HPB-IU v.2 ch.8: Difference between revisions

known that this venerable kabalist never imparted the most important points of his doctrine otherwise than orally, and to a very limited number of friends and disciples, including his only son. Therefore, without the final initiation into the {{Style S-Italic|Mercaba}} the study of the {{Style S-Italic|Kabala}} will be ever incomplete, and the {{Style S-Italic|Mercaba}} can be taught only in “darkness, in a deserted place, and after many and terrific trials.” Since the death of Simeon Ben-Iochai this hidden doctrine has remained an inviolate secret for the outside world. Delivered {{Style S-Italic|only as a mystery,}} it was communicated to the candidate orally, “{{Style S-Italic|face to face and mouth to ear.”}}

This Masonic commandment, “mouth to ear, and the word at low breath,” is an inheritance from the Tanaim and the old Pagan Mysteries. Its modern use must certainly be due to the indiscretion of some renegade kabalist, though the “word” itself is but a “substitute” for the “lost word,” and is a comparatively modern invention, as we will further show. The real sentence has remained forever in the sole possession of the adepts of various countries of the Eastern and Western hemispheres. Only a limited number among the chiefs of the Templars, and some Rosicrucians of the seventeenth century, always in close relations with Arabian alchemists and initiates, could really boast of its possession. From the seventh to the fifteenth centuries there was no one who could claim it in Europe; and although there had been alchemists before the days of Paracelsus, he was the first who had passed through the true initiation, that last ceremony which conferred on the adept the power of travelling toward the “burning bush” over the holy ground, and to “burn the golden calf in the fire, grind it to powder, and strow it upon the water.” Verily, then, this magic {{Style S-Italic|water}}, and the “lost word,” resuscitated more than one of the pre-Mosaic Adonirams, Gedaliahs, and Hiram Abiffs. The real word now substituted by {{Style S-Italic|Mac Benac}} and Mah was used ages before its pseudo-magical effect was tried on the “widow’s sons” of the last two centuries. Who was, in fact, the first operative Mason of any consequence? Elias Ashmole, {{Style S-Italic|the last of the Rosicrucians and alchemists.}} Admitted to the freedom of the Operative Masons’ Company in London, in 1646, he died in 1692. At that time Masonry was not what it became later; it was neither a political nor a Christian institution, but a true secret organization, which admitted into the ties of fellowship all men anxious to obtain the priceless boon of liberty of conscience, and avoid clerical persecution.^{[#fn1647 1647]} Not until about thirty years after his death did what is now termed modern Freemasonry see the light. It was born on the 24th day of June, 1717, in the Apple-tree Tavern, Charles Street, Covent Garden, London. And it was then, as we are told in Anderson’s

[#fn1647anc 1647]. Plot: “Natural History of Staffordshire.” Published in 1666.

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{{Style S-Italic|Constitutions,}} that the only four lodges in the south of England elected Anthony Sayer first Grand Master of Masons. Notwithstanding its great youth, this grand lodge has ever claimed the acknowledgment of its supremacy by the whole body of the fraternity throughout the whole world, as the Latin inscription on the plate put beneath the corner-stone of Freemasons’ Hall, London, in 1775, would tell to those who could see it. But of this more anon.

In {{Style S-Italic|Die Kabbala,}} by Franck, the author, following its “esoteric ravings,” as he expresses it, gives us, in addition to the translations, his commentaries. Speaking of his predecessors, he says that Simeon Ben-Iochai mentions repeatedly what the “companions” have taught in the older works. And the author cites one “Ieba, the {{Style S-Italic|old,}} and Hamnuna, the {{Style S-Italic|old.”^{[#fn1648 1648]}}} But what the two “old” ones mean, or who they were, in fact, he tells us not, for he does not know himself.

Among the venerable sect of the Tanaim, or rather the Tananim, the wise men, there were those who taught the secrets practically and initiated some disciples into the grand and final Mystery. But the {{Style S-Italic|Mishna Hagiga,}} 2d section, say that the table of contents of the {{Style S-Italic|Mercaba}} “must only be delivered to wise old ones.”^{[#fn1649 1649]} The {{Style S-Italic|Gemara}} is still more dogmatic. “The more important secrets of the Mysteries were not even revealed to all priests. Alone the initiates had them divulged.” And so we find the same great secresy prevalent in every ancient religion.

But, as we see, neither the {{Style S-Italic|Sohar}} nor any other kabalistic volume contains merely Jewish wisdom. The doctrine itself being the result of whole millenniums of thought, is therefore the joint property of adepts of every nation under the sun. Nevertheless, the {{Style S-Italic|Sohar}} teaches practical occultism more than any other work on that subject; not as it is translated though, and commented upon by its various critics, but with the secret signs on its margins. These signs contain the hidden instructions, apart from the metaphysical interpretations and apparent absurdities so fully credited by Josephus, who was never initiated, and gave out the {{Style S-Italic|dead letter}} as he had received it.^{[#fn1650 1650]}

[#fn1648anc 1648]. “Die Kabbala,” 75; “Sod,” vol. ii.

[#fn1649anc 1649]. “Die Kabbala,” 47.

[#fn1650anc 1650]. He relates how Rabbi Eleazar, in the presence of Vespasian and his officers, expelled demons from several men by merely applying to the nose of the demoniac one of the number of roots recommended by King Solomon! The distinguished historian assures us that the Rabbi drew out the devils through the nostrils of the patients in the name of Solomon and by the power of the incantations composed by the king-kabalist. Josephus: “Antiquities,” VIII., ii., 5.

351 JOB AND REVELATION INITIATION ALLEGORIES.

tles—at least, those who are said to have produced “miracles” {{Style S-Italic|at will^{[#fn1651 1651]}}}—had to be acquainted with this science. It ill-behooves a Christian to look with horror or derision upon “magic” gems, amulets, and other talismans against the “evil eye,” which serve as charms to exercise a mysterious influence, either on the possessor, or the person whom the magician desires to control. There are still extant a number of such charmed amulets in public and private collections of antiquities. Illustrations of convex gems, with mysterious legends—the meaning of which baffles all scientific inquiry—are given by many collectors. King shows several such in his {{Style S-Italic|Gnostics,}} and he describes a white carnelian (chalcedony), covered on both sides with interminable legends, to interpret which would ever prove a failure; yes, in every case, perhaps, but that of a Hermetic student or an adept. But we refer the reader to his interesting work, and the talismans described in his plates, to show that even the “Seer of Patmos” himself was well-versed in this kabalistic science of talismans and gems. St. John clearly alludes to the potent “white carnelian”—a gem well-known among adepts, as the “{{Style S-Italic|alba petra}},” or the stone of initiation, on which the word {{Style S-Italic|“prize”}} is generally found engraved, as it was given to the candidate who had successfully passed through all the preliminary trials of a neophyte. The fact is, that no less than the {{Style S-Italic|Book of Job}}, the whole {{Style S-Italic|Revelation}}, is simply an allegorical narrative of the Mysteries and initiation therein of a candidate, who is John himself. No high Mason, well versed in the different degrees, can fail to see it. The numbers {{Style S-Italic|seven}}, {{Style S-Italic|twelve}}, and others are all so many lights thrown over the obscurity of the work. Paracelsus maintained the same some centuries ago. And when we find the “one like unto the Son of man” saying (chap. ii. 17): “{{Style S-Italic|To him that overcometh}}, will I give to eat of the {{Style S-Italic|hidden manna}}, and will give him a white stone, and in the stone a new name written”—the word—which {{Style S-Italic|no man knoweth}} saving {{Style S-Italic|he that receiveth it}}, what Master Mason can doubt but it refers to the last head-line of this chapter?

[#fn1651anc 1651]. There are {{Style S-Italic|unconscious}} miracles produced sometimes, which, like the phenomena now called “Spiritual,” are caused through natural cosmic powers, mesmerism, electricity, and the invisible beings who are always at work around us, whether they be human or elementary spirits.

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were then delivered to the “newly-born” that are represented in the {{Style S-Italic|Revelation}} as the seven seals which are opened “in order” (see chap. v. and vi.). There can be no doubt that the Seer of Patmos referred to this ceremony.

But consistency is a virtue which we fear is losing, under Jesuit influence, the slight hold it may ever have had on the Church. That crafty, learned, conscienceless, terrible soul of Jesuitism, within the body of Romanism, is slowly but surely possessing itself of the whole prestige and spiritual power that clings to it. For the better exemplification of our theme it will be necessary to contrast the moral principles of the ancient Tanaïm and Theurgists with those professed by the modern Jesuits, who practically control Romanism to-day, and are the hidden enemy that would-be reformers must encounter and overcome. Throughout the whole of antiquity, where, in what land, can we find anything like this Order or anything even approaching it? We owe a place to the Jesuits in this chapter on secret societies, for more than any other they are a secret body, and have a far closer connection with actual Masonry—in France and Germany at least—than people are generally aware of. The cry of an outraged public morality was raised against this Order from its very birth.^{[#fn1652 1652]} Barely fifteen years had elapsed after the bull approving its constitution was promulgated, when its members began to be driven away from one place to the other. Portugal and the Low Countries got rid of them, in 1578; France in 1594; Venice in 1606; Naples in 1622. From St. Petersburg they were expelled in 1815, and from all Russia in 1820.

[#fn1652anc 1652]. It dates from 1540; and in 1555 a general outcry was raised against them in some parts of Portugal, Spain, and other countries.

353 FRENCH PARLIAMENTARY REPORT UPON JESUITS.

our readers in America, who now know little about them, are made acquainted with their principles (principia) and rules as they appear in various works written by the Jesuits themselves. We beg leave to remind the public that every one of the statements which follow in quotation marks are extracted from authenticated manuscripts, or folios printed by this distinguished body. Many are copied from the large Quarto^{[#fn1653 1653]} published by the authority of, and verified and collated by the Commissioners of the French Parliament. The statements therein were collected and presented to the King, in order that, as the “Arrest du Parlement du 5 Mars, 1762,” expresses it, “the elder son of the Church might be made aware of the perversity of this doctrine. . . . A doctrine authorizing Theft, Lying, Perjury, Impurity, every Passion and Crime, teaching Homicide, Parricide, and Regicide, overthrowing religion in order to substitute for it superstition, by favoring {{Style S-Italic|Sorcery,}} Blasphemy, Irreligion, and Idolatry . . . etc.” Let us then examine the ideas on {{Style S-Italic|magic}} of the Jesuits. Writing on this subject in his secret instructions, Anthony Escobart^{[#fn1654 1654]} says:

“It is lawful . . . to make use of the science acquired {{Style S-Italic|through the assistance of the Devil,}} provided the preservation and use of that knowledge do not depend upon the Devil, {{Style S-Italic|for the knowledge is good in itself, and the sin by which it was acquired has gone by.”^{[#fn1655 1655]}}} Hence, why should not a Jesuit cheat the Devil as well as he cheats every layman?

[#fn1653anc 1653]. Extracts from this “Arret” were compiled into a work in 4 vols., 12mo., which appeared at Paris, in 1762, and was known as “Extraits des Assertions, etc.” In a work entitled “Reponse aux Assertions,” an attempt was made by the Jesuits to throw discredit upon the facts collected by the Commissioners of the French Parliament in 1762, as for the most part malicious fabrications. “To ascertain the validity of this impeachment,” says the author of “The Principles of the Jesuits,” “the libraries of the two universities of the British Museum and of Sion College have been searched for the authors cited; and in every instance where the volume was found, the correctness of the citation established.”

[#fn1654anc 1654]. “Theologiæ Moralis,” Tomus iv., Lugduni, 1663.

[#fn1655anc 1655]. Tom. iv., lib. xxviii., sect. 1, de Præcept I., c. 20, n. 184.

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cept where he has used no effort, or was ignorant of his diabolic art; because, when he has used his endeavors he has not deceived.”^{[#fn1656 1656]}

Further, we find the following on astrology: “If any one affirms, through conjecture founded upon the influence of the stars and the character, disposition of a man, that he will be a soldier, an ecclesiastic, or a bishop, {{Style S-Italic|this divination may be devoid of all sin;}} because the stars and the disposition of the man may have the power of inclining the human will to a certain lot or rank, but not of constraining it.”^{[#fn1657 1657]}

Busembaum and Lacroix, in {{Style S-Italic|Theologia Moralis,^{[#fn1658 1658]}}} say, “Palmistry may be considered lawful, if from the lines and divisions of the hands it can ascertain the disposition of the body, and conjecture, with probability, the propensities and affections of the soul.”^{[#fn1659 1659]}

This noble fraternity, which many preachers have of late so vehemently denied to have ever been a {{Style S-Italic|secret}} one, has been sufficiently proved as such. Their constitutions were translated into Latin by the Jesuit Polancus, and printed in the college of the Society at Rome, in 1558. “They were jealously kept secret, the greater part of the Jesuits themselves knowing only extracts from them.^{[#fn1660 1660]} {{Style S-Italic|They were never produced to the light until}} 1761 {{Style S-Italic|, when they were published by order of the French Parliament}} in 1761, 1762, in the famous process of Father Lavalette.” The degrees of the Order are: I. Novices; II. Lay Brothers, or temporal Coadjutors; III. Scholastics; IV. Spiritual Coadjutors; V. Professed of Three Vows; VI. Professed of Five Vows. “There is also a secret class, known only to the General and a few faithful Jesuits, which, perhaps more than any other, contributed to the dreaded and mysterious power of the Order,” says Niccolini. The Jesuits reckon it among the greatest achievements of their Order that Loyola supported, by a special memorial to the Pope, a petition for the reorganization of that abominable and abhorred instrument of wholesale butchery—the infamous tribunal of the Inquisition.

[#fn1656anc 1656]. Ibid., sect. 2, de Præcept I., Probl. 113, n. 586.

[#fn1657anc 1657]. Richard Arsdekin, “Theologia Tripartita,” Coloniae, 1744, Tom. ii., Pars. ii., Tr. 5, c. 1, § 2, n. 4.

[#fn1658anc 1658]. “Theologia Moralis nunc pluribus partibus aucta, a R. P. Claudio Lacroix, Societatis Jesu.” Coloniæ, 1757 (Ed. Mus. Brit.).

[#fn1659anc 1659]. Tom. ii., lib. iii., Pars. 1, Fr. 1, c. 1, dub. 2, resol. viii. What a pity that the counsel for the defense had not bethought them to cite this orthodox legalization of “cheating by palmistry or otherwise,” at the recent religio-scientific prosecution of the medium Slade, in London.

[#fn1660anc 1660]. Niccolini: “History of the Jesuits.”

355 HORRIFYING PRINCIPLES OF THE ORDER.

Affairs. The Pontifical Government was for years previous to Victor Emanuel’s occupation of Rome entirely in their hands. The Society now numbers 8,584 members. But we must see what are their chief rules. By what is seen above, in becoming acquainted with their mode of action, we may ascertain what the whole Catholic body is likely to be. Says Mackenzie: “The Order has secret signs and passwords, according to the degrees to which the members belong, and as they wear no particular dress, it is very difficult to recognize them, unless they reveal themselves as members of the Order; for they may appear as Protestants or Catholics, democrats or aristocrats, infidels or bigots, according to the special mission with which they are entrusted. Their spies are everywhere, of all apparent ranks of society, and they may appear learned and wise, or simple or foolish, as their instructions run. There are Jesuits of both sexes, and all ages, and it is a well-known fact that members of the Order, of high family and delicate nurture, are acting as menial servants in Protestant families, and doing other things of a similar nature in aid of the Society’s purposes. We cannot be too much on our guard, for the whole Society, being founded on a law of unhesitating obedience, can bring its force on any given point with unerring and fatal accuracy.”^{[#fn1661 1661]}

The Jesuits maintain that “the Society of Jesus is not of human invention, {{Style S-Italic|but it proceeded from him whose name it bears.}} For Jesus himself described that rule of life which the Society follows, {{Style S-Italic|first by his example,}} and afterwards by his words.”^{[#fn1662 1662]}

“A man of a religious order, who for a short time lays aside his habit {{Style S-Italic|for a sinful purpose,}} is free from heinous sin, and does not incur the penalty of excommunication” (Lib. iii., sec. 2., Probl. 44, D. 212).^{[#fn1663 1663]}

[#fn1661anc 1661]. “Royal Masonic Cyclopædia,” p. 369.

[#fn1662anc 1662]. Imago: “Primi Sæculi Societatis Jesu,” lib. 1., c. 3., p. 64.

[#fn1663anc 1663]. Anthony Escobar: “Universæ Theologiæ Moralis receptiore, absque lite sententiæ,” etc., Tomus i., Lugduni, 1652 (Ed. Bibl. Acad. Cant.). “Idem sentio, e breve illud tempus ad unius horæ spatium traho. Religiosus itaque habitum demittens assignato hoc temporis interstitio, non incurrit excommunicationem, {{Style S-Italic|etiamsi dimittat non solum ex causa, turpi, scilicet fornicandi, aut clam aliquid abripiendi, set etiam ut incognitus ineat lupanar.”}} Probl. 44, n. 213.

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John Baptist Taberna ({{Style S-Italic|Synopsis Theologiae Practicæ),}} propounds the following question: “Is a judge bound to restore the bribe which he has received for passing sentence?” {{Style S-Italic|Answer:}} “{{Style S-Italic|If he has received the bribe for passing an -unjust sentence, it is probable that he may keep it}}. . . . {{Style S-Italic|This opinion is maintained and defended by fifty-eight doctors”^{[#fn1664 1664]}}} (Jesuits).

We must abstain at present from proceeding further. So disgustingly licentious, hypocritical, and demoralizing are nearly all of these precepts, that it was found impossible to put many of them in print, except in the Latin language.^{[#fn1665 1665]} We will return to some of the more decent as we proceed, for the sake of comparison. But what are we to think of the future of the Catholic world, if it is to be controlled in word and deed by this villainous society? And that it is to be so, we can hardly doubt, as we find the Cardinal Archbishop of Cambrai loudly proclaiming the same to all the faithful? His pastoral has made a certain noise in France; and yet, as two centuries have rolled away since the {{Style S-Italic|exposé}} of these infamous principles, the Jesuits have had ample time to lie so successfully in denying the just charges, that most Catholics will never believe such a thing. The {{Style S-Italic|infallible}} Pope, Clement XIV. (Ganganelli), suppressed them on the 23d of July, 1773, and yet they came to life again; and another equally infallible Pope, Pius VII., reëstablished them on the 7th of August, 1814.

“Among other things, he maintains that {{Style S-Italic|Clericalism, Ultramontanism, and Jesuitism are one and the same thing—that is to say, Catholicism}}—and that the distinctions between them have been created by the enemies of religion. There was a time, he says, when a certain theological opinion was commonly professed in France concerning the authority of the Pope. It was restricted to our nation, and was of recent origin. The civil power during a century and a half imposed official instruction. Those who profess these opinions were called Gallicans, and those who protested were called Ultramontanes, because they had their doctrinal centre beyond the Alps, at Rome. To-day the distinction between the two schools is no longer admissible. Theological Gallicanism can no longer exist, since this opinion has ceased to be tolerated by the Church. {{Style S-Italic|It has been solemnly condemned, past all return, by the Œcumenical Council of the Vatican. One cannot now be Catholic without being Ultramontane—and Jesuit.”^{[#fn1666 1666]}}}

[#fn1664anc 1664]. Pars. 11, Tra. 2, c. 31.

[#fn1665anc 1665]. See “The Principles of the Jesuits, Developed in a Collection of Extracts from their own Authors.” London, 1839.

[#fn1666anc 1666]. From the Pastoral of the Archbishop of Cambrai.

357 MURDER, ADULTERY, PERJURY CONDONED.

Rabbi Jehoshua Ben Chananea, who died about a.d. 72, openly declared that he had performed “miracles” by means of the {{Style S-Italic|Book of Sepher Jezireh,}} and challenged every skeptic.^{[#fn1667 1667]} Franck, quoting from the Babylonian {{Style S-Italic|Talmud}}, names two other thaumaturgists, Rabbis Chanina and Oshoi.^{[#fn1668 1668]}

[#fn1667anc 1667]. See “Jerusalem Talmud, Synhedrin,” c. 7, etc.

[#fn1668anc 1668]. “Franck,” pp. 55, 56.

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heretics, in comparison with that of the same Jesuits who have now so completely mastered the Pope, ecclesiastical Rome, and the entire Catholic world? Listen again to their profession of faith.

“Do what your conscience tells you to be good and commanded: if, through invincible error, you believe lying or blasphemy to be commanded by God, {{Style S-Italic|blaspheme.”^{[#fn1669 1669]}}}

“Omit to do what your conscience tells you is forbidden: omit the worship of God, if you invincibly believe it to be prohibited by God.”^{[#fn1670 1670]}

“There is an implied law . . . obey an invincibly erroneous dictate of conscience. As often as you believe invincibly that a lie is commanded—{{Style S-Italic|lie.”^{[#fn1671 1671]}}}

“Let us suppose a Catholic to believe invincibly that the worship of images is forbidden: in such a case our Lord Jesus Christ will be obliged to say to him, ‘{{Style S-Italic|Depart from me thou cursed . . . because thou hast worshipped mine image.’}} So, neither, is there any absurdity in supposing that Christ may say, {{Style S-Italic|‘Come thou blessed . . . because thou hast lied, believing invincibly, that in such a case I commanded the lie.’”^{[#fn1672 1672]}}}

In what particular was then Simon Magus a blasphemer, if he only did that which his conscience invincibly told him was true? And in what particular were ever the “Heretics,” or even {{Style S-Italic|infidels}} of the worst kind more reprehensible than the Jesuits—those of Caen,^{[#fn1673 1673]} for instance—who say the following:

[#fn1669anc 1669]. Charles Antony Casnedi: “Crisis Theologica,” Ulyssipone, 1711. Tome i., Disp. 6, Sect. 2, § 1, n. 59.

[#fn1670anc 1670]. Ibid.

[#fn1671anc 1671]. Ibid., § 2, n. 78.

[#fn1672anc 1672]. Ibid., Sect. 5, § 1, n. 165.

[#fn1673anc 1673]. “Thesis propugnata in regio Soc. Jes. Collegio celeberrimæ Academiæ Cadomensis, die Veneris, 30 Jan., 1693.” Cadomi, 1693.

359 JESUITS MAY IDOLATRIZE FOR JESUITISM.

it is prudent. {{Style S-Italic|It is not evidently true;}} for it either teaches obscurely or the things which it teaches are obscure. And they who affirm that the Christian religion is evidently true, are obliged to confess that it is evidently false.”

Hence, it is also more than “evident” that there are moments in the life of the greatest liar when he may utter some truths. It is in this case so perfectly exemplified by the “good Fathers,” that we can see more clearly than ever whence proceeded the solemn condemnations at the Œcumenical Council of 1870, of certain “heresies,” and the enforcement of other articles of faith in which none believed less than those who inspired the Pope to issue them. History has yet perhaps to learn that the octogenarian Pope, intoxicated with the fumes of his newly-enforced infallibility, was but the faithful echo of the Jesuits. “An old man is raised trembling upon the {{Style S-Italic|pavois}} of the Vatican;” says Michelet, “every thing becomes absorbed and confined in him. . . . For fifteen centuries Christendom had submitted to the spiritual yoke of the Church. . . . But that yoke was not sufficient for them; they wanted the whole world to bend under the hand of one master. Here my own words are too weak; I shall borrow those of others. They (the Jesuits) wanted (this is the accusation flung in their faces by the Bishop of Paris in the full Council of Trent) {{Style S-Italic|faire de l’epouse de Jesus Christ une prostituee aux volontes d’un homme.”^{[#fn1674 1674]}}}

[#fn1674anc 1674]. Michelet and Quinet of the College of France: “The Jesuits.”

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They have succeeded. The Church is henceforth an inert tool, and the Pope a poor weak instrument in the hands of this Order. But for how long? Until the end comes, well may sincere Christians remember the prophetic lamentations of the thrice-great Trismegistus over his own country: “Alas, alas, my son, a day will come when the sacred hieroglyphics will become but idols. {{Style S-Italic|The world will mistake the emblems of science for gods,}} and accuse grand Egypt of having worshipped hell-monsters. But those who will calumniate us thus, will themselves worship Death instead of Life, folly in place of wisdom; they will denounce love and fecundity, fill their temples with dead men’s bones, as relics, and waste their youth in solitude and tears. Their {{Style S-Italic|virgins will be widows}} ({{Style S-Italic|nuns}}) {{Style S-Italic|before being wives,}} and consume themselves in grief; because men will have despised and profaned the sacred mysteries of Isis.”^{[#fn1675 1675]}

“The more true opinion is, {{Style S-Italic|that all inanimate and irrational things may be legitimately worshipped,”}} says Father Gabriel Vasquez, treating of Idolatry. “If the doctrine which we have established be rightly understood, not only may a painted image and every holy thing, set forth by public authority for the worship of God, be properly adored with God as the image of Himself, but also any other thing of this world, whether it be inanimate and irrational, or in its nature rational.”^{[#fn1676 1676]}

“Why may we not adore and worship with God, apart from danger, anything whatsoever of this world; for God is in it according to His essence . . . [This is precisely what the Pantheist and Hindu philosophy maintains.] and preserves it continually by His power; and when we bow down ourselves before it and impress it with a kiss, we present ourselves before God, the author of it, with the whole soul, as unto the prototype of the image [follow instances of relics, etc.] . . . . To this we may add that, since everything of this world is the work of God, and God is always abiding and working in it, we may more readily conceive Him to be in it than a saint in the vesture which belonged to him. And, therefore, {{Style S-Italic|without regarding in any way the dignity of the thing created, to direct our thoughts to God, while we give to the creature the sign and mark of submission by a kiss or prostration, is neither vain nor superstitious, but an act of the purest religion.”^{[#fn1677 1677]}}}

[#fn1675anc 1675]. Champollion: “Hermes Trismegistus,” xxvii.

[#fn1676anc 1676]. “De Cultu Adorationis Libri Tres.,” Lib. iii., Disp. i., c. 2.

[#fn1677anc 1677]. Ibid.

361 THE PROPHECY OF HERMES FULFILLED.

other heathen when rebuked for his worship of idols. We purposely quote it for the benefit of our respected “heathen” friends who will see these lines.

Baron Bunsen shows that the origin of the ancient prayers and hymns of the Egyptian {{Style S-Italic|Book of the Dead}} is {{Style S-Italic|anterior}} to Menes, and belongs, probably, to the pre-Menite Dynasty of Abydos, between 3100 and 4500 b.c. The learned Egyptologist makes the era of Menes, or National Empire, as not later than 3059 b.c., and demonstrates that “the system of Osirian worship and mythology was already formed”^{[#fn1678 1678]} before this era of Menes.

We find in the hymns of this scientifically-established pre-Edenic epoch (for Bunsen carries us back several centuries {{Style S-Italic|beyond}} the year of the creation of the world, 4004 b.c., as fixed by biblical chronology) precise lessons of morality, identical in substance, and nearly so in form of expression, with those preached by Jesus in his Sermon on the Mount. We give the authority of the most eminent Egyptologists and hierologists for our statement. “The inscriptions of the twelfth Dynasty are filled with ritualistic formulæ,” says Bunsen. Extracts from the Hermetic books are found on monuments of the earliest dynasties, and “on those of the twelfth (dynasty) portions of an {{Style S-Italic|earlier}} ritual are by no means uncommon. . . . {{Style S-Italic|To feed the}} hungry, give drink to the thirsty, clothe the naked, bury the {{Style S-Italic|dead}} . . . {{Style S-Italic|formed the first duty of a pious man}}. . . . The doctrine of the immortality of the soul is as old as this period” (Tablet, {{Style S-Italic|Brit. Mus.,}} 562){{Style S-Italic|.^{[#fn1679 1679]}}}

[#fn1678anc 1678]. {{Style S-Italic|“Egypt’s Place in Universal History,” vol. v., p. 94.}}

[#fn1679anc 1679]. {{Style S-Italic|Ibid., vol. v., p. 129.}}

And far older, perhaps. It dates from the time when the soul was an {{Style S-Italic|objective}} being, hence when it could hardly be denied by {{Style S-Italic|itself;}} when humanity was a spiritual race and death existed not. Toward the decline of the cycle of life, the ethereal {{Style S-Italic|man-spirit}} then fell into the sweet slumber of temporary unconsciousness in one sphere, only to find himself awakening in the still brighter light of a higher one. But while the spiritual man is ever striving to ascend higher and higher toward its source of being, passing through the cycles and spheres of individual life, physical man had to descend with the great cycle of universal creation until it found itself clothed with the terrestrial garments. Thenceforth the soul was too deeply buried under physical clothing to reassert its existence, except in the cases of those more spiritual natures, which, with every cycle, became more rare. And yet none of the pre-historical nations ever thought of denying either the existence or the immortality of the inner man, the real “self.” Only, we must bear in mind the teachings of the old philosophies: the spirit alone is immortal—the soul, {{Style S-Italic|per se,}} is neither eternal nor divine. When linked too closely with the physical brain of its terrestrial casket, it gradually becomes a {{Style S-Italic|finite}} mind, a simple animal and sentient life-principle, the {{Style S-Italic|nephesh}} of the Hebrew {{Style S-Italic|Bible .^{[#fn1680 1680]}}}

[#fn1680anc 1680]. “And God created . . . every {{Style S-Italic|nephesh}} (life) that moveth” (Gen. i. 21), meaning animals; and (Genesis ii. 7) it is said: “And man became a {{Style S-Italic|nephesh”}} (living soul); which shows that the word {{Style S-Italic|nephesh}} was indifferently applied to {{Style S-Italic|immortal}} man and to {{Style S-Italic|mortal}} beast. “And surely your blood of your {{Style S-Italic|nepheshim}} (lives) will I require; at the hand of every beast will I require it, and at the hand of man” (Gen. ix. 5). “Escape for {{Style S-Italic|nepheshe”}} (escape for thy {{Style S-Italic|life}} is translated) (Gen. xix. 17). “Let us not kill him,” reads the English version (Gen. xxxvii. 21). “Let us not kill his {{Style S-Italic|nephesh,”}} is the Hebrew text. “{{Style S-Italic|Nephesh}} for {{Style S-Italic|nephesh,”}} says Leviticus (xvii. 8). “He that killeth any man shall surely be put to death.” “He that smiteth the {{Style S-Italic|nephesh}} of a man” (Levit. xxiv. 17); and from verse 18 and following it reads: “And he that killeth a beast (nephesh) shall make it good. . . . Beast for beast,” whereas the original text has it “nephesh for nephesh.”

363 ADULTEROUS PRIESTS MAY KILL HUSBANDS.

the few brief allusions to them in the {{Style S-Italic|Metamorphoses of Apuleius,}} taught the greatest virtues. They unveiled to the aspirant in the “higher” mysteries of initiation that which many of our modern Hermetic students vainly search for in the kabalistic books, and which no obscure teachings of the Church, under the guidance of the Order of Jesuits, will ever be able to unveil. To compare, then, the ancient secret societies of the hierophants with the artificially-produced hallucinations of those few followers of Loyola, who were, perchance, sincere at the beginning of their career, is to insult the former. And yet, in justice to them, we are compelled to do so.

“Christian and Catholic sons,” says Stephen Fagundez, “may accuse their fathers of the crime of heresy if they wish to turn them from the faith, although they may know that their parents will be burned with fire, and put to death for it, as Tolet teaches. . . . And not only may they refuse them food . . . {{Style S-Italic|but they may also justly kill them.”^{[#fn1681 1681]}}}

“If a father were obnoxious to the State (being in banishment), and to the society at large, and there were no other means of averting such an injury, then I should approve of this” (for a son to kill his father), says Sec. XV., {{Style S-Italic|on Parricide and Homicide.^{[#fn1682 1682]}}}

“It will be lawful for an ecclesiastic, or one of the religious order, {{Style S-Italic|to kill a calumniator}} who threatens to spread atrocious accusations against himself or his religion,”^{[#fn1683 1683]} is the rule set forth by the Jesuit Francis Amicus.

[#fn1681anc 1681]. In “Præcepta Decalogi “(Edit. of Sion Library), Tom. i., lib. iv., c. 2, n. 7, 8.

[#fn1682anc 1682]. Opinion of John de Dicastille, Sect. xv., “De Justitia et Jure,” etc., cens. pp. 319, 320.

[#fn1683anc 1683]. “Cursus Theologici,” Tomus v., Duaci, 1642, Disp. 36, Sect. 5, n. 118.

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In Egypt every city of importance was separated from its burial place by a sacred lake. The same ceremony of judgment which the {{Style S-Italic|Book of the Dead}} describes as taking place in the world of Spirit, took place on earth during the burial of the mummy. Forty-two judges or assessors assembled on the shore and judged the departed “soul” according to its actions when in the body, and it was only upon a unanimous approval of this {{Style S-Italic|post-mortem}} jury that the boatman, who represented the Spirit of Death, could convey the justified defunct’s body to its last resting-place. After that the priests returned within the sacred precincts and instructed the neophytes upon the probable solemn drama which was then taking place in the invisible realm whither the soul had fled. The immortality of the spirit was strongly inculcated by the Al-om-jah.^{[#fn1684 1684]} In the {{Style S-Italic|Crata Repoa^{[#fn1685 1685]}}} the following is described as the {{Style S-Italic|seven}} degrees of the initiation.

After a preliminary trial at Thebes, where the neophyte had to pass through many trials, called the “Twelve Tortures,” he was commanded to govern his passions and never lose for a moment the idea of his God. Then as a symbol of the wanderings of the unpurified soul, he had to ascend several ladders and wander in darkness in a cave with many doors, all of which were locked. When he had overcome the dreadful trials, he received the degree of {{Style S-Italic|Pastopkoris,}} the second and third degrees being called the {{Style S-Italic|Neocoris,}} and the {{Style S-Italic|Melanephoris.}} Brought into a vast subterranean chamber thickly furnished with mummies lying in state, he was placed in presence of the coffin which contained the mutilated body of Osiris covered with blood. This was the hall called “Gates of Death,” and it is most certainly to this mystery that the passages in the {{Style S-Italic|Book of Job}} (xxxviii. 17) and other portions of the {{Style S-Italic|Bible}} allude when these gates are spoken of.^{[#fn1686 1686]} In chapter x., we give the esoteric interpretation of the “Book of Job,” which is the poem of initiation {{Style S-Italic|par excellence.}}

[#fn1684anc 1684]. Name of the highest Egyptian hierophants.

[#fn1685anc 1685]. “Crata Repoa, or the Mysteries of the Ancient Egyptian Priests.”

[#fn1686anc 1686]. See Matthew xvi. 18, where it is mistranslated “the gates of Hell.”

365 INDECENT CHRISTIAN FESTIVALS.

asks the “Lord”—{{Style S-Italic|i.e}}., the Al-om-jah, the Initiator—of Job, alluding to this third degree of initiation.

When the neophyte had conquered the terrors of this trial, he was conducted to the “Hall of Spirits,” to be judged by them. Among the rules in which he was instructed, he was commanded “{{Style S-Italic|never to either desire or seek revenge; to be always ready to help a brother in danger, even unto the risk of his own life; to bury every dead body; to honor his parents above all;}} respect old age and protect those weaker than himself; and finally, to ever bear in mind the hour of death, and that of resurrection, in a new and imperishable body.”^{[#fn1687 1687]} Purity and chastity were highly recommended, and {{Style S-Italic|adultery threatened with death.}}

We have read above the rules of these holy initiates of the {{Style S-Italic|Christian}} Society of Jesus. Compare them with those enforced upon the Pagan postulant, and Christian (!) morality with that inculcated in those mysteries of the Pagans upon which all the thunders of an avenging Deity are invoked by the Church. Had the latter no mysteries of its own? Or were they in any wise purer, nobler, or more inciting to a holy, virtuous life? Let us hear what Niccolini has to say, in his able {{Style S-Italic|History of the Jesuits,}} of the {{Style S-Italic|modern}} mysteries of the Christian cloister.^{[#fn1688 1688]}

“In most monasteries, and more particularly in those of the Capuchins and reformed (reformati), there begins at Christmas a series of feasts, which continues till Lent. All sorts of games are played, the most splendid banquets are given, and in the small towns, above all, the refectory of the convent is the best place of amusement for the greater number of the inhabitants. At carnivals, two or three very magnificent entertainments take place; the board so profusely spread that one might imagine that Copia had here poured forth the whole contents of her horn. It must be remembered that these two orders live by alms.^{[#fn1689 1689]} The

[#fn1687anc 1687]. Humberto Malhandrini: “Ritual of Initiations,” p. 105. Venice, 1657.

[#fn1688anc 1688]. Pages 43, 44, note f. Niccolini of Rome, author of “The History of the Pontificate of Pius IX.”; “The Life of Father Gavazzi,” etc.

[#fn1689anc 1689]. And begged in the name of {{Style S-Italic|Him}} who had nowhere to lay his head!

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sombre silence of the cloister is replaced by a confused sound of merry-making, and its gloomy vaults now echo with other songs than those of the psalmist. A ball enlivens and terminates the feast; and, to render it still more animated, and perhaps to show {{Style S-Italic|how completely their vow of chastity has eradicated all their carnal appetite,}} some of the young monks appear coquettishly dressed in the garb of the fair sex, and begin the dance, along with others, transformed into gay cavaliers. {{Style S-Italic|To describe the scandalous scene which ensues would be but to disgust my readers.}} I will only say that I have myself often been a spectator at such saturnalia.”

The cycle is moving down, and, as it descends, the physical and bestial nature of man develops more and more at the expense of the Spiritual Self.^{[#fn1690 1690]} With what disgust may we not turn from this religious farce called modern Christianity, to the noble faiths of old!

[#fn1690anc 1690]. In “Egypt’s Place in Universal History,” Bunsen gives the cycle of 21,000 years, which he adopts to facilitate the chronological calculations for the reconstruction of the universal history of mankind. He shows that this cycle “for the nutation of the ecliptic,” arrived at its apex in the year 1240 of our era. He says:

“The cycle divides itself into two halves of 10,500 (or twice 5,250) years each.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Baron explains that “in round numbers, the most favorable epochs for our hemisphere since the great catastrophe in Middle Asia (Deluge 10,000 years b.c.) are: “the 4,000 years before, and the 4,000 years after Christ; and the beginning of the first epoch, {{Style S-Italic|of which alone we can judge,}} as it alone is complete before us, coincides exactly with the beginnings of national history, or (what is identical) with the beginning of {{Style S-Italic|our consciousness}} of continuous existence” (“Egypt’s Place in Universal History,” Key, p. 102).

367 THE EGYPTIAN FUNERAL RITUAL.

{{Style P-Quote|“30. I have given thee thy {{Style S-Italic|Spirit.}}

In another place the entity, addressed as “Father” by the disembodied soul, is shown to mean the “spirit” of man; for the verse says: “I have made my soul come and speak with {{Style S-Italic|his Father,”}} its {{Style S-Italic|Spirit.^{[#fn1691 1691]}}}

The Egyptians regarded their {{Style S-Italic|Ritual}} as essentially a Divine inspiration; in short, as modern Hindus do the {{Style S-Italic|Vedas,}} and modern Jews their Mosaic books. Bunsen and Lepsius show that the term {{Style S-Italic|Hermetic}} means inspired; for it is Thoth, the Deity itself, that speaks and reveals to his elect among men the will of God and the arcana of divine things. Portions of them are expressly stated “to have been written by the very finger of Thoth himself;” to have been the work and composition of the great God.^{[#fn1692 1692]} “At a later period their Hermetic character is still more distinctly recognized, and on a coffin of the 26th Dynasty, Horus announces to the deceased that Thoth himself has brought him the books of his divine words, or Hermetic writings.”^{[#fn1693 1693]}

In the Egyptian notions, as in those of all other faiths founded on philosophy, man was not merely, as with the Christians, a union of soul and body; he was a trinity when spirit was added to it. Besides, that doctrine made him consist of {{Style S-Italic|kha}}—body; {{Style S-Italic|khaba—}}astral form, or shadow; {{Style S-Italic|ka}}—animal soul or life-principle; {{Style S-Italic|ba}}—the higher soul; and {{Style S-Italic|akh}}—terrestrial intelligence. They had also a sixth principle named {{Style S-Italic|Sah}}—or mummy; but the functions of this one commenced only after the death of the body. After due purification, during which the soul, separated from its body, continued to revisit the latter in its mummified condition,

[#fn1691anc 1691]. “The Funeral Ritual of the Deeds of Horus.”

[#fn1692anc 1692]. Bunsen: “Egypt’s Place in Universal History,” vol. v., p. 133.

[#fn1693anc 1693]. Lepsius: “Abth.,” iii.; Bl., 276; Bunsen, 134.

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this astral soul “became a God,” for it was finally absorbed into “the Soul of the world.” It became transformed into one of the creative deities, “the god of Phtah,”^{[#fn1694 1694]} the Demiurgos, a generic name for the creators of the world, rendered in the {{Style S-Italic|Bible}} as the Elohim. In the {{Style S-Italic|Ritual}} the good or purified {{Style S-Italic|soul,}} “in conjunction with its higher or {{Style S-Italic|uncreated}} spirit, is more or less the victim of the dark influence of the dragon Apophis. If it has attained the final knowledge of the heavenly and the infernal mysteries—the {{Style S-Italic|gnosis, i.e.,}} complete reunion with the spirit, it will triumph over its enemies; if not the soul could not escape its {{Style S-Italic|second death.}} It is ‘the lake that burneth with fire and brimstone’ (elements), into which those that are cast undergo a ‘second death’”^{[#fn1695 1695]} ({{Style S-Italic|Apocalypse}}){{Style S-Italic|.}} This death is the gradual dissolution of the astral form into its primal elements, alluded to several times already in the course of this work. But this awful fate can be avoided by the knowledge of the “Mysterious Name”—the “Word,”^{[#fn1696 1696]} say the kabalists.

[#fn1694anc 1694]. In the eighty-first chapter of the “Ritual” the soul is called {{Style S-Italic|the germ of lights}} and in the seventy-ninth the Demiurgos, or one of the creators.

[#fn1695anc 1695]. “Ritual,” vi, 44; Champollion: “Manifestations to the Light;” Lepsius: “Book of the Dead;” Bunsen: “Egypt’s Place in Universal History.”

[#fn1696anc 1696]. We cannot help quoting a remark by Baron Bunsen in relation to the “Word” being identical with the “Ineffable Name” of the Masons and the kabalists. While explaining the “Ritual,” some of the details of which “resemble rather the {{Style S-Italic|enchantments of a magician than solemn rites,}} although a hidden and mystical meaning must have been attached to them” (the honest admission of this much, at least, is worth something), the author observes: “The mystery of names, the knowledge of which was a sovereign virtue, and which, at a later period, degenerated into the {{Style S-Italic|rank heresy}} (?) of the Gnostics and the magic of enchanters, appears to have {{Style S-Italic|existed not only in Egypt but elsewhere.}} Traces of it are found in the ‘Cabala’ . . . it prevailed in the Greek and Asiatic mythology” (“Egypt’s Place, etc.,” p. 147).

369 LIVING SOULLESS MEN AND WOMEN.

grows in strength and power at the expense of its spiritual parent. Then the already half-unconscious soul, now fully intoxicated by the fumes of earthly life, becomes senseless, beyond hope of redemption. It is powerless to discern the splendor of its higher spirit, to hear the warning voice of its “guardian Angel,” and its “God.” It aims but at the development and fuller comprehension of natural, earthly life; and thus, can discover but the mysteries of physical nature. Its grief and fear, hope and joy, are all closely blended with its terrestrial existence. It ignores all that cannot be demonstrated by either its organs of action, or sensation. It begins by becoming virtually dead; it dies at last completely. It is {{Style S-Italic|annihilated.}} Such a catastrophe may often happen long years before the final separation of the {{Style S-Italic|life}}-principle from the body. When death arrives, its iron and clammy grasp finds work with {{Style S-Italic|life}} as usual; but there is no more a soul to liberate. The whole essence of the latter has been already absorbed by the vital system of the physical man. Grim death frees but a spiritual corpse; at best an idiot. Unable either to soar higher or awaken from lethargy, it is soon dissolved in the elements of the terrestrial atmosphere.

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