CHAPTER XV.

The great hall of the palace was illuminated gloriously by huge

dragons made of gold, placed high up on the walls; within these

strange creatures were powerful lamps, which shed their light not

only through the eyes and opened mouths, but from the gleaming

claws. The whole place was filled with a blaze of light from them;

and the dresses of the household assembled below seemed to Hilary

another blaze of light, so gay were they. Yet this was only a

domestic reception. It was late, and Otto had refused to allow any

more general demonstration to take place that night. Yet Fleta, when

she threw off her travelling cloak and hood, might have been the

centre of any pageant. She showed no trace of the weariness of

travel, or even of the strange excitement she had passed through.

She was pale, but her face was calm and wore its most haughty and

unapproachable expression. Her dress of black lace hung about her

slender form like clouds. Otto was filled with pride as he noted her

superb dignity and beauty; with hatred, as he observed that her eyes

never met his own, that she treated him with just the same civility

as the steward, or any servant of the establishment. No one could

notice this but himself and perhaps Hilary, supposing the latter to

be capable of regarding anyone but Fleta herself; for she was too

much a woman of the world, this mystic, this wild girl, to admit

anyone even to the most evident of the secrets of her life.

After a few moments passed among the little crowd assembled in the

great hall, Fleta proposed to go to her own rooms for the night, and

a stately little procession formed itself at once to conduct her

there. But before going she beckoned to Hilary.

“The Duchess must come to me to-night,” she said. “I wish her to be

in my own room. Send a carriage and servants to fetch her.”

How her eyes glittered! Had he ever seen them shine so vividly

before?

“Tell me one thing,” he said hoarsely. “I believe you have taken to

yourself that creature’s life and very body that I killed for you.

Is it not true?”

“You are shrewd,” she said with a laugh. “Yes, it is true. My whole

being is stronger for his death; I absorbed his vital power the

instant you wrenched it from him.”

“And he?” said Hilary, with wild eyes.

“Was one of those half-human, half-animal creatures that haunt men

to their ill, and which fools call ghosts or demons. I have done him

a service in taking his life into my own.”

Hilary shuddered violently.

“You doubt me,” said Fleta very quietly. “You still doubt if it is

not I who am the devil. Be it so. I am indifferent to your opinion

of me, Hilary; you cannot help loving and serving me. We were born

under the same star. Now go and give orders about the Duchess.”

Under the same star! Those words had not come to his mind for a long

while; yet how horribly true they were. For he, Hilary, it was who

had actually done this dreadful deed and killed this unseen,

unknown, unimaginable creature. Horror made him clutch his hands

together as he thought that he had touched this thing, more, had

killed it hideously. Might it not have been some good thing striving

to baffle Fleta? Ah, yes! he still doubted her. And yet to doubt her

so completely made the very earth to sink away from under his feet.

He himself, his life, his all, were given to her, be she good or

evil! Staggering and overpowered by the terrible thoughts that

crushed his wearied brain, Hilary found his way to a supper-table;

and too exhausted to think of anything else but recruiting his

strength, sat down to drink wine—and to try to eat. This latter

seemed impossible, but the wine revived him; and presently he

remembered that it was his business to look after the Duchess.

By-and-bye she was carried into the palace; she could not yet stand,

for she had only come out of one fainting fit to fall into another.

And now came a strange and dreadful scene—one which only a few

witnessed, Hilary as it happened being among those few, for he

saw the Duchess taken to the suite of rooms Fleta occupied. In

the corridor Fleta came out to them; she was still in her

travelling-dress, and looked very quiet and even subdued. But at

the sight of her the young Duchess screamed as if she saw some

awful thing; she would not let Fleta touch her, she absolutely

refused to enter her room.

“But you must be with me,” said Fleta in a low voice.

“I will not,” answered the Duchess with a firm resolution which

amazed everyone who knew her. She rose up and walked unassisted

along the corridor and down the great staircase; she met the young

king coming up it; he had heard her shrill cries and came to see

what was happening.

“What is the matter, little cousin?” seeing her tear-stained and

agitated face.

“Fleta wants me to be in her room all night! I would not do it for

all the world! She is a devil—she would kill me or make her lover

kill me, and then no one would ever hear of me or even find my body.

No! No!”

And so she ran on, down the wide stairs, leaving Otto thunderstruck.

He noticed that a number of persons were gathering on the landing

and stairs, and so, with a stern and quiet face, he passed through

the little throng, making no observation. He went down the corridor

and straight into Fleta’s room. Here he found her standing silent,

dark, like a sombre statue. One other person was in the room—Hilary

Estanol. He was in the most extraordinary state of agitation,

pouring out words and accusations; some horror appeared to possess

and blind him, for he took no notice of the king’s entrance. Fleta

did, however; she looked up at him and smiled—such a strange, sweet,

subtle smile. Seldom, indeed, had Fleta given him a look like this.

Otto’s heart leaped within him, and he knew himself her slave. For

he loved her increasingly with every passing moment; and she had but

to turn her face on him softly to make the loving soul in him burn

with ardour. But that burning was fiery indeed. He turned upon

Hilary and stayed his words by a sudden sharp order:

“Leave the room,” he said. “And you had better go and see Doctor

Brandener before you go to bed, for you are either in a fever or

mad. Go at once.”

Hilary was in a condition in which an order given in such a tone

took the place of the action of his own brain, and he mechanically

obeyed it. This was the best possible thing that could have happened

to him; for he was in fact in a high fever, and if he had not,

without thinking about it, done as he was told and gone to the

resident doctor of the palace, he would probably have wandered

raving about all night. As it was he was obliged to drink a strong

sleeping draught, and was placed in his bed, where he fell at once

into a sleep so profound it seemed like death.

Hilary gone, Fleta closed the door behind him.

“Do not let there be any struggle of wills between us to-night,”

said Fleta very softly. “I warn you, I am much stronger than I was;

I am very much stronger than you are, now. And you found before that

you could not even come near enough to touch me. Let me rest, and

that quietly; I wish to retain my beauty, both for your sake and my

own.”

Otto paused a few moments before he made any answer to this

extraordinary speech. Then he spoke with difficulty; and as he did

so raised his hand to brush away some great drops of sweat which had

gathered on his forehead.

“I know I am powerless against you to-night, Fleta,” he said. “I

cannot even move nearer to you. But be warned; I intend to probe the

mystery of your being. I intend to conquer you at last. I will do it

if I have to visit hell itself for the magic which shall be stronger

than yours.”

(_To be continued._)

——*———

TWILIGHT VISIONS.

PART II.—THE CRESCENT.

“_The_ LORD _appeared of old unto me, saying, ‘Yea, I have loved

thee with an everlasting love: therefore with loving-kindness have

I drawn thee.’_”—JER. xxxi., 3.

“In life, in death, O Lord! abide with me!”

Thou, Ruler o’er the Living Rosy Cross—

Great Master Mason of the mortal frame,

Which is the temple of the Holy Ghost—

Grand Power of all who through the secret sun

Dost hold the soul in tenement of clay

To guide it safely through the gloom of night

Into the golden morn, when all things then

In Light of Love—thine own Eternal Self—

Shall truly stand revealed to those that strive

In truth to know the Power which all mankind

Shall worship in the Universal King.

* * * * *

My children! saith the living God of Love,

Now “if with all your hearts ye truly seek,”[153]

Ye surely shall find me your King in Heaven,

And finding me shall know yourselves to be

Anointed Princes—Rulers of the Earth—

The Powers of Light sent by me in the flesh,

And named Michael! You are here to fight,

To hurl down Satan to his black abyss,

Where ignorance and error, sin and crime,

And hellish spirits dark for ever dwell

With all who in the bonds of slavery

Lead deathly lives as creatures of the world—

The wretched earth-worms of that bounden sphere,

Which is the only Hell mankind can know!

* * * * *

The night is now far spent, and in the sky

From out a dark blue setting there hath shone

In ages past, as now, full many a star

Proclaiming to mankind the Light of Heaven,

Each with its own peculiar brilliancy

Illumining the minds of men with rays

Which point to other realms beyond this world,

And ever tell of one star differing

In glory from its fellow star on high.

What great and hidden meaning lieth here!

Why are the stars above held forth to man

As entities which tell of other states?

The Stars of Heaven are never seen by man;

As man, he cannot know that glorious light

Sent forth—from States of Wisdom not in skies—

Through brilliant rays which meet not mortal gaze,

And are invisible save to the one

Who—seeing through perception—contacts light,

That Light of ancient days, since passed away

Into the sombre gloom of deepest night;

Because in ignorance and selfishness

Man willed to dwell in darkness on this earth.

And now behold the fallen Lucifer!—

Thou Morning Star of Truth—again arise—

To touch with thy bright rays the mind of man

And open to his gaze the Light of Love,

Reflected in the silv’ry Crescent now

About to crown the Living Cross of Truth.

* * * * *

Shine forth, fair Luna! Man hath waited long

For thee—O bringer of the Golden Light.

Surmount the Cross—thou Goddess of the Gods—

Which suff’ring mortals here in agony

Have borne along, desiring of their King—

Of whom thou art—those better things on earth,

Which He hath promised them in days of old,

Shall take the place of former things to pass—

With mourning, weeping, bitterness, and death—

Away for ever, as the first-born states

Of Heaven and earth and sea no more to be.[154]

* * * * *

Fair Keeper of the rays shed by the Sun!

Whilst feeble mortals now deny thy power,

We of the morn declare thee as thou art;

The mediate force to govern all mankind,

The force of love which mortals cannot know.

For that man holds as love is passion foul:

It hath transformed the earth into a hell,

And none save thou can mediately stand

To rid the earth—by Truth who comes from thee—

From that curs’d tyrant in the world or hell,

The devil—Satan—he that doth deceive,

Accuser of our brethren, soon to be

Bound hand and foot in heaven, then cast to earth,

When angels dark and all who fight for him

Shall fall with him through Michael’s power and might.[155]

* * * * *

The grandest vision seen in heaven from earth

Has burst upon the wond’ring mind of man,

For woman has appear’d with Sun array’d—

She stands on Luna, o’er her holy brow

A coronet of twelve bright golden stars:

She crieth out and travaileth in pain

To be delivered of the Child of Truth,

Which is, in love, to rule mankind as one,

The one great body in the Spirit CHRIST[156]

Who cometh now a second time to man

Through her who clothes him with a mortal form,

Our Holy Mother in the Living God.

And yet about the woman, as of old,

Damned Satan’s lurks, with seven diadems—

The dragon stands as knowledge of the World,

Which would devour the holy child of God.

But so-called knowledge is not ever true,

Frail mortals know not that the states of Heaven

Permit below themselves the states of Hell

To be—that mortals there may feel the Truth—

The everlasting fire, consuming Self—

Destroying all the former things in man

Through fiery sufferings induced by self,

Through freedom granted by a Loving God.

The Universal King in love ordains

That man shall ever reap the crop he sows,

And so the Woman clothed with the Sun,

Who sows the seed of love amongst mankind,

Shall reap the fruits of love in Heaven—her home—

Where happiness and peace eternal reign,

Wherein the dragon hath no place—no power.

All hail! thou glorious Bride, in Light array’d,

O, woman, clothed with the Bridegroom’s Power,[157]

Arise and shine! The time is now at hand

To change this earth into a heaven bright,

This hell into a paradise of Saints;

Through thee alone can mortals rise from earth

To soar into Eternity—God’s Peace;

Through thee alone can man perceive the light—

The Sun of Wisdom,[158] which shall soon appear

Acknowledged King supreme of all that is,

Which He hath made in love for all mankind.

Woman! behold a groaning world awaits

The crushing of the Serpent’s power through thee;

Look on the fairest cities of this globe,

In misery the love-starved of the earth

Now walk the streets; whilst degradation vile

Confronts them in their daily—hourly lives,

Because mankind will sell itself for gold

To one, who is the prince of hell; he rules

The States of falsehood in this mortal world

Wherein the moaning of tormented souls

Appeals to God[159] in mortal agony

To ease the burdens of their earthly lives

By teaching them of thee, O Queen of Heaven!

* * * * *

Woman, behold the sighing, wretchedness,

Depravity, disease and death on earth!

Pure life has left these mortals who transgress

The laws of God by being of the world;

They know not happiness and peace and thee.

Thou art of nations all, the Saving Health.

Stretch forth thine hands and save, O Queen of Heaven!

* * * * *

Woman! behold the man of war exists

Whose work it is to shed the blood of him

Who truly is a portion of thyself;

Nay more, thine ALL, within this weary state;

The Father of thy loved ones in the flesh!

How long wilt thou permit ungodly strife

To keep thee from thy lawful throne on earth,

The one great Empire that shall bow to thee,

That thou alone can’st rule, Queen of the South?[160]

O, Bride of Heaven, thou knowest well that He—

The Son of Man—thy bridegroom—came to save,

Not to destroy, the lives of men on earth![161]

* * * * *

Great Spirit Love! Bright Queen of Highest Heaven,

Send forth thy potent force, and let it fire

The hearts of all within this little sphere;

Show worldly rulers in their sinful states

That thou alone art Queen of all Mankind;

And in these petty princes of the earth

Destroy, we pray thee, all the mortal lusts

Of self, of gold, and praise, and feeble power,

Implanted in their natures by the one

Who rules them with their subjects in this hell

Created by themselves through ignorance

Of thee, O, Spirit Love, Blest Queen of Heaven!

WM. C. ELDON SERJEANT.

London, 28th January, 1888.

-----

Footnote 153:

See Deut. iv.

Footnote 154:

See Rev. xxi.

Footnote 155:

See Rev. xii.

Footnote 156:

_i.e._, The invisible, universal, and eternal principle which

mortals can only conceive of as the sum total of the combined

spirits of Truth, Love, and Wisdom, when manifested in that “Son

of Man,” or HUMANITY, which is also the “Son of God,” collectively

and individually.

Footnote 157:

In the Kabala, the Bride of the “Heavenly Man,” _Tetragrammaton_,

is Malkuth—the foundation or kingdom. It is our earth, which, when

_regenerated_ and purified (as matter), will be united to her

bridegroom (Spirit). But in Esotericism there are two aspects of

the LOGOS, or the “Father-Son,” which latter becomes his own

father; one is the UNMANIFESTED Eternal, the other the manifested

and periodical LOGOS. The “Bride” of the former is the universe as

nature in the abstract. She is also his “MOTHER”; who, “clothed

with the bridegroom’s power,” gives birth to the manifested

universe (the second _logos_) through her own inherent, mystic

power, and is, therefore, the Immaculate Mother; “the woman

clothed with the sun, and travailing” in child birth, in

Revelation, ch. xii.—ED.

Footnote 158:

See Psalm lxxxiv., 11.

Footnote 159:

_i.e._ The Universal Spirit in whom all things exist and have

being. That Eternal Principle which fills all Space and Time, and

is SPACE and Time (in its abstract sense, as otherwise it would be

an _extra-Cosmic_ God), and is perfect in perfection.

Footnote 160:

See Matt. xii., 42.

Footnote 161:

Luke ix., 56.

-----

------------------

EDITORS’ NOTE.

This second part of the three which form the bulk of the poem

called “Twilight Visions” by their author—from a purely Kabalistic

standpoint of universal symbolical Esotericism, is most

suggestive. Its literary value is apparent. But literary form in

occultism counts for nothing in such mystic writing if its spirit

is sectarian—if the symbolism fails in universal application or

lacks correctness. In this, Part II., however (of the third to

come we can yet say nothing), the Christian-Judæan names may be

altered and replaced by their Sanskrit or Egyptian equivalents,

and the ideas will remain the same. It seems written in the

universal “mystery-language,” and may be readily understood by an

occultist, of whatever school or nationality. Nor will any true

mystic, versed in that international tongue, whose origin is lost

in the dark night of pre-historic ages, fail to recognise a true

Brother, who has adopted the phraseology of the Initiates of the

ancient Judæan Tanaim—Daniel and St. John of the Apocalypse—and

partially that of the Christian Gnostics, only to be the more

readily understood by the profane of Christian lands. Yet the

author means precisely the same thing that would be in the mind of

any Brahminical or Buddhist Initiate, who, while deploring the

present degenerated state of things, would place all his hope in

the transient character of even the _Kali Yuga_, and trust in the

speedy coming of the Kalki Avatar. We say again, the divine

Science and Wisdom—_Theosophia_—is universal and common property,

and the same under every sky. It is the physical type and the

outward appearance in the dress, that make of one individual a

Chinaman and of another a European, and of a third a red-skinned

American. The inner man is one, and all are “Sons of God” by

birth-right.

The editors regret that, by an over-sight, the sub-title, “The

Cross,” that headed Part I. of “Twilight Visions,” published in

our January number, should have been omitted.

THE WHITE MONK.

By the Author of “A Professor of Alchemy.”

(_Continued._)

“Margaret had been in grief so sad and potent since her brother’s

death, that it at last brought her into a fever, from which, with

difficulty, she recovered, and which kept her long to her chamber.

“During this time the monk roamed like a restless spirit, seeming to

seek her, and despairing because he found her not. Giles Hughson

even went so far as to suspect he was no true priest at all, until

he had seen his tonsure. Even then he was drawn into most

sacrilegious surmises by what he beheld some few nights after.

“Having some work to do in Castle Troyes garden, he noted the White

Monk, his lodger, glide noiselessly through the grounds, hidden

behind the thick black walls of yew, and pause under the casement of

Mistress Margaret and stand there listening intently for a certain

space. At last, with a gesture of despair, he slung himself with

infinite agile stillness up some feet of the ivy that covered the

wall, from which insecure footing he did long and earnestly search

if he might see her shadow cross the room. Giles, the gardener,

swore afterwards that the sight of that priest, with his cowl fallen

back from his dark face, and that look of straining, terrified

attention had in it something so partaking of the unearthly, that

for the life of him he dared not accost the daring intruder. ‘Time

enough if there were need,’ he excused himself afterwards, ‘but

Castle Troyes is ever well enow defended, and at that time there

must have been enough of inmates watching over Margaret, the

beautiful, to win her back to life.’

“The horrible recklessness of an act such as this, with the carbines

of a round thirty men within a few yards of him, made the monk seem

to Giles a creature of charmed life, who may not be addressed as

ordinary mortals.

“But the White Monk saw his discoverer when he descended and glided

away again, scared by some noise made by Margaret’s attendants. And

thus there occurred a tragedy, which you shall learn as far as it

was ever known.

“Now Giles Hughson had a young son afflicted with total dumbness,

but whom Mistress Margaret de Troyes had taught to write; and it is

through this scholarship of his that we come to know as much as we

do of what really happened. The White Monk appeared fond of this

boy, possibly because he had seen Margaret kiss him. Thus the lad

had greater access to the monk’s small attic than any other; and

this is the tale he tells of the night after Giles had espied his

lodger clinging to the wall of Castle Troyes.

“The boy had noiselessly, so as not to disturb the often musings of

the solitary one, stepped up the attic stairs to fetch some trifle

he wanted of the monk. Pausing timidly at the door, he beheld the

familiar white-clad figure, with an air of terrible malignity,

mixing some powder of a greenish colour, which, at the sight of the

intruder, he hastily laid aside, thinking it had not been seen.

“But the lad was unnerved by the expression he had caught on the

monk’s face, and he forgot not so lightly.

“At the frugal supper, that very night, he observed the monk ate

even less than was his wont, and of one dish only, the which he also

pressed upon the young lad by his side, seeming to wish to keep the

others from him. The others of the family, Giles Hughson and his

dame, did eat as usual, and were both found dead on the morrow.

“The monk strove to comfort the poor boy by every means in his

power, but it was all of no avail. The lad seized a moment, fled

into the wood, and there wrote down all that he had seen and

suspected, with which account he presently did seek the justices.

These caused proper inquiry into the manner of the deaths of the

workman and his wife to be made, and, finding they had died of

potent poison, instituted careful search for the person of the White

Monk, who had vanished from the cottage.

“At length they found him, in a strange state for one of his way of

living. Into the wood had he gone, but not so far as that he could

hide him. He had stopped beside a little brook, where he had sat

when first he saw fair Margaret, the sister of his victims. There,

even there, was he found, in so deep contemplation that he never

heard his pursuers’ footsteps. He had made a cross of two elder

branches (folk about us say that the elder-wood formed the Cross

whereon Christ died), and having set it on the summit of a bank, was

deep in prayer, as it seemed, before it.

“One of his Italian repentances, I doubt not.

“He seemed in sore distress of mind, and lost to all thought of his

surroundings.

“So they took him; the foreign wild beast, tracked at last. But not

without trouble for he fought like the panther he was. Escaping

lissomely from their hands at the moment when they would have bound

him, the ex-bravo snatched a genuine stiletto from the folds of his

monastic frock and stabbed one man to death, laughing coarsely at

the stupid astonishment of the harquebusiers to see this weapon in

so unseemly a hand.

“He had no chance, being taken thus unawares, and exhaustion came

upon him; so, with tremours, the officers of justice held him fast.

Before the first cord was fastened round his struggling wrists, he

fell back, rigid, in their arms; sighed once or twice, smiled

bitterly to himself at their consternation, and flung his head back,

dead.

“A small quantity of a green powder was found on him (a large dose,

I ween, had killed so hardy a villain!), and by comparing the signs

of death with those of Giles Hughson and his wife, they saw he had

poisoned himself some time within the last five hours. Whether he

had seen Margaret again, and by seeing her upon the earth, had come

to know himself too bad for it; or whether the weariness attendant

upon sins so heavy had worn him out at last, remains a mystery. The

leeches said a man so wasted and wan as this could scarce, in the

way of Nature, have lived many years longer; but I question this,

and so did the men who had so great trouble to hold him!

“News travelled slowly in those days from Italy to England, and it

was not until very shortly after the White Monk’s death that our

town learnt it had harboured Pietro Rinucci, the slayer of the two

good brothers, Ambrose and Gilbert de Troyes. No one ever told

Mistress Margaret that she had spoken with such a man. And now the

beautiful maiden rose from her bed, and asked for her mostly costly

gowns, of amber, blue and rosy colours; and went amongst her friends

brightly, wreathed with pearls and radiant in smiles. She was

thought to have recovered, though she looked ethereal as a daisy or

white cloud; but she said and averred that she was dying, and that

her brother Ambrose had appeared to her in a vision, bidding her

make all speed to do what remained to her upon the earth and be soon

ready, when he should come behind the angels to fetch her hence. Her

kinsfolk thought she wandered in her mind. She asked for the man who

had wooed her, and held long speech with him, very merrily, and yet

with tears; beseeching him to pause e’er he rashly threw away his

life on this earth, since we know not in the beginning, whither our

pleasant sins may carry us, and when we have no enjoyment of them,

save by memory, what are they to us? The instruments of our present

ruin.

“‘All this,’ said the lovely Margaret with a smile, ‘hath right off,

my Lord, been heard, by you and others; but from a lady’s lips (and

that lady who is even now bent to consider the past failings of her

own life, soon to be taken from her) it hath been made evident to

me, these poor oft-repeated words shall have some power. God bless

you, my Lord—farewell.’

“The gentleman came out from her boudoir exceeding sobered, and

essaying as he might to conceal his tears.

“The words of this dying angel—for so indeed she seemed—he vowed

should be as a challenge to him from God to purify his ways. And

indeed from that day the gentleman made such progress in godliness

as can be made by one of his complexion.

“And now a strange and terrible portent was observed.

“Those who watched by the Lady Margaret, began to see a vision, and

of that most dreaded being, the White Monk!

“Night or day, it mattered not; with a chill like to that of Death

itself, the horrified watchers knew the presence of the phantom. In

the dark corners of the room would shape themselves dimly the

features of the murderer, Rinucci, and his monastic gown, so glaring

white in its dimness through the dark that the eye could not search

it, and gone, ever gone, if some bold spirit neared the spot where

he had thought he saw it.

“No one said aught of this to the Lady Margaret, in fear to fright

her; and she alone, of all who watched, did never see nor feel the

constant presence. It seemed sometimes as though the phantom yearned

to make itself visible to her kind, half-divine eyes, but her

thoughts were too high-set for it to be given her to see a sight so

horrible.

“She was much upheld by visions then—her contemplative soul shaped

to itself many fair sights and sounds that others knew not. Sitting

by the open casement in her sun-coloured gown, with white arms,

pearl encircled, leaning out, and her smile ever brighter as she

murmured to herself, she would stretch far over the lattice and

grasp at rosy clouds, which she said floated past her in the peopled

air. She would reply, still leaning out and smiling, to what she

vowed was said to her by wandering happy spirits. And all this

while, behind her, there would stand the White Mystery, with slight

hand lifting the cowl from a face whose eyes were as deep as death

and more despairing.

“Small marvel that the murderer’s ghost should cling to our saint

while she yet lived on earth! He may have known that, once dead,

restored to Heaven, she would thenceforth move in worlds where such

as he should never have the force to breathe.

“And in her due hour she died; and after that for a space no one saw

aught of the dread ghost. His spirit, drawn by some power to enter

our house, wherein was held all he knew of goodness, had now no

further business there, for a while. His loathed name, fraught with

horror to your ancestors’ home, was now never spoken. It was

thought, doubtless, that since Margaret de Troyes—the innocent

avenger—had unwittingly caused the murderer’s death, the house he

had so deeply injured was for ever free from his godless presence.

And, indeed, for a while, the chronicles are silent respecting him.

The next two generations were happy, and no great misfortune blasted

the house. But in the third generation there were harsh feuds in the

city, and much bloodshed, and several of your name came to violent

and sometimes mysterious ends. Then it was that there arose a

searching into past traditions to discover the secret of a certain

white spectre said to appear about the castle previous to each

calamity. Not all saw it; but still it grew known, and it bore a

marked resemblance to an ancient portrait—hung up for curiosity’s

sake—of Pietro Rinucci.

“Well, young master, I myself served your grandfather, and I myself

can bear witness to the presence of the White Monk’s ghost on one of

the shrewd moments of the family destinies. Wilt hear it? So your

father was then a stalwart young man, away at the wars in Spain.

Your uncles, two blithe young gallants, were at home at the time I

speak of, and there was some merry-making toward in the castle.

Myself was seeing to the torches in the garden, when I chanced to

see your uncle, Geoffrey de Troyes, come hastily into the yew-walk

with his rapier drawn, followed by another youth whom I knew well,

his rival, and in some sort, his enemy.

“As the guests danced within, these nobles fought without. A man

dared not have interposed; it was matter of life and death to them,

and they were there to prove it.

“I was glad, as I stood on the further side the hedge, to mark the

vigour and the skill of our Geoffrey. Methought the vantage was with

him, and with my whole heart I hated his opponent, the cold, selfish

Ernle Deane, and wished him to succumb.

“And so, by mine honour, he should have done, for my boy was the

pride of us all for swordsmanship; but it was not to be.

“Geoffrey de Troyes never suffered more from his mortal wound than I

did in my heart and my pride, as I led him, bleeding piteously to

this very stable-room, where he sank on the hay and said he must

die.

“‘Look to it,’ groaned the poor young noble, as he lay dying, ‘that

Mistress Beatrice Savile has this token from me—my gold chain—warn

her from me when I am dead, that she wed not Ernle Deane—he is bad

to the core, and she is too good to mend him. Oh! but for that

hateful vision!’

“‘What vision, a God’s name?’ I cried.

“And he told me trembling—he who had never trembled of his whole

life!—that even at the moment when he had thought to subdue his

enemy—even as he raised his sword to strike home to a worthless

heart—even then had his arm fallen paralysed and a frightful shiver

quite unmanned him at the sight of a poor monk in white, who stood

some yards away, and raised his cowl with a thin white hand, and

fixed unearthly eyes upon him with a steadfast look that drew the

soul away from the deadliest earthly peril.

“‘And so I fell!’ cried the shamed noble, crimsoning though the

pallor of exhaustion. ‘_I_—a practised hand, a not unworthy

courage—a De Troyes! I fell—for this!—and so would any man have

fallen,’ he defiantly ended, ‘for ’twas a devil—’twas Pietro Rinucci

himself, who came from hell to lure me from my hopes of earthly

happiness. O, life! O, Beatrice!’

“And I nursed him and wept over him like any woman, whilst one

young, bright life more departed,

“In truth, young master,” ended honest Ralph, “the noble Geoffrey

may have been deceived, and fancied this; but, you shall pardon me,

I would rather think that armies of devils nightly march these

grounds than that one De Troyes was ever seen to quail, save under

magic! Thus it is that I, and that many of us yet believe in the

spectre of Pietro Rinucci, ‘the White Monk.’”

Oh these faithful servitors, they would die for us children of the

house, I believe, and yet they have ever this curious bent to

terrify the childish minds. I know not when it was precisely that I

thus first heard the White Monk’s story, but this I know, I was

young enough to sit with my clenched fistlets supporting my chin,

and my eyes and mouth very wide open.

“And was he always in _white_, that fearful man?” I asked, somewhere

toward the middle of the story. “_Always in white?_” I know not why,

but this detail struck my child’s phantasy more powerfully than all

the rest; _this_ was awful, this was the pith of the whole matter,

and from that moment I sat trembling, and drinking in the history

with reluctant suspense, until it became the bane of my life for a

term of years.

For hours I lay shuddering ofttimes in my bed, dreading with my body

and my soul lest the Monk should appear to me! And never had I

courage to speak of this to anyone of the many loving house mates

who would so promptly have put an end to my fears by leaving me no

more alone at night. There is a keen, hard honour for children to

maintain, and to them the confession of nocturnal terror is as

flight to the soldier. So, as the banquet sped its course below, I

shuddered lonely in my bed in the oaken room, often weeping angrily

amidst my fears because I alone, the only son of the house, was the

only soul in it left desolate.

A little later I was comforted in some sort by my baby sister

Margaret, who was put to sleep in an adjacent cot, and being too

tiny for Fear to reach, would sleep secure, all gold and white in

the dusky gleam of our rushlight—the one oasis of hope throughout

the terrible oaken room. Yet she in her turn, became a source of

fear to me. Should the Monk appear, and should the dire extremity

cause me to shriek, what would become of Marguerite? She would die

of sudden terror. Worse—if he should stand by her bedside, raising

his cowl off the awful face, and her blue eyes should open at that

instant? How should I protect her?

But before I wander further, I must begin straight and tell how we

lived, and where, and to what end.

PERCY ROSS.

(_To be continued._)

AN AUTO-HYPNOTIC RHAPSODY.

“_When all desires_ that dwell in the heart _cease, then the mortal

becomes immortal, and obtains Brahman_.

_When all the fetters of the heart_ here on earth _are broken_;

_When all that bind us to_ this life _is undone, then the mortal

becomes immortal—here my teaching ends_.”

—KATHA UPANISHAD.

I (Âtman) have crossed the sea—I have reached the other shore—I have

triumphed over gravitation, my soul is in the sun-currents, moving

sunwards with the sun.

Where the currents are bearing me to I scarcely know, but yet

something has been revealed.

I died the mystical death, I was received by the Dawn-Maidens—the

bright ones of the eternal twilights, the two bright Ushas, Ahana

and Antigone, Isis, and Nephtys of Aanru.[162]

-----

Footnote 162:

_Aanru_ is the celestial field where the defunct’s soul received

wheat and corn, growing therein _seven cubits high_. (See “Book of

the Dead,” 124 _et seq._)—ED.

-----

The Ahana-Aurora of Eternity laid me asleep on her bosom, giving me

_amrita_[163] to drink, as Hebe gave to Herakles, and then I at once

knew that I (_Atman_) was immortal; the Mask of Personality had

fallen to earth, the Âtma was revealed—my true SELF—I knew my name,

and found myself soaring sunwards. Then the Voice of that DAWN said,

“I give you the ‘Amrita’ of the cessation of deaths,” and her lips

burning with sun-ardours, kissed my forehead, and said, “I bring you

to the sun; when blind—on earth, that Sanskara of sorrow—you fancied

your sun was nothing but a great centre of physical force—light and

heat, and their equivalents; but it was Maya, the Earth-Queen of

illusions, who thus deceived your earth eyes. Look now, and you can

see nothing but a vast group of mighty spirit-wills clustered round

a yet mightier Spirit centre, drawing from thence inspiration, and

ever-radiating sun effluxes, for the good and advancement of those

unhappy lower wills yet sunk in the earth. What you called light was

intelligence, and heat was—love. Did not Koré suggest this to you, O

my weak child, for she, too, was one of the Ushas, a Maiden of the

Dawn, kindling your soul to love?”

-----

Footnote 163:

_Amrita_ (immortal) applied to the Soma juice, and called the

“Water of Life.”—ED.

-----

I was silent to this question, for a dread sorrow clung to me.

“Though” (began again the Voice) “the sun-souls attract the

earth-souls, the lost ones, for a while, to bring them up to

themselves by the path that leads to Nirvana[164] ‘where there is no

sorrow’; yet the sun-groups of Spirits are themselves attracted by a

grander centre of force, and the Sun, with his planet-children, are

speeding in a mighty orbit round a far mightier Soul-centre—the lost

Pleiad—lost on earth to be found in Heaven. Dost thou not hear the

solemn music of that tempest flight?” And then she touched my ears,

and I heard the myriad voiced song of the blessed ones as they

passed on rejoicing, and the Voice continued: “That lost Pleiad, the

dove-woman, the ‘Woman Clothed with the Sun,’ who, as Jeremiah

prophesied, should ‘compass man,’ is that eternal womanhood which

attracts all men.” And the chorus of the psalm I heard them sing, as

they passed on Pleiad-ward, was “Freedom and Love—Love in Bi-unity.

The Two in One foretold has come even to earth.” And the souls in

that Pleiad-world are infinite in number as the sands of the seas of

countless worlds, elective affinities attract like to like, forming

celestial choirs, each member of which breathes the akasian air

synchronously with the other, and what you call in your

earth-symbol-language their “hearts,” beat and throb in unison

together as one heart, and thus become coalesced in, and by, love.

-----

Footnote 164:

This is a doctrine of the Visishtadwaita sect of the Vedantins.

The _Jiva_ (spiritual life principle, the living _Monad_) of one

who attained Moksha or Nirvana, “breaks through the Brahmarandra

and goes to _Suryamandala_ (the region of the sun) through the

Solar rays. Then it goes, through a dark spot in the Sun, to

Paramapeda to which it is directed by the Supreme Wisdom acquired

by _Yoga_, and helped thereinto by the _Devas_ (gods) called

Archis, the “Flames,” or Fiery Angels, answering to the Christian

archangels.—ED.

-----

“Listen, O my child, to the music of their breathing,” and I said,

“Is Koré there?” Then I heard voices in Heaven, and I began to

breathe the interior akasa breath synchronously with her—our breaths

became one, I was mingled with, and melted in her; and lo! a great

mystery! that Dawn-maiden changed to Koré, and Koré gave me the

amrita of the Pleiad, and I knew that our biune love was immortal.

I have passed over the deep waters, I am free, I have infinite peace

and infinite joy, at rest for ever.

Have I not, like Herakles, slept on the bosom of Athéné, breathing

the wisdom of her breaths? I, too, breathe internally akasian

love-breaths, I live in the love-choirs of the Pleiad Sun, I am in

the true Nirvana, where there is no sorrow and no desire, for desire

is lost in an ever-abiding and eternal fruition. The Lotus has

bloomed in the Sun-fire,[165] and my soul is newborn in the pure

white calyx, and floats down the golden waters that wash the eternal

shores. I have found the “Path,” “suffering, and the cause of

suffering” (separation from the loved one) have been seen, and have

passed away, whilst we ever rise and pass onwards by the star-paths.

I am no more blind, but, like Orion of old, gazing eastwards on that

rising sun, the red flush of whose dawn is ever blushing in our

central souls. I have received my sight.—OM....

A. J. C.

Lucerne.

-----

Footnote 165:

_Vide_ Legend of Jyotishka, mentioned in “Life of Buddha from the

Bkah-Hgyur.”

-----

---

Since writing the foregoing, A. J. C. has met with the following

note contained in Mr. Edwin Arnold’s interesting essay, “Death and

Afterwards,” which throws light on the views in said Rhapsody: “That

which safely bears our ‘solid world’ in the gulfs of space is no

base or basis, no moveless central rock, but _throbbing energies_ in

complex and manifold action, _in swing and wave and thrill_;

whirling us onward in mighty sweeps of three-fold rythm _to which

our hearts are set_. So therefore not solidity of base in fixity of

status is our supreme and vital need, but moving _power beyond our

ken or senses_; known to us in _energising action_, and working

through blue ‘void’; impelling us in rings of spiral orbit round a

moving sun in which we are dependent.”

The same book contains Walt Whitman’s beautiful and striking poem on

Death, in which the poet says:

“Have none chanted for thee a chant of fullest welcome?”

Yes, one other, the writer of the foregoing Rhapsody, has attempted

a song in praise of Death the deliverer, and the Italian poet,

Leopardi, stated in beautiful verse years ago that the world had two

good things in it—Love and Death.

“Due belle cose ho il mondo

L’amor e la Morte”...

----------

OUR OTHER HALF.

When our ancient brethren, the Kabalists, Jewish as well as

Oriental, taught that the divine monad, starting on its long journey

from the bosom of the Infinite One was divided into halves, they had

a double meaning, one exoteric, the other esoteric. The exoteric

one, being that the two halves, swept through cycles upon cycles of

time, in search of each other; and, that, when they finally met, in

a perfect union, or marriage, the two halves became one on earth,

and after death, united again. The true explanation, however, the

esoteric one, is, that each and every one of us, contains within

himself, both the halves: the feminine predominating through some

incarnations, the masculine through others. It adds that, when we

evolute into the perfect being, the Adept, the Mahatma, both

principles are in perfect harmony. Or, as the Kabalists have

recorded it, harmony is in equilibrium, and equilibrium exists by

the analogy of contraries. How often we discern in the most

masculine of men, distinct feminine traits of character, and _vice

versa_, in the gentlest of the fair sex, discover masculine traits.

The Jewish Kabbalists represented these two principles in the

letters forming their Ineffable Name. Its first three characters

mean Eve, or Eva, or Hâyah היה or woman, or by another reading it

means mother, and is, in fact, the proper name as given in Genesis

for Eve, “the mother of all living.” Adding the character י Yodh or

Yah, the male, the number one, the masculine, we have Jehovah, or

Jah-eve, or being as male-female, the perfect number—10, symbolised

by the Sephirothal Adam Kadmon.

A few evenings ago, while pondering on this subject, in a room

devoted to occult research, where an Eastern incense burning with a

ruddy glow on the triangular-shaped altar, sent its refreshing

fragrance through the apartment, my outer senses were lulled, and

the inner ones came into play, and I became conscious of my other

“half.” I saw standing before me, a being, whom I had hitherto

considered as my guardian angel stretching out her hands to me, and

saying—“my beloved one, know thy-_self_.”

The fire on the altar burnt low. The north-east wind, which had been

blowing in furious gusts outside, lashing the bosom of the lake into

white foam, died away, sounding like some far distant choral chant.

An unearthly silence ensued, and seemed to pervade the infinitudes

of space. A thousand voices spoke to me, saying, “Man, know

thyself.” Shadowy, ghostly forms filled the apartment. One, more

distinct than the rest, tall in form, clad in a long flowing garment

of pure white, the long black hair falling in curly locks over his

shoulders, the silky beard reaching to his waist, the light of

centuries of centuries gleaming forth from his dark eyes—extended

his right hand toward me. A thrill of unutterable delight passed

through my being. Slowly I emerged from my earthly casket, looked

for an instant at its sleeping form, then felt irresistibly drawn to

the fair being, who still stood with outstretched hands, and seemed

to lose myself in her. The twain had become one. The mystic union

had taken place. For a few brief moments I realized the

possibilities of _jnânayoga_, the wisdom-power of the adepts. Space

was annihilated. I could see systems upon systems of worlds,

galaxies of stars, suns and systems of suns, whirling through space.

I thought of some distant place, and I was there. Complex problems

solved themselves quite naturally: I had become all THOUGHT....

The extended hand of the tall form flashed before my eyes, and I

became unconscious. When I awoke, I found lying on the altar a

full-blown white rose. The north-east wind was again roaring in

fierce gusts, the fire on the altar had died out. The mirrors had

draped themselves with their curtains of black. The two interlaced

triangles had merged into a circle, of pure gold in colour. Once

more I took upon myself my objective life. But I had solved the

problem which has taken me seven years to solve. I was content....

“BERTRAND STONEX,” F.T.S.

[Illustration: decorative separator]

THE THREE DESIRES.

The first three of the numbered rules of “Light on the Path” must

appear somewhat of an unequal character to bracket together. The

sense in which they follow each other is purely spiritual. Ambition

is the highest point of personal activity reached by the mind, and

there is something noble in it, even to an Occultist. Having

conquered the desire to stand above his fellows, the restless

aspirant, in seeking what his personal desires are, finds the thirst

for life stand next in his way. For all that are ordinarily classed

as desires have long since been subjugated, passed by, or forgotten,

before this pitched battle of the soul is begun. The desire for life

is entirely a desire of the spirit, not mental at all; and in facing

it a man begins to face his own soul. But very few have even

attempted to face it; still fewer can guess at all at its meaning.

The connection between ambition and the desire of life is of this

kind. Men are seldom really ambitious in whom the animal passions

are strong. What is taken for ambition in men of powerful physique

is more often merely the exercise of great energy in order to obtain

full gratification of all physical desires. Ambition pure and simple

is the struggle of the mind upwards, the exercise of a native

intellectual force which lifts a man altogether above his peers. To

rise—to be preeminent in some special manner, in some department of

art, science, or thought, is the keenest longing of delicate and

highly-tuned minds. It is quite a different thing from the thirst

for knowledge which makes of a man a student always—a learner to the

end, however great he may become. Ambition is born of no love for

anything for its own sake, but purely for the sake of oneself. “It

is I that will know, I that will rise, and by my own power.”

“Cromwell, I charge thee, fling away ambition;

By that sin fell the angels.”

The place-seeking for which the word was originally used, differs in

degree, not in kind, from that more abstract meaning now generally

attached to it. A poet is considered ambitious when he writes for

fame. It is true; so he is. He may not be seeking a place at court,

but he is certainly seeking the highest place he knows of. Is it

conceivable that any great author could really be anonymous, and

remain so? The human mind revolts against the theory of the Baconian

authorship of Shakespeare’s works, not only because it deprives the

world of a splendid figure, but also because it makes of Bacon a

monster, unlike all other human beings. To the ordinary intelligence

it is inconceivable that a man should hide his light in this

purposeless manner. Yet it is conceivable to an occultist that a

great poet might be inspired by one greater than himself, who would

stand back entirely from the world and all contact with it. This

inspirer would not only have conquered ambition but also the

abstract desire for life, before he could work vicariously to so

great an extent. For he would part with his work for ever when once

it had gone to the world; it would never be his. A person who can

imagine making no claim on the world, neither desiring to take

pleasure from it nor to give pleasure to it, can dimly apprehend the

condition which the occultist has reached when he no longer desires

to live. Do not suppose this to mean that he neither takes nor gives

pleasure; he does both, as also he lives. A great man, full of work

and thought, eats his food with pleasure; he does not dwell on the

prospect of it, and linger over the memory, like the gluttonous

child, or the gourmand pure and simple. This is a very material

image, yet sometimes these simple illustrations serve to help the

mind more than any others. It is easy to see, from this analogy,

that an advanced occultist who has work in the world may be

perfectly free from the desires which would make him a part of it,

and yet may take its pleasures and give them back with interest. He

is enabled to give more pleasure than he takes, because he is

incapable of fear or disappointment. He has no dread of death, nor

of that which is called annihilation. He rests on the waters of

life, submerged and sleeping, or above them and conscious,

indifferently. He cannot feel disappointment, because although

pleasure is to him intensely vivid and keen, it is the same to him

whether he enjoys it himself or whether another enjoys it. It is

pleasure, pure and simple, untarnished by personal craving or

desire. So with regard to what occultists call “progress”—the

advance from stage to stage of knowledge. In a school of any sort in

the external world emulation is the great spur to progress. The

occultist, on the contrary, is incapable of taking a single step

until he has acquired the faculty of realizing progress as an

abstract fact. Someone must draw nearer to the Divine in every

moment of life; there must always be progress. But the disciple who

desires that he shall be the one to advance in the next moment, may

lay aside all hope of it. Neither should he be conscious of

preferring progress for another or of any kind of vicarious

sacrifice. Such ideas are in a certain sense unselfish, but they are

essentially characteristic of the world in which separateness

exists, and form is regarded as having a value of its own. The shape

of a man is as much an _eidolon_ as though no spark of divinity

inhabited it; at any moment that spark may desert the particular

shape, and we are left with a substantial shadow of the man we knew.

It is in vain, after the first step in occultism has been taken,

that the mind clings to the old beliefs and certainties. Time and

space are known to be non-existent, and are only regarded as

existing in practical life for the sake of convenience. So with the

separation of the divine-human spirit into the multitudes of men on

the earth. Roses have their own colours, and lilies theirs; none can

tell why this is when the same sun, the same light, gives the colour

to each. Nature is indivisible. She clothes the earth, and when that

clothing is torn away, she bides her time and re-clothes it again

when there is no more interference with her. Encircling the earth

like an atmosphere, she keeps it always glowing and green, moistened

and sun-lit. The spirit of man encompasses the earth like a fiery

spirit, living on Nature, devouring her, sometimes being devoured by

her, but always in the mass remaining more ethereal and sublime than

she is. In the individual, man is conscious of the vast superiority

of Nature; but when once he becomes conscious that he is part of an

indivisible and indestructible whole, he knows also that the whole

of which he is part stands above nature. The starry sky is a

terrible sight to a man who is just self-less enough to be aware of

his own littleness and unimportance as an individual; it almost

crushes him. But let him once touch on the power which comes from

knowing himself as part of the human spirit, and nothing can crush

him by its greatness. For if the wheels of the chariot of the enemy

pass over his body, he forgets that it is his body, and rises again

to fight among the crowd of his own army. But this state can never

be reached, nor even approached, until the last of the three desires

is conquered, as well as the first. They must be apprehended and

encountered together.

Comfort, in the language used by occultists, is a very comprehensive

word. It is perfectly useless for a neophyte to practise discomfort

or asceticism as do religious fanatics. He may come to prefer

deprivation in the end, and then it has become his comfort.

Homelessness is a condition to which the religious Brahmin pledges

himself; and in the external religion he is considered to fulfil

this pledge if he leaves wife and child, and becomes a begging

wanderer, with no shelter of his own to return to. But all external

forms of religion are forms of comfort, and men take vows of

abstinence in the same spirit that they take pledges of boon

companionship. The difference between these two sides of life is

only apparent. But the homelessness which is demanded of the

neophyte is a much more vital thing than this. It demands the

surrender from him of choice or desire. Dwelling with wife and

child, under the shelter of a familiar roof-tree, and fulfilling the

duties of citizenship, the neophyte may be far more homeless, in the

esoteric sense, than when he is a wanderer or an outcast. The first

lesson in practical occultism usually given to a pledged disciple is

that of fulfilling the duties immediately to hand with the same

subtle mixture of enthusiasm and indifference as the neophyte would

imagine himself able to feel when he had grown to the size of a

ruler of worlds and a designer of destinies. This rule is to be

found in the Gospels and in the Bhagavad Gita. The immediate work,

whatever it may be, has the abstract claim of duty, and its relative

importance or non-importance is not to be considered at all. This

law can never be obeyed until all desire of comfort is for ever

destroyed. The ceaseless assertions and re-assertions of the

personal self must be left behind for ever. They belong as

completely to the character of this world as does the desire to have

a certain balance at the bank, or to retain the affections of a

loved person. They are equally subject to the change which is

characteristic of this world; indeed, they are even more so, for

what the neophyte does by becoming a neophyte is simply to enter a

forcing-house. Change, disillusionment, disheartenment, despair will

crowd upon him by invitation; for his wish is to learn his lessons

quickly. And as he turns these evils out they will probably be

replaced by others worse than themselves—a passionate longing for

separate life, for sensation, for the consciousness of growth in his

own self, will rush in upon him and sweep over the frail barriers

which he has raised. And no such barriers as asceticism, as

renunciation, nothing indeed which is negative, will stand for a

single moment against this powerful tide of feeling. The only

barrier is built up of new desires. For it is perfectly useless for

the neophyte to imagine he can get beyond the region of desires. He

cannot; he is still a man, Nature must bring forth flowers while she

is still Nature, and the human spirit would loose its hold on this

form of existence altogether did it not continue to desire. The

individual man cannot wrench himself instantly out of that life of

which he is an essential part. He can only change his position in

it. The man whose intellectual life dominates his animal life,

changes his position; but he is still in the dominion of desire. The

disciple who believes it possible to become selfless in a single

effort, will find himself flung into a bottomless pit as the

consequence of his rash endeavour. Seize upon a new order of

desires, purer, wider, nobler; and so plant your foot upon the

ladder firmly. It is only on the last and topmost rung of the

ladder, at the very entrance upon Divine or Mahatmic life, that it

is possible to hold fast to that which has neither substance or

existence.

The first part of “Light on the Path” is like a chord in

music; the notes have to be struck together though they must

be touched separately. Study and seize hold of the new desires

before you have thrust out the old ones; otherwise in the

storm you will be lost. Man while he is man has substance and

needs some step to stand on, some idea to cling to. But let it

be the least possible. Learn as the acrobat learns, slowly and

with care, to become more independent. Before you attempt to

cast out the devil of ambition—the desire of something,

however fine and elevated, outside of yourself,—seize on the

desire to find the light of the world within yourself. Before

you attempt to cast out the desire of conscious life, learn to

look to the unattainable or in other language to that which

you know you can only reach in unconsciousness. In knowing

that your aim is of this lofty character, that it will never

bring conscious success, never bring comfort to you, that it

will never carry you _in your own temporary personal self_ to

any haven of rest or place of agreeable activity, you cut away

all the force and power of the desires of the lower astral

nature. For what avail is it, when these facts have been once

realised, to desire separateness, sensation or growth?

The armour of the warrior who rises to fight for you in the battle

depicted in the second part of “Light on the Path,” is like the

shirt of the happy man in the old story. The king was to be cured of

all his ills by sleeping in this shirt; but when the one happy man

in his kingdom was found, he was a beggar, without care, without

anxiety—and shirtless. So with the divine warrior. None can take his

armour and use it, for he has none. The king could never find

happiness like that of the careless beggar. The man of the world,

however fine and cultivated he may be, is hampered by a thousand

thoughts and feelings which have to be cast aside before he can even

stand on the threshold of occultism. And, be it observed, he is

chiefly handicapped by the armour he wears, which isolates him. He

has personal pride, personal respect. These things must die out as

the personality recedes. The process described in the first part of

“Light on the Path,” is one which takes off that shell, or armour,

and casts it aside for ever. Then the warrior arises, armourless,

defenceless, offenceless, identified with the afflicters and the

afflicted, the angered and the one that angers; fighting not on any

side, but for the Divine, the highest in all.

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GOLDEN SENTENCES OF DEMOCRITUS.

It is beautiful to impede an unjust man; but if this be not

possible, it is beautiful not to act in conjunction with him.

Sin should be abstained from, not through fear, but, for the sake of

the becoming.

Many who have not learnt to argue rationally, still live according

to reason.

Vehement desires about any one thing render the soul blind with

respect to other things.

The equal is beautiful in everything, but excess and defect to me do

not appear to be so.

It is the property of a divine intellect to be always intently

thinking about the beautiful.

THE RELATION OF COLOUR TO THE INTERLACED

TRIANGLES, OR THE PENTACLE.[166]

-----

Footnote 166:

A paper read before the Chicago Branch of the Theosophical

Society, by its Secretary, M. L. Brainard.

-----

Colour registers grades of vibration. Vibration registers grades of

life. Life, esoterically considered, is ascent towards its

source—the great First Cause, the celestial sun which lights

universal creation.

If a ray of white light is passed through a triangular piece of

glass, called a prism, it becomes separated into the seven colours

known as the “solar spectrum.” Careful scientific analysis has

proven that these colours are produced by different rates of

vibration.

It has shown that the slowest vibrations are red, the quickest

violet. The red ray of the spectrum gives 477 millions of millions

(or billions) of vibrations in a second, the orange 506, the yellow

535, the green 577, the blue 622, Indigo 658, and violet 699.

Thus there is a regular ascent in the colour-scale from red to

violet, and the trans-violet rays go on octaves higher, becoming

invisible to the physical eye as their rates of vibration increase.

It has also been discovered that these seven prismatic rays of the

solar spectrum correspond to the seven notes on the musical scale,

the ray of slowest vibration, red, being a correlate of the base

note of the musical gamut, and the violet ray answering to the

highest musical note.

When the vibrations exceed a certain limit, the tympanum of the ear

has not time to recoil before a succeeding impulse arrives, and it

remains motionless. Darkness and silence are, therefore, equivalents

for the cessation of vibrations on the retina of the eye and

tympanum of the ear respectively. Incidentally it may be stated that

cold is also considered to be the cessation of vibrations through

the nerves of feeling.

Colour, therefore, is to light what pitch is to sound—both depend on

length of vibrations.

The thought will immediately suggest itself in this connection that

if colour and music are thus correlated, the perfect clairvoyant

might _see_ a concert as well as hear it. This is true, and there

are instances on record of such transcendent views. In one case of

this kind, it was not alone a poetical play of colour springing into

life under the touch of a German professor’s hands, but a host of

airy sprites clothed in the various rays which called them forth.

_Isis_ declares that “sounds and colours are all spiritual numerals;

and as the seven prismatic rays proceed from one spot in Heaven, so

the seven powers of Nature, each of them a number, are the seven

radiations of the unity, the central spiritual sun.”[167]

-----

Footnote 167:

“ISIS UNVEILED,” Vol 1., p. 514.

-----

It is easy to follow along the lines of these suggestions, and trace

the origin of chanting the seven vowels to one of their gods, among

the Egyptians, as a hymn of praise at sunrise. In the so-called

mythical Golden Age this must have been the mode of putting

themselves _en rapport_ or _in tune_ with the Cosmic powers, and

ensuring harmony while the vibrations were synchronous.

The third necessary correlation to be considered in this analysis is

that of form. Scientific research has proven that not only are music

and colour due to rates of vibration, but form also marshals itself

into objective being in obedience to the same mysterious law. This

is demonstrated by the familiar experiment of placing some dry sand

on a square of glass, and drawing a violin bow across the edge.

Under the influence of this intonation, the sand assumes star shapes

of perfect proportion; if other material is placed on the square of

glass at the same time, other shapes are assumed, varying in

proportion to the power resident in the atoms to _respond_ to the

vibrations communicated.

It is noticeable, however, that the vibration makes the spaces, and

the sand falls into the _rest_ places.

We have now discovered a triangular key—light, music, form—which

will disclose to us the exact relations which colour sustains to the

interlaced triangles, the six-rayed star, universal symbol of

creative force acting upon matter.[168] This triangular key is

simply three modes of one being, three differential expressions of

one force—vibration.

-----

Footnote 168:

Hence in Kabalistic symbolism the _pentacle_, or the six-pointed

star, is the sign of the _manifested_ “Logos,” or the “Heavenly

man,” the Tetragrammaton. “The four-lettered Adni (_Adonai_, “the

Lord”), is the _Eheieh_ (the symbol of _life_ or existence), is

the Lord of the six limbs (6 Sephiroth) and his Bride (_Malkuth_,

or physical nature, also Earth) is his seventh limb.” (Ch. _Book

of Numbers_ viii. 3-4.)—ED.

-----

That which causes the vibration we can only represent by the

Ineffable Name, behind which burns the quenchless glory of En Soph,

the Boundless.

Thus, in our symbology we start from the centre of a circle, which

should be represented by white light.

The seven rays issuing therefrom, must first pass through the

interior and invisible triangle of Akasa, the prism A.U.M., before

they can flow outward, and by their action upon chaos, wheel the

myriad forms of physical life into consonance with their rates of

vibration. In this manner is the visible formulated from the

invisible. By such subtle music is born the gorgeous flora of our

tropics, drinking its wealth of colour from the yellow and warm rays

of the sunlight; and in accord with the same harmony is produced the

subdued vegetation of colder climes. The blue and violet beams carry

the quick pulses of the parent flame deep within the earth, and

by-and-bye she gives back that which she has received, transformed

into a thousand brilliant hues woven in the magic loom of Love,

presided over by the solar spectrum. Or, as Egyptian myth phrases

it, Osiris (the sun) weds Isis (the earth), and the child,

Horus-Apollo, glorifies all things as the product of this divine

union.

The culmination of light resides in the yellow ray, and hence to

that colour is given the East point in our symbolised centre of

radiation.[169] The others follow in the order of the solar

spectrum.

-----

Footnote 169:

It is the secret of the great reverence shown in the East for this

colour. It is the colour of the _Yogi_ dress in India, and of the

_Gelupka_ sect (“Yellow caps”) in Thibet. It symbolizes _pure

blood_ and sunlight, and is called “the stream of life.” Red, as

its opposite, is the colour of the _Dugpas_, and black

magicians.—ED.

-----

But it is noticeable in this connection, that _in_ that order, the

coarsest and warmest of the visible rays—red—is placed next to the

coldest and most refined ray, the violet. Here we have the analogy

of contraries. The ray of lowest refrangibility and the ray of

highest refrangibility become next-door neighbours in the divergent

circle of necessity. What is the result? It is not hard to discover,

when we know that the cooling colours are essential to the balanced

action of the thermal rays. “A small amount of blue when combined

with other rays will even increase the heat, because it kindles into

activity its opposite warm principle, red, through chemical

affinity.”

Having determined the law which should govern the symbology of

colours at the centre of our circle, we come next to the interlaced

triangles.

The truly Theosophical Pentacle should be made by the interlacing of

a white triangle with a black triangle—the white representing pure

spirit, the black, gross matter. This is the true symbology, for the

reason that white reflects all colours, and black absorbs all

colours. It is the face of the White Ancient looking into the face

of the Black Ancient.

Absolute blackness appears to give back nothing; nor does it ever,

save through processes of slow evolution, wrought by continued

vibration upon its molecules from the Divine Centre of Light.

Continuous vibration polarizes these particles, so that at last

rising from the lowest grade of refrangibility to the highest, into

the invisible octaves of being, our planetary chain in its

culmination will reach a point where every atom will give an

answering thrill of resonance to the throbbing of the heart of the

Universe—the Central Spiritual Sun.

As every substance in Nature has its colour, so the human family

publish their grades of advancement to the clairvoyant eye by their

astral colours; and seekers after the true Light may know what “ray”

they are in, by a comparison of their own auras with the colours of

the overshadowing soul.

The middle rays of the solar spectrum—blue, green, and yellow—give a

very powerful triangle, a wonderful _working_ triangle of forces;

for green is Hermetic silver, yellow is Hermetic gold, and blue is a

despatch-messenger from the “Lord of the Worlds,” Jupiter.

The blue and the yellow of this group, on account of their

position—the third and the fifth reckoned both ways—have been chosen

as the colours of our incense-holders, alternating on the points of

the Pentacle. As odours are also correlated with colours, and as

sandal-wood is the perfume which belongs to the sun, we use that

incense to intensify the vibrations from the radiating points, in

order to increase the volume of accord which will reach other

centres at a distance; for the akasa is more sensitive than an

Eolian harp—it registers the very aroma of our thoughts. It was,

therefore, no exaggeration of the poet when he said:

“Guard well thy thought:

Our thoughts are _heard_ in Heaven.”

But if colours and sounds are spiritual numerals, then the seven

symbolical points of the Pentacle represent numbers of the greatest

importance in world-building, and in soul-building also. For we must

all build our own souls. And the symbology of the interlacing of the

triangle of spirit with the triangle of matter, finds its

correspondence in man, the little world, who, though a spiritual

ego, yet dwells in a physical house, and whose business it is to

merge himself completely into the region of the white triangle.

When Man has raised his vibrations into perfect harmony with the

universal sun, he has then unbound himself from the wheel of

re-birth—the Zodiac—and is ready to enter Nirvana.

The word “heaven” in Hebrew signifies the abode of the sun. When,

therefore, the Nazarene said “The Kingdom of Heaven is within you,”

he virtually declared that all the seven cosmic powers are resident

within us.

Esoteric science recognises man as a septenary, working in

conjunction with other orders of numerals which register divine

vibrations.

All nature listens to that universal song, and the music of the

spheres is no fable. The swarming zöospores in the protoplasm of

plants hear it, and thrilled by that enchantment, fall into

invisible rhythm, bringing up by quick marches into the region

of Day the tiny dwellers in stem and leaf. How do we know that

the mystery of the six-sided cell of the honey-bee may not find

its solution here? Perhaps the bee is susceptible only to

vibrations which fall into these lines, and faithfully obeys the

master-musician in the construction of its hexagonal house. The

great law of cosmic and microcosmic correspondence was revealed

ages ago to the Sages who _listened_, and listening, _heard_ the

wondrous revelations breathed forth from the harp of Akasa.

Sighing winds from other worlds passed over the delicate

strings, and as they passed, uttered in soundless tones the

profound mystery of near and remote planets. These Sages dwelt

in that White Palace—the Lotus of the Heart—the sun-palace

indeed. From centre to circumference their vast circle of vision

was permeated by the reflected _All_, and from the White Palace

they ascended the sacred mountain Meru, where dwelleth wisdom

and love.

The key which opens the White Palace is held by the seven mystic

children of the Royal Arch of the Rainbow, guarding the seven gates

of the Sun, every gate of which answers to a musical note, and every

note of which enfolds three tones.

Hence, if we understand the analogies of colour, we may open the six

doors of Nature, and also the seventh, to Nirvana.

M. L. BRAINARD.

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QUESTIONS.

What can we do in temptation’s hour?

How shall we conquer its fiery power?

How can we master it—standing _alone_,

Just on the threshold of things unknown?

Strong is its power as Death and Hell,

Led by its lure, even angels fell!

Dazed by the glare of a rising light

How shall poor mortals see aright?

Tempted we were in the morning of life,

With earth’s simple joys that are ever rife,

To idly bask in the sun’s warm beam

And to care no jot for a holier dream.

Tempted again in the heyday sun,

To choose fair paths and in gardens run,

_Claiming_ as ours, all joy—all love,

Flowerets of bliss from the Heavens above.

Temptings come now, in life’s later prime,

Deeper and stronger than in past time,

To feed with fuel the inward fire,

The passionate dream of the _soul’s desire_!

-----------------------

Two feet are creeping on paths unknown,

Weary and mournful, sad and lone;

Two eyes are looking and longing for light,

Two hands are locked in a desperate fight.

A heart is breaking with pain and grief,

A soul in strong agony cries for relief;

Echoes no kindred chord above?

Stretcheth no Hand in responsive love?

Is our Great God, but a God of stone?

Are we—His people—dazed and alone?

Is there no Ear that can hear us cry?

No Christ,—to succour us e’er we die?

L. F. Ff.

A THEORY OF HAUNTINGS.

Very few persons realise the powerful and long-lasting effects of

human “auras”—those mysterious psychical emanations which are

mentally cognised, and which silently impress one as to the

character of a locality, the idiosyncrasies of a nation, a family,

or an individual. Personal auras are strictly speaking the effects

of the innate, and presumably hidden natures, of individuals, and

are entirely the effluence of soul and mind. A house, or a

neighbourhood, becomes imbued with the individual or collective

auras of its inhabitants, which convey to the psychic senses, and

thence to the mind, a powerful impression of character. At the same

time within the aura of individuals, or families, are indelibly

imprinted their thought-pictures, which may, or may not, have been

embodied in acts; the faces and forms of relatives, friends,

visitors, of the very animals they pet, the image of their pursuits,

in short the whole life. These are imprinted in the _astral_ element

which surrounds each individual soul, as the atmosphere surrounds

our bodies; and as the air we breathe becomes changed in

respiration, so this ethereal atmosphere becomes transformed by

personal impress.

Education, morality, religion, health, disease, happiness or misery,

are largely the effects of the widely diffused auras of individuals

continually given forth into the ambient atmosphere. As a man, or

body of men, think, act, and live, such is the quality of the aura,

or odylic sphere they emanate. This has an effect for good or evil

upon all who approach within its radius; a formative, educating

effect upon the ignorant, if it is of a high, intellectual, or

spiritual quality; or a depressing, stultifying, deforming effect

upon the minds and souls of innocent, or negative sensitives, when

it is of an impure, debased, or brutal character.

Thought governs the world. It is by thought, and its embodiment in

acts, that progress is made. Every thought has its aura, and nothing

can prevent its diffusion in the atmospheres, both the astral and

the natural or physical. Hence being continually surrounded by the

effects of thoughts universally diffused, we are insensibly governed

by their aura of good or evil, and we grow in beauty, or are warped

in deformity, mental and bodily, from infancy, under the moulding

consequences of the local thought-auras of the family, neighbourhood

and nation in which we happen to be born.

Psychometry proves that even stones retain the impression of the

scenes which have been enacted in their neighbourhood. That is, the

stone having been bathed in the psychic emanations of creatures,

human and animal, during, perhaps, centuries, retains such auras

indestructibly in its atmosphere; and a psychometric clairvoyant

will gradually perceive the most trivial details of the more active

life which has daily passed in the vicinity of the stone. A fragment

from the Temple of Diana of Ephesus, for instance, were it

procurable, would enable a good psychometrist to describe every

minute particular of the ancient temple worship and ceremonies. A

stone from the Colosseum held in the hand, or to the forehead of a

psychometrist, would produce a vision of the scenes in the arena

which were wont to attract the Roman population. A fossil of some

antediluvian animal would bring before the mind’s eye surroundings

corresponding to the period in which the animal had lived. In truth,

upon the plane of more ethereal matter adjacent to this, are to be

found the images of all things, subject neither to time nor the

changes of time; and there our image-producing faculties,

temporarily divested of the blinding veil of flesh, may call them up

at will.

The aura of a great crime becomes diffused in the neighbourhood of

its commission, and concealment would be impossible if the psychic

vision of men were open instead of being closed. A picture of the

deed committed becomes impressed upon the astral atmosphere, with

the faces and forms of those engaged in its commission. This effect

is never destroyed, but may be recalled at will by a good

clairvoyante. At the same time the aura of good deeds is equally

powerful and indestructible. The one is like a transitory

convulsion, disturbing the beauty of order and harmony with Nature;

the other is the fixed and equable moral atmosphere arising from

thoughts and actions consonant with wisdom. In short, the aura of

good thoughts and deeds is the _pabulum_ of souls; the invigorating

and supporting air they inspire and respire, producing health,

happiness, mental activity, and inciting to progress. If it were not

for the good on the earth, we might doubtless often cry in

vain—“Heaven help us!”—for we should be so smothered under evil

auras that spiritual breathing, and rapport with purer realms of

life, would be a radical impossibility.

A crime is the insane product of an unbalanced, disordered mind. It

causes a species of astral electric disturbance, which is as

sensibly felt by sensitives as any explosion or convulsion on the

natural plane. Astral, or ethereal molecules become violently

displaced, and forced into new conditions of juxtaposition. A

mysterious terror pervades the air, which affects all neighbouring

minds, even to the very animals. It is as if the living soul of

Nature had been violently wrenched from its normal condition of

peace and happiness, and stood electrified with horror, whilst upon

its veil of ethereal matter is fixed an indestructible image of the

painful tragedy which has been suddenly enacted.

We are, in fact, surrounded, upon the soul plane of life, by an

atmosphere which receives, so to speak, a photographic impression of

even our very thoughts, which is a mirror to reflect our whole life,

an image-world, retaining sounds as well as forms. It may be made

subject to our will, which can call up before the mind, and make

visible to the eye of the soul whatsoever, without exception, we

will to see, to hear, or to know. The phantoms or apparitions of

which we so frequently hear, are matters of fact to all psychic

seers; are things as absolutely existent as any objects on the more

familiar plane of dense matter. Once to realise this great fact, and

to understand some of the laws which would enable us consciously to

control, and illustrate to our satisfaction, certain of the hidden

mysteries of the inner world of ethereal matter, from which our own

proceeds as an effect from a cause, would set us upon a mountain

height of knowledge whence all clouds of superstition, doubt, and

uncertainty, would roll away.

There are many stories extant of certain haunting apparitions which

have been seen at various times during the lapse of centuries,

reappearing again and again in the same families as warnings, or

otherwise; or it may be a mysterious sound, such as the cry of the

“banshee” in Ireland. The popular fallacy regarding such apparitions

is that a _human_ soul, or “spirit”—it may be wrongly called—is

compelled, as a retribution for the commission of some crime, to

remain on the earth haunting the scene of its former sins. Or, if

the visitant be a benevolent ghost, it is supposed that it is some

ancestor or ancestress, ever present in loving watchfulness over the

destinies of the family, giving warning of death or danger. The idea

of a human soul being chained in this melancholy fashion to the

earth is exceedingly repugnant to most minds, and naturally excites

the utmost compassion for the poor ghost which has to wear out so

dreary a doom. Such a hypothesis contradicts all those religious

teachings which assign to souls either a state of absolute

unconscious sleep, until the day of judgment, or an abode,

presumably in a conscious state, in heaven or hell. It contradicts

all those more modern teachings of “progress” after death, of the

gradual ascension of the soul to its place of rest. If we accept the

ideas of Eastern teachers concerning those occult mysteries—that the

higher self, the spiritualised entity, gradually separates from its

more animal, or lower principles of organism, which adhere together

for a longer or shorter period as a shell-like or shadowy

personality—even then, these principles or ethereal molecules which

go to form an astral body, disintegrate after a time. They would not

be likely, at all events, to endure over a century. Apparitions of

persons deceased _within_ a century might be considered as

essentially ghosts, or shades—the shadowy, sidereal shapes of

personalities passed away from the physical plane, and in a

condition of gradual separation from all that can attach them to the

earth. And it is presumable that a phantom which is seen repeatedly

during the lapse of centuries, is merely a reflection in the astral

light, called up by the will of a seer; or projected upon the plane

of soul-vision either by some psychological disturbance, or by some

change of condition on the part of those who see the phantom. The

immediate action may be due to “_elementals_,” those mysterious

entities called by Liebnitz “Monads,” which are in close attendance

upon mankind, and have so much to do with his very existence that he

would fare but indifferently without them. Not only are they as

intimately consociated with him as his own thoughts, but certain

grades of them depend upon him also for their existence. These

beings often become tutelary, or “house-spirits,” and the _rôle_ of

re-appearing again and again, as a sort of hereditary ghost, to give

warning of death or danger, is not incompatible with their condition

of existence. Time does not exist for them, and one century would be

like any other. They live in the personal or family aura, and become

intimately blended with the daily lives of its members. When, as in

the case of royal or noble houses, the family aura remains

undisturbed in its ancient palaces or castles during centuries, a

haunting elemental would find it an easy matter to make itself

visible, frequently by a semi-materialisation, or a condensation of

the ethereal atoms of its body. In such a case it would be seen

objectively by anyone who happened to be present. In other cases,

when an apparition is only a reflection in the astral light, a

sensitive in moments of abnormal or psychic lucidity would perceive

it. Others sympathetically inclined would perceive the same. At

length, after repeated similar visions, the locality would get the

name of being haunted. The image so repeatedly beheld becomes fixed

in the atmosphere of that particular spot. Upon entering a locality

with such a reputation a species of psychological inebriation would

assail every individual so constituted as to fall under the effects

of the aura already established, and they would then always behold

the spectre thus ideally produced. These mental or astral spectres

need not necessarily be merely immovable pictures. They will move,

or walk, threaten, or act a pantomime exactly as they may have the

reputation of doing; or as the person who beholds them expects or

imagines them to be doing.

In some respects these apparitions or warning cries may be mental

legacies left indelibly impressed in the astral light by the

powerful will of a departed ancestor, friendly or inimical, as a

blessing or a curse; or even by a member of some alien family, as a

pursuing Nemesis which falls as a retribution upon the perpetrator

of evil, but can possess no power over the innocent and good.

FRANK FAIRHOLME.

(_To be continued._)

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THE ESOTERIC CHARACTER OF THE GOSPELS.

III.

No one can be regarded as a Christian unless he professes, or is

supposed to profess, belief in Jesus, by baptism, and in salvation,

“through the blood of Christ.” To be considered a good Christian,

one has, as a _conditio sine quâ non_, to show faith in the dogmas

expounded by the Church and to profess them; after which a man is at

liberty to lead a private and public life on principles

diametrically opposite to those expressed in the Sermon on the

Mount. The chief point and that which is demanded of him is, that he

should have—or _pretend to have_—a blind faith in, and veneration

for, the ecclesiastical teachings of his special Church.

“Faith is the key of Christendom,”

saith Chaucer, and the penalty for lacking it is as clearly stated

as words can make it, in St. Mark’s Gospel, Chapter xvi., verse

16th: “He that believeth and is baptised shall be saved; but he that

believeth not shall be damned.”

It troubles the Church very little that the most careful search for

these words in the oldest texts during the last centuries, remained

fruitless; or, that the recent revision of the Bible led to a

unanimous conviction in the truth-seeking and truth-loving scholars

employed in that task, that no such _un-Christ_-like sentence was to

be found, except in some of the latest, fraudulent texts. The good

Christian people had assimilated the consoling words, and they had

become the very pith and marrow of their charitable souls. To take

away the hope of eternal damnation, for all others except

themselves, from these chosen vessels of the God of Israel, was like

taking their very life. The truth-loving and God-fearing revisers

got scared; they left the forged passage (an interpolation of eleven

verses, from the 9th to the 20th), and satisfied their consciences

with a foot-note remark of a very equivocal character, one that

would grace the work and do honour to the diplomatic faculties of

the craftiest Jesuits. It tells the “believer” that:—

“The two oldest Greek MSS. and some other authorities OMIT from

verse 9 to the end. Some authorities _have a different ending_ to

the Gospel.”[170]—

—and explains no further.

-----

Footnote 170:

Vide “Gospel according to St. Mark,” in the _revised_ edition

printed for the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, 1881.

-----

But the two “oldest Greek MSS.” _omit_ the verses _nolens volens_,

as these _have never existed_. And the learned and truth-loving

revisers know this better than any of us do; yet the wicked

falsehood is printed at the very seat of Protestant Divinity, and it

is allowed to go on, glaring into the faces of coming generations of

students of theology and, hence, into those of their future

parishioners. Neither can be, nor are they deceived by it, yet both

_pretend_ belief in the authenticity of the cruel words worthy of a

_theological Satan_. And this Satan-Moloch is their own _God of

infinite mercy and justice_ in Heaven, and the incarnate symbol of

love and charity on Earth—blended in one!

Truly mysterious are your paradoxical ways, oh—Churches of Christ!

I have no intention of repeating here stale arguments and logical

_exposés_ of the whole theological scheme; for all this has been

done, over and over again, and in a most excellent way, by the

ablest “Infidels” of England and America. But I may briefly repeat

a prophecy which is a self-evident result of the present state of

men’s minds in Christendom. Belief in the Bible _literally_, and

in a _carnalised_ Christ, will not last a quarter of a century

longer. The Churches will have to part with their cherished

dogmas, or the 20th century will witness the downfall and ruin of

all Christendom, and with it, belief even in a Christos, as pure

Spirit. The very name has now become obnoxious, and theological

Christianity must die out, _never to resurrect again_ in its

present form. This, in itself, would be the happiest solution of

all, were there no danger from the natural reaction which is sure

to follow: crass materialism will be the consequence and the

result of centuries of blind faith, unless the loss of old ideals

is replaced by other ideals, unassailable, because _universal_,

and built on the rock of eternal truths instead of the shifting

sands of human fancy. Pure immateriality must replace, in the end,

the terrible anthropomorphism of those ideals in the conceptions

of our modern dogmatists. Otherwise, why should Christian

dogmas—the perfect counterpart of those belonging to other

exoteric and pagan religions—claim any superiority? The bodies of

all these were built upon the same astronomical and physiological

(or phallic) symbols. Astrologically, every religious dogma the

world over, may be traced to, and located in, the Zodiacal signs

and the Sun. And so long as the science of comparative symbology

or any theology has only two keys to open the mysteries of

religious dogmas—and these two only very partially mastered, how

can a line of demarcation be drawn, or any difference made between

the religions of say, Chrishna and Christ, between salvation

through the blood of the “first-born primeval male” of one faith,

and that of the “only _begotten_ Son” of the other, far younger,

religion?

Study the Vedas; read even the superficial, often disfigured

writings of our great Orientalists, and think over what you will

have learnt. Behold Brahmans, Egyptian Hierophants, and Chaldean

Magi, teaching several thousand years before our era that the gods

themselves had been only mortals (in previous births) until they won

their immortality by _offering their blood to their Supreme God_ or

chief. The “Book of the Dead,” teaches that mortal man “became one

with the gods through an interflow of a common life in the common

blood of the two.” Mortals gave the blood of their first-born sons

in sacrifice to the Gods. In his _Hinduism_, p. 35, Professor Monier

Williams, translating from the _Taitiriya Brâhmana_, writes:—“By

means of the sacrifice the gods obtained heaven.” And in the _Tandya

Brâhmana_:—“The lord of creatures offered himself a sacrifice for

the gods.”... And again in the _Satapatha Brâhmana_:—“He who,

knowing this, sacrifices with the _Purusha-madha_ or the sacrifice

of the primeval male, becomes everything.”

Whenever I hear the Vedic rites discussed and called “disgusting

human sacrifices,” and cannibalism (_sic._), I feel always inclined

to ask, where’s the difference? Yet there is one, in fact; for while

Christians are compelled to accept the allegorical (though, when

understood, highly philosophical) drama of the New Testament

Crucifixion, as that of Abraham and Isaac literally,[171]

Brahmanism—its philosophical schools at any rate—teaches its

adherents, that this (_pagan_) sacrifice of the “primeval male” is a

purely allegorical and philosophical symbol. Read in their

dead-letter meaning, the four gospels are simply slightly altered

versions of what the Church proclaims as Satanic plagiarisms (by

anticipation) of Christian dogmas in Pagan religions. Materialism

has a perfect right to find in all of them the same sensual worship

and “solar” myths as anywhere else. Analysed and criticised

superficially and on its dead-letter face, Professor Joly (“Man

before Metals,” pp. 189-190) finding in the _Swastika_, the _crux

ansata_, and the cross pure and simple, mere sexual symbols—is

justified in speaking as he does. Seeing that “the father of the

sacred fire (in India) bore the name of _Twashtri_, that is the

divine carpenter who made the _Swastika_ and the _Pramantha_, whose

friction produced the divine child _Agni_, in Latin _Ignis_; that

his mother was named _Maya_; he himself, styled _Akta_ (_anointed_,

or _Christos_) after the priests had poured upon his head the

spirituous _soma_ and on his body butter purified by sacrifice”;

seeing all this he has a full right to remark that:—

“The close resemblance which exists between certain ceremonies of

the worship of _Agni_ and certain rites of the Catholic religion

may be explained by their common origin. _Agni_ in the condition

of _Akta_, or anointed, is suggestive of Christ; _Maya_, Mary, his

mother; _Twashtri_, St. Joseph, the carpenter of the Bible.”