CONCERNING GOD AND RELIGION.

" . . . and may T.G.A.O.T.U. say: 'It is well finished," and admit
us to the Grand Lodge Above, where the divisions of time shall
cease, and a glorious eternity burst open to our view."

(Masonic Ritual.)

"The glory of this latter house shall be greater than of the
former, saith the Lord of hosts : and in this place will I give
peace, saith the Lord of hosts."
(HAGGAI, 2, 9.)

"To depths obscure the favour'd trine
A dreary course engage,
Till through the arch the ray divine
Illumine the Sacred Page !
From the wide wonders of this blaze,
Our ancient signs restored ;
The Royal Arch alone displays,
The long lost mystic Word."

("The Mystic Word," by J.F. STANDFIELD.)


Part Six: THE FIFTH INITIATION.

This initiation is divided into two halves, the Resurrection and
Ascension, and of neither of them do we know very much.  The detail
of the Resurrection episode is left untold by the writers of the
New Testament, and after the Crucifixion crisis we can glean but
little of the life of the Christian Master, or what occupied Him
between the time He "rose again" until He left the company of the
Apostles, and "ascended into heaven" - a symbolic phrase which
alludes to the process of initiation carried to the highest
conceivable degree of attainment.  In our Masonic system the
Installation Rite (the climax of the work of a Craft Lodge)
corresponds to the Resurrection half of the fifth initiation, and
likewise observes a proper reticence regarding the actual
attainment symbolised by the conferment of the special rank or
degree of Installed Master.  Ceremonially, of course, the Royal
Arch is the natural conclusion and fulfilment of the Third Degree,
but nevertheless the "complete knowledge" of this Supreme Degree is
restricted to candidates qualified by Installation.  The grade
signified by the Royal Arch shows the initiation process carried a
stage beyond that forthshadowed in the Third Degree, and is
designed to exhibit the "exaltation" - or apotheosis of him who has
undergone the mystical death and revival therefrom into newness of
life.  As a basis for comparison, the Third Degree and Installation
Ceremonies might be said to be represented in the terms of
Christian theology by the formula "He suffered and was buried and
rose again," whilst the equivalent of the Exaltation Ceremony and
Royal Arch Installations is "He ascended into heaven." The Royal
Arch Degree, therefore, corresponds to the Ascension half of the
fifth initiation, in which the human merges in the Divine
consciousness, and it follows that Freemasonry as a sacramental
system reaches its climax in this Supreme Degree, wherein that
achievement is hypothetically effected. 

The crucial initiation for humanity to understand at this time is
the fourth.  Only when we have mastered the significance of service
can the fact of immortality and its true meaning be revealed to us.
"I have yet many things to say unto you." spoke the Christian
Master to his disciples, "but ye cannot bear them now" (John,
chapter 16, verse 12).  Therefore veils are drawn, which protect
spiritual truth, until by our sincere and earnest application we
prepare ourselves not only to bear or to grasp its far-reaching
implications, but also to express its teaching wisely in the
activities of life.  It is well to remember also, in this
connection, that "the real problem of personal immortality cannot
concern the limited or the endless duration of the self.  The mere
lengthening of existence would no more add to personal value than
would the extension of one's arms reach to the further star. 
Personal worth does not demand duration but significance." ("The
Problem of Immortality," by R. A. Tsanoff).

Our present duty is obviously to endeavour to lead the enquirer in
the right direction and to give him certain hints which will enable
him, if he so wishes, to retire with confidence into his own inner
sanctuary and discover the solution; for it is there, in that holy
of holies, that these fundamental problems relative to the
mysteries of existence must ultimately be solved.  When a man's
life has gained significance, then he is ready to tread the path of
purification and probation in preparation for the mysteries, and as
his significance and influence increase he can pass, stage by
stage, through the traditional grades of initiation. He can be
"born in Bethlehem," because the germ of that which is dynamic and
living is awakened, is gaining in potency, and must of necessity
make its appearance ("come to birth"); he can be "baptised in
Jordan" by passing through the "waters" of purification; he can
attain to the mountain-top of transfiguration, where that which is
of worth shines forth in all its glory. And having achieved such a
moment of heightened experience, he is then, and then only, ready
to "go up to Jerusalem," there to suffer "crucifixion unto death"
of the self-will, the final test of merit, qualifying him for
entrance into that "City of Peace" which has no geographical site. 
The necessity of self-dying - not the physical death of the body
but a mystical death-in-life of everything except the body - is the
first and fundamental fact to be grasped before we may hope to
realise or even to understand the mystery of the Ascension.  "Mors
janua vitae;" death to self is the portal to true life.  There is
no other way it is the unescapable law and condition of the soul's
progress.  Since, however, this is a process involving a "most
serious trial of fortitude and fidelity," and a grapple with
oneself from which the timorous and self-diffident may well shrink,
the Mystery systems have always exhibited an example for the
instruction, encouragement, and emulation of those who are prepared
to make the necessary sacrifice.
It matters nothing whether the prototype associated with a
particular Initiatory School is one whose historic actuality and
identity can be demonstrated, or whether he can be regarded only as
legendary or mythical; the point being not to teach a merely
historical fact, but to enforce a spiritual principle.  In Egypt
the prototype' was Osiris, who was slain by his malignant brother
Typhon, but whose mangled limbs were collected in a coffer from
which he emerged reintegrated and divinised.  In Greece the
prototype was Bacchus, who was torn to pieces by the Titans.  In
our Masonic system the prototype is Hiram Abiff, who met his death
as the result of a conspiracy by a crowd of workmen of whom there
were three principal ruffians.  Finally, in the Christian and chief
of all system, since it comprehends and re-expresses all the
others, the greatest of the Exemplars died at the hands of the mob,
headed also by three chief ruitians, Judas, Caiaphas and Pilate. 
If in Freemasonry the mystical death is dramatised more
realistically than the resurrection that follows upon it, that
resurrection is nevertheless shown in the "raising" of the
candidate to the rank of Master Mason and his "reunion with the
companions of former toils," implying the reintegration and
resumption of all his old faculties and powers in a sublimated
state; just as the limbs of the risen Osiris were said to reunite
into a new whole, and as the Christian Master withdrew His
mutilated boy from the tomb and reassumed it, transmuted into one
of supernatural substance and splendour.

We have, therefore, now to consider again what Initiation really
involves, and how greatly it differs from popular notions about it. 
Firstly, it is not merely a moral "change of heart," a re-direction
of mental interest from temporal to eternal things, and a turn-over
of conduct from evil to commendable ways, although all these are
included in the preliminary stages of preparation.  Secondly, it
involves the total recasting, by the light of a scientific system
of self-knowledge, of all the inter-involved departments of our
complex organism, about which the ordinary person is entirely
ignorant.  Thirdly, it involves the complete transformation of all
our currents of thought and desire (the "re-newing of your mind")
on the subjective side of us, and even the repolarisation of our
physical tissues and cells on the objective side. This the old
"work" of the prechristian Mysteries and of the spiritual
Alchemists; it was the function too of the Christian Mysteries; and
it is to-day perpetuated in our Masonic system.  The effect of this
"work" is an organic change of a man's entire nature, transforming
the "body of sin" (the psychic or astral body), in which we all
stand clothed in virtue of our natural generation and existence,
into a "new creature," and permanently detaching the consciousness
and activities from their present self-willedness and centre of
gravity in the sense-world, and re-fixating them in the universal
consciousness and will.  Thus the "first Adam" in us is consciously
and deliberately to be done to death by a well defined process (the
keys of which are in the Gospels and our Masonic Ritual) before the
"second Adam" can fully emerge and stand upon the former's ruins. 
We are, of course, without going to the full length of this
process, susceptible to, and sensible of, partial regeneration in
one or other parts of our organism, but partial attainment
necessarily results in a state of unbalance and disharmony between
our conflicting wills of the flesh and of the spirit, because the
"body of sin" remains untransmuted and its roots and spirillae are
not totally extirpated.  Moreover, death and post-mortem
purifications do not deliver us, as so many hope, from the dominion
of sin and of the subtler forms of the flesh, but only from the
solid body of the latter. "Matter," "flesh," have their finer modes
which still adhere to and cloud our spiritual essence after death,
unless previously alchemically reduced and transmuted.  For they
generate a subtle, viscous, elastic coagulation of impure psychic
stuff which is not eliminated by the mortality of the gross body,
a coagulation which is sometimes spoken of by mystics as the
"gluten in the blood"; and it is upon the transmutation of this
that effective regeneration hinges.  It has to be worked out of the
system and evaporated ; literally sweated out, as in that sweat in
Gethsemane (see Lake, chapter 22, verse 44); members of the Craft
will recall also the significant explanation given in the Raising
Ceremony.  If not transmuted here, initiation silence teaches, the
"flesh" persists hereafter in a rarefied form, and is the magnetic
link which draws the soul back into successive incarnations, itself
thickening and densifying in each earth-life and tending to become
less susceptible to regenerative treatment.

According to the traditional doctrine regeneration is accomplished
by an interior oft-repeated journey round the spiral circle of
one's own subjectivity ("as though ascending a winding staircase")
until the fortress walls of self-will are razed, as Israel brought
down the walls of Jericho, and the impure coagulations, knots and
accretions of past sinfulness are scavenged away so that the inner
organism becomes a pure vehicle for the holy Light and Substance. 
This teaching is identical with that of Jacob Boehme ("The
Threefold life of Man," chapter 9), as illustrated by the diagrams
of William Law, of Gichtel in his "Theosophia Practica," and of
many Alchemical writers.  The same doctrine, moreover, is very
ancient and widespread and is referred to even by Omar Khayam, as
follows:-

"Up from Earth's centre to the Seventh Gate
I rose and on the throne of Saturn sate;
And many a knot unravelled on the way,
But not the master-knot of human fate."

In most systems the process is described in terms of the zodiac and
planets, but precisely how the journeying is accomplished is not
explained.  Sign, symbol, metaphor and parable can only be solved
by incisive penetration.  The profound wisdom of the ancients, like
our modern Freemasonry, is "veiled in allegory and illustrated by
symbols"; by the writers and transmittors it was deftly and
intentionally concealed, and by the generality it has long been
overlooked.

When men discover the wealth of wisdom stored up in the
"Scriptures" or inspired writings of all the ancient races, and lay
hold of the right method of interpreting myth, parable, metaphor
and symbol, it will no longer be possible for them to remain in the
pessimistic and agnostic state of mind so prevalent today. We are
in the dark as to our past and future, origin and destiny, only
because ostrich-like we have buried our heads in the sand, shut our
eyes to the truth and failed to make proper use and application of
that glorious heritage left us by sage and prophet and philosopher. 
Despite obvious counsel to the contrary, and in direct
contravention of innumerable veiled hints throughout mystic,
hermetic, cryptic or arcane literature, the vast majority still
persist in following the letter and ignoring the spirit thereby
inflicting upon themselves psychological suicide.  To penetrate
beyond the letter and arrive at the spirit of all Scriptures,
whether Christian, Hebrew, Greek, Egyptian, Hindu or Scandinavian,
the first important step is to apply them to ourselves.  For every
man is a microcosm, a little universe in himself, a pocket edition
of the vast macrocosm.  Macrocosmic creation or evolution is
repeated microcosmically in every human being.  By no means
completed, the process goes on hour by hour, day by day, year by
year, life by life.  Within us all the light is being separated
from the darkness.  Within us also Adam and Eve are generating
Cain, Abel and Seth, and their offspring or seed.  We are, or have
within us, the principles and faculties known as Noah, Abraham,
Isaac and Jacob.  It is of our Joseph and Mary that the divine
child will ultimately be born.  All these "characters" and many
others are represented in the wonderful mystery play of which a
"continuous performance" is taking place in every human
psychological theatre.  God is the supreme dramatist and his word
or play is being enacted in every local centre.  If, therefore, we
seek to know the mysteries of life and of the universe, we need
only sit apart and study the play as it proceeds on our own stage,
and this is where the Scriptures can afford us great assistance. 
They are, so to speak, the "book" of the play; programme,
explanatory notes, and commentary.  Of this book of the play there
are, or have been, many versions and editions.  All are not of
equal value or completeness.  Yet he who would understand the great
mystery drama will be well advised not to limit his studies to one
particular version, but to make use of all that the inspired minds
of every race and every age have left behind.  For the purpose of
English speaking students, however, there cannot be the least doubt
that on the whole, the Bible is the most valuable, complete and
systematic collection of traditional inspired books that we have
inherited from the pas. It contains, we have good reason to
believe, an orderly and sequential account of the origin of man and
the manifest universe, of man's earthly phases, of his ultimate
glorious destiny and the means whereby it can be attained - every
chapter indeed, of his mythology.

Those who have attentively studied the genealogy lists appearing in
Genesis will no doubt agree that this is by no means a book
suitable for the literal minds who wish to "run and read." Regarded
literally, as merely physical and historical pedigrees, these
ancestor-lists possess little or no interest, and their presence in
a work so highly venerated is, and has been, a stumbling block to
most commentators of the ordinary type.  Almost every word requires
continued and profound thought to decipher and determine.  But that
need not discourage the genuine student, for by the efforts which
he will be compelled to make in order to assimilate a little of its
meaning, he is actually cultivating his more or less latent
intuitive faculty which will enable him to penetrate further into
its mysteries from time to time.  Moreover, this development leads
"pari passu" to a corresponding advance into his own inner nature,
which is the laboratory where all truth is finally tested.

To return to the genealogies, the discerning French scholar Fabre
d'Olivet has clearly demonstrated ("The Hebrew Language Restored"
- English translation by Miss Louise Nayan Redfield) that the names
in Genesis are not those of persons, but of metaphysical principles
and faculties which are gradually developed one from the other by
a process allied to that of chemical combination, and most
appropriately symbolised by the physical activities of marriage and
childbirth.  This system of symbolism, however, is not confined to
Genesis, nor even to the Pentateuch, but is maintained throughout
the Bible, penetrating even into the New Testament.  Hence, it is
recorded that Abraham and David are the predecessors of Jesus (see
Matthew, chapter 1, verse 1 - "The book of the generation of Jesus
Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham") this means that the
"sonship" is metaphysical an inner or spiritual descent being
implied.  Thus "Abraham" and "David" signify certain definite
stages of spiritual growth which the soul must pass through before
the Master degree of development can be attained.  There are also
many intermediate steps, and certain psychological offshoots or
failures, all denoted by proper names. Students will not fail to
observe how this peculiar, but excellent, method is likewise
adopted in the Greek myths, where the parentage or ancestry of the
heroes is invariably given, so that if you can discover the meaning
of the proper names, you know the principles involved.  The tenth
chapter of Genesis is important from the point of view of our
present study as it reveals a marvellous geological
("earth-science" in the broadest possible sense) picture in the
terms of Egyptian wisdom.  It is a picture or panorama of the
condensation, compaction, or precipitation from an etheric or even
more metaphysical condition of the whole globe with all its
concomitant life from man to mineral.  It shows the building of the
theatre and stage of the earth, with all its scenery, properties,
effects, actors and supernumeraries. The collective Man who had
contained all things within himself, within his essential
consciousness, now projects them without, and his consciousness
becomes decentralised, peripheral, and broken up into myriads of
spiritual "atomic" each one possessing the potentiality of the
whole. His intrinsic "awareness" gives place to limited but
progressive "cognisance"; he has inverted the polarity of his
being, he has turned himself inside out. To most of us, in so far
as we can grasp such a vast and overwhelming conception, this is
indeed an astounding revelation.  For from it we are led to the
inevitable conclusion that according to the philosophy of Moses,
the various kingdoms of the globe, usually regarded as separate and
distinct one from another, are parts or differentiations of one
fertile whole, the Adamic ray or element, which was absorbed and
then re-projected by the cosmogonic being Noah, the nucleus of life
and intelligence.

We may then recognise that all organic life and all that we call
Nature, including the forces, energies, and properties of matter,
all in fact regarded as the "not-self," is nevertheless part and
parcel of the Adamic ray of which man is fundamentally but the most
refined essence, that is to say the intelligible soul.  Man indeed
is the agent and has brought all into existence by means of his
volitional faculty in its Hevahic ("formative") action. It follows,
therefore, that Nature as we come in contact with it, is the
outcome of the will of collective humanity upon the less sublimed
portions of the Adamic element.  But man has identified himself in
consciousness with this rawer material out of which he was drawn,
for he gradually precipitated himself into a state of existence
which is actually neither more nor less than the aggregative effect
of his self-centred will upon the totality of the Adamic ray, an
act which has, so to speak, turned the ray inside out, or reversed
its polarity and so transformed its unity into multiplicity.  Hence
man has no longer divine consciousness, but an artificial
self-centred consciousness or "Babel" which he has fabricated for
himself.  This manifestation, extension and differentiation upon
the physical and phenomenal plane is brought about by the action
and interaction of three primary principles inherent in the nucleus
Noah, namely Shem, Ham and Japheth.  In regard to these three
principles, it is not difficult to perceive that Shem, Ham and
Japheth represent a trinity proceeding from a unity, and that they
manifest the potentiality of that unity in three different aspects. 
Shem presents the most spiritual, the upward tendency, the
"rajasic" aspect.  Ham, the opposite, the most material, the
downward tendency, or "tamasic" aspect; whilst Japheth is the
connecting link between these two poles, the expanding, extending
tendency, the "satvic" aspect.  And just as these three principles
express themselves in the macrocosmic man and regulate his
manifestation, so in corresponding degree they operate in the
microcosmic man (the individual), where they are termed spirit,
body and soul. The next important point to observe is that the
descent into earthly conditions, and the differentiation of the
races and tribes with their characteristic variations, is produced
by the agency of one of the sub-emanations of Japheth - Tharshish
the offspring of Javan (the word Javan is the equivalent of Ion). 
That is to say, generative ductility, the ionic energy, gives birth
to sympathy which polarises into attraction and repulsion, and
according to the Karmic impute and temperament of the will or soul,
so is its general or specific location or environment, and likewise
its constitution or equipment of faculties, on earth.  We may
perhaps illustrate this action by appropriating the words of the
well known maxim: "Birds of a feather flock together."

To follow all the separations and developments of these essential
principles under whose threefold influence man and nature have
received their present characteristics, would be far too lengthy an
undertaking to enter into now, but the subsequent "history" of the
Israelites is recommended as the field for further study.  We may
further add that the Kabalistic student will find, in counting the
offspring of Shem, Ham and Japheth properly, seventy-two names in
all - representing the Shemhamphorash, which words approximately
denote outward or self-centred manifestation.  The seventy-two
descendants of Noah, therefore, show the powers of God dissected,
projected and expressed in the world.  Thus Noah may be compared
with an acorn, a seed-manu, to use the Hindu term.  He sends out a
three-fold trunk, which again splits up into branches, twigs and
leaves, each of which latter has its peculiar character, brought
about by the emphasis of one principle over another at certain
stages of growth.  In this manner the varied characteristics and
proclivities of races, tribes, clans and individuals, and of
everything comprised in the earth are produced.

The foregoing commentary on the genealogical symbolism of Genesis,
although suggestive rather than conclusive, will nevertheless serve
to show that the books of the Bible are not the simple narratives
many to-day think they are, but profound psychophilosophical
writings in which we may read the whole story of the human soul,
its origin, phases of involution and evolution, and the means
whereby it may ultimately attain reintegration.  Paradoxical as it
may seem, the Bible is both history and myth; sometimes the first
aspect is in the ascendant, but for the most part the second is the
dominating feature; yet all along the two are closely interwoven.
We must make no mistake, however, about this important word "myth,"
for few words have been more basely materialised.  Applied
originally to the semi-dramatic recital forming a part of the
Mysteries or Sacred Ceremonies of Ancient Greece, wherein some
aspect of the soul's pilgrimage was represented symbolically, it
has now become the term for a fanciful story devoid of truth.

The distinction between myth and history needs to be carefully
explained in order to make the contrast absolutely clear.

To write history is to give a circumstantial and statistical
account of past events as they were manifested on the phenomenal
plane of existence.  For this, it is not necessary to be
illuminated or inspired.  But the mythos, although it includes
outward events, subordinates them to the central motive of the
narrative, which is to put on record the psychological and
spiritual arch-history of the collective souls of mankind as
illustrated by certain "types." Ordinary history deals, so to
speak, only with the outside of the house, but the myths include
what is going on inside the house also.  History treats of outward
things as having no inner essence, while the mythos is concerned
primarily with the hidden operations of the universe and of men,
and only in a secondary manner with the outward phenomena which
spring from them.

Myths can only be uttered by a seer or prophet, one who possesses
the powers of introspection and intuition in exceptional degree,
whose consciousness enjoys an elasticity, a power of extension, and
a capacity for the reception of inspiration.  Should anyone naively
enquire, is myth true, the emphatic answer is yes, far more true
than history.  The latter represents truth within certain
restrictions, truth as concerned with the objective aspect of
things, partial truth; but the former is truth not only concerning
the objective, but embracing the subjective also; it is "the truth,
the whole truth, and nothing but the truth."

We have said that the correct term to apply to the sacred
traditional allegorical narrative of the Bible mythos or myth. Now
this word according to its modern usage has been completely
inverted in meaning.  The modern dictionaries confirm this
statement, and furthermore they clearly indicate a similar if not
equally serious degradation of the closely related words "parable"
and "allegory." These terms are one and all more or less associated
with the word "fable," and regraded as relating to purely fanciful
stories having no foundation in truth save in so far as they may
contain fragments of distorted history or serve to "point a moral
and adorn a tale." Let us, then, attempt to trace the word myth to
its source, and ascertain as far as we can its original meaning
before it fell into the hands of the formalists.  It is derived
from the Greek "mythos," and among the early Greeks the "mythoi" or
"muthoi" were the sacred traditional narratives recited or acted
before initiates of an elementary grade in the Mysteries at Eleusis
and elsewhere; which narratives were permitted to be subsequently
related to the uninitiated and so became common property, as the
sculpture, the plays and the general literature of ancient Greece
proclaim.  That these "mythoi" carried an inner meaning was also
known to the initiates, but on that score they were sworn to
secrecy.  But the Greek word "mythos" or "muthos" has a more remote
source.  It is made up of two Hebrew roots, "mu" and "thu," which
are hieroglyphs.  "Mu" means something mobile or plastic and
passive, a feminine watery principle of which the intimate essence
remains unknown without the application and conjunction of an
active, masculine, fiery principle to bring about vivification. 
"Thu" means a sign, a symbol, or a symbolical narrative or recital. 
We may define the mythos as a mute, literal, narrative with a
certain hidden potentiality.

What then is needed to make its potentiality manifest, to cause the
mute narrative to speak ? The application of the "gnosis" or higher
knowledge and the presence and energy of the "logos," the living
word.  This term "logos" is also derived from those mysterious
Hebrew-Egyptian hieroglyphs. The roots are "lou," the universal
connecting link, and "gou," all manifest organic life.  "Logos"
therefore denotes the word of God, the divine thought, the love
which gives life to man and the universe.  Thus the mythos may be
regarded as external form, and the logos as internal life; the
mythos is the body of the logos, and the logos is the sort of the
mythos. Without the "breath of life" the mythos cannot be ensouled;
take away the vitality and you leave but the dead letter. Hence the
vehement accusation of the Christian Master: "Woe unto you, lawyers
(literalists) for ye have taken away the key of knowledge (gnosis);
ye entered not in yourselves, and them that were entering in ye
hindered " (Luke, chapter II, verse 52).
A typical example of the mythos occurs in the Seventh Chapter of
Genesis, the Cosmogony of Moses, where the entry into the Thebah
(Ark) and the outburst of the waters is described.  This deluge,
the bursting of the waters, was not a flooding of the earth with
the physical fluid ordinarily called water and known to the chemist
as H20.  Deluges in the ordinary sense are known to have occurred
upon our globe not once, but frequently during its history.  It is
possible, even probable, that Moses may have had the traditional
Atlantean deluge in mind when he wrote his Cosmogony, but he simply
employed that catastrophe as an outward symbol to represent
something far more profound and far reaching in character.  The
"water" of Noah's flood is the metaphysical "Water " (whereof
material water is the emblem), one of the four principles (fire,
air, water, earth) of manifest existence, a term devised by the
illuminate of the ancient mystery schools.  This philosophical
water is the element or principle upon which he who attains
Mastership has the power of walking and also of turning into wine. 
In the latter connection it is worth noting that Noah, on emanating
from the ark, plants a vineyard and produces wine.  Hence it
follows that the waters of Noah's deluge denote the primary watery
element out of which physical life is evolved, and into which it
can again be dissolved.

During the long period antecedent to the bursting of the waters,
man had gradually descended into matter, first building his
physical framework and outer nature, and was now completely
manifest or objective on the stage of existence, but not as yet
shut off in consciousness from the celestial realms.  However, his
objective or earthly consciousness, which had been very slight at
first, likewise gradually increased at the expense of his
subjective or heavenly consciousness, which slowly decreased.  The
flood marks a distinct epoch in the involution of man, and
indicates the point at which his subjectivity was entirely
objectified, but at this stage also it became possible for mankind
to yield a harvest. That harvest is represented by Noah ("nous"),
the first fruits of intelligence.  Noah stands for the grain or
seed of the first harvest, which seed was sown again at the next
phenomenal manifestation, or at the emergence from the Ark. One
could write a long dissertation upon the animals which Noah took
into the ark with him.  They primarily signify man's passions,
affections and appetites, clean and unclean, or pure and mixed. 
When objectified in time and space they become living creatures, or
rather, they became so when everything was in plastic condition and
man ruled over nature. This is the meaning of Adam naming the
animals, for to name is to give quality.  God created them
potentially "en masse;" but Adam differentiated them and projected
them into actuality.  The terms seven-by-seven and two-by-two have
no numerical, relative, or proportional value, but a figurative
one.  Seven denotes that which is complete, and in a condition of
rest or balance; seven-by-seven emphasises the fact.  The reference
is to those attributes of man which are perfected, or to precepts
which he has so far put fully into practice.  Two denotes the pairs
of opposites, good and evil, while two-by-two is its emphasised
form, and these "animals" relate to attributes which are in the
intermediate state, between precept and practice, knowledge which
is in the head, but not yet completely in the heart and not
expressed by the will in life and action.

Finally, the food provided signifies all that is necessary for the
sustenance and development of the intellect and will, and their
attributes.  All races which have preserved the tradition of the
deluge, and nearly all have done so, have not neglected to record
the name of the supposed mountain upon which the mysterious Ark,
carrying the germs of a new existence, came to rest.  Nicholas of
Damascus, cited by Josephus, calls it Mount Barris, a name which is
not very far removed from that of Syparis or Sypara, which Berosus
gives to this town of the sun, in which an Assyrian monarch,
preparing to suffer the catastrophe of the deluge, had placed the
world's archives.  We know also that the Greeks named it Luxoreos,
the mountain of light, the place of Parnassus where Deucalion was
stayed; but perhaps it is not so generally known that the Americans
had also a celebrated mountain upon which they asserted that the
survivors of the human race took refuge, and whose name they
consecrated by a temple dedicated to the sun.  This name was
Olagmi.  It would be easy to prove that all these names have a more
or less direct connection with the course of light; but without
invoking at the moment other languages than Hebrew, we will examine
the word Ararat which appears in Genesis as translated.  The word
is composed of two roots, "aur" and "rth." The first, "aur"
(incidentally, this is the word translated "light" in the first
chapter of Genesis) is known; it is light and all ideas connected
therewith.  The second, "rth," formed of the signs of proper
movement and of resistance, may be said to characterise a course
influenced, inflected or determined by something.  The whole word,
therefore, signifies the mountain of the reflected course of light. 
We have only to turn to the host of analogous or derivative words
for abundant confirmation.  "Arhat," a Sanscrit term, denotes a
highly advanced intelligence, a master.  The prefix "ar" is found
in Arjuna, Arthur, Artemis, Armageddon, Armna and even Archbishop,
not to mention many others, and in every case signifies spiritual
royalty or elevation.  If we reverse the letters of the root "ar,"
a procedure frequently practised in the Mystery schools, we obtain
"ra," the Egyptian word for the sun.  We now pass to another
important glyph, "Ereb," the raven.  The same word occurs in the
first chapter of Genesis, where it is translated "evening," and in
Greek mythology as "Erebus," said to be the son of Chaos and Nox. 
Ereb signifies "western darkness" as the opposite pole of "eastern
light," but this "darkness" is darkness in the sense of mystery, of
deeply hidden forces, having a close analogy with the dark or
invisible infra-red chemical rays of the spectrum.  It is for this
reason that the to-and-fro movement of the raven ("And he sent
forth a raven, which went forth to and fro, until the waters were
dried up from off the earth" - Genesis, chapter 8, verse 7) is made
use of in order to suggest the prescribing of an expanse (a sphere
or a circle) within which a definite creation is to take place. 
Ereb is also rendered "Oreb," and corresponds with Mount Horeb, the
mountain of fire, clouds and darkness; the Mount of the Law, of
statutes and judgments, external, binding and formal.  The name
"Ionah" or "Iona" is associated with the dove for similar reasons
to those applying in the case of the raven, i.e., because of moral
and physical analogies.  The Hebrew root "ion" denotes infinite
being passing from potentiality into activity, or from an
unmanifest to a manifest condition, and this will explain the
frequent allusions to the "dove" in scriptural records.  It should
be observed, too, how this root "ion" forms the basis of a number
of cryptic proper names; for example, Juno, Ioannes, Pelion and
Deucalion, all of them "types," and all communicators of the
creative spirit in one aspect or another.  And, wonderful to
relate, modern scientists in trying to discern the ultimate nature
of physical matter, have attributed it to etheric formes and
electrical stresses, to which they likewise give the name "ions."

We learn from the Hermetic tradition that in the formula "the Sons
of God" (as used in Genesis and throughout the Bible) there is
concealed a great mystery, one which until this epoch has been kept
a secret from all but very advanced initiates, and concerning which
they have given only dark hints to those in lower grades.  It is
asserted, however, that the time has now come with the arrival of
the Aquarian Age for much enlightenment to be given even to novices
regarding the cosmic secret thus cryptically kept in mind.

Ages ago, according to the hitherto carefully guarded instructions,
the ancestors of our humanity were about on a level with the most
intelligent creatures of the animal kingdom, so far as mental power
is concerned. They had attained perfection of instincts and
creative power unfoldment, but they were "mindless." The time had
come to awaken the intellect, the power of thinking, of
observation, comparison and conclusion, the power which is
satisfied by the perception of truth. To bring this about, the
teaching tells us, other planets of our system were drawn upon for
souls who would and could volunteer to undertake the training of
the as yet unmanifesting mind-substance latent in the sows of the
future humanity.  The appeal was responded to by a large number of
highly-evolved beings, and it is these beings who are referred to
by the term "Sons of God" in Genesis.  Elsewhere, they are known as
"Sons of Mind," the Angelic heaven-born, Higher-heaven-born and the
Heaven-born, according to their degree of evolution.  By the
Hebrews the Angelic heaven-born were called Angels (such was
Raphael in the Book of Tobit, and the Angels which appeared to
Abraham and others), and these became the practical guides and
"gods" of the planet.  Of a lower grade, under the direction of the
Angelic, were a host of inferior souls corresponding to "chelas" or
pupils of these exalted beings, styled the Higher-heaven-born, who
desired to accompany their old leaders into their new field of
responsibility and were permitted to do so.  These were they who
eventually "took to wife the daughters of men," causing the mixing
of the two species. The third and lowest rank of the Heaven-born
were of enormous numbers and so little beyond the Earth-born in
soul-growth that they immediately began to be incarnated in the
earth-races of proto-humans.  In this way a new race of souls was
mingled with the old, bringing a new set of instincts with them,
leavening the mass of the Earth-born and initiating an upward move,
under the immediate direction of the Higher-heaven-born and the
superintendence of the Angelic heaven-born.

We can now see that our humanity, popularly thought to be
homogeneous in its nature, consists of two distinct species,
although these have become commingled instead of being kept
separate as was intended.  One species is that of the fallen "Sons
of God," an immortal race which became subjected to mortal
conditions, one whose "memory is restored by God when it pleases
Him" (as the "Divine Pymander" of Hermes teaches), and which has
also been described as "the race which never dies" (see the Secret
Doctrine," by H.P. Blavatsky).  The other is that of the "sons of
men," who did not "fall" from the God-kingdom, since they had never
risen or evolved into it, but whose evolution thitherward, ordained
to be superintended by the "Sons of God," became arrested by the
latter's "fall" and failure in duty, with the result that the two
species have become chaotically intermixed. Despite the
intermixing, however, the inherent spiritual dignity of the "Sons
of God," into whatever great wickedness they have fallen (and many
of them have descended into far lower hells of vice and shame than
their less evolved brethren), has never been obliterated; as
Tennyson wrote, they have been "like coins, some true, some false,"
but remaining always "stamped with the image of the King"; and as
a species they are easily distinguishable from the "sons of men." 
Breed and blood tell, we are accustomed to say; but these factors
relate rather to the animal side of our nature; what tells still
more than physical heredity is a person's "spiritual" ancestry and
seniority, and, in this respect throughout history an ineffaceable
and unmistakable distinction between the two species has always
persisted.  That distinction of quality and age of soul lies at the
root of the Caste system in the East; it has displayed itself in
the "Aristoi" and "helotes" of Greece, in the "Patricians" and
"plebians" of Rome, in the "Nobles" and "serfs" of the feudal
system, and to-day it is perpetuated in our own "Lords" and
"commons." Furthermore, in virtue of an innate superiority of
spirit the "Sons of God" are the natural leaders of the "sons of
men," and remain so notwithstanding the consistent blind striving
of the democratic movement to equalise the two species, and thereby
to efface the age-old distinction between them.

There is, nevertheless, a deep and good reason for the hostility of
"Demos" towards "Aristos," which periodically flares out violently,
for in every age some of the "Sons of God," perverting their
spiritual capacity, have been the great criminals, the tyrants and
oppressors, socially, politically and intellectually, of the
humbler species.  The force, then, that has been at work behind
every great religious and political upheaval may be described as
the counter-offensive of the "sons of men" against the "Sons of
God" for sins committed in the past; it is a karmic retribution,
and is part of the penalty that the "Sons of God" have to pay for
having originally thwarted the evolution of the "sons of men." And
it will continue to operate in some form until such time as the
"Sons of God" have laboriously and painfully reformed themselves
and made their true nature and function manifest before the eyes of
the masses ; demonstrating, as they have never yet done, their
fitness and ability to be the only possible framers of a sound
social community, and the instructors in spiritual science to their
younger brethren.

Meanwhile, a deluded public imagines that a "new heaven and new
earth" can be created by the simple expedient of giving and
counting votes, quite oblivious of the fact that while "the blind
lead the blind" sincere motives cannot prevent the old vices from
breaking forth afresh in new and unexpected directions.  The
imperative need of the peoples to-day is for guidance by spiritual
Patricians, seers with eyes open equally to heaven and earth, wise
leaders "anointed with the oil of gladness above their fellows,"
and in order to achieve this it is first incumbent upon the "Sons
of God" to resume their "allotted task" at the point at which, ages
ago, they failed in it; they alone can regenerate the world and
reconstruct the social edifice upon an indefeasible basis.  The
"Sons of God" are, indeed, the "foundation stones" of T.G.A.O.T.U.,
upon which the whole superstructure was intended to be reared; and
despite the "utter confusion" now prevailing owing to the heavy
calamity which befell them, and through them the "sons of men,"
human society will eventually have to be re-erected in accordance
with "those plans and designs" which, prior to their "fall," had
been "regularly supplied to the various classes of the workmen." An
ideal state of human society on earth must ultimately be one which
reflects the ordered organisation of life beyond this world; in
other words, it must be "As above, so below"; "in earth as it is in
heaven"; the inferior must become a true reflex of the "pattern in
the mount." The perfect "temple" of humanity must, therefore,
ultimately be constructed upon the same architectural principle,
the divine principle of Hierarchy, as our Craft; it will be as a
pyramid of living "stones," built up from a broad base, and rising
through a series of narrowing courses which taper, towards the
summit, to a point or chief corner-stone which binds them all
together.  At that supreme point the earthly hierarchy ends and the
heavenly hierarchy begins; and contact between the two being
established there by the "head-stone of the corner," Light and
Wisdom from on high will flow through to those who minister to the
spiritual needs of the less advanced junior brethren in the ever
widening ranks below.  Hierarchy is the negation of anarchy, of
mass-rule, and of all forms of self-willed despotism, whether by
means of unenlightened individuals or fluctuating majorities; it
conforms with the divine ordinance:-

"Order is Heaven's first law, and, that confessed, 
Some are and must be greater than the rest."

In proclaiming the principle of Hierarchy the Christian Church, in
its Collect for Michaelmas Day, declares that the Most High has
"ordained and constituted the service of Angels and men in a
"wonderful order" It is this "wonderful order"  which is today
preserved in the Craft; every Masonic Lodge is a little
self-contained hierarchical cell within the larger organism of
London or one of the Provinces; the Provinces and London in turn
function as a similar hierarchy within the greater matrix of Grand
Lodge; and, finally, the Grand Lodge on earth reflects, moves
within, and is mothered by the Grand Lodge Above, "whose Grand
Master is the great Jehovah and whose Officers are holy Angels."
Here let us pause; for, in these days of hurried reading and
shallow hearing, familiar phrases of the deepest import are apt to
run meaningful of the mind, and to leave no impressions where one
is striving to impress deeply and every word is meant to weigh. To
whomsoever in the Craft the foregoing passage speaks vitally - and
to some few it is pointedly addressed - we are suggesting the wider
application of a most wonderful and sacred message which is
enshrined at the very heart of our Masonic system.

The trend in human affairs at this time towards synthesis,
co-operation, fusion and amalgamation is a portent of promise; it
indicates that the resurrection, to which the noblest of the "Sons
of God," down the ages, have testified, is now a general
possibility.  Moreover, humanity to-day, as a whole, faces towards
the higher life because its integrity is being steadily assured,
while slowly it is being "properly prepared" as a vehicle or matrix
(a literal although mystical "body") which the impregnating Power
of the Highest can overshadow, and into which once again the Light
from Above can be attracted and brought to birth and manifestation,
in a number of dedicated individuals, for the further saving of the
world.  A new kingdom is coming into being; a fifth kingdom in
nature is materialising; and already it has a nucleus functioning
on earth in physical bodies.

The striving and struggling of the present time, the upheaval and
chaos, are signs of the resurrection; they accompany the words, not
uttered once and finally, but spoken now to all who can hear them:
"The Holy Ghost shall come upon the, and the Power of the Highest
shall overshadow thee." The Holy Spirit is always "coming upon"
human souls and inspiring them, but who has been consciously
overshadowed by this further something - this Power of the Highest
- or gives a thought to what it may mean? What, then, is this
"Dunamis Hupsiston," this fecundating "Force subsisting and
stationed in the heights" (to give full value to the eloquent Greek
words), which is intermediate and mediating between God and
ourselves.  The "Power of the Highest" is not the Divine
potentiality in the abstract; it is a most concrete reality; the
Power behind and controlling all other powers. In the first place
it is the antithesis, and ultimate corrective and antidote of that
"force" of which we have already spoken; and which in relation to
this may be thought of as the "power of the lowest." As the latter
is the power of disorder in this world, so the former is that of
the supreme Order beyond it, Order which can and will impose its
rectifying will upon human indiscipline when the right hour
strikes.  The "Highest" or "Most High," is not God; it is the Force
(using that term in the same sense as in the "Police-Force" or
"Air-Force") through which God's transmitted majesty works both in
and beyond this world.

It is, from the point of view of Freemasonry, the Grand Lodge
Above; it is the Great White Lodge of the Masters of Wisdom forming
the "throne of grace" from which rules the Most Wise Sovereign of
Angels and men, and through whose heavenly cohorts He transmits
Himself to us in this world, as we in turn have access to Him. 
"The Highest," that potent yet most withdrawn Holy Assembly (the
Grand Sanhedrin), has still on earth as aforetime its human links
and delegates, and it is this fact alone which will explain the
problem of the institution of modern Freemasonry in the 17th
century by those members of the "Invisible Society" who, as agents
of the Superior Hierarchy, inspired the formation of the Craft,
although they themselves remained in concealment. These originators
of be Craft were a group of advanced Illuminates, some of whom took
the Masonic Initiation so as to forge a personal link between the
Craft and their superior allegiance, and it was they also who
prompted four old London Lodges to form the but Grand Lodge thereby
inaugurating what has since become our world-wide Masonic movement. 
The Craft continues to exit on earth because the Craft also exists,
in a higher disposition, in the heavens.  "As below, so above," and
our earthly Craft, with its hierarchy of graded Freemasons, is a
reflection of the similarly graded Great Hierarchy of Masters, Past
Masters and Brethren in the Grand Lodge Above.  By entering the
Craft on earth we have focused upon us the "Power of the Highest"
(even when we remain unaware of it), and, if we will, can so
perfect our natures until we too are, consciously and whilst in the
flesh, "overshadowed" and qualified to be "fit members for well
organised society" both here and in the supernal kingdom.

Unfortunately, so few Brethren realise on admission to the Craft
(what every student comes one day to learn) the fact that, behind
and beyond all elementary religious sanctions, there is a spiritual
law, an unformulated but iron-strong controlling principle, to
which sooner or later our rebellious self-willed reason has to
become obedient, and which has been called for ages "Disciplina
arcani," the "discipline of the secret" (or "of what is secret"). 
It is the law which prescribes for everyone the conditions upon
which knowledge of esoteric truth and acquaintance with the deeper
aspects of the mysteries of faith can be imparted and received. 
Each of us finds and must learn it for himself, but if one's motive
be worthy and the rule of the road is followed by means of a
"prudent and well regulated course of discipline," the simplest way
to its discovery leads through a humble conformity with, and
spiritual discernment of, what is implied in the duly instituted
universal symbols, until the Realities are reached which those
symbols both veil and reveal and to proclaim which they were
ordained.  Those who have discovered this way seem uniformly silent
about it, as having found something ineffable which each one of us
is put to finding for himself.  They are very obviously typed (in
the V. of the S.L.), by those "wise Men" who once saw a star in the
East and followed it.  They were intercepted in their search, you
will no doubt recall, by a less well-motivated and less spiritually
advanced person, who said "When ye have found, bring me word again
that I may come and worship also." But, having found, something -
the "discipline of the secret" - admonished them not to return and
tell. And it is just the same to-day. Those who learn the Mysteries
"depart into their own country another way," and keep very silent. 
But they know that others will follow them into the same "country"
when they too have become wise, and that all is well.

We will conclude this part of our Paper with an appeal to every
enlightened member of the Craft both in his character as a
Freemason and as a "citizen of the world." Hitherto the mystical
aspect of Freemasonry has tended to be a subject confined to
individual Brethren unactuated by  any common policy, and with no
prescribed purpose towards which they could labour concertedly.
Lack of knowledge and the conditions of the age have, of course,
been largely responsible for students of Masonic doctrine being
forced to work singly or in small groups. What is needed now,
however, is united action by instructed Freemasons everywhere, "for
the good of Freemasonry in general," and we confidently assert that
all who respond to the call in "love and unity" will not fail in
finding and doing their part (small or great, near at hand or from
afar), even although they never meet to speak of it together in the
flesh.  We are at the beginning of great changes and events,
spiritual and temporal, and it is perhaps well that the part of
this Circle in that beginning, however large in prospect and full
in faith, should be at present small and of mean account.  Let us,
then, resolve to "steadily persevere" in our work dedicated to our
Brethren in the Craft, and if visible results are slow in
manifestation we may yet find inspiration in the words of an
outstanding " Son of God of former days :-

By mutual confidence and mutual aid
Great deeds are done and great discoveries made,
The wise new prudence from the wise acquire,
And one brave hero fans another's ire."

(Iliad, Book X, 265).

SO MOTE IT BE.

TO BE CONCLUDED.