CHAPTER THE SECOND
A question may here arise whether two corresponding pillars, or
columns, in the White Tower, London, do not very ingeniously conceal,
masonically, the mythic
formula of the Mosaic Genesis, 'Male
and Female created He them', etc. Refer below to figs. 119, 120.
1. Tor, or 'Hammer of Thor' T(au).
Figs. 119, 120: Columns to Chapel in the 'White
Tower', London. Style, Early Norman, 1081. Fig. 119--(1) Mystic
'Tau'; (2) Male, Right; (3) Female, Left. Fig. 122: Egypt,
Persia: Sect of Ali; Fig. 123: Castle-Rising Church, Norfolk.
Fig. 124: Romsey Abbey, Hants.
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Fig. 125: St. Peter's Church, Northampton; Fig.
126: S--out of the Arms of the +. (Font, Runic and Saxon,
Bridekirk Church, Cumberland); Fig. 127: ת
ω T: The Ten
Commandments, 'Tables of Stone' Five 'Commandments' to the Right,
Masculine, 'Law', Five 'Commandments' to the Left, the
'Prophets', or the 'Gospel'
|
2. Corinthian Volutes, or 'Ram's Horns'.
The crescent moon and star is a Plantagenet badge. It is also the
Badge of the Sultan of Turkey. Also, with a difference, it displays
the insignia of Egypt.
The flag of Egypt is the ensign of the sect of Ali (the second
Mohammedan head of religion), which is 'Mars, a Crescent, Luna;
within the horns of which is displayed an estoile of the
second'--abandoning the vert, or green, of the 'Hadgi', or of Mecca,
the site of the apotheosis of Mohammed. The Mohammedan believers of
the sect of Ali rely on the 'masculine principle'--more closely, in
this respect, assimilating with the Jews; and therefore their
distinctive heraldic and theological colour is red, which is male, to
the exclusion of the other Mohammedan colour,
Fig. 130 A lamp, Roma Sotteranea ΙΧΘΥΣ.';
Fig. 131: Devices from the Tombs in the Catacombs at Rome
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green, which is female. The 'Hadgi', or Pilgrims to Mecca, wear
green; the Turkish Mussulmans wear red and green, according to their
various. titles of honour, and to their various ranks.
The Hospital of St. Cross, near Winchester, abounds in the
earliest Norman mouldings. The architecture of St. Cross presents
numerous hermetic suggestions.
The identity of Heathen and of Christian Symbols is displayed in
all our old churches in degrees more or less conclusive.
The 'Ten fingers' of the two hands (made up of each 'Table' of
Five) are called in old parlance, the ten commandments'. 'I will
write the ten commandments
Fig. 137: Monogram of the Three Figs. 138, 139:
The Heathen Monogram Emblems carried in the Mysteries of the
Triune; Fig. 140: Monogram of the Saviour.
|
in thy face' was spoken in fury, in the old-fashioned days, of an
intended assault. The hands explain the meaning of this proverbial
expression, interpreted astrologically. Palmistry is called
Chiromancy, because Apollo, mythologically, was taught 'letters' by
Chiron, the 'Centaur'.
The devices on most Roman Bronze Lamps present continual Gnostic
ideas.
The Temple Church, London, will be found to abound with
Rosicrucian hieroglyphs and anagrammatical hints in all parts, if
reference be made to it by an attentive inquirer--one accustomed to
these abstruse studies.
These designs supply a variety of Early Christian Symbols or
Hieroglyphs, drawn from Roman originals in all parts of the world.
The Æolian Harp, or Magic Harp, gave forth real strains in
the wind. .These were supposed to be communications from the
invisible spirits that people the, air in greater or lesser number.
See figs. 141, 142.
The above music consists of a magical incantation to the air, or
musical Charms, supposed magically to
Fig. 141: Melody (or Melodic Expression) of the
Portico of the Parthenon
Fig. 142: General Melody (or Melodic
Expression) of the Pantheon, Rome
Fig. 143: Alternate Direct
and Crooked Radii, or 'Glories' set round Sacred Objects
Figs.
144, 145: Collar of Esses
|
be played from the frontispieces, as musical instruments, of two
of the most celebrated ancient religious structures. The Cabalists
imagined that the arrangements of the stars in the, sky, and
particularly the accidental circumvolvent varying speed of the
planets of the solar system, produced music--as men know music. The
Sophists maintained that architecture, in another sense, was
harmonious communication,
Fig. 146: Egg-and-Tongue Moulding, Caryatic
Prostyle, Pandroseum
(Temple
of Erechthæus, Athens)
Fig. 147: Moslem: the Crescent
and Star: also Plantagenet
Fig. 148: Honeysuckle, Greek
Stele
Fig. 149: Egg-and-Tongue Moulding, Roman example
Fig.
150: Rhamasseion, Thebes, Caryatic Portico
Fig. 151: India,
origin of the 'Corinthian'
Fig. 152: India, Rudimental
Corinthian Capital, as also Rudimental Christian
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addressed to a capable apprehension--when the architecture was
true to itself, and therefore of divine origin. These passages were supposed to be magic charms, or
invocations, addressed by day and night, to the intelligent beings
who filled the air invisibly. They were played from the fronts
Fig. 154: Stone Crosses at Sandbach, in
Cheshire
of the Parthenon, Athens, and the Pantheon, Rome, according to the
ideas of the superstitious Greeks and of the Oriental Christian
Church.
In fig. 153 we have a representation of Bersted Church, as seen
(magnified) from a rising hill, over a hop-garden, at about the
distance of half a mile. Bersted is a little village, about three
miles from Maidstone, Kent, on the Ashford road. In the chancel of
Bersted Church, Robert Fludd, or Flood ('Robertus de Fluctibus'), the
head of the Rosicrucians in England, lies buried. He died in 1637.
Fig. 155 displays the standard Maypole, or authentic Maypole, with
all its curious additions; and we add their explanation. In the upper
portion we have the
Fig. 157: Hindoo Monograms of Planets: (1)
Mercury, Buddha (Boodh)' (2) Venus; (3) Mars; (4) Jupiter; (5)
Saturn; (6) Moon; (7) Sun
Fig. 158: Astrological Symbols of
Planets: (1) Sol (2) Luna; (3) Mercury; (4) Venus; (5) Mars; (6)
Jupiter; (7) Saturn
Fig. 159: Buddhist Emblem
Fig. 160:
'Shield of David', or, the 'Seal of Solomon'
Fig. 161: Phallic
Triad
Fig. 162: Astrological Hand: (1) Jupiter; (2) Saturn;
(3) Sun; (4) Mercury; (5) Mars; (6) Moon; (7) Venus
Fig. 163:
Indian and Greek
Fig. 164: Isis, 'Dragon’s Head'
Fig.
165: Hand in Benediction
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Apex of the Phallus, the Quatre-feuilles, and the Discus or Round.
The lower portion is the Linga, Lingham, or Phallus, 'wreathed'; also
the 'Pole' of the ship 'Argo' ('Arco'); otherwise the 'Tree of
Knowledge'. The ribbons of the Maypole should be of the seven
prismatic colours.
Fig. 156 shows the union of the Phallus and Yoni, and exhibits
Unmistakably the destination and purpose of the familiar Maypole.
Fig. 166: Egyptian Alto-Relievo (British Museum);
Fig. 167, 'Hook of Saturn', 'Crook of Bishops'.
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Each finger in fig. 162 is devoted to a separate planet. Refer to
the engraving of the hand.
Fig. 167, 'Hook of Saturn', 'Crook of Bishops'. 'By hook or
crook', meaning, 'By fair means or foul', is a proverbial expression,
continually heard.
There are two works which will assist in throwing light upon that
mystic system of the ancients, probably originating in the dreaming
East, that refers the production of music to architectural forms or
geometric diagrams; as columns and entablatures, or upright lines and
cross-lines, and mathematical arcs and diagonals, in their
modifications and properties, of course are: figs. 141, 142, are Hay's
Natural Principles and Analogy
of the Harmony of Form, and a very original and learned musical
production, entitled
The Analogy of the Laws of Musical
Temperament to the Natural Dissonance of Creation, by M. Vernon,
published in London in 1867. Through a strange theory, the music
of our book is taken as the expression of the geometrical
fronts of the two great temples, the Parthenon at Athens and the
Pantheon at Rome, which are supposed to have been built with perfect
art. We have 'translated' these phantom Æolian melodies played
in the winds (so to express it), and fixed them in modern musical
notation.
Templar
Banner
CHAPTER THE THIRD
The 'Collar of Esses' is supposed always to be a part of the
Order of the Garter. The coupled 'S.S.' mean the 'Sanctus Spiritus',
or 'Holy Spirit', or the 'Third Person'. The 'Fleurs-de-Lis', or
'Lisses', or the Lilies of the Field', invariably appear in close
connexion with St. John, or the 'Sanctus Spiritus', and also with the
Blessed Virgin Mary, in all Christian
Fig. 168: Collar of Esses
symbola or
insignia. The Prince of Wales's triple
plume appears to have the same mythic Egyptian and Babylonian origin,
and to be substantially the same symbol as the 'Fleur-de-Lis'. When
arranged in threes, the 'Fleurs-de-Lis' represent the triple powers
of nature--the 'producer', the 'means of production', and 'that
produced': The 'Fleur-de-Lis' is presented in a deep disguise in the
'Three Feathers', which is the crest of the Prince of Wales;
in this form the Fleur-de-Lis is intended to elude ordinary
recognition. The reader will observe the hint of these significant
'Lisses' in the triple scrolls or 'Esses' coiled around the bar in
the reverse of the Gnostic gem, the 'Chnuphis Serpent', elsewhere
given. This amulet is a fine opalescent chalcedony, very convex on
both sides. It is the figure of the 'Chnuphis Serpent' rearing
himself aloft in act to dart, crowned with the seven vowels, the
cabalistic gift to Man in his Fall, signifying 'speech'. The re verse
presents the triple 'S.S.S.' coiled around the 'Phallus'.
In fig. 170 we have the Prince of Wales's Feathers, from the Tomb
of Edward the Black Prince, in Canterbury Cathedral. This badge
presents the idea of the 'Fleur-de-Lis', 'Ich Dien!'--'I serve!'
Fig. 171 represents the Egyptian Triple Plumes, which are the same
badge as the 'Fleur-de-Lis' and the Prince of Wales's Feathers,
meaning the 'Trinity'.
Fig. 172--also (
ante) referred to as fig. 191--is a Gnostic
Gem. It represents the 'Chnuphis Serpent', spoken of above.
A famous inscription (Delphic E) was placed above the portal of
the Temple at Delphi. This, inscription
was a single letter, namely, the letter E, the name of which in
Greek was E, 'which is the second person of the present of the
indicative of the verb ειμι, and signifies 'Thou
art'; being as Plutarch has interpreted it, the salutation bf the god
by those who entered the Temple. See Plutarch
de E
apud
Delph. Lord Monboddo's
Origin and Progress of Language
(1774), vol. ii. p. 85, refers to this letter E.
The Delphic 'E' means the number 'Five', or the half of the
Cabalistic Zodiac, or the Five Ascending Signs. This 'Delphic E' is
also the Seleucidan Anchor. It was adopted by the Gnostics to
indicate the 'Saviour', and it is frequent in the talismans and
amulets of the early Christians. It is one of the principal gems of
the Gnostics, and is a cameo in flat relief.
One of the charges against the Knights Templars was as follows:
'That they bound, or touched, the head of an idol with cords,
wherewith they bound themselves about their. shirts or next their
skins'
('Processus contra Templarios', Dugd.
Monast. Ang. vol. vi.
part ii. pp. 844-846, etc.). There is something strange about these
cords, cordons, ropes, belts, bands, baldrics (also in the term
'belted earls'). These are always male accessories; except the
'zones', sashes, or girdles, worn as the mark of virgins, which
cinctures may yet draw their symbolic meaning from this same
'
umbilicus' in question. The reader will notice also the
connexion of these ideas and the practice in the Roman race of the
'Lupercal', at the February Roman religious solemnities (February of
the 'Fishes'). At these it was the custom of the runners to flog
bystanders,
particularly women, with thongs or cords; which
were probably intended to be the racers’ own girdles. Julius
Cæsar, Mark Antony, and Calphurnia form a group illustrative of
this meaning. Thus Shakespeare:
Our elders say,
The barren, touched in this holy chase,
Shake off
the sterile curse.
--Julius Cæsar, act is sc. 2.
Is this the origin of the custom of the people pelting or
.flogging each other at the Italian Carnivals? It seems highly
probable. The Carnivals occur at the same time as these Roman
Lupercalia.
Many early Norman mouldings exhibit various examples of the cable.
Thongs, ties, and network are seen to bind all the significant
figures in the early English and Irish churches. Is there any
connexion between these bonds, or ties, or lacings, with the
'cable-tow' of the initiates among the Masons? Perhaps the 'tow' in
this 'cable-tow' means the 'Tau', or stood for it originally.
Reference may here be made to the snake which forms the girdle of the
Gnostic 'Good Shepherd' in the illustration later in our book (fig.
252).
The cable-mouldings in Gothic architecture are intended to carry
an important meaning. They are found in the pointed or Christian
architecture in continual close connexion with the triplicated
zigzag, the vandykes, or '
aquarii', as we designate them,
because all these architectural forms, which are hieroglyphs, mean
the feminine or 'Second Principle', and express the sign of Aquarius,
with its watery or lunar hints, its twin-fishes, and its Jonah-like
anagrams of the 'Redeemer'. Hence the boatlike, elongated, peculiar
form called the
vesica piscis, which is the oblong
shuttle-shaped frame continually set over doors and windows and
elsewhere in Gothic churches, to contain effigies of the Saviour, or
Virgin Mary, or groups from the New Testament in connexion with these
Two Sacred Persons. A doorway in Barfreston Church, Kent, supplies an
excellent example of the employment of this oblong figure; which is
also Babylonian, and means the female member as its starting-point.
In a previous part of our book we give various figures of the
prows or cutwater-heads of gondolas, in which we clearly show the
origin of their peculiar form, which represents the
securis,
or 'sacrificial axe', that crook originally expressed in the 'hook of
Saturn'. The 'Bu-Centaur' indicates the fabulous being, the
bicorporate 'ox' or 'horse' and 'Man', as will be found by a
separation of the syllables 'Bu-Centaur'. It is the name of the
state-galley of the Doge of Venice, used on the occasion of his
figurative stately marriage with, the Adriatic, or espousal of the
'Virgin of the Sea', who was Cybele of the 'sacrificial hook'. The
hatchet of Dis, the glaive, the halberd, the reaping-hook of Ceres,
the crescent moon, the 'Delphic E', are all the same mystic figure.
The prow of the gondola exhibits unmistakably the
securis and
fasces conjointly, or the axe of the
sacrifice and the rods for the scourging of the victim first, if
human, and afterwards for his burning--the rods being the firewood.
Lictors have their name probably from '
Llec'. From this
peculiar cutwater arose the Dragon-beak, the 'Prow', or 'Frow', the
figurehead and fiddle-head. They have all a feminine origin.
Fig. 174 represents 'S. Johan' (St., John), from an early woodcut
of the Twelve Apostles: His right hand is raised in the act of the
holy sign, whilst hid left clasps the chalice of the 'S.S.', or
Sacrament of Wine; in the cup is a salamander, signifying the 'H. G'.
This is St. John the Apostle, the author of the 'Apocalypse'; or the
'Sanctus Spiritus', who baptizes in the mystic Eucharist with the
'Holy Ghost and with Fire'.
The following are the names pf the angels of the planets,
according to the Gnostics. At the beginning of all things is Jehovah
(Sabaoth), Victory; at the end, the 'Old Serpent' (Ophis). Between
these are the Seraphim (Intelligences) and Cherubim (Benevolences),
and their representatives. Origen calls the Sun, Adonai; the Moon,
Iao; Jupiter, Eloi; Mars, Sabao; Orai, Venus; Astaphai; Mercury;
Ildabaoth, Saturn. All this is Gnostic--highest mysticism therefore.
The name Tarasque is given for the Dragon of a Northern Nation.
(Qy. the 'Hill of Tara', etc.?) Under the Roman Emperors, and under
the Emperors of Byzantium, every cohort or centurion bore a dragon as
its ensign (Modestus,
De Vocabul.
Rei Milit.; Flav.
Veget.
De Re Militari, lib. ii. c. xiii.: Georget,
Insig.
Europ.,
loc. cit.) Matthew of Westminster, speaking of the
early battles of this country of England, says: 'The King’s
place was
between the Dragon and the Standard'--'Regius locus
fuit inter draconem et standardum' (Lower's
Curiosities of
Heraldry, p. 96). This is the undoubted origin of the ensign’s
'pair of colours' in a battalion; viz. the first colour, or 'King’s
Colour', whose place is to the right, is properly the standard; and
the second colour, or the 'regimental colour', to which is assigned
the left-hand, or female, or sinister place, is the 'Dragon'. The
Dragon was supposed to conduct to victory, because its figure was a
most potent charm. The standards and guidons of the cavalry follow
the same magic rule.
The planets are supposed by the astrologers and alchemists to
exercise dominion more particularly in the order following, and to
produce effects upon their own appropriate under-mentioned metals, on
planetarily corresponding days. These are Sol, for gold, on Sunday;
Luna, for silver, on Monday; Mars, for iron, on Tuesday; Mercury, for
quicksilver, on Wednesday; Jupiter, for tin, on Thursday; Venus, for
copper, on Friday; and Saturn, for lead, on Saturday (Lucas's
Travels, p. 79; Count Bernard of Treviso). The emblematical
sculptures, in which the whole enigma of the art of transmutation is
supposed to be contained, are those over the fourth arch of the
Cemetery of the Innocents, at Paris, as you go through the great gate
of St. Denis, on the right-hand side. They were placed there by
Nicholas Flamel.
The old traditions, from time immemorial, aver that it is neither
proper for sailors nor for servants of the sea to wear beards. That
they have never done so is true, except at those times when profound
mythic meanings were not understood or were neglected. This
smoothness of a sailor's face arises from the fact that the sea has
always been mythologically feminine, and that sailors and men or
followers of the sea are under the protection of the 'Queen of the
Deep', or the 'Virgin of the Sea'. Hence the figure of Britannia,
with her sceptre of the sea or trident, and not that of Neptune.
The Virgin Mary, the 'Star of the Sea', and Patroness of Sailors,
rules and governs the ocean, and her colours are the ultramarine of
the 'Deep', and sea-green, when viewed in this phase of her divine
character. In all representations, ancient or modern, sailors have
beardless faces, unless they belong to the reprobate and barbarian
classes--such as pirates and outlaws, and men who have supposedly
thrown off devotional observance, and fallen into the rough recusancy
of mere nature.
Fig. 175 is a very curious design from Sylvanus Morgan, an old
herald. Above is the spade, signifying here the
phallus; and
below is the distaff, or instrument of woman's work, meaning the
answering member, or
Yoni; these are united by the snake. We
here perceive the meaning of the rhymed chorus sung by Wat Tyler's
mob: 'When Adam delved' (with his spade), 'and Eve span'
(contributing her [producing] part of the work), 'where was then the
Gentleman?'--or what, under these ignoble conditions, makes
difference or degree? It is supposed
that Shakespeare plays upon this truth when he makes his clown in
Hamlet observe 'They' (i.e. Adam and Eve) 'were the first who
ever bore arms.' By a reference to the foot of the figure, we shall
see what
these arms were, and discover male and female resemblances in the
shape of the man’s 'escutcheon' and the woman's diamond-shaped
'lozenge'. As thus:
a is the shield of arms, or 'spade', or
'spada', or 'male implement', on man’s own side, or dexter
side;
b is the 'lozenge', or distaff, or 'article
representative of woman's work', on her proper side, or the left or
sinister side.
A chalice is, in general, the sign of the Priestly Order. The
chalice on the tombstone of a knight, or over the door of a castle,
is a sign of the Knights Templars, of whom St. John the Evangelist
was the Patron Saint. The 'cup' was forbidden to the laity, and was
only received by the Priests, in consequence of the decree of Pope
Innocent III, A.D. 1215. It means the 'S.S.', or Holy Spirit, to
which we have frequently adverted.
We have carefully inspected that which has been designated the
crux antiquariorum, or the Puzzle of
Antiquaries, namely, the famous Font, which is of unknown and
bewildering antiquity, in the nave of Winchester Cathedral. Milner (a
feeble narrator and misty, unreliable historian), in his
History
of Winchester, has the following superficial notice of this
relic: 'The most distinguished ornaments on the top are doves
"
breathing"' (they are not 'breathing', they are
drinking) 'into phials surmounted with crosses
fichée.
And on the sides' (the north side, he should say, which is faced
wrongly, and ought properly to front the east) 'the doves are again
depicted with a
salamander, emblematic of fire; in allusion to
that passage of St. Matthew: "He shall baptize you with the
Holy
Ghost and with fire".'
All the secrets of masonry are concealed in the Hebrew or Chaldee
language. In the First Chapter of the
Gospel according to St. John
is contained the mythical outline of the Cabala, in its highest part.
'Les anciens astrologues, dit le plus savant les Juifs'
(Maimonides), 'ayant consacré à chaque planète,
une
couleur, un
animal, un
bois, un
métal,
un
fruit, une
plante, ils formaient de toutes ces
choses une
figure ou réprésentation de l’astre,
observant pour cet effet de choisir un
instant approprié,
un jour heureux, tel que la
conjonction, ou tout autre
aspect favorable. Par leurs cérémonies (magiques) ils
croyaient pouvoir faire passer dans ces figures ou idoles les
influences des êtres supérieurs (leurs modèles).
C’étaient ces idoles qu’adoraient les
Kaldéens-sabéens. Les prêtres égyptiens,
indiens, perses--on les croyait lier les dieux à leurs idoles,
les faire descendre du ciel à leur gré. Ils menacent le
soleil et la lune dé révéler les secrets des
mystères.'--Eusebius Iamblicus,
De Mysteriis Egyptiorum.
The mystic emblems of the religions of India, China, Greece, and
Rome are closely similar, and are
set forth in the ornaments on the friezes of the temples of all
those countries, explaining their general principles. 'Your popular
societies are an emanation from the lodges of the Freemasons; in like
manner as these proceeded from the funeral pile of the Templars'
('
Castle'
of the Tuileries, year viii). Thus the
'egg-and-tongue moulding ('egg and adder's tongue', for the egg and
the serpent were two of the emblems of the Egyptian and Greek
mysteries), the griffin, the lion of St. Mark, the
honeysuckle-and-lotus ornament, the convolutions and volutes, the
horns as floriation springing from the lighted candelabra, the lotus
and tori of Egypt, and the Greek ornaments and Roman Templar
ornaments, are all related in their religious meanings.
The names of the 'Three Kings', or 'Shepherds'; who descried, the
Star of Annunciation in the East, are Caspar, Melchior, and
Balthasar. Caspar, or Gaspar, is the 'White One'; Melchior is the
'King of Light'; Balthasar, the 'Lord of Treasures'. Balthasar, or
Balthazar, is the Septuagint spelling of Belshazzar.
Linga is the old name of an island near Iona, called the
'Dutchman's Cap'. (Qy. the Phrygian cap?--also the first 'cocked
hat', and its recondite meaning?)
Gallus, or the Cock, is
sacred to Mars, whose-colour is
red. In this connexion, and as
bespeaking Hermes or Mercurius, the 'messenger of the dawn', may have
arisen the use of the 'cock', as the emblem supposedly of the first
descrier of the daily light from the tops of the steeples. It
probably signifies the phallic myth. The grasshopper, dragon, arrow,
and fox, as weathercocks, have undoubtedly a remote reference to the
same idea of symbolizing the 'Prince of the Powers of the Air'.
The form of the Pointed Arch reached the Orientals
--as we see in their Temples--in the shape of the Phrygian and Median
Bonnet (Lascelles, 1820). In these strange curves we have mingling
the
scarab, scorpion, Σ, or (--).
Cocks crow at day-dawn. Weathercocks turn to the wind, and invite
the meteoric or elementary influences, the 'Powers of the Air'. The
question as to the mystic side of all this is very interesting and
curious. The fields of the air were supposed by the Rosicrucians to
be filled with spirits.
'Tous les Lamas portent la mitre, ou bonnet conique, qui était
l’emblème du soleil. Le Dalai-Lama, ou immense prêtre
de La, est ce que nos vieilles relations appelaient le prêtre
Jean, par l’abus du mot persan
Djehân, qui veut
dire le monde. Ainsi le prêtre Monde, le dieu Monde, se tient
parfaitement.'--Volney,
Ruines, p. 251. (Qy. Prester-John? Qy.
also this verbal connexion with '
Saint John', as if Prêtre
John?) In the old Norman-French
Maistre is frequently met for
Maître. This Prestre, or Prester (Anglicized), or Prêtre
John, is probably no other than the Priest or High-Priest 'John',
otherwise Saint John, or the 'Saint-Esprit'. The recognition of the +
in the Great Llama, Al-Ama, Ama, Anima (Soul, Spirit), Alma, El-Om,
etc., meaning 'white', is very curious. The antiquary Bryant is
positively of opinion, from the very names of Columbkil and Iona,
that this island Iöna was anciently sacred to the Arkite
divinities. The great asylum of the Northern Druids was the Island of
Hu or Iona, Vs Colan, or Columba (
Mythology and Rites of the
British Druids, by Edward Davies, 1809, p. 479).
The glories around sacred persons and objects, which have
straight-darting and curvilinear or wavy or serpentine rays
alternately, are continual in theological or heraldic illustration;
which waved and straight
rays alternately imply a deep mystery. They are constant symbols
in the sacred
nimbi, and are found upon sacramental cups; they
are set as the symbolical
radii around reliquaries, and they
appear as the mystic fiery circle of the Pyx. The
straight
spires and the brandished waved flames, or cherubic (or rather
seraphic) gladii, or crooked swords guarding Paradise, imply
two of the chief Christian mysteries. In the curved spires of flame,
alternating with the aureole or ring of glory, there is possibly a
remote hint of ♄, or the 'Reconciler of the Worlds Visible and
Invisible', or 'S.S.'.
To account for the universal deification of 'horns' in
architecture all over the world, as its symbolic keynote, as it were,
which sigma has been transmitted into modern emblematic science, and
incorporated unconsciously into the ornaments and elevated into the
high places, over and over again, even in Christian buildings, an old
Talmudist--Simeon Ben-Iochay by name--hazards the startling
conjecture that this adoration arose originally in the supernatural
light of knowledge of the old day, for the following reasons: the
strange explanation which this mysterious writer gives is, that the
bovine animals would have themselves become men in their future
generations, but for that divine arrest which interfered athwart as
it were, and wasted the ruminative magnetic force; which otherwise
miraculously would have effected the transformation, by urging the
powers of the brain from the radix of the rudimentary templar region
into the enormous branching, tree-like, then improvised appendages,
where this possibility or extension of the nervous lines became
spoiled and attenuate, solidified and degraded. Growth and
development are assumed as taken from expansion and radiation off a
nervous sensitive centre, by election or affinity governed by an
Fig. 176: The Templar Banner, 'Beauséant'
Fig.
177: Arches of the Temple Church, London. Symbol of the B.V.M.
Also Delphic E, or Seleucidan Anchor
Fig. 178: Eight-pointed
Buddhist Cross, 'Poor Soldiers' of the 'Temple'
Fig. 179:
Teutonic Knights
|
invisible Power operating from without. It is to descend very deep
into cabalistic and Talmudical mysteries to gain comprehension of an
idea concerning-the origin of this absurd worship of animal horns.
The cabalist Simeon Ben-Iochay declares that it was in gratitude
for this changed intention, and because the creature man became
'Man', and not the bovine creatures--a 'catastrophe which might have
happened, except for this diversion of the brain-power into horns'
(mere fable or dream as all this sounds!)--that the Egyptians set up
the very 'horns,' to worship as the real thing--the depository or
'ark'--into which the supernatural 'rescue' was committed. Thus the
horns of the animal--as the idol standing for the means, equally as
another representative figure (the phallus), expressive of the mighty
means to which man’s existence and multiplication was
entrusted--were exalted for adoration, and placed as the trophies
heroically '
won even out of the reluctance and hostility of
nature',
Fig. 180: Knights of Malta; Fig. 181: Cross
Potent, Knights Hospitallers; Fig. 182: St. John. (Hospital of
St. Cross, Winchester); Fig. 183 Egyptian Torus, Lotus
Enrichment, and various Lunar Symbols; Fig. 184: Temple of
Apollinopolis Magna, in Upper Egypt; Fig. 185: Norman Capital,
Door-shaft: Honeysuckle-and-Lotus Ornament, early example.
|
and adored, not for themselves, but for that of which they spoke.
Shakspeare has several covert allusions to the dignity of the myth
of the 'Horns'. There is much more, probably, in these spoils of the
chase--the branching horns or the antlers--than is usually supposed.
They indicate infinitely greater things than when they are only seen
placed aloft as sylvan trophies. The crest of his late Royal Highness
Prince Albert displays the Runic horns, or the horns of the Northern
mythic hero. They were always a mark of princely and of conquering
eminence, and they are frequently observable in the crests and blazon
of the soldier-chiefs, the Princes of Germany. They come from the
original Taut, Tat, Thoth, Teat, whence 'Teuton' and 'Teutonic'.
These names derive from the mystic Mercurius
Fig. 186: Uræon
Fig. 187: Winged
Disc
Fig. 188: Ionic--Greek: 'Egg-and-tongue' Moulding (two of
the Emblems of the mysteries)
Fig. 189: Grecian Moulding,
expressing Religious Mysteries
Fig. 190: Corinthian--Temple of
Vesta. Central Flower, probably the Egyptian Lotus
Fig. 191:
Pantheon at Rome.
Fig. 192: Volute
Fig. 193:
Corinthian
Fig. 194: Ionic Capital, Erecthæum at
Athens
Fig. 195: Composite features
Fig. 196: Temple of
Vesta, or the Sybil, at Tivoli; Ram's Horns for Volutes
Fig.
197: Temple of Ellora and Bheems-Chlori (Mokundra Pass)
Fig.
198: India and Greece (similar capitals)
Fig. 199:
Greek--Corinthian: Choragic Monument, Athens
|
Trismegistus, 'Thrice-Master; Thrice Mistress'--for this personage is
double-sexed: 'Phoebe above, Diana on earth, Hecate below.'
Fig. 177,
ante (from the arches of the Temple Church,
London), is a symbol of the 'Blessed Virgin; it is also the 'Delphic
E', or 'Seleucidan Anchor'.
Fig. 200; Norman Capital: Foliated Ornament,
resembling the Honeysuckle and Lotus; Fig. 201: Canterbury
Cathedral: Volutes of the Corinthian form; Fig. 202: Canterbury
Cathedral: Corinthian Scrolls or Horns.
|
The 'horns' of the Talmud account for the mythological
Minotaur,
the Bucen
taur, Pan and Priapus,
the 'Sagittary' or Centaur, the sign 'Sagittarius', and perhaps all
bicorporate human and animal forms.
In the group of figures above, showing the various classical forms
of the volutes, or flourished horns, in the Corinthian, Ionic, and
Composite capitals, a close affinity will be remarked to examples of
capitals with horns or volutes from the temple of Ellora, in India,
and other Indian and Persian temples: placed under, for comparison,
in the illustration.
Various mouldings, both Gothic and Classic, present shapes drawn
from the astronomical sign 'Aquarius'. These signs, or ciphers, are
significant of the 'Sea' and of the 'Moon'. Glyphs resembling
'fishes' mean Iona, or Jonah. They are also symbols of the 'Saviour',
when they occur amidst the relics left by the early Christians, and
in forms of the first Christian centuries.
Vertical
Arch: Early Norman (Temple Church)
CHAPTER THE FOURTH
In the following part of our book we supply, in a series of
figures, the succession of changes to which the most ancient
head-covering--in itself a significant hieroglyph--the Phrygian cap,
the classic Mithraic cap, the sacrificial cap, or
bonnet conique,
all deducing from a common symbolical ancestor, became subject, The
Mithraic or Phrygian cap is the origin of the priestly mitre in all
faiths. It was worn by the priest in sacrifice. When worn by a male,
it had its crest, comb, or point, set jutting forward; when worn by a
female, it bore the same prominent part of the cap in reverse, or on
the nape of the neck, as in the instance of the Amazon's helmet,
displayed in all old sculptures, or that of Pallas-Athene, as
exhibited in the figures of Minerva. The peak,
pic, or point,
of caps or hats (the term 'cocked hat' is a case .in point) all refer
to the same idea. This point had a sanctifying meaning afterwards
attributed to it, when it was called the
christa,
crista,
or crest, which signifies a triumphal top, or tuft. The 'Grenadier
Cap', and the loose black Hussar Cap, derive remotely from the same
sacred, Mithraic, or emblematical bonnet, or high pyramidal-cap. It,
in this instance, changes to black, because it is
devoted to the illustration of the 'fire-workers' (grenadiers),
who, among modern military, succeed the Vulcanists,
Cyclopes,
classic 'smiths', or servants of Vulcan, or Mulciber, the artful
worker among the metals in the fire, or amidst the forces of nature.
This idea will be found by a reference to the high cap among the
Persians, or Fire-Worshippers; and to the black cap among the
Bohemians and in the East. All travellers in Eastern lands will
remember that the tops of the minarets reminded them of the
high-pointed black caps of the Persians.
The Phrygian Cap is a most recondite antiquarian form; the symbol
comes from the highest antiquity. It is displayed on the head of the
figure sacrificing in the celebrated sculpture, called the 'Mithraic
Sacrifice' (or the Mythical Sacrifice), in the British Museum. This
loose cap, with the point protruded, gives the original form from
which all helmets or defensive headpieces, whether Greek or
Barbarian, deduce. As a Phrygian Cap, or Symbolizing Cap, it is
always
sanguine in its colour. It then stands as the 'Cap of
Liberty', a revolutionary form; also, in another way, it is even a
civic or
incorporated badge. It is always masculine in its
meaning. It marks the 'needle' of the obelisk, the crown or tip of
the
phallus, whether 'human' or representative. It has its
origin in the rite of circumcision--unaccountable as are both the
symbol and the rite.
The real meaning of the
bonnet rouge, or 'cap of liberty',
has been involved from time immemorial in deep obscurity,
notwithstanding that it has always been regarded as a most important
hieroglyph or figure. It signifies the supernatural simultaneous
'sacrifice' and 'triumph'. It has descended from the time of Abraham,
and it is supposed to emblem the strange mythic rite of the
'
circumcisio preputii'. The loose
Phrygian bonnet,
bonnet conique, or 'cap of liberty' may be
accepted as figuring, or standing for, that detached integument or
husk, separated from a certain point or knob, which has various names
in different languages, and which supplies the central idea of this
'sacrificial rite--the spoil or refuse of which (absurd and
unpleasant as it may seem) is borne aloft at once as a 'trophy' and
as the 'cap of liberty'. It is now a magic sign, and becomes a
talisman of supposedly inexpressible power--from what particular dark
reason it would be difficult to say. The whole is a sign of
'initiation', and of baptism of a peculiar kind. The Phrygian cap,
ever after this first inauguration, has stood as the sign of the
'Enlightened'. The heroic figures in most Gnostic Gems, which we give
in our illustrations, have caps of this kind. The sacrificer in the
sculptured group of the 'Mithraic Sacrifice', among the marbles in
the British Museum, has a Phrygian cap on his head, whilst in the act
of striking the Bull with the poniard--meaning the office of the
immolating priest. The
bonnet conique is the mitre of the Doge
of Venice.
Besides the
bonnet rouge, the Pope's mitre--nay, all mitres
or conical head-coverings--have their name from the terms
'Mithradic', or 'Mithraic'. The origin of this whole class of names
is Mittra, or Mithra. The cap of the grenadier, the shape of which is
alike all over Europe, is related to the Tartar lambskin caps, which
are dyed black; and it is black also from its association with Vulcan
and the 'Fire-Worshippers' (Smiths). The Scotch Glengarry cap will
prove on examination to be only a 'cocked' Phrygian. All the black
conical caps, and the meaning of this strange symbol, came from the
East. The loose black fur caps derive from the Tartars.
The 'Cap of Liberty' (
Bonnet Rouge), the Crista or
Fig. 203: Phrygian Cap (Male); Fig. 204: Phrygian
Cap; Fig. 205: Peak, pic, or cock ('cocked'); Fig. 206: Phrygian
Cap (Classic Shepherds); Fig. 207: Pallas-Athene; Fig. 208:
Athene (Minerva); Fig. 209: Jitra, Persia; Fig. 210: Persia
|
Crest (Male), and the Female (Amazon) helmet, all mean the same idea;
in the 'instance of the female crest, the
knob is, however,
depressed--as shown in the figures next.
The forms of Grenadier caps, and of those worn by Pioneers also,
are those of the head-covers of the Fire-workers or Fire-raisers
(Vulcanists) of an army. All the black fur caps--militarily called
busbies are Bohemian, Ishmaelitish, heathen, irregular; their origin
lies in the magic East.
Few would suspect the uniform of the Hussars to have had a
religious origin; both the flaps which depend from their bushy fur
caps, and the loose jacket or
dolman which hangs from their
left shoulder, are mythic. 'The long triangular flaps, which hang
down like a jelly-bag, consist in a
double slip of cloth,
which,
Fig. 211: Motley or Scaramouch: 'Bonnet Conique,'
cloven and set about with bells
Fig. 212: Knight's head-gear,
with 'torse'
Fig. 213: Cap of Maintenance
Fig. 214: Tartar
or Cossack Fur Cap, with double pendants
Fig. 215: Mediæval
Cap of Estate
Fig: 216: Double Mitre--Horns of the Jester or
Buffoon, set about with bells or jingles
Fig. 217: Fool's Cap.
This shape has Egyptian indications
Fig. 218: Bulgarian; also
worn by the Pandours
Fig. 219: Hussar and Cossack
|
when necessary, folds round the soldier's face on each side, and
forms a comfortable night-cap. In our service,
one single slip
is left to fly.'--Sir Walter Scott. to T. Crofton Croker, 7th July
1827. (Qy. whether the above-named
double fly of the Hussar
Cap be not the dependent ears or horns of the original Motley?) The
Hussars wear the original fur cap of Tubal-Cain, or the Smiths, or
'Artful Workers in Nature'. The name Hussar is borrowed from the
Oriental exclamation to (or invocation of) 'Al
huza',
'Al-husa', or Venus, or Aphrodite--the original patroness of these
Ishmaelitish irregular light troops. The
dolman or pelisse,
properly worn on the left shoulder of the Hussar, has its
signification and origin in the following act related in Scripture,
which refers to a certain Rosicrucian myth: 'Shem and Japheth took a
garment'
Fig. 220: Hussar Conical Cap
Fig. 221:
Artillery
Fig. 222: Sapeur, Pioneer
Fig. 223: Fur Cap of
the Sword-bearer (mythic gladius) of the City of
London
Fig. 224: Turkish
Fig. 225: Judge, in imitation of
the Egyptian Klaft: the black Coif, placed on the sensorium, is
the mark or 'brand' of Isis (Saturn)
|
(a cover or extra piece of clothing), 'and laid it upon both their
shoulders' (on the left shoulder of each), 'and went backward, and
covered their father Noah.' It is astonishing how successfully this
mythic act, with its original strange Rosicrucian meaning, should
have been hidden away in this apparently little corresponding,
trivial fact, of the wearing of the Hussar loose cloak or pelisse
(
pallium or pall) on the left or sinister shoulder; which is
the shoulder nearest to the
woman: because the
Talmudists
say that Man was Made from the left hand.
Regarding the Templar
insignia, we may make the following
remarks. The famous flag, or 'Beauséant', was their
distinguishing symbol. Beauséant--that is to say, in the
Gallic tongue,
Bien-séant; because they are fair and
honourable to the friends of Christ, but black and terrible to His
enemies: 'Vexillum bipartitum, ex Albo et Nigro, quod nominant
"Beau-séant", id est; Gallica lingua, "
Bien-séant",
eo quod Christi amices candidi sunt et benigni, inimices vero
terribiles atque nigri' (Jac. de Vitr.
Hist. Hierosol. apud
Gesta Dei, cap. lxv).
The Cardinal de Vitry is totally uninformed as to the meaning and
purpose indicated in this mysterious banner. Its black and white was
originally derived from the Egyptian sacred 'black and white', and it
conveys the same significant meanings.
Now, in the
heraldic sense--as we shall soon see--there is no colour
white.
Argent is the silver of the moon's light, the light of the
'woman'; or it is light generally, in opposition to darkness, which
is the absence of all colour. White is the synthesis and identity of
all the colours--in other words, it is light. Thus white is
blazoned, in the correct heraldic sense, as also in reference to its
humid, feminine origin (for, as the old heralds say, 'light was
begotten of darkness', and its 'type, product, and representative,
woman, also'), as the melancholy or silver light of the moon,
'Argent'; also, in the higher heraldic grade, 'Pearl', as signifying
tears; lastly, 'Luna', whose figure or mark is the crescent
or
which is either the new moon (or the moon of hope), or the moon of
the Moslem (or 'horned moon resting on her back'). Black (or
sable,
sab.,
sabbat,
Sat., Saturn) is the absence of
light, and is blazoned 'sable', diamond (carbon, or the densest of
matter), 'without form and void', but cradle of possibilities, 'end'
being taken as synonymous with 'beginning'. It is
sab., or
Saturn, whose mark is ♄, and who is both masculine and
feminine--sex being indifferent to this 'Divine Abstraction, whose
face is masked in Darkness.'
Lykos--'wolf',
lykê--'light'; whence comes
Lux
(Volney, 1st English edition, 1792, p. 378). 'Je' and 'V' are of
Tartar origin. It is probable that St. John's College at Cambridge is
the
Domus Templi of the Round Church of the Templars there.
The present St. John's is only of modern foundation. There is annexed
to, or connected with, this church
an almshouse called 'Bede's House', the name of which has puzzled
all the antiquaries. There is little doubt that this was the original
Domus Templi, the house of Buddha, corrupted into Bede, and
meaning 'wisdom'.
A Discourse concerning the Tartars, proving (in all
probability) that they are the Israelites, or Ten Tribes which, being
taken captive by Salmaneser, were transplanted into Media. By Giles
Fletcher, Doctor of Both Laws, and sometime Ambassador from
Elizabeth, Queen of England, to the Emperor of Russia. This was
found in Sir Francis Nethersole's study after his death (
Memoirs
of the Life of William Whiston, 1749)
Mr. Cavendish, an eminent chemist, 'had reason to be persuaded
that the
very water itself consisted solely of inflammable air
united to dephlogisticated air.' This last conclusion has since been
strengthened very much by some subsequent experiments of Dr.
Priestley’s (see p. 299 of
Morsels of Criticism, tending to
illustrate some few passages in the Holy Scriptures upon
Philosophical Principles. 2d. edition, 2 vols. 8vo. London: J
Davis, Chancery Lane, 1800).
The jewel of the Rossi-crucians (Rosicrucians) is formed of a
transparent red stone, with a red
cross on one side, and a red
rose on the other--thus, it is a
crucified rose. The
Rossi--or Rosy--crucians' ideas concerning this emblematical red
cross and red rose probably came from the fable of Adonis--who was
the sun whom we have seen so often crucified--being changed into a
red rose by Venus (see Drummond's
Origines, vol. iii. p. 121).
Rus (which is
Ras in Chaldee) in Irish signifies
'tree', 'knowledge', 'science', magic', 'power'. This is the Hebrew
R--as. Hence the Persian
Rustan (
Val. Col. Hib.
vol. iv: pt. i. p. 84). 'The ancient Sardica, in lat. 40° 50´,
is now called "Sophia"'; the ancient Aquineum,
Buda, or Buddha. These were, I believe, old names restored' (
vide
D’Anville's
Atlas). The society bearing the name of the
Rosicrucians (or Rosicruxians) is closely allied with the Templars.
Their emblem is a monogram or jewel; or, as malicious And bigoted
adversaries would say, their 'object of adoration' is a 'red rose on
a cross'. Thus:
Fig.
226
When it can be done, it is surrounded with a glory, and placed on
a Calvary. This is the Naurutz, Natsir, or Rose of Isuren, of Tamul,
or Sharon, or the Water-Rose, the Lily Padma, Pema, Lotus 'crucified'
for the salvation of man--crucified in the heavens at the Vernal
Equinox. It is celebrated at that time by the Persians in what they
call their Nou-Rose, i.e. Neros, or Naurutz (Malcolm's
History of
Persia, vol. ii. p. 406). The Tudor Rose, or
Rose-en-Soleil
(the Rose of the Order of the Garter), is the Rosicrucian 'Red Rose',
crucified, with its rays of glory, or golden sunbeams, or mythical
thorns,
issuant from its white, immaculate 'centre-point', or
'lily-point'--all which have further occult meanings lying hidden in
theurgic mysticism. All these are spoken in the famous 'Round Table'
of the Prince (and Origin) of Christian knighthood, King Arthur. His
table is now hanging on the wall, dusty and neglected, over the.
'King’s Seat or Bench' in the Court-House on the Castle Hill of
our ancient Winchester. But upon this abstruse subject ofthe Round Table we have spoken more fully in another place. See
Elias Ashmole.
Pope John XIV, about the year 970, issued a Bull for the baptizing
of bells 'To cleanse the air of devils'; with which it was imagined
to be full in the time of storms or of public commotion. To this end,
the kettledrums of the Lacedæmonians were also supposed to be
used on all extraordinarily harmful occasions. Pagodas are uprights
and obelisks, with the same meaning as other steeples, and their
angles are set about with bells, which are agitated in the wind, and
are supposed to exercise the same power of driving off evil spirits.
Vesper bells secure spiritual serenity. The bells of the churches are
tolled in thunderstorms still, in some parishes in England,
supposedly to disperse the clouds, and to open their rifts for the
returning sunshine.
Edward the First of England was in every way an extraordinary man.
There are certain reasons for supposing that he was really initiated
in Eastern occult ideas. It is to be remembered that he made the
Crusade to Palestine. He invited to England, Guido dalla Colonna, the
author of the Troy-book
Tale of Troy; and he also invited
Raymond Lully into his kingdom. Raymond Lully is affirmed to have
supplied to Edward six millions of money, to enable him to carry on
war against the Turks. The origin of the rose-nobles is from the
Rosicrucians.
No. 1. Catherine-wheel window--12 columns. Query, the 12 signs,
with the Rose, Disc, or Lotus, in the centre? From a Saracenic
fountain near the Council-House, Jerusalem. This fountain seems to be
built of fragments; the proof of which is that this inscribed stone
(No. 2) is placed over half the
discus. The whole structure,
though Oriental or Saracenic, abounds with Gothic or pointed
features. Such are the frets, the spandrel-work, the hood-moulding, etc.
No. 3. Query, 'Aquarii'? The
Aquarii always indicate the
Lunar element, or the female. The Baptisteries dedicated to St. John,
or to the S.S., are eight-sided. The
Baptisteria in Italy
follow the same emblematical rule. The sections into which the Order
of the Knights of Malta were divided were eight, answering to the
eight points of the cross, which was their emblem. The Order was
composed of eight nations, whereof the English, which was one,
disappeared at the Reformation.
The colours of the monastic knightly orders were the following:
The Teutonic Knights wore white, with the eight-pointed black cross;
the Knights of Malta wore black, with the eight-pointed white cross.
The
foregoing obtained their Black and White from the Egyptians. The
Knights Templars, or Red-Cross Knights, wore white, with the
eight-pointed Bhuddist red cross displayed on their mantles. The
Guardian of the Temple Chapel was called '
Custos Capellæ,
(
Capella, a 'kid', 'star', 'she-goat', also 'chapel').
Attila, surnamed the Scourge of God', is represented as having
worn a 'Teraphim', or head, on his breast--
a snaky-haired head, which purported to be that of Nimrod, whom he
claimed as his great progenitor. This same Medusa-like head was an
object of adoration to the heretical followers of Marcion, and was
the Palladium set up by Antiochus Epiphanes, at Antioch, though it
has been called the visage of Charon. This Charon may be 'Dis'--or
the 'Severe', or 'Dark', Deity.
The human head is a magnet, with a natural electric circle moving
in the path of the sun. The sign of this
ring is serpentine, and is Σ; each man being considered--as
far as his head is concerned--as magnetic. The positive pole of the
magnet is the
os frontis, sinciput, os sublime. The negative
pole is the
occiput.
Tonsure of the head is considered as a sacred observance. Hair (
in
se) is barbarous, and is the mark and investiture of the beasts.
The Cabalists abstained from wine and marriage. Tonsure means 'the
sun's disc' in the East. 'Les Arabes, dit Hérodote, lib. iii.
se rasent la tête en rond et autour des tempes, ainsi que se
rasait, disent-ils, Bacchus' (Volney,
Ruines, p. 265). 'La
touffe qui conservent les musulmans est encore prise du soleil, qui,
chez les Égyptiens, était peint, au solstice d’hiver,
n’ayant plus
qu’un cheveu sur la tête.' 'Les
étoiles de la déesse de Syrie et de la Diane,
Fig. 229: Anagram of the 'Divine Powers and
Distinctions'--exemplifying the Athanasian Creed
|
d’Ephèse, d’où dérivent celles
des prêtres, portent les douze animaux du zodiaque.'
Fig. 230, Chapter-Houses of York Cathedral and of Salisbury
Cathedral. Most of the Chapter-Houses of the Cathedrals are
eight-sided. In this they imitate the eight-sided or 'Bhuddist' cross
of the Templars. This is the crown, cap, capital, chapiter,
tabernacle, mythic
domus templi, or
domus Dei. They are
miniature, mystical Round Churches, or 'Tors'. The Chapter-Houses
oblong in shape are imitative of the 'Ark' of the Mosaical Covenant.
All the Basilicas are of this figure. The symbol is a parallelogram,
or an oblong, when the shape adopted is that of the temples. It then
is the
navis, 'nave', or ship--which is the 'Argo'.
'Les Chinois l'adorent dans Fôt. La langue chinoise n'ayant
ni le
B ni le
D, ce peuple a prononcé Fôt
ce que les Indiens et les Perses prononcent Bôt, Bot, Bod,
Bodd, ou Boùdd--par où bref Fôt, au Pegou, est
devenu Fota et Fta.'' Query, Pthah (Vulcan) of the Egyptians, and the
Teutonic
F’s in 'Friga' (the Runic Venus),
'Ffriga'--'Friday'?
B--F,
P--F, are interchangeable letters (see Arabic and
Sanscrit vocabularies).
The Æolic Digamma is the
crux of philologists. The
ancients pronounced every word which began with a vowel with an
aspirate, which had the sound of our
w,
and was often expressed by β or υ,
and also γ. For this the figure of a double Γ, or
,
was invented, whence the name Digamma; which was called Æolic,
because the Æolians, of all the tribes, retained the greatest
traces of the original language. Thus, the Æolians wrote or
pronounced Fοίνος, Fελέα,
velia. The Latin language was derived from the Æolic
dialect, and naturally adopted the Digamma, which it generally
Fylfot:
Digamma (Dr. Valpy’s crest)
A notable Rosicrucian,
Cabalistic, and Masonic emblem
expressed by
V. These significant, mysterious sounds and
characters--
V,
W,
B, and
F--are reputed
to be the key of the Lunar, or Feminine, Apotheosis. The symbol (or
that meant in the symbol) is the keynote, as it were, of all Grecian
architecture and art; which is
all beauty, refinement, and elegance, with power at the highest.
This is the foundation mark of the famous symbols--
|
 Teutonic
(Fourfold Mysticism)
|
 (Greek
forms)
|
This latter double Cross (in ascension) is indicative of the
Left-Hand Greek forms, or of the Eastern Church.
CHAPTER THE FIFTH
The branch sect of the Gnostics, called Basilideans, who were
properly Ophites, arose in the second century, deriving their name
from Basilides, the chief of the Egyptian Gnostics. They taught that
in the beginning there were Seven Being's, or Æons, of a most
excellent nature; in whom we recognize the cabalistic Seven Spirits
before the Throne. Two of these first Æons, called Dyamis and
Sophia--that is 'Power' and 'Wisdom'--engendered the, angels of the
highest order. The name of Abraxas; the Deity of the Gnostics, is
made up of 'the numerical letters representing the total 365--the
aggregate of days of the solar year. The 'manifestation' of Abraxas
rests in his Son, Nūs (knowledge), or Christ, the chief of the
Æons, who descended to earth and assumed the form of 'Man'; was
baptized, and crucified in appearance (Mosheim's
Eccles. Hist.
vol. i. pp. 181-4). The Manichæans, who deny the reality of the
Crucifixion of the Son of God, and whose tenets concerning the
Saviour Jesus are peculiar, derive their name from Manes, or Mani;
and their doctrine was first disseminated in Persia about the year
270. They speak mysteriously of the
Anima Mundi, or 'Hyle';
they call this principle a deity, and agree with the Rosicrucians in
asserting that it is a power presenting itself at once in reverse to
the world and to the heavens, in as far as that, while it is dark to
the one, it is light
to the other; and contrariwise. The Gnostic hierarchy consisted of
an arch-priest or patriarch, twelve. masters, and seventy-two leaders
or bishops. The Gnostics called Matter, or Body, 'evil', and
'darkness', and seemed uncertain whether, in its operations, it were
active or passive. It was believed by these sectaries that there were
successive emanations of intelligent beings--these were the Æons
(αἰῶνες), producing the various
phases in creation. In this way, there arose in time a mighty being,
the Demiurge, who set to work on the inert matter then existing, and
out of it formed the world. The reconcilement, or restoration, is to
the Bhuddistic
pleroma, or fullness of light. It is absorption
into 'annihilation', or into victory, oblivious of the vexations of
'life'. Here, in this fullness of light--or independence of all
worlds, or of life, according to Man’s ideas--the Supreme God
has His habitation: but it is not 'nothingness', according to our
ideas of nothing; it is so only because it has not anything in it
comprehensible. The Alexandrian Gnostics inclined to the opinion that
Matter was inert, or passive; the Syrian, Gnostics, on the contrary,
held that it was active. Valentinus came from Alexandria to Rome
about A.D. 140. St. Augustine fell under the Gnostic influence, and
retained their beliefs from his twentieth to his twenty-ninth
year--viz., from 374 to 383 A.D. Their books have for titles: the
Mysteries, the
Chapters or
Heads, the
Gospel,
and the
Treasure. Refer to Beausobre, Walch, Fuësslin,
and Hahn.
The Gnostics held that Christ's teaching was not fully understood
even by His disciples; and therefore He promised to send, in due
time, a still greater Apostle, the Paraclete, who should effectually
separate truth from falsehood. This Paraclete appeared in Mani.
The West Front of Lichfield Cathedral displays
accurately the mythic idea of the union of the Male and Female
Principles in the parallel double towers, which are uniform.
The claims for the real reading of the Egyptian hieroglyphics are
distinct and unhesitating, as put forward by the Egyptologists; who,
if industry could have succeeded, certainly would have realized their
desire. But it is extremely doubtful whether, after all, they are not
very widely astray. The late Sir George Cornewall Lewis, in his
History of Ancient Astronomy, has disposed conclusively of the
assumed correctness of most of these interpretations. The
Egyptologists, the principal of whom are Champollion, Rawlinson,
Dean, Milman, Sir George Lewis (perhaps the best critic), Professor
Wilson, Sir Gardner Wilkinson, Dr. Cureton, Dr. Hincks, M. Oppert,
Mr. Fox Talbot, with a large amount of ingenious and very plausible
research and conjecture, have not truly touched or appreciated these
enigmas. They yet remain, baffling the curiosity of the moderns; and
they are likely to preserve their real mysteries unread as long as
the stones of the Pyramids and the remembrance of the Sphinx--if not
her visible figure--themselves endure. We believe that there is no
adequate mystical comprehension among modern decipherers to read the
hopeless secrets--purposely evading discovery--which lie locked in
the hieroglyphics: the most successful readings are probably guesses
only, founded on readily accepted likeness and likeliness.
The Temple Church, London, presents many mythic figures which have
a Rosicrucian expression. In the spandrels of the arches of the long
church, besides the 'Beauséant', which is repeated in many
places, there are the armorial figures following: 'Argent, on a cross
gules, the Agnus Dei, or Paschal Lamb,
or'; 'Gules, the Agnus Dei, displaying over the right shoulder the
standard of the Temple; or, a banner, triple cloven, bearing a cross
gules'; 'Azure, a cross prolonged, potent, issuant out of the
crescent moon argent, horns upwards; on either side of the cross, a
star or'. This latter figure signifies the Virgin Mary, and displays
the cross as rising like the pole, or mast of a ship (
argha),
out of the midst of the crescent moon, or
navis biprora,
curved at both ends; 'azure, semée of estoiles, or'. The staff
of the Grand Master of the Templars displayed a curved cross of four
splays, or blades, red upon white. The eight-pointed red Bhuddist
cross was also one of the Templar ensigns. The temple arches abound
with brandished
estoiles, or stars, with wavy or crooked
flames. The altar at the east end of the Temple Church has a cross
flourie, with lower limb prolonged or, on a field of
estoiles,
wavy; to the right is the Decalogue, surmounted by the initials, Α.
Ω. (Alpha and Omega); on the left are the monograms of the
Saviour, Ι C∙Χ C; beneath, is the Lord's
Prayer. The whole altar displays feminine colours and emblems, the
Temple Church being dedicated to the Virgin Maria. The winged horse,
or Pegasus, argent, in a field gules, is a badge of the Templars. The
tombs of the Templars, disposed around the circular church in London,
are of that early Norman shape called
dos d’âne;
their tops are triangular; the ridge-moulding passes through the
temples and out of the mouth of a mask at the upper end, and issues
out of the horned skull, apparently, of some purposely
trodden
creature. The head at the top is shown in the 'honour-point' of the
cover of the tomb. There is an amount of unsuspected meaning in every
curve of these Templar tombs; but it would at present too much occupy
us to more fully explain.
Fig. 232: Signature or Talisman of the Jaina
Kings: also Gnostic
Fig. 233: India
Fig. 234: Talisman:
the Four Elements
Fig. 235: 'Wizard's Foot' Pentalpha
Fig.
237: Pillars of Seth
Fig. 238: (1) Osiris, Bhudd (2) Thus in
India (3) Hermes. Thus in Egypt (4) Bel or Baal. Thus in Britain
(All the above are different versions of the Phallus, with its
meanings)
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The crook part of a Bishop's staff shows the undulating curve of
S.S. issuing out of the foliations: meaning the Blessed Virgin Mary.
This is particularly observable in the statue of William of Wykeham,
the founder, at St. Mary's College, Winchester; who, holding the
spiritual crook in the left hand, gives the usual benediction of the
two extended fingers with his right. The crook is the Shepherd Crook
of the 'Second Person', and of the 'Holy Spirit'.
We now give a series of Gnostic Talismans, from originals. The
reader is requested to refer to our numerous figures and symbols from
the Temple Church,
Fig. 241: 'Mithraic Sacrifice' Gnostic; Fig. 242:
Jacinth: Gnostic Gem.
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London, and to the insignia of the Templars, as displayed in all
countries, for hints as to their connexion with the mysterious
beliefs constituting that which is called Gnosticism.
Concerning the Pillars of Seth (see fig. 237), Josephus asserts
that No. 1 was existent in his time. It is a Cabalistic tradition
that No. 2 was destroyed in the Deluge. Notice also their resemblance
to the Phallus or Phallos, Lingam or Lingham. Lithoi = Ll-th-oi.
Figs. 239-240, represent, under different aspects, the armed
Abraxas, the chief deity of the Gnostics. In fig. 239 he is displayed
with characteristics of Apollo, or the Sun rising in the East, in the
quadriga or four-horsed chariot. Fig. 240: 'Abraxas
brandishing his whip, as if chasing away the evil genii.
Fig. 243: Egyptian Apis, or Golden Calf
Fig.
244: Cancer grasping with One Claw at the Lunar Crescent: Gnostic
Gem
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On his shield; the titles ΙΨ. ΙΑΩ. Neat
work. Green jasper' (
The Gnostics, p. 201).
The '
Uræon', or winged solar disc, or egg, from which
issue, on reversed sides, the two emblematical asps, has certain
characteristics which ally it with the '
Scarabæus'. Both
Uræon and Scarabæus are symbols continual on the fronts
of the Egyptian temples, and they are principally placed over the
portals; they are talismans or charms.
Fig. 248: 'Osiris', or the 'Old Man'; a terminal figure. At the
foot, the celestial globe and masonic pentagon, or 'Solomon’s
Seal'. The field is occupied by symbols and letters, seemingly
Hebrew. The whole design is mediæval, hardly a production of
even the lowest times of the Empire. This is one of the pieces most
evidently bespeaking a 'Rosicrucian' origin. Deeply cut in a
coarse-grained green jasper (
Gnostics, p. 213).
Fig. 249: Anubis walking; in each hand, a long
Fig. 245: Uræon; Fig. 246: Uræon;
Fig. 247: Uræus
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Egyptian sceptre terminating in a ball; in the field, the sun and
moon (adjuncts marking the astrological character of this talisman,
which therefore must be ascribed to the class of Abraxoids). The
whole enclosed in a sunken circle. Rev. MIXAHA, between four stars.
The Cabalists make Michael the Angel of the Sun. Plasma of bad
quality (
The Gnostics, p. 200).
Fig. 250: This object is the 'Chnuphis Serpent', to which frequent
reference has been made in our book. The 'Serpent' is raising itself
in act to give the mythic dart. On its, head is the crown of seven
points or vowels. The second amulet presents the name of the Gnostic
'Unknown Angel', with the four stars in the angles. This is Michael
or the 'Saviour', the 'Chief of the Æons', seventy-two in
number, and composed of six times twelve; there being three 'double
decades', for the night and for the day, in each lunar period or sign
of the zodiac; each of which consists of thirty degrees. In another
aspect, this symbol stands for the Gnostic Chief Deity Abraxas, the
letters of whose name make up the number of days of the solar circle.
The following group of figures gives some of the significant
hieroglyphs from the Egyptian sculptures. (
a) Plume,
'Spiritual Power' (
b) Jackal, 'Priesthood'. (
c) Tau,
Fleur-de-Lis, Crux-Ansata. (
d) Placenta, 'Religious
Solemnities'. (
e) Horns, 'Power'. (
f) Anser,
'Prudence'. (
g) 'Nonage'. (
h) Asp, 'Sovereignty'. (
i)
Hawk, 'Sagacity'. The Lotus-headed Sceptre means 'Religious
Authority'. A Snake-headed Rod or Staff signifies 'Military
Dominion'. A Snaky Rod or Sceptre is the 'Lituus' or 'Augur's
Divining-rod', when it is curved at the lower as well as the upper
end. It is said that this was the sceptre of Romulus.
We give in another place the Procession of the 'Logos', or 'Word',
according to the Gnostics,
Fig. 252: 'The Good Shepherd bearing upon his shoulders the Lost
Lamb, as he seems to the uninitiated eye: but on close inspection he
becomes the double-headed Anubis; having one head human, the other a
jackal’s, whilst his girdle assumes the form of a serpent,
rearing aloft its crested head. In his hand is a long hooked staff.
It was perhaps the signet of some chief teacher or, apostle among the
Gnostics, and its impression one of the tokens serving
for mutual recognition mentioned by Epiphanius. Neatly engraved in
a beautiful red sard, fashioned to an octagon form; a shape never met
in the class of antique gems, though so much affected in Mediæval
art, on account of its supposed mystic virtues' (
The Gnostics,
p. 201).
One of the Gnostic Gems, reputed the most efficacious of amulets,
is of red jasper, and presents the Gorgon's Head ('Gorgoneion'), with
the legend below, 'ΑΡΗΓΩ ΡΩΠΟΜΑΝΔΑΡΗ',
'I protect Rhoromandares'.
In India, the 'Great Abad' is Bhudda; Bauddha, Buddha, or Baddha.
There is a connexion. suggested here with the 'Abaddon' of the
Greeks. In the same way, a relation may be traced with 'Budha’s
Spiritual Teacher'; who was the mythic Pythagoras,
the originator, of the system of transmigration, afterwards
transplanted to Egypt, and thence to Greece. Thus in Sanscrit it is
'Bud’ha-Gooros'; in Greek it is 'Pythagoras', in English it is
'Pythagoras'; the whole, 'Budha's Spiritual Teacher'.
The
crista, or crest, or symbolic knob of the Phrygian cap
or Median bonnet, is found also, in a feminine form, in the same
mythic head-cover or helmet, for it unites both sexes in its
generative idea, being an 'idol'. In the feminine case--as obviously
in all the statues of Minerva or Pallas-Athene, and in the
representations of the Amazons, or woman-champions, or
warriors--everywhere the cap or helmet has the elongated, rhomboidal,
or globed, or salient part in reverse, or dependent on the nape of
the neck. This is seen in the illustration of the figure of the armed
'Pallas-Athene', among our array of these Phallic caps. The whole is
deeply mythic in its origin. The ideas became Greek; and when treated
femininely in Greece, the round or display--which in the masculine
helmet was naturally pointed forward, saliently or exaltedly (the
real '
christa', or 'crest')--became reversed or collapsed,
when worn as the trophy on a woman's head. On a narrow review of
evidence which evades, there is no doubt that, these classic helmets
with their 'crests', this
pileus, Phrygian cap, Cap of
Liberty, or the Grenadiers’ or Hussars’ fur caps, or
cocked hats, have all a phallic origin.
The Cardinal's 'Red Hat' follows the same idea in a different way;
it is a chapel, chapter, chapiter, or chapeau, a discus or table
crimson, as the mystic feminine 'rose', the 'Queen' of Flowers, is
crimson. The word 'Cardinal' comes both from
Cardo (Hinge,
Hinge-Point, 'Virgo' of the Zodiac), and also from
Caro, It.
Carne, flesh--the Word made flesh.'
It is probable that these mythological hints and secret
expressions, as to the magic working of nature, were insinuated by
the imaginative and ingenious Greeks into dress and personal
appointments. In the temples, and in templar furniture, mythological
theosophic hints abound; every curve and every figure, every colour
and every boss and point, being significant among the Grecian
contrivers, and among those from whom they borrowed--the Egyptians.
We may assume that this classic Grecian form of the
Fig. 253: 'Bai', a Prize; Fig. 254: Gnostic
Invocation.
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head-cover or helmet of the Athenian goddess Pallas-Athene, or
Minerva, not only originated the well-known Grecian mode of arranging
women's hair at the back, but that this style is also the far-off,
classic progenitor of its clumsy, inelegant imitation, the modern
chignon, which is only an abused copy of the antique. In our
deduction (as shown in a previous group of illustrations) of the
modern military fur caps--particularly the Grenadier caps of all
modern armies, as well as those of other branches of the military
service--from that common great original, into which they can be
securely traced, the mythic Phrygian cap when red, the Vulcan's
pileus when black, we prove the transmission of an
inextinguishable important hint in religion.
The following are some of the most significant talismans of the
Gnostics:
In fig. 255 we have the representation of the Gnostic Female Power
in Nature--Venus, or Aphrodite, disclosing in the beauty, grace, and
splendour of the material creation. On the other, or terrible, side
of her character, the endowments of Venus, or of the impersonated
idea of beauty, change into the alarming; these are the attributes of
the malific feminine elementary genius born of 'darkness' or
'matter', whose tremendous countenance, veiled as in the instance of
Isis, or masked as in that of the universal mythological Queen of
Beauty, inspires or destroys according to the angle of contemplation
at which she is mythically revealed.
Fig. 256 (A) is the crested 'Snake', curved as the symbol of the
'Dragon’s Tail', traversing from left to right the fields of
creation, in which the stars are scattered as 'estoiles', or waved
serpentining flames--the mystic 'brood' of the 'Great Dragon'. The
reverse of this amulet (B) presents the 'crescent'
and 'decrescent' moons, placed back to back, with a trace or line,
implying that the 'Microcosmos', or 'Man', is made as between the
'Moons'. This
Fig.258
figure suggests a likeness to the sign of the 'Twins', and to that
of the February 'Fishes'.
Fig. 257 is the mythological 'Medusa's Head', terrible in her
beauty, which transforms the beholder to stone. This direful head is
twined around with snakes for hair, and the radii which dart from it
are lightning. It is, nevertheless, esteemed one of the most powerful
talismans in the Gnostic, preservative group, though it expresses
nothing (in a strange, contradictory way) but dismay and destruction.
Fig. 258 is referred to in a previous part of our book as fig.
313.
CHAPTER THE SIXTH
'Had Man preserved his original innocence and refused to taste of
the means of that bitter and condemned knowledge (or power of
recognition) of good and evil, as then there would have been none, of
that physical deficiency asserted to be debited to Women, would there
likewise have been no females engendered; no propagation of the human
species? By some the preference of the robust to the delicate sex is
accounted beyond all question as self-evident. A certain class of
philosophers have made no scruple to call a woman an imperfect and
even monstrous animal. These have affirmed that nature, in
generation, always intends a male, and that it is only from mistake
or deficiency, either of the matter or the faculty, that a woman is
produced.' The oriental ethics have degraded woman to the level of a
chattel. It is Christianity alone, in the discovery of the Divine
Mary 'Virgin-Mother', 'Mother-Virgin'--that has elevated 'Woman', and
found for 'Her' a possible place (of course as a Sexed-Sexless,
Sexless-Sexed 'Idea') in Heaven--or in that state other than this
state; irradiated with the 'light', breathing with the 'breath' of
Divinity.
Almaricus, a doctor at Paris in the twelfth century, advances an
opinion that, had the state of innocence continued, every individual
of our species would have
come into existence a complete 'MAN', and that God would have
created them by Himself, as He created Adam. He theorizes that woman
is. a defective animal, and that the generation of her is purely
fortuitous and foreign from nature's intent. He therefore infers that
there would have been no women 'in a state of innocence'. On the
other hand, there exists a counterbalancing singular idea, combated
by St. Austin in his
City of God, Book xxii. chap. xvii.; and
of which its partisans take upon themselves to say that at the
universal resurrection this imperfect work (woman) will be rendered
perfect by a change of sex; all the women becoming men--grace and
finish being then to complete the work of the human form, which
nature (in Man) only, as it were, had left coarse, unfinished,
rough-hewn. These ideas resemble closely the conclusions of the
alchemists (or of the Rosicrucians when applying to practical art),
who declare that nature, in the production of metals, always
intends
the generation of gold, and that it is only from accidental diversion
or interposing difficulty, or from the deficiency of the virtue or
faculty, that the working out of the aim falls short, and issues
(bluntly and disappointed) in another metal--the blanker, blacker,
and coarser metals being, in fact, only as the 'DISEASES' of matter,
which aims at clear perfect
health--or
as gold. Here
the alchemists contend that their superhuman (in apparent-sense)
science, felicitously applied, 'completes the operation', and
transmutes or compels-on, 'into gold' what weaker-handed nature was
compelled to 'forego' as 'iron'. Thus nature always intends the
production of male (sun--gold--fire being the workman, or 'agent');
but that, in the production of female (silver as against gold--the
moon--sublimated matter, or 'patient'), nature's operation
miscarries; the effort degenerates
into struggle, and struggle submits in failure. Therefore;
'Female'. But this shortcoming, when the Divine perfecting-means (in
another state, and through another nature or 'mode') is applied, will
be rectified. And in the universal resurrection, Women will transcend
into the nobler creature, and, changing sex or ceasing sex, will
become--'Woman’d-Men': Both sexes interchanging 'sex' to form
the 'Angel', or rather blending sex and uniting sex--bicorporate no
longer, but becoming 'Ideal'--fit spirit-populace, winnowed of
materiality and of humanity. 'Unintelligible to the
intellect
as Music, but beautiful to the
heart as Music.'
Yet it must be understood that no man’s
dreams
(dreams, we have elsewhere contended, quite contrary to the usual
ideas, are
real things) are wholly and altogether evil and
vain; for that cannot be except men were utter (or outer) devils;
which also cannot be so long as we live in the human nature, for
Man’s Fall was not like the Fall of the Evil Angels; for these
latter fell into the Dark Abyss, or Original. Wrathful Principle (the
Rosicrucian 'Refuse' or 'Lees' of Creation, without, or beyond;
nature and creature, and therefore there was for them no help or
recovery). But, on the contrary, Men fell and were saved thereby (the
Knowledge of Good and Evil), that is,
into Nature and
Creature, which is Man’s inexpressible happiness, as not being
left destitute of Hope or the Regenerating Seed of the Woman. For
there does centrally dwell in the human nature that which the wise
man galls the Voice of Wisdom, or conscience-recall; which in the
suggestion of the Immortal Sorrow, planted deep in the soul of man
for his 'Lost Paradise' (of which the very air and hint and proof to
him, is Music--Man’s Music--with its
shadow of
discords). And this Immortal Sorrow languishes
to Redemption in repentance. Thus the pathetic languishment of the
Saviour (and Sufferer), Jesus Christ: 'My soul is sad, even unto
death!' Hence the 'Garden' of 'Agony'.
This is the
Genius Optimus, the 'Soul of the Soul' and the
'Eye of the Mind'--that part
incapable of damnation even in
the greatest sinner (this was Cromwell's firm reliance and belief,
and his last question to his attendant chaplain bore reference to the
assurance of it). This is the last supernatural power which can and
will defend man from all the assaults of evil angels, and unto this
holy principle and benevolent upspring the dictates and the efforts
of all Good Angels and Spirits do tend, it being a great part of
their work and business to assist man, and to defend and preserve him
from the inward incursions of the multitude of the malignant Spirits
in their various degrees.
Trithemius, a noted Rosicrucian, asserts that 'never any good
Angel appeared in the shape of a woman.' Van Helmont, in the
ninety-third chapter of one of his books, has these words: 'If an
Angel appear bearded, let him be accounted an evil one; for a Good
Angel hath never appeared with a beard. The truth is, a woman is the
weaker vessel, and was first in the Transgression. Therefore, that
sex is an emblem of weakness and a means of seduction. And therefore
there is no reason why the Good Angels, amongst whom there is no
difference of sex, should elect to appear as a female; but rather,
being a species of creature above humankind, they assume the shape of
the most excellent of that kind (only feminine in regard of grace and
beauty); and for the same reason they may appear without beards, both
because ''hair is an excrement", and verges greatly, in the more
conspicuous instances, to the brutish nature, as also more especially
in their beardless, beautiful, glorified
aspects, and graceful delicacy and yet
power of form, to
express their perpetual virgin-youth, unspoiled heavenly beauty, and
immortal star-born vigour. Hair being an abhorred, tentacled,
reaching-out or brute-like animal superflux--the stigma or disgrace
of the glorious spark of light or nearly suffocated human entity,
condemned to its earth-birthed investiture or body--it can have
nothing about the parts of the "Deified Idea of Man"--or
the various classes of the Blessed Angels.' The contrary of all this
is to be assumed of the evil Genii or the Recusant Genii (Luciferent
and yet Lucifugent), except in regard to their power or knowledge.
For the 'Soul of the World' and 'Matter', and to an important
one-half, the 'Means of the World'--are 'Feminine'. For Night (which
is the other side of the curtain of Day) is Feminine. Thus Bœhmen
and Plato; as representing all the closest-of-thought of the
centuries.
All the above is the reproduction of the singular ideas of the
'Idealists' of the Middle Ages.
CHAPTER THE SEVENTH
The natural horns of the Bull or the Cow--both which animals were
deified by the Egyptians, and also by the Indians, who particularly
elected the Cow as the object of religious honour--were the models
from which originally all the volves and volutes, presenting the
figure of curved horns, or the significant suggestion of the thin
horns of the crescent or growing moon, were obtained. The
representative horns figured largely afterwards in all architecture,
and were copied as an important symbol expressive of the second
operative power of nature. The 'Lunar' or 'Feminine Symbol' is the
universal parent of the Hindoo and Mahometan returned arches; find
therefore, also, of the Horse-shoe curves of the Arabian arches, and
the hooked curves of all Gothic architectural reproduction, whether
in arches or otherwise. The Egyptian volutes to the pillars, the
Egyptian horns everywhere apparent, the innumerable spiral radii
distinct in all directions, or modified, or interpenetrating the
ornamentation of buildings in the East; the Ionic volutes, the
Corinthian volutes, which became pre-eminently pictorial and floral
in their treatment in this beautiful order, particularly in the Greek
examples (which are, however, very few); the more masculine volves
and volutes, or horns, of the Roman solid, majestic columns; the
capitals to the ruder and more grotesque of the
Indian temples; the fantastic scrolls and crooks and oval curves,
abounding on the tops of the spiring columns in the Gothic or, more
properly to call it, the Romantic architecture called 'pointed'--all
have a common ancestor in the horns of the bull, calf, or cow. All
these horns are everywhere devoted in their signification to the
Moon. It is in connexion with this secondary god or goddess, who is
always recognizable through the peculiar appendage of horns,--it is
in proximity to this god or goddess, who takes the second place in
the general Pantheon, the Sun taking the first--it is here, in all
the illustrations which the mythic theology borrows from
architecture, or the science of expressing religious ideas through
hieroglyphical forms--that the incoherent horns reiterate, always
presenting themselves to recognition, in some form or other, at
terminal or at salient points. Thus they become a most important
figure, if not the most important figure, in the templar architecture
everywhere--of India, of Egypt, of Greece, of Rome, even of the
Christian periods--all the Christian ages, earlier and later.
The figure called Nehustan--the mysterious upright set up by Moses
in the Wilderness--was a talisman in the form of a serpent coiled
around the mystic 'Tau'. This is a
palladium offered for
worship, as we have explained in several places.
In a previous part of our book, we have brought forward certain
reasons for supposing that the origin of the Most Noble Order of the
Garter was very different from that usually and popularly assigned.
The occurrence which gave rise to the formation of the Order, and
which explains the adoption of the motto, does not admit of being
told, except in far-off, roundabout terms; propriety otherwise would
be infringed.
We may say no more than that it was a feminine
accident,
of not quite the character commonly accepted and not quite so
simple and ordinary as letting fall a garter. But this accident,
which brought about the foundation of the exalted Order,
pre-eminently 'Rosicrucian' in its hidden meanings--however clear it
becomes when understood, and however sublime, as the Rosicrucians
asserted it was, when it is apprehended in its physiological and also
in its deeply mythic sense--could not, of necessity, be placed before
the world, because ordinary persons could not have appreciated it,
nor would they have felt any other idea than repulsion and disbelief
at the statement. The commonplace, coarse, unprepared mind instantly
associates indecency with any explanation, however conclusive, which
cannot for obvious reasons be spoken 'on the house-tops'. We are now
ourselves, against our desire, compelled to speak circuitously about
the real, successfully concealed, very strange origin, in our modern
ideas, of this famous 'Order of the Garter'. The subject is, however,
of very great consequence, because there is either meaning of the
highest force in this, which may be called the 'brotherhood of
princes', as the Order undoubtedly is in a high sense; or there is no
particular meaning, and certainly nothing challenging startled
attention. There is either truth in the abstract, occult matters
which the Order supposedly is formed to whisper and to maintain, or
there is only empty, meaningless pretence and affectation. There is
grandeur and reality in its formalities, or the whole institution is
no more than a parade of things that have no solidity, and an
assumption of oaths and obligations that regard nothing of
consequence--nothing of real, vital seriousness. We seek thus to
ennoble the 'Order' in idea, by giving it conclusively the
sanction of religion, and rendering to it the respect due to the
mighty mystery which may be suspected
to lie in it; which it
was supposed to emphasize,
whatever
it be held now. We are inclined to view with surprise--although
in no grudging, prejudiced, spirit--the obtrusion of the 'Crescent
and Star,' the symbol of the Grand Signior, Soldan, or Sultan of
Turkey, the Representative of Mohammed, the 'Denier of Christ',
according to his supposed religious obligations. It is certainly an
anomaly to admit the denier of Christ in an Order intended to exalt
into vital distinct recognition the Divinity of Christ as 'the
Saviour of Mankind'. How can the Sultan of Turkey, or any Mahometan,
or any disbeliever, discharge the oaths which he is solemnly assumed
to take in this respect? We are disposed to contemplate the addition
of the Moslem banner--the direct contradiction and neutraliser of the
ensigns of the Christian knights--suspended in the Chapel of the
Order, the Chapel of St. George at Windsor, as a perplexing,
uncomfortable intrusion, according to assumed correct Christian
ideas. We fear that the admission of this heathen knight may possibly
imply heraldically the infraction of the original constitutions of
the Order, which created it as exclusively Christian. The 'Garter' is
specially devoted to the Virgin Mary and to the honour (in the
glorification of 'Woman') of the Saviour of Mankind. The
knights-companions are accepted; supposedly, as the special initiated
holy guard bf the Christian mysteries, and they. are viewed as a
sworn body of 'brothers', by day and night, from their first
association, bound to maintain and uphold, in life and in death, the
faith that had Bethlehem for its beginning and Calvary for its end.
The bond and mark of this brotherhood is the Red Cross of
Crucifixion. The 'Red Cross' which is the 'Cross' of the
'Rosicrucians'--thence their name.
Even the badge and star and symbol of this most
Christian Order, if ever there were a Christian Order--which presents
this red or sanguine cross of the Redeemer, imaged in the cognisance
of His champion, or captain, or chief soldier, St. George or St.
Michael, the Trampler of the Dragon, and Custos of the Keys of the
Bottomless Pit, where the devils are confined--protests against the
mingling of this Mussulman banner with the Red Cross, which opposed
it in the hands of the Crusaders, and in those of all Christian
knights. Now all the Christian 'Garter' badges only seem to appeal
and to protest quietly and under allowance, with 'bated breath' as it
were (as if afraid), deficient in firmness and life, leaving results
to chance, and abandoning expostulation to be regarded or disregarded
(or taken up faintly)
according to circumstances.
These are matters, however, which properly appertain to the
office, and lie in the hands of the dignitaries of the Order of the
Garter. These officials are its Prelate and 'Garter' himself (the
personified 'Order'), who are supposed, because of the sublime duties
with which they are charged, to be the guardians of the meanings and
the myths of an Order of Knighthood whose heraldic display in one
form or other covers the land (or covers the world), and must be
interpreted
either as talisman or toy. The Bishop of
Winchester is always the chief ecclesiastical authority of the Order.
Remark here; as the sanctions of this 'Most Noble Order', that in
Winchester we directly alight upon 'King Arthur and his Knights of
the "Round Table"'--what the 'Round Table' is, we have
explained elsewhere. In these days without faith, wherein science (as
it is called in the too arbitrary and overriding sense) has
extinguished the lights of enthusiasm, leaving even our altars dark,
desecrated, and cold, and has eliminated all possible wonder from
the earth, as miracle from religion, and magic from the sensible
or insensible fields of creation--in these questioning, doubting,
dense, incredulous days, it is no inconsistency that the gorgeous
emblazonments of the Garter should provoke no more curiosity or
religious respect than peculiar ornaments do, signifying anything or
nothing.
But to return to the import of the title of the Order of the
Garter. This is a point very engrossing to heralds, antiquaries, and
all persons who are interested in the history, traditions, and
archæology of our country. The origin of the Order would be
trivial, ridiculous, and unbelievable, if it be only thought due to
the picking up of a lady's garter. It is impossible that the great
name and fame of this 'Garter' could have arisen alone from this
circumstance. The Garter, on the contrary, is traceable from the
times of King Arthur, to whose fame throughout Europe as the mythic
hero there was no limit in his own period. This we shall soon show
conclusively from the accounts of the Garter by Elias Ashmole, who
was 'Garter King of Arms', and who was one of its most painstaking
and enlightened historians; besides himself being a faithful and
conscientious expositor and adherent of the hermetic Rosicrucian
science. The 'Round Table' of King Arthur--the 'mirror of
chivalry'--supplies the model of all the miniature tables, or
tablets, which bear the contrasted roses--red and white, as they were
originally (and implying the female
discus and its
accidents)--with the noble 'vaunt', or motto, round them--'Evil to
him', or the same to him, 'who thinks ill' of these natural (and yet
these magical) feminine circumstances, the character of which our
readers will by this time not fail to recognize. The glory of woman
and the punishment of woman after the Fall, as indicated in Genesis,
go hand in hand. It was in honour
of Woman, and to raise into dignity the expression of the
condemned 'means' (until sanctified and reconciled by the
intervention of the 'S.S.', or of the Holy Spirit, or of the Third
Person of the Trinity), which is her mark and betrayal, but which
produced the world in producing Man, and which saved the world in the
person of the Redeemer, 'born of Woman'. It is to glorify typically
and mystically this 'fleshly vehicle', that the Order of the
'Garter'--Or 'Garder'--that keeps it sacred was instituted. The
Knights of the Garter stand sentinel, in fact, over 'Woman's Shame',
at the same time that they proclaim her 'Glory', in the pardoned
sense. These strange ideas are strictly those of the old
Rosicrucians, or Brethren of the 'Red Cross', and we only reproduce
them. The early writers saw no indecency in speaking openly of these
things, which are usually hidden away, as improper to be spoken
about.
The blackness or darkness of 'Matter', or of the 'Mother of
Nature', is figured in another respect in the belongings of this
famous feminine Order, instituted for the glory of woman. Curious
armorists, skilled in the knowledge of the deep sacred symbolism with
which the old heralds suffused their illustrations or emblazonments,
will remember that
black is a feature in the Order of the
Garter; and that, among figures and glyphs and hints the most
profound, the 'Black Book', containing the original constitutions of
the Order--from which 'Black Book' comes the important 'Black
Rod'--was
lost, or taken away for some secret reason before
the time of Henry the Fifth. See various pages,
ante, for
previous remarks about the 'Garter'.
Elias Ashmole mentions the Order in the following terms: 'We may
ascend a step higher and if we may give credit to Harding, it is
recorded that King.
Arthur paid St. George, whose red cross is the badge of the Garter,
the most particular honours; for he advanced his effigy in one of his
banners, which was about two hundred years after his martyrdom, and
very early for a country so remote from Cappadocia to have him in
reverence and esteem.'
In regard to the story of the Countess of Salisbury, and her
garter, we shall insert the judgment of Dr. Heylin, who took great
pains to ascertain its foundation. 'This I take to be a vain and idle
romance', he says, 'derogatory both to the founder and the Order,
first published by Polydore Virgil, a stranger to the affairs of
England, and by him taken upon no better ground than
fama vulgi,
the tradition of the common people--too trifling a foundation upon
which to raise so great a building.'
The. material whereof the Garter was composed at first is an
arcanum, nor is it described by any writer before Polydore
Virgil, and he only speaks of it in general terms. The Garter was
originally without a motto
[1]
As to the appointments of the Order, we may gain the most authentic
idea of them from the effigies of some of the first knights. Sir
William Fitz-warin was buried on the north side of the chancel of the
church of Wantage, in Berkshire, in the thirty-fifth year of the
reign of King Edward the Third. Sir Richard Pembridge, who was a
Knight of the Garter, of the time of Edward the Third, lies on the
south side of the cathedral of Hereford. The monument of Sir Simon
Burley, beheaded A.D. 1388, was raised in the north wall, near the
choir of St. Paul's, London. It is remarkable that, Du Chesne, a
noted French historian, is the source from which we derive the
acknowledgment that it was by the special invocation of St. George
that King Edward the Third
gained the Battle of Cressy; which 'lying deeply in his
remembrance, he founded', continues Du Chesne, 'a chapel within the
Castle of Windsor, and dedicated it in gratitude to the Saint, who is
the Patron of England.' The first example of a Garter that occurs is
on the before-mentioned monument of Sir Francis Burley; where, on the
front, towards the head, are his own arms, impaling his first wife’s,
set within a garter. This wants the impress, or motto. Another shield
of arms, having the same impalement placed below the feet, is
surrounded with a collar of 'S.S.', of the same form with that about
his neck. It was appointed by King Henry the Eighth, and embodied in
the Statutes of the Order, that the collar should be composed of
pieces of gold, in fashion of Garters; the ground enamelled blue, and
the letters of the motto gold. In the midst of each garter
two
roses were to be placed, the innermost enamelled red, and the
outermost white; contrarily, in the next garter, the innermost Rose
enamelled white, and the outermost red, and so alternately; but of
later times, these roses are wholly red. The number of these Garters
is so many as to be the ordained number of the sovereign and
knights-companions. At the institution they were twenty-six, being
fastened together with as many knots of gold. And this mode hitherto
has continued invariable; nor ought the collar to be adorned or
enriched with precious stones (as the 'George' may be), such being
prohibited by the laws of the Order. At what time the collar of
'S.S.' came into England is not fully determined; but it would seem
that it came at least three hundred years since. The collar of 'S.S.'
means the Magian, or First Order, or brotherhood. In the Christian
arrangements, it stands for the 'Holy Spirit', or 'Third Person of
the Trinity.' In the
Gnostic talismans, it is displayed as the bar, curved with the triple
'S.'. Refer to the 'Cnuphis Abraxoids' occurring in our book, for we
connect the collar of 'S.S.' with the theology of the Gnostics.
That the Order of the Garter is feminine, and that its origin is
an apotheosis of the 'Rose', and of a certain singular physiological
fact connected with woman’s life, is proven in many ways--such
as the double garters, red and white; the twenty-six knights,
representing the double thirteen lunations in the year, or their
twenty-six mythic 'dark and light' changes of 'night and day'.
There are 13 Lunations in the Year, or the Solar Circle:--twice 13
are Twenty-Six, the dark and the light renewals or changes of the
Moon (which is feminine). The dark infer the red rose, the light
imply the white rose; both equally noble and coequal in rank with
parallel, but different, Rosicrucian meanings. These mythic discs, or
red and white roses, correspond with the Twenty-Six Seats, or
'Stalls', around the 'Round Table' (which is an Apotheosis), allowing
two chief seats (or one 'Throne') as preeminent for the King-Priest,
Priest-King, in the 'Siege-Perilous.' The whole refers to King Arthur
and his Knights of the Round Table; set round as sentinels ('in
lodge') of the
Sangreal, or
Holy Graal--the 'Sacrifice
Mysterious', or 'Eucharist'.
'But how is all this magic and sacred in the estimate of the
Rosicrucians?' an inquirer will very naturally ask. The answer to all
this is very, ample and satisfactory; but particulars must be left to
the sagacity of the querist himself, because propriety does not admit
of explanation. Suffice it to say, that it is one of the most curious
and wonderful subjects which has occupied the attention of
antiquaries. That archaeological puzzle, the 'Round Table of King
Arthur', is a perfect display of this whole subject of the origin of
the 'Garter'; it springs directly from it, being the same object as
that enclosed by the mythic garter, 'garder', or 'girther.'
King Edward the Third chose the Octave of the 'Purification of the
Blessed Virgin' for the inauguration of his Order. Andrew du Chesne
declares that this new Order was announced on 'New Year's Day, A.D.
1344'. There were jousts holden in honour of it on the 'Monday after
the Feast of St. Hilary following--January 19th'. There are
variations in the histories as to the real period of the institution
of the Garter; most historians specifying the year 1349 Ashmole
states that a great supper was ordered to inaugurate the solemnity of
the institution, and that a Festival was to be annually held at
Whitsuntide (which means the 'S.S.'); that King Edward erected
a particular building in the Castle, and therein placed a table
('Round Table') of 200 feet diameter, giving to the
building
itself the name of the 'Round Table'. He appropriated £100
per week--an enormous sum in those days--for the maintenance of this
table. In imitation of this, the French King, Philip de Valois,
instituted a 'Round Table' for himself at his court. Some say that he
had an intention of instituting an order of knighthood upon the same
'feminine subject', but that he was anticipated by King Edward; which
shows that it was something more than an accident and a mere garter
which inspired the idea of this Rose forming the mystery. The knights
were denominated 'Equites Aureæ Periscelidis'. King Edward the
Third had such veneration for the Blessed Virgin Mary, that he
ordained that the habit of his Knights of the Garter should be worn
on the days of her Five Solemnities. Elias Ashmole states that the
original of the Statutes of Institution had wholly perished
long before his time. There was a transcript existing in the reign
of Henry the Fifth, in an old book called
Registrum Ordinis
Chartaceum. Though the Order was instituted so long ago as in the
year 1344, it was not till the reign of Charles the Second that the
Knights were empowered to wear the star they use at present
embroidered on their coats. The rays are the 'glory' round the 'Red
Cross'.
Sir John Froissart, the only writer of the age that treats of this
institution, assigns no such origin as the picking up of the Countess
of Salisbury's garter; nor does he adduce the words of the motto of
the Garter as having been spoken by King Edward the Third when
encountering the laughter of his court, and assuring them that he
would make the proudest eventually wear it as the most illustrious
badge. There can be only one conclusion as to the character of the
investment which was picked up; and which article of dress makes it
clear that the Countess of Salisbury--or the lady, whoever she may
be, who has succeeded in becoming so wonderfully celebrated in the
after-ages of chivalry--should have rather been at home,
and at
rest, than inattentive to saltatory risks in engaging in a dance
or in forgetful gambols at a crowded court. There was no mention of
this supposed picking up of a garter for 200 years, nor was there
anything referring to such an origin occurring in any of our
historians other than Sir John Froissart, until Polydore Virgil took
occasion to say something of it in his notices of the origin of the
Order. In the original Statutes of the Order (which is a most
important point in the inquiry) there is not the least conjecture
expressed, nor does the compiler of that tract entitled
Institutio
clarissimi Ordinis Militaris a prænobili Subligaculo nuncupata,
prefaced to the
Black Book of the Garter, let fall any passage
on which to ground the adroit conclusions about the Garter. Polydore does
not mention whose garter it was; this he cautiously declines to do.
He says that it was either the Queen’s, or that of the King’s
mistress--meaning Joan, Countess of Salisbury, with whom it was
supposed the King was in love, and whom he believed when she was
bravely holding out for him against the Scots, in her Castle of
Wark-upon-Tweed; but she was certainly no mistress of the King's, in
the injurious and unworthy sense. It is to be particularly noticed
that the Latin words
subliGAR subligaculum, mean
not a
'garter' but 'breeches, drawers, or trousers'. It was therefore not a
garter for the leg, but a cincture for the body, which was thus
picked up publicly, and elevated for honour, as such an unexpected
illustrious object; one around which the most noble knights were to
take enthusiastic oaths of the most devoted religious homage. Now,
unless there had been some most extraordinary meaning under all this
(lying under the apparent but only apparent, indecency), such an
idolizing of a garter could never have occurred, and the whole
occurrence ages ago would have been laughed into oblivion, carrying
the sublime honours of the 'Garter' with it. Instead of this, the
Garter is the highest token of greatness the Sovereign of England can
bestow, and it is contended for and accepted with eager pride by
Princes. 'Subligaculum,
breeches, drawers, trousers'.
'Subligatus,
cinctured, bound, etc., wearing drawers'. The
origin of the 'Garter' is proven in this word not to be a garter at
all.
It is most generally supposed that it was on January 19th, 1344,
that King Edward instituted his famous Order of the Garter. This
period, it will be perceived, was almost within an octave of the
purification of
the Blessed Virgin Mary; under whose patronage, and under the
guardianship of St. George on, earth (St. Michael in heaven; both
these Saints being the same, with earthly and spiritual attributes
refluent respectively) King Edward placed his profoundly religious
Order. The whole was a revival of the 'Round Table' of King Arthur,
or the apotheosized female
discus in certain mythical aspects.
To confirm us in our assertion of the feminine origin of the Order of
the Garter--which many in their ignorance have questioned--we may
state that one of the old chroniclers, though somewhat guardedly, as
befitted those great persons of whom he spoke, declares that the lady
who let fall her garter, or 'garder', was the
Queen, who had
suddenly left the courtly assembly in some confusion, and was
hastening to her own apartments, followed by the King, who, at first,
did not perceive the reason when the spectators avoided lifting the
article, being aware to whom it belonged; but who raised it himself,
and called aloud, not the words of the motto of the Garter, which the
historian says that the Queen herself spoke, but giving an intimation
that he would, spite of their laughter, 'make the proudest of the
refusers wear the rejected cincture as the grandest badge that
knighthood ever bore'. Rightly viewed, this little evaded
incident--which we desire to restore to its proper place of due
respect in the knowledge of Englishmen--is the most conclusive proof
of King Edward’s nobleness and greatness of heart, and of his
chivalrous, inexpressibly gallant delicacy; an instance admirable to
all future generations, and worthy of the most enduring applause. The
reader finally is referred to our observations in a previous part of
our book for evidence in our justification. In the foregoing we, give
the Rosicrucian view of the origin of the
'Garter'. It is the centre-point round which have converged the
noblest ideas and the most illustrious individuals in the world. It
is still the proudest and most solemn badge, and the chiefest English
knightly dignity. Strangely enough, too, this whole history of the
'Garter' teaches, as its moral, the greatness of the proper
independence of shame, and the holiness of its unconsciousness.
Also the gallantry and the knighthood of the holding sacred these
strange natural things.
CHAPTER THE EIGHTH
The Dragon's Head and Dragon's Tail are the points called Nodes,
in which the ecliptic is intersected by the orbits of the planets,
particularly by that of the moon. These points are of course
shifting. The Dragon's Head is the point where the moon or other
planet commences its northward latitude; it is considered masculine
and benevolent in its influence. The Dragon's Tail is the point where
the planet's southward progress begins; it is feminine and
malevolent. The Dragon mystically is the 'self-willed spirit', which
is .externally derived into nature by the 'fall into generation'
(
Hermes Trismegistus).
The same fine, catholic nature--which in its preternatural
exaltation appears so very precious in the eyes of the
philosopher--is in the common world defiled; abiding everywhere in
putrefactions and the vilest forms of seemingly sleeping, but in
reality most active, forms of life.
According to Ennemoser, 'Magiusiah, Madschusie' signified the
office and knowledge of the priest, who was called 'Mag, Magius,
Magiusi', and afterwards 'Magi' and 'Magician'. Brucker maintains
(
Historia Philosophiæ Criticæ, i. 160) that the
positive meaning of the word is 'Fire-Worshipper', 'Worship of the
Light'; to which opinion he had been led by, the Mohammedan
dictionaries. In the modern
Persian the word is 'Mag', and 'Magbed' signifies high-priest. The
high-priest of the Parsees at Surat, even at the present day, is
called 'Mobed'.
The mythic figure placed in the front of the Irish Harp--the
meaning of which we have explained in a previous part of our book,
and which is now represented as a woman with the lower parts twined
as foliage, or as scrolls, into the body of the harp--is properly a
Siren. This 'Siren' is the same as Venus Aphrodite, Astarte, the
Sea-Deity, or Woman-Deity, the Dag, Dagan, Dagon, or idol of the
Syrians, Tyrians, or Phœnicians; hence her colour is green in
the Iona, Ierne, or Irish acceptation. The woman or virgin of the
Irish Harp, who is impaled on the stock or 'Tree of Life'--the Siren
whose fatal singing means her mythic Bhuddistic or Buddhistic
'penance of existence'--the Medusa whose insupportable beauty
congeals in its terror the beholder to stone, according to the
mythologists--this magic being is translated from the sign of Virgo
in the heavens, and sent mythically to travel condemned the verdant
line of beauty, or the cabalistic
benedicta line a viriditatis.
The whole of the meaning, notwithstanding its glory, is, none the
less, 'sacrifice'. The Woman of the Harp of the Seven Strings, or the
seven vocables, vowels, or aspirations, or intelligent breathings, or
musical notes, or music-producing planets (in their progress); is
purely an astrological sigma--although a grand one--adopted into
heraldry. In the old books of heraldry, the curious inquirer will
find (as will all those who doubt) this 'Woman' or 'Virgin' of the
'Irish harp'--to whom, in the modern heraldic exemplification,
celestial wings are given, and who is made beautiful as an angel
(which in reality she is, the other form being only her disguise)
represented as a dragon with extended forky pinions, and piscine or
semi-fish-like
or basilisk extremity. There is a wonderful refluent, or
interfluent, unaccountable connexion, in the old mythology, between
the 'Woman', the 'Dragon', or the 'Snake' and the 'Sea': so that
sometimes, in the obscure hints supplied in the picturesque
suggestive ancient fables, it is really difficult to distinguish one
from the other. The associations of an interchangeable character
between dark and light, and 'Dragon' and 'Hero', ascribing to each
some mystic characteristic of the other, cannot be all fabling
accident. There are hints of deep mysteries, transcendent in their
greatness: and beauty, lying under these things in some concealed,
real way. To bring these to the surface, to discover their origin,
and, to the justifiable and guarded extent, to assign them properly,
has been our aim. There must have been some governing, excellent
armorial reason, special and authorized, for the changing of this
first figure of a dragon into a woman, or a siren, or virgin, on the
Irish Harp; and this fact assists the supposition of an identity, at
some time, of these two figures, all drawn from the double sign
'Virgo-Scorpio' in the Zodiac. There is a strange confirmation of the
account of Creation in the
Book of Genesis, in the discovery
of the 'Woman and Snake' in the most ancient Babylonian or Chaldæan
Zodiac. The Indian zodiacs and the Egyptian zodiacs repeat the same
myth, slightly varied in certain particulars. The different versions
of the story of the Temptation and Fall, in the main respects, are
the same legend, only altered to suit ideas in every varying country.
Traversing all the long-descended paths of the mythologies, this
singular, but in reality sublime, myth preserves its place, and
recurs up to the last in its identity. The first chapter of Genesis
seems to us to be clearly found here in the signs of the Zodiac;
which we know are
derived from the earliest astronomical studies, and which
extraordinary hieroglyphical zodiacal figures descended originally
from the summit of the famous Tower of Bel, or Belus--the first
observatory where the movements and the story of the stars were at
the outset noted, and handed as from the earliest expositors of the
secrets of the heavens. This 'Procession of Twelve' (in the origin it
was the 'Procession of Ten'), under the name of the Zodiac, tells, in
its 'signs' the history of the making of the world, according to the
Chaldæans and Egyptians, and also, in the hidden way,
according, to the account in the Bible.
As the little and the large have sometimes a closer connexion than
is ordinarily supposed, we will pass on now to some more familiar and
commonplace examples.
It may be worth while to dwell with greater minuteness on the
little-understood origin of those light auxiliary troops, as they
were organized originally, the modern Hussars. This irregular,
lightly-equipped European cavalry plays an important part as a
skirmishing or foraging force. We are all accustomed to see the
elegantly appointed light cavalry called Hussars, and doubtless many
persons have frequently wondered as to the origin of that
dolman,
pelisse, or loose jacket, which is worn, contrary to all apparent
use, dangling--an encumbrance rather than a cover or defence--on the
trooper's left shoulder. This pelisse, richly embroidered in the
Eastern fashion, is always the genuine distinctive mark or badge,
with the Wallachian or Hungarian, or Oriental, busby of the Hussar.
The precise time when this originally loosely disciplined and heathen
soldiery came into Europe is not fixed. They now form a dazzling and
formidable branch of light-cavalry service everywhere. All armies of
modern times possess regiments
of Hussars. They came originally from Tartary and the East, and
they brought with them their invariable mark, the rough fur cap, or
Ishmaelitish or 'Esau-like' black head-cover. They adventured into
the West with the now thickly ornamented and embroidered 'trophy',
called the pelisse or 'skin-coat ('
pel' from
pellis,
'skin'; thence 'pall').
In these modern tasteless, ignorant days all these distinctive
learned marks are obliterated in the equipment of troops. We may also
instance, as proofs of disregard and of bad taste, the blundering
dishonour offered to the majestic Obelisk brought to England in 1878,
in the choice of its inappropriate site, and in the ignoring, for
state reward, those who brought it to this country.
This pelisse is an imitation or reminder, and is the very remote
symbol, or garment, or 'cover of shame,' as it is called, with which,
for very singular cabalistic reasons (which, however, do not admit of
explanation), the two dutiful sons of Noah covered and 'atoned' for
that disgrace of their father, when, after he had 'planted a
vineyard, and had drunken of the wine, he lay disgracefully extended
in his tent', and was seen by his son Ham; whom Noah denounced. The
Hussars (under other names) were originally Eastern, Saracenic, or
Moslem cavalry. The horse-tails and jingles, or numberless little
bells, which ought to distinguish the caparisons of Hussars to the
modern day, and which are part of the special insignia of their
origin, are all Oriental in their character, like the bells of the
wandering Zingari, 'Morris', or Moresque, or Gypsy, or Bohemian
fantastical dancers. Deep-lying in the magical ideas of the Eastern
peoples was the sacredness, and the efficacy against evil spirits, of
their small bells, like the bells of the Chinese pagodas. All bells,
in every instance, even from the giant bell
of the Dom-Kirche or Duomo, or the cathedrals of Kasan or Casan,
Moscow or Muscovia generally, down to the 'knell', or the 'sacring'
or warning bell of the Romish Mass (which latter 'signal' has a
signification overpowering in its profundity), are held to disturb
and to scare and drive off evil spirits. These were supposed,
according to the old superstitious ideas, to congregate thickly, with
opportunities accidentally offered either in the din of battle to
impair invisibly the exertions of the combatants, or in the church to
spoil the Eucharist, by tempting the celebrating priest, or hampering
or hindering the ceremonial and its triumphant sacred climax.
The Eastern name of Venus is
Al-Huza or
Husa, which
stands for the Egyptian 'Divine Woman', or Isis.
'Hussey', with its inflections of opprobrium, in the
vernacular--strangely to say in regard of the champions mentioned
above, who are the followers and the children of Venus. Venus
'Hussey', as in a certain sense she may be considered.
Al-Huza means the hyacinth, acacia, or lily, sacred to the
'Woman', or to the complying and therefore productive powers of
nature. The word 'Hussar' comes, through circuitous paths of
translation, from its original
Al-Husa. These Hussars are the
alert, agile, armed children, or soldiers, of Cybele. It is well
known that the knights of old--particularly the Crusaders when they
returned to the West--adopted the Oriental fashion of covering their
appointments and horse-furniture with bells, the jingle raised by
which, and at the same time the spreading or flying-out, in onset, of
the
lambrequin or slit scarf attached to the helmet, with the
shouted war-cry, or
cri de guerre, struck terror into the
opposed horse and rider. Naturalists suppose that even the spangled
tail of the
peacock, with its emerald eyes, answers a similar, purpose, when
spread out, of frightening animals who intend an attack. The knights,
therefore, may have borrowed the hint of thus, startling their foes,
and of confusing them with the sudden display of colours and
disturbing points--as if sprung from a spontaneous, instant, alarming
centre--from the peacock when startled by an enemy. The bird has also
his terrifying outcry, similar to the knight's
mot de guerre,
or individual 'motto'.
The Hebrew priests were directed to fringe their garments round
about with 'bells and pomegranates', in the words of the text. The
use and intention of these 'bells and pomegranates' have been
subjected to much discussion, particularly a passage which we now
cite:
'A golden bell and a pomegranate, a golden bell and a pomegranate,
upon the hem of the robe round about.' And it shall be upon Aaron to
minister: and
his sound shall be heard when he goeth in unto
the holy place before the Lord, and when he cometh out,
that he
die not' (
Exodus. xxviii. 34-35).
The reason supposed in the Targum for the directions given to the
priest in these two verses of the chapter containing the law is, that
the priest's approach should be
cautious to the innermost
'Holy of Holies', or sanctuary of the Tabernacle. The sound of the
small bells upon his robe was intended to announce his approach
before his, actual appearance, in order to recall the attention of
the 'Angel of the Lord' to the fact of the coming of a mortal, so
that He who was supposed to be then personally descended, and
possibly 'brooding' (to make use of the words of
Genesis), in
the secret shrine or penetralia, might be allowed
time
(according to the ideas of men) to gather up and concentrate His
presence--which 'no
man can be permitted to behold
[2]
and live'--and to withdraw. For the Divinity to be seen by the
profane eye is guilt and annihilation to the latter; therefore the
gods and all spirits have, in every account of their appearance, been
seen in some worldly form, which might be acceptable to, and
supportable by, a human face. There is, theoretically, such
contrariety, and such fatal difference to the constitution of man, in
the actual disclosure of a spirit, that it is wholly impossible
except by his death; therefore spirits and divine appearances have
always been invested in some natural escape or guise, by the medium
of which the personal communication, whatever it might be, might be
made without alarm, and without that bodily disturbance of nervous
assent which should destroy. This alarm would, by the utter upsetting
of the mind, and the possible fatal effect, otherwise have rendered
the disclosure impossible. The denial of the interior parts of a
sanctuary, or adytum, to the priests of the temple, or even to the
chief hierarch sometimes, is supposed to have arisen on this account.
Mythological story is full of the danger of breaking in unpreparedly
upon spiritual presences, or of venturing into their haunts rashly or
foolhardily. The real object and purpose of the veil to the Hebrew
Temple, and of the curtains and enclosures ordered in the Jewish
ceremonial complicated arrangements, are certainly of this class.
Thus, in the idea that God did really pass down at chosen times from
Heaven, even in a possible visible shape, to His Altar (though not,
perhaps, in the form expected by man in his ignorant notions), the
sacred place was carefully shut in, and all access to it set round
with rigid, awful caution. There is fine and subtle meaning in that
old expression in
Genesis, 'to brood',
as if to be fixed or rapt, and thus to be self-contained and
oblivious, even inattentive. The ancients--the Greeks
especially--constructed their temples originally without roofs, in
order that there might be no obstacle interposed by them to the
descent of the God to the temple which was especially raised in His
honour. He was imagined, at favourable opportunities, to
descend--either visibly or invisibly--into His appropriate temple;
and it was not to seem to exclude, but rather in every way to invite
straight from the supernal regions, that the ancients left open the
direct downward way to the penetralia. From this sacred point, when
the God was supposed to be expected or present, every eye, even that
of the High-Priest, was shut out. The covered temple, or the ceiled
temple--of which the chapter-house, or particular temple, with a
'crown', or 'cap', or 'cover', presents the small example--is the
domus templi or
domus Dei, where the 'Manifested God'
is supposed to be enclosed, or wherein the 'Man is made Flesh'--the
microcosmos or spirit within his cincture, or walls, or castle of
comprehension, or of senses.
CHAPTER THE NINTH
The letters of all languages are significant marks or symbols,
which have the 'Twelve', or rather the original 'Ten Signs' of the
'Zodiac' for their beginning. Of these letters there is a certain
group which has, in the characters of all languages, a secret
hieroglyphical, hagiographical reference to the originally single,
and afterwards double, sign 'Virgo-Scorpio', which is supposed to
give the key to the secret or cabalistic 'Story of Creation'. These
letters are S and Z, L and M; or rather a group, which is marked by
Λ, Π, Μ, Σ, S, Z--L, M, V, W. The significant
aspirates, or 'vowel-sounds', follow the same rule. The 'Snake-like
Glyph', or 'mystery of the Serpent', or disguise, in which the
'Recusant Principle' is supposed to have invested himself, has coiled
(so to say), and projects significant curves and inflections, through
all this group of letters and sounds; which is perceivable, by a
close examination and quick ear, in all languages, living and dead.
The sigma presents itself to the eye (that recognizes) in the Hebrew,
the Sanscrit, the Persian, the Arabic, the Coptic, the old Gothic,
the Georgian or Iberian, the Ancient Armenian, the Ethiopic or Gheez,
the Sclavonic, the Greek, the Latin, the Samaritan, the Irish, the
Etruscan--of all which alphabets, and the symbols serving for their
'numerals', we had prepared a
comparative table, to prove the identity of the sign
'Virgo-Scorpio' and its ciphers; but we forbore in deference to our
limits (and from other circumstances), which did not advisedly admit
of the addition.
A comparative display of all marks or symbols which give occult
expression to the 'female side of nature', and its astronomical and
astrological signs, affords the same result of identity. The marks of
the 'signs' ♍ and ♏, and their ciphers, are
interchangeable, and reflect intimately from one to the other. It
must be remembered that the sign Libra--our modern September--the
'hinge-point' or 'balance-centre' of the two wings of the celestial
Zodiac--was an addition by the Greeks. Here, according to the Sabæan
astrological tradition, the origin of 'Good and Evil', of the malific
and the benevolent 'cabalistic investments of nature', the beginning
of this 'two-sexed', intelligent sublunary world, were to be
found--all contained in the profoundest mysteries of this double
sign.
The cabalistic theory, and the Chaldæan reading is, that the
problems of the production of the sensible world are not to be read
naturally, but
supernaturally. It was held that man’s
interior natural law is contained in God’s exterior magical
law. It followed from this that present nature is secondary nature:
that man is living in the 'ruins' of the angelic world, and that man
himself is a 'ruin'. Man fell into the degradation of 'nature' as the
result of the seduction by the woman (to sexual sin), which produced
the 'generations' according to Man’s ideas. The strange
theories as to the history of the first world prevalent among the
Cabalists imply that the appearance of 'woman' upon the scene was an
'obtrusion' in the sense of a thing unintended; even accidental and
unexpected in a certain (non natural) sense. Thus
her advent upon the scheme of creation--to use one of their
mysterious expressions--was at a late spoiled and evil period of the
world, which had sunk from the 'supernatural' into the 'natural'. As
woman had no part in the earliest world, and as her origin was
altogether of another nature and from other sources than that of man,
the traces of her introduction, and the hints as to her true
character, are to be found mystically in the original sign
'Virgo-Scorpio', double-sided (yet identical) at first but afterwards
divided. These divided 'personalities' were set thereafter in
mythologic opposition. The reader is referred to the previous Zodiac,
fig. 12, where will be found the diagram illustrative of this idea,
which was originated amidst the magic of the Syro-Chaldæans; it
yet remains the key to all the mythologies and to all the religions.
The sign 'Virgo-Scorpio' stands, in the present order of things,
or in this non-angelic or mortal world, as a divided sign, because in
the 'World of Man' as 'born of Woman'--enmity has been, placed
between the 'Snake' and the 'Woman'. Thenceforth, from the 'Fall',
and as a consequence of it, they are, in opposition. The sign of the
'Balances' is placed between, as the rescuing heavenly shield,
miraculously interposed, separating, as the tremendous 'Ægis',
the two originally conjoint signs, and simultaneously presented 'both
ways' (to speak in figure), defending 'each from destruction by
either'--'until the time shall be complete!'--which means the
Apocalyptic 'New Heaven and New Earth'.
Marks, movements, or influence from the side of 'Scorpio', or from
the sinister side, are malign, and mean danger; because they
represent the 'Old Serpent', or, in other terms, the 'Great Deep', or
'Matter'. Of such magic character are the letters
'S' and 'Z', and all their compounds; because this originally
'single' sound, or letter 'S-Z, Z-S', came into the world
representing its sinful side. Man is pardoned through the 'Promise to
the Woman', and 'Woman' is saved because through her the 'Saviour of
the World', or the 'Rescuer of the World', or the 'Deified Man', or
the 'Sacrifice', came into the world. Woman has the intermediate
office of reconciling and consoling. In the abstract sense, as '
virgo
intacta' (or holy unknowing means), woman is free and unconscious
of that deadly 'Original Sin', which in the disobedience to the
Divine Command (to refrain from that 'Fruit' with 'Eve', or with the
'Natural Woman'), lost 'Man' his place in the scheme of the 'Immortal
World'. All this is part of the cabalistic view of the Mysteries of
Creation. The Cabalists say that the 'Lost Man' Adam should not have
yielded to those which he found the irresistible fascinations of Eve,
but should have contented himself--to speak in parable--with 'his
enjoined, other impersonated delights',
whom he outraged in
this preference, winning 'Death' as its punishment: We conceal, under
this term, a great Rosicrucian mystery, which we determine to be
excused explaining more particularly, and which must ever remain at
its safest in the impossibility of belief of it. This is of course
obscure, because it is a part of the secret, unwritten Cabala, never
spoken of in direct words--never referred to except in parable.
In the views of the refining Gnostics, woman is the accidental
unknowing 'obtrusion' upon the universal design. The ideal woman (as
'ideal virgin') is spiritually free (because of her nothingness
except 'possessed') from the curse and corruption of things material.
From these ideas came the powers superstitiously imagined to be
possible in the virgin
ASTRO-THEOSOPHIC
CHART (No. 1):
WESTERN OR ROMAN RITE
ASTRO-THEOSOPHIC
CHART (No. 2)
EASTERN OR GREEK RITE
state, and capable of being exercised by virgin woman.
All the marks and forms connected with these proscribed letters
'S' and 'Z' have, on their material and worldly side, the character
of charms, sigils and talismans, in the evil sense, or dark sense.
They were supposed to be means of magic by the old soothsayers. The
celebrated Lord Monboddo produced a very elaborate treatise--quite
contrary to recognized ideas--to show that speech was
not natural
to Man, but that language was a result of the Primeval Fall, and
that the punishment of Babel signified the
acquisition of the
tongues, and not the 'confusion of language'. This idea is
sufficiently startling.
A general display of the 'Esses' (S.S.) and the 'Zeds' (Z.Z), and
their involutions, combinations, and sounds in all languages, would
result in a persuasion of their serpentine origin. The forms of these
snake-like glyphs and their cursive lines in all the alphabets will,
on examination, present the same suspicious undulation. These letters
have an intimate refluent connexion with all the signs which mean the
'Sea', the 'Great Deep', 'Matter in the abstract', or the
'Personified Receptive Feminine Principle', which eventually is to be
the Conqueror of the 'Dragon' or 'Enemy'. We thus desire to show the
unity of the myths and the forms made use of, for the expression of
religious ideas in the glory of 'Woman'. Woman, in fact, is the
maker of Nature; as we know Nature.
We wish the reader particularly to take notice that the above
singular notions are in no way shared by us, further than as
occurring in our account of some of the strange reveries of the
'Illuminati.' or 'Gnostics'; due, therefore, in our comments.
'I will put enmity between thee and the woman,
and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and
thou shalt bruise his heel' (
Genesis iii. 15).
A careful and critical inspection of all the alphabets or
letter-forms, whether cursive or fluent, or rigid and rectangular--as
in the Greek, and still more obviously in the Latin--will show that
certain ideas are expressed pictorially in them. Two principal ideas
seem to be furtively suggested. These are the upright or
phallus,
and the cross-line or 'snake', whether the horizontal be undulated or
direct. In the Greek letters these ideas make the form. The first
letters, according to the Cabalists, were the original 'Ten Signs of
the Zodiac', which contained mythologically the history of the
'making of the world'. These 'Ten Signs' afterwards multiplied and
produced other broods of letters (when the original magical knowledge
was veiled); some of which were the cuneiform and early tree-like
alphabets. There seems to be an 'event' symbolized or pictured, in
the alphabets. This mystic idea, which is hidden in the hieroglyphics
called letters, is supposed by the more profound of the Talmudists to
be the introduction of 'Man' into the world, through the very fact
and in the force of his 'Fall', or as arising through the
'Temptation', the chief agent or efficient in which is the 'Snake'.
Thus every letter is an anagram of 'Man, Woman, and Snake', in
various phases of the story. Each letter has embodied in it the
'Legend of the Temptation', and conceals it safely in a 'sign'.
'Ut omnia uno tenore currunt, redeamus ad mysticam serpentis
significationem. Si igitur sub serpentis imagine Phallicum Signum
intelligimus, quam
plana sunt et concinna cuncta pictura
lineamenta. Neque enim pro Phallo poneretur Serpens nisi res
significata cum typo accurate congrueret' (
Jasher, editio
secunda, p. 48).
The late Dr. Donaldson has a dissertation upon the word עקב,
which is translated 'heel' in
Genesis iii. 15. He adduces
Jeremiah xiii. 22, and
Nahum iii. 5, and, comparing the
words made use of in the original, shows that the 'heel' is a
euphemism, as are the 'feet' in
Isaiah vii. 20. His exhaustive
argument demonstrates that the part intended to be signified by the
word is
pudenda muliebria. The whole proves the extreme
importance--in the mythical and magical sense--of this unexpected
figure, and throws quite a new philosophical light on it. These views
fortify completely our Rosicrucian explanation of the origin of the
Order of the Garter, and other kindred subjects, fully heretofore
discussed in our book. This significant connexion of the two
figures--the
phallus and the
discus--explains the text
in
Genesis i. 27: 'Male and Female created He them', i.e.,
זָכָר
gladius, sword'; נְקֵבָה,
'sheath'. In this latter word, the part which characterizes the
female is used for the woman herself. Qy., in this connexion
Kebah
('case', or 'container', or 'deep'), the Caaba at Mecca, and Keb or
Cab, standing for Cabala, Kabbala, Gebala, Kebla, or 'Ark', or
'Mystery'--the grand central point of all religions?
A modern learned writer, Thomas Inman, M.D., gives the following
as an interpretation of the passage: 'Thou shalt bruise his
head,
and he shall bruise thy
heel': 'Gloriam fascini congressio
tollit et caput ejus humile facit, sed infligit injuriam moritura
mentula, quum impregnationem efficit et uteri per novas menses
tumorem profert.' This may explain the reason why the cube of the
Phrygian Cap, in the ancient sculptures of the 'armed female', is
worn in reverse, or at the back of the head, as shown in figs. 207
and 208
The celebrated philosopher, Petrus Gassendus, assailed the system
of Robertus de Fluctibus, or Robert Flood, and criticized it at great
length, in his work entitled
Examen in qua Principia Philosophiæ
Roberti Fluddi, Medici, reteguntur, published at Paris in 1630.
But he never really seized the spirit of Flood's system, and he
wasted his force. He did not comprehend, .nor could he ever realize,
the Rosicrucian views with. the largeness of insight of a man of
great critical powers, which Gassendus otherwise undoubtedly
possessed. Gassendes, however, was a prejudiced theologian, and was
ill calculated. for a disquisition upon a secret philosophy so remote
and subtle. Before an insight of greater depth, of more readiness,
and less obstinacy, the difficulties presented by Flood melt away,
even converting into brilliancy in new proofs. His exhaustive logical
positions indeed, the necessity of his theorems--are soon recognized
by an investigator, when he shakes off trammels and clears himself of
prepossessions. But a rapid and complete philosophical grasp,
extraordinary in its decision, is indispensable. Flood's system is
profound, shadowy, difficult, and deep-lying. Short of consummate
judgment, and clear, fine mind, in those to whom they are submitted,
Flood’s ideas, in their very strangeness and apparent
contradiction, startle and bewilder, because they contradict all the
accepted philosophies, or at least all their conclusions, and stand
alone. The ordinary recognized knowledge, hired from the current
accumulation, opposes him. Flood’s deeper teaching, by its very
nature, and through the character of those from whom it sprung, is
secret, or at all events evading, where the knowledge is not wholly
suppressed.
As an instance of the impossibility of accepting Flood's ideas, if
these were such, Gassendus charges
him with a stupendous puzzle, that of passing the entire
interpretation of Scripture over, not to the Mystics only, but to
Alchemy. This is fully commented upon in the latter part of this
work. Gassendus asserts, as the opinion of Flood, that the key of the
Bible mysteries is really to be found in the processes of alchemy and
of the hermetic science; that the mystical sense of Scripture is not
otherwise explainable than by the 'Philosopher's Stone'; and that the
attainment of the 'Great Art', or of the secrets which lie locked, is
'Heaven', in the Rosicrucian profundities. Old and New Testament, and
their historical accounts, are alike hermetic in this respect. The
'Grand Magisterium', the 'Great Work' as the Alchemists call it, is
mythed by Moses in
Genesis, in the Deliverance from Egypt, in
the Passage of the Red Sea, in the Jewish Ceremonial Law, in the
Lives of the Patriarchs and Prophets, such as Abraham, David,
Solomon, Jacob, Job. In this manner the true Cabalists are supposed
to be Alchemists in common with the Magi, the Sages, Philosophers,
and Priests, when these possessed the 'true and only knowledge'. The
'Just Man made Perfect' is the Alchemist who, having found the
'Philosopher's Stone', becomes glorified and immortal by the use of
it. To be said to 'die' is when the material elements can no longer
maintain or cohere. To 'rise' is when the immaterial life or spark is
liberated out of its perishable temporary investment. To be
'glorified' is when the powers, or independence, are attained which
properly appertain to the supernaturally perfect 'Light', into which,
like Enoch or Elijah, the Rosicrucian is transfigured, and in which
he knows 'all', can be 'all', and do 'all'. It is this 'draught of
immortality' which enables him to assume what form he will, by
passing through Nature as its master,
and renewing his body by means of his art projected by Nature
through, to the other side of Nature.
The adept stands in the place of Nature, and does that with the
obstruction of matter--separating by dissolution the pure from the
impure--which it takes unassisted Nature ages, perhaps, to effect.
The Alchemist is supposed to be superior to Nature to that extent,
that he can pass through it (that is, through its appearances), and
work on it, and in it, on the other side. It is here--in this true
Anima
Mundi, or 'Soul of the World'--that the Alchemist, or
Rosicrucian, regathers the light dispersed or shaken out of its old
broken forms. Gold is the flux of the sunbeams, or of light, suffused
invisibly and magically into the body of the world. Light is
sublimated gold rescued magically, by invisible stellar attraction,
out of the material depths. Gold is thus the deposit of light, which
of itself generates. Light in the celestial world is subtle,
vaporous, magically exalted gold, or 'spirit of flame'. Gold draws
and compels inferior natures in the metals, and, intensifying and
multiplying, converts into itself. It is a part of the first-formed
'Glory' or 'Splendour', of which all objects and all souls are points
or parts.
Gassendus asserts that when the Rosicrucians teach that the
'Divinity' is the 'Light' or the 'Realization of Creation', displayed
from the beginning (Α) to the end (Ω) of the whole
visible or comprehensible frame, they mean that the Divine Being is
not possible or existent, according to human idea, unless 'He', or
the 'Original Light', is manifested or expressed in some special
'comprehensible' other light or form. The 'Second' reflects the glory
of the 'First Light', and is that in which the 'First' displays. This
second light, or
Anima Mundi, is 'Manifestation', or the 'Son
as proceeding from the Father'. This synthesis
is the light, breath, life,
aura, or Sacred Spirit. It is
the solar or golden alchemical soul, which is the sustainment and
perfection of everything.
The pendulum of the world beats between inspiration and
expiration. This is the breath of the angels who 'burn and glow'
(scriptural expression), in the pulsative access and re-inforcement
of the 'soul of the world'. This 'breath of the angels' is made human
in the mechanism of the heart, and is eternal; but becomes personal
and limited in the 'world of man'--down, in inhalation,
to a
point, and
up, in exhalation,
from that point. So Jacob
Bœhm. All lies between hermetic rarefaction and
condensation--mortal and spiritual both.
'Is not the Devil the "Deep Darkness", or "Matter"?
the "
terra damnata et maledicta", which is left at
the bottom of the process of the Supreme Distiller, who condenses and
evokes the "Light" from out of it? Is not "Lucifer"
the "Lord of the False Light", and the "Splendours of
the Visible World"? Can the Prince and Ruler of this Relegate or
Lower World soar with his imitations? Can the "Adversary"
pass into the "Region of God’s Light"? Can he rise
anew to combat in that Heaven where he has already encountered the
"Mighty Ones" who have driven him down; and can he there
spread again, like a cloud, his concentrate darkness?' The Cabalists
and Talmudists aver that Scripture, history, fable, and Nature, are
alike obscure and unintelligible without their interpretation. They
aver that the Bible is the story of heavenly things put forward in a
way that can be alone comprehensible by man, and that without their
Cabala, and the parables in which they have chosen to invest its
revelation, not religion only, but even familiar Nature--the Nature
of Things and of Men--is unintelligible.
It has been a common opinion, and it so remains, that there is no
such thing as the Philosopher's Stone, and that the whole history and
accounts of it are a dream and a fable. A multitude of ancient and
modern philosophers have thought otherwise. As to the possibility of
metals transmuting from one into the other, and of the conversion of
the whole material into gold, Libavius brings forward many, instances
in his treatise
De Natura Metallorum. He produces accounts to
this effect out of Geberus, Hermes, Arnoldus, Guaccius, Thomas
Aquinas (
Ad Fratrem, c. i.), Bernardus Comes, Joannes Rungius,
Baptista Porta, Rubeus, Dornesius, Vogelius, Penotus, Quercetanus,
and others. Franciscus Picus, in his book
De Auro, sec. 3, c.
2, gives eighteen instances in which he saw gold produced by
alchemical transmutation. To those who allege the seeming
impossibility, he rejoins, that difficult things always seem at first
impossible, and that even easy things appear impracticable to the
unskilled and unknowing.
The principles and grounds for concluding that there may be such
an art possible as alchemy we shall sum up as follows. Firstly, it is
assumed that every metal consists of mercury as a common versatile
and flexible base, from which all metals spring, and into which they
may be ultimately reduced by art. Secondly, the
species of
metals, and their specific and essential forms, are not subject to
transmutation, but only the individuals; in other words, what is
general is abstract and invisible, what is particular is
concrete
and visible, and therefore can be acted upon. Thirdly, all metals
differ, not in their common nature and matter, but in their degree of
perfection or purity towards that invisible 'light' within
everything, or celestial 'glory' or base for objects, which has
'matter' as its
mask. Fourthly, Art surmounteth
and transcendeth Nature; for Art, directed upon Nature, may in a
short while perfect that which Nature by itself is a thousand Years
in accomplishing. Fifthly, God hath created every metal of its own
kind, and hath fixed in them a principle of' growth, especially in
the perfect metal gold, which is the master of the material, and
which in itself has magnetic seed, or magic light, an unseen and
heavenly power, unknown in this world, but which can by Art be
evoked, be made to inspire and multiply and take in all matter.
It is said of the alchemical philosophers, that no sooner did they
attain this precious 'Stone' or 'Power', than the very knowledge of
it, in the magic surprise, at its existence, delighted them more than
aught that the world could give. They made greater use of it in its
supernatural effects upon the human body than in turning it upon the
base matter, to make 'gold' of this latter, which they treated with
contempt. And in answer to those who would ask what was the reason
that those supposed greatest of all philosophers did not render
themselves and their friends rich by a process so speedy and
thorough, it was rejoined, that they wanted not, that they were
satisfied in the possession of the ability, that they lived in the
mind, that they rested satisfied in theory and declined practice,
that they were so overcome and astonished at the immensity of the
power accorded by God’s grace to man, that they disdained to
become gold-makers to the greedy, or suppliers to the possible idle
and mischievous needy, and that they were afraid to be made the prey
and sacrifice of avaricious, cruel tyrants; which would be but too
surely their fate if they were, through vainglory, or temptation, or
avoidable effects of force, to make known their wondrous gifts, or to
disclose or betray the fact of the supernatural method of their
existence--clearly at the safest in being disbelieved, and being
looked upon as lie or delusion.
Therefore these conclusive reasons, and others similar, impelled
the Society to hide from the world, not only their stupendous art,
but also themselves. They thus remained (and remain) the unknown,
'invisible', 'illuminated' Rosicrucians, or Brethren of the Rosy
Cross; regarding whose presence and intentions no one knows anything,
or ever did know anything, truly and in reality, although their power
has been felt in the ages, and still remains unsuspectedly
conspicuous: all which we think we have in some measure proved.
And shall still farther establish (we hope), before we arrive at
the end of our book.
CHAPTER THE TENTH
'Conscientious readers will thank the man who states accurately
that which they agree with, but will be almost equally grateful to
the man who states clearly what they most dissent from. What they
want is either truth or error; not a
muddle between them.'
The reason of the real superlative importance of the ideas
entertained by people respecting the Rosicrucians, is that they were
REALLY magical men, appearing like real men; carrying, in very deed,
through the world
eternally forbidden secrets--safe, however,
in the fact that they were sure never to be believed. De Quincey, who
has written the most lucid and intelligible (until this present work)
speculation concerning these profoundest of mystics; and which
account, though (most naturally)
humanly lucid and
intelligible--
groping as it were at the claims of these
men--is yet as far from the truth and as different to the real
beliefs of the Rosicrucians as darkness is from light; De Quincey
says; in exemplification of the grandeur of their mystery: 'To be
hidden amidst crowds is sublime. To come down hidden amongst crowds
from distant generations is
doubly sublime.' This appears in
The London Magazine of 1821; reprinted, corrected, enlarged,
and greatly improved in the last edition of his collected works in
volumes, published by Groombridge, Paternoster
Row. De Quincey, Works, Vol. 6: Secret Societies, p. 235.
It is very little reflected upon, but it is no less a truth, which
(because profound) is therefore contradictory--that if you take away
Man from out the universe, that no universe remains. There cannot be
any proof of there being anything outside of us when you take away
Man, TO WHOM ALONE THE WORLD IS. For to any other intelligence than
Man’s, the world real CANNOT BE. And hence arises a curious
question. It is, whether space as occurring AS AN IDEA in sleep
(which implies time) would be real space? The truth of time, and of
space, depend alone upon this question. Consider the depth of void
('something') into which thought has the power to extend. Consider
the preposterous (in our senses) wall of separation (utterly
IMPOSSIBLE to our POSSIBLE) which divides living human life (or
'living possibility') from the life (and the 'possibility') of the
world
even next-off this world. Not to speak of possibly
multitudinous other worlds (or other possibilities), which
stretch--for all we know to the contrary--we know not whither. And
these 'possibilities' or metaphysical intelligible worlds--of what
kind, of what nature, or of what (whether pleasant or unpleasant)
character we can conceive not. We understand not
what they
are; or
how they are; or
why they are.
Indeed--penetrating down to this truth--we know not why WE ourselves
exist, or what we ARE. For we, that is, the human race, are not
intelligible. Creation is not intelligible. That single word SOMEHOW
alone covers the whole of our knowledge. The entire ground next-off
this ground of senses (or of nature) is wholly conjecture. Nature
itself--
away from us, and
not us--may be 'UNNATURAL',
for all we know to the contrary. For Man himself is only a
'PHENOMENON', and HE alone MAKES nature, which
exists not without Him. All the foregoing is the groundwork of the
arguments of the deep Buddhists in regard to the
real nature
of things.
The result of all these sound and only possible philosophical
conclusions is, that there is nothing left for man but
entire
submission--entire subjection to the UNKNOWN POWER--the
humbleness of the UNKNOWING CHILD. And herein we see the force of
that
dictum of the Saviour: 'Unless ye become as one of THESE'
(little children), 'ye shall in nowise see the 'Kingdom of God.'
Certainly, we are unable to know absolutely (that is,
philosophically) that WE OURSELVES EXIST. (Berkeley, in showing that
our senses are only
medium, but not
means, implied that
we did not exist.) By a side-glance, as it were, we can suspect
whether 'Life' itself be only a 'grand DREAM' which may be, or be
not; be anything, or be nothing. There is no such thing as pain or
pleasure, radically; without a medium which makes it pain or
pleasure. And both are only 'disturbance',
made pain or pleasure
from without. Our pain may be pleasure in another
differently-constituted nervous method (or medium of) existence. Our
pleasures may be pains (or PENALTIES) elsewhere. This possibility,
which is the foundation of supernaturalism--or of the doctrine of the
'intelligent population of the elements'--proves that pain, and
pleasure, and the countless shades between them, necessitate the idea
of
body, or of
capacity, of some kind or other: because
capacity is 'state', and state is 'material'. So says Paracelsus; so
says Van Helmont; so says Jacob Boehm. Nothing can be anything,'
unless it is fixed in something material.
Hume, in demonstrating that in reality there is 'no connexion
between cause and effect', proved that there is some
delusion
between cause and effect; and therefore that life
may be a
dream. Benedictus
Spinoza, in his merciless logic, although he was a man so
interpenetrated with the idea of Deity, as to be called 'The
God-intoxicated man', proved that GOD MUST BE 'MATTER'; in
evaporating, or exhausting, or '
calculating Him the closest
OUT of His own works'. So much for the AUDACITY of mind--mind which
is 'knowledge', knowledge which is the 'devil'; the devil which is
the 'DENIER'. Our highest knowledge--the most refined 'sum-up' of the
thinnest-sifted (until disappearing,
evanishing) metaphysics,
is peremptorily passed back upon us when we essay beyond the frontier
of 'second causes'. All is guess over that brink. All is cloud where
this pathway--turn Which way we will--ends. Man’s human arms
are insufficient to lift as 'weights' aught than second
causes--'CAUSED CAUSES'. He falls asleep, helpless, when the Great
Veil is dropped over him to insulate his understanding. All is
possible in 'SLEEP', because 'DREAMS' are in sleep. God is in sleep.
And God, who is in sleep, although He is a reality AWAY from us, is a
delusion, when sought to be demonstrated TO us. And sleep, which is
men’s thoughts, or rather
the dreams are that are in his
(man’s sleep), is the stumbling-block over which the whole
comprehensible theory of man parts into nothing and falls into
absurdity; as in which dream he is himself ALONE, perhaps, made.
These general ideas of the profound constitute the 'BYTHOS' of the
GNOSTICS, and the 'MAYA', or annihilation, of the BUDDHISTS--however
defectively interpreted heretofore, where these sublime subjects have
not been wholly misunderstood or thought absurd--
Firstly.--In the affairs of God Almighty and the world
there is some mighty reason--
ab extrâ--which contradicts
itself; inasmuch as it contradicts reason--
having no reason.
But
because it contradicts reason,
it proves itself to HAVE a REASON--divine and ABOVE REASON--which
is human; that is, INTELLIGIBLE ONLY. It follows from this,
logically, (even)--that in being 'UNINTELLIGIBLE' it is master of the
'INTELLIGIBLE'. Therefore 'MIRACLE' is superior to 'REALITY'. Because
miracle is true (being impossibility and wonder), and reality is
untrue, being possible, and
therefore limited (in the face of
the
illimitable). Reality (reason) is satisfied, and complete,
and 'full'--so to speak. While the 'impossible', and therefore the
'supernatural', must be true, because it
encloses nature:
which is only intelligible up to its certain point of nature. (But
not beyond.) Nature
itself being yet to be accounted for--inasmuch
as NATURE is NOT REASONABLE. What is truth? There is no
truth--inasmuch as nature itself, which must necessarily be the basis
of everything, is not
true truth, but only apparent truth.
Secondly.--So long as Nature must have a 'farther'--or a
'whereto'--beyond the present apparent 'whole' (and forward to which,
in the necessity of things it must pass)--it may be reasonable--that
is, all of TRUTH APPARENT. (The Cabalists (Rosicrucians, the Brothers
of the 'CRUCIFIED ROSE') say that 'Man' is unintelligible, that
'Nature' is unintelligible, that the Old Testament, with its Genesis,
its Pentateuch; that the New Testament, with Christianity and the
'Scheme of Redemption', that all is unintelligible without their
secret--to the world wholly forbidden '
interpretation').
But it cannot be TRUE TRUTH; or abstract, positive truth. Man is
made. Man is not a maker. In other words, man gets nothing that is
outside of him. He only obtains that which is already in him. He is
in his world. He is of his world. But he is not of another world. His
helplessness--unsupported--is perfectly ridiculous. He only
lives--forgetting himself. He '
falls asleep', blindly '
into
his morrow'. If he had independent power he would not do
this. He would
know his 'morrow'. (This is the contention of
the Buddhists.)
Now, in regard of real truth, it has been settled for very many
ages that there is no possibility of there ever being such. '
Cogito;
ergo sum.' I am; because I am. Existent only to the periphery of
consciousness--no more.
Thirdly.--For there is something in the ring outside which
(converging) makes the centre--or, in other words, that creates
consciousness. That which insulates is greater than that which it
insulates. 'Power' is only escaped 'Rest'. The 'Living' out of the
'Dead'.
Fourthly.--Thus IMPOSSIBILITY, alone, makes POSSIBILITY
POSSIBLE.
Fifthly.--The 'made' cannot know its 'maker'; otherwise it
would be 'its maker itself'. For the MAKER knows that which It (HE)
makes, up to the farthest possible limit of its making or
prolongation. Every man’s morrow (
not yet arrived at him)
is already PAST to the SUPERIOR INTELLIGENCE that is altogether
independent of 'morrows'--that is, ordinary morrows. 'The ANGELS have
their manacles on the wrists of the MEN-MOVERS.' Men think they act
their own intentions; but in reality they act
other agents’
intentions. In this 'delusion' perhaps lies the reconcilement of that
unresolvable puzzle by MAN--at least, in his waking, or real,
state--'Free-Will' and 'Necessity'. Free-will is 'necessity' UPWARDS,
while necessity is 'free-will' DOWNWARDS; or mutual reversal of the
ends of the same lever--GOD’S INTENT-TONS. This is as
far as MAN is concerned; for Fate is Fate as regards the universal
frame of things; the human reason being capable of grasping
no
possibility otherwise.
CHAPTER THE ELEVENTH
The monastic or separate (sexual) state, where nature is ignored
and its suggestions and the indulgence of the seductive individual
appetite is held to be ruinous (to the spiritual aims of the
human creature), is a dangerous--nay, almost an impossible
abnegation. From the spirit-side, in this respect, nature is held
abominable. Its practice is the shutting of the heavenly door. Thus
fleshly incitements are AWFUL; and yet--such are the contradictions
of nature--they are necessitated. We must 'whip' the body, as it
were, 'into wood' before we can drive the devil
[3] therefrom.
We must fast and watch, and watch and fast. We must reduce our
robustness into leanness. Our physical graceful, worthy or handsome
'selves', we must punish down into everything that is incapable and
pitiable. We must become
pitiless in our body's own maceration
and mortification. Meanwhile (in faith, and in reliance on the
efficacy of our penances) we grow into holiness-intensifying into
SAINT-HOOD. The lights of the soul are to shine through the rents and
fractures of the flagellated and punished body, until the fleshly
sense or enchantment and enticement is trampled-up, through the
destruction of its
medium, into
life other than this life.
But truly, in this view, the necessities--or rather the
requirements--of nature cannot be set at naught
--cannot be contended with. Religion evades this question.
Men
suffer to a very grievous extent. To descend to realities in this
living world of flesh of ours. Farther, however, in natural
arrangements. The most cruel nervous disorders, such as the
furor
uterinus, hysteric spasms, and a whole train of vengeful
mischiefs, chiefly attack such women as have throughout life
refused
the pleasures of love. Many fatal affections, such as mania,
epilepsy, and so on, prey upon those of
both sexes who have
imposed upon themselves too severe refraining or bridling. This
incidence is ingrain in nature. But the dangers resulting from the
abuse of these amiable pleasures are much more formidable. Pp. 38,
39, of
Curiositates Eroticæ Physiologiæ (1875).
Woman's physical constitution adapts her for love. 'Excitements
more
numerous, and of more
exquisite sense, are
bestowed on
Woman'--Casanova,
Physiology, 1865, p. 78, quoting from
Swedenborg. 'Polarity of the Two Sexes--
Vito-electro galvanic.
Attractive power is effected from within'--Casanova (1865), p. 25.
'The slumber of the body seems to be but the waking of the
soul'--Grindon, on 'Life'--Casanova,
Physiology, p. 39. But
(until proven) she is rigid, and to a certain extent (like virgins
usually) insensate, and even rebelliously irresponsive.
All the '
pittoresques', to the number of twelve, invented
by the Greek courtesan Cyrene, as being the best in which to
signalize that particular loving mystery which has everything
(enjoined) under it; all those enchanting modes of sympathy which
Phyleiris and Ashyanase published, which Elephaseus composed in
Leonine verse, and which afterwards the Roman Emperor Nero caused to
be painted on the Walls of the Imperial Banquetting Hall, in his
famous Golden Palace, by the first artists of Rome, all these
prove that women are much better adepts in the
ars amandi
and its mysteries than men--that they have a much keener relish for
its intricacies, to which they deliver themselves up--
with the
chosen object--with a delight and
abandon unknown to man.
In short, in all the solicitation of love, women are the most
inventive, assiduous, intense and persevering. Catherine the Second
of Russia possessed boundless power. She set no limits to her
gratification in the sensual respect. She was imperial and
magnificent in her luxurious enormities. Her will was law--she was
the 'modern Messalina'; she richly earned the title which was
accorded to her of literally being (no small distinction in its way)
'
la piū futatrice nel mondo'. But, on the other hand,
there were wonderful contradictions to this state of irregular
eagerness. Maria (Mariana) Coanel, wife of Juan de la Cerda, not
being able to bear the absence of her husband, preferred committing
suicide to yielding to the otherwise irresistible temptations of the
flesh--as she found them in their occasional assaults. The
extraordinary unconsciousness and ignorance of some women is
remarkable--however rare; especially in these, in some respects,
scarcely modest, all-knowing times. Isabella Gonzaga, the wife of the
Duke of Urbino, passed two years with her husband still remaining a
virgin; and so great was her ignorance of the matrimonial usage that,
until enlightened, she had imagined all married women lived as she
lived; and she received the new knowledge in all simplicity.
Greek pictorial and statuary art was suffused with ideas of
matchless and--of immortal beauty. The curves and undulation of form,
the enchanting and enchanted art which peopled Grecian landscapes
with shapes of ravishment and Greek temples with wonders: the eye
that saw, the hand that traced,
the taste that toned, the delicacy that softened--all was
exquisite, all was successful. The most intensely poetical and
subduing (nay, the most religious, moving one to tears), and the most
gloriously beautiful object in the whole universe, is the naked form
of a symmetrical woman. This is difficult to understand--but it is
true. The reason may be--sorrow that such a glorious
object--Divinity's handiwork, as a 'present' to Man--should perish.
Reflect upon matter immediately following.
No wonder that the ancients made a woman (thus) in object of
idolatry. In the excess--in the super-excelling--of their refinement,
other ideals were reached. Beauty became
bifurcated (so to
express), and irregular; heated as it were into a sinister--a
devilish (
forbidden) temptation, for passion of taste. Excess,
or a deviating superflux or
overdoing, of desire supervened.
Longing became delirious: because 'Lucifer', or the 'Lost
One'--'Unchastened Presumption'--had passed his lightning-like
availing spear of
apotheosizing, enchanted, tempting DEATH
through the transmuted 'human female body'; advanced and addressed in
its snaring graces to Hell’s perfectness.
The 'Sexes' were 'Two'. But 'Beauty' was 'One'. Beards have naught
of beauty, apart from strength. Beards are barbarous--hence their
name. Hair is of the beasts, '
excrementa'; '
tentacula'.
The Greek artists exercised their talents in the production of a kind
of beauty mixed of that of the 'Two Sexes', merging and blending the
softness and enchanting shapeliness of the one with the aggressive
picturesque roundness and boldness of the other. Each (separate) was
the acmé of picturelike propriety and grace. But the third
'Thing' was a 'New Thing'--otherwise a miracle--a new sensation.
Hence Paris, hence Adonis,
hence Ganymede, hence the loves of Salmacis and Hermaphroditus,
hence the 'feminine' Bacchus, hence Hylas--hence these deities, in
tresses, of neither sex, and yet of both. Greek art in this respect
presents a phenomenon. As a phenomenon we must recognize and regard
it. The flower is
supra-natural, treasonous, and abhorrent. It
is 'a flower of Hell'. Nevertheless, it is a 'flower'. And thus the
idea dominates the
alternate 'shaded' and 'shining' halves of
the whole world; of all art; of all philosophy; of all RELIGION.
Philosophy must not ignore, or affect not to see, or decline
hypocritically, or too nicely (not wisely), to consider these
powerful--these ALL POWERFUL--factors. This whole round of subjects
intimately refers to the Rosicrucians, and to their supposed
'unintelligible' beliefs. They are intelligible enough to the
'knowing ones'; but they are not to be divulged.
The most difficult problem of the Greek artists was to exercise
their talent in the production of a kind of beauty mixed with that of
the Two Sexes, and time has spared some of the masterpieces. Such is
the figure known under the name of the
Hermaphrodite
(
Hermes-Aprodite; Venus-Mercury). In the classic times, both
amongst the Greeks and Romans, as also in Oriental countries, a cruel
and flagitious
violation of nature (not supposed-so; even
accepted as sacred) produced this beauty by enforcing sacrifice of a
peculiar kind on young male victims. In the case of true
Hermaphroditism, that which art could only effect by dispossession,
nature brings about by super-addition, or rather by concurrent
transformation or mutual 'coincidence'. The idea even lies '
perdue'
(like a silver snake) in the supposed origin of 'Mankind. The most
extraordinary ideas as to the origin of the human race have been
entertained by speculative
thinkers, and by theologians. The celebrated William Law believed
that the First Human Being was a creature combining the
characteristics of both sexes in his own individual person. 'God
created man in His own Image. In the Image of God created He him.'
Some controversionists consider that there is. a LONG space due (but
not allowed) between the foregoing and the succeeding: 'Male and
Female created He THEM'.
'Increase and Multiply, and replenish the earth.' This command was
given on the Sixth Day. Eve was not created until the Seventh Day.
Hence Eve must have been born of Adam--or separated from him 'Ejus
autem imago ea est quæ exhibetur,
ore videlicet
excellentissimo, ut sunt Arnobii verba, et specie inter
virginem et puerum eximia. Catullus hoc idem voluit. Carm. 64.
Quod enim genus figuræ est, ego quod non
habuerim?
Ego mulier, ego adolescens, ego ephebus, ego puer,
Ego
gymnasii fui flos, ego eram decus olei.
Marcianus Capella, Lib. i.:
Atys pulcher item curvi et puer almus aratri.
Caput autem tectum
mithra Phrygem indicat.'
Laurentii Pignorii Patavini Magnæ Deum Matris Idææ
et Attidis initia. Amstelodami Andreæ Frisii. MDCLXIX.
Admitting, moreover, that the term 'Day'--as used in
Genesis--is
employed to express an indefinite period of time, in order to form
Woman, God deprived Adam of his
androgyne character, and
reduced him to a Being having one sex only. And here steps in a
fanciful idea of some speculative thinkers; which (however
extravagant) is very poetical and beautiful. They ask in specifying
the question--in serious truth
a not-altogether improbable conjecture--whether the irresistible
inclination and the otherwise mysterious, unaccountable
drawing-together and sympathy of two persons who meet for the first
time and find themselves mutually charmed (they cannot tell how or
why); or who even 'hear' or 'read' of each other; whether even the
continual natural inclination which impels 'man to woman' and 'woman
to man' be not the spirit-reflex and the atoning 'Penance' (there is
a great amount of
sadness which mingles in the delight of
these feelings) of the 'Original Grand Human Division'. And that this
extra-natural (and yet natural) inclination which draws One Sex
towards the Other be not the movements of Fate (lying down
deep-buried in the necessities of things); and that the whole is the
active tendency and forced (however latent, sometimes) searching
through the world for the 'Missed' and 'Lost Half' (whether feminine,
whether masculine), to once more embrace and supernaturally in
rapture in the recognition to become ONE again? Hence, perhaps
(also), that inconstancy and feebleness of decision and 'puzzled
distress' ('seeing through the glass darkly') so aboundingly manifest
in human nature, becoming dramatic in a thousand ways in the
confusions of history--a stupendous scheme of contradictions itself.
May such affinities--and such unsuspected enchantment in this
hard, practical, disbelieving world--lie mysteriously deep as the
eternal secret of original human fellowship and society? And may even
the amusement and the wonder of uninterested spectators and
standers-by arise only from their having the unimagined fact (to
them) of dream and magic being presented, while this unaccountable
show is the secret foundation (as dream started at the beginning of
time) of all the sentimental phenomena of the
world? In all the infinite gradations of love, and passion, and
sympathy (and in the experience of their opposites), we may be
witnessing the baffled attempts of the whole round of
human-nature--of the succession of the generations in the
centuries--life being hopelessly too short, and circumstances
controlling everything; we may be seeing the efforts of the 'Halves'
to recover 'Each Other'. The masculine half of mankind wandering
unconsciously to find its fellow-feminine, and the female half of the
human family urging (from its nature) with the still more lively and
more sensitive, and more acutely disappointed at repeated
failure--quest. Each sex in its half-individuality, and prosecuting
through time its melancholy 'penance', straining blindly towards that
'Shadow', the complement and double of 'Itself'. Vain indeed in the
nature of things must be that human search to find, in this world,
the supernaturally divorced 'Half'. For that other 'Half-Self'
originated in 'another world', and thence started on a
'Dream-Pilgrimage' as a Shadow, or Spirit, recognizable only through
the
imagination (a mischievous, deluding faculty) of a real
person, to recover its other original Half in 'This World'. We doubt,
indeed, whether
in this world (and were the original duality
of persons true) that in this state of flesh the discovery would be
welcome, even were discovery and recovery possible. Such is the
preordainment of fate (which has made circumstances), that the halves
of this first-junction may wander all the world over and exhaust the
generations, and all time, in the search, and yet never meet; save at
that 'Grand Assize' or General Resurrection where impend the New
Heaven and the New Earth; and at which Final Consummation the two
parts of the same Unit might be united never to be sundered
more--complete and
summed as. the 'One Being'--sexless in the bosom of DIVINITY;
where there is 'neither marriage, nor giving in marriage'.
But the reader will find, in the latter part of the book,
plausible theories--nay, cogent arguments, scarcely to be
refuted--not only as to the possible (and likely) incorporation of
spirits; but as to the difference of sexes among them, with natural
incidents, and apparently contradictory results from their
semi-spiritual, semi-bodily Rosicrucian conditions.
The idea that Adam and Eve were both originally Hermaphrodites was
revived in the thirteenth century by Amaury de Chartres. He
held--among other fanciful notions--that at the end of the
world--both sexes
should be re-united in the same person.
Some learned Rabbis asserted that Adam was created
double;
that is, with two bodies, one
male and the other
female,
joined together by the shoulders; their heads (like those of Janus)
looking in opposite directions. And that, when God created Eve, He
only
divided such body in Two. Others maintained that Adam and
Eve were each of them, separately, an Hermaphrodite. Other Jewish
authorities, among whom are Samuel Manasseh and Ben-Israel, are of
opinion that our Great Progenitor was created with Two Bodies, and
that 'HE' separated them afterwards during Adam's sleep; an opinion
founded by these writers upon the second chapter of
Genesis,
verse 21: 'the literal translation of the Hebrew being: 'He (God)
separated the Woman from his side, and substituted Flesh in her
place.' This idea resembles that of Plato. Origen, St. Chrysostom,
and St. Thomas believed that the Woman was not created till the
Seventh Day. But the most generally received opinion is, that Adam
and Eve were created on the
Sixth. These particular
notions--extravagant as they must be
admitted to be--as to the original 'single-dual, dual-single'
characteristics of Adam and Eve are eminently Platonic--nay,
cabalistic.
Plato proceeds to account for the love which some men have for
some women, and
vice versa. 'The males', he says, 'which are
halves of an Androgyne, are much given to women; and the women, which
are the halves of an Androgyne, are passionately fond of men. As for
the women' (a not uncommon Case) 'who indulge an inclination for
their own sex, they are the halves of the Androgyne females who were
doubled, and the men who exhibit a liking for other men are the
halves of the males who were also doubled. In the beginning there
were three kinds of Human Beings, not only the Two which still exist
(namely, the Male and the Female)--but a Third, which was composed of
the Two First.' Of this last sex--
or kind--nothing remains but
the tradition, and the name. 'The Androgynes, for so they were
called, had not only both the male and female faces, but also
possessed the sexual distinctions of both. Of these creatures,
likewise, nothing now exists but the
name, which survives as a
stigma, and which is considered
infamous.' Nature had made
this, the fact; as 'out of' nature. The reason assigned for the
different shape of these three kinds was that 'the males were formed
by the
Sun; the females by the
Earth; and the mixed
race of Androgynes by the
Moon:--which partakes both of the
Sun and the
Earth.'
Ecclesiastical writers declare that such an Eunuch was the Holy
Evangelist, St. John, whom Jesus loved beyond all His other
disciples, who lay upon Jesus’ bosom; who, while Peter tardily
advanced, flew, borne on the wings of virginity, to the LORD; and
penetrating into the secrets of the Divine Nativity, was emboldened
to declare what preceding ages had
been ignorant of. 'In the Beginning was the Word. And the Word was
with God, and the Word was God.' Reynardi
Opera, vol. viii. p.
252.
If the disciples of the doctrine of 'evolution' or 'selection of
the fittest' are right--if your Darwins, your Huxleys, your Herbert
Spencers, your Leweses, your dense unimaginative men (only specious
philosophers), are correct in their deductions of
correlation--'bowing-out God'
[4]
as it were (in sublimity of
fools’ not '
mad'
presumption), 'exterior of His own Creation'--then reverence, and
devotion, and martyrdom, and the sacredness, and the magic of
virginity, must be the merest ludicrous superstition and
figment. Is MAN alone in his world? Are there OTHERS in it with him?
The ancients universally held virginity as a real magic,
transcendental, mysterious something, which exercised power
supernaturally both through Heaven and through Earth. It was
an unnatural-natural outspring set apart and sacred 'of the Gods'.
None but the barbarous touch, the brutal touch, could profane it. It
worked miracles.
’Tis said that the Lion will turn and
flee
From a Maid in the pride of her purity.
For maidhood and virginity is a phenomenon
independent of
Creation, and bears through the worlds visible and invisible--the
worlds immortal--the impress and seal upon its forehead of
GOD’S
REST, and 'Refusal', not of His ACTIVITY and 'Consent'. Hence its
sacredness in all religions and under all beliefs. '
Voilà
pourquoi, pendant les persécutions, il y eut tant de vierges
chrétiennes outragées par leurs bourreaux, qui ne
faisaient qu’appliquer l’antique loi
romaine, en vertu de la quelle une vierge ne pouvait pas être
mise à mort.'--
L’Antiquité la plus reculée
jusqu’à nos jours,
par Pierre Dufour, vol. 3,
chap. i. p. 29. Bruxelles, J. Rosez, 1861. The reason for this lies
very deep, and is very refined and very true. It will be seen, on
adequate reflection, that the heathen executioners, in exercising
their supposed
human right of death-giving in law, did not
dare touch the 'property of the Gods' in death, owing to their
superstition; and they therefore made their victims 'things' in
'getting godhood' (so to speak) 'out of them' before the
death-penalty. This was the reason why, in the old English
executioners’ practice, women were always burnt or strangled at
the stake, but not hanged vulgarly like men or dogs. It was a tribute
to the supposed sacredness of women's characteristics, and from the
fact of her (phenomenal) character. 'Les Juges Païens qui
prenaient un odieux plaisir à les frapper dans ce qu’elles
avaient de plus cher. Mais leur virginité était un
sacrifice qu’elles offraient chastement à Dieu en
échange de la couronne du martyre. "Une vierge",
disait Saint-Ambroise, "peut être prostituée et non
souillée." "Les vierges", dit Saint-Cyprien,
"sont comme les fleurs du Jardin de Ciel".' Pierre Dufour.
'
Le viol des vierges chrétiennes n’était donc
dans l’origine qu’un préliminaire de la peine
capitale, conformément à l’usage de la penalité
romaine. Vitiatæ prius a carnifice dein strangulatæ.'
Suetonius,
dans la vie de Tibère: Pierre Dufour.
'
L’Histoire de Prostitution'.
'Because Virgins by a received custom were not to be strangled, he
caused the Hangman first to deflower a Virgin, and then to strangle
her'. Tacitus. Suetonius. Edward Leigh's
Analecta de Primis
Cæsaribus. And when
forced, the author might have
added, became still more glorious flowers (or lights) of Paradise,
We live, in nature, in contradiction--in 'impossibilities' that make
'possibilities'. Our 'forms' ignore 'ourselves'. Maidhood is the
possibility of bearing joy beyond compare (the human-natural joys
locked therein)--the first, last, and best of this world’s
pleasures--through the world; and yet withstanding the use of it.
Refraining in the carrying the precious casket from 'one world'
(
through the world for which it is intended 'as the temptation')
into 'another world'. It is the successful resistance and baffling of
the Devil, who lures in this mysterious respect, with his most
exquisite inducement. Hence the reason of our King Edward the
Confessor being marked as the 'Saint; for he 'forbore his wife
Edith'. This is the
raison d'être of all triumph of the
kind: Virginity in itself (strangely as it may sound for mankind),
though without its infraction heaven could not be--for it is our
senses that make heaven--is a Key of Heaven. Hence the inherent
sacredness of the--human--'Act' all the world over; and highest so in
the religions of the most civilized peoples, those which have risen
to the highest refinement. Mary Magdalen was the
first at the
tomb of the Redeemer, and was the
first to whom our Lord
showed Himself. It was through a WOMAN that our race was rendered
possible. This must never be forgotten.
It is not difficult to discover how inveterate the belief of their
system, which seems naturally to account for everything, has become
to the Materialists; who (to use a wild figure) have identified the
time that has got into the watch with the
reason that the
watch goes. Their whole work is the falling-in-love-with and
believing their own work. It would be cruel to make these men
believe. It would be the dispossession of themselves, out of
themselves. Their scope, and range, and judgment are an impenetrable
world’s
presumption; working only from the centre outwards--as from
'particulars' to 'generals'--the false way. These accepted
reasonable
reasoners do not see that if God’s reasons had been man’s
reasons man would never have been; because MAN has no place
in
reason--he is not reasonable. It is the self-assertion and the
self-presumption that is at fault--mere miserable self-conceit
produces these men:--volubility--and reading--provide them with a
cloud of words wherewith they may (and do) confuse. They have dared
in their lofty (toppling) philosophical climbing--like the men of
Babel--or 'Babble', as the tongues afterwards became--forcing into
their Heights of Metaphysics (as it were) to
look down upon
God--spying Him at His work! Impious--mad stupidity;--trusting
brains, in which the Devil (or Denier) forges lies--forgetting
that
Darkness is only the reversed side of Light, as light is
only the presented side of Darkness--and that Both are the Same. We
should know no light without darkness, which shows us the light; just
in the same way as we see the wrong side of the light in seeing the
darkness when the welcome light appears--so to speak.
These men want contradiction. They are ruined in their own
self-esteem. They are floated upward in the pride of knowledge--with
wings of wax. They grape in, the
débris of nature.
Their knowledge is scientific knowledge. Knowledge as an acquisition
to enlighten (its only use) is as ashes with the fire all out of
it--fire which is faith. These philosophers are converted into the
vehicle of the comprehension of their own theories: and there they
rest, absorbed and occupied in these alone. Self-centred, complete,
satisfied, distrustless, they fortify themselves in their triumph,
and become incompetent to see aught that shall challenge their own
fixed ideas. In regard to
these merely scientific people, an apt and a forcible remark has
been made: 'Natural selection can only preserve such slight
variations as are immediately useful. It cannot provide a savage with
brain
suited to the remote needs of his civilized descendants some
thousands of years later.' All is progressive, and all is
development, with these philosophers. They have no idea of cataclysm.
When the whole world is the offspring--when the mountains, with the
mutilated and the riven faces which they present to us, are the
children--thunderstricken--of the INTELLIGENT (
sudden to the
world sometimes, snapping 'gradations' and 'evolutions' with
miracle), MASTER, GUIDE and GOD of ALL! Thinkest thou that
those skies have forgotten to be in earnest, because thou goest
mouthing through the world like an ape?' Be what you wish to be then,
and go down into the dust! Very probably your fate it may prove to
be; though it may be the lot of some others to escape. By
humbleness--by FAITH!
Revelation and supernatural disclosure, quite different to
progress and circumstantial natural advance--as the 'nature of
nature'--are to be inferred from the apparition of certain deplorable
maladies--diseases which puzzle and bewilder as to their true
character; which lead us astray, sometimes, as to their likeliest
best treatment. The ideas of the ROSICRUCIANS as to the real (hidden
and unsuspected) origin of these diseases, which seem--large as is
the catalogue of maladies--so
contrary to all the
physiological, natural groundwork upon which (so to say) man’s
health and healthy exercise of his nature expand and expound, are
speculative and
recherché in the extreme. Such querists
ask in vain where such diseases--so momentous, so super-horrid--could
have first sprung. Philosophers of this class affirm that there is
nothing of
these in the
true character of man. That these diseases
stand aloof, and are of themselves. That they bear in themselves
proofs of the indignation (intelligent) exterior to man; to
some violent invasion and inversion--to some inappeasable outrage of
God’s law. Flesh and blood has become an accursed--a
super-accursed
weed, from the devils having gained access to
it. Man’s unholy passions have hurried him into an abyss of
physical perdition, wherein he has obliterated his 'image' and gifts,
and done things (worse than the beasts)
beyond the laws of his
impress; wide already as the area of the exercise of those laws was,
even for evil. The penalty has pursued the original guilt
through the generations and still survives; because Man has dared to
intrude into the 'DISORDERS OF DARKNESS', and brought back out of
ORCUS and made physical guilt and horror which were the property of
the devils and within the compass of their range, alone, of accursed
activity, but which
were not for him--were not naturally for him.
Hence the marks and tokens of this supernatural 'cancer', some of the
imported effects--otherwise lying out of his reach as being far above
what his limited nature could endure without utter consumption of
itself--of the 'FIRST FALL'. Conquest is wide-spread just according
to the weakness and incidence of the subjected. Fire finds its easy
prey in dry leaves and in light combustible. These 'immortal-mortal'
diseases spread and ramified, and spread and ramify (though with
diminution now), with an extension, and with a vigour, just in the
proportion of the necessitated surrender arising from the
incompetency and inability to resist; these hitherto supersensual and
supernatural terrors had found an access into this real world of
BODY, and there the disaster revelled in its appropriate forms in its
newly-found dominion. 'The imagination of man
is evil continually.' There are blots and imperfections which have
fastened upon Man’s very mortal composition or body. His nature
is struggling to free itself of the contagion. But the poison is not
poison of this world. The generations suffer in all the crowd
forward--in all their procession and replication for the sin--for the
unbelievable sin--for the wanton, out-of-the-way wickedness of
predecessors. This is the theory as to the origin of certain
diseases, which are considered 'NOT HUMAN'; but which have been
conveyed-to, and are inherited by, those who have no affinity with
these inflictions by their nature or by the intentions of the
'EXTERIOR PROVIDENCE'. Man has brought all this upon himself, as
farther fruits and newer penalties arising from the First Great
Lapse, and in farther proof, in still more degrading and still more
disfiguring decadence, of the imbibing of the first sweet poison--so
deliciously and yet so treacherously (lecherously) brewed by the
First Great Tempter:--Nameless--Anonymous--with 'Its' Janus Mask, and
offering to that 'Phenomenon', man, under 'Its' many 'Names'. Man is
another ruin, perhaps, in a series of
several previous ruins,
of which mortality has lost all trace.
The terms superstition and science are counter-changed. In reality
science may be the superstition, and superstition the truth
(otherwise the 'science', assumed as truth). Scientific men are the
most superstitious of any class, for they have raised an idol which
they call science, and therefore truth (why,
therefore,
forsooth?); and they have fallen down and worshipped Science (their
own ignorance) as God. They have taken themselves out of themselves,
and worshipped 'themselves'--otherwise their heads, instead of their
hearts; their reason (their head), which is no reason (no head)
really, instead of their hearts, or
their emotions and instincts; which are true, and which are
infallible--because they contradict the apparent and the reasonable,
which is never true. Hence we cannot know God through God, or
rather through the Intellect; but we must know God through the
'Saviour', or through the heart or affections; which entity, or sum
of heart and affections, is Second God, or Man 'in the image', etc.
The Third 'Person' of the Trinity is the Holy Ghost, or 'Recognition'
in which 'Both' are--'Seen in the Spirit', wherein, and absorbing the
'Two Others', is interfluent, miraculous, instant union and
'ASSUMPTION' of God and Means, in 'Belief'. This is the groundwork of
all religious systems. God’s anger (the 'denunciation' or the
'shaking-off' by the All-Pure and the All-Powerful) is shown in those
immortal (become fleshly), or 'Spirit-Cancers' (so to speak),
imported, as adaptations to the nature of physical man, into
body-corporate (that is, intelligible): the supernatural
become natural.
'Enfin, un des plus grands hommes qui aient porté
le flambeau dans les tenèbres de l’art médical:
Grand Chirurgie (liv. i. ch. 7) "La vérole",
dit-il avec cette conviction que la génie peut seul donner, "a
pris son origine dans le commerce impur d’un Français
lépreux avec une courtisane qui avait des bubons vénériens,
laquelle infecta ensuite tous ceux qui eurent affaire à elle.
C’est ainsi", continue cet habile et audacieux
observateur, "c’est ainsi que la vérole, provenue
de la lépre et des bubons vénériens, à
peu près comme la race des mulets est sortie de l’accouplement
d’un cheval et d’une ànesse, se répandit
par contagion dans tout l’univers." Paracelse considérait,
donc, le vérole de 1494 comme "un genre nouveau dans
l’antique famille des maladies vénériennes."'
Pierre Dufour, tome quatrième, p. 292.
'Un saint laïque', dit Jean Baptiste van Helmont
dans son Tumulus Pestis, 'tâchant de diviner pourquoi la
vérole avait paru au siècle passé et non
auparavant, fut ravi en esprit et eut une vision d’une jument
rongée. du farcin, d’où il soupçonna qu’au
siége de Naples, où cette maladie parut pour la
première fois, quelque homme avait eu un commerce abominable
avec une bête de cette espèce attaquée du même
mal, et qu’ensuite, par un effet
de la justice divine, il avait malheureusement
infecté le genre humain.' Pierre Dufour, tome quatriéme,
chap. xx. p. 292.
'Manardi, Mathiole, Brassavola, et Paracelse disent
que l’infection vénérienne est née de la
lèpre et de la prostitution.' Pierre Dufour, tome quatrième,
p. 297 (8vo edition).
Nothing can exceed the importance of the foregoing observations in
regard to the welfare (bodily and spiritually) of Man; especially in
these questioning, inquisitive modern times, when everything is
brought to the front, and remorselessly (although often foolishly,
because conceitedly) canvassed. Such names as the great
(much-libelled) Paracelsus, the prince of chemists and physiologists,
and that of Van Helmont, the most subtle and profound of magnetists
and psychologists, secure attention among the best-informed, and
carry their own consummate guarantee--the most convincingly to the
adepts. MEN of REFLECTION are needed to comprehend these theories and
speculations, and to weigh this evidence.
CHAPTER THE TWELFTH
The extraordinary philosophy of the Rosicrucians (and of the
Rosicrucian system) is best explained (though it is all erroneous as
to the true meanings of the Brothers of the 'R. C.') through the
following, charges which were brought forward to the disparagement of
these famous men. Petri Gassendi Theologi Epistolica Exercitatio. In
qua Principia Philosophiæ Roberti. Fluddi Medici reteguntur.
Parisiis, apud Sebastianum Cramoisy, via Jacobæa sub Ciconiis,
M.DC.XXX.
'Primo. Totam scripturam sacram referri ad
alchymiam, et principia alchymistica. Sensum scripturæ mysticum
non esse alium, quàm explicatum per alchymiam, et
philosophicum lapidem. Non interesse ad ilium habendum cujus
religionis sis, Romanæ, Lutheranæ, aut alterius.
Catholicum ilium solum esse, qui credit in Lapidem Catholicum, hoc
est Philosophicum, cujus ope homines Dæmonia ejiciant, linguis
loquantur novis, etc.
'Second. Cum Deus sit quædam Lux per
totum mundum diffusa, illum tamen non ingredi in ullam rem, nisi
privs assumpserit quasi vestem spiritum quendam æthereum,
qualis opera alchymiæ extrahitur, et quinta essentia vocatur.
Facere proinde Deum compositionem cum hoc spiritu æthereo.
Residere cum illo præsertim in sole, unde evibretur ad
generationem, et vivificationem omnium rerum. Deum hoc modo esse
formam omnium rerum, et ita agere omnia, ut causæ secundæ
per se nihil agant.
'Tertio. Compositum ex Deo, et Spiritu isto
Æthereo esse animam mundi. Purissimam partem hujus animæ
esse naturam angelicam, et cœlum empyreum, quod intelligatur
permistum esse omnibus rebus. Dæmones etiam particulas esse
ejusdem essentiæ, sed malignæ materiæ alligatas.
Omnes animas tam hominum, quam
brutorum, nihil esse aliud, quam particulas ejusdem
animæ. Eandem animam esse Angelum Michaelem, seu Mitattron.
'Quarto. Quod est amplios, eandem mundi animam
esse verum Messiam, Salvatorem, Christum, Lapidem Angularem, et
Petram universalem, supra quam Ecclesia, et tota salus fundata sit.
Hanc nempe esse præcipuam partem Philosophici Lapidis, quæcum
addensata rubescat, exinde dicatur esse sanguis Christi, quo
emundati, et redempti sumus. Neque enim nos emundari sanguine Christi
humano, sed hoc divino, et mystico.
'Quinto. Hominem justum esse alchymistam, qui
Philosophico Lapide invento, illius usu immortalis fiat. Mori tamen
dici, cum partes corruptibiles abijicit; Resurgere, cum fit
incorruptibilis; Glorificari, cum proinde easdem dotes assequitur,
quæ tribuuntur corporibus gloriosis. Hommes quihuc evaserint
"FRATRES CRUCIS ROSEÆ" dictos, scire omnia, posse
omnia, non arbitrari rapinam esse se equales Deo, cum eadem in illis
sit mens, quæ in Christo Jesu.
'Sexto. Creationem none esse productionem rei
ex nihilo, ut nos vulgo intelligimus nihil. Materiam (quam sæpissime
tenebras vocant) esse id, quod proprie appelletur nihil; ac proinde
cum Deus dicitur creare, aut facere aliquid ex nihilo, intelligi
creare, aut facere ex materia. Moysen, cum Creationem Mundi
descripsit, fuisse alchymistam, itemque Davidem, Salomonem, Jacob,
Job, et omnes alios; adeo ut etiam yeti Cabbalistæ nihil aliud
quam alchymistæ sint; itemque Magi, sapientes, philosophi,
sacerdotes, et alii.' Marinus Mersennus significantly adds: 'Quæso
autem, nisi ista sunt impia, quid potest esse impium?'
In the first place, the whole of the Sacred Scriptures are a grand
mystical puzzle referring to ALCHEMY, and to the universal alchemic
process. The mystical sense of the Old and the New Testaments is none
other than the HISTORY OF ALCHEMY--originated in the
Cabala
(with the secrets contained therein), and the
rationale of
that called 'The Philosophers’ Stone'. It matters not to the
question of these secrets fixed what religions be professed; whether
Christian, whether those of the 'Sects', whether infidel and heathen.
That only is 'Catholic' which lies in the 'Stone'--otherwise
practical magic; whereby Demons are commanded, good spirits
evoked, and the innermost hidden resources of nature, and the Spirits of Nature, laid bare
and availed-of.
Secondly.--When Deity is said to be 'Light', pervading and
vivifying all nature, He enters not in anything unless a
mask
of the object is adopted as the medium in which He fixes. This
aura
(or the deliquescence of the uproused light) is the infinite Ethereal
Spirit. The spring or the moving spirits, or the means, of alchemy
evolve out of it. They are fivefold in their exercise or
delimitation. God is indeed
identical with this supreme
spirit. And the radiant or intense material-nucleus is the lucid
conflux-spot or the SUN stored (by its spirits) with vigour,
sensitiveness, and intelligence. From this Intense Centre or Fiery
Blaze of Power (the Sun), agitations and life vibrate in masterdom
from the middle-point to circumference. God, thus, in producing, is
said to be identified with Matter, and He so fills (and IS) that
there are not (nor can there be) secondary causes, except to Man; who
can
only know second causes. This, be it noted, is
'Berkeleyism' on the one side, and its opposite, or 'Spinozism', on
the other--both being the same thing in reality; looked at
from
either side; or from before and from behind.
Thirdly.--Composed of this 'mask', and of this infinite
medium or Divine Movement, is the general investment (or spirit)
called the 'Soul of the World'. The purer part of this sensitive,
responsive soul is, in its own nature, of the breath of the angels
(
for 'the Angels were made'). The
anima mundi is the
Flaming Spiritual Region, in which all things live. Even the devils
are portions of this efflux, which is the general life. But the
Rebellious Spirits (the
vis inertiæ, or the
laziness,
so to speak), of matter--dense, contradictory, inaccessible--are
buried or lost--and were afterwards
chained--in inapprehensive
matter. All particular
'sentiences'--whether of the brutes or man--are nothing other than
parts of the whole lucid spirit. Of the same soul (in essence) is the
Archangel Michael, or Mitattron. Also all the Angels in their
Sevenfold Regions; both of the Bad, and of the Good; of the Dexter
and of the Sinister Sides of Creation.
Fourthly.--Which is still more dreadful (in appearance),
the same
anima mundi, or Soul of the World, is the real
Messiah, Saviour, Christ, the 'Corner-Stone of the Temple', the
'Temple' itself (the universe) the 'STONE' (
Petram Universalem),
or 'ROCK' (Peter--St. Peter), upon which the Church, and Salvation,
is founded. This is the mystical end and scope of that longed-for
Beatitude--or Magical Transfiguration--the 'Philosophers’
Stone', or 'Foundation'. Which (being to be obtained 'out of the
material' by 'supernatural' means) when contracted into itself, and
concentrated and intensified, glows (or martyrises) into
flaming
red, or possession, or Glorified Agony (made Heaven). From thence
it is said to be the 'Blood' of Christ (and the 'Gross' of Christ),
which 'blood' was shed for the redemption of the world from the
penalties of the (First?) FALL (by Which We Are). By means of the
'Great Sacrifice' mortality is purged into purity back into the
celestial fire, and redeemed from Hell or Matter. However, we are not
redeemed by the blood of a 'Human' Christ, but by the atoning blood
in a divine and mystical sense. (See corresponding plates.)
Fire is contention--whether holy or unholy. Heat, intensified in
the struggle, agitates furiously to FIRE. Fire, triumphing and
mastering the matter which lends it its material and strength, when
passing into victory brandishes
into the calm and the glory of
victory, and becomes yellow in its flaming precious. gold, and
quiet
LIGHT intense as the grandest phenomenon--
sprung up skywards; or against gravity; therefore
reversing
nature's principal law. The intenser the darkness, or the mass of
matter (the Rosicrucians’ 'other side' of Spirit, and of
Light), the greater the Light, and the greater the spirit and
vivacity and force in the Liberation
into Light (and into
Spirit) of the Darkness and the Matter; when
its
farthest-winnowed atoms are forced asunder in the darts of the fire,
and turned '
inside-outwards'. See preceding pages. This is the
'Holy Grail', or 'Sangreal', or 'Sang-Reale' or Fire', or 'Mighty
Redeeming Magic', sought by the Champions, or the Knights, of King
Arthur's Round Table. See Supplementary Explanations.
Fifthly.--The 'Just Man made Perfect' is the Alchemist (or
rather, Rosicrucian) who, having found the Philosophers’ Stone
(San Graal, or Holy Grail, or '
Sang Reale' or 'Holy Rapture'
or Magic Birth into the Celestial Fire, or flame of
Self-Extinguishment, or of 'Ecstasy'), becomes immortal (and
disappears, or 'dies' to the world). His 'chariot of fire' being that
of Enoch, or 'Translation'. To die is simply the falling asunder and
disintegration of the mechanism of the senses, which have contracted
inwards and formed (in life) the prison of the soul--a prison of
pains and penalties; from between the bars of the windows of which
(or out of the eyes) the suffering, languishing SPIRIT looks for the
often long-coming releasing GREAT SPIRIT-DEATH. The flitting is of
the flickering flame (consciousness) out of the urn. To 'Rise'--is to
cast off the chains of mortality. To become 'Glorified' is to
discover
in one's own identity the glorious, godlike gifts or
MAGIC--which are the wings upon which to rise. Those men who have
passed (as through a door) in their lifetime from the 'hither' side
(or world) to the 'thither' side (or the world invisible)--following into the LIGHT the divine beckon to
Paradise of the ANGELS of LIGHT, are the BROTHERS of the ROSY CROSS,
or the ROSICRUCIANS, as they have been called; who 'know everything',
can 'do anything', and have even arrogated to themselves, when in
them should be set up the same angelical-magical spirit which was in
the Christ-Jesus, to be of the 'COUNCIL of GOD'. Though, in the
world, they were the humblest of the servants of the Almighty.
In the Sixth Place,--Creation is not the making of things
out of nothing, which we understand commonly (or vulgarly) of God’s
work in the beginning of the universe or of Creation. Matter, which
the Rosicrucians frequently refer to as Darkness, is that only which
is properly, to be called 'Nothing'. Thus when God is said to create,
or make something out of nothing (to do which is impossible), it is
to be understood that He worked with material, or with DARKNESS,
which is the 'Blank side' or the 'Other Side of Light; turned away'.
These profound metaphysical distinctions are the key of all the
Theologies. Moses, when he describes the Creation of the World, is
the Alchemist, relating in parable the generation of the solids, and
the flowing-over into the border-country (out of the flesh) of the
Invisible--WHERE EVERYTHING ULTIMATELY IS. The history of David,
Solomon (of the 'Temple'), Jacob (of the 'Ladder; or Staircase from
Earth to Heaven, and from Heaven to Earth', etc.), Job; the accounts
of the Heroes of the stories of the
Apocrypha (the most
concealed or recondite of the 'things hidden'--
thence its name),
etc., are cabalistic and alchemical, similarly to all the
mythologies, which are, in their fanciful and mystic range of
supposed facts, cabalistic and alchemical. The true
Cabalistæ
are none other than Alchemists and Rosicrucians. Likewise the Magi,
Wise Men, Philosophers, Priests, and
Heroes; from Jason and the 'Three Kings' to King Arthur, and from
Adam, Noah, Abraham, and Moses, to Numa, Paracelsus, Borrichius,
Robertus de Fluctibus (nearer our own time), AND OTHERS.
The Rosicrucian system took the following forms:--These
Philosophers believed that there were Two Principles in the
Beginning--Light and Darkness, or Form and the Material
out of
which the Form was. That before the Creation (distinctively so
called), the Light Itself was as 'Divinity Latent' or 'At Rest'. In
the Creation, or in the production of things, Divinity became active,
aroused, and inventive. By whatever name distinguished, or by
whatever style identified, Moses’ description of Creation is to
be taken as the process of alchemy, as worked by Nature itself, being
her Form; to which head are referred the kingdoms of darkness, or
chaos, and the Light emerging out of its own bosom or DARKNESS.
After the active movement from the centre, or evolvement, or
Creation, the radiation and counter-working or interchange of Light
and Darkness in crossing and encountering irritated mutually,
naturally; became expansive and contractive angularly--thence
pyramidal and starry. And in the relative counterbalancing
contemperation, the diversity of things arose at the points of the
masterdom into form or Light. The medium in which the elements were
(and the elements themselves) now grew 'in their natures'. From these
various rudiments of being--(in the vehicle Light) the archetypical
scheme arranged itself; which, 'One' in essence, was 'Triple' in
procession or 'parade'. Hence the TRINITY.
But it is Incomprehensible, obviously,
without the means to
comprehend it--which is CHRIST. Christ the 'PENALTY'--Christ the
'SACRIFICE'. Christ the 'Glass' of the 'Universe', in which 'God' saw
'Himself'. But 'Christ' is not 'God' any more than the 'Glass' is the
'Seer'. From the TRINITY and the vivifying
substratum in the
mathematical four corners of the world, comes the ineffable
name--'
Tetragrammaton'. The archetypical 'Idea' is also called
Reflective--Intelligible--Informed--Superessential--Endless in
resource.
Object--Subject--Result: or the Three 'Persons' of the Trinity.
The reflection of God is in the Archetype which is the Second
Principle, or 'Macrocosmos' (created worlds), exhibiting 'Either
Side', or 'Will' in 'Action'. This is displayed in Three Divisions,
or Spheres--called (1st) the 'Empyræum' (God). (2nd) The
'Etheræum' (the 'Saviour'). (3rd) The 'Elements' (the Virgin
Mary). Light emanates in the Sephiroth ('CABALA') or 'Seven-fold'
rotation--hence the 'production of phenomena'. In uniting with the
Ethereal Spirit, it becomes the Soul, or 'Responsive Sentience of the
World'. The further elucidation of the Rosicrucian theological
system, in its general features--
so far as in hint or parable
submitted to unenlightened comprehension--will be found prestated
in previous pages, and elsewhere.
The Rosicrucians contend that music, or melody--
which is
enchantment--pervades all nature in its prosperous or intended
progress, although it is only the wail, or plaint, of the instinctive
soul on its 'wounded', or 'sacrificed', or '
Ruined Side'. It
mourns for its 'Original Lost Paradise'. The music of the spheres is
no unreal thing, but real as is the atmosphere of the spirits; for
'music is the atmosphere of the spirits', and discords (though the
necessity, support, and balance of Creation) are a medium for the
coarse and low spirits, who inundate, as it were, the lees and the
settlings of nature. In discords, or in the inharmonious strife
amidst the sounds, the
rabble of the spirits (so to term them) are stimulated to their
envious and spiteful, or malific or freakish and blundering, bad
life. Beauty is not, however, necessarily beauty--it may be
seduction. For the higher grades of the recusant or rebellious
spirits who find their power in the original permission that there
'
might be phenomena' are beautiful in their assumption--or
usurpation--of the lovely forms of spirit-life and of nature. And
they will prevail, sometimes, even against the best efforts of the
Angels of Light. The Cabalists whisper that God 'made the world' by
the 'means of music'--that music, as man knows music, is essentially
a power; that it is the faint, much-changed, much-enfeebled, sole
relic, and tradition, and reminder of Man’s Lost Paradise; that
(through it originally) everything was possible, as the gift of God;
which explains the classic fables of Orpheus, Amphion, and the
mythological wonder-workers in music; that music is modulated in the
movements of the planets according to the rearrangement of the
post-diluvian world, and in conformity with the readjustment of the
solar-system after mysterious aberration or cataclysm; that mortality
cannot hear, and that the human soul is so debased that it only
catches intermittently the faint echo of the continuous universal
music which in other--now material--senses is the life and growth and
splendour of everything.
There’s not the smallest orb, that thou
behold’st,
But in his motion like an angel sings,
Still
quiring to the young-eyed cherubims:
Such harmony is in immortal
souls;
But, whilst this muddy vesture of decay
Doth grossly
close it in, we cannot hear it.
Music is magic, is sacred, and a power--as all harmony must
be;--the nerves of the world--the aspiration
of living things--the spell which breaks up and extols--into
super-added, super-natural life--the 'Real' into the 'Ideal'.
Harmony--or the mysterious solace and satisfaction and happiness at
heroism which we feel--is found in the beauty of the human figure,
the glories and graces of all growing objects and moving or unmoving
natures. Success in nature, and in life, with their changes--as man
knows 'nature' and 'life'--arise from the interstarry, mechanical
modifications, and the incidents (and, the apparent interference and
intertangle) through the restless movement of the planets. All the
glorious seeming mechanism of the starry sky shows so as mechanism
only to the
measuring senses of man; but in reality it may be
the play of Infinite Spirit. (See accompanying Charts, A, B, C.) The
planets of our own system may be directed in their
'continual-speaking' changes by their several crowds of governing
spirits. Spirits being everywhere the directors of matter, its solids
are only to be separated by soul or energy--as the wedge (directed by
the will) cleaves inert or resistant solids. Music is always in the
air. Man has no ears for it, unless it is
enlivened to, or
finds access to, his senses. But
his heart is its home--if he
has a heart, and not an 'animal’s mechanic throbbing-machine'
only. Air is the breathing of nature. Music is always in the
air--more particularly at night, for Nature (being born of it) is
necessarily more nervously sensitive at night, whether for the
'beautiful' or the 'dreadful'; because both are equally exciting and
fascinating--basilisks both--as they are mysterious. We obtain by
pulsation, or scientific commotion of the air, by musical
instruments, the music out of it; and our fine nerves are the fine
sensitives (born of God), as the harp played upon to receive it.
Otherwise there is no sense in music. Otherwise our passions
could not be stirred by it.
These are storms and convulsions (rendered beautiful) certainly not
born of God’s original 'REST'. Rather they come of the stirring
ambitions of Lucifer--uprising--'Son of the Morning', 'Son of the
Awakening'--'Son' of the 'Sun'. Music and its success depend upon the
prosperous progress of the Planets which make it, as (in Astrology)
they prearrange, order and fix the fates of men. It is no
inconsistent thing to say that, in the Rosicrucian sense, every
stone, flower, and tree has its horoscope (we know that there are no
two leaves alike), and that they are produced and flourish in the
mechanical resources of the mysterious necessities of
astrology--every object bearing its history in its lines and
marks (sigillated magnetism), as inspired by the Great Soul of the
World; which is all continual changing
purpose, urging
restlessly towards 'REST'.
'Nullam esse herbam, aut plantain inferius, cujus non sit stella
in firmamento, quæ eam percutiat, et dicat ei, cresce.'
Exercitatio in Fluddanam Philosophiam, p. 228. Parisiis, 1630.
Or back again to that from which it came. Moving in the
arc
of the pendulum between the two points--Life and Death (as we know
Life and Death)--beyond which the 'swing' of this world’s
'Creation' points, cannot pass--OR BE.
CHAPTER THE THIRTEENTH
General note on the
Sacti Puja. POWER means the good
goddess,
Maya Maia (i.e. Delusion). She is also called
Bhagala, Vagula, Bagala-mukhi. She has neither images nor pictures.
The Girl in the Indian sacred, secret Temple rites, who figures as
the representative of Sacti, is the supposed embodiment of the
goddess offered for worship. The word Sacti corresponds to genius, or
'sylph', of the Rosicrucian creed. The doctrine of guardian angels
and of patron saints is conveyed in these Hindoo meanings in the
machinery of the 'sylphs'.
During
Puja, the Yogini is supposed to be in an exalted
visionary state (
guyána nidra), wherein, like the
sibyls among the ancients, and the modern
clairvoyantes, she
answers questions in a delirious manner, and is supposed to be for
the time inspired.
The Foreign Quarterly Review, No X. for
February 1830; art. viii.: '
Histoire Critique de Gnosticisme, et
de son influence sur les Sects religieuses et philosophiques des six
premiers siècles de l’ère chrétienne.
Ouvrage couronné par l’Académie Royale des
Inscriptions et Belles Lettres. Par M. J. Matter, Professeur. 2
tomes, avec planches, 8vo, Paris, 1828.' The third volume is of small
size, and contains eleven plates of gems and symbols. This book
proves Gnosticism to be identical with the Sacti creed of the Hindus.
Edward Sellon advances this. See
Annotations on the Sacred
Writings of the Hindus, being an epitome of some of the most
remarkable and leading tenets in the faith of that people.
Printed for Private Circulation, 1865. London.
Brühm Atma, the Breathing Soul, is, according to the
Hindoos, a spiritual Supreme Being, coeval with the formation of the
world. In process of time the Hindoos appear to have adopted a
material type or emblem of Brühm. A rude block of stone began to
be set up. This was the '
Phallus', or, as they termed it, the
'
Linga'. This emblem had reference to the Procreative Power
seen throughout nature, and in that primæval age was regarded
with the greatest awe and veneration. This simple and primitive
Idolatry came by degrees to diverge into the adoration of the
elements, particularly Fire, and at length developed itself by the
institution of an emanation from
Brühm Atma in his Triune
capacity, as Creator, Preserver (or 'Saviour'), and Destroyer. These
attributes were deified under the names of
Brahma,
Vishnu,
and
Siva, on whom were conferred three
gunas, or
qualities, viz.
Rajas (passion),
Sat (purity), and
Tumas (darkness). This is the
Trimurti. 'Trimurti'
(three-formed
Murti), signifying also an image. Our vital
souls are, according to the
Vedanta, no more than images, or
εἴδωλοα of the
'Supreme Spirit'--
As. Res. vol. iii. It may be concluded that
the most exalted notion of worship among the Hindus is a service of
fear. The Brahmins say that the other Gods are good and
benevolent, and will not hurt their creatures; but that Siva is
powerful and cruel, and that it is necessary to appease him. As fear
is, and must be everywhere, the most potent feeling. Thence vital and
active physical religion. Distrust and fear of the external phenomena
of the world, as meaning mischief to us (it means the greatest
--apparently--in Death), created religion. Fear creates
respect--respect is attention to an object, and therefore dread of
it. Because we are not acquainted with its possible operation upon
ourselves in regard of our being interfered with or injured. Hence
all religion is selfishness apart from 'inspiration', which the world
(in its folly) calls 'superstition'.
The most popular representation of the Divine Being in India is
unquestionably the
Linga; a smooth stone rising out of another
stone of finer texture,
simulacrum membri virilis et pudendum
muliebre.
This emblem is identical with
Siva in his capacity of 'Lord
of all'. It is necessary, however, to observe that Professor Wilson,
while admitting that 'the
Linga is perhaps the most ancient
object of homage adopted in India', adds, 'subsequently to the ritual
of the
Vedhas, which was chiefly, if not wholly, addressed to
the Elements,
and particularly to Fire. How far the worship of
the
Linga is authorized by the
Vedhas is doubtful, but
that it is the main purport of several of the
Puranas
[5]
there can be no doubt.'
[6]
The universality of
Linga puja (or worship) at the period
of the Mohammedan invasion of India is well attested. The idol
destroyed by Mahmoud of Ghizni was nothing more than one of those
mystical blocks of stone called Lingas. The worship of Siva under the
type of the
Linga is almost the only form in which that Deity
is reverenced. The Linga of black or white marble, and sometimes of
alabaster slightly tinted and gilt, is placed in the middle of the
Hindu temples. This is a Chinese hint. The Chinese Pagodas are
Phalli, storied 'Tors', or Obelisks; abounding
in bells to be agitated in the winds to drive off the crowds of
roving malignant spirits. The whole of China may be mystically said
to be populated by '
Bells and the Dragon'. Speaking of Siva
and Pawáti, M. de Langlet says 'Les deux divinités
dont-il s’agit, sont très souvent et très
pieusement adorées sous le figure du Linga (le Phallus des
anciens), et de l’Yoni dans leur mystérieuse
conjonction. L’Yoni so nomme aussi Bhaga (pudendum muliebre).
Madheri, douce; et
Argha, vase en forme de bateau.'
Benares is the peculiar seat of the Linga or Phallic worship. No less
than forty-seven Lingas are visited, all of pre-eminent sanctity; but
there are hundreds of inferior note still worshipped, and thousands
whose fame and fashion have passed away. It is a singular fact, that
upon this adoration of the procreative and sexual Sacti (or power)
seen throughout nature, hinges the whole strength of the Hindu faith.
Notwithstanding all that has been said by half-informed and
prejudiced persons to the contrary, this
puja does not appear
to be prejudicial to the morals of the people. Nearly all the
Pujas
are conducted with the frequent ringing of bells, and the object of
this is twofold--first, to wake up the attention at particular parts
of the service; and secondly, to scare away malignant
Dewtas
and evil spirits; precisely, in fact, for the same reasons as they
are used at the celebration of Mass in Roman Catholic countries.
Prakriti, the mother of gods and men, one with matter, the source
of error, is identified with Maya or delusion, and coexistent with
the Omnipotent, as his
Sacti, his personified energy, his
bride.
Prakriti
is inherent
Maya, 'because she beguiles all things'.--
As.
Res. xvii. It is stated in one of the
Purans that
Brahma,
having determined to create the universe, became androgynous, male
and female (or
'reflector' and 'reflected'); the right half having the sex and form
of a man, the left that of a woman. In his images he is sometimes
thus represented, and is then termed Ardnari. 'This is
Prakriti
of one nature with
Brühm--illusion, eternal, as the soul
so is its active energy, as the faculty of burning is in fire.' The
Sacti system bears a striking affinity with Epicureanism. It teaches
Materialism, and the Atomic System of the 'Confluence of Chance'.
Compare the
Ananda Tantram, c. xvii. with Lucretius, lib. iii.
On the base of Minerva's statue at Sais, whom the Egyptians regarded
to be the same as Isis, a goddess who bears so striking an analogy to
the Hindu
Prakriti or nature, there was this inscription: 'I
am everything that was, that is, that is to be. Nor has mortal ever
been able to discover
what I am.'--Plutarch,
De Iside et
Osiride, S. ix. According to the immediate object of worship is
the particular ceremony, but all the forms (lighter or heavier)
require the use of some or all of the five
Makaras: Mánsa,
Matsya,
Madya,
Maithuna, and
Mudra, that
is, fish, flesh, wine, women, and certain charms or mystical
gesticulations with the fingers. Suitable
muntrus, or
incantations, are also indispensable, according to the end proposed,
consisting of various seemingly unmeaning monosyllabic combinations
of letters, of great imaginary efficacy. 'The combination of H and S
is principal, and is called
Prásáda-Mantra, and
described in the
Kulárnava.'--Wilson,
As. Res.
In many of the religious observances solitude is enjoined, but all
the principal ceremonies culminate in the worship of Sacti, or POWER,
and require, for that purpose, the presence of a young and beautiful
girl, as the living representative of the goddess. This worship is
mostly celebrated, in all due serious religious formality, in a mixed
society; the men of which represent
Bhairavas,
or
Viras, and the women
Bhanravis and
Nayikas.
The female thus worshipped is ever after denominated Yogini, i.e.
'attached' (set apart, sacred). This Sanscrit word is in the dialects
pronounced
Jogi and
Zogee, and is equivalent to a
secular nun, as these women are subsequently supported by alms. The
leading rites of the
Sakti-Sodhana are described in the
Devi-Radhasya, a section of the
Rudra-Yámala. It
is therein enjoined that the object of worship should be either 'A
dancing-girl, a female devotee (or nun), a courtesan, a
Dhobee
woman, a barber's wife, a female of the Brahminical or Sudra tribe, a
flower-girl, or a milkmaid'. Appropriate
muntrus are to be
used. She is to be solemnly placed
naked (as a sacred,
unapproachable 'Thing', or object), but richly ornamented with jewels
and flowers--the triumphant spoils of glorious nature--
on the left
of a circle (inscribed for the purpose), with
muntrus and
gesticulations. The circle, or vacant enchanted space, must be
rendered pure by repeated incantations and rites; being finally
baptized
with wine by the peculiar
mantra. The
Sacti
is now sublimized or 'apotheosized'; but if not previously initiated,
she is to be farther made an adept by the communication of the
radical
Mantra or last charm whispered thrice in her ear, when
the object of the ceremony is complete. The finale to this solemnity
is what might be concluded as likely, but--strange to
say--accompanied throughout by
muntrus and forms of meditation
and of devotion incomprehensibly foreign to the scene. In other
aspects this presentation of the 'Yogini' is a '
Sacrifice',
and the whole meaning of the rites is sacrificial--rites performed
before an altar, and implying--superstition undoubtedly--but
deep mystery and some profoundest suggestions. (Wilson,
As. Res.
vol. xii. 225: on Hind. Sects. Vide
Rig
Veda, Book ii. c. viii. ss. 13, 14, 2nd attham, 8th pannam,
Rigs B. 14, which contain the
Sucla Homa Mantram, etc.)
The caste-mark of the
Saivas and
Sactas consist of
three horizontal lines on the forehead, with ashes obtained if
possible
from the hearth, on which a
consecrated fire
is perpetually maintained.
The
Sacti (or 'Sacred Presence') is personified by a naked
girl, to whom offerings are made of meat and wine, which are then
distributed amongst the assistants. Here follows the chanting of the
Muntrus, and sacred texts, and the performance of the
mudra,
or gesticulations with the fingers. The whole service terminates with
orgies amongst the votaries of a very licentious description. This
ceremony is entitled the
Sri Chakra, or
Purnabisheka,
THE RING or 'Full Initiation'. This method of adoring the
Sacti
is unquestionably acknowledged by the texts regarded by the
Vanis
as authorities for the excesses practised. Wilson, on Hind. Sects,
vol. xvii.
As. Res. Ward, on the Vaisnavas, p. 309.
In Gregory's Works (
Notes and Observations upon several
difficult passages in Scripture, vol. i. 4to. London 1684) is to
be found a significant comment. '
Noah prayed daily in the Ark
before the body of Adam', i.e. before the PHALLUS, or Regenerator
(Adam being the primitive 'Phallus', or great Procreator of the Human
Race)--(under its present circumstances, and in the existing
dispensation). 'It may possibly seem strange', Gregory says, 'that
this orison should be daily said before the body of
Adam; but
it is a most confessed Tradition among the Eastern men that Adam was
commanded by God that his dead body should be kept above ground till
a fullness of time should come to commit it פיוססאלאוע
to the
middle of the earth by a priest of the
Most High God.' See previous pages.
This 'middle of the earth' is Mount Moriah--the Meru of India.
The 'Brazen Serpent' continued to be worshipped by the Jews, and
to have incense offered to that Idol, till the reign of Hezekiah:
'For, it being written in the Law of Moses "Whosoever looks upon
it shall live", they fancied they might obtain blessings by its
mediation, and therefore thought it worthy to be worshipped. Our
learned Dr. Jackson observes that "the pious Hezekiah was moved
with the greater indignation against the worship of this image,
because in truth it never was--nor was intended to be--a type of our
Saviour, but a figure of His Grand Enemy"', etc.
The Jews relapsed into idolatry by the adoration of the Golden
Calf; set up, too, not by a few schismatics, but by the entire
people, with Aaron at their head. The calf-superstition was doubtless
a relic of what they had seen in Egypt in the worship of Apis and
Mnevis. Next we have the 'Golden Calves' set up by Jeroboam at Dan
and Bethel. Then follows (
Judges viii. 22, etc.) the worship
of Gideon's Ephod. 'The Ephod made by Gideon with the spoil of the
Midianites became after his death an object of idolatry' (ibid., p.
41). We have also Micah's images and the 'Teraphim'. We learn from
St. Jerome (who received it by tradition from the ancient Jews, and
indeed it is so stated in
Numbers xxv. 1, 2, etc.; xxiii. 28,
and numerous other passages of the Old Testament) that the Jews
adored Baal Phegor (Baal-Pheor), the Priapus of the Greeks and
Romans. 'It was'; he says, 'principally worshipped by women;
colentibus maxime feminis (Baal-Phegor).' Maimonides observes
that the adoration offered to this Idol, called Pehor, consisted in
discovering ------. Chemosh, probably the same as Baal-Pheor, also
received the
homage of the Jews, as also did Milcom, Molech, Baal-berith (or
Cybele), and numerous others--all of the same sexual cast.
From all this in regard to their irregular worship--or rather
(mysteriously) to their
regular or assigned worship, it will
be seen that the Jews fell into Idolatry (and Phallic Idolatry, too)
to an extent interpenetrating, again most mysteriously, the whole
scope of their religion. There will consequently not appear anything
so very startling in the supposition that the Ark of the Covenant
contained symbolic objects referring to Phallic ideas. We have seen
that the 'Stone', or 'Pillar', of Jacob was held in particular
veneration--that it was worshipped and anointed. We know from the
Jewish records that the Ark was supposed to contain the tables of
stone. And if it can be demonstrated that these stones implied a
Phallic reference, and that these 'tables' were identical with the
symbolism accompanying the sacred name Jehovah, Iehovah, or Yehovah,
which, written in unpointed Hebrew, with four letters is--IEVE or
IHVH (the HE being merely an aspirate and the same as E)--this
process leaves us the two letters I and V (or, in another of its
forms, U). Then if we add the I
in the U we have the 'Holy of
Holies'; we also have the Linga and Yoni and Argha (Ark or Arc) of
the Hindus, the 'Iswarra' or 'Supreme Lord'. In all this may be
found--mystically--the 'Arc-Celestial' replicating-in upon
itself--symbolically and anagrammatically--and presenting itself as
identical with the 'Lingayoni' of the 'Ark of the Covenant'. Gregory
observes that the '
middle of the Ark was the place of
prayer--made holy (consecrated) by the presence of Adam's Body.'
(Refer to the glyptic symbolism, the mystical engraving of the 'Ark',
placed among the full-page plates.
Thence 'Man' was the Cabalistic (Rosicrucian)
Microcosmos or
'Little World', in contradistinction to the causer, or pattern, or
original--
Macrocosmos, or 'Great', or 'Producing' ('Outside'),
or 'Originating World'.
'The body of Adam was embalmed and transmitted from father to son,
till at last it was delivered up by Lamech into the hands of Noah.'
Again, the '
middle of the Ark' was the place of prayer (and
worship) made holy by the presence of 'Adam's "Body".'--Gregory,
p. 118. 'And "
so soon as ever the day began to break"
Noah stood up towards the "body of Adam",' etc., etc., 'and
"prayed" (or "worshipped").' Here was the origin
of the 'Eucharist', as the reader will clearly see farther on (see
accompanying plate).
The most ancient monuments of Idolatry among the Gentiles were
consecrated pillars (Lingas), or columns, which the Jews were
forbidden to erect as objects of divine homage and adoration. And
yet--a most extraordinary contradiction--this practice is conceived
to arise from an imitation of Jacob, who 'took a stone' and 'set it
up', etc. Further, 'this stone was held in great veneration in
subsequent times by the Jews, and removed to Jerusalem.' They were
accustomed to 'anoint this stone'; and from the word
Bethel,
the place where the pillar was erected, came the word Bœtylia
among the Heathen, which signified rude stones, or uprights, which
they worshipped either as 'symbols of Divinity', or as 'true gods',
animated (at certain times) by the heavenly power. Thence the name
'Bowing Stones' amongst the Welsh--not as stones to be 'bowed to',
but 'bowing of themselves', like the modern 'tipping-discs' or other
supposed enchanted idols or consultative tables or objects. Indeed it
would seem not
improbable that the erection of the Pillar of Jacob actually gave
rise to the worship of Phallus among some of the Pagan peoples.
'For', says Lewis, 'the learned Bochart asserts that the Phœnicians
(at least as the Jews think) first worshipped this
very stone
which Jacob set up, and afterwards consecrated others in imitation
and in reminder of it.'
It is to little purpose that we are reminded that the Jews were
forbidden by their law to 'make unto themselves any graven image';
for, as Lewis shows in the following passage, there may be exceptions
to this, as to every other general rule. 'Notwithstanding', he says,
'the severity of the Law against the making of Images, yet, as Justin
Martyr observes in his Book against Trypho, it must be somewhat
mysterious, that God in the case of the "Brazen Serpent"
should command an image to be made, for which one of the Jews
confessed he never could hear a reason from any of their Doctors.'
According to Theodoret, Arnobius, and Clemens of Alexandria, the
Yoni
(then become
Ioni; thence
Ionia and
Ionic) of
the Hindus was the sole object of veneration in the Mysteries of
Eleusis (Demosthenes,
On the Crown).
CHAPTER THE FOURTEENTH
Il est avéré pour les Théologiens et les
Philosophes, que de la copulation de l’homme, mâle ou
femelle, avec le Démon, naissent quelquefois des hommes. Et
c’est de la sorte que doit naître l’Antichrist,
suivant bon nombre de Docteurs: Bellarmin, Suarez, Maluenda, etc. Ils
observent en outre que, par une cause toute naturelle, les enfans
ainsi procréés par les Incubes (Exterior Spirits, with
more or less power, enabled to embody themselves with male human
characteristics, and drawn to earth with the desire to form alliances
with women--as hinted in the Bible), sont grands, très-robustes,
très-audacieux, très-superbes, et très-méchants.
Voyez là-dessus Maluenda; quant à la cause en question,
il nous le donne d’après Vallesius, Archiatre de Reggio.
'Ce que les Incubes introduisent
in uteros
n’est pas
qualecumque, neque quantumcumque--mais
abondant, très-chargé d’esprits et sans aucune
sérosité. Ceci est d’ailleurs pour eux chose
facile: ils n’ont qu’à choisir des hommes chauds,
robustes, et
quibus succumbant; puis des femmes de même
tempérament,
quibus incombant. Tels sont les termes de
Vallesius. Maluenda confirme ce qui a été dit plus
haut, prouvant, par le témoignage de divers Auteurs,
classiques la plupart, que c’est à pareilles unions que
doivent leur naissance: Romulus et Rémus, d’après
Tite-Live et Plutarque; Servius-Tullius, sixième roi des
Romains, d’après Denys d’Halicarnasse et Pline
l’Ancien; Plato le Philosophe, d’après Diogène
Laërce et Saint Jérôme, Alexandre le Grand, d’après
Plutarque et Quinte-Curce; Séleucus, roi de Syrie, d’après
Justin et Appien; Scipion l’Africain, premier du
nom, d’après Tite-Live; l’empereur César-Auguste,
d’après Suétone; Aristomène de Messénie,
illustre général grec, d’après Strabon et
Pausanias. Ajoutons encore l’Anglais Merlin or Melchin, né
d’un Incube et d’une Religieuse, fille de Charlemagne.
Et, enfin, comme l’écrit Cocleus, cité par
Maluenda, ce Hérésiarque qui a nom Martin Luther.'
On lit aussi dans la Sainte Écriture,
Genèse,
chap. 6,
verset 4, que des géants sont nés
du commerce des Fils de Dieu (the 'Angels of God') avec les Filles
des Hommes (the 'Daughters of Men'). Ceci est la lettre même du
texte sacré. Or, ces géants étaient des hommes
de
grande stature, comme qu’il est dit dans
Baruch,
chap. 3,
verset 26, et de beaucoup supérieurs
aux autres hommes. Outre cette taille monstreuse, ils se signalaient
encore par leur force, leurs rapines, leur tyrannie; aussi est-ce aux
crimes des Géants qu’il convient d’attribuer la
cause première et principale du Déluge, suivant
Cornélius â Lapide, dans son
Commentaire sur la
Genèse.
Ces animaux Incubi (spirits capable of incorporating themselves
and of borrowing forms to effect their purpose without
'alarming'--asserted to be an 'essential Rosicrucian tenet') ces
animaux naitraient-ils dans le péché originel, et
auraient-ils rachetés par le Seigneur Christ? La grâce
leur serait-elle conferèe, et par quels sacrements, sous
quelle loi vivraient-ils, et seraient-ils capables de Béatitude
et de Damnation?
Dans un monastère de saintes Religieuses
vivait comme pensionnaire une jeune vierge de noble famille, laquelle
était tentée par un Incube qui lui apparaissait jour et
nuit, et, avec les plus instantes prières, avec les allures de
l’amant le plus passionné, la sollicitait sans cesse au
péché. Elle cependant, soutenue par la grâce de
Dieu et la fréquentation des sacrements, demeurait ferme dans
sa résistance. Mais malgré toutes ses dévotions,
ses jeûnes, ses vœux; malgré les exorcismes, les
bénédictions, les injonctions faites par les exorcistes
à l’Incube de renoncer à ses persécutions;
en dépit de la multitude de reliques et autres objets sacrés
accumulés dans
la chambre de la jeune fille, des flambeaux ardents
qu’on y entretenait toute la nuit, l’Incube n’en
persistait pas moins à lui apparaître comme de coutume
sous la forme d’un très-beau jeune homme. Enfin,
parmi les doctes personnages consultés, à ce propos, se
trouva un Théologien d’une grande érudition:
lequel, observant que la jeune fille tentée était d’un
temperament tout à fait flegmatique, conjectura que cet Incube
devait être un démon aqueux (il y a en effet, comme en
témoigne Guaccius, des démons ignés, aériens,
flagmatiques, terrestres, souterrains, ennemis du jour).'
We may here remark that the above expresses some of the notions of
the Rosicrucians in regard to those that they denominate: '
Les
Enfans Aériens et Les Enfantes Aériennes', their
Ondins and
Ondines, their
Sylphs and
Sylphides,
their
Gnomes and
Gnomides, their
Kebels,
Kebelles or
Kobolds (
Krolls or
Krolles),
and their
Salamanders and
Salamandrines.
'Le Théologien érudit ordonna qu’on
fît immédiatement dans la chambre de la jeune fille une
fumigation de vapeur. On apporte en conséquence une marmite
neuve en terre transparente; on y met une once de canne aromatique,
de poivre cubèbe, de racines d’aristoloche des deux
espèces, de cardomome grand et petit, de gingembre, de poivre
long, de caryophyllée, de cinnamome, de canelle caryophyllée,
de macis, de noix muscades, de storax calamite, de benjoin, de bois
d’aloès, et de trisanthes, le tout dans trois livres
d’eau-de-vie demipure; on place la marmite sur des cendres
chaudes, afin de faire monter la vapeur fumigante, et l’on
tient la chambre close. La fumigation fait arriver l’Incube,
mais qui, cette fois, n’osa jamais pénétrer dans
la chambre. Seulement, si la jeune fille en sortait pour se promener
dans le jardin ou dans le cloître, il lui apparaissait aussitôt
tout en restant invisible aux autres, et lui jetant ses bras autour
du cou, lui dérobait ou plutôt lui arrachait des
baisers, ce qui faisait cruellement souffrir cette honnête
pucelle, Enfin, après nouvelle consultation, notre Théologien
ordonna à la jeune fille de porter sur elle de petites
boulettes composées de parfums exquis, tels que musc, ambre,
civette, baume de Pérou et autres. Ainsi munie, elle s’en
alla se promener dans le jardin où sur-le-champ lui apparut
l’Incube, furieux et menaçant; toutefois, il n’osa
point l’approcher, et après s’être mordille
le doigt, comme s’il méditait une vengeance, il disparut
pour ne plus revenir.--Confesseur de Nonnes, homme grave et
très-digne de foi.'
Je sais que beaucoup de mes lecteurs, la plupart peut-être,
diront de moi ce que les Epicuriens et bon nombre de Philosophes
Stoïciens disaient de S. Paul (
Actes des Apôtres,
c. 17, v. r8): 'Il semble qu’il annonce des divinités
nouvelles', et tourneront ma doctrine en ridicule. Mais ils n’en
seront pas moins tenus de détruire les arguments qui
précèdent, de nous dire ce que c’est que ces
Démons Incubes, vulgairement appelés
Follets,
qui n’ont peur ni des exorcismes, ni des objets sacrés,
ni de la Croix du Christ; et enfin de nous expliquer les divers
effets et phénomènes relatés par nous dans
l’exposition de cette doctrine.
The above passage is very curious, since it gives the key (a
matter which has puzzled every speculator) as to the meaning of the
masquerade and 'Folly' and antic system which prevails in the
Catholic application of the Christian Doctrine at the 'Pre-Lent'
period, and the recurring Festivals, or the Jovial, Mercurial,
Venus-patronized periods.
Folle: Follets (m),
Follettes
(f), Folletins (m.), Folletinnes (f). These are the names of the male
and female masquerading, gambolling 'Follies', or Fays or Elves or
Sprightly Spirits--under their various fanciful names, and in their
picturesque, sportive, masquerading disguises--the 'pied-populace' of
that 'world-turned-upside-down', in the general male and female
interchange and frolicsome 'Glorying'--the Carnival, or Grotesque (in
reality, religious) Celebration of all countries. Dancing is also
sacred in certain senses. The 'Precentor' of the Cathedrals was
originally the Leader of the
Choirephists, or Chorephists, or
Corephests. Thence Coriphes, or Coryphées, for female dancers.
Luxure et humidité sont deux termes correspondants: ce
n’est pas sans raison que les Poëtes ont fait naître
Vénus de la mer, voulant indiquer, comme l’expliquent
les Mythologues, que la luxure a sa source
dans l’humidité. Lorsque les Incubes s’unissent
aux femmes dans leur corps propre et naturel, sans métamorphose
ou artifice, les femmes ne les voient pas, ou, si elles les voient,
c’est comme une ombre presque incertaine et à peine
sensible.
Quando vero volunt se visibiles amasiis reddere, atque
ipsis delectationem in congressu carnale afferre, sibi indumentum
visibile assumunt, et corpus crassum reddunt. Par quel art
(magic), ceci est leur secret. Notre philosophie à courte vue
est impuissante à le découvrir.
Hector Boethius, Hist. Scot., raconte aussi le cas d’un
jeune Ecossais qui, pendant plusieurs mois, reçut dans sa
chambre, quoique les portes et fenêtres en fussent
hermétiquement (note: this word comes from the 'Hermetic
Brothers', or the Rosicrucians) fermées, les visites d’une
Diablesse Succube (as it was supposed or assumed, perhaps wrongfully)
de la plus ravissante beauté; caresses, baisers,
embrassements, sollicitations, cette Diablesse (or Temptress) mit
tout en œuvre,
ut secum--ce qu’elle ne put
toutefois obtenir de ce virtueux jeune homme. A worthy example to
youth: 'especially in this generation' will be an exclamation vividly
rising to the mind of the reader.
D’autres fois aussi le Démon, soit incube, soit
succube, s’accouple avec des hommes ou des femmes dont-il ne
reçoit rien des hommages, sacrifices ou offrandes qu’il
a coutume d’imposer aux Sorciers et aux Sorcierès, comme
on l’a vu plus haut. C’est alors simplement un amoureux
passionné, n’ayant qu’un but, un désir:
posséder--la personne qu’il aime. Il y a de ceci une
foule d’exemples, qu’on peut trouver dans les Auteurs,
entre autres celui de Menippus Lycius, lequel, après avoir
maintes et maintes fois--avec une femme, en fut prié de
l’épouser; mais un certain Philosophe, qui assistait au
repas de noces, ayant deviné ce qu’était cette
femme, dit à Menippus
qu’il avait affaire à une
Compuse,
c’est-à-dire à une Diablesse Succube; aussitôt
notre mariée s’évanouit en gémissant.--Lisez
là-dessus Cœlius Rodiginus,
Antiq., livre 29,
chap. 5. These extraordinary narrations form the basis, and supply
the material, for Keats's poem
Lamia and Coleridge's poetic
sketch '
Christabel'.
Nous avons de plus, à l’appui de notre thèse,
l’Evangile de S. Jean, ch. 10, v. 16, où il est
dit: 'J’ai encore d’autres brebis qui ne sont pas de
cette bergerie: il faut aussi que je les amène, et elles
entendront ma voix, et il n’y aura qu’une seule bergerie
et qu’un seul berger.’ Si nous demandons quelles peuvent
être ces brebis qui ne sont pas de cette bergerie, et quelle
est cette bergerie dont parle le Seigneur Christ, tous les
Commentateurs nous réspondent que la seule bergerie du Christ
c’est l’Eglise, à laquelle la prédication
de l’Evangile devait amener les Gentils, qui étaient
d’une autre bergerie que celle des Hebreux. Pour eux, en effet,
la bergerie du Christ, c’était la Synagogue, d’abord
parce que David avait dit (
Psaume 95, v. 7): 'Nous sommes son
peuple et ses brebis qu’il nourrit dans ses pâturages’;
puis, parce que la promesse avait été faite à
Abraham et à David que la Messie sortirait de leur race, parce
qu’il etait attendu par le peuple Hébreu, annoncé
par les Prophètes, que étaient Hébreux, et que
son avénement, ses actes, sa passion, sa mort et sa
résurrection étaient comme figurés d’avance
dans les sacrifices, le culte et les cérémonies de la
loi des Hébreux.
Les Anges ne sont pas tours de purs esprits: décision
conforme du deuxième Concile de Nicée. Existence de
créatures ou animaux raisonnables autres que l’homme, et
ayant comme lui un corps et une âme. Et quoi ces animaux
diffèrent-ils de l’homme? Quelle est leur origine?
Descendent-ils, comme tous les hommes d’Adam, d’un seul
individu? Y a-t-il entre
eux distinction de sexes? Quelles sont leurs mœurs, leurs
lois, leurs habitudes sociales? Quelle sont la forme et
l'organization de leur corps? Comparaison tirée de la
formation du vin. Ces animaux sont-ils sujets aux maladies, aux
infirmités physiques et morales, à la mort?
Naissent-ils dans le péché originel? Ont-ils été
rachetés par Jésus-Christ, et sont-ils capables de
béatitude et de damnation? Preuves de leur existence.
De la Démonialité et des
'Animaux Incubes et Succubes' ('Children of the Elements'); où
l’on prouve qu’il existe sur terre des créatures
raisonnables outres que l’homme, ayant comme lui un corps et
une âme, naissant et mourant comme lui, rachetées par N.
S. Jésus-Christ et capables de salut ou de damnation. Par
le R. P. Louis Marie Sinistrari d’Ameno, de l’Ordre des
Mineurs Réformés de l’étroite Observance
de Saint-François (xviie siècle). Publié d’après
le Manuscrit original découvert à Londres en 1872, et
traduit du Latin par Isidore Liseux. (Seconde Edition.) Paris,
Isidore Liseux, 5 Rue Scribe, 1876.
A translation of this exceedingly curious book into
English was afterwards simultaneously published in London and Paris.
CHAPTER THE FIFTEENTH
It is a reflection on the knowledge of the compilers of all books
treating of the history and topography of Kent, that perhaps the most
remarkable man born in it--because his pursuits lay out of the beaten
track of recognition or of praise--should not be mentioned in any of
the descriptive or biographical works that we have met with
concerning that county--undoubtedly one of the most interesting in
England. In some general biographies and dictionaries the name of
Robert Fludd, Doctor of Medicine, etc., does occur. But the notices
concerning his life are very scanty, possibly because there was
little material for them existent in his own age. We have, in our
studies of the Rosicrucian doctrines, purposely made the life of Dr.
Robert Flood an object of close examination. We have searched for
every possible personal memorial of him. We have been rewarded with,
however, but fragmentary matter. Our information concerning his life
is quite the reverse of extensive, notwithstanding our intimacy with
his writings.
Our ideas and conviction in regard of this truly great man being
what they are, the extreme curiosity, and the vivid interest, may be
divined with which we set out on our first expedition to discover,
and to make ourselves fully acquainted with his place of birth, and
his own place and the seat of his family. It was in the afternoon of
a summer day that we sought
out the village of Bersted, situate a few miles distant from
Maidstone in Kent, on the Ashford Road. Flood is buried in the
ancient church (a small one) of Bersted--a village, or rather hamlet,
boasting an assemblage of larger or smaller houses around a green,
none of any considerable pretension; cottages--neat specimens of
English rural cottages they may be called, with small gardens,
varying gables, and crossed lattices. There are woody grounds and
picturesque hop-plantations enclosing this quiet, homely-looking
place; with its solemn church up an elevation in the corner of this
extensive triangular green--with excellent smooth cricket-space in
the centre. The church in which he lies!--what words for such a man.
To us--or to any Rosicrucian student who knew who he was and what he
had done--he was the whole country. His influence extended from, and
vivified everything--this, the whole way from 'The Star'--the old
inn, or rather hotel, from which we had started in the morning in
order to pilot our way thither; through the quiet country, passing
few people and only small groups of cattle straggling along the
sunshiny road.
It was with feelings just as reverential, just as melancholy, and
greatly as enthusiastic, as those with which we contemplated the tomb
of Shakespeare in Stratford-on-Avon, that we stood (knowing the man,
as it were, so well) silent and absorbed--revolving many--many
thoughts--before the oblong slab of dark slate-coloured
marble--(greatly like Shakespeare's again)--which covered the place
of last deposition of Robertus de Fluctibus--as into which parallel
he had latinized, according to the usage mostly of the Elizabethan
period, his name--Robert Fludd or Flood. Flood's monument occupies a
large space of the wall of the chancel on the left hand, as you stand
before
the altar looking up the body of the small church towards the
door. The monument is singularly like Shakespeare's, even allowing
for the prevailing architectural fashion of the time. There is a
seated half-length figure of Flood with his hand on a book, as if
just raising his head, from reading, to look at you. The figure is
nearly of life-size. There is, moreover, a very striking similarity
in Dr. Flood's grand thinking countenance to that of Shakespeare
himself, and his brow has all the same breadth, and is as equally
suggestive of knowledge and of power.
The church of Bersted is very small and old. The square tower of
the church is covered with masses of dark ivy. The grassy ground
slopes, with its burial mounds, from about the foundation of the old
building towards the somewhat distant village of Bersted. The
churchyard descends in picturesque inclination, and is divided by a
low brick-wall; over which, here and there, flowers and overgrowth
have broadly scaled from the garden of the old-fashioned, though
neat-looking rustic, picturesque parsonage. There is a winding green
lane, with high hedges, which leads down to the village. All is open,
and quietly rural. It is true English scenery, homely and still. The
large trees, and the abundance of turfy cover over the whole
ground-view, pleases. The rustic impression and the deep country
silence befit that spot where one of the most extraordinary thinkers
in the English roll of original men lies at rest. When we were in
this neighbourhood, and on the first occasion that we sought out
Bersted, it was a calm grey summer's afternoon. The still clouds,
which seemed to prolong the grey general haze dwelling on the more
distant landscape, were impressive of a happy--quietly happy--repose.
And as we stood on our return towards Maidstone--having spent, we
believe, upwards of three hours in meditative
notice either in the church or musing and strolling round it--the
slopes of the hopgrounds presented a field of view of light, lovely
green. Out of this low-lying landscape to which we reverted, Bersted
Church tower rose small. It has four sculptured bears ('Bersted,
Bearstead') at the four angles, for pinnacles, to the square tower.
These miniature bears, perched upon the summit, looked to me at about
half-a-mile's distance like four crows. The distant wooded hills
showed faint to the eye. There was no wind. The air was warm and
silent. The country was green and luxuriant.
Robert Flood was a Brother of the Rosy-Cross. He is called the
English Rosicrucian. To those who never heard his name, the titles of
his books will suffice to prove the wonderful extent of his
erudition, and the strange, mystical character of the man. We would
warn every inquirer to place not the least reliance upon any account
which they may meet of Robert Flood in any of the ordinary
biographies, or in any Encyclopædia or other book professing to
give an account of the Rosicrucians. We beg the curious not to
believe one word--except dates, and scarcely these--that are to be
found in accepted scientific treatises, or otherwise, purporting to
speak of Flood, or of his compeers. These are all at fault--
and
ignorant--particularly and generally.
Robert Flood was the second son of Sir Thomas Flood, Treasurer of
War to Queen Elizabeth. The name was originally Lloyd, and the family
came from Wales. Robert Flood was born at Milgate House, of which
edifice one corner still remains built in the manor-house which was
erected on its site when the old house fell to ruin. Milgate House is
situated near Bersted. Flood was born in the year 1574. He was
entered at St. John's College, Oxford, in 1591.
He travelled for six years in France, Spain, Italy, and Germany. He
was a member of the College of Physicians, London. He was M.B., M.D.,
B. A., and M.A. The latter degree he took in 1605. He began to
publish in 1616. He died at his house in Coleman Street, London, in
the year 1637. Flood is also stated by Fuller to have lived in
'Fanchurch' Street.
The list of Flood's works comprise the following:--
1. Utriusque Cosmi, Majoris et Minoris, Technica
Historia. Oppenheim, 1617. In Two Volumes, Folio.
2. Tractatus Apologeticus Integritatem Societatis
de Rosea-Cruce defendens. Leyden, 1617.
3. Monochordon Mundi Syunphoniarum, seu Replicatio
ad Apologiam Johannis Kepleri. Francfort, 1620.
4. Anatomia Theatrum Triplici Effigie Designatum.
At the same place, 1623.
5. Philosophia Sacra et vere Christiana, seu
Meteorologia Cosmica. At the same place, 1626.
6. Medicina Catholica, seu Mysterium Artis
Medicandi Sacrarium. The same, 1626.
7. Integrum Morborum Mysterium. The same,
1631.
8. Clavis Philosophiæ et Alchymiæ.
The same, 1633.
9. Philosophia Mosaïca. Gondæ,
1638.
10. Pathologia Dæmoniaca. The same,
1640.
The above account of Flood's Rosicrucian works is from Fuller's
Worthies.
There are notices of Dr. Flood in the
Athenæ et Fasti
Oxoniensis; in Chalmers'
Biographical Dictionary under the
names of Flood, Mersenne, and Gassendi; in Granger's
Celebrated
Characters; and in Renaudot,
Conferences Publiques, tom.
iv. page 87. Also in Brucker.
Upon Flood's monument there are two marble-books bearing the
following titles:--
Misterium Cabalisticum, and
Philosophia
Sacra. There were originally eight books represented in all;
'studding' the front of the tablet (as the look of it may be
described). The inscription to his memory is as follows:
viii. Die Mensis vii. Ao.Dm.,
M.D.C.XXXVII. (8th September 1627). Odoribus vrna vaporat crypta
tegit cineres nec speciosa tvos ovod mortale minvs tibi. Te
commitimus vnum ingenii vivent hic monumenta tui nam tibi qui similis
scribit moritur-que sepulchrum pro tota eternum posteritate facit.
Hoc monumentum Thomas Flood Gore Covrte in-oram apud Cantianos
armiger infœlissimam in charissimi patrui sui memoriam erexit,
die Mensis Augusti, MDCXXXVIII.
In the life of the astronomer Gassendi will be found some mention
of the career, and of the distinctions, of Robert Flood. A work of
Gassendi's bearing the title '
Epistolica Exercitatio, in qua
precipua principia philosophiæ Roberti Fluddi deteguntur, et ad
recentes illius libris adversus patrem Marinum Mersennum scriptos
respondetur' was
printed at Paris in 1628. This piece was reprinted in the third
volume of Gassendi's works published at Paris in 1658, under the
title of
Examen Philosophiæ Fluddanæ, etc. Flood
wrote two books against Mersennus, who had assailed his philosophy.
The title of the first book was
Sophia cum Moria Certamen, in quo
Lapis Lydius a falso structore Patre Marino Mersenno, monacho
reprobatus, voluminis sui Babylonici in Genesi figurata
accurate-examinat. This work was published in Folio at Francfort
in 1629. The name of the second book was
Summum bonorum, quod est
verum magiæ, Cabalæ, Alchymiæ, Fratrum Rosæ-Crucis
Virorum. subjectum indictarum scientiarum laudem, in insignis
calumniatoris Fr. Mar. Mersenni dedecus publicatum, per Joachim
Frizium, 1629.
In this Book, which we now bring to a close in its Fourth Edition,
we have traced and expounded the philosophy of the authentic
Rosicrucians, as developed in the folios of the celebrated Dr. Flood,
'Robertus de Fluctibus'. We are the first Author who has brought
forward Flood's name to the reading world, justified his claims, and
made him known through
the most laboured and long-studied translation with continual
reference to hundreds of books in all languages, dead and living,
which bore reference to Flood's sublimest philosophical speculations.
All the world has heard of the Rosicrucians--few or none have ever
taken the trouble to ascertain whether the stupendous and apparently
audacious claims of these philosophers were rightly or wrongly
estimated--that is, whether to be adjudged as founded on the rock of
truth, or seeking steadiness and root only in the sands of delusion.
The Author began his inquiries, in the year 1850, in a spirit of the
utmost disbelief; thus taught by the world’s assumptions and
opinions. Much of this indoctrinated preoccupation the wise man has
to unlearn in his progress through life. Fogs, and prejudices, and
prepossessions cleared from the Author’s mind as he advanced.
After the very considerable space of thirty-six years of study of
the Rosicrucians, the Author of this work ends (
as he ends).
Let the candid reader, himself, judge in what frame of mind the
Author of the 'Rosicrucians' concludes. How should any one complete
an inquiry in regard to the Majestic Brothers of the Rosy Cross,
otherwise the Rosicrucians? The story of the Rosicrucians is of the
widest interest. The proof of this fact lies in the accumulation of
letters from persons in every condition of life addressed to the
Authors of the present work since the publication of the First
Edition from all parts of the world; anonymously, or with particulars
of names, etc.
The celebrated author of the
Confessions of an English Opium
Eater (Thomas de Quincey), in his
Rosicrucians and the
Free-Masons, originally published in The London Magazine of
January 1824, also continued in the succeeding number, has this
remarkable passage: 'Rosicrucianism is not Freemasonry.
The
exoterici, at whose head Bacon stood, and who afterwards
composed the Royal Society of London, were the antagonist party of
the Theosophists, Cabbalists, and Alchemists.
At the head of whom
stood Fludd; and from whom Freemasonry took its rise.'
Thus we leave the Rosicrucians--as men--(just as we ought to leave
them)--in the same mystery as that state of really impenetrable
mystery in which we find them. Let the mask and the 'mystery' still
remain before them, concealing them and their purposes in the
world.--As it is enjoined!
CHAPTER THE SIXTEENTH
The following extraordinary work--which is so rare and so valuable
(see below)
in its original edition, that we have reason to
believe the Authors of the 'Rosicrucians' can congratulate themselves
in being the possessors, in all probability, of the
only copy
in existence--was suppressed, wherever found, on its appearance. The
author, in reality, was never known. It is considered probable that
this book had a paramount effect in bringing about, and in compassing
the success of, the Reformation.
Disputatio Nova contra Mulieres; qua Probatur eas Homines non
esse. Anno MDXCV
. Theses de Mulieribus quod Homines non sint.
Cum in Samaria, ut in campo omnis licentiæ, liberum sit credere
et do cere,
Jesum Christum, Filium Dei Salvatorem et
Redeptorem animarum nostrarum, una cum Spiritu Sancto non esse Deum,
licebit opinor etiam mihi credere, quod multo minus est, mulieres
scilicet non esse Homines--et quod rode sequitur--Christum ergo pro
its non esse passum, nec eas salvari. Si enim non solum in hoc regno
tolerantur, sed etiam a magnatibus præmiis afficiuntur, qui
blasphemant Creatorem, cur ego exilium aut supplicium timere debeo,
qui simpliciter convicior creaturam? præsertim cum eo modo ex
Sacris literis probare possim, mulierem non esse hominem, quo illi
probant Christum non esse Deum.
Admonitio Theologicæ Facultatis in Academia Witebergensi,
ad scholasticam juventutem, de libello famoso
et blasphemo recens sparso, cujus titulus est:
Disputatio Nova
contra Mulieres, qua ostenditur, cas hommes non esse. Witenbergæ.
Excudebat Vidua Matthæi Welaci, Anno MDXCV (1595).
Defensio Sexus Muliebris, Opposita futilissimæ
Disputationi recens editæ, qua suppresso Authores et Typographi
nomine blaspheme contendïtur. Mulieres Hommes non Esse. Simon
Gediccus S.S. Theol. Doct., etc. Lipsiæ, Apud Henricum Samuelem
Scipionem, Anno MDCCVIII (1708).
Auctor hujus
Dissert. rarissima credit: valeat Acidalius.
Vide, inter alios, Freytagii Analecta--de
libris rarioribus,
p. 5. (Very ancient handwriting in the copy itself) 'Acidalius died,
aged 28 years only, 1595.' Hallam's
Lit. Hist. p. 14. This is
only surmise. The authorship of the book is unknown. It was
rigorously suppressed.
CHAPTER THE SEVENTEENTH
THE ARK OF NOAH
Note
to Plate '
Mysterium': The explanation of this
engraving will be found at a previous page. The ancient volume from
which it is taken is very rare, and bears the following title:
Antiquitatum ludaicarum LIBRI IX:
In qüis, præter Ivdæe, Hierosolymorum, et
Templi Salomonis accuratam delineationem, præcipui Sacri ac
profani gentis Titus describuntur (auctore Benedicto Aria Montano
Hispalensi). Adiectis formis æneis. Lvgdani Batavorum. Ex
officina Planteniana apud Franciscum Raphelengium--1595.
The Ark of Noah--the medium of escape from the Deluge, and the
mythic means of the perpetuation of the Human Family (afterwards
Race). The Post-Diluvian 'Signs of the Zodiac' are here correctly
designated as in number 'Twelve'. Let the judicious Reader remark
that twelve times thirty are Three-Hundred-and-Sixty, which is not
the number of the degrees of this symbolical plan. There are twelve
divisions in this ark. The centre space is that through which the
'Dove', or 'Raven', escaped out into the 'open' in search of its new
home, or into the restored world when the waters 'went down' or
'disappeared'. Each of the twelve spaces in the accompanying plan
contains twenty-five degrees, which make an aggregate of three
hundred degrees. The mythical figure contained
in the Ark is presumably that of Noah. It is also evidently the
symbolical figure of the 'Saviour', and typically only that of Noah;
for the hands are 'crossed', and the feet and hands bear the marks of
the 'Incision'--the 'Nails of the Crucifixion (or Passion)'.
Twenty-five, the number of the degrees in each space or sign of this
'Noachic Ark', Arca, or Chest (Gigantic), are the number of the
Knights of the Garter; with the reserved 'twenty-sixth', or Kingly or
Sovereign Seat. In this respect the ark may be regarded as the grand
mythic 'Idea' of the 'Round Table'; as that was the production of the
central mythic 'Idea' of the 'Sangreal', or 'Sangreil'--Refer to
the Engravings, and to the Rosicrucian comment throughout both parts.
See pages generally, and the whole of the Chapters referring to the
'origin' of the Order of the 'Garter'.
CHAPTER THE EIGHTEENTH
The engraving No. 4 at the end gives the mystical idea, or
suggestion, of the Round Table of the Knights of King Arthur, which
is again typical of the San Grëal. The romance of Guyot, or at
least the traditional fable of the
San Grëal, spread over
France, Germany, and England. In the twelfth century the dogma of
transubstantiation not being yet defined by the Church, the
chalice,
the mark of the Knights Templars, had not the deep mystic meaning
which it received in the following century. The
graal
signifies a
vase. The San Grëal is identified with the
vessel in which Jesus celebrated the Holy Supper, and which also was
used to receive His blood flowing from the wound inflicted upon Him
by the centurion Longinus.
Walter Mapes, the historian of the San Grëal, ascribes to it
a supernatural origin. He gave out that God was its real author, and
had revealed it, in a celestial vision, to a holy hermit of Britain
towards the year A.D. 720. This writer makes Joseph one of the
coryphœi of his history of the San Grëal. After
forty-two years of captivity Joseph of Arimathæa, the guardian
of the Grail or Grëal, is at last set at liberty by the Emperor
Vespasian. In possession of the sacred vessel, and a few more relics,
and accompanied by his relations and disciples Hebron and Alain the
Fishermen, he travels over a part of Asia, where he converts Enelach,
King of Sarras. He then goes to Rome, and thence to Britain, where he
preaches the gospel and
performs thirty-four miracles. He settles in the Island
Yniswitrin, Isle of Glass (the Grëal is of emerald, and
consequently green), or
Glastonbury, where he founds an Abbey
(Glastonbury Abbey), and institutes the Round Table (Arthur did
this), in imitation of the Holy Supper, which was partaken of at a
'Round Table' with the Twelve Disciples, in their mythical
double-places, twenty-four in all, and with the double
chief-seat, or 'cathedra', for the President or the 'Saviour'.
Lastly, the apostle of the Britons builds a palace, in which he
preserves his precious relics, the Sacred Cup (refused to the Laity
as a communion), which takes the name of San Grëal, the bloody
spear (the 'upright' of the St. George’s Cross, to whom the
'Garter' is dedicated), with which the centurion Longinus pierced the
side of the Lord, from whence issued 'blood and water'--the
Rosicrucian heraldic colours (royal),
Mars--Red;
Luna--Argent
(or 'Fire' and 'Water'). There are Eight Angels, one to each
half-heaven, or dark or light sides, guarding the Four Corners of the
World.
The Sacred Cup is identified with the vessel of the Holy Supper.
The Templars are the successors of the Knights of the Round Table.
Their successors again were the Knights of Malta, with their Eight
'Langues', or Nations--each represented in a blade of, or ray, of the
Eight-pointed RED Templar Cross.
The Temple Church, London, was dedicated to St. Mary. The Grëal
is a sort of oracle. It is, so to speak, at the orders of the 'Mother
of God', to execute all 'Her' commands. Parsival--the German
champion-hero--thinks of transporting the Grëal to the East,
from whence it originally came. He takes the San Grëal, embarks
at Marseilles with the Templars, and arrives at the court of his
brother Feirifix in India. The Sacred Cup manifests a desire that
Parsival
should remain possessor of the 'Grëal', and only change his
name into that of Prester John (Prestre, or Prêtre, Jehan, or
John). Parsival and the Templars settle in India. After the
disappearance of the Grëal in the West, King Arthur and the
Knights of the Round Table, losing the 'central object', or the
'Rose' (Rosicrucianism) of the Table, go on a scattered
(Knight-Errant or romantic) championship in search of it. They travel
over the world--but in vain. They cannot find the 'Grëal'. For
it is for ever
hidden in the far 'East', or in the land of the
'Sun'. Wolfram von Eschenbach tells us that Meister
Guyot-le-Provençal found at Toledo an Arabian book, written by
an astrologer named Flegetanis, containing the story of the
marvellous vase called 'Grëal'.
The sacred vase, or the San Grëal, was placed, according to
the myth of Guyot, in a Temple (or Chapel), guarded by Knights
Templeis or
Temiplois (Knights Templars). The Temple of
the Grëal was placed upon a mountain in the midst of a thick
wood. The name of this mysterious mountain (like the Mount Meru of
the Hindoos and Olympus of the Greeks) hints sublimity and secrecy.
Guyot calls it
Mont Salvagge, wild or inaccessible mountain
(or 'Holy Way'). The Grëal was made of a wonderful 'Stone'
called
Exillis, which had once been the most brilliant jewel
in the 'Crown of the Archangel Lucifer'--the gem was emerald (green;
Friday; the unlucky in one sense, the 'sacred' woman's day in another
sense). This famous legendary stone was struck out of the crown or
helmeted double-rayed or double-springing 'winged'
crown--mythically--of the Prince of the Archangels ('Lucifer'), in
his conflict with the opposing 'general of the skies'--Saint Michael,
the 'Champion of Heaven'; and the combative guardian of innocence and
of 'virginity' (mark).
This immortal 'Stone'--the Grëal--fell into the 'Abyss'. It was
mythologically recovered.
The 'Stone' was brought from heaven (rescue) by Angels, and left
to the care of Titurel, the First King of the Grëal, who
transmitted it to Amfortas, the Second King, whose sister
'
Herze'-loïde was the mother of Parsival, the Third King
of the San Grëal. (These are the Three Kings of Cologne, or the
Three Magi or Astrologers.) A great many towns pretended to possess
this holy relic. In 1247 the Patriarch of Jerusalem sent the San
Grëal to King Henry the Third of England, as having belonged to
Nicodemus (see the
Gospel of Nicodemus) and Joseph of
Arimathæa. The inhabitants of Constantinople, about the same
time, also fancied that a vessel which they had long esteemed as a
sacred relic was the San Grëal. The Genoese also felt certain
that their
canto catino (Catillo, v. a. (L.) 'to lick dishes';
Catinus, i. m. (L.) 'a dish') was nothing else than the San
Grëal. The same (or similar) modifications of the myth are to be
noticed in a romance, in prose, entitled
Percival-le-Gallois.
Not only is the Round Table considered in this book as an imitation
of the 'Holy Supper', but the author goes so far as to give it the
name of San Grëal itself. In the
Romance of Merlin,
written towards the end of the thirteenth century, it is said that
the
Round Table instituted by Joseph in imitation of the Holy
Supper was called 'Graal' that Joseph induced Arthur's father to
create a third
Round Table in honour of the Holy Trinity.
The San Grëal: an Inquiry into the Origin and
Signification of the Romances of the San Grëal. By Dr. F. G.
Bergmann, Dean of the Faculty of Letters at Strasburg, and Member of
the Royal Society of Antiquaries, Copenhagen. Edinburgh: Edmonston
and Douglas, 1870. We quote the above in parts.
Round Table
(Mythical)
1. ROSE 'Crucified'
2. ROSE 'restored to
Life'
3. 'CONSUMMATION'
|
CHAPTER THE NINETEENTH
HONI-SOIT QUI MAL-Y-PENSE
The Round Table of King Arthur is a Grand Mythological Synthesis.
It is a whole Mythology in itself. It is perennial. It is Christian.
By tradition, the Round Table of King Arthur devolves from the very
earliest period. The illustration opposite a previous page was copied
from the original with great care and attention. King Arthur, in the
principal seat, is idealized in the person of King Henry the Eighth,
in whose time the Round Table is supposed to have been repaired and
refaced. In the Revolution, Cromwell's soldiery, after the capture of
Winchester, and in the fury at the imputed idea of
idolatry
(the Round Table is the English 'Palladium'), made a target of it.
The marks of many balls are still conspicuous.
The five-leaved Roses (Red and White Roses;
Rhodion,
Rhodes--Knights of Rhodes or of Malta, the
successors of the Templars) typify the Ten Original Signs of the
Zodiac. Red-Rose, Five Signs (Aspiration or Ascension); White Rose,
Five Signs (or Leaves), Descension (or 'Con'-descension, or S.S., or
Holy Ghost (the key of the whole
apotheosis; according to the
mystical Jacob Bœhmen).
The whole is radiant (notwithstanding that the rays are
green;
otherwise expressive of the '
Linea Viridis',
seu
'
Benedicta Viriditas'--Rosicrucian). (See former pages) out
from the 'seed-spot', or 'Golden Sun' (Grand Astronomical Central
Flame), in the centre. This double-rose, 'barbed' or 'thorned', Sol,
is (in this form) the Tudor Rose (the
Rose-en-Soleil, be it
remembered, was another of the Tudor badges); denoting the union of
the Houses of York and Lancaster in the person of Harry the Eighth.
It will be observed that each Knight of the Round Table is seated
as at the base of an
obelisk. The architectural 'obeliscar'
form (rayed, or spread, or bladed) is universal, all the world over,
both in old times and modern times. The Egyptian Obelisks are sacred
to the Sun. The Paladins of Charlemagne were Twelve in number. The
Marshals of France should be twelve in number. The Judges of England,
according to old constitutional
rationale, should be twelve;
as the number of a Jury are twelve. All these are mythical of the
Twelve Signs, or Divisions, of the Zodiac, the Twelve Jewish Tribes,
the twelve oracular stones in the breastplate of the High Priest of
the Jews, and, in the Christian aspect of the mysticism, the Twelve
Apostles; with the 'Reprobate Condemned Central Sign' as Judas, the
Traitor. The whole is Cabalistic in the highest degree;
and
therefore ordinarily unintelligible. It signifies the Second
Dispensation, or the astrological reproduction and rearrangement of
the Zodiac, when the original Ten
Signs of the Ecliptic (mythically the
gladius of the Archangel
Michael) became Twelve; and when the mystic system underwent the
GREATEST CHANGE--presenting a new traditionary and reproductive face.
(Refer to Chapter on the origin of the Order of the Garter, previous,
and thenceforward.)
510. Perceval Le Galloys; Tresplaisante et
Recreative Hystoire du Trespreulx et vaillant Chevallier Perceval le
galloys jadis chevallier de la Table ronde. Lequel acheva les
adventures du sainct Graal. Avec aulchuns Picts belliqueulx du noble
chevallier Gauvaīn. Et aultres Chevalliers estans au temps du
noble Roy Arthus, non auparavant Imprime. On les vend au Pallais
a Paris. En la boutique de Jehan logis. Jehan sainct denis, et
Galliot du pre. [A la fin] Et fut acheve de Imprimer le premier jour
de Septembre. Lan mil cinq cents trente [1530]. Folio.
,
fine woodcut border to title, woodcuts, old french olive morocco
extra, gilt edges, 1351. Aug. 1879. 29 New Bond Street.
CHAPTER THE TWENTIETH
The following old book is a very extraordinary one; as the design
and tendency of it will puzzle most persons who are acquainted with
the nature of the antagonistic relations which were supposed to exist
between the Church of Rome and the Rosicrucians. The book is
exceedingly scarce and valuable:
Rosa Jesuitica, oder Jesuitische Rottgesellen, das ist, Eine
Frag ob die Zween Orden, der ganandten Ritter von der Neerscharen
Jesu, und der Rosen-Creuzer ein einiger Ordensen: per J. P. D. a
S. Jesuitarum Protectorum. Prague, 1620. (4to.) This is a truly
curious tract upon the 'relations of the Jesuits and the
Rosicrucians'.
A very curious book upon the subject of the peculiar and fanciful
attributed notions of the Rosicrucians, and which drew a large
amount of surprised and 'left-handed' attention when it first
appeared, was that which bore the title (in its improved
edition--published without a date):
Comte de Gabalis, ou
Entretiens sur Les Sciences Secrètes. Renouvellé et
augmenté d’une Lettre sur ce sujet. This book was
brought out at Cologne. The printer’s name was Pierre Marteau.
Bound up with the copy in the possession of the present Authors of
the Rosicrucians is another volume bearing the following title:
La
Suite du Comte de Gabalis; ou Nouveaux Entretiens sur les Sciences
Secrètes, touchant La Nouvelle Philosophie. This latter
work was published at Amsterdam, with no yearmentioned of its publication, by Pierre Mortier. Upon the
title-page of the first-named of these books appears the 'rescript'
'Quod tanto impendio absconditur, etiam solum-modò
demonstrare, destruere est.--'Tertullian.
These works were considered--although written from the questioning
and cautiously satirical point--as unwelcome and even obnoxious; even
among those who freely commented on religion. Nevertheless they
provoked (and still provoke) extraordinary curiosity.
CHAPTER THE TWENTY-FIRST
The noted mystic, Jacob Bœhm, was born in the year 1575, and
is said to have died in the year 1619. He was undoubtedly acquainted
with the volumes of Robertus de Fluctibus, known as the 'English
Rosicrucian'.
There is considerable doubt whether there were not two Robert
Fludds, and whether, in reality, the theories and the mystic ideas of
the one were not accepted as arising from the other. The following
attestation will sufficiently establish these important facts:
'Quelques bibliographes ont confondu Robert Flood’ (the
Rosicrucian Philosopher), ’avec un autre Robert, dominicain
Anglais, nè a York, et qui florissait dans le 14
o
siècle.
'Ce religieux avait fait aussi des recherches et laissé des
ecrits sur les Mysterès de la Nature, et ce qui l’avait
fait surnommer "Perscrutator" (le "Chercheur").
Jean Pits et Jacques Echard, d’après Jean Leland, lui
attribuent:
De impressionibus aëris; de Mirabilibus
Elementorum de Magia Cæremoniali; de Mysteriis Secretorum; et
Correctorium Alchymiæ.'--Biographie Universelle:--Tome
Quinzieme, p. 109,
et supra.
The character of the above books by Robert Flood, the Dominican,
and the close similarity of his studies
with those of the famous Robert Flood, or 'Robertus de Fluctibus',
of Milgate House, in Kent, would seem to come very near to proof that
there was some family descent from the one to the other. The
circumstances will at all events go a long way towards establishing a
possible connexion or relationship between the first Robert and the
second Robert; though divided through such a long space of time as
intervenes between the fourteenth century and the period of James the
First and Charles the First.
In all the matters treated of in this book, in the meaning and
purpose of art--such as music particularly--the grand philosophical
contention is, whether the world may be said to have 'sprung'--to
apply the word thus--from FEELING, or was constructed--so to describe
the mythic: making of nature--from SCIENCE. In this distinction lies
everything of philosophic abstraction in regard to the subjects
'POWER' and 'LOVE', as originators of the scheme of things.
We may put the question in other words as a theosophic
speculation, whether 'Man'--and therefore 'art'--is from the HEAD, or
the HEART. We think entirely the latter, in as far as 'LOVE' is
greater than 'WISDOM', and is its ruler. In this great fact lies all
the hope of the world. By wisdom and justice the world is naught.
Mercy and love (the 'IMMORTAL PITY') alone saves the world. Therefore
contrition. Therefore sacrifice. Therefore submission--submission and
innocence 'like as little children'.
It follows from the above that to this possible relaxing of the
sternness of punishment ('JUSTICE') the saints penetrated. This means
the theosophic, all-sufficient (because accepted) 'Propitiation,' or
the sacrifice of the 'SAVIOUR', or of the 'sensitive side of human
nature'. In this emotion from the heart lies all religion, and all
that we can know of
ourselves of hope. All that by any possibility we can know of
ourselves--'OF HOPE'.
The following are certain Masonic observations:
(I. N. R. I.) These significant letters (or symbols)
may be interpreted: 'Igne Nova Renovatur Integra'.
INRI: Jes. Naz.
Rex. Judæ.
The office of the Rosary contains fifteen repetitions of the
'Lord's Prayer'. It comprises One Hundred and Fifty Salutations of
the Blessed Virgin Mary. In the astronomical and astrological
reference this implies: Firstly, the fifteen lunations (half of
thirty days), or the feminine half-dark, mystic, naturally
unconscious--magic--insensible corporeal changes incident of each
month. The second instance carries reference to the magic
semi-diameter of the ever-revolving solar circle, or the mythical
'Ezekiel’s wheel', to which we have referred (cabalistically)
in various places.
CHAPTER THE TWENTY-SECOND
The persuasion as to the possibility of the convertibility of the
metals, and as to the existence of a master-means of improving and
intensifying generally through all nature, until the confine was
approached; and then by supernatural method (that is, supernatural to
the world of man), that this border-line or limit (apparently so
invincible) was passed over (indeed
evaded) with power of
return into the world with the fruits of the daring exploration
openly in the hands:--this idea, which nothing could drive out of the
mind, was fixed--spite of all the sense of those who supposed such
contradictions. The proper cool-headed realization of the
impossibilities, so far as Nature made them impossibilities, was not
entertained.
There was much that urged--as a prime motive--such destruction as
that effected by the Caliph Omar, on his conquest of Alexandria, in
his committal to the flames of the famous Alexandrian Library. This
destruction is usually taken as a reason for this elimination or
extinguishment of previous accumulations of such imagined priceless
value. It was not jealousy, but
fear, that actuated the Caliph
Omar.
The object of the Sultan, in regard to this immense collection of
writings, is well known, and is usually attributed to the dogmatism
and narrowness of his views in regard to his Mohammedan
beliefs:--namely,
that if the books contained any philosophy which justified or
explained, or enforced, the religion of Mahomet, or any wisdom which
could be interpreted as explanatory of it, it was needless, because
all such was already contained in the
Koran; and that if it
taught other things, or advanced any contrary religious beliefs, it
was correspondingly mischievous, and as such should be relentlessly
destroyed. Thus the Caliph took up such a position that he was right
both ways. All the secrets of alchemy were supposed to be contained
in the Alexandrian Library.
The sun is alchemic gold. The moon is alchemic silver. In the
operation of these two potent spirits, or mystic rulers of this
world, it is supposed, astrologically, that all phenomena are
produced. It is a common opinion, and it is a generally assumed idea,
even among the most learned, that that which is called
The
Philosophers’ Stone is a mere fable. It prevails as an
assurance in all books of instruction, or of learning, that it is
purely
romantic--a delusion--a wild idea--poetical, and
therefore necessarily untrue. But all poetry--even
poetry--is
true enough in a certain way, and whilst it is conceived in the mind,
just the same as the
colour of the flower, which has nothing
to do with the flower. It is very difficult to get over the
assertions of competent persons as to the possibility of making gold.
The chemical records abound with accounts of its artificial
production, and of its having been exhibited under extraordinary--and
certainly (necessarily) under secret circumstances. A multitude of
ancient and modern philosophers have contended that in the secret
spirits of nature, urging towards the light, and towards the sun,
which is gold (
Chrysos, or the 'Saviour'), there was a
movement in all matter towards extrication, and therefore out of the
curse of nothingness, or of 'matter'. Thence
the precious gold, prepared and purged by the scorching fire. As
to the possibility of metals being transmuted from one into the
other, 'doctored', as we may say, in the skill of the alchemists, and
'purged' by the fierce conflagration, clear of their defacements,
defilements, and
diseases, into the divine
angelic
gold--responsive to the sun's brightness;--as to this stupendous
art--believed in by the ancients, wholly discredited by the
moderns--Libavius brings forward many instances in his treatise
De
Natura Metallorum. He produces accounts to this effect out of
Geberus, Hermes, Arnoldus, Guaccius, Thomas Aquinas (
Ad Fratrem,
c. I), Bernardus Comes, Joannes Rungius, Baptista Porta, Rubeus,
Dornesius, Vogelius, Penotus, Quercetanus, and others. Franciscus
Picus (in his book
De Auro, sec. 3, c. 2) gives
eighteen
instances in which he saw gold produced by alchemical transmutation.
The principles and grounds for concluding that there may be such
an art
possible as alchemy, we shall sum up as follows.
Firstly, it is assumed that every metal consists of mercury as a
common versatile and flexible base, from which all metals spring, and
into which they may be ultimately reduced by art. Secondly, the
species of metals and their specific and essential forms are
not subject to transmutation, but only the individuals; in other
words, what is general is abstract and invisible, what is particular
is
concrete and visible, and therefore can be acted upon.
Thirdly, all metals differ, not in their common nature and matter,
but in their degree of perfection or purity towards that
invisible
light to which all matter tends for its relief or
rescue--that
celestial, imperishable glory, which necessarily in the world of
sentience or possibility of recognition to itself (or oneness), must
have 'matter' (in this world made
up of senses, and of the avenues to those senses) as its '
mask',
or the vehicle in which it is to be, and out of and exterior to which
all is magic or miracle. Fourthly, art or design or contrivance in
its own respects, and directed by the immortal resource or
intelligence which is a matter of spiritual tradition, a pitying gift
to man in his lost or fallen state, surmounteth and transcendeth
Nature--as we see every day in the mastery of the soul of man over
his fleshly lusts, which otherwise would urge him into daily ruin.
For Art directed upon Nature, may in a short while--seeing the
end
of things, and not being 'put-off' by their
appearances
only--perfect that which Nature, by itself, is a thousand years in
accomplishing. Fifthly, God has created every metal of its own kind,
and hath implanted in them a really vital,
restless principle
of growth, struggling against diseases and interruptions; as we see
in the efforts of the metals--especially in the perfect metal, gold,
born of the sun--which is the king of the material, and which in its
healthy state overflows with magnetic seed or sparks of
magic
light, welcomed by the aerial world, and usurped only by the
devil for his bad purposes in this world of dazzling shows. The true
spiritual side of this golden well-spring of lucidity--free of all
debasement of matter--is never seen in
this world. But it is
the medium of connexion, and is the golden bridge--one-half gold, as
it refers backwards to man from the fountain of all life and light,
the Sun, and the other half forward, into the celestial and heavenly
eternal GOD'S LIGHT! Thus gold, and light, as its consequence, can by
art (assisted by the angels, and farthered by prayer) be evoked, be
made to fructify and grow, and can inspire and multiply, and take in
ALL matter.
We will now compress (into certain well-considered
passages) some of the ideas of that very remarkable chemist and
speculative philosopher, B. V. Van Helmont, advanced in his
Paradoxal
Discourses concerning the Macrocosm and Microcosm, or the Greater and
Lesser World, and Their Union.
[7]
Metals consist universally of a hot and a cold sulphur. They are
as of male and female; in respect to both of which, the more
intimately they be united or naturally interwoven, the nearer those
metals approach to the nature of gold. And from the difference and
disparity of this union (according to the proportion and quantity of
every one), arises the distinction of all metals and minerals--that
is, in the due proportions, as the said sulphurs are more or less
united in them.
If metals be produced, and consist by the union of these two,
where then is there room for a third principle in metals--which is
vulgarly called salt--and which is spoken of by the chemists; who
make salt, sulphur, and mercury the principles of all metals?
But this is indeed only an enigmatical speech of the chemists. For
when we see that the superfluous combustible sulphur, which is found
in great quantity in the ore of the perfectly united metals, is by
mortification, transmutation, or calcination, changed into an acid
salt, it ceaseth to be sulphur. Now, forasmuch as all of the said
sulphur can be changed into a salt, so as that it cannot be rechanged
into brimstone back again (because the salt serveth only as a means
to dissolve the two perfect sulphurs in order to unite them); and
whereas the white incombustible sulphur can never be changed into
salt, how can we then make out three parts or principles which concur
to the composition of metals? For two fathers to one mother would
be monstrous and superfluous; forasmuch as both of them are but one
and the same. Likewise, also, there cannot be two mothers to one
father, in order to the bringing-forth of one birth, for so there
would be two births, out of each mother one. For it cannot be denied
that to generate a child, whether boy or girl (of which the one hath
more of the father's nature and property, the other more of the
mother's), there needs only a union of man and wife, and it is
impossible that a third thing should be superadded essentially.
This visible, glorious, spiritual body may lead us to endless
glorious thoughts and meditations; namely, if we consider that in all
the sands created by God, there is a little gold and silver from
whence all other beings do exist and have their being, as proceeding
from their father, the Sun, and their mother, the Moon. From the sun,
as from a living and spiritual gold, which is a mere fire, and beyond
all thoroughly refined gold, and, consequently, is the common and
universal first created mover (even as is the heart of man), from
whence all moveable things derive all their distinct and particular
motions; and also from the moon, as from the wife of the sun, and the
common mother of all sublunary things.
And forasmuch as man is, and must be, the comprehensive end of all
creatures, and the Little World (in whom all seeds exist and are
perfected, which thenceforth can never be annihilated), we shall not
find it strange that he is counselled (
Rev. iii. i8) to buy
gold 'tried in the fire' (the Greek words imply gold all or
thoroughly fired, or all a mere
fire), that he may become rich
and like unto the sun, as on the contrary he becomes poor when he
doth abuse the arsenical poison, so that his silver by the fire must
be burnt to dross, which comes to pass when he will keep and hold
the 'menstrual blood' (out of which he in part exists), for his own
property in his own thoughts and outworkings, and doth not daily
offer up the same in the fire of the sun, to the end the 'Woman' may
be 'clothed with the Sun', and become a 'Sun', and thereby rule over
the Moon; that is to say, that he may get the Moon 'under his feet',
as we may see,
Rev. xii.
Forasmuch as we are here treating concerning gold, it will not be
inconvenient to query yet further, Whether is anything more to he
considered and taken notice of about gold--namely, How many sorts of
gold there be? And how gold is properly formed?
There are three sorts of gold.
Firstly. There is a white gold, which hath the weight and all the
qualities of gold except the colour; for it is white as silver, and
hath either lost its colour or hath not yet attained it.
Secondly. The second sort of gold is of a pale yellow colour.
Thirdly. The third sort is a high, yellow-coloured gold. But how
little the tincture or colour doth, that is in gold, we may perceive
from what follows:
1. In that the first sort, namely, the white gold, in its
substance is as ponderous as any other gold, from which hint or
instance we may see how little the colour conduceth to the being of
gold; seeing it is not at all, or very hardly to be perceived in its
weight and substance.
2. The whole body of common gold is nothing else, and cannot
consist of anything else, but silver, which is a perfect body, and
wants nothing of being gold but the fiery male tincture. If now it
should happen that a certain quantity of silver should be tinged into
gold with one grain of tincture, and that the said
grain should be only sufficient to turn it into gold, without
giving it the true colour to supply this, we have already showed that
the gold-beaters and gilders know how to give it a fixed yellow
gold-colour.
It may be further queried, how it comes to pass that antimony and
copper can give to pale gold its perfect colour, and so can help
others, whereas they cannot help themselves. As also, whence it is
that they can communicate this colour to gold, and not to silver or
any other metal, and not to themselves.
Forasmuch as gold doth want this colour, and must have it as its
due and property, which it hath either had before, and now lost it,
or hath not yet attained to it, but must attain it for the future;
wherefore the gold, to satiate itself, takes in this gold-colour in
order to its perfection, and can naturally take no more than it ought
to have.
There remains yet one considerable question to be asked, namely,
forasmuch as it has been said that gold naturally takes in no more of
a golden-colour than it stands in need of for itself, and that a
tincture which must first turn the Imperfect metals into silver (as
being the body of gold), and afterwards tinge them into gold, must
consist and proceed from gold and silver (for no third or strange
thing can be here admitted), and yet the said tincture must not be
gold or silver, but the very principle and beginning of gold and
silver, and so be partaker of the end and perfection of gold and
silver, and have the sulphur of gold and silver in it: for that
bodies of one nature (as before mentioned), cannot mechanically enter
into each other, as being both of them equally hard to be melted. The
tincture, therefore, must needs be and consist of just such a
sulphurous nature--(namely, which is easily fusible)--as the sulphur
of gold and silver is of, which hath
given them their form, and as it was before it entered into the
composition of gold and silver, at the beginning of their being made
such. And forasmuch as the said tincture is to tinge the other metals
through and through not mechanically but vitally and naturally, it
must of necessity abound with the said perfect metallic yellow and
white tincture. Now silver and gold (according to what has been said)
cannot mechanically take in more than they stand in need of
themselves. The question therefore is, From whence such a tincture as
this must be taken. And this question, in itself, may be said to
include the whole challenge to the powers of alchemy.
We are likewise to weigh and consider how it can be, that such a
little body of one grain should naturally be able so to subtiliate
itself, as to be able to pierce a body of a pound weight in all its
parts; which commonly is held to be impossible, because they suppose
the metals to be mere gross bodies, and that one body cannot
penetrate another.
Ask Nature of what she makes gold and silver in the gold and
silver mines, and she will answer thee, out of red and white arsenic;
but she will tell thee withal, that indeed gold and silver are made
of the same. For the gold which is there in its vital place where it
is wrought and made, is killed by the abundance of arsenic, and
afterwards made alive again and volatilized, to bring forth other
creatures, as vegetables and animals, and to give unto them their
being and life. From whence we may conclude, that gold is not only in
the earth, to be dug thence and made into coin and plate: for should
we suppose this, it would follow, that an incomprehensible great
quantity of gold must have been created in vain, and be of no use at
all, there being vast quantities of gold which never are, nor ever
can be, dug-up. And now
to draw a parallel between the divine part or soul of man, and the
purged and perfected gold.
Seeing that man, as a perfect and express Image of God, had all
created beings, and consequently all living creatures in himself, and
that therefore it would have been unnecessary to bring the outward
living creatures outwardly to him; must it not then be supposed, that
this was done inwardly in the centre, wherein Adam then stood. And
that in this centre he gave to all creatures their proper and
essential names, forasmuch as this could not have been done by him,
in case the essential living ideas of the said creatures had not been
in him, from which he gave forth those essential names, as water
gusheth out from a living fountain. And may we not therefore with
evidence conclude from hence that the 'Garden of Eden' was not only
an outward place without man. Doth it not also clearly appear from
this that the 'Garden of Eden' was not only a place 'without man?'
For that when Adam by his 'FALL' had lost the inward life out of the
centre (which proceeds from the centre to the circumference),
and
was come into the circumference, his eyes were 'opened' so that
now he was fain to take in his light from without from the outward
world, because his own 'inward world' was hid and shut up from him;
and now he saw his earthliness and bodily nakedness (which is the
present state of all men in the world), for before he was 'full of
light' from the continual irradiation 'from the centre'.
Pure gold is the sediment or settlement of 'light'. It is the
child of the 'Sun', and is implanted and perfected by him.
CHAPTER THE TWENTY-THIRD
What is more dream-like than the transactions in the Apocalypse?
To ordinary comprehension, the mysteries of the Cabala, and the
outline (spiritual) of the beginning of things, suggested in the
Revelation of Saint John, are equally unintelligible.
It seems natural to believe, that the All-Powerful, All-Wise Deity
hath, before all time (as far back as we can imagine), formed and
governed a world of spiritual beings, active, conscious, having
understanding and reason to conduct them, and '
passions' to
stimulate them. We may also conceive, that in so enormous a rebellion
as that of Lucifer, where so many orders of operative spirits were
drawn in, that several (or many, or a multitude) of these did more
eminently
transgress than others. Some, from the heights of
arrogance and pride, against the Almighty Dispenser of Rewards; and
others through malice and envy, and some by other specious pretences,
according to the powers and capacities they enjoyed in their several
states of subordination, in which they were placed; and therefore, at
that period, when they shall be solemnly tried, different degrees of
punishment will be awarded against them; and for a larger or shorter
time, in proportion to their crimes. As confinement is also a
reasonable intermediate punishment, until their general trial and
sentence; so also, according to their offences, it may be reasonable
to believe, that the degrees of confinement may be greater or less,
and they may have more or less enjoyment of life and sensations, in
proportion to their crimes. That, accordingly, some may be deprived
of life and sensation, and be entirely unconscious, until the General
Judgment. Some may be deprived in part, and for part of the time, and
be conscious sometimes; and yet, when conscious, may be deprived of
the memory of past actions, or any knowledge for the time to come;
whilst others may know both, and fear and tremble at the approach of
their trial and judgment.
Since the Divine Being has an infinite variety of purposes and
occupations in which to employ, and infinite extensions and
limitations of rewards and punishments to dispense to conscious free
spirits, who may deserve rewards and punishments, and may have passed
on and 'thrilled', and grown into power; so these entities rose into
higher, and nobler, and more fully-informed life in the
ever-springing and ever-fluent Creation. The innumerable items in
this physical world, ever resigning, ever renewed, ever balanced,
(subsiding to evil; recovering to good): these were in active motion.
All this state of restless, universal conflict or competition; of
affirmation, and of negation, in different degrees, both as to
duration and intenseness; at the time of the formation of the scheme
of the 'Cosmos', in the developing of the (speculative) Mosaic
creation, was perhaps the area of the operations of the lapsed
spirits. These had been doomed to a state of silence, by being
deprived of their sensations, and had been chained down to the
abysses of the several suns, or chaos of planets, by the impulse
of gravitation, or mutual attraction (gravity being, magically,
the magnetic, sensitive, '
angelical effluvium' spoken of by
Robertus de Fluctibus and the Rosicrucians). Such may have had an
opportunity of gaining degrees and impetus back again into angelic
life, in recovery out of the soulless densities of matter (that meant
by the 'darkness' allegorized by Moses); and reappearing, in the new
order of things, in the beautiful form of new efforts at
life--star-raised--astrologically raised--vegetables, growing plants,
and flowers (sexed, even, in their own mysterious differences and
forms and fashions), or
[8]
animals, in their higher or lower, or pure or impure kinds. These
animal or 'plantal souls' come from the metamorphosed
'spirits’-world' (all this is perfectly possible, however
strange and mysterious), being, in their seeds, dispersed not only
over the surfaces of the several suns and planets ('if particles of
light are spiritual forms'), but also throughout all the matter in
the several stars, through infinite space. Those who are doomed to a
long inactivity until a future judgment are within the surfaces of
the several globes, and are not to 'take life' during this present
period, or reign of things. That to such as the Deity thinks proper,
only a fossil, vegetable, or animal, brutal life was to be given,
until the conflagration of this globe. It has been a doctrine
advanced in the mysticism of the Gnostics, that only for such as our
Saviour Jesus Christ had interposed for mercy, a state of probation
was allowed. These are the condemned (the conquered 'Hosts of the
"First Fall"'--that fall of the 'Angels'). This class of
spirits by their entering human bodies (having been allowed
sufficient machine, and adequate physical means), combined the
synthesis of reason, memory,
and judgment, which combination makes them accountable for their
behaviour and actions here. At the same time others, who have not
these powers, at the last Judgment are to be doomed according to
their
former crimes; crimes
of the nature and character of
which poor human nature--incapable and childish as it is--can
form no idea;--humanity having been never intended for a
comprehension of the
supernatural, mighty secrets--resting
alone in the hidden MYSTERIES OF GOD! These crimes of the lapsed
spirits (committed in their former state), before they were
imprisoned in these globes, are as totally unimaginable by men, as
crimes, and the 'wherefore', and the 'nature' of crimes, in the human
mature state, are not known by children.
Let us consider a little the nature of that mysterious thing--in
reality, the Master of the World--called 'Fire'. The 'body' and the
'spirit' are alike traceable into it. The human scale or register of
fire is nothing; because our instruments--thermometers, pyrometers,
and so forth--fail at a given point. They cannot inform us of the
intensities of heat or of cold (instant destruction) which shoot
upward, or downward, from either end, baffling mortal computation or
idea, flying through hundreds of degrees by leaps, impossible of
recognition by man. Thus man knows nothing of Fire, except the
ordinary comfortable little
minimum of fire--which, answering
his purposes in certain indispensable respects, when risen into
magnitude, destroys him as his master in a moment, and all his
belongings--nay, the whole world, and
its belongings, and
everything conceivable. FIRE, in fact, devours every cosmic
possibility.
Many particles of light lose their motion when they enter into the
pores of the several bodies around us, and many remain and adhere to
the bodies they
enter; so that, we apprehend, vegetables consist, in great part,
of these particles, which makes them so inflammable; and that the
pabulum of our material fire is nothing more than the
imprisoned rays or particles of light, when united to salts, and
other particles of body; and that the strong heat and motion of fire,
when kindled, is nothing more than the struggle of the imprisoned or
fettered rays to break from the salts and aqueous particles they are
united with; and, when that motion becomes exceeding quick, Fire then
glows, and is thrown off in lucid rays. Where the struggle is
strongest, as in metals, sulphurs, and consolidated impenetrability,
the fire and flame is intense, as requiring a stronger motion to
break up the atoms into brightness, and to liberate that 'flower',
glory, or crown of heat, which we call flame--flame and light,
nature's last achievement and brandishing victory. Out of the
solidest matters for burning, comes the fiercest and the most
abundant Fire; until the masses of fiery molecules burst (being
turned inside-out) into the blaze of the brightest of Light! The
whole late mass is then passed into the 'unknown', leaving the ruin
only as ashes,
with the whole power out.
An opinion was put forward in the middle ages that our souls were
all originally in the first Adam; and that both our spirits and
bodies are all come from him; and, by throwing off one tegument or
skin after another, at each conception, we at last appear in the
world in the condition we are now in. But this seems to be too much
of a piece with the materialists, who may believe our souls, like
matter in their conception, divisible infinitely; for this would
confirm their hypothesis, that our souls are material, and infinitely
divisible; and that there are souls
within souls, looking
backwards as far as thought can reach; for myriads of millions are
included in the
vehicle of one, since so many souls or animalcules are thrown off
at each act of copulation, as we now observe by microscopes, when in
the least drop of the
semen there are such surprising numbers
seen. This would also confirm their opinion, who imagine that souls
take up no room or place in space, by being infinitely small; and may
thus, in a manner, be conceived not to be anywhere. Whereas, from the
powers we observe in ourselves, and other spiritual beings, we must
take up room, and be extended in space, since we act in a limited
part of it. It is impossible that souls, in the spiritual sense, can
be born into this world out of so much waste.
In the cabalistic, which is; therefore, the astrological view, the
sun in every vortex is the centre and lowest part; the ascent is from
the sun, the descent to it. A vortex may be divided into four
concentric orbs or worlds (unequal), and termed the utmost, or
highest,
Aziluth; the next,
Briah; the third,
Jetzirah;
the lowest, or inmost,
Asiah (or
Asia). The first,
Aziluth ('absorbed in divine contemplations'), extends from
the margin of the vortex to Saturn; the second,
Briah (social
or political), from Saturn to Mars; the third,
Jetzirah
(leonine and belluine), from Mars to Mercury; the fourth,
Asia
(mechanical), from Mercury to the frigescent Sun.
Asia,
superior, from Mercury to the atmosphere of the now frigid star.
Asia, inferior, the atmosphere and body of the frigid star
itself. Hence, perhaps, Saturn and Jupiter were worshipped by the
sons of darkness, corrupting old traditions at the will of their
Prince, the Old Serpent (as the causer of all visible things), and as
presiding over counsel and benignity, as apparent, and as to work in
a world which is half-shadow. Mars and Venus over the irascible and
concupiscible. Mercury over ingenuity and human production, or
'making',
technical and mechanical. These are all astrological meanings and
interpretations. All souls, even
Aziluthic were clothed with
corporeal vehicles, they being the means of sensation and commerce,
the highest gratifications of animal, or perhaps of all created
natures. The deeper immersed these entities are in the vortex, that
is in matter (or 'darkness'), the more gross the vehicle; and yet
supplying the most abundant means--contributing the most of power--to
the Fire, or the Light, because all
comprehensible FIRE and
LIGHT is material. There is a revolution of human souls through all
the four worlds (the Four Elements, or the four corners of the
universe of the Rosicrucians,
Aziluth, etc.), either by divine
fate, or their own fault. The periods are unequal, especially the
Aziluthic and
Briathic. The legitimate revolution of
angelic souls is no lower than
Asia, superior. Their vehicles
are richer in the exquisite sensual gratifications than the human;
but their souls are less gifted with the possibility of the divine
aspiration than the human. This mystery lies at the very base of the
cabalistic profundities, which form the first step upon which, in
mounting upwards out of man’s ordinary nature, the true
Rosicrucians (humblest, and yet haughtiest, of the children of men)
place their feet. Hence the above-referred-to 'darkened' angels--a
certain number, at least, of them, fell first by breaking-forth into
'
Jetzirah', without Divine Leave, out of that region
cabalistically denominated '
Briah', in which, and in
'
Aziluth', innocence reigned universally. And there the
augmented delights and vigour of their vehicles, through the greater
heat and increased magnificent fulgency of the sun, allured them, and
strengthened them, to those inordinate deeds (impossible to be
comprehended by man), by the
divine magic of those regions,
and to the traitorous embassy of that proud
princely genius, the 'Rebel Leader' amongst the principal
Archangels, known afterwards by many names, but herein by that of
Ophioneus, or
Lucifer, 'Bringer of Light', or 'Morning
Star' (
Lux-fero)--which brought to them the name of Rephaim,
or giants; and to human souls the lapse out of '
Briah', by
joining the rebel angels. This is the cabalistic, theosophical or
mystical story of the 'First Fall'--or that of the 'Angels'. Souls
which degenerate into the vivified region, cabalistically called
'
Asia', not through their own fault, but by divine fate,
return safe into '
Aziluth', neither broken by adversity, nor
softened by pleasures, aided in all states, by Grace Divine. This is
the meaning of the 'Elect', or the chosen of God.
In '
Aziluth' the souls of men and angels, wholly intent on
the adoration of the Supreme Master, and occupied in sublime
wonderings, neglect and scarcely perceive the life of the natural
vehicle--'that of wants'. From the celestially igneous and vivacious,
and illuminated character of this life, and of the magic
aura,
or matter of this supernatural region, it is named
cœlum
empyræum. This was Adam's state before Eve was created, and
before the 'sexes' became possible, or the distinctions of 'sex'
sprang into existence. For, whereas Adam owed his birth to God, who
made him out of matter, Eve owed her birth to Adam, who produced her
out of 'ruined' matter. Thus we see the necessity of the Saviour,
'born of Woman', through the pardon, under penalties, which in the
continual generations absolve the sin--the seed of the WOMAN
' bruising'
(crushing) the SERPENT'S Head. Eve was the 'Feminized Adam', and was
the 'First in the Fall', misinterpreting the Devil as a God: but out
of this temptation, and as a result of its success, arises the
'possibility of Man'--the great stumbling-block to all the
disbelievers, who are unable to rise into any
supernatural idea. In '
Briah'--or the region in which
descent was furthered, the
Aziluthic ardour being abated, the
view became turned to the outward world, or the world of physical
construction, and to the life, and sensations, and sustainment of the
vehicle. This became the state
after the formation of Eve.
Then arose the transaction between God and the Soul of the Messiah
concerning his 'Passion', and the 'Redemption of the World'. The soul
of the Messiah profited so much in the cabalistic '
Aziluth',
and adhered to the eternal
Logos with so strict a love, that,
at length, they were united into one 'Person' (
Partzuph)--(this
is the mystic doctrine of the Gnostics)--with the highest
aziluthic,
or rather
hyperaziluthic union, as Soul and Body, into one
Individuality, thence rightly called the Son of God, name or nature
ineffable. This Divine Messiah is constituted by God the Father,
Ruler of all Souls, human and angelical, King of Kings, and Lord of
Lords. Upon his undertaking to become the Saviour of the Lost
World--thence arose his union with the divine
Logos, which was
completed and declared. (
John xvii. 5;
Heb. i. 6;
Philippians ii. 6-8;
Ps. lxxii. 5, according to the
Septuagint.) Its mystical primæval duration until the sun of
this vortex (the solar system) cooled into a planet (rather comet),
through the rebel Rephaim overturning all order and beauty; and
therefore deprived of the solar light and heat, the principle of
their magic power and operations, and before the moon became frigid,
and was struck off from the bulk of the earth, and set rolling,
circumvolving, in its new magic,
feminine light--maker of the
sensitives--as a satellite to our world. The chaotic comet being
formed into a habitable earth through the force of gravitation, and,
physically, in the exertion of the powers centripetal and
centrifugal, solidifying it into a globe, the lapsed human
souls--having
drank of the 'river of Lethe' to make this new state of trial and
purification (here we encounter the Buddhistic system) more
attainable and effectual, sank into terrestrial bodies. All this, and
the new operations arising in place of that divine magic so greatly
abused by them in their former state, and in their cabalistical
state, called '
Jetzirah'--
Gen. iii.
The
Jetzirathic Rephaim of the
Cabala esteemed
themselves
Elohim (Gods) in their supernaturally drunken and
mad frolics, as being experimentally skilled in all sorts of
contrivances, good and evil, through the use and abuse of magic. And
so the Serpent persuaded Eve it would be with her. Whence the name of
Jetzirah, the Cabalistic term for this development, from the
Chaldaic, or foundation--Hebrew '
jatzar', to form 'good and
evil' magically, not mechanically.
Catachismus,
Cabalisticus,
Mercavæus
Sephirothicus. Refer to a very valuable old Book, published in
London, in the possession of the authors of this present work and
entitled '
A Miscellaneous Metaphysical Essay, or, An Hypothesis
concerning the Formation and Generation of Spiritual and Material
Beings, with Their Several Characteristics and Properties, and how
far the several surrounding Beings partake of either property. To
which is added Some Thoughts upon Creation in General, upon
Pre-existence, the Cabalistic Account of the Mosaic Creation, the
Formation of Adam, and Fall of Mankind; and upon the Nature of Noah's
Deluge. As also upon the Dormant State of the Soul, from the Creation
to our Birth, and from our Death to the Resurrection. The whole
considered upon the Principles of Reason, and from the Tenor of the
Revelations in the Holy Scriptures. By an Impartial Inquirer
after Truth.--London.' (No name or date.)
It is impossible to tell now who was the author of
this remarkable work. It was, in fact, an explanatory treatise on
the
Cabala.
We have, as far as allowable, given the Rosicrucian interpretation
thereof. The whole range of these subjects is pre-eminently
mysterious and Phallic. For Phallicism seems to rest as the basis of
everything, as it proffers undoubtedly as the foundation and the
meaning of all the mythologies. It follows from this, that this human
state must be a supernatural (natural) place, of inquietude, and of
penitential suffering; and that this place of trial--the world--is
only a state of purgation and of trouble, introductory to some
other--and it is to be hoped--better state. 'The whole Creation
groaneth and travaileth in pain together, until now.'--St. Paul.
The following suggestions are from Scripture:
'And those "
members of the body" which we think
to be "
less honourable", upon them we bestow "
more
abundant honour".'--1
Cor. xii. 23.
'But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound
the wise, and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to
confound the things which are mighty; and base things of the world,
and things which are despised hath God chosen, yea, and things which
are
not, to bring to nought things that
are.'--1
Cor.
i. 27 and 28.
'For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and
will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent.'--1
Cor.
i. 19.
'He that overcometh shall not be hurt of the second death.'--
Rev.
ii. II.
'To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the hidden manna,
and will give him a white stone' (the '
Philosophers’
Stone?') 'and in the stone a
new name written, which no
man knoweth saving he that receiveth it.'--
Rev. ii. 17.
'And he that overcometh, and keepeth my works unto the end, to him
will I give power over the nations.'--
Rev. ii. 26.
'And I will give him the Morning Star.'--
Rev. ii. 28.
'And I will write upon him my New Name.'--
Rev. iii. I2.
'He that overcometh shall inherit all things; and I will be his
God, and he shall be my son.'--
Rev. xxi. 7.
'We discover that, not only is the "Garden of Eden" an
allegory in itself, but the whole structure of the Bible is an
allegory, beginning with Creation, (as described by Moses), and
ending with Christ's spiritual, or clairvoyant, appearance to St.
John in the
Revelation.'
The whole is, however, indicative of pure spiritual life.
CHAPTER THE TWENTY-FOURTH, AND LAST
It is an assertion of the occult philosophers that the meaning and
purpose of life is altogether mistaken:--necessarily--that is, in the
'Necessity of Things'--mistaken. That, inasmuch as
he lives,
man is incapacitated for pronouncing upon the
nature of his life;
being it--
itself. He being as a 'Liver'--'It'--(i.e. 'Life',
'Itself'). Philosophy and common sense take it for granted that life
needs consciousness, or some form in which the consciousness may be,
in order that the liver may 'live'. Abstract philosophy asserts that
the liver (living), UNLIVES (in the true sense),
for the very
purpose of living. In other words, it is concluded that, as man
is the 'thing seen', the individual cannot ever go out of himself,
'to see himself'; that the 'judged at the bar' cannot cease his
character to become another character, and thus 'change places' with
his judge, and thus become the judge on the bench, going out of
'himself', to become 'something other' than himself, and to judge of
what he is, himself. Now this, obviously, cannot be in common-sense,
or in any sense. Thus, this philosophy is applied in the hermetic
sense. The alchemists contended that it is possible (by art) to
obtain out of the boundless, holy, unappropriated eternal Youth of
Nature, a wherewithal, by means of which to 'wreak'--to use a strange
word. Thus there could be miraculous renewal, even out of the powers
of nature. No one knows the purposes
of God, nor can any one limit the powers of God.
'
Angelicarum animarum
revolutionem, quanquam ad
terrestrem regionem proprie, dictam haud pertingit, ad superiorem
tamen partem mundi
Asiathici et atmosphœram extendi. Nec
tamen nisi parcius et compendiosius hisce de rebus egimus in
Cabbala
Philosophica; in
Geneseos, Cap. 2 & 3.
Animas, quæ non
sua quidem culpa, laborant, sed
Divino quodam
Fato, in mundum
Asiathicum
delabuntur. Divina quadam vi munitas ac agitatas tuto certoque in
mundum Aziluthicum reverti.
Animam
Messiæ in mundo Aziluthico tan tum profecisse
et tam arcto amore ac unione cum Divino Intellectu, sive æterno
Logo coaluisse ut tandem summo plane gradu
Aziluthico
vel potius
Hyperaziluthico, et si scholastici loqui liceat
Hypostatico, cum eo unitus esset, adeo ut Anima
Messiæ
et Divinus
Logos unafieret פרעוף,
i.e. unapersona (ut anima et corpus unus Homo) quæ recte
appellanda esset Filius DEI.
Electrum vero in
medio Ignis est Elementum Divinum
cælestis vortices materiæ inclusum et interspersum.'
'Upward of the "server" or of the heavenly-assisted
influences.' Sphara Litera (M) signata, representat Mundum
Briathicum, ubi observanda.
|
(Sephiroth)
|
(Nomina)
|
(Angeli)
|
(Chori Angelorum)
|
1.
|
Kether
|
אהיה
|
Jehuel
|
Seraphim.
|
2.
|
Chochmah
|
אה֗הי
|
Raphaël
|
Ophanim.
|
3.
|
Binah
|
אה֗ה
|
Cherubiel
|
Cherubim.
|
4.
|
Daath
|
היה֗א
|
Schemuel.
|
|
5.
|
Chesed
|
הה֗יא
|
Zadkiel
|
Schinanim.
|
6.
|
Gebhurah
|
הה֗אי
|
Tarschisch
|
Tarschischim. p.
456
|
7.
|
Tiphereth
|
הא֗הי
|
Chasmel: alii
|
Chaschmalin.
|
8.
|
Nezach
|
הא֗יה
|
Metatron
Usiel
|
Malachim.
|
9.
|
Hod
|
היא֗ה
|
Chasmel
|
Bene Elohim.
|
10.
|
Jesod
|
יאה֗ה
|
Zephaniah:
alii Jehuel
|
Ischim.
|
11.
|
Malchuth
|
יה֗ה֗א
יהאה
אל טדי
|
Michaël
|
Arelim.
|
FINIS
'Soli deo gloria per Christum.'
'
Kabbala Denudata seu doctrina Hebræroum Transcendentalis
et Metaphysica atque Theologia scriptum Omnibus Philologis,
Philosophis, Theologis omnium religionum, atqu: Philo-Chymicis.
Sulzbaci, Typis Abrahami Lichtenthalbri--1677.'
Extracts from the Cabala
THE 'SECOND RUIN'
In which Second Ruin the origin of the strangely great, strangely
mysterious religion of the first Buddhism, or first Buddhistic (or
more properly Bhuddhistic) system is to be found.
'When the old primæval world was ruined.'
'הוה
chavvah. R. Moscheh inquit, sic appellari Malchuth,
quia est vere est Mater omnis viventis, et uxor Adami primi sub
mysterio מה
to quod refert numerum ארם.
Pardes. Tr., 23, c. 8.
'חופה
Thalamus, vel cælum nuptiale, sub quo
sponsus et sponsa consecrantur. Kabbalistæ totum systema
Aziluthicum in Chuppah præfigurant. Kether enim est Tectum.
Chocmah Parietes; Binah ostium; Chesed, Gebburah, Nezach et Hod quasi
brachia in introitu Thalami constituta; Tiphereth et Malchuth sponsus et
sponsa intra Thalamum per Jesod, qui est Paranymphus.
Pardes. Tr.,
23, c. 8. Kabbala Denudata, p. 338.'
Morum trium est terra, de qua ibidem; sicut trium nominum
receptaculum est Adonai, a quo omnium judiciorum fit executio. Hinc
intelligitur mysticum illud
Genes, 42, vers. 33. Vir
אר֞ני
האר֞ץ Dominus terræ.
Conf. Jehosch., 3, vers. 11.
'
Arca, est Malchuth: unde in eam ingressus dicitur Noach,
i.e.
Jesod. Gen., 6, 9,
Pard.
'Duodecim ergo signacula Tetragrammati et 4 vexilla eorum sunt
hæc: Vexillum primum; vexillum secundum; vexillum tertium;
vexillum quartum.
'Duodecim autem Tribus in hæc vexilla distribuuntur.
Vexillum 1. Juhudah, Jissaschar, Sebulon. Vexillum 2. Reuben,
Schimeon, Gad. Vexillum 3. Ephraim, Menanche, Binjamin. Vexillum 4.
Dan, Asser, Napthali.
'Duodecim vero menses cum 12. Signis et limitibus Zodiaci in 4
Quadrantibus anni ita locantur.
'דר Incola
inhabitans. Omnium interpretum consensu vocatur Malchuth. Et in
Schaare Zedek additur ratio, quod sit דירה
hospitium Tetragrammati Tiphereth, vel quod habitet in
tonos sicut scriptum est:
Lev., 16, 16, qui commoratur cum eis
in medio immunditiarum eorum. R. Moscheh autem dicit, דר
esse nomen Lapidis pretiosi; item spinarum et
tribulorum. Atqui sit et hæc mensura se habet, quippe a qua
provenit bonum et malum Dicetque quod a דר
venit vox דרזם
meridies. Ipse autem R. Moscheh hanc vocent applicat ad
Binah, in Malchuth ergo illius respectu erit.
Pard. Tr., 23,
c. 4.'
Kabbala Denudata. Ed. 1677. Salzbuch.
'Cerva amorum.
Prov., 5, 19. Ita vocatur Malchuth
potissimum ob mysterium
novilunii quando sc. ista in altu porrigit Cornua, quæ sint Cornua. Hod
gloriosa in ipsa apparentia quando nova sit h. m.
:
aliquando tamen cornu unum altius est altero h. m.
:
sit tradit R. Schimeon ben Jochai in Raja Mehimna, hac adjecta
ratione: Hæc variare secundum diversitatem renovationis. Vel
enim æqualis sit ab utroque loco: et tunc cornua equalem habent
altitudinem. Si vero a parte plus accipit, ita ut hæc sinistræ
prævaleat, tunc cornu unum elevatius est altero: atque tunc
vocatur
cerva amorum, ob mysterium amoris et Chesed seu
benignitatis in ipsa prævalentis. Si autem sinistrum prævalet
latus, vocatur הטחר:
אלת
cerva nigricans seu diluculi caliginosi.
Ps.,
22, 1, nim. ob nigredinem et anxietatem cui subjecta est in exilio.'
'Lurking principles in the physiology of the human construction.'
Extracted from
Cabala: חבעלת״
Rosa. Est Schechinah, juxta
Cant., 2, 1. Ratio
datur in
Sohar Sect. Æmor, quod sicut Rosa crescit ad
aquas, et emittit odorem bonum, sic Malchuth hoc gaudeat nomine, cum
influxum affugit a Binah, quæ bonum elevat odorem. Item: quod
tunc sic vocetur, cum copulari desiderat cum Rege: cum vero Eidem jam
adhæret per oscula, nominantur טוטנח
Crinorrhodon; juxta
Cant. 5, 13.
Pardes
Tractat., 2, 3, c. 8.
Kabbala Denudata. Ed. 1677.
Salzburg. P. 333.
'Sed a muris versus exteriora sunt turmæ malignæ ad
latus sinistrum, non quidem supra, sed infra tantum. Et caput omnium
catervarum malarum est Samaël: et illæ omnes sunt autores
jurgiorum et odii, et non pertinent ad habitatores atrii Regii; sed
extra degunt extra tertium aggerem et extra muros, qui circum castra.
Et huc pertinet illud
Num., 5, 2, de exclusione Leprosorum,
fluentium; et aliorum immundorum; quæ sunt tres catervæ.
Isti dicuntur inquinare l. c. attendunt enim, quam accuratissime sicubi peccatis
se polluant homines, atque turn in supernis eos accusant. Atque sic
dicitur
Psal., 104, 4. Faciens angelos suos spiritus,
ministros suos ignem flagrantem. Hinc Aqua ad El, Ignis ad Elohim,
Aër ad Tetragrammaton, et Terra ad Adonai refertur. Ordinem
reperies
Gene., 1, 2, ubi inter tenebras (quibus Ignis
æquipollet) et aquas, ferri dicitur spiritus, ut inter Elohim
et El est Tetragrammaton. Receptaculum autem quod a דר
veniat vox דרום
meridies. Ipse autem R. Moscheh hanc vocent applicat ad
Binah, in Malchuth ergo illius respectu erit.
Pard. Tr., 23,
c. 4.
Kabbala Denudata. Ed. 1677. Salzbuch.
'Cerva amorum,
Prov., 5, 19. Ita vocatur Malchuth
potissimum ob mysterium
novilunii quando sc. ista in altu
porrigit Cornua, quæ sint Cornua Hod gloriosa in ipsa
apparentia quando nova sit h. m.
:
aliquando tamen cornu unum altius est altero h. m.
:
Sit tradit R. Schimeon ben Jochai in Raja Mehimna, hac adjecta
ratione: Hæc variare secundum diversitatem renovationis. Vel
enim æqualem accipit influxum a dextra et a sinistra, et
renovatio æqualis sit ab utroque loco: et tunc cornua equalem
habent altitudinem. Si vero a parte dextra plus accipit, ita ut hæc
sinistræ prævaleat, tunc cornu unum elevatius est altero;
atque tunc vocatur
cerva amorum, ob mysterium amoris et Chesed
seu benignitatis in ipsa prævalentis. Si autem sinistrum
prævalet latus, vocatur: השחר:
אלט
cerva nigricans seu diluculi caliginosi.--
Ps.,
22, 1, nim. ob nigredinem et anxietatem cui subjecta est in exilio.'
Pairing (human) is synthesis--it is the union of 'Half-Sex', Man
(so assumed in this abstract sense), and 'Half-Sex', Woman (so
assumed, also, in this abstract sense). The union of these 'Two'
half-sexes is the establishment of a 'Whole' Sex--
Hermaphrodite: (Hermes-Aphrodite. Venus-Mercury). The mechanical
definition of the exercise of Sex is power of blissful
protrusion;
human organic-advance; willed, conscious magnetism (for an
end):--with climax of dissolution and destruction (in the
end).--Perishing as in the 'flower' of this 'stalk'. Thus Cornelius
Agrippa and Paracelsus--thus the mystic anatomists, like Fludd and
Van Helmont. Thus, the Mythologists say that the orders are to be
taken as identical, although, in fact, they are directly
contradictory. It is these things, which are set against each other,
which constitute the stupendous and irresistible natural temptation
(obtained out of shame or out of denial, and disgrace), of all this
enchanted side of life.
'טבור
Umbilicus. Est schechinah, quatenus adhuc occulta;
Corpus enim est Tiphereth, et venter Malchuth de parte Binah; sub
mysterio הא.
Sed Tibbur est notio Jod, quatenus est in ventre et in Tiphereth. Et
hoc est punctum illud, quo fundamentum habet mundus, quod vocant
Tibbur seu medium terræ; nempe punctum Zijon. Et forte Tibbur
est
Jesod. Pard. Tr., 23, c. 9.
חטוקיהם
Ligaturæ illarum.' (
Kabbala.)
There is nothing in the lower and sensible world, that is not
produced, and hath its image, in the superior world. Since the form
of the body, as well as the soul, is made after the image of the
Heavenly Man, a figure of the forthcoming body which is to clothe the
newly descending soul is sent down from the celestial regions to
hover over the couch of the husband and wife when they copulate, in
order that the conception may be formed according to this model. We
have before declared in our chapter on the mystic anatomy, enlarged
upon by Cornelius Agrippa, that the human 'act' by which the power of
perpetuation has been placed in the exercise by man, and has been elevated into
the irresistible natural temptation, is rightly a solemnity or magic
endowment, or celebration to which all nature not assents simply, but
concurs, as the master-key, however blindly or ignorantly, or
brutally often practised.
The Sohar, iii. 104, a, b, declares
that 'At connubial intercourse on earth, the Holy One (blessed be he)
sends a human form which bears the impress of the divine stamp. This
form is present at intercourse, and, if we were permitted to see it,
we should perceive over our heads an image resembling a human face.
And it is in this image that we are formed. As long as this image is
not sent by God, and does not descend and hover over our heads, there
can be no conception; for it is written 'And God created man in his
own image' (
Gen. i. 27). This image receives us when we enter
the world; it develops itself with us when we grow; and accompanies
us when we depart this life, as it is written: 'Surely man walked in
an image'.
The followers of this secret doctrine of the
Kabbalah claim
for it a pre-Adamite existence. It is also called the secret Wisdom,
because it was only handed down by tradition through the initiated,
and its whole story indicated in the Hebrew Scriptures by signs which
are hidden and unintelligible to those who have not been instructed
in its mysteries. 'All human countenances are divisible into the four
primordial types of faces which appeared at the mysterious
chariot-throne in the vision of the prophet Ezekiel; viz. the face of
man, of the lion, the ox, and the eagle. Our faces resemble these
more or less according to the rank which our souls occupy in the
intellectual or moral dominion. Physiognomy does not consist in the
external lineaments, but in the features which are mysteriously drawn
in us.'
The following are fragments from the
Cabala:
'Ad Kether, Mundus Intelligentiæ, Sphæra prima, que
dat facultatem omnibus stellis et circulis.
'Ad Chochmah, sphæra motus diurni.
'Ad Binah, sphæra otava stellarum fixarum, et duodecim
signorum cælestium, cum quibus combinantur duodecim menses.
'Ad Gedulah--Saturnus.
'Ad Gebhurah--Jupiter.
'Ad Tiphereth--Mars.
'Ad Nezach--Sol.
'Ad Hod--Venus.
'Ad Jesod--Mercurius.
'Ad Malchuth--et in medio locatur Terra.
'Figura T. representat Hortum-Eden, ejusque septem mansiones: ubi
in circuitu est murus Paradisiacus et sequuntur septem palatia; in
medio autem arbor Vitæ.
Ut legitur
Deuter. 30, 15. "Vide, exhibui coram te
vitam et bonum, mortem et malum", etc., added locum
Proverb,
31, 11, 12. Beatus, qui intelligit insigne hoc mysterium, quia ex eo
potest intelligere mysterium albedinis et Lunæ a principio ad
finem' (pre-eminently indicative of the mysteries of the
Rosicrucians). 'Hinc etiam Lepra continetur sub mysterio Labani
Aramæi. Qui hoc intelligit, etiam capiet mysterium Lepræ,
quæ signum est, quod clausus sit mundus dilectionem unde
Targumice
Lepra dicitur.'
'These are sexual notions--in fact as such must be
everywhere'--'Et Malchuth, quando locata et alligata est inter Jesod
et Binah etiam vocatur Fœdus. Et hoc est mysterium
הפריעה
Denudiationis: quia circumcisio refertur ad Jesod et
denudatio ad Malchuth. Et propteria dicitur: Qui circumcisus est, et
non denudatus, idem est, ac si circumcisus non esset;
quia fodicat portam ingressus, quæ est Malchuth, et Ista est
denudatio.
'Appetitus bonus et prava concupiscentia. Vid.
Sohar, Sect.
Lechlecha, 57, 227;
Vajera, 68, c. 269;
Vajischlach,
95, c. 379;
Toledoth, 82, c. 325;
Vajischlach, 101, c.
406;
Vajescheb, 106, c. 424;
Mikkez, III, c. 445
sqq.,
etc., etc. Also
Kabbala Denudata. Ed. 1677. Salzburg.
'Ignis אש
Fire. Cum in viri appellatione, id est in איֹש
reperiatur, וֹ,
quasi dicatur אש
וֹ Ignis Joddatus, id est masculinus.
Si autem componantur ambo, inde fit אשיֹה
Ignis Dominio.' Et unus quidem Ignis, remoto omni
dubio, est ad dextram; estque
Ignis albus; Alter autem est ad
sinistram;
Ignis nemper
ruber: quæ apparent ex
יהׁ,
ubi Jod dextrum, He, sinistrum designat.
Pardes Rimmonim Tract.,
23, c. 1, h, t, Videantur plura de Uxore in Sohar, Part Sect.
Breschith, fol. 39. Col. 154, 155.
'Cum purum non dicatur, nisi respectu prioris impuritatis.
Fundamentum ergo sanctitatis est in Chesed, supra qua Chochmah; cui
nomen
sancti tribuitur; et hinc per dextram sanctitas venit
super omnia. Sed fundamentum puritatis est in Gebhura; quia igne
Gebhuræ omnia dealbatur.'
Ligaturæ illarum,
Trabeationes, Exod., 27, 10, 11, etc.
'In Tikkunim hoc nomen applicatur ad Hezach et Hod; vel quod se
invicem colligant, ut fiant unum in copula: vel a fulciendo, quod
sint Trabeationes Domus, et Domus firmetur super eas, quatenus. Sunt
Jachin et Boas. Vel quatenus sunt in classe Tiphereth et Malchuth,
qui inter ambas istas uniuntur. Pardes I, c.'
'The exercise of the mysteries.'--
'יין
Vinum. Hæc vox absolute posita refertur ad
Gebhurah. Sed si album intelligitur inclinarecenseatur ad Chesed, cum rubrum sit vis Gebhuræ: Dicitur
autem
bonum, quando miscetur aquis; subintelligendo aquas
Chesed, unde bonum provenit, ut dictum sub טוב.
Eccl., 7, 12;
Jeches., 10, 20;
Pard. Tr., 23, c.
10. Vid.
Soh., Sect. Noach, 54, c. 216;
Lechlecha, 61,
c. 244; et
Toledoth, 81, c. 321;
Vajikra, 5, c. 19;
Schemini, 17, c. 67;
Æmor, 46, c. 182;
Fol.,
48, 192;
Pinchas, 114, c. 454;
Debharim, 123, c. 491.'
Cabala Denudata. SALZBACH edn., 1677.
'סגידּן,
quasi clausura, (et Leprosus מוסגר
quasi clausus, sive quis Leprosus sit simpliciter
(primo aspectu, ut nulla inclusione opus est) sive mundari queat;
quod est mysterium magnum. Lepra enim venit ob linguam malum; quæ
omnia clara sunt; omni enim proveniunt e scaturigine serpentis
antiqui, qui causa est, ut claudantur portæ Rachamim. Ille
autem qui intelligit mysteria hæc magna, de comestione Adami ab
arbore cognitionis tempore præputii, etiam intelliget, quare
vocetur
Arbor cognitionis; et quare vocetur
Boni et Mali.
Kabbala Denudata, p. 495. (Edn. 1677.)
End Section Three
Next
Section
Back to Contents
End Notes
[1] A proof that it did not originate with Edward the Third.
[2] Unless self-disclosed.
[3] And thereout.
[4] 'Bowing-out', or 'complimenting-out'; to express in a strong
figure--but not inapt.
[5] Puranas (New Testament), the Modern Scriptures of the Hindus, as distinguished from the Vedhas (as Bible), or more Ancient Scriptures. Wilson on Hindu Sects--As. Res. vol. xvii.
[6] As. Res. vol. xvii. pp. 208-10.
[7] London: Printed by J. C. and Freeman Collins, for Robert Kettlewel,
at The Hand and Scepter, near S. Dunstan's Church in Fleet Street.
1685.
[8] This agrees with the Pythagorean ideas, and with those of Lucretius.
