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SECTION II
Modern Criticism and the Ancients
The Secret Doctrine of the Aryan East is found repeated under Egyptian symbolism and phraseology in the Book of Hermes. At, or near, the beginning of the present century, all the books called Hermetic were, in the opinion of the average man of Science unworthy of serious attention. They were set down and loudly proclaimed as simply a collection of tales, of fraudulent pretences and most absurd claims. They "never existed before the Christian era," it was said: "they were all written with the triple object of speculation, deceiving and pious fraud;" they were all, even the best of them, silly apocrypha. * In this respect the nineteenth century proved a most worthy scion of the eighteenth, for, in the age of Voltaire as well as in this century, everything, save what emanated direct from the Royal Academy, was false, superstitious, foolish. Belief in the wisdom of the Ancients was laughed to scorn, perhaps more so even than it is now. The very thought of accepting as authentic the works and vagaries of "a false Hermes, a false Orpheus, a false Zoroaster," of false Oracles, false Sibyls, and a thrice false Mesmer and his absurd fluid, was tabooed all along the line. Thus all that had its genesis outside the learned and dogmatic precincts of Oxford and Cambridge, † or the Academy of France, was
* See in this connection, Pneumatologie des Esprits, by the Marquis de Mirville, who devotes six enormous volumes to show the absurdity of those who deny the reality of Satan and Magic, or the Occult Sciences – the two being with him synonymous.
† We think we see the sidereal phantom of the old Philosopher and Mystic – once of Cambridge University – Henry More, moving about in the astral mist over the old moss-covered roofs of the ancient town in which he wrote his famous letter to Glanvil about "witches." The "soul" seems restless and indignant, as on that day of May, 1678, when the doctor complained so bitterly to the author of Sadducismus Triumphatus of Scot, Adie and Webster. "Our new inspired saints," the soul is heard to mutter, "sworn advocates of the witches. . . . who against all sense and reason . . . Will have no Samuel but a confederate knave these in-blown buffoons, puffed up with . . . ignorance, vanity and stupid infidelity!" (See "Letter to Glanvil," and Isis Unveiled, i. 205, 206.)
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denounced in those days as ‘unscientific," and "ridiculously absurd." This tendency has survived to the present day.
Nothing can be further from the intention of any true Occultist – who stands possessed, by virtue of his higher psychic development, of instruments of research far more penetrating in their power than any as yet in the hands of physical experimentalists – than to look unsympathetically on the efforts that are being made in the area of physical enquiry. The exertions and labours undertaken to solve as many as possible of the problems of Nature have always been holy in his sight. The spirit in which Sir Isaac Newton remarked that at the end of all his astronomical work he felt a mere child picking up shells beside the Ocean of Knowledge, is one of reverence for the boundlessness of Nature which Occult Philosophy itself cannot eclipse. And it may freely be recognised that the attitude of mind which this famous simile describes is one which fairly represents that of the great majority of genuine Scientists in regard to all the phenomena of the physical plane of Nature. In dealing with this they are often caution and moderation itself. They observe facts with a patience that cannot be surpassed. They are slow to cast these into theories, with a prudence that cannot be too highly commended. And, subject to the limitations under which they serve Nature, they are beautifully accurate in the record of their observations. Moreover, it may be conceded further that modern Scientists are exceedingly improbable that any discovery will ever conflict with such or such a theory, now supported by such and such an aggregation of recorded facts. But even in reference to the broadest generalizations – which pass into a dogmatic form only in brief popular text books of scientific knowledge – the tone of "Science" itself, if that abstraction may be held to be embodied in the persons of its most distinguished representatives, is one of reserve and often of modesty.
Far, therefore, from being disposed to scoff at the errors into which the limitations of their methods may betray men of Science, the true Occultist will rather appreciate the pathos of a situation in which great industry and thirst for truth are condemned to disappointment, and often to confusion.
That which is to be deplored, however, in respect to Modern Science, is in itself an evil manifestation of the excessive caution which in its most favourable aspect protects Science from over-hasty conclusions:
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namely, the tardiness of Scientists to recognise that other instruments of research may be applicable to the mysteries of Nature besides those of the physical plane, and that it may consequently be impossible to appreciate the phenomena of any one plane correctly without observing them as well from the points of view afforded by others. In so far then as they wilfully shut their eyes to evidence which ought to have shown them clearly that Nature is more complex than physical phenomena alone would suggest, that there are means by which the faculties of human perception can pass sometimes from one plane to the other, and that their energy is being misdirected while they turn it exclusively on the minutiae of physical structure or force, they are less entitled to sympathy than to blame.
One feels dwarfed and humbled in reading what M. Renan, that learned modern "destroyer" of every religious belief, past, present and future, has to say of poor humanity and its powers of discernment. He believes
Mankind has but a very narrow mind; and the number of men capable of seizing acutely (finement) the true analogy of things, is quite imperceptible. *
Upon comparing, however, this statement with another opinion expressed by the same author, namely, that:
The mind of the critic should yield to facts, hand and feet bound, to be dragged by them wherever they may lead him. †
one feels relieved. When, moreover, these two philosophical statements are strengthened by a third enunciation of the famous Academician, which declares that:
Tout parti pris a priori, doit etre banni de la science, ‡
there remains little to fear. Unfortunately M. Renan is the first to break this golden rule.
The evidence of Herodotus – called, sarcastically no doubt, the "Father of History," since in every question upon which Modern Thought disagrees with him, his testimony goes for nought – the sober and earnest assurances in the philosophical narratives of Plato and Thucydides, Polybius, and Plutarch, and even certain statements of Aristotle himself, are invariably laid aside whenever they are involved in what modern criticism is pleased to regard as myth. It is some time since Strauss proclaimed that:
* Études Religieuses.
† Études Historiques.
‡ Mémoire read at the Academie des Inscriptions des Belles Lettres, in 1859.
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The presence of a supernatural element or miracle in a narrative is an infallible sign of the presence in it of a myth;
and such is the canon of criticism tacitly adopted by every modern critic. But what is a myth – μυθος – to begin with? Are we not told distinctly by ancient writers that the word means tradition? Was not the Latin term fabula, a fable, synonymous with something told, as having happened in pre-historic times, and not necessarily an invention. With such autocrats of criticism and despotic rulers as are most of the French, English, and German Orientalists, there may, then, be no end of historical, geographical, ethnological and philological surprises in store for the century to come. Travesties in Philosophy have become so common of late, that the public can be startled by nothing in this direction. It has already been stated by one learned speculator that Homer was simply "a mythical personification of the épopée"; * by another, that Hippocrates, son of Esculapius, "could only be a chimera"; that the Asclepiades, their seven hundred years of duration notwithstanding, might after all prove simply a "fiction"; that "the city of Troy (Dr. Schliemann to the contrary) existed only on the maps." etc. Why should not the world be invited after this to regard every hitherto historical character of days of old as a myth? Were not Alexander the Great needed by Philology as a sledge- hammer wherewith to break the heads of Brahmanical chronological pretensions, he would have become long ago simply "a symbol for annexation," or "a genius of conquest," as has been already suggested by some French writer.
Blank denial is the only refuge left to the critics. It is the most secure asylum for some time to come in which to shelter the last of the sceptics. For one who denies unconditionally, the trouble of arguing is unnecessary, and he also thus avoids what is worse, having to yield occasionally a point or two before the irrefutable arguments and facts of his opponent. Creuzer, the greatest of all the modern Symbologists, the most learned among the masses of erudite German Mythologists, must have envied the placid self-confidence of certain sceptics, when he found himself forced in a moment of desperate perplexity to admit that:
We are compelled to return to the theories of trolls and genii, as they were understood by the ancients; [it is a doctrine] without which it becomes absolutely impossible to explain to oneself anything with regard to the Mysteries †
of the Ancients, which Mysteries are undeniable.
* See Alfred Maury's Histoire des Religions de la Grèce. i. 248: and the speculations of Holzmann in Zeitschriftfur Vergleichende Sprach forschung, ann. 1882, p. 487, sq.
† Creuzer's Introduction des Mystères, iii. 456.
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Roman Catholics, who are guilty of precisely the same worship, and to the very letter – having borrowed it from the later Chaldaeans, the Lebanon Nabathaeans, and the baptized Sabaeans, * and not from the learned Astronomers and Initiates of the days of old – would now, by anathematizing it, hide the source from which it came. Theology and Churchianism would fain trouble the clear fountain that fed them from the first, to prevent posterity from looking into it, and thus seeing their original prototype. The Occultists, however, believe the time has come to give everyone his due. As to our other opponents – the modern sceptic and the Epicurean, the cynic and the Sadducee – they may find an answer to their denials in our earlier volumes. As to many unjust aspersions on the ancient doctrines, the reason for them is given in these words in Isis Unveiled:
The thought of the present-day commentator and critic as to the ancient learning, is limited to and runs round the exoterism of the temples; his insight is either unwilling or unable to penetrate into the solemn adyta of old, where the hierophant instructed the neophyte to regard the public worship in its true light. No ancient sage would have taught that man is the king of creation, and that the starry heaven and our mother earth were created for his sake. †
When we find such works as Phallicism ‡ appearing in our day in print, it is easy to see that the day of concealment and travesty has passed away. Science, in Philology, Symbolism and Comparative Religion, has progressed too far to make wholesale denials any longer, and the Church is too wise and cautious not to be now making the best of the situation. Meanwhile, the "rhombs of Hecate" and the "wheels of Lucifer," § daily exhumed on the sites of Babylonia, can no longer be used as clear evidence of a Satan-worship, since the same symbols are shown in the ritual of the Latin Church. The latter is too learned to be ignorant of the fact that even the later Chaldaeans, who had gradually fallen into dualism, reducing all things to two primal Principles, never worshipped Satan or idols, any more than did the Zoroastrians, who now lie under the same accusation, but that their Religion was as highly philosophical as any; their dual and exoteric Theosophy became the heirloom of the Jews, who, in their turn, were forced to share it with the Christians. Parsis are to this day charged with
* The later Nabathaeans adhered to the same belief as the Nazarenes and the Sabaeans, honoured John the Baptist, and used Baptistm. (See Isis Unveiled, ii. 127; Munck, Palestine, p. 525; Dunlap, Sod, the Son of Man, etc.)
† i. 535.
‡ By Hargrave Jennings.
§ See De Mirville's Pneumatologie, iii. 267 et seq.
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Heliolatry, and yet in the Chaldean Oracles, under the "Magical and Philosophical Precepts of Zoroaster" one finds the following:
Direct not thy mind to the vast measures of the earth; For the plant of truth is not upon ground.
Nor measure the measures of the sun, collecting rules,
For he is carried by the eternal will of the Father, not for your sake.
Dismiss the impetuous course of the moon; for she runs always by work of necessity.
The progression of the stars was not generated for your sake.
There was a vast difference between the true worship taught to those who showed themselves worthy, and the state religions. The Magians are accused of all kinds of superstition, but this is what the same Chaldaean Oracle says:
The wide aerial flight of birds is not true, |
As we say in our former work:
Surely it is not those who warn people against "mercenary fraud" who can be accused of it; and if they accomplished acts which seem miraculous, who can with fairness presume to deny that it was done merely because they possessed a knowledge of natural philosophy and psychological science to a degree unknown to our schools? †
The above quoted stanzas are a rather strange teaching to come from those who are universally believed to have worshipped the sun, and moon, and the starry hosts, as Gods. The sublime profundity of the Magian precepts being beyond the reach of modern materialistic thought, the Chaldean Philosophers are accused of Sabaeanism and Sun-worship, which was the religion only of the uneducated masses.
* Psellus, 4; in Cory's Ancient Fragments, 269.
† Isis Unveiled, i. 535, 536.