XIV. consulted his horoscope, and the learned Casini commenced his

career as an astrologer.

The ancient Sabæans established feasts in honor of each planet, on the
day, for each, when it entered its place of _exaltation_, or reached the
particular degree in the particular sign of the zodiac in which
astrology had fixed the place of its exaltation; that is, the place in
the Heavens where its influence was supposed to be greatest, and where
it acted on Nature with the greatest energy. The place of exaltation of
the Sun was in Aries, because, reaching that point, he awakens all
Nature, and warms into life all the germs of vegetation; and therefore
his most solemn feast among all nations, for many years before our Era,
was fixed at the time of his entrance into that sign. In Egypt, it was
called the Feast of Fire and Light. It was the Passover, when the
Paschal Lamb was slain and eaten, among the Jews, and Neurouz among the
Persians. The Romans preferred the place of _domicile_ to that of
exaltation; and celebrated the feasts of the planets under the signs
that were their _houses_. The Chaldeans, whom, and not the Egyptians,
the Sabæans followed in this, preferred the places of exaltation.

Saturn, from the length of time required for his apparent revolution,
was considered the most remote, and the Moon the nearest planet. After
the Moon came Mercury and Venus, then the Sun and then Mars, Jupiter,
and Saturn.

So the risings and settings of the Fixed Stars, and their conjunctions
with the Sun, and their first appearance as they emerged from his rays,
fixed the epochs for the feasts instituted in their honor; and the
Sacred Calendars of the ancients were regulated accordingly.

In the Roman games of the circus, celebrated in honor of the Sun and of
entire Nature, the Sun, Moon, Planets, Zodiac, Elements, and the most
apparent parts and potent agents of Nature were personified and
represented, and the courses of the Sun in the Heavens were imitated in
the Hippodrome; his chariot being drawn by four horses of different
colors, representing the four elements and seasons. The courses were
from East to West, like the circuits round the Lodge, and seven in
number, to correspond with the number of planets. The movements of the
Seven Stars that revolve around the pole were also represented, as were
those of Capella, which by its heliacal rising at the moment when the
Sun reached the Pleiades, in Taurus, announced the commencement of the
annual revolution of the Sun.

The intersection of the Zodiac by the colures at the Equinoctial and
Solstitial points, fixed four periods, each of which has, by one or more
nations, and in some cases by the same nation at different periods, been
taken for the commencement of the year. Some adopted the Vernal Equinox,
because then day began to prevail over night, and light gained a victory
over darkness. Sometimes the Summer Solstice was preferred; because then
day attained its maximum of duration, and the acme of its glory and
perfection. In Egypt, another reason was, that then the Nile began to
overflow, at the heliacal rising of Sirius. Some preferred the Autumnal
Equinox, because then the harvests were gathered, and the hopes of a new
crop were deposited in the bosom of the earth. And some preferred the
Winter Solstice, because then, the shortest day having arrived, their
length commenced to increase, and Light began the career destined to end
in victory at the Vernal Equinox.

The Sun was figuratively said to _die_ and be _born again_ at the Winter
Solstice; the games of the Circus, in honor of the invincible God-Sun,
were then celebrated, and the Roman year, established or reformed by
Numa, commenced. Many peoples of Italy commenced their year, Macrobius
says, at that time; and represented by the four ages of man the gradual
succession of periodical increase and diminution of day, and the light
of the Sun; likening him to an infant born at the Winter Solstice, a
young man at the Vernal Equinox, a robust man at the Summer Solstice,
and an old man at the Autumnal Equinox.

This idea was borrowed from the Egyptians, who adored the Sun at the
Winter Solstice, under the figure of an infant.

The image of the Sign in which each of the four seasons commenced,
became the form under which was figured the Sun of that particular
season. The Lion's skin was worn by Hercules; the horns of the Bull
adorned the forehead of Bacchus; and the autumnal serpent wound its long
folds round the Statue of Serapis, 2500 years before our era; when those
Signs corresponded with the commencement of the Seasons. When other
constellations replaced them at those points, by means of the precession
of the Equinoxes, those attributes were changed. Then the Ram furnished
the horns for the head of the Sun, under the name of Jupiter Ammon. He
was no longer born exposed to the waters of Aquarius, like Bacchus, nor
enclosed in an urn like the God Canopus; but in the Stables of Augeas or
the Celestial Goat. He then completed his triumph, mounted on an ass, in
the constellation Cancer, which then occupied the Solstitial point of
Summer.

Other attributes the images of the Sun borrowed from the constellations
which, by their rising and setting, fixed the points of departure of the
year, and the commencements of its four principal divisions.

First the Bull and afterward the Ram (called by the Persians the Lamb),
was regarded as the regenerator of Nature, through his union with the
Sun. Each, in his turn, was an emblem of the Sun overcoming the winter
darkness, and repairing the disorders of Nature, which every year was
regenerated under these Signs, after the Scorpion and Serpent of Autumn
had brought upon it barrenness, disaster, and darkness. Mithras was
represented sitting on a Bull; and that animal was an image of Osiris:
while the Greek Bacchus armed his front with its horns, and was pictured
with its tail and feet.

The Constellations also became noteworthy to the husbandman, which by
their rising or setting, at morning or evening, indicated the coming of
this period of renewed fruitfulness and new life. Capella, or the kid
Amalthea, whose horn is called that of abundance, and whose place is
over the equinoctial point, or Taurus; and the Pleiades, that long
indicated the Seasons, and gave rise to a multitude of poetic fables,
were the most observed and most celebrated in antiquity.

The original Roman year commenced at the Vernal Equinox. July was
formerly called _Quintilis_, the 5th month, and August _Sextilis_, the
6th, as _September_ is still the 7th month, _October_ the 8th, and so
on. The Persians commenced their year at the same time, and celebrated
their great feast of Neurouz when the Sun entered Aries and the
Constellation Perseus rose,--Perseus, who first brought down to earth
the heavenly fire consecrated in their temples: and all the ceremonies
then practised reminded men of the renovation of Nature and the triumph
of Ormuzd, the Light-God, over the powers of Darkness and Ahriman their
Chief.

The Legislator of the Jews fixed the commencement of their year in the
month Nisan, at the Vernal Equinox, at which season the Israelites
marched out of Egypt and were relieved of their long bondage; in
commemoration of which Exodus, they ate the Paschal Lamb at that
Equinox. And when Bacchus and his army had long marched in burning
deserts, they were led by a Lamb or Ram into beautiful meadows, and to
the Springs that watered the Temple of Jupiter Ammon. For, to the Arabs
and Ethiopians, whose great Divinity Bacchus was, nothing was so perfect
a type of Elysium as a Country abounding in springs and rivulets.

Orion, on the same meridian with the Stars of Taurus, died of the sting
of the celestial Scorpion, that rises when he sets; as dies the Bull of
Mithras in Autumn: and in the Stars that correspond with the Autumnal
Equinox we find those malevolent genii that ever war against the
Principle of good, and that take from the Sun and the Heavens the
fruit-producing power that they communicate to the earth.

With the Vernal Equinox, dear to the sailor as to the husbandman, came
the Stars that, with the Sun, open navigation, and rule the stormy Seas.
Then the Twins plunge into the solar fires, or disappear at setting,
going down with the Sun into the bosom of the waters. And these tutelary
Divinities of mariners, the Dioscuri or Chief Cabiri of Samothrace,
sailed with Jason to possess themselves of the golden-fleeced ram, or
Aries, whose rising in the morning announced the Sun's entry into
Taurus, when the Serpent-bearer Jason rose in the evening, and, in
aspect with the Dioscuri, was deemed their brother. And Orion, son of
Neptune, and most potent controller of the tempest-tortured ocean,
announcing sometimes calm and sometimes tempest, rose after Taurus,
rejoicing in the forehead of the new year.

The Summer Solstice was not less an important point in the Sun's march
than the Vernal Equinox, especially to the Egyptians, to whom it not
only marked the end and term of the increasing length of the days and of
the domination of light, and the _maximum_ of the Sun's elevation; but
also the annual recurrence of that phenomenon peculiar to Egypt, the
rising of the Nile, which, ever accompanying the Sun in his course,
seemed to rise and fall as the days grew longer and shorter, being
lowest at the Winter Solstice, and highest at that of Summer. Thus the
Sun seemed to regulate its swelling; and the time of his arrival at the
solstitial point being that of the first rising of the Nile, was
selected by the Egyptians as the beginning of a year which they called
the Year of God, and of the Sothiac Period, or the period of Sothis, the
Dog-Star, who, rising in the morning, fixed that epoch, so important to
the people of Egypt. This year was also called the Heliac, that is the
Solar year, and the Canicular year; and it consisted of three hundred
and sixty-five days, without intercalation; so that at the end of four
years, or of four times three hundred and sixty-five days, making 1460
days, it needed to add a day, to make four complete revolutions of the
Sun. To correct this, some Nations made every fourth year consist, as we
do now, of 366 days: but the Egyptians preferred to add nothing to the
year of 365 days, which, at the end of 120 years, or of 30 times 4
years, was short 30 days or a month; that is to say, it required a month
more to complete the 120 revolutions of the Sun, though so many were
counted, that is, so many years. Of course the commencement of the 121st
year would not correspond with the Summer Solstice, but would precede it
by a month: so that, when the Sun arrived at the Solstitial point whence
he at first set out, and whereto he must needs return, to make in
reality 120 years, or 120 complete revolutions, the first month of the
121st year would have ended.

Thus, if the commencement of the year went back 30 days every 120 years,
this commencement of the year, continuing to recede, would, at the end
of 12 times 120 years, or of 1460 years get back to the Solstitial
point, or primitive point of departure of the period. The Sun would then
have made but 1459 revolutions though 1460 were counted; to make up
which, a year more would need to be added. So that the Sun would not
have made his 1460 revolutions until the end of 1461 years of 365 days
each,--each revolution being in reality not 365 days exactly, but
365-l/4.

This period of 1461 years, each of 365 days, bringing back the
commencement of the Solar year to the Solstitial point, at the rising of
Sirius, after 1460 complete Solar revolutions, was called in Egypt the
_Sothiac_ period, the point of departure whereof was the Summer
Solstice, first occupied by the Lion and afterward by Cancer, under
which sign is Sirius, which opened the period. It was, says Porphyry, at
this Solstitial New Moon, accompanied by the rising of Seth or the
Dog-Star, that the beginning of the year was fixed, and that of the
generation of all things, or, as it were, the natal hour of the world.

Not Sirius alone determined the period of the rising of the Nile.
Aquarius, his urn, and the stream flowing from it, in opposition to the
sign of the Summer Solstice then occupied by the Sun, opened in the
evening the march of Night, and received the full Moon in his cup. Above
him and with him rose the feet of Pegasus, struck wherewith the waters
flow forth that the Muses drink. The Lion and the Dog, indicating, were
supposed to _cause_ the inundation, and so were worshipped. While the
Sun passed through Leo, the waters doubled their depth; and the sacred
fountains poured their streams through the heads of lions. Hydra, rising
between Sirius and Leo, extended under three signs. Its head rose with
Cancer, and its tail with the feet of the Virgin and the beginning of
Libra; and the inundation continued while the Sun passed along its whole
extent.

The successive contest of light and darkness for the possession of the
lunar disk, each being by turns victor and vanquished, exactly resembled
what passed upon the earth by the action of the Sun and his journeys
from one Solstice to the other. The lunary revolution presented the same
periods of light and darkness as the year, and was the object of the
same religious fictions. Above the Moon, Pliny said, everything is pure,
and filled with eternal light. There ends the cone of shadow which the
earth projects, and which produces night; there ends the sojourn of
night and darkness; to it the air extends; but there we enter the pure
substance.

The Egyptians assigned to the Moon the demiurgic or creative force of
Osiris, who united himself to her in the spring, when the Sun
communicated to her the principles of generation which she afterward
disseminated in the air and all the elements. The Persians considered
the Moon to have been impregnated by the Celestial Bull, first of the
signs of spring. In all ages, the Moon has been supposed to have great
influence upon vegetation, and the birth and growth of animals; and the
belief is as widely entertained now as ever, and that influence regarded
as a mysterious and inexplicable one. Not the astrologers alone, but
Naturalists like Pliny, Philosophers like Plutarch and Cicero,
Theologians like the Egyptian Priests, and Metaphysicians like Proclus,
believed firmly in these lunar influences.

"The Egyptians," says Diodorus Siculus, "acknowledged two great gods,
the Sun and Moon, or Osiris and Isis, who govern the world and regulate
its administration by the dispensation of the seasons.... Such is the
nature of these two great Divinities, that they impress an active and
fecundating force, by which the generation of beings in effected; the
Sun, by heat and that spiritual principle that forms the breath of the
winds; the Moon by humidity and dryness; and both by the forces of the
air which they share in common. By this beneficial influence everything
is born, grows, and vegetates. Wherefore this whole huge body, in which
nature resides, is maintained by the combined action of the Sun and
Moon, and their five qualities,--the principles spiritual, fiery, dry,
humid, and airy."

So five primitive powers, elements, or elementary qualities, are united
with the Sun and Moon in the Indian theology,--air, spirit, fire, water,
and earth: and the same five elements are recognized by the Chinese. The
Phoenicians, like the Egyptians, regarded the Sun and Moon and Stars as
sole causes of generation and destruction here below.

The Moon, like the Sun, changed continually the track in which she
crossed the Heavens, moving ever to and fro between the upper and lower
limits of the Zodiac; and her different places, phases, and aspects
there, and her relations with the Sun and the constellations, have been
a fruitful source of mythological fables.

All the planets had what astrology termed their _houses_, in the
Zodiac. The House of the Sun was in Leo, and that of the Moon in Cancer.
Each other planet had two signs; Mercury had Gemini and Virgo; Venus,
Taurus and Libra; Mars, Aries and Scorpio; Jupiter, Pisces and
Sagittarius; and Saturn, Aquarius and Capricornus. From this
distribution of the signs also came many mythological emblems and
fables; as also many came from the places of exaltation of the planets.
Diana of Ephesus, the Moon wore the image of a crab on her bosom,
because in that sign was the Moon's domicile; and lions bore up the
throne of Horus, the Egyptian Apollo, the Sun personified, for a like
reason: while the Egyptians consecrated the tauriform scarabæsus to the
Moon, because she had her place of exaltation in Taurus; and for the
same reason Mercury is said to have presented Isis with a helmet like a
bull's head.

A further division of the Zodiac was of each sign into three parts of
10° each, called Decans, or, in the whole Zodiac, 36 parts, among which
the seven planets were apportioned anew, each planet having an equal
number of Decans, except the first, which, opening and closing the
series of planets five times repeated, necessarily had one Decan more
than the others. This subdivision was not invented until after Aries
opened the Vernal Equinox; and accordingly Mars, having his house in
Aries, opens the series of decans and closes it; the planets following
each other, five times in succession, in the following order, Mars, the
Sun, Venus, Mercury, the Moon, Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, etc.; so that to
each sign are assigned three planets, each occupying 10 degrees. To each
Decan a God or Genius was assigned, making thirty-six in all, one of
whom, the Chaldeans said, came down upon earth every ten days, remained
so many days, and re-ascended to Heaven. This division is found on the
Indian sphere, the Persian, and that Barbaric one which Aben Ezra
describes. Each genius of the Decans had a name and special
characteristics. They concur and aid in the effects produced by the Sun,
Moon, and other planets charged with the administration of the world:
and the doctrine in regard to them, secret and august as it was held,
was considered of the gravest importance; and its principles, Firmicus
says, were not entrusted by the ancients, inspired as they were by the
Deity, to any but the Initiates, and to them only with great reserve,
and a kind of fear, and when cautiously enveloped with an obscure veil,
that they might not come to be known by the profane.

With these Decans were connected the _paranatellons_ or those stars
_outside_ of the Zodiac, that rise and set at the same moment with the
several divisions of 10° of each sign. As there were anciently only
forty-eight celestial figures or constellations, of which twelve were in
the Zodiac, it follows that there were, outside of the Zodiac,
thirty-six other asterisms, paranatellons of the several thirty-six
Decans. For example, as when Capricorn set, Sirius and Procyon, or Canis
Major and Canis Minor, rose, they were the Paranatellons of Capricorn,
though at a great distance from it in the heavens. The rising of Cancer
was known from the setting of Corona Borealis and the rising of the
Great and Little Dog, its three paranatellons.

The risings and settings of the Stars are always spoken of as connected
with the Sun. In that connection there are three kinds of them,
cosmical, achronical, and heliacal, important to be distinguished by all
who would understand this ancient learning.

When any Star rises or sets with the same degree of the same sign of the
Zodiac that the Sun occupies at the time, it rises and sets
simultaneously with the Sun, and this is termed rising or setting
_cosmically_; but a star that so rises and sets can never be seen, on
account of the light that precedes, and is left behind by the Sun. It is
therefore necessary, in order to know his place in the Zodiac, to
observe stars that rise just before or set just after him.

A Star that is in the East when night commences, and in the West when it
ends, is said to rise and set _achronically_. A Star so rising or
setting was in _opposition_ to the Sun, rising at the end of evening
twilight, and setting at the beginning of morning twilight, and this
happened to each Star but once a year, because the Sun moves from West
to East, with reference to the Stars, one degree a day.

When a Star rises as night ends in the morning, or sets as night
commences in the evening, it is said to rise or set _heliacally_,
because the Sun (_Helios_) seems to touch it with his luminous
atmosphere. A Star thus re-appears after a disappearance, often, of
several months, and thenceforward it rises an hour earlier each day,
gradually emerging from the Sun's rays, until at the end of three months
it precedes the Sun six hours, and rises at midnight. A Star sets
heliacally, when no longer remaining visible above the Western horizon
after sunset, the day arrives when they cease to be seen setting in the
West. They so remain invisible, until the Sun passes so far to the
Eastward as not to eclipse them with his light; and then they re-appear,
but in the East, about an hour and a half before sunrise: and this is
their _heliacal_ rising. In this interval, the cosmical rising and
setting take place.

Besides the relations of the constellations and their paranatellons with
the houses and places of exaltation of the Planets, and with their
places in the respective Signs and Decans, the Stars were supposed to
produce different effects according as they rose or set, and according
as they did so either cosmically, achronically, or heliacally; and also
according to the different seasons of the year in which these phenomena
occurred; and these differences were carefully marked on the old
Calendars; and many things in the ancient allegories are referable to
them.

Another and most important division of the Stars was into good and bad,
beneficent and malevolent. With the Persians, the former, of the
Zodiacal Constellations, were from Aries to Virgo, inclusive; and the
latter from Libra to Pisces, inclusive. Hence the good Angels and Genii,
and the bad Angels, Devs, Evil Genii, Devils, Fallen Angels, Titans, and
Giants of the Mythology. The Other thirty-six Constellations were
equally divided, eighteen on each side, or, with those of the Zodiac,
twenty-four.

Thus the symbolic Egg, that issued from the mouth of the invisible
Egyptian God KNEPH; known in the Grecian Mysteries as the Orphic Egg;
from which issued the God CHUMONG of the Coresians, and the Egyptian
OSIRIS, and PHANES, God and Principle of Light; from which, broken by
the Sacred Bull of the Japanese, the world emerged; and which the Greeks
placed at the feet of BACCHUS TAURI-CORNUS; the Magian Egg of ORMUZD,
from which came the Amshaspands and Devs; was divided into two halves,
and equally apportioned between the Good and Evil Constellations and
Angels. Those of Spring, as for example Aries and Taurus, Auriga and
Capella, were the beneficent stars; and those of Autumn, as the Balance,
Scorpio, the Serpent of Ophiucus, and the Dragon of the Hesperides, were
types and subjects of the Evil Principle, and regarded as malevolent
causes of the ill effects experienced in Autumn and Winter. Thus are
explained the mysteries of the journeyings of the human soul through the
spheres, when it descends to the earth by the Sign of the Serpent, and
returns to the Empire of light by that or the Lamb or Bull.

The creative action of Heaven was manifested, and all its demiurgic
energy developed, most of all at the Vernal Equinox, to which refer all
the fables that typify the victory of Light over Darkness, by the
triumphs of Jupiter, Osiris, Ormuzd, and Apollo. Always the triumphant
god takes the form of the Bull, the Ram, or the Lamb. Then Jupiter
wrests from Typhon his thunderbolts, of which that malignant Deity had
possessed himself during the Winter. Then the God of Light overwhelms
his foe, pictured as a huge Serpent. Then Winter ends; the Sun, seated
on the Bull and accompanied by Orion, blazes in the Heavens. All nature
rejoices at the victory; and Order and Harmony are everywhere
re-established, in place of the dire confusion that reigned while gloomy
Typhon domineered, and Ahriman prevailed against Ormuzd.

The universal Soul of the World, motive power of Heaven and of the
Spheres, it was held, exercises its creative energy chiefly through the
medium of the Sun, during his revolution along the signs of the Zodiac,
with which signs unite the paranatellons that modify their influence,
and concur in furnishing the symbolic attributes of the Great Luminary
that regulates Nature and is the depository of her greatest powers. The
action of this Universal Soul of the World is displayed in the movements
of the Spheres, and above all in that of the Sun, in the successions of
the risings and settings of the Stars, and in their periodical returns.
By these are explainable all the metamorphoses of that Soul, personified
as Jupiter, as Bacchus, as Vishnu, or as Buddha, and all the various
attributes ascribed to it; and also the worship of those animals that
were consecrated in the ancient Temples, representatives on earth of the
Celestial Signs, and supposed to receive by transmission from them the
rays and emanations which in them flow from the Universal Soul.

All the old Adorers of Nature, the Theologians, Astrologers, and Poets,
as well as the most distinguished Philosophers, supposed that the Stars
were so many animated and intelligent beings, or eternal bodies, active
causes of effect here below, animated by a living principle, and
directed by an intelligence that was itself but an emanation from and a
part of the life and universal intelligence of the world: and we find in
the hierarchical order and distribution of their eternal and divine
Intelligences, known by the names of Gods, Angels, and Genii, the same
distributions and the same divisions as those by which the ancients
divided the visible Universe and distributed its parts. And the famous
divisions by seven and by twelve, appertaining to the planets and the
signs of the zodiac, is everywhere found in the hierarchical order of
the Gods, and Angels, and the other Ministers that are the depositaries
of that Divine Force which moves and rules the world.

These, and the other Intelligences assigned to the other Stars have
absolute dominion over all parts of Nature; over the elements, the
animal and vegetable kingdoms, over man and all his actions, over his
virtues and vices, and over good and evil, which divide between them his
life. The passions of his soul and the maladies of his body,--these and
the entire man are dependent on the heavens and the genii that there
inhabit, who preside at his birth, control his fortunes during life, and
receive his soul or active and intelligent part when it is to be
re-united to the pure life of the lofty Stars. And all through the great
body of the world are disseminated portions of the universal Soul,
impressing movement on everything that seems to move of itself, giving
life to the plants and trees, directing by a regular and settled plan
the organization and development of their germs, imparting constant
mobility to the running waters and maintaining their eternal motion,
impelling the winds and changing their direction or stilling them,
calming and arousing the ocean, unchaining the storms, pouring out the
fires of volcanoes, or with earthquakes shaking the roots of huge
mountains and the foundations of vast continents; by means of a force
that, belonging to Nature, is a mystery to man.

And these invisible Intelligences, like the stars, are marshalled in two
great divisions, under the banners of the two Principles of Good and
Evil, Light and Darkness; under Ormuzd and Ahriman, Osiris and Typhon.
The Evil Principle was the motive power of brute matter; and it,
personified as Ahriman and Typhon, had its hosts and armies of Devs and
Genii, Fallen Angels and Malevolent Spirits, who waged continual wage
with the Good Principle, the Principle of Empyreal Light and Splendor,
Osiris, Ormuzd, Jupiter or Dionusos, with his bright hosts of
Amshaspands, Izeds, Angels, and Archangels; a warfare that goes on from
birth until death, in the soul of every man that lives.

We have heretofore, in the 24th Degree, recited the principal incidents
in the legend of Osiris and Isis, and it remains but to point out the
astronomical phenomena which it has converted into mythological facts.

The Sun, at the Vernal Equinox, was the fruit-compelling star that by
his warmth provoked generation and poured upon the sublunary world all
the blessings of Heaven; the beneficent god, tutelary genius of
universal vegetation, that communicates to the dull earth new activity,
and stirs her great heart, long chilled by Winter and his frosts, until
from her bosom burst all the greenness and perfume of spring, making her
rejoice in leafy forests and grassy lawns and flower-enamelled meadows,
and the promise of abundant crops of grain and fruits and purple grapes
in their due season.

He was then called Osiris, Husband of Isis, God of Cultivation and
Benefactor of Men, pouring on them and on the earth the choicest
blessings within the gift of the Divinity. Opposed to him was Typhon,
his antagonist in the Egyptian mythology, as Ahriman was the foe of
Ormuzd, the Good Principle, in the theology of the Persians.

The first inhabitants of Egypt and Ethiopia, as Diodorus Siculus informs
us, saw in the Heavens two first eternal causes of things, or great
Divinities, one the Sun, whom they called Osiris, and the other the
Moon, whom they called Isis; and these they considered the causes of all
the generations of earth. This idea, we learn from Eusebius, was the
same as that of the Phœnicians. On these two great Divinities the
administration of the world depended. All sublunary bodies received from
them their nourishment and increase, during the annual revolution which
they controlled, and the different seasons into which it was divided.

To Osiris and Isis, it was held, were owing civilization, the discovery
of agriculture, laws, arts of all kinds, religious worship, temples, the
invention of letters, astronomy, the gymnastic arts, and music; and thus
they were the universal benefactors. Osiris travelled to civilize the
countries which he passed through, and communicate to them his valuable
discoveries. He built cities, and taught men to cultivate the earth.
Wheat and wine were his first presents to men. Europe, Asia, and Africa
partook of the blessings which he communicated, and the most remote
regions of India remembered him, and claimed him as one of their great
gods.

You have learned how Typhon, his brother, slew him. His body was cut
into pieces, all of which were collected by Isis, except his organs of
generation, which had been thrown into and devoured in the waters of the
river that every year fertilized Egypt. The other portions were buried
by Isis, and over them she erected a tomb. Thereafter she remained
single, loading her subjects with blessings. She cured the sick,
restored sight to the blind, made the paralytic whole, and even raised
the dead. From her Horus or Apollo learned divination and the science of
medicine.

Thus the Egyptians pictured the beneficent action of the two luminaries
that, from the bosom of the elements, produced all animals and men, and
all bodies that are born, grow, and die in the eternal circle of
generation and destruction here below.

When the Celestial Bull opened the new year at the Vernal Equinox,
Osiris, united with the Moon, communicated to her the seeds of
fruitfulness which she poured upon the air, and therewith impregnated
the generative principles which gave activity to universal vegetation.
Apis, represented by a bull, was the living and sensible image of the
Sun or Osiris, when in union with Isis or the Moon at the Vernal
Equinox, concurring with her in provoking everything that lives to
generation. This conjunction of the Sun with the Moon at the Vernal
Equinox, in the constellation Taurus, required the Bull Apis to have on
his shoulder a mark resembling the Crescent Moon. And the fecundating
influence of these two luminaries was expressed by images that would now
be deemed gross and indecent, but which then were not misunderstood.

Everything good in Nature comes from Osiris,--order, harmony, and the
favorable temperature of the seasons and celestial periods. From Typhon
come the stormy passions and irregular impulses that agitate the brute
and material part of man; maladies of the body, and violent shocks that
injure the health and derange the system; inclement weather, derangement
of the seasons, and eclipses. Osiris and Typhon were the Ormuzd and
Ahriman of the Persians; principles of good and evil, of light and
darkness, ever at war in the administration of the Universe.

Osiris was the image of generative power. This was expressed by his
symbolic statues, and by the sign into which he entered at the Vernal
Equinox. He especially dispensed the humid principle of Nature,
generative element of all things; and the Nile and all moisture were
regarded as emanations from him, without which there could be no
vegetation.

That Osiris and Isis were the Sun and Moon, is attested by many ancient
writers; by Diogenes Laertius, Plutarch, Lucian, Suidas, Macrobius,
Martianus Capella, and others. His power was symbolized by an Eye over a
Sceptre. The Sun was termed by the Greeks the Eye of Jupiter, and the
Eye of the World; and his is the All-Seeing Eye in our Lodges. The
oracle of Claros styled him King of the Stars and of the Eternal Fire,
that engenders the year and the seasons, dispenses rain and winds, and
brings about daybreak and night. And Osiris was invoked as the God that
resides in the Sun and is enveloped by his rays, the invisible and
eternal force that modifies the sublunary world by means of the Sun.

Osiris was the same God known as Bacchus, Dionusos, and Serapis. Serapis
is the author of the regularity and harmony of the world. Bacchus,
jointly with Ceres (identified by Herodotus with Isis) presides over the
distribution of all our blessings; and from the two emanates everything
beautiful and good in Nature. One furnishes the germ and principle of
every good; the other receives and preserves it as a deposit; and the
latter is the function of the Moon in the theology of the Persians. In
each theology, Persian and Egyptian, the Moon acts directly on the
earth; but she is fecundated, in one by the Celestial Bull and in the
other by Osiris, with whom she is united at the Vernal Equinox, in the
sign Taurus, the place of her exaltation or greatest influence on the
earth. The force of Osiris, says Plutarch, is exercised through the
Moon. She is the passive cause relatively to him, and the active cause
relatively to the earth, to which she transmits the germs of
fruitfulness received from him.

In Egypt the earliest movement in the waters of the Nile began to appear
at the Vernal Equinox, when the new Moon occurred at the entrance of the
Sun into the constellation Taurus; and thus the Nile was held to receive
its fertilizing power from the combined action of the equinoctial Sun
and the new Moon, meeting in Taurus. Osiris was often confounded with
the Nile, and Isis with the earth; and Osiris was deemed to act on the
earth, and to transmit to it his emanations, through both the Moon and
the Nile; whence the fable that his generative organs were thrown into
that river. Typhon, on the other hand, was the principle of aridity and
barrenness; and by his mutilation of Osiris was meant that drought which
caused the Nile to retire within his bed and shrink up in Autumn.

Elsewhere than in Egypt, Osiris was the symbol of the refreshing rains
that descend to fertilize the earth; and Typhon the burning winds of
Autumn; the stormy rains that rot the flowers, the plants, and leaves;
the short, cold days; and everything injurious in Nature, and that
produces corruption and destruction.

In short, Typhon is the principle of corruption, of darkness, of the
lower world from which come earthquakes, tumultuous commotions of the
air, burning heat, lightning, and fiery meteors, and plague and
pestilence. Such too was the Ahriman of the Persians; and this revolt of
the Evil Principle against the Principle of Good and Light, has been
represented in every cosmogony, under many varying forms. Osiris, on the
contrary, by the intermediation of Isis, fills the material world with
happiness, purity, and order, by which the harmony of Nature is
maintained. It was said that he died at the Autumnal Equinox, when
Taurus or the Pleiades rose in the evening, and that he rose to life
again in the Spring, when vegetation was inspired with new activity.

Of course the two signs of Taurus and Scorpio will figure most largely
in the mythological history of Osiris, for they marked the two
equinoxes, 2500 years before our Era; and next to them the other
constellations, near the equinoxes, that fixed the limits of the
duration of the fertilizing action of the Sun; and it is also to be
remarked that Venus, the Goddess of Generation, has her domicile in
Taurus, as the Moon has there her place of exaltation.

When the Sun was in Scorpio, Osiris lost his life, and that fruitfulness
which, under the form of the Bull, he had communicated, through the
Moon, to the Earth. Typhon, his hands and feet horrid with serpents, and
whose habitat in the Egyptian planisphere was under Scorpio, confined
him in a chest and flung him into the Nile, under the 17th degree of
Scorpio. Under that sign he lost his life and virility; and he recovered
them in the Spring, when he had connection with the Moon. When he
entered Scorpio, his light diminished, Night reassumed her dominion, the
Nile shrunk within its banks, and the earth lost her verdure and the
trees their leaves. Therefore it is that on the Mithriac Monuments, the
Scorpion bites the testicles of the Equinoctial Bull, on which sits
Mithras, the Sun of Spring and God of Generation; and that, on the same
monuments, we see two trees, one covered with young leaves, and at its
foot a little bull and a torch burning; and the other loaded with
fruit, and at its foot a Scorpion, and a torch reversed and
extinguished.

Ormuzd or Osiris, the beneficent Principle that gives the world light,
was personified by the Sun, apparent source of light. Darkness,
personified by Typhon or Ahriman, was his natural enemy. The Sages of
Egypt described the necessary and eternal rivalry or opposition of these
principles, ever pursuing one the other, and one dethroning the other in
every annual revolution, and at a particular period, one in the Spring
under the Bull, and the other in Autumn under the Scorpion, by the
legendary history of Osiris and Typhon, detailed to us by Diodorus and
Synesius; in which history were also personified the Stars and
constellations Orion, Capella, the Twins, the Wolf, Sirius, and
Hercules, whose risings and settings noted the advent of one or the
other equinox.

Plutarch gives us the positions in the Heavens of the Sun and Moon, at
the moment when Osiris was murdered by Typhon. The Sun, he says, was in
the Sign of the Scorpion, which he then entered at the Autumnal Equinox.
The Moon was full, he adds; and consequently, as it rose at sunset, it
occupied Taurus, which, opposite to Scorpio, rose as it and the Sun sank
together, so that she was then found alone in the sign Taurus, where,
six months before, she had been in union or conjunction with Osiris, the
Sun, receiving from him those germs of universal fertilization which he
communicated to her. It was the sign through which Osiris first ascended
into his empire of light and good. It rose with the Sun on the day of
the Vernal Equinox; it remained six months in the luminous hemisphere,
ever preceding the Sun and above the horizon during the day; until in
Autumn, the Sun arriving at Scorpio, Taurus was in complete opposition
with him, rose when he set, and completed its entire course above the
horizon during the night; presiding, by rising in the evening, over the
commencement of the long nights. Hence in the sad ceremonies
commemorating the death of Osiris, there was borne in procession a
golden bull covered with black crape, image of the darkness into which
the familiar sign of Osiris was entering, and which was to spread over
the Northern regions, while the Sun, prolonging the nights, was to be
absent, and each to remain under the dominion of Typhon, Principle of
Evil and Darkness.

Setting out from the sign Taurus, Isis, as the Moon, went seeking for
Osiris through all the superior signs, in each of which she became full
in the successive months from the Autumnal to the Vernal Equinox,
without finding him in either. Let us follow her in her allegorical
wanderings.

Osiris was slain by Typhon his rival, with whom conspired a Queen of
Ethiopia, by whom, says Plutarch, were designated the winds. The
paranatellons of Scorpio, the sign occupied by the Sun when Osiris was
slain, were the Serpents, reptiles which supplied the attributes of the
Evil Genii and of Typhon, who himself bore the form of a serpent in the
Egyptian planisphere. And in the division of Scorpio is also found
Cassiopeia, Queen of Ethiopia, whose setting brings stormy winds.

Osiris descended to the shades or infernal regions. There he took the
name of Serapis, identical with Pluto, and assumed his nature. He was
then in conjunction with Serpentarius, identical with Æsculapius, whose
form he took in his passage to the lower signs, where he takes the names
of Pluto and Ades.

Then Isis wept for the death of Osiris, and the golden bull covered with
crape was carried in procession. Nature mourned the impending loss of
her Summer glories, and the advent of the empire of night, the
withdrawing of the waters, made fruitful by the Bull in Spring, the
cessation of the winds that brought rains to swell the Nile, the
shortening of the days, and the despoiling of the earth. Then Taurus,
directly opposite the Sun, entered into the cone of shadow which the
earth projects, by which the Moon is eclipsed at full, and with which,
making night, the Bull rises and descends as if covered with a veil,
while he remains above our horizon.

The body of Osiris, enclosed in a chest or coffin, was cast into the
Nile. Pan and the Satyrs, near Chemmis, first discovered his death,
announced it by their cries, and everywhere created sorrow and alarm.
Taurus, with the full Moon, then entered into the cone of shadow, and
under him was the Celestial River, most properly called the Nile, and
below, Perseus, the God of Chemmis, and Auriga, leading a she-goat,
himself identical with Pan, whose wife Aiga the she-goat was styled.

Then Isis went in search of the body. She first met certain children who
had seen it, received from them their information, and gave them in
return the gift of divination. The second full Moon occurred in Gemini,
the Twins, who presided over the oracles of Didymus, and one of whom was
Apollo, the God of Divination.

She learned that Osiris had, through mistake, had connection with her
sister Nephte, which she discovered by a crown of leaves of the melilot,
which he had left behind him. Of this connection a child was born, whom
Isis, aided by her dogs, sought for, found, reared, and attached to
herself, by the name of Anubis, her faithful guardian. The third full
Moon occurs in Cancer, domicile of the Moon. The paranatellons of that
sign are, the crown of Ariadne or Proserpine, made of leaves of the
melilot, Procyon and Canis Major, one star of which was called the Star
of Isis, while Sirius himself was honored in Egypt under the name of
Anubis.

Isis repaired to Byblos, and seated herself near a fountain, where she
was found by the women of the Court of a King. She was induced to visit
his Court, and became the nurse of his son. The fourth full Moon was in
Leo, domicile of the Sun, or of Adonis, King of Byblos. The
paranatellons of this sign are the flowing water of Aquarius, and
Cepheus, King of Ethiopia, called Regulus, or simply The King. Behind
him rise Cassiopeia his wife, Queen of Ethiopia, Andromeda his daughter,
and Perseus his son-in-law, all paranatellons in part of this sign, and
in part of Virgo.

Isis suckled the child, not at her breast, but with the end of her
finger, at night. She burned all the mortal parts of its body, and then,
taking the shape of a swallow, she flew to the great column of the
palace, made of the tamarisk-tree that grew up round the coffin
containing the body of Osiris, and within which it was still enclosed.
The fifth full Moon occurred in Virgo, the true image of Isis, and which
Eratosthenes calls by that name. It pictured a woman suckling an infant,
the son of Isis, born near the Winter Solstice. This sign has for
paranatellons the mast of the Celestial Ship, and the swallow-tailed
fish or swallow above it, and a portion of Perseus, son-in-law of the
King of Ethiopia.

Isis, having recovered the sacred coffer, sailed from Byblos in a vessel
with the eldest son of the King, toward Boutos, where Anubis was, having
charge of her son Horus; and in the morning dried up a river, whence
arose a strong wind. Landing, she hid the coffer in a forest. Typhon,
hunting a wild boar by moonlight discovered it, recognized the body of
his rival, and cut it into fourteen pieces, the number of days between
the full and new Moon, and in every one of which days the Moon loses a
portion of the light that at the commencement filled her whole disk. The
sixth full Moon occurred in Libra, over the divisions separating which
from Virgo are the Celestial Ship, Perseus, son of the King of Ethiopia
and Boötes, said to have nursed Horus. The river of Orion that sets in
the morning is also a paranatellon of Libra, as are Ursa Major, the
Great Bear or Wild Boar of Erymanthus, and the Dragon of the North Pole,
or the celebrated Python from which the attributes of Typhon were
borrowed. All these surround the full Moon of Libra, last of the
Superior Signs, and the one that precedes the new Moon of Spring, about
to be reproduced in Taurus, and there be once more in conjunction with
the Sun.

Isis collects the scattered fragments of the body of Osiris, buries
them, and consecrates the phallus, carried in pomp at the _Pamylia_, or
feasts of the Vernal Equinox, at which time the congress of Osiris and
the Moon was celebrated. Then Osiris had returned from the shades, to
aid Horus his son and Isis his wife against the forces of Typhon. He
thus reappeared, say some, under the form of a wolf, or, others say,
under that of a horse. The Moon, fourteen days after she is full in
Libra, arrives at Taurus and unites herself to the Sun, whose fires she
thereafter for fourteen days continues to accumulate on her disk from
new Moon to full. Then she unites with herself all the months in that
superior portion of the world where light always reigns, with harmony
and order, and she borrows from him the force which is to destroy the
germs of evil that Typhon had, during the winter, planted everywhere in
nature. This passage of the Sun into Taurus, whose attributes he assumes
on his return from the lower hemisphere or the shades, is marked by the
rising in the evening of the Wolf and the Centaur, and by the heliacal
setting of Orion, called the Star of Horus, and which thenceforward is
in conjunction with the Sun of Spring, in his triumph over the darkness
or Typhon.

Isis, during the absence of Osiris, and after she had hidden the coffer
in the place where Typhon found it, had rejoined that malignant enemy;
indignant at which, Horus her son deprived her of her ancient diadem,
when she rejoined Osiris as he was about to attack Typhon: but Mercury
gave her in its place a helmet shaped like the head of a bull. Then
Horus, as a mighty warrior, such as Orion was described, fought with and
defeated Typhon; who, in the shape of the Serpent or Dragon of the Pole,
had assailed his father. So, in Ovid, Apollo destroys the same Python,
when Io, fascinated by Jupiter, is metamorphosed into a cow, and placed
in the sign of the Celestial Bull, where she becomes Isis. The
equinoctial year ends at the moment when the Sun and Moon, at the
Vernal Equinox, are united with Orion, the Star of Horus, placed in the
Heavens under Taurus. The new Moon becomes young again in Taurus, and
shows herself as a crescent, for the first time, in the next sign,
Gemini, the domicile of Mercury. Then Orion, in conjunction with the
Sun, with whom he rises, precipitates the Scorpion, his rival, into the
shades of night, causing him to set whenever he himself re-appears on
the eastern horizon, with the Sun. Day lengthens and the germs of evil
are by degrees eradicated: and Horus (from _Aur_, Light) reigns
triumphant, symbolizing, by his succession to the characteristics of
Osiris, the eternal renewal of the Sun's youth and creative vigor at the
Vernal Equinox.

Such are the coincidences of astronomical phenomena with the legend of
Osiris and Isis; sufficing to show the origin of the legend, overloaded
as it became at length with all the ornamentation natural to the
poetical and figurative genius of the Orient.

Not only into this legend, but into those of all the ancient nations,
enter the Bull, the Lamb, the Lion, and the Scorpion or the Serpent; and
traces of the worship of the Sun yet linger in all religions.
Everywhere, even in our Order, survive the equinoctial and solstitial
feasts. Our ceilings still glitter with the greater and lesser
luminaries of the Heavens, and our lights, in their number and
arrangement, have astronomical references. In all churches and chapels,
as in all Pagan temples and pagodas, the altar is in the East; and the
ivy over the east windows of old churches is the Hedera Helix of
Bacchus. Even the cross had an astronomical origin; and our Lodges are
full of the ancient symbols.

The learned author of the Sabæan Researches, Landseer, advances another
theory in regard to the legend of Osiris; in which he makes the
constellation Boötes play a leading part. He observes that, as none of
the stars were visible at the same time with the Sun, his actual place
in the Zodiac, at any given time, could only be, ascertained by the
Sabæsan astronomers by their observations of the stars, and of their
heliacal and achronical risings and settings. There were many solar
festivals among the Sabæans, and part of them agricultural ones; and the
concomitant signs of those festivals were the risings and settings of
the stars of the Husbandman, Bear-driver, or Hunter, BOÖTES. His stars
were, among the Hierophants, the established nocturnal indices or signs
of the Sun's place in the ecliptic at different seasons of the year, and
the festivals were named, one, that of the _Aphanism_ or disappearance;
another, that of the _Zetesis,_ or search, etc., of Osiris or Adonis,
that is, of _Boötes._

The returns of certain stars, as connected with their concomitant
seasons of spring (or seed-time) and harvest, seemed to the ancients,
who had not yet discovered that gradual change, resulting from the
apparent movement of the stars in longitude, which has been termed the
precession of the equinoxes, to be eternal and immutable; and those
periodical returns were to the initiated, even more than to the vulgar,
celestial oracles, announcing the approach of those important changes,
upon which the prosperity, and even the very existence of man must ever
depend; and the oldest of the Sabæan constellations seem to have been,
an astronomical _Priest,_ a _King,_ a _Queen,_ a _Husbandman,_ and a
_Warrior_; and these more frequently recur on the Sabæan cylinders than
any other constellations whatever. The _King_ was _Cepheus_ or
_Chepheus_ of Ethiopia: the _Husbandman, Osiris, Bacchus, Sabazeus,
Noah_ or _Boötes_. To the latter sign, the Egyptians were nationally,
traditionally and habitually grateful; for they conceived that from
Osiris all the greatest of terrestrial enjoyments were derived. The
stars of the Husbandman were the signal for those successive
agricultural labors on which the annual produce of the soil depended;
and they came in consequence to be considered and hailed, in Egypt and
Ethiopia, as the genial stars of terrestrial productiveness; to which
the oblations, prayers, and vows of the pious Sabæan were regularly
offered up.

Landseer says that the stars in Boötes, reckoning down to those of the
5th magnitude inclusive, are _twenty-six,_ which, seeming achronically
to disappear in succession, produced the fable of the cutting of Osiris
into twenty-six pieces by Typhon. There are more stars than this in the
constellation; but no more that the ancient votaries of Osiris, even in
the clear atmosphere of the Sabæan climates, could observe without
telescopes.

Plutarch says Osiris was cut into _fourteen_ pieces: Diodorus, into
_twenty-six_; in regard to which, and to the whole legend, Landseer's
ideas, varying from those commonly entertained, are as follows:

Typhon, Landseer thinks, was the _ocean_, which the ancients fabled or
believed surrounded the Earth, and into which all the stars in their
turn appear successively to sink; [perhaps it was DARKNESS personified,
which the ancients called TYPHON. He Was hunting by moonlight, says the
old legend, when he met with Osiris].

The ancient Saba must have been near latitude 15° north. Axoum is nearly
in 14°, and the Western Saba or Meroë is to the north of that.
Forty-eight centuries ago, Aldebaran, the leading star of the year, had,
at the Vernal Equinox, attained at daylight in the morning, an elevation
of about 14 degrees, sufficient for him to have ceased to be _combust_,
that is, to have emerged from the Sun's rays, so as to be visible. The
ancients allowed _twelve_ days for a star of the first magnitude to
emerge from the solar rays; and there is less twilight, the further
South we go.

At the same period, too, Cynosura was not the pole-star, but Alpha
Draconis was; and the stars rose and set with very different degrees of
obliquity from those of their present risings and settings. By having a
globe constructed with circumvolving poles, capable of any adjustment
with regard to the colures, Mr. Landseer ascertained that, at that
remote period, in lat. 15° north, the 26 stars in Bootes, or 27,
including Arcturus, did not set anchronically in succession; but several
set simultaneously in couples, and six by threes simultaneously; so
that, in all, there were but _fourteen_ separate settings or
disappearances, corresponding with the fourteen pieces into which Osiris
was cut, according to Plutarch. Kappa, Iota, and Theta, in the uplifted
western hand, disappeared together, and last of all. They really skirted
the horizon; but were invisible in that low latitude, for the three or
four days mentioned in some of the versions; while the _Zetesis_ or
search was proceeding, and the women of Phœnicia and Jerusalem sat
weeping for the Wonder, Thammuz; after which they immediately
reappeared, below and to the eastward of _a_ Draconis.

And, on the very morning after the achronical departure of the last star
of the Husbandman, Aldebaran rose heliacally, and became visible in the
East in the morning before day.

And precisely at the moment of the heliacal rising of Arcturus, also
rose Spica Virginis. One is near the middle of the Husbandman, and the
other near that of the Virgin; and Arcturus may have been the part of
Osiris which Isis did not recover with the other pieces of the body.

At Dedan and Saba it was thirty-six days, from the beginning of the
_aphanism_, i.e., the _disappearances_ of these stars, to the heliacal
rising of Aldebaran. During these days, or forty at Medina, or a few
more at Babylon and Byblos, the stars of the Husbandman successively
sank out of sight, during the _crepusculum_ or short-lived morning
twilight of those Southern climes. They disappear during the glancings
of the dawn, the special season of ancient sidereal observation.

Thus the forty days of mourning for Osiris were measured out by the
period of the departure of his Stars. When the last had sunken out of
sight, the vernal season was ushered in; and the Sun arose with the
splendid Aldebaran, the Tauric leader of the Hosts of Heaven; and the
whole East rejoiced and kept holiday.

With the exception of the Stars χ, ε˛ and δ, Boötes did not begin to
reappear in the Eastern quarter of the Heavens till after the lapse of
about four months. Then the Stars of Taurus had declined Westward, and
Virgo was rising heliacally. In that latitude, also, the Stars of Ursa
Major [termed anciently the Ark of Osiris] set; and Benetnasch, the last
of them, returned to the Eastern horizon, with those in the head of Leo,
a little before the Summer Solstice. In about a month, followed the
Stars of the Husbandman; the chief of them, Ras, Mirach, and Arcturus,
being very nearly simultaneous in their heliacal rising.

Thus the Stars of Boötes rose in the East immediately after
Vindemiatrix, and as if under the genial influence of its rays; he had
his annual career of prosperity; he revelled orientally for a quarter of
a year, and attained his meridian altitude with Virgo; and then, as the
Stars of the Water-Urn rose, and Aquarius began to pour forth his annual
deluge, he declined Westward, preceded by the Ark of Osiris. In the
East, he was the sign of that happiness in which Nature, the great
Goddess of passive production, rejoiced. Now, in the West, as he
declines toward the Northwestern horizon, his generative vigor gradually
abates; the Solar year grows old; and as his Stars descend beneath the
Western Wave, Osiris dies, and the world mourns.

The Ancient Astronomers saw all the great Symbols of Masonry in the
Stars. Sirius still glitters in our Lodges as the Blazing Star,
(_l'Étoile Flamboyante_). The Sun is still symbolized by the point
within a Circle; and, with the Moon and Mercury or Anubis, in the three
Great Lights of the Lodge. Not only to these, but to the figures and
numbers exhibited by the Stars, were ascribed peculiar and divine
powers. The veneration paid to numbers had its source there. The three
Kings in Orion are in a straight line, and equidistant from each other,
the two extreme Stars being 3° apart, and each of the three distant from
the one nearest it 1° 30'. And as the number _three_ is peculiar to
apprentices, so the straight line is the first principle of Geometry,
having length but no breadth, and being but the extension of a point,
and an emblem of Unity, and thus of Good, as the divided or broken line
is of Duality or Evil. Near these Stars are the Hyades, _five_ in
number, appropriate to the Fellow-Craft; and close to them the Pleiades,
of the master's number, _seven_; and thus these three sacred numbers,
consecrated in Masonry as they were in the Pythagorean philosophy,
always appear together in the Heavens, when the Bull, emblem of
fertility and production, glitters among the Stars, and Aldebaran leads
the Hosts of Heaven (_Tsbauth_).

Algenib in Perseus and Almaach and Algol in Andromeda form a
right-angled triangle, illustrate the 47th problem, and display the
Grand Master's square upon the skies. Denebola in Leo, Arcturus in
Boötes, and Spica in Virgo form an equilateral triangle, universal
emblem of Perfection, and the Deity with His Trinity of Infinite
Attributes, Wisdom, Power, and Harmony; and that other, the generative,
preserving, and destroying Powers. The Three Kings form, with Rigel in
Orion, two triangles included in one: and Capella and Menkalina in
Auriga, with Bellatrix and Betelgueux in Orion, form two isosceles
triangles with β Tauri, that is equidistant from each pair; while the
first four make a right-angled parallelogram,--the oblong square so
often mentioned in our Degrees.

Julius Firmicus, in his description of the Mysteries, says, "But in
those funerals and lamentations which are annually celebrated in honor
of Osiris, their defenders pretend a physical reason. They call the
seeds of fruit, Osiris; the Earth, Isis; the natural heat, Typhon: and
because the fruits are ripened by the natural heat, and collected for
the life of man, and are separated from their marriage to the earth, and
are sown again when Winter approaches, this they would have to be the
death of Osiris: but when the fruits, by the genial fostering of the
earth, begin again to be generated by a new procreation, this is the
finding of Osiris."

No doubt the decay of vegetation and the falling of the leaves, emblems
of dissolution and evidences of the action of that Power that changes
Life into Death, in order to bring Life again out of Death, were
regarded as signs of that Death that seemed coming upon all Nature; as
the springing of leaves and buds and flowers in the spring was a sign of
restoration to life: but these were all secondary, and referred to the
Sun as first cause. It was _his_ figurative death that was mourned, and
not theirs; and that with that death, as with his return to life, many
of the stars were connected.

We have already alluded to the relations which the twelve signs of the
Zodiac bear to the legend of the Master's Degree. Some other
coincidences may have sufficient interest to warrant mention.

Khir-Om was assailed at the East, West, and South Gates of the Temple.
The two equinoxes were called, we have seen, by all the Ancients, the
Gates of Heaven, and the Syrians and Egyptians considered the Fish (the
Constellation near Aquarius, and one of the Stars whereof is Fomalhaut)
to be indicative of violence and death.

Khir-Om lay several days in the grave; and, at the Winter Solstice, for
five or six days, the length of the days did not perceptibly increase.
Then, the Sun commencing again to climb Northward, as Osiris was said to
arise from the dead, so Khir-Om was raised, by the powerful attraction
of the Lion (Leo), who waited for him at the Summer Solstice, and drew
him to himself.

The names of the three assassins may have been adopted from three Stars
that we have already named. We search in vain in the Hebrew or Arabic
for the names _Jubelo, Jubela_, and _Jubelum_. They embody an utter
absurdity, and are capable of no explanation in those languages. Nor are
the names _Gibs, Gravelot, Hobhen_, and the like, in the Ancient and
Accepted Rite, any more plausible, or better referable to any ancient
language. But when, by the precession of the Equinoxes, the Sun was in
Libra at the Autumnal Equinox, he met in that sign, where the reign of
Typhon commenced, three Stars forming a triangle,--_Zuben-es Chamali_ in
the West, _Zuben-Hak-Rabi_ in the East, and _Zuben-El-Gubi_ in the
South, the latter immediately below the Tropic of Capricorn, and so
within the realm of Darkness. From these names, those of the murderers
have perhaps been corrupted. In Zuben-Hak-Rabi we may see the original
of Jubelum Akirop; and in Zuben-El-Gubi, that of Jubelo Gibs: and time
and ignorance may even have transmuted the words Es Chamali into one as
little like them as Gravelot.

Isis, the Moon personified, sorrowing sought for her husband. Nine or
twelve Fellow-Crafts (the Rites vary as to the number), in white aprons,
were sent to search for Khir-Om, in the Legend of the Master's Degree;
or, in this Rite, the Nine Knights Elu. Along the path that the Moon
travels are nine conspicuous Stars, by which nautical men determine
their longitude at Sea;--Arietis, Aldebaran, Pollux, Regulus, Spica
Virginis, Antares, Altair, Fomalhaut, and Markab. These might well be
said to accompany Isis in her search.

In the York Rite, _twelve_ Fellow-Crafts were sent to search for the
body of Khir-Om and the murderers. Their number corresponds with that of
the Pleiades and Hyades in Taurus, among which Stars the Sun was found
when Light began to prevail over Darkness, and the Mysteries were held.
These Stars, we have shown, received early and particular attention from
the astronomers and poets. The Pleiades were the Stars of the ocean to
the benighted mariner; the Virgins of Spring, heralding the season of
blossoms.

As six Pleiades only are now visible, the number twelve may have been
obtained by them, with Aldebaran, and five far more brilliant Stars than
any other of the Hyades, in the same region of the Heavens, and which
were always spoken of in connection with the Pleiades; the Three Kings
in the belt of Orion, and Bellatrix and Betelgueux on his shoulders;
brightest of the flashing starry hosts.

"Canst thou," asks Job, "bind the sweet influences of the Pleiades or
loose the bands of Orion?" And in the book of Amos we find these Stars
connected with the victory of Light over Darkness: "Seek Him," says that
Seer, "that maketh the Seven Stars (the familiar name of the Pleiades),
and Orion, AND TURNETH THE SHADOW OF DEATH INTO MORNING."

An old legend in Masonry says that a dog led the Nine Elus to the cavern
where Abiram was hid. Boötes was anciently called Caleb Anubach, a
Barking Dog; and was personified in Anubis, who bore the head of a dog,
and aided Isis in her search. Arcturus, one of his Stars, fiery red, as
if fervent and zealous, is also connected by Job with the Pleiades and
Orion. When Taurus opened the year, Arcturus rose after the Sun, at the
time of the Winter Solstice, and seemed searching him through the
darkness, until, sixty days afterward, he rose at the same hour. Orion
then also, at the Winter Solstice, rose at noon, and at night seemed to
be in search of the Sun.

So, referring again to the time when the Sun entered the Autumnal
Equinox, there are nine remarkable Stars that come to the meridian
nearly at the same time, rising as Libra sets, and so seeming to chase
that Constellation. They are Capella and Menkalina in the Charioteer,
Aldebaran in Taurus, Bellatrix, Betelgueux, the Three Kings, and Rigel
in Orion. Aldebaran passes the meridian first, indicating his right to
his peculiar title of _Leader_. Nowhere in the heavens are there, near
the same meridian, so many splendid Stars. And close behind them, but
further South, follows Sirius, the Dog-Star, who showed the nine Elus
the way to the murderer's cave.

Besides the division of the signs into the ascending and descending
series (referring to the upward and downward progress of the soul), the
latter from Cancer to Capricorn, and the former from Capricorn to
Cancer, there was another division of them not less important; that of
the six superior and six inferior signs; the former, 2455 years before
our era, from Taurus to Scorpio, and 300 years before our era, from
Aries to Libra; and the latter, 2455 years B.C. from Scorpio to Taurus,
and 300 years B.C. from Libra to Aries; of which we have already spoken,
as the two Hemispheres, or Kingdoms of Good and Evil, Light and
Darkness; of Ormuzd and Ahriman among the Persians, and Osiris and
Typhon among the Egyptians.

With the Persians, the first six Genii, created by Ormuzd, presided over
the first six signs, Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo, and Virgo: and
the six evil Genii, or Devs, created by Ahriman, over the six others,
Libra, Scorpio, Sagittarius, Capricornus, Aquarius, and Pisces. The soul
was fortunate and happy under the Empire of the first six; and began to
be sensible of evil, when it passed under the Balance or Libra, the
seventh sign. Thus the soul entered the realm of Evil and Darkness when
it passed into the Constellations that belong to and succeed the
Autumnal Equinox; and it re-entered the realm of Good and Light, when it
arrived, returning, at those of the Vernal Equinox. It lost its felicity
by means of the Balance, and regained it by means of the Lamb. This is a
necessary consequence of the premises; and it is confirmed by the
authorities and by emblems still extant.

Sallust the Philosopher, speaking of the Feasts of Rejoicing celebrated
at the Vernal Equinox, and those of Mourning, in memory of the rape of
Proserpine, at the Autumnal Equinox, says that the former were
celebrated, because then is effected, as it were, the return of the soul
toward the Gods; that the time when the principle of Light recovered its
superiority over that of Darkness, or day over night, was the most
favorable one for souls that tend to re-ascend to their Principle; and
that when Darkness and the Night again become victors, was most
favorable to the descent of souls toward the infernal regions.

For that reason, the old astrologers, as Firmicus states, fixed the
locality of the river Styx in the 8th degree of the Balance. And he
thinks that by Styx was allegorically meant the earth.

The Emperor Julian gives the same explanation, but more fully developed.
He states, as a reason why the august Mysteries of Ceres and Proserpine
were celebrated at the Autumnal Equinox, that at that period of the year
men feared lest the impious and dark power of the Evil Principle, then
commencing to conquer, should do harm to their souls. They were a
precaution and means of safety, thought to be necessary at the moment
when the God of Light was passing into the opposite or adverse region of
the world; while at the Vernal Equinox there was less to be feared,
because then that God, present in one portion of the world, _recalled
souls to Him_, he says, _and showed Himself to be their Saviour_. He had
a little before developed that theological idea, of the attractive force
which the Sun exercises over souls, drawing them to him and raising them
to his luminous sphere. He attributes this effect to him at the feasts
of Atys, dead and restored to life, or the feasts of Rejoicing, which at
the end of three days succeeded the mourning for that death; and he
inquires why those Mysteries were celebrated at the Vernal Equinox. The
reason, he says, is evident. As the sun, arriving at the equinoctial
point of Spring, drawing nearer to us, increases the length of the days,
that period seems most appropriate for those ceremonies. For, besides
that there is a great affinity between the substance of Light and the
nature of the Gods, the Sun has that occult force of attraction, by
which he draws matter toward himself, by means of his warmth, making
plants to shoot and grow, etc.; and why can he not, by the same divine
and pure action of his rays, attract and draw to him fortunate souls?
Then, as light is analogous to the Divine Nature, and favorable to souls
struggling to return to their First Principle, and as that light so
increases at the Vernal Equinox, that the days prevail in duration over
the nights, and as the Sun has an attractive force, besides the visible
energy of his rays, it follows that souls are attracted toward the solar
light. He does not further pursue the explanation; because, he says, it
belongs to a mysterious doctrine, beyond the reach of the vulgar and
known only to those who understand the mode of action of Deity, like the
Chaldean author whom he cites, who had treated of the Mysteries of
Light, or the God with seven rays.

Souls, the Ancients held, having emanated from the Principle of Light,
partaking of its destiny here below, cannot be indifferent to nor
unaffected by these revolutions of the Great Luminary, alternately
victor and overcome during every Solar revolution.

This will be found to be confirmed by an examination of some of the
Symbols used in the Mysteries. One of the most famous of these was THE
SERPENT, the peculiar Symbol also of this Degree. The Cosmogony of the
Hebrews and that of the Gnostics designated this reptile as the author
of the fate of Souls. It was consecrated in the Mysteries of Bacchus and
in those of Eleusis. Pluto overcame the virtue of Proserpine under the
form of a serpent; and, like the Egyptian God Serapis, was always
pictured seated on a serpent, or with that reptile entwined about him.
It is found on the Mithriac Monuments, and supplied with attributes of
Typhon to the Egyptians, The sacred basilisc, in coil, with head and
neck erect, was the royal ensign of the Pharaohs. Two of them were
entwined around and hung suspended from the winged Globe on the Egyptian
Monuments. On a tablet in one of the Tombs at Thebes, a God with a spear
pierces a serpent's head. On a tablet from the Temple of Osiris at Philæ
is a tree, with a man on one side, and a woman on the other, and in
front of the woman an erect basilisc, with horns on its head and a disk
between the horns. The head of Medusa was encircled by winged snakes,
which, the head removed, left the Hierogram or Sacred Cypher of the
Ophites or Serpent-worshippers. And the Serpent, in connection with the
Globe or circle, is found upon the monuments of all the Ancient Nations.

Over Libra, the sign through which souls were said to descend or fall,
is found, on the Celestial Globe, the Serpent, grasped by Serpentarius,
the Serpent-bearer. The head of the reptile is under Corona Borealis,
the Northern Crown, called by Ovid, _Libera_, or _Proserpine_; and the
two Constellations rise, with the Balance, after the Virgin (or Isis),
whose feet rest on the eastern horizon at Sunrise on the day of the
equinox. As the Serpent extends over both signs, Libra and Scorpio, it
has been the gate through which souls descend, during the whole time
that those two signs in succession marked the Autumnal Equinox. To this
alluded the Serpent, which, in the Mysteries of Bacchus Saba-Zeus, was
flung into the bosom of the Initiate.

And hence came the enigmatical expression, _the Serpent engenders the
Bull, and the Bull the Serpent_; alluding to the two adverse
constellations, answering to the two equinoxes, one of which rose as the
other set, and which were at the two points of the heavens through which
souls passed, ascending and descending. By the Serpent of Autumn, souls
fell; and they were regenerated again by the Bull on which Mithras sate,
and whose attributes Bacchus-Zagreus and the Egyptian Osiris assumed, in
their Mysteries, wherein were represented the fall and regeneration of
souls, by the Bull slain and restored to life.

Afterward the regenerating Sun assumed the attributes of _Aries_ or the
Lamb; and in the Mysteries of Ammon, souls were regenerated by passing
through that sign, after having fallen through the Serpent.

The Serpent-bearer, or Ophicus, was Æsculapius, God of Healing. In the
Mysteries of Eleusis, that Constellation was placed in the eighth
Heaven: and on the eighth day of those Mysteries, the feast of
Æsculapius was celebrated. It was also termed Epidaurus, or the feast of
the Serpent of Epidaurus. The Serpent was sacred to Æsculapius; and was
connected in various ways with the mythological adventures of Ceres.

So the libations to Souls, by pouring wine on the ground, and looking
toward the two gates of Heaven, those of day and night, referred to the
ascent and descent of Souls.

Ceres and the Serpent, Jupiter Ammon and the Bull, all figured in the
Mysteries of Bacchus. Suppose Aries, or Jupiter Ammon occupied by the
Sun setting in the West;--Virgo (Ceres) will be on the Eastern horizon,
and in her train the Crown, or Proserpine. Suppose Taurus setting;--then
the Serpent is in the East; and reciprocally; so that Jupiter Ammon, or
the Sun of Aries, causes the Crown to rise after the Virgin, in the
train of which comes the Serpent. Place reciprocally the Sun at the
other equinox, with the balance in the West, in conjunction with the
Serpent under the Crown; and we shall see the Bull and the Pleiades rise
in the East. Thus are explained all the fables as to the generation of
the Bull by the Serpent and of the Serpent by the Bull, the biting of
the testicles of the Bull by the Scorpion, on the Mithriac Monuments;
and that Jupiter made Ceres with child by tossing into her bosom the
testicles of a Ram.

In the Mysteries of the bull-horned Bacchus, the officers held serpents
in their hands, raised them above their heads, and cried aloud "Eva!"
the generic oriental name of the serpent, and the particular name of the
constellation in which the Persians placed Eve and the serpent. The
Arabians call it _Hevan_, Ophiucus himself, _Hawa_, and the brilliant
star in his head, _Ras-al-Hawa_. The use of this word _Eva_ or _Evoë_
caused Clemens of Alexandria to say that the priests in the Mysteries
invoked _Eve_, by whom evil was brought into the world.

The mystic winnowing-fan, encircled by Serpents, was used in the feasts
of Bacchus. In the Isiac Mysteries a basilisc twined round the handle of
the mystic vase. The Ophites fed a serpent in a mysterious ark, from
which they took him when they celebrated the Mysteries, and allowed him
to glide among the sacred bread. The Romans kept serpents in the Temples
of Bona Dea and Æsculapius. In the Mysteries of Apollo, the pursuit of
Latona by the serpent Python was represented. In the Egyptian Mysteries,
the dragon Typhon pursued Isis.

According to Sanchoniathon, TAAUT, the interpreter of Heaven to men,
attributed something divine to the nature of the dragon and serpents, in
which the Phœnicians and Egyptians followed him. They have more
vitality, more spiritual force, than any other creature; of a fiery
nature, shown by the rapidity of their motions, without the limbs of
other animals. They assume many shapes and attitudes, and dart with
extraordinary quickness and force. When they have reached old age, they
throw off that age and are young again, and increase in size and
strength, for a certain period of years.

The Egyptian Priests fed the sacred serpents in the temple at Thebes.
Taaut himself had in his writings discussed these mysteries in regard to
the serpent. Sanchoniathon said in another work, that the serpent was
immortal, and re-entered into himself; which, according to some ancient
theosophists, particularly those of India, was an attribute of the
Deity. And he also said that the serpent never died, unless by a violent
death.

The Phœnicians called the serpent _Agathodemon_ [the good spirit]; and
Kneph was the Serpent-God of the Egyptians.

The Egyptians, Sanchoniathon said, represented the serpent with the head
of a hawk, on account of the swift flight of that bird: and the chief
Hierophant, the sacred interpreter, gave very mysterious explanations of
that symbol; saying that such a serpent was a very divine creature, and
that, opening his eyes, he lighted with their rays the whole of
first-born space: when he closes them, it is darkness again. In reality,
the hawk-headed serpent, genius of light, or good genius, was the symbol
of the Sun.

In the hieroglyphic characters, a snake was the letter T or DJ. It
occurs many times on the Rosetta stone. The horned serpent was the
hieroglyphic for a God.

According to Eusebius, the Egyptians represented the world by a blue
circle, sprinkled with flames, within which was extended a serpent with
the head of a hawk. Proclus says they represented the four quarters of
the world by a cross, and the soul of the world, or Kneph, by a serpent
surrounding it in the form of a circle.

We read in Anaxagoras, that Orpheus said, that the water, and the vessel
that produced it, were the primitive principles of things, and together
gave existence to an animated being, which was a serpent, with two
heads, one of a lion and the other of a bull, between which was the
figure of a God whose name was Hercules or Kronos: that from Hercules
came the egg of the world, which produced Heaven and earth, by dividing
itself into two hemispheres: and that the God Phanes, which issued from
that egg, was in the shape of a serpent.

The Egyptian Goddess _Ken_, represented standing naked on a lion, held
two serpents in her hand. She is the same as the _Astarte_ or
_Ashtaroth_ of the Assyrians. _Hera_, worshipped in the Great Temple at
Babylon, held in her right hand a serpent by the head; and near _Khea_,
also worshipped there, were two large silver serpents.

In a sculpture from Kouyunjik, two serpents attached to poles are near a
fire-altar, at which two eunuchs are standing. Upon it is the sacred
fire, and a bearded figure leads a wild goat to the sacrifice.

The serpent of the Temple of Epidaurus was sacred to _Æsculapius_, the
God of Medicine, and 462 years after the building of the city, was taken
to Rome after a pestilence.

The Phœnicians represented the God _Nomu_ (_Kneph_ or _Amun-Kneph_) by a
serpent. In Egypt, a Sun supported by two asps was the emblem of
_Horhat_ the good genius; and the serpent with the winged globe was
placed over the doors and windows of the Temples as a tutelary God.
Antipater of Sidon calls _Amun_ "the renowned Serpent," and the Cerastes
is often found embalmed in the Thebaid.

On ancient Tyrian coins and Indian medals, a serpent was represented,
coiled round the trunk of a tree. _Python_, the Serpent Deity, was
esteemed oracular; and the tripod at Delphi was a triple-headed serpent
of gold.

The portals of all the Egyptian Temples are decorated with the hierogram
of the Circle and the Serpent. It is also found upon the Temple of
Naki-Rustan in Persia; on the triumphal arch at Pechin, in China; over
the gates of the great Temple of Chaundi Teeva, in Java; upon the walls
of Athens; and in the Temple of Minerva at Tegea. The Mexican hierogram
was formed by the intersecting of two great Serpents, which described
the circle with their bodies, and had each a human head in its mouth.

All the Buddhists crosses in Ireland had serpents carved upon them.
Wreaths of snakes are on the columns of the ancient Hindu Temple at
Burwah-Sangor.

Among the Egyptians, it was a symbol of Divine Wisdom, when extended at
length; and, with its tail in its mouth, of Eternity.

In the ritual of Zoroaster, the Serpent was a symbol of the Universe. In
China, the ring between two Serpents was the symbol of the world
governed by the power and wisdom of the Creator. The Bacchanals carried
serpents in their hands or round their heads.

The Serpent entwined round an Egg, was a symbol common to the Indians,
the Egyptians, and the Druids. It referred to the creation of the
Universe. A Serpent with an egg in his mouth was a symbol of the
Universe containing within itself the germ of all things that the Sun
develops.

The property possessed by the Serpent, of casting its skin, and
apparently renewing its youth, made it an emblem of eternity and
immortality. The Syrian women still employ it as a charm against
barrenness, as did the devotees of Mithras and Saba-Zeus. The
Earth-born civilizers of the early world, Fohi, Cecrops, and Erechtheus,
were half-man, half-serpent. The snake was the guardian of the Athenian
Acropolis. NAKHUSTAN, the brazen serpent of the wilderness, became
naturalized among the Hebrews as a token of healing power. "Be ye," said
Christ, "wise as serpents, and harmless as doves."

The Serpent was as often a symbol of malevolence and enmity. It appears
among the emblems of Siva-Roudra, the power of desolation and death: it
is the bane of Aëpytus, Idom, Archemorus, and Philoctetes: it gnaws the
roots of the tree of life in the Eddas, and bites the heel of
unfortunate Eurydice. In Hebrew writers it is generally a type of evil;
and is particularly so in the Indian and Persian Mythologies. When the
Sea is churned by Mount Mandar rotating within the coils of the Cosmical
Serpent Vasouki, to produce the Amrita or water of immortality, the
serpent vomits a hideous poison, which spreads through and infects the
Universe, but which Vishnu renders harmless by swallowing it. Ahriman in
serpent-form invades the realm of Ormuzd; and the Bull, emblem of life,
is wounded by him and dies. It was therefore a religious obligation with
every devout follower of Zoroaster to exterminate reptiles, and other
impure animals, especially serpents. The moral and astronomical
significance of the Serpent were connected. It became a maxim of the
Zend-Avesta, that Ahriman, the Principle of Evil, made the Great Serpent
of Winter, who assaulted the creation of Ormuzd.

A serpent-ring was a well-known symbol of time: and to express
dramatically how time preys upon itself, the Egyptian priests fed vipers
in a subterranean chamber, as it were in the sun's Winter abode on the
fat of bulls, or the year's plenteousness. The dragon of Winter pursues
Ammon, the golden ram, to Mount Casius. The Virgin of the zodiac is
bitten in the heel by Serpens, who, with Scorpio, rises immediately
behind her; and as honey, the emblem of purity and salvation, was
thought to be an antidote to the serpent's bite, so the bees of
Aristæus, the emblems of nature's abundance, are destroyed through the
agency of the serpent, and regenerated within the entrails of the Vernal
Bull.

The Sun-God is finally victorious. Christina crushes the head of the
serpent Calyia; Apollo destroys Python, and Hercules that Lernæan
monster whose poison festered in the foot of Philoctetes, of Mopsus, of
Chiron, or of Sagittarius. The infant Hercules destroys the pernicious
snakes detested of the gods, and ever, like St. George of England and
Michael the Archangel, wars against hydras and dragons.

The eclipses of the sun and moon were believed by the orientals to be
caused by the assaults of a dæmon in dragon-form; and they endeavored to
scare away the intruder by shouts and menaces. This was the original
Leviathan or Crooked Serpent of old, transfixed in the olden time by the
power of Jehovah, and suspended as a glittering trophy in the sky; yet
also the Power of Darkness supposed to be ever in pursuit of the Sun and
Moon. When it finally overtakes them, it will entwine them in its folds,
and prevent their shining. In the last Indian Avatara, as in the Eddas,
a serpent vomiting flames is expected to destroy the world. The serpent
presides over the close of the year, where it guards the approach to the
golden fleece of Aries, and the three apples or seasons of the
Hesperides; presenting a formidable obstacle to the career of the
Sun-God. The Great Destroyer of snakes is occasionally married to them;
Hercules with the northern dragon begets the three ancestors of Scythia;
for the Sun seems at one time to rise victorious from the contest with
darkness, and at another to sink into its embraces. The northern
constellation Draco, whose sinuosities wind like a river through the
wintry bear, was made the astronomical cincture of the Universe, as the
serpent encircles the mundane egg in Egyptian hieroglyphics.

The Persian Ahriman was called "The old serpent, the liar from the
beginning, the Prince of Darkness, and the rover up and down." The
Dragon was a well-known symbol of the waters and of great rivers; and it
was natural that by the pastoral Asiatic Tribes, the powerful nations of
the alluvial plains in their neighborhood who adored the dragon or Fish,
should themselves be symbolized under the form of dragons; and overcome
by the superior might of the Hebrew God, as monstrous Leviathans maimed
and destroyed by him. Ophioneus, in the old Greek Theology, warred
against Kronos, and was overcome and cast into his proper element, the
sea. There he is installed as the Sea-God Oannes or Dragon, the
Leviathan of the watery, half of creation, the dragon who vomited a
flood of water after the persecuted woman of the Apocalypse, the monster
who threatened to devour Hesione and Andromeda, and who for a time
became the grave of Hercules and Jonah; and he corresponds with the
obscure name of _Rahab_, whom Jehovah is said in Job to have transfixed
and overcome.

In the Spring, the year or Sun-God appears as Mithras or Europa mounted
on the Bull; but in the opposite half of the Zodiac he rides the emblem
of the waters, the winged horse of Nestor or Poseidon: and the Serpent,
rising heliacally at the Autumnal Equinox, besetting with poisonous
influence the cold constellation Sagittarius, is explained as the
reptile in the path who "bites the horse's heels, so that his rider
falls backward." The same serpent, the Oannes Aphrenos or Musaros of
Syncellus, was the Midgard Serpent which Odin sunk beneath the sea, but
which grew to such a size as to encircle the whole earth.

For these Asiatic symbols of the contest of the Sun-God with the Dragon
of darkness and Winter were imported not only into the Zodiac, but into
the more homely circle of European legend; and both Thor and Odin fight
with dragons, as Apollo did with Python, the great scaly snake, Achilles
with the Scamander, and Bellerophon with the Chimæra. In the apocryphal
book of Esther, dragons herald "a day of darkness and obscurity"; and
St. George of England, a problematic Cappadocian Prince, was originally
only a varying form of Mithras. Jehovah is said to have "cut Rahab and
wounded the dragon." The latter is not only the type of earthly
desolation, the dragon of the deep waters, but also the leader of the
banded conspirators of the sky, of the rebellious stars, which,
according to Enoch, "came not at the right time"; and his tail drew a
third part of the Host of Heaven, and cast them to the earth. Jehovah
"divided the sea by his strength, and broke the heads of the Dragons in
the waters." And according to the Jewish and Persian belief, the Dragon
would, in the latter days, the Winter of time, enjoy a short period of
licensed impunity, which would be a season of the greatest suffering to
the People of the earth; but he would finally be bound or destroyed in
the great battle of Messiah; or, as it seems intimated by the Rabbinical
figure of being eaten by the faithful, be, like Ahriman or Vasouki,
ultimately absorbed by and united with the Principle of good.

Near the image of Rhea, in the Temple of Bel at Babylon, were two large
serpents of silver, says Diodorus, each weighing thirty talents; and in
the same temple was an image of Juno, holding in her right hand the head
of a serpent. The Greeks called Bel _Beliar_; and Hesychius interprets
that word to mean a dragon or great serpent. We learn from the book of
Bel and the Dragon that in Babylon was kept a great, live serpent, which
the people worshipped.

The Assyrians, the Emperors of Constantinople, the Parthians Scythians,
Saxons, Chinese, and Danes all bore the serpent as a standard, and among
the spoils taken by Aurelian from Zenobia were such standards, _Persici
Dracones_. The Persians represented Ormuzd and Ahriman by two serpents,
contending for the mundane egg. Mithras is represented with a lion's
head and human body, encircled by a serpent. In the Sadder is this
precept: "When you kill serpents, you will repeat the Zend-Avesta, and
thence you will obtain great merit; for it is the same as if you had
killed so many devils."

Serpents encircling rings and globes, and issuing from globes, are
common in the Persian, Egyptian, Chinese, and Indian monuments. Vishnu
is represented reposing on a coiled serpent, whose folds form a canopy
over him. Mahadeva is represented with a snake around his neck, one
around his hair, and armlets of serpents on both arms. Bhairava sits on
the coils of a serpent, whose head rises above his own. Parvati has
snakes about her neck and waist. Vishnu is the Preserving Spirit,
Mahadeva is Siva, the Evil Principle, Bhairava is his son, and Parvati
his consort. The King of Evil Demons was called in Hindū Mythology,
_Naga_, the King of Serpents, in which name we trace the Hebrew
_Nachash_, serpent.

In Cashmere were seven hundred places where carved images of serpents
were worshipped; and in Thibet the great Chinese Dragon ornamented the
Temples of the Grand Lama. In China, the dragon was the stamp and symbol
of royalty, sculptured in all the Temples, blazoned on the furniture of
the houses, and interwoven with the vestments of the chief nobility. The
Emperor bears it as his armorial device; it is engraved on his sceptre
and diadem, and on all the vases of the imperial palace. The Chinese
believe that there is a dragon of extraordinary strength and sovereign
power, in Heaven, in the air, on the waters, and on the mountains. The
God Fohi is said to have had the form of a man, terminating in the tail
of a snake, a combination to be more fully explained to you in a
subsequent Degree.

The dragon and serpent are the 5th and 6th signs of the Chinese Zodiac;
and the Hindus and Chinese believe that, at every eclipse, the sun or
moon is seized by a huge serpent or dragon, the serpent _Asootee_ of the
Hindus, which enfolds the globe and the constellation Draco; to which
also refers "the War in Heaven, when Michael and his Angels fought
against the dragon."

Sanchoniathon says that Taaut was the author of the worship of serpents
among the Phœnicians. He "consecrated," he says, "the species of dragons
and serpents; and the Phœnicians and Egyptians followed him in this
superstition." He was "the first who made an image of Cœlus"; that is,
who represented the Heavenly Hosts of Stars by visible symbols; and was
probably the same as the Egyptian Thoth. On the Tyrian coins of the age
of Alexander, serpents are represented in many positions and attitudes,
coiled around trees, erect in front of altars, and crushed by the Syrian
Hercules.

The seventh letter of the Egyptian alphabet, called _Zeuta_ or _Life_,
was sacred to Thoth, and was expressed by a serpent standing on his
tail; and that Deity, the God of healing, like Æsculapius, to whom the
serpent was consecrated, leans on a knotted stick around which coils a
snake. The Isiac tablet, describing the Mysteries of Isis, is charged
with serpents in every part, as her emblems. The _Asp_ was specially
dedicated to her, and is seen on the heads of her statues, on the
bonnets of her priests, and on the tiaras of the Kings of Egypt. Serapis
was sometimes represented with a human head and serpentine tail: and in
one engraving two minor Gods are represented with him, one by a serpent
with a bull's head, and the other by a serpent with the radiated head of
a lion.

On an ancient sacrificial vessel found in Denmark, having several
compartments, a serpent is represented attacking a kneeling boy,
pursuing him, retreating before him, appealed to beseechingly by him,
and conversing with him. We are at once reminded of the Sun at the new
year represented by a child sitting on a lotus, and of the relations of
the Sun of Spring with the Autumnal Serpent, pursued by and pursuing
him, and in conjunction with him. Other figures on this vessel belong to
the Zodiac.

The base of the _tripod_ of the Pythian Priestess was a triple-headed
serpent of brass, whose body, folded in circles growing wider and wider
toward the ground, formed a conical column, while the three heads,
disposed triangularly, upheld the _tripod_ of gold. A similar column
was placed on a pillar in the Hippodrome at Constantinople, by the
founder of that city; one of the heads of which is said to have been
broken off by Mahomet the Second, by a blow with his iron mace.

The British God Hu was called "The Dragon--Ruler of the World," and his
car was drawn by serpents. His ministers were styled _adders_. A Druid
in a poem of Taliessin says, "I am a Druid, I am an _Architect_, I am a
Prophet, I am a _Serpent_ (Gnadi)." The Car of the Goddess Ceridwen also
was drawn by serpents.

In the elegy of Uther Pendragon, this passage occurs in a description of
the religious rites of the Druids: "While the Sanctuary is earnestly
invoking _The Gliding King_, before whom _the Fair One_ retreats, upon
the evil that covers the huge stones; whilst the Dragon moves round over
the places which contain vessels of drink-offering, whilst the
drink-offering is in _the Golden Horns_;" in which we readily discover
the mystic and obscure allusion to the Autumnal Serpent pursuing the Sun
along the circle of the Zodiac, to the celestial cup or crater, and the
Golden horns of Virgil's milk-white Bull; and, a line or two further on,
we find the Priest imploring the victorious _Beli_, the Sun-God of the
Babylonians.

With the serpent, in the Ancient Monuments, is very often found
associated the Cross. The Serpent upon a Cross was an Egyptian Standard.
It occurs repeatedly upon the Grand Staircase of the Temple of Osiris at
Philæ; and on the pyramid of Ghizeh are represented two kneeling figures
erecting a Cross, on the top of which is a serpent erect. The _Crux
Ansata_ was a Cross with a coiled Serpent above it; and it is perhaps
the most common of all emblems on the Egyptian Monuments, carried in the
hand of almost every figure of a Deity or a Priest. It was, as we learn
by the monuments, the form of the iron tether-pins, used for making fast
to the ground the cords by which young animals were confined: and as
used by shepherds, became a symbol of Royalty to the Shepherd Kings.

A Cross like a Teutonic or Maltese one, formed by four curved lines
within a circle, is also common on the Monuments, and represented the
Tropics and the Colures.

The Caduceus, borne by Hermes or Mercury, and also by Cybele, Minerva,
Anubis, Hercules Ogmius the God of the Celts, and the personified
Constellation Virgo, was a winged wand, entwined by two serpents. It
was originally a simple Cross, symbolizing the equator and equinoctial
Colure, and the four elements proceeding from a common centre. This
Cross, surmounted by a circle, and that by a crescent, became an emblem
of the Supreme Deity--or of the active power of generation and the
passive power of production conjoined,--and was appropriated to Thoth or
Mercury. It then assumed an improved form, the arms of the Cross being
changed into wings, and the circle and crescent being formed by two
snakes, springing from the wand, forming a circle by crossing each
other, and their heads making the horns of the crescent; in which form
it is seen in the hands of Anubis.

The triple Tau, in the centre of a circle and a triangle, typifies the
Sacred Name; and represents the Sacred Triad, the Creating, Preserving,
and Destroying Powers; as well as the three great lights of Masonry. If
to the Masonic point within a Circle, and the two parallel lines, we add
the single Tau Cross, we have the Ancient Egyptian Triple Tau.

A column in the form of a cross, with a circle over it, was used by the
Egyptians to measure the increase of the inundations of the Nile. The
Tau and Triple Tau are found in many Ancient Alphabets.

With the Tau or the Triple Tau may be connected, within two circles, the
double cube, or perfection; or the perfect ashlar.

The _Crux Ansata_ is found on the sculptures of Khorsabad; on the
ivories from Nimroud, of the same age, carried by an Assyrian Monarch;
and on cylinders of the later Assyrian period.

As the single Tau represents the one God, so, no doubt, the Triple Tau,
the origin of which cannot be traced, was meant to represent the Trinity
of his attributes, the three Masonic pillars, WISDOM, STRENGTH, and
HARMONY.

The Prophet Ezekiel, in the 4th verse of the 9th chapter, says: "And the
Lord said unto him, 'Go through the midst of the city, through the midst
of Jerusalem, and mark the letter TAU upon the foreheads of those that
sigh and mourn for all the abominations that be done in the midst
thereof." So the Latin Vulgate, and the probably most ancient copies of
the Septuagint translate the passage. This _Tau_ was in the form of the
cross of this Degree, and it was the emblem of _life_ and _salvation_.
The Samaritan _Tau_ and the Ethiopic _Tavvi_ are the evident prototype
of the Greek [Greek: τ]; and we learn from Tertullian, Origen, and St.
Jerome, that the Hebrew _Tau_ was anciently written in the form of a
Cross.

In ancient times the mark _Tau_ was set on those who had been acquitted
by their judges, as a symbol of innocence. The military commanders
placed it on soldiers who escaped unhurt from the field of battle, as a
sign of their safety under the Divine Protection.

It was a sacred symbol among the Druids. Divesting a tree of part of its
branches, they left it in the shape of a Tau Cross, preserved it
carefully, and consecrated it with solemn ceremonies. On the tree they
cut deeply the word THAU, by which they meant God. On the right arm of
the Cross, they inscribed the word HESULS, on the left BELEN or BELENUS,
and on the middle of the trunk THARAMIS. This represented the sacred
_Triad_.

It is certain that the Indians, Egyptians, and Arabians paid veneration
to the sign of the Cross, thousands of years before the coming of
Christ. Everywhere it was a sacred symbol. The Hindus and the Celtic
Druids built many of their Temples in the form of a Cross, as the ruins
still remaining clearly show, and particularly the ancient Druidical
Temple at Classerniss in the Island of Lewis in Scotland. The Circle is
of 12 Stones. On each of the sides, east, west, and south, are three. In
the centre was the image of the Deity; and on the north an avenue of
twice nineteen stones, and one at the entrance. The Supernal Pagoda at
Benares is in the form of a Cross; and the Druidical subterranean grotto
at New Grange in Ireland.

The Statue of Osiris at Rome had the same emblem. Isis and Ceres also
bore it; and the caverns of initiation were constructed in that shape
with a pyramid over the _Sacellum_.

Crosses were cut in the stones of the Temple of Serapis in Alexandria;
and many Tau Crosses are to be seen in the sculptures of Alabastion and
Esné, in Egypt. On coins, the symbol of the Egyptian God Kneph was a
Cross within a Circle.

The Crux Ansata was the particular emblem of Osiris, and his sceptre
ended with that figure. It was also the emblem of Hermes, and was
considered a Sublime Hieroglyphic, possessing mysterious powers and
virtues, as a wonder-working amulet.

The Sacred Tau occurs in the hands of the mummy-shaped figures between
the forelegs of the row of Sphynxes, in the great avenue leading from
Luxor to Karnac. By the Tau Cross the Cabalists expressed the number
10, a perfect number, denoting Heaven, and the Pythagorean Tetractys, or
incommunicable name of God. The Tau Cross is also found on the stones in
front of the door of the Temple of Amunoth III, at Thebes, who reigned
about the time when the Israelites took possession of Canaan: and the
Egyptian Priests carried it in all the sacred processions.

Tertullian, who had been initiated, informs us that the Tau was
inscribed on the forehead of every person who had been admitted into the
Mysteries of Mithras.

As the simple Tau represented Life, so, when the Circle, symbol of
Eternity, was added, it represented Eternal Life.

At the Initiation of a King, the Tau, as the emblem of life and key of
the Mysteries, was impressed upon his lips.

In the Indian Mysteries, the Tau Cross, under the name of _Tiluk_, was
marked upon the body of the candidate, as a sign that he was set apart
for the Sacred Mysteries.

On the upright tablet of the King, discovered at Nimroud, are the names
of thirteen Great Gods (among which are YAV and BEL); and the left-hand
character of every one is a cross composed of two cuneiform characters.

The Cross appears upon an Ancient Phœnician medal found in the ruins of
Citium; on the very ancient Buddhist Obelisk near Ferns in Ross-shire;
on the Buddhist Round Towers in Ireland, and upon the splendid obelisk
of the same era at Forres in Scotland.

Upon the facade of a temple at Kalabche in Nubia are three regal
figures, each holding a Crux Ansata.

Like the Subterranean Mithriatic Temple at New Grange in Scotland, the
Pagodas of Benares and Mathura were in the form of a Cross. Magnificent
Buddhist Crosses were erected, and are still standing, at Clonmacnoise,
Finglas, and Kilcullen in Ireland. Wherever the monuments of Buddhism
are found, in India, Ceylon, or Ireland, we find the Cross: for Buddha
or Boudh was represented to have been crucified.

All the planets known to the Ancients were distinguished by the Mystic
Cross, in conjunction with the solar or lunar symbols; Saturn by a cross
over a crescent, Jupiter by a cross under a crescent, Mars by a cross
resting obliquely on a circle, Venus by a cross under a circle, and
Mercury by a cross surmounted by a circle and that by a crescent.

The Solstices, Cancer and Capricorn, the two Gates of Heaven are the two
pillars of Hercules, beyond which he, the Sun, never journeyed: and they
still appear in our Lodges, as the two great columns, Jachin and Boaz,
and also as the two parallel lines that bound the circle, with a point
in the centre, emblem of the Sun between the two tropics of Cancer and
Capricorn.

The Blazing Star in our Lodges, we have already said, represents Sirius,
Anubis, or Mercury, Guardian and Guide of Souls. Our Ancient English
brethren also considered it an emblem of the Sun. In the old Lectures
they said: "The Blazing Star or Glory in the centre refers us to that
Grand Luminary the Sun, which enlightens the Earth, and by its genial
influence dispenses blessings to mankind." It is also said in those
lectures to be an emblem of Prudence. The word _Prudentia_ means, in its
original and fullest signification, _Foresight_: and accordingly the
Blazing Star has been regarded as an emblem of Omniscience, or the
All-Seeing Eye, which to the Ancients was the Sun.

Even the Dagger of the Elu of Nine is that used in the Mysteries of
Mithras; which, with its blade black and hilt white, was an emblem of
the two principles of Light and Darkness.

Isis, the same as Ceres, was, as we learn from Eratosthenes, the
Constellation Virgo, represented by a woman holding an ear of wheat. The
different emblems which accompany her in the description given by
Apuleius, a serpent on either side, a golden vase, with a serpent twined
round the handle, and the animals that marched in procession, the bear,
the ape, and Pegasus, represented the Constellations that, rising with
the Virgin, when on the day of the Vernal Equinox she stood in the
Oriental gate of Heaven, brilliant with the rays of the full moon,
seemed to march in her train.

The cup, consecrated in the Mysteries both of Isis and Eleusis, was the
Constellation Crater or the Cup. The sacred vessel of the Isiac ceremony
finds its counterpart in the Heavens. The Olympic robe presented to the
Initiate, a magnificent mantle, covered with figures of serpents and
animals, and under which were twelve other sacred robes, wherewith he
was clothed in the sanctuary, alluded to the starry Heaven and the
twelve signs: while the seven preparatory immersions in the sea alluded
to the seven spheres, through which the soul plunged, to arrive here
below and take up its abode in a body.

The Celestial Virgin, during the last three centuries that preceded the
Christian era, occupied the horoscope or Oriental point, and that gate
of Heaven through which the Sun and Moon ascended above the horizon at
the two equinoxes. Again it occupied it at midnight, at the Winter
Solstice, the precise moment when the year commenced. Thus it was
essentially connected with the march of times and seasons, of the Sun,
the Moon, and day and night, at the principal epochs of the year. At the
equinoxes were celebrated the greater and lesser Mysteries of Ceres.
When souls descended past the Balance, at the moment when the Sun
occupied that point, the Virgin rose before him; she stood at the gates
of day and opened them to him. Her brilliant Star, Spica Virginis, and
Arcturus, in Boötes, northwest of it, heralded his coming. When he had
returned to the Vernal Equinox, at the moment when souls were generated,
again it was the Celestial Virgin that led the march of the signs of
night; and in her stars came the beautiful full moon of that month.
Night and day were in succession introduced by her, when they began to
diminish in length; and souls, before arriving at the gates of Hell,
were also led by her. In going through these signs, they passed the Styx
in the 8th Degree of Libra. She was the famous Sibyl who initiated
Eneas, and opened to him the way to the infernal regions.

This peculiar situation of the Constellation Virgo, has caused it to
enter into all the sacred fables in regard to nature, under different
names and the most varied forms. It often takes the name of Isis or the
Moon, which, when at its full at the Vernal Equinox, was in union with
it or beneath its feet. Mercury (or Anubis) having his domicile and
exaltation in the sign Virgo, was, in all the sacred fables and
Sanctuaries, the inseparable companion of Isis, without whose counsels
she did nothing.

This relation between the emblems and mysterious recitals of the
initiations, and the Heavenly bodies and order of the world, was still
more clear in the Mysteries of Mithras, adored as the Sun in Asia Minor,
Cappadocia, Armenia, and Persia, and whose Mysteries went to Rome in the
time of Sylla. This is amply proved by the descriptions we have of the
Mithriac cave, in which were figured the two movements of the Heavens,
that of the fixed Stars and that of the Planets, the Constellations, the
eight mystic gates of the spheres, and the symbols of the elements. So
on a celebrated monument of that religion, found at Rome, were figured,
the Serpent or Hydra under Leo, as in the Heavens, the Celestial Dog,
the Bull, the Scorpion, the Seven Planets, represented by seven altars,
the Sun, Moon, and emblems relating to Light, to Darkness, and to their
succession during the year, where each in turn triumphs for six months.

The Mysteries of Atys were celebrated when the Sun entered Aries; and
among the emblems was a ram at the foot of a tree which was being cut
down.

Thus, if not the whole truth, it is yet a large part of it, that the
Heathen Pantheon, in its infinite diversity of names and
personifications, was but a multitudinous, though in its origin
unconscious allegory, of which physical phenomena, and principally the
Heavenly Bodies, were the fundamental types. The glorious images of
Divinity which formed Jehovah's Host, were the Divine Dynasty or real
theocracy which governed the early world; and the men of the golden age,
whose looks held commerce with the skies, and who watched the radiant
rulers bringing Winter and Summer to mortals, might be said with poetic
truth to live in immediate communication with Heaven, and, like the
Hebrew Patriarchs, to see God face to face. Then the Gods introduced
their own worship among mankind: then Oannes, Oe or Aquarius rose from
the Red Sea to impart science to the Babylonians; then the bright Bull
legislated for India and Crete; and the Lights of Heaven, personified as
Liber and Ceres, hung the Bœotian hills with vineyards, and gave the
golden sheaf to Eleusis. The children of men were, in a sense, allied or
married, to those sons of God who sang the jubilee of creation; and the
encircling vault with its countless Stars, which to the excited
imagination of the solitary Chaldean wanderer appeared as animated
intelligences, might naturally be compared to a gigantic ladder, on
which, in their rising and setting, the Angel luminaries appeared to be
ascending and descending between earth and Heaven. The original
revelation died out of men's memories; they worshipped the Creature
instead of the Creator; and holding all earthly things as connected by
eternal links of harmony and sympathy with the heavenly bodies, they
united in one view astronomy, astrology, and religion. Long wandering
thus in error, they at length ceased to look upon the Stars and external
nature as Gods; and by directing their attention to the microcosm or
narrower world of self, they again became acquainted with the True Ruler
and Guide of the Universe, and used the old fables and superstitions as
symbols and allegories, by which to convey and under which to hide the
great truths which had faded out of most men's remembrance.

In the Hebrew writings, the term "Heavenly Hosts" includes not only the
counsellors and emissaries of Jehovah, but also the celestial
luminaries; and the stars, imagined in the East to be animated
intelligences, presiding over human weal and woe, are identified with
the more distinctly impersonated messengers or angels, who execute the
Divine decrees, and whose predominance in Heaven is in mysterious
correspondence and relation with the powers and dominions of the earth.
In Job, the Morning Stars and the Sons of God are identified; they join
in the same chorus of praise to the Almighty; they are both susceptible
of joy; they walk in brightness, and are liable to impurity and
imperfection in the sight of God. The Elohim originally included not
only foreign superstitious forms, but also all that host of Heaven which
was revealed in poetry to the shepherds of the desert, now as an
encampment of warriors, now as careering in chariots of fire, and now as
winged messengers, ascending and descending the vault of Heaven, to
communicate the will of God to mankind.

"The Eternal," says the Bereshith Rabba to Genesis, "called forth
Abraham and his posterity out of the dominion of the stars; by nature,
the Israelite was a servant to the stars, and born under their
influence, as are the heathen; but by virtue of the law given on Mount
Sinai, he became liberated from this degrading servitude." The Arabs had
a similar legend. The Prophet Amos explicitly asserts that the
Israelites, in the desert, worshipped, not Jehovah, but Moloch, or a
Star-God, equivalent to Saturn. The Gods El or Jehovah were not merely
planetary or solar. Their symbolism, like that of every other Deity, was
coextensive with nature, and with the mind of man. Yet the astrological
character is assigned even to Jehovah. He is described as seated on the
pinnacle of the Universe, leading forth the Hosts of Heaven, and telling
them unerringly by name and number. His stars are His sons and His eyes,
which run through the whole world, keeping watch over men's deeds. The
stars and planets were properly the angels. In Pharisaic tradition, as
in the phraseology of the New Testament, the Heavenly Host appears as an
Angelic Army, divided into regiments and brigades, under the command of
imaginary chiefs, such as Massaloth, Legion, Kartor Gistra etc.--each
Gistra being captain of 365,000 myriads of stars. The Seven Spirits
which stand before the throne, spoken of by several Jewish writers, and
generally presumed to have been immediately derived from the Persian
Amshaspands, were ultimately the seven planetary intelligences, the
original model of the seven-branched golden candlestick exhibited to
Moses on God's mountain. The stars were imagined to have fought in their
courses against Sisera. The heavens were spoken of as holding a
predominance over earth, as governing it by signs and ordinances, and as
containing the elements of that astrological wisdom, more especially
cultivated by the Babylonians and Egyptians.

Each nation was supposed by the Hebrews to have its own guardian angel,
and its own provincial star. One of the chiefs of the Celestial Powers,
at first Jehovah Himself in the character of the Sun, standing in the
height of Heaven, overlooking and governing all things, afterward one of
the angels or subordinate planetary genii of Babylonian or Persian
mythology, was the patron and protector of their own nation, "the Prince
that standeth for the children of thy people." The discords of earth
were accompanied by a warfare in the sky; and no people underwent the
visitation of the Almighty, without a corresponding chastisement being
inflicted on its tutelary angel.

The fallen Angels were also fallen Stars; and the first allusion to a
feud among the spiritual powers in early Hebrew Mythology, where Rabab
and his confederates are defeated, like the Titans in a battle against
the Gods, seems to identify the rebellious Spirits as part of the
visible Heavens, where the "high ones on high" are punished or chained,
as a signal proof of God's power and justice. God, it is said--

"Stirs the sea with His might--by His understanding He smote Rahab--His
breath clears the face of Heaven--His hand pierced the crooked
Serpent.... God withdraws not His anger; beneath Him bow the
confederates of Rahab."

Rahab always means a sea-monster: probably some such legendary monstrous
dragon, as in almost all mythologies is the adversary of Heaven and
demon of eclipse, in whose belly, significantly called the belly of
Hell, Hercules, like Jonah, passed three days, ultimately escaping with
the loss of his hair or rays. Chesil, the rebellious giant Orion,
represented in Job as riveted to the sky, was compared to Ninus or
Nimrod, the mythical founder of Nineveh (City of Fish) the mighty
hunter, who slew lions and panthers before the Lord. Rahab's
confederates are probably the "High ones on High," the Chesilim or
constellations in Isaiah, the Heavenly Host or Heavenly Powers, among
whose number were found folly and disobedience.

"I beheld," says Pseudo-Enoch, "seven stars like great blazing
mountains, and like Spirits, entreating me. And the angel said, This
place, until the consummation of Heaven and Earth, will be the prison of
the Stars and of the Host of Heaven. These are the Stars which
overstepped God's command before their time arrived; and came not at
their proper season; therefore was he offended with them, and bound
them, until the time of the consummation of their crimes in the secret
year." And again: "These Seven Stars are those which have transgressed
the commandment of the Most High God, and which are here bound until the
number of the days of their crimes be completed."

The Jewish and early Christian writers looked on the worship of the sun
and the elements with comparative indulgence. Justin Martyr and Clemens
of Alexandria admit that God had appointed the stars as legitimate
objects of heathen worship, in order to preserve throughout the world
some tolerable notions of natural religion. It seemed a middle point
between Heathenism and Christianity; and to it certain emblems and
ordinances of that faith seemed to relate. The advent of Christ was
announced by a Star from the East; and His nativity was celebrated on
the shortest day of the Julian Calendar, the day when, in the physical
commemorations of Persia and Egypt, Mithras or Osiris was newly found.
It was then that the acclamations of the Host of Heaven, the unfailing
attendants of the Sun, surrounded, as at the spring-dawn of creation,
the cradle of His birth-place, and that, in the words of Ignatius, "a
star, with light inexpressible, shone forth in the Heavens, to destroy
the power of magic and the bonds of wickedness; for God Himself had
appeared, in the form of man, for the renewal of eternal life."

But however infinite the variety of objects which helped to develop the
notion of Deity, and eventually assumed its place, substituting the
worship of the creature for that of the creator; of Parts of the body,
for that of the soul, of the Universe, still the notion itself was
essentially one of unity. The idea of one God, of a creative,
productive, governing unity, resided in the earliest exertion of
thought: and this monotheism of the primitive ages, makes every
succeeding epoch, unless it be the present appear only as a stage in the
progress of degeneracy and aberration Everywhere in the old faiths we
find the idea of a supreme or presiding Deity. Amun or Osiris presides
among the many gods of Egypt; Pan, with the music of his pipe, directs
the chorus of the constellations, as Zeus leads the solemn procession of
the celestial troops in the astronomical theology of the Pythagoreans.
"Amidst an infinite diversity of opinions on all other subjects," says
Maximus Tyrius, "the whole world is unanimous in the belief of one only
almighty King and Father of all."

There is always a Sovereign Power, a Zeus or Deus, Mahadeva or Adideva,
to whom belongs the maintenance of the order of the Universe. Among the
thousand gods of India, the doctrine of Divine Unity is never lost sight
of; and the ethereal Jove, worshipped by the Persian in an age long
before Xenophanes or Anaxagoras, appears as supremely comprehensive and
independent of planetary or elemental subdivisions, as the "Vast One" or
"Great Soul" of the Vedas.

But the simplicity of belief of the patriarchs did not exclude the
employment of symbolical representations. The mind never rests satisfied
with a mere feeling. That feeling ever strives to assume precision and
durability as an idea, by some _outward_ delineation of its thought.
Even the ideas that are above and beyond the senses, as all ideas of God
are, require the aid of the senses for their expression and
communication. Hence come the representative forms and symbols which
constitute the external investiture of every religion; attempts to
express a religious sentiment that is essentially _one_, and that vainly
struggles for adequate external utterance, striving to tell to one man,
to _paint_ to him, an idea existing in the mind of another, and
essentially incapable of utterance or description, in a language all the
words of which have a sensuous meaning. Thus, the idea being perhaps the
same in all, its expressions and utterances are infinitely various, and
branch into an infinite diversity of creeds and sects.

All religious expression is symbolism; since we can describe only what
we see; and the true objects of religion are unseen. The earliest
instruments of education were symbols; and they and all other religious
forms differed and still differ according to external circumstances and
imagery, and according to differences of knowledge and mental
cultivation. To present a visible symbol to the eye of another is not to
inform him of the meaning which that symbol has to _you_. Hence the
philosopher soon superadded to these symbols, explanations addressed to
the ear, susceptible of more precision, but less effective, obvious, and
impressive than the painted or sculptured forms which he despised. Out
of these explanations grew by degrees a variety of narratives, whose
true object and meaning were gradually forgotten. And when these were
abandoned, and philosophy resorted to definitions and formulas, its
language was but a more refined symbolism, grappling with and attempting
to picture ideas impossible to be expressed. For the most abstract
expression for Deity which language can supply, is but a _sign_ or
_symbol_ for an object unknown, and no more truthful and adequate than
the terms Osiris and Vishnu, except as being less sensuous and explicit.
To say that He is a _Spirit_, is but to say that He is not matter.
_What_ spirit is, we can only define as the Ancients did, by resorting,
as if in despair, to some sublimized species of matter, as Light, Fire,
or Ether.

No symbol of Deity can be appropriate or durable except in a relative or
moral sense. We cannot exalt words that have only a sensuous meaning,
_above_ sense. To call Him a _Power_ or a _Force_, or an _Intelligence_,
is merely to deceive ourselves into the belief that we use words that
have a meaning to us, when they have none, or at least no more than the
ancient visible symbols had. To call Him _Sovereign, Father, Grand
Architect of the Universe, Extension, Time, Beginning, Middle, and End,
whose face is turned on all sides, the Source of life and death_, is but
to present other men with symbols by which we vainly endeavor to
communicate to them the same vague ideas which men in all ages have
impotently struggled to express. And it may be doubted whether we have
succeeded either in communicating, or in forming in our own minds, any
more distinct and definite and true and adequate idea of the Deity, with
all our metaphysical conceits and logical subtleties, than the rude
ancients did, who endeavored to symbolize and so to express His
attributes, by the Fire, the Light, the Sun and Stars, the Lotus and the
Scarabæus; all of them types of what, except by types, more or less
sufficient, could not be expressed at all.

The primitive man recognized the Divine Presence under a variety of
appearances, without losing his faith in this unity and Supremacy. The
invisible God, manifested and on one of His many sides visible, did not
cease to be God to him. He recognized Him in the evening breeze of Eden,
in the whirlwind of Sinai in the Stone of Beth-El: and identified Him
with the fire or thunder or the immovable rock adored in Ancient Arabia.
To him the image of the Deity was reflected in all that was pre-eminent
in excellence. He saw Jehovah, like Osiris and Bel, in the Sun as well
as in the Stars, which were His children, His eyes, "which run through
the whole world, and watch over the Sacred Soil of Palestine, from the
year's commencement to its close." He was the sacred fire of Mount
Sinai, of the burning bush, of the Persians, those Puritans of Paganism.

Naturally it followed that Symbolism soon became more complicated, and
all the powers of Heaven were reproduced on earth, until a web of
fiction and allegory was woven, which the wit of man, with his limited
means of explanation, will never unravel. Hebrew Theism itself became
involved in symbolism and image-worship, to which all religions ever
tend. We have already seen what was the symbolism of the Tabernacle, the
Temple, and the Ark. The Hebrew establishment tolerated not only the use
of emblematic vessels, vestments, and cherubs, of Sacred Pillars and
Seraphim, but symbolical representations of Jehovah Himself, not even
confined to poetical or illustrative language.

"Among the Adityas," says Chrishna, in the Bagvat Ghita, "I am Vishnu,
the radiant Sun among the Stars; among the waters, I am ocean; among the
mountains, the Himalaya; and among the mountain-tops, Meru." The Psalms
and Isaiah are full of similar attempts to convey to the mind ideas of
God, by ascribing to Him sensual proportions. He rides on the clouds,
and sits on the wings of the wind. Heaven is His pavilion, and out of
His mouth issue lightnings. Men cannot worship a mere abstraction. They
require some outward form in which to clothe their conceptions, and
invest their sympathies. If they do not shape and carve or paint visible
images, they have invisible ones, perhaps quite as inadequate and
unfaithful, within their own minds.

The incongruous and monstrous in the Oriental images came from the
desire to embody the Infinite, and to convey by multiplied, because
individually inadequate symbols, a notion of Divine Attributes to the
understanding. Perhaps we should find that we mentally do the same
thing, and make within ourselves images quite as incongruous, if judged
of by our own limited conceptions, if we were to undertake to analyze
and gain a clear idea of the mass of infinite attributes which we assign
to the Deity: and even of His infinite Justice and infinite Mercy and
Love.

We may well say, in the language of Maximus Tyrius: "If, in the desire
to obtain some faint conception of the Universal Father, the Nameless
Lawgiver, men had recourse to words or names, to silver or gold, to
animals or plants, to mountain-tops or flowing rivers, every one
inscribing the most valued and most beautiful things with the name of
Deity, and with the fondness of a lover clinging with rapture to each
trivial reminiscence of the Beloved, why should we seek to reduce this
universal practice of symbolism, necessary, indeed, since the mind often
needs the excitement of the imagination to rouse it into activity, to
one monotonous standard of formal propriety? Only let the image duly
perform its task, and bring the divine idea with vividness and truth
before the mental eye; if this be effected, whether by the art of
Phidias, the poetry of Homer, the Egyptian Hieroglyph, or the Persian
element, we need not cavil at external differences, or lament the
seeming fertility of unfamiliar creeds, _so long as the great essential
is attained_, THAT MEN ARE MADE TO REMEMBER, TO UNDERSTAND, AND TO
LOVE."

Certainly, when men regarded Light and Fire as something spiritual, and
above all the corruptions and exempt from all the decay of matter; when
they looked upon the Sun and Stars and Planets as composed of this finer
element, and as themselves great and mysterious Intelligences,
infinitely superior to man, living Existences, gifted with mighty powers
and wielding vast influences, those elements and bodies conveyed to
them, when used as symbols of Deity, a far more adequate idea than they
can now do to us, or than we can comprehend, now that Fire and Light are
familiar to us as air and water, and the Heavenly Luminaries are
lifeless worlds like our own. Perhaps they gave them ideas as adequate
as we obtain from the mere _words_ by which we endeavor to symbolize and
shadow forth the ineffable mysteries and infinite attributes of God.

There are, it is true, dangers inseparable from symbolism, which
countervail its advantages, and afford an impressive lesson in regard to
the similar risks attendant on the use of language. The imagination,
invited to assist the reason, usurps its place, or leaves its ally
helplessly entangled in its web. Names which stand for things are
confounded with them; the means are mistaken for the end: the instrument
of interpretation for the object; and thus symbols come to usurp an
independent character as truths and persons. Though perhaps a necessary
path, they were a dangerous one by which to approach the Deity; in which
"many," says Plutarch, "mistaking the sign for the thing signified, fell
into a ridiculous superstition; while others, in avoiding one extreme,
plunged into the no less hideous gulf of irreligion and impiety."

All great Reformers have warred against this evil, deeply feeling the
intellectual mischief arising out of a degraded idea of the Supreme
Being; and have claimed for their own God an existence or personality
distinct from the objects of ancient superstition; disowning in His name
the symbols and images that had profaned His Temple. But they have not
seen that the utmost which can be effected by human effort, is to
substitute impressions relatively correct, for others whose falsehood
has been detected, and to replace a gross symbolism by a purer one.
Every man, without being aware of it, worships a conception of his own
mind; for all symbolism, as well as all language, shares the subjective
character of the ideas it represents. The epithets we apply to God only
recall either visible or intellectual symbols to the eye or mind. The
modes or forms of manifestation of the reverential feeling that
constitutes the religious sentiment, are incomplete and progressive;
each term and symbol predicates a partial truth, remaining always
amenable to improvement or modification, and, in its turn, to be
superseded by others more accurate and comprehensive.

Idolatry consists in confounding the symbol with the thing signified,
the substitution of a material for a mental object of worship, after a
higher spiritualism has become possible; an ill-judged preference of the
inferior to the superior symbol, an inadequate and sensual conception of
the Deity: and every religion and every conception of God is idolatrous,
in so far as it is imperfect, and as it substitutes a feeble and
temporary idea in the shrine of that Undiscoverable Being who can be
known only in part, and who can therefore be honored, even by the most
enlightened among His worshippers, only in proportion to their limited
powers of understanding and imagining to themselves His perfections.

Like the belief in a Deity, the belief in the soul's immortality is
rather a natural feeling, an adjunct of self-consciousness, than a dogma
belonging to any particular age or country. It gives eternity to man's
nature, and reconciles its seeming anomalies and contradictions; it
makes him strong in weakness and perfectable in imperfection; and it
alone gives an adequate object for his hopes and energies, and value and
dignity to his pursuits. It is concurrent with the belief in an
infinite, eternal Spirit, since it is chiefly through consciousness of
the dignity of the mind within us, that we learn to appreciate its
evidences in the Universe.

To fortify, and as far as possible to impart this hope, was the great
aim of ancient wisdom, whether expressed in forms of poetry or
philosophy; as it was of the Mysteries, and as it is of Masonry. Life
rising out of death was the great mystery, which symbolism delighted to
represent under a thousand ingenious forms. Nature was ransacked for
attestations to the grand truth which seems to transcend all other gifts
of imagination, or rather to be their essence and consummation. Such
evidences were easily discovered. They were found in the olive and the
lotus, in the evergreen myrtle of the _Mystæ_ and of the grave of
Polydorus, in the deadly but self-renewing serpent, the wonderful moth
emerging from the coffin of the worm, the phenomena of germination, the
settings and risings of the sun and stars, the darkening and growth of
the moon, and in sleep, "the minor mystery of death."

The stories of the birth of Apollo from Latona, and of dead heroes, like
Glaucus, resuscitated in caves, were allegories of the natural
alternations of life and death in nature, changes that are but
expedients to preserve her virginity and purity inviolable in the
general sum of her operations, whose aggregate presents only a majestic
calm, rebuking alike man's presumption and his despair. The typical
death of the Nature-God, Osiris, Atys, Adonis, Hiram, was a profound but
consolatory mystery: the healing charms of Orpheus were connected with
his destruction; and his bones, those valued pledges of fertility and
victory, were, by a beautiful contrivance, often buried within the
sacred precincts of his immortal equivalent.

In their doctrines as to the immortality of the soul, the Greek
Philosophers merely stated with more precision ideas long before extant
independently among themselves, in the form of symbolical suggestion.
Egypt and Ethiopia in these matters learned from India, where, as
everywhere else, the origin of the doctrine was as remote and
untraceable as the origin of man himself. Its natural expression is
found in the language of Chrishna, in the Bagvat Ghita: "I myself never
was non-existent, nor thou, nor these princes of the Earth; nor shall we
ever hereafter cease to be ... The soul is not a thing of which a man
may say, it hath been, or is about to be, or is to be hereafter; for it
is a thing without birth; it is pre-existent, changeless, eternal, and
is not to be destroyed with this mortal frame."

According to the dogma of antiquity, the thronging forms of life are a
series of purifying migrations, through which the divine principle
re-ascends to the unity of its source. Inebriated in the bowl of
Dionusos, and dazzled in the mirror of existence, the souls, those
fragments or sparks of the Universal Intelligence, forgot their native
dignity, and passed into the terrestrial frames they coveted. The most
usual type of the spirit's descent was suggested by the sinking of the
Sun and Stars from the upper to the lower hemisphere. When it arrived
within the portals of the proper empire of Dionusos, the God of this
World, the scene of delusion and change, its individuality became
clothed in a material form; and as individual bodies were compared to a
garment, the world was the investiture of the Universal Spirit. Again,
the body was compared to a vase or urn, the soul's recipient; the world
being the mighty bowl which received the descending Deity. In another
image, ancient as the Grottoes of the Magi and the denunciations of
Ezekiel, the world was as a dimly illuminated cavern, where shadows seem
realities, and where the soul becomes forgetful of its celestial origin
in proportion to its proneness to material fascinations. By another, the
period of the Soul's embodiment is as when exhalations are condensed,
and the aerial element assumes the grosser form of water.

But if vapor falls in water, it was held, water is again the birth of
vapors, which ascend and adorn the Heavens. If our mortal existence be
the death of the spirit, our death may be the renewal of its life; as
physical bodies are exalted from earth to water, from water to air, from
air to fire, so the man may rise into the Hero, the Hero into the God.
In the course of Nature, the soul, to recover its lost estate, must pass
through a series of trials and migrations. The scene of those trials is
the Grand Sanctuary of Initiations, the world: their primary agents are
the elements; and Dionusos, as Sovereign of Nature, or the sensuous
world personified, is official Arbiter of the Mysteries, and guide of
the soul, which he introduces into the body and dismisses from it. He is
the Sun, that liberator of the elements, and his spiritual mediation was
suggested by the same imagery which made the Zodiac the supposed path of
the spirits in their descent and their return, and Cancer and Capricorn
the gates through which they passed.

He was not only Creator of the World, but guardian, liberator, and
Saviour of the Soul. Ushered into the world amidst lightning and
thunder, he became the Liberator celebrated in the Mysteries of Thebes,
delivering earth from Winter's chain, conducting the nightly chorus of
the Stars and the celestial revolution of the year. His symbolism was
the inexhaustible imagery employed to fill up the stellar devices of the
Zodiac: he was the Vernal Bull, the Lion, the Ram, the Autumnal Goat,
the Serpent: in short, the varied Deity, the resulting manifestation
personified, the all in the many, the varied year, life passing into
innumerable forms; essentially inferior to none, yet changing with the
seasons, and undergoing their periodical decay.

He mediates and intercedes for man, and reconciles the Universal Unseen
Mind with the individualized spirit of which he is emphatically the
Perfecter; a consummation which he effects, first through the
vicissitudes of the elemental ordeal, the alternate fire of Summer and
the showers of Winter, "the trials or test of an immortal Nature"; and
secondarily and symbolically through the Mysteries. He holds not only
the cup of generation, but also that of wisdom or initiation, whose
influence is contrary to that of the former, causing the soul to abhor
its material bonds, and to long for its return. The first was the Cup of
Forgetfulness; while the second is the Urn of Aquarius, quaffed by the
returning spirit, as by the returning Sun at the Winter Solstice, and
emblematic of the exchange of wordly impressions for the recovered
recollections of the glorious sights and enjoyments of its
pre-existence. Water nourishes and purifies; and the urn from which it
flows was thought worthy to be a symbol of Deity, as of the
Osiris-Canobus who with living water irrigated the soil of Egypt; and
also an emblem of Hope that should cheer the dwellings of the dead.

The second birth of Dionusos, like the rising of Osiris and Atys from
the dead, and the raising of Khurum, is a type of the spiritual
regeneration of man. Psyche (the Soul), like Ariadne, had two lovers,
an earthly and an immortal one. The immortal suitor is Dionusos, the
Eros-Phanes of the Orphici, gradually exalted by the progress of
thought, out of the symbol of Sensuality into the torch-bearer of the
Nuptials of the Gods; the Divine Influence which physically called the
world into being, and which, awakening the soul from its Stygian trance,
restores it from earth to Heaven.

Thus the scientific theories of the ancients, expounded in the
Mysteries, as to the origin of the soul, its descent, its sojourn here
below, and its return, were not a mere barren contemplation of the
nature of the world, and of the intelligent beings existing there. They
were not an idle speculation as to the order of the world, and about the
soul, but a study of the means for arriving at the great object
proposed,--the perfecting of the soul; and, as a necessary consequence,
that of morals and society. This Earth, to them, was not the Soul's
home, but its place of exile. Heaven was its home, and there was its
birth-place. To it, it ought incessantly to turn its eyes. Man was not a
terrestrial plant. His roots were in Heaven. The soul had lost its
wings, clogged by the viscosity of matter. It would recover them when it
extricated itself from matter and commenced its upward flight.

Matter being, in their view, as it was in that of St. Paul, the
principle of all the passions that trouble reason, mislead the
intelligence, and stain the purity of the soul, the Mysteries taught man
how to enfeeble the action of matter on the soul, and to restore to the
latter its natural dominion. And lest the stains so contracted should
continue after death, lustrations were used, fastings, expiations,
macerations, continence, and above all, initiations. Many of these
practices were at first merely symbolical,--material signs indicating
the moral purity required of the Initiates; but they afterward came to
be regarded as actual productive causes of that purity.

The effect of initiation was meant to be the same as that of philosophy,
to purify the soul of its passions, to weaken the empire of the body
over the divine portion of man, and to give him here below a happiness
anticipatory of the felicity to be one day enjoyed by him, and of the
future vision by him of the Divine Beings. And therefore Proclus and the
other Platonists taught "that the Mysteries and initiations withdrew
souls from this mortal and material life, to re-unite them to the gods;
and dissipated for the adepts the shades of ignorance by the splendors
of the Deity." Such were the precious fruits of the last Degree of the
Mystic Science,--to see Nature in her springs and sources, and to become
familiar with the causes of things and with real existences.

Cicero says that the soul must exercise itself in the practice of the
virtues, if it would speedily return to its place of origin. It should,
while imprisoned in the body, free itself therefrom by the contemplation
of superior beings, and in some sort be divorced from the body and the
senses. Those who remain enslaved, subjugated by their passions and
violating the sacred laws of religion and society, will re-ascend to
Heaven, only after they shall have been purified through a long
succession of ages.

The Initiate was required to emancipate himself from his passions, and
to free himself from the hindrances of the senses and of matter, in
order that he might rise to the contemplation of the Deity, or of that
incorporeal and unchanging light in which live and subsist the causes of
created natures. "We must," says Porphyry, "flee from everything
sensual, that the soul may with ease re-unite itself with God, and live
happily with Him." "This is the great work of initiation," says
Hierocles,--"to recall the soul to what is truly good and beautiful, and
make it familiar therewith, and they its own; to deliver it from the
pains and ills it endures here below, enchained in matter as in a dark
prison; to facilitate its return to the celestial splendors, and to
establish it in the Fortunate Isles, by restoring it to its first
estate. Thereby, when the hour of death arrives, the soul, freed of its
mortal garmenting, which it leaves behind it as a legacy to earth, will
rise buoyantly to its home among the Stars, there to re-take its ancient
condition, and approach toward the Divine nature as far as man may do."

Plutarch compares Isis to knowledge, and Typhon to ignorance, obscuring
the light of the sacred doctrine whose blaze lights the soul of the
Initiate. No gift of the gods, he holds, is so precious as the knowledge
of the Truth, and that of the Nature of the gods, so far as our limited
capacities allow us to rise toward them. The Valentinians termed
initiation LIGHT. The Initiate, says Psellus, becomes an Epopt, when
admitted to see THE DIVINE LIGHTS. Clemens of Alexandria, imitating the
language of an Initiate in the Mysteries of Bacchus, and inviting this
Initiate, whom he terms blind like Tiresias, to come to see Christ, Who
will blaze upon his eyes with greater glory than the Sun, exclaims: "Oh
Mysteries most truly holy! Oh pure Light! When the torch of the Dadoukos
gleams, Heaven and the Deity are displayed to my eyes! I am initiated,
and become holy!" This was the true object of initiation; to be
sanctified, and TO SEE, that is, to have just and faithful conceptions
of the Deity, the knowledge of Whom was THE LIGHT of the Mysteries. It
was promised the Initiate at Samothrace, that he should become pure and
just Clemens says that by baptism, souls are _illuminated_, and led to
_the pure light_ with which mingles no darkness, nor anything material.
The Initiate, become an Epopt, was called A SEER. "HAIL, NEW-BORN
LIGHT!" the Initiates cried in the Mysteries of Bacchus.

Such was held to be the effect of complete initiation. It lighted up the
soul with rays from the Divinity, and became for it, as it were, the eye
with which, according to the Pythagoreans, it contemplates the field of
Truth; in its mystical abstractions, wherein it rises superior to the
body, whose action on it, it annuls for the time, to re-enter into
itself, so as entirely to occupy itself with the view of the Divinity,
and the means of coming to resemble Him.

Thus enfeebling the dominion of the senses and the passions over the
soul, and as it were freeing the latter from a sordid slavery, and by
the steady practice of all the virtues, active and contemplative, our
ancient brethren strove to fit themselves to return to the bosom of the
Deity. Let not our objects as Masons fall below theirs. We use the
symbols which they used; and teach the same great cardinal doctrines
that they taught, of the existence of an intellectual God, and the
immortality of the soul of man. If the details of their doctrines as to
the soul seem to us to verge on absurdity, let us compare them with the
common notions of our own day, and be silent. If it seems to us that
they regarded the symbol in some cases as the thing symbolized, and
worshipped the sign as if it were itself Deity, let us reflect how
insufficient are our own ideas of Deity, and how we worship those ideas
and images formed and fashioned in our own minds, and not the Deity
Himself: and if we are inclined to smile at the importance they attached
to lustrations and fasts, let us pause and inquire whether the same
weakness of human nature does not exist to-day, causing rites and
ceremonies to be regarded as _actively_ efficient for the salvation of
souls.

And let us ever remember the words of an old writer, with which we
conclude this lecture: "It is a pleasure to stand on the shore, and to
see ships tossed upon the sea: a pleasure to stand in the window of a
castle, and see a battle and the adventures thereof: but no pleasure is
comparable to the standing on the vantage-ground of TRUTH (a hill not to
be commanded, and where the air is always clear and serene), and to see
the errors and wanderings, and mists and tempests, in the vale below;
_so always that this prospect be with pity, and not with swelling or
pride_. Certainly it is Heaven upon Earth to have a man's mind move in
charity, rest in Providence, AND TURN UPON THE POLES OF TRUTH."




XXVI.

PRINCE OF MERCY, OR SCOTTISH TRINITARIAN.


While you were veiled in darkness, you heard repeated by the Voice of
the Great Past its most ancient doctrines. None has the right to object,
if the Christian Mason sees foreshadowed in Chrishna and Sosiosch, in
Mithras and Osiris, the Divine WORD that, as he believes, became Man,
and died upon the cross to redeem a fallen race. Nor can _he_ object if
others see reproduced, in the WORD of the beloved Disciple, that was in
the beginning with God, and that was God, and by Whom everything was
made, only the LOGOS of Plato, and the WORD or Uttered THOUGHT or first
Emanation of LIGHT, or the Perfect REASON of the Great, Silent, Supreme,
Uncreated Deity, believed in and adored by all.

We do not undervalue the importance of any Truth. We utter no word that
can be deemed irreverent by any one of any faith. We do not tell the
Moslem that it is only important for him to believe that there is but
one God, and wholly unessential whether Mahomet was His prophet. We do
not tell the Hebrew that the Messiah whom he expects was born in
Bethlehem nearly two thousand years ago; and that he is a heretic
because he will not so believe. And as little do we tell the sincere
Christian that Jesus of Nazareth was but a man like us, or His history
but the unreal revival of an older legend. To do either is beyond our
jurisdiction. Masonry, of no one age, belongs to all time; of no one
religion, it finds its great truths in all.

To every Mason, there is a GOD; ONE, Supreme, Infinite in Goodness,
Wisdom, Foresight, Justice, and Benevolence; Creator, Disposer, and
Preserver of all things. How, or by what intermediates He creates and
acts, and in what way He unfolds and manifests Himself, Masonry leaves
to creeds and Religions to inquire.

To every Mason, the soul of man is immortal. Whether it emanates from
and will return to God, and what its continued mode of existence
hereafter, each judges for himself. Masonry was not made to settle that.

To every Mason, WISDOM or INTELLIGENCE, FORCE or STRENGTH, and HARMONY,
or FITNESS and BEAUTY, are the Trinity of the attributes of God. With
the subtleties of Philosophy concerning them Masonry does not meddle,
nor decide as to the reality of the supposed Existences which are their
Personifications: nor whether the Christian Trinity be such a
personification, or a Reality of the gravest import and significance.

To every Mason, the Infinite Justice and Benevolence of God give ample
assurance that Evil will ultimately be dethroned, and the Good, the
True, and the Beautiful reign triumphant and eternal. It teaches, as it
feels and knows, that Evil, and Pain, and Sorrow exist as part of a wise
and beneficent plan, all the parts of which work together under God's
eye to a result which shall be perfection. Whether the existence of evil
is rightly explained in this creed or in that, by Typhon the Great
Serpent, by Ahriman and his Armies of Wicked Spirits, by the Giants and
Titans that war against Heaven, by the two co-existent Principles of
Good and Evil, by Satan's temptation and the fall of Man, by Lok and the
Serpent Fenris, it is beyond the domain of Masonry to decide, nor does
it need to inquire. Nor is it within its Province to determine how the
ultimate triumph of Light and Truth and Good, over Darkness and Error
and Evil, is to be achieved; nor whether the Redeemer, looked and longed
for by all nations, hath appeared in Judea, or is yet to come.

It reverences all the great reformers. It sees in Moses, the Lawgiver of
the Jews, in Confucius and Zoroaster, in Jesus of Nazareth, and in the
Arabian Iconoclast, Great Teachers of Morality, and Eminent Reformers,
if no more: and allows every brother of the Order to assign to each such
higher and even Divine Character as his Creed and Truth require.

Thus Masonry disbelieves no truth, and teaches unbelief in no creed,
except so far as such creed may lower its lofty estimate of the Deity,
degrade Him to the level of the passions of humanity, deny the high
destiny of man, impugn the goodness and benevolence of the Supreme God,
strike at those great columns of Masonry, Faith, Hope, and Charity, or
inculcate immorality, and disregard of the active duties of the Order.

Masonry is a worship; but one in which all civilized men can unite; for
it does not undertake to explain or dogmatically to settle those great
mysteries, that are above the feeble comprehension of our human
intellect. It trusts in God, and HOPES; it BELIEVES, like a child, and
is humble. It draws no sword to compel others to adopt its belief, or to
be happy with its hopes And it WAITS with patience to understand the
mysteries of Nature and Nature's God hereafter.

The greatest mysteries in the Universe are those which are ever going on
around us; so trite and common to us that we never note them nor reflect
upon them. Wise men tell us of the _laws_ that regulate the motions of
the spheres, which, flashing in huge circles and spinning on their axes,
are also ever darting with inconceivable rapidity through the infinities
of Space; while we atoms sit here, and dream that all was made for _us_.
They tell us learnedly of centripetal and centrifugal _forces_, gravity
and attraction, and all the other sounding terms invented to hide a
_want_ of meaning. There are other forces in the Universe than those
that are mechanical.

Here are two minute seeds, not much unlike in appearance, and two of
larger size. Hand them to the learned Pundit, Chemistry, who tells us
how combustion goes on in the lungs, and plants are fed with phosphorus
and carbon, and the alkalies and silex. Let her decompose them, analyze
them, torture them in all the ways she knows. The net result of each is
a little sugar, a little fibrin, a little water--carbon, potassium,
sodium, and the like--one cares not to know what.

We hide them in the ground: and the slight rains moisten them, and the
Sun shines upon them, and little slender shoots spring up and grow;--and
what a miracle is the mere growth!--the force, the power, the _capacity_
by which the little feeble shoot, that a small worm can nip off with a
single snap of its mandibles, extracts from the earth and air and water
the different elements, so learnedly catalogued, with which it increases
in stature, and rises imperceptibly toward the sky.

_One_ grows to be a slender, fragile, feeble stalk, soft of texture,
like an ordinary weed; another a strong bush, of woody fibre, armed with
thorns, and sturdy enough to bid defiance to the winds: the third a
tender tree, subject to be blighted by the frost, and looked down upon
by all the forest; while another spreads its rugged arms abroad, and
cares for neither frost nor ice, nor the snows that for months lie
around its roots.

But lo! out of the brown foul earth, and colorless invisible air, and
limpid rain-water, the chemistry of the seeds has extracted
_colors_--four different shades of green, that paint the leaves which
put forth in the spring upon our plants, our shrubs, and our trees.
Later still come the flowers--the vivid colors of the rose, the
beautiful brilliance of the carnation, the modest blush of the apple,
and the splendid white of the orange. Whence come the _colors_ of the
leaves and flowers? By what process of chemistry are _they_ extracted
from the carbon, the phosphorus, and the lime? Is it any greater miracle
to make something out of nothing?

Pluck the flowers. Inhale the delicious _perfumes_; each perfect, and
all delicious. Whence have _they_ come? By what combination of acids and
alkalies could the chemist's laboratory produce _them_?

And now on two comes the fruit--the ruddy apple and the golden orange.
Pluck them--open them! The texture and fabric how totally different! The
_taste_ how entirely dissimilar--the _perfume_ of each distinct from its
flower and from the other. Whence the taste and this new perfume? The
same earth and air and water have been made to furnish a different taste
to each fruit, a different perfume not only to each fruit, but to each
fruit and its own flower.

Is it any more a problem whence come thought and will and perception and
all the phenomena of the mind, than this, whence come the colors, the
perfumes, the taste, of the fruit and flower?

And lo! in each fruit new seeds, each gifted with the same wondrous
power of reproduction--each with the same wondrous _forces_ wrapped up
in it to be again in turn evolved. Forces that had lived three thousand
years in the grain of wheat found in the wrappings of an Egyptian mummy;
forces of which learning and science and wisdom know no more than they
do of the nature and laws of action of God. What can _we_ know of the
nature, and how can _we_ understand the powers and mode of operation of
the human soul, when the glossy leaves, the pearl-white flower, and the
golden fruit of the orange are miracles wholly beyond our comprehension?

We but hide our ignorance in a cloud of words;--and the words too often
are mere combinations of sounds without any meaning. What is the
centrifugal force? A _tendency_ to go in a particular direction! What
external "_force_," then, produces that tendency?

What force draws the needle round to the north? What force moves the
muscle that raises the arm, when the will determines it shall rise?
Whence comes the _will itself_? Is it spontaneous--a first cause, or an
effect? These too are miracles; inexplicable as the creation, or the
existence and self-existence of God.

Who will explain to us the passion, the peevishness, the anger, the
memory, and affections of the small canary-wren? the consciousness of
identity and the dreams of the dog? the reasoning powers of the
elephant? the wondrous instincts, passions, government, and civil
policy, and modes of communication of ideas of the ant and bee?

Who has yet made us to understand, with all his learned words, how heat
comes to us from the Sun, and light from the remote Stars, setting out
upon its journey earth-ward from some, at the time the Chaldeans
commenced to build the Tower of Babel? Or how the image of an external
object comes to and fixes itself upon the retina of the eye; and when
there, how that mere empty, unsubstantial image becomes transmuted into
the wondrous thing that we call SIGHT? Or how the waves of the
atmosphere striking upon the tympanum of the ear--those thin, invisible
waves--produce the equally wondrous phenomenon of HEARING, and become
the roar of the tornado, the crash of the thunder, the mighty voice of
the ocean, the chirping of the cricket, the delicate sweet notes and
exquisite trills and variations of the wren and mocking-bird, or the
magic melody of the instrument of Paganini?

Our senses are mysteries to us, and we are mysteries to ourselves.
Philosophy has taught us nothing as to the _nature_ of our sensations,
our perceptions, our cognizances, the origin of our thoughts and ideas,
but _words_. By no effort or degree of reflection, never so long
continued, can man become conscious of a personal identity in himself,
separate and distinct from his body and his brain. We torture ourselves
in the effort to gain an idea of ourselves, and weary with the exertion.
Who has yet made us understand how, from the contact with a foreign
body, the image in the eye, the wave of air impinging on the ear,
particular particles entering the nostrils, and coining in contact with
the palate, come sensations in the nerves, and from that, perception in
the mind, of the animal or the man?

What do we know of Substance? Men even doubt yet whether it exists.
Philosophers tell us that our senses make known to us only the
_attributes_ of substance, extension, hardness, color, and the like; but
not _the thing itself_ that _is_ extended, solid, black or white; as we
know the _attributes_ of the Soul, its thoughts and its perceptions, and
not the Soul itself which perceives and thinks.

What a wondrous mystery is there in heat and light, existing, we know
not how, within certain limits, narrow in comparison with infinity,
beyond which on every side stretch out infinite space and the blackness
of unimaginable darkness, and the intensity of inconceivable cold! Think
only of the mighty Power required to maintain warmth and light in the
central point of such an infinity, to whose darkness that of Midnight,
to whose cold that of the last Arctic Island is nothing. And yet GOD is
everywhere.

And what a mystery are the effects of heat and cold upon the wondrous
fluid that we call water! What a mystery lies hidden in every flake of
snow and in every crystal of ice, and in their final transformation into
the invisible vapor that rises from the ocean or the land, and floats
above the summits of the mountains!

What a multitude of wonders, indeed, has chemistry unveiled to our eyes!
Think only that if some single law enacted by God were at once repealed,
that of attraction or affinity or cohesion, for example, the whole
material world, with its solid granite and adamant, its veins of gold
and silver, its trap and porphyry, its huge beds of coal, our own frames
and the very ribs and bones of this apparently indestructible earth,
would instantaneously dissolve, with all Suns and Stars and Worlds
throughout all the Universe of God, into a thin invisible vapor of
infinitely minute particles or atoms, diffused throughout infinite
space; and with them light and heat would disappear; unless the Deity
Himself be, as the Ancient Persians thought, the Eternal Light and the
Immortal Fire.

The mysteries of the Great Universe of God! How _can_ we with our
limited mental vision expect to grasp and comprehend them! Infinite
SPACE, stretching out from us every way, without limit: infinite TIME,
without beginning or end; and WE, HERE, and NOW, in the centre of each!
An infinity of suns, the nearest of which only _diminish_ in size,
viewed with the most powerful telescope: each with its retinue of
worlds; infinite numbers of such suns, so remote from us that their
light would not reach us, journeying during an infinity of time, while
the light that _has_ reached us, from some that we _seem_ to see, has
been upon its journey for fifty centuries: our world spinning upon its
axis, and rushing ever in its circuit round the sun; and it, the sun,
and all our system revolving round some great central point; and that,
and suns, stars, and worlds evermore flashing onward with incredible
rapidity through illimitable space: and then, in every drop of water
that we drink, in every morsel of much of our food, in the air, in the
earth, in the sea, incredible multitudes of living creatures, invisible
to the naked eye, of a minuteness beyond belief, yet organized, living,
feeding, _perhaps_ with consciousness of identity, and memory and
instinct.

Such are some of the mysteries of the great Universe of God. And yet we,
whose life and that of the world on which we live form but a point in
the centre of infinite Time: we, who nourish animalculæ within, and on
whom vegetables grow without, would fain learn how God created this
Universe, would understand His Powers, His Attributes, His Emanations,
His Mode of Existence and of Action; would fain know the plan according
to which all events proceed, that plan profound as God Himself; would
know the laws by which He controls His Universe; would fain _see_ and
_talk_ to Him face to face, as man talks to man: and we try not to
believe, because we do not _understand_.

He commands us to love one another, to love our neighbor as ourself; and
we dispute and wrangle, and hate and slay each other, because we cannot
be of one opinion as to the Essence of His Nature, as to His Attributes;
whether He became man born of a woman, and was crucified; whether the
Holy Ghost is of the _same_ substance with the Father, or only of a
_similar_ substance; whether a feeble old man is God's Vicegerent;
whether some are elected from all eternity to be saved, and others to be
condemned and punished; whether punishment of the wicked after death is
to be eternal; whether this doctrine or the other be heresy or
truth;--drenching the world with blood, depopulating realms, and turning
fertile lands into deserts; until, for religious war, persecution, and
bloodshed, the Earth for many a century has rolled round the Sun, a
charnel-house, steaming and reeking with human gore, the blood of
brother slain by brother for opinion's sake, that has soaked into and
polluted all her veins, and made her a horror to her sisters of the
Universe.

And if men were all Masons, and obeyed with all their heart her mild
and gentle teachings, that world would be a paradise; while intolerance
and persecution make of it a hell. For this is the Masonic Creed:
BELIEVE, in God's Infinite Benevolence, Wisdom, and Justice: HOPE, for
the final triumph of Good over Evil, and for Perfect Harmony as the
final result of all the concords and discords of the Universe: and be
CHARITABLE as God is, toward the unfaith, the errors, the follies, and
the faults of men: for all make one great brotherhood.


INSTRUCTION.

_Sen. W. Brother Junior Warden, are you a Prince of Mercy?

_Jun. W. I have seen the Delta and the HOLY NAMES upon it, and am an
AMETH like yourself, in the TRIPLE COVENANT, of which we bear the mark.

_Qu_ What is the first Word upon the Delta?

_Ans_ The Ineffable Name of Deity, the true mystery of which is known
to the Ameth alone.

_Qu_ What do the three sides of the Delta denote to us?

_Ans_ To us, and to all Masons, the three Great Attributes or
Developments of the Essence of the Deity; WISDOM, or the Reflective and
Designing Power, in which, when there was naught but God, the Plan and
Idea of the Universe was shaped and formed: FORCE, or the Executing and
Creating Power, which instantaneously acting, realized the Type and Idea
framed by Wisdom; and the Universe, and all Stars and Worlds, and Light
and Life, and Men and Angels and all living creatures WERE; and HARMONY,
or the Preserving Power, Order, and Beauty, maintaining the Universe in
its State, and constituting the law of Harmony, Motion, Proportion, and
Progression:--WISDOM, which _thought_ the plan; STRENGTH, which
_created_: HARMONY, which _upholds_ and _preserves_:--the Masonic
Trinity, three Powers and one Essence: the three columns which support
the Universe, Physical, Intellectual, and Spiritual, of which every
Masonic Lodge is a type and symbol:--while to the Christian Mason, they
represent the Three that bear record in Heaven, the FATHER, the WORD,
and the HOLY SPIRIT, which three are ONE.

_Qu_ What do the three Greek letters upon the Delta, _Ι Η Σ_
[_Iota, Eta_, and _Sigma_] represent?

_Ans_ Three of the Names of the Supreme Deity among the Syrians,
Phoenicians, and Hebrews ... IHUH [Hebrew: יהה]; _Self-Existence_ ...
AL [Hebrew: א]: _the Nature-God, or Soul of the Universe_ ... SHADAI
[Hebrew: שד] _Supreme Power_. Also three of the Six Chief Attributes of
God, among the Kabbalists:--WISDOM [IEH], the _Intellect_, ([Greek:
Νούς]) of the Egyptians, the _Word_ ([Greek: Λόγος]) of the Platonists,
and the _Wisdom_ ([Greek: Σοφία]) of the Gnostics: ... MAGNIFICENCE
[AL], the Symbol of which was the Lion's Head: ... and VICTORY and GLORY
[_Tsabaoth_], which are the two columns JACHIN and BOAZ, that stand in
the Portico of the Temple of Masonry. To the Christian Mason they are
the first three letters of the name of the Son of God, Who died upon the
cross to redeem mankind.

_Qu_ What is the first of the THREE COVENANTS, of which we bear the
mark?

_Ans_ That which God made with Noah; when He said, "I will not again
curse the earth any more for man's sake, neither will I smite any more
everything living as I have done. While the Earth remaineth, seed-time
and harvest, and cold and heat, and Winter and Summer, and day and night
shall not cease. I will establish My covenant with you, and with your
seed after you, and with every living creature. All mankind shall no
more be cut off by the waters of a flood, nor shall there any more be a
flood to destroy the earth. This is the token of My covenant: I do set
My bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between
Me and the earth: an everlasting covenant between Me and every living
creature on the earth."

_Qu_ What is the second of the Three Covenants?

_Ans_ That which God made with Abraham; when He said, "I am the
Absolute Uncreated God. I will make My covenant between Me and thee, and
thou shalt be the Father of Many Nations, and Kings shall come from thy
loins. I will establish My covenant between Me and thee, and thy
descendants after thee, to the remotest generations, for an everlasting
covenant; and I will be thy God and their God, and will give thee the
land of Canaan for an everlasting possession."

_Qu_ What is the third Covenant?

_Ans_ That which God made with all men by His prophets; when He said:
"I will gather all nations and tongues, and they shall come and see My
Glory. I will create new Heavens and a new earth; and the former shall
not be remembered, nor come into mind. The Sun shall no more shine by
day, nor the Moon by night; but the Lord shall be an everlasting light
and splendor. His Spirit and His Word shall remain with men forever.
The heavens shall vanish away like vapor, and the earth shall wax old
like a garment, and they that dwell therein shall die; but my salvation
shall be forever, and my righteousness shall not end; and there shall be
Light among the Gentiles, and salvation unto the ends of the earth. The
redeemed of the Lord shall return, and everlasting joy be on their
heads, and sorrow and mourning shall flee away."

_Qu_ What is the symbol of the Triple Covenant?

_Ans_ The Triple Triangle.

_Qu_ Of what else is it the symbol to us?

_Ans_ Of the Trinity of Attributes of the Deity; and of the triple
essence of Man, the Principle of Life, the Intellectual Power, and the
Soul or Immortal Emanation from the Deity.

_Qu_ What is the first great Truth of the Sacred Mysteries?

_Ans_ No man hath seen God at any time. He is One, Eternal,
All-Powerful, All-Wise, Infinitely Just, Merciful, Benevolent, and
Compassionate, Creator and Preserver of all things, the Source of Light
and Life, coextensive with Time and Space; Who thought, and with the
Thought created the Universe and all living things, and the souls of
men: THAT IS:--the PERMANENT; while everything beside is a perpetual
genesis.

_Qu_ What is the second great Truth of the Sacred Mysteries?

_Ans_ The Soul of Man is Immortal; not the result of organization, nor
an aggregate of modes of action of matter, nor a succession of phenomena
and perceptions; but an EXISTENCE, one and identical, a living spirit, a
spark of the Great Central Light, that hath entered into and dwells in
the body; to be separated therefrom at death, and return to God who gave
it: that doth not disperse nor vanish at death, like breath or a smoke,
nor can be annihilated; but still exists and possesses activity and
intelligence, even as it existed in God, before it was enveloped in the
body.

_Qu_ What is the third great Truth in Masonry?

_Ans_ The impulse which directs to right conduct, and deters from
crime, is not only older than the ages of nations and cities, but coeval
with that Divine Being Who sees and rules both Heaven and earth. Nor did
Tarquin less violate that Eternal Law, though in his reign there might
have been no written law at Rome against such violence; for the
principle that impels us to right conduct, and warns us against guilt,
springs out of the nature of things. It did not begin to be law when it
was first _written_, nor was it _originated_; but it is coeval with the
Divine Intelligence itself. The consequence of virtue is not to be made
the end thereof: and laudable performances must have deeper roots,
motives and instigations, to give them the stamp of virtues.

_Qu_ What is the fourth great Truth in Masonry?

_Ans_ The moral truths are as absolute as the metaphysical truths. Even
the Deity cannot make it that there should be effects without a cause,
or phenomena without substance. As little could He make it to be sinful
and evil to respect our pledged word, to love truth, to moderate our
passions. The principles of Morality are axioms, like the principles of
Geometry. The moral laws are the necessary relations that flow from the
nature of things, and they are not created by, but have existed
eternally in God. Their continued existence does not depend upon the
exercise of His WILL. Truth and Justice are of His ESSENCE. Not because
we are feeble and God omnipotent, is it our duty to obey His law. We may
be forced, but are not under obligation, to obey the stronger. God is
the principle of Morality, but not by His mere will, which, abstracted
from all other of His attributes, would be neither just nor unjust. Good
is the expression of His will, in so far as that will is itself the
expression of eternal, absolute, uncreated justice, which is _in_ God,
which His will did not create; but which it executes and promulgates, as
_our_ will proclaims and promulgates and executes the idea of the good
which is in us. He has given us the law of Truth and Justice; but He has
not arbitrarily instituted that law. Justice is inherent in His will,
because it is contained in His intelligence and wisdom, in His very
nature and most intimate essence.

_Qu_ What is the fifth great Truth in Masonry?

_Ans_ There is an essential distinction between Good and Evil, what is
just and what is unjust; and to this distinction is attached, for every
intelligent and free creature, the absolute obligation of conforming to
what is good and just. Man is an intelligent and free being,--free,
because he is conscious that it is his duty, and because it is _made_
his duty, to obey the dictates of truth and justice, and therefore he
must necessarily have the power of doing so, which involves the power of
_not_ doing so;--capable of comprehending the distinction between good
and evil, justice and injustice, and the obligation which accompanies
it, and of naturally adhering to that obligation, independently of any
contract or positive law; capable also of resisting the temptations
which urge him toward evil and injustice, and of complying with the
sacred law of eternal justice.

That man is not governed by a resistless Fate or inexorable Destiny; but
is free to choose between the evil and the good: that Justice and Right,
the Good and Beautiful, are of the essence of the Divinity, like His
Infinitude; and therefore they are laws to man: that we are conscious of
our freedom to act, as we are conscious of our identity, and the
continuance and connectedness of our existence; and have the same
evidence of one as of the other; and if we can put _one_ in doubt, we
have no certainty of _either_, and everything is unreal: that we can
deny our free will and free agency, only upon the ground that they are
in the nature of things impossible; which would be to deny the
Omnipotence of God.

_Qu_ What is the sixth great Truth of Masonry?

_Ans_ The necessity of practising the moral truths, is _obligation_.
The moral truths, necessary in the eye of reason, are obligatory on the
will. The moral obligation, like the moral truth that is its foundation,
is _absolute_. As the necessary truths are not more or less necessary,
so the obligation is not more or less obligatory. There are degrees of
importance among different obligations; but none in the obligation
itself. We are not _nearly_ obliged, _almost_ obliged. We are _wholly_
so, or not at all. If there be any place of refuge to which we can
escape from the obligation, it ceases to exist. If the obligation is
absolute, it is immutable and universal. For if that of to-day may not
be that of to-morrow, if what is obligatory on _me_ may not be
obligatory on _you_, the obligation would differ from itself, and be
variable and contingent. This fact is the principle of all morality.
That every act contrary to right and justice, deserves to be repressed
by force, and punished when committed, equally in the absence of any law
or contract: that man naturally recognizes the distinction between the
merit and demerit of actions, as he does that between justice and
injustice, honesty and dishonesty; and feels, without being taught, and
in the absence of law or contract, that it is wrong for vice to be
rewarded or go unpunished, and for virtue to be punished or left
unrewarded: and that, the Deity being infinitely just and good, it must
follow as a necessary and inflexible law that punishment shall be the
result of Sin, its inevitable and natural effect and corollary, and not
a mere arbitrary vengeance.

_Qu_ What is the seventh great Truth in Masonry?

_Ans_ The immutable law of God requires, that besides respecting the
absolute rights of others, and being merely just, we should do good, be
charitable, and obey the dictates of the generous and noble sentiments
of the soul. Charity is a law, because our conscience is not satisfied
nor at ease if we have not relieved the suffering, the distressed, and
the destitute. It is to _give_ that which he to whom you give has no
right to _take_ or _demand_. To be charitable is obligatory on us. We
are the Almoners of God's bounties. But the obligation is not so precise
and inflexible as the obligation to be _just_. Charity knows neither
rule nor limit. It goes beyond all obligation. Its beauty consists in
its liberty. "He that loveth not, knoweth not God; FOR GOD IS LOVE. If
we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and His love is perfected in
us. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love, dwelleth in God, and God
in him." To be kindly affectioned one to another with brotherly love; to
relieve the necessities of the needy, and be generous, liberal, and
hospitable; to return to no man evil for evil; to rejoice at the good
fortune of others, and sympathize with them in their sorrows and
reverses; to live peaceably with all men, and repay injuries with
benefits and kindness; these are the sublime dictates of the Moral Law,
taught from the infancy of the world, by Masonry.

_Qu_ What is the eighth great Truth in Masonry?

_Ans_ That the laws which control and regulate the Universe of God, are
those of motion and harmony. We see only the isolated incidents of
things, and with our feeble and limited capacity and vision cannot
discern their connection, nor the mighty chords that make the apparent
discord perfect harmony. Evil is merely apparent, and all is in reality
good and perfect. For pain and sorrow, persecution and hardships,
affliction and destitution, sickness and death are but the means, by
which alone the noblest virtues could be developed. Without them, and
without sin and error, and wrong and outrage, as there can be no effect
without an adequate cause, there could be neither patience under
suffering and distress; nor prudence in difficulty; nor temperance to
avoid excess; nor courage to meet danger; nor truth, when to speak the
truth is hazardous; nor love, when it is met with ingratitude; nor
charity for the needy and destitute; nor forbearance and forgiveness of
injuries; nor toleration of erroneous opinions; nor charitable judgment
and construction of men's motives and actions; nor patriotism, nor
heroism, nor honor, nor self-denial, nor generosity. These and most
other virtues and excellencies would have no existence, and even their
names be unknown; and the poor virtues that still existed, would scarce
deserve the name; for life would be one flat, dead, low level, above
which none of the lofty elements of human nature would emerge; and man
would lie lapped in contented indolence and idleness, a mere worthless
negative, instead of the brave, strong soldier against the grim legions
of Evil and rude Difficulty.

_Qu_ What is the ninth great Truth in Masonry?

_Ans_ The great leading doctrine of this Degree;--that the JUSTICE, the
WISDOM, and the MERCY of God are alike infinite, alike perfect, and yet
do not in the least jar nor conflict one with the other; but form a
Great Perfect Trinity of Attributes, three and yet one: that, the
principle of merit and demerit being absolute, and every good action
deserving to be rewarded, and every bad one to be punished, and God
being as just as He is good; and yet the cases constantly recurring in
this world, in which crime and cruelty, oppression, tyranny, and
injustice are prosperous, happy, fortunate, and self-contented, and rule
and reign, and enjoy all the blessings of God's beneficence, while the
virtuous and good are unfortunate, miserable, destitute, pining away in
dungeons, perishing with cold, and famishing with hunger, slaves of
oppression, and instruments and victims of the miscreants that govern;
so that this world, if there were no existence beyond it, would be one
great theatre of wrong and injustice, proving God wholly disregardful of
His own necessary law of merit and demerit;--it follows that there must
be another life in which these apparent wrongs shall be repaired; That
all the powers of man's soul tend to infinity; and his indomitable
instinct of immortality, and the universal hope of another life,
testified by all creeds, all poetry, all traditions, establish its
certainty; for man is not an orphan; but hath a Father near at hand: and
the day must come when Light and Truth, and the Just and Good shall be
victorious, and Darkness, Error, Wrong, and Evil be annihilated, and
known no more forever: That the Universe is one great Harmony, in which,
according to the faith of all nations, deep-rooted in all hearts in the
primitive ages, Light will ultimately prevail over Darkness, and the
Good Principle over the Evil: and the myriad souls that have emanated
from the Divinity, purified and ennobled by the struggle here below,
will again return to perfect bliss in the bosom of God to offend against
Whose laws will then be no longer possible.

_Qu_ What, then, is the one great lesson taught to us, as Masons, in
this Degree?

_Ans_ That to that state and realm of Light and Truth and Perfection,
which is absolutely certain, all the good men on earth are tending; and
if there is a law from whose operation none are exempt, which inevitably
conveys their bodies to darkness and to dust, there is another not less
certain nor less powerful, which conducts their spirits to that state of
Happiness and Splendor and Perfection, the bosom of their Father and
their God. The wheels of Nature are not made to roll backward.
Everything presses on to Eternity. From the birth of Time an impetuous
current has set in, which bears all the sons of men toward that
interminable ocean. Meanwhile, Heaven is attracting to itself whatever
is congenial to its nature, is enriching itself by the spoils of the
Earth, and collecting within its capacious bosom whatever is pure,
permanent, and divine, leaving nothing for the last fire to consume but
the gross matter that creates concupiscence; while everything fit for
that good fortune shall be gathered and selected from the ruins of the
world, to adorn that Eternal City.

Let every Mason then obey the voice that calls him thither. Let us seek
the things that are above, and be not content with a world that must
shortly perish, and which we must speedily quit, while we neglect to
prepare for that in which we are invited to dwell forever. While
everything within us and around us reminds us of the approach of death,
and concurs to teach us that this is not our rest, let us hasten our
preparations for another world, and earnestly implore that help and
strength from our Father, which alone can put an end to that fatal war
which our desires have too long waged with our destiny. When these move
in the same direction, and that which God's will renders unavoidable
shall become our choice, all things will be ours; life will be divested
of its vanity, and death disarmed of its terrors.

_Qu_ What are the symbols of the purification necessary to make us
perfect Masons?

_Ans_ Lavation with pure water, or baptism; because to cleanse the body
is emblematical of purifying the soul; and because it conduces to the
bodily health, and virtue is the health of the soul, as sin and vice are
its malady and sickness:--unction, or anointing with oil; because
thereby we are set apart and dedicated to the service and priesthood of
the Beautiful, the True, and the Good:--and robes of white, emblems of
candor, purity, and truth.

_Qu_ What is to us the chief symbol of man's ultimate redemption and
regeneration?

_Ans_ The fraternal supper, of bread which nourishes, and of wine which
refreshes and exhilarates, symbolical of the time which is to come, when
all mankind shall be one great harmonious brotherhood; and teaching us
these great lessons: that as matter changes ever, but no single atom is
annihilated, it is not rational to suppose that the far nobler soul does
not continue to exist beyond the grave: that many thousands who have
died before us might claim to be joint owners with ourselves of the
particles that compose our mortal bodies; for matter ever forms, new
combinations; and the bodies of the ancient dead, the patriarchs before
and since the flood, the kings and common people of all ages, resolved
into their constituent elements, are carried upon the wind over all
continents, and continually enter into and form part of the habitations
of new souls, creating new bonds of sympathy and brotherhood between
each man that lives and all his race. And thus, in the bread we eat, and
in the wine we drink to-night _may_ enter into and form part of us the
identical particles of matter that once formed parts of the material
bodies called Moses, Confucius, Plato, Socrates, or Jesus of Nazareth.
In the truest sense, we eat and drink the bodies of the dead; and cannot
say that there is a single atom of our blood or body, the ownership of
which some other soul might not dispute with us. It teaches us also the
infinite beneficence of God who sends us seed-time and harvest, each in
its season, and makes His showers to fall and His sun to shine alike
upon the evil and the good: bestowing upon us unsolicited His
innumerable blessings, and asking no return. For there are no angels
stationed upon the watch-towers of creation to call the world to prayer
and sacrifice; but He bestows His benefits in silence, like a kind
friend who comes at night, and, leaving his gifts at the door, to be
found by us in the morning, goes quietly away and asks no thanks, nor
ceases his kind offices for our ingratitude. And thus the bread and wine
teach us that our Mortal Body is no more WE than the house in which we
live, or the garments that we wear; but the Soul is I, the ONE,
identical, unchangeable, immortal emanation from the Deity, to return
to God and be forever happy, in His good time; as our mortal bodies,
dissolving, return to the elements from which they came, their particles
coming and going ever in perpetual genesis. To our Jewish Brethren, this
supper is symbolical of the Passover: to the Christian Mason, of that
eaten by Christ and His Disciples when, celebrating the Passover, He
broke bread and gave it to them, saying, "Take! eat! this is My body;"
and giving them the cup, He said, "Drink ye all of it! for this is My
blood of the New Testament, which is shed for many for the remission of
sins;" thus symbolizing the perfect harmony and union between Himself
and the faithful; and His death upon the cross for the salvation of man.

The history of Masonry is the history of Philosophy. Masons do not
pretend to set themselves up for instructors of the human race: but,
though Asia produced and preserved the Mysteries, Masonry has, in Europe
and America, given regularity to their doctrines, spirit, and action,
and developed the moral advantages which mankind may reap from them.
More consistent, and more simple in its mode of procedure, it has put an
end to the vast allegorical pantheon of ancient mythologies, and itself
become a science.

None can deny that Christ taught a lofty morality. "Love one another:
forgive those that despitefully use you and persecute you: be pure of
heart, meek, humble, contented: lay not up riches on earth, but in
Heaven: submit to the powers lawfully over you: become like these little
children, or ye cannot be saved, for of such is the Kingdom of Heaven:
forgive the repentant; and cast no stone at the sinner, if you too have
sinned: do unto others as ye would have others do unto you:" such, and
not abstruse questions of theology, were His simple and sublime
teachings.

The early Christians followed in His footsteps. The first preachers of
the faith had no thought of domination. Entirely animated by His saying,
that he among them should be first, who should serve with the greatest
devotion, they were humble, modest, and charitable, and they knew how to
communicate this spirit of the inner man to the churches under their
direction. These churches were at first but spontaneous meetings of all
Christians inhabiting the same locality. A pure and severe morality,
mingled with religious enthusiasm, was the characteristic of each, and
excited the admiration even of their persecutors. Everything was in
common among them; their property, their joys, and their sorrows. In the
silence of night they met for instruction and to pray together. Their
love-feasts, or fraternal repasts, ended these reunions, in which all
differences in social position and rank were effaced in the presence of
a paternal Divinity. Their sole object was to make men better, by
bringing them back to a simple worship, of which universal morality was
the basis; and to end those numerous and cruel sacrifices which
everywhere inundated with blood the altars of the gods. Thus did
Christianity reform the world, and obey the teachings of its founder. It
gave to woman her proper rank and influence; it regulated domestic life;
and by admitting the slaves to the love-feasts, it by degrees raised
them above that oppression under which half of mankind had groaned for
ages.

This, in its purity, as taught by Christ Himself, was the true primitive
religion, as communicated by God to the Patriarchs. It was no new
religion, but the reproduction of the oldest of all; and its true and
perfect morality is the morality of Masonry, as is the morality of every
creed of antiquity.

In the early days of Christianity, there was an initiation like those of
the pagans. Persons were admitted on special conditions only. To arrive
at a complete knowledge of the doctrine, they had to pass three degrees
of instruction. The initiates were consequently divided into three
classes; the first, _Auditors_, the second, _Catechumens_, and the
third, _the Faithful_. The Auditors were a sort of novices, who were
prepared by certain ceremonies and certain instruction to receive the
dogmas of Christianity. A portion of these dogmas was made known to the
Catechumens; who, after particular purifications, received baptism, or
the initiation of the _theogenesis (divine generation)_; but in the
grand mysteries of that religion, the incarnation, nativity, passion,
and resurrection of Christ, none were initiated but _the Faithful_.
These doctrines, and the celebration of the Holy Sacraments,
particularly the Eucharist, were kept with profound secrecy. These
Mysteries were divided into two parts; the first styled the Mass of the
Catechumens; the second, the Mass of the Faithful. The celebration of
the Mysteries of Mithras was also styled _a mass_; and the ceremonies
used were the same. There were found all the sacraments of the Catholic
Church, even the breath of confirmation. The Priest of Mithras promised
the Initiates deliverance from sin, by means of confession and baptism,
and a future life of happiness or misery. He celebrated the oblation of
bread, image of the resurrection. The baptism of newly-born children,
extreme unction, confession of sins,--all belonged to the Mithriac
rites. The candidate was purified by a species of baptism, a mark was
impressed upon his forehead, he offered bread and water, pronouncing
certain mysterious words.

During the persecutions in the early ages of Christianity, the
Christians took refuge in the vast catacombs which stretched for miles
in every direction under the city of Rome, and are supposed to have been
of Etruscan origin. There, amid labyrinthine windings, deep caverns,
hidden chambers, chapels, and tombs, the persecuted fugitives found
refuge, and there they performed the ceremonies of the Mysteries.

The Basilideans, a sect of Christians that arose soon after the time of
the Apostles, practised the Mysteries, with the old Egyptian legend.
They symbolized Osiris by the Sun, Isis by the Moon, and Typhon by
Scorpio; and wore crystals bearing these emblems, as amulets or
talismans to protect them from danger; upon which were also a brilliant
star and the serpent. They were copied from the talismans of Persia and
Arabia, and given to every candidate at his initiation.

Irenæus tells us that the Simonians, one of the earliest sects of the
Gnostics, had a Priesthood of the Mysteries.

Tertullian tells us that the Valentinians, the most celebrated of all
the Gnostic schools, imitated, or rather perverted, the Mysteries of
Eleusis. Irenæus informs us, in several curious chapters, of the
Mysteries practised by the Marcosians; and Origen gives much information
as to the Mysteries of the Ophites; and there is no doubt that all the
Gnostic sects had Mysteries and an initiation. They all claimed to
possess a secret doctrine, coming to them directly from Jesus Christ,
different from that of the Gospels and Epistles, and superior to those
communications, which in their eyes, were merely exoteric. This secret
doctrine they did not communicate to every one; and among the extensive
sect of the Basilideans hardly one in a thousand knew it, as we learn
from Irenæus. We know the name of only the highest class of their
Initiates. They were styled _Elect_ or _Elus_ [[Greek: Έκλεκτοί]], and
Strangers to the World [[Greek: ξένοι έν κόσμώ]]. They had at least
three Degrees--the _Material_, the _Intellectual_, and the _Spiritual_,
and the lesser and greater Mysteries; and the number of those who
attained the highest Degree was quite small.

Baptism was one of their most important ceremonies; and the Basilideans
celebrated the 10th of January, as the anniversary of the day on which
Christ was baptized in Jordan.

They had the ceremony of laying on of hands, by way of purification; and
that of the mystic banquet, emblem of that to which they believed the
Heavenly Wisdom would one day admit them, in the fullness of things
[[Greek: Πλήρωμα]].

Their ceremonies were much more like those of the Christians than those
of Greece; but they mingled with them much that was borrowed from the
Orient and Egypt: and taught the primitive truths, mixed with a
multitude of fantastic errors and fictions.

The discipline of the secret was the concealment (_occultatio_) of
certain tenets and ceremonies. So says Clemens of Alexandria.

To avoid persecution, the early Christians were compelled to use great
precaution, and to hold meetings of the Faithful [_of the Household of
Faith_] in private places, under concealment by darkness. They assembled
in the night, and they guarded against the intrusion of false brethren
and profane persons, spies who might cause their arrest. They conversed
together figuratively, and by the use of symbols, lest cowans and
eavesdroppers might overhear: and there existed among them a favored
class, or Order, who were initiated into certain Mysteries which they
were bound by solemn promise not to disclose, or even converse about,
except with such as had received them under the same sanction. They were
called _Brethren, the Faithful, Stewards of the Mysteries,
Superintendents, Devotees of the Secret_, and ARCHITECTS.

In the _Hierarchiœ_, attributed to St. Dionysius the Areopagite, the
first Bishop of Athens, the tradition of the sacrament is said to have
been divided into three Degrees, or grades, _purification, initiation_,
and _accomplishment_ or _perfection_; and it mentions also, as part of
the ceremony, _the bringing to sight_.

The Apostolic Constitutions, attributed to Clemens, Bishop of Rome,
describe the early church, and say: "These regulations must on no
account be communicated to all sorts of persons, because of the
Mysteries contained in them." They speak of the Deacon's duty to keep
the doors, that none uninitiated should enter at the oblation.
_Ostiarii_, or doorkeepers, kept guard, and gave notice of the time of
prayer and church-assemblies; and also by private signal, in times of
persecution, gave notice to those within, to enable them to avoid
danger. The Mysteries were open to the _Fideles_ or _Faithful_ only; and
no spectators were allowed at the communion.

Tertullian, who died about A.D. 216, says in his _Apology_: "None are
admitted to the religious Mysteries without an oath of secrecy. We
appeal to your Thracian and Eleusinian Mysteries; and we are especially
bound to this caution, because if we prove faithless, we should not only
provoke Heaven, but draw upon our heads the utmost rigor of human
displeasure. And should strangers betray us? They know nothing but by
report and hearsay. Far hence, ye Profane! is the prohibition from all
holy Mysteries."

Clemens, Bishop of Alexandria, born about A.D. 191, says, in his
_Stromata_, that he cannot explain the Mysteries, because he should
thereby, according to the old proverb, put a sword into the hands of a
child. He frequently compares the Discipline of the Secret with the
heathen Mysteries, as to their internal and recondite wisdom.

Whenever the early Christians happened to be in company with strangers,
more properly termed _the Profane_, they never spoke of their
sacraments, but indicated to one another what they meant by means of
symbols and secret watchwords, disguisedly, and as by direct
communication of mind with mind, and by enigmas.

Origen, born A.D. 134 or 135, answering Celsus, who had objected that
the Christians had a concealed doctrine said: "Inasmuch as the essential
and important doctrines and principles of Christianity are openly
taught, it is foolish to object that there are other things that are
recondite; for this is common to Christian discipline with that of those
philosophers in whose teaching some things were exoteric and some
esoteric: and it is enough to say that it was so with some of the
disciples of Pythagoras."

The formula which the primitive church pronounced at the moment of
celebrating its Mysteries, was this: "Depart, ye Profane! Let the
Catechumens, and those who have not been admitted or initiated, go
forth."

Archelaus, Bishop of Cascara in Mesopotamia, who, in the year 278,
conducted a controversy with the Manichæans, said: "These Mysteries the
church now communicates to him who has passed through the introductory
Degree. They are not explained to the Gentiles at all; nor are they
taught openly in the hearing of Catechumens: but much that is spoken is
in disguised terms, that the Faithful ([Greek: Πιστοί]), who possess
the knowledge, may be still more informed, and those who are not
acquainted with it, may suffer no disadvantage."

Cyril, Bishop of Jerusalem, was born in the year 315, and died in 386,
In his _Catechesis_ he says; "The Lord spake in parables to His hearers
in general; but to His disciples He explained in private the parables
and allegories which He spoke in public. The splendor of glory is for
those who are early enlightened: obscurity and darkness are the portion
of the unbelievers and ignorant. Just so the church discovers its
Mysteries to those who have advanced beyond the class of Catechumens: we
employ obscure terms with others."

St. Basil, the Great Bishop of Cæsarea, born in the year 326, and dying
in the year 376, says: "We receive the dogmas transmitted to us by
writing, and those which have descended to us from the Apostles, beneath
the mystery of oral tradition: for several things have been handed to us
without writing, lest the vulgar, too familiar with our dogmas, should
lose a due respect for them. ... This is what the uninitiated are not
permitted to contemplate; and how should it ever be proper to write and
circulate among the people an account of them?"

St. Gregory Nazianzen, Bishop of Constantinople, A.D. 379, says; "You
have heard as much of the Mystery as we are allowed to speak openly in
the ears of all; the rest will be communicated to you in private; and
that you must retain within yourself.... Our Mysteries are not to be
made known to strangers."

St Ambrose, Archbishop of Milan, who was born in 340, and died in 393,
says in his work _De Mysteries_: "All the Mystery should be kept
concealed, guarded by faithful silence, lest it should be inconsiderately
divulged to the ears of the Profane..... It is not given to all to
contemplate the depths of our Mysteries..... that they may not be seen
by those who ought not to behold them; nor received by those who cannot
preserve them." And in another work: "He sins against God, who divulges
to the unworthy the Mysteries confided to him. The danger is not merely
in violating truth, but in telling truth, if he allow himself to give
hints of them to those from whom they ought to be concealed.....Beware
of casting pearls before swine!... Every Mystery ought to be kept
secret; as it were, to be covered over by silence, lest it should rashly
be divulged to the ears of the Profane. Take heed that you do not
incautiously reveal the Mysteries!"

St. Augustine, Bishop of Hippo, who was born in 347, and died in 430,
says in one of his discourses: "Having dismissed the Catechumens, we
have retained you only to be our hearers; because besides those things
which belong to all Christians in common, we are now to discourse to you
of sublime Mysteries, which none are qualified to hear, but those who,
by the Master's favor, are made partakers of them.....To have taught
them openly, would have been to betray them." And he refers to the Ark
of the Covenant and says that it signified a Mystery, or secret of God,
shadowed over by the cherubim of glory, and honored by being veiled.

St. Chrysostom and St. Augustine speak of initiation more than fifty
times. St. Ambrose writes to those who are initiated; and initiation was
not merely baptism, or admission into the church, but it referred to
initiation into the Mysteries. To the baptized and initiated the
Mysteries of religion were unveiled; they were kept secret from the
Catechumens; who were permitted to hear the Scriptures read and the
ordinary discourses delivered, in which the Mysteries, reserved for the
Faithful, were never treated of. When the services and prayers were
ended, the Catechumens and spectators all withdrew.

Chrysostom, Bishop of Constantinople, was born in 354, and died in 417.
He says: "I wish to speak openly: but I dare not, on account of those
who are not initiated. I shall therefore avail myself of disguised
terms, discoursing in a shadowy manner..... Where the holy Mysteries are
celebrated, we drive away all uninitiated persons, and then close the
doors" He mentions the acclamations of the initiated; "which", he says,
"I here pass over in silence; for it is forbidden to disclose such
things to the Profane". Palladius, in his life of Chrysostom, records, as
a great outrage, that, a tumult having been excited against him by his
enemies, they forced their way into the _penetralia_, where the
uninitiated beheld what was not proper for them to see; and Chrysostom
mentions the same circumstance in his epistle to Pope Innocent.

St. Cyril of Alexandria, who was made Bishop in 412, and died in 444,
says in his 7th Book against Julian: "These Mysteries are so profound
and so exalted, that they can be comprehended by those only who are
enlightened. I shall not, therefore, attempt to speak of what is so
admirable in them, lest by discovering them to the uninitiated, I
should offend against the injunction not to give what is holy to the
impure, nor cast pearls before such as cannot estimate their worth.....I
should say much more, if I were not afraid of being heard by those who
are uninitiated: because men are apt to deride what they do not
understand. And the ignorant, not being aware of the weakness of their
minds, condemn what they ought most to venerate."

Theodoret, Bishop of Cyropolis in Syria, was born in 393, and made
Bishop in 420. In one of his three Dialogues, called the Immutable, he
introduces _Orthodoxus_, speaking thus: "Answer me, if you please, in
mystical or obscure terms: for perhaps there are some persons present
who are not initiated into the Mysteries." And in his preface to
Ezekiel, tracing up the secret discipline to the commencement of the
Christian era, he says: "These Mysteries are so august, that we ought to
keep them with the greatest caution."

Minucius Felix, an eminent lawyer of Rome, who lived in 212, and wrote a
defence of Christianity, says: "Many of them [the Christians] know each
other by tokens and signs (_notis et insignibus_), and they form a
friendship for each other, almost before they become acquainted."

The Latin Word, _tessera_, originally meant a square piece of wood or
stone, used in making tesselated pavements; afterward a tablet on which
anything was written, and then a cube or die. Its most general use was
to designate a piece of metal or wood, square in shape, on which the
watchword of an Army was inscribed; whence _tessera_ came to mean the
watchword itself. There was also a _tessera hospitalis_, which was a
piece of wood cut into two parts, as a pledge of friendship. Each party
kept one of the parts; and they swore mutual fidelity by Jupiter. To
break the _tessera_ was considered a dissolution of the friendship. The
early Christians used it as a Mark, the watchword of friendship. With
them it was generally in the shape of a fish, and made of bone. On its
face was inscribed the word [Greek: Ίχθύς], a fish, the initials of
which represented the Greek words, [Greek: Ιησούς Χριστός ϴεού Υίός
Σωτήρ]; _Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the Saviour_.

St. Augustine (_de Fide et Symbolis_) says: "This is the faith which in
a few words is given to the Novices to be kept by a symbol; these few
words are known to all the Faithful; that by believing they may be
submissive to God; by being thus submissive, they may live rightly; by
living rightly, they may purify their hearts and with a pure heart may
understand what they believe."

Maximus Taurinus says: "The tessera is a symbol and sign by which to
distinguish between the Faithful and the Profane."

There are _three_ Degrees in Blue Masonry; and in addition to the two
words of two syllables each, embodying the binary, three of three
syllables each. There were three Grand Masters, the two Kings, and
Khir-Om the Artificer. The candidate gains admission by three raps, and
three raps call up the Brethren. There are three principal officers of
the Lodge, three lights at the Altar, three gates of the Temple, all in
the East, West, and South. The three lights represent the Sun, the Moon,
and Mercury; Osiris, Isis, and Horus; the Father, the Mother, and the
Child; Wisdom, Strength, and Beauty; Hakamah, Binah, and Daath; Gedulah,
Geburah, and Tepareth. The candidate makes three circuits of the Lodge:
there were three assassins of Khir-Om, and he was slain by three blows
while seeking to escape by the three gates of the Temple. The
ejaculation at his grave was repeated three times. There are three
divisions of the Temple, and three, five, and seven Steps. A Master
works with Chalk, Charcoal, and a vessel of Clay; there are three
movable and three immovable jewels. The Triangle appears among the
Symbols: the two parallel lines enclosing the circle are connected at
top, as are the Columns Jachin and Boaz, symbolizing the equilibrium
which explains the great Mysteries of Nature.

This continual reproduction of the number three is not accidental, nor
without a profound meaning: and we shall find the same repeated in all
the Ancient philosophies.

The Egyptian Gods formed Triads, the third member in each proceeding
from the other two. Thus we have the Triad of Thebes, Amun, Maut, and
Kharso; that of Philae, Osiris, Isis, and Horus; that of Elephantinē and
the Cataracts, Neph, Sate, and Anoukē.

Osiris, Isis, and Horus were the Father, Mother, and Son; the latter
being Light, the Soul of the World, the Son, the Protogonos or
First-Begotten.

Sometimes this Triad was regarded as SPIRIT, or the _active_ Principle
or Generative Power; MATTER, or the PASSIVE Principle or Productive
Capacity; and the Universe, which proceeds from the two Principles.

We also find in Egypt this Triad or Trinity; Ammon-Ra, the Creator:
Osiris-Ra, the Giver of Fruitfulness: Horus-Ra, the Queller of Light;
symbolized by the Summer, Autumn, and Spring Sun. For the Egyptians had
but three Seasons, the three gates of the Temple; and on account of the
different effects of the Sun on those three Seasons, the Deity appears
in these three forms.

The Phœnician Trinity was Ulomos, Chusoros, and the Egg out of which the
Universe proceeded.

The Chaldean Triad consisted of Bel, [the Persian Zervana Akherana],
Oromasdes, and Ahriman; the Good and Evil Principle alike outflowing
from the Father, by their equilibrium and alternating preponderance to
produce harmony. Each was to rule, in turn, for equal periods, until
finally the Evil Principle should itself become good.

The Chaldean and Persian oracles of Zoroaster give us the Triad, Fire,
Light, and Ether.

Orpheus celebrates the Triad of Phanes, Ouranos, and Kronos. Corry says
the Orphic Trinity consisted of Metis, Phanes, and Ericapaeus; Will,
Light or Love, and Life. Acusilaus makes it consist of Metis, Eros, and
Æther: Will, Love, and Ether. Phereycides of Syros, of Fire, Water, and
Air or Spirit. In the two former we readily recognize Osiris and Isis,
the Sun and the Nile.

The first three of the Persian Amshaspands were BAHMAN, the Lord of
LIGHT; Ardibehest, the Lord of FIRE; and Shariver, the Lord of SPLENDOR.
These at once lead us back to the Kabala.

Plutarch says: "The better and diviner nature consists of three; the
Intelligible (_i.e._ that which exists within the Intellect only as
yet), and Matter; [Greek: το Νοητος] and [Greek: Ύλη], and that which
proceeds from these, which the Greeks call Kosmos: of which Plato calls
the Intelligible, the Idea, the Exemplar, the Father: Matter, the
Mother, the Nurse, and the receptacle and place of generation: and the
issue of these two, the Offspring and Genesis."

The Pythagorean fragments say: "Therefore, before the Heaven was made,
there existed Idea and Matter, and God the Demiourgos [workman or active
instrument], of the former. He made the world out of matter, perfect,
only-begotten, with a soul and intellect, and constituted it a
divinity."

Plato gives us Thought, the Father; Primitive Matter, the Mother; and
KOSMOS, the Son, the issue of the two Principles. Kosmos is the ensouled
Universe.

With the later Platonists, the Triad was Potence, Intellect, and Spirit,
Philo represents Sanchoniathon's as Fire, Light, and Flame, the three
Sons of Genos; but this is the Alexandrian, not the Phœnician idea.

Aurelius says the Demiourgos or Creator is triple, and the three
Intellects are the three Kings: He who exists; He who possesses; He who
beholds. The first is that which exists by its essence; the second
exists in the first, and contains or possesses in itself the Universal
of things; all that afterward becomes: the third beholds this Universal,
formed and fashioned intellectually, and so having a separate existence.
The Third exists in the Second, and the Second in the First.

The most ancient Trinitarian doctrine on record is that of the Brahmins.
The Eternal Supreme Essence, called PARABRAHMA, BRAHM, PARATMA, produced
the Universe by self-reflection, and first revealed himself as BRAHMA,
the _Creating_ Power, then as VISHNU, the Preserving Power, and lastly
as SIVA, the _Destroying_ and _Renovating_ Power; the three Modes in
which the Supreme Essence reveals himself in the material Universe; but
which soon came to be regarded as three distinct Deities. These three
Deities they styled the TRIMURTI, or TRIAD.

The Persians received from the Indians the doctrine of the three
principles, and changed it to that of a principle of Life, which was
individualized by the Sun, and a principle of Death, which was
symbolized by cold and darkness; parallel of the moral world; and in
which the continual and alternating struggle between light and darkness,
life and death, seemed but a phase of the great struggle between the
good and evil principles, embodied in the legend of ORMUZD and AHRIMAN.
MITHRAS, a Median reformer, was deified after his death, and invested
with the attributes of the Sun; the different astronomical phenomena
being figuratively detailed as actual incidents of his life; in the same
manner as the history of BUDDHA was invented among the Hindūs.

The Trinity of the Hindūs became among the Ethiopians and Abyssinians
NEPH-AMON, PHTHA, and NEITH--the God CREATOR, whose emblem was a
ram--MATTER, or the primitive mud, symbolized by a globe or an egg, and
THOUGHT, or the LIGHT which contains the germ of everything; triple
manifestation of one and the same God (ATHOM), considered in three
aspects, as the _creative power, goodness_, and _wisdom_. Other Deities
were speedily invented; and among them OSIRIS, represented by the Sun,
ISIS, his wife, by the Moon or Earth, TYPHON, his Brother, the
Principle of Evil and Darkness, who was the son of Osiris and Isis. And
the Trinity of OSIRIS, ISIS, and HORUS became subsequently the Chief
Gods and objects of worship of the Egyptians.

The ancient Etruscans (a race that emigrated from the Rhætian Alps into
Italy, along whose route evidences of their migration have been
discovered, and whose language none have yet succeeded in reading)
acknowledged only one Supreme God; but they had images for His different
attributes, and temples to these images. Each town had one National
Temple, dedicated to the three great attributes of God, STRENGTH,
RICHES, and WISDOM, or _Tina, Talna_, and _Minerva_. The National Deity
was always a Triad under one roof; and it was the same in Egypt, where
one Supreme God alone was acknowledged, but was worshipped as a Triad,
with different names in each different home. Each city in Etruria might
have as many gods and gates and temples as it pleased; but three sacred
gates, and one Temple to three Divine Attributes were obligatory,
wherever the laws of Tages (or Taunt or Thoth) were received. The only
gate that remains in Italy, of the olden time, undestroyed, is the Porta
del Circo at Volterra; and it has upon it the three heads of the three
National Divinities, one upon the keystone of its magnificent arch, and
one above each side-pillar.

The Buddhists hold that the God SAKYA of the Hindūs, called in Ceylon,
GAUTAMA, in India beyond the Ganges, SOMONAKODOM, and in China, CHY-KIA,
or Fo, constituted a Trinity [TRIRATNA], of BUDDHA, DHARMA, and
SANGA,--_Intelligence, Law_, and _Union_ or _Harmony_.

The Chinese Sabæans represented the Supreme Deity as composed of
CHANG-TI, the _Supreme Sovereign_; TIEN, the _Heavens_; and TAO, the
_Universal Supreme Reason_ and _Principle of Faith_; and that from
Chaos, an immense silence, an immeasurable void without perceptible
forms, alone, infinite, immutable, moving in a circle in illimitable
space, without change or alteration, when vivified by the Principle of
Truth, issued all Beings, under the influence of TAO, Principle of
Faith, who produced one, one produced two, two produced three, and three
produced all that is.

The Sclavono-Vendes typified the Trinity by the three heads of the God
TRICLAV; and the Pruczi or Prussians by the Tri-une God PERKOUN,
PIKOLLOS, and POTRIMPOS, the Deities of _Light_ and _Thunder_, of
_Hell_ and the _Earth_, its fruits and animals: and the Scandinavians by
ODIN, FREA, and THOR.

In the KABALAH, or the Hebrew traditional philosophy, the Infinite
Deity, beyond the reach of the Human Intellect, and without Name, Form,
or Limitation, was represented as developing Himself, in order to
create, and by self-limitation, in ten emanations or out-flowings,
called SEPHIROTH, or _rays_. The first of these, in the world AZILUTH,
that is, within the Deity, was KETHER, or the _Crown_, by which we
understand the Divine Will or Potency. Next came, as a pair, HAKEMAH and
BAINAH, ordinarily translated "Wisdom" and "Intelligence," the former
termed the FATHER, and the latter the MOTHER. HAKEMAH is the active
_Power_ or _Energy_ of Deity, by which He produces within Himself
Intellection or Thinking: and BAINAH, the passive _Capacity_, from
which, acted on by the Power, the Intellection flows. This Intellection
is called DAATH: and it is the "WORD," of Plato and the Gnostics; the
_unuttered_ word, _within_ the Deity. Here is the origin of the Trinity
of the Father, the Mother or Holy Spirit, and the Son or Word.

Another Trinity was composed of the fourth Sephirah, GEDULAH or KHASED,
_Benignity_ or _Mercy_, also termed FATHER (_Aba_); the fifth, GEBURAH,
_Severity_ or Strict _Justice_, also termed the MOTHER (_Imma_); and the
sixth, the SON or _Issue_ of these, TIPHARETH, _Beauty_ or _Harmony_.
"Everything," says the SOHAR, "proceeds according to the Mystery of the
Balance"--that is, by the equilibrium of Opposites: and thus from the
Infinite Mercy and the Infinite Justice, in equilibrium, flows the
perfect Harmony of the Universe. Infinite POWER, which is Lawless, and
Infinite WISDOM, in Equilibrium, also produce BEAUTY or HARMONY, as Son,
Issue, or Result--the Word, or utterance of the Thought of God. Power
and Justice or Severity are the _same_: Wisdom and Mercy or Benignity
are the same;--in the Infinite Divine Nature.

According to Philo of Alexandria, the Supreme Being, Primitive Light or
Archetype of Light, uniting with WISDOM [Σοψια], the mother of Creation,
forms in Himself the types of all things, and acts upon the Universe
through the WORD [Λογος ... Logos], who dwells in God, and in whom all
His powers and attributes develop themselves; a doctrine borrowed by him
from Plato.

Simon Magus and his disciples taught that the Supreme Being or Centre of
Light produced first of all, three couples of united Existences, of
both sexes, [[Greek: Συζυγίας] ...Suzugias], which were the origins of
all things: REASON and INVENTIVENESS; SPEECH and THOUGHT; CALCULATION
and REFLECTION: [[Greek: Νούς] and [Greek: Επίνοιa, Φωνή] and [Greek:
Εννοια, Λογισμός] and [Greek: Ενθύμησις] ... Nöus and Epinoia, Phōne and
Ennoia, Logismos and Enthumēsis]; of which Ennoia or WISDOM was the
first produced, and Mother of all that exists.

Other Disciples of Simon, and with them most of the Gnostics, adopting
and modifying the doctrine, taught that the [Greek: Πλήρωμα] .. Plerōma,
or PLENITUDE of Superior Intelligences, having the Supreme Being at
their head, was composed of eight Eons [[Greek: Αίόνης] .. Aiōnes] of
different sexes;.. PROFUNDITY and SILENCE; SPIRIT and TRUTH; the WORD
and LIFE; MAN and the CHURCH: [[Greek: Βυθός] and [Greek: Σιγή; Πνεϋμα]
and [Greek: Αλήθεια; Λόγος] and [Greek: Ζωή; Ανθρωπος] and [Greek:
Έκκλησία] ... Buthos and Sigē; Pneuma and Aletheia; Logos and Zōe;
Anthrōpos and Ekklēsia].

Bardesanes, whose doctrines the Syrian Christians long embraced, taught
that the unknown Father, happy in the Plenitude of His Life and
Perfections, first produced a Companion for Himself [[Greek: Σύζυγος]
... Suzugos], whom He placed in the Celestial Paradise and who became,
by Him, the Mother of CHRISTOS, Son of the Living God: _i.e._ (laying
aside the allegory), that the Eternal conceived, in the silence of His
decrees, the Thought of revealing Himself by a Being who should be His
image or His Son: that to the Son succeeded his Sister and Spouse, the
Holy Spirit, and they produced four Spirits of the elements, male and
female, Maio and Jabseho, Nouro and Rucho; then Seven Mystic Couples of
Spirits, and Heaven and Earth, and all that is; then seven spirits
governing the planets, twelve governing the Constellations of the
Zodiac, and thirty-six Starry Intelligences whom he called Deacons:
while the Holy Spirit [_Sophia Achamoth_], being both the Holy
Intelligence and the Soul of the physical world, went from the Plerōma
into that material world and there mourned her degradation, until
CHRISTOS, her former spouse, coming to her with his Divine Light and
Love, guided her in the way to purification, and she again united
herself with him as his primitive Companion.

Basilides, the Christian Gnostic, taught that there were seven
emanations from the Supreme Being: The First-born, Thought, the Word,
Reflection, Wisdom, Power, and Righteousness.

[Greek: Πρωτογονος, Νους, Λογος, Φροντσις, Σοψα, Δυναμις], and [Greek:
Δικαιοσύνη] Protogonos, Nous, Logos, Phronesis, Sophia, Dunamis, and
Dikarosunē; from whom emanated other Intelligences in succession, to the
number, in all, of three hundred and sixty-five; which were God
manifested, and composed the Plenitude of the Divine Emanations, or the
God Abraxas; of which the Thought [or Intellect, [Greek: Nouς] ... Nous]
united itself, by baptism in the river Jordan, with the man Jesus,
servant [[Greek: διάκονος]. Diakonos] of the human race; but did not
suffer with Him; and the disciples of Basilides taught that the [Greek:
Νοϋς], put on the appearance only of humanity, and that Simon of Cyrene
was crucified in His stead and ascended into Heaven.

Basilides held that out of the unrevealed God, who is at the head of the
world of emanations, and exalted above all conception or designation
[[Greek: Ό άατονόμαστος, άρρητος]], were evolved seven living,
self-subsistent, ever-active hyposatized powers:


FIRST: THE INTELLECTUAL POWERS.

1st. NOUS [Greek: Νοϋς] The Mind.
2d. LOGOS [Greek: Λόγος] The Reason.
3d. Phronesis [Greek: Φρόνησις] The Thinking Power.
4th. Sophia [Greek: Σοφία] Wisdom.


SECOND: THE ACTIVE OR OPERATIVE POWER.

5th. Dunamis [Greek: Δυναμις] Might, accomplishing the
purposes of Wisdom.

THIRD: THE MORAL ATTRIBUTES.

6th. Dikaiosunē [Greek: Δικαιοσύνη] Holiness or Moral Perfection.
7th. Eirēnē [Greek: Είρήνη] Inward Tranquility.

These Seven Powers ([Greek: Δυνάμεις].. Dunameis), with the Primal
Ground out of which they were evolved, constituted in his scheme the
[Greek: Πρωτη Όγδοάς][Prote Ogdoas], or First Octave, the root of all
Existence. From this point, the spiritual life proceeded to evolve out
of itself continually many gradations of existence, each lower one being
still the impression, the _antetype_, of the immediate higher one. He
supposed there were 365 of these regions or gradations, expressed by the
mystical word [Greek: Αβραξας] [Abraxas].

The [Greek: αβραξας] is thus interpreted, by the usual method of
reckoning Greek letters numerically.... [Greek:
α,1..β,2..ρ,100..a,l..ξ] 60..[Greek: α,l..ς], 200==365: which is the
whole Emanation-World, as the development of the Supreme Being.

In the system of Basilides, Light, Life, Soul, and Good were opposed to
Darkness, Death, Matter, and Evil, throughout the whole course of the
Universe.

According to the Gnostic view, God was represented as the immanent,
incomprehensible and original source of all perfection; the unfathomable
ABYSS ([Greek: βυθος].. buthos), according to Valentinus, exalted above
all possibility of designation; of whom, properly speaking, nothing can
be predicated; the [Greek: άκατονόμαστς] of Basilides, the [Greek: ών]
of Philo. From this incomprehensible Essence of God, an _immediate_
transition to finite things is inconceivable. _Self-limitation_ is the
first beginning of a communication of life on the part of God--the first
passing of the hidden Deity into manifestation; and from this proceeds
all further self-developing manifestation of the Divine Essence. From
this primal link in the chain of life there are evolved, in the first
place, the manifold powers or attributes inherent in the divine Essence,
which, until that first self-comprehension, were all hidden in the Abyss
of His Essence. Each of these attributes presents the whole divine
Essence under one particular aspect; and to each, therefore, in this
respect, the title of God may appropriately be applied. These Divine
Powers evolving themselves to self-subsistence, become thereupon the
germs and principles of all further developments of life. The life
contained in them unfolds and individualizes itself more and more, but
in such a way that the successive grades of this evolution of life
continually sink lower and lower; the spirits become feebler, the
further they are removed from the first link in the series.

The first manifestation they termed [Greek: πρώτη κατάληψις έαυτού protē
katalēpsis heautou] or [Greek: πρώτον καταληπτόν τού θεου] [_proton
Katalēpton tou Theou_]; which was hypostatically represented in a
[Greek: νόύς] or [Greek: λόγος], [_Nous_ or _Logos_].

In the Alexandrian Gnosis, the Platonic notion of the [Greek: ύλη]
[Hulē] predominates. This is the dead, the unsubstantial--the boundary
that limits from without the evolution of life in its gradually
advancing progression, whereby the Perfect is ever evolving itself into
the less Perfect. This [Greek: ύλη] again, is represented under various
images;--at one time as the darkness that exists alongside of the light;
at another, as the void [Greek: κένωμα, κενόν] ....Kenoma, Kenon, in
opposition to the Fullness, [Greek: Πλήρωμα ...Pleroma] of the Divine
Life; or as the shadow that accompanies the light; or as the chaos, or
the sluggish, stagnant, dark water. This matter, dead in itself,
possesses by its own nature no inherent tendency; as life of every sort
is foreign to it, itself makes no encroachment on the Divine. As,
however, the evolutions of the Divine Life (the essences developing
themselves out of the progressive emanation) become feebler, the further
they are removed from the first link in the series; and as their
connection with the first becomes looser at each successive step, there
arises at the last step of the evolution, an imperfect, defective
product, which, unable to retain its connection with the chain of Divine
Life, sinks from the World of Eons into the material chaos: or,
according to the same notion, somewhat differently expressed [according
to the Ophites and to Bardesanes], a drop from the fullness of the
Divine life bubbles over into the bordering void. Hereupon the dead
matter, by commixture with the living principle, which it wanted, first
of all receives animation. But, at the same time, also, the divine, the
living, becomes corrupted by mingling with the chaotic mass. Existence
now multiplies itself. There arises a subordinate, defective life; there
is ground for a new world; a creation starts into being, beyond the
confines of the world of emanation. But on the other hand, since the
chaotic principle of matter has acquired vitality, there now arises a
more distinct and more active opposition to the God-like--a barely
negative, blind, ungodly nature-power, which obstinately resists all
influence of the Divine; hence, as products, of the spirit of the
[Greek: ύλη], (of the [Greek: πνεύμα ύλικον].. Pneuma Hulikon), are
Satan, malignant spirits, wicked men, in none of whom is there any
reasonable or moral principle, or any principle of a rational will; but
blind passions alone have the ascendency. In them there is the same
conflict, as the scheme of Platonism supposes, between the soul under
the guidance of Divine reason the [Greek: νούς... Nous], and the soul
blindly resisting reason--between the [Greek: πρόνοια] [pronoia] and the
[Greek: αναγη] [anagē], the Divine Principle and the natural.

The Syrian Gnosis assured the existence of an active, turbulent kingdom
of evil, or of darkness, which, by its encroachments on the kingdom of
light, brought about a commixture of the light with the darkness, of the
God-like with the ungodlike.

Even among the Platonists, some thought that along with an organized,
inert matter, the substratum of the corporeal world, there existed from
the beginning a blind, lawless motive power, an ungodlike soul, as its
original motive and active principle. As the inorganic matter was
organized into a corporeal world, by the plastic power of the Deity, so,
by the same power, law and reason were communicated to that turbulent,
irrational soul. Thus the chaos of the [Greek: ύλη] was transformed into
an organized world, and that blind soul into a rational principle, a
mundane soul, animating the Universe. As from the latter proceeds all
rational, spiritual life in humanity, so from the former proceeds all
that is irrational, all that is under the blind sway of passion and
appetite; and all malignant spirits are its progeny.

In one respect _all_ the Gnostics agreed: they _all_ held, that there
was a world purely emanating out of the vital development of God, a
creation evolved directly out of the Divine Essence, far exalted above
any outward creation produced by God's plastic power, and conditioned by
pre-existing matter. They agreed in holding that the framer of _this
lower world_ was not the Father of _that higher world_ of emanation; but
the Demiurge [[Greek: Δεμιουργος]], a being of a kindred nature with the
Universe framed and governed by him, and far inferior to that higher
system and the Father of it.

But some, setting out from ideas which had long prevailed among certain
Jews of Alexandria, supposed that the Supreme God created and governed
the world by His ministering spirits, by the angels. At the head of
these angels stood one who had the direction and control of all;
therefore called the Artificer and Governor of the World. This Demiurge
they compared with the plastic, animating mundane spirit of Plato and
Platonists, the [Greek: δεύτερος θεός].. Deuteros Theos; the [Greek:
θεός γενητός]..., Theos Genetos, who, moreover, according to the Timæus
of Plato, strives to represent the IDEA of the Divine Reason, in that
which is _becoming_ (as contradistinguished from that which _is_) and
temporal. This angel is a representative of the Supreme God, on the
lower stage of existence: he does not act independently, but merely
according to the ideas inspired in him by the Supreme God; just as the
plastic, mundane soul of the Platonists creates all things after the
pattern of the ideas communicated by the Supreme Reason [[Greek: Νούς]
... Nous--the [Greek: ό έστι ζώον].... ho esti zōon--the [Greek:
παράδειγμα]. paradeigma, of the Divine Reason hypostatized]. But these
ideas transcend his limited essence; he cannot understand them; he is
merely their unconscious organ; and therefore is unable himself to
comprehend the whole scope and meaning of the work which he performs. As
an organ under the guidance of a higher inspiration, he reveals higher
truths than he himself can comprehend. The mass of the Jews, they held,
recognized not the angel, by whom, in all the Theophanies of the Old
Testament, God _revealed_ Himself; they knew not the Demiurge in his
true relation to the hidden Supreme God, _who never reveals Himself_ in
the sensible world. They confounded the type and the archetype, the
symbol and the idea. They rose no higher than the Demiurge; they took
him to be the Supreme God Himself. But the spiritual men among them, on
the contrary, clearly perceived, or at least _divined_, the ideas veiled
under Judaism; they rose beyond the Demiurge, to a knowledge of the
Supreme God; and are therefore properly His worshippers [[Greek
θεραπευταί].. Therapeutai].

Other Gnostics, who had not been followers of the Mosaic religion, but
who had, at an earlier period, framed to themselves an oriental Gnosis,
regarded the Demiurge as a being absolutely _hostile_ to the Supreme
God. He and his angels, notwithstanding their finite nature, wish to
establish their independence: they will tolerate no foreign rule within
their realm. Whatever of a higher nature descends into their kingdom,
they seek to hold imprisoned there, lest it should raise itself above
their narrow precincts. Probably, in this system, the kingdom of the
Demiurgic Angels corresponded, for the most part, with that of the
deceitful Star-Spirits, who seek to rob man of his freedom, to beguile
him by various arts of deception, and who exercise a tyrannical sway
over the things of this world. Accordingly, in the system of these
Sabæans, the seven Planet-Spirits, and the twelve Star-Spirits of the
zodiac, who sprang from an irregular connection between the cheated
Fetahil and the Spirit of Darkness, play an important part in everything
that is bad. The Demiurge is a limited and limiting being, proud,
jealous, and revengeful; and this his character betrays itself in the
Old Testament, which, the Gnostics held, came from him. They transferred
to the Demiurge himself, whatever in the idea of God, as presented by
the Old Testament, appeared to then defective. Against his will and rule
the [Greek: υνη] was continually rebelling, revolting without control
against the dominion which he, the fashioner, would exercise over it,
casting off the yoke imposed on it, and destroying the work he had
begun. The same jealous being, limited in his power, ruling with
despotic sway, they imagined they saw in nature. He strives to check the
germination of the divine seeds of life which the Supreme God of
Holiness and Love, who has no connection whatever with the sensible
world, has scattered among men. That perfect God was at most known and
worshipped in Mysteries by a few spiritual men.

The Gospel of St. John is in great measure a polemic against the
Gnostics, whose different sects, to solve the great problems, the
creation of a material world by an immaterial Being, the fall of man,
the incarnation, the redemption and restoration of the spirits called
men, admitted a long series of intelligences, intervening in a series of
spiritual operations; and which they designated by the names, _The
Beginning, the Word, the Only-Begotten, Life, Light_, and _Spirit_
[Ghost]: in Greek, [Greek: Άρχή, Δόγος, Μονογενής, Ζωή, Φώς] and [Greek:
Πνεϋμα], [Archē, Logos, Monogenēs, Zōe, Phōs, and Pneuma]. St. John, at
the beginning of his Gospel, avers that it was Jesus Christ who existed
in the Beginning; that He was the WORD of God by which everything was
made; that He was the Only-Begotten, the Life and the Light, and that He
diffuses among men the Holy Spirit [or Ghost], the Divine Life and
Light.

So the Plēroma [[Greek: Πλήρωμα]], Plenitude or Fullness, was a favorite
term with the Gnostics, and Truth and Grace were the Gnostic Eons; and
the Simonians, Dokētēs, and other Gnostics held that the Eon Christ
Jesus was never really, but only apparently clothed with a human body:
but St. John replies that the Word did really become Flesh, and dwelt
among us; and that in Him were the Plēroma and Truth and Grace.

In the doctrine of Valentinus, reared a Christian at Alexandria, God was
a perfect Being, an Abyss [[Greek: Βυθός].. Buthos], which no
intelligence could sound, because no eye could reach the invisible and
ineffable heights on which He dwelt, and no mind could comprehend the
duration of His existence; He has always been; He is the Primitive
Father and Beginning [the [Greek: Προπατωρ] and [Greek: ροαρχή]..
Propatōr and Proarchē]: He will BE always, and does not grow old. The
development of His Perfections produced the intellectual world. After
having passed infinite ages in repose and silence, He manifested Himself
by His Thought, source of all His manifestations, and which received
from Him the germ of His creations. Being of His Being, His Thought
[[Greek: Έννοια].. Ennoia] is also termed [Greek: Χάρις] [Charis],
Grace or Joy, and [Greek: Σιγή], or [Greek: Άρρητον] [Sigē or Arrēton],
Silence or the Ineffable. Its first manifestation was [Greek: Νους]
[Nous], the Intelligence, first of the Eons, commencement of all things,
first revelation of the Divinity, the [Greek: Μονογενής] [Monogenēs], or
Only-Begotten: next, Truth [[Greek: Άλήθεια] .. Alētheia], his
companion. Their manifestations were the Word [[Greek: Λογος].. Logos]
and Life [[Greek: Ζοή].. Zoe]; and theirs, Man and the Church [[Greek:
Ανθροπος] and [Greek: Έκκλησία].. Anthrōpos and Ekklēsia]: and from
these, other twelve, six of whom were Hope, Faith, Charity,
Intelligence, Happiness, and Wisdom; or, in the Hebrew, _Kesten, Kina,
Amphe, Ouananim, Thaedes_, and _Oubina_. The harmony of the Eons,
struggling to know and be united to the Primitive God, was disturbed,
and to redeem and restore them, the Intelligence [Greek: Νούς] produced
Christ and the Holy Spirit His companion; who restored them to their
first estate of happiness and harmony; and thereupon they formed the Eon
Jesus, born of a Virgin, to whom the Christos united himself in baptism,
and who, with his Companion Sophia-Achamoth, saved and redeemed the
world.

The Marcosians taught that the Supreme Deity produced by His words the
[Greek: Λογος] [Logos] or Plenitude of Eons: His first utterance was a
syllable of four letters, each of which became a being; His second of
four, His third of ten, and His fourth of twelve: thirty in all, which
constituted the [Greek: Πλήρωμα] [Plēroma].

The Valentinians, and others of the Gnostics, distinguished three orders
of existences:--1st. The divine germs of life, exalted by their nature
above matter, and akin to the [Greek: Σοφία] [Sophia], to the mundane
soul and to the Plēroma:--the spiritual natures, [Greek: φύσεις
πνεματικαί] [Phuseis Pneumatikai]: 2d. The natures originating in the
life, divided from the former by the mixture of the [Greek: ύλη]--the
psychical natures, [Greek: φύσεις ψυχικαί] [Phuseis Psuchikai]; with
which begins a perfectly new order of existence, an image of that higher
mind and system, in a subordinate grade; and finally, 3d. The Ungodlike
or Hylic Nature, which resists all amelioration, and whose tendency is
only to destroy--the nature of blind lust and passion.

The nature of the [Greek: πνευματικόν] [pneumatikon], the spiritual, is
essential relationship with God (the [Greek: όμοούσιον τώ θεώ]..
Homoousion tō Theō): hence the life of Unity, the undivided, the
absolutely simple (ούσία ένική, μονοειδής.. Ousia henike, monoeides).

The essence of the ψυχικοί [psuchikoi] is disruption into multiplicity,
manifoldness; which, however, is subordinate to a higher unity, by which
it allows itself to be guided; first unconsciously, then consciously.

The essence of the ύλικοì [Hulikoi] (of whom Satan is the head), is the
direct opposite to all unity; disruption and disunion in itself, without
the least sympathy, without any point of coalescence whatever for unity;
together with an effort to destroy all unity, to extend its own inherent
disunion to everything, and to rend everything asunder. This principle
has no power to posit anything; but only to negative: it is unable to
create, to produce, to form, but only to destroy, to decompose.

By Marcus, the disciple of Valentinus, the idea of a Λογος του οντος
[Logos Tou Ontos], of a WORD, manifesting the hidden Divine Essence, in
the Creation, was spun out into the most subtle details--the entire
creation being, in his view, a continuous _utterance_ of the Ineffable.
The way in which the germs of divine life [the σπέρματα πνευματικά..
spermata pneumatika], which lie shut up in the Eons, continually unfold
and individualize themselves more and more, is represented as a
spontaneous analysis of the several _names_ of the Ineffable, into their
several _sounds_..An _echo_ of the Plēroma falls down into the ύλη
[Hule], and becomes the forming of a new but lower creation.

One formula of the pneumatical baptism among the Gnostics ran thus: "In
the NAME which is hidden from all the Divinities and Powers" [of the
Demiurge], "The Name of Truth" [the Αλήθεια [Aletheia],
self-manifestation of the Buthos], which Jesus of Nazareth has put on in
the light-zones of Christ, the living Christ, through the Holy Ghost,
for the redemption of the angels,--the Name by which all things attain
to Perfection. The candidate then said: "I am established and redeemed;
I am redeemed in my soul from this world, and from all that belongs to
it, by the name of יהוה, who has redeemed the Soul of Jesus by the
living Christ". The assembly then said: "Peace (or Salvation) to all on
whom this name rests!"

The boy Dionusos, torn in pieces, according to the Bacchic Mysteries, by
the Titans, was considered by the Manicheans as simply representing the
Soul, swallowed up by the powers of darkness,--the divine life rent
into fragments by matter:--that part of the luminous essence of the
primitive man [the [Greek: πρώτος άνθρωπος] [Protos Anthropos] of Mani,
the [Greek: πράων άνθρωπος] [Praōn Anthrōpos] of the Valentinians, the
Adam Kadmon of the Kabalah; and the Kaiomorts of the Zendavesta],
swallowed up by the powers of darkness; the Mundane Soul, mixed with
matter--the seed of divine life, which had fallen into matter, and had
thence to undergo a process of purification and development.

The [Greek: Γνώσις] [Gnosis] of Carpocrates and his son Epiphanes
consisted in the knowledge of one Supreme Original being, the highest
unity, from whom all existence has emanated, and to whom it strives to
return. The finite spirits that rule over the several portions of the
Earth, seek to counteract this universal tendency to unity; and from
their influence, their laws, and arrangements, proceeds all that checks,
disturbs, or limits the original communion, which is the basis of
nature, as the outward manifestation of that highest Unity. These
spirits, moreover, seek to retain under their dominion the souls which,
emanating from the highest Unity, and still partaking of its nature,
have lapsed into the corporeal world, and have there been imprisoned in
bodies, in order, under their dominion, to be kept within the cycle of
migration. From these finite spirits, the popular religions of different
nations derive their origin. But the souls which, from a reminiscence of
their former condition, soar upward to the contemplation of that higher
Unity, reach to such perfect freedom and repose, as nothing afterward
can disturb or limit, and rise superior to the popular deities and
religions. As examples of this sort, they named Pythagoras, Plato,
Aristotle, and Christ. They made no distinction between the latter and
the wise and good men of every nation. They taught that any other soul
which could soar to the same height of contemplation, might be regarded
as equal with Him.

The Ophites commenced their system with a Supreme Being, long unknown to
the Human race, and still so the greater number of men; the [Greek:
Βυθος] [Buthos], or Profundity, Source of Light, and of Adam-Kadmon, the
Primitive Man, made by the Demiourgos, but perfected by the Supreme God
by the communication to him of the Spirit [[Greek: Πνεύμα].. Pneuma].
The first emanation was the Thought of the Supreme Deity [the [Greek:
Έννοια].. Ennoia], the conception of the Universe in the Thought of
God. This Thought, called also Silence ([Greek: Σιγη].. Sigē), produced
the Spirit [[Greek: Πνευμα].. Pneuma], Mother of the Living, and Wisdom
of God. Together with this Primitive Existence, Matter existed also (the
Waters, Darkness, Abyss, and Chaos), eternal like the Spiritual
Principle. Buthos and His Thought, uniting with Wisdom, made her
fruitful by the Divine Light, and she produced a perfect and an
imperfect being, _Christos_, and a Second and inferior wisdom,
_Sophia-Achamoth_, who falling into chaos remained entangled there,
became enfeebled, and lost all knowledge of the Superior Wisdom that
gave her birth. Communicating movement to Chaos, she produced
Ialdabaoth, the Demiourgos, Agent of Material Creation, and then
ascended toward her first place in the scale of creation. Ialdabaoth
produced an angel that was his image, and this a second, and so on in
succession to the sixth after the Demiourgos: the seven being
_reflections_ one of the other, yet different and inhabiting seven
distinct regions. The names of the six thus produced were IAO, SABAOTH,
ADONAI, ELOI, ORAI, and ASTAPHAI. Ialdabaoth, to become independent of
his mother, and to pass for the Supreme Being, made the world, and man,
in his own image; and his mother caused the Spiritual principle to pass
from him into man so made; and henceforward the contest between the
Demiourgos and his mother, between light and darkness, good and evil,
was concentrated in man; and the image of Ialdabaoth, reflected upon
matter, became the Serpent-Spirit, Satan, the Evil Intelligence. Eve,
created by Ialdabaoth, had by his Sons children that were angels like
themselves. The Spiritual light was withdrawn from man by Sophia, and
the world surrendered to the influence of evil; until the Spirit, urged
by the entreaties of Wisdom, induced the Supreme Being to send Christos
to redeem it. Compelled, despite himself, by his Mother, Ialdabaoth
caused the man Jesus to be born of a Virgin, and the Celestial Saviour,
uniting with his Sister, Wisdom, descended through the regions of the
seven angels, appeared in each under the form of its chief, concealed
his own, and entered with his sister into the man Jesus at the baptism
in Jordan. Ialdabaoth, finding that Jesus was destroying his empire and
abolishing his worship, caused the Jews to hate and crucify Him; before
which happened, Christos and Wisdom had ascended to the celestial
regions. They restored Jesus to life and gave Him an ethereal body, in
which He remained eighteen mouths on earth, and receiving from Wisdom
the perfect knowledge [Γνωσις.. Gnosis], communicated it to a small
number of His apostles, and then arose to the intermediate region
inhabited by Ialdabaoth, where, unknown to him, He sits at his right
hand, taking from him the Souls of Light purified by Christos. When
nothing of the Spiritual world shall remain subject to Ialdabaoth, the
redemption will be accomplished, and the end of the world, the
completion of the return of Light into the Plenitude, will occur.

Tatian adopted the theory of Emanation, of Eons, of the existence of a
God too sublime to allow Himself to be known, but displaying Himself by
Intelligences emanating from His bosom. The first of these was His
spirit [Πνευμα.. Pneuma], God Himself, God thinking, God conceiving the
Universe. The second was the Word [Λογος.. Logos], no longer merely the
Thought or Conception, but the Creative Utterance, manifestation of the
Divinity, but emanating from the Thought or Spirit; the First-Begotten,
author of the visible creation. This was the Trinity, composed of the
Father, Spirit, and Word.

The Elxaïtes adopted the Seven Spirits of the Gnostics; but named them
Heaven, Water, Spirit, The Holy Angels of Prayer, Oil, Salt, and the
Earth.

The opinion of the Doketes as to the human nature of Jesus Christ, was
that most generally received among the Gnostics. They deemed the
intelligences of the Superior World too pure and too much the
antagonists of matter, to be willing to unite with it: and held that
Christ, an Intelligence of the first rank, in appearing upon the earth,
did not become confounded with matter, but took upon Himself only the
_appearance_ of a body, or at the most used it only as an envelope.

Noëtus termed the Son the first Utterance of the Father; the Word, not
by Himself, as an Intelligence, and unconnected with the flesh, a real
Son; but a Word, and a perfect Only-Begotten; light emanated from the
Light; water flowing from its spring; a ray emanated from the Sun.

Paul of Samosata taught that Jesus Christ was the Son of Joseph and
Mary; but that the Word, Wisdom, or Intelligence of God, the Νους [Nous]
of the Gnostics, had united itself with Him, so that He might be said to
be at once the Son of God, and God Himself.

Arius called the Saviour the first of creatures, non-emanated from God,
but really created, by the direct will of God, before time and the
ages. According to the Church, Christ was of the same nature as God;
according to some dissenters, of the same nature as man. Arius adopted
the theory of a nature analogous to both. When God resolved to create
the Human race, He made a Being which He called THE WORD, THE SON,
WISDOM [Λόγος, Υίòς, Σοφíα.. Logos, Uios, Sophia], to the end that He
might give existence to men. This WORD is the Ormuzd of Zoroaster, the
Ensoph of the Kabalah, the Νούς [Nous] of Platonism and Philonism, and
the Σοφια or Δεμιουργος [Sophia or Demiourgos] of the Gnostics. He
distinguished the Inferior Wisdom, or the daughter, from the Superior
Wisdom; the latter being _in_ God, inherent in His nature, and incapable
of communication to any creature: the second, by which the Son was made,
communicated itself to Him, and therefore He Himself was entitled to be
called the Word and the Son.

Manes, founder of the Sect of the Manicheans, who had lived and been
distinguished among the Persian Magi, profited by the doctrines of
Scythianus, a Kabalist or Judaizing Gnostic of the times of the
Apostles; and knowing those of Bardesanes and Harmonius, derived his
doctrines from Zoroasterism, Christianity, and Gnosticism. He claimed to
be the Παράκλητος [Paraklētos] or Comforter, in the Sense of a Teacher,
organ of the Deity, but not in that of the Holy Spirit or Holy Ghost:
and commenced his _Epistola Fundamenti_ in these words: "Manes, Apostle
of Jesus Christ, elect of God the Father; Behold the Words of Salvation,
emanating from the living and eternal fountain." The dominant idea of
his doctrine was Pantheism, derived by him from its source in the
regions of India and on the confines of China: that the cause of all
that exists is in God; and at last, God is all in all. All souls are
equal--God is in all, in men, animals, and plants. There are two Gods,
one of Good and the other of Evil, each independent, eternal, chief of a
distinct Empire; necessarily, and of their very natures, hostile to one
another. The Evil God, Satan, is the Genius of matter alone. The God of
Good is infinitely his Superior, the True God; while the other is but
the chief of all that is the Enemy of God, and must in the end succumb
to His Power. The Empire of Light alone is eternal and true; and this
Empire is a great chain of Emanations, all connected with the Supreme
Being which they make manifest; all HIM, under different forms, chosen
for one end, the triumph of the Good. In each of His members lie hidden
thousands of ineffable treasures. Excellent in His Glory,
incomprehensible in His Greatness, the Father has joined to Himself
those fortunate and glorious Eons [Αιωνες.. Aionēs], whose Power and
Number it is impossible to determine. This is Spinoza's Infinity of
Infinite Attributes of God. Twelve Chief Eons, at the head of all, were
the Genii of the twelve Constellations of the Zodiac, and called by
Manes Olamin. Satan, also, Lord of the Empire of Darkness, had an Army
of Eons or Demons, emanating from his Essence, and reflecting more or
less his image, but divided and inharmonious among themselves. A war
among them brought them to the confines of the Realm of Light.
Delighted, they sought to conquer it. But the Chief of the Celestial
Empire created a Power which he placed on the frontiers of Heaven to
protect his Eons, and destroy the Empire of Evil. This was the Mother of
Life, the Soul of the World, an Emanation from the Supreme Being, too
pure to come in immediate contact with matter. It remained in the
highest region; but produced a Son, the first Man the _Kaiomorts_,
Adam-Kadmon, Πρώτος Ανθρωπος [Protos Anthropos,] and Hivil-Zivah; of the
Zend-Avesta, the Kabalah, the Gnosis, and Sabeism; who commenced the
contest with the Powers of Evil, but, losing part of his panoply, of his
Light, his Son and many souls born of the Light, who were devoured by
the darkness, God sent to his assistance the living Spirit, or the Son
of the First Man Υίός Άνθρώπου ... Uios Anthropou, or Jesus Christ. The
Mother of Life, general Principle of Divine Life, and the first Man,
Primitive Being that reveals the Divine Life, are too sublime to be
connected with the Empire of Darkness. The Son of Man or Soul of the
World, enters into the Darkness, becomes its captive, to end by
tempering and softening its savage nature. The Divine Spirit, after
having brought back the Primitive Man to the Empire of Light, raises
above the world that part of the Celestial Soul that remained unaffected
by being mingled with the Empire of Darkness. Placed in the region of
the Sun and Moon, this pure soul, the Son of Man, the Redeemer or
Christ, labors to deliver and attract to Himself that part of the Light
or of the Soul of the First Man diffused through matter; which done, the
world will cease to exist. To retain the rays of Light still remaining
among his Eons, and ever tending to escape and return, by concentrating
them, the Prince of Darkness, with their consent, made Adam, whose soul
was of the Divine Light, contributed by the Eons, and his body of
matter, so that he belonged to both Empires, that of Light and that of
Darkness. To prevent the light from escaping at once, the Demons forbade
Adam to eat the fruit of "knowledge of good and evil," by which he would
have known the Empire of Light and that of Darkness. He obeyed; an Angel
of Light induced him to transgress, and gave him the means of victory;
but the Demons created Eve, who seduced him into an act of Sensualism,
that enfeebled him, and bound him anew in the bonds of matter. This is
repeated in the case of every man that lives.

To deliver the soul, captive in darkness, the Principle of Light, or
Genius of the Sun, charged to redeem the Intellectual World, of which he
is the type, came to manifest Himself among men. Light appeared in the
darkness, but the darkness comprehended it not; according to the words
of St. John. The Light could not unite with the darkness. It but put on
the _appearance_ of a human body, and took the name of Christ in the
Messiah, only to accommodate itself to the language of the Jews. The
Light did its work, turning the Jews from the adoration of the Evil
Principle, and the Pagans from the worship of Demons. But the Chief of
the Empire of Darkness caused Him to be crucified by the Jews. Still He
suffered in appearance only, and His death gave to all souls the symbol
of their enfranchisement. The person of Jesus having disappeared, there
was seen in His place a cross of Light, over which a celestial voice
pronounced these words: "The cross of Light is called The Word, Christ,
The Gate, Joy, The Bread, The Sun, The Resurrection, Jesus, The Father,
The Spirit, Life, Truth, and Grace."

With the Priscillianists there were two principles, one the Divinity,
the other, Primitive Matter and Darkness; each eternal. Satan is the son
and lord of matter; and the secondary angels and demons, children of
matter. Satan created and governs the visible world. But the soul of man
emanated from God, and is of the same substance with God. Seduced by the
evil spirits, it passes through various bodies, until, purified and
reformed, it rises to God and is strengthened by His light. These powers
of evil hold mankind in pledge; and to redeem this pledge, the Saviour,
Christ the Redeemer, came and died upon the cross of expiation, thus
discharging the written obligation. He, like all souls, was of the same
substance with God, a manifestation of the Divinity, not forming a
second person; unborn, like the Divinity, and nothing else than the
Divinity under another form.

It is useless to trace these vagaries further; and we stop at the
frontiers of the realm of the three hundred and sixty-five thousand
emanations of the Mandaıtes from the Primitive Light, Fira or Ferho
and Yavar; and return contentedly to the simple and sublime creed of
Masonry.

Such were some of the ancient notions concerning the Deity; and taken in
connection with what has been detailed in the preceding Degrees, this
Lecture affords you a true picture of the ancient speculations. From the
beginning until now, those who have undertaken to solve the great
mystery of the creation of a material universe by an Immaterial Deity,
have interposed between the two, and between God and man, divers
manifestations of, or emanations from, or personified attributes or
agents of, the Great Supreme God, who is coexistent with Time and
coextensive with Space.

The universal belief of the Orient was, that the Supreme Being did not
Himself create either the earth or man. The fragment which commences the
Book of Genesis, consisting of the first chapter and the three first
verses of the second, assigns the creation or rather the _formation_ or
_modelling_ of the world from matter already existing in confusion, not
to IHUH, but to the ALHIM, well known as Subordinate Deities, Forces, or
Manifestations, among the Phœnicians. The second fragment imputes it to
IHUH-ALHIM,[3] and St. John assigns the creation to the Λογος or WORD;
and asserts that CHRIST was that WORD, as well as LIGHT and LIFE, other
emanations from the Great Primeval Deity, to which other faiths had
assigned the work of creation.

[Footnote 3: _The Substance_, or _Very Self_, of which the Alohayim are
the manifestations.]

An absolute existence, wholly immaterial, in no way within the reach of
our senses; a cause, but not an effect, that never was not, but existed
during an infinity of eternities, before there was anything else except
Time and Space, is wholly beyond the reach of our conceptions. The mind
of man has wearied itself in speculations as to His nature, His essence,
His attributes; and ended in being no wiser than it began. In the
impossibility of conceiving of immateriality, we feel at sea and lost
whenever we go beyond the domain of matter. And yet we know that there
_are_ Powers, Forces, Causes, that are themselves _not_ matter. We give
them names, but _what_ they really are, and what their essence, we are
wholly ignorant.

But, fortunately, it does not follow that we may not _believe_, or even
_know_, that which we cannot _explain_ to ourselves, or that which is
beyond the reach of our comprehension. If we believed only that which
our intellect can grasp, measure, comprehend, and have distinct and
clear ideas of, we sh+ ould believe scarce anything. The senses are not
the witnesses that bear testimony to us of the loftiest truths.

Our greatest difficulty is, that language is not adequate to express our
ideas; because our words refer to _things_, and are images of what is
substantial and material. If we use the word "_emanation_," our mind
involuntarily recurs to something material, _flowing out_ of some other
thing that is material; and if we _reject_ this idea of materiality,
nothing is left of the emanation but an unreality. The word "thing"
itself suggests to us that which is material and within the cognizance
and jurisdiction of the senses. If we cut away from it the idea of
materiality, it presents itself to us as _no_ thing, but an intangible
unreality, which the mind vainly endeavors to grasp. _Existence_ and
_Being_ are terms that have the same color of materiality; and when we
speak of a _Power_ or _Force_, the mind immediately images to itself one
physical and material thing acting upon another. Eliminate that idea;
and the Power or Force, devoid of physical characteristics, seems as
unreal as the shadow that dances on a wall, itself a mere _absence_ of
light; as spirit is to us merely that which is _not_ matter.

Infinite space and infinite time are the two primary ideas. We formulize
them thus: add body to body and sphere to sphere, until the imagination
wearies; and still there will remain beyond, a void, empty, unoccupied
SPACE, limitless, because it _is_ void. Add event to event in continuous
succession, forever and forever, and there will still remain, before and
after, a TIME in which there was and will be no event, and also endless
because it too _is_ void.

Thus these two ideas of the boundlessness of space and the endlessness
of time seem to _involve_ the ideas that matter and events are limited
and finite. We cannot conceive of an _infinity_ of worlds or of events;
but only of an _indefinite_ number of each; for, as we struggle to
conceive of their _infinity_, the thought ever occurs in despite of all
our efforts--there must be _space_ in which there are _no_ worlds;
there must have been _time_ when there were no events.

We cannot conceive how, if this earth moves millions of millions of
miles a million times repeated, it is still _in the centre of space_;
nor how, if we lived millions of millions of ages and centuries, we
should still be in the centre of eternity--with still as much _space_ on
one side as on the other; with still as much _time_ before us as behind;
for that seems to say that the world has not moved nor we lived at all.

Nor can we comprehend how an infinite series of worlds, added together,
is no larger than an infinite series of atoms; or an infinite series of
centuries no longer than an infinite series of seconds; both being alike
infinite, and therefore one series containing no more nor fewer units
than the other.

Nor have we the capacity to form in ourselves any idea of that which is
_immaterial_. We use the word, but it conveys to us only the idea of the
absence and negation of materiality; which vanishing, Space and Time
alone, infinite and boundless, seem to us to be left.

We cannot form any conception of an effect without a cause. We cannot
but believe, indeed we know, that, how far soever we may have to run
back along the chain of effects and causes, it cannot be _infinite_; but
we must come at last to _something_ which is not an effect, but the
first cause: and yet the fact is literally beyond our comprehension. The
mind refuses to grasp the idea of _self_-existence, of existence without
a beginning. As well expect the hair that grows upon our head to
understand the nature and immortality of the soul.

It does not need to go so far in search of mysteries; nor have we any
right to disbelieve or doubt the existence of a Great First Cause,
itself no effect, because we cannot comprehend it; because the words we
use do not even express it to us adequately.

We rub a needle for a little while, on a dark, inert mass of iron ore,
that had lain idle in the earth for many centuries. Something is thereby
communicated to the steel--we term it a _virtue_, a _power_, or a
_quality_--and then we balance it upon a pivot; and, lo! drawn by some
invisible, mysterious Power, one pole of the needle turns to the North,
and there the same Power keeps the same pole for days and years; will
keep it there, perhaps, as long as the world lasts, carry the needle
where you will, and no matter what seas or mountains intervene between
it and the North Pole of the world. And this Power, thus acting, and
indicating to the mariner his course over the trackless ocean, when the
stars shine not for many days, saves vessels from shipwreck, families
from distress, and those from sudden death on whose lives the fate of
nations and the peace of the world depend. But for it, Napoleon might
never have reached the ports of France on his return from Egypt, nor
Nelson lived to fight and win at Trafalgar. Men call this Power
_Magnetism_, and then complacently think that they have explained it
all; and yet they have but given a new _name_ to an unknown thing, to
_hide_ their ignorance. What is this wonderful Power? It is a real,
actual, _active_ Power: that we know and see. But what its _essence_ is,
or how it acts, we do not know, any more than we know the essence or the
mode of action of the Creative Thought and Word of God.

And again, what is that which we term _galvanism_ and
_electricity_,--which, evolved by the action of a little acid on two
metals, aided by a magnet, circles the earth in a second, sending from
land to land the _Thoughts_ that govern the transactions of individuals
and nations? The mind has formed no notion of matter, that will include
_it_; and no name that we can give it, helps us to understand its
essence and its being. It _is_ a Power, like Thought and the Will. We
know no more.

What is this power of _gravitation_ that makes everything upon the earth
tend to the centre? How does it reach out its invisible hands toward the
erratic meteor-stones, arrest them in their swift course, and draw them
down to the earth's bosom? It _is_ a _power_. We know no more.

What is that _heat_ which plays so wonderful a part in the world's
economy?--that _caloric_, latent everywhere, within us and without us,
produced by combustion, by intense pressure, and by swift motion? Is it
substance, matter, spirit, or immaterial, a mere Force or State of
Matter?

And what is _light?_ A _substance_, say the books,--_matter_, that
travels to us from the sun and stars, each ray separable into seven, by
the prism, of distinct colors, and with distinct peculiar qualities and
actions. And _if_ a substance, what is its essence, and what power is
inherent in it, by which it journeys incalculable myriads of miles, and
reaches us ten thousand years or more after it leaves the stars?

All power is equally a mystery. Apply intense cold to a drop of water
in the centre of a globe of iron, and the globe is shattered as the
water freezes. Confine a little of the same limpid element in a cylinder
which Enceladus or Typhon could not have riven asunder, and apply to it
intense heat, and the vast power that couched latent in the water
shivers the cylinder to atoms. A little shoot from a minute seed, a
shoot so soft and tender that the least bruise would kill it, forces its
way downward into the hard earth, to the depth of many feet, with an
energy wholly incomprehensible. What are these mighty forces, locked up
in the small seed and the drop of water?

Nay, what is LIFE itself, with all its wondrous, mighty energies,--that
power which maintains the heat within us, and prevents our bodies, that
decay so soon without it, from resolution into their original,
elements--Life, that constant miracle, the nature and essence whereof
have eluded all the philosophers; and all their learned dissertations on
it are a mere jargon of words?

No wonder the ancient Persians thought that Light and Life were
one,--both emanations from the Supreme Deity, the archetype of light. No
wonder that in their ignorance they worshipped the Sun. God breathed
into man the spirit of life,--not matter, but an emanation from Himself;
not a creature _made_ by Him, nor a distinct existence; but a _Power_,
like His own Thought: and light, to those great-souled ancients, also
seemed no creature, and no gross material substance, but a pure
emanation from the Deity, immortal and indestructible like Himself.

What, indeed, is REALITY? Our dreams are as real, while they last, as
the occurrences of the daytime. We see, hear, feel, act, experience
pleasure and suffer pain, as vividly and actually in a dream as when
awake. The occurrences and transactions of a year are crowded into the
limits of a second: and the dream remembered is as real as the past
occurrences of life.

The philosophers tell us that we have no cognizance of _substance_
itself, but only of its _attributes_: that when we see that which we
call a block of marble, our perceptions give us information only of
something extended, solid, colored, heavy, and the like; but not of the
very _thing_ itself, to which these attributes belong. And yet the
attributes do not exist without the substance. They are not substances,
but adjectives. There is no such _thing_ or _existence_ as hardness,
weight or color, by itself, detached from any subject, moving first
here, then there, and attaching itself to this and to the other subject.
And yet, they say, the attributes are not the subject.

So Thought, Volition, and Perception are not the soul, but its
_attributes_; and we have no cognizance of the soul _itself_, but only
of _them_, its manifestations. Nor of God; but only of His Wisdom,
Power, Magnificence, Truth, and other attributes.

And yet we know that there is matter, a soul within our body, a God that
lives in the Universe.

Take, then, the attributes of the soul. I am conscious that I exist and
am the same identical person that I was twenty years ago. I am conscious
that my body is not I,--that if my arms were lopped away, this _person_
that I call ME, would still remain, complete, entire, identical as
before. But I cannot ascertain, by the most intense and long-continued
reflection, what I am, nor where within my body I reside, nor whether I
am a point, or an expanded substance. I have no power to examine and
inspect. I exist, will, think, perceive. _That_ I know, and nothing
more. I think a noble and sublime Thought. What is that Thought? It is
not Matter, nor Spirit. It is not a Thing; but a _Power_ and _Force_. I
make upon a paper certain conventional marks, that _represent_ that
Thought. There is no Power or Virtue in the _marks_ I write, but only in
the Thought which they tell to others. I die, but the Thought still
lives. It is a Power. It acts on men, excites them to enthusiasm,
inspires patriotism, governs their conduct, controls their destinies,
disposes of life and death. The words I speak are but a certain
succession of particular sounds, that by conventional arrangement
communicate to others the Immaterial, Intangible, Eternal Thought. The
fact that Thought continues to exist an instant, after it makes its
appearance in the soul, proves it immortal: for there is nothing
conceivable that can destroy it. The spoken words, being mere sounds,
may vanish into thin air, and the written ones, mere marks, be burned,
erased, destroyed: but the THOUGHT itself lives still, and must live on
forever.

A Human Thought, then, is an actual EXISTENCE, and a FORCE and POWER,
capable of acting upon and controlling matter as well as mind. Is not
the existence of a God, who is the immaterial soul of the Universe, and
whose THOUGHT, embodied or not embodied in His WORD, is an Infinite
Power, of Creation and production, destruction and preservation, quite
as comprehensible as the existence of a Soul, of a Thought separated
from the Soul, of the Power of that Thought to mould the fate and
influence the Destinies of Humanity?

And yet we know not when that Thought comes, nor what it is. It is not
WE. We do not mould it, shape it, fashion it. It is neither our
mechanism nor our invention. It appears spontaneously, flashing, as it
were, into the soul, making that soul the involuntary instrument of its
utterance to the world. It comes to us, and seems a stranger to us,
seeking a home.

As little can we explain the mighty power of the human WILL. Volition,
like Thought, seems spontaneous, an effect without a cause.
Circumstances _provoke_ it, and serve as its _occasion_, but do not
_produce_ it. It springs up in the soul, like Thought, as the waters
gush, upward in a spring. Is it the manifestation of the soul, merely
making apparent what passes _within_ the soul, or an emanation from it,
going abroad and acting outwardly, itself a real Existence, as it is an
admitted Power? We can but own our ignorance. It is certain that it acts
on other souls, controls, directs them, shapes their action, legislates
for men and nations: and yet it is not material nor visible; and the
laws it writes merely inform one soul of what has passed within another.

God, therefore, is a mystery, only as everything that surrounds us, and
as we ourselves, are mysteries. We know that there is and must be a
FIRST CAUSE. His attributes, severed from Himself, are unrealities. As
color and extension, weight and hardness, do not exist apart from matter
as separate existences and substantives, spiritual or immaterial; so the
Goodness, Wisdom, Justice, Mercy, and Benevolence of God are not
independent existences, personify them as men may, but _attributes_ of
the Deity, the _adjectives_ of One Great Substantive. But we know that
He must be Good, True, Wise, Just, Benevolent, Merciful: and in all
these, and all His other attributes, Perfect and Infinite; because we
are conscious that these are laws imposed on us by the very nature of
things, necessary, and without which the Universe would be confusion and
the existence of a God incredible. They are of His _essence_, and
necessary, as His existence is.

He is the Living, Thinking, Intelligent SOUL of the Universe, the
PERMANENT, the STATIONARY [Εστως.. Estos], of Simon Magus, the ONE that
always is [To Ον, To ON] of Plato, as contradistinguished from the
perpetual flux and reflux, or _Genesis_, of _things_.

And, as the Thought of the Soul, emanating _from_ the Soul, becomes
audible and visible in Words, so did THE THOUGHT OF GOD, springing up
within Himself, immortal _as_ Himself, when once conceived,--immortal
_before_, because _in_ Himself, utter Itself in THE WORD, its
manifestation and mode of communication, and thus create the Material,
Mental, Spiritual Universe, which, like Him, never _began_ to exist.

This is the _real_ idea of the Ancient Nations: GOD, the Almighty
Father, and Source of All; His THOUGHT, _conceiving_ the whole Universe,
and _willing_ its creation: His WORD, _uttering_ that THOUGHT, and thus
becoming the Creator or Demiourgos, in whom was Life and Light, and that
Light the Life of the Universe.

Nor did that Word _cease_ at the single act of Creation; and having set
going the great machine, and enacted the laws of its motion and
progression, of birth and life, and change and death, cease to exist, or
remain thereafter in inert idleness.

FOR THE THOUGHT OF GOD LIVES AND IS IMMORTAL. Embodied in the WORD, is
not only _created_, but it _preserves_. It conducts and controls the
Universe, all spheres, all worlds, all actions of mankind, and of every
animate and inanimate creature. It speaks in the soul of every man who
lives. The Stars, the Earth, the Trees, the Winds, the universal voice
of Nature, tempest, and avalanche, the Sea's roar and the grave voice of
the waterfall, the hoarse thunder and the low whisper of the brook, the
song of birds, the voice of love, the speech of men, all are the
alphabet in which it communicates itself to men, and informs them of the
will and law of God, the Soul of the Universe. And thus most truly _did_
"THE WORD BECOME FLESH AND DWELL AMONG MEN."

God, the unknown FATHER [Πατήρ Άγνωστος.. Pater Agnōstos], known to us
only by His Attributes; the ABSOLUTE I AM:... The THOUGHT of God
[Ένννοια. Ennoia], and the WORD [Λόγος.... Logos], Manifestation and
expression of the Thought; .... Behold THE TRUE MASONIC TRINITY; the
UNIVERSAL SOUL, the THOUGHT _in_ the Soul, the WORD, or Thought
expressed; the THREE IN ONE, of a Trinitarian Ecossais.

Here Masonry pauses, and leaves its Initiates to carry out and develop
these great Truths in such manner as to each may seem most accordant
with reason, philosophy, truth, and his religious faith. It declines to
act as Arbiter between them. It looks calmly on, while each multiplies
the intermediates between the Deity and Matter, and the personifications
of God's manifestations and attributes, to whatever extent his reason,
his conviction, or his fancy dictates.

While the Indian tells us that PARABRAHMA, BRAHM, and PARATMA were the
first Triune God, revealing Himself as BRAHMA, VISHNU, and SIVA,
_Creator, Preserver, and Destroyer_;....

The Egyptian, of AMUN-RE, NEITH, and PHTHA, _Creator, Matter, Thought_
or _Light_; the Persian of _his_ Trinity of Three Powers in ORMUZD,
Sources of _Light, Fire_, and _Water_; the Buddhists of the God SAKYA, a
Trinity composed of BUDDHA, DHARMA, and SANGA,--_Intelligence, Law_, and
_Union_ or _Harmony_; the Chinese Sabeans of _their_ Trinity of
_Chang-ti_, the Supreme Sovereign; _Tien_, the Heavens; and _Tao_, the
Universal Supreme Reason and Principle of all things; who produced the
Unit; that, two; two, three; and three, all that is;....

While the Sclavono-Vend typifies _his_ Trinity by the three heads of the
God _Triglav_; the Ancient Prussian points to _his_ Triune God,
_Perkoun, Pikollos_, and _Potrimpos_, Deities of Light and Thunder, of
Hell and of the Earth; the Ancient Scandinavian to _Odin, Frea_, and
_Thor_; and the old Etruscans to TINA, TALNA, and MINERVA, _Strength,
Abundance_, and _Wisdom_;....

While Plato tells us of the _Supreme Good_, the _Reason_ or _Intellect_,
and the _Soul_ or _Spirit_; and Philo of the _Archetype of Light_,
_Wisdom_ [Σοψια], and the _Word_ [Λογος]; the Kabalists, of the Triads
of the Sephiroth;....

While the disciples of Simon Magus, and the many sects of the Gnostics,
confuse us with their _Eons, Emanations, Powers, Wisdom Superior_ and
_Inferior, Ialdabaoth, Adam-Kadmon_, even to the three hundred and
sixty-five thousand emanations of the Maldaïtes; ....

And while the pious Christian believes that the WORD dwelt in the Mortal
Body of Jesus of Nazareth, and suffered upon the Cross; and that the
HOLY GHOST was poured out upon the Apostles, and now inspires every
truly Christian Soul:....

While all these faiths assert their claims to the exclusive possession
of the Truth. Masonry inculcates its old doctrine, and no more:.... That
God is ONE; that His THOUGHT uttered in His WORD, created the Universe,
and preserves it by those Eternal Laws which are the expression of that
Thought: that the Soul of Man, breathed into him by God, is immortal as
His Thoughts are; that he is free to do evil or to choose good,
responsible for his acts and punishable for his sins: that all evil and
wrong and suffering are but temporary, the discords of one great
Harmony, and that in His good time they will lead by infinite
modulations to the great, harmonic final chord and cadence of Truth,
Love, Peace, and Happiness, that will ring forever and ever under the
Arches of Heaven, among all the Stars and Worlds, and in all souls of
men and Angels.

[Illustration]




XXVII.

KNIGHT COMMANDER OF THE TEMPLE


This is the first of the really Chivalric Degrees of the Ancient and
Accepted Scottish Rite. It occupies this place in the Calendar of the
Degrees between the 26th and the last of the Philosophical Degrees, in
order, by breaking the continuity of these, to relieve what might
otherwise become wearisome; and also to remind you that, while engaged
with the speculations and abstractions of philosophy and creeds, the
Mason is also to continue engaged in the active duties of this great
warfare of life. He is not only a Moralist and Philosopher, but a
Soldier, the Successor of those Knights of the Middle Age, who, while
they wore the Cross, also wielded the Sword, and were the Soldiers of
Honor, Loyalty, and Duty.

Times change, and circumstances; but Virtue and Duty remain the same.
The Evils to be warred against but take another shape, and are developed
in a different form.

There is the same need now of truth and loyalty as in the days of
Frederic Barbarossa.

The characters, religious and military, attention to the sick and
wounded in the Hospital, and war against the Infidel in the field, are
no longer blended; but the same duties, to be performed in another
shape, continue to exist and to environ us all.

The innocent virgin is no longer at the mercy of the brutal Baron or
licentious man-at-arms; but purity and innocence still need protectors.

War is no longer the apparently natural State of Society; and for most
men it is an empty obligation to assume, that they will not recede
before the enemy; but the same high duty and obligation still rest upon
all men.

Truth, in act, profession, and opinion, is rarer now than in the days of
chivalry. Falsehood has become a current coin, and circulates with a
certain degree of respectability; because it has an actual value. It is
indeed the great Vice of the Age--it, and its twin-sister, Dishonesty.
Men, for political preferment, profess whatever principles are
expedient and profitable. At the bar, in the pulpit, and in the halls of
legislation, men argue against their own convictions, and, with what
they term _logic_, prove to the satisfaction of others that which they
do not themselves believe. Insincerity and duplicity are valuable to
their possessors, like estates in stocks, that yield a certain revenue:
and it is no longer the _truth_ of an opinion or a principle, but the
net _profit_ that may be realized from it, which is the measure of its
value.

The Press is the great sower of falsehood. To slander a political
antagonist, to misrepresent all that he says, and, if that be
impossible, to invent for him what he does _not_ say; to put in
circulation whatever baseless calumnies against him are necessary to
defeat him,--these are habits so common as to have ceased to excite
notice or comment, much less surprise or disgust.

There was a time when a Knight would die rather than utter a lie, or
break his Knightly word. The Knight Commander of the Temple revives the
old Knightly spirit; and devotes himself to the old Knightly worship of
Truth. No profession of an opinion not his own, for expediency's sake or
profit, or through fear of the world's disfavor; no slander of even an
enemy; no coloring or perversion of the sayings or acts of other men; no
insincere speech and argument for any purpose, or under any pretext,
must soil his fair escutcheon. Out of the Chapter, as well as in it, he
must speak the Truth, and _all_ the Truth, no more and no less; or else
speak not at all.

To purity and innocence everywhere, the Knight Commander owes
protection, as of old; against bold violence, or those, more guilty than
murderers, who by art and treachery seek to slay the soul; and against
that want and destitution that drive too many to sell their honor and
innocence for food.

In no age of the world has man had better opportunity than now to
display those lofty virtues and that noble heroism that so distinguished
the three great military and religious Orders, in their youth, before
they became corrupt and vitiated by prosperity and power.

When a fearful epidemic ravages a city, and death is inhaled with the
air men breathe; when the living scarcely suffice to bury the
dead,--most men flee in abject terror, to return and live, respectable
and influential, when the danger has passed away. But the old Knightly
spirit of devotion and disinterestedness and contempt of death still
lives, and is not extinct in the human heart. Everywhere a few are found
to stand firmly and unflinchingly at their posts, to front and defy the
danger, not for money, or to be honored for it, or to protect their own
household; but from mere humanity, and to obey the unerring dictates of
duty. They nurse the sick, breathing the pestilential atmosphere of the
hospital. They explore the abodes of want and misery. With the
gentleness of woman, they soften the pains of the dying, and feed the
lamp of life in the convalescent. They perform the last sad offices to
the dead; and they seek no other reward than the approval of their own
consciences.

These are the true Knights of the present age: these, and the captain
who remains at his post on board his shattered ship until the last boat,
loaded to the water's edge with passengers and crew, has parted from her
side; and then goes calmly down with her into the mysterious depths of
the ocean:--the pilot who stands at the wheel while the swift flames
eddy round him and scorch away his life:--the fireman who ascends the
blazing walls, and plunges amid the flames to save the property or lives
of those who have upon him no claim by tie of blood, or friendship, or
even of ordinary acquaintance:--these, and others like these:--all men,
who, set at the post of duty, stand there manfully; to die, if need be,
but not to desert their post: for these, too, are sworn not to recede
before the enemy.

To the performance of duties and of acts of heroism like these, you have
devoted yourself, my Brother, by becoming a Knight Commander of the
Temple. Soldier of the Truth and of Loyalty! Protector of Purity and
Innocence! Defier of Plague and Pestilence! Nurser of the Sick and
Burier of the Dead! Knight, preferring Death to abandonment of the Post
of Duty! Welcome to the bosom of this Order!

[Illustration]




XXVIII.

KNIGHT OF THE SUN, OR PRINCE ADEPT.


God, is the author of everything that existeth; the Eternal, the
Supreme, the Living, and Awful Being; from Whom nothing in the Universe
is hidden. Make of Him no idols and visible images; but rather worship
Him in the deep solitudes of sequestered forests; for He is invisible,
and fills the Universe as its soul, and liveth not in any Temple!

Light and Darkness are the World's Eternal ways. God is the principle of
everything that exists, and the Father of all Beings. He is eternal,
immovable and Self-Existent. There are no bounds to His power. At one
glance He sees the Past, the Present, and the Future; and the procession
of the builders of the Pyramids, with us and our remotest Descendants,
is now passing before Him. He reads our thoughts before they are known
to ourselves. He rules the movements of the Universe and all events and
revolutions are the creatures of His will. For He is the infinite Mind
and Supreme Intelligence.

In the beginning Man had the WORD, and that WORD was from God: and out
of the living power which, in and by that WORD, was communicated to man,
came the LIGHT of his existence. Let no man speak the WORD, for by it
THE FATHER made light and darkness, the world and living creatures.

The Chaldean upon his plains worshipped me, and the sea-loving
Phœnician. They builded me temples and towers, and burned sacrifices to
me upon a thousand altars. Light was divine to them, and they thought me
a God. But I am nothing--_nothing_; and LIGHT is the creature of the
unseen GOD that taught the true religion to the Ancient Patriarchs:
AWFUL, MYSTERIOUS, THE ABSOLUTE.

Man was created pure; and God gave him TRUTH, as He gave him LIGHT. He
has lost the _truth_ and found _error_. He has wandered far into
darkness; and round him Sin and Shame hover evermore. The Soul that is
impure, and sinful, and defiled with earthly stains, cannot again unite
with God, until, by long trials and many purifications, it is finally
delivered from the old calamity; and Light overcomes Darkness and
dethrones it, in the Soul.

God is the First; indestructible, eternal, UNCREATED, INDIVISIBLE.
_Wisdom, Justice, Truth_, and _Mercy_, with _Harmony_ and _Love_, are of
His essence, and _Eternity_ and _Infinitude of Extension_. He is silent,
and consents with MIND, and is known to Souls through MIND alone. In Him
were all things originally contained, and from Him all things were
evolved. For out of His Divine SILENCE and REST, after an infinitude of
time, was unfolded the WORD, or the Divine POWER; and then in turn the
Mighty, ever-acting, measureless INTELLECT; and from the WORD were
evolved the myriads of suns and systems that make the Universe; and
_fire_, and _light_, and the electric HARMONY, which is the harmony of
spheres and numbers: and from the INTELLECT all Souls and intellects of
men.

In the Beginning, the Universe was but ONE SOUL. HE was THE ALL, alone
with TIME and SPACE, and Infinite as they.

--HE HAD THIS THOUGHT: "I Create Worlds:" and lo! _the Universe_, and
the laws of _harmony_ and _motion_ that rule it, the expression of a
thought of God; and bird and beast, and every living thing but Man: and
light and air, and the mysterious currents, and the dominion of
mysterious numbers!

--HE HAD THIS THOUGHT: "_I Create Man, whose Soul shall be my image,
and he shall rule_." And lo! _Man_, with senses, instinct, and a
reasoning mind!

--And yet not MAN! but an _animal_ that breathed, and saw, and
thought: until an immaterial spark from God's own Infinite Being
penetrated the brain, and became the Soul: and lo, MAN THE IMMORTAL!
Thus, threefold, fruit of God's thought, is Man; that sees and hears and
feels; that thinks and reasons; that loves and is in harmony with the
Universe.

Before the world grew old, the primitive Truth faded out from men's
Souls. Then man asked himself, "_What am I? and how and whence am I? and
whither do I go?_" And the Soul, looking inward upon itself, strove to
learn whether that "I" were mere matter; its thought and reason and its
passions and affections mere results of material combination; or a
material Being enveloping an immaterial Spirit: ... and further it
strove, by self-examination, to learn whether that Spirit were an
individual essence, with a separate immortal existence, or an
infinitesimal portion of a Great First Principle, inter-penetrating the
Universe and the infinitude of space, and undulating like light and
heat: ... and so they wandered further amid the mazes of error; and
imagined vain philosophies; wallowing in the sloughs of materialism and
sensualism, of beating their wings vainly in the vacuum of abstractions
and idealities.

While yet the first oaks still put forth their leaves, man lost the
perfect knowledge of the One True God, the Ancient Absolute Existence,
the Infinite Mind and Supreme Intelligence; and floated helplessly out
upon the shoreless ocean of conjecture. Then the soul vexed itself with
seeking to learn whether the material Universe was a mere chance
combination of atoms, or the work of Infinite, Uncreated Wisdom:...
whether the Deity was a concentrated, and the Universe an extended
immateriality; or whether He was a personal existence, an Omnipotent,
Eternal, Supreme Essence, regulating matter at will; or subjecting it to
unchangeable laws throughout eternity; and to Whom, Himself Infinite and
Eternal, Space and Time are unknown. With their finite limited vision
they sought to learn the source and explain the existence of Evil, and
Pain, and Sorrow; and so they wandered ever deeper into the darkness,
and were lost; and there was for them no longer any God; but only a
great, dumb, soulless Universe, full of mere emblems and symbols.

You have heretofore, in some of the Degrees through which you have
passed, heard much of the ancient worship of the Sun, the Moon, and the
other bright luminaries of Heaven, and of the Elements and Powers of
Universal Nature. You have been made, to some extent, familiar with
their personifications as Heroes suffering or triumphant, or as personal
Gods or Goddesses, with human characteristics and passions, and with the
multitude of legends and fables that do but allegorically represent
their risings and settings, their courses, their conjunctions and
oppositions, their domiciles and places of exaltation.

Perhaps you have supposed that we, like many who have written on these
subjects, have intended to represent this worship to you as the most
ancient and original worship of the first men that lived. To undeceive
you, if such was your conclusion, we have caused the Personifications of
the Great Luminary of Heaven, under the names by which he was known to
the most ancient nations, to proclaim the old primitive truths that were
known to the Fathers of our race, before men came to worship the visible
manifestations of the Supreme Power and Magnificence and the Supposed
Attributes of the Universal Deity in the Elements and in the glittering
armies that Night regularly marshals and arrays upon the blue field of
the firmament.

We ask now your attention to a still further development of these
truths, after we shall have added something to what we have already said
in regard to the Chief Luminary of Heaven, in explanation of the names
and characteristics of the several imaginary Deities that represented
him among the ancient races of men.

ATHOM or ATHOM-RE, was the Chief and Oldest Supreme God of Upper Egypt,
worshipped at Thebes; the same as the OM or AUM of the Hindūs, whose
name was unpronounceable, and who, like the BREHM of the latter People,
was "The Being that was, and is, and is to come; the Great God, the
Great Omnipotent, Omniscient, and Omnipresent One, the Greatest in the
Universe, the Lord;" whose emblem was a perfect sphere, showing that He
was first, last, midst, and without end; superior to all Nature-Gods,
and all personifications of Powers, Elements, and Luminaries; symbolized
by Light, the Principle of Life.

AMUN was the Nature-God, or Spirit of Nature, called by that name or
AMUN-RE, and worshipped at Memphis in Lower Egypt, and in Libya, as well
as in Upper Egypt. He was the Libyan Jupiter, and represented the
intelligent and organizing force that develops itself in Nature, when
the intellectual types or forms of bodies are revealed to the senses in
the world's order, by their union with matter, whereby the generation
of bodies is effected. He was the same with Kneph, from whose mouth
issued the Orphic egg out of which came the Universe.

DIONUSOS was the Nature-God of the Greeks, as AMUN was of the Egyptians.
In the popular legend, Dionusos, as well as Hercules, was a Theban Hero,
born of a mortal mother. Both were sons of Zeus, both persecuted by
Heré. But in Hercules the God is subordinate to the Hero; while
Dionusos, even in poetry, retains his divine character, and is identical
with Iacchus, the presiding genius of the Mysteries. Personification of
the Sun in Taurus, as his ox-hoofs showed, he delivered earth from the
harsh dominion of Winter, conducted the mighty chorus of the Stars, and
the celestial revolution of the year, changed with the seasons, and
underwent their periodical decay. He was the Sun as invoked by the
Eleans, [Greek: Πυριγενης], ushered into the world amidst lightning and
thunder, the Mighty Hunter of the Zodiac, Zagreus the Golden or
ruddy-faced. The Mysteries taught the doctrine of Divine Unity; and that
Power whose Oneness is a seeming mystery, but really a truism, was
Dionusos, the God of Nature, or of that, moisture, which is the life of
Nature, who prepares in darkness, in Hades or Iasion, the return of life
and vegetation, or is himself the light and change evolving their
varieties. In the Egean Islands he was Butes, Dardanus, Himeros or
Imbros; in Crete he appears as Iasius or even Zeus, whose orgiastic
worship, remaining unveiled by the usual forms of mystery, betrayed to
profane curiosity the symbols which, if irreverently contemplated, were
sure to be misunderstood.

He was the same with the dismembered Zagreus, the son of Persephone, an
Ancient Subterranean Dionusos, the horned progeny of Zeus in the
Constellation of the Serpent, entrusted by his father with the
thunderbolt, and encircled with the protecting dance of Curetes. Through
the envious artifices of Heré, the Titans eluded the vigilance of his
guardians and tore him to pieces; but Pallas restored the still
palpitating heart to his father, who commanded Apollo to bury the
dismembered remains upon Parnassus.

Dionusos, as well as Apollo, was leader of the Muses; the tomb of one
accompanied the worship of the other; they were the same, yet different,
contrasted, yet only as filling separate parts in the same drama; and
the mystic and heroic personifications, the God of Nature and of Art,
seem, at some remote period, to have proceeded from a common source.
Their separation was one of form rather than of substance: and from the
time when Hercules obtained initiation from Triptolemus, or Pythagoras
received Orphic tenets, the two conceptions were tending to re-combine.
It was said that Dionusos or Poseidon had preceded Apollo in the
Oracular office; and Dionusos continued to be esteemed in Greek Theology
as Healer and Saviour, Author of Life and Immortality. The dispersed
Pythagoreans, "Sons of Apollo," immediately betook themselves to the
Orphic Service of Dionusos, and there are indications that there was
always something Dionysiac in the worship of Apollo.

Dionusos is the Sun, that liberator of the elements; and his spiritual
meditation was suggested by the same imagery which made the Zodiac the
supposed path of the Spirits in their descent and their return. His
second birth, as offspring of the highest, is a type of the spiritual
regeneration of man. He, as well as Apollo, was precentor of the Muses
and source of inspiration. His rule prescribed no unnatural
mortification: its yoke was easy, and its mirthful choruses, combining
the gay with the severe, did but commemorate that golden age when earth
enjoyed eternal spring, and when fountains of honey, milk, and wine
burst forth out of its bosom at the touch of the thyrsus. He is the
"Liberator." Like Osiris, he frees the soul, and guides it in its
migrations beyond the grave, preserving it from the risk of again
falling under the slavery of matter or of some inferior animal form. All
soul is part of the Universal Soul, whose totality is Dionusos; and he
leads back the vagrant spirit to its home, and accompanies it through
the purifying processes, both real and symbolical, of its earthly
transit. He died and descended to the Shades; and his suffering was the
great secret of the Mysteries, as death is the grand mystery of
existence. He is the immortal suitor of Psyche (the Soul), the Divine
influence which physically called the world into being, and which,
awakening the soul from its Stygian trance, restores it from earth to
Heaven.

Of HERMES, the Mercury of the Greeks, the Thoth of the Egyptians, and
the Taaut of the Phœnicians, we have heretofore spoken sufficiently at
length. He was the inventor of letters and of Oratory, the winged
messenger of the Gods, bearing the Caduceus wreathed with serpents; and
in our Council he is represented by the ORATOR.

The _Hindūs_ called the Sun SURYA; the _Persians_, MITHRAS; the
_Egyptians_, OSIRIS; the _Assyrians_ and _Chaldæans_, BEL; the
_Scythians_ and _Etruscans_ and the ancient _Pelasgi_, ARKALEUS or
HERCULES; the _Phœnicians_, ADONAI or ADON; and the _Scandinavians_,
ODIN.

From the name SURYA, given by the Hindūs to the Sun, the Sect who paid
him particular adoration were called _Souras_. Their painters describe
his car as drawn by seven green horses. In the Temple of Visweswara, at
Benares, there is an ancient piece of sculpture, well executed in stone,
representing him sitting in a car drawn by a horse with twelve heads.
His charioteer, by whom he is preceded, is ARUN [from [Hebrew: אןך], AUR
the _Crepusculum?_], or the Dawn; and among his many titles are twelve
that denote his distinct powers in each of the twelve months. Those
powers are called Adityas, each of whom has a particular name. Surya is
supposed frequently to have descended upon earth, in a human shape, and
to have left a race on earth, equally renowned in Indian story with the
Heliades of Greece. He is often styled King of the Stars and Planets,
and thus reminds us of the Adon-Tsbauth (Lord of the Starry Hosts) of
the Hebrew writings.

MITHRAS was the Sun-God of the Persians; and was fabled to have been
born in a grotto or cave, at the Winter Solstice. His feasts were
celebrated at that period, at the moment when the sun commenced to
return Northward, and to increase the length of the days. This was the
great Feast of the Magian religion. The Roman Calendar, published in the
time of Constantine, at which period his worship began to gain ground in
the Occident, fixed his feast-day on the 25th of December. His statues
and images were inscribed, _Deo-Soli invicto Mithrœ_--to the invincible
Sun-God Mithras. _Nomen invictum Sol Mithra ... Soli Omnipotenti
Mithrœ_. To him, gold, incense, and myrrh were consecrated. "Thee," says
Martianus Capella, in his hymn to the Sun, "the dwellers on the Nile
adore as Serapis, and Memphis worships as Osiris; in the sacred rites of
Persia thou art Mithras, in Phrygia, Atys, and Libya bows down to thee
as Ammon, and Phœnician Byblos as Adonis; and thus the whole world
adores thee under different names."

OSIRIS was the son of Helios (Phra), the "divine offspring congenerate
with the dawn," and at the same time an incarnation of Kneph or
Agathodæmon, the Good Spirit, including all his possible manifestations,
either physical or moral. He represented in a familiar form the
beneficent aspect of all higher emanations and in him was developed the
conception of a Being purely good, so that it became necessary to set up
another power as his adversary called Seth, Babys or Typhon, to account
for the injurious influences of Nature.

With the phenomena of agriculture, supposed to be the invention of
Osiris, the Egyptians connected the highest truths of their religion.
The soul of man was as the seed hidden in the ground, and the mortal
framework, similarly consigned to its dark resting-place, awaited its
restoration to life's unfailing source. Osiris was not only benefactor
of the living; he was also Hades, Serapis, and Rhadamanthus, the monarch
of the dead. Death, therefore, in Egyptian opinion, was only another
name for _renovation_, since its God is the same power who incessantly
renews vitality in Nature. Every corpse duly embalmed was called
"Osiris," and in the grave was supposed to be united, or at least
brought into approximation, to the Divinity. For when God became
incarnate for man's benefit, it was implied that, in analogy with His
assumed character, He should submit to _all_ the conditions of visible
existence. In death, as in life, Isis and Osiris were patterns and
precursors of mankind; their sepulchres stood within the temples of the
Superior Gods; yet though their remains might be entombed at Memphis or
Abydus, their divinity was unimpeached, and they either shone as
luminaries in the heavens, or in the unseen world presided over the
futurity of the disembodied spirits whom death had brought nearer to
them.

The notion of a dying God, so frequent in Oriental legend, and of which
we have already said much in former Degrees, was the natural inference
from a literal interpretation of nature-worship; since nature, which in
the vicissitudes of the seasons seems to undergo a dissolution, was to
the earliest religionists the express image of the Deity, and at a
remote period one and the same with the "varied God," whose attributes
were seen not only in its vitality, but in its changes. The unseen Mover
of the Universe was rashly identified with its obvious fluctuations. The
speculative Deity suggested by the drama of nature, was worshipped with
imitative and sympathetic rites. A period of mourning about the Autumnal
Equinox, and of joy at the return of Spring, was almost universal.
Phrygians and Paphlagonians, Bœotians, and even Athenians, were all more
or less attached to such observances; the Syrian damsels sat weeping for
Thammuz or Adoni, mortally wounded by the tooth of Winter, symbolized
by the boar, its very general emblem: and these rites, and those of Atys
and Osiris, were evidently suggested by the arrest of vegetation, when
the Sun, descending from his altitude, seems deprived of his generating
power.

Osiris is a being analogous to the Syrian ADONI; and the fable of his
history, which we need not here repeat, is a narrative form of the
popular religion of Egypt, of which the Sun is the Hero, and the
agricultural calendar the moral. The moist valley of the Nile, owing its
fertility to the annual inundation, appeared, in contrast with the
surrounding desert, like life in the midst of death. The inundation was
in evident dependence on the Sun, and Egypt, environed with arid
deserts, like a heart within a burning censer, was the female power,
dependent on the influences personified in its God. Typhon his brother,
the type of darkness, drought, and sterility, threw his body into the
Nile; and thus Osiris, the "good," the "Saviour," perished, in the 28th
year of his life or reign, and on the 17th day of the month Athor, or
the 13th of November. He is also made to die during the heats of the
early Summer, when, from March to July, the earth was parched with
intolerable heat, vegetation was scorched, and the languid Nile
exhausted. From that death he rises when the Solstitial Sun brings the
inundation, and Egypt is filled with mirth and acclamation anticipatory
of the second harvest. From his Wintry death he rises with the early
flowers of Spring, and then the joyful festival of Osiris found was
celebrated.

So the pride of Jemsheed, one of the Persian Sun-heroes, or the solar
year personified, was abruptly cut off by Zohak, the tyrant of the West.
He was sawn asunder by a fish-bone, and immediately the brightness of
Iran changed to gloom. Ganymede and Adonis, like Osiris, were hurried
off in all their strength and beauty; the premature death of Linus, the
burthen of the ancient lament of Greece, was like that of the Persian
Siamek, the Bithynian Hylas, and the Egyptian Maneros, Son of Menes or
the Eternal. The elegy called Maneros was sung at Egyptian banquets, and
an effigy enclosed within a diminutive Sarcophagus was handed round to
remind the guests of their brief tenure of existence. The beautiful
Memnon, also, perished in his prime; and Enoch, whose early death was
lamented at Iconium, lived 365 years, the number of days of the solar
year; a brief space when compared with the longevity of his patriarchal
kindred.

The story of Osiris is reflected in those of Orpheus and Dionusos
Zagreus, and perhaps in the legends of Absyrtus and Pelias, of Æson,
Thyestes, Melicertes, Itys, and Pelops. Io is the disconsolate Isis or
Niobe: and Rhea mourns her dismembered Lord Hyperion, and the death of
her son Helios, drowned in the Eridanus; and if Apollo and Dionusos are
immortal, they had died under other names, as Orpheus, Linus, or
Hyacinthus. The sepulchre of Zeus was shown in Crete. Hippolytus was
associated in divine honors with Apollo, and after he had been torn to
pieces like Osiris, was restored to life by the Pæonian herbs of Diana,
and kept darkling in the secret grove of Egeria. Zeus deserted Olympus
to visit the Ethiopians; Apollo underwent servitude to Admetus; Theseus,
Peirithous, Hercules, and other heroes, descended for a time to Hades; a
dying Nature-God was exhibited in the Mysteries, the Attic women fasted,
sitting on the ground, during the Thesmophoria, and the Bœotians
lamented the descent of Cora-Proserpine to the Shades.

But the death of the Deity, as understood by the Orientals, was not
inconsistent with His immortality. The temporary decline of the Sons of
Light is but an episode in their endless continuity; and as the day and
year are more convenient subdivisions of the Infinite, so the fiery
deaths of Phaëthon or Hercules are but breaks in the same Phœnix process
of perpetual regeneration, by which the spirit of Osiris lives forever
in the succession of the Memphian Apis. Every year witnesses the revival
of Adonis; and the amber tears shed by the Heliades for the premature
death of their brother, are the golden shower full of prolific hope, in
which Zeus descends from the brazen vault of Heaven into the bosom of
the parched ground.

BAL, representative or personification of the sun, was one of the Great
Gods of Syria, Assyria, and Chaldea, and his name is found upon the
monuments of Nimroud, and frequently occurs in the Hebrew writings. He
was the Great Nature-God of Babylonia, the Power of heat, life, and
generation. His symbol was the Sun, and he was figured seated on a bull.
All the accessories of his great temple at Babylon, described by
Herodotus, are repeated with singular fidelity, but on a smaller scale,
in the Hebrew tabernacle and temple. The golden statue alone is wanted
to complete the resemblance. The word _Bal_ or _Baal_, like the word
_Adon_, signifies Lord and Master. He was also the Supreme Deity of the
Moabites, Amonites, and Carthaginians, and of the Sabeans in general;
the Gauls worshipped the Sun under the name of Belin or Belinus: and
Bela is found among the Celtic Deities upon the ancient monuments.

The Northern ancestors of the Greeks maintained with hardier habits a
more manly style of religious symbolism than the effeminate enthusiasts
of the South, and had embodied in their _Perseus_, HERCULES and MITHRAS,
the consummation of the qualities they esteemed and exercised.

Almost every nation will be found to have had a mythical being, whose
strength or weakness, virtues or defects, more or less nearly describe
the Sun's career through the seasons. There was a Celtic, a Teutonic, a
Scythian, an Etruscan, a Lydian Hercules, all whose legends became
tributary to those of the Greek hero. The name of Hercules was found by
Herodotus to have been long familiar in Egypt and the East, and to have
originally belonged to a much higher personage than the comparatively
modern hero known in Greece as the Son of Alcmena. The temple of the
Hercules of Tyre was reported to have been built 2300 years before the
time of Herodotus; and Hercules, whose Greek name has been sometimes
supposed to be of Phœnician origin, in the sense of Circuitor, _i.e._
"rover" and "perambulator" of earth, as well as "Hyperion" of the sky,
was the patron and model of those famous navigators who spread his
altars from coast to coast through the Mediterranean, to the extremities
of the West, where "ARKALEUS" built the City of Gades, and where a
perpetual fire burned in his service. He was the lineal descendant of
Perseus, the luminous child of darkness, conceived within a subterranean
vault of brass; and he a representation of the Persian Mithras, rearing
his emblematic lions above the gates of Mycenæ, and bringing the sword
of Jemsheed to battle against the Gorgons of the West. Mithras is
similarly described in the Zend-Avesta as the "mighty hero, the rapid
runner, whose piercing eye embraces all, whose arm bears the club for
the destruction of the Darood."

Hercules Ingeniculus, who, bending on one knee, uplifts his club and
tramples on the Serpent's head, was, like Prometheus and Tantalus, one
of the varying aspects of the struggling and declining Sun. The
victories of Hercules are but exhibitions of Solar power which have
ever to be repeated. It was in the far North, among the Hyperboreans,
that, divested of his Lion's skin he lay down to sleep, and for a time
lost the horses of his chariot. Henceforth that Northern region of
gloom, called the "place of the death and revival of Adonis," that
Caucasus whose summit was so lofty, that, like the Indian Meru, it
seemed to be both the goal and commencement of the Sun's career, became
to Greek imaginations the final bourne of all things, the abode of
Winter and desolation, the pinnacle of the arch connecting the upper and
lower world, and consequently the appropriate place for the banishment
of Prometheus. The daughters of Israel, weeping for Thammuz, mentioned
by Ezekiel, sat looking to the North, and waiting for his return from
that region. It was while Cybele with the Sun-God was absent among the
Hyperboreans, that Phrygia, abandoned by her, suffered the horrors of
famine. Delos and Delphi awaited the return of Apollo from the
Hyperboreans, and Hercules brought thence to Olympia the olive. To all
Masons, the North has immemorially been the place of darkness; and of
the great lights of the Lodge, none is in the North.

Mithras, the rock-born hero [Greek: Πετρογενης], heralded the Sun's
return in Spring, as Prometheus, chained in his cavern, betokened the
continuance of Winter. The Persian beacon on the mountain-top
represented the Rock-born Divinity enshrined in his worthiest temple;
and the funeral conflagration of Hercules was the sun dying in glory
behind the Western hills. But though the transitory manifestation
suffers or dies, the abiding and eternal power liberates and saves. It
was an essential attribute of a Titan, that he should arise again after
his fall; for the revival of Nature is as certain as its decline, and
its alternations are subject to the appointment of a power which
controls them both.

"God", says Maximus Tyrius, "did not spare His own Son [Hercules], or
exempt Him from the calamities incidental to humanity". The Theban
progeny of Jove had his share of pain and trial. By vanquishing earthly
difficulties he proved his affinity with Heaven. His life was a
continuous struggle. He fainted before Typhon in the desert; and in the
commencement of the Autumnal season (cum longæ redit hora noctis),
descended under the guidance of Minerva to Hades. He died; but first
applied for initiation to Eumolpus, in order to foreshadow that state of
religious preparation which should precede the momentous change. Even in
Hades he rescued Theseus and removed the stone of Ascalaphus,
reanimated the bloodless spirits, and dragged into the light of day the
monster Cerberus, justly reputed invincible because an emblem of Time
itself; he burst the chains of the grave (for Busiris is the grave
personified), and triumphant at the close as in the dawn of his career,
was received after his labors into the repose of the heavenly mansions,
living forever with Zeus in the arms of Eternal Youth.

ODIN is said to have borne twelve names among the old Germans, and to
have had 114 names besides. He was the Apollo of the Scandinavians, and
is represented in the Voluspa as destined to slay the monstrous snake.
Then the Sun will be extinguished, the earth be dissolved in the ocean,
the stars lose their brightness, and all Nature be destroyed, in order
that it may be renewed again. From the bosom of the waters a new world
will emerge clad in verdure; harvests will be seen to ripen where no
seed was sown, and evil will disappear.

The free fancy of the ancients, which wove the web of their myths and
legends, was consecrated by faith. It had not, like the modern mind, set
apart a petty sanctuary of borrowed beliefs, beyond which all the rest
was common and unclean. Imagination, reason, and religion circled round
the same symbol; and in all their symbols there was serious meaning, if
we could but find it out. They did not devise fictions in the same vapid
spirit in which we, cramped by conventionalities, read them. In
endeavoring to interpret creations of fancy, fancy as well as reason
must guide: and much of modern controversy arises out of heavy
misapprehensions of ancient symbolism.

To those ancient peoples, this earth was the centre of the Universe. To
them there were no other worlds, peopled with living beings, to divide
the care and attention of the Deity. To them the World was a great
plain, of unknown, perhaps inconceivable limits, and the Sun, the Moon,
and the Stars journeyed above it, to give them light. The worship of the
Sun became the basis of all the religions of antiquity. To them light
and heat were mysteries; as indeed they still are to us. As the Sun
caused the day, and his absence the night; as, when he journeyed
Northward, Spring and Summer followed him; and when he again turned to
the South, Autumn and inclement Winter, and cold and long dark nights
ruled the earth; ... as his influence produced the leaves and flowers,
and ripened the harvests, and brought regular inundation, he
necessarily became to them the most interesting object of the material
Universe. To them he was the innate fire of bodies, the fire of nature.
Author of Life, heat, and ignition, he was to them the efficient cause
of all generation, for without him there was no movement, no existence,
no form. He was to them immense, indivisible, imperishable, and
everywhere present. It was their need of light, and of his creative
energy, that was felt by all men; and nothing was more fearful to them
than his absence. His beneficent influences caused his identification
with the Principle of Good; and the BRAHMA of the Hindus, the MITHRAS of
the Persians, and ATHOM, AMUN, PHTHA, and OSIRIS, of the Egyptians, the
BEL of the Chaldeans, the ADONAI of the Phœnicians, the ADONIS and
APOLLO of the Greeks became but personifications of the Sun, the
regenerating Principle, image of that fecundity which perpetuates and
rejuvenates the world's existence.

So too the struggle between the Good and Evil Principles was
personified, as was that between life and death, destruction and
re-creation; in allegories and fables which poetically represented the
apparent course of the Sun; who, descending toward the Southern
Hemisphere, was figuratively said to be conquered and put to death by
darkness, or the genius of Evil; but, returning again toward the
Northern Hemisphere, he seemed to be victorious, and to arise from the
tomb. This death and resurrection were also figurative of the succession
of day and night, of death, which is a necessity of life, and of life
which is born of death; and everywhere the ancients still saw the combat
between the two Principles that ruled the world. Everywhere this contest
was embodied in allegories and fictitious histories: into which were
ingeniously woven all the astronomical phenomena that accompanied,
preceded, or followed the different movements of the Sun, and the
changes of Seasons, the approach or withdrawal of inundation. And thus
grew into stature and strange proportions the histories of the contests
between Typhon and Osiris, Hercules and Juno, the Titans and Jupiter,
Ormuzd and Ahriman, the rebellious Angels and the Deity, the Evil Genii
and the Good; and the other like fables, found not only in Asia, but in
the North of Europe, and even among the Mexicans and Peruvians of the
New World; carried thither, in all probability, by those Phœnician
voyagers who bore thither civilization and the arts. The Scythians
lamented the death of Acmon, the Persians that of Zohak conquered by
Pheridoun, the Hindūs that of Soura-Parama slain by Soupra-Muni, as the
Scandinavians did that of Balder, torn to pieces by the blind Hother.

The primitive idea of infinite space existed in the first men, as it
exists in us. It and the idea of infinite time are the first two innate
ideas. Man cannot conceive how thing can be added to thing, or event
follow event, forever. The idea will ever return, that no matter how
long bulk is added to bulk, there must be, still beyond, an empty void
_without_ limit; in which is _nothing_. In the same way the idea of time
without beginning or end forces itself on him. _Time_, without events,
is also a _void_, and _nothing_.

In that empty void space the primitive men knew there was no light nor
warmth. They _felt_, what we know scientifically, that there must be a
thick darkness there, and an intensity of cold of which we have no
conception. Into that void they thought the Sun, the Planets, and the
Stars went down when they set under the Western Horizon. Darkness was to
them an enemy, a harm, a vague dread and terror. It was the very
embodiment of the evil principle; and out of it they said that he was
formed. As the Sun bent Southward toward that void, they shuddered with
dread: and when, at the Winter Solstice, he again commenced his
Northward march, they rejoiced and feasted; as they did at the Summer
Solstice, when most he appeared to smile upon them in his pride of
place. These days have been celebrated by all civilized nations ever
since. The Christian has made them feast-days of the church, and
appropriated them to the two Saints John; and Masonry has done the same.

We, to whom the vast Universe has become but a great _machine_, not
instinct with a great SOUL, but a _clockwork_ of proportions
unimaginable, but still infinitely less than infinite; and part at least
of which we with our orreries can imitate; we, who have measured the
distances and dimensions, and learned the specific gravity and
determined the orbits of the moon and the planets; we, who know the
distance to the sun, and his size; have measured the orbits of the
flashing comets, and the distances of the fixed stars; and know the
latter to be suns like our sun, each with his retinue of worlds, and all
governed by the same unerring, mechanical laws and outwardly imposed
forces, centripetal and centrifugal; we, who with our telescopes have
separated the galaxy and the nebulae into other stars and groups of
stars; discovered new planets, by first discovering their disturbing
forces upon those already known; and learned that they all, Jupiter,
Venus, and the fiery Mars, and Saturn and the others, as well as the
bright, mild, and ever-changing Moon, are mere dark, dull opaque clods
like our earth, and not living orbs of brilliant fire and heavenly
light; we, who have counted the mountains and chasms in the moon, with
glasses that could distinctly reveal to us the temple of Solomon, if it
stood there in its old original glory; we, who no longer imagine that
the stars control our destinies, and who can calculate the eclipses of
the sun and moon, backward and forward, for ten thousand years; we, with
our vastly increased conceptions of the powers of the Grand Architect of
the Universe, but our wholly material and mechanical view of that
Universe itself; we cannot, even in the remotest degree, _feel_, though
we may partially and imperfectly _imagine_, how those great, primitive,
simple-hearted children of Nature felt in regard to the Starry Hosts,
there upon the slopes of the Himalayas, on the Chaldean plains, in the
Persian and Median deserts, and upon the banks of that great, strange
River, the Nile. To them the Universe was _alive_--instinct with forces
and powers, mysterious and beyond their comprehension. To them it was no
machine, no great system of clockwork; but a great live creature, an
army of creatures, in sympathy with or inimical to man. To them, all was
a mystery and a miracle, and the stars flashing overhead spoke to their
hearts almost in an audible language. Jupiter, with his kingly
splendors, was the Emperor of the starry legions. Venus looked lovingly
on the earth and blessed it; Mars, with his crimson fires, threatened
war and misfortune; and Saturn, cold and grave, chilled and repelled
them. The ever-changing Moon, faithful companion of the Sun, was a
constant miracle and wonder; the Sun himself the visible emblem of the
creative and generative power. To them the earth was a great plain, over
which the sun, the moon, and the planets revolved, its servants, framed
to give it light. Of the stars, some were beneficent existences that
brought with them Spring-time and fruits and flowers,--some, faithful
sentinels, advising them of coming inundation, of the season of storm
and of deadly winds; some heralds of evil, which, steadily foretelling,
they seemed to cause. To them the eclipses were portents of evil, and
their causes hidden in mystery, and supernatural. The regular returns of
the stars, the comings of Arcturus, Orion, Sirius, the Pleiades, and
Aldebaran, and the journeyings of the Sun, were voluntary and not
mechanical to them. What wonder that astronomy became to them the most
important of sciences; that those who learned it became rulers; and that
vast edifices, the Pyramids, the tower or temple of Bel, and other like
erections everywhere in the East, were builded for astronomical
purposes?--and what wonder that, in their great child-like simplicity,
they worshipped Light, the Sun, the Planets, and the Stars, and
personified them, and eagerly believed in the histories invented for
them; in that age when the capacity for belief was infinite; as indeed,
if we but reflect, it still is and ever will be?

If we adhered to the literally historic sense, antiquity would be a mere
inexplicable, hideous chaos, and all the Sages deranged: and so it would
be with Masonry and those who instituted it. But when these allegories
are explained, they cease to be absurd fables, or facts purely local;
and become lessons of wisdom for entire humanity. No one can doubt, who
studies them, that they all came from a common source.

And he greatly errs who imagines that, because the mythological legends
and fables of antiquity are referable to and have their foundation in
the phenomena of the Heavens, and all the Heathen Gods are but mere
names given to the Sun, the Stars, the Planets, the Zodiacal Signs, the
Elements, the Powers of Nature, and Universal Nature herself, therefore
the first men worshipped the Stars, and whatever things, animate and
inanimate, seemed to them to possess and exercise a power or influence,
evident or imagined, over human fortunes and human destiny.

For ever, in all the nations, ascending to the remotest antiquity to
which the light of History or the glimmerings of tradition reach, we
find, seated above all the gods which represent the luminaries and the
elements, and those which personify the innate Powers of universal
nature, a still higher Deity, silent, undefined, incomprehensible, the
Supreme, one God, from Whom all the rest flow or emanate, or by Him are
created. Above the Time-God Horus, the Moon-Goddess or Earth-Goddess
Isis, and the Sun-God Osiris, of the Egyptians, was Amun, the
Nature-God; and above him, again, the Infinite, Incomprehensible Deity,
ATHOM. BREHM, the silent, self-contemplative, one original God, was the
Source, to the Hindūs, of Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva. Above Zeus, or
before him, were Kronos and Ouranos. Over the Alohayim was the great
Nature-God AL, and still beyond him, Abstract Existence, IHUH--He that
IS, WAS, and SHALL BE. Above all the Persian Deities was the Unlimited
Time, ZERUANE-AKHERENE; and over Odin and Thor was the Great
Scandinavian Deity ALFADIR.

The worship of Universal Nature as a God was too near akin to the
worship of a Universal Soul, to have been the instinctive creed of any
savage people or rude race of men. To imagine all nature with all its
apparently independent parts, as forming one consistent whole, and as
itself a unit, required an amount of experience and a faculty of
generalization not possessed by the rude uncivilized mind, and is but a
step below the idea of a universal Soul.

In the beginning man had the WORD; and that WORD was from God; and out
of the living POWER communicated to man in and by that WORD, came THE
LIGHT of His Existence.

God made man in His own likeness. When, by a long succession of
geological changes, He had prepared the earth to be his habitation, He
created him, and placed him in that part of Asia which all the old
nations agreed in calling the cradle of the human race, and whence
afterward the stream of human life flowed forth to India, China, Egypt,
Persia, Arabia, and Phœnicia. HE communicated to him a knowledge of the
nature of his Creator, and of the pure, primitive, undefiled religion.
The peculiar and distinctive excellence and real essence of the
primitive man, and his true nature and destiny, consisted in his
likeness to God. HE stamped His own image upon man's soul. That image
has been, in the breast of every individual man and of mankind in
general, greatly altered, impaired, and defaced; but its old,
half-obliterated characters are still to be found on all the pages of
primitive history; and the impress, not entirely effaced, every
reflecting mind may discover in its own interior.

Of the original revelation to mankind, of the primitive WORD of Divine
TRUTH, we find clear indications and scattered traces in the sacred
traditions of all the primitive Nations; traces which when separately
examined, appear like the broken remnants, the mysterious and
hieroglyphic characters, of a mighty edifice that has been destroyed;
and its fragments, like those of the old Temples and Palaces of Nimroud,
wrought incongruously into edifices many centuries younger. And,
although amid the ever-growing degeneracy of mankind, this primeval word
of revelation was falsified by the admixture of various errors, and
overlaid and obscured by numberless and manifold fictions, inextricably
confused, and disfigured almost beyond the power of recognition, still a
profound inquiry will discover in heathenism many luminous vestiges of
primitive Truth.

For the old Heathenism had everywhere a foundation in Truth; and if we
could separate that pure intuition into nature and into the simple
symbols of nature, that constituted the basis of all Heathenism, from
the alloy of error and the additions of fiction, those first
hieroglyphic traits of the instinctive science of the first men, would
be found to agree with truth and a true knowledge of nature, and to
afford an image of a free, pure, comprehensive, and finished philosophy
of life.

The struggle, thenceforward to be eternal, between the Divine will and
the natural will in the souls of men, commenced immediately after the
creation. Cain slew his brother Abel, and went forth to people parts of
the earth with an impious race, forgetters and defiers of the true God.
The other Descendants of the Common Father of the race intermarried with
the daughters of Cain's Descendants: and all nations preserved the
remembrance of that division of the human family into the righteous and
impious, in their distorted legends of the wars between the Gods, and
the Giants and Titans. When, afterward, another similar division
occurred, the Descendants of Seth alone preserved the true primitive
religion and science, and transmitted them to posterity in the ancient
symbolical character, on monuments of stone: and many nations preserved
in their legendary traditions the memory of the columns of Enoch and
Seth.

Then the world declined from its original happy condition and fortunate
estate, into idolatry and barbarism: but all nations retained the memory
of that old estate; and the poets, in those early days the only
historians, commemorated the succession of the ages of gold, silver,
brass, and iron.

In the lapse of those ages, the sacred tradition followed various
courses among each of the most ancient nations; and from its original
source, as from a common centre, its various streams flowed downward;
some diffusing through favored regions of the world fertility and life;
but others soon losing themselves, and being dried up in the sterile
sands of human error.

After the internal and Divine WORD originally communicated by God to
man, had become obscured; after man's connection with his Creator had
been broken, even outward language necessarily fell into disorder and
confusion. The simple and Divine Truth was overlaid with various and
sensual fictions, buried under illusive symbols, and at last perverted
into horrible phantoms.

For in the progress of idolatry it needs came to pass, that what was
originally revered as the symbol of a higher principle, became gradually
confounded or identified with the object itself, and was worshipped;
until this error led to a more degraded form of idolatry. The early
nations received much from the primeval source of sacred tradition; but
that haughty pride which seems an inherent part of human nature led each
to represent these fragmentary relics of original truth as a possession
peculiar to themselves; thus exaggerating their value, and their own
importance, as peculiar favorites of the Deity, who had chosen them as
the favored people to whom to commit these truths. To make these
fragments, as far as possible, their private property, they reproduced
them under peculiar forms, wrapped them up in symbols, concealed them in
allegories, and invented fables to account for their own special
possession of them. So that, instead of preserving in their primitive
simplicity and purity these blessings of original revelation, they
overlaid them with poetical ornament; and the whole wears a fabulous
aspect, until by close and severe examination we discover the truth
which the apparent fable contains.

These being the conflicting elements in the breast of man; the old
inheritance or original dowry of truth, imparted to him by God in the
primitive revelation; and error, or the foundation for error, in his
degraded sense and spirit now turned from God to nature, false faiths
easily sprung up and grew rank and luxuriant, when the Divine Truth was
no longer guarded with jealous care, nor preserved in its pristine
purity. This soon happened among most Eastern nations, and especially
the Indians, the Chaldeans, the Arabians, the Persians, and the
Egyptians; with whom imagination, and a very deep but still sensual
feeling for nature, were very predominant. The Northern firmament,
visible to their eyes, possesses by far the largest and most brilliant
constellations; and they were more alive to the impressions made by such
objects, than are the men of the present day.

With the Chinese, a patriarchal, simple, and secluded people, idolatry
long made but little progress. They invented writing within three or
four generations after the flood; and they long preserved the memory of
much of the primitive revelation; less overlaid with fiction than those
fragments which other nations have remembered. They were among those who
stood nearest to the source of sacred tradition; and many passages in
their old writings contain remarkable vestiges of eternal truth, and of
the WORD of primitive revelation, the heritage of old thought, which
attest to us their original eminence.

But among the other early nations, a wild enthusiasm and a sensual
idolatry of nature soon superseded the simple worship of the Almighty
God, and set aside or disfigured the pure belief in the Eternal
Uncreated Spirit. The great powers and elements of nature, and the vital
principle of production and procreation through all generations; then
the celestial spirits or heavenly Host, the luminous armies of the
Stars, and the great Sun, and mysterious, ever-changing Moon (all of
which the whole ancient world regarded not as mere globes of light or
bodies of fire, but as animated living substances, potent over man's
fate and destinies); next the genii and tutelar spirits, and even the
souls of the dead, received divine worship. The animals, representing
the starry constellations, first reverenced as symbols merely, came to
be worshipped as gods; the heavens, earth, and the operations of nature
were personified; and fictitious personages invented to account for the
introduction of science and arts, and the fragments of the old religious
truths; and the good and bad principles personified, became also objects
of worship; while, through all, still shone the silver threads of the
old primitive revelation.

Increasing familiarity with early oriental records seems more and more
to confirm the probability that they all originally emanated from one
source. The eastern and southern slopes of the Paropismus, or
Hindukusch, appear to have been inhabited by kindred Iranian races,
similar in habits, language, and religion. The earliest Indian and
Persian Deities are for the most part symbols of celestial light, their
agency being regarded as an eternal warfare with the powers of Winter,
storm, and darkness. The religion of both was originally a worship of
outward nature, especially the manifestations of fire and light; the
coincidences being too marked to be merely accidental. Deva, God, is
derived from the root _div_, to shine. Indra, like Ormuzd or
Ahura-Mazda, is the bright firmament; Sura or Surya, the Heavenly, a
name of the Sun, recurs in the Zend word Huare, the Sun, whence Khur and
Khorshid or Corasch. Uschas and Mitra are Medic as well as Zend Deities
and the Amschaspands or "immortal Holy Ones" of the Zend-Avesta may be
compared with the seven Rishis or Vedic Star-God, of the constellation
of the Bear. Zoroastrianism, like Buddhism, was an innovation in regard
to an older religion; and between the Parsee and Brahmin may be found
traces of disruption as well as of coincidence. The original
Nature-worship, in which were combined the conceptions both of a
Universal Presence and perpetuity of action, took different directions
of development, according to the difference between the Indian and
Persian mind.

The early shepherds of the Punjaub, then called the country of the Seven
Rivers, to whose intuitional or inspired wisdom (Veda) we owe what are
perhaps the most ancient religious effusions extant in any language,
apostrophized as living beings the physical objects of their worship.
First in this order of Deities stands Indra, the God of the "blue" or
"glittering" firmament, called Devaspiti, Father of the Devas or
Elemental Powers, who measured out the circle of the sky, and made fast
the foundations of the Earth; the ideal domain of Varouna, "the
All-encompasser," is almost equally extensive, including air, water,
night, the expanse between Heaven and Earth; Agni, who lives on the fire
of the sacrifice, on the domestic hearth, and in the lightnings of the
sky, is the great Mediator between God and Man; Uschas, or the Dawn,
leads forth the Gods in the morning to make their daily repast in the
intoxicating Soma of Nature's offertory, of which the Priest could only
compound, from simples a symbolical imitation. Then came the various
Sun-Gods, Adityas or Solar Attributes, Surya the Heavenly, Savitri the
Progenitor, Pashan the Nourisher, Bagha the Felicitous, and Mitra the
Friend.

The coming forth of the Eternal Being to the work of creation was
represented as a marriage, his first emanation being a universal mother,
supposed to have potentially existed with him from Eternity, or, in
metaphorical language, to have been "his sister and his spouse." She
became eventually promoted to be the Mother of the Indian Trinity, of
the Deity under His three Attributes, of Creation, Preservation, and
Change or Regeneration.

The most popular forms or manifestations of Vishnu the Preserver, were
his successive avataras or historic impersonations, which represented
the Deity coming forth out of the incomprehensible mystery of His
nature, and revealing Himself at those critical epochs which either in
the physical or moral world seemed to mark a new commencement of
prosperity and order. Combating the power of Evil in the various
departments of Nature, and in successive periods of time, the Divinity,
though varying in form, is ever in reality the same, whether seen in
useful agricultural or social inventions, in traditional victories over
rival creeds, or in physical changes faintly discovered through
tradition, or suggested by cosmogonical theory. As Rama, the Epic hero
armed with sword, club, and arrows, the prototype of Hercules and
Mithras, he wrestles like the Hebrew Patriarch with the Powers of
Darkness; as Chrishna-Govinda, the Divine Shepherd, he is the Messenger
of Peace, overmastering the world by music and love. Under the human
form he never ceases to be the Supreme Being. "The foolish" (he says, in
Bhagavad Ghita), "unacquainted with my Supreme Nature, despise me in
this human form, while men of great minds, enlightened by the Divine
principle within them, acknowledge me as incorruptible and before all
things, and serve me with undivided hearts." "I am not recognized by
all," he says again, "because concealed by the supernatural power which
is in me; yet to me are known all things past, present, and to come; I
existed before Vaivaswata and Menou. I am the Most High God, the Creator
of the World, the Eternal Poorooscha (Man-World or Genius of the World).
And although in my own nature I am exempt from liability to birth or
death, and am Lord of all created things, yet as often as in the world
virtue is enfeebled, and vice and injustice prevail, so often do I
become manifest and am revealed from age to age, to save the just, to
destroy the guilty, and to reassure the faltering steps of virtue. He
who acknowledgeth me as even so, doth not on quitting this mortal frame
enter into another, for he entereth into me; and many who have trusted
in me have already entered into me, being purified by the power of
wisdom. I help those who walk in my path, even as they serve me."

Brahma, the creating agent, sacrificed himself, when, by descending into
material forms, he became incorporated with his work; and his
mythological history was interwoven with that of the Universe. Thus,
although spiritually allied to the Supreme, and Lord of all creatures
(Prajapati), he shared the imperfection and corruption of an inferior
nature, and, steeped in manifold and perishable forms, might be said,
like the Greek Uranus, to be mutilated and fallen. He thus combined two
characters, formless form, immortal and mortal, being and non-being,
motion and rest. As Incarnate Intelligence, or THE WORD, he communicated
to man what had been revealed to himself by the Eternal, since he is
creation's Soul as well as Body, within which the Divine Word is written
in those living letters which it is the prerogative of the
self-conscious spirit to interpret.

The fundamental principles of the religion of the Hindūs consisted in
the belief in the existence of One Being only, of the immortality of the
soul, and of a future state of rewards and punishments. Their precepts
of morality inculcate the practice of virtue as necessary for procuring
happiness even in this transient life; and their religious doctrines
make their felicity in a future state to depend upon it.

Besides their doctrine of the transmigration of souls, their dogmas may
be epitomized under the following heads: 1st. The existence of one God,
from Whom all things proceed, and to Whom all must return. To him they
constantly apply these expressions--The Universal and Eternal Essence;
that which has ever been and will ever continue; that which vivifies and
pervades all things; He who is everywhere present, and causes the
celestial bodies to revolve in the course He has prescribed to them. 2d.
A tripartite division of the Good Principle, for the purposes of
Creation, Preservation, and Renovation by change and death. 3d. The
necessary existence of an Evil Principle, occupied in counteracting the
benevolent purposes of the first, in their execution by the Devata or
Subordinate Genii, to whom is entrusted the control over the various
operations of nature.

And this was part of their doctrine: "One great and incomprehensible
Being has alone existed from all Eternity. Everything we behold and we
ourselves are portions of Him. The soul, mind or intellect, of gods and
men, and of all sentient creatures, are detached portions of the
Universal Soul, to which at stated periods they are destined to return.
But the mind of finite beings is impressed by one uninterrupted series
of illusions, which they consider as real, until again united to the
great fountain of truth. Of these illusions, the first and most
essential is individuality. By its influence, when detached from its
source, the soul becomes ignorant of its own nature, origin, and
destiny. It considers itself as a separate existence, and no longer a
spark of the Divinity, a link of one immeasurable chain, an infinitely
small but indispensable portion of one great whole."

Their love of imagery caused them to personify what they conceived to be
some of the attributes of God, perhaps in order to present things in a
way better adapted to the comprehensions of the vulgar, than the
abstruse idea of an indescribable, invisible God; and hence the
invention of a Brahma, a Vishnu, and a Siva or Iswara. These were
represented under various forms; but no emblem or visible sign of Brihm
or Brehm, the Omnipotent, is to be found. They considered the great
mystery of the existence of the Supreme Ruler of the Universe, as beyond
human comprehension. Every creature endowed with the faculty of
thinking, they held, must be conscious of the existence of a God, a
first cause; but the attempt to explain the nature of that Being, or in
any way to assimilate it with our own, they considered not only a proof
of folly, but of extreme impiety.

The following extracts from their books will serve to show what were the
real tenets of their creed:

"By one Supreme Ruler is this Universe pervaded; even every world in the
whole circle of nature.... There is one Supreme Spirit, which nothing
can shake, more swift than the thought of man. That Supreme Spirit moves
at pleasure, but in itself is immovable; it is distant from us, yet near
us; it pervades this whole system of worlds; yet it is infinitely beyond
it. That man who considers all beings as existing even in the Supreme
Spirit, and the Supreme Spirit as pervading all beings, henceforth views
no creature with contempt.... All spiritual beings are the same in kind
with the Supreme Spirit.... The pure enlightened soul assumes a luminous
form, with no gross body, with no perforation, with no veins or tendons,
unblemished, untainted by sin; itself being a ray from the Infinite
Spirit, which knows the Past and the Future, which pervades all, which
existed with no cause but itself, which created all things as they are,
in ages most remote. That all-pervading Spirit which gives light to the
visible Sun, even the same in _kind_ am I, though infinitely distant in
_degree_. Let my soul return to the immortal Spirit of God, and then let
my body, which ends in ashes, return to dust! O Spirit, who pervadest
fire, lead us in a straight path to the riches of beatitude. Thou, O
God, possessest all the treasures of knowledge! Remove each foul taint
from our souls!

"From what root springs mortal man, when felled by the hand of death?
Who can make him spring again to birth? God, who is perfect wisdom,
perfect happiness. He is the final refuge of the man who has liberally
bestowed his wealth, who has been firm in virtue, who knows and adores
that Great One.... Let us adore the supremacy of that Divine Sun, the
Godhead who illuminates all, who re-creates all, from whom all proceed,
to whom all must return, whom we invoke to direct our understandings
aright, in our progress toward his holy seat.... What the Sun and Light
are to this visible world, such is truth to the intellectual and visible
Universe.... Our souls acquire certain knowledge, by meditating on the
light of Truth, which emanates from the Being of Beings.... That Being,
without eyes sees, without ears hears all; he knows whatever can be
known, but there is none who knows him; him the wise call the Great,
Supreme, Pervading Spirit.... Perfect Truth, Perfect Happiness, without
equal, immortal; absolute unity, whom neither speech can describe, nor
mind comprehend: all-pervading, all-transcending, delighted with his own
boundless intelligence, nor limited by space or time; without feet,
running swiftly; without hands, grasping all worlds; without eyes,
all-surveying; without ears, all-hearing; without an intelligent guide,
understanding all; without cause, the first of all causes; all-ruling,
all-powerful, the Creator, Preserver, Transformer of all things: such is
the Great One; this the Vedas declare.

"May that soul of mine, which mounts aloft in my waking hours as an
ethereal spark, and which, even in my slumber, has a like ascent,
soaring to a great distance, as an emanation from the Light of Lights,
be united by devout meditation with the Spirit supremely blest, and
supremely intelligent!.... May that soul of mine, which was itself the
primeval oblation placed within all creatures.... which is a ray of
perfect wisdom, which is the inextinguishable light fixed within created
bodies, without which no good act is performed.... in which as an
immortal essence may be comprised whatever has passed, is present, or
will be hereafter.... be united by devout meditation with the Spirit
supremely blest and supremely intelligent!

"The Being of Beings is the Only God, eternal and everywhere present,
Who comprises everything. There is no God but He.... The Supreme Being
is invisible, incomprehensible, immovable, without figure or shape. No
one has ever seen Him; time never comprised Him; His essence pervades
everything; all was derived from Him.

"The duty of a good man, even in the moment of his destruction, consists
not only in forgiving, but even in a desire of benefiting his destroyer;
as the sandal-tree, in the instant of its overthrow, sheds perfume on
the axe which fells it."

The Vedanta and Nyaya philosophers acknowledge a Supreme Eternal Being,
and the immortality of the soul: though, like the Greeks, they differ in
their ideas of those subjects. They speak of the Supreme Being as an
eternal essence that pervades space, and gives life or existence. Of
that universal and eternal pervading spirit, the Vedanti suppose four
modifications; but as these do not change its nature, and as it would be
erroneous to ascribe to each of them a distinct essence, so it is
equally erroneous, they say, to imagine that the various modifications
by which the All-pervading Being exists, or displays His power, are
individual existences. Creation is not considered as the instant
production of things, but only as the manifestation of that which exists
eternally in the one Universal Being. The Nyaya philosophers believe
that spirit and matter are eternal; but they do not suppose that the
world in its present form has existed from eternity, but only the
primary matter from which it sprang when operated on by the almighty
Word of God, the Intelligent Cause and Supreme Being, Who produced the
combinations or aggregations which compose the material Universe. Though
they believe that soul is an emanation from the Supreme Being, they
distinguish it from that Being, in its individual existence. Truth and
Intelligence are the eternal attributes of God, not, they say, of the
individual soul, which is susceptible both of knowledge and ignorance,
of pleasure and pain; and therefore God and it are distinct. Even when
it returns to the Eternal, and attains supreme bliss, it undoubtedly
does not cease. Though _united_ to the Supreme Being, it is not
_absorbed_ in it, but still retains the abstract nature of definite or
visible existence.

"The dissolution of the world," they say, "consists in the destruction
of the visible forms and qualities of things; but their material essence
remains, and from it new worlds are formed by the creative energy of
God; and thus the Universe is dissolved and renewed in endless
succession."

The Jainas, a sect at Mysore and elsewhere, say that the ancient
religion of India and of the whole world consisted in the belief in one
God, a pure Spirit, indivisible, omniscient and all-powerful; that God,
having given to all things their appointed order and course of action,
and to man a sufficient portion of reason, or understanding, to guide
him in his conduct, leaves him to the operation of free will, without
the entire exercise of which he could not be held answerable for his
conduct.

Menou, the Hindū lawgiver, adored, not the visible, material Sun, but
"that divine and incomparably greater light," to use the words of the
most venerable text in the Indian Scripture, "which illumines all,
delights all, from which all proceed, to which all must return, and
which alone can irradiate our intellects." He thus commences his
Institutes:

"Be it heard!

"This Universe existed only in the first divine idea yet unexpanded, as
if involved in darkness, imperceptible, undefinable, undiscoverable by
reason, and undiscovered by revelation, as if it were wholly immersed in
sleep:

"Then the Sole Self-existing Power, Himself undiscovered, but making
this world discernible, with five elements, and other principles of
nature, appeared with undiminished glory, _expanding His idea_, or
dispelling the gloom.

"He Whom the mind alone can perceive, whose essence eludes the eternal
organs, who has no visible parts, who exists from Eternity, even He, the
soul of all beings, Whom no being can comprehend, shone forth.

"He, having willed to produce various beings from His own divine
Substance, first with a thought created the waters ... From that which
is [precisely the Hebrew יהוה], the first cause, not the object of
sense, existing everywhere in substance, not existing to our perception,
without beginning or end" [the A and Ω, or the I A Ω], "was
produced the divine male famed in all worlds under the appellation of
Brahma."

Then recapitulating the different things created by Brahma, he adds:
"He," meaning Brahma [the Λογος, the WORD], "whose powers are
incomprehensible, having thus created this Universe, was again absorbed
in the Supreme Spirit, changing the time of energy for the time of
repose."

The _Antareya A'ran'ya_, one of the Vedas, gives this primitive idea of
the creation: "In the beginning, the Universe was but a Soul: nothing
else, active or inactive, existed. Then HE had this thought, _I will
create worlds_; and thus HE created these different worlds; air, the
light, mortal beings, and the waters.

"HE had this thought: _Behold the worlds; I will create guardians for
the worlds._ So HE took of the water and fashioned a being clothed with
the human form. He looked upon him, and of that being so contemplated,
the mouth opened like an egg, and speech came forth, and from the speech
fire. The nostrils opened, and through them went the breath of
respiration, and by it the air was propagated. The eyes opened; from
then came a luminous ray, and from it was produced the sun. The ears
dilated; from them came hearing, and from hearing space:" ... and, after
the body of man, with the senses, was formed;--"HE, the Universal Soul,
thus reflected: _How can this body exist without Me?_ He examined
through what extremity He could penetrate it. He said to Himself: If,
_without Me, the World is articulated, breath exhales, and sight sees;
if hearing hears, the skin feels, and the mind reflects, deglutition
swallows, and the generative organ fulfills its functions, what then am
I?_ And separating the suture of the cranium, He penetrated into man."

Behold the great fundamental primitive truths! God, an infinite Eternal
Soul or Spirit. Matter, not eternal nor self-existent, but
created--created by a thought of God. After matter, and worlds, then
man, by a like thought: and finally, after endowing him with the senses
and a thinking mind, a portion, a spark, of God Himself penetrates the
man, and becomes a living spirit within him.

The Vedas thus detail the creation of the world:

"In the beginning there was a single God, existing of Himself; Who,
after having passed an eternity absorbed in the contemplation of His own
being, desired to manifest His perfections outwardly of Himself; and
created the matter of the world. The four elements being thus produced,
but still mingled in confusion, He breathed upon the waters, which
swelled up into an immense ball in the shape of an egg, and, developing
themselves, became the vault and orb of Heaven which encircles the
earth. Having made the earth and the bodies of animal beings, this God,
the essence of movement, gave to them, to animate them, a portion of His
own being. Thus, the soul of everything that breathes being a fraction
of the universal soul, none perishes; but each soul merely changes its
mould and form, by passing successively into different bodies. Of all
forms, that which most pleases the Divine Being is Man, as nearest
approaching His own perfections. When a man, absolutely disengaging
himself from his senses, absorbs himself in self-contemplation, he comes
to discern the Divinity, and becomes part of Him."

The Ancient Persians in many respects resembled the Hindūs,--in their
language, their poetry, and their poetic legends. Their conquests
brought them in contact with China; and they subdued Egypt and Judea.
Their views of God and religion more resembled those of the Hebrews than
those of any other nation; and indeed the latter people borrowed from
them some prominent doctrines, that we are in the habit of regarding as
an essential part of the original Hebrew creed.

Of the King of Heaven and Father of Eternal Light, of the pure World of
LIGHT, of the Eternal WORD by which all things were created, of the
Seven Mighty Spirits that stand next to the Throne of Light and
Omnipotence, and of the glory of those Heavenly Hosts that encompass
that Throne, of the Origin of Evil, and the Prince of Darkness, Monarch
of the rebellious spirits, enemies of all good, they entertained tenets
very similar to those of the Hebrews. Toward Egyptian idolatry they felt
the strongest abhorrence, and under Cambyses pursued a regular plan for
its utter extirpation. Xerxes, when he invaded Greece, destroyed the
Temples and erected fire-chapels along the whole course of his march.
Their religion was eminently spiritual, and the earthly fire and earthly
sacrifice were but the signs and emblems of another devotion and a
higher power.

Thus the fundamental doctrine of the ancient religion of India and
Persia was at first nothing more than a simple veneration of nature, its
pure elements and its primary energies, the sacred fire, and above all,
Light,--the air, not the lower atmospheric air, but the purer and
brighter air of Heaven, the breath that animates and pervades the breath
of mortal life. This pure and simple veneration of nature is, perhaps
the most ancient, and was by far the most generally prevalent in the
primitive and patriarchal world. It was not originally a deification of
nature, or a denial of the sovereignty of God. Those pure elements and
primitive essences of created nature offered to the first men, still in
a close communication with the Deity, not a likeness of resemblance,
nor a mere fanciful image or a poetical figure, but a natural and true
symbol of Divine power. Everywhere in the Hebrew writings the pure light
or sacred fire is employed as an image of the all-prevading and
all-consuming power and omnipresence of the Divinity. His breath was the
source of life; and the faint whisper of the breeze announced to the
prophet His immediate presence.

"All things are the progeny of one fire. The Father perfected all
things, and delivered them over to the Second Mind, whom all nations of
men call the First. Natural works co-exist with the intellectual light
of the Father; for it is the Soul which adorns the great Heaven, and
which adorns it after the Father. The Soul, being a bright fire, by the
power of the Father, remains immortal, and is mistress of life, and
fills up the recesses of the world. For the fire which is first beyond,
did not shut up his power in matter by works, but by mind, for the
framer of the fiery world is the mind of mind, who first sprang from
mind, clothing fire with fire. Father-begotten Light! for He alone,
having from the Father's power received the essence of intellect, is
enabled to understand the mind of the Father; and to instill into all
sources and principles the capacity of understanding, and of ever
continuing in ceaseless revolving motion." Such was the language of
Zoroaster, embodying the old Persian ideas.

And the same ancient sage thus spoke of the Sun and Stars: The Father
made the whole Universe of fire and water and earth, and all-nourishing
ether. He fixed a great multitude of moveless stars, that stand still
forever, not by compulsion and unwillingly, but without desire to
wander, fire acting upon fire. He congregated the seven firmaments of
the world, and so surrounded the earth with the convexity of the
Heavens; and therein set seven living existences, arranging their
apparent disorder in regular orbits, six of them planets, and the Sun,
placed in the centre, the seventh;--in that centre from which all lines,
diverging which way soever, are equal; and the swift sun himself,
revolving around a principal centre, and ever striving to reach the
central and all-pervading light, bearing with him the bright Moon.

And yet Zoroaster added: "Measure not the journeyings of the Sun, nor
attempt to reduce them to rule; for he is carried by the eternal will of
the Father, not for your sake. Do not endeavor to understand the
impetuous course of the Moon; for she runs evermore under the impulse
of necessity; and the progression of the Stars was not generated to
serve any purpose of yours."

Ormuzd says to Zoroaster, in the Boundehesch: "I am he who holds the
Star-Spangled Heaven in ethereal space; who makes this sphere, which
once was buried in darkness, a flood of light. Through me the Earth
became a world firm and lasting--the earth on which walks the Lord of
the world. I am he who makes the light of Sun, Moon, and Stars pierce
the clouds. I make the corn seed, which perishing in the ground sprouts
anew.... I created man, whose eye is light, whose life is the breath of
his nostrils. I placed within him life's unextinguishable power."

Ormuzd or Ahura-Mazda himself represented the primal light, distinct
from the heavenly bodies, yet necessary to their existence, and the
source of their splendor. The Amschaspands (Ameschaspenta, "immortal
Holy Ones"), each presided over a special department of nature. Earth
and Heaven, fire and water, the Sun and Moon, the rivers, trees, and
mountains, even the artificial divisions of the day and year were
addressed in prayer as tenanted by Divine beings, each separately ruling
within his several sphere. Fire, in particular, that "most energetic of
immortal powers," the visible representative of the primal light, was
invoked as "Son of Ormuzd." The Sun, the Archimagus, that noblest and
most powerful agent of divine power, who "steps forth as a Conqueror
from the top of the terrible Alborj to rule over the world which he
enlightens from the throne of Ormuzd," was worshipped among other
symbols by the name of MITHRAS, a beneficent and friendly genius, who,
in the hymn addressed to him in the Zend-Avesta, bears the names given
him by the Greeks, as the "Invincible" and the "Mediator"; the former,
because in his daily strife with darkness he is the most active
confederate of Ormuzd; the latter, as being the medium through which
Heaven's choicest blessings are communicated to men. He is called "the
eye of Ormuzd, the effulgent Hero, pursuing his course triumphantly,
fertilizer of deserts, most exalted of the Izeds or Yezatas, the
never-sleeping, the protector of the land." "When the dragon foe
devastates my provinces," says Ormuzd, "and afflicts them with famine,
then is he struck down by the strong arm of Mithras, together with the
Devs of Mazanderan. With his lance and his immortal club, the Sleepless
Chief hurls down the Devs into the dust, when as Mediator he interposes
to guard the City from evil."

Ahriman was by some Parsee sects considered older than Ormuzd, as
darkness is older than light; he is imagined to have been unknown as a
Malevolent Being in the early ages of the world, and the fall of man is
attributed in the Boundehesch to an apostate worship of him, from which
men were converted by a succession of prophets terminating with
Zoroaster.

Mithras is not only light, but intelligence; that luminary which, though
born in obscurity, will not only dispel darkness but conquer death. The
warfare through which this consummation is to be reached, is mainly
carried on through the instrumentality of the "Word," that "ever-living
emanation of the Deity, by virtue of which the world exists," and of
which the revealed formulas incessently repeated in the liturgies of the
Magi are but the expression. "What shall I do," cried Zoroaster, "O
Ormuzd, steeped in brightness, in order to battle with Daroodj-Ahriman,
father of the Evil Law; how shall I make men pure and holy?" Ormuzd
answered and said: "Invoke, O Zoroaster, the pure law of the Servants of
Ormuzd; invoke the Amschaspands who shed abundance throughout the seven
Keshwars; invoke the Heaven, Zeruana-Akarana, the birds travailing on
high, the swift wind, the Earth; invoke my Spirit, me who am
Ahura-Mazda, the purest, strongest, wisest, best of beings; me who have
the most majestic body, who through purity am Supreme, whose Soul is the
Excellent Word; and ye, all people, invoke me as I have commanded
Zoroaster."

Ahura-Mazda himself is the living WORD; he is called "First-born of all
things, express image of the Eternal, very light of very light, the
Creator, who by power of the Word which he never ceases to pronounce,
made in 365 days the Heaven and the Earth." The Word is said in the
Yashna to have existed before all, and to be itself a Yazata, a
personified object of prayer. It was revealed in Serosch, in Homa, and
again, under Gushtasp, was manifested in Zoroaster.

Between life and death, between sunshine and shade, Mithras is the
present exemplification of the Primal Unity from which all things arose,
and into which, through his mediation, all contrarieties will ultimately
be absorbed. His annual sacrifice is the passover of the Magi, a
symbolical atonement or pledge of moral and physical regeneration. He
created the world in the beginning; and as at the close of each
successive year he sets free the current of life to invigorate a fresh
circle of being, so in the end of all things he will bring the weary
sum of ages as a hecatomb before God, releasing by a final sacrifice the
Soul of Nature from her perishable frame, to commence a brighter and
purer existence.

Iamblichus (_De Mys_. viii. 4) says: "The Egyptians are far from
ascribing all things to physical causes; life and intellect they
distinguish from physical being, both in man and in the Universe. They
place intellect and reason first as self-existent, and from these they
derive the created world. As Parent of generated things they constitute
a Demiurge, and acknowledge a vital force both in the Heavens and before
the Heavens. They place Pure Intellect above and beyond the Universe,
and another (that is, Mind revealed in the Material World), consisting
of one continuous mind pervading the Universe, and apportioned to all
its parts and spheres." The Egyptian idea, then, was that of all
transcendental philosophy--that of a Deity both immanent and
transcendent--spirit passing into its manifestations, but not exhausted
by so doing.

The wisdom recorded in the canonical rolls of Hermes quickly attained in
this transcendental lore, all that human curiosity can ever discover.
Thebes especially is said to have acknowledged a being without beginning
or end, called Amun or Amun-Kneph, the all-prevading Spirit or Breath of
Nature, or perhaps even some still more lofty object of reverential
reflection, whom it was forbidden even to name. Such a being would in
theory stand at the head of the three orders of Gods mentioned by
Herodotus, these being regarded as arbitrary classifications of similar
or equal beings, arranged in successive emanations, according to an
estimate of their comparative dignity. The Eight Great Gods, or primary
class, were probably manifestations of the emanated God in the several
parts and powers of the Universe, each potentially comprising the whole
Godhead.

In the ancient Hermetic books, as quoted by Iamblichus, occurred the
following passage in regard to the Supreme Being:

"Before all the things that actually exist, and before all beginnings,
there is one God, prior even to the first God and King, remaining
unmoved in the singleness of his own Unity: for neither is anything
conceived by intellect inwoven with him, nor anything else; but he is
established as the exemplar of the God who is good, who is his own
father, self-begotten, and has only Parent. For he is something greater
and prior to, and the fountain of all things, and the foundation of
things conceived by the intellect, which are the first species. And from
this ONE, the self-originated God caused himself to shine forth; for
which reason he is his own father, and self-originated. For he is both a
beginning and God of Gods, a Monad from the One, prior to substance and
the beginning of substance; for from him is substantiality and
substance, whence also he is called the beginning of things conceived by
the intellect. These then are the most ancient beginnings of all things,
which Hermes places before the ethereal and empyrean and celestial
Gods."

"CHANG-TI, or the Supreme Lord or Being," said the old Chinese creed,
"is the principle of everything that exists, and Father of all living.
He is eternal, immovable, and independent: His power knows no bounds:
His sight equally comprehends the Past, the Present, and the Future, and
penetrates even to the inmost recesses of the heart. Heaven and earth
are under his government: all events, all revolutions, are the
consequences of his dispensation and will. He is pure, holy, and
impartial; wickedness offends his sight; but he beholds with an eye of
complacency the virtuous actions of men. Severe, yet just, he punishes
vice in an exemplary manner, even in Princes and Rulers; and often casts
down the guilty, to crown with honor the man who walks after his own
heart, and whom he raises from obscurity. Good, merciful, and full of
pity, he forgives the wicked upon their repentance: and public
calamities and the irregularity of the seasons are but salutary
warnings, which his fatherly goodness gives to men, to induce them to
reform and amend."

Controlled by reason infinitely more than by the imagination, that
people, occupying the extreme East of Asia, did not fall into idolatry
until after the time of Confucius, and within two centuries of the birth
of Christ; when the religion of BUDDHA or FO was carried thither from
India. Their system was long regulated by the pure worship of God, and
the foundation of their moral and political existence laid in a sound,
upright reason, conformable to true ideas of the Deity. They had no
false gods or images, and their third Emperor _Hoam-ti_ erected a
Temple, the first probably ever erected, to the Great Architect of the
Universe. And though they offered sacrifices to divers tutelary angels,
yet they honored them infinitely less than XAM-TI or CHANG-TI, the
Sovereign Lord of the World.

Confucius forbade making images or representations of the Deity. He
attached no idea of personality to Him; but considered Him as a Power or
Principle, pervading all Nature. And the Chinese designated the Divinity
by the name of THE DIVINE REASON.

The Japanese believe in a Supreme Invisible Being, not to be represented
by images or worshipped in Temples. They styled him AMIDA or OMITH; and
say that he is without beginning or end; that he came on earth, where he
remained a thousand years, and became the Redeemer of our fallen race:
that he is to judge all men; and the good are to live forever, while the
bad are to be condemned to Hell.

"The Chang-ti is represented," said Confucius, "under the general emblem
of the visible firmament, as well as under the particular symbols of the
Sun, the Moon, and the Earth, because by their means we enjoy the gifts
of the Chang-ti. The Sun is the source of life and light: the Moon
illuminates the world by night. By observing the course of these
luminaries, mankind are enabled to distinguish times and seasons. The
Ancients, with the view of connecting the act with its object, when they
established the practice of sacrificing to the Chang-ti, fixed the day
of the Winter Solstice, because the Sun, after having passed through the
twelve places assigned apparently by the Chang-ti as its annual
residence, began its career anew, to distribute blessings throughout the
Earth."

He said: "The TEEN is the universal principle and prolific source of all
things.... The Chang-ti is the universal principle of existence."

The Arabians never possessed a poetical, high-wrought, and
scientifically arranged system of Polytheism. Their historical
traditions had much analogy with those of the Hebrews, and coincided
with them in a variety of points. The tradition of a purer faith and the
simple Patriarchal worship of the Deity appear never to have been
totally extinguished among them; nor did idolatry gain much foothold
until near the time of Mahomet; who, adopting the old primeval faith,
taught again the doctrine of one God, adding to it that he was His
Prophet.

To the mass of Hebrews, as well as to other nations, seem to have come
fragments only of the primitive revelation: nor do they seem, until
after their captivity among the Persians, to have concerned themselves
about metaphysical speculations in regard to the Divine Nature and
essence; although it is evident, from the Psalms of David, that a select
body among them preserved a knowledge, in regard to the Deity, which was
wholly unknown to the mass of the people; and those chosen few were made
the medium of transition for certain truths, to later ages.

Among the Greeks, the scholars of the Egyptians, all the higher ideas
and severer doctrines on the Divinity, his Sovereign Nature and Infinite
Might, the Eternal Wisdom and Providence that conducts and directs all
things to their proper end, the Infinite Mind and Supreme Intelligence
that created all things, and is raised far above external nature,--all
these loftier ideas and nobler doctrines were expounded more or less
perfectly by Pythagoras, Anaxagoras, and Socrates, and developed in the
most beautiful and luminous manner by Plato, and the philosophers that
succeeded him. And even in the popular religion of the Greeks are many
things capable of a deeper import and more spiritual signification;
though they seem only rare vestiges of ancient truth, vague
presentiments, fugitive tones, and momentary flashes, revealing a belief
in a Supreme Being, Almighty Creator of the Universe, and Common Father
of Mankind.

Much of the primitive Truth was taught to Pythagoras by Zoroaster, who
himself received it from the Indians. His disciples rejected the use of
Temples, of Altars, and of Statues; and smiled at the folly of those
nations who imagined that the Deity sprang from or had any affinity with
human nature. The tops of the highest mountains were the places chosen
for sacrifices. Hymns and prayers were their principal worship. The
Supreme God, who fills the wide circle of Heaven, was the object to Whom
they were addressed. Such is the testimony of Herodotus. Light they
considered not so much as an object of worship, as rather the most pure
and lively emblem of, and first emanation from, the Eternal God; and
thought that man required something visible or tangible to exalt his
mind to that degree of adoration which is due to the Divine Being.

There was a surprising similarity between the Temples, Priests,
doctrines, and worship of the Persian Magi and the British Druids. The
latter did not worship idols in the human shape, because they held that
the Divinity, being invisible, ought to be adored without being seen.
They asserted the Unity of the Godhead. Their invocations were made to
the One All-preserving Power; and they argued that, as this power was
not matter, it must necessarily be the Deity; and the secret symbol used
to express his name was O.I.W. They believed that the earth had
sustained one general destruction by water; and would again be destroyed
by fire. They admitted the doctrines of the immortality of the soul, a
future state, and a day of judgment, which would be conducted on the
principle of man's responsibility. They even retained some idea of the
redemption of mankind through the death of a Mediator. They retained a
tradition of the Deluge, perverted and localized. But, around these
fragments of primitive truth they wove a web of idolatry, worshipped two
Subordinate Deities under the names of HU and CERIDWEN, male and female
(doubtless the same as Osiris and Isis), and held the doctrine of
transmigration.

The early inhabitants of Scandinavia believed in a God who was "the
Author of everything that existeth; the Eternal, the Ancient, the Living
and Awful Being, the Searcher into concealed things, the Being that
never changeth." Idols and visible representations of the Deity were
originally forbidden, and He was directed to be worshipped in the lonely
solitude of sequestered forests, where He was said to dwell, invisible,
and in perfect silence.

The Druids, like their Eastern ancestors, paid the most sacred regard to
the odd numbers, which, traced backward, ended in Unity or Deity, while
the even numbers ended in nothing. 3 was particularly reverenced.
19(7+3+3²): 30 (7x3+3x3): and 21 (7x3) were numbers observed in the
erection of their temples, constantly appearing in their dimensions, and
the number and distances of the huge stones.

They were the sole interpreters of religion. They superintended all
sacrifices; for no private person could offer one without their
permission. They exercised the power of excommunication; and without
their concurrence war could not be declared nor peace made: and they
even had the power of inflicting the punishment of death. They professed
to possess a knowledge of magic, and practised augury for the public
service.

They cultivated many of the liberal sciences, and particularly
astronomy, the favorite science of the Orient; in which they attained
considerable proficiency. They considered day as the offspring of night,
and therefore made their computations by nights instead of days; and we,
from them, still use the words fortnight and sen'night. They knew the
division of the heavens into constellations; and finally, they practised
the strictest morality, having particularly the most sacred regard for
that peculiarly Masonic virtue, Truth.

In the Icelandic Prose Edda is the following dialogue:

"Who is the first or eldest of the Gods?

"In our language he is called ALFADIR (All-Father, or the Father of
All); but in the old Asgard he had twelve names.

"Where is this God? What is his power? and what hath he done to display
his glory?

"He liveth from all ages, he governeth all realms, and swayeth all
things both great and small.

"He hath formed Heaven and earth, and the air, and all things thereunto
belonging.

"He hath made man and given him a soul which shall live and never
perish, though the body shall have mouldered away or have been burnt to
ashes. And all that are righteous shall dwell with him in the place
called _Gimli_ or _Vingolf_; but the wicked shall go to _Hel_ and thence
to _Niflhel_ which is below, in the ninth world."

Almost every heathen nation, so far as we have any knowledge of their
mythology, believed in one Supreme Overruling God, whose name it was not
lawful to utter.

"When we ascend", says MÜLLER, "to the most distant heights of Greek
history, the idea of God as the Supreme Being stands before us as a
simple fact. Next to this adoration of One God, the Father of Heaven,
the Father of men, we find in Greece a Worship of Nature." The original
Ζεύς was the God or Gods, called by the Greeks the Son of Time, meaning
that there was no God before Him, but He was Eternal. "Zeus," says the
Orphic line, "is the Beginning, Zeus the Middle; out of Zeus all things
have been made". And the Peleides of Dodona said, "Zeus was, Zeus is,
Zeus will be; O great Zeus!" Ζεύς νή, Ζεύς έστίν, Ζεύς ἐσσεται ώ μεγάλη
Ζεύ: and he was Ζεύς, κύδιστος, μέγιστος, Ζεus, Best and Greatest.

The Parsees, retaining the old religion taught by Zaradisht, say in
their catechism: "We believe in only one God, and do not believe in any
beside Him; Who created the Heavens, the Earth the Angels.... Our God
has neither face nor form, color nor shape, nor fixed place. There is no
other like Him, nor can our mind comprehend Him."

The Tetragrammaton, or _some other word covered by it_, was forbidden to
be pronounced. But that its pronunciation might not be lost among the
Levites, the High-Priest uttered it in the Temple once a year, on the
10th day of the Month Tisri, the day of the great feast of expiation.
During this ceremony, the people were directed to make a great noise,
that the Sacred Word might not be heard by any who had not a right to
it; for every other, said the Jews, would be incontinently stricken
dead.

The Great Egyptian Initiates, before the time of the Jews, did the same
thing in regard to the word Isis; which they regarded as sacred and
incommunicable.

Origen says: "There are names which have a natural potency. Such as
those which the Sages used among the Egyptians, the Magi in Persia, the
Brahmins in India. What is called Magic is not a vain and chimerical
act, as the Stoics and Epicureans pretend. The names SABAOTH and ADONAI
were not made for created beings; but they belong to a mysterious
theology, which goes back to the Creator. From Him comes the virtue of
these names, when they are arranged and pronounced according to the
rules."

The Hindū word AUM represented the three Powers combined in their Deity:
Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva; or the Creating, Preserving, and Destroying
Powers: A, the first; U or Ŏ-Ŏ, the second; and M, the third. This word
could not be pronounced, except by the letters: for its pronunciation as
one word was said to make Earth tremble, and even the Angels of Heaven
to quake for fear.

The word AUM, says the Ramayan, represents "The Being of Beings, One
Substance in three forms; without mode, without quality, without
passion: Immense, Incomprehensible, Infinite, Indivisible, Immutable,
Incorporeal, Irresistible."

An old passage in the Purana says: "All the rites ordained in the Vedas,
the sacrifices to the fire, and all other solemn purifications, shall
pass away; but that which shall never pass away is the word A-Ŏ-Ŏ-M
for it is the symbol of the Lord of all things."

Herodotus says that the Ancient Pelasgi built no temples and worshipped
no idols, and had a sacred name of Deity, which it was not permissible
to pronounce.

The Clarian Oracle, which was of unknown antiquity, being asked which of
the Deities was named IAΩ, answered in these remarkable words: "The
Initiated are bound to conceal the mysterious secrets. Learn, then, that
IAΩ is the Great God Supreme, that ruleth over all."

The Jews consider the True Name of God to be irrecoverably lost by
disuse, and regard its pronunciation as one of the Mysteries that will
be revealed at the coming of their Messiah. And they attribute its loss
to the illegality of applying the Masoretic points to so sacred a Name,
by which a knowledge of the proper vowels is forgotten. It is even said,
in the Gemara of Abodah Zara, that God permitted a celebrated Hebrew
Scholar to be burned by a Roman Emperor, because he had been heard to
pronounce the Sacred Name with points.

The Jews feared that the Heathen would get possession of the Name: and
therefore, in their copies of the Scriptures, they wrote it in the
Samaritan character, instead of the Hebrew or Chaldaic, that the
adversary might not make an improper use of it: for they believed it
capable of working miracles; and held that the wonders in Egypt were
performed by Moses, in virtue of this name being engraved on his rod:
and that any person who knew the true pronunciation would be able to do
as much as he did.

Josephus says it was unknown until God communicated it to Moses in the
wilderness: and that it was lost through the wickedness of man.

The followers of Mahomet have a tradition that there is a secret name of
the Deity which possesses wonderful properties; and that the only method
of becoming acquainted with it, is by being initiated into the Mysteries
of the _Ism Abla_.

H O M was the first framer of the new religion among the Persians, and
His Name was Ineffable.

AMUN, among the Egyptians, was a name pronounceable by none save the
Priests.

The old Germans adored God with profund reverence, without daring to
name Him, or to worship Him in Temples. The Druids expressed the name
of Deity by the letters O-I-W.

Among all the nations of primitive antiquity, the doctrine of the
immortality of the soul was not a mere probable hypothesis, needing
laborious researches and diffuse argumentation to produce conviction of
its truth. Nor can we hardly give it the name of _Faith_; for it was a
lively _certainty_, like the feeling of one's own existence and
identity, and of what is actually present; exerting its influence on all
sublunary affairs, and the motive of mightier deeds and enterprises than
any mere earthly interest could inspire.

Even the doctrine of transmigration of souls, universal among the
Ancient Hindūs and Egyptians, rested on a basis of the old primitive
religion, and was connected with a sentiment purely religious. It
involved this noble element of truth: That since man had gone astray,
and wandered far from God, he must needs make many efforts, and undergo
a long and painful pilgrimage, before he could rejoin the Source of all
Perfection: and the firm conviction and positive certainty, that nothing
defective, impure, or defiled with earthy stains, could enter the pure
region of perfect spirits, or be eternally united to God; wherefore the
soul had to pass through long trials and many purifications before it
could attain that blissful end. And the end and aim of all these systems
of philosophy was the final deliverance of the soul from the old
calamity, the dreaded fate and frightful lot of being compelled to
wander through the dark regions of nature and the various forms of the
brute creation, ever changing its terrestrial shape, and its union with
God, which they held to be the lofty destiny of the wise and virtuous
soul.

Pythagoras gave to the doctrine of the transmigration of souls that
meaning which the wise Egyptians gave to it in their Mysteries: He never
taught the doctrine in that literal sense in which it was understood by
the people. Of that literal doctrine not the least vestige is to be
found in such of his symbols as remain, nor in his precepts collected by
his disciple Lysias. He held that men always remain, in their essence,
such as they were created; and can degrade themselves only by vice, and
ennoble themselves only by virtue.

Hierocles, one of his most zealous and celebrated disciples, expressly
says that he who believes that the soul of man, after his death, will
enter the body of a beast, for his vices, or become a plant for his
stupidity, is deceived; and is absolutely ignorant of the eternal form
of the soul, which can never change; for, always remaining man, it is
said to become God or beast, through virtue or vice, though it can
become neither one nor the other by nature, but solely by resemblance of
its inclinations to theirs.

And Timæus of Locria, another disciple, says that to alarm men and
prevent them from committing crimes, they menaced them with strange
humiliations and punishments; even declaring that their souls would pass
into new bodies,--that of a coward into the body of a deer; that of a
ravisher into the body of a wolf; that of a murderer into the body of
some still more ferocious animal; and that of an impure sensualist into
the body of a hog.

So, too, the doctrine is explained in the Phædo. And Lysias says, that
after the soul, purified of its crimes, has left the body and returned
to Heaven, it is no longer subject to change or death, but enjoys an
eternal felicity. According to the Indians, it returned to, and became a
part of, the universal soul which animates everything.

The Hindūs held that Buddha descended on earth to raise all human beings
up to the perfect state. He will ultimately succeed, and all, himself
included, be merged in Unity.

Vishnu is to judge the world at the last day. It is to be consumed by
fire: The Sun and Moon are to lose their light; the Stars to fall; and a
New Heaven and Earth to be created.

The legend of the fall of the Spirits, obscured and distorted, is
preserved in the Hindū Mythology. And their traditions acknowledged, and
they revered, the succession of the first ancestors of mankind, or the
Holy Patriarchs of the primitive world, under the name of the Seven
Great RISHIS, or Sages of hoary antiquity; though they invested their
history with a cloud of fictions.

The Egyptians held that the soul was immortal; and that Osiris was to
judge the world.

And thus reads the Persian legend:

"After Ahriman shall have ruled the world until the end of time,
SOSIOSCH, the promised Redeemer, will come and annihilate the power of
the DEVS (or Evil Spirits), awaken the dead, and sit in final judgment
upon spirits and men. After that the comet _Gurzsher_ will be thrown
down, and a general conflagration take place, which will consume the
whole world. The remains of the earth will then sink down into
_Duzakh_, and become for three periods a place of punishment for the
wicked. Then, by degrees all will be pardoned, even _Ahriman_ and the
_Devs_, and admitted to the regions of bliss, and thus there will be a
new Heaven and a new earth."

In the doctrines of Lamaism also, we find, obscured, and partly
concealed in fiction, fragments of the primitive truth. For according to
that faith, "There is to be a final judgment before ESLIK KHAN: The good
are to be admitted to Paradise, the bad to be banished to hell, where
there are eight regions burning hot and eight freezing cold."

In the Mysteries, wherever they were practised, was taught that truth of
the primitive revelation, the existence of One Great Being, Infinite and
pervading the Universe, Who was there worshipped without superstition;
and His marvellous nature, essence, and attributes taught to the
Initiates; while the vulgar attributed His works to Secondary Gods,
personified, and isolated from Him in fabulous independence.

These truths were covered from the common people as with a veil; and the
Mysteries were carried into every country, that, without disturbing the
popular beliefs, truth, the arts, and the sciences might be known to
those who were capable of understanding them, and maintaining the true
doctrine incorrupt; which the people, prone to superstition and
idolatry, have in no age been able to do; nor, as many strange
aberrations and superstitions of the present day prove, any more now
than heretofore. For we need but point to the doctrines of so many sects
that degrade the Creator to the rank, and assign to Him the passions of
humanity, to prove that now, as always, the old truths must be committed
to a few, or they will be overlaid with fiction and error, and
irretrievably lost.

Though Masonry is identical with the Ancient Mysteries, it is so in this
qualified sense; that it presents but an imperfect image of their
brilliancy; the ruins only of their grandeur, and a system that has
experienced progressive alterations, the fruits of social events and
political circumstances. Upon leaving Egypt, the Mysteries were modified
by the habits of the different nations among whom they were introduced.
Though originally more moral and political than religious, they soon
became the heritage, as it were, of the priests, and essentially
religious, though in reality limiting the sacerdotal power, by teaching
the intelligent laity the folly and absurdity of the creeds of the
populace. They were therefore necessarily changed by the religious
systems of the countries into which they were transplanted. In Greece,
they were the Mysteries of Ceres; in Rome, of _Bona Dea_, the Good
Goddess; in Gaul, the School of Mars; in Sicily, the Academy of the
Sciences; among the Hebrews, they partook of the rites and ceremonies of
a religion which placed all the powers of government, and all the
knowledge, in the hands of the Priests and Levites. The pagodas of
India, the retreats of the Magi of Persia and Chaldea, and the pyramids
of Egypt, were no longer the sources at which men drank in knowledge.
Each people, at all informed, had its Mysteries. After a time the
Temples of Greece and the School of Pythagoras lost their reputation,
and Freemasonry took their place.

Masonry, when properly expounded, is at once the interpretation of the
great book of nature, the recital of physical and astronomical
phenomena, the purest philosophy, and the place of deposit, where, as in
a Treasury, are kept in safety all the great truths of the primitive
revelation, that form the basis of all religions. In the modern Degrees
three things are to be recognized: The image of primeval times, the
tableau of the efficient causes of the Universe, and the book in which
are written the morality of all peoples, and the code by which they must
govern themselves if they would be prosperous.

The Kabalistic doctrine was long the religion of the Sage and the
Savant; because, like Freemasonry, it incessantly tends toward spiritual
perfection, and the fusion of the creeds and Nationalities of Mankind.
In the eyes of the Kabalist, all men are his brothers; and their
relative ignorance is, to him, but a reason for instructing them. There
were illustrious Kabalists among the Egyptians and Greeks, whose
doctrines the Orthodox Church has accepted; and among the Arabs were
many, whose wisdom was not slighted by the Mediæval Church.

The Sages proudly wore the name of Kabalists. The Kabalah embodied a
noble philosophy, pure, not mysterious, but symbolic. It taught the
doctrine of the Unity of God, the art of knowing and explaining the
essence and operations of the Supreme Being, of spiritual powers and
natural forces, and of determining their action by symbolic figures; by
the arrangement of the alphabet, the combinations of numbers, the
inversion of letters in writing and the concealed meanings which they
claimed to discover therein. The Kabalah is the key of the occult
sciences; and the Gnostics, were born of the Kabalists.

The science of numbers represented not only arithmetical qualities, but
also all grandeur, all proportion. By it we necessarily arrive at the
discovery of the Principle or First Cause of things, called at the
present day THE ABSOLUTE.

Or UNITY,--that loftiest term to which all philosophy directs itself;
that imperious necessity of the human mind, that pivot round which it is
compelled to group the aggregate of its ideas: Unity, this source, this
centre of all systematic order, this principle of existence, this
central point, unknown in its essence, but manifest in its effects;
Unity, that sublime centre to which the chain of causes necessarily
ascends, was the august Idea toward which all the ideas of Pythagoras
converged. He refused the title of _Sage_, which means _one who knows_.
He invented, and applied to himself that of _Philosopher_, signifying
one who _is fond of_ or _studies things secret and occult_. The
astronomy which he mysteriously taught, was _astrology_: his science of
numbers was based on Kabalistical principles.

The Ancients, and Pythagoras himself, whose real principles have not
been always understood, never meant to ascribe to numbers, that is to
say, to abstract signs, any special virtue. But the Sages of Antiquity
concurred in recognizing a ONE FIRST CAUSE (material or spiritual) of
the existence of the Universe. Thence UNITY became the symbol of the
Supreme Deity. It was made to express, to represent God; but without
attributing to _the mere number_ ONE any divine or supernatural virtue.

The Pythagorean ideas as to particular numbers are partially expressed
in the following:

LECTURE OF THE KABALISTS.

_Qu_ Why did you seek to be received a Knight of the Kabalah?

_Ans_ To know, by means of numbers, the admirable harmony which there
is between nature and religion.

_Qu_ How were you announced?

_Ans_ By twelve raps.

_Qu_ What do they signify?

_Ans_ The twelve bases of our temporal and spiritual happiness.

_Qu_ What is a Kabalist?

_Ans_ A man who has learned, by tradition, the Sacerdotal Art and the
Royal Art.

_Qu_ What means the device, _Omnia in numeris sita sunt_?

_Ans_ That everything lies veiled in numbers.

_Qu_ Explain me that.

_Ans_ I will do so, as far as the number 12. Your sagacity will discern
the rest.

_Qu_ What signifies the _unit_ in the number 10?

_Ans_ GOD, creating and animating matter, expressed by 0, which, alone,
is of no value.

_Qu_ What does the unit _mean_?

_Ans_ In the moral order, a Word incarnate in the bosom of a virgin--or
religion.... In the physical, a spirit embodied in the virgin earth--or
nature.

_Qu_ What do you mean by the number _two_?

_Ans_ In the moral order, _man_ and _woman_.... In the physical, the
_active_ and the _passive_.

_Qu_ What do you mean by the number 3?

_Ans_ In the moral order, the three theological virtues.... In the
physical, the three principles of bodies.

_Qu_ What do you mean by the number 4?

_Ans_ The four cardinal virtues.... The four elementary qualities.

_Qu_ What do you mean by the number 5?

_Ans_ The quintessence of religion.... The quintessence of matter.

_Qu_ What do you mean by the number 6?

_Ans_ The theological cube.... The physical cube.

_Qu_ What do you mean by the number 7?

_Ans_ The seven sacraments.... The seven planets.

_Qu_ What do you mean by the number 8?

_Ans_ The small number of Elus.... The small number of wise men.

_Qu_ What do you mean by the number 9?

_Ans_ The exaltation of religion.... The exaltation of matter.

_Qu_ What do you mean by the number 10?

_Ans_ The ten commandments.... The ten precepts of nature.

_Qu_ What do you mean by the number 11?

_Ans_ The multiplication of religion.... The multiplication of nature.

_Qu_ What do you mean by the number 12?

_Ans_ The twelve Articles of Faith; the twelve Apostles, foundation of
the Holy City, who preached throughout the whole world, for our
happiness and spiritual joy.... The twelve operations of nature: The
twelve signs of the Zodiac, foundation of the _Primum Mobile_, extending
it throughout the Universe for our temporal felicity.

[The Rabbi (President of the Sanhedrim) adds: From all that you have
said, it results that the unit develops itself in 2, is completed in
three internally, and so produces 4 externally; whence, through 6, 7, 8,
9, it arrives at 5, half of the spherical number 10, to ascend, passing
through 11, to 12, and to raise itself, by the number 4 times 10, to the
number 6 times 12, the final term and summit of our eternal happiness.]

_Qu_ What is the generative number?

_Ans_ In the Divinity, it is the unit; in created things, the number 2:
Because the Divinity, 1, engenders 2, and in created things 2 engenders
1.

_Qu_ What is the most majestic number?

_Ans_ 3, because it denotes the triple divine essence.

_Qu_ What is the most mysterious number?

_Ans_ 4, because it contains all the mysteries of nature.

_Qu_ What is the most occult number?

_Ans_ 5, because it is inclosed in the centre of the series.

_Qu_ What is the most salutary number?

_Ans_ 6, because it contains the source of our spiritual and corporeal
happiness.

_Qu_ What is the most fortunate number?

_Ans_ 7, because it leads us to the decade, the perfect number.

_Qu_ Which is the number most to be desired?

_Ans_ 8, because he who possesses it, is of the number of the Elus and
Sages.

_Qu_ Which is the most sublime number?

_Ans_ 9, because by it religion and nature are exalted.

_Qu_ Which is the most perfect number?

_Ans_ 10, because it includes unity, which created everything, and
zero, symbol of matter and chaos, whence everything emerged. In its
figures it comprehends the created and uncreated, the commencement and
the end, power and force, life and annihilation. By the study of this
number, we find the relations of all things; the power of the Creator,
the faculties of the creature, the Alpha and Omega of divine knowledge.

_Qu_ Which is the most multiplying number?

_Ans_ 11, because with the possession of two units, we arrive at the
multiplication of things.

_Qu_ Which is the most solid number?

_Ans_ 12, because it is the foundation of our spiritual and temporal
happiness.

_Qu_ Which is the favorite number of religion and nature?

_Ans_ 4 times 10, because it enables us, rejecting everything impure,
eternally to enjoy the number 6 times 12, term and summit of our
felicity.

_Qu_ What is the meaning of the square?

_Ans_ It is the symbol of the four elements contained in the triangle,
or the emblem of the three chemical principles: these things united form
absolute unity in the primal matter.

_Qu_ What is the meaning of the centre of the circumference?

_Ans_ It signifies the universal spirit, vivifying centre of nature.

_Qu_ What do you mean by the quadrature of the circle?

_Ans_ The investigation of the quadrature of the circle indicates the
knowledge of the four vulgar elements, which are themselves composed of
elementary spirits or chief principles; as the circle, though round, is
composed of lines, which escape the sight, and are seen only by the
mind.

_Qu_ What is the profoundest meaning of the figure 3?

_Ans_ The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. From the action of
these three results the triangle within the square; and from the seven
angles, the decade or perfect number.

_Qu_ Which is the most confused figure?

_Ans_ Zero,--the emblem of chaos, formless mixture of the elements.

_Qu_ What do the four devices of the Degree signify?

_Ans_ That we are to hear, see, be silent, and enjoy our happiness.

The _unit_ is the symbol of identity, equality, existence, conservation,
and general harmony; the Central Fire, the Point within the Circle.

_Two_, or the _duad_, is the symbol of diversity, inequality, division,
separation, and vicissitudes.

The figure 1 signifies the living man [a body standing upright]; man
being the only living being possessed of this faculty. Adding to it a
head, we have the letter P, the sign of Paternity, Creative Power; and
with a further addition, R, signifying man in motion, going, _Iens_,
_Iturus_.

The Duad is the origin of contrasts. It is the imperfect condition into
which, according to the Pythagoreans, a being falls, when he detaches
himself from the Monad, or God. Spiritual beings, emanating from God,
are enveloped in the duad, and therefore receive only illusory
impressions.

As formerly the number ONE designated harmony, order, or the Good
Principle (the ONE and ONLY GOD, expressed in Latin by _Solus_, whence
the words _Sol_, _Soleil_, symbol of this God), the number Two expressed
the contrary idea. There commenced the fatal knowledge of good and evil.
Everything double, false, opposed to the single and sole reality, was
expressed by the Binary number. It expressed also that state of
contrariety in which nature exists, where everything is double; night
and day, light and darkness, cold and heat, wet and dry, health and
sickness, error and truth, one and the other sex, etc. Hence the Romans
dedicated the second month in the year to Pluto, the God of Hell, and
the second day of that month to the _manès_ of the dead.

The number _One_, with the Chinese, signified unity, harmony, order, the
Good Principle, or God; _Two_, disorder, duplicity, falsehood. That
people, in the earliest ages, based their whole philosophical system on
the two primary figures or lines, one straight and unbroken, and the
other broken or divided into two; doubling which, by placing one under
the other, and trebling by placing three under each other, they made the
four symbols and eight _Koua_; which referred to the natural elements,
and the primary principles of all things, and served symbolically or
scientifically to express them. Plato terms unity and duality the
original elements of nature, and first principles of all existence: and
the oldest sacred book of the Chinese says: "The Great First Principle
has produced two equations and differences, or primary rules of
existence; but the two primary rules or two oppositions, namely YN and
YANG, or repose and motion, have produced four signs or symbols, and
the four symbols have produced the eight KOUA or further combinations."

The interpretation of the Hermetic fables shows, among every ancient
people, in their principal gods, first, 1, the Creating Monad, then 3,
then 3 times 3, 3 times 9, and 3 times 27. This triple progression has
for its foundation the three ages of Nature, the Past, the Present, and
the Future; or the three degrees of universal generation ... Birth,
Life, Death ... Beginning, middle, end.

The Monad was male, because its action produces no change _in_ itself,
but only _out_ of itself. It represented the creative principle.

The Duad, for a contrary reason, was female, ever changing by addition,
subtraction, or multiplication. It represents matter capable of form.

The union of the Monad and Duad produces the Triad, signifying the world
formed by the creative principle out of matter. Pythagoras represented
the world by the right-angled triangle, in which the squares of the two
shortest sides are equal, added together, to the square of the longest
one; as the world, as formed, is equal to the creative cause, and matter
clothed with form.

The ternary is the first of the unequal numbers. The Triad, mysterious
number, which plays so great a part in the traditions of Asia and the
philosophy of Plato, image of the Supreme Being, includes in itself the
properties of the first two numbers. It was, to the Philosophers, the
most excellent and favorite number: a mysterious type, revered by all
antiquity, and consecrated in the Mysteries; wherefore there are but
three essential Degrees among Masons; who venerate, in the triangle, the
most august mystery, that of the Sacred Triad, object of their homage
and study.

In geometry, a line cannot represent a body absolutely perfect. As
little do two lines constitute a figure demonstratively perfect. But
three lines form, by their junction, the TRIANGLE, or the first figure
regularly perfect; and this is why it has served and still serves to
characterize The Eternal; Who, infinitely perfect in His nature, is, as
Universal Creator, the first Being, and consequently the first
Perfection.

The Quadrangle or Square, perfect as it appears, being but the second
perfection, can in no wise represent God; Who is the first. It is to be
noted that the name of God in Latin and French (Deus, Dieu), has for its
initial the Delta or Greek Triangle. Such is the reason, among ancients
and moderns, for the consecration of the Triangle, whose three sides
are emblems of the three Kingdoms, or Nature, or God. In the centre is
the Hebrew JOD (initial of יהוה), the Animating Spirit of Fire, the
generative principle, represented by the letter G., initial of the name
of Deity in the languages of the North, and the meaning whereof is
Generation.

The first side of the Triangle, offered to the study of the Apprentice,
is the mineral kingdom, symbolized by Tub ¤.

The second side, the subject of the meditations of the Fellow Craft, is
the vegetable kingdom, symbolized by Schib (an ear of corn). In this
reign begins the Generation of bodies; and this is why the letter G., in
its radiance, is presented to the eyes of the adept.

The third side, the study whereof is devoted to the animal kingdom, and
completes the instruction of the Master, is symbolized by Mach (Son of
putrefaction).

The figure 3 symbolizes the Earth. It is a figure of the terrestrial
bodies. The 2, upper half of 3, symbolizes the vegetable world, the
lower half being hidden from our sight.

Three also referred to harmony, friendship, peace, concord, and
temperance; and was so highly esteemed among the Pythagoreans that they
called it perfect harmony.

Three, four, ten, and twelve were sacred numbers among the Etrurians, as
they were among the Jews, Egyptians, and Hindūs.

The name of Deity, in many Nations, consisted of three letters: among
the Greeks, Ι.Α.Ω.; among the Persians, H.O.M.; among the Hindūs, AUM;
among the Scandinavians, I.O.W. On the upright Tablet of the King,
discovered at Nimroud, no less than five of the thirteen names of the
Great Gods consist of three letters each,--ANU, SAN, YAV, BAR, and BEL.

The quaternary is the most perfect number, and the root of other
numbers, and of all things. The tetrad expresses the first mathematical
power. Four represents also the generative power, from which all
combinations are derived. The Initiates considered it the emblem of
Movement and the Infinite, representing everything that is neither
corporeal nor sensible. Pythagoras communicated it to his disciples as a
symbol of the Eternal and Creative Principle, under the name of
Quaternary, the Ineffable Name of God, which signifies Source of
everything that has received existence: and which, in Hebrew, is
composed of four letters.

In the Quaternary we find the first solid figure, the universal symbol
of immortality, the pyramid. The Gnostics claimed that the whole edifice
of their science rested on a square whose angles were ... Σιγή,
_Silence_: Βυθος, _Profundity_: Νοος, _Intelligence_: and Αληθεια,
_Truth_. For if the Triangle, figured by the number 3, forms the
triangular base of the pyramid, it is unity which forms its point or
summit.

Lysias and Timæus of Locria said that not a single thing could be named,
which did not depend on the quaternary as its root.

There is, according to the Pythagoreans, a connection between the gods
and numbers, which constitutes the kind of Divination called
Arithmomancy. The soul is a number: it is moved of itself: it contains
in itself the quaternary number.

Matter being represented by the number 9, or 3 times 3, and the Immortal
Spirit having for its essential hieroglyphic the quaternary or the
number 4, the Sages said that Man, having gone astray and become
entangled in an inextricable labyrinth, in going from _four_ to _nine_,
the only way which he could take to emerge from these deceitful paths,
these disastrous detours, and the abyss of evil into which he had
plunged, was to retrace his steps, and go from _nine_ to _four_.

The ingenious and mystical idea which caused the Triangle to be
venerated, was applied to the figure 4 (4). It was said that it
expressed a living being, I, bearer of the Triangle Δ, the emblem of
God; _i.e._, man bearing with himself a Divine principle.

Four was a divine number; it referred to the Deity, and many Ancient
Nations gave God a name of four letters; as the Hebrews יהוה, the
Egyptians AMUN, the Persians SURA, the Greeks ΘΕΟΣ, and the Latins DEUS.
This was the Tetragrammaton of the Hebrews, and the Pythagoreans called
it Tetractys, and swore their most solemn oath by it. So too ODIN among
the Scandinavians, ΖΕΥΣ among the Greeks, PHTA among the Egyptians,
THOTH among the Phoenicians, and AS-UR and NEBO among the Assyrians. The
list might be indefinitely extended.

The number 5 was considered as mysterious, because it was compounded of
the Binary, Symbol of the False and Double, and the Ternary, so
interesting in its results. It thus energetically expresses the state of
imperfection, of order and disorder, of happiness and misfortune, of
life and death, which we see upon the earth. To the Mysterious Societies
it offered the fearful image of the Bad Principle, bringing trouble
into the inferior order,--in a word, the Binary acting in the Ternary.

Under another aspect it was the emblem of marriage; because it is
composed of 2, the first equal number, and of 3, the first unequal
number. Wherefore Juno, the Goddess of Marriage, had for her
hieroglyphic the number 5.

Moreover, it has one of the properties of the number 9, that of
reproducing itself, when multiplied by itself: there being always a 5 on
the right hand of the product; a result which led to its use as a symbol
of material changes.

The ancients represented the world by the number 5. A reason for it,
given by Diodorus, is, that it represents earth, water, air, fire, and
ether or spirit. Thence the origin of πεντε (5) and Παν the Universe, as
the whole.

The number 5 designated the universal quintessence, and symbolized, by
its form ς, the vital essence, the animating spirit, which flows
[_serpentat_] through all nature. In fact, this ingenious figure is the
union of the two Greek accents, placed over those vowels which ought
to be or ought not to be aspirated. The first sign [?] bears the name of
potent spirit; and signifies the Superior Spirit, the Spirit of God
aspirated (_spiratus_), respired by man. The second sign is styled
mild spirit, and represents the secondary spirit, the spirit purely
human.

The triple triangle, a figure of five lines uniting in five points, was
among the Pythagoreans an emblem of Health.

It is the Pentalpha of Pythagoras, or Pentangle of Solomon; has five
lines and five angles; and is, among Masons, the outline or origin of
the five-pointed Star, and an emblem of Fellowship.

The number 6 was, in the Ancient Mysteries, a striking emblem of nature;
as presenting the six dimensions of all bodies; the six lines which make
up their form, viz., the four lines of direction, toward the North,
South, East, and West; with the two lines of height and depth,
responding to the zenith and nadir. The sages applied the senary to the
physical man; while the septenary was, for them, the symbol of his
immortal spirit.

The hieroglyphical senary (the double equilateral triangle) is the
symbol of Deity.

Six is also an emblem of health, and the symbol of justice; because it
is the first perfect number; that is, the first whose aliquot parts
(1/2, 1/3, 1/6, or 3, 2, and 1), added together, make itself.

Ormuzd created six good spirits, and Ahriman six evil ones. These typify
the six Summer and the six Winter months.

No number has ever been so universally in repute as the septenary. Its
celebrity is due, no doubt, to the planets being _seven_ in number. It
belongs also to sacred things. The Pythagoreans regarded it as formed of
the numbers 3 and 4; the first whereof was, in their eyes, the image of
the three material elements, and the second the principle of everything
that is neither corporeal nor sensible. It presented them, from that
point of view, the emblem of everything that is perfect.

Considered as composed of 6 and unity, it serves to designate the
invisible centre or soul of everything; because no body exists, of which
six lines do not constitute the form, nor without a seventh interior
point, as the centre and reality of the body, whereof the external
dimensions give only the appearance.

The numerous applications of the septenary confirmed the ancient sages
in the use of this symbol. Moreover, they exalted the properties of the
number 7, as having, in a subordinate manner, the perfection of the
unit: for if the unit is uncreated, if no number produces it, the seven
is also not engendered by any number contained in the interval between 1
and 10. The number 4 occupies an arithmetical middle-ground between the
unit and 7, inasmuch as it is as much over 1, as it is under 7, the
difference each way being 3.

The number 7, among the Egyptians, symbolized life; and this is why the
letter Z of the Greeks was the initial of the verb Ζάω, I live; and
Ζεύς (Jupiter), Father of Life.

The number 8, or the octary, is composed of the sacred numbers 3 and 5.
Of the heavens, of the seven planets, and of the sphere of the fixed
stars, or of the eternal unity and the mysterious number 7, is composed
the ogdoade, the number 8, the first cube of equal numbers, regarded as
sacred in the arithmetical philosophy.

The Gnostic ogdoade had eight stars, which represented the eight Cabiri
of Samothrace, the eight Egyptian and Phœnician principles, the eight
gods of Xenocrates, the eight angles of the cubic stone.

The number eight symbolizes perfection: and its figure, 8 or ∞ indicates
the perpetual and regular course of the Universe.

It is the first cube (2 X 2 X 2), and signifies friendship, prudence,
counsel, and justice. It was a symbol of the primeval law which regarded
all men as equal.

The novary, or triple ternary. If the number three was celebrated among
the ancient sages, that of three times three had no less celebrity;
because, according to them, each of the three elements which constitute
our bodies is ternary: the water containing earth and fire; the earth
containing igneous and aqueous particles; and the fire being tempered by
globules of water and terrestrial corpuscles which serve to feed it. No
one of the three elements being entirely separated from the others, all
material beings composed of these three elements, whereof each is
triple, may be designated by the figurative number of three times three,
which has become the symbol of all formations of bodies. Hence the name
of ninth envelope, given to matter. Every material extension, every
circular line, has for representative sign the number nine, among the
Pythagoreans; who had observed the property which this number possesses,
of reproducing itself incessantly and entire, in every multiplication;
thus offering to the mind a very striking emblem of matter which is
incessantly composed before our eyes, after having undergone a thousand
decompositions.

The number nine was consecrated to the Spheres and the Muses. It is the
sign of every circumference; because a circle of 360 degrees is equal to
9, that is to say, 3+6+0=9. Nevertheless, the ancients regarded this
number with a sort of terror: they considered it a bad presage; as the
symbol of versatility, of change, and the emblem of the frailty of human
affairs. Wherefore they avoided all numbers where nine appears, and
chiefly 81, the product of 9 multiplied by itself, and the addition
whereof, 8+1, again presents the number 9.

As the figure of the number 6 was the symbol of the terrestrial globe,
animated by a divine spirit, the figure of the number 9 symbolized the
earth, under the influence of the Evil Principle; and thence the terror
it inspired. Nevertheless, according to the Kabalists, the figure 9
symbolizes the generative egg, or the image of a little globular being,
from whose lower side seems to flow its spirit of life.

The E_n_nead, signifying an aggregate of 9 things or persons, is the
first square of unequal numbers.

Every one is aware of the singular properties of the number 9, which,
multiplied by itself or any other number whatever, gives a result whose
final sum is always 9, or always divisible by 9.

Nine, multiplied by each of the ordinary numbers, produces an
arithmetical progression, each member whereof, composed of two figures,
presents a remarkable fact; for example:

1...2...3...4...5...6...7...8...9..10
9..18..27..36..45..54..63..72..81..90

The first line of figures gives the regular series, from 1 to 10.

The second reproduces this line doubly; first ascending, from the first
figure of 18, and then returning from the second figure of 81.

It follows, from the curious fact, that the half of the numbers which
compose this progression represents, in inverse order, the figures of
the second half:

9...18..27..36..45 = 135 = 9.._and_ 1 + 3 + 5 = 45 = 9
90..81..72..63..54 = 360 = 9.
-- -- -- -- -- --- --
99 99 99 99 99 495 = 18 = 9.


So 9² = 81 ...81² = 6561 = 19 = 9 ...9x2 = 18 ...18² = 324 = 9.

9x3=27 ...27² = 729 = 18 = 9. 9x4 = 36 ...36² = 1296 = 18 = 9.

_And so with every multiple of_ 9--_say_ 45, 54, 63, 72, etc.

Thus 9x8 = 72 ...72² = 5184 = 18 = 9.

And further:

18 27 36 72
18 27 36 72
--- --- --- ---
144 = 9 189 = 18 = 9 216 = 9 144 = 9
18 = 9 54 = 9 = 108 = 9 504 = 9

324 = 9...18 = 9 729 = 18= 9 1296 = 18 = 9 5184 = 18 = 9
108
108
----
864 = 18
108 = 9
-----
11664 = 18 = 9.

_And so the cubes:_

27²=729x729=18=9 18²=324=9 9²=81 81²=6561=18=9
729 324 6561
---- ---- ----
6561=18=9 1296=18=9 6561=18=9
1458 =18=9 648 =18=9 39366 =27=9
5103 =9 972 =18=9 32805 =18=9
39366 =27=9
------ ------ ------
531441=18=9 104976=27=9 43,046,721=27=9.

The number 10, or the Denary, is the measure of everything; and reduces
multiplied numbers to unity. Containing all the numerical and harmonic
relations, and all the properties of the numbers which precede it, it
concludes the Abacus or Table of Pythagoras. To the Mysterious
Societies, this number typified the assemblage of all the wonders of the
Universe. They wrote it thus Θ[Greek: THETA], that is to say, Unity in
the middle of Zero, as the centre of a circle, or symbol of Deity. They
saw in this figure everything that should lead to reflection: the
centre, the ray, and the circumference, represented to them God, Man,
and the Universe.

This number was, among the Sages, a sign of concord, love, and peace. To
Masons it is a sign of union and good faith; because it is expressed by
joining two hands, or the Master's grip, when the number of fingers
gives 10: and it was represented by the Tetractys of Pythagoras.

The number 12, like the number 7, is celebrated in the worship of
nature. The two most famous divisions of the heavens, that by 7, which
is that of the planets, and that by 12, which is that of the Signs of
the Zodiac, are found upon the religious monuments of all the peoples of
the Ancient World, even to the remote extremes of the East. Although
Pythagoras does not speak of the number 12, it is none the less a sacred
number. It is the image of the Zodiac; and consequently that of the Sun,
which rules over it.

Such are the ancient ideas in regard to those numbers which so often
appear in Masonry; and rightly understood, as the old Sages understood
them, they contain many a pregnant lesson.

Before we enter upon the final lesson of Masonic Philosophy, we will
delay a few moments to repeat to you the Christian interpretations of
the Blue Degrees.

In the First Degree, they said, there are three symbols to be applied.

1st. Man, after the fall, was left naked and defenceless against the
just anger of the Deity. Prone to evil, the human race staggered blindly
onward into the thick darkness of unbelief, bound fast by the strong
cable-tow of the natural and sinful will. Moral corruption was followed
by physical misery. Want and destitution invaded the earth. War and
Famine and Pestilence filled up the measure of evil, and over the sharp
flints of misfortune and wretchedness man toiled with naked and bleeding
feet. This condition of blindness, destitution, misery, and bondage,
from which to save the world the Redeemer came, is symbolized by the
condition of the candidate, when he is brought up for the first time to
the door of the Lodge.

2d. Notwithstanding the death of the Redeemer, man can be saved only by
faith, repentance, and reformation. To repent, he must feel the sharp
sting of conscience and remorse, like a sword piercing his bosom. His
confidence in his guide, whom he is told to follow and fear no danger;
his trust in God, which he is caused to profess; and the point of the
sword that is pressed against his naked left breast over the heart, are
symbolical of the faith, repentance and reformation necessary to bring
him to the light of a life in Christ the Crucified.

3d. Having repented and reformed, and bound himself to the service of
God by a firm promise and obligation, the light of Christian hope shines
down into the darkness of the heart of the humble penitent, and blazes
upon his pathway to Heaven. And this is symbolized by the candidate's
being brought to light, after he is obligated, by the Worshipful Master,
who in that is a symbol of the Redeemer, and so brings him to light,
with the help of the brethren, as He taught the Word with the aid of the
Apostles.

In the Second Degree there are two symbols:

4th. The Christian assumes new duties toward God and his fellows. Toward
God, of love, gratitude, and veneration, and an anxious desire to serve
and glorify Him; toward his fellows, of kindness, sympathy, and justice.
And this assumption of duty, this entering upon good works, is
symbolized by the Fellow-Craft's obligation; by which, bound as an
apprentice to secrecy merely, and set in the Northeast corner of the
Lodge, he descends as a Fellow-Craft into the body of the brethren, and
assumes the active duties of a good Mason.

5th. The Christian, reconciled to God, sees the world in a new light.
This great Universe is no longer a mere machine, wound up and set going
six thousand or sixty millions years ago, and left to run on afterward
forever, by virtue of a law of mechanics created at the beginning,
without further care or consideration on the part of the Deity; but it
has now become to him a great emanation from God, the product of His
thought, not a mere dead machine, but a thing of life, over which God
watches continually, and every movement of which is immediately produced
by His present action, the law of harmony being the essence of the
Deity, re-enacted every instant. And this is symbolized by the imperfect
instruction given in the Fellow-Craft's Degree, in the sciences, and
particularly geometry, connected as the latter is with God Himself in
the mind of a Mason, because the same letter, suspended in the East,
represents both; and astronomy, or the knowledge of the laws of motion
and harmony that govern the spheres, is but a portion of the wider
science of geometry. It is so symbolized, because it is here, in the
Second Degree, that the candidate first receives an other than moral
instruction.

There are also two symbols in the Third Degree, which, with the 3 in the
first, and 2 in the second, make the 7.

6th. The candidate, after passing through the first part of the
ceremony, imagines himself a Master; and is surprised to be informed
that as yet he is not, and that it is uncertain whether he ever will be.
He is told of a difficult and dangerous path yet to be travelled, and is
advised that upon that journey it depends whether he will become a
Master. This is symbolical of that which our Saviour said to Nicodemus,
that, notwithstanding his morals might be beyond reproach, he could not
enter the Kingdom of Heaven unless he were born again; symbolically
dying, and again entering the world regenerate, like a spotless infant.

7th. The murder of Hiram, his burial, and his being raised again by the
Master, are symbols, both of the death, burial, and resurrection of the
Redeemer; and of the death and burial in sins of the natural man, and
his being raised again to a new life or born again, by the direct action
of the Redeemer; after Morality (symbolized by the Entered Apprentice's
grip), and Philosophy (symbolized by the grip of the Fellow-Craft), had
failed to raise him. That of the Lion of the House of Judah is the
strong grip, never to be broken, with which Christ, of the royal line of
that House, has clasped to Himself the whole human race, and embraces
them in His wide arms as closely and affectionately as brethren embrace
each other on the five points of fellowship.

As Entered Apprentices and Fellow-Crafts, Masons are taught to imitate
the laudable example of those Masons who labored at the building of King
Solomon's Temple; and to plant firmly and deep in their hearts those
foundation-stones of principle, truth, justice, temperance, fortitude,
prudence, and charity, on which to erect that Christian character which
all the storms of misfortune and all the powers and temptations of Hell
shall not prevail against; those feelings and noble affections which are
the most proper homage that can be paid to the Grand Architect and Great
Father of the Universe, and which make the heart a living temple builded
to Him: when the unruly passions are made to submit to rule and
measurement, and their excesses are struck off with the gavel of
self-restraint; and when every action and every principle is accurately
corrected and adjusted by the square of wisdom, the level of humility,
and the plumb of justice.

The two columns, Jachin and Boaz, are the symbols of that profound faith
and implicit trust in God and the Redeemer that are the Christian's
_strength_; and of those good works by which alone that faith can be
_established_ and made operative and effectual to salvation.

The three pillars that support the Lodge are symbols of a Christian's
HOPE in a future state of happiness; FAITH in the promises and the
divine character and mission of the Redeemer; and CHARITABLE JUDGMENT of
other men.

The three murderers of Khir-Om symbolize Pontius Pilate, Caiaphas the
High-Priest, and Judas Iscariot: and the three blows given him are the
betrayal by the last, the refusal of Roman protection by Pilate, and the
condemnation by the High-Priest. They also symbolize the blow on the
ear, the scourging, and the crown of thorns. The twelve fellow-crafts
sent in search of the body are the twelve disciples, in doubt whether to
believe that the Redeemer would rise from the dead.

The Master's word, supposed to be lost, symbolizes the Christian faith
and religion, supposed to have been crushed and destroyed when the
Saviour was crucified, after Iscariot had betrayed Him, and Peter
deserted Him, and when the other disciples doubted whether He would
arise from the dead; but which rose from His tomb and flowed rapidly
over the civilized world; and so that which was supposed to be _lost_
was _found_. It symbolizes also the Saviour Himself; the WORD that was
in the beginning--that was _with_ God, and that _was_ God; the Word of
life, that was made flesh and dwelt among us, and was supposed to be
lost, while He lay in the tomb, for three days, and His disciples "as
yet knew not the scripture that He must rise again from the dead," and
doubted when they heard of it, and were amazed and frightened and still
doubted when He appeared among them.

The bush of acacia placed at the head of the grave of Khir-Om is an
emblem of resurrection and immortality.

Such are the explanations of our Christian brethren; entitled, like
those of all other Masons, to a respectful consideration.


CLOSING INSTRUCTION,

There is no pretence to infallibility in Masonry. It is not for us to
dictate to any man what he shall believe. We have hitherto, in the
instruction of the several Degrees, confined ourselves to laying before
you the great thoughts that have found expression in the different ages
of the world, leaving you to decide for yourself as to the orthodoxy or
heterodoxy of each, and what proportion of truth, if any, each
contained. We shall pursue no other course in this closing Philosophical
instruction; in which we propose to deal with the highest questions that
have ever exercised the human mind,--with the existence and the nature
of a God, with the existence and the nature of the human soul, and with
the relations of the divine and human spirit with the merely material
Universe. There can be no questions more important to an intelligent
being, none that have for him a more direct and personal interest; and
to this last word of Scottish Masonry we invite your serious and
attentive consideration. And, as what we shall now say will be but the
completion and rounding-off of what we have already said in several of
the preceding Degrees, in regard to the Old Thought and the Ancient
Philosophies, we hope that you have noted and not forgotten our previous
lessons, without which this would seem imperfect and fragmentary.

In its idea of rewarding a faithful and intelligent workman by
conferring upon him a knowledge of the True Word, Masonry has
perpetuated a very great truth, because it involves the proposition that
the idea which a man forms of God is always the most important element
in his speculative theory of the Universe, and in his particular
practical plan of action for the Church, the State, the Community, the
Family, and his own individual life. It will ever make a vast difference
in the conduct of a people in war or peace, whether they believe the
Supreme God to be a cruel Deity, delighting in sacrifice and blood, or a
God of Love; and an individual's speculative theory as to the mode and
extent of God's government, and as to the nature and reality of his own
free-will and consequent responsibility, will needs have great influence
in shaping the course of his life and conversation.

We see every day the vast influence of the popular idea of God. All the
great historical civilizations of the race have grown out of the
national ideas which were formed of God; or have been intimately
connected with those ideas. The popular Theology, which at first is only
an abstract idea in the heads of philosophers, by and by shows itself in
the laws, and in the punishments for crime, in the churches, the
ceremonies and the sacraments, the festivals and the fasts, the
weddings, the baptisms and the funerals, in the hospitals, the colleges,
the schools, and all the social charities, in the relations of husband
and wife, parent and child, in the daily work and the daily prayer of
every man.

As the world grows in its development, it necessarily _out_grows its
ancient ideas of God, which were only temporary and provisional. A man
who has a higher conception of God than those about him, and who denies
that their conception _is_ God, is very likely to be called an Atheist
by men who are really far less believers in a God than he. Thus the
Christians, who said the Heathen idols were no Gods, were accounted
Atheists by the People, and accordingly put to death; and Jesus of
Nazareth was crucified as an unbelieving blasphemer, by the Jews.

There is a mere formal Atheism, which is a denial of God in _terms_, but
not in _reality_. A man says, There is no God; that is, no God that is
self-originated, or that never originated, but always WAS and HAD BEEN,
who is the cause of existence, who is the Mind and the Providence of the
Universe; and so the order, beauty, and harmony of the world of matter
and mind do not indicate any plan or purpose of Deity. But, he says,
NATURE,--meaning by that the whole sum-total of existence,--_that_ is
powerful, active, wise, and good; _Nature_ is self-originated, or
always was and had been, the cause of its own existence, the mind of the
Universe and the Providence of itself. There is obviously a plan and
purpose whereby order, beauty, and harmony are brought about; but all
that is the plan and purpose of nature.

In such cases, the absolute denial of God is only formal and not real.
The _qualities_ of God are admitted, and affirmed to be real; and it is
a mere change of name to call the possessor of those qualities,
_Nature_, and not _God_. The real question is, whether such Qualities
exist, as we call God; and not, by what particular name we shall
designate the Qualities. One man may call the sum total of these
Qualities, Nature; another, Heaven; a third, Universe, a fourth, Matter;
a fifth, Spirit; a sixth, God, Theos, Zeus, Alfadir, Allah, or what he
pleases. All admit the existence of the Being, Power, or ENS, thus
diversely named. The name is of the smallest consequence.

_Real_ Atheism is the denial of the existence of _any_ God, of the
actuality of all possible ideas of God. It denies that there is _any_
Mind, Intelligence, or ENS, that is the Cause and Providence of the
Universe, and of any Thing or any Existence, Soul, Spirit, or Being,
that _intentionally_ or _intelligently_ produces the Order, Beauty, and
Harmony thereof, and the constant and regular modes of operation
therein. It must necessarily deny that there is any law, order, or
harmony in existence, or any constant mode of operation in the world;
for it is utterly impossible for any human creature to conceive, however
much he may _pretend_ to do so, of either of these, except as a
consequence of the action of Intelligence; which is, indeed, that
otherwise unknown thing, the existence of which these alone prove;
otherwise than as the cause of these, not a thing at all; a mere _name_
for the wholly uncognizable cause of these.

The _real_ atheist must deny the existence of the Qualities of God, deny
that there is any mind of or in the Universe, any self-conscious
Providence, any Providence at all. He must deny that there is any Being
or Cause of Finite things, that is self-consciously powerful, wise,
just, loving, and faithful to itself and its own nature. He must deny
that there is any _plan_ in the Universe or any part of it. He must
hold, either that matter is eternal, or that it originated itself, which
is absurd, or that it was originated by an Intelligence, or at least by
a Cause; and then he admits a God. No doubt it is beyond the reach of
our faculties to imagine _how_ matter originated,--how it began to _be_,
in space where before was nothing, or God only. But it is equally beyond
the reach of our faculties to imagine it eternal and _un_originated. To
hold it to be eternal, without thought or will; that the specific forms
of it, the seed, the rock, the tree, the man, the solar system, all came
with no forethought planning or producing them, by "chance" or "the
fortuitous concourse of atoms" of matter that has no thought or will;
and that they indicate no mind, no plan, no purpose, no providence, is
absurd. It is not to deny the _existence_ of what we understand by mind,
plan, purpose, Providence; but to insist that these words shall have
some other meaning than that which the human race has ever attached to
them: shall mean some unknown thing, for which the human race has no
_name_, because it has of such a thing no possible idea. Either there
never was any such thing as a "plan," and the word is nonsense, or the
Universe exists in conformity to a plan. The _word_ never meant, and
never can mean, any other _thing_ than that which the Universe exhibits.
So with the word "_purpose_;" so with the word "_Providence_." They mean
nothing, or else only what the Universe proves.

It was soon found that the denial of a Conscious Power, the cause of man
and of his life, of a Providence, or a Mind and Intelligence arranging
man in reference to the world, and the world in reference to man, would
not satisfy the instinctive desires of _human_ nature, or account for
the facts of _material_ nature. It did not long answer to say, if it
ever _was_ said, that the Universe was drifting in the void inane, and
neither it, nor any mind within or without it, knew of its whence, its
whither, or its whereabouts; that man was drifting in the Universe,
knowing little of his whereabouts, nothing of his whence or whither;
that there was no Mind, no Providence, no Power, that knew any better;
nothing that guided and directed man in his drifting, or the Universe in
the weltering waste of Time. To say to man and woman, "your heroism,
your bravery, your self-denial all comes to nothing: your nobleness will
do you no good: you will die, and your nobleness will do mankind no
service; for there is no plan or order in all these things; everything
comes and goes by the fortuitous concourse of atoms;" did not, nor ever
will, long satisfy the human mind.

True, the theory of Atheism has been uttered. It has been said, "Death
is the end: this is a world without a God: you are a body without a
soul: there is a Here, but no Hereafter for you; an Earth, but no
Heaven. Die, and return to your dust. Man is bones, blood, bowels, and
brain; mind is matter: there is no soul in the brain, nothing but
nerves. We can see all the way to a little star in the nebula of Orion's
belt; so distant that it will take light a thousand millions of years to
come from it to the earth, journeying at the rate of twelve millions of
miles a minute. There is no Heaven this side of that: you see all the
way through: there is not a speck of Heaven; and do you think there is
any beyond it; and if so, when would you reach it? There is no
Providence. Nature is a fortuitous concourse of atoms; thought is a
fortuitous function of matter, a fortuitous result of a fortuitous
result, a chance-shot from the great wind-gun of the Universe,
accidentally loaded, pointed at random, and fired off by chance. Things
_happen_; they are not _arranged_. There is luck, and there is ill-luck;
but there is no Providence. Die you into dust!" Does all this satisfy
the human instinct of immortality, that makes us ever long, with
unutterable longing, to join ourselves again to our dear ones who have
gone away before us, and to mankind, for eternal life? Does it satisfy
our mighty hungering and thirst for immortality, our anxious longing to
come nearer to, and to know more of, the Eternal Cause of all things?

Men never could be content to believe that there was no mind that
thought for man, no conscience to enact eternal laws, no heart to love
those whom nothing of earth loves or cares for, no will of the Universe
to marshal the nations in the way of wisdom, justice, and love. History
is not--thank God! we _know_ it is not,--the fortuitous concourse of
events, or Nature that of atoms. We cannot believe that there is no plan
nor purpose in Nature, to guide our going out and coming in: that there
is a mighty going, but it goes nowhere; that all beauty, wisdom,
affection, justice, morality in the world, is an accident, and may end
to-morrow.

All over the world there is heroism unrequited, or paid with misery;
vice on thrones, corruption in high places, nobleness in poverty or even
in chains, the gentle devotion of woman rewarded by brutal neglect or
more brutal abuse and violence; everywhere want, misery, over-work, and
under-wages. Add to these the Atheist's creed,--a body without a soul,
an earth without a Heaven, a world without a God; and what a
Pandemonium would we make of this world!

The intellect of the Atheist would find matter everywhere; but no
Causing and Providing Mind: his moral sense would find no Equitable
Will, no Beauty of Moral Excellence, no Conscience enacting justice into
the unchanging law of right, no spiritual Order or spiritual Providence,
but only material Fate and Chance. His affections would find only finite
things to love; and to them the dead who _were_ loved and who died
yesterday, are like the rainbow that yesterday evening lived a moment
and then passed away. His soul, flying through the vast Inane, and
feeling the darkness with its wings, seeking the Soul of all, which at
once is Reason, Conscience, and the Heart of all that is, would find no
God, but a Universe all disorder; no Infinite, no Reason, no Conscience,
no Heart, no Soul of things; nothing to reverence, to esteem, to love,
to worship, to trust in; but only an Ugly Force, alien and foreign to
us, that strikes down those we love, and makes us mere worms on the hot
sand of the world. No voice would speak from the Earth to comfort him.
It is a cruel mother, that great Earth, that devours her young,--a Force
and nothing more. Out of the sky would smile no kind Providence, in all
its thousand starry eyes; and in storms a malignant violence, with its
lightning-sword, would stab into the darkness, seeking for men to
murder.

No man ever was or ever can be content with that. The evidence of God
has been ploughed into Nature so deeply, and so deeply woven into the
texture of the human soul, that Atheism has never become a faith, though
it has sometimes assumed the shape of theory. Religion is natural to
man. Instinctively he turns to God and reverences and relies on Him. In
the Mathematics of the Heavens, written in gorgeous diagrams of fire, he
sees law, order, beauty, harmony without end: in the ethics of the
little nations that inhabit the ant-hills he sees the same; in all
Nature, animate and inanimate, he sees the evidences of a Design, a
Will, an Intelligence, and a God,--of a God beneficent and loving as
well as wise, and merciful and indulgent as well as powerful.

To man, surrounded by the material Universe, and conscious of the
influence that his material environments exercised upon his fortunes and
his present destiny;--to man, ever confronted with the splendors of the
starry heavens, the regular march of the seasons, the phenomena of
sunrise and moonrise, and all the evidences of intelligence and design
that everywhere pressed upon and overwhelmed him, all imaginable
questions as to the nature and cause of these phenomena constantly
recurred, demanding to be solved, and refusing to be sent away
unanswered. And still, after the lapse of ages, press upon the human
mind and demand solution, the same great questions--perhaps still
demanding it in vain.

Advancing to the period when man had ceased to look upon the separate
parts and individual forces of the Universe as gods,--when he had come
to look upon it as a whole, this question, among the earliest, occurred
to him, and insisted on being answered: "Is this material Universe
self-existent, or was it created? Is it eternal, or did it originate?"

And then in succession came crowding on the human mind these other
questions:

"Is this material Universe a mere aggregate of fortuitous combinations
of matter, or is it the result and work of intelligence, acting upon a
plan?

"If there _be_ such an Intelligence, what and where is it? Is the
material Universe _itself_ an Intelligent being? Is it like man, a body
and a soul? Does Nature act upon itself, or is there a Cause beyond it
that acts upon it?

"If there is a _personal_ God, _separate from_ the material Universe,
that created all things, Himself uncreated, is He corporeal or
incorporeal, material or spiritual, the soul of the Universe or wholly
apart from it? and if He be Spirit, what then is spirit?

"Was that Supreme Deity active or quiescent before the creation; and if
quiescent during a previous eternity, what necessity of His nature moved
Him at last to create a world; or was it a mere whim that had no motive?

"Was matter co-existent with Him, or absolutely created by him out of
nothing? Did He _create_ it, or only _mould_ and _shape_ and _fashion_ a
chaos already existing, co-existent with Himself?

"Did the Deity _directly_ create matter, or was creation the work of
inferior deities, emanations from Himself?

"If He be good and just, whence comes it that, foreknowing everything,
He has allowed sorrow and evil to exist; and how to reconcile with His
benevolence and wisdom the prosperity of vice and the misfortunes of
virtue in this world?" And then, as to man himself, recurred these
other questions, as they continue to recur to all of us:

"What is it in us that thinks? Is Thought the mere result of material
organization; or is there in us a _soul_ that thinks, separate from and
resident in the body? If the latter, is it eternal and uncreated; and if
not, how created? Is it distinct from God, or an emanation from Him? Is
it _inherently_ immortal, or only so by destination, because God has
willed it? Is it to return to and be merged in Him, or ever to exist,
separately from Him, with its present identity?

"If God has fore-seen and fore-arranged all that occurs, how has man any
real free-will, or the least control over circumstances? How can
anything be done _against_ the will of Infinite Omnipotence; and if all
is done _according_ to that will, how is there any wrong or evil, in
what Infinite Wisdom and Infinite Power does not choose to prevent?

"What is the foundation of the moral law? Did God enact it of His own
mere pleasure; and if so, can He not, when He pleases, repeal it? Who
shall assure us He will not repeal it, and make right wrong, and virtue
vice? Or is the moral law a necessity of His nature; and if so, who
enacted it; and does not that assert a power, like the old Necessity,
superior to Deity?"

And, close-following after these, came the great question of HEREAFTER,
of another Life, of the soul's Destiny; and the thousand other
collateral and subordinate questions, as to matter, spirit, futurity,
and God, that have produced all the systems of philosophy, all
metaphysics, and all theology, since the world began.

What the old philosophic mind thought upon these great questions, we
have already, to some extent, developed. With the Emanation-doctrine of
the Gnostics and the Orient, we have endeavored to make you familiar. We
have brought you face to face with the Kabalists, the Essenes, and Philo
the Jew. We have shown that, and how, much of the old mythology was
derived from the daily and yearly recurring phenomena of the heavens. We
have exhibited to you the ancient notions by which they endeavored to
explain to themselves the existence and prevalence of evil; and we have
in some degree made known to you their metaphysical ideas as to the
nature of the Deity. Much more remains to be done than it is within our
power to do. We stand upon the sounding shore of the great ocean of
Time. In front of us stretches out the heaving waste of the illimitable
Past; and its waves, as they roll up to our feet along the sparkling
slope of the yellow sands, bring to us, now and then, from the depths of
that boundless ocean, a shell, a few specimens of algæ torn rudely from
their stems, a rounded pebble; and that is all; of all the vast
treasures of ancient thought that lie buried there, with the mighty
anthem of the boundless ocean thundering over them forever and forever.

Let us once more, and for the last time, along the shore of that great
ocean, gather a few more relics of the Past, and listen to its mighty
voices, as they come, in fragmentary music, in broken and interrupted
rhythm, whispering to us from the great bosom of the Past.

Rites, creeds, and legends express, directly or symbolically, some
leading idea, according to which the Mysteries of Being are supposed to
be, explained in Deity. The intricacies of mythical genealogies are a
practical acknowledgment of the mysterious nature of the Omnipotent
Deity; displaying in their beautiful but ineffectual imagery the first
efforts of the mind to communicate with nature: the flowers which fancy
strewed before the youthful steps of Psyche, when she first set out in
pursuit of the immortal object of her love. Theories and notions, in all
their varieties of truth and falsehood, are a machinery more or less
efficacious, directed to the same end. Every religion was, in its
origin, an embryo philosophy, or an attempt to interpret the unknown by
mind; and it was only when philosophy, which is essentially progress,
outgrew its first acquisitions, that religion became a thing apart,
cherishing as unalterable dogmas the notions which philosophy had
abandoned. Separated from philosophy, it became arrogant and
fantastical, professing to have already attained what its more authentic
representative was ever pursuing in vain; and discovering, through its
initiations and Mysteries, all that to its contracted view seemed
wanting to restore the well-being of mankind, the means of purification
and expiation, remedies for disease, expedients to cure the disorders of
the soul, and to propitiate the gods.

Why should we attempt to confine the idea of the Supreme Mind within an
arbitrary barrier, or exclude from the limits of veracity any conception
of the Deity, which, if imperfect and inadequate, may be only a little
more so than our own? "The name of God," says Hobbes, "is used not to
make us _conceive_ Him, for He is inconceivable, but that we may _honor_
Him." "Believe in God, and adore Him," said the Greek Poet, "but
investigate Him not; the inquiry is fruitless, seek not to discover who
God is; for, by the desire to know, you offend Him who chooses to remain
unknown." "When we attempt," says Philo, "to investigate the essence of
the Absolute Being, we fall into an abyss of perplexity; and the only
benefit to be derived from such researches is the conviction of their
absurdity."

Yet man, though ignorant of the constitution of the dust on which he
treads, has ventured, and still ventures, to speculate on the nature of
God, and to define dogmatically in creeds the subject least within the
compass of his faculties; and even to hate and persecute those who will
not accept his views as true.

But though a knowledge of the Divine Essence is impossible, the
conceptions formed respecting it are interesting, as indications of
intellectual development. The history of religion is the history of the
human mind; and the conception formed by it of Deity is always in exact
relation to its moral and intellectual attainments. The one is the index
and the measure of the other.

The _negative_ notion of God, which consists in abstracting the inferior
and finite, is, according to Philo, the only way in which it is possible
for man worthily to apprehend the nature of God. After exhausting the
varieties of symbolism, we contrast the Divine Greatness with human
littleness, and employ expressions apparently affirmative, such as
"Infinite," "Almighty," "All-wise," "Omnipotent," "Eternal," and the
like; which in reality amount only to denying, in regard to God, those
limits which confine the faculties of man; and thus we remain content
with a name which is a mere conventional sign and confession of our
ignorance.

The Hebrew יהוה and the Greek _To ON_ expressed abstract existence,
without outward manifestation or development. Of the same nature are the
definitions, "God is a sphere whose centre is everywhere, and whose
circumference nowhere;" "God is He who sees all, Himself unseen:" and
finally, that of Proclus and Hegel--"the _To_ μη ον--that which has no
outward and positive existence." Most of the so-called ideas or
definitions of the "Absolute" are only a collection of negations; from
which, as they affirm nothing, nothing is learned.

God was first recognized in the heavenly bodies and in the elements.
When man's consciousness of his own intellectuality was matured, and he
became convinced that the internal faculty of thought was something more
subtle than even the most subtle elements, he transferred that new
conception to the object of his worship, and deified a mental principle
instead of a physical one. He in every case makes God after his own
image; for do what we will, the highest efforts of human thought can
conceive nothing higher than the supremacy of intellect; and so he ever
comes back to some familiar type of exalted humanity. He at first
deifies nature, and afterward himself.

The eternal aspiration of the religious sentiment in man is to become
united with God. In his earliest development, the wish and its
fulfillment were simultaneous, through unquestioning belief. In
proportion as the conception of Deity was exalted, the notion of His
terrestrial presence or proximity was abandoned; and the difficulty of
comprehending the Divine Government, together with the glaring
superstitious evils arising out of its misinterpretation, endangered the
belief in it altogether.

Even the lights of Heaven, which, as "bright potentates of the sky,"
were formerly the vigilant directors of the economy of earth, now shine
dim and distant, and Uriel no more descends upon a sunbeam. But the real
change has been in the progressive ascent of man's own faculties, and
not in the Divine Nature; as the Stars are no more distant now than when
they were supposed to rest on the shoulders of Atlas. And yet a little
sense of disappointment and humiliation attended the first awakening of
the soul, when reason, looking upward toward the Deity, was impressed
with a dizzy sense of having fallen.

But hope revives in despondency; and every nation that ever advanced
beyond the most elementary conceptions, felt the necessity of an attempt
to fill the chasm, real or imaginary, separating man from God. To do
this was the great task of poetry, philosophy, and religion. Hence the
personifications of God's attributes, developments, and manifestations,
as "Powers," "Intelligences," "Angels," "Emanations;" through which and
the oracular faculty in himself, man could place himself in communion
with God.

The various ranks and orders of mythical beings imagined by Persians,
Indians, Egyptians, or Etrurians, to preside over the various
departments of nature, had each his share in a scheme to bring man into
closer approximation to the Deity; they eventually gave way only before
an analogous though less picturesque symbolism; and the Deities and
Dæmons of Greece and Rome were perpetuated with only a change of names,
when their offices were transferred to Saints and Martyrs. The attempts
by which reason had sometimes endeavored to span the unknown by a bridge
of metaphysics, such as the idealistic systems of Zoroaster, Pythagoras,
or Plato, were only a more refined form of the poetical illusions which
satisfied the vulgar; and man still looked back with longing to the lost
golden age, when his ancestors communed face to face with the Gods; and
hoped that, by propitiating Heaven, he might accelerate the renewal of
it in the islands of the Far West, under the sceptre of Kronos, or in a
centralization of political power at Jerusalem. His eager hope overcame
even the terrors of the grave; for the Divine power was as infinite as
human expectation, and the Egyptian, duly ensepulchred in the Lybian
Catacombs, was supposed to be already on his way to the Fortunate Abodes
under the guidance of Hermes, there to obtain a perfect association and
reunion with his God.

Remembering what we have already said elsewhere in regard to the old
ideas concerning the Deity, and repeating it as little as possible, let
us once more put ourselves in communion with the Ancient poetic and
philosophic mind, and endeavor to learn of it what it thought, and how
it solved the great problems that have ever tortured the human
intellect.

The division of the First and Supreme Cause into two parts, one Active
and the other Passive, the Universe Agent and Patient, or the
hermaphroditic God-World, is one of the most ancient and widespread
dogmas of philosophy or natural theology. Almost every ancient people
gave it a place in their worship, their mysteries, and their ceremonies.

Ocellus Lucanus, who seems to have lived shortly after Pythagoras opened
his School in Italy, five or six hundred years before our era, and in
the time of Solon, Thales, and the other Sages who had studied in the
Schools of Egypt, not only recognizes the eternity of the Universe, and
its divine character as an unproduced and indestructible being, but also
the distinction of Active and Passive causes in what he terms the Grand
Whole, or the single hermaphroditic Being that comprehends all
existences, as well causes as effects; and which is a system regularly
ordered, perfect and complete, of all Natures. He well apprehended the
dividing-line that separates existence eternally the same, from that
which eternally changes; the nature of celestial from that of
terrestrial bodies, that of causes from that of effects, that which is
from that which only BECOMES,--a distinction that naturally struck every
thinking man.

We shall not quote his language at full length. The heavenly bodies, he
thought, are first and most noble; they move of themselves, and ever
revolve, without change of form or essence. Fire, water, earth, and air
change incessantly and continually, not place, but form. Then, as in the
Universe there are generation and cause of generation,--as generation is
where there are change and displacement of parts, and cause where there
is stability of nature, evidently it belongs to what is the cause of
generation, to move and to act, and to the recipient, to be made and
moved. In his view, everything above the Moon was the habitation of the
gods; all below, that of Nature and discord; _this_ operates dissolution
of things made; _that_, production of those that are being made. As the
world is unproduced and indestructible, as it had no beginning, and will
have no end, necessarily the principle that operates generation in
another than itself, and that which operates it _in_ itself, have
co-existed.

The former is all above the moon, and especially the sun: the latter is
the sublunary world. Of these two parts, one active, the other
passive--one divine and always the same, the other mortal and ever
changing, all that we call the "world" or "universe" is composed.

These accorded with the principles of the Egyptian philosophy, which
held that man and the animals had always existed together with the
world; that they were its effects, eternal like itself. The chief
divisions of nature into active and passive causes, its system of
generation and destruction, and the concurrence of the two great
principles, Heaven and earth, uniting to form all things, will,
according to Ocellus, always continue to exist. "Enough," he concludes,
"as to the Universe, the generations and destructions effected in it,
the mode in which it now exists, the mode in which it will ever exist,
by the eternal qualities of the two principles, one always moving, the
other always moved; one always _governing_, the other always
_governed_."

Such is a brief summary of the doctrine of this philosopher, whose work
is one of the most ancient that has survived to us. The subject on which
he treated occupied in his time all men's minds: the poets sang of
cosmogonies and theogonies, and the philosophers wrote treatises on the
birth of the world and the elements of its composition. The cosmogony of
the Hebrews, attributed to Moses; that of the Phœnicians, ascribed to
Sanchoniathon; that of the Greeks, composed by Hesiod; that of the
Egyptians, the Atlantes, and the Cretans, preserved by Diodorus Siculus;
the fragments of the theology of Orpheus, divided among different
writers; the books of the Persians, or their Boundehesh; those of the
Hindūs; the traditions of the Chinese and the people of Macassar; the
cosmogonic chants which Virgil puts in the mouth of Iopas at Carthage;
and those of the old Silenus, the first book of the Metamorphoses of
Ovid; all testify to the antiquity and universality of these fictions as
to the origin of the world and its causes.

At the head of the causes of nature, Heaven and earth were placed; and
the most apparent parts of each, the sun, the moon, the fixed stars and
planets, and, above all, the zodiac, among the _active_ causes of
generation; and among the _passive_, the several elements. These causes
were not only classed in the progressive order of their energy, Heaven
and earth heading the respective lists, but distinct sexes were in some
sort assigned to them, and characteristics analogous to the mode in
which they concur in universal generation.

The doctrine of Ocellus was the general doctrine everywhere, it
naturally occurring to all to make the same distinction. The Egyptians
did so, in selecting those animals in which they recognized these
emblematic qualities, in order to symbolize the double sex of the
Universe. Their God KNEPH, out of whose mouth issued the Orphic egg,
whence the author of the Clementine Recognitions makes a hermaphroditic
figure to emerge, uniting in itself the two principles whereof Heaven
and the earth are forms, and which enter into the organization of all
beings which the heavens and the earth engender by their concourse,
furnishes another emblem of the double power, active and passive, which
the ancients saw in the Universe, and which they symbolized by the egg.
Orpheus, who studied in Egypt, borrowed from the theologians of that
country the mysterious forms under which the science of nature was
veiled, and carried into Greece the symbolic egg, with its division
into two parts or causes figured by the hermaphroditic being that issued
from it, and whereof Heaven and earth are composed.

The Brahmins of India expressed the same cosmogonic idea by a statue,
representative of the Universe, uniting in itself both sexes. The male
sex offered an image of the sun, centre of the active principle, and the
female sex that of the moon, at the sphere whereof, proceeding downward,
the passive portion of nature begins. The Lingam, unto the present day
revered in the Indian temples, being but the conjunction of the organs
of generation of the two sexes, was an emblem of the same. The Hindūs
have ever had the greatest veneration for this symbol of
ever-reproductive nature. The Greeks consecrated the same symbols of
universal fruitfulness in their Mysteries; and they were exhibited in
the sanctuaries of Eleusis. They appear among the sculptured ornaments
of all the Indian temples. Tertullian accuses the Valentinians of having
adopted the custom of venerating them; a custom, he says, introduced by
Melampus from Egypt into Greece. The Egyptians consecrated the Phallus
in the Mysteries of Osiris and Isis, as we learn from Plutarch and
Diodorus Siculus; and the latter assures us that these emblems were not
consecrated by the Egyptians alone, but by every people. They certainly
were so among the Persians and Assyrians; and they were regarded
everywhere as symbolic of the generative and productive powers of all
animated beings. In those early ages, the works of Nature and all her
agents were sacred like herself.

For the union of Nature with herself is a chaste marriage, of which the
union of man and woman was a natural image, and their organs were an
expressive emblem of the double energy which manifests itself in Heaven,
and Earth uniting together to produce all beings. "The Heavens," says
Plutarch, "seemed to men to fulfill the functions of father, and the
Earth of mother. The former impregnated the earth with its fertilizing
rains, and the earth, receiving them, became fruitful and brought
forth." Heaven, which covers and embraces the earth everywhere, is her
potent spouse, uniting himself to her to make her fruitful, without
which she would languish in everlasting sterility, buried in the shades
of chaos and of night. Their union is their marriage; their productions
or parts are their children. The skies are our Father, and Nature the
great Mother of us all.

This idea was not the dogma of a single sect, but the general opinion of
all the Sages. "Nature was divided," says Cicero, "into two parts, one
active, and the other that submitted itself to this action, which it
received, and which modified it. The former was deemed to be a Force,
and the latter the material on which that Force exerted itself."
Macrobius repeated almost literally the doctrine of Ocellus. Aristotle
termed the earth the fruitful mother, environed on all sides by the air.
Above it was Heaven, the dwelling-place of the gods and the divine
stars, its substance ether, or a fire incessantly moving in circles,
divine and incorruptible, and subject to no change. Below it, nature,
and the elements, mutable and acted on, corruptible and mortal.

Synesius said that generations were effected in the portions of the
Universe which we inhabit; while the cause of generations resided in the
portions above us, whence descend to us the germs of the effects
produced here below. Proclus and Simplicius deemed Heaven the Active
Cause and Father, relatively to the earth. The former says that the
World or the Whole is a single Animal; what is done _in_ it, is done
_by_ it; the same World _acts_, and _acts upon itself_. He divides it
into "Heaven" and "Generation." In the former, he says, are placed and
arranged the conservative causes of generation, superintended by the
Genii and Gods. The Earth, or Rhea, associated ever with Saturn in
production, is mother of the effects of which Heaven is Father; the womb
or bosom that receives the fertilizing energy of the God that engenders
ages. The great work of generation is operated, he says, primarily by
the action of the Sun, and secondarily by that of the Moon, so that the
Sun is the primitive source of this energy, as father and chief of the
male gods that form his court. He follows the action of the male and
female principles through all the portions and divisions of nature,
attributing to the former the origin of stability and identity, to the
latter, that of diversity and mobility. Heaven is to the earth, he says,
as the male to the female. It is the movement of the heavens that, by
their revolutions, furnished the seminal incitements and forces, whose
emanations received by the earth, make it fruitful, and cause it to
produce animals and plants of every kind.

Philo says that Moses recognized this doctrine of two causes, active and
passive; but made the former to reside in the Mind or Intelligence
external to matter.

The ancient astrologers divided the twelve signs of the Zodiac into six
male and six female, and assigned them to six male and six female Great
Gods. Heaven and Earth, or Ouranos and Ghê, were among most ancient
nations, the first and most ancient Divinities. We find them in the
Phœenician history of Sanchoniathon, and in the Grecian Genealogy of the
Gods given by Hesiod. Everywhere they marry, and by their union produce
the later Gods. "In the beginning," says Apollodorus, "Ouranos or the
Heavens was Lord of all the Universe: he took to wife Ghê or the earth,
and had by her many children." They were the first Gods of the Cretans,
and under other names, of the Armenians, as we learn from Berosus, and
of Panchaia, an island South of Arabia, as we learn from Euhemerus.
Orpheus made the Divinity, or the "Great Whole," male and female,
because, he said, it could produce nothing, unless it united in itself
the productive force of both sexes. He called Heaven PANGENETOR, the
Father of all things, most ancient of Beings, beginning and end of all,
containing in Himself the incorruptible and unwearying force of
Necessity.

The same idea obtained in the rude North of Europe. The Scythians made
the earth to be the wife of Jupiter; and the Germans adored her under
the name of HERTA. The Celts worshipped the Heavens and the Earth, and
said that without the former the latter would be sterile, and that their
marriage produced all things. The Scandinavians acknowledged BÖR or the
Heavens, and gave FURTUR, his son, the Earth as his wife. Olaus Rudbeck
adds, that their ancestors were persuaded that Heaven intermarried with
the Earth, and thus uniting his forces with hers, produced animals and
plants. This marriage of Heaven and Earth produced the AZES, Genii
famous in the theology of the North. In the theology of the Phrygians
and Lydians, the ASII were born of the marriage of the Supreme God with
the Earth, and Firmicus informs us that the Phrygians attributed to the
Earth supremacy over the other elements, and considered her the Great
Mother of all things.

Virgil sings the impregnation of the joyous earth, by the Ether, its
spouse, that descends upon its bosom, fertilizing it with rains.
Columella sings the loves of Nature and her marriage with Heaven
annually consummated at the sweet Spring-time. He describes the Spirit
of Life, the soul that animates the world, fired with the passion of
Love, uniting with Nature and itself, itself a part of Nature, and
filling its own bosom with new productions. This union of the Universe
with itself, this mutual action of two sexes, he terms "the great
Secrets of Nature," "the Mysteries of the Union of Heaven with Earth,
imaged in the Sacred Mysteries of Atys and Bacchus."

Varro tells us that the great Divinities adored at Samothrace were the
Heavens and the Earth, considered as First Causes or Primal Gods, and as
male and female agents, one bearing to the other the relations that the
Soul and Principle of Movement bear to the body or the matter that
receives them. These were the gods revered in the Mysteries of that
Island, as they were in the orgies of Phœnicia.

Everywhere the sacred body of Nature was covered with the veil of
allegory, which concealed it from the profane, and allowed it to be seen
only by the sage who thought it worthy to be the object of his study and
investigation. She showed herself to those only who loved her in spirit
and in truth, and she abandoned the indifferent and careless to error
and to ignorance. "The Sages of Greece," says Pausanias, "never wrote
otherwise than in an enigmatical manner, never naturally and directly."
"Nature," says Sallust the Philosopher, "should be sung only in a
language that imitates the secrecy of her processes and operations. She
is herself an enigma. We see only bodies in movement; the forces and
springs that move them are hidden from us." The poets inspired by the
Divinity, the wisest philosophers, all the theologians, the chiefs of
the initiations and Mysteries, even the gods uttering their oracles,
have borrowed the figurative language of allegory. "The Egyptians," says
Proclus, "preferred that mode of teaching, and spoke of the great
secrets of Nature, only in mythological enigmas." The Gymnosophists of
India and the Druids of Gaul lent to science the same enigmatic
language, and in the same style wrote the Hierophants of Phœnicia.

The division of things into the active and the passive cause leads to
that of the two Principles of Light and Darkness, connected with and
corresponding with it. For Light comes from the ethereal substance that
composes the active cause, and darkness from earth or the gross matter
which composes the passive cause. In Hesiod, the Earth, by its union
with Tartarus, engenders Typhon, Chief of the Powers or Genii of
Darkness. But it unites itself with the Ether or Ouranos, when it
engenders the Gods of Olympus, or the Stars, children of Starry Ouranos.

Light was the first Divinity worshipped by men. To it they owed the
brilliant spectacle of Nature. It seems an emanation from the Creator of
all things, making known to our senses the Universe which darkness hides
from our eyes, and, as it were, giving it existence. Darkness, as it
were, reduces all nature again to nothingness, and almost entirely
annihilates man.

Naturally, therefore, two substances of opposite natures were imagined,
to each of which the world was in turn subjected, one contributing to
its felicity and the other to its misfortune. Light multiplied its
enjoyments; Darkness despoiled it of them: the former was its friend,
the latter its enemy. To one all good was attributed; to the other all
evil; and thus the words "Light" and "Good" became synonymous, and the
words "Darkness" and "Evil." It seeming that Good and Evil could not
flow from one and the same source, any more than could Light and
Darkness, men naturally imagined two Causes or Principles, of different
natures and opposite in their effects, one of which shed Light and Good,
and the other Darkness and Evil, on the Universe.

This distinction of the two Principles was admitted in all the
Theologies, and formed one of the principal bases of all religions. It
entered as a primary element into the sacred fables, the cosmogonies and
the Mysteries of antiquity. "We are not to suppose," says Plutarch,
"that the Principles of the Universe are inanimate bodies, as Democritus
and Epicurus thought; nor that a matter devoid of qualities is organized
and arranged by a single Reason or Providence, Sovereign over all
things, as the Stoics held; for it is not possible that a single Being,
good or evil, is the cause of all, inasmuch as God can in nowise be the
cause of any evil. The harmony of the Universe is a combination of
contraries, like the strings of a lyre, or that of a bow, which
alternately is stretched and relaxed." "The good," says Euripides, "is
never separated from the Evil. The two must mingle, that all may go
well." And this opinion as to the two principles, continues Plutarch,
"is that of all antiquity. From the Theologians and Legislators it
passed to the Poets and Philosophers. Its author is unknown; but the
opinion itself is established by the traditions of the whole human race,
and consecrated in the mysteries and sacrifices both of the Greeks and
Barbarians, wherein was recognized the dogma of opposing principles in
nature, which, by their contrariety, produce the mixture of good and
evil. We must admit two contrary causes, two opposing powers, which
lead, one to the right and the other to the left, and thus control our
life, as they do the sublunary world, which is therefore subject to so
many changes and irregularities of every kind. For if there can be no
effect without a cause, and if the Good cannot be the cause of the Evil,
it is absolutely necessary that there should be a cause for the Evil, as
there is one for the Good." This doctrine, he adds, has been generally
received among most nations, and especially by those who have had the
greatest reputation for wisdom. All have admitted two gods, with
different occupations, one making the good and the other the evil found
in nature. The former has been styled "God," the latter "Demon." The
Persians, or Zoroaster, named the former Ormuzd and the latter Ahriman;
of whom they said one was of the nature of Light, the other of that of
Darkness. The Egyptians called the former Osiris, and the latter Typhon,
his eternal enemy.

The Hebrews, at least after their return from the Persian captivity, had
their good Deity, and the Devil, a bad and malicious Spirit, ever
opposing God, and Chief of the Angels of Darkness, as God was of those
of Light. The word "Satan" means, in Hebrew, simply, "The Adversary."

The Chaldeans, Plutarch says, had their good and evil stars. The Greeks
had their Jupiter and Pluto, and their Giants and Titans, to whom were
assigned the attributes of the Serpent with which Pluto or Serapis was
encircled, and the shape whereof was assumed by Typhon, Ahriman, and the
Satan of the Hebrews. Every people had something equivalent to this.

The People of Pegu believe in two Principles, one author of Good and the
other of Evil, and strive to propitiate the latter, while they think it
needless to worship the former, as he is incapable of doing evil. The
people of Java, of the Moluccas, of the Gold Coast, the Hottentots, the
people of Teneriffe and Madagascar, and the Savage Tribes of America,
all worship and strive to avert the anger and propitiate the good-will
of the Evil Spirit.

But among the Greeks, Egyptians, Chaldeans, Persians, and Assyrians, the
doctrine of the two Principles formed a complete and regularly arranged
theological system. It was the basis of the religion of the Magi and of
Egypt. The author of an ancient work, attributed to Origen, says that
Pythagoras learned from Zarastha, a Magus at Babylon (the same, perhaps,
as Zerdusht or Zoroaster), that there are two principles of all things,
whereof one is the _father_ and the other the _mother_; the former,
Light, and the latter, Darkness. Pythagoras thought that the
Dependencies on Light were warmth, dryness, lightness, swiftness; and
those of Darkness, cold, wet, weight, and slowness; and that the world
derived its existence from these two principles, as from the male and
the female. According to Porphyry, he conceived two opposing powers, one
good, which he termed Unity, the Light, Right, the Equal, the Stable,
the Straight; the other evil, which he termed Binary, Darkness, the
Left, the Unequal, the Unstable, the Crooked. These ideas he received
from the Orientals, for he dwelt twelve years at Babylon, studying with
the Magi. Varro says he recognized two Principles of all things,--the
Finite and the Infinite, Good and Evil, Life and Death, Day and Night.
White he thought was of the nature of the Good Principle, and Black of
that of the Evil; that Light and Darkness, Heat and Cold, the Dry and
the Wet, mingled in equal proportions; that Summer was the triumph of
heat, and Winter of cold; that their equal combination produced Spring
and Autumn, the former producing verdure and favorable to health, and
the latter, deteriorating everything, giving birth to maladies. He
applied the same idea to the rising and setting of the sun; and, like
the Magi, held that God or Ormuzd in the body resembled light, and in
the soul, truth.

Aristotle, like Plato, admitted a principle of Evil, resident in matter
and in its eternal imperfection.

The Persians said that Ormuzd, born of the pure Light, and Ahriman, born
of darkness, were ever at war. Ormuzd produced six Gods, Beneficence,
Truth, Good Order, Wisdom, Riches, and Virtuous Joy. These were so many
emanations from the Good Principle, so many blessings bestowed by it on
men. Ahriman, in his turn, produced six Devs, opponents of the six
emanations from Ormuzd. Then Ormuzd made himself three times as great as
before, ascended as far above the sun as the sun is above the earth, and
adorned the heavens with stars, of which he made Sirius the sentinel or
advance-guard: that he then created twenty-four other Deities, and
placed them in an egg, where Ahriman also placed twenty-four others,
created by him, who broke the egg; and so intermingled Good and Evil.
Theopompus adds that, according to the Magi, for two terms of three
thousand years, each of the two Principles is to be by turns victor and
the other vanquished; then for three thousand more for each they are to
contend with each other, each destroying reciprocally the works of the
other; after which Ahriman is to perish, and men, wearing transparent
bodies, to enjoy unutterable happiness.

The twelve great Deities of the Persians, the six Amshaspands and six
Devs, marshalled, the former under the banner of Light, and the latter
under that of Darkness, are the twelve Zodiacal Signs or Months; the six
supreme signs, or those of Light, or of Spring and Summer, commencing
with Aries, and the six inferior, of Darkness, or of Autumn and Winter,
commencing with Libra. Limited Time, as contradistinguished from Time
without limits, or Eternity, is Time created and measured by the
celestial revolutions. It is comprehended in a period divided into
twelve parts, each subdivided into a thousand parts, which the Persians
termed years. Thus the circle annually traversed by the Sun was divided
into 12,000 parts, or each sign into 3,000: and thus, each year, the
Principle of Light and Good triumphed for 3,000 years, that of Evil and
Darkness for 3,000, and they mutually destroyed each other's labors for
6,000, or 3,000 for each: so that the Zodiac was equally divided between
them. And accordingly Ocellus Lucanus, the Disciple of Pythagoras, held
that the principal cause of all sublunary effects resided in the Zodiac,
and that from it flowed the good or bad influences of the planets that
revolved therein.

The twenty-four good and twenty-four evil Deities, enclosed in the Egg,
are the forty-eight constellations of the ancient sphere, equally
divided between the realms of Light and Darkness, on the concavity of
the celestial sphere which was apportioned among them; and which,
enclosing the world and planets, was the mystic and sacred egg of the
Magi, the Indians, and the Egyptians,--the egg that issued from the
mouth of the God Kneph, that figured as the Orphic Egg in the Mysteries
of Greece, that issued from the God Chumong of the Coresians, and from
the Egyptian Osiris and the God Phanes of the Modern Orphics, Principle
of Light,--the egg crushed by the Sacred Bull of the Japanese, and from
which the world emerged; that placed by the Greeks at the feet of
Bacchus the bull-horned God, and from which Aristophanes makes Love
emerge, who with Night organizes Chaos.

Thus the Balance, the Scorpion, the Serpent of Ophiucus, and the Dragon
of the Hesperides became malevolent Signs and Evil Genii; and entire
nature was divided between the two principles, and between the agents or
partial causes subordinate to them. Hence Michael and his Archangels,
and Satan and his fallen compeers. Hence the wars of Jupiter and the
Giants, in which the Gods of Olympus fought on the side of the
Light-God, against the dark progeny of earth and Chaos; a war which
Proclus regarded as symbolizing the resistance opposed by dark and
chaotic matter to the active and beneficent force which gives it
organization; an idea which in part appears in the old theory of two
Principles, one innate in the active and luminous substance of Heaven,
and the other in the inert and dark substance of matter that resists the
order and the good that Heaven communicates to it.

Osiris conquers Typhon, and Ormuzd, Ahriman, when, at the Vernal
Equinox, the creative action of Heaven and its demiourgic energy is most
strongly manifested. Then the principle of Light and Good overcomes that
of Darkness and Evil, and the world rejoices, redeemed from cold and
wintry darkness by the beneficent Sign into which the Sun then enters
triumphant and rejoicing, after his resurrection.

From the doctrine of the two Principles, Active and Passive, grew that
of the Universe, animated by a Principle of Eternal Life, and by a
Universal Soul, from which every isolated and temporary being received
at its birth an emanation, which, at the death of such being, returned
to its source. The life of matter as much belonged to nature as did
matter itself; and as life is manifested by movement, the sources of
life must needs seem to be placed in those luminous and eternal bodies,
and above all in the Heaven in which they revolve, and which whirls them
along with itself in that rapid course that is swifter than all other
movement. And fire and heat have so great an analogy with life, that
cold, like absence of movement, seemed the distinctive characteristic of
death. Accordingly, the vital fire that blazes in the Sun and produces
the heat that vivifies everything, was regarded as the principle of
organization and life of all sublunary beings.

According to this doctrine, the Universe is not to be regarded, in its
creative and eternal action, merely as an immense machine, moved by
powerful springs and forced into a continual movement, which, emanating
from the circumference, extends to the centre, acts and re-acts in
every possible direction, and re-produces in succession all the varied
forms which matter receives. So to regard it would be to recognize a
cold and purely mechanical action, the energy of which could never
produce life.

On the contrary, it was thought, the Universe should be deemed an
immense Being, always living, always moved and always moving in an
eternal activity inherent in itself, and which, subordinate to no
foreign cause, is communicated to all its parts, connects them together,
and makes of the world of things a complete and perfect whole. The order
and harmony which reign therein seem to belong to and be a part of it,
and the design of the various plans of construction of organized beings
would seem to be graven in its Supreme Intelligence, source of all the
other Intelligences which it communicates together with life to man.
Nothing existing out of it, it must be regarded as the principle and
term of all things.

Chæremon had no reason for saying that the Ancient Egyptians, inventors
of the sacred fables, and adorers of the Sun and the other luminaries,
saw in the Universe only a machine, without life and without
intelligence, either in its whole or in its parts; and that their
cosmogony was a pure Epicureanism, which required only matter and
movement to organize its world and govern it. Such an opinion would
necessarily exclude all religious worship. Wherever we suppose a
worship, there we must suppose intelligent Deities who receive it, and
are sensible to the homage of their adorers; and no other people were so
religious as the Egyptians.

On the contrary, with them the immense, immutable, and Eternal Being,
termed "God" or "the Universe," had eminently, and in all their
plenitude, that life and intelligence which sublunary beings, each an
infinitely small and temporary portion of itself, possess in a far
inferior degree and infinitely less quantity. It was to them, in some
sort, like the Ocean, whence the springs, brooks, and rivers have risen
by evaporation, and to the bosom whereof they return by a larger or
shorter course, and after a longer or shorter separation from the
immense mass of its waters. The machine of the Universe was, in their
view, like that of man, moved by a Principle of Life which kept it in
eternal activity, and circulated in all its parts. The Universe was a
living and animated being, like man and the other animals; or rather
they were so only because the Universe was essentially so, and for a few
moments communicated to each an infinitely minute portion of its
eternal life, breathed by it into the inert and gross matter of
sublunary bodies. That withdrawn, man or the animal died; and the
Universe alone, living and circulating around the wrecks of their
bodies, by its eternal movement, organized and animated new bodies,
returning to them the eternal fire and subtle substance which vivifies
itself, and which, incorporated in its immense mass, was its universal
soul.

These were the ancient ideas as to this Great GOD, Father of all the
gods, or of the World; of this BEING, Principle of all things, and of
which nothing other than itself is Principle,--the Universal cause that
was termed God. Soul of the Universe, eternal like it, immense like it,
supremely active and potent in its varied operations, penetrating all
parts of this vast body, impressing a regular and symmetrical movement
on the spheres, making the elements instinct with activity and order,
mingling with everything, organizing everything, vivifying and
preserving everything,--this was the UNIVERSE-GOD which the ancients
adored as Supreme Cause and God of Gods.

Anchises, in the Æneid, taught Æneas this doctrine of Pythagoras,
learned by him from his Masters, the Egyptians, in regard to the Soul
and Intelligence of the Universe, from which _our_ souls and
intelligences, as well as our life and that of the animals, emanate,
Heaven, Earth, the Sea, the Moon and the Stars, he said, are moved by a
principle of internal life which perpetuates their existence; a great
intelligent soul, that penetrates every part of the vast body of the
Universe, and, mingling with everything, agitates it by an eternal
movement. It is the source of life in all living things. The force which
animates all, emanates from the eternal fire that burns in Heaven. In
the Georgics, Virgil repeats the same doctrine; and that, at the death
of every animal, the life that animated it, part of the universal life,
returns to its Principle and to the source of life that circulates in
the sphere of the Stars.

Servius makes God the active Cause that organizes the elements into
bodies, the vivifying breath or spirit, that, spreading through matter
or the elements, produces and engenders all things. The elements compose
the substance of our bodies: God composes the souls that vivify these
bodies. From it come the instincts of animals, from it their life, he
says: and when they die, that life returns to and re-enters into the
Universal Soul, and their bodies into Universal Matter.

Timæus of Locria and Plato his Commentator wrote of the Soul of the
World, developing the doctrine of Pythagoras, who thought, says Cicero,
that God is the Universal Soul, resident everywhere in nature, and of
which our Souls are but emanations. "_God is one_," says Pythagoras, as
cited by Justin Martyr: "He is not, as some think, _without_ the world,
but within it, and entire in its entirety. He sees all that _becomes_,
forms all immortal beings, is the author of their powers and
performances, the origin of all things, the Light of Heaven, the
_Father_, the _Intelligence_, the _Soul_ of all beings, the Mover of all
spheres."

God, in the view of Pythagoras, was ONE, a single substance, whose
continuous parts extended through all the Universe, without separation,
difference, or inequality, like the soul in the human body. He denied
the doctrine of the spiritualists, who had severed the Divinity from the
Universe, making Him exist apart from the Universe, which thus became no
more than a material work, on which acted the Abstract Cause, a God,
isolated from it. The Ancient Theology did not so separate God from the
Universe. This Eusebius attests, in saying that but a small number of
wise men, like Moses, had sought for God or the Cause of all, outside of
that ALL; while the Philosophers of Egypt and Phœnicia, real authors of
all the old Cosmogonies, had placed the Supreme Cause _in_ the Universe
itself, and in its parts, so that, in their view, the world and all its
parts are _in_ God.

The World or Universe was thus compared to man: the Principle of Life
that moves it, to that which moves man; the Soul of the World to that of
man. Therefore Pythagoras called man a _microcosm_, or little world, as
possessing in miniature all the qualities found on a great scale in the
Universe; by his reason and intelligence partaking of the Divine Nature:
and by his faculty of changing aliments into other substances, of
growing, and reproducing himself, partaking of elementary Nature. Thus
he made the Universe a great intelligent Being, like man--an immense
Deity, having in itself, what man has in himself, movement, life, and
intelligence, and besides, a perpetuity of existence, which man has not;
and, as having in itself perpetuity of movement and life, therefore the
Supreme Cause of all.

Everywhere extended, this Universal Soul does not, in the view of
Pythagoras, act everywhere equally nor in the same manner. The highest
portion of the Universe, being as it were its head, seemed to him its
principal seat, and there was the guiding power of the rest of the
world. In the seven concentric spheres is resident an eternal order,
fruit of the intelligence, the Universal Soul that moves, by a constant
and regular progression, the immortal bodies that form the harmonious
system of the heavens.

Manilius says: "I sing the invisible and potent Soul of Nature; that
Divine Substance which, everywhere inherent in Heaven, Earth, and the
Waters of the Ocean, forms the bond that holds together and makes one
all the parts of the vast body of the Universe. It, balancing all
Forces, and harmoniously arranging the varied relations of the many
members of the world, maintains in it the life and regular movement that
agitate it, as a result of the action of the living breath or single
spirit that dwells in all its parts, circulates in all the channels of
universal nature, flashes with rapidity to all its points, and gives to
animated bodies the configurations appropriate to the organization of
each.... This eternal Law, this Divine Force, that maintains the harmony
of the world, makes use of the Celestial Signs to organize and guide the
animated creatures that breathe upon the earth; and gives to each of
them the character and habits most appropriate. By the action of this
Force Heaven rules the condition of the Earth and of its fields
cultivated by the husbandman: it gives us or takes from us vegetation
and harvests: it makes the great ocean overpass its limits at the flow,
and retire within them again at the ebbing, of the tide."

Thus it is no longer by means of a poetic fiction only that the heavens
and the earth become animated and personified, and are deemed living
existences, from which other existences proceed. For now they live, with
their own life, a life eternal like their bodies, each gifted with a
life and perhaps a soul, like those of man, a portion of the universal
life and universal soul; and the other bodies that they form, and which
they contain in their bosoms, live only through them and with their
life, as the embryo lives in the bosom of its mother, in consequence and
by means of the life communicated to it, and which the mother ever
maintains by the active power of her own life. Such is the universal
life of the world, reproduced in all the beings which its superior
portion creates in its inferior portion, that is as it were the _matrix_
of the world, or of the beings that the heavens engender in its bosom.

"The soul of the world," says Macrobius, "is nature itself" [as the
soul of man is man himself], "always acting through the celestial
spheres which it moves, and which but follow the irresistible impulse it
impresses on them. The heavens, the sun, great seat of generative power,
the signs, the stars, and the planets act only with the activity of the
soul of the Universe. From that soul, through them, come all the
variations and changes of sublunary nature, of which the heavens and
celestial bodies are but the secondary causes. The zodiac, with its
signs, is an existence, immortal and divine, organized by the universal
soul, and producing, or gathering in itself, all the varied emanations
of the different powers that make up the nature of the Divinity."

This doctrine, that gave to the heavens and the spheres living souls,
each a portion of the universal soul, was of extreme antiquity. It was
held by the old Sabræns. It was taught by Timæsus, Plato, Speusippus,
Iamblichus, Macrobius, Marcus Aurelius, and Pythagoras. When once men
had assigned a soul to the Universe, containing in itself the plenitude
of the animal life of particular beings, and even of the stars, they
soon supposed that soul to be essentially intelligent, and the source of
intelligence of all intelligent beings. Then the Universe became to them
not only animated but intelligent, and of that intelligence the
different parts of nature partook. Each soul was the vehicle, and, as it
were, the envelope of the intelligence that attached itself to it, and
could repose nowhere else. Without a soul there could be no
intelligence; and as there was a universal soul, source of all souls,
the universal soul was gifted with a universal intelligence, source of
all particular intelligences. So the soul of the world contained in
itself the intelligence of the world. All the agents of nature into
which the universal soul entered, received also a portion of its
intelligence, and the Universe, in its totality and in its parts, was
filled with intelligences, that might be regarded as so many emanations
from the sovereign and universal intelligence. Wherever the divine soul
acted as a cause, there also was intelligence; and thus Heaven, the
stars, the elements, and all parts of the Universe, became the seats of
so many divine intelligences. Every minutest portion of the great soul
became a partial intelligence, and the more it was disengaged from gross
matter, the more active and intelligent it was. And all the old adorers
of nature, the theologians, astrologers, and poets, and the most
distinguished philosophers, supposed that the stars were so many
animated and intelligent beings, or eternal bodies, active causes of
effects here below, whom a principle of life animated, and whom an
intelligence directed, which was but an emanation from, and a portion
of, the universal life and intelligence of the world.

The Universe itself was regarded as a supremely intelligent being. Such
was the doctrine of Timæus of Locria. The soul of man was part of the
intelligent soul of the Universe, and therefore itself intelligent. His
opinion was that of many other philosophers. Cleanthes, a disciple of
ZENO, regarded the Universe as God, or as the unproduced and universal
cause of all effects produced. He ascribed a soul and intelligence to
universal nature, and to this intelligent soul, in his view, divinity
belonged. From it the intelligence of man was an emanation, and shared
its divinity. Chrysippus, the most subtle of the Stoics, placed in the
universal reason that forms the soul and intelligence of nature, that
divine force or essence of the Divinity which he assigned to the world
moved by the universal soul that pervades its every part.

An interlocutor in Cicero's work, _De Natura Deorum_, formally argues
that the Universe is necessarily intelligent and wise, because man, an
infinitely small portion of it, is so. Cicero makes the same argument in
his oration for Milo. The physicists came to the same conclusion as the
philosophers. They supposed that movement essentially belonged to the
soul, and the direction of regular and ordered movements to the
intelligence. And, as both movement and order exist in the Universe,
therefore, they held, there must be in it a soul and an intelligence
that rule it, and are not to be distinguished from itself; because the
idea of the Universe is but the aggregate of all the particular ideas of
all things that exist.

The argument was, that the Heavens, and the Stars which make part of
them, are _animated_, because they possess a portion of the Universal
Soul: they are _intelligent_ beings, because that Universal Soul, part
whereof they possess, is supremely intelligent; and they share
_Divinity_ with Universal Nature, because Divinity resides in the
Universal Soul and Intelligence which move and rule the world, and of
each of which they hold a share. By this process of logic, the
interlocutor in Cicero assigned Divinity to the Stars, as animated
beings gifted with sensibility and intelligence, and composed of the
noblest and purest portions of the ethereal substance, unmixed with
matter of an alien nature, and essentially containing light and heat.
Hence he concluded them to be so many gods, of an intelligence superior
to that of other existences, corresponding to the lofty height in which
they moved with such perfect regularity and admirable harmony, with a
movement spontaneous and free. Hence he made them "Gods," active,
eternal, and intelligent "Causes"; and peopled the realm of Heaven with
a host of Eternal Intelligences, celestial Genii or Angels, sharing the
universal Divinity, and associated with it in the administration of the
Universe, and the dominion exercised over sublunary nature and man.

_We_ make the motive-force of the planets to be a mechanical law, which
we explain by the combination of two forces, the centripetal and
centrifugal, whose _origin_ we cannot demonstrate, but whose _force_ we
can calculate. The ancients regarded them as moved by an intelligent
force that had its origin in the first and universal Intelligence. Is it
so certain, after all, that we are any nearer the truth than they were;
or that we know what our "centripetal and centrifugal forces" _mean_;
for what _is_ a _force?_ With us, the entire Deity acts upon and moves
each planet, as He does the sap that circulates in the little blade of
grass, and in the particles of blood in the tiny veins of the invisible
rotifer. With the Ancients, the Deity of each Star was but a portion of
the Universal God, the Soul of Nature. Each Star and Planet, with them,
was moved of _itself_, and directed by _its own_ special intelligence.
And this opinion of Achilles Tatius, Diodorus, Chrysippus, Aristotle,
Plato, Heraclides of Pontus, Theophrastus, Simplicius, Macrobius, and
Proclus, that in each Star there is an immortal Soul and
Intelligence,--part of the Universal Soul and Intelligence of the
Whole,--this opinion of Orpheus, Plotinus, and the Stoics, was in
reality, that of many Christian philosophers. For Origen held the same
opinion; and Augustin held that every visible thing in the world was
superintended by an Angelic Power: and Cosma the Monk, believed that
every Star was under the guidance of an Angel; and the author of the
Octateuch, written in the time of the Emperor Justin, says that they are
moved by the impulse communicated to them by Angels stationed above the
firmament. Whether the stars were animated beings, was a question that
Christian antiquity did not decide. Many of the Christian doctors
believed they were. Saint Augustin hesitates, Saint Jerome doubts, if
Solomon did not assign souls to the Stars. Saint Ambrose does not doubt
they _have_ souls; and Pamphilus says that many of the Church believe
they are reasonable beings, while many think otherwise, but that neither
one nor the other opinion is heretical.

Thus the Ancient Thought, earnest and sincere, wrought out the idea of a
Soul _inherent_ in the Universe and in its several parts. The next step
was to _separate_ that Soul from the Universe, and give to it an
external and independent existence and personality; still omnipresent,
in every inch of space and in every particle of matter, and yet not a
part of Nature, but its Cause and its Creator. This is the middle ground
between the two doctrines, of Pantheism (or that all is God, and God is
_in_ all and is all), on the one side, and Atheism (or that all is
nature, and there is no other God), on the other; which doctrines, after
all, when reduced to their simplest terms, seem to be the same.

We complacently congratulate ourselves on our recognition of a
_personal_ God, as being the conception most suited to human sympathies,
and exempt from the mystifications of Pantheism. But the Divinity
remains still a mystery, notwithstanding all the devices which
symbolism, either from the organic or inorganic creation, can supply;
and personification is itself a symbol, liable to misapprehension as
much as, if not more so than, any other, since it is apt to degenerate
into a mere reflection of our own infirmities; and hence _any_
affirmative idea or conception that we can, in our own minds, picture of
the Deity, must needs be infinitely inadequate.

The spirit of the Vedas (or sacred Indian Books, of great antiquity), as
understood by their earliest as well as most recent expositors, is
decidedly a pantheistic monotheism--one God, and He all in all; the many
divinities, numerous as the prayers addressed to them, being resolvable
into the titles and attributes of a few, and ultimately into THE ONE.
The machinery of personification was understood to have been
unconsciously assumed as a mere expedient to supply the deficiencies of
language; and the Mimansa justly considered itself as only interpreting
the true meaning of the Mantras, when it proclaimed that, in the
beginning, "Nothing was but Mind, the Creative Thought of Him which
existed alone from the beginning, and breathed without afflation." The
idea suggested in the Mantras is dogmatically asserted and developed in
the Upanischadas. The Vedanta philosophy, assuming the mystery of the
"ONE IN MANY" as the fundamental article of faith, maintained not only
the Divine Unity, but the identity of matter and spirit. The unity which
it advocates is that of mind. Mind is the Universal Element, the One
God, the Great Soul, Mahaatma. He is the material as well as efficient
cause, and the world is a texture of which he is both the web and the
weaver. He is the Macrocosmos, the universal organism called Pooroosha,
of which Fire, Air, and Sun are only the chief members. His head is
light, his eyes the sun and moon, his breath the wind, his voice the
opened Vedas. All proceeds from Brahm, like the web from the spider and
the grass from the earth.

Yet it is only the impossibility of expressing in language the
origination of matter from spirit, which gives to Hindū philosophy the
appearance of materialism. Formless Himself, the Deity is present in all
forms. His glory is displayed in the Universe as the image of the sun in
water, which is, yet is not, the luminary itself. All maternal agency
and appearance, the subjective world, are to a great extent phantasms,
the notional representations of ignorance. They occupy, however, a
middle ground between reality and non-reality; they are unreal, because
nothing exists but Brahm; yet in some degree real, inasmuch as they
constitute an outward manifestation of him. They are a self-induced
hypostasis of the Deity, under which He _presents to Himself_ the whole
of animate and inanimate Nature, the actuality of the moment, the
diversified _appearances_ which successively invest the one Pantheistic
Spirit.

The great aim of reason is to generalize; to discover unity in
multiplicity, order in apparent confusion; to separate from the
accidental and the transitory, the stable and universal. In the
contemplation of Nature, and the vague, but almost intuitive perception
of a general uniformity of plan among endless varieties of operation and
form, arise those solemn and reverential feelings, which, if accompanied
by intellectual activity, may eventually ripen into philosophy.

Consciousness of self and of personal identity is co-existent with our
existence. We cannot conceive of mental existence without it. It is not
the work of reflection nor of logic, nor the result of observation,
experiment, and experience. It is a gift from God, like instinct; and
that consciousness of a thinking soul which is really the person that
we are, and other than our body, is the best and most solid proof of the
soul's existence. We have the same consciousness of a Power on which we
are dependent; which we can _define_ and form an idea or picture of, as
little as we can of the soul, and yet which we _feel_, and therefore
know, exists. True and correct ideas of that Power, of the Absolute
Existence from which all proceeds, we cannot trace; if by true and
correct we mean _adequate_ ideas; for of such we are not, with our
limited faculties, capable. And ideas of His nature, so far correct as
we are capable of entertaining, can only be attained either by direct
inspiration or by the investigations of philosophy.

The idea of the universal preceded the recognition of any system for its
explanation. It was _felt_ rather than understood; and it was long
before the grand conception on which all philosophy rests received
through deliberate investigation that analytical development which might
properly entitle it to the name. The sentiment, when first observed by
the self-conscious mind, was, says Plato, "a Divine gift, communicated
to mankind by some Prometheus, or by those ancients who lived nearer to
the gods than our degenerate selves." The mind deduced from its first
experiences the notion of a general Cause or Antecedent, to which it
shortly gave a name and personified it. This was the statement of a
theorem, obscure in proportion to its generality. _It explained all
things but itself_. It was _a true_ cause, but an _incomprehensible_
one. Ages had to pass before the nature of the theorem could be rightly
appreciated, and before men, acknowledging the First Cause to be an
object of faith rather than science, were contented to confine their
researches to those nearer relations of existence and succession, which
are really within the reach of their faculties. At first, and for a long
time, the intellect deserted the real for a hastily-formed ideal world,
and the imagination usurped the place of reason, in attempting to put a
construction on the most general and inadequate of conceptions, by
transmuting its symbols into realities, and by substantializing it under
a thousand arbitrary forms.

In poetry, the idea of Divine unity became, as in Nature, obscured by a
multifarious symbolism; and the notionalities of transcendental
philosophy reposed on views of nature scarcely more profound than those
of the earliest symbolists. Yet the idea of unity was rather obscured
than extinguished; and Xenophanes appeared as an enemy of Homer, only
because he more emphatically insisted on the monotheistic element,
which, in poetry, has been comparatively overlooked. The first
philosophy reasserted the unity which poetry had lost; but being unequal
to investigate its nature, it again resigned it to the world of
approximate sensations, and became bewildered in materialism,
considering the conceptional whole or First Element as some refinement
of matter, unchangeable in its essence, though subject to mutations of
quality and form in an eternal succession of seeming decay and
regeneration; comparing it to water, air, or fire, as each endeavored to
refine on the doctrine of his predecessor, or was influenced by a
different class of theological traditions.

In the philosophical systems, the Divine Activity, divided by the poets
and by popular belief among a race of personifications, in whom the idea
of descent replaced that of cause, or of pantheistic evolution, was
restored, without subdivision or reservation, to nature as a whole; at
first as a mechanical _force_ or _life_; afterward as an all-pervading
_soul_ or inherent _thought_; and lastly as an external directing
_Intelligence_.

The Ionian revival of pantheism was materialistic. The Moving Force was
inseparable from a material element, a subtle yet visible ingredient.
Under the form of _air_ or _fire_, the principle of life was associated
with the most obvious material machinery of nature. Everything, it was
said, is alive and full of gods. The wonders of the volcano, the magnet,
the ebb and flow of the tide, were vital indications, the breathing or
moving of the Great World-Animal. The imperceptible ether of Anaximenes
had no _positive_ quality beyond the atmospheric air with which it was
easily confused: and even the "Infinite" of Anaximander, though free of
the conditions of quality or quantity, was only an ideal chaos, relieved
of its coarseness by negations. It was the illimitable storehouse or
Pleroma, out of which is evolved the endless circle of phenomenal
change. A moving Force was recognized _in_, but not clearly
distinguished _from_, the material. Space, Time, Figure, and Number, and
other common forms or properties, which exist only as _attributes_, were
treated as _substances_, or at least as making a substantial connection
between the objects to which they belong: and all the conditions of
material existence were supposed to have been evolved out of the
Pythagorean Monad.

The Eleatic philosophers treated conceptions not only as entities, but
as the only entities, alone possessing the stability and certainty and
reality vainly sought among phenomena. The only reality was Thought.
"All _real_ existence," they said, "is _mental_ existence;
non-existence, being inconceivable, is therefore impossible; existence
fills up the whole range of thought, and is inseparable from its
exercise; thought and its object are one."

Xenophanes used ambiguous language, applicable to the material as well
as to the mental, and exclusively appropriate to neither. In other
words, he availed himself of material imagery to illustrate an
indefinite meaning. In announcing the universal being, he appealed to
the heavens as the visible manifestation, calling it _spherical_; a term
borrowed from the material world. He said that God was neither moved nor
unmoved, limited nor unlimited. He did not even attempt to express
clearly, what cannot be conceived clearly; admitting, says Simplicius,
that such speculations were above physics. Parmenides employed similar
expedients, comparing his metaphysical Deity to a sphere, or to heat, an
aggregate or a continuity, and so involuntarily withdrawing its nominal
attributes.

The Atomic school, dividing the All into Matter and Force, deemed matter
unchangeable in its ultimate constitution, though infinitely variable in
its resultant forms. They made all variety proceed from the varied
combinations of atoms; but they required no mover nor director of the
atoms external to themselves; no universal Reason; but a Mechanical
Eternal _Necessity_, like that of the Poets. Still it is doubtful
whether there ever was a time when reason could be said to be entirely
asleep, a stranger to its own existence, notwithstanding this apparent
materialism. The earliest contemplation of the external world, which
brings it into an imagined association with ourselves, assigns, either
to its whole or its parts, the sensation and volition which belong to
our own souls.

Anaxagoras admitted the existence of ultimate elementary particles, as
Empedocles did, from the combinations whereof all material phenomena
resulted. But he asserted the Moving Force to be Mind; and yet, though
he clearly saw the impossibility of advancing by illustration or
definition beyond a reasonable faith, or a simple negation of
materiality, yet he could not wholly desist from the endeavor to
illustrate the nature of this non-matter or mind, by symbols drawn from
those physical considerations which decided him in placing it in a
separate category. Whether as human reason, or as the regulating
Principle in nature, he held it different from all other things in
character and effect, and that therefore it must necessarily differ in
its essential constitution. It was neither Matter, nor a Force conjoined
with matter, or homogeneous with it, but independent and generically
distinct, especially in this, that, being the source of all motion,
separation, and cognition, it is something entirely unique, pure, and
unmixed; and so, being unhindered by any interfering influence limiting
its independence of individual action, it has Supreme Empire over all
things, over the vortex of worlds as well as over all that live in them.
It is most penetrating and powerful, mixing with other things, though no
other thing mixes with it; exercises universal control and cognition,
and includes the _Necessity_ of the Poets, as well as the independent
power of thought which we exercise within ourselves. In short, it is the
self-conscious power of thought extended to the Universe, and exalted
into the Supreme External Mind which sees, knows, and directs all
things.

Thus Pantheism and Materialism were both avoided; and matter, though as
infinitely varied as the senses represent it, was held in a bond of
unity transferred to a ruling power apart from it. That Power could not
be Prime Mover, if it were itself moved; nor All-Governing, if not apart
from the things it governs. If the arranging Principle were _inherent_
in matter, it would have been impossible to account for the existence of
a chaos: if something _external_, then the old Ionian doctrine of a
"beginning" became more easily conceivable, as being the epoch at which
the Arranging Intelligence commenced its operations.

But this grand idea of an all-governing independent mind involved
difficulties which proved insuperable; because it gave to matter, in the
form of chaos, an independent and eternal self-existence, and so
introduced a dualism of mind and matter. In the Mind or Intelligence,
Anaxagoras included not only life and motion, but the moral principles
of the noble and good; and probably used the term on account of the
popular misapplication of the word "God," and as being less liable to
misconstruction, and more specifically marking his idea. His
"Intelligence" principle remained practically liable to many of the same
defects as the "Necessity" of the poets. It was the presentiment of a
great idea, which it was for the time impossible to explain or follow
out. It was not yet intelligible, nor was even the road opened through
which it might be approached.

Mind cannot advance in metaphysics beyond self-deification. In
attempting to go further, it only enacts the apotheosis of its own
subtle conceptions, and so sinks below the simpler ground already taken.
The realities which Plato could not recognize in phenomena, he
discovered within his own mind, and as unhesitatingly as the old
Theosophists installed its creations among the gods. He, like most
philosophers after Anaxagoras, made the Supreme Being to be
Intelligence; but in other respects left His nature undefined, or rather
indefinite through the variety of definitions, a conception vaguely
floating between Theism and Pantheism. Though deprecating the
demoralizing tendencies of poetry, he was too wise to attempt to replace
them by other representations of a positive kind. He justly says, that
spiritual things can be made intelligible only through figures; and the
forms of allegorical expression which, in a rude age, had been adopted
unconsciously, were designedly chosen by the philosopher as the most
appropriate vehicles for theological ideas.

As the devices of symbolism were gradually stripped away, in order, if
possible, to reach the fundamental conception, the religious feeling
habitually connected with it seemed to evaporate under the process. And
yet the advocates of Monotheism, Xenophanes and Heraclitus, declaimed
only against the making of gods in human form. They did not attempt to
strip nature of its divinity, but rather to recall religious
contemplation from an exploded symbolism to a purer one. They continued
the veneration which, in the background of poetry, has been maintained
for Sun and Stars, the Fire or Ether. Socrates prostrated himself before
the rising luminary; and the eternal spheres, which seem to have shared
the religious homage of Xenophanes, retained a secondary and qualified
Divinity in the Schools of the Peripatetics and Stoics.

The unseen being or beings revealed only to the Intellect became the
theme of philosophy; and their more ancient symbols, if not openly
discredited, were passed over with evasive generality, as beings
respecting whose problematical existence we must be "content with what
has been reported by those ancients, who, assuming to be their
descendants, must therefore be supposed to have been well acquainted
with their own ancestors and family connections." And the Theism of
Anaxagoras was still more decidedly subversive, not only of Mythology,
but of the whole religion of outward nature; it being an appeal from the
world without, to the consciousness of spiritual dignity within man.

In the doctrines of Aristotle, the world moves on uninterruptedly,
always changing, yet ever the same, like Time, the Eternal Now, knowing
neither repose nor death. There is a principle which makes good the
failure of _identity_, by multiplying _resemblances_; the destruction of
the _individual_ by an eternal renewal of the _form_ in which matter is
manifested. This regular eternal _movement_ implies an Eternal Mover;
not an inert Eternity, such as the Platonic _Eidos_, but one always
_acting_, His _essence_ being _to act_, for otherwise he might _never_
have acted, and the existence of the world would be an accident; for
what should have, in that case, decided Him to act, after long
inactivity? Nor can He be partly _in act_ and partly _potential_, that
is, quiescent and undetermined to act or not to act, for even in that
case motion would not be eternal, but contingent and precarious. He is
therefore _wholly in act_, a pure, untiring activity, and for the same
reasons wholly immaterial. Thus Aristotle avoided the idea that God was
inactive and self-contemplative for an eternity, and then for some
unknown reason, or by some unknown motive, commenced to act outwardly
and produce; but he incurred the opposite hazard, of making the result
of His action, matter and the Universe, be co-existent with Himself; or,
in other words, of denying that there was any time when His outward
action _commenced_.

The First Cause, he said, unmoved, moves all. _Act_ was _first_, and the
Universe has existed forever; one persistent cause directing its
continuity. The _unity_ of the First Mover follows from His
immateriality. If He were not Himself unmoved, the series of motions and
causes of motion would be infinite. Unmoved, therefore, and unchangeable
Himself, all movement, even that in space, is caused by Him: He is
necessary: He cannot be otherwise than as He is; and it is only through
the necessity of His being that we can account for those necessary
eternal relations which make a science of Being possible. Thus Aristotle
leaned to a seemingly personal God; not a Being of parts and passions,
like the God of the Hebrews, or that of the mass even of educated men in
our own day, but a Substantial Head of all the categories of being, an
Individuality of Intelligence, the dogma of Anaxagoras revived out of a
more elaborate and profound analysis of Nature; something like that
living unambiguous Principle which the old poets, in advance of the
materialistic cosmogonists from Night and Chaos, had discovered in
Ouranos or Zeus. Soon, however, the vision of personality is withdrawn,
and we reach that culminating point of thought where the real blends
with the ideal; where moral action and objective thought (that is,
thought exercised as to anything outside of itself), as well as the
material body, are excluded; and where the divine action in the world
retains its veil of impenetrable mystery, and to the utmost ingenuity of
research presents but a contradiction. At this extreme, the series of
efficient causes resolves itself into the Final Cause. That which moves,
itself _un_moved, can only be the immobility of Thought or Form. God is
both formal, efficient, and final cause; the One Form comprising all
forms, the one good including all good, the goal of the longing of the
University, moving the world as the object of love or rational desire
moves the individual. He is the internal or self-realized Final Cause,
having no end beyond Himself. He is no moral agent; for if He were, He
would be but an instrument for producing something still higher and
greater. One sort of act only, activity of mind or thought, can be
assigned to Him who is at once all act yet all repose. What we call our
highest pleasure, which distinguishes wakefulness and sensation, and
which gives a reflected charm to hope and memory, is with Him perpetual.
His existence is unbroken enjoyment of that which is most excellent but
only temporary with us. The divine quality of active and yet tranquil
self-contemplation characterizing intelligence, is pre-eminently
possessed by the divine mind; His thought, which is His existence,
being, unlike ours, unconditional and wholly _act_. If He can receive
any gratification or enjoyment from that which exists beyond Himself, He
can also be displeased and pained with it, and then He would be an
imperfect being. To suppose pleasure experienced by Him from anything
outward, supposes an insufficient _prior_ enjoyment and happiness, and a
sort of dependency. Man's Good is beyond himself; not so God's. The
eternal act which produces the world's life is the eternal desire of
good. The object of the Absolute Thought is the Absolute Good. Nature is
all movement, and Thought all repose. In contemplating that absolute
good, the Finality can contemplate only itself; and thus, all material
interference being excluded, the distinction of subject and object
vanishes in complete identification, and the Divine Thought is "the
thinking of thought". The energy of mind is life, and God is that energy
in its purity and perfection. He is therefore life itself, eternal and
perfect; and this sums up all that is meant by the term "God". And yet,
after all this transcendentalism, the very essence of thought consists
in its mobility and power of transference from object to object; and we
can conceive of no thought, without an object beyond itself, about which
to think, or of any activity in mere self-contemplation, without outward
act, movement, or manifestation.

Plato endeavors to show how the Divine Principle of Good becomes
realized in Nature: Aristotle's system is a vast analogical induction to
prove how all Nature tends toward a final good. Plato considered Soul as
a principle of movement, and made his Deity realize, that is, turn into
realities, his ideas as a free, intelligent Force. Aristotle, for whom
Soul is the motionless centre from which motion radiates, and to which
it converges, conceives a correspondingly unmoved God. The Deity of
Plato creates, superintends, and rejoices in the universal joy of, His
creatures. That of Aristotle is the perfection of man's intellectual
activity extended to the Universe. When he makes the Deity to be an
eternal act of self-contemplation, the world is not excluded from His
cognizance, for He contemplates it within Himself. Apart from and beyond
the world, He yet mysteriously intermingles with it. He is universal as
well as individual; His agency is necessary and general, yet also makes
the real and the good of the particular.

When Plato had given to the unformed world the animal life of the
Ionians, and added to that the Anaxagorean Intelligence, overruling the
wild principle of Necessity; and when to Intelligence was added
Beneficence; and the dread Wardours, Force and Strength, were made
subordinate to Mildness and Goodness, it seemed as if a further advance
were impossible, and that the Deity could not be more than The Wise and
The Good.

But the contemplation of the Good implies that of its opposite, Evil.
When God is held to be "The Good," it is not because Evil is unknown,
but because it is designedly excluded from His attributes. But if Evil
be a separate and independent existence, how would it fare with His
prerogative of Unity and Supremacy? To meet this dilemma, it remained
only to fall back on something more or less akin to the vagueness of
antiquity; to make a virtual confession of ignorance, to deny the
ultimate reality of evil, like Plato and Aristotle, or, with Speusippus,
the eternity of its antithetical existence, to surmise that it is only
one of those notions which are indeed provisionally indispensable in a
condition of finite knowledge, but of which so many have been already
discredited by the advance of philosophy; to revert, in short, to the
original conception of "The Absolute," or of a single Being, in whom all
mysteries are explained, and before whom the disturbing principle is
reduced to a mere turbid spot on the ocean of Eternity, which to the eye
of faith may be said no longer to exist.

But the absolute is nearly allied to the non-existent. Matter and evil
obtruded themselves too constantly and convincingly to be confuted or
cancelled by subtleties of Logic. It is in vain to attempt to merge the
world in God, while the world of experience exhibits contrariety,
imperfection, and mutability, instead of the immutability of its source.
Philosophy was but another name for uncertainty; and after the mind had
successively deified Nature and its own conceptions, without any
practical result but toilsome occupation; when the reality it sought,
without or within, seemed ever to elude its grasp, the intellect,
baffled in its higher flights, sought advantage and repose in aiming at
truth of a lower but more applicable kind.

The Deity of Plato is a Being proportioned to human sympathies; the
Father of the World, as well as its Creator; the author of good only,
not of evil. "Envy," he says, "is far removed from celestial beings, and
man, if willing, and braced for the effort, is permitted to aspire to a
communion with the solemn troops and sweet societies of Heaven. God is
the Idea or Essence of Goodness, the Good itself [τό άγαθόν]: in
goodness, He created the World, and gave to it the greatest perfection
of which it was susceptible; making it, as far as possible, an image of
Himself. The sublime type of all excellence is an object not only of
veneration but love." The Sages of old had already intimated in enigmas
that God is the Author of Good; that like the Sun in Heaven, or
Æsculapius on earth, He is "Healer," "Saviour," and "Redeemer," the
destroyer and averter of Evil, ever healing the mischiefs inflicted by
Herè, the wanton or irrational power of nature.

Plato only asserts with more distinctness the dogma of antiquity when he
recognizes LOVE as the highest and most beneficent of gods, who gives to
nature the invigorating energy restored by the art of medicine to the
body; since Love is emphatically the physician of the Universe, the
Æsculapius to whom Socrates wished to sacrifice in the hour of his
death.

A figurative idea, adopted from familiar imagery, gave that endearing
aspect to the divine connection with the Universe which had commanded
the earliest assent of the sentiments, until, rising in refinement with
the progress of mental cultivation, it ultimately established itself as
firmly in the deliberate approbation of the understanding, as it had
ever responded to the sympathies. Even the rude Scythians, Bithynians,
and Scandinavians, called God their "Father"; all nations traced their
ancestry more or less directly to Heaven. The Hyperborean Olen, one of
the oldest symbols of the religious antiquity of Greece, made Love the
First-born of Nature. Who will venture to pronounce at what time God was
first worthily and truly honored, or when man first began to feel aright
the mute eloquence of nature? In the obscure physics of the mystical
Theologers who preceded Greek philosophy, Love was the Great First Cause
and Parent of the Universe. "Zeus," says Proclus, "when entering upon
the work of creation, changed Himself into the form of Love: and He
brought forward Aphrodite, the principle of Unity and Universal Harmony,
to display her light to all. In the depths of His mysterious being, He
contains the principle of love within Himself; in Him creative wisdom
and blessed love are united."

"From the first
Of Days on these his love divine be fixed,
His admiration; till in time complete
What he admired and loved, his vital smile
Unfolded into being."

The speculators of the venerable East, who had conceived the idea of an
Eternal Being superior to all affection and change, in his own
sufficiency enjoying a plenitude of serene and independent bliss, were
led to inquire into the apparently inconsistent fact of the creation of
the world. Why, they asked, did He, who required nothing external to
Himself to complete His already-existing Perfection, come forth out of
His unrevealed and perfect existence, and become incorporated in the
vicissitudes of nature? The solution of the difficulty was Love. The
Great Being beheld the beauty of His own conception, which dwelt with
Him alone from the beginning, Maia, or Nature's loveliness, at once the
germ of passion and the source of worlds. Love became the universal
parent, when the Deity, before remote and inscrutable, became ideally
separated into the loving and the beloved.

And here again recurs the ancient difficulty; that, at whatever early
period this creation occurred, an eternity had previously elapsed,
during which God, dwelling alone in His unimpeached unity, had no object
for His love; and that the very word implies to us an existing object
toward which the love is directed; so that we cannot conceive of love in
the absence of any object to be loved; and therefore we again return to
this point, that if love is of God's essence, and He is unchangeable,
the same necessity of His nature, supposed to have caused creation, must
ever have made His existence without an object to love impossible: and
so that the Universe must have been co-existent with Himself.

The questions how and why evil exists in the Universe: how its existence
is to be reconciled with the admitted wisdom and goodness and
omnipotence of God; and how far man is a free agent, or controlled by an
inexorable necessity or destiny, have two sides. On one, they are
questions as to the qualities and attributes of God; for we must infer
His moral nature from His mode of governing the Universe, and they ever
enter into any consideration of His intellectual nature: and on the
other, they directly concern the moral responsibility, and therefore the
destiny, of man. All-important, therefore, in both points of view, they
have been much discussed in all ages of the world, and have no doubt
urged men, more than all other questions have, to endeavor to fathom the
profound mysteries of the Nature and the mode of Existence and action of
an incomprehensible God.

And, with these, still another question also presents itself: whether
the Deity governs the Universe by fixed and unalterable laws, or by
special Providences and interferences, so that He may be induced to
change His course and the results of human or material action, by prayer
and supplication.

God alone is all-powerful; but the human soul has in all ages asserted
its claim to be considered as part of the Divine. "The purity of the
spirit," says Van Helmont, "is shown through energy and efficaciousness
of will. God, by the agency of an infinite will, created the Universe,
and the same sort of power in an inferior degree, limited more or less
by external hindrances, exists in all spiritual beings." The higher we
ascend in antiquity, the more does prayer take the form of incantation;
and that form it still in a great degree retains, since the rites of
public worship are generally considered not merely as an expression of
trust or reverence, as real spiritual acts, the effect of which is
looked for only within the mind of the worshipper, but as acts from
which some direct outward result is anticipated, the attainment of some
desired object, of health or wealth, of supernatural gifts for body or
soul, of exemption from danger, or vengeance upon enemies. Prayer was
able to change the purposes of Heaven, and to make the Devs tremble
under the abyss. It exercised a compulsory influence over the gods. It
promoted the magnetic sympathy of spirit with spirit; and the Hindū and
Persian liturgies, addressed not only to the Deity Himself, but to His
diversified manifestations, were considered wholesome and necessary
iterations of the living or creative Word which at first effectuated the
divine will, and which from instant to instant supports the universal
frame by its eternal repetition.

In the narrative of the Fall, we have the Hebrew mode of explaining the
great moral mystery, the origin of evil and the apparent estrangement
from Heaven; and a similar idea, variously modified, obtained in all the
ancient creeds. Everywhere, man had at the beginning been innocent and
happy, and had lapsed, by temptation and his own weakness, from his
first estate. Thus was accounted for the presumed connection of increase
of knowledge with increase of misery, and, in particular, the great
penalty of death was reconciled with Divine Justice. Subordinate to
these greater points were the questions, Why is the earth covered with
thorns and weeds? whence the origin of clothing, of sexual shame and
passion? whence the infliction of labor, and how to justify the degraded
condition of woman in the East, or account for the loathing so generally
felt toward the Serpent Tribe?

The hypothesis of a fall, required under some of its modifications in
all systems, to account for the apparent imperfection in the work of a
Perfect Being, was, in Eastern philosophy, the unavoidable accompaniment
and condition of limited or individual existence; since the Soul,
considered as a fragment of the Universal Mind, might be said to have
lapsed from its pre-eminence when parted from its source, and ceasing to
form part of integral perfection. The theory of its reunion was
correspondent to the assumed cause of its degradation. To reach its
prior condition, its individuality must cease; it must be emancipated
by re-absorption into the Infinite, the consummation of all things in
God, to be promoted by human effort in spiritual meditation or
self-mortification, and completed in the magical transformation of
death.

And as man had fallen, so it was held that the Angels of Evil had, from
their first estate, to which, like men, they were, in God's good time,
to be restored, and the reign of evil was then to cease forever. To this
great result all the Ancient-Theologies point; and thus they all
endeavored to reconcile the existence of Sin and Evil with the perfect
and undeniable wisdom and beneficence of God.

With man's exercise of thought are inseparably connected freedom and
responsibility. Man assumes his proper rank as a moral agent, when with
a sense of the limitations of his nature arise the consciousness of
freedom, and of the obligations accompanying its exercise, the sense of
duty and of the capacity to perform it. To suppose that man ever
imagined himself not to be a free agent until he had argued himself into
that belief, would be to suppose that he was in that below the brutes;
for he, like them, is _conscious_ of his freedom to act. Experience
alone teaches him that this freedom of action is limited and controlled;
and when what is outward to him restrains and limits this freedom of
action, he instinctively rebels against it as a wrong. The rule cf duty
and the materials of experience are derived from an acquaintance with
the conditions of the external world, in which the faculties are
exerted; and thus the problem of man involves those of Nature and God.
Our freedom, we learn by experience, is determined by an agency external
to us; our happiness is intimately dependent on the relations of the
outward World, and on the moral character of its Ruler.

Then at once arises this problem: The God of Nature must be One, and His
character cannot be suspected to be other than good. Whence, then, came
the evil, the consciousness of which must invariably have preceded or
accompanied man's moral development? On this subject human opinion has
ebbed and flowed between two contradictory extremes, one of which seems
inconsistent with God's Omnipotence, and the other with His beneficence.
If God, it was said, is perfectly wise and good, evil must arise from
some _independent_ and _hostile_ principle: if, on, the other hand, all
agencies are subordinate to One, it is difficult, if evil does indeed
exist, if there is any such thing as Evil, to avoid the impiety of
making God the Author of it.

The recognition of a moral and physical dualism in nature was adverse to
the doctrine of Divine Unity. Many of the Ancients thought it absurd to
imagine one Supreme Being, like Homer's Jove, distributing good and evil
out of two urns. They therefore substituted, as we have seen, the
doctrine of two distinct and eternal principles; some making the cause
of evil to be the inherent imperfection of matter and the flesh, without
explaining how God was not the cause of that; while others personified
the required agency, and fancifully invented an Evil Principle, the
question of whose origin indeed involved all the difficulty of the
original problem, but whose existence, if once taken for granted, was
sufficient as a popular solution of the mystery; the difficulty being
supposed no longer to exist when pushed a step further off, as the
difficulty of conceiving the world upheld by an elephant was supposed to
be got rid of when it was said that the elephant was supported by a
tortoise.

The simpler, and probably the older, notion, treated the one only God as
the Author of all things. "I form the light," says Jehovah, "and create
darkness; I cause prosperity and create evil; I, the Lord, do all these
things." "All mankind," says Maximus Tyrius, "are agreed that there
exists one only Universal King and Father, and that the many gods are
His Children." There is nothing improbable in the supposition that the
primitive idea was that there was but one God. A vague sense of Nature's
Unity, blended with a dim perception of an all-pervading Spiritual
Essence, has been remarked among the earliest manifestations of the
Human Mind. Everywhere it was the dim remembrance, uncertain and
indefinite, of the original truth taught by God to the first men.

The Deity of the Old Testament is everywhere represented as the direct
author of Evil, commissioning evil and lying spirits to men, hardening
the heart of Pharaoh, and visiting the iniquity of the individual sinner
on the whole people. The rude conception of sternness predominating over
mercy in the Deity, can alone account for the human sacrifices,
purposed, if not executed, by Abraham and Jephthah. It has not been
uncommon, in any age or country of the world, for men to recognize the
existence of one God, without forming any becoming estimate of His
dignity. The causes of both good and ill are referred to a mysterious
centre, to which each assigns such attributes as correspond with his own
intellect and advance in civilization. Hence the assignment to the Deity
of the feelings of envy and jealousy. Hence the provocation given by the
healing skill of Æsculapius and the humane theft of fire by Prometheus.
The very spirit of Nature, personified in Orpheus, Tantalus, or Phineus
was supposed to have been killed, confined, or blinded, for having too
freely divulged the Divine Mysteries to mankind. This Divine Envy still
exists in a modified form, and varies according to circumstances. In
Hesiod it appears in the lowest type of human malignity. In the God of
Moses, it is jealousy of the infringement of the autocratic power, the
check to political treason; and even the penalties denounced for
worshipping other gods often seem dictated rather by a jealous regard
for His own greatness in Deity, than by the immorality and degraded
nature of the worship itself. In Herodotus and other writers it assumes
a more philosophical shape, as a strict adherence to a moral equilibrium
in the government of the world, in the punishment of pride, arrogance,
and insolent pretension.

God acts providentially in Nature by regular and universal laws, by
constant modes of operation; and so takes care of material things
without violating their constitution, acting always according to the
nature of the things which He has made. It is a fact of observation
that, in the material and unconscious world, He works _by_ its
materiality and unconsciousness, not against them; in the animal world,
_by_ its animality and partial consciousness, not against them. So in
the providential government of the world, He acts by regular and
universal laws, and constant modes of operation; and so takes care of
human things without violating their constitution, acting always
according to the human nature of man, not against if, working in the
human world by means of man's consciousness and partial freedom, not
against them.

God acts by general laws for general purposes. The attraction of
gravitation is a good thing, for it keeps the world together; and if the
tower of Siloam, thereby falling to the ground, slays eighteen men of
Jerusalem, that number is too small to think of, considering the myriad
millions who are upheld by the same law. It could not well be repealed
for _their_ sake, and to hold up that tower; nor could it remain in
force, and the tower stand.

It is difficult to conceive of a Perfect _Will_ without confounding it
with something like mechanism; since language has no name for that
combination of the Inexorable with the Moral, which the old poets
personified separately in Ananke or Eimarmene and Zeus. How combine
understandingly the Perfect Freedom of the Supreme and All-Sovereign
Will of God with the inflexible necessity, as part of His Essence, that
He should and must continue to be, in all His great attributes, of
justice and mercy for example, what He is now and always has been, and
with the impossibility of His changing His nature and becoming unjust,
merciless, cruel, fickle, or of His repealing the great moral laws which
make crime wrong and the practice of virtue right?

For all that we familiarly know of Free-Will is that capricious exercise
of it which we experience in ourselves and other men; and therefore the
notion of Supreme Will, still guided by Infallible Law, even if that law
be self-imposed, is always in danger of being either stripped of the
essential quality of Freedom, or degraded under the ill-name of
Necessity to something of even less moral and intellectual dignity than
the fluctuating course of human operations.

It is not until we elevate the idea of law above that of partiality or
tyranny, that we discover that the self-imposed limitations of the
Supreme Cause, constituting an array of certain alternatives, regulating
moral choice, are the very sources and safeguards of human freedom; and
the doubt recurs, whether we do not set a law above God Himself; or
whether laws self-imposed may not be self-repealed: and if not, what
power prevents it.

The Zeus of Homer, like that of Hesiod, is an array of antitheses,
combining strength with weakness, wisdom with folly, universal parentage
with narrow family limitation, omnipotent control over events with
submission to a superior destiny;--DESTINY, a name by means of which the
theological problem was cast back into the original obscurity out of
which the powers of the human mind have proved themselves as incapable
of rescuing it, as the efforts of a fly caught in a spider's web to do
more than increase its entanglement.

The oldest notion of Deity was rather indefinite than repulsive. The
positive degradation was of later growth. The God of nature reflects the
changeful character of the seasons, varying from dark to bright.
Alternately angry and serene, and lavishing abundance which she again
withdraws, nature seems inexplicably capricious, and though capable of
responding to the highest requirements of the moral sentiment through a
general comprehension of her mysteries, more liable, by a partial or
hasty view to become darkened into a Siva, a Saturn, or a Mexitli, a
patron of fierce orgies or blood-stained altars. All the older poetical
personifications exhibit traces of this ambiguity. They are neither
wholly immoral nor purely beneficent.

No people have ever deliberately made their Deity a malevolent or guilty
Being. The simple piety which ascribed the origin of all things to God,
took all in good part, trusting and hoping all things. The Supreme Ruler
was at first looked up to with unquestioning reverence. No startling
discords or contradictions had yet raised a doubt as to His beneficence,
or made men dissatisfied with His government. Fear might cause anxiety,
but could not banish hope, still less inspire aversion. It was only
later, when abstract notions began to assume the semblance of realities,
and when new or more distinct ideas suggested new words for their
expression, that it became necessary to fix a definite barrier between
Evil and Good.

To account for moral evil, it became necessary to devise some new
expedient suited both to the piety and self-complacency of the inventor,
such as the perversity of woman, or an agent distinct from God, a Typhon
or Ahriman, obtained either by dividing the Gods into two classes, or by
dethroning the Ancient Divinity, and changing him into a Dev or Dæmon.
Through a similar want, the Orientals devised the inherent corruption of
the fleshy and material; the Hebrew transferred to Satan everything
illegal and immoral; and the Greek reflection, occasionally adopting the
older and truer view, retorted upon man the obloquy cast on these
creatures of his imagination, and showed how he has to thank himself
alone for his calamities, while his good things are the voluntary
_gifts_, not the _plunder_ of Heaven. Homer had already made Zeus
exclaim, in the Assembly of Olympus, "Grievous it is to hear these
mortals accuse the Gods; they pretend that evils come from us; but they
themselves occasion them gratuitously by their own wanton folly." "It is
the fault of man," said Solon, in reference to the social evils of his
day, "not of God, that destruction comes;" and Euripides, after a formal
discussion of the origin of evil, comes to the conclusion that men act
wrongly, not from want of natural good sense and feeling, but because
knowing what is good, they yet for various reasons neglect to practise
it.

And at last reaching the highest truth, Pindar, Hesiod, Æschylus, Æsop,
and Horace said, "All virtue is a struggle; life is not a scene of
repose, but of energetic action. Suffering is but another name for the
teaching of experience, appointed by Zeus himself, the giver of all
understanding, to be the parent of instruction, the schoolmaster of
life. He indeed put an end to the golden age; he gave venom to serpents
and predacity to wolves; he shook the honey from the leaf, and stopped
the flow of wine in the rivulets; he concealed the element of fire, and
made the means of life scanty and precarious. But in all this his object
was beneficent; it was not to destroy life, but to improve it. It was a
blessing to man, not a curse, to be sentenced to earn his bread by the
sweat of his brow; for nothing great or excellent is attainable without
exertion; safe and easy virtues are prized neither by gods nor men; and
the parsimoniousness of nature is justified by its powerful effect in
rousing the dormant faculties, and forcing on mankind the invention of
useful arts by means of meditation and thought."

Ancient religious reformers pronounced the worship of "idols" to be the
root of all evil; and there have been many iconoclasts in different ages
of the world. The maxim still holds good; for the worship of idols, that
is, of fanciful conceits, if not the source of _all_ evil, is still the
cause of much; and it prevails as extensively now as it ever did. Men
are ever engaged in worshipping the picturesque fancies of their own
imaginations.

Human wisdom must always be limited and incorrect; and even right
opinion is only a something intermediate between ignorance and
knowledge. The normal condition of man is that of progress. Philosophy
is a kind of journey, ever learning, yet never arriving at the ideal
perfection of truth. A Mason should, like the wise Socrates, assume the
modest title of a "lover of wisdom"; for he must ever long after
something more excellent than he possesses, something still beyond his
reach, which he desires to make eternally his own.

Thus the philosophic sentiment came to be associated with the poetical
and the religious, under the comprehensive name of Love. Before the
birth of Philosophy, Love had received but scanty and inadequate homage.
This mightiest and most ancient of gods, coeval with the existence of
religion and of the world, had been indeed unconsciously felt, but had
neither been worthily honored nor directly celebrated in hymn or pæan.
In the old days of ignorance it could scarcely have been recognized. In
order that it might exercise its proper influence over religion and
philosophy, it was necessary that the God of Nature should cease to be a
God of terrors, a personification of mere Power or arbitrary Will, a
pure and stern Intelligence, an inflictor of evil, and an unrelenting
Judge. The philosophy of Plato, in which this charge became forever
established, was emphatically a mediation of Love. With him, the
inspiration of Love first kindled the light of arts and imparted them to
mankind; and not only the arts of mere existence, but the heavenly art
of wisdom, which supports the Universe. It inspires high and generous
deeds and noble self-devotion. Without it, neither State nor individual
could do anything beautiful or great. Love is our best pilot,
confederate, supporter, and saviour; the ornament and governor of all
things human and divine; and he with divine harmony forever soothes the
minds of men and gods.

Man is capable of a higher Love, which, marrying mind with mind and with
the Universe, brings forth all that is noblest in his faculties, and
lifts him beyond himself. This higher love is neither mortal nor
immortal, but a power intermediate between the human and the Divine,
filling up the mighty interval, and binding the Universe together. He is
chief of those celestial emissaries who carry to the gods the prayers of
men, and bring down to men the gifts of the gods. "He is forever poor,
and far from being beautiful as mankind imagine, for he is squalid and
withered; he flies low along the ground, is homeless and unsandalled;
sleeping without covering before the doors and in the unsheltered
streets, and possessing so far his mother's nature as being ever the
companion of want. Yet, sharing also that of his father, he is forever
scheming to obtain things good and beautiful; he is fearless, vehement,
and strong; always devising some new contrivance; strictly cautious and
full of inventive resource; a philosopher through his whole existence, a
powerful enchanter, and a subtle sophist."

The ideal consummation of Platonic science is the arrival at the
contemplation of that of which earth exhibits no express image or
adequate similitude, the Supreme Prototype of all beauty, pure and
uncontaminated with human intermixture of flesh or color, the Divine
Original itself. To one so qualified is given the prerogative of
bringing forth not mere images and shadows of virtue, but virtue itself,
as having been conversant not with shadows, but with the truth; and
having so brought forth and nurtured a progeny of virtue, he becomes the
friend of God, and, so far as such a privilege can belong to any human
being, immortal.

Socrates believed, like Heraclitus, in a Universal Reason pervading all
things and all minds, and consequently revealing itself in ideas. He
therefore sought truth in general opinion, and perceived in the
communication of mind with mind one of the greatest prerogatives of
wisdom and the most powerful means of advancement. He believed true
wisdom to be an attainable idea, and that the moral convictions of the
mind, those eternal instincts of temperance, conscientiousness, and
justice, implanted in it by the gods, could not deceive, if rightly
interpreted.

This metaphysical direction given to philosophy ended in visionary
extravagance. Having assumed truth to be discoverable in thought, it
proceeded to treat thoughts as truths. It thus became an idolatry of
notions, which it considered either as phantoms exhaled from objects, or
as portions of the divine pre-existent thought; thus creating a
mythology of its own, and escaping from one thraldom only to enslave
itself afresh. Theories and notions indiscriminately formed and defended
are the false gods or "idols" of philosophy. For the word _idolon_ means
_image_, and a false _mind_-picture of God is as much an idol as a false
_wooden_ image of Him. Fearlessly launching into the problem of
universal being, the first philosophy attempted to supply a compendious
and decisive solution of every doubt. To do this, it was obliged to make
the most sweeping assumptions; and as poetry had already filled the vast
void between the human and the divine, by personifying its Deity as man,
so philosophy bowed down before the supposed reflection of the divine
image in the mind of the inquirer, who, in worshipping his own notions,
had unconsciously deified himself. Nature thus was enslaved to common
notions, and notions very often to words.

By the clashing of incompatible opinions, philosophy was gradually
reduced to the ignominious confession of utter incapacity, and found its
check or intellectual fall in skepticism. Xenophanes and Heraclitus
mournfully acknowledged the unsatisfactory result of all the struggles
of philosophy, in the admission of a universality of doubt; and the
memorable effort of Socrates to rally the discomfited champions of
truth, ended in a similar confession.

The worship of abstractions continued the error which personified Evil
or deified Fortune; and when mystical philosophy resigned its place to
mystical religion, it changed not its nature, but only its name. The
great task remained unperformed, of reducing the outward world and its
principles to the dominion of the intellect, and of reconciling the
conception of the supreme unalterable power asserted by reason, with the
requisitions of human sympathies.

A general idea of purpose and regularity in nature had been suggested by
common appearances to the earliest reflection. The ancients perceived a
natural order, a divine legislation, from which human institutions were
supposed to be derived, laws emblazoned in Heaven, and thence revealed
to earth. But the divine law was little more than an analogical
inference from human law, taken in the vulgar sense of arbitrary will or
partial covenant. It was surmised rather than discovered, and remained
unmoral because unintelligible. It mattered little, under the
circumstances, whether the Universe were said to be governed by chance
or by reason, since the latter, if misunderstood, was virtually one with
the former. "Better far," said Epicurus, "acquiesce in the fables of
tradition, than acknowledge the oppressive necessity of the physicists";
and Menander speaks of God, Chance, and Intelligence as
undistinguishable. Law unacknowledged goes under the name of _Chance_:
perceived, but not understood, it becomes _Necessity_. The wisdom of the
Stoic was a dogged submission to the arbitrary behests of one; that of
the Epicurean an advantage snatched by more or less dexterous management
from the equal tyranny of the other.

Ignorance sees nothing necessary, and is self abandoned to a power
tyrannical because defined by no rule, and paradoxical because
permitting evil, while itself assumed to be unlimited, all-powerful, and
perfectly good. A little knowledge, presuming the identification of the
Supreme Cause with the inevitable certainty of perfect reason, but
omitting the analysis or interpretation of it, leaves the mind
chain-bound in the ascetic fatalism of the Stoic. Free-will, coupled
with the universal rule of Chance; or Fatalism and Necessity, coupled
with Omniscience and fixed and unalterable Law,--these are the
alternatives, between which the human mind has eternally vacillated.
The Supernaturalists, contemplating a Being acting through impulse,
though with superhuman wisdom, and considering the best courtier to be
the most favored subject, combines contradictory expedients,
inconsistently mixing the assertion of free action with the enervating
service of petition; while he admits, in the words of a learned
archbishop, that "if the production of the things we ask for depend on
antecedent, natural, and necessary causes, our desires will be answered
no less by the omission than the offering of prayers, which, therefore,
are a vain thing."

The last stage is that in which the religion of action is made
legitimate through comprehension of its proper objects and conditions.
Man becomes morally free only when both notions, that of Chance and that
of incomprehensible Necessity, are displaced by that of Law. Law, as
applied to the Universe, means that universal, providential
pre-arrangement, whose conditions can be discerned and discretionally
acted on by human intelligence. The sense of freedom arises when the
individual independence develops itself according to its own laws,
without external collisions or hindrance; that of constraint, where it
is thwarted or confined by other Natures, or where, by combination of
external forces, the individual force is compelled into a new direction.
Moral choice would not exist safely, or even at all, unless it were
bounded by conditions determining its preferences. Duty supposes a rule
both intelligible and certain, since an uncertain rule would be
unintelligible, and if unintelligible, there could be no responsibility.
No law that is unknown can be obligatory; and that Roman Emperor was
justly execrated, who pretended to promulgate his penal laws, by putting
them up at such a height that none could read them.

Man commands results, only by selecting among the contingent the
pre-ordained results most suited to his purposes. In regard to absolute
or divine morality, meaning the final cause or purpose of those
comprehensive laws which often seem harsh to the individual, because
inflexibly just and impartial to the universal, speculation must take
refuge in faith; the immediate and obvious purpose often bearing so
small a proportion to a wider and unknown one as to be relatively
absorbed or lost. The rain that, unseasonable to me, ruins my hopes of
an abundant crop, does so because it could not otherwise have blessed
and prospered the crops of another kind of a whole neighboring district
of country. The obvious purpose of a sudden storm of snow, or an
unexpected change of wind, exposed to which I lose my life, bears small
proportion to the great results which are to flow from that storm or
wind over a whole continent. So always, of the good and ill which at
first seemed irreconcilable and capriciously distributed, the one holds
its ground, the other diminishes by being explained. In a world of a
multitude of individuals, a world of action and exertion, a world
affording, by the conflict of interests and the clashing of passions,
any scope for the exercise of the manly and generous virtues, even
Omnipotence cannot make it, that the comfort and convenience of one man
alone shall always be consulted.

Thus the educated mind soon begins to appreciate the moral superiority
of a system of law over one of capricious interference; and as the
jumble of means and ends is brought into more intelligible perspective,
partial or seeming good is cheerfully resigned for the disinterested and
universal. Self-restraint is found not to imply self-sacrifice. The true
meaning of what appeared to be Necessity is found to be, not arbitrary
Power, but Strength and Force enlisted in the service of Intelligence.
God having made us men, and placed us in a world of change and eternal
renovation, with ample capacity and abundant means for rational
enjoyment, we learn that it is folly to repine because we are not
angels, inhabiting a world in which change and the clashing of interests
and the conflicts of passion are unknown.

The mystery of the world remains, but is sufficiently cleared up to
inspire confidence. We are constrained to admit that if every man would
but do the best in his power to do, and that which he knows he ought to
do, we should need no better world than this. Man, surrounded by
necessity, is free, not in a dogged determination of isolated will,
because, though inevitably complying with nature's laws, he is able,
proportionately to his knowledge, to modify, in regard to himself, the
conditions of their action, and so to preserve an average uniformity
between their forces and his own.

Such are some of the conflicting opinions of antiquity; and we have to
some extent presented to you a picture of the Ancient Thought. Faithful,
as far as it goes, it exhibits to us Man's Intellect ever struggling to
pass beyond the narrow bounds of the circle in which its limited powers
and its short vision confine it; and ever we find it travelling round
the circle, like one lost in a wood, to meet the same unavoidable and
insoluble difficulties. Science with her many instruments, Astronomy,
particularly, with her telescope, Physics with the microscope, and
Chemistry with its analyses and combinations, have greatly enlarged our
ideas of the Deity, by discovering to us the vast extent of the Universe
in both directions, its star-systems and its invisible swarms of
minutest animal life; by acquainting us with the new and wonderful Force
or Substance we call Electricity, apparently a link between Matter and
Spirit: and still the Deity only becomes more incomprehensible to us
than ever, and we find that in our speculations we but reproduce over
and over again the Ancient Thought.

Where, then, amid all these conflicting opinions, is the True Word of a
Mason?

My Brother, most of the questions which have thus tortured men's minds,
it is not within the reach and grasp of the Human Intellect to
understand; but without understanding, as we have explained to you
heretofore, we may and must _believe_.

The True Word of a Mason is to be found in the concealed and profound
meaning of the Ineffable Name of Deity, communicated by God to Moses;
and which meaning was long lost by the very precautions taken to conceal
it. The true pronunciation of that name was in truth a secret, in which,
however, was involved the far more profound secret of its meaning. In
that meaning is included all the truth than can be known by us, in
regard to the nature of God.

Long known as AL, AL SCHADAI, ALOHAYIM, and ADONAI; as the Chief or
Commander of the Heavenly Armies; as the aggregate of the Forces
[ALOHAYIM] of Nature; as the Mighty, the Victorious, the Rival of Bal
and Osiris; as the Soul of Nature, Nature itself, a God that was but Man
personified, a God with human passions, the God of the Heathen with but
a mere change of name, He assumes, in His communications to Moses, the
name יהוה [IHUH], and says to Him, אהיה אשר אהיה [AHIH ASHR AHIH], I AM
WHAT I AM. Let us examine the esoteric or inner meaning of this
Ineffable Name.

היה [HIH] is the imperfect tense of the verb To BE, of which יהיה [HIHI]
is the present; אהי [AHI--א being the personal pronoun "I" affixed] the
first person, by apocope; and יהי [IHI] the third. The verb has the
following forms: ... Preterite, 3d person, masculine singular, היה
[HIH], did exist, was; 3d person com. plural, היו [HIU] ... Present, 3d
pers. masc. sing. יהיה [IHIH], once יהוא [IHUA], by apocope יהי,אהי
[AHI, IHI].. Infinitive, היה, היו [HIH, HIU] ... Imperative, 2d pers.
masc. sing., היה [HIH], fem. הוי [HUI] ... Participle, masc. sing., הוה
[HUH], ENS--EXISTING .. EXISTENCE.

The verb is never used, as the mere logical copula or connecting word,
_is, was_, etc., is used with the Greeks, Latins, and ourselves. It
always implies _existence, actuality_. The _present_ form also includes
the _future_ sense,... _shall_ or _may_ be or exist. And הוה and הוא [HUH
and HUA] Chaldaic forms of the imperfect tense of the verb, are the same
as the Hebrew היה and הוה [HUH and HIH], and mean _was, existed,
became_.

Now הוא and היא [HUA and HIA] are the Personal Pronoun [Masculine and
Feminine], HE, SHE. Thus in Gen. iv. 20 we have the phrase, הוא היה [HUA
HIH], HE WAS: and in Lev. xxi. 9, אה אביה היא [ATH ABIH HIA], HER
Father. This feminine pronoun, however, is often written הוא [HUA], and
היא [HiA] occurs only eleven times in the Pentateuch. Sometimes the
feminine form means IT; but _that_ pronoun is generally in the masculine
form.

When either ה,ו,י, or א [Yod, Vav, He, or Aleph] terminates a word, and
has no vowel either immediately preceding or following it, it is often
rejected; as in ני [GI], for ניא [GIA], a valley.

So הוא-היא [HUA-HIA], He-She, could properly be written הו-הי [Hu-HI];
or by transposition of the letters, common with the Talmudists, יה-וה
[IH-UH], which is the Tetragrammaton or Ineffable Name.

In Gen. i. 27, it is said, "So the ALHIM created man in His image: _in
the image_ of ALHIM created He him: MALE and FEMALE created He them."

Sometimes the word was thus expressed; triangularly:

ה ו ה ה י ה י ה ו ה

And we learn that this designation of the Ineffable Name was, among the
Hebrews, a symbol of Creation. The mysterious union _of God with His
creatures_ was in the letter ה, which they considered to be the Agent of
Almighty Power; and to enable the possessor of the Name to work
miracles.

The Personal Pronoun הוא [HuA], HE, is often used _by itself_, to
express the Deity, Lee says that in such cases, IHUH, IH, or ALHIM, or
some other name of God, is _understood_; but there is no necessity for
that. It means in such cases the Male, Generative, or Creative Principle
or Power.

It was a common practice with the Talmudists to conceal secret meanings
and sounds of words by transposing the letters.

The reversal of the letters of words was, indeed, anciently common
everywhere. Thus from _Neitha_, the name of an Egyptian Goddess, the
Greeks, writing backward, formed _Athenè_, the name of Minerva. In
Arabic we have _Nahid_, a name of the planet Venus, which, reversed,
gives _Dihan_, Greek, in Persian, _Nihad_, Nature; which Sir William
Jones writes also Nahid. Strabo informs us that the Armenian name of
Venus was _Anaitis_.

_Tien_, Heaven, in Chinese, reversed, is _Neit_, or _Neith_, worshipped
at _Sais_ in Egypt. Reverse Neitha, drop the _i_, and add an _e_, and
we, as before said, _Athenè. Mitra_ was the name of Venus among the
ancient Persians. Herodotus, who tells us this, also informs us that her
name, among the Scythians, was _Artim pasa. Artim_ is _Mitra_, reversed.
So, by reversing it, the Greeks formed Artemis, Diana.

One of the meanings of _Rama_, in Sanscrit, is _Kama_, the Deity of
_Love_. Reverse this, and we have _Amar_, and by changing _a_ into _o,
Amor_, the Latin word for _Love_. Probably, as the verb is _Amare_, the
oldest reading was _Amar_ and not _Amor_. So _Dipaka_, in Sanscrit, one
of the meanings whereof is _love_, is often written _Dipuc_. Reverse
this, and we have, adding _o_, the Latin word _Cupido_.

In Arabic, the radical letters _rhm_, pronounced _rahm_, signify the
_trunk, compassion, mercy_; this reversed, we have _mhr_, in Persic,
_love_ and the _Sun_. In Hebrew we have _Lab_, the _heart_; and in
Chaldee, _Bal_, the _heart_; the radical letters of both being _b_ and
_l_.

The Persic word for _head_ is _Sar_. Reversed, this becomes _Ras_ in
Arabic and Hebrew, Raish in Chaldee, Rash in Samaritan, and Ryas in
Ethiopic; all meaning _head, chief_, etc. In Arabic we have _Kid_, in
the sense of _rule_, regulation, article of agreement, obligation;
which, reversed, becomes, adding _e_, the Greek _dikè_ justice. In
Coptic we have _Chlom_, a crown. Reversed, we have in Hebrew, _Moloch_
or _Malec_, a King, or he who wears a crown.

In the Kou-onen, or oldest Chinese writing, by Hieroglyphics, [Glyph]
_Ge_ [_Hi_ or _Khi_, with the initial letter modified], was the Sun: in
Persic. _Gaw:_ and in Turkish _Giun. Yue_, was the Moon; in
Sanscrit _Uh_, and in Turkish _Ai_. It will be remembered that, in Egypt
and elsewhere, the Sun was originally feminine, and the Moon masculine.
In Egypt, _Ioh_ was the moon; and in the feasts of Bacchus they cried
incessantly, _Euoï Sabvi! Euoï Bakhè! Io Bakhe! lo Bakhe!_

Bunsen gives the following personal pronouns for _he_ and _she_;

_He She_

Christian Aramtic Hû Hî

Jewish Aramaic Hû Hî

Hebrew Hû᾿ Hî᾿

Arabic Huwa Hiya

Thus the Ineffable Name not only embodies the Great Philosophical Idea,
that the Deity is the ENS, the TO ON, the Absolute Existence, that of
which the Essence is To Exist, the only Substance of Spinoza, the BEING,
that never could _not_ have existed, as contradistinguished from that
which only _becomes_, not Nature or the Soul of Nature, but that which
created Nature; but also the idea of the Male and Female Principles, in
its highest and most profound sense; to wit, that God originally
comprehended in Himself all that is: that matter was not co-existent
with Him, or independent of Him; that He did not merely fashion and
shape a pre-existing chaos into a Universe; but that His Thought
manifested itself outwardly in that Universe, which so _became_, and
before _was not_, except as comprehended in Him: that the Generative
Power or Spirit, and Productive Matter, ever among the ancients deemed
the Female, originally were in God; and that He Was and Is all that Was,
that Is, and that Shall be: _in_ Whom all else lives, moves, and has its
being.

This was the great Mystery of the Ineffable Name; and this true
arrangement of its letters, and of course its true pronunciation and its
meaning, soon became lost to all except the select few to whom it was
confided; it being concealed from the common people, because the Deity
thus metaphysically named was not that personal and capricious, and as
it were tangible God in whom they believed, and who alone was within the
reach of their rude capacities.

Diodorus says that the name given by Moses to God was ΙΑΩ. Theodoras
says that the Samaritans termed God _IABE_, but the Jews ΙΑΩ. Philo
Byblius gives the form ΙΕΥΩ; and Clemens of Alexandria ΙΑΟΥ. Macrobius
says that it was an admitted axiom among the Heathen, that the
triliteral ΙΑΩ was the sacred name of the Supreme God. And the Clarian
oracle said: "Learn thou that ΙΑΩ is the great God Supreme, that ruleth
over all." The letter Ι signified Unity. Α and Ω are the first and last
letters of the Greek Alphabet.

Hence the frequent expression: "I am the First, and I am the Last; and
besides Me there is no other God. I am A and Ω, the First and the Last.
I am A and Ω, the Beginning and the Ending, which Is, and Was, and Is to
come: the Omnipotent." For in this we see shadowed forth the same great
truth; that God is all in all--the Cause and the Effect--the beginning,
or Impulse, or Generative Power: and the Ending, or Result, or that
which is produced: that He is in reality all that is, all that ever was,
and all that ever will be; in this sense, that nothing besides Himself
has existed eternally, and co-eternally with Him, independent of Him,
and self-existent, or self-originated.

And thus the meaning of the expression, ALOHAYIM, a _plural_ noun, used,
in the account of the Creation with which Genesis commences, with a
singular verb, and of the name or title IHUH-ALHIM, used for the first
time in the 4th verse of the 2d chapter of the same book, becomes clear.
The ALHIM is the aggregate unity of the manifested Creative Forces or
Powers of Deity, His Emanations; and IHUH-ALHIM is the ABSOLUTE
Existence, or Essence of these Powers and Forces, of which they are
Active Manifestations and Emanations.

This was the profound truth hidden in the ancient allegory and covered
from the general view with a double veil. This was the esoteric meaning
of the generation and production of the Indian, Chaldean, and Phœnician
cosmogonies; and the Active and Passive Powers, of the Male and Female
Principles; of Heaven and its Luminaries generating, and the Earth
producing; all hiding from vulgar view, as above its comprehension, the
doctrine that matter is not eternal, but that God was the only original
Existence, the ABSOLUTE, from Whom everything has proceeded, and to Whom
all returns: and that all moral law springs not from the relation of
things, but from His Wisdom and Essential Justice, as the Omnipotent
Legislator. And this TRUE WORD is with entire accuracy said to have been
_lost_; because its _meaning_ was lost, even among the Hebrews, although
we still find the name (its real meaning unsuspected), in the Hu of the
Druids and the Fo-Hi of the Chinese.

When we conceive of the Absolute Truth, Beauty, or Good, we cannot stop
short at the abstraction of either. We are forced to refer each to some
living and substantial Being, in which they have their foundations, some
being that is the first and last principle of each.

Moral Truth, like every other universal and necessary truth, cannot
remain a mere abstraction. Abstractions are unrealities. In ourselves,
moral truth is merely conceived of. There must be _somewhere_ a Being
that not only _conceives_ of, but _constitutes_ it. It has this
characteristic; that it is not only, to the eyes of our intelligence, an
universal and necessary truth, but one obligatory on our will. It is A
LAW. _We_ do not establish that law _ourselves_. It is imposed on us
_despite_ ourselves: its principle must be _without_ us. It supposes a
legislator. He cannot be the being to whom the law applies; but must be
one that possesses in the highest degree all the characteristics of
moral truth. The moral law, universal and necessary, necessarily has as
its author a necessary being--composed of justice and charity, its
author must be a being possessing the plenitude of both.

As all _beautiful_ and all _true_ things refer themselves, _these_ to a
Unity which is absolute TRUTH, and those to a Unity which is absolute
BEAUTY, so all the _moral_ principles centre in a single principle,
which is THE GOOD. Thus we arrive at the conception of THE GOOD _in
itself_, the ABSOLUTE Good, superior to all _particular_ duties, and
determinate in those duties. This Absolute _Good_ must necessarily be an
attribute of the Absolute BEING. There cannot be _several_ Absolute
Beings; the one in whom are realized Absolute Truth and Absolute Beauty
being different from the one in whom is realized Absolute Good. The
Absolute necessarily implies absolute Unity. The True, the Beautiful,
and the Good are not three distinct essences: but they are one and the
same essence, considered in its fundamental attributes: the different
phases which, in our eyes, the Absolute and Infinite Perfection assumes.
Manifested in the World of the Finite and Relative, these three
attributes separate from each other, and are distinguished by our minds,
which can comprehend nothing except by division. But in the Being from
Whom they emanate, they are indivisibly united; and this Being, at once
triple and one, Who sums up in Himself perfect _Beauty_, perfect
_Truth_, and the perfect _Good_, is GOD.

God is necessarily the principle of Moral Truth, and of personal
morality. Man is a moral person, that is to say, one endowed with reason
and liberty. He is capable of Virtue: and Virtue has with him two
principal forms, respect for others and love of others,--_justice_ and
_charity_.

The _creature_ can possess no real and essential attribute which the
_Creator_ does not possess. The _effect_ can draw its reality and
existence only from its _cause_. The _cause_ contains in itself, at
least, what is essential in the _effect_. The characteristic of the
effect is inferiority, short-coming, imperfection. Dependent and
derivate, it bears in itself the marks and conditions of dependence; and
its imperfection proves the perfection of the cause; or else there would
be in the effect something immanent, without a cause.

God is not a logical Being, whose Nature may be explained by deduction,
and by means of algebraic equations. When, setting out with a primary
attribute, the attributes of God are deduced one from the other, after
the manner of the Geometricians and Scholastics, we have nothing but
abstractions. We must emerge from this empty dialetic, to arrive at a
true and living God. The first notion which we have of God, that of an
_Infinite_ Being, is not given us _à priori_, independently of all
experience. It is our consciousness of ourself, as at once a Being and a
limited Being, that immediately raises us to the conception of a Being,
the principle of _our_ being, and Himself without limits. If the
existence that we possess forces us to recur to a cause possessing the
same existence in an infinite degree, all the substantial attributes of
existence that we possess equally require each an infinite cause. God,
then, is no longer the Infinite, Abstract, Indeterminate Being, of which
reason and the heart cannot lay hold, but a real Being, determinate like
ourselves, a moral person like ourself; and the study of our own souls
will conduct us, without resort to hypothesis, to a conception of God,
both sublime and having a connection with ourselves.

If man be free, God must be so. It would be strange if, while the
creature has that marvellous power of disposing of himself, of choosing
and willing freely, the Being that has made him should be subject to a
necessary development, the cause of which, though in Himself, is a sort
of abstract, mechanical, or metaphysical power, inferior to the
personal, voluntary cause which we are, and of which we have the
clearest consciousness. God is free _because_ we are: but he is not free
as we are. He is at once _everything_ that we are, and _nothing_ that we
are. He possesses the same attributes as we, but extended to infinity.
He possesses, then, an infinite liberty, united to an infinite
intelligence; and as His intelligence is infallible, exempt from the
uncertainty of deliberation, and perceiving at a glance where the Good
is, so His liberty accomplishes it spontaneously and without effort.

As we assign to God that liberty which is the basis of our existence, so
also we transfer to His character, from our own, justice and charity. In
man they are virtues: in God, His attributes. What is in us the
laborious conquest of liberty, is in Him His very nature. The idea of
the right, and the respect paid to the right, are signs of the dignity
of our existence. If respect of rights is the very essence of justice,
the Perfect Being must know and respect the rights of the lowest of His
creatures; for He assigned them those rights. In God resides a sovereign
justice, that renders to every one what is due him, not according to
deceitful appearances, but according to the truth of things. And if man,
a limited being, has the power to go out of himself, to forget his own
person, to love another like himself, and devote himself to his
happiness, dignity, and perfection, the Perfect Being must have, in an
infinite degree, that disinterested tenderness, that Charity, the
Supreme Virtue of the human person. There is in God an infinite
tenderness for His creatures, manifested in His giving us existence,
which He might have withheld; and every day it appears in innumerable
marks of His Divine Providence.

Plato well understood that love of God, and expresses it in these great
words: "Let us speak of the cause which led the Supreme Arranger of the
Universe to produce and regulate that Universe. He was good; and he who
is good has no kind of ill-will. Exempt from that, He willed that
created things should be, as far as possible, like Himself." And
Christianity in its turn said, "_God has so loved men that He has given
them His only Son_."

It is not correct to affirm, as is often done, that Christianity has in
some sort _discovered_ this noble sentiment. We must not lower human
nature, to raise Christianity. Antiquity knew, described, and practised
charity; the first feature of which, so touching, and thank God! so
common, is goodness, as its loftiest one is heroism. Charity is devotion
to another; and it is ridiculously senseless to pretend that there ever
was an age of the world, when the human soul was deprived of that part
of its heritage, the power of devotion. But it is certain that
Christianity has diffused and popularized this virtue, and that, before
Christ, these words were never spoken: "LOVE ONE ANOTHER; FOR THAT IS
THE WHOLE LAW." _Charity_ presupposes _Justice_. He who truly loves his
brother respects the rights of his brother; but he does more, he forgets
his own. Egoism _sells_ or _takes_. Love delights in _giving_. In God,
love is what it is in us; but in an infinite degree. God is
inexhaustible in His charity, as He is inexhaustible in His essence.
That Infinite Omnipotence and Infinite Charity, which, by an admirable
good-will, draws from the bosom of its immense love the favors which it
incessantly bestows on the world and on humanity, teaches us that the
more we give, the more we possess.

God being all just and all good, He can will nothing but what is good
and just. Being Omnipotent, whatever He wills He can do, and
consequently does. The world is the work of God: it is therefore
perfectly made.

Yet there is disorder in the world, that seems to impugn the justice and
goodness of God.

A principle indissolubly connected with the very idea of good, tells us
that every moral agent deserves reward when he does well, and punishment
when he does ill. This principle is universal and necessary. It is
absolute. If it does not apply in this world, it is false, or the world
is badly ordered.

But good actions are not always followed by happiness, nor evil ones by
misery. Though often this fact is more apparent than real; though
virtue, a war against the passions, full of dignity but full of sorrow
and pain, has the latter as its condition, yet the pains that follow
vice are greater; and virtue conduces most to health, strength, and long
life;--though the peaceful conscience that accompanies virtue creates
internal happiness; though public opinion generally decides correctly on
men's characters, and rewards virtue with esteem and consideration, and
vice with contempt and infamy; and though, after all, justice reigns in
the world, and the surest road to happiness is still that of virtue, yet
there are exceptions. Virtue is not always rewarded, nor vice punished,
in this life.

The data of this problem are these: 1st. The principle of merit and
demerit within us is absolute: every good action _ought_ to be rewarded,
every bad one punished: 2d. God is just as He is all-powerful: 3d. There
are in this world particular cases, contradicting the necessary and
universal law of merit and demerit. What is the result?

To reject the two principles, that God is just, and the law of merit and
demerit absolute, is to raze to the foundations the whole edifice of
human faith.

To maintain them, is to admit that the present life is to be terminated
or continued elsewhere. The moral person who acts well or ill, and
awaits reward or punishment, is connected with a body, lives with it,
makes use of it, depends upon it in a measure, but is not _it_. The
_body_ is composed of parts. It diminishes or increases, it is divisible
even to infinity. But this _something_ which has a consciousness of
itself, and says "I, ME"; that feels itself free and responsible, feels
too that it is incapable of division, that it is a being _one_ and
_simple_; that the ME cannot be halved, that if a limb is cut off and
thrown away, no part of the ME goes with it: that it remains identical
with itself under the variety of phenomena which successively manifest
it. This identity, indivisibility, and absolute unity of the person, are
its _spirituality_, the very essence of the person. It is not in the
least an hypothesis to affirm that the soul differs essentially from the
body. By the soul we mean _the person_, not separated from the
consciousness of the attributes which constitute it,--_thought_ and
_will_. The Existence without consciousness is an abstract being, and
not a person. It is _the person_, that is _identical, one, simple_. Its
attributes, developing it, do not divide it. Indivisible, it is
indissoluble, and, may be immortal. If absolute justice requires this
immortality, it does not require what is impossible. The spirituality of
the soul is the condition and necessary foundation of immortality: the
law of merit and demerit the direct demonstration of it. The first is
the metaphysical, the second the moral proof. Add to these the tendency
of all the powers of the soul toward the Infinite, and the principle of
final causes, and the proof of the immortality of the soul is complete.

God, therefore, in the Masonic creed, is INFINITE TRUTH, INFINITE
BEAUTY, INFINITE GOODNESS. He is the Holy of Holies, as Author of the
Moral Law, as the PRINCIPLE of Liberty, of Justice, and of Charity,
Dispenser of Reward and Punishment. Such a God is not an abstract God;
but an intelligent and free _person_, Who has made us in His image, from
Whom we receive the law that presides over our destiny, and Whose
judgment we await. It is His love that inspires us in _our_ acts of
charity: it is His justice that governs _our_ justice, and that of
society and the laws. We continually remind ourselves that He is
infinite; because otherwise we should degrade His nature: but He would
be for us as if He were not, if His infinite nature had not forms
inherent in ourselves, the forms of our own reason and soul.

When we love Truth, Justice, and Nobility of Soul, we should know that
it is God we love underneath these special forms, and should unite them
all into one great act of total piety. We should feel that we go in and
out continually in the midst of the vast forces of the Universe, which
are only the Forces of God; that in our studies, when we attain a truth,
we confront the thought of God; when we learn the right, we learn the
will of God laid down as a rule of conduct for the Universe; and when we
feel disinterested love, we should know that we partake the feeling of
the Infinite God. Then, when we reverence the mighty cosmic force, it
will not be a blind Fate in an Atheistic or Pantheistic world, but the
Infinite God, that we shall confront and feel and know. Then we shall be
mindful of the mind of God, conscious of God's conscience, sensible of
His sentiments, and our own existence will be in the infinite being of
God.

The world is a whole, which has its harmony; for a God who is One, could
make none but a complete and harmonious work. The harmony of the
Universe responds to the unity of God, as the indefinite quantity is the
defective sign of the infinitude of God. To say that the Universe is
God, is to admit the world only, and deny God. Give it what name you
please, it is atheism at bottom. On the other hand, to suppose that the
Universe is void of God, and that He is wholly apart from it, is an
insupportable and almost impossible abstraction. To distinguish is not
to separate. I distinguish, but do not separate myself from my qualities
and effects. So God is not the Universe, although He is everywhere
present in spirit and in truth.

To us, as to Plato, absolute truth is in God. It is God Himself under
one of His phases. In God, as their original, are the immutable
principles of reality and cognizance. In Him things receive at once
their existence and their intelligibility. It is by participating in the
Divine reason that our own reason possesses something of the Absolute.
Every judgment of reason envelopes a necessary truth, and every
necessary truth supposes the necessary Existence.

Thus, from every direction,--from metaphysics, aesthetics, and morality
above all, we rise to the same Principle, the common centre, and
ultimate foundation of all truth, all beauty, all good. The True, the
Beautiful, the Good, are but diverse revelations of one and the same
Being. Thus we reach the threshold of religion, and are in communion
with the great philosophies which all proclaim a God; and at the same
time with the religions which cover the earth, and all repose on the
sacred foundation of natural religion; of that religion which reveals to
us the natural light given to all men, without the aid of a particular
revelation. So long as philosophy does not arrive at religion, it is
below all worships, even the most imperfect; for they at least give man
a Father, a Witness, a Consoler, a Judge. By religion, philosophy
connects itself with humanity, which, from one end of the world to the
other, aspires to God, believes in God, hopes in God. Philosophy
contains in itself the common basis of all religious beliefs; it, as it
were, borrows from them their principle, and returns it to them
surrounded with light, elevated above uncertainty, secure against all
attack.

From the necessity of His Nature, the Infinite Being must create and
preserve the Finite, and to the Finite must, in its forms, give and
communicate of His own kind. We cannot conceive of any finite thing
existing without God, the Infinite basis and ground thereof; nor of God
existing without something. God is the necessary logical condition of a
world, its necessitating cause; a world, the necessary logical condition
of God, His necessitated consequence. It is according to His Infinite
Perfection to create, and then to preserve and bless whatever He
creates. That is the conclusion of modern metaphysical science. The
stream of philosophy runs down from Aristotle to Hegel, and breaks off
with this conclusion: and then again recurs the ancient difficulty. If
it be of His nature to create,--if we cannot conceive of His existing
_alone_, without creating, without _having_ created, then what He
created was co-existent with Himself. If He could exist an instant
without creating, He could as well do so for a myriad of eternities.
And so again comes round to us the old doctrine of a God, the Soul of
the Universe, and co-existent with it. For what He created had a
_beginning_; and however long since that creation occurred, an eternity
had before elapsed. The difference between _a_ beginning and _no_
beginning is infinite.

But of some things we can be certain. We are conscious of ourselves--of
ourselves if not as substances, at least as Powers to be, to do, to
suffer. We are conscious of ourselves not as self-originated at all or
as self-sustained alone; but only as dependent, first for existence,
ever since for support.

Among the primary ideas of consciousness, that are inseparable from it,
the atoms of self-consciousness, we find the idea of God. Carefully
examined by the scrutizing intellect, it is the idea of God as infinite,
perfectly powerful, wise, just, loving, holy; absolute being with no
limitation. This made us, made all, sustains us, sustains all; made our
body, not by a single act, but by a series of acts extending over a vast
succession of years,--for man's body is the resultant of all created
things,--made our spirit, our mind, conscience, affections, soul, will,
appointed for each its natural mode of action, set each at its several
aim. Thus self-consciousness leads us to consciousness of God, and at
last to consciousness of an infinite God. That is the highest evidence
of our own existence, and it is the highest evidence of His.

If there is a God at all, He must be omnipresent in space. Beyond the
last Stars He must be, as He is here. There can be no mote that peoples
the sunbeams, no little cell of life that the microscope discovers in
the seed-sporule of a moss, but He is there.

He must also be omnipresent in time. There was no second of time before
the Stars began to burn, but God was in that second. In the most distant
nebulous spot in Orion's belt, and in every one of the millions that
people a square inch of limestone, God is alike present. He is in the
smallest imaginable or even unimaginable portion of time, and in every
second of its most vast and unimaginable volume; His Here conterminous
with the All of Space, His Now coeval with the All of Time.

Through all this Space, in all this Time, His Being extends, spreads
undivided, operates unspent; God in all His infinity, perfectly
powerful, wise, just, loving, and holy. His being is an infinite
activity, a creating, and so a giving of Himself to the World. The
World's being is a _becoming_, a being created and continued. It is so
now, and was so, incalculable and unimaginable millions of ages ago.

All this is philosophy, the unavoidable conclusion of the human mind. It
is not the _opinion_ of Coleridge and Kant, but their _science_; not
what they _guess_, but what they _know_.

In virtue of this in-dwelling of God in matter, we say that the world is
a revelation of Him, its existence a show of His. He is _in_ His work.
The manifold action of the Universe is only His mode of operation, and
all material things are in communion with Him. All grow and move and
live in Him, and by means of Him, and only so. Let Him withdraw from the
space occupied by anything, and it ceases to be. Let Him withdraw any
quality of His nature from anything, and it ceases to be. All must
partake of Him, He dwelling in each, and yet transcending all.

The failure of fanciful religion to become philosophy, does not preclude
philosophy from coinciding with true religion. Philosophy, or rather its
object, the divine order of the Universe, is the intellectual guide
which the religious sentiment needs; while exploring the real relations
of the finite, it obtains a constantly improving and self-correcting
measure of the perfect law of the Gospel of Love and Liberty, and a
means of carrying into effect the spiritualism of revealed religion. It
establishes law, by ascertaining its terms; it guides the spirit to see
its way to the amelioration of life and the increase of happiness. While
religion was stationary, science could not walk alone; when both are
admitted to be progressive, their interests and aims become identified.
Aristotle began to show how religion may be founded on an intellectual
basis; but the basis he laid was too narrow. Bacon, by giving to
philosophy a definite aim and method, gave it at the same time a safer
and self-enlarging basis. Our position is that of intellectual beings
surrounded by limitations; and the latter being constant, have to
intelligence the practical value of laws, in whose investigation and
application consists that seemingly endless career of intellectual and
moral progress which the sentiment of religion inspires and ennobles.
The title of Saint has commonly been claimed for those whose boast it
has been to despise philosophy yet faith will stumble and sentiment
mislead, unless knowledge be present, in amount and quality sufficient
to purify the one and to give beneficial direction to the other.

Science consists of those matured inferences from experience which all
other experience confirms. It is no fixed system superior to revision,
but that progressive mediation between ignorance and wisdom in part
conceived by Plato, whose immediate object is happiness, and its impulse
the highest kind of love. Science realizes and unites all that was truly
valuable in both the old schemes of mediation; the heroic, or system of
action and effort; and the mystical theory of spiritual, contemplative
communion. "Listen to me," says Galen, "as to the voice of the
Eleusinian Hierophant, and believe that the study of nature is a mystery
no less important than theirs, nor less adapted to display the wisdom
and power of the Great Creator. Their lessons and demonstrations were
obscure, but ours are clear and unmistakable."

To science we owe it that no man is any longer entitled to consider
himself the central point around which the whole Universe of life and
motion revolves--the immensely important individual for whose
convenience and even luxurious ease and indulgence the whole Universe
was made. On one side it has shown us an infinite Universe of stars and
suns and worlds at incalculable distances from each other, in whose
majestic and awful presence we sink and even our world sinks into
insignificance; while, on the other side, the microscope has placed us
in communication with new worlds of organized livings beings, gifted
with senses, nerves, appetites, and instincts, in every tear and in
every drop of putrid water.

Thus science teaches us that we are but an infinitesimal portion of a
great whole, that stretches out on every side of us, and above and below
us, infinite in its complications, and which infinite wisdom alone can
comprehend. Infinite wisdom has arranged the infinite succession of
beings, involving the necessity of birth, decay, and death, and made the
loftiest virtues possible by providing those conflicts, reverses,
trials, and hardships, without which even their names could never have
been invented.

Knowledge is convertible into power, and axioms into rules of utility
and duty. Modern science is social and communicative. It is moral as
well as intellectual; powerful, yet pacific and disinterested; binding
man to man as well as to the Universe; filling up the details of
obligation, and cherishing impulses of virtue, and, by affording clear
proof of the consistency and identity of all interests, substituting
co-operation for rivalry, liberality for jealousy, and tending far more
powerfully than any other means to realize the spirit of religion, by
healing those inveterate disorders which, traced to their real origin,
will be found rooted in an ignorant assumption as to the penurious
severity of Providence, and the consequent greed of selfish men to
confine what seemed as if extorted from it to themselves, or to steal
from each other rather than quietly to enjoy their own.

We shall probably never reach those higher forms containing the true
differences of things, involving the full discovery and correct
expression of their very self or essence. We shall ever fall short of
the most general and most simple nature, the ultimate or most
comprehensive law. Our widest axioms explain many phenomena, but so too
in a degree did the principles or elements of the old philosophers, and
the cycles and epicycles of ancient astronomy. We cannot in any case of
causation assign the whole of the conditions, nor though we may
reproduce them in practice, can we mentally distinguish them all,
without knowing the essences of the things including them; and we
therefore must not unconsciously ascribe that absolute certainty to
axioms, which the ancient religionists did to creeds, nor allow the
mind, which ever strives to insulate itself and its acquisitions, to
forget the nature of the process by which it substituted scientific for
common notions, and so with one as with the other lay the basis of
self-deception by a pedantic and superstitious employment of them.

Doubt, the essential preliminary of all improvement and discovery, must
accompany all the stages of man's onward progress. His intellectual life
is a perpetual beginning, a preparation for a birth. The faculty of
doubting and questioning, without which those of comparison and judgment
would be useless, is itself a divine prerogative of the reason.
Knowledge is always imperfect, or complete only in a prospectively
boundless career, in which discovery multiplies doubt, and doubt leads
on to new discovery. The boast of science is not so much its manifested
results, as its admitted imperfection and capacity of unlimited
progress. The true religious philosophy of an imperfect being is not a
system of creed, but, as Socrates thought, an infinite search or
approximation. Finality is but another name for bewilderment or defeat.
Science gratifies the religious feeling without arresting it, and opens
out the unfathomable mystery of the One Supreme into more explicit and
manageable Forms, which express not indeed His Essence, which is wholly
beyond our reach and higher than our faculties can climb, but His Will,
and so feeds an endless enthusiasm by accumulating forever new objects
of pursuit. We have long experienced that knowledge is profitable, we
are beginning to find out that it is moral, and we shall at last
discover it to be religious.

God and truth are inseparable; a knowledge of God is possession of the
saving oracles of truth. In proportion as the thought and purpose of the
individual are trained to conformity with the rule of right prescribed
by Supreme Intelligence, so far is his happiness promoted, and the
purpose of his existence fulfilled. In this way a new life arises in
him; he is no longer isolated, but is a part of the eternal harmonies
around him. His erring will is directed by the influence of a higher
will, informing and moulding it in the path of his true happiness.

Man's power of apprehending outward truth is a qualified privilege; the
mental like the physical inspiration passing through a diluted medium;
and yet, even when truth, imparted, as it were, by intuition, has been
specious, or at least imperfect, the intoxication of sudden discovery
has ever claimed it as full, infallible, and divine. And while human
weakness needed ever to recur to the pure and perfect source, the
revelations once popularly accepted and valued assumed an independent
substantiality, perpetuating not themselves only, but the whole mass of
derivitive forms accidentally connected with them, and legalized in
their names. The mists of error thickened under the shadows of
prescription, until the free light again broke in upon the night of
ages, redeeming the genuine treasure from the superstition which
obstinately doted on its accessories.

Even to the Barbarian, Nature reveals a mighty power and a wondrous
wisdom, and continually points to God. It is no wonder that men
worshipped the several things of the world. The world of matter is a
revelation of fear to the savage in Northern climes; he trembles at his
deity throned in ice and snow. The lightning, the storm, the earthquake
startle the rude man, and he sees the divine in the extraordinary.

The grand objects of Nature perpetually constrain men to think of their
Author. The Alps are the great altar of Europe; the nocturnal sky has
been to mankind the dome of a temple, starred all over with admonitions
to reverence, trust, and love. The Scriptures for the human race are
writ in earth and Heaven. No organ or miserere touches the heart like
the sonorous swell of the sea or the ocean-wave's immeasurable laugh.
Every year the old world puts on new bridal beauty, and celebrates its
Whit-Sunday, when in the sweet Spring each bush and tree dons reverently
its new glories. Autumn is a long All-Saints' day; and the harvest is
Hallowmass to Mankind. Before the human race marched down from the
slopes of the Himalayas to take possession of Asia, Chaldea, and Egypt,
men marked each annual crisis, the solstices and the equinoxes, and
celebrated religious festivals therein; and even then, and ever since,
the material was and has been the element of communion between man and
God.

Nature is full of religious lessons to a thoughtful man. He dissolves
the matter of the Universe, leaving only its forces; he dissolves away
the phenomena of human history, leaving only immortal spirit; he studies
the law, the mode of action of these forces and this spirit, which make
up the material and the human world, and cannot fail to be filled with
reverence, with trust, with boundless love of the Infinite God, who
devised these laws of matter and of mind, and thereby bears up this
marvellous Universe of things and men. Science has its New Testament;
and the beatitudes of Philosophy are profoundly touching. An undevout
astronomer is mad. Familiarity with the grass and the trees teaches us
deeper lessons of love and trust than we can glean from the writings of
Fénélon and Augustine. The great Bible of God is ever open before
mankind. The eternal flowers of Heaven seem to shed sweet influence on
the perishable blossoms of the earth. The great sermon of Jesus was
preached on a mountain, which preached to Him as He did to the people,
and His figures of speech were first natural figures of fact.

If to-morrow I am to perish utterly, then I shall only take counsel for
to-day, and ask for qualities which last no longer. My fathers will be
to me only as the ground out of which my bread-corn is grown; dead, they
are but the rotten mould of earth, their memory of small concern to me.
Posterity!--I shall care nothing for the future generations of mankind!
I am one atom in the trunk of a tree, and care nothing for the roots
below, or the branch above, I shall sow such seed only as will bear
harvest to-day. Passion may enact my statutes to-day, and ambition
repeal them to-morrow. I will know no other legislators. Morality will
vanish, and expediency take its place. Heroism will be gone; and instead
of it there will be the savage ferocity of the he-wolf, the brute
cunning of the she-fox, the rapacity of the vulture, and the headlong
daring of the wild bull; but no longer the cool, calm courage that, for
truth's sake, and for love's sake, looks death firmly in the face, and
then wheels into line ready to be slain. Affection, friendship,
philanthropy, will be but the wild fancies of the monomaniac, fit
subjects for smiles or laughter or for pity.

But knowing that we shall live forever, and that the Infinite God loves
all of us, we can look on all the evils of the world, and see that it is
only the hour before sunrise, and that the light is coming; and so we
also, even we, may light a little taper, to illuminate the darkness
while it lasts, and help until the day-spring come. Eternal morning
follows the night: a rainbow scarfs the shoulders of every cloud that
weeps its rain away to be flowers on land and pearls at sea: Life rises
out of the grave, the soul cannot be held by fettering flesh. No dawn is
hopeless; and disaster is only the threshold of delight.

Beautifully, above the great wide chaos of human errors, shines the
calm, clear light of natural human religion, revealing to us God as the
Infinite Parent of all, perfectly powerful, wise, just, loving, and
perfectly holy too. Beautiful around stretches off every way the
Universe, the Great Bible of God. Material nature is its Old Testament,
millions of years old, thick with eternal truths under our feet,
glittering with everlasting glories over our heads; and Human Nature is
the New Testament from the Infinite God, every day revealing a new page
as Time turns over the leaves. Immortality stands waiting to give a
recompense for every virtue not rewarded, for every tear not wiped away,
for every sorrow undeserved, for every prayer, for every pure intention
and emotion of the heart. And over the whole, over Nature, Material and
Human, over this Mortal Life and over the eternal Past and Future, the
infinite Loving-kindness of God the Father comes enfolding all and
blessing everything that ever was, that is, that ever shall be.

Everything is a thought of the Infinite God. Nature is His prose, and
man His Poetry. There is no Chance, no Fate; but God's Great Providence,
enfolding the whole Universe in its bosom, and feeding it with
everlasting life. In times past there has been evil which we cannot
understand; now there are evils which we cannot solve, nor make square
with God's perfect goodness by any theory our feeble intellect enables
us to frame. There are sufferings, follies, and sins for all mankind,
for every nation, for every man and every woman. They were all foreseen
by the infinite wisdom of God, all provided for by His infinite power
and justice, and all are consistent with His infinite love. To believe
otherwise would be to believe that He made the world, to amuse His idle
hours with the follies and agonies of mankind, as Domitian was wont to
do with the wrigglings and contortions of insect agonies. Then indeed we
might despairingly unite in that horrible utterance of Heine: "Alas,
God's Satire weighs heavily on me! The Great Author of the Universe, the
Aristophanes of Heaven, is bent on demonstrating, with crushing force,
to me, the little, earthly, German Aristophanes, how my wittiest
sarcasms are only pitiful attempts at jesting, in comparison with His,
and how miserably I am beneath Him, in humor, in colossal mockery."

No, no! God is not thus amused with and prodigal of human suffering. The
world is neither a Here without a Hereafter, a body without a soul, a
chaos with no God; nor a body blasted by a soul, a Here with a worse
Hereafter, a world with a God that hates more than half the creatures He
has made. There is no Savage, Revengeful, and Evil God: but there is an
Infinite God, seen everywhere as Perfect Cause, everywhere as Perfect
Providence, transcending all, yet in-dwelling everywhere, with perfect
power, wisdom, justice, holiness, and love, providing for the future
welfare of each and all, foreseeing and forecaring for every bubble that
breaks on the great stream of human life and human history.

The end of man and the object of existence in this world, being not only
happiness, but happiness in virtue and through virtue, virtue in this
world is the condition of happiness in another life, and the condition
of virtue in this world is suffering, more or less frequent, briefer or
longer continued, more or less intense. Take away suffering, and there
is no longer any resignation or humanity, no more self-sacrifice, no
more devotedness, no more heroic virtues, no more sublime morality. We
are subjected to suffering, both because we are sensible, and because we
ought to be virtuous. If there were no physical evil, there would be no
possible virtue, and the world would be badly adapted to the destiny of
man. The apparent disorders of the physical world, and the evils that
result from them, are not disorders and evils that occur despite the
power and goodness of God. God not only allows, but wills them. It is
His will that there shall be in the physical world causes enough of pain
for man, to afford him occasions for resignation and courage.

Whatever is favorable to virtue, whatever gives the moral liberty more
energy, whatever can serve the greater moral development of the human
race, is good. Suffering is not the worst condition of man on earth. The
worst condition is the moral brutalization which the absence of physical
evil would engender.

External or internal physical evil connects itself with the object of
existence, which is to accomplish the moral law here below, whatever the
consequences, with the firm hope that virtue unfortunate will not fail
to be rewarded in another life. The moral law has its sanction and its
reason in itself. It owes nothing to that law of merit and demerit that
accompanies it, but is not its basis. But, though the principle of merit
and demerit ought not to be the determining principle of virtuous
action, it powerfully concurs with the moral law, because it offers
virtue a legitimate ground of consolation and hope.

Morality is the recognition of duty, as duty, and its accomplishment,
whatever the consequences.

Religion is the recognition of duty in its necessary harmony with
goodness; a harmony that must have its realization in another life,
through the justice and omnipotence of God.

Religion is as true as morality; for once morality is admitted, its
consequences must be admitted.

The whole moral existence is included in these two words, harmonious
with each other: DUTY and HOPE.

Masonry teaches that God is infinitely good. What motive, what reason,
and, morally speaking, what possibility can there be to Infinite Power
and Infinite Wisdom, to be anything but good? Our very sorrows,
proclaiming the loss of objects inexpressibly dear to us, demonstrate
His Goodness. The Being that made us intelligent cannot Himself be
without intelligence; and He Who has made us so to love and to sorrow
for what we love, must number love for the creatures He has made, among
His infinite attributes. Amid all our sorrows, we take refuge in the
assurance that He loves us; that He does not capriciously, or through
indifference, and still less in mere anger, grieve and afflict us; that
He chastens us, in order that by His chastisements, which are by His
universal law only the consequences of our acts, we may be profited; and
that He could not show so much love for His creatures, by leaving them
unchastened, untried, undisciplined. We have faith in the Infinite;
faith in God's Infinite Love; and it is that faith that must save us.

No dispensations of God's Providence, no suffering or bereavement is a
messenger of wrath: none of its circumstances are indications of God's
Anger. He is incapable of Anger; higher above any such feelings than the
distant stars are above the earth. Bad men do not die because God hates
them. They die because it is best for them that they should do so; and,
bad as they are, it is better for them to be in the hands of the
infinitely good God, than anywhere else.

Darkness and gloom lie upon the paths of men. They stumble at
difficulties, are ensnared by temptations, and perplexed by trouble.
They are anxious, and troubled, and fearful. Pain and affliction and
sorrow often gather around the steps of their earthly pilgrimage. All
this is written indelibly upon the tablets of the human heart. It is not
to be erased; but Masonry sees and reads it in a new light. It does not
expect these ills and trials and sufferings to be removed from life; but
that the great truth will at some time be believed by all men, that they
are the means, selected by infinite wisdom, to purify the heart, and to
invigorate the soul whose inheritance is immortality, and the world its
school.

Masonry propagates no creed except its own most simple and Sublime One;
that universal religion, taught by Nature and by Reason. Its Lodges are
neither Jewish, Moslem, nor Christian Temples. It reiterates the
precepts of morality of all religions. It venerates the character and
commends the teachings of the great and good of all ages and of all
countries. It extracts the good and not the evil, the truth, and not the
error, from all creeds; and acknowledges that there is much which is
good and true in all.

Above all the other great teachers of morality and virtue, it reveres
the character of the Great Master Who, submissive to the will of His and
our Father, died upon the Cross. All must admit, that if the world were
filled with beings like Him, the great ills of society would be at once
relieved. For all coercion, injury, selfishness, and revenge, and all
the wrongs and the greatest sufferings of life, would disappear at
once. These human years would be happy; and the eternal ages would roll
on in brightness and beauty; and the still, sad music of Humanity, that
sounds through the world, now in the accents of grief, and now in
pensive melancholy, would change to anthems, sounding to the March of
Time, and bursting out from the heart of the world.

If every man were a perfect imitator of that Great, Wise, Good Teacher,
clothed with all His faith and all His virtues, how the circle of Life's
ills and trials would be narrowed! The sensual passions would assail the
heart in vain. Want would no longer successfully tempt men to act
wrongly, nor curiosity to do rashly. Ambition, spreading before men its
Kingdoms and its Thrones, and offices and honors, would cause none to
swerve from their great allegiance. Injury and insult would be shamed by
forgiveness. "Father," men would say, "forgive them; for they know not
what they do." None would seek to be enriched at another's loss or
expense. Every man would feel that the whole human race were his
brothers. All sorrow and pain and anguish would be soothed by a perfect
faith and an entire trust in the Infinite Goodness of God. The world
around us would be new, and the Heavens above us; for here, and there,
and everywhere, through all the ample glories and splendors of the
Universe, all men would recognize and feel the presence and the
beneficent care of a loving Father.

However the Mason may believe as to creeds, and churches, and miracles,
and missions from Heaven, he must admit that the Life and character of
Him who taught in Galilee, and fragments of Whose teachings have come
down to us, are worthy of all imitation. That Life is an undenied and
undeniable Gospel. Its teachings cannot be passed by and discarded. All
must admit that it would be happiness to follow and perfection to
imitate Him. None ever felt for Him a sincere emotion of contempt, nor
in anger accused Him of sophistry, nor saw immorality lurking in His
doctrines; however they may judge of those who succeeded Him, and
claimed to be His apostles. Divine or human, inspired or only a
reforming Essene, it must be agreed that His teachings are far nobler,
far purer, far less alloyed with error and imperfection, far less of the
earth earthly, than those of Socrates, Plato, Seneca, or Mahomet, or any
other of the great moralists and Reformers of the world.

If our aims went as completely as His beyond personal care and selfish
gratification; if our thoughts and words and actions were as entirely
employed upon the great work of benefiting our kind--the true work which
we have been placed here to do--as His were; if our nature were as
gentle and as tender as His; and if society, country, kindred,
friendship, and home were as dear to us as they were to Him, we should
be at once relieved of more than half the difficulties and the diseased
and painful affections of our lives. Simple obedience to rectitude,
instead of self-interest; simple self-culture and self-improvement,
instead of constant cultivation of the good opinion of others;
single-hearted aims and purposes, instead of improper objects, sought
and approached by devious and crooked ways, would free our meditations
of many disturbing and irritating questions.

Not to renounce the nobler and better affections of our natures, nor
happiness, nor our just dues of love and honor from men; not to vilify
ourselves, nor to renounce our self-respect, nor a just and reasonable
sense of our merits and deserts, nor our own righteousness of virtue,
does Masonry require, nor would our imitation of Him require; but to
renounce our vices, our faults, our passions, our self-flattering
delusions; to forego all outward advantages, which are to be gained only
through a sacrifice of our inward integrity, or by anxious and petty
contrivances and appliances; to choose and keep the better part; to
secure that, and let the worst take care of itself; to keep a good
conscience, and let opinion come and go as it will; to retain a lofty
self-respect, and let low self-indulgence go; to keep inward happiness,
and let outward advantages hold a subordinate place; to renounce our
selfishness, and that eternal anxiety as to what we are to have, and
what men think of us; and be content with the plenitude of God's great
mercies, and so to be happy. For it is the inordinate devotion to self,
and consideration of self, that is ever a stumbling-block in the way;
that spreads questions, snares, and difficulties around us, darkens the
way of Providence, and makes the world a far less happy one to us than
it might be.

As He taught, so Masonry teaches, affection to our kindred, tenderness
to our friends, gentleness and forbearance toward our inferiors, pity
for the suffering, forgiveness of our enemies; and to wear an
affectionate nature and gentle disposition as the garment of our life,
investing pain, and toil, and agony, and even death, with a serene and
holy beauty. It does not teach us to wrap ourselves in the garments of
reserve and pride, to care nothing for the world because it cares
nothing for us, to withdraw our thoughts from society because it does us
not justice, and see how patiently we can live within the confines of
our own bosoms, or in quiet communion, through books, with the mighty
dead. No man ever found peace or light in that way. Every relation, of
hate, scorn, or neglect, to mankind, is full of vexation and torment.
There is nothing to do with men but to love them, to admire their
virtues, pity and bear with their faults, and forgive their injuries. To
hate your adversary will not help you; to kill him will help you still
less: nothing within the compass of the Universe will help you, but to
pity, forgive, and love him.

If we possessed His gentle and affectionate disposition, His love and
compassion for all that err and all that offend, how many difficulties,
both within and without us, would they relieve! How many depressed minds
should we console! How many troubles in society should we compose! How
many enmities soften! How many a knot of mystery and misunderstanding
would be untied by a single word, spoken in simple and confiding truth!
How many a rough path would be made smooth, and how many a crooked path
be made straight! Very many places, now solitary, would be made glad;
very many dark places be filled with light.

Morality has its axioms, like the other sciences; and these axioms are,
in all languages, justly termed moral truths. Moral truths, considered
in themselves, are equally as certain as mathematical truths. Given the
idea of a deposit, the idea of keeping it faithfully is attached to it
as necessarily, as to the idea of a triangle is attached the idea that
its three angles are equal to two right angles. You may violate a
deposit; but in doing so, do not imagine that you change the nature of
things, or make what is in itself a deposit become your own property.
The two ideas exclude each other. You have but a false semblance of
property: and all the efforts of the passions, all the sophisms of
interest, will not overturn essential differences. Therefore it is that
a moral truth is so imperious; because, like all truth, it is what it
is, and shapes itself to please no caprice. Always the same, and always
present, little as we may like it, it inexorably condemns, with a voice
always heard, but not always regarded, the insensate and guilty will
which thinks to prevent its existing, by denying, or rather by
pretending to deny, its existence.

The moral truths are distinguished from other truths by this singular
characteristic: so soon as we perceive them, they appear to us as the
rule of our conduct. If it is true that a deposit is made in order to be
returned to its legitimate possessor, it _must_ be returned. To the
necessity of _believing_ the truth, the necessity of _practising_ it is
added.

The necessity of practising the moral truths is obligation. The moral
truths, necessary to the eye of reason, are obligatory on the will. The
moral obligation, like the moral truth which is its basis, is absolute.
As necessary truths are not _more_ or _less_ necessary, so obligation is
not more or less _obligatory_. There are degrees of importance among
different obligations; but there are no degrees in _the obligation
itself_. One is not nearly obliged, _almost_ obliged; but _wholly_ so,
or _not at all_. If there be any place of refuge against the obligation,
it ceases to exist.

If the obligation is absolute, it is _immutable_ and _universal_. For if
what is obligation to-day may not be so _to-morrow_, if what is
obligatory for _me_ may not be so for you, the obligation differing from
itself, it would be relative and contingent. This fact of absolute,
immutable, universal obligation is certain and manifest. _The good_ is
the foundation of obligation. If it be not, obligation has _no_
foundation; and that is impossible. If one act ought to be done, and
another ought not, it must be because evidently there is an essential
difference between the two acts. If one be not good and the other bad,
the obligation imposed on us is arbitrary.

To make the Good a _consequence_, of anything whatever, is to annihilate
it. It is the first, or it is nothing. When we ask an honest man why,
despite his urgent necessities, he has respected the sanctity of a
deposit, he answers, because it was _his duty_. Asked why it was his
duty, he answers, because it was _right_, was _just_, was _good_. Beyond
that there is no answer to be made, but there is also no question to be
asked. No one permits a duty to be imposed on him without giving himself
a reason for it: but when it is admitted that the duty is commanded by
justice, the mind is satisfied; for it has arrived at a principle beyond
which there is nothing to seek, justice being its own principle. The
primary truths include their own reason: and justice, the essential
distinction between good and evil, is the first truth of morality.

Justice is not a _consequence_; because we cannot ascend to any
principle above it. Moral truth _forces itself_ on man, and does not
_emanate from him_. It no more becomes subjective, by appearing to us
obligatory, than truth does by appearing to us necessary. It is in the
very nature of the true and the good that we must seek for the reason of
necessity and obligation. Obligation is founded on the necessary
distinction between the good and the evil; and it is itself the
foundation of liberty. If man has his duties to perform, he must have
the faculty of accomplishing them, of resisting desire, passion, and
interest, in order to obey the law. He must be free; therefore he is so,
or human nature is in contradiction with itself. The certainty of the
_obligation_ involves the corresponding certainty of _free will_.

It is the _will_ that is free: though sometimes that will may be
ineffectual. The power _to do_ must not be confounded with the power _to
will_. The former may be _limited_: the latter is _sovereign_. The
_external effects_ may be prevented: _the resolution_ itself cannot. Of
this sovereign power of the will we are conscious. We feel in ourselves,
before it becomes determinate, the force which can determine itself in
one way or another. At the same time when I will this or that, I am
equally conscious that I _can_ will the contrary. I am conscious that I
am the master of my resolution: that I may check it, continue it, retake
it. When _the act_ has ceased, the consciousness of _the power_ which
produced it has not. That consciousness and the power remain, superior
to all the manifestations of the power. Wherefore free-will is the
essential and ever-subsisting attribute of the will itself.

At the same time that we judge that a free agent has done a good or a
bad act, we form another judgment, as necessary as the first; that if he
has done well, he deserves compensation; if ill, punishment. That
judgment may be expressed in a manner more or less vivid, according as
it is mingled with sentiments more or less ardent. Sometimes it will be
a merely kind feeling toward a virtuous agent, and moderately hostile to
a guilty one; sometimes enthusiasm or indignation. The judgment of merit
and demerit is intimately connected with the judgment of good and evil.
Merit is the natural right which we have to be rewarded; demerit the
natural right which others have to punish us. But whether the reward is
received, or the punishment undergone, or not, the merit or demerit
equally subsists. Punishment and reward are the satisfaction of merit
and demerit, but do not constitute them. Take away the former, and the
latter continue. Take away the latter, and there are no longer real
rewards or punishments. When a base man encompasses our merited honors,
he has obtained but the mere appearance of a reward; a mere material
advantage. The reward is essentially moral; and its value is independent
of its form. One of those simple crowns of oak with which the early
Romans rewarded heroism, was of more real value than all the wealth of
the world, when it was the sign of the gratitude and admiration of a
people. Reward accorded to merit is a debt; without merit it is an alms
or a theft.

The Good is good in itself, and to be accomplished, whatever the
consequences. The results of the Good cannot but be fortunate.
Happiness, separated from the Good, is but a fact to which no moral idea
is attached. As an effect of the Good, it enters into the moral order,
completes and crowns it.

Virtue without happiness, and crime without misery, is a contradiction
and disorder. If virtue suppose sacrifice (that is, suffering), eternal
justice requires that sacrifice generously accepted and courageously
borne, shall have for its reward the same happiness that was sacrificed:
and it also requires that crime shall be punished with unhappiness, for
the guilty happiness which it attempted to procure.

This law that attaches pleasure and sorrow to the good and the evil, is,
in general, accomplished even here below. For order rules in the world;
because the world lasts. Is that order sometimes disturbed? Are
happiness and sorrow not always distributed in legitimate proportion to
crime and virtue? The absolute judgment of the Good, the absolute
judgment of obligation, the absolute judgment of merit and demerit,
continue to subsist, inviolable and imprescriptible; and we cannot help
but believe that He Who has implanted in us the sentiment and idea of
order, cannot therein Himself be wanting; and that He will, sooner or
later, reestablish the holy harmony of virtue and happiness, by means
belonging to Himself.

The Judgment of the Good, the decision that such a thing is good, and
that such another is not,--this is the primitive fact, and reposes on
itself. By its intimate resemblances to the judgment of the true and the
beautiful, it shows us the secret affinities of morality, metaphysics,
and aesthetics. The good, so especially united to the true, is
distinguished from it, only because it is truth put in practice. The
good is obligatory. These are two indivisible but not identical ideas.
The idea of obligation reposes on the idea of the Good. In this intimate
alliance, the former borrows from the latter its universal and absolute
character.

The obligatory good is the moral law. That is the foundation of all
morality. By it we separate ourselves from the morality of interest and
the morality of sentiment. We admit the existence of those facts, and
their influence; but we do not assign them the same rank.

To the moral law, in the reason of man, corresponds liberty in action.
Liberty is deduced from obligation, and is a fact irresistibly evident.
Man, as free, and subject to obligation, is a moral person; and that
involves the idea of rights. To these ideas is added that of merit and
demerit; which supposes the distinction between good and evil,
obligation and liberty; and creates the idea of reward and punishment.

The sentiments play no unimportant part in morality. All the moral
judgments are accompanied by sentiments that respond to them. From the
secret sources of enthusiasm the human will draws the mysterious virtue
that makes heroes. Truth enlightens and illumines. Sentiment warms and
inclines to action. Interest also bears its part; and the hope of
happiness is the work of God, and one of the motive powers of human
action.

Such is the admirable economy of the moral constitution of man. His
Supreme Object, the Good: his law, Virtue, which often imposes upon him
suffering, thus making him to excel all other created beings known to
us. But this law is harsh, and in contradiction with the instinctive
desire for happiness. Wherefore the Beneficent Author of his being has
placed in his soul, by the side of the severe law of duty, the sweet,
delightful force of sentiment. Generally he attaches happiness to
virtue; and for the exceptions, for such there are, he has placed Hope
at the end of the journey to be travelled.

Thus there is a side on which morality touches religion. It is a sublime
necessity of Humanity to see in God the Legislator supremely wise, the
Witness always present, the infallible Judge of virtue. The human mind,
ever climbing up to God, would deem the foundations of morality too
unstable, if it did not place in God the first principle of the moral
law. Wishing to give to the moral law a _religious_ character, we run
the risk of taking from it its _moral_ character. We may refer it so
entirely to God as to make His will an arbitrary degree. But the will of
God, whence we deduce morality, in order to give it authority, itself
has no moral authority, except as it is just. The Good comes from the
will of God alone; but from His will, in so far as it is the expression
of His wisdom and justice. The Eternal Justice of God is the sole
foundation of Justice, such as Humanity perceives and practises it. The
Good, duty, merit and demerit, are referred to God, as everything is
referred to Him; but they have none the less a proper evidence and
authority. Religion is the crown of Morality, not its base. The base of
Morality is in itself.

The Moral Code of Masonry is still more extensive than that developed by
philosophy. To the requisitions of the law of Nature and the law of God,
it adds the imperative obligation of a contract. Upon entering the
Order, the Initiate binds to himself every Mason in the world. Once
enrolled among the children of Light, every Mason on earth becomes his
brother, and owes him the duties, the kindnesses, and the sympathies of
a brother. On every one he may call for assistance in need, protection
against danger, sympathy in sorrow, attention in sickness, and decent
burial after death. There is not a Mason in the world who is not bound
to go to his relief, when he is in danger, if there be a greater
probability of saving his life than of losing his own. No Mason can
wrong him to the value of anything, knowingly, himself, nor suffer it to
be done by others, if it be in his power to prevent it. No Mason can
speak evil of him, to his face or behind his back. Every Mason must keep
his lawful secrets, and aid him in his business, defend his character
when unjustly assailed, and protect, counsel, and assist his widow and
his orphans. What so many thousands owe to him, he owes to each of them.
He has solemnly bound himself to be ever ready to discharge this sacred
debt. If he fails to do it he is dishonest and forsworn; and it is an
unparalleled meanness in him to obtain good offices by false pretences,
to receive kindness and service, rendered him under the confident
expectation that he will in his turn render the same, and then to
disappoint, without ample reason, that just expectation.

Masonry holds him also, by his solemn promise, to a purer life, a nobler
generosity, a more perfect charity of opinion and action; to be
tolerant, catholic in his love for his race, ardent in his zeal for the
interest of mankind, the advancement and progress of humanity.

Such are, we think, the Philosophy and the Morality, such the TRUE WORD
of a Master Mason.

The world, the ancients believed, was governed by Seven Secondary
Causes; and these were the universal forces, known to the Hebrews by the
plural name ELOHIM. These forces, analogous and contrary one to the
other, produce equilibrium by their contrasts, and regulate the
movements of the spheres. The Hebrews called them the Seven great
Archangels, and gave them names, each of which, being a combination of
another word with AL, the first Phœnician Nature-God, considered as the
Principle of Light, represented them as His manifestations. Other
peoples assigned to these Spirits the government of the Seven Planets
then known, and gave them the names of their great divinities.

So, in the Kabala, the last Seven Sephiroth constituted ATIK YOMIN, the
Ancient of Days; and these, as well as the Seven planets, correspond
with the Seven colors separated by the prism, and the Seven notes of the
musical octave.

Seven is the sacred number in all theogonies and all symbols, because it
is composed of 3 and 4. It represents the magical power in its full
force. It is the Spirit assisted by all the Elementary Powers, the Soul
served by Nature, the Holy Empire spoken of in the clavicules of
Solomon, symbolized by a warrior, crowned, bearing a triangle on his
cuirass, and standing on a cube, to which are harnessed two Sphinxes,
one white and the other black, pulling contrary ways, and turning the
head to look backward.

The vices are Seven, like the virtues; and the latter were anciently
symbolized by the Seven Celestial bodies then known as planets. FAITH,
as the converse of arrogant Confidence, was represented by the Sun;
HOPE, enemy of Avarice, by the _Moon_; CHARITY, opposed to Luxury, by
_Venus_; FORCE, stronger than Rage, by _Mars_; PRUDENCE, the opposite of
Indolence, by _Mercury_; TEMPERANCE, the antipodes of Gluttony, by
Saturn; and JUSTICE, the opposite of Envy, by _Jupiter_.

The Kabalistic book of the Apocalypse is represented as closed with
Seven Seals. In it we find the Seven genii of the Ancient Mythologies;
and the doctrine concealed under its emblems is the pure Kabala, already
lost by the Pharisees at the advent of the Saviour. The pictures that
follow in this wondrous epic are so many pantacles, of which the
numbers 3, 4, 7, and 12 are the keys.

The Cherub, or symbolic bull, which Moses places at the gate of the
Edenic world, holding a blazing sword, is a Sphinx, with the body of a
bull and a human head; the old Assyrian Sphinx whereof the combat and
victory of Mithras were the hieroglyphic analysis. This armed Sphinx
represents the law of the Mystery, which keeps watch at the door of
initiation, to repulse the Profane. It also represents the grand Magical
Mystery, all the elements whereof the number 7 expresses, still without
giving its last word. This "unspeakable word" of the Sages of the school
of Alexandria, this word, which the Hebrew Kabalists wrote יהוה [IHUH],
and translated by אראריהא, [ARARITA,] so expressing the threefoldness of
the Secondary Principle, the dualism of the middle ones, and the Unity
as well of the first Principle as of the end; and also the junction of
the number 3 with the number 4 in a word composed of four letters, but
formed of seven by one triplicate and two repeated,--this word is
pronounced _Ararita_.

The vowels in the Greek language are also _Seven_ in number, and were
used to designate the Seven planets.

Tsadok or Sydyc was the Supreme God in Phœnicia. His Seven Sons were
probably the Seven Cabiri; and he was the Heptaktis, the God of Seven
Rays.

Kronos, the Greek Saturn, Philo makes Sanchoniathon say, had six sons,
and by Astarte Seven daughters, the Titanides. The Persians adored Ahura
Masda or Ormuzd and the Six Amshaspands, the first three of whom were
Lords of the Empires of Light, Fire, and Splendor; the Babylonians, Bal
and the Gods; the Chinese, Shangti, and the Six Chief Spirits; and the
Greeks, Kronos, and the Six great Male Gods, his progeny, Zeus,
Poseidon, Apollo, Arēs, Hēphaistos, and Hermes; while the female deities
were also Seven: Rhea, wife of Kronos, Hērē, Athēnē, Artemis, Aphrodite,
Hestia, and Dēmētēi. In the Orphic Theogony, Gaia produced the fourteen
Titans, Seven male and Seven female, Kronos being the most potent of the
males; and as the number _Seven_ appears in these, nine by threes, or
the triple triangle, is found in the three Mœraê or Fates, the three
Centimanēs, and the three Cyclopēs, offspring of Ouranos and Gaia, or
Heaven and Earth.

The metals, like the colors, were deemed to be Seven in number, and a
metal and color were assigned to each planet. Of the metals, gold was
assigned to the Sun and silver to the Moon.

The palace of Deioces in Echatana had Seven circular walls of different
colors, the two innermost having their battlements covered respectively
with silvering and gilding.

And the Seven Spheres of Borsippa were represented by the Seven Stories,
each of a different color, of the tower or truncated pyramid of Bel at
Babylon.

Pharaoh saw in his dream, which Joseph interpreted, _Seven_ ears of
wheat on one stalk, full and good, and after them _Seven_ ears,
withered, thin, and blasted with the East wind; and the Seven thin ears
devoured the Seven good ears; and Joseph interpreted these to mean Seven
years of plenty succeeded by Seven years of famine.

Connected with this Ebn Hesham relates that a flood of rain laid bare to
view a sepulchre in Yemen, in which lay a woman having on her neck
_Seven_ collars of _pearls_, and on her hands and feet bracelets and
ankle-rings and armlets, Seven on each, with an inscription on a tablet
showing that, after attempting in vain to purchase grain of Joseph, she,
Tajah, daughter of Dzu Shefar, and her people, died of famine.

Hear again the words of an adept, who had profoundly studied the
mysteries of science, and wrote, as the Ancient Oracles spoke, in
enigmas; but who knew that the theory of mechanical forces and of the
materiality of the most potent agents of Divinity, explains nothing, and
ought to satisfy no one!

Through the veil of all the hieratic and mystic allegories of the
ancient dogmas, under the seal of all the sacred writings, in the ruins
of Nineveh or Thebes, on the worn stones of the ancient temples, and on
the blackened face of the sphinx of Assyria or Egypt, in the monstrous
or marvellous pictures which the sacred pages of the Vedas translate for
the believers of India, in the strange emblems of our old books of
alchemy, in the ceremonies of reception practised by all the mysterious
Societies, we find the traces of a doctrine, everywhere the same, and
everywhere carefully concealed. The occult philosophy seems to have been
the nurse or the godmother of all religions, the secret lever of all the
intellectual forces, the key of all divine obscurities, and the absolute
Queen of Society, in the ages when it was exclusively reserved for the
education of the Priests and Kings.

It had reigned in Persia with the Magi, who perished one day, as the
masters of the world had perished, for having abused their power. It had
endowed India with the most marvellous traditions, and an incredible
luxury of poetry, grace, and terror in its emblems: it had civilized
Greece by the sounds of the lyre of Orpheus: it hid the principles of
all the sciences, and of the whole progression of the human spirit, in
the audacious calculations of Pythagoras: fable teemed with its
miracles; and history, when it undertook to judge of this unknown power,
confounded itself with fable: it shook or enfeebled empires by its
oracles; made tyrants turn pale on their thrones, and ruled over all
minds by means of curiosity or fear. To this science, said the crowd,
nothing is impossible; it commands the elements, knows the language of
the planets, and controls the movements of the stars; the moon, at its
voice, falls, reeking with blood, from Heaven; the dead rise upright on
their graves, and shape into fatal words the wind that breathes through
their skulls. Controller of Love or Hate, this science can at pleasure
confer on human hearts Paradise or Hell: it disposes at will of all
forms, and distributes beauty or deformity as it pleases: it changes in
turn, with the rod of Circe, men into brutes and animals into men: it
even disposes of Life or of Death, and can bestow on its adepts riches
by the transmutation of metals, and immortality by its quintessence and
elixir, compounded of gold and light.

This is what magic had been, from Zoroaster to Manes, from Orpheus to
Apollonius Thyaneus; when positive Christianity, triumphing over the
splendid dreams and gigantic aspirations of the school of Alexandria,
publicly crushed this philosophy with its anathemas, and compelled it to
become more occult and more mysterious than ever.

At the bottom of magic, nevertheless, was science, as at the bottom of
Christianity there was love; and in the Evangelic Symbols we see the
incarnate WORD adored in its infancy by three magi whom a star guides
(the ternary and the sign of the microcosm), and receiving from them
gold, frankincense, and myrrh; another mysterious ternary, under the
emblem whereof are allegorically contained the highest secrets of the
Kabala.

Christianity should not have hated magic; but human ignorance always
fears the unknown. Science was obliged to conceal itself, to avoid the
impassioned aggressions of a blind love. It enveloped itself in new
hieroglyphs, concealed its efforts, disguised its hopes. Then was
created the jargon of alchemy, a continual deception for the vulgar
herd, greedy of gold, and a living language for the true disciples of
Hermes alone.

Resorting to Masonry, the alchemists there invented Degrees, and partly
unveiled their doctrine to their Initiates; not by the language of their
receptions, but by oral instruction afterward; for their rituals, to one
who has not the key, are but incomprehensible and absurd jargon.

Among the sacred books of the Christians are two works which the
infallible church does not pretend to understand, and never attempts to
explain,--the prophecy of Ezekiel and the Apocalypse; two cabalistic
clavicules, reserved, no doubt, in Heaven, for the exposition of the
Magian kings; closed with Seven seals for all faithful believers; and
perfectly clear to the unbeliever initiated in the occult sciences.

For Christians, and in their opinion, the scientific and magical
clavicules of Solomon are lost. Nevertheless, it is certain that, in the
domain of intelligence governed by the WORD, nothing that is written is
lost. Only those things which men cease to understand no longer exist
for them, at least as WORD; then they enter into the domain of enigmas
and mystery.

The mysterious founder of the Christian Church was saluted in His cradle
by the three Magi, that is to say by the hieratic ambassadors from the
three parts of the known world, and from the three analogical worlds of
the occult philosophy.

In the school of Alexandria, Magic and Christianity almost take each
other by the hand under the auspices of Ammonius Saccos and Plato. The
dogma of Hermes is found almost entire in the writings attributed to
Dionysius the Areopagite. Synesius traces the plan of a treatise on
dreams, which was subsequently to be commented on by Cardan, and
composes hymns which might serve for the liturgy of the Church of
Swedenborg, if a church of illuminati could have a liturgy.

To this epoch of ardent abstractions and impassioned logomachies belongs
the philosophical reign of Julian, an illuminatus and Initiate of the
first order, who believed in the unity of God and the universal Dogma of
the Trinity, and regretted the loss of nothing of the old world but its
magnificent symbols and too graceful images. He was no Pagan, but a
Gnostic, infected with the allegories of Grecian polytheism, and whose
misfortune it was to find the name of Jesus Christ less sonorous than
that of Orpheus.

We may be sure that so soon as Religion and Philosophy become distinct
departments, the mental activity of the age is in advance of its Faith;
and that, though habit may sustain the latter for a time, its vitality
is gone.

The dunces who led primitive Christianity astray, by substituting faith
for science, reverie for experience, the fantastic for the reality; and
the inquisitors who for so many ages waged against Magism a war of
extermination, have succeeded in shrouding in darkness the ancient
discoveries of the human mind; so that we now grope in the dark to find
again the key of the phenomena of nature. But all natural phenomena
depend on a single and immutable law, represented by the philosophal
stone and its symbolic form, which is that of a cube. This law,
expressed in the Kabala by the number 4, furnished the Hebrews with all
the mysteries of their divine Tetragram.

Everything is contained in that word of four letters. It is the _Asot_
of the Alchemists, the _Thot_ of the Bohemians, the _Taro_ of the
Kabalists. It supplies to the Adept the last word of the human Sciences,
and the Key of the Divine Power: but he alone understands how to avail
himself of it who comprehends the necessity of never revealing it. If
Œdipus, in place of _slaying_ the Sphynx, had _conquered_ it, and driven
it into Thebes harnessed to his chariot, he would have been King,
without incest, calamities, or exile. If Psyche, by submission and
caresses, had persuaded Love to reveal himself, she would never have
lost him. Love is one of the mythological images of the grand secret and
the grand agent, because it expresses at once an action and a passion, a
void and a plenitude, an arrow and a wound. The Initiates ought to
understand this, and, lest the profane should overhear, Masonry never
says too much.

When Science had been overcome in Alexandria by the fanaticism of the
murderers of Hypalia, it became Christian, or, rather, it concealed
itself under Christian disguises, with Ammonius, Synosius, and the
author of the books of Dionysius the Areopagite. Then it was necessary
to win the pardon of miracles by the appearances of superstition, and of
science by a language unintelligible. Hieroglyphic writing was revived,
and pantacles and characters were invented, that summed up a whole
doctrine in a sign, a whole series of tendencies and revelations in a
word. What was the object of the aspirants to knowledge? They sought for
the secret of the great work, or the Philosophal Stone, or the perpetual
motion, or the squaring of the circle, or the universal medicine;
formulas which often saved them from persecution and general ill-will,
by exposing them to the charge of folly; and each of which expressed one
of the forces of the grand magical secret. This lasted until the time of
the Roman de la Rose, which also expresses the mysterious and magical
meaning of the poem of Dante, borrowed from the High Kabalah, that
immense and concealed source of the universal philosophy.

It is not strange that man knows but little of the powers of the human
will, and imperfectly appreciates them; since he knows nothing as to the
nature of the will and its mode of operation. That his own will can move
his arm, or compel another to obey him; that his thoughts, symbolically
expressed by the signs of writing, can influence and lead other men, are
mysteries as incomprehensible to him, as that the will of Deity could
effect the creation of a Universe.

The powers of the will are as yet chiefly indefinite and unknown.
Whether a multitude of well-established phenomena are to be ascribed to
the power of the will alone, or to magnetism or some other natural
agent, is a point as yet unsettled; but it is agreed by all that a
concentrated effort of the will is in every case necessary to success.

That the phenomena are real is not to be doubted, unless credit is no
longer to be given to human testimony; and if they are real, there is no
reason for doubting the exercise heretofore, by many adepts, of the
powers that were then termed magical. Nothing is better vouched for than
the extraordinary performances of the Brahmins. No religion is supported
by stronger testimony; nor has any one ever even attempted to explain
what may well be termed their miracles.

How far, in this life, the mind and soul can act without and
independently of the body, no one as yet knows. That the will can act at
all without bodily contact, and the phenomena of dreams, are mysteries
that confound the wisest and most learned, whose explanations are but a
Babel of words.

Man as yet knows little of the forces of nature. Surrounded,
controlled, and governed by them, while he vainly thinks himself
independent, not only of his race, but the universal nature and her
infinite manifold forces, he is the slave of these forces, unless he
becomes their master. He can neither ignore their existence nor be
simply their neighbor.

There is in nature one most potent force, by means whereof a single man,
who could possess himself of it, and should know how to direct it, could
revolutionize and change the face of the world.

This force was known to the ancients. It is a universal agent, whose
Supreme law is equilibrium; and whereby, if science can but learn how to
control it, it will be possible to change the order of the Seasons, to
produce in night the phenomena of day, to send a thought in an instant
round the world, to heal or slay at a distance, to give our words
universal success, and make them reverberate everywhere.

This agent, partially revealed by the blind guesses of the disciples of
Mesmer, is precisely what the Adepts of the middle ages called the
elementary matter of the great work. The Gnostics held that it composed
the igneous body of the Holy Spirit; and it was adored in the secret
rites of the Sabbat or the Temple, under the hieroglyphic figure of
Baphomet or the hermaphroditic goat of Mendes.

There is a Life-Principle of the world, a universal agent, wherein are
two natures and a double current, of love and wrath. This ambient fluid
penetrates everything. It is a ray detached from the glory of the Sun,
and fixed by the weight of the atmosphere and the central attraction. It
is the body of the Holy Spirit, the universal Agent, the Serpent
devouring his own tail. With this electro-magnetic ether, this vital and
luminous caloric, the ancients and the alchemists were familiar. Of this
agent, that phase of modern ignorance termed physical science talks
incoherently, knowing naught of it save its effects; and theology might
apply to it all its pretended definitions of spirit. Quiescent, it is
appreciable by no human sense; disturbed or in movement, none can
explain its mode of action; and to term it a "fluid," and speak of its
"currents," is but to veil a profound ignorance under a cloud of words.

Force attracts force, life attracts life, health attracts health. It is
a law of nature.

If two children live together, and still more if they sleep together,
and one is feeble and the other strong, the strong will absorb the
feeble, and the latter will perish.

In schools, some pupils absorb the intellect of the others, and in every
circle of men some one individual is soon found, who possesses himself
of the wills of the others.

Enthralments by currents is very common; and one is carried away by the
crowd, in morals as in physics. The human will has an almost absolute
power in determining one's acts; and every external demonstration of a
will has an influence on external things.

Tissot ascribed most maladies to disorders of the will, or the perverse
influences of the wills of others. We become subject to the wills of
others by the analogies of our inclinations, and still more by those of
our defects. To caress the weaknesses of an individual, is to possess
ourself of him, and make of him an instrument in the order of the same
errors or depravations. But when two natures, analogical in defects, are
subordinated one to the other, there is effected a kind of substitution
of the stronger instead of the weaker, and a genuine imprisonment of one
mind by the other. Often the weaker struggles, and would fain revolt;
and then falls lower than ever in servitude.

We each have some dominant defect, by which the enemy can grasp us. In
some it is vanity, in others indolence, in most egotism. Let a cunning
and evil spirit possess himself of this, and you are lost. Then you
become, not foolish, nor an idiot, but positively a lunatic, the slave
of an impulse from without. You have an instinctive horror for
everything that could restore you to reason, and will not even listen to
representations that contravene your insanity.

Miracles are the natural effects of exceptional causes.

The immediate action of the human will on bodies, or at least this
action exercised without visible means, constitutes a miracle in the
physical order.

The influence exercised on wills or intellects, suddenly or within a
given time, and capable of taking captive the thoughts, changing the
firmest resolutions, paralyzing the most violent passions, constitutes a
miracle in the moral order.

The common error in relation to miracles is, to regard them as effects
without causes; as contradictions of nature; as sudden fictions of the
Divine imagination; and men do not reflect that a single miracle of
this sort would break the universal harmony and re-plunge the Universe
into Chaos.

There are miracles impossible to God Himself: absurd miracles are so. If
God could be absurd for a single instant, neither He nor the Universe
would exist an instant afterward. To expect of the Divine Free-Will an
effect whose cause is unacknowledged or does not exist, is what is
termed tempting God. It is to precipitate one's self into the void.

God acts by His works: in Heaven, by angels; on earth, by men.

In the heaven of human conceptions, it is humanity that creates God; and
men think that God has made them in His image, because they make Him in
theirs.

The domain of man is all corporeal nature, visible on earth; and if he
does not rule the planets or the stars, he can at least calculate their
movement, measure their distances, and identify his will with their
influence: he can modify the atmosphere, act to a certain point on the
seasons, cure and afflict with sickness other men, preserve life and
cause death.

The absolute in reason and will is the greatest power which it is given
to men to attain; and it is by means of this power that what the
multitude admires under the name of miracles, are effected.

POWER is the wise use of the will, which makes Fatality itself serve to
accomplish the purposes of Sages.

Omnipotence is the most absolute Liberty; and absolute Liberty cannot
exist without a perfect equilibrium; and the columns JACHIN and BOAZ are
also the unlimited POWER and SPLENDOR OF PERFECTION of the Deity, the
seventh and eighth SEPHIROTH of the Kabalah, from whose equilibrium
result the eternal permanence and Stability of His plans and works, and
of that perfect Success and undivided, unlimited Dominion, which are the
ninth and tenth SEPHIROTH, and of which the Temple of Solomon, in its
stately symmetry, erected without the sound of any tool of metal being
heard, is to us a symbol. "For Thine," says the Most Perfect of Prayers,
"is the DOMINION, the POWER, and the GLORY, during all the ages! Amen!"

The ABSOLUTE is the very _necessity_ of BEING, the immutable law of
Reason and of Truth. It is THAT WHICH IS. BUT THAT WHICH IS is in some
sort before HE WHO IS. God Himself is not without a _reason of
existence_. He does not exist _accidentally_. He could not _not_ have
been. His Existence, then, is _necessitated_ is _necessary_. He _can_
exist only in virtue of a Supreme and inevitable REASON. That REASON,
then, is THE ABSOLUTE; for it is in IT we must believe, if we would that
our faith should have a reasonable and solid basis. It has been said in
our times, that God is a Hypothesis; but Absolute Reason is not one: it
is essential to Existence.

Saint Thomas said, "_A thing is not just because God wills it_, BUT GOD
WILLS IT BECAUSE IT IS JUST." If he had deduced all the consequences of
this fine thought, he would have discovered the true Philosopher's
Stone; the magical elixir, to convert all the trials of the world into
golden mercies. Precisely as it is a necessity for God to BE, so it is a
necessity for Him to be just, loving, and merciful. He cannot be unjust,
cruel, merciless. He cannot repeal the law of right and wrong, of merit
and demerit; for the moral laws are as absolute as the physical laws.
There are impossible things, As it is impossible to make two and two be
five and not four; as it is impossible to make a thing be and not be at
the same time; so it is impossible for the Deity to make crime a merit,
and love and gratitude crimes. So, too, it was impossible to make Man
perfect, with his bodily senses and appetites, as it was to make his
nerves susceptible of pleasure and not also of pain.

Therefore, according to the idea of Saint Thomas, the moral laws are the
_enactments_ of the Divine WILL, only because they are the _decisions_
of the Absolute WISDOM and REASON, and the _Revelations_ of the Divine
NATURE. In this alone consists the _right_ of Deity to enact them; and
thus only do we attain the certainty in Faith that the Universe is one
Harmony.

To believe in the Reason of God, and in the God of Reason, is to make
Atheism impossible. It is the Idolaters who have made the Atheists.

Analogy gives the Sage all the forces of Nature. It is the key of the
Grand Arcanum, the root of the Tree of Life, the science of Good and
Evil.

The Absolute, is REASON. Reason IS, by means of Itself. It IS BECAUSE IT
IS, and not because we suppose it. IT IS, where nothing _exists_; but
nothing could possibly exist without IT. Reason is Necessity, Law, the
Rule of all Liberty, and the direction of every Initiative. If God IS,
HE IS by Reason. The conception of an Absolute Deity, outside of, or
independent of, Reason, is the IDOL of Black Magic, the PHANTOM of the
Dæmon.

The Supreme Intelligence is necessarily _rational_. God, in philosophy,
can be no more than a Hypothesis; but a Hypothesis imposed by good sense
on Human Reason. To personify the Absolute Reason, is to determine the
Divine Ideal.

NECESSITY, LIBERTY, and REASON! Behold the great and Supreme Triangle of
the Kabalists!

FATALITY, WILL, and POWER! Such is the magical ternary which, in human
things, corresponds with the Divine Triangle.

FATALITY is the inevitable linking together, in succession, of effects
and causes, in a given order.

WILL is the faculty that directs the forces of the Intellect, so as to
reconcile the liberty of persons with the necessity of things.

The argument from these premises must be made by yourself. Each one of
us does that. "Seek," say the Holy Writings, "and ye shall find." Yet
discussion is not forbidden; and without doubt the subject will be fully
treated of in your hearing hereafter. Affirmation, negation,
discussion,--it is by these the truth is attained.

To explore the great Mysteries of the Universe and seek to solve its
manifold enigmas, is the chief use of Thought, and constitutes the
principal distinction between Man and the animals. Accordingly, in all
ages the Intellect has labored to understand and explain to itself the
Nature of the Supreme Deity.

That one Reason and one Will created and governed the Universe was too
evident not to be at once admitted by the _philosophers_ of all ages. It
was the ancient _religions_ that sought to multiply gods. The _Nature_
of the One Deity, and the mode in which the Universe had its beginning,
are questions that have always been the racks in which the human
intellect has been tortured: and it is chiefly with these that the
Kabalists have dealt.

It is true that, in one sense, we can have no actual knowledge of the
Absolute Itself, the _very_ Deity. Our means of obtaining what is
commonly termed _actual_ knowledge, are our senses only. If to _see_ and
_feel_ be _knowledge_, we have none of our own Soul, of electricity, of
magnetism. We see and feel and taste an acid or an alkali, and know
something of the _qualities_ of each; but it is only when we use them in
combination with other substances, and learn their _effects_, that we
really begin to know their _nature_. It is the combination and
experiments of Chemistry that give us a knowledge of the nature and
powers of most animal and vegetable substances. As these are cognizable
by inspection by our senses, we may partially know them by that alone:
but the Soul, either of ourself or of another, being beyond that
cognizance, can only be known by the acts and words which are its
effects. Magnetism and electricity, when at rest, are equally beyond the
jurisdiction of the senses; and when they are in action, we see, feel,
hear, taste, and smell only their effects. We do not know what they
_are_, but only what they _do_. We can know the attributes of Deity only
through His manifestations. To ask anything more, is to ask, not
_knowledge_, but something else, for which we have no name. God is a
Power; and we know nothing of any Power _itself_, but only its effects,
results, and action, and what Reason teaches us by analogy.

In these later days, in laboring to escape from all _material_ ideas in
regard to Deity, we have so refined away our notions of GOD, as to have
no idea of Him at all. In struggling to regard Him as a pure immaterial
Spirit, we have made the word _Spirit_ synonymous with _nothing_, and
can only say that He is a _Somewhat_, with certain attributes, such as
Power, Wisdom, and Intelligence. To compare Him to LIGHT, would now be
deemed not only unphilosophical, but the equivalent of Atheism; and we
find it necessary to excuse and pity the ancients for their inadequate
and gross ideas of Deity, expressed in considering Him as the
Light-Principle, the invisible essence or substance from which visible
Light flows.

Yet our own holy writings continually speak of Him as Light; and
therefore the Tsabeans and the Kabala may well be pardoned for doing the
same; especially since they did not regard Him as the _visible_ Light
known to us, but as the Primordial Ether-Ocean from which light flows.

Before the creation, did the Deity dwell alone in the Darkness, or in
the Light? Did the Light co-exist with Him, or was it created, after an
eternity of darkness? and if it co-existed, was it an effluence from
Him, filling all space as He also filled it, He and the Light at the
same time filling the same place and every place?

MILTON says, expressing the Hebraic doctrine:

Hail, Holy Light, offspring of Heaven first-born,
Or of th' Eternal, co-eternal beam!
May I express thee unblamed, _since God is Light_.

And never but in unapproached Light
Dwelt from Eternity; dwelt then in Thee,
_Bright effluence of bright Essence uncreate_.

"The LIGHT," says the Book _Omschim_, or Introduction to the Kabala,
"Supremest of all things, and most Lofty, and Limitless, and styled
INFINITE, can be attained unto by no cogitation or speculation; and its
VERY SELF is evidently withdrawn and removed beyond all intellection. It
WAS, before all things whatever, produced, created, formed, and made by
Emanation; and in it was neither Time, Head, or Beginning; since it
always existed, and remains forever, without commencement or end."

"Before the Emanations flowed forth, and created things were created,
the Supreme Light was infinitely extended, and filled the whole WHERE;
so that with reference to Light no vacuum could be affirmed, nor any
unoccupied space; but the ALL was filled with that Light of the
Infinite, thus extended, whereto in every regard was no end, inasmuch as
nothing was, except that extended Light, which, with a certain single
and simple equality, was everywhere like unto itself."

AINSOPH is called _Light_, says the Introduction to the Sohar, because
it is impossible to express it by any other word.

To conceive of God as an actuality, and not as a mere non-substance or
name, which involved non-_existence_, the Kabala, like the Egyptians,
imagined Him to be "a most occult Light," AUR; not our material and
visible Light, but the Substance out of which Light flows, the _fire_,
as relative to its heat and flame. Of this Light or Ether, the Sun was
to the Tsabeans the only manifestation or out-shining, and as such it
was worshipped, and not as the type of dominion and power. God was the
_Phōs Noēton_, the Light cognisable only by the Intellect, the
Light-Principle, the Light-Ether, from which souls emanate, and to which
they return.

Light, Fire, and Flame, with the Phœnicians, were the sons of Kronos.
They are the Trinity in the Chaldæan Oracles, the AOR of the Deity,
manifested in _flame_, that issues out of the invisible _Fire_.

In the first three Persian Amshaspands, Lords of LIGHT, FIRE, and
SPLENDOR, we recognize the AOR, ZOHAR, and ZAYO, _Light, Splendor_, and
_Brightness_, of the Kabalah. The first of these is termed AOR MUPALA,
_Wonderful_ or _Hidden_ Light, unrevealed, undisplayed--which is KETHER,
the first Emanation or _Sephirah_, the _Will_ of Deity: the second is
NESTAR, _Concealed_--which is HAKEMAH, the second _Sephirah_, or the
Intellectual Potence of the Deity: and the third is METANOTSATS,
_coruscating_--which is BINAH, the third _Sephirah_, or the intellectual
_producing_ capacity. In other words, they are THE VERY SUBSTANCE of
light, _in_ the Deity: _Fire_, which is that light, limited and
furnished with attributes, so that it _can_ be revealed, but yet remains
unrevealed, and its _splendor_ or out-shining, or the _light_ that goes
out from the fire.

Masonry is a search after Light. That search leads us directly back, as
you see, to the Kabalah. In that ancient and little understood medley of
absurdity and philosophy, the Initiate will find the source of many
doctrines; and may in time come to understand the Hermetic philosophers,
the Alchemists, all the Anti-papal Thinkers of the Middle Ages, and
Emanuel Swedenborg.

The Hansavati Rich, a celebrated Sanscrit Stanza, says: "He is Hansa
(the Sun), dwelling in light; Vasu, the atmosphere dwelling in the
firmament; the invoker of the gods (Agni), dwelling on the altar
(_i.e._, the altar fire); the guest (of the worshipper), dwelling in the
house (the domestic fire); the dweller amongst men (as consciousness);
the dweller in the most excellent orb, (the Sun); the dweller in truth;
the dweller in the sky (the air); born in the waters, in the rays of
light, in the verity (of manifestation), in the Eastern mountains; the
Truth (itself)."

"In the beginning," says a Sanscrit hymn, "arose the Source of golden
light. _He was the only born Lord of all that is_. He established the
earth and the sky. Who is the God to Whom we shall offer our sacrifice?"

"He who gives life, He who gives strength; Whose blessing all the bright
gods desire; _Whose shadow is immortality; Whose shadow is death_; Who
is the God, etc?"

"He through Whom the sky is bright and the earth for us; He through Whom
the Heaven was established, nay, the highest Heaven; He who measured out
the light in the air; Who is the God, etc?"

"He to Whom the Heaven and earth, standing firm by His will, look up
trembling inwardly; He over Whom the rising sun shines forth; Who is the
God, etc?"

"Wherever the mighty water-clouds went, where they placed the seed and
lit the fire, thence arose He Who is the only life of the bright gods;
Who is the God, etc?"

The WORD of God, said the Indian philosophy, is the universal and
invisible Light, cognizable by the senses, that emits its blaze in the
Sun, Moon, Planets, and other Stars. Philo calls it the "Universal
Light," which loses a portion of its purity and splendor in descending
from the intellectual to the sensible world, manifesting itself
outwardly from, the Deity; and the Kabalah represents that only so much
of the Infinite Light flowed into the circular void prepared for
creation within the Infinite Light and Wisdom, as could pass by a canal
like a line or thread. The Sephiroth, emanating from the Deity, were the
rays of His splendor.

The Chaldæan Oracles said: "The intellect of the Generator, stirred to
action, out-spoke, forming within itself, by intellection, universals of
every possible form and fashion, which issued out, flowing forth from
the One Source ... For Deity, impersonated as Dominion, before
fabricating the manifold Universe, posited an intellected and
unchangeable universal, the impression of the form whereof goes forth
through the Universe; and that Universe, formed and fashioned
accordingly, becomes visibly beautified in infinitely varying types and
forms, the Source and fountain whereof is one.... Intellectual
conceptions and forms from the Generative source, succeeding each other,
considered in relation to ever-progressing Time, and intimately
partaking of THE PRIMAL ETHER or FIRE; but yet all these Universals and
Primal Types and Ideas flowed forth from, and are part of, the first
Source of the Generative Power, perfect in itself."

The Chaldeans termed the Supreme Deity ARAOR, Father of Light. From Him
was supposed to flow the light above the world, which illuminates the
heavenly regions. This Light or Fire was considered as the Symbol of the
Divine Essence, extending itself to inferior spiritual natures. Hence
the Chaldean oracles say: "The Father took from Himself, and did not
confine His proper fire within His intellectual potency:" ... "All
things are begotten from one Fire."

The Tsabeans-held that all inferior spiritual beings were emanations
from the Supreme Deity; and therefore Proclus says: "The progression of
the gods is one and continuous, proceeding downward from the
intelligible and latent unities, and terminating in the last partition
of the Divine cause."

It is impossible to speak clearly of the Divinity. Whoever attempts to
express His attributes by the help of abstractions, confines himself to
negatives, and at once loses sight of his ideas, in wandering through a
wilderness of words. To heap Superlatives on Superlatives, and call Him
_best, wisest, greatest_, is but to exaggerate qualities which are found
in man. That there exists one only God, and that He is a Perfect and
Beneficent Being, Reason legitimately teaches us; but of the Divine
_Nature_, of the _Substance_ of the Deity, of the manner of His
Existence, or of the mode of creation of His Universe, the human mind is
inadequate to form any just conception. We can affix no clear ideas to
Omnipotence, Omniscience, Infinity or Eternity; and we have no more
right to attribute intelligence to Him, than any other mental quality of
ourselves, extended indefinitely; or than we have to attribute our
senses to Him, and our bodily organs, as the Hebrew writings do.

We satisfy ourselves with negativing in the Deity everything that
constitutes existence, so far as we are capable of conceiving of
existence. Thus He becomes to us logically nothing, _Non-Ens_. The
Ancients saw no difference between that and Atheism, and sought to
conceive of Him as something real. It is a necessity of Human Nature.
The theological idea, or rather non-idea, of the Deity, is not shared or
appreciated by the unlearned. To them God will always be The Father Who
is in Heaven, a Monarch on His Throne, a Being with human feelings and
human sympathies, angry at their misdeeds, lenient if they repent,
accessible to their supplications. It is the Humanity, far more than the
Divinity, of Christ, that makes the mass of Christians worship Him, far
more than they do the Father.

"The Light of the Substance of The Infinite," is the Kabalistic
expression. Christ was, according to Saint John, "the Light that
lighteth every man that cometh into the world"; and "that Light was the
life of men." "The Light shone in the darkness, and the darkness
comprehended it not."

The ancient ideas in respect to Light were perhaps quite as correct as
our own. It does not appear that they ascribed to Light any of the
qualities of matter. But modern Science defines it to be a flood of
particles of _matter_, flowing or shot out from the Sun and Stars, and
moving through space to come to us. On the theories of mechanism and
force, what force of attraction here or repulsion at the Sun or at the
most distant Star could draw or drive these impalpable, weightless,
infinitely minute particles, appreciably by the Sense of Sight alone, so
far through space? What has become of the immense aggregate of particles
that have reached the earth since the creation? Have they increased its
bulk? Why cannot chemistry detect and analyze them? If matter, why can
they travel only in right lines?

No characteristic of matter belongs to Light, or Heat, or flame, or to
Galvanism, Electricity, and Magnetism. The electric spark is light, and
so is that produced by the flint, when it cuts off particles of steel.
Iron, melted or heated, radiates light; and insects, infusoria, and
decayed wood emit it. Heat is produced by friction and by pressure; to
explain which, Science tells us of _latent_ Caloric, thus representing
it to us as existing without its only known distinctive quality. What
quality of matter enables lightning, blazing from the Heavens, to rend
the oak? What quality of matter enables it to make the circuit of the
earth in a score of seconds?

Profoundly ignorant of the nature of these mighty agents of Divine
Power, we conceal our ignorance by words that have no meaning; and we
might well be asked _why_ Light may not be an effluence from the Deity,
as has been agreed by all the religions of all the Ages of the World.

All truly dogmatic religions have issued from the Kabalah and return to
it: everything scientific and grand in the religious dreams of all the
illuminati, Jacob Bœhme, Swedenborg, Saint-Martin, and others, is
borrowed from the Kabalah; all the Masonic associations owe to it their
Secrets and their Symbols.

The Kabalah alone consecrates the alliance of the Universal Reason and
the Divine Word; it establishes, by the counterpoises of two forces
apparently opposite, the eternal balance of being; it alone reconciles
Reason with Faith, Power with Liberty, Science with Mystery; it has the
keys of the Present, the Past, and the Future.

The Bible, with all the allegories it contains, expresses, in an
incomplete and veiled manner only, the religious science of the Hebrews.
The doctrine of Moses and the Prophets, identical at bottom with that of
the ancient Egyptians, also had its outward meaning and its veils. The
Hebrew books were written only to recall to memory the traditions; and
they were written in Symbols unintelligible to the Profane. The
Pentateuch and the prophetic poems were merely elementary books of
doctrine, morals, or liturgy; and the true secret and traditional
philosophy was only written afterward, under veils still less
transparent. Thus was a second Bible born, unknown to, or rather
uncomprehended by, the Christians; a collection, _they_ say, of
monstrous absurdities; a monument, the adept says, wherein is everything
that the genius of philosophy and that of religion have ever formed or
imagined of the sublime; a treasure surrounded by thorns; a diamond
concealed in a rough dark stone.

One is filled with admiration, on penetrating into the Sanctuary of the
Kabalah, at seeing a doctrine so logical, so simple, and at the same
time so absolute. The necessary union of ideas and signs, the
consecration of the most fundamental realities by the primitive
characters; the Trinity of Words, Letters, and Numbers; a philosophy
simple as the alphabet, profound and infinite as the Word; theorems more
complete and luminous than those of Pythagoras; a theology summed up by
counting on one's fingers; an Infinite which can be held in the hollow
of an infant's hand; ten ciphers, and twenty-two letters, a triangle, a
square, and a circle,--these are all the elements of the Kabalah. These
are the elementary principles of the written Word, reflection of that
spoken Word that created the world!

This is the doctrine of the Kabalah, with which you will no doubt seek
to make yourself acquainted, as to the Creation.

The Absolute Deity, with the Kabalists, has no name. The terms applied
to Him are אור פשו, AOR PASOT, the Most Simple [or Pure] Light, "called
אור סוףּ, AYEN SOPI, or INFINITE, before any Emanation. For then there
was no space or vacant place, but all was infinite Light."

Before the Deity created any Ideal, any limited and intelligible Nature,
or any form whatever, He was alone, and without form or similitude, and
there could be no cognition or comprehension of Him in any wise. He was
without Idea or Figure, and it is forbidden to form any Idea or Figure
of Him, neither by the letter He (ה), nor by the letter Yōd (י), though
these are contained in the Holy Name; nor by any other letter or point
in the world.

But after He created this Idea [this limited and
existing-in-intellection Nature, which the ten Numerations, SEPHIROTH
or Rays are], of the Medium, the First Man ADAM KADMON, He descended
therein, that, by means of this Idea, He might be called by the name
TETRAGRAMMATON; that created things might have cognition of Him, in His
own likeness.

When the Infinite God willed to emit what were to flow forth, He
contracted Himself in the centre of His light, in such manner that most
intense light should recede to a certain circumference, and on all sides
upon itself. And this is the first contraction, and termed צמצם,
_Tsemsum_.

אדם קדמון, ADAM KADMON, the Primal or First Man, is the first Aziluthic
emanant from the Infinite Light, immitted into the evacuated Space, and
from which, afterward, all the other degrees and systems had their
beginnings. It is called the Adam prior to all the first. In it are
imparted ten spherical numerations; and thereafter issued forth the
rectilinear figure of a man in his sephirothic decade, as it were the
diameter of the said circles; as it were the axis of these spheres,
reaching from their highest point to their lowest; and from it depend
all the systems.

But now, as the Infinite Light would be too excellent and great to be
borne and endured, except through the medium of this Adam Kadmon, its
most Secret Nature preventing this, its illuminating light had again to
emanate in streams out of itself, by certain apertures, as it were, like
windows, and which are termed the ears, eyes, nostrils, and mouth.

The light proceeding from this Adam Kadmon is indeed but one; but in
proportion to its remoteness from the place of out-flowing, and to the
grades of its descent, it is more dense.

From the word אצל, ATSIL, to emanate or flow forth, comes the word
אצילוח, ATSILOTH or Aziluth, Emanation, or the System of Emanants. When
the primal space was evacuated, the surrounding Light of the Infinite,
and the Light immitted into the void, did not touch each other; but the
Light of the Infinite flowed into that void through a line or certain
slender canal; and that Light is the Emanative and emitting Principle,
or the out-flow and origin of Emanation: but the Light within the void
is the emanant subordinate; and the two cohere only by means of the
aforesaid line.

Aziluth means specifically and principally the first system of the four
Olamoth [עלמות], worlds or systems; which is thence called the Aziluthic
World.

The ten Sephiroth of the general Aziluthic system are ten Nekudoth or
Points.

איןות, AINSOPH, AENSOPH, or AYENSOPH, is the title of the Cause of
Causes, its meaning being "_endless_" because there is no limit to Its
loftiness, and nothing can comprehend it. Sometimes, also, the name is
applied to KETHER, or the CROWN, the first emanation, because that is
the Throne of the Infinite, that is, its first and highest Seat, than
which none is higher, and because Ainsoph resides and is concealed
therein: hence it rejoices in the same name.

Before that anything was, says the _Emech Hammelech_, He, of His mere
will, proposed to Himself to make worlds ... but at that time there was
no vacant space for worlds; but all space was filled with the light of
His Substance, which He had with fixed limits placed in the centre of
Himself, and of the parts whereof, and wherein, He was thereafter to
effect a folding together.

What then did the Lord of the Will, that most perfectly free Agent, do?
By His own estimation, He measured off within His own Substance the
width and length of a circular space to be made vacant, and wherein
might be posited the worlds aforesaid; and of that Light which was
included within the circle so measured, He compressed and folded over a
certain portion ... and that Light He lifted higher up, and so a place
was left unoccupied by the Primal Light.

But yet was not this space left altogether empty of that Light; for the
vestiges of the Primal Light still remained in the place where Itself
had been; and they did not recede therefrom.

Before the Emanations out-flowed, and created things were created, the
Supreme Light was infinitely extended, and filled the whole _Where_:
nothing _was_, except that extended light, called AOR H' AINSOPH, the
Light of the non-finite.

When it came into the mind of the Extended to will to make worlds, and
by forth-flowing to utter Emanations, and to emit as Light the
perfection of His active powers, and of His aspects and attributes,
which was the impelling cause of the creation of worlds; then that
Light, in some measure compressed, receded in every direction from a
particular central point, and on all sides of it drew back, and so a
certain vacuum was left, called void space, its circumference everywhere
equidistant from that point which was exactly in the centre of the
space ... a certain void place and space left in Mid-Infinite: a certain
_Where_ was thereby constituted wherein Emanations might BE, and the
Created, the Fashioned and the Fabricated.

This world of the _garmenting_,--this circular vacant space, with the
vestiges of the withdrawn light of the Infinite yet remaining, is the
inmost garment, nearest to His substance; and to it belongs the name AOR
PENAI-AL, _Light of the Countenance of God_.

An interspace surrounds this great circle, established _between_ the
light of the _very_ substance, surrounding the circle on its outside,
and the substance contained _within_ the circle. This is called SPLENDOR
EXCELSES, in contradistinction to Simple Splendor.

This light "of the vestige of the garment," is said to be, relatively to
that of the vestige of the substance, like a point in the centre of a
circle. This light, a point in the centre of the Great Light, is called
Auir, Ether, or Space.

This Ether is somewhat more gross than the Light--not so Subtle--_though
not perceptible by the Senses_--is termed the Primal Ether--extends
everywhere; Philosophers call it _the Soul of the World._

The Light so _forth-shown_ from the Deity, cannot be said to be
_severed_ or _diverse_ from Him. "It is flashed forth from Him, and yet
all continues to be perfect unity..." The Sephiroth, sometimes called
the _Persons_ of the Deity, _are His rays_, by which He is enabled most
perfectly to manifest Himself.

The Introduction to the Book SOHAR says:

The first compression was effected, in order that the Primal Light might
be upraised, and a space become vacant. The second compression occurred
when the vestiges of the removed Light remaining were compressed into
points; and that compression was effected by means of the emotion of
joy; the Deity rejoicing, it had already been said, on account of His
Holy People, thereafter to come into being; and that joy being vehement,
and a commotion and exhilaration in the Deity being caused by it, so
that He flowed forth in His delight; and of this commotion an abstract
power of judgment being generated, which is a collection of the letters
generated by the points of the vestiges of Light left within the circle.
_For He writes the finite expressions, or limited manifestations of
Himself upon the Book, in single letters_.

Like as when water or fire, it had been said, is blown upon by the wind,
it is wont to be greatly moved, and with flashes like lightning to
smite the eyes, and gleam and coruscate hither and thither, even so The
Infinite was moved within Himself, and shone and coruscated in that
circle, from the centre outward and again to the centre: and that
commotion we term exhilaration; and from that exhilaration, variously
divided within Himself, was generated the potency of determining the
fashioning of the letters.

Of that exhilaration, it had also been said, was generated the
determination of _forms_, by which determination the Infinite determined
them within Himself, as if by saying: "Let this Sphere be the appointed
place, wherein let all worlds be created!"

He, by radiating and coruscating, effected the points, so that their
sparkling should smite the eyes like lightning. Then He combined
diversely the single points, until _letters_ were fashioned thereof, in
the similitude and image of those wherewith THE BLESSED had set forth
the decrees of His Wisdom.

It is not possible to attain to an understanding of the creation of man,
except by the mystery of letters; and in these worlds of The Infinite is
nothing, except the letters of the Alphabet and their combinations. All
the worlds are Letters and Names; but He Who is the Author of all, has
no name.

This world of the covering [or _garment--vestimenti_], [that is, the
circular vacant space, with the vestiges of the removed Light of The
Infinite still remaining after the first contraction and compression],
is the _inmost_ covering, _nearest_ to His substance; and to this
covering belongs the general name AUR PENIAL, _Light of the Countenance
of God_: by which we are to understand the Light of The Substance.

And after this covering was effected, He contracted it, so as to lift up
the lower moiety; ... and this is the _third_ contraction; and in this
manner He made vacant a space for the worlds, which had not the capacity
to use the great Light of the covering, the end whereof was lucid and
excellent as its beginning. And so [by drawing up the lower half and
half the letters], are made the _Male_ and _Female_, that is, the
anterior and posterior adhering mutually to one another.

The vacant space effected by this retraction is called AUIR KADMON, the
PRIMAL SPACE: for it was the first of all Spaces; nor was it allowable
to call it _covering_, which is AUR PENI-BAL, the Light of the
Countenance of God.

The vestiges of the Light of the Garment still remained there. And this
world of the garment has a name _that includes all things_, which is the
name IHUH. Before the world of the vacant space was created, HE was, and
His Name, and they alone; that is, AINSOPH and His garmenting.

The EMECH HAMMELECH says again:

The lower half of the garment [by the third retraction], was left empty
of the light of the garment. But the vestiges of that light remained in
the place so vacated ... and _this_ garment is called SHEKINAH, God
in-dwelling; that is, the place where יה Yöd He, of the anterior [or
male], and וה Vav He, of the posterior [or female], combinations of
letters dwelt.

This vacant space was square, and is called the _Primal Space_; and in
Kabalah it is called _Auira Kadmah_, or _Rasimu Ailah_, The Primal
Space, or The Sublime Vestige. It is the vestige of the Light of the
Garment, with which is intermingled somewhat of the vestige of the Very
Substance. It is called _Primal Ether_, but not void Space ... The Light
of the Vestige still remains in the place it occupied, and adheres
there, like somewhat spiritual, of extreme tenuity.

In this Ether are two Lights; that is, the Light of the SUBSTANCE, which
was taken away, and that of the Garment. There is a vast difference
between the two; for that of the Vestige of the Garment is, relatively
to that of the Vestige of the Substance, _like a point in the centre of
a circle_. And as the only appropriate name for the Light of the Vestige
of Ainsoph is AUR, _Light_, therefore the Light of the Vestige of the
Garment could not be called by _that_ name; and so we term it a point,
that is, Yōd [' or י], which is that point in the centre of Light ...
and _this_ Light, a point in the centre of the Great Light, is called
_Auir_, Ether, or Space.

This Ether is somewhat more gross than The Light ... not so subtle,
though not perceptible by the senses ... is termed the Primal Ether ...
extends everywhere; whence the Philosophers call it The Soul of the
World ... Light is visible, though not perceptible. _This Ether is
neither perceptible nor visible_.

The Introduction to the Book Sohar continues, in the Section of the
Letter Yōd, etc:

Worlds could not be framed in this Primal Ether, on account of its
extreme tenuity and the excess of Light; and also, because in it
remained the vital Spirit of the Vestige of the Light Ainsoph, and that
of the Vestige of the Light of the Garment; whereby such manifestation
was prevented.

Wherefore HE directed the letter Yōd, since it was not so brilliant as
the Primal Ether, to descend, and take to itself the light remaining in
the Primal Ether, and return above, with that Vestige which so impeded
the manifestation; which Yōd did.

It descended below five times, to remove the vital Spirit of the Vestige
of the Light Ainsoph; and the Vestige of the Light and vital Spirit of
the Garment from the Sphere of Splendor, so as to make of it ADAM,
called KADMON. And by its return, manifestation is effected in the space
below, and a Vestige of the Sublime Brilliance yet remains there,
existing as a Spherical Shape, and termed in the Sohar simply _Tehiru_,
that is, Splendor; and it is styled The First Matter ... it being, as it
were, vapor, and, as it were, smoke. And as smoke is formless, not
comprehended under any fixed definite form, so this Sphere is a formless
somewhat, since it seems to be somewhat that is spherical, and yet is
not limited.

The letter Yōd, while adhering to the Shekinah, had adhering, to himself
the Light of the Shekinah, though his light was not so great as that of
the Shekinah. But when he descended, he left that light of his own
below, and the Splendor consisted of it. After which there was left in
Yōd only a vestige of that light, inasmuch as he could not re-ascend to
the Shekinah and adhere to it. Wherefore The Holy and Blessed directed
the letter He [Hebrew: ה], the female letter, to communicate to Yōd of
her Light; and sent him forth, to descend and share with _that_ light in
the Splendor aforesaid ... and when he re-descended into the Sphere of
Splendor, he diffused abroad in it the Light communicated to him by the
letter He.

And when he again ascended he left behind him the productive light of
the letter He, and thereof was constituted another Sphere, _within_ the
Sphere of Splendor; which _lesser_ Sphere is termed in the Sohar KETHER
AILAH, CORONA SUMMA, _The Supreme Crown_, and also ATIKA DE ATIKIM,
_Antiquus Antiquum, The Ancient of Ancients_, and even AIUT H' AIUT,
_Causa Causarum, the Cause of Causes_. But the Crown is very far smaller
than the Sphere of Splendor, so that within the latter an immense
unoccupied place and space is still left.

The BETH ALOHIM says:

Before the Infinite God, the Supreme and First Good, formed objectively
within Himself a particular conception, definite, limited, and the
object of intellection, and gave form and shape to an intellectual
conception and image. HE was alone, companionless, without form or
similitude, utterly without Ideal or Figure ... It is forbidden to make
of Him any figure whatever, by any image in the world, neither by the
letter He nor by the letter Yōd, nor by any other letter or point in the
world.

But after He had formed this Idea, the particular conception, limited
and intelligible, which the Ten Numerations are, of the medium of
transmission, Adam Kadmon, the Primal or Supreme Man, He by that medium
descended, and may, through that Idea, be called by the name IHUH, and
so created things have cognizance of Him, by means of His proper
likeness.

Woe unto him who makes God to be like unto any mode or attribute
whatever, even were it to one of His own; and still more if he make Him
like unto the Sons of Men, whose elements are earthly, and so are
consumed and perish!

There can be no conception had of Him, except in so far as He manifests
Himself, in exercising dominion by and through some attribute ...
Abstracted from this, there can be no attribute, conception, or ideal of
Him. He is comparable only to the Sea, filling some great reservoir, its
bed in the earth, for example; wherein it fashions for itself a certain
concavity, so that thereby we may begin to compute the dimensions of the
Sea itself.

For example, the Spring and Source of the Ocean is a somewhat, which is
_one_. If from this Source or Spring there issues forth a certain
fountain, proportioned to the space occupied by the Sea in that
hemispherical reservoir, such as is the letter Yōd, there the Source of
Spring is the first somewhat, and the fountain that flows forth from it
is the second. Then let there be made a great reservoir, as by
excavation, and let this be called the Ocean, and we have the third
thing, a vessel [_Vas_]. Now let this great reservoir be divided into
seven beds of rivers, that is, into seven oblong reservoirs, so that
from this ocean the waters may flow forth in seven rivers; and the
Source, Fountain, and Ocean thus make _ten_ in all.

The Cause of Causes made ten Numerations, and called the Source of
Spring KETHER, _Corona_, the Crown, in which the idea of circularity is
involved, for there is no _end_ to the out-flow of Light; and therefore
He called this, like Himself, _endless_; for this also, like Him, has no
similitude or configuration, nor hath it any vessel or receptacle
wherein it may be contained, or by means whereof any possible cognizance
can be had of it.

After thus forming the Crown, He constituted a certain smaller
receptacle, the letter Yōd, and filled it from that source; and this is
called "The Fountain gushing with Wisdom," and, manifested in this, He
called Himself WISE, and the vessel He called HAKEMAH, _Wisdom,
Sapientia_.

Then He also constituted a great reservoir, which He called the Ocean;
and to it He gave the name of BINAH, Understanding, _Intelligentia_. In
this He characterized Himself as Intelligent or _Conceiver_. HE is
indeed the Absolutely Wise and Intelligent, but Hakemah is not Absolute
Wisdom of itself, _but is wise by means of Binah_, who fills Himself
from it, and if this supply were taken from it, would be dry and
unintelligent.

And thereupon seven precious vessels become, to which are given the
following names: GEDULAH, _Magnificence_ or _Benignity_ [or KHASED,
_Mercy_]; GEBURAH, _Austerity, Rigor_ or _Severity_; TEPHARETH;
_Beauty_; NETSAKH, _Victory_; HŌD, _Glory_; YESOD, _Foundation_ or
_Basis_; and MALAKOTH, _Rule, Reign, Royalty, Dominion_ or _Power_. And
in GEDULAH He took the character of _Great_ and _Benignant_; in GEBURAH,
of _Severe_; in TEPHARETH, of _Beautiful_; in NETSAKH, of _Overcoming_;
in HŌD, of OUR GLORIOUS AUTHOR; in YESOD, of _Just_, by Yesod all
vessels and worlds being upheld; and in MALAKOTH He applied to Himself
the title of _King_.

These numerations or Sephiroths are held in the Kabala to have been
originally contained in each other; that is, Kether contained the nine
others, Hakemah contained Binah, and Binah contained the last seven.

For all things, says the commentary of Rabbi _Jizchak Lorja_, in a
certain most abstruse manner, consist or reside and are contained in
Binah, and it projects them, and sends them downward, species by
species, into the several worlds of Emanation, Creation, Formation, and
Fabrication; all whereof are derived from what are above them, and are
termed their out-flowings; for, from the potency which was their state
there, they descend into actuality.

The INTRODUCTION says:

It is said in many places in the Sohar, that all things that emanate or
are created have their root above. Hence also the Ten Sephiroth have
their root above, in the world of the garment, with the very Substance
of HIM. And AINSOPH had full consciousness and appreciation, prior to
their actual existence, of all the Grades and Impersonations contained
unmanifested within Himself, with regard to the essence of each, and its
domination then in potency ... When He came to the Sephirah of the
Impersonation Malakoth, which He then contained hidden within Himself,
He concluded within Himself that therein worlds should be framed; since
the scale of the first nine Sephiroths was so constituted, that it was
neither fit nor necessary for worlds to be framed from _them_; for all
the attributes of these nine Superior Sephiroth could be assigned to
Himself, even if He should never operate outwardly; but Malakoth, which
is Empire or Dominion, could not be attributed to Him, unless He ruled
over other Existences; whence from the point Malakoth He produced all
the worlds into actuality.

These circles are ten in number. Originated by points, they expanded in
circular shape. Ten Circles, under the mystery of the ten Sephiroth, and
between them ten Spaces; whence it appears that the sphere of Splendor
is in the centre of the space Malakoth of the First Occult Adam.

The First Adam, _in the ten circles above the Splendor_, is called the
First _occult_ Adam; and in each of these spaces are formed many
thousand worlds. The first Adam is _involved_ in the Primal Ether, and
is the analogue of the world Binah.

Again the Introduction repeats the first and second descent of Yōd into
the vacated space, to make the light there less great and subtile; the
constitution of the _Tehiru_, Splendor, from the light left behind there
by him; the communication of Light to him by the female letter He; the
emission by him of that Light, within the sphere of Splendor, and the
formation thereof, within the sphere "of a certain sphere called the
Supreme Crown," _Corona Summa_, KETHER, "wherein were contained, in
potence, all the remaining Numerations, so that they were not
distinguishable from it. Precisely as in man exist the four elements, in
potence specifically undistinguishable, so in this Corona were in
potence all the ten Numerations, specifically undistinguishable." This
Crown, it is added, was called, after the restoration, The Cause of
Causes, and the Ancient of the Ancients.

The point, Kether, adds the Introduction, was the aggregate of all the
Ten ... when it first emanated, it consisted of all the Ten; and the
Light which extended from the Emanative Principle simultaneously flowed
into _it_; and beheld the two _Universals_ [that is, the Unities out of
which manifoldness flows; as, for example, the _idea_, within the Deity,
of Humanity as a Unit, out of which the individuals were to flow], the
Vessel or Receptacle containing this immitted Light, and the Light
Itself within it. And _this Light is the Substance of the point Kether;
for the WILL, of God is the Soul of all things that are_.

The Ainsophic Light, it had said, was infinite in every direction, and
without end or limit. To prevent it from flowing into and re-filling the
quasi-vacant space, occupied by an infinitely less Splendor, a partition
between the greater and lesser Splendor was necessary; and this
partition, the boundary of the sphere of Splendor, and a like one
bounding the sphere Kether, were called _Vessels_ or _Receptacles,
containing_, including, and enclosing within themselves the light of the
sphere. Imagine a sea of pellucid water, and in the centre of it a
spherical mass of denser and darker water. The outer surface of this
sphere, or its limits every way, is the vessel containing it. The
Kabalah regards the vessels "as by their nature somewhat opaque, and not
so splendid as the light they enclose."

The contained Light is the Soul of the vessels, and is active in them,
like the Human Soul in the human body. The Light of the Emanative
Principle [Ainsoph] _inheres_ in the vessels, as their _Life_, internal
_Light_, and _Soul_ ... Kether emanated, with its Very Substance, at the
same time as Substance and Vessel, in like manner as the flame is
annexed to the live coal, and as the Soul pervades, and is within, the
body. All the Numerations were potentially contained in it.

And this potentiality is thus explained: When a woman conceives, a Soul
is immediately sent into the embryo which is to become the infant, in
which Soul are then, potentially, all the members and veins of the body,
which afterward, from that potency of the Soul, _become_ in the human
body of the child to be born.

Then the wisdom of God commanded that these Numerations potentially in
Kether, should be produced from potentiality into actuality, in order
that worlds might consist; and HE directed Yōd again to descend, and to
enter into and shine within Kether, and then to re-ascend: which was so
done. From which illumination and re-ascension, all the other
numerations, potentially in Kether, were manifested and disclosed; but
they continued still compacted together, remaining within Kether in a
circle.

When God willed to produce the other emanations or numerations from
Kether, it is added, HE sent Yōd down again, to the upper part of
Kether, one-half of him to remain without and one-half to penetrate
within the sphere of Kether. Then He sent the letter Vav into the
Splendor, to pour out its light on Yōd: and thus,--

Yōd received light from Vav, and thereby so directed his countenance
that it should illuminate and confer exceeding great energy on Hakemah,
which yet remained in Kether; so giving it the faculty to proceed forth
therefrom; and that it might collect and contain within itself, and
there reveal, all the other eight numerations, until that time in
Kether.

The sphere of Kether opened, and thereout issued Hakemah, to remain
below Kether, containing in itself all the other numerations.

By a similar process, Binah, illuminated within Hakemah by a second Yōd,
"issued forth out of Hakemah, having within itself the Seven lower
Numerations."

And since the vessel of Binah was excellent, and coruscated with rays of
the color of sapphire, and was so nearly of the same color as the vessel
of Hakemah that there was scarcely any difference between them, hence it
would not quietly remain below Hakemah, but rose, and placed itself on
his left side.

And because the light from above profusely flowed into and accumulated
in the vessel of Hakemah, to so great an extent that it overflowed, and
escaped, coruscating, outside of that vessel, and, flowing off to the
left, communicated potency and increase to the vessel of Binah.... For
Binah is _female_....

Binah, therefore, by means of this energy that flowed into it from the
left side of Hakemah, by virtue of the second Yōd, came to possess such
virtue and potency, as to project beyond itself the Seven remaining
vessels contained within itself, and so emitted them all, continuously,
one after the other ... all connected and linked one with the other,
like the links of a chain.

Three points first emanated, one under the other; Kether, Hakemah, and
Binah; and, so far, there was no copulation. But afterward the positions
of Hakemah and Binah changed, so that they were side by side, Kether
remaining above them; and then conjunction of the Male and Female, ABA
and IMMA, _Father_ and _Mother_, as points.

He, from Whom all emanated, created Adam Kadmon, consisting of all the
worlds, so that in him should be somewhat from those above, and somewhat
from those below. Hence in Him was NEPHESCH [PSYCHE, _anima infima_, the
lowest spiritual part of man, _Soul_], from the world ASIAH, which is
one letter _He_ of the Tetragrammaton; _RUACH_ [SPIRITUS, _anima media_,
the next higher spiritual part, or _Spirit_], from the world YEZIRAH,
which is the _Vav_ of the Tetragrammaton; NESCHAMAH [the highest
spiritual part, _mens_ or _anima superior_], from the world BRIAH, which
is the other letter _He_; and NESCHAMAH LENESCHAMAH, from the world
ATSILUTH, which is the YŌD of the Tetragrammaton.

And these letters [the Sephiroth] were changed from the spherical form
into the form of a person, the symbol of which person is the BALANCE, it
being _Male_ and _Female_ ... Hakemah on one side, Binah on the other,
and Kether over them: and so Gedulah on one side, Geburah on the other,
and Tephareth under them.

The Book _Omschim_ says: Some hold that the ten Sephiroth succeeded one
another in ten degrees, one above the other, in regular gradation, one
connected with the other in a direct line, from the highest to the
lowest. Others hold that they issued forth in three lines, parallel with
each other, one on the right hand, one on the left, and one in the
middle; so that, beginning with the highest and going clown to the
lowest, Hakemah, Khased [or Gedulah], and Netsach are one over the
other, in a perpendicular line, on the right hand; Binah, Geburah, and
Hōd on the left; and Kether, Tephareth, Yesod, and Malakoth in the
middle: and many hold that all the ten subsist in circles, one within
the other, and all homocentric.

It is also to be noted, that the Sephirothic tables contain still
another numeration, sometimes called also a Sephirah, which is called
Daath, cognition. It is in the middle, below Hakemah and Binah, and is
the result of the conjunction of these two.

To Adam Kadmon, the Idea of the Universe, the Kabalah assigns a human
form. In this, Kether is the cranium, Hakemah and Binah the two lobes
of the brain, Gedulah and Geburah the two arms, Tephareth the trunk,
Netsach and Hōd the thighs, Yesod the male organ, and Malkuth the female
organ, of generation.

Yōd is Hakemah, and He Binah; Vav is Tephareth, and the last He,
Malkuth.

The whole, say the Books _Mysterii_ or of _Occultation_, is thus summed
up: The intention of God The Blessed was to form Impersonations, in
order to diminish the Light. Wherefore HE constituted, in
Macroprosopos, Adam Kadmon, or Arik Anpin; three Heads. The first is
called, "The Head whereof is no cognition"; the second, "The Head of
that which is non-existent"; and the third, "The Very Head of
Macroprosopos"; and these three are _Corona, Sapientia_, and
_Informatio_, Kether, Hakemah, and Binah, existent in the Corona of the
World of Emanation, or in Macroprosopos; and these three are called in
the Sohar ATIKA KADISCHA, _Senex Sanctissimus_, The Most Holy Ancient.
But the Seven inferior Royalties of the first Adam are called "The
Ancient of Days"; and this Ancient of Days is the internal part, or
Soul, of Macroprosopos.

The human mind has never struggled harder to understand and explain to
itself the process of creation, and of Divine manifestation, _and at the
same time to conceal its thoughts from all but the initiated_, than in
the Kabalah. Hence, much of it seems at first like jargon. Macroprosopos
or Adam Kadmon is, we have said, the idea or intellectual aggregate of
the whole Universe, included and contained unevolved in the manifested
Deity, Himself yet contained unmanifested in the Absolute. The Head,
Kether, "whereof is no cognition," is the _Will_ of the Deity, or the
Deity _as_ Will. Hakemah, the head "of that which is non-existent," is
the Generative Power of begetting or producing Thought; yet _in_ the
Deity, not in action, and therefore non-existent. Binah, "the very or
actual head" of Macroprosopos, is the productive intellectual capacity,
which, impregnated by Hakemah, is to _produce_ the Thought. This Thought
is Daath; or rather, the result is Intellection, Thinking; the Unity, of
which Thoughts are the manifold outflowings.

This may be illustrated by a comparison. Pain, in the human being, is a
feeling or sensation. It must be _produced_. To produce it, there must
be, not only the _capacity_ to _produce_ it, in the nerves, but also the
_power_ of _generating_ it by means of that capacity. This generative
Power, the Passive Capacity which produces, and the pain produced, are
like Hakemah, Binah, and Daath.

The four Worlds or Universals, Aziluth, Briah, Yetzirah, and Asiah, of
Emanation, Creation, Formation, and Fabrication, are another enigma of
the Kabalah. The first three are wholly _within_ the Deity. The first is
the Universe, as it exists potentially in the Deity, determined and
imagined, but as yet wholly formless and undeveloped, except so far as
it is contained in His Emanations. The second is the Universe in idea,
distinct within the Deity, but not invested with forms; a simple unity.
The third is the same Universe in potence in the Deity, unmanifested,
but invested with forms,--the idea developed into manifoldness and
individuality, and succession of species and individuals; and the fourth
is the potentiality become the Actuality, the Universe fabricated, and
existing as it exists for us.

The Sephiroth, says the _Porta Cœlorum_, by the virtue of their Infinite
Emanator, who uses them as a workman uses his tools, and who operates
with and through them, are the cause of existence of everything created,
formed, and fashioned, employing in their production certain _media_.
But these same _Sephiroth, Persons_ and _Lights_, are not creatures _per
se_, but _ideas_, and _Rays_ of THE INFINITE, which, by different
gradations, so descended from the Supreme Source as still not to be
severed from It; but It, through them, is extended to the production and
government of all Entities, and is the Single and Perfect Universal
Cause of All, though becoming determinate for this or the other
operation, through this or that Sephiroth or MODE.

God produced all things by His Intellect and Will and free
Determination. He willed to produce them by the mediation of His
Sephiroth, and Persons ... by which He is enabled most perfectly to
manifest Himself; and that the _more_ perfectly, by producing the causes
themselves, and the Causes of Causes, and not merely the viler effects.

God produced, in the first Originate, all the remaining causates. For,
as He Himself is most simply One, and from One Simple Being One only can
_im_mediately proceed, hence it results that from the First Supreme
Infinite Unity flowed forth at the same time All and One. One, that is,
in so far as flowing from the Most Simple Unity, and being like unto It;
but also All, in so far as, departing from that perfect Singleness which
can be measured by no other Singleness, it became, to a certain extent,
manifold, though still Absolute and Perfect.

Emanation, says the same, is the Resulting displayed from the
Unresulting, the Finite from the Infinite, the Manifold and Composite
from the Perfect Single and Simple, Potentiality from that which is
Infinite Power _and_ Act, the mobile from that which is perennially
permanent; and therefore in a more imperfect and diminished mode than
His Infinite Perfection is. As the First Cause is all things, in an
unresulting and Infinite mode, so the Entities that flow from Him are
the First Causes, in a resulting and finite mode.

THE NECESSARY ENTITY, subsisting of Itself, as It cannot be dissevered
into the manifold, yet becomes, as it were, multiplied in the Causates,
in respect of their Nature, or of the Subsistences, Vessels, and
openings assigned to them; whereby the Single and Infinite Essence,
being inclosed or comprehended in these limits, bounds, or
externalnesses, takes on Itself Definiteness of dimension, and becomes
Itself manifold, by the manifoldness of these envelopes.

As man [the unit of Humanity] is a microcosm, so Adam Kadmon is a
macrocosm, containing all the Causates of the First Cause ... as the
Material Man is the end and completion of all creation, so in the Divine
Man is the beginning thereof. As the inferior Adam _receives_ all things
_from_ all, so the superior Adam _supplies_ all things _to_ all. As the
former is the principle of _reflected_ light, so the latter is of
_Direct_ Light. The former is the terminus of the Light, descending; the
latter its terminus, ascending. As the Inferior man ascends from the
lowest matter even to the First Cause, so the Superior Adam descends
from the Simple and Infinite Act, even to the lowest and most attenuated
Potence.

The Ternary is the bringing back of duality to unity.

The Ternary is the Principle of Number, because, bringing back the
binary to unity, it restores to it the same quantity whereby it had
departed from unity. It is the first odd number, containing in itself
the first even number and the unit, which are the Father and Mother of
all Numbers; and it has in itself the beginning, middle, and end.

Now, Adam Kadmon emanated from the Absolute Unity, and so is himself a
unit; but he also descends and flows downward into his own Nature, and
so is duality. Again, he returns to the Unity, which he hath in himself,
and to The Highest, and so is the Ternary and Quaternary.

And this is why the Essential Name has four letters,--three different
ones, and one of them once repeated; since the first He is the wife of
the Yōd, and the second He is the wife of the Vav.

Those _media_ which manifest the First Cause, in Himself profoundly
hidden, are the Sephiroth, which emanate immediately from that First
Cause, and by Its Nature have produced and do control all the rest.

These Sephiroth were put forth from the One First and Simple,
manifesting His Infinite Goodness. They are the mirrors of His Truth,
and the analogues of His Supremest Essence, the Ideas of His Wisdom, and
the representations of His will; the receptacles of His Potency, and the
instruments with which He operates; the Treasury of His Felicity, the
dispensers of His Benignity, the Judges of His Kingdom, and reveal His
Law; and finally, the Denominations, Attributes, and Names of Him Who is
above all and the Cause of all ... the ten categories, wherein all
things are contained; the universal genera, which in themselves include
all things, and utter them outwardly ... the Second Causes, whereby the
First Cause effects, preserves, and governs all things; the rays of the
Divinity, whereby all things are illumined and manifested; the Forms and
Ideas and Species, out whereof all things issue forth; the Souls and
Potencies, whereby essence, life, and movement are given to all things;
the Standard of times, whereby all things are measured; the incorporeal
Spaces which, in themselves, hold and inclose the Universe; the Supernal
Monads to which all manifolds are referred, and through them to The One
and Simple; and finally the Formal Perfections, flowing forth from and
still connected with the One Eminent Limitless Perfection, are the
Causes of all dependent Perfections, and so illuminate the elementary
Intelligences, not adjoined to matter, and the intellectual Souls, and
the Celestial, Elemental and Element-produced bodies.

The IDRA SUTA says:

HE, the Most Holy Hidden Eldest, separates Himself, and is ever more and
more separated from all that are; nor yet does HE in very deed separate
Himself; because all things cohere with Him and HE with All. HE is All
that is, the Most Holy Eldest of All, the Occult by all possible
occultations.

When HE takes shape, HE produces nine Lights, which shine forth from
Him, from His outforming. And those Lights outshine from Him and emit
flames, and go forth and spread out on every side; as from one elevated
Lamp the Rays are poured forth in every direction, and these Rays thus
diverging, are found to be, when one approaching has cognizance of them,
but a single Lamp.

The Space in which to create is fixed by THE MOST HOLY ANCIENT, and
illuminated by His inflowing, which is the Light of Wisdom, and the
Beginning from which manifestation flows.

And HE is conformed in three Heads, which are but one Head; and these
three are extended into Microprosopos, and from them shines out all that
is.

Then this Wisdom instituted investiture with form, whereby the
unmanifested and informous became manifested, putting on form; and
produced a certain outflow.

When this Wisdom is thus expanded by flowing forth, then it is called
"Father of Fathers," the whole Universe of Things being contained and
comprehended in it. This Wisdom is the principle of all things, and in
it beginning and end are found.

The Book of the Abstruse, says the _Siphra de Zeniutha_, is that which
describes the equilibrium of the Balance. Before the Balance was, face
did not look toward face.

And the _Commentary_ on it says: The Scales of the Balance are
designated as Male and Female. In the Spiritual world Evil and Good are
_in equilibrio_, and it will be restored, when of the Evil Good becomes,
until all is Good. Also this other world is called the World of the
Balance. For, as in the Balance are two scales, one on either side and
the beam and needle between them, so too in this world of restoration,
the Numerations are arranged as distinct persons. For Hakemah is on the
right hand, on the side of Gedulah, and Binah on the left, on the side
of Geburah; and Kether is the beam of the Balance above them in the
middle. So Gedulah or Khased is on one hand, and Geburah on the other,
and under these Tephareth; and Netsach is on one side, and Hōd on the
other, and under these Yesōd.

The Supreme Crown, which is the Ancient Most Holy, the most Hidden of
the Hidden, is fashioned, _within_ the occult Wisdom, of both sexes,
Male and Female.

Hakemah, and Binah, the Mother, whom it impregnates, are quantitatively
equal. Wisdom and the Mother of Intellection go forth at once and dwell
together; for when the Intellectual Power emanates, the productive
_Source_ of intellection is included in Him.

Before Adam Kadmon was fashioned into Male and Female, and the state of
equilibrium introduced, the Father and Mother did not look each other in
the face; for the Father denotes most perfect Love, and the Mother most
perfect Rigor; and she averted her face.

There is no _left_ [female], says the _Idra Rabba_, in the Ancient and
Hidden One; but His totality is Right [male]. The totality of things is
HUA, HE, and HE is hidden on every side.

Macroprosopos [Adam Kadmon] is not so near unto us as to speak to us in
the first person; but is designated in the third person, HUA, HE.

Of the letters it says:

Yōd is male, He is female, Vav is both.

In Yōd [י] are three Yōds, the upper and the lower apex, and Vav in the
middle. By the upper apex is denoted the Supreme Kether; by Vav in the
middle, Hakemah; and by the lower apex, Binah.

The IDRA SUTA says:

The Universe was out-formed in the form of Male and Female. Wisdom,
pregnant with all that is, when it flowed and shone forth, shone
altogether under the form of male and female. Hakemah is the Father, and
Binah is the Mother; and so the two are in equilibrium as male and
female, and for this reason, all things whatsoever are constituted in
the form of male and female; _and if it were not_ so _they would not
exist_.

This Principle, Hakemah, is the Generator of all things; and He and
Binah conjoin, and she shines within Him. When they thus conjoin, she
conceives, and the out-flow is Truth.

Yōd impregnates the letter He and begets a son; and she, thus pregnant,
brings forth. The Principle called Father [the Male or Generative
Principle] is comprehended in Yōd, which itself flows downward from the
energy of the Absolute Holy One.

Yōd is the beginning and the end of all things that are. The stream that
flows forth is the Universe of things, which always _becomes_, having no
cessation. And this _becoming_ world is created by Yōd: for Yōd includes
two letters. All things are included in Yōd; wherefore it is called the
Father of all.

All Categories whatever go forth from Hakemah; and in it are contained
all things, unmanifested; and the aggregate of all things, or the Unity
_in_ which the many _are_, and _out_ of which all flow, is the Sacred
Name IHUH.

In the view of the Kabalists, all individuals are _contained_ in
species, and all species in genera, and all particulars in a Universal,
which is an idea, abstracted from all consideration of individuals; not
an _aggregate_ of individuals; but, as it were, an _Ens_, Entity or
Being, ideal or intellectual, but none the less real; prior to _any_
individual, _containing_ them all, and out of which they are all in
succession evolved.

If this discontents you, reflect that, supposing the theory correct,
that _all_ was originally in the Deity, and that the Universe has
proceeded forth from Him, and not been _created_ by Him out of nothing,
the _idea_ of the Universe, existing in the Deity before its out-flow,
must have been as real as the Deity Himself. The whole Human race, or
Humanity, for example, then existed in the Deity, not distinguished into
individuals, but as a Unit, out of which the Manifold was to flow.

Everything _actual_ must also first have been _possible_, before having
actual existence; and this possibility or potentiality was to the
Kabalists a real Ens. Before the evolvement of the Universe, it had to
exist _potentially_, the whole of it, with all its individuals, included
in a single Unity. This was the Idea or Plan of the Universe; and this
had to be _formed_. It had to emanate from the Infinite Deity, and be
_of_ Himself, though not His Very Self.

Geburah, Severity, the Sephirah opposite to and conjoined sexually with
Gedulah, to produce Tephareth, Harmony and Beauty, is also called in the
Kabalah "_Judgment_," in which term are included the ideas of
_limitation_ and _conditioning_, which often seems, indeed, to be its
principal sense; while Benignity is as often styled _Infinite_. Thus it
is obscurely taught that in everything that is, not only the _Finite_
but also the _Infinite_ is present; and that the rigor of the stern law
of limitation, by which everything below or beside the Infinite Absolute
is limited, bounded, and conditioned, is tempered and modified by the
_grace_, which so relaxes it that the Infinite, Unlimited,
Unconditioned, is also everywhere present; and that it is thus the
Spiritual and Material Natures are _in equilibrio_, Good everywhere
counterbalancing Evil, Light everywhere in equilibrium with Darkness:
from which again results the Universal Harmony of things. In the vacant
space effected for creation, there at last remained a faint vestige or
trace of Ainsophic Light, of the Light of the Substance of the Infinite.
Man is thus both human and divine: and the _apparent_ antagonisms in his
Nature are a real equilibrium, _if he wills it shall be so_; from which
results the Harmony, not only of Life and Action, but of Virtue and
Perfection.

To understand the Kabalistic idea of the Sephiroth, it must be borne in
mind that they were assigned, not only to the world of Emanation,
Aziluth, but also to each of the other worlds, Briah, Jezirah, and
Asiah. They were not only attributes of the Unmanifested Deity, not only
Himself in limitation, but His actual manifestations, or His qualities
made apparent as modes; and they were also qualities of the Universal
Nature--Spiritual, Mental, and Material, produced and made existent by
the outflow of Himself.

In the view of the Kabalah, God and the Universe were One, and in the
One General, as the type or source, were included and involved, and from
it have been evolved and issued forth, the manifold and all particulars.
Where, indeed, does individuality begin? Is it the Hidden Source and
Spring alone that is the individual, the Unit, or is it the flowing
fountain that fills the ocean, or the ocean itself, or its waves, or the
drops, or the vaporous particles, that are the individuals? The Sea and
the River--these are each One; but the drops of each are many. The tree
is one; but its leaves are a multitude: they drop with the frosts, and
fall upon his roots; but the tree still continues to grow, and new
leaves come again in the Spring. Is the Human Race not the Tree, and are
not individual men the leaves? How else explain the force of will and
sympathy, and the dependence of one man at every instant of his life on
others, except by the oneness of the race? The links that bind all
created things together are the links of a single Unity, and the whole
Universe is One, developing itself into the manifold.

Obtuse commentators have said that the Kabalah assigns sexual
characteristics to the very Deity. There is no warrant for such an
assertion, anywhere in the Sohar or in any commentary upon it. On the
contrary, the whole doctrine of the Kabalah is based on the fundamental
proposition, that the Very Deity is Infinite, everywhere extended,
without limitation or determination, and therefore without any
conformation whatever. In order to commence the process of creation, it
was necessary for Him, first of all, to effect a vacant space within
Himself. To this end the Deity, whose Nature is approximately expressed
by describing Him as Light filling all space, formless, limitless,
contracts Himself on all sides from a point within Himself, and thus
effects a quasi-vacant space, in which only a vestige of His Light
remains; and into this circular or spherical space He immits His
Emanations, portions of His Light or Nature; and to some of these,
sexual characteristics are symbolically assigned.

The Infinite first limits Himself by flowing forth in the shape of
_Will_, of determination to act. This _Will_ of the Deity, or the Deity
_as_ will, is _Kether_, or the _Crown_, the first Sephirah. In it are
_included_ all other Emanations. This is a philosophical necessity. The
Infinite does not _first_ will, and _then_, as a sequence to, or
consequence of, that determination, _subsequently_ perform. To will and
to act must be, with Him, not only simultaneous, but in reality _the
same_ ... Nor does He, by His Omniscience, _learn_ that a particular
action will be wise, and then, in consequence of being so convinced,
first _determine_ to do the act, and _then_ do it. His Wisdom and His
Will, also, act simultaneously; and, with Him, to decide that it was
wise to create, _was_ to create. Thus His will contains in itself all
the Sephiroth. This will, determining Him to the exercise of
intellection, to thought, to frame the Idea of the Universe, caused the
Power in Him to excite the intellectual Faculty to exercise, and _was_
that Power. Its SELF, which had flowed forth from Ainsoph as Will, now
flows forth as the Generative Power to beget intellectual action in the
Intellectual Faculty, or Intelligence, Binah. The _Act_ itself, the
Thought, the Intellection, producing the Idea, is _Daath_; and as the
text of the _Siphra de Zeniutha_ says, The Power and Faculty, the
Generative and Productive, the Active and Passive, the Will and
Capacity, which unite to produce that Act of reflection or Thought or
Intellection, are _always_ in conjunction. As is elsewhere said in the
Kabalah, both of them are _contained_ and essentially _involved_ in the
result. And the Will, _as_ Wisdom or Intellectual Power, and the
Capacity or Faculty, are really the Father and Mother of all that is;
for to the creation of _anything_, it was absolutely necessary that The
Infinite should form for Himself and _in_ Himself, an idea of what HE
willed to produce or create: and, as there is no Time with Him, to _will
was_ to _create_, to _plan_ was to _will_ and to _create_; and in the
Idea, the Universe in potence, the universal succession or things was
included. Thenceforward all was merely evolution and development.

Netsach and Hōd, the Seventh and Eighth Sephiroth, are usually called in
the Kabalah, Victory and Glory. Netsach is the perfect _Success_, which,
with the Deity, to Whom the Future is present, _attends_, and to His
creatures is to _result_, from the plan of Equilibrium everywhere
adopted by Him. It is the reconciliation of Light and Darkness, Good and
Evil, Free-will and Necessity, God's omnipotence and Man's liberty; and
the harmonious issue and result of all, without which the Universe would
be a failure. It is the inherent Perfection of the Deity, manifested in
His Idea of the Universe, and in all the departments or worlds,
spiritual, mental, or material, of that Universe; but it is that
Perfection regarded as the successful _result_, which it both causes or
produces and _is_; the _perfection_ of the plan _being_ its _success_.
It is the prevailing of Wisdom over Accident; and it, in turn, both
produces and _is_ the Glory and Laudation of the Great Infinite
Contriver, whose plan is thus Successful and Victorious.

From these two, which are one,--from the excellence and perfection of
the Divine Nature and Wisdom, considered as Success and Glory, as the
opposites of Failure and Mortification, results what the Kabalah,
styling it Yesod, Foundation or Basis, characterizes as the Generative
member of the Symbolical human figure by which the ten Sephiroth are
represented, and from this flows Malakoth, Empire, Dominion, or Rule.
Yesod is the Stability and Permanence, which would, in ordinary
language, be said to _result_ from the perfection of the Idea or
Intellectual Universal, out of which all particulars are evolved; from
the _success_ of that scheme, and the consequent _Glory_ or
Self-Satisfaction of the Deity; but which Stability and Permanence that
Perfection, Success, and Glory really Is; since the Deity, infinitely
Wise, and to Whom the Past, Present, and Future were and always will be
one Now, and all space one HERE, had not to await the operation and
evolution of His plan, as men do the result of an experiment, in order
to see if it would succeed, and so to determine whether it should stand,
and be stable and permanent, or fall and be temporary. Its _Perfection_
was its _Success_; His _Glory_, its _permanence_ and _stability_: and
the Attributes of Permanence and Stability belong, like the others, to
the Universe, material, mental, spiritual, and real, _because_ and _as_
they belong to the Infinite Himself.

This Stability and Permanence causes continuance and generates
succession. It _is_ Perpetuity, and continuity without solution; and by
this continuous succession, whereby out of Death comes new Life, out of
dissolution and resolution comes reconstruction, Necessity and Fatality
result as a consequence: that is to say, the absolute control and
dominion (Malakoth) of The Infinite Deity over all that He produces, and
over chance and accident; and the absolute non-existence in the
Universe, in Time and in Space, of any other powers or influences than
those which, proceeding from Him, are and cannot _not_ be perfectly
submissive to His will. This _results_, humanly speaking; but in
reality, the Perfection of the plan, which is its _success_, His
_glory_, and its _stability_, IS also His Absolute Autocracy, and the
utter absence of Chance, Accident, or Antagonism. And, as the Infinite
Wisdom or Absolute Reason rules in the Divine Nature itself, so also it
does in its Emanations, and in the worlds or systems of Spirit, Soul,
and Matter; in each of which there is as little Chance or Accident or
Unreasoning Fate, as in the Divine Nature unmanifested.

This is the Kabalistic theory as to each of the four worlds;--1st, of
the Divine Nature, or Divinity itself, quantitatively limited and
determined, but not manifested into Entities, which is the world of
_Emanation_; 2d, of the first Entities, that is, of Spirits and Angels,
which is the world of _Creation_; 3d, of the first _forms_; souls, or
psychical natures, which is the world of _Formation_ or _Fashioning_;
and, 4th, of Matter and Bodies, which is the world of _Fabrication_, or,
as it were, of manufacture. In each of these the Deity is _present, as,
in_, and _through_ the Ten Sephiroth. First of these, in each, is
Kether, the Crown, ring, or circlet, the HEAD. Next, _in_ that Head, as
the two Hemispheres of the Brain, are Hakemah and Binah, and their
result and progeny, Daath. These three are found also in the Spiritual
world, and are universals in the psychical and material world, producing
the lower Sephiroth. Then follow, in perfect Equilibrium, Law and
Equity, Justice and Mercy, the Divine Infinite Nature and the Human
Finite Nature, Good and Evil, Light and Darkness, Benignity and
Severity, the Male and the Female again, as Hakerrah and Binah are,
mutually tempering each other, and by their intimate union producing the
other Sephiroth.

The whole Universe, and all the succession of entities and events were
present to The Infinite, before any act of creation; and His Benignity
and Leniency, tempering and qualifying the law of rigorous Justice and
inflexible Retribution, enabled Him to create: because, but for it, and
if He could not but have administered the strict and stern law of
justice, that would have compelled Him to destroy, immediately after its
inception, the Universe He purposed to create, and so would have
_prevented_ its creation. This Leniency, therefore, was, as it were, the
very essence and quintessence of the Permanence and Stability of the
plan of Creation, and part of the Very Nature of the Deity. The Kabalah,
therefore, designates it as _Light_ and _Whiteness_, by which the Very
Substance of Deity is symbolized. With this agree Paul's ideas as to Law
and Grace; for Paul had studied the Kabalah at the feet of Gamaliel the
Rabbi.

With this Benignity, the Autocracy of the dominion and control of the
Deity is imbued and interpenetrated. The former, _poured_, as it were,
into the latter, is an integral and essential _part_ of it, and causes
it to give birth to the succession and continuance of the Universe. For
Malakoth, in the Kabalah, is _female_, and the matrix or womb out of
which all creation is born.

¤_The Sephiroth may be arranged as on page 770._

The Kabalah is the primitive tradition, and its entirety rests on the
single dogma of Magism, "the visible is for us the proportional measure
of the invisible." The Ancients, observing that equilibrium is in
physics the universal law, and that it results from the apparent
opposition of two forces, concluded from the physical to the
metaphysical equilibrium, and thought that in God, that is to say, in
the first living and active cause, two properties necessary to each
other, should be recognized; stability and movement, necessity and
liberty, order dictated by reason and the self-rule of Supreme Will,
Justice, and Love, and consequently Severity and Grace, Mercy or
Benignity.

The idea of equilibrium among all the impersonations; of the male on one
side, and the female on the other, with the Supreme Will, which _is_
also the Absolute Reason, above each two, holding the balance, is,
according to the Kabalah, the foundation of all religions and all
sciences, the primary and immutable idea of things. The Sephiroth are a
triple triangle and a circle, the idea of the Ternary explained by the
balance and multiplied by itself in the

¤ כתר: Kether: Crown
Will.
/\
/ \
/ \
/ \
Binah: ¤ חכמח ¤ / \ כינח: Hakemah:
Passive capacity <──────────> Active Potency
of being impregnated \ / of begetting intellection
and producing \ /
intellection. \ /
\ /
\/ ¤ דעת: Daath: Intellection.
/\
/ \
/ \
/ \
/ \ ¤ גדולה Gedulah: Benignity
Geburah: ¤ גבורה <──────────> or or or
Severity or rigid \ / ¤ הםד Khased: Mercy.
Justice \ /
\ /
\ /
\/ תפארה: Tĕphareth: Beauty:
/\ the Universal Harmony.
/ \
/ \
/ \
<────────>
Hod: ¤ נצה ¤ \ / הוד: Netsach: Victory
Glory \ / or Success.
\ /
\/
| ¤ יםוב Yesūd: Foundation:
| _i.e._, Stability and
| Permanency of things.
|
|
¤ מלכות: Malakoth: Dominion:
Supremacy and absolute control of the Divine Will in all things,
domain of the Ideal; then the realization of this Idea in forms.

Unity can only be manifested by the Binary. Unity itself and the idea of
Unity are already two.

The human unity is made complete by the right and left. The primitive
man was of both sexes.

The Divinity, one in its essence, has two essential conditions as
fundamental bases of its existence--Necessity and Liberty.

The laws of the Supreme Reason necessitate and regulate liberty in God,
Who is necessarily reasonable and wise.

Knowledge supposes the binary. An object known is indispensable to the
being that knows.

The binary is the generator of Society and the law. It is also the
number of the _gnosis_, a word adopted in lieu of _Science_, and
expressing only the idea of cognizance by intuition. It is Unity,
multiplying itself by itself to create; and therefore it is that the
Sacred Symbols make Eve issue from the very chest of Adam.

Adam is the human Tetragram, which is summed up in the mysterious Yōd of
the Kabalah, image of the Kabalistic Phallus. Add to this Yōd [י], the
ternary name of Eve, and you form the name of Jehova, the _Divine_
Tetragram, the transcendent Kabalistic and magical word:

יהוה

Thus it is that Unity, complete in the fecundity of the Ternary, forms,
with it, the Quaternary, which is the key of all numbers, movements, and
forms.

The Square, turning upon itself, produces the circle equal to itself,
and the circular movement of four equal angles turning around one point,
is the quadrature of the circle.

The Binary serves as a measure for Unity; and the relation of equality
between the Above and the Below, forms with them the Ternary.

To us, Creation is Mechanism: to the Ancients it was Generation. The
world-producing egg figures in all cosmogonies; and modern science has
discovered that all animal production is oviparous. From this idea of
generation came the reverence everywhere paid the image of generative
power, which formed the Stauros of the Gnostics, and the philosophical
Cross of the Masons.

_Aleph_ is the man; _Beth_ is the woman. _One_ is the Principle; _two_
is the Word. A. is the Active; B. is the Passive. Unity is Boaz, and the
Binary is Jachin.

The two columns, Boaz and Jachin, explain in the Kabalah all the
mysteries of natural, political, and religious antagonism.

Woman is man's creation; and universal creation is the female of the
First Principle. When the Principle of Existence made Himself Creator,
He produced by emanation an ideal Yōd; and to make room for it in the
plenitude of the uncreated Light, He had to hollow out a pit of shadow,
equal to the dimension determined by His creative desire; and attributed
by Him to the ideal Yōd of radiating Light.

The nature of the Active Principle is to diffuse: of the Passive
Principle, to collect and make fruitful.

Creation is the habitation of the Creator-Word. To create, the
Generative Power and Productive Capacity must unite, the Binary become
Unity again by the conjunction. The WORD is the First-BEGOTTEN, not the
first _created_ Son of God.

SANCTA SANCTIS, we repeat again; the Holy things to the Holy, and to him
who is so, the mysteries of the Kabalah will be holy. Seek and ye shall
find, say the Scriptures: knock and it shall be opened unto you. If you
desire to find and to gain admission to the Sanctuary, we have said
enough to show you the way. If you do not, it is useless for us to say
more, as it has been useless to say so much.

The Hermetic philosophers also drew their doctrines from the Kabalah;
and more particularly from the Treatise _Beth Alohim_ or _Domus Dei_,
known as the _Pneumatica Kabalistica_, of Rabbi Abraham Cohen Irira, and
the Treatise _De Revolutionibus Animarum_ of Rabbi Jitz-chak Lorja.

This philosophy was concealed by the Alchemists under their Symbols, and
in the jargon of a rude Chemistry,--a jargon incomprehensible and absurd
except to the Initiates; but the key to which is within your reach; and
the philosophy, it may be, worth studying. The labors of the human
intellect are always interesting and instructive.

To be always rich, always young, and never to die: such has been in all
times the dream of the Alchemists.

To change into gold, lead, mercury, and all the other metals; to possess
the universal medicine and elixir of life; such is the problem to be
resolved, in order to accomplish this desire and realize this dream.

Like all the Mysteries of Magism, the Secrets of "the Great Work" have a
threefold signification; they are religious, philosophical, and natural.

The philosophal gold, in religion, is the Absolute and Supreme Reason:
in philosophy, it is the Truth; in visible nature, the Sun; in the
subterranean and mineral world, the most perfect and pure gold.

It is for this that the pursuit of the Great Work is called the Search
for the Absolute; and the work itself, the work of the Sun.

All the masters of the Science admit that it is impossible to attain the
material results, unless there are found in the two higher Degrees all
the analogies of the universal medicine and of the philosophal stone.

Then, they say, the work is simple, easy, and inexpensive; otherwise, it
consumes fruitlessly the fortune and lives of the seekers.

The universal medicine for the Soul is the Supreme Reason and Absolute
Justice; for the mind, mathematical and practical Truth; for the body,
the Quintessence, a combination of light and gold.

The prima materia of the Great Work, in the Superior World, is
enthusiasm and activity; in the intermediate world, intelligence and
industry; in the lower world, labor: and, in Science, it is the Sulphur,
Mercury, and Salt, which by turns volatilized and fixed, compose the
AZOTH of the Sages.

The Sulphur corresponds with the elementary form of the Fire; Mercury
with the Air and Water; and Salt with the Earth.

The Great Work is, above all things, the creation of man by himself;
that is to say, the full and entire conquest which he effects of his
faculties and his future. It is, above all, the perfect emancipation of
his will, which assures him the universal empire of Azoth, and the
domain of magnetism, that is, complete power over the universal Magical
agent.

This Magical agent, which the Ancient Hermetic philosophers disguised
under the name of "_Prima Materia_," determines the forms of the
modifiable Substance; and the Alchemists said that by means of it they
could attain the transmutation of metals and the universal medicine.

There are two Hermetic operations, one spiritual, the other material,
dependent the one on the other.

The whole Hermetic Science is contained in the dogma of Hermes, engraven
originally, it is said, on a tablet of emerald. Its sentences that
relate to operating the Great Work are as follows:

"Thou shalt separate the earth from the fire, the subtile from the
gross, gently, with much industry.

"It ascends from earth to Heaven, and again descends to earth, and
receives the force of things above and below.

"Thou shalt by this means possess the glory of the whole world, and
therefore all obscurity shall flee away from thee.

"This is the potent force of all force, for it will overcome everything
subtile, and penetrate everything solid.

"So the world was created."

All the Masters in Alchemy who have written of the Great Work, have
employed symbolic and figurative expressions; being constrained to do
so, as well to repel the profane from a work that would be dangerous for
them, as to be well understood by Adepts, in revealing to them the whole
world of analogies governed by the single and sovereign dogma of Hermes.

So, in their language, gold and silver are the King and Queen, or the
Sun and Moon; Sulphur, the flying Eagle; Mercury, the Man-woman, winged,
bearded, mounted on a cube, and crowned with flames; Matter or Salt, the
winged Dragon; the Metals in ebullition, Lions of different colors; and,
finally, the entire work has for its symbols the Pelican and the Phœnix.

The Hermetic Art is, therefore, at the same time a religion, a
philosophy, and a natural science. As a religion, it is that of the
Ancient Magi and the Initiates of all ages; as a philosophy, we may find
its principles in the school of Alexandria and the theories of
Pythagoras; as a science, we must inquire for its processes of
Paracelsus, Nicholas Flamel, and Raymond Lulle.

The Science is a real one only for those who admit and understand the
philosophy and the religion; and its process will succeed only for the
Adept who has attained the sovereignty of will, and so become the King
of the elementary world: for the grand agent of the operation of the
Sun, is that force described in the Symbol of Hermes, of the table of
emerald; it is the universal magical power; the spiritual, fiery, motive
power; it is the Od, according to the Hebrews, and the Astral light,
according to others.

Therein is the secret fire, living and philosophical, of which all the
Hermetic philosophers speak with the most mysterious reserve: the
Universal Seed, the secret whereof they kept, and which they represented
only under the figure of the Caduceus of Hermes.

This is the grand Hermetic arcanum. What the Adepts call dead matter are
bodies as found in nature; living matters are substances assimilated and
magnetized by the science and will of the operator.

So that the Great Work is more than a chemical operation; it is a real
creation of the human word initiated into the power of the Word of God.

The creation of gold in the Great Work is effected by transmutation and
multiplication.

Raymond Lulle says, that to make gold, one must have gold and mercury;
and to make silver, silver and mercury. And he adds: "I mean by mercury,
that mineral spirit so fine and pure that it gilds even the seed of
gold, and silvers that of silver." He meant by this, either electricity,
or Od, the astral light.

The Salt and Sulphur serve in the work only to prepare the mercury, and
it is to the mercury especially that we must assimilate, and, as it
were, incorporate with it, the magnetic agent. Paracelsus, Lulle, and
Flamel alone seem to have perfectly known this mystery.

The Great Work of Hermes is, therefore, an operation essentially
magical, and the highest of all, for it supposes the Absolute in Science
and in Will. There is light in gold, gold in light, and light in all
things.

The disciples of Hermes, before promising their adepts the elixir of
long life or the powder of projection, advised them to seek for the
Philosophal _Stone_.

The Ancients adored the _Sun_, under the form of a black Stone, called
Elagabalus, or Heliogabalus. The faithful are promised, in the
Apocalypse, a white Stone.

This Stone, says the Masters in Alchemy, is the true _Salt_ of the
philosophers, which enters as one-third into the composition of Azoth.
But Azoth is, as we know, the name of the grand Hermetic Agent, and the
true philosophical Agent: wherefore they represent their Salt under the
form of a cubical Stone.

The Philosophal Stone is the foundation of the Absolute philosophy, the
Supreme and unalterable Reason. Before thinking of the Metallic work,
we must be firmly fixed on the Absolute principles of Wisdom; we must be
in possession of this Reason, which is the touchstone of Truth. A man
who is the slave of prejudices will never become the King of Nature and
the Master of transmutations. The Philosophal Stone, therefore, is
necessary above all things. How shall it be found? Hermes tells us, in
his "Table of Emerald," we must separate the subtile from the fixed,
with great care and extreme attention. So we ought to separate our
certainties from our beliefs, and make perfectly distinct the respective
domains of science and faith; and to comprehend that we do not know the
things we believe, nor believe anything that we come to know; and that
thus the essence of the things of Faith are the unknown and indefinite,
while it is precisely the contrary with the things of Science. Whence we
shall conclude, that Science rests on reason and experience, and Faith
has for its bases sentiment and reason.

The Sun and Moon of the Alchemists concur in perfecting and giving
stability to the Philosophal Stone. They correspond to the two columns
of the Temple, Jachin and Boaz. The Sun is the hieroglyphical sign of
Truth, because it is the source of Light; and the rough Stone is the
symbol of Stability. Hence the Mediæval Alchemists indicated the
Philosophal Stone as the first means of making the philosophical gold,
that is to say, of transforming all the vital powers figured by the six
metals into Sun, that is, into Truth and Light; which is the first and
indispensable operation of the Great Work, which leads to the secondary
adaptation, and enables the creators of the spiritual and living gold,
the possessors of the true philosophical Salt, Mercury, and Sulphur, to
discover, by the analogies of Nature, the natural and palpable gold.

To find the Philosophal Stone, is to have discovered the Absolute, as
all the Masters say. But the Absolute is that which admits of no errors,
is the Fixed from the Volatile, is the Law of the Imagination, is the
very necessity of Being, is the immutable Law of Reason and Truth. The
Absolute is that which IS.

To find the Absolute in the Infinite, in the Indefinite, and in the
Finite, this is the Magnum Opus, the Great Work of the Sages, which
Hermes called the Work of the Sun.

To find the immovable bases of true religious Faith, of Philosophical
Truth, and of Metallic transmutation, this is the secret of Hermes in
its entirety, the Philosophal Stone.

This stone is one and manifold; it is decomposed by Analysis, and
re-compounded by Synthesis. In Analysis, it is a powder, the powder of
projection of the Alchemists; before Analysis, and in Synthesis, it is a
stone.

The Philosophal Stone, say the Masters, must not be exposed to the
atmosphere, nor to the gaze of the Profane; but it must be kept
concealed and carefully preserved in the most secret place of the
laboratory, and the possessor must always carry on his person the key of
the place where it is kept.

He who possesses the Grand Arcanum is a genuine King, and more than a
king, for he is inaccessible to all fear and all empty hopes. In all
maladies of soul and body, a single particle from the precious stone, a
single grain of the divine powder, is more than sufficient to cure him.
"Let him hear, who hath ears to hear!" the Master said.

The Salt, Sulphur, and Mercury are but the accessorial elements and
passive instruments of the Great Work. All depends, as we have said, on
the internal Magnet of Paracelsus. The entire work consists in
_projection_: and the projection is perfectly accomplished by the
effective and realizable understanding of a single word.

There is but a single important operation in the work; this consists in
_Sublimation,_ which is nothing else, according to Geber than the
elevation of dry matter, by means of fire, with adhesion to its proper
vessel.

He who desires to attain to the understanding of the Grand Word and the
possession of the Great Secret, ought carefully to read the Hermetic
philosophers, and will undoubtedly attain initiation, as others have
done; but he must take, for the key of their allegories, the single
dogma of Hermes, contained in his table of Emerald, and follow, to class
his acquisitions of knowledge and direct the operation, the order
indicated in the Kabalistic alphabet of the Tarot.

Raymond Lulle has said that, to make gold, we must first have gold.
Nothing is made out of nothing; we do not absolutely _create_ wealth; we
increase and multiply it. Let aspirants to science well understand,
then, that neither the juggler's tricks nor miracles are to be asked of
the adept. The Hermetic science, like all the _real_ sciences, is
mathematically demonstrable. Its results, even material, are as rigorous
as that of a correct equation.

The Hermetic Gold is not only a true dogma, a light without Shadow, a
Truth without alloy of falsehood; it is also a material gold, real,
pure, the most precious that can be found in the mines of the earth.

But the living gold, the living sulphur, or the true fire of the
philosophers, is to be sought for in the house of Mercury. This fire is
fed by the air: to express its attractive and expansive power, no better
comparison can be used than that of the lightning, which is at first
only a dry and earthly exhalation, united to the moist vapor, but which,
by self-exhalation, takes a fiery nature, acts on the humidity inherent
in it, which it attracts to itself and transmutes in its nature; after
which it precipitates itself rapidly toward the earth, whither it is
attracted by a fixed nature like unto its own.

These words, in form enigmatic, but clear at bottom, distinctly express
what the philosophers mean by their Mercury, fecundated by Sulphur, and
which becomes the Master and regenerator of the Salt. It is the AZOTH,
the universal magnetic force, the grand magical agent, the Astral light,
the light of life, fecundated by the mental force, the intellectual
energy, which they compare to sulphur, on account of its affinities with
the Divine fire.

As to the Salt, it is Absolute Matter. Whatever is matter contains salt;
and all salt [nitre] may be converted into pure gold by the combined
action of Sulphur and Mercury, which sometimes act so rapidly, that the
transmutation may be effected in an instant, in an hour, without fatigue
to the operator, and almost without expense. At other times, and
according to the more refractory temper of the atmospheric _media,_ the
operation requires several days, several months, and sometimes even
several years.

Two primary laws exist in nature, two essential laws, which produce, by
counterbalancing each other, the universal equilibrium of things. These
are fixedness and movement, analogous, in philosophy, to Truth and
Fiction, and, in Absolute Conception, to Necessity and Liberty, which
are the very essence of Deity. The Hermetic philosophers gave the name
_fixed_ to everything ponderable, to everything that tends by its
natural to central repose and immobility; they term _volatile_
everything that more naturally and more readily obeys the law of
movement; and they form their stone by analysis, that is to say, by the
volatilization of the Fixed, and then by synthesis, that is, by fixing
the volatile, which they effect by applying to the fixed, which they
call their salt, the sulphurated Mercury, or the light of life, directed
and made omnipotent by a Sovereign Will. Thus they master entire Nature,
and their stone is found wherever there is salt, which is the reason for
saying that no substance is foreign to the Great Work, and that even the
most despicable and apparently vile matters may be changed into gold,
which is true in this sense, that they all contain the original
salt-principle, represented in our emblems by the cubical stone.

To know how to extract from all matter the pure salt concealed in it, is
to have the Secret of the Stone. Wherefore this is a Saline stone, which
the Od or universal astral light decomposes or re-compounds: it is
single and manifold; for it may be dissolved like ordinary salt, and
incorporated with other substances. Obtained by analysis, we might term
it _the Universal Sublimate:_ found by way of synthesis, it is the true
_panacea_ of the ancients, for it cures all maladies of soul and body,
and has been styled, _par-excellence_, the medicine of all nature. When
one, by absolute initiation, comes to control the forces of the
universal agent, he always has this stone at his disposal, for its
extraction is then a simple and easy operation, very distinct from the
metallic projection or realization. This stone, when in a state of
sublimation, must not be exposed to contact with the atmospheric air,
which might partially dissolve it and deprive it of its virtue; nor
could its emanations be inhaled without danger. The Sage prefers to
preserve it in its natural envelopes, assured as he is of extracting it
by a single effort of his will, and a single application of the
Universal Agent to the envelopes, which the Kabalists call _cortices_,
the shells, bark, or integuments.

Hieroglyphically to express this law of prudence, they gave their
Mercury, personified in Egypt as Hermanubis, a dog's head; and to their
Sulphur, represented by the Baphomet of the Temple, that goat's head
which brought into such disrepute the occult Mediæval associations.

Let us listen for a few moments to the Alchemists themselves, and
endeavor to learn the hidden meaning of their mysterious words.

The RITUAL of the Degree of Scottish Elder MASTER, and Knight of Saint
Andrew, being the fourth Degree of Ramsay, it is said upon the
title-page, or of the Reformed or Rectified Rite of Dresden, has these
passages:

"O how great and glorious is the _presence_ of the Almighty God which
gloriously _shines_ from between the Cherubim!

"How adorable and astonishing are the _rays_ of that glorious _Light_,
that sends forth its bright and brilliant beams from the Holy Ark of
Alliance and Covenant!

"Let us with the deepest veneration and devotion adore the great Source
of Life, that Glorious Spirit Who is the Most Merciful and Beneficent
Ruler of the Universe and of all the creatures it contains!

"The secret knowledge of the Grand Scottish Master relates to the
combination and transmutation of different substances; whereof that you
may obtain a clear idea and proper understanding, you are to know that
all matter and all material substances are composed of combinations of
three several substances, extracted from the four elements, which three
substances in combination are, _Salt, Sulphur_, and _Spirit_. The first
of these produces _Solidity_, the second _Softness_, and the third the
_Spiritual_, vaporous particles. These three compound substances work
potently together; and therein consists the true process for the
transmutation of metals.

"To these three substances allude the three golden basins, in the first
of which was engraved the letter M. in the second, the letter G. and
in the third nothing. The first, M. is the initial letter of the Hebrew
word _Malakh_, which signifies _Salt_; and the second, G. of the Hebrew
word _Geparaith_, which signifies _Sulphur_; and as there is no word in
Hebrew to express the vaporous and intangible _Spirit_, there is no
letter in the third basin.

"With these three principal substances you may effect the transmutation
of metals, which must be done by means of the five points or rules of
the Scottish Mastership.

"The first Master's point shows us the Brazen Sea, wherein must always
be rain-water; and out of this rain-water the Scottish Masters extract
the first substance, which is Salt; which salt must afterward undergo a
_seven-fold_ manipulation and purification, before it will be properly
prepared. This seven-fold purification is symbolized by the Seven Steps
of Solomon's Temple, which symbol is furnished us by the first point or
rule of the Scottish Masters.

"After preparing the first substance, you are to extract the second,
Sulphur, out of the purest gold, to which must then be added the
purified or celestial Salt. They are to be mixed as the Art directs, and
then placed in a vessel in the form of a SHIP, in which it is to remain,
as the Ark of Noah was afloat, one hundred and fifty days, being brought
to the first damp, warm degree of fire, that it may putrefy and produce
the mineral fermentation. This is the second point or rule of the
Scottish Masters."

If you reflect, my Brother, that it was impossible for any one to
imagine that either common salt or nitre could be extracted from
rain-water, or sulphur from pure gold, you will no doubt suspect that
some secret meaning was concealed in these words.

The Kabalah considers the immaterial part of man as threefold,
consisting of NEPHESCH, RUACH, and NESCHAMAH, _Psyche, Spiritus_, and
_Mens_, or _Soul, Spirit_, and _Intellect_. There are Seven Holy
Palaces, Seven Heavens and Seven Thrones; and Souls are purified by
ascending through Seven Spheres. A _Ship_, in Hebrew, is _Ani_; and the
same word means _I, Me_, or _Myself_.

The RITUAL continues:

"Multiplying the substance thus obtained, is the third operation, which
is done by adding to them the animate, volatile _Spirit_; which is done
by means of the water of the Celestial Salt, as well as by the Salt,
which must daily be added to it very carefully, and strictly observing
to put neither too much nor too little; inasmuch as, if you add too
much, you will destroy that growing and multiplying substance; and if
too little, it will be self-consumed and destroyed, and shrink away, not
having sufficient substantiality for its preservation. This third point
or rule of the Scottish Masters gives us the emblem of the building of
the Tower of Babel, used by our Scottish Masters, because by
irregularity and want of due proportion and harmony that work was
stopped; and the workmen could proceed no further.

"Next comes the fourth operation, represented by the Cubical Stone,
whose faces and angles are all equal. As soon as the work is brought to
the necessary point of multiplication, it is to be submitted to the
third Degree of Fire, wherein it will receive the due proportion of the
strength and substance of the metallic particles of the Cubical Stone;
and this is the fourth point or rule of the Scottish Masters.

"Finally, we come to the fifth and last operation, indicated to us by
the Flaming Star. After the work has become a duly-proportioned
substance, it is to be subjected to the fourth and strongest Degree of
fire, wherein it must remain three times twenty-seven hours; until it is
thoroughly glowing, by which means it becomes a bright and shining
tincture, wherewith the lighter metals may be changed, by the use of one
part to a thousand of the metal. Wherefore this Flaming Star shows us
the fifth and last point of the Scottish Masters.

"You should pass practically through the five points or rules of the
Master, and by the use of one part to a thousand, transmute and ennoble
metals. You may then in reality say that your age is a thousand years."

In the oration of the Degree, the following hints are given as to its
true meaning:

"The three divisions of the Temple, the Outer Court, Sanctuary, and Holy
of Holies, signify the three Principles of our Holy Order, which direct
to the knowledge of morality, and teach those most practical virtues
that ought to be practised by mankind. Therefore the Seven Steps which
lead up to the Outer Court of the Temple, are the emblem of the
Seven-fold Light which we need to possess, before we can arrive at the
height of knowledge, in which consist the ultimate limits of our order.

"In the Brazen Sea we are symbolically to purify ourselves from all
pollutions, all faults and wrongful actions, as well those committed
through error of judgment and mistaken opinion, as those intentionally
done; inasmuch as they equally prevent us from arriving at the knowledge
of True Wisdom. We must thoroughly cleanse and purify our hearts to
their inmost recesses, before we can of right contemplate that _Flaming
Star_, which is the emblem of the Divine and Glorious Shekinah, or
presence of God; before we may dare approach the Throne of Supreme
Wisdom."

In the Degree of The True Mason [_Le Vrai Maçon_], styled in the
title-page of its Ritual the 23d Degree of Masonry, or the 12th of the
5th class, the Tracing-board displays a luminous Triangle, with a great
Yōd in the centre.

"The Triangle," says the Ritual, "represents one God in three Persons;
and the great Yōd is the initial letter of the last word.

"The Dark Circle represents the Chaos, which in the beginning God
created.

"The Cross within the Circle, the Light by means whereof He developed
the Chaos.

"The Square, the four Elements into which it was resolved.

"The Triangle, again, the three _Principles_ [Salt, Sulphur, and
Mercury], which the intermingling of the elements produced.

"God _creates_; Nature _produces_; Art _multiplies_. God created Chaos;
Nature produced it; God, Nature, and Art, have perfected it.

"The Altar of Perfumes indicates the _Fire_ that is to be applied to
Nature. The two _towers_ are the two furnaces, moist and dry, in which
it is to be worked. The bowl is the mould of oak that is to inclose the
philosophal egg.

"The two figures surmounted by a Cross are the two vases, Nature and
Art, in which is to be consummated the double marriage of the white
woman with the red Servitor, from which marriage will spring a most
Potent King.

"Chaos means universal matter, formless, but susceptible of all forms.
Form is the Light inclosed in the seeds of all species; and its home is
in the Universal Spirit.

"To work on universal matter, use the internal and external fire: the
four elements result, the _Principia Principiorum_ and _Inmediata_;
Fire, Air, Water, Earth. There are four qualities of these elements--the
warm and dry, the cold and moist. Two appertain to each element: The dry
and cold, to the Earth; the cold and moist, to Water; the moist and
warm, to the Air; and the warm and dry, to Fire: whereby the Fire
connects with the Earth; all the elements, as Hermes said, moving in
circles.

"From the mixture of the four Elements and of their four qualities,
result the three Principles,--Mercury, Sulphur, and Salt. These are the
philosophical, not the vulgar.

"The philosophical Mercury is a _Water_ and SPIRIT, which dissolves and
sublimates the Sun; the philosophical _Sulphur_, a _fire_ and a Soul,
which mollifies and colors it; the philosophical Salt, an _Earth_ and a
BODY, which coagulates and fixes it; and the whole is done in the bosom
of the _Air_.

"From these three Principles result the four Elements duplicated, or the
Grand Elements, _Mercury, Sulphur, Salt_, and _Glass_; two of which are
volatile,--the Water [Mercury] and the Air [Sulphur], which is oil; for
all substances liquid in their nature avoid fire, which takes from the
one [water] and burns the other [oil]; but the other two are dry and
solid, to wit, the Salt, wherein Fire is contained, and the pure
_Earth_, which is the Glass; on both of which the Fire has no other
action than to melt and refine them, unless one makes use of the liquid
alkali; for, just as each element consists of two qualities, so these
great duplicated Elements partake, each of two of the simple elements,
or, more properly speaking, of all the four, according to the greater or
less degree of each,--the Mercury partaking more of the Water, to which
it is assigned; the Oil or Sulphur, more of the Air; the Salt, of the
Fire; and the Glass, of the Earth; which is found, pure and clear, in
the centre of all the elementary composites, and is the last to
disengage itself from the others.

"The four Elements and three Principles reside in all the Compounds,
Animal, Vegetable, and Mineral; but more potently in some than in
others.

"The Fire gives them Movement; the Air, Sensation; the Water, Nutriment;
and the Earth, Subsistence.

"The four duplicated Elements engender THE STONE, if one is careful
enough to supply them with the proper quantity of fire, and to combine
them according to their natural weight. Ten parts of Air make one of
Water; ten of Water, one of Earth; and ten of Earth, one of Fire; the
whole by the Active Symbol of the one, and the Passive Symbol of the
other, whereby the conversion of the Elements is effected."

The Allusion of the Ritual, here, is obviously to the four Worlds of the
Kabalah. The ten Sephiroth of the world Briah proceed from Malakoth, the
last of the ten Emanations of the world Aziluth; the ten Sephiroth of
the world Yezirah, from Malakoth of Briah; and the ten of the world
Asian, from Malakoth of Yezirah. The Pass-word of the Degree is given as
_Metralon_, which is a corruption of METATRON, the Cherub, who and
Sandalphon are in the Kabalah the Chief of the Angels. The Active and
Passive Symbols are the Male and Female.

The Ritual continues:

"It is thereby evident that, in the Great Work, we must employ ten parts
of philosophical Mercury to one of Sun or Moon.

"This is attained by _Solution_ and _Coagulation_. These words mean that
we must dissolve the body and coagulate the spirit; which operations are
effected by the moist and dry bath.

"Of colors, _black_ is the Earth; _white_, the Water; _blue_, the Air;
and _red_, the Fire; wherein also are involved very great secrets and
mysteries.

"The apparatus employed in 'The Great Work' consists of the Moist bath,
the Dry bath, the Vases of Nature and Art, the bowl of oak, _lutum
sapientiœ_, the Seal of Hermes, the tube, the physical lamp, and the
iron rod.

"The work is perfected in seventeen philosophical months, according to
the mixture of ingredients. The benefits reaped from it are of two
kinds--one affecting the soul, and the other the body. _The former
consist in knowing God, Nature, and ourself_; and those to the body are
wealth and health.

"The Initiate traverses Heaven and Earth. Heaven is the World manifest
to the Intelligence, subdivided into Paradise and Hell; Earth is the
World manifest to the Senses, also subdivided into the Celestial and
that of the Elements.

"There are Sciences specially connected with each of these. _The one is
ordinary and common; the other, mystic and secret_. The World cognizable
by the Intellect has the Hermetic Theology and the Kabalah; the
Celestial Astrology; and that of the Elements, Chemistry, which by its
decompositions and separations, effected by fire, reveals all the most
hidden secrets of Nature, in the three kinds of Compound Substances.
This last science is styled 'Hermetic,' or 'The operating of the Great
Work.'"

The Ritual of the Degree of Kabalistic and Hermetic Rose, has these
passages:

"The true Philosophy, known and practised by Solomon, is the basis on
which Masonry is founded.

"Our Ancient Masons have concealed from us the most important point of
this Divine Art, under hieroglyphical characters, which are but enigmas
and parables, to all the Senseless, the Wicked, and the Ambitious.

"He will be supremely fortunate, who shall, by arduous labor, discover
this sacred place of deposite, wherein all naked the sublime Truth is
hidden; for he may be assured that he has found the True Light, the True
Felicity, the True Heavenly Good. Then may it truly be said that he is
one of the True Elect; for it _is the only real and most Sublime Science
of all those to which a mortal can aspire_: his days will be prolonged,
and his soul freed of all vices and corruption; into which" (it is
added, to mislead, as if from fear too much would be disclosed), "_the
human race is often led by indigence_."

As the symbolism of the Hall and the language of the ritual mutually
explain each other, it should be noted here, that in this Degree the
columns of the hall, 12 in number, are white variegated with black and
red. The hangings are black, and over that crimson.

Over the throne is a great Eagle, in gold, on a black ground. In the
centre of the Canopy the Blazing Star in gold, with the letter Yōd in
its centre. On the right and left of the throne are the Sun in gold and
the Moon in silver. The throne is ascended to by _three_ Steps. The hall
and ante-room are each lighted by _ten_ lights, and a single one at the
entrance. The colors, black, white, and crimson appear in the clothing;
and the Key and Balance are among the symbols.

The duty of the Second Grand Prior, says the Ritual, is "to see if the