He, 751-l.\nSphere the emblem of Athom-Re, worshipped at Thebes, 584-l.\nSphere used as an expression for Deity by Xenophanes and Parmenides,\n  676-u.\nSpheres of Borsippa, represented by seven stories of different colors,\n  729-u.\nSphinx, armed, represents the Magical Mystery expressed in the\n  number seven, 728-u.\nSphinx the symbolic Key to a Knowledge of Nature, 321-l.\nSphinxes, white and black, symbolized the Holy Empire, 727-m.\nSphynx, great enigmas of the, 8-l.\nSphynx was a symbol, 148-l.\nSpinoza's Infinity of Infinite Attributes of God, 566-u.\nSpirit, as applied to God, synonymous with nothing, 739-m.\nSpirit assisted by the elemental powers; Soul served by Nature,\n  represented by Seven, 727-m.\nSpirit can only be defined by some sublimized species of matter, 513-m.\nSpirit, Mother of the Living and Wisdom of God, 563-u.\nSpirit of life breathed into Man by God, 572-m.\nSpirit, or Generative Power, and Matter originally were in Deity, 700-m.\nSpirit personified by the Goddess of Neith, conceived by Power, the\n  Divine Intelligence, 254-m.\nSpirit represented by the quaternary; symbolism of four to nine, 633-m.\nSpirit, the active principle, generative power, one of the Egyptian\n  Triad, 548-l.\nSpirit: the number five symbolizes the vital essence, the animating,\n  634-m.\nSpirit the same in kind with the Supreme Spirit, a ray of it, 605-l.\nSpirit Universal, the home of the Light inclosed in the seeds of\n  species, 783-m.\nSpirit within man a spark of God himself, 609-m.\nSpirits of Carpocrates originate the different religions, 562-m.\nSpirit's relations with the material Universe one of the highest\n  questions, 642-m.\nSpiritual, affections, hopes, interests of life center in the, 195-m\nSpiritual and material natures in equilibrium; Good and Evil, 784-l.\nSpiritual beings possess limited divine will power, 684-l.\nSpiritual forces of man act according to ideal modes of action, 829-u.\nSpiritual instincts infuse into the mind--, 226-l.\nSpiritual life touched by every phenomenon, 242-l.\nSpiritual meditation or self mortification promotes reabsorbtion, 686-u.\nSpiritual nature in conflict with our material where the greatest\n  glory is won, 854-u.\nSpiritual Principle passed from Demiourgos into Man, 563-m.\nSpiritual purity shown through the efficaciousness of the will, 684-l.\nSpiritual victory over the earthly nature symbolized by the Master's\n  Compass, 854-l.\nSpiritual world, the world of human consciousness, has a law, 828-l.\nSpiritualist doctrine denied by Pythagoras, 667-m.\nSpiritualistic doctrine separated God from the Universe, 667-m.\nSpirituality of the person its identity, indivisibility, absolute unity,\n  706-m.\nSplendor Excelsus in contradistinction to Simple Splendor, 748-u.\nSplendor, termed Teheru in the Sohar, is styled The First Matter, 751-u.\nSplendor, the eighth Sephiroth, is Boaz, one of columns of the\n  Temple, 736-l.\nSplendor, the sphere in the centre of the space Malakoth; First'\n  Adam, 754-m.\nSpring Equinox a period of general joy, 588-l.\nSpring Equinox, Mysteries celebrated the triumph of light at the, 405-u.\nSpring's return heralded by Mithras, the rock-born hero, 592-m.\nSpy, dishonorable is the occupation of a, 336-l.\nSquare, a Hermetic symbol of the productive Earth or Universe, 851-m.\nSquare, a symbol of the Earth and the things that belong to it, 850-m.\nSquare, an instrument adapted for plane surfaces only, 850-u.\nSquare and Compass; unsuccessful work follows a departure from\n  the center of the, 786-l.\nSquare, being the second perfection, does not represent God, 631-l.\nSquare, Compass, Plumb, Level, have peculiar meanings to a Judge, 826-u.\nSquare containing an equilateral triangle a symbol of the Divine and\n  Human, 858-m.\nSquare, definition of; belongs to plane trigonometry, 11-l.\nSquare held in the hand on the male side of the Hermetic figure, 850-m.\nSquare is the symbol of the four elements of the triangle, 629-m.\nSquare, Level, Plumb, Balance used to prepare the rough Ashlar, 787-m.\nSquare of the Form united to the Triangle of the Idea becomes the\n  Crown of Numbers, 321-l.\nSquare represents the four elements into which Chaos was resolved, 783-u.\nSquare represents the material, sensual, baser portion of Humanity, 851-l.\nSquare, symbol of what concerns earth and the body, 11-l.\nSquare turning upon itself produces the circle equal to itself, 771-m.\nSt. George of England fights the Dragon, a form of Mithras, 499-m.\nSt. John assigns the Creation to the Word, and asserts Christ was\n  that Word, 568-m.\nSt. John avers Christ was the Word by which everything was made, 559-m.\nSt. John explains the double triangle of Solomon, 792-u.\nSt. Louis, Falkland, Tancred, Castiglione would give their friendship\n  to a true Knight, 808-m.\nSt. Paul discourses concerning the flesh, spirit, good, evil, 853-u.\nSt. Paul quoted as writing to the Christians at Rome, 853-u.\nStability is the Intellectual Capacity to produce, or female, 305-m.\nStability of the Universe a result of the equilibrium between Wisdom\n  and Power, 859-u.\nStability, one of the last four Sephiroth of the Kabalah, 848-l.\nStability symbolized by the rough stone, 776-m.\nStandards depicting a serpent borne by Assyrians, Danes, etc, 500-u.\nStar guided the Magi from the East to adore the Saviour in his\n  cradle, 841-l.\nStar, magical adored under name of Remphan, 103-u\nStar of five points originated from the Pentalpha of Pythagoras, 634-m.\nStar of Knowledge advises the Magi of the birth of Truth, 843-m.\nStar of Solomon formed the lines of the Celestial triangle meeting\n  those of the Compass, 841-u.\nStar worship a middle point between Heathen and Christian, 511-m.\nStar worship: certain ordinances of the Christian religion related to,\n  511-m.\nStar worship looked on with indulgence by Jewish and Christian\n  writers, 511-m.\nStar worship; Maimonides explains origin of, 435-l.\nStar worshippers established feasts for planets at their \"exhaltation\",\n  463-m.\nStars and Sun, magnitude and extent of the, 303-u.\nStars animated by a living principle a part of the universal\n  intelligence, 473-l.\nStars are divine as animated beings, by the logic of Cicero, 670-l.\nStars are Gods, active Causes, sharing the universal divinity, 671-u.\nStars considered intelligent beings causing effects on the earth, 473-l.\nStars directed by an intelligence, an emanation of the Universal\n  Intelligence, 670-u.\nStars distinguished by terrestrial phenomena with which they seemed\n  to be connected, 445-m.\nStars divided into good and bad, beneficent and malevolent, 472-m.\nStars, emblematic meaning of the North and Morning, 202-m.\nStars in the hand disappeared three days during the search for Osiris,\n  485-l.\nStars moved of themselves, directed by their own special intelligence,\n  671-m.\nStars' movements supposed to be voluntary by the ancients, 597-u.\nStars named by the Ethiopians of Thebes, 446.\nStars observed by primitive people to be more regular than the Sun,\n  445-m.\nStars part of the Universal Soul and Intelligence, the opinion of\n  many Christian philosophers, 671-m.\nStars possess an immortal Soul and Intelligence, held by many\n  philosophers, 671-m.\nStars preceding event mistaken for cause, 450-m.\nStars rise and set cosmically, achronically, heliacally with the Sun,\n  471-m.\nStars seen in Taurus at new-born year, 453-u\nStars, signs of the Zodiac, reference to in Royal Arch Degree, 409-l.\nStars, so many animated and intelligent beings, the cause of effects,\n  669-l.\nState, making and executing laws interests the citizens of a free, 51-m.\nState, sovereignty of the Individual in the, 43-l.\nState, tendency towards centralization in a Democratic, 51-l.\nState, three departments of, 6-u.\nStates, creation of caste the tendency of free, 51-m.\nStature of men is great or small as it pleases God, 813-m.\nStauros of the Gnostics the image of generative power, 771-l.\nSteps of the Master Mason Degree; origin of the, 428-u.\nStoic School retained a secondary divinity in the eternal spheres, 678-m.\nStoics' ascetic fatalism proceeds from a little knowledge, 694-l.\nStoics held that each Star contained an immortal Soul and Intelligence,\n  671-m.\nStoics' wisdom a dogged submission to the arbitrary behests of one,\n  694-m.\nStone, colored black, adored a white stone promised the Faithful, 775-l.\nStone, in the rough, the symbol of Stability, 776-m.\nStone of philosophy the foundation of Absolute philosophy, the\n  Supreme Reason. 775-l.\nStone of the Philosophers explained and analyzed, 779-m.\nStone, say the Alchemists, is the true Salt of the Philosophers, 775-l.\nStrabo says the one Supreme Essence embraces us all, 283-u.\nStrength and Force in the service of Intelligence the true meaning\n  of Necessity, 696-m.\nStrength is the Intellectual Energy or Activity, or male, 305-m.\nStrength of the Christian Mason represented by the column Jachin, 641-m.\nStrength or Force represented by the Senior Warden in a Lodge, 7-l.\nStrength or Power, the Infinite Divine Will, a side of the Masonic\n  triangle, 826-m.\nStruggle between the Divine and the natural will, 599-m.\nStuart dynasty runs out, 49-u.\nSublunary bodies received nourishment and increase from Sun and\n  Moon, 475-m.\nSublimation the important operation in the Great Work, 777-m.\nSublime Elect (Elu) of the Twelve, 11th Degree, duties of, 176-u.\nSublime number is nine; religion and nature are exalted by it, 628-l.\nSublime Prince of the Royal Secret, Master of the Royal Secret,\n  32d Degree, 839.\nSublimity of natural phenomena, 244-l.\nSubstance known only by its attributes, 572-l.\nSubstance of the Soul of Man same as that of God, 567-l.\nSuccess attends the plan of Equilibrium adopted everywhere by\n  Deity, 767-u.\nSuccess, the accumulation of many small efforts, 174-l.\nSuffering a condition of virtue in this world, 716-l.\nSuffering appointed by Zeus to be the parent of instruction, 691-u.\nSuffering, evil, wrong, are but temporary and discords, 577-u.\nSuffering is good because favorable to virtue and moral development,\n  717-u.\nSuffering is not the worst condition of man on earth, 717-u.\nSuffering is the discipline of virtue, 181-m.\nSuffering necessary to virtue and morality, 716-l.\nSulla in a period of convulsion, 80-l.\nSulla, reference to the Dictatorship of, 3-m.\nSulphur and Salt prepares the Mercury for assimilation with the\n  magnetic agent, 775-m.\nSulphur corresponds, with the Alchemists, with the elementary form\n  of the Fire, 773-l.\nSulphur expressed by the letter G, the initial letter of the Hebrew\n  word Geparaith, 780-m.\nSulphur, Mercury, Salt, volatilized and fixed, compose the Azoth, 773-l.\nSulphur of philosophy represents the vital energy and ardor of the\n  will, 790-u.\nSulphur, one of the great symbols of the Alchemists, 57-l.\nSulphur, resin and the laurel served for purification, 431-l.\nSulphur, the Baphomet of the Temple, given a goat's head, 779-l.\nSummary of all the doctrines of the Old World by Hermes, 324-m.\nSummer and Winter, in equal proportion, produce Spring and Autumn, 662-m.\nSummer: good angels ruled by a King controlled the hemisphere of, 449-u.\nSummer Solstice beginning of Egyptian New Year, 467-m.\nSummer Solstice brought heat and exhaustion, 444-l.\nSummer Solstice marked the rising cf the Nile, 467-u.\nSun a great globe of fire to the ancients, 443-l.\nSun and Moon and Horus form the Equilateral Triangle, 14-u.\nSun and Moon, Blazing Star or Horus the offspring of the, 14-u.\nSun and Moon considered the cause of the generations of earth, 475-m.\nSun and Moon correspond to the columns of the Temple, Jachin\n  and Boaz. 776-m.\nSun and Moon emblems of the two Divine sexes, 305-l.\nSun and Moon impress a force by which generation is effected, 469-m.\nSun and Moon in lodge emblems of--, 252-l.\nSun and Moon, King and Queen, symbolized by the Hermetics as\n  gold and silver, 774-m.\nSun and Moon of Alchemists give stability to the Philosophal Stone, 776-m.\nSun and Moon, represent the principles of all generation, 13-l.\nSun and Moon the eyes of the Universal organism, 673-u.\nSun and Stars rising and sinking typify the Soul's movement, 518-m.\nSun appeared under the image of the Sign at the commencement\n  of the season, 465-u.\nSun, Archimagus, worshipped as Mithras, the Mediator, the Invincible,\n  612-m.\nSun at the Vernal Equinox communicates to the earth his warmth, 475-u.\nSun, at Vernal Equinox, enters triumphant into the beneficent Sign, 664-m.\nSun, by his beneficent influences identified with the Principle of Good,\n  594-u.\nSun called Heliogabalus and adored under the form of a black stone, 775-l.\nSun called Osiris, husband of Isis, God of Cultivation, 475-u.\nSun called Sura or Surya, the Heavenly, or Khur, 602-u.\nSun, center of the Active principle, offered by the male of the Indian\n  Statue, 656-u.\nSun changes his place in the Zodiac at each vernal equinox, 449-m.\nSun dragged down to his death by the scorpion, Archer, He Goat, 447-m.\nSun enters Taurus at the Vernal Equinox 2,455 years B.C., 446-l.\nSun entering his twelve houses should be received by the four elements,\n  786-m.\nSun gives the Soul the senses and imagination as it passes through,\n  439-m.\nSun God finally victorious over the Serpent, 496-l.\nSun God rides on the winged horse, but the Serpent bites the horse's\n  heels, 499-u.\nSun Gods of the Veda, Adityas, Savitri, Pashan, Mitra, 602-l.\nSun Gods were mostly carried off in their strength and beauty, 589-l.\nSun hesitates at Winter Solstice whether to descend or retrace, 445-u.\nSun: in all religions linger traces of the worship of the. 483-m.\nSun in Taurus personified in Dionusos, 585-u.\nSun, in the region of Light is the sphere of the, 76-m.\nSun, Moon and Mercury represented by officers of Mysteries of\n  Eleusis, 411-m.\nSun, Moon and Mercury symbolized in the three great lights, 486-l.\nSun now in constellation Pisces when he is in the sign Aries, 449-m.\nSun, observations of the ancients regarding the movement of the, 444-m.\nSun originally feminine and Moon masculine, 700-u.\nSun personified as Brahma, Mithras, Osiris, Bel, Adonai, Apollo, etc,\n  594-u.\nSun personified by--, 77-m.\nSun personified in connection with the ancient worships, 583-l.\nSun, Planets and Zodiac represented in the Mithraic cave of initiation,\n  424-l.\nSun remained stationary three days, then began to rise, 447-l.\nSun represents Faith, 727-l.\nSun reverenced by the Essenes as a symbol of light and fire, 265-l.\nSun said to die and be born again at the Winter Solstice, 464-l.\nSun said to have been slain at the Winter Solstice, 447-l.\nSun, symbolism of the; manifestation and visible image of God, 13-u.\nSun symbolized by the point within the circle, 486-l.\nSun termed by an inscription on an obelisk as \"Apollo,\" etc, 460-u.\nSun, the festival of May day of Druidical origin and in honor of the,\n  367-l.\nSun, the great symbol of the Mysteries, purified Souls, 408.\nSun, the moderator in the celestial harmony; fourth in musical scale,\n  410-m.\nSun the name of the seventh gate of the ladder; material, gold, 414-m.\nSun, the source of light, the hieroglyphic sign of Truth, 776-m.\nSun, to the ancients, the all-sufficient Cause of all, Author of all,\n  594-u.\nSun typified by Mithras; the Parent of the Universe, the Mediator, 424-m.\nSun variously named by different peoples, 586-l.\nSun, with names beginning with Kur many places are sacred to the, 78-m.\nSun worship not the Primitive religion, 584-u.\nSun, worship of the, 77-m.\nSun worship the basis of all the religions of antiquity, 593-l.\nSun worshipped as the manifestation, but not as the type of dominion,\n  740-l.\nSun worshipped by Egyptians under the name of Osiris, 406-u.\nSun worshipped by the Persians; light an emanation from Deity, 572-m.\nSun's course made to typify the contest between Good and Evil, 594-m.\nSun's \"exhaltation\" was in Aries, hence feasts of the Lamb; reason,\n  463-l.\nSun's image changed with the precession of the equinoxes, 465-m.\nSun's journey across the sky, 442-l.\nSun's journey through the twelve Signs gives rise to legends, 448-u.\nSun's journey through the twelve Signs origin of murder of Khurum, 448-u.\nSun's journeys supposed to be voluntary by the ancients, 597-u.\nSun's movements watched anxiously by primitive people, 447.\nSun's path through the constellations called Ecliptic, 447-u.\nSun's primary metal holds within itself the Principle of the germ, 788-u.\nSuperior Intelligence of eight Eons, a Gnostic modification, 553-u.\nSuper-naturalists mix free action with the service of petition, 695-u.\nSuperstitions and fables used as symbols and allegories, 508-l.\nSupper of bread a symbol of man's redemption and regeneration, 539-u.\nSupper of bread and wine symbolic of Passover or the Lord's Supper, 540-u.\nSupper of bread and wine; theory and teachings of the, 539-u.\nSupreme Being a center of light, 252-m.\nSupreme Being, at the intercession of Wisdom, sent Christ to redeem Man,\n  563-l.\nSupreme Being discussed in Hermetic books quoted by Iamblichus, 614-l.\nSupreme Being, Kabalistic idea of the attributes of the, 266-l.\nSupreme Being, Philo's conception of the, 251-u.\nSupreme Being, Primitive Light, Archetype of Light, 552-l.\nSupreme Being represented by the number three, 209-u.\nSupreme Being, the Soul of the Universe, 251-u.\nSupreme Being the source of the rays which illuminate Souls, 251-u.\nSupreme Being, the Word, Logos, is the image of the, 251-m.\nSupreme Being, the Word occupies the place of the, 251-l.\nSupreme Being uniting with Wisdom acts upon the Universe through.\n  the Word, 552-l.\nSupreme Being uniting with Wisdom forms in himself the type of.\n  all things, 552-l.\nSupreme Council, So. Jur., revised its thirty degrees, 328-m.\nSupreme Entity of the New Platonists known only by the Spirit, 284-u.\nSupreme God created the Universe through agents or manifestations, 568-m.\nSupreme Intelligence of the Universe the source of all Intelligences,\n  665-u.\nSupreme Lord or Being of the old Chinese creed is Chang-ti, 615-u.\nSupreme Ruler of the Universe beyond human comprehension, 605-u.\nSura or Surya, the Heavenly, a name of the Sun, 602-u.\nSurya descended upon earth in human form and left a race of renown, 587-m.\nSurya is preceded by Arun, the Dawn, and he has twelve powers, 587-u.\nSurya styled King of the Stars and Planets, 587-m.\nSurya the Hindu name for the Sun, 586-l.\nSurya's car drawn by seven green horses, or one horse with twelve heads,\n  587-u.\nSwedenborgianism explained somewhat through the Kabala, 741-u.\nSwedenborg's system is the Kabalah minus the Hierarchy, 823-m.\nSwedenborg's system the Temple without Keystone and foundation, 823-m.\nSword; initiate in Druidical Mysteries obligated on a naked, 430-l.\nSword of persecuted Templars, after being broken became a poniard, 820-l.\nSword piercing the heart represents the sting of conscience, 639-m.\nSword, symbol of speech in the Bible, 53-l.\nSword, symbol of war and of the soldier, 57-u.\nSword, symbolism of the, 54-u.\nSwords, symbols of Honor and Duty, taught you Masonry as a Knight, 854-m.\nSydyc, or Tsadok, the Supreme God in Phoenicia, was the Heptaktis, 728-m.\nSyene, exile of, 48-u.\nSymbol a more efficacious instrument of instruction than didactic\n  language, 355-m.\nSymbol and allegory a method of indirect suggestion, 355-m.\nSymbol confounded with the thing symbolized is idolatry, 516-m.\nSymbol of a principle confounded with object symbolized, 600-u.\nSymbol of an object unknown the most abstract expression for Deity, 513-u.\nSymbol of Deity appropriate only in a relative or moral sense, 513-m.\nSymbol of the disc and crescent on the Bull and Ram, 452.\nSymbol of the Hermetics from a Frankfurt treatise dated 1613, 850-m.\nSymbol of the right angle triangle found in the Apprentice Degree, 861-m.\nSymbol of the 31st Degree is the Tetractys of Pythagoras, 826-m.\nSymbol, pronunciation of the Word a, 205-l.\nSymbol: to bring the idea before the mental eye vividly and truthfully\n  the task of the, 515-m.\nSymbolic and philosophic systems intimately allied, 372-u.\nSymbolic character of the Hebrew Bible and writings, 745-u.\nSymbolic figures to represent the essence and operations of the Deity,\n  625-l.\nSymbolic imagery may give ideas as adequate as words, 515-l.\nSymbolic imagery of Deity defended by Maximus Tyrius, 515-m.\nSymbolic instruction recommended by the uniform usage of antiquity, 372-m.\nSymbolic meaning of Pyramids unknown, 148-m.\nSymbolic meaning of the left hand with palm opened and expanded, 388-u.\nSymbolic meaning of the Rose to be looked for in Kabalistic\n  Commentaries, 821-l.\nSymbolic reference of air, fire, water, 357-l.\nSymbolic Triad of Salt, Sulphur, Mercury, or Body, Soul, Spirit, 792-m.\nSymbolism becomes complicated and can not be explained, 514-m.\nSymbolism, earliest instruments of education, 62-m.\nSymbolism expounded by philosophy, 356-u.\nSymbolism is nature's method of instruction, 355-m.\nSymbolism, misinterpretation of, 64-u.\nSymbolism of ceiling, border, brazen sea in lodge, 209-m.\nSymbolism of Masonry, 250-l.\nSymbolism of Nature, 64-m.\nSymbolism of number Seven with several references, 233-m.\nSymbolism of numbers, 626-638.\nSymbolism of Solomon's Temple in its stately symmetry, 736-l.\nSymbolism of Temples and Mithraic cave, 234-l.\nSymbolism of the Alchemists only understood by children of Science, 792-u.\nSymbolism of the Ancients bears the footprints of Science, 842-l.\nSymbolism of the Apartments of the 18th Degree, 288-u.\nSymbolism of the Blue Degrees according to the Christian interpretation,\n  639-642.\nSymbolism of the Cherubim according to Clemens and Philo, 409-l.\nSymbolism of the circle in the Druidical Mysteries, 367-m.\nSymbolism of the Clasped Hands, 88-m.\nSymbolism of the colors, white and black, in juxtaposition, 818-m.\nSymbolism of the columns Jachin and Boaz, 270-l.\nSymbolism of the Compass and Square to guide the Knight, 808-u.\nSymbolism of the double sex of the Universe and Orphic egg, 655-l.\nSymbolism of the egg; borrowed from the Egyptians; found in Japan, 400.\nSymbolism of the Fellow-Craft obligation, 639-l.\nSymbolism of the figure four, 633-m.\nSymbolism of the Hermaphroditic figure, square, compass, Sun, Moon, 851-m.\nSymbolism of the Hermetic Rose Croix and the decorations, 786-u.\nSymbolism of the luminous pedestal, 210-u.\nSymbolism of the ladder of Mithraic initiations, 233-l.\nSymbolism of the language of the Hermetics and Alchemists, 774-m.\nSymbolism of the Lion, the Hawk, the Eagle, the Bull, 254-l.\nSymbolism of the Mountain of Meru, 234-m.\nSymbolism of the Mysteries to aid explanation, 434-l.\nSymbolism of the number four, 209-u.\nSymbolism of the number three, 209.\nSymbolism of the number twelve, 209-m.\nSymbolism of the Ocean and its sources or springs, 752-m.\nSymbolism of the point within the circle in the Mysteries, 401-l.\nSymbolism of the \"Recovery of the Word\", 252-l.\nSymbolism of the Rose Croix Degree, 290-292.\nSymbolism of the sacred vessels in Solomon's Temple, 409-m.\nSymbolism of the Scriptures, 250-l.\nSymbolism of the serpent, 278-l.\nSymbolism of the serpent, 376-m.\nSymbolism of the Sphinx or Bull with a blazing sword at the gate\n  of Eden, 728-u.\nSymbolism of the Square, Compass, Plumb, Level, for a Judge. 826-u.\nSymbolism of the Sun; origin of his mediation, 519-u.\nSymbolism of the Templars misunderstood and deemed pantheistical, 818-l.\nSymbolism of the tests of water, air and fire, 397-u.\nSymbolism of the three divisions of the Temple; sevenfold light;\n  Brazen Sea, 782-m.\nSymbolism of the tower, the fire, the basin of purification, 787-l.\nSymbolism of the triangle, 87--.\nSymbolism of the triangle, 826-827.\nSymbolism of the two columns and parallel lines, 252-l.\nSymbolism of the two columns at the entrance of the Temple, 305-m.\nSymbolism of the weeping woman at the broken column and Time, 379-u.\nSymbolism of two edged sword in Revelations, 53-l.\nSymbolism of washing hands by Initiates of Eleusinian Mysteries, 357-l.\nSymbolism of words, example of, in \"I hail\", 63-m.\nSymbolism originated in the efforts of the mind to communicate\n  with Nature, 650-m.\nSymbolism: religious feeling evaporated with the stripping away of,\n  678-m.\nSymbolism, results obtained notwithstanding the vagueness of, 22-u.\nSymbolism tends to complication, 63-l.\nSymbolism: the mistaking of names for the things named a danger in,\n  516-u.\nSymbols attempted to be explained by words generally lose their\n  meaning, 513-u.\nSymbols conceal from the Profane and preserve to the Elect the\n  Truth, 840-u.\nSymbols constituted, chiefly, the first learning, 436-u.\nSymbols conveyed in the Mysteries what is now given in books, 354-m.\nSymbols derived from Pythagoras, 366-l.\nSymbols eloquent to Adepts are meaningless to the mass of Initiates,\n  819-m.\nSymbols: epithets applied to God either visible or intellectual, 516-m.\nSymbols explained according to the capacity of the multitude, 37-l.\nSymbols given a broad interpretation, 329-m.\nSymbols have wider meaning, 24-m.\nSymbols in the Mysteries to represent life rising out of death, 395-m.\nSymbols in time mistaken for the thing symbolized, 516-u.\nSymbols, medium of conveying knowledge, 22-m.\nSymbols, misunderstood, 62-l.\nSymbols, more than one interpretation have the ancient, 205-l.\nSymbols, motions of stars and the passage of the Soul represented by,\n  233-l.\nSymbols multiplied by the Hierophants to conceal absolute science, 321-l.\nSymbols necessary to express ideas above and beyond the senses, 512-m.\nSymbols none the less impressive because known to be symbols, 396-l.\nSymbols of a Masonic lodge of astronomical origin, 486-l.\nSymbols of ancients wore encircled by imagination, reason, religion,\n  593-m.\nSymbols of Degrees used to conceal, not reveal, 106-m.\nSymbols of Good and Evil, Light and Darkness and resultant Beauty, 792-m.\nSymbols of Masonry appear in the Kabalah, 267-l.\nSymbols of Masonry are its instructions; lectures an explanation, 356-m.\nSymbols of Masonry date beyond the monuments of Egypt, 311-l.\nSymbols of Masonry displayed in the outer court of the Temple to\n  mislead, 819-u.\nSymbols of Masonry have more than one meaning; they conceal the\n  Truth, 148-l.\nSymbols of Masonry: only to the adepts are known the real meanings\n  of the, 819-u.\nSymbols of Masonry reveal no new secret to those incapable of\n  interpreting them, 356-l.\nSymbols of Mysteries not always explained, meanings lost, 423-l.\nSymbols of purification, redemption and regeneration, 538-l--539.\nSymbols of purity mistaken for the causes, 520-l.\nSymbols of religion mistaken for realities, 22-u.\nSymbols of 17th Degree refer to the ancient doctrines, 254-l.\nSymbols of the Active and Passive, the Male and Female, 784-m.\nSymbols of the end and perfection of the Great Work, 790-l.\nSymbols of the Kabalah, Apocalypse, Ezekiel's visions, are little.\n  understood, 321-l.\nSymbols of the old world and its images lost, 731-l.\nSymbols of the wise became the idols of the ignorant multitude, 818-l.\nSymbols represented the metaphysical ideas of the Mysteries, 385-u.\nSymbols, signs, doctrines of ancients should not be disparaged by us,\n  522-m.\nSymbols the almost universal language of ancient theology, 371.\nSymbols the earliest, instruments of education, 512-l.\nSymbols: the Incarnate Word adored by three Magi depicted in\n  the Evangelic, 730-l.\nSymbols transmuted into realities, 674-m.\nSymbols used in the Mysteries; ceremonies referred to agriculture\n  and astronomy, 382-u.\nSymbols with material things made the imagination teach the Intellect,\n  397-u.\nSympathy a force analogous to that of electricity, 89-l.\nSympathy for suffering and misery exists, 214-m.\nSynesius, Bishop, held the doctrine of the transmigration of souls,\n  399-l.\nSynesius, Bishop of Ptolemais, a Kabalist, saying of, 103-m.\nSynesius composed hymns fitted for the liturgy of Swedenborg's church,\n  731-l.\nSynosius concealed Science under a Christian disguise, 732-l.\nSyrians abstain from fish out of dread and abhorrence, 456-m.\n\nT\n\nTaaut of the Phoenicians the same as Hermes, 586-l.\nTaaut the author of serpent worship among the Phoenicians, 501-u.\nTaaut the first to represent the Stars by symbols, 501-u.\nTabernacle and Temple; seven lamps in the great candlestick of the, 59-m.\nTabernacles, Feast of, lasted seven days, 59-l.\nTabernaculum, the Zodiac, the Great Tent, symbolism of the, 409-l.\n\"Tablet of Emerald,\" words engraven by Hermes on the, 324-m.\nTabunah, Intelligence represented by the Hebrew letters, 800-m.\nTacitus held no office, 47-l.\nTacitus, writings of, 27-u.\nTages, the Etruscan Tamet or Thoth, the giver of laws, 551-m.\nTalismans given to candidates for the Mysteries of the Basilideans, 542-m.\nTalmud, personification of the elements in the, 270-l.\nTalmudists transpose letters to conceal secret meanings, 699-u.\nTamerlane's conquest less important than the invention of Faust, 314-u.\nTarot contains the Kabalistic alphabet, 777-l.\nTaro, of the Kabalists, corresponds to the Hebrew Tetragram, 732-m.\nTartarus, allegorical to the Initiates, the ceremonies depicted horrors\n  of, 396-m.\nTartarus, physical tortures of, were but a symbol of the consequences\n  of sin, 383-u.\nTartarus, Virgil describes the punishments of the wicked in, 381-m.\nTatian adopted the theory of the Emanation of Eons, 564-u.\nTatius, Achilles, held that each Star is an immortal Soul, 671-m.\nTau cross in various forms and applications, 503-505.\nTau, the last letter of the Sacred Alphabet, signifies the end of the\n  Great Work, 790-l.\nTaurus and Scorpio figure in history of Osiris, being the two equinoxes,\n  478-m.\nTaurus opening the new year was the Creative Bull, 448-u.\nTaurus or Bull: after Sun advanced to Aries reverence was paid to, 450-m.\nTaurus, the Bull, a symbol in the Mithraic case of initiation, 424-l.\nTaurus, the Bull, named because it was time to plow, 446-m.\nTeacher, Death is the great, 183-l.\nTeachings of Gnosticism, 248-l.\nTeachings of Masonry are--, 221-u.\nTeen is the universal principle and prolific source of all things, 616-m.\nTehiru, Splendor, the First Matter, a Vestige of the Sublime Brilliance,\n  751-u.\nTemperance, the antipodes of Gluttony, represented by Saturn, 727-l.\nTemplar ambitions and aims were to be rulers over the Masters of\n  the World, 817-l.\nTemplar Chiefs: hints in the degrees and symbols indicate the real\n  beliefs of the, 819-u.\nTemplar Chiefs studied the Hermetic science, 840-l.\nTemplar doctrines were two--Johannism for the Masters, and Roman\n  Catholics, 817-l.\nTemplar efforts all directed against the Pope after the execution of\n  the King, 824-u.\nTemplar fall coincided with the period of manifestations of Occultism,\n  823-u.\nTemplar Order professed orthodoxy, but the chiefs only knew the\n  aim of the Order, 817-m.\nTemplar secret object the rebuilding of the Temple on the model of\n  Ezekiel, 816-u.\nTemplar Secret Order had princes as Grand Masters, 823-l.\nTemplarism lived under other names, governed by unknown chiefs, 821-u.\nTemplars accused of impiety, obscenity and the worship of Baphomet,\n  820-m.\nTemplars and Hospitallers took vows of obedience, chastity, poverty,\n  802-u.\nTemplars arrested and imprisoned by Clement the Fifth and Philip\n  le Bel, 820-m.\nTemplars, at the origin, were opposed to the tiara of Rome and the\n  crown of kings, 817-m.\nTemplars' avowed object was to protect pilgrims visiting Holy places,\n  815-l.\nTemplars became a menace to Church and Society, 815-l.\nTemplars concealed themselves under the name of Brethren Masons, 816-m.\nTemplars, dead long ago, haunt the Vatican and disturb the Papacy, 814-l.\nTemplars' decay due to inherent weakness, haughty ambition, ignorance,\n  819-m.\nTemplars disappeared at once and their wealth confiscated, 821-u.\nTemplars' dogma connected with Oriental philosophy by symbols\n  used, 235-m.\nTemplars encouraged new worship, promising liberty of conscience, 818-l.\nTemplars initiated in the mysterious doctrines of the Kabalah, 815-l.\nTemplars: occult science of the Magi guessed at under the obscurities\n  of the, 839-m.\nTemplars of modern days have no right to the title, 821-m.\nTemplars, or Poor Fellow-Soldiery of the Holy House of the Temple, 816-m.\nTemplars perished in their fatal victory, 824-u.\nTemplars preserved or profaned the remembrance of the Absolute, 840-m.\nTemplars saved the French King, to afterwards, ensure the scaffold, 823-l.\nTemplars succeeded by the Knights of the East and of the East and\n  West. 816-m.\nTemplars the dream of sects of Gnostics or Illuminati, 815-l.\nTemplars' trowel has triangular plates arranged in the form of a cross,\n  816-m.\nTemplars united with Rose Croix Adepts and formed a Mystic Sect, 821-m.\nTemplars, when rich, became insolent and overbearing, 820-u.\nTemple an abridged image of the world, furniture, symbolism, 410.\nTemple built by Wisdom has at its portal Jachin and Boaz, 860-m.\nTemple built painfully slowly, destroyed very quickly, 320-m.\nTemple gates opened but once a year for ceremonies of initiation, 421-u.\nTemple of Jerusalem a symbol, 241-u.\nTemple of Mecca an Iona surrounded by 330 stones, 236-u.\nTemple of Paestum had fourteen pillars on each side, 235-l.\nTemple of Saba Zeus at Thrace, on mount Zelmisso, form, 410-l.\nTemple of Solomon a symbolic image of the Universe, resembled--, 208-l.\nTemple of Solomon and ornaments referred to the order of the\n  World, 408-l.\nTemple of Solomon represented World, Sea, Earth, Heaven, 409-m.\nTemple of Solomon symbolic of the Universe, 304-l.\nTemple of Solomon, symbolism of the, 235-m.\nTemple, one object of the early Christians was the building of the\n  Symbolic, 369-l.\nTemple represented the world in miniature, 234-l.\nTemple, spirit of the Divine law at the rebuilding of the, 241-l.\nTemple, the whole world one grand; Plato Macrobius, 235-u.\nTemples everywhere, 241-u.\nTemples have for roofs the starred vault of Heaven, 235-l.\nTemples in the shape of a cross built by the Druids, 337-m.\nTemples of Chilminar, Baalbeck, Tartary, had forty pillars, 235-l.\nTemples of Hindus and Druids built in the form of a cross, 504-m.\nTemples, Persians, Celts, Scythians, disliked roofed, 235-u.\nTemples, reason for burning the Grecian, 235-u.\nTemples surrounded by pillars a representation of--, 235-l.\nTemples, the most ancient, were roofless, 235-u.\nTemples, thick groves were planted to produce gloom in the, 383-l.\nTemptation, evils of yielding, even in slight matters, to, 217.\nTemptation, reason for not falling may be freedom from, 130-l.\nTen Commandments, Masonic, 17-l.\nTen, concludes the Abacus or Table of Pythagoras, 638-m.\nTen, in its relation to the Ocean, as a conception of God, 752-l.\nTen includes all the other numbers; represented by--, 60-l.\nTen numerations or Sephiroth contained in each other, 753-l.\nTen represented God, Man, the Universe, 638-m.\nTen the number of Perfection, 60-l.\nTen, the Perfect number, corresponds with the Tetractys, 323-m.\nTen, the perfect number of the Cabalists, denotes Heaven, etc, 505-u.\nTen written as Unity in the center of Zero; a symbol of Deity, 638-m.\nTenth Degree, Illustrious Elect (Elu) of the Fifteen, devoted to--,\n  160-l.\nTenth Degree members should lead in enlightening, 171-l.\nTenets of Mason's profession, 21-u.\nTepharet, Harmony and Beauty, produced by Geburah and Gedulah, 764-l.\nTepharet, one of the Sephiroth; Beauty, 753-m.\nTephareth degree concealed and contained in Malakoth, Haikal, 799-m.\nTephareth including numerations from Khased or Gedulah to Yesod,\n  is a person, 799-m.\nTephareth is a person called Seir Aupin, or Microprosopos, 799-m.\nTephareth represented by Vau, Beauty, the column which supports\n  the world, 799-l.\nTerritorial extension, injustice of, 73-l.\nTernaries form a part of the Evangelic Symbols, 730-l.\nTernary conceals the great Mysteries of God and the Universe, 791-l.\nTernary explained by the balance and multiplied by itself, 769-l.\nTernary formed by the relation of equality between Above and\n  Below, 771-m.\nTernary hidden in Masonry and the Hermetic Philosophy, 791-l.\nTernary is the bringing back of duality to unity, 760-l.\nTernary is the first odd number having in itself the beginning,\n  middle, end, 760-l.\nTernary teaches the equilibrium of Contraries and resultant Harmony,\n  792-u.\nTernary the first of the unequal numbers, 631-m.\nTertullian states that none were admitted to the Mysteries without\n  an oath, 544-u.\nTessel, description and symbolism of the Indented, 14-u.\nTessellated pavement and bicolored handle of the dagger a reminder\n  of the two principles, 818-u.\nTessera, a square piece of metal or wood; meanings and application,\n  547-m.\nTessera, a symbol to distinguish between the Faithful and Profane, 548-u.\nTessera Hospitalis, a piece of wood cut in two as a pledge of\n  friendship, 547-m.\nTessera in the shape of a fish used as a mark by early Christians, 547-l.\nTessera inscribed with a Greek word, the initials signifying--, 547-l.\nTesserated, not tessellated, floor of white and black lozenges,\n  denticulated, 818-m.\nTestament: human nature is the new, 715-m.\nTestament: material nature is the old, 715-m.\nTests of water, air and fire, symbolism of the, 397-u.\nTetractys composed of three times three smaller triangles, 826-l.\nTetractys, Hebrew formation of: cut of, 88-m.\nTetractys leads to study of numbers, Kabalah, True Word, 88-m.\nTetractys of Pythagoras corresponds to the ten Sephiroth, 323-m.\nTetractys of Pythagoras, how composed, 60-l.\nTetractys of Pythagoras represents the ten, 638-m.\nTetractys of round dots revered by the Essenes, 264-l.\nTetractys of the Pythagoreans by which they swore their oaths, 633-l.\nTetractys should be replaced among symbols of Master's Degree, 88-m.\nTetractys, suspended in the East in the 31st Degree, represents\n  Deity, 826-m.\nTetractys, symbol borrowed by Pythagoras from Egyptians, 88-m.\nTetractys the symbol of the generative power of the Universe, 826-l.\nTetrad expresses the first mathematical power, 632-l.\nTetragram of the Hebrews is Azot, Thot, Taro; it contains everything,\n  732-m.\nTetragram, signification of the four letters of the Sacred, 104-l.\nTetragram the last word of Science and the key of Divine Power, 732-m.\nTetragram understood only by those who know the necessity of\n  secrecy, 732-m.\nTetragrammaton expressed triangularly a symbol of Creation, 698-l.\nTetragrammaton forbidden to be pronounced except once each year, 620-u.\nTetragrammaton in Adam Kadmon by its letters, 757-u.\nTetragrammaton of the Hebrews the four-lettered word, 633-l.\nTetragrammaton of three Hebrew letters, one repeated, 323-m.\nTetragrammaton or the Ineffable Name is I, H, U, H, 698-m.\nTetragrammaton sometimes expressed triangularly, 698-l.\nTetragrammaton: the Elder Most Holy is the name, 795-u.\nTetragrammaton's meaning and pronunciation concealed, 700-l.\nThales learned that the Earth revolved around the Sun in Egypt, 843-u.\nThartae, a god with the head of an ass, Christianity said to be the\n  reign of, 103-u.\nTheater of Scaurus surrounded by 360 columns, 236-u.\nThebes, seven gates of, 233-m.\nTheism of Anaxagoras subversive of the religion of outward nature, 679-u.\nTheism of the Hebrews involved in symbols and image worship, 514-m.\nTheoclet, Johannite Pontiff, initiated de Payens into the Gnostic\n  Mysteries, 817-u.\nTheodoret, Bishop of Cyropolis, speaks of the secrecy of Christian\n  Mysteries, 547-u.\nTheodorus gives Iabe as the Samaritan name of Deity, 700-l.\nTheologers preceded Greek Philosophy, 683-m.\nTheological ideas expressed by allegory by philosophers, 678-u.\nTheological system formed on the doctrine of the two principles, 661-l.\nTheology, at first an abstract idea, grows into all our relations, 643-m.\nTheology based on writings of Aristotle and Lombard purely scholastic,\n  847-u.\nTheology of the Kabalah like that which is best explained by the\n  Fathers, 843-l.\nTheology of the Kabalah is consistent and harmonious, 843-l.\nTheopmatus held that each Star is a part of the Universal Soul, 671-m.\nTheopompus declares the two principles shall alternate in victory, 663-u.\nTheoretical principles of right may work practical injustice, 834-l.\nTheories advanced to explain the independent existence of Good and Evil,\n  682-u.\nTheorists, the Mason should have no alliance with impracticable, 338-m.\nTheosophy, in Greek traditions were found the mysteries of, 250-u.\nTherapeutae were Christians, their writings our Gospels, 265-m.\nTherapeuts, Persian and Pythagorean opinions in the creed of the, 259-l.\nTherapeuts reside in Egypt in the vicinity of Alexandria, 260-u.\nThibet, Pythagorean doctrine of numbers preserved by monks of, 235-m.\nThibet: the great Chinese dragon ornamented the Temples of, 500-l.\nThings and beings, marvelous relations between; instances--, 41-m.\nThings material and things of the intellect, 41-l.\nThings the progeny of one fire; the Soul a bright fire, is immortal,\n  611-m.\nThink as the Old Lords of Thought command us, 315-m.\nThird day of Greek Mysteries devoted to sacrifices, religious rites,\n  etc, 433-l.\nThird Degree, Master, 62-u.\nThirteen robes presented to initiates represent Heavens and signs, 506-l.\nThirteenth Degree, legend of; an allegory representing--, 208-l.\nThirteenth Degree, Royal Arch of Solomon; legend and history of, 204-u.\nThirty-second Degree, Master of the Royal Secret, Sublime Prince\n  of the Royal Secret, 839.\nThomas, Christian General at the battle of Damascus, 53-m.\nThor and Odin fight with Dragons, 499-m.\nThor, Odin, Frea, the Scandinavian Trinity, 552-u.\nThor, son of Odin and Frea, one of the Northern triune Deity, 13-l.\nThor was the Sun, a counterpart of Osiris and Bel, 368-u.\nThot, of the Bohemians, corresponds to the Hebrew Tetragram, 732-m.\nThoth named by other nations Taaut, Hermes, Trismegistus and\n  Adris; doings of, 364.\nThoth of the Egyptians the same as Hermes, 586-l.\nThoth or Phtha, an Egyptian skilled in the Mysteries of India,\n  Persia, Ethiopia, 364-u.\nThoth, the Egyptian God of Healing, leans on a stick with coiled\n  snake, 501-m.\nThoth the terrestrial repetition of the first Hermes, 255-u.\nThought, a Force, 2-u.\nThought in the Soul: the second in the Masonic Trinity, 575-l.\nThought is a Power; not matter or spirit; lives after a man, 573-m.\nThought is all repose and Nature all movement, 680-l.\nThought is eternal, is an actual existence, a Force and Power, 573-l.\nThought: nothing can compare with the grandeur of a, 201-m.\nThought of God a Power, 573-u.\nThought of God, Being of his Being, manifested in Intelligence, 560-u.\nThought of God, immortal as Himself, uttered itself in the Word, 575-u.\nThought personified by the Goddess Neith, a divinity of Light, 254-u.\nThought the only reality, 676-u.\nThought unlocks all the treasures of the Universe, 201-l.\nThoughts are the scintillations and rays of Intellect, 845-u.\nThoughts of dead legislators govern our present deeds, 315-l.\nThrace, passion, death and resurrection of Bakchos represented at, 411-u.\nThree appears in all the ancient Philosophies, 548-m--552.\nThree degrees of generation, Birth, Life, Death; beginning, middle, end,\n  631-u.\nThree essential degrees in Masonry because of the sacred Triad, 631-m.\nThree figures constantly in Masonry; instances--, 548-m.\nThree in One of a Trinitarian Ecossais, 575-l.\nThree lights at the Altar represented the Sun, Moon, Mercury, etc, 548-m.\nThree means Father, Son, Spirit; the triangle within the square, 629-l.\nThree, or Triad, expressed by a triangle, 57-l.\nThree, peculiar to Apprentices, from the three Kings of Orion, 487-u.\nThree, Pythagoras on the number, 97-m.\nThree represented by the Supreme Being, 209-u.\nThree revered by all antiquity and consecrated in the Mysteries, 631-m.\nThree, symbolism of the number, 209.\nThree symbolizes the Earth; it is a figure of the terrestrial bodies,\n  632-m.\nThree, the number of the triangle, measures the base, 861-m.\nThree times three in a symbolic sense, 827-u.\nThree was called perfect harmony by the Pythagoreans, 632-m.\nThree worlds of the Philosophy of the Sephiroth, 99-m.\nThreefold alliance of day and night; the luminous image of the dogma,\n  848-u.\nThrees form the triple progression, Past, Present, Future, 631-u.\nThrone and Church mutually sustain each other, 33-u.\nThrone of France to be overthrown upon the tomb of de Molai, 824-u.\nThrone of Solomon, bulls on arms, lions supporting, symbolism, 410-l.\nTiara of Rome opposed by the Templars at their origin, 817-m.\nTiberius as Emperor to be opposed by Masonry, 20-l.\nTiberius, reference to the reign of, 47-l.\nTimaeus explains the symbolism of the pyramid, 460-u.\nTimacus, of Locria, wrote of the Pythagorean doctrine, Soul of the\n  World, 667-u.\nTimacus regarded the Universe as an intelligent being, 670-u.\nTime; evolution of the ancient division of, 445-m.\nTime; seeking a revelation from the busy ant-hill of, 191-u.\nTime symbolized by a serpent ring, 497-l.\nTime, waste of, 115-m.\nTipharet, the Son, or issue, Beauty or Harmony, the sixth Sephiroth,\n  552-m.\nTiphe, wife of Re, clad in blue and gold, the type of Wisdom, 254-l.\nTitans tore Dionusos in pieces, assisted by Heri, 585-l.\nToil, a part of the spiritual instrumentality is every implement of,\n  243-l.\nToil is worship--the noblest thing beneath the Stars, 342-l.\nToil of brain or hand or heart the only true manhood, 344-u.\nToil, religion of, 212-u.\nToleration a component part of Charity, 166-l.\nToleration enemy of that fanaticism which persecutes for opinion's\n  sake, 160-l.\nToleration holds that every other man has the same right of faith\n  as ourselves, 160-m.\nToleration, in early Christianity were evidences of the spirit of, 247-l.\nToleration, Masonic creed and view of, 167-m.\nToleration taught as one of the chief duties of a Mason, 166-l.\nTomb a part of the paraphernalia of the Mysteries of Isis at Sais, 405-m.\nTools and implements of Masonry are symbols, 330-l.\nTower, Temple of Bal at Babylon was a, 234-m.\nTowers surmounting Pagodas, 234-m.\nTowers symbolize the two furnaces for the fire, 783-u.\nTracingboard displays a luminous triangle with a Yod in the center,782-l.\nTranscendental philosophy reposed on comparatively shallow bases, 674-l.\nTranscendental philosophy, that of a Deity both eminent and\n  transcendent, 614-m.\nTransmigration of souls a doctrine of the Hindu religion, 604-m.\nTransmigration of souls according to Pythagoras and disciples, 622-623.\nTransmigration of souls, explanation of the doctrine of the, 398-m--399.\nTransmigration of souls held by the Druids, 618-u.\nTransmigration of souls involved a noble element of truth, 622-m.\nTransmigration of souls taught by Pythagoras as an allegory was accepted\n  literally, 398-m.\nTransmigration of souls, the early Christians held the doctrine of the,\n  399-l.\nTransposition of the letters of a word common amongst Talmudists, 698-m.\nTransposition used to conceal secret meanings, 699-u.\nTree of Knowledge became the Tree of Death, 844-u.\nTree of Life represented by the branch of Acacia, 786-l.\nTree under which Atys died was a pins and held sacred to him, 423-l.\nTriad includes in itself the properties of the first two numbers, 631-m.\nTriad of the Druids inscribed on a cruciform tree, 504-u.\nTriad of Plato, explanation and symbolism of the, 87-l.\nTriad plays an important part in the philosophy of Plato; the image\n  of Deity, 631-m.\nTriad produced by the union of the Monad and Duad, 631-m.\nTriad signifies the world formed by a creative principle out of matter,\n  631-m.\nTriad venerated by Masons in the symbol of the triangle, 631-m.\nTriads, Egyptian deities arranged in, 87-m.\nTriads formed of the old Gods, often called a Trinity, 548-549.\nTriads of ancient religions, 548-m--552.\nTriads of the Egyptians, of Thebes. Philae, the Cataracts, 548 m.\nTrials of candidates during Initiations were very severe, 385-m.\nTriangle consecrated whose sides are emblems of the three Kingdoms,\n  or God, 632-u.\nTriangle: Deity symbolized by the double equilateral, 634-l.\nTriangle, description and symbolism of Kabalistic, 104-m.\nTriangle, Divine, the Trinity, the Triliteral Name, composed of--, 323-m.\nTriangle, equilateral, one of the symbols of Chinese Mysteries, 429-m.\nTriangle, equilateral, reversed, inscribed in double circle, Kabalistic,\n  104-m.\nTriangle figures to the Masonic, Judge the Pyramids, firm and unshaken,\n  826-l.\nTriangle has for its center the Hebrew Jod, the generative principle,\n  632-u.\nTriangle in connection with the Compass forms the Star of Solomon, 841-u.\nTriangle in a Lodge indicates--, 209-l.\nTriangle, infinite, above equaling what is below, 34-l.\nTriangle, mystic and interlaced, found in India, 292-m.\nTriangle of Perfection: One is three and three are one in each, 861-l.\nTriangle of Solomon explained by St. John, 792-u.\nTriangle of the Greeks the initial of the Latin or French word for God,\n   631-l.\nTriangle of the Idea united to the Square of the Form becomes the\n  Septenary, 321-l.\nTriangle represents one God in three persons; the Yod the initial of\n  the last word, 782-l.\nTriangle represents the eternal because it is the first perfect figure,\n  631-l.\nTriangle surmounted by a cross symbolizes the perfection of the\n  Great Work, 790-l.\nTriangle, symbolism of a right-angled, 87--.\nTriangle symbolizes action and reaction and the result, 861-u.\nTriangle, the chief symbol in Masonry, formed by the points of the\n  Tetractys, 826-m.\nTriangle, three great words names of the three sides of the Kabalistic,\n  104-m.\nTriangle to all the Sages the symbol of Deity, 861-u.\nTriangle upon a square within a circle part of an Hermetic symbol, 850-m.\nTriangle with right angles in a diagram and described, 789-m.\nTriangles, Kabalistic and Divine, 738-u.\nTriangles represented in the Stars, 487-m.\nTriangle's sides offered for the study of the Apprentice, Fellow-Craft,\n  Master, 632-u.\nTriangle's sides represent Wisdom, Strength, Beauty or Harmony, 826-m.\nTriangular plate sunk in cube; teachings of the name of Deity engraved\n  on a, 209-u.\nTriangulation, measurement by, 34-m.\nTriglav, the three-headed God of the Sclavo-Vendes, 551-m.\nTriliteral A, U, M gives initiate of the Indian Mysteries, 428-m.\nTriliteral Iao was the sacred name of the Supreme Deity, 701-u.\nTrimalcion as Legislator to be opposed by Masonry, 20-l.\nTrimurti or Brahmin Trinity, Brahma, Vishnu, Siva, 550-m.\nTrinitarian, Scottish, or Prince of Mercy, the 26th Degree, 524.\nTrinities of the Ancient Religions, 576-m.\nTrinities of the Kabalists the origin of the Christian Trinity, 552-m.\nTrinity, article in all creeds, 57-l.\nTrinity believed in by Julian; also one God, 731-l.\nTrinity of attributes of Deity, Justice, Wisdom, Mercy, the ninth\n  Truth of Masonry, 537-u.\nTrinity of attributes of God, Wisdom, Strength, Harmony, 525-u.\nTrinity of God's attributes are Perfect and do not conflict, 537-u.\nTrinity of God's attributes represented by the Triple Tau, 503-l.\nTrinity of Power, Wisdom and Harmony, 209-l.\nTrinity of the Chaldean oracles, Light, Fire, Flame, 740-l.\nTrinity of the Christians; origin of the, 552-m.\nTrinity of the Druids, significance of names of the, 103-l.\nTrinity of the Father, the Spirit, the Word, 564-m.\nTrinity, philosophical dissertation on the, 99-m.\nTrinity represented by the three sides of the Delta, 531-m.\nTrinity, the three principles of the, 210-u.\nTripartite division of the Good principle, a dogma of the Hindus, 604-m.\nTriple progression of threes has foundation in the three ages of\n  nature, 631-u.\nTriple progression, three; three times three; three times nine; three\n  times twenty-seven, 631-u.\nTriple Tau cross in center of a circle and triangle typifies the Sacred\n  Name, 503-m.\nTriple Tau represents the creating, preserving, destroying powers, 503-m.\nTriple Tau represents the three great lights of Masonry, 503-m.\nTriple triangle, a Pythagorean emblem of Health, 634-m.\nTriple triangle, a symbol of the Triple Covenant and--, 533-m.\nTriple triangle among all nations a symbol of Deity, 826-l.\nTriple triangle and a circle are the Sephiroth, 769-l.\nTriple triangle found in the number of the offspring of Heaven and\n  Earth, 728-l.\nTripod of Pythian Priestess embodied a triple-headed serpent, 501-l.\nTriptolemus gave initiation to Hercules, 586-u.\nTrismegistus engraved on stone the dogmas of the science of\n  Magism, 839-l.\nTrismegistus, Hermes, supposed to have written \"Minerva Mundi\", 790-m.\nTriune Deity represented by the cord of the initiate, our cable tow,\n  361-u.\nTriune Deity symbolized by the three officers, lights, jewels, pillars,\n  361-u.\nTriune God of Chinese alluded to by the symbol Y, 429-m.\nTrowel an emblem of the Degrees of Prince of Jerusalem, 242-m.\nTrowel and Sword the emblem of the Templars, 816-m.\nTrowels of the proscribed Templars built tombs for its persecutors,\n  821-u.\nTrowel of the Templars is quadruple, making the Kabalist pantacle, 816-m.\nTrue God, only religious requisite is a virtuous life and belief in one,\n  164-u.\n\"True Mason\" styled the twenty-third or the twelfth of the fifth\n  class, 782-l.\nTrue name of God to be revealed at the coming of the Messiah, 621-m.\nTrue Royal Secret which makes possible the Holy Empire, 861-l.\nTrue, the Beautiful, the Good, are but revelations of one and the\n  same Being, 708-u.\nTrue things refer themselves to a Unity which is Absolute Truth, 702-m.\nTrue Word discovered by the aid of the Tetractys, 88-m.\nTrue Word found, without naming, in Hu of the Druids, and Fo-Hi, 702-u.\nTrue Word of a Mason finds a meaning in the Ineffable Name of\n  Deity, 697-m.\nTrue Word of a Master Mason, 727-u.\nTrue Word of a Master Mason, 861-l.\nTrue Word said to be lost because its meaning was lost, 701-l.\nTruth a divine attribute, the foundation of virtue, 184-l.\nTruth and Intelligence are attributes of God, but not of the individual\n  Soul, 607-l.\nTruth and Intelligence not the eternal attributes of the individual\n  Soul, 852-u.\nTruth and Intelligence the eternal attributes of God, not of the individual\n  Soul, 852-u.\nTruth and loyalty needed now as in days of old, 578-m.\nTruth and morality were virtues practiced by the Druids, 619-u.\nTruth: amelioration and improvement effected by dissemination of, 218-m.\nTruth as a basis of all religions, 311-l.\nTruth at the foundation of the old Heathenism, 599-u.\nTruth, Christ proclaims the old primitive, 309-u.\nTruth comes to us tinged and colored with our prejudices, 166-m.\nTruth concealed from the Profane preserved to the Elect by symbols, 810-u.\nTruth deposited in a sacred place to be searched for, 785-l.\nTruth, Divine, given to the first men preserved by Masonry, 136-m.\nTruth, Divine, symbolized by the Star blazing in the distance, 136-m.\nTruth hidden under symbols and allegories, 246-l.\nTruth, incapacity to grasp, prevalent, 77-l.\nTruth: Indians taught Zoroaster, who taught Pythagoras Primitive, 617-l.\nTruth is a Divine attribute and the foundation of every virtue, 852-u.\nTruth is in God and is God under one of His phases, 707-l.\nTruth, Justice, Right in principle a result of the equilibrium of\n  Wisdom and Power, 859-u.\nTruth known concerning the nature of Deity contained in the True\n  Word of a Mason. 697-m.\nTruth, mathematical and practical, the Hermetic universal medicine\n  of the mind, 773-m.\nTruth, not acceptable to the mass of mankind is the highest, 37-u.\nTruth, not attainable anywhere is perfect, 223-u.\nTruth of a less metaphysical and more applicable kind sought after, 682-m.\nTruth, our duty to press forward in search of, 223-u.\nTruth overlaid with fictions after the Divine Word became obscured, 599-l.\nTruth put in practice is the Good, 725-u.\nTruth represented by symbols and hidden images, 436-u.\nTruth separable into kinds, 148-l.\nTruth sometimes reaches us on the borrowed wings of Error, 224-m.\nTruth sought in general opinion by Socrates, 693-u.\nTruth symbolized by Light, 148-l.\nTruth symbolized by the Sun, 776-m.\nTruth the object of worship of a Masonic Knight, 579-m.\nTruth, the outflowing of the conjunction of Hakemah and Binah, 763-l.\nTruth the Sun and Light of the intellectual and visible Universe, 606-u.\nTruth to the Philosopher not Truth to the Peasant, 224-m.\nTruth which creates the Future heralded by the Star of Knowledge\n  at its birth, 843-m.\nTruths, Astronomical details and natural operations in the Mysteries\n  veil great, 375-m.\nTruths fitted to make earth a Paradise revealed to man, 227-u.\nTruths have been hated as errors at times by public opinion, 218-l.\nTruths hidden by symbols and allegories of old fables and superstitions,\n  508-l.\nTruths, Masonry teaches all, 148-l.\nTruths must be committed to the few to preserve their purity, 624-l.\nTruths of Masonry, 533-538.\nTruths of Masonry not inculcated, but hinted, 218-u.\nTruths of primitive revelation veiled from the knowledge of the\n  people, 624-m.\nTruths of religion inculcated by Masonry, 576-l.\nTruths of the Period as good as men were capable of receiving, 37-u.\nTruths: the great fundamental primitive, 609-m.\nTruths which are concealed are not lost; those discovered are not\n  new, 842-l.\nTruths which have been and are the law in every age, 227-m.\nTsaboath, with Alohayim; symbolism of, 104-m.\nTsadoc, Hebrew name for Jupiter, meaning and symbol of, 202-m.\nTsadok, the Supreme God of Phoenicia, the Heptaktis, 728-m.\nTsemsum the term applied to the first contraction, 746-u.\nTsur, Tyre, celebration of the festival of Dec. 25th at, 78-l.\nTuscan order of architecture is emblematic of--, 202-u.\nTwelfth Degree; Grand Master Architect; duties of the, 189-u.\nTwelfth Degree, teachings of the, 202-l.\nTwelve chief Eons were the Genii of the Constellations, called Olamin\n  566-u.\nTwelve divisions adopted by Plato, Lycurgus, Cecrops, Chun, Romulus,\n  462-u.\nTwelve fellowcrafts in search of body and assassins; reference to\n  Stars, 489.\nTwelve Gods recognized by most ancient peoples, 460-m.\nTwelve-inch rule and common gavel, 1-m.\nTwelve is celebrated in the worship of Nature, 638-l.\nTwelve, number of oxen under Brazen Sea; of stones in the breastplate\n  of the H.P., 61-u.\nTwelve represents the Articles of Faith; twelve Apostles, etc., 628-u.\nTwelve signs of the Zodiac related to the Master's legend, 488-u.\nTwelve signs of the Zodiac represented in the Labyrinth, 459-l.\nTwelve the image of the Zodiac and the Sun, which rules over it, 638-l.\nTwelve, the number of lines of equal length that form a cube, 61-u.\nTwentieth Degree, Master of the Symbolic Lodge, duty of the, 325-u.\nTwenty-eighth Degree, Knight of the Sun, or Prince Adept, 581.\nTwenty-fifth Degree, Knight of the Brazen Serpent, teachings, 435-m.\nTwenty-first Degree, Noachite or Prussian Knight; lessons of the, 334-u.\nTwenty-fourth Degree, Prince of the Tabernacle, 371-u.\nTwenty-ninth Degree, Grand Scottish Knight of St. Andrew, 801-u.\nTwenty-second Degree, Prince of Libanus, Knight of the Royal Axe, 340-u.\nTwenty-seventh Degree, Knight Commander of the Temple, 578-u.\nTwenty-sixth Degree, Prince of Mercy or Scottish Trinitarian, 524.\nTwenty-third Degree, Chief of the Tabernacle, 352-u.\nTwo expresses disorder, the Bad principle, 630-m.\nTwo independent, hostile Gods, according to the Manicheans, 565-l.\nTwo is the Word; One is the Principle, 772-u.\nTwo principles, Good and Evil, acknowledged by philosophers, 660-m.\nTwo principles the basis of the religion of the Magi and of Egypt, 661-l.\nTwo principles whereof heaven and earth are forms, 655-l.\nTwo, symbol of Antagonism; Good and Evil; Light and Darkness, 57-l.\nTwo, with the Chinese, signified disorder, duplicity, 630-l.\nTyphon, a power set up as an adversary of Osiris to account for Evil,\n  588-u.\nTyphon: all stormy passions, etc., that agitate material man come\n  from, 476-m.\nTyphon, born of the earth, comparable to Python, slain by Apollo, 376-u.\nTyphon, brother of Osiris, slew him and cut his body in pieces, 475-l.\nTyphon compared to ignorance by Plutarch, 521-l.\nTyphon derived from Tupoul, signifying a tree producing apples, 376-m.\nTyphon, in morals, signifies Pride, Ignorance, Falsehood, 376-l.\nTyphon is the personification of Winter, the desert, the ocean, 447-l.\nTyphon put Osiris to death in the Mysteries of Isis at Sais, 405-m.\nTyphon, Scorpion, ruled over evil genii of the hemisphere of winter, 449-u.\nTyphon signifies serpent, life which circulates through all nature, 376-m.\nTyphon signifies the human passions which expel wisdom, 376-m.\nTyphon slew Osiris when the Sun was in the sign of Scorpion, at\n  the Autumn, 377-l.\nTyphon, the brother of Osiris, threw his body into the Nile, 589-m.\nTyphon the principle and source of all evil, confounded with Matter, 255-u.\nTyphon, the principle of corruption, darkness, evil, 478-u.\nTyphon, the principle of Evil or Darkness, from the union of earth\n  and Tartarus, 659-l.\nTyphon, toward autumn the Woman's heel seems to crush the head of, 376-m.\nTyrannies of Rome, 3-u.\nTyrants use the force of people to enyoke the people, 3-l.\nTyre: description and symbolism of the furniture of the Temple at, 410-m.\nTyre, location of the Temple of Malkarth; old form, Tsur, 9-m.\nTyre, the seat of the celebration of the Phoenician Mysteries, 363-m.\nTyrian coins represented serpents in many attitudes, 501-u.\nTyrius, Maximus, says God did not spare his son, Hercules, 592-l.\nTyrius: Symbolic imagery of Deity defended by Maximus, 515-m.\n\nU\n\nUltimate nature of things probably never will be known, 712-u.\nUnbelief of the many, 296.\nUnderstanding, the Capacity to be impregnated by the Active Energy, 305-m.\nUnchanging nature of Deity compared with his perfect Freedom, 689-u.\nUniformity of plan among endless varieties of operation and form, 673-l.\nUnion of Deity with his creatures expressed by the Hebrew letter \"He\",\n  698-l.\nUnion of the Universe with itself termed \"the Great Secrets of Nature\",\n  659-u.\nUnion of True, Beautiful, Good in the Being from whom they emanate, 702-l.\nUnion with Deity the aspiration of the religious sentiment in man, 652-m.\nUnit in number ten signifies God creating matter, the 0, 627-u.\nUnit, in the fecundity of the Ternary, forms the Quaternary, the\n  Key of all numbers, 771-m.\nUnit is the symbol of identity, existence, harmony, point within the\n  circle, 629-l.\nUnit means a spirit embodied in the virgin earth--nature, 627-m.\nUnit means a Word incarnate in the bosom of a virgin, or religion, 627-u.\nUnit, or monad, a figure of the cube, 5-l.\nUnity a necessary sequence from the conception of the Absolute, 702-l.\nUnity and duality termed the first principles of all existence, 630-l.\nUnity in which the many are and out of which all flow is Ihuh, 764-u.\nUnity itself and the Idea of Unity are two; Unity manifested by\n  the Binary, 771-u.\nUnity measured by the Binary, 771-l.\nUnity of Aristotle's First Mover follows from His immateriality, 679-l.\nUnity of Force underneath the lives, wishes, wills of the people of\n  the earth, 829-l.\nUnity of God taught in the Orphic hymn quoted by Aristobulus, 415-u.\nUnity of God taught in the Kabalah, 625-l.\nUnity of Nature blended with a dim perception of Spiritual Essence, 687-m.\nUnity of the Universe represented by the symbolic egg, 415-u.\nUnity: the links that bind all created things together are the links\n  of a single, 765-m.\nUnity, the pivot, source, center, the august Idea of Pythagoras, 626-u.\nUniversal agent adored in the rites of the Sabbat or the Temple, 734-m.\nUniversal agent adored under figure of Baphomet or goat of Mendes, 734-m.\nUniversal agent is a force which if controlled would be infinite in\n  power, 734-m.\nUniversal agent is the Life, principle, 734-l.\nUniversal Cause that was termed God; ancient ideas in reference to, 666-u.\nUniversal forces called the Seven great Archangels, 727-u.\nUniversal forces which govern the world create equilibrium by their\n  contrasts, 727-u.\nUniversal: His ways are divided and judgment is on our side in\n  the second, 794-u.\nUniversal idea felt rather than understood, 674-m.\nUniversal is an Idea abstracted from all considerations of individuals,\n  764-u.\nUniversal Laws of God: we strive to enact our notions into the, 830-u.\nUniversal medicine required for the Soul, Mind, Body, by the Hermetic\n  practice, 773-m.\nUniversal Mover identified with the fluctuations of the Universe, 588-l.\nUniversal Nature worship a kin to that of the Universal Soul, 593-u.\nUniversal Principle is Wisdom, the Father of Fathers, 791-m.\nUniversal Reason believed in by Socrates and Heraclitus, 693-u.\nUniversal Seed represented under the figure of the Caduceus of Hermes,\n  775-u.\nUniversal Soul a Pythagorean doctrine from the Egyptians, 666-m.\nUniversal Soul comprised in Dionusos; all soul is a part of the, 586-m.\nUniversal Soul disseminated throughput the world in active operation,\n  474-m.\nUniversal Soul embraces all, is all, and to it all will return, 604-l.\nUniversal Soul idea sprung from doctrine of the Active and Passive,\n  661-m.\nUniversal Soul moves the immortal bodies that form the harmonious\n  system of the heavens, 668-u.\nUniversal Soul organizes the Zodiac which gathers the varied.\n  emanations, 669-u.\nUniversal Soul, the first of the Masonic Trinity, 575-l.\nUniversal Soul the source of all living things, 666-m.\nUniversal: the first person, Ani, I, is used by the second, 793-l.\nUniversal: the third person, Hua, He, is used by the first, 793-l.\nUniversals: all things are equally one in each of the two, 794-u.\nUniversals have each a wisdom, one above, one below, 794-m.\nUniversals, or four, Worlds, are Aziluth, Briah, Yetzirah, Asiah, 759-u.\nUniversals, or four Worlds, defined, 759-u.\nUniversals, the Unities out of which manifoldness flows, 755-u.\nUniverse: a combination of contraries the cause of the harmony of the,\n  660-l.\nUniverse a harmony, not a discord, the eighth Truth of Masonry, 536-l.\nUniverse a point half way upon the infinite line of eternity, 849-u.\nUniverse always existed in the Divine Mind, 849-m.\nUniverse an emanation from God to the Fellow-Craft, 640-u.\nUniverse an immense Being with an inherent activity, 665-u.\nUniverse and all the succession of events present to the infinite\n  before Creation, 769-u.\nUniverse and God were one, according to the Kabalistic view, 765-m.\nUniverse and Soul separate, yet omnipresent, in the Universe, 672-u.\nUniverse and World synonymous terms to the ancients, 302-m.\nUniverse assigned a double sex by the Egyptians, 655-l.\nUniverse became so by the manifestation of the Thought of Deity\n  outwardly, 700-m.\nUniverse: Benignity poured into the Autocracy of Deity ensures\n  the succession of the, 769-m.\nUniverse came from the Orphic egg issued from the mouth of Kneph, 585-u.\nUniverse can not be viewed today from the ancient standpoint, 595-l.\nUniverse communicated its eternal life to animated beings, 665-l.\nUniverse composed of the Active, or Divine, and the Passive, or\n  changing, 654-m.\nUniverse conceived by God's Thought and its creation willed, 575-u.\nUniverse controlled by the Word, God's Thought, 575-m.\nUniverse created by Deity through the agency of an infinite will, 684-l.\nUniverse created by God's Thought uttered in His Word, 576-l.\nUniverse emanating from Deity symbolized by the triangle, 827-m.\nUniverse: every particle is related to each other particle in the, 828-l.\nUniverse evolved from the Word, 582-m.\nUniverse existed in the first divine idea, yet unexpanded, 608-m.\nUniverse-God adored by the Ancients as Supreme Cause, God of Gods, 666-u.\nUniverse governed by fixed laws or special Providences, 684-l.\nUniverse has no more a beginning than Deity himself, 849-u.\nUniverse has no voids or empty space, 845-m.\nUniverse having perpetuity of movement and life, the Supreme Cause,\n  667-l.\nUniverse in action is God's mode of operation, 710-u.\nUniverse in idea and actuality contained in Deity to be developed, 849-u.\nUniverse in its totality and its parts was filled with intelligences,\n  669-l.\nUniverse in potence followed the Idea of Creation in Deity, 767-u.\nUniverse in the beginning but one Soul, the All, alone with Time\n  and space, 582-m.\nUniverse intelligent and wise because man, a part of it, is so, 670-m.\nUniverse is dissolved and renewed in endless succession, 607-l.\nUniverse is God, atheistic at bottom is the statement that the, 707-l.\nUniverse is One, developing itself into the manifold, 765-m.\nUniverse is one Harmony, 737-m.\nUniverse: Laws and forces of the, 526-m.\nUniverse made by Ahura Mazda in 365 days, 613-l.\nUniverse made of fire, water, earth and all-nourishing ether, 611-l.\nUniverse moves, changes, exists by the Eternal Law of Harmony, 826-m.\nUniverse must have been coexistent with Deity because--, 684-u.\nUniverse never began to exist; created by the Word, 575-u.\nUniverse not an immense machine forced into movement, 664-l.\nUniverse not only animated, but intelligent, 669-m.\nUniverse of necessities, sequences of cause and effect, of life evolved\n  from death, 831-u.\nUniverse of the Egyptians a living, animated being, like man, 665-l.\nUniverse of things is the stream that flows from Deity; His energy\n  without cessation, 763-l.\nUniverse, or God, likened to the Ocean by the Egyptians, 665-m\nUniverse, or productive Earth, symbolized by the Square, 851-m.\nUniverse outformed in the form of Male and Female, 763-m.\nUniverse plunged into chaos by a single effect without a cause, 735-l.\nUniverse preserved by Eternal Laws, the expression of God's Thought,\n  577-u.\nUniverse proceeded forth from Deity; not created by Him out of nothing,\n  764-m.\nUniverse put in movement by the power of the name of Adonai, 787-l.\nUniverse: questions concerning the creation or self-existence of the,\n  648.\nUniverse regarded as an intelligent being by some philosophers, 670-u.\nUniverse supplied the first model of the Temple, 408-l.\nUniverse sustained by the Divine Mercies, 800-u.\nUniverse, symbolism indicating the Power, Wisdom, Harmony of the, 209-l.\nUniverse, symbolized by a cave, displayed in the Mysteries, 417-u.\nUniverse symbolized by an egg, 254-m.\nUniverse symbolized by the Temple of Solomon, 208-l.\nUniverse symbolized by Zoroaster by a serpent, 496-l.\nUniverse the aggregate of the ideas of all things that exist, 670-m.\nUniverse the great Bible of God, 715-m.\nUniverse, the Infinite utterance of one of an infinite number of\n  Infinite Thoughts, 100-m.\nUniverse the result of the creative Thought of God, 582-l.\nUniverse, the Thought of God pronounced, always was, 303-u.\nUniverse the utterance of the Divine Thought, 849-u.\nUniverse, the uttered Word of God, is infinite in extent, 303-u.\nUniverse to the ancients was a living thing, 596-m.\nUniverse to us a machine, a great clockwork, 595-l.\nUniverse vivified by a great Soul diffused everywhere, 414-l.\nUniverse void of God is an impossible abstraction, 707-l.\nUniverse was comprehended in Deity before it became, 700-m.\nUniverse was planned by Deity and was of Himself, though not\n  His Very Self, 764-m.\nUniverse, whether governed by reason or chance, of little account\n  if misunderstood, 694-m.\nUniverse will not conform to any absolute principle or arbitrary\n  theory, 831-u.\nUniverse with Soul inherent, an ancient idea, 672-u.\nUniverse would be a failure without the reconciliation of Good\n  and Evil, 767-m.\nUpanischads asserts and develops the doctrine of the Mantras, 672-l.\nUriel, the face of an Eagle, on the East and forward, with Vau\n  and Air, 798-m.\nUrn, symbolism of the, 519-m.\nUschas and Mitra are Medie as well as Zend Deities, 602-u.\nUschas, the Dawn, leads forth the Gods in the morning, 602-m.\nUtopia not possible with men having bodily wants and human passions,\n  835-m.\nUtterance of the name of the Great God unlawful, 619-l.\n\nV\n\nVacant space for Worlds formed by the recession of the Primal Light,\n  747-750.\nVacant space formed by the contraction of Deity within Himself\n  at Creation, 766-u.\nVacant space, the Primal Space, called in the Kabalah Auira\n  Kadmah, was square, 750-m.\nValentinians distinguished three orders of existence; described, 560-l.\nValentinians venerated the generative organs, symbols of fruitfulness,\n  656-m.\nValentinus defined God as exalted above all possibility of designation,\n  555-u.\nValentinus published the Materia Prima containing an Hermetic symbol,\n  850-m.\nValentinus, reared a Christian at Alexandria, held God was an Abyss,\n  559-l.\nValue of little things and humble efforts, 230.\nVan Helmont asserts spiritual beings possess limited divine power, 684-l.\nVarouna, the \"All Encompasser,\" almost as extensive as Indra, 602-m.\nVase of water in Mysteries to symbolize purification by water, 412-m.\nVau and He comprehend all things; all are one system, 800-m.\nVau, in the triliteral word, denotes the six members of the\n  Microprosopos, 793-l.\nVau is Beauty and Harmony, 798-m.\nVau is denoted Microprosopos and is composed of the six parts\n  that follow Hakemah and Binah, 794-l.\nVau is Tepharth considered as Unity, in which are the six members;\n  itself is one, 799-l.\nVau is Yod moved lengthwise, as communication is from above to below,\n  792-l.\nVau moved sideways produces superfices, which is Daleth, 792-l.\nVaults, subterranean, represent--, 208-l.\nVav gave light to Yod by which great energy was conferred on Hakemah,\n  756-u.\nVav, in the middle of the three Yods, denotes Hakemah, 763-m\nVav is both male and female, 763-m.\nVav is Tephareth, 758-u.\nVav of the Tetragrammaton in Adam Kadmon as Ruach, 757-u.\nVav with Yod and He completes the Triliteral Name, 323-m.\nVeda apostrophized as living beings the physical objects of worship,\n  602-m\nVeda contains the most ancient religious effusions, 602-m.\nVedanta and Myaya philosophy regarding God and the Soul, 607-u.\nVedanta philosophy maintained the divine unity, 673-u\nVedas detail the creation of the world, 609-l.\nVedas the voice of the universal organism called Pooroosha, 673-u.\nVedic book, Antareya A'ran'ya, gives an account of the creation, 609-u\nVedic Gods, their origin and signification, 602-612.\nVedic spirit a pantheist monotheism, 672-l.\nVegetable Kingdom symbolized by Schib; studied by the Fellow-Craft,\n  632-u.\nVeil; noises, lightning, thunder preceded the lowering of the, 433-u.\nVeil removed revealed the image of the Goddess of the Mysteries, 433-u.\nVeils of four colors represented the four elements, 409-m.\nVenus inspires the soul with desires while passing through, 439-m.\nVenus represents Charity, 727-l.\nVenus, the name of the second gate of the ladder; material, tin, 414-u.\nVerity: there is a method of knowing the incontestable, 842-m.\nVernal Equinox brought soft winds and warmth, 444-m.\nVernal Equinox most fully develops the creative or demiurge energy,\n  473-u.\nVernal Equinox; Principle of Good overcomes that of Evil at the, 664-m.\nVernal Equinox; Sun 4,500 years ago in Gemini at the, 401-l.\nVernal Equinox: the demiourgic action and energy most active at the,\n  664-m.\nVernal Equinox: the Israelites marched out of Egyptian bondage at the,\n  466-m.\nVery Deity is all that may possibly be besides all that is, was, shall\n  be, 819-m.\nVessels comparable to the Kings produced by Binah, 797-u.\nVessels contain within themselves the light of the sphere, 755-m.\nVessels of the Sephiroth below Binah broken that evil might be\n  created, 791-l.\nVessels somewhat opaque and not so splendid as the light, 755-m.\nVessels were partitions between the greater and lesser Splendor, 755-m.\nVestige of His Light remains in the vacant space formed by Deity's\n  contraction, 766-u.\nVestige of the Sublime Brilliance exists in a spherical shape, termed\n  splendor, 751-u.\nVestiges of the Light, 747-750.\nVestiges of the seven Numerations formed by the light flowing\n  down from Binah, 797-u.\nVestments of the High Priest and furniture described, 409-u.\nVice, condemnation for an undeserved reputation for, 131-l.\nVice generally rewarded with contempt and infamy, 705-l.\nVice only degrades men who are ennobled by virtue, 622-l.\nVice punished in this life, 101-u.\nVictory: God's Will is not defeated nor thwarted, and that is the\n  Divine, 848-l.\nVictory is one of the last four of the Sephiroth of the Kabalah, 848-l.\nVictory, one of the Sephiroth, the column Jachin, 267-l.\nVictory over the human in man by the Divine the true Holy Empire, 855-u.\nVingolf or Gimli the Heaven of the Icelanders, 619-m.\nVirgil enunciated the doctrine of the preexistence of souls in eternal\n  fire, 399-l.\nVirgil, in the Georgics, states that life returns to the Universal life,\n  666-l.\nVirgil's verse borrowed from the ceremonies of initiation, 381-m.\nVirgin mother idea among ancients, 104-u.\nVirgin of the Zodiac bitten in the heel by the Serpent, 497-l.\nVirgin: Spica Virginis and Arcturus heralded the coming of the Sun,\n  507-u.\nVirgin: the march of time, seasons and epochs of the year connected\n  with the, 507-u.\nVirgo and Bootes at the Autumnal Equinox introduce the serpent, 455-l.\nVirgo at the Winter Solstice rose with the Sun in her bosom, 455-l.\nVirgo becomes Isis with Horus in her arms, 455-m.\nVirgo in the domicile of Mercury, the device of Napthali, 462-u.\nVirgo: Mercury was the companion and counsellor of Isis or the, 507-m.\nVirgo named because of the Gleaning Virgin at Harvest, 446-m.\nVirgo represented by Isis and Ceres at the Vernal Equinox, 506-m.\nVirgo takes the name of Isis, or the Moon, and appears in all the\n  fables, 507-m.\nVirtue and Wisdom, only, defend and perfect man, 803-l.\nVirtue as necessary to happiness a fundamental principle of the\n  Hindu religion, 604-m.\nVirtue assailed gains strength from resisted temptations, 194-l.\nVirtue, credit given for an undeserved reputation for, 131-l.\nVirtue ennobles men and vice only degrades them, 622-l.\nVirtue exists in the perception and thought of a mind, 201-l.\nVirtue in man shown in respect and love of others--justice, charity,\n  703-u.\nVirtue in this world the condition of happiness in another life, 716-l.\nVirtue is equilibrium in the Affections, 845-u.\nVirtue is the truest liberty; the best example, 181-l.\nVirtue means manliness chiefly, and includes patient endurance, 803-l.\nVirtue not always rewarded, nor vice punished, in this life, 705-l.\nVirtue rewarded in this life, 101-u.\nVirtue: Sir Launcelot thought no chivalry equal to that of, 803-l.\nVirtue the highest good and aim and purpose of man's life, 226-l.\nVirtue the prize of the hard-fought battle or race, 181-m.\nVirtue the surest road to happiness, 705-l.\nVirtue, the work of genius less noble than that of, 349-l.\nVirtue, Truth, Honor, and fidelity to vows prove the true Knight, 808-u.\nVirtue, Truth is the foundation of, 184-l.\nVirtue, unfortunate, hopes to be rewarded in another life, 717-u.\nVirtue without happiness is a contradiction and a disorder, 724-m.\nVirtues, by labor will man continually learn the, 342-m.\nVirtues of man are God's attributes, 704-u.\nVirtues of Masonry, four cardinal, 21-m.\nVirtues turned into offenses against a forced, impractical law, 831-m.\nVishnu, the Preserver, manifested by his avatars or impersonations, 603.\nVishnu, the Preserving Power of the Hindu Trinity, 550-m.\nVishnu to judge the world at the last day: new Universe created, 623-m.\nVishnu, with Bramah and Seeva, manifestations of the One Deity, 205-u.\n\"Visible is for us the proportional measure of the invisible\", 769-l.\nVisible the measure of the invisible, 222-u.\nVital force of some persons absorbed by others, 735-u.\nVitellius, 3-u.\nVitellius, horrors of despotism under, 27-u.\nVoid does not exist in the Universe, nor does empty space, 845-m.\nVoid into which the Sun and Stars went on setting, 595-m.\nVolatile applied to everything that more readily obeys the law of\n  movement, 778-l.\nVoltaire, throughout the ages will ring the words of, 43-u.\nVote of the People expresses the Active Energy of the Will of the\n  Present, 860-u.\nVows and obligations to be well considered and kept, 111-l.\nVows of obedience, chastity, poverty, taken by the Hospitallers\n  and Templars, 802-u.\n\nW\n\nWar, for great principle, noble; for commercial supremacy, despicable,\n  70-m.\nWar, prevalence and effects of, 297-298.\nWar, results of, 124-l.\nWashington adored because of his constant effort to be practically\n  just, 836-l.\nWater, a test representing the purifying of the soul in the march\n  of years, 397-u.\nWater and the vessel that produced it the primitive principle of\n  things, 495-m.\nWater formed by the action of a force of God on two invisible gases,\n  845-l.\nWater gives the elements and principles of compounds nutriment, 784-m.\nWater, the source of all things, one of the symbols of regeneration\n  in the Mysteries, 357-l.\nWaters and great rivers symbolized by a Dragon, 498-l.\nWaters first created by a thought of the Sole, Self Existing Power,\n  608-l.\nWaters of forgetfulness, Rivers Ameles and Lethe, 439-u.\nWealth, degeneration of the families of, 347-l.\nWealth, evils of thirst for, 68-m.\nWealth, laudable methods of employing, 348-u.\nWebb, explanations and improvements of, 105-m.\nWellington, saved by Blucher, defeats Napoleon, 42-m.\nWell being, that wealth is to be acquired in a short time is against\n  human, 345-m.\nWest, faith of the people of the East connected with that of the, 247-l.\n\"What is above is like what is below and what is below is like\n  what is above,\" Hermetic Dogma, 790-m.\nWhite and black in juxtaposition a symbol of the two Principles, 818-m.\nWhite stone promised the faithful in the Apocalypse, 775-l.\nWhite was of the nature of the Good Principle, or light, 662-m.\nWicked, according to the Edda, shall go to Hel and then to Nifthel,\n  619-m.\nWicked ultimately pardoned and admitted to endless bliss, 624-u.\nWill action independent or outside the body not understood, 733-l.\nWill and Capacity which unite to produce the Act of Intellection\n  is always in conjunction, 766-l.\nWill concentration necessary to success, 733-m.\nWill is a Force, 91-u.\nWill is the faculty that directs the forces of the Intellect, 738-u.\nWill, like Thought, seems spontaneous; both Powers, 574-u.\nWill, Man distinguished from the brute by the mastery of his, 192-l.\nWill of Deity as Wisdom and the Capacity are Father and Mother\n  of all that is, 766-l.\nWill of Deity caused the Power in Him to exist, the intellectual\n  faculty to exercise, 766-m.\nWill of Deity determined Him to frame the idea of the Universe, 766-m.\nWill of Deity flows forth as the Generative Power to beget\n  intellectual action, 766-m.\nWill of Deity is Kether, Crown, in which are included all other\n  Emanations, 766-u.\nWill of God and his perfect Freedom difficult of comprehension, 689-u.\nWill of God is the Soul of all things that are, 755-u.\nWill of God not defeated nor thwarted and that is the Divine\n  Victory, 848-l.\nWill of God only works in the material world, no secondary finite\n  will, 828-m.\nWill power and influence little understood, 733-m.\nWill, strong and determined, can attain complete independence, 790-l.\nWill to create was Creation; to plan was to will and create, 766-l.\nWills of others subject ours or are subjected by ours, 735.\nWind the breath of the universal organism called Pooroosha, 673-u.\nWinter became emblematic of sin, evil and suffering, 447-l.\nWinter: fallen angels ruled by a chief controlled the hemisphere of,\n  449-u.\nWinter Solstice brought frost and long nights, 445-u.\nWinter Solstice, Sun was said to die and be born again at the, 464-l.\nWinter's continuance betokened by Prometheus chained in his\n  cavern, 592-m.\nWisdom: a serpent extended at length was a symbol of Divine, 496-m.\nWisdom an attainable idea, 693-u.\nWisdom and Intellectual Generative Energy is male, 305-m.\nWisdom and Love, in Infinity, orders and does all that is, 859-u.\nWisdom and Power in equilibrium gives the principles of Truth,\n  Justice, Right, 859-u.\nWisdom and Power of Deity are in equilibrium, 7-l.\nWisdom and Understanding are in Equilibrium in the Sohar, 305-m.\nWisdom and Understanding in the Kabalah are male and female, 305-m.\nWisdom and Will of Deity act simultaneously, 766-u.\nWisdom called Nous and Logos, Intellect or the Word, 267-l.\nWisdom communicated to Jesus the perfect Knowledge, Gnosis, 563-l.\nWisdom conjoined with Intelligence generates and are expanded\n  in the Truth, 800-u.\nWisdom, Force, Harmony, the Great Attributes of the Essence of\n  Deity, 531-m.\nWisdom in aiming at the best and being content with the best\n  possible, 835-u.\nWisdom in each Universal, one above, one below, 791-m.\nWisdom in Hebrew writings is the Word of God, 323-l.\nWisdom in Kabalistic books is the creative agent of God, 323-l.\nWisdom, Infinite, rules in the Divine nature and in its Emanations,\n 768-m.\nWisdom is equilibrium in the Thoughts, 845-u.\nWisdom is the All, and contains the All, and the summary is the\n  Holy Name, 793-u.\nWisdom is the Logos that creates, 323-m.\nWisdom is the principle of all things; in it beginning and end are\n  found, 762-m.\nWisdom is the Principle of the Universe and from it thirty ways\n  diverge, 794-m.\nWisdom issuing and shining from the Ancient shines as male and\n  female, 800-u.\nWisdom, made fruitful by the Divine Light, produced Christos\n  and Sophia-Achamoth, 563-u.\nWisdom must be possessed in the Absolute before Hermetic work\n  can be thought of, 776-u.\nWisdom, Occult, conformed into male and female, Rigor and Love, 796-u.\nWisdom of God is His Will; His Will includes His Wisdom, 323-m.\nWisdom of God the mother of Creation, 251-l.\nWisdom of man a reflection of that of God, 251-l.\nWisdom of the daughter, or inferior, distinguished from the Superior\n  Wisdom, 565-u.\nWisdom of the Divine limits the Divine Will; the result Beauty or\n  Harmon, 846-l.\nWisdom of the Stoic and Epicurean contrasted, 694-m.\nWisdom, or the Infinite Divine Intelligence, a side of the Masonic\n  triangle, 826-m.\nWisdom, pregnant with all that is, shone under the form of male and\n  female, 763-m.\nWisdom represented by the Master of a Lodge, 7-l.\nWisdom, Strength, Harmony represented by the Triple Tau, 503-l.\nWisdom, Supernal, is Yod and all things are included in Yod, 793-u.\nWisdom synonymous with the Word, Son, Einsoph, the Nous, Sophia, 565-u.\nWisdom taught by consequences of erring, 181-u.\nWisdom the first produced and the Mother of all that exists. 553-u.\nWisdom the Mother of Creation, 552-l.\nWisdom, when expanded by flowing forth, is called the \"Father of\n  Fathers\", 762-m.\nWisdom which thought the plan, 531-m.\nWolf chased by Sagittarius the emblem of Benjamin, the hunter, 461-l.\nWoman in the constellation at the end of Autumn seems to crush\n  the head of the Serpent, 376-m.\nWoman is man's creation, 772-u.\nWoman's perversity devised to account for moral evil, 690-m.\nWord, a symbol is the pronunciation of the, 205-m.\nWord, an allegory is made out of the loss of the True, 205-l.\nWord and Secret; an understanding of the Hermetic necessary to an\n  understanding of the, 777-l.\nWord and the Sacred Name synonymous, 204-l.\nWord, as Brahma, communicated to man the revelations to himself, 604-u.\nWord became flesh, dwelt with us, and in Him were Pleroma, Truth,\n  Grace, 559-l.\n\"Word becomes flesh and dwells among men;\" communicates itself\n  to men, 575-m.\nWord, Christ proclaims a new God's, 309-u.\nWord communicated living Power to man, 598-m.\nWord created by God to give existence to men; the Ensoph of the\n  Kabalah, 565-u.\nWord created the Universe which, like Him, never began to exist, 575-u.\nWord evolved the Universe, 582-m.\nWord, examples of the personification of the, 268-l.\nWord, found in the Phoenician creed, 268-m.\nWord from the Father, by its power, brought the Light of Existence,\n  581-l.\nWord given to initiate of Chinese and Japanese Mysteries, 429-u.\nWord given to the initiate of the Indian mysteries, 428-m.\nWord, God reveals Himself to us by His uttered, 324-u.\nWord, Hebrews not permitted to pronounce now the, 204-m.\nWord, in verity, of a Master Mason, 861-l.\nWord Incarnate adored by three Magi, guided by a star, bearing gifts,\n  730-l.\nWord is Light and the Life of Humanity, 849-l.\nWord is lost when it ceases to be understood, 731-m.\nWord is the First and Only begotten of the Father, 849-l.\nWord is the First Begotten, not the first created Son of God, 772-m.\nWord is Two: Principle is One, 772-u.\nWord, Jehovah not the Ineffable, 205-m.\nWord, Light and Life are emanations from the Primal Deity, 568-l.\nWord, Logos, dwells in God in whom all his powers and attributes\n  develop, 552-l.\nWord, Logos, through which God acts on the Universe, 552-l.\nWord, meaning of superstitious notions concerning the, 205-u.\nWord not only Creator, but occupies the place of the Supreme Being,\n  251-l.\nWord of a Mason found in the meaning of the ineffable Name, 697-m.\nWord of a Master Mason, the true knowledge of God, 209-u.\nWord of a Master supposed to be lost symbolizes the Christian faith\n  after--, 641-l.\nWord of God the universal invisible Light, cognizable by the senses,\n  742-u.\n\"Word\" of Masonry a symbol of Ormuzd, 256-l.\nWord of Plato and the Gnostics: the unuttered word within the\n  Deity, 552-m.\nWord or Thought expressed the third in the Masonic Trinity, 575-l.\nWord, out of original truths misunderstood grew fables of the, 205-u.\nWord, representing the Absolute, the reason for strange rites of\n  initiation, 840-m.\nWord, Sacred, written by Isis, but effaced by Typhon as soon as\n  written, 376-l.\nWord said to be a personified object of prayer, revealed and manifested,\n  613-l.\nWord; \"symbolism of the Alexandrian\" unspeakable, 728-u.\nWord, symbolism of the ignorance of the True, 223-m.\nWord symbolizes the Saviour himself, 642-u.\nWord, synonymous with Son, Wisdom; the Ormuzd of Zoroaster, 565-u.\nWord that is the utterance and expression of being and life is that\n  of the Absolute, 841-l.\nWord, The, appears in ancient sects, 271-l.\n\"Word,\" the ever living emanation of the Deity, by virtue of which\n  the world exists, 613-u.\nWord, the highest conception of Deity we can form is the True, 223-m.\nWord, the Image of the Supreme Being, Logos, 251-u.\nWord, The, in the Phoenician Cosmogony, 278-m.\n\"Word,\" the instrumentality through which the warfare against death\n  is carried on, 613-u.\nWord, The, is Ormuzd, Ainsoph, Nous, Sophia, or Demiourgos, 271-l.\nWord, The, is the reason of belief; the source of Logic: Jesus is\n  the Word incarnate, 323-l.\nWord, the manifestation and expression of God's Thought, 575-l.\nWord, the manifestation and mode of communication of God's\n  Thought, 575-u.\nWord, the powers and attributes of God act through the, 251-l.\nWord the protector of men and their Shepherd, 251-l.\nWord, The, spoken of by Philo as being the same with God, 269-u.\nWord, the statement of Arius concerning the, 279-l.\nWord, the synonym for Wisdom, Intellect, 267-l.\nWord, the True, is ineffable because--, 223-m.\nWord, the utterance of the thought of God, 552-m.\nWord, The, various assertions concerning, 280-281.\nWord, triple, of Pythagoras, 97-m.\nWord united itself with Jesus, son of Joseph and Mary, 564-l.\nWord was in common use and written, 204-m.\nWord was in the beginning with God and was God, 849-m.\nWord, when lost, 205-l.\nWord which was lost found after Christ's ascent from the tomb, 642-u.\nWord with man at the beginning and that Word from God, 598-m.\nWord worn on the person as an amulet, 204-m.\nWords formed by the reversion of letters of former words; examples,\n  699-m.\nWords inadequate to express conception of Deity, hence personification,\n  672-l.\nWords nothing but letters and their combinations, 749-m.\nWords refer to things and are images of what is material, 569-u.\nWork done worthy of Masonry and acceptable to God, 351-u.\nWork, from first to last Masonry is, 340-u.\nWork is noble; ease for neither God nor man, 340-l.\nWork is prayer; is life, 342-u.\nWork, not wholly in vain is any good, 230-m.\nWork of lowly and uninfluential important; instances--, 41-42.\nWork, there is a nobleness and sacredness in, 341-l.\nWorkman of the Deity is Yod, according to the Kabalah, 792-l.\nWorkingman, condition of the, 179.\nWorkingman, the hero of Masonry is a, 340-u.\nWorks, Doubt, Sorrow, Remorse, Indignation shrink away when man, 342-u.\nWorld a great plain to the ancients, 593-l.\nWorld and all its parts in God, the Supreme Cause, 667-m.\nWorld and its modes will ever exist by the eternal qualities of the\n  Active and Passive, 654-l\nWorld and its spherical envelope represented by the mystic egg, 400-u.\nWorld and Man made in the image of Ialdaboth in order to--, 563-m.\nWorld cognizable by the Intellect has the Hermetic Theology and\n  the Kabalah, 785-m.\nWorld compared to man, 667-l.\nWorld consumed by the comet, Gurzsher, 623-l.\nWorld created by Fear did not subsist until Compassion was adjoined,\n  796-l.\nWorld created by Ormurzd in six periods of 500 years each, 258-u.\nWorld created by the Logos (Word), 252-l.\nWorld declined into idolatry and barbarism, 599-l.\nWorld, different views of by different men, 193.\nWorld first created by Judgment, but it could not subsist, 800-u.\nWorld formed by the creative principle out of matter, the Triad, 631-m.\nWorld good enough if men will do the best they know how, 696-m.\nWorld is a whole which has its harmony, for God could make none other,\n  707-l.\nWorld judged by Vishnu; consumed by fire; new Universe created, 623-m.\nWorld not merely a material and mechanical machine, 414-l.\nWorld of action produces clashing of passion and conflict of interests,\n  696-u.\nWorld of Ideas created by God; material world by His Logos, 251-l.\nWorld of Inanity, the first World, could not continue because it had\n  no human conformation, 795-u.\nWorld of matter a revelation of fear to the Northern savages, 713-l.\nWorld of restitution formed throughout in the human form, 794-l.\nWorld of restitution instituted after evil was made possible, 794-l.\nWorld of restitution instituted after the fashion of the Balance, 794-l.\nWorld of the Balance refers to the other World, 762-l.\nWorld of the covering, or garment, is the inmost, nearest his substance,\n  749-m.\nWorld of the garment has a name which includes all things: Ihuh, 750-u.\nWorld peopled by Christs would be relieved of the ills of society, 718-l.\nWorld perfect and good because God made it, 705-m.\nWorld-producing egg figures in all cosmogonies, 771-l.\nWorld represented by a blue circle, flames and a serpent with a\n  hawk's head, 495-m.\nWorld represented by the number five: earth, water, air, fire, ether,\n  634-U.\nWorld, the germ of creation communicated to Wisdom brought forth the,\n  251-l.\nWorld, the great and appointed school of industry is the, 344-m.\nWorld, the necessary logical condition of God; His necessitated\n  consequence, 708-l.\nWorld; the Sephiroth were points, one below the other in the first,\n  795-u.\nWorld, the visible World the image of the invisible, 252-l.\nWorld, unimportance of the Universe and importance of our, 302-m.\nWorld what we make it by character and adaption, 193.\nWorld will end when the Redeemer has attracted to Himself the\n  Light or Soul of Matter, 566-l.\nWorld-wonder all around us, 244-m.\nWorld worth living in, 140-m.\nWorld would be a Paradise if all men were true Masons, 530-l.\nWorlds could not be framed in the Primal Ether because of--, 750-l.\nWorld's disorder seems to impugn the justice and goodness of God, 705-m.\nWorlds, four, represented by Yod, He, Vau; He, 798-m.\nWorlds in actuality produced from the Sepiroth Malakoth, 754-u.\nWorld's mystery remains but sufficiently cleared to inspire confidence,\n  696-m.\nWorlds of the Kabalah are four: Emanation; Creation; Formation;\n  Fabrication, 768-m.\nWorlds produced by the potentialities of the Sephiroth becoming\n  actualities, 755-l.\nWorship, a teaching, should be magnificent, not mean, 102-u.\nWorship of an abstraction not possible, must have some form, 514-l.\nWorship of nature seems to have emanated from Iranian races, 601-l.\nWorship of the Active and Passive divisions of the Great First Cause\n  widespread, 653-l.\nWorship of the Heavenly Bodies by different peoples, 457.\nWorship of the things symbolized superseded that of God, 601-m.\nWorship of Zoroastrians principally hymns and prayers, 617-l.\nWorship, only those initiated were admitted to the private, 352-u.\nWorship, the Mysteries constituted the private, 352-u.\nWorships, among ancient nations were public and private, 352-u.\nWreaths of laurel as a reward for--, 157-m.\nWriting in hieroglyphs revived to hide the true meaning of the doctrine,\n  732-l.\nWritten human speech gives power and permanency to human thought, 54-m.\nWrong conflicts with justice and falls, 830-u.\nWrong done to another an injury to our own Nature, 127-m.\nWrong, evil, suffering but temporary and discords, 577-u.\nWrong in human nature yields to the divine in us, 133-l.\nWrong is surely unsuccessful; the Knave deceives himself, 837-l.\nWrongdoer often does more injury to himself, 134-u.\nWrongdoer who exults in his acts, no benedictions for the, 134-u.\nWrongdoers, without revenge or anger should come the punishment of, 75-m.\nWrongful acts, no remittance of the natural effects of, 127-l.\n\nX\n\nXenophanes acknowledged the unsatisfactory results of Philosophy, 093-l.\nXenophanes advocated Monotheism, 678-m.\nXenophanes called the universal being spherical, 676-u.\nXenophanes used material imagery to illustrate an indefinite meaning,\n  676-u.\n\nY\n\nY, alludes to the Triune God and is the ineffable name in Chinese, 429-m.\nYahveh, see Iahaveh, 104-m.\nYazata a personified object of prayer, 613-l.\nYear of the Romans commenced at the Winter Solstice, 464-l.\nYear's commencement fixed by different nations at one of four periods,\n  464-l.\nYesod characterized as the Generative member of the symbolic\n  human figure, 767-m.\nYesod is stability and permanence from which flows Malakoth,\n  Empire, Rule, 767-m.\nYesod, one of the Sephiroth; Foundation or Basis; by which all\n  worlds are upheld, 753-m.\nYesod, the male organ of Adam Kadmon, 758-u.\nYesod, the result of Victory and Glory, Netsach and Hod, in the\n  Kabalah, 767-u.\nYesirah, the World of Formation of the Sephiroth Theology, 99-m.\nYod, a smaller receptacle than Crown, but filled from that source, 753-u.\nYod, added to the ternary name of Eve, gives the Kabalistic word\n  Jehova, 771-m.\nYod and He represent the Male and Female principles in equilibrium, 323-m.\nYod comprehends the principle called Father (the Male or Generative\n  Principle), 763-l.\nYod created the becoming world; for Yod includes two letters, 763-l.\nYod descended into the vacant space to lessen the Light, 754-l.\nYod of the Tetragrammaton as Neschamah Leneschamah in Adam Kadmon, 757-u.\nYod, He, denotes Hakemah and Binah, 789-m.\nYod, He, of the anterior or male, and Vav He, of the posterior or\n  female, 750-u.\nYod, He, or Jah, is bi-sexual, 849-m.\nYod, He Vau, denotes Gedulah, Geburah, Tephareth, 798-m.\nYod, He, Vau, He, is the name of Deity manifested in the act of\n  Creation, 849-u.\nYod impregnated the letter He, and begets a son, 763-l.\nYod in the triangle is the initial of the last word of the Trinity, 782-l.\nYod, in the Kabalah, is the opifex, workman of the Deity, 792-l.\nYod, in the Kabalah, the Creative energy of God, 16-l.\nYod is Hakemah, 758-u.\nYod is male; in it are three Yods, the upper and lower apex and the\n  middle, 763-m.\nYod is primal, like one, first among numbers; like a point, first\n  before all bodies, 792-l.\nYod is the beginning and end of all things that are; the Father of all,\n  763-l.\nYod is the beginning and end of all things which are contained in Yod,\n  793-u.\nYod is the symbol of Wisdom and of the Father, the Principle, 792-l.\nYod lost its brilliancy when it descended from the Shekinah, 751-m.\nYod moved lengthwise produces a line, which is Vau, 792-l.\nYod not as brilliant as the Primal Ether, 751-u.\nYod, on his ascension left behind him the productive light of the\n  letter He, 751-l.\nYod placed in a pit of shadow made by the Creator, 772-u.\nYod produced by Emanation by the Creator, 772-u.\nYod, symbol of Unity; symbolism of--, 15-m.\nYod, the Father, approaches He, the Mother, according to the Siphra\n  de Zeniutha, 793-u.\nYod, \"The Fountain gushing with Wisdom\", 753-u.\nYod, the image of the Kabalistic Phallus, represents the human\n  Tetragram, 771-m.\nYod uttered by Wisdom creates worlds, first as an Idea, 323-m.\nYod's light increased when the letter He communicated to him her\n  light, 751-m.\nYod's middle is Hakemah; Hakemah is Father, 763-m.\nYod's number is ten; Vau is six, Daleth is four, equal to that of Yod,\n  792-l.\nYod's plenitude, the name of the letter spelled, is--, 792-l.\nYods sometimes compose the Tetractys of Pythagoras, 60-l.\nYod's upper apex denotes the Supreme Kether; the lower apex Binah, 763-m.\nYork Rite explanation of Lodge and ladder, 9-l.\nYork Rite explanation of symbolic meaning of Ashlars, 5-u.\nYork Rite explanation of symbols, 16-m.\nYn and Yang signify repose and motion amongst Chinese, 630-l.\n\n\nZ\n\nZ, the initial of Zeus because of its resemblance to the figure seven,\n  635-l.\nZagreus dismembered; protected by the dance of the Curetes, 585-l.\nZagreus the same as Dionusos; entrusted with the thunderbolt, 585-l.\nZayo, is the third Sephirah, the intellectual producing capacity, 741-u.\nZebulon dwelt on the sea shore, his device is Capricorn, the tail of\n  a fish, 461-l.\nZechariah, visions of; symbolism of numbers, 58-u.\nZend-Avesta, borrowed from and added to the Jewish doctrine, 256-u.\nZend-Avesta, Doctrines and teachings of the, 256-258.\nZend-Avesta, God's nature in the, 256-m.\nZend-Avesta, Kabalists and Gnostics adopted doctrines of the, 282-l.\nZend-Avesta, many doctrines of Revelations found in the, 273-m.\nZend-Avesta, Persian faith and doctrines as taught in the, 282.\nZend-Avesta, the Creator called the Ancient of Days in the, 266-l.\nZend-Avesta, the Word created the World, 282.\nZeruane-Akherene, Unlimited Time, above all of the Persian Gods, 598-u.\nZetesis or search of Osiris or Adonis, that is of Bootes, 484-u.\nZeus, King of the Gods, 13-u.\nZeus of Homer an array of antitheses, 689-l.\nZeus put an end to the Golden Age for beneficent reasons, 691-u.\nZeus, the God of Gods, the Son of Time; the Beginning, the Middle,\n  the All, 619-l.\nZodiac and signs on coins, medals, seals, 462-l.\nZodiac assigned to six male and six female Great Gods by Astrologers,\n  658-u.\nZodiac crossed by the Sun at two opposite points which change, 437-l.\nZodiac is an existence, organized by the universal soul, 669-u.\nZodiac; Plato in his Republic adopted the divisions of the planets\n  and, 462-u.\nZodiac, six signs were male and six female in the, 402-m.\nZodiac the cause of all sublunary effects, 663-m.\nZodiac, the path along which the Sun traveled, 446-l.\nZodiac, veils of the Royal Arch have reference to the signs and stars\n  of the, 409.\nZodiacal signs are unchanged, 437-l.\nZodiacal signs; characteristics of Jacob's sons compared with those\n  of the, 461.\nZodiacal signs, commencing with Aries, are those of Light, 663-u.\nZodiacal signs, commencing with Libra, are those of Darkness, 663-u.\nZodiacal signs divided in three Decans of ten degrees each, 470-m.\nZodiacal signs represented by the twelve Deities of the Persians, 663-u.\nZohak, conquered by Pheridoun, lamented by the Persians, 594-l.\nZohar, is Nestar, Concealed, the intellectual potency of Deity, 741-u.\nZoroaster; Magism was the science of, 839-l.\nZoroaster asks Ormuzd what to do to combat Evil and make men holy, 613-m.\nZoroaster claimed to have conversed, man to man, with Deity, 424-l.\nZoroaster discourses on the old Fire and Light Idea, 611-m.\nZoroaster drew his doctrines from the Mysteries, 373-m.\nZoroaster, from Bactria came the doctrines of, 258-l.\nZoroaster, Hindu and Buddists elements in the doctrines of, 258-l.\nZoroaster, Masonry reiterates the maxims of, 221-m.\nZoroaster, Pharisees and Jews borrowed the doctrines of, 238-l.\nZoroaster possessed a true knowledge of Deity, 207-l.\nZoroaster received the Primitive Truth from the Indians, 017-m.\nZoroaster speaks of the Sun and Stars, 611-l.\nZoroaster taught the Primitive Truth to Pythagoras, 617-m.\nZoroaster, the Aions, Ideas, Angels, correspond to the Ferouers of, 256-u.\nZoroaster's sayings to the Persians, 170-u.\nZoroaster's disciples used the symbolism of the Mystic Egg, 403-u.\nZoroaster's doctrine more ancient than Kuros, 256-u.\nZoroaster's doctrines carried by Jews into Syria and Palestine, 256-u.\nZoroaster's doctrines taught, 167-l.\nZoroaster's doctrines the best the Persians were fitted to receive, 38-u.\nZoroastrian doctrines suggested the worship of the Supreme God, 617-l.\nZoroastrian oracles give a Triad of Fire, Light and Ether, 549-u.\nZoroastrian Two Principles symbolized by white and black in\n  juxta-position, 818-m.\nZoroastrians rejected Temples, Altars, Statues, 617-l.\nZoroastrians religiously exterminate serpents, etc, 497-m.\nZoroastrianism an innovation on an older religion, 602-u.\nZorobabel's Warrior-Masons the model of the Templars, 816-m.","title":"Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":439174}