Footnotes

[1] “The doctrine of the immortality of the soul, if it is a real

advantage, follows unavoidably from the idea of God. The _best_ Being, he

must _will_ the best of good things; the _wisest_, he must devise plans

for that effect; the _most powerful_, he must bring it about. None can

deny this.”–THEO. PARKER, _Discourse of Matters pertaining to Religion_,

b. ii. ch. viii. p. 205.

[2] “This institution of religion, like society, friendship, and marriage,

comes out of a principle, deep and permanent in the heart: as humble, and

transient, and partial institutions come out of humble, transient, and

partial wants, and are to be traced to the senses and the phenomena of

life, so this sublime, permanent, and useful institution came out from

sublime, permanent, and universal wants, and must be referred to the soul,

and the unchanging realities of life.”–PARKER, _Discourse of Religion_,

b. i. ch. i. p. 14.

[3] “The sages of all nations, ages, and religions had some ideas of these

sublime doctrines, though more or less degraded, adulterated and obscured;

and these scattered hints and vestiges of the most sacred and exalted

truths were originally rays and emanations of ancient and primitive

traditions, handed down from, generation to generation, since the

beginning of the world, or at least since the fall of man, to all

mankind.”–CHEV. RAMSAY, _Philos. Princ. of Nat. and Rev. Relig.,_ vol ii.

p. 8.

[4] “In this form, not only the common objects above enumerated, but gems,

metals, stones that fell from heaven, images, carved bits of wood, stuffed

skins of beasts, like the medicine-bags of the North American Indians, are

reckoned as divinities, and so become objects of adoration. But in this

case, the visible object, is idealized; not worshipped as the brute thing

really is, but as the type and symbol of God.”–PARKER, _Disc. of Relig._

b. i. ch. v. p. 50.

[5] A recent writer thus eloquently refers to the universality, in ancient

times, of sun-worship: “Sabaism, the worship of light, prevailed amongst

all the leading nations of the early world. By the rivers of India, on the

mountains of Persia, in the plains of Assyria, early mankind thus adored,

the higher spirits in each country rising in spiritual thought from the

solar orb up to Him whose vicegerent it seems–to the Sun of all being,

whose divine light irradiates and purifies the world of soul, as the solar

radiance does the world of sense. Egypt, too, though its faith be but

dimly known to us, joined in this worship; Syria raised her grand temples

to the sun; the joyous Greeks sported with the thought while feeling it,

almost hiding it under the mythic individuality which their lively fancy

superimposed upon it. Even prosaic China makes offerings to the yellow orb

of day; the wandering Celts and Teutons held feasts to it, amidst the

primeval forests of Northern Europe; and, with a savagery characteristic

of the American aborigines, the sun temples of Mexico streamed with human

blood in honor of the beneficent orb.”–_The Castes and Creeds of India,_

Blackw. Mag., vol. lxxxi. p. 317.–“There is no people whose religion is

known to us,” says the Abbé Banier, “neither in our own continent nor in

that of America, that has not paid the sun a religious worship, if we

except some inhabitants of the torrid zone, who are continually cursing

the sun for scorching them with his beams.”–_Mythology_, lib. iii. ch.

iii.–Macrobius, in his _Saturnalia,_ undertakes to prove that all the

gods of Paganism may be reduced to the sun.

[6] “Varro de religionibus loquens, evidenter dicit, multa esse vera, quae

vulgo scire non sit utile; multaque, quae tametsi falsa sint, aliter

existimare populum expediat.”–St. AUGUSTINE, _De Civil. Dei._–We must

regret, with the learned Valloisin, that the sixteen books of Varro, on

the religious antiquities of the ancients, have been lost; and the regret

is enhanced by the reflection that they existed until the beginning of the

fourteenth century, and disappeared only when their preservation for less

than two centuries more would, by the discovery of printing, have secured

their perpetuity.

[7] Strabo, Geog., lib. i.

[8] Maurice, Indian Antiquities, vol. ii. p. 297.

[9] Div. Leg., vol. i. b. ii. § iv. p. 193, 10th Lond. edit.

[10] The hidden doctrines of the unity of the Deity and the immortality of

the soul were taught originally in all the Mysteries, even those of Cupid

and Bacchus.–WARBURTON, apud Spence’s _Anecdotes_, p. 309.

[11] Isoc. Paneg., p. 59.

[12] Apud Arrian. Dissert., lib. iii. c. xxi.

[13] Phaedo.

[14] Dissert. on the Eleusinian and Bacchic Mysteries, in the Pamphleteer,

vol. viii. p. 53.

[15] Symbol. und Mythol. der Alt. Völk.

[16] In these Mysteries, after the people had for a long time bewailed the

loss of a particular person, he was at last supposed to be restored to

life.–BRYANT, _Anal. of Anc. Mythology_, vol. iii. p. 176.

[17] Herod. Hist., lib. iii. c. clxxi.

[18] The legend says it was cut into _fourteen_ pieces. Compare this with

the _fourteen_ days of burial in the masonic legend of the third degree.

Why the particular number in each? It has been thought by some, that in

the latter legend there was a reference to the half of the moon’s age, or

its dark period, symbolic of the darkness of death, followed by the

fourteen days of bright moon, or restoration to life.

[19] Mystères du Paganisme, tom. i. p. 6.

[20] Notes to Rawlinson’s Herodotus, b. ii. ch. clxxi. Mr. Bryant

expresses the same opinion: “The principal rites in Egypt were confessedly

for a person lost and consigned for a time to darkness, who was at last

found. This person I have mentioned to have been described under the

character of Osiris.”–_Analysis of Ancient Mythology_, vol. iii. p. 177.

[21] Spirit of Masonry, p. 100.

[22] Varro, according to St. Augustine (De Civ. Dei, vi. 5), says that

among the ancients there were three kinds of theology–a _mythical_, which

was used by the poets; a _physical_, by the philosophers, and a _civil_,

by the people.

[23] “Tous les ans,” says Sainte Croix, “pendant les jours consacrés au

souvenir de sa mort, tout étoit plongé dans la tristesse: on ne cessoit de

pousser des gémissemens; on alloit même jusqu’à se flageller et se donner

des coups. Le dernier jour de ce deuil, on faisoit des sacrifices funèbres

en l’honneur de ce dieu. Le jour suivant, on recevoit la nouvelle

qu’Adonis venoit d’être rappelé à la vie, qui mettoit fin à leur

deuil.”–_Recherches sur les Myst. du Paganisme_, tom. ii. p. 105.

[24] Clement of Alexandria calls them [Greek: mystê/ria ta\ pro\

mystêri/ôn], “the mysteries before the mysteries.”

[25] Les petits mystères ne consistoient qu’en cérémonies

préparatoires.–_Sainte Croix_, i. 297.–As to the oath of secrecy, Bryant

says, “The first thing at these awful meetings was to offer an oath of

secrecy to all who were to be initiated, after which they proceeded to the

ceremonies.”–_Anal. of Anc. Myth._, vol. iii. p. 174.–The Orphic

Argonautics allude to the oath: [Greek: meta\ d’ o(rkia My/si~ais,

k. t. l.], “after the oath was administered to the mystes,” &c.–_Orph.

Argon._, v. 11.

[26] The satirical pen of Aristophanes has not spared the Dionysiac

festivals. But the raillery and sarcasm of a comic writer must always be

received with many grains of allowance. He has, at least, been candid

enough to confess that no one could be initiated who had been guilty of

any crime against his country or the public security.–_Ranae_, v.

360-365.–Euripides makes the chorus in his Bacchae proclaim that the

Mysteries were practised only for virtuous purposes. In Rome, however,

there can be little doubt that the initiations partook at length of a

licentious character. “On ne peut douter,” says Ste. Croix, “que

l’introduction des fêtes de Bacchus en Italie n’ait accéleré les progrès

du libertinage et de la débauche dans cette contrée.”–_Myst. du Pag._,

tom. ii. p. 91.–St. Augustine (De Civ. Dei, lib. vii. c. xxi.) inveighs

against the impurity of the ceremonies in Italy of the sacred rites of

Bacchus. But even he does not deny that the motive with which they were

performed was of a religious, or at least superstitious nature–“Sic

videlicet Liber deus placandus fuerat.” The propitiation of a deity was

certainly a religious act.

[27] Hist. Greece, vol. ii. p. 140.

[28] This language is quoted from Robison (_Proofs of a Conspiracy_, p.

20, Lond. edit. 1797), whom none will suspect or accuse of an undue

veneration for the antiquity or the morality of the masonic order.

[29] We must not confound these Asiatic builders with the play-actors, who

were subsequently called by the Greeks, as we learn from Aulus Gellius

(lib. xx. cap. 4), “artificers of Dionysus”–[Greek: Dionysiakoi

technitai\].

[30] There is abundant evidence, among ancient authors, of the existence

of signs and passwords in the Mysteries. Thus Apuleius, in his Apology,

says, “Si qui forte adest eorundem Solemnium mihi particeps, signum dato,”

etc.; that is, “If any one happens to be present who has been initiated

into the same rites as myself, if he will give me the sign, he shall then

be at liberty to hear what it is that I keep with so much care.” Plautus

also alludes to this usage, when, in his “Miles Gloriosus,” act iv. sc. 2,

he makes Milphidippa say to Pyrgopolonices, “Cedo signum, si harunc

Baccharum es;” i.e., “Give the sign if you are one of these Bacchae,” or

initiates into the Mysteries of Bacchus. Clemens Alexandrinus calls these

modes of recognition [Greek: sôthêmata], as if _means of safety_. Apuleius

elsewhere uses _memoracula_, I think to denote passwords, when he says,

“sanctissimè sacrorum signa et memoracula custodire,” which I am inclined

to translate, “most scrupulously to preserve the signs and passwords of

the sacred rites.”

[31] The Baron de Sainte Croix gives this brief view of the ceremonies:

“Dans ces mystères on employoit, pour remplir l’âme des assistans d’une

sainte horreur, les mêmes moyens qu’à Eleusis. L’apparition de fantômes et

de divers objets propres à effrayer, sembloit disposer les esprits à la

crédulité. Ils en avoient sans doute besoin, pour ajouter foi à toutes les

explications des mystagogues: elles rouloient sur le massacre de Bacchus

par les Titans,” &c.–_Recherches sur les Mystères du Paganisme_, tom. ii.

sect. vii. art. iii. p. 89.

[32] Lawrie, Hist. of Freemasonry, p. 27.

[33] Vincentius Lirinensis or Vincent of Lirens, who lived in the fifth

century of the Christian era, wrote a controversial treatise entitled

“Commonitorium,” remarkable for the blind veneration which it pays to the

voice of tradition. The rule which he there lays down, and which is cited

in the text, may be considered, in a modified application, as an axiom by

which we may test the _probability_, at least, of all sorts of traditions.

None out of the pale of Vincent’s church will go so far as he did in

making it the criterion of positive truth.

[34] Prolog. zu einer wissenshaftlich. Mythologie.

[35] In German _hutten_, in English _lodges_, whence the masonic term.

[36] Historical Essay on Architecture, ch. xxi.

[37] Bishop England, in his “Explanation of the Mass,” says that in every

ceremony we must look for three meanings: “the first, the literal,

natural, and, it may be said, the original meaning; the second, the

figurative or emblematic signification; and thirdly, the pious or

religious meaning: frequently the two last will be found the same;

sometimes all three will be found combined.” Here lies the true difference

between the symbolism of the church and that of Masonry. In the former,

the symbolic meaning was an afterthought applied to the original, literal

one; in the latter, the symbolic was always the original signification of

every ceremony.

[38] /P “Was not all the knowledge Of the Egyptians writ in mystic

symbols? Speak not the Scriptures oft in parables? Are not the choicest

fables of the poets, That were the fountains and first springs of wisdom,

Wrapped in perplexed allegories?”

BEN JONSON, _Alchemist_, act ii. sc. i. P/

[39] The distinguished German mythologist Müller defines a symbol to be

“an eternal, visible sign, with which a spiritual feeling, emotion, or

idea is connected.” I am not aware of a more comprehensive, and at the

same time distinctive, definition.

[40] And it may be added, that the word becomes a symbol of an idea; and

hence, Harris, in his “Hermes,” defines language to be “a system of

articulate voices, the symbols of our ideas, but of those principally

which are general or universal.”–_Hermes_, book iii. ch. 3.

[41] “Symbols,” says Müller, “are evidently coeval with the human race;

they result from the union of the soul with the body in man; nature has

implanted the feeling for them in the human heart.”–_Introduction to a

Scientific System of Mythology_, p. 196, Leitch’s translation.–R.W.

Mackay says, “The earliest instruments of education were symbols, the most

universal symbols of the multitudinously present Deity, being earth or

heaven, or some selected object, such as the sun or moon, a tree or a

stone, familiarly seen in either of them.”–_Progress of the Intellect_,

vol. i p. 134.

[42] Between the allegory, or parable, and the symbol, there is, as I have

said, no essential difference. The Greek verb [Greek: paraballô], whence

comes the word _parable_, and the verb [Greek: symballô] in the same

language, which is the root of the word _symbol_, both have the synonymous

meaning “to compare.” A parable is only a spoken symbol. The definition of

a parable given by Adam Clarke is equally applicable to a symbol, viz.: “A

comparison or similitude, in which one thing is compared with another,

especially spiritual things with natural, by which means these spiritual

things are better understood, and make a deeper impression on the

attentive mind.”

[43] North British Review, August, 1851. Faber passes a similar encomium.

“Hence the language of symbolism, being so purely a language of ideas, is,

in one respect, more perfect than any ordinary language can be: it

possesses the variegated elegance of synonymes without any of the

obscurity which arises from the use of ambiguous terms.”–_On the

Prophecies_, ii. p. 63.

[44] “By speculative Masonry we learn to subdue our passions, to act upon

the square, to keep a tongue of good report, to maintain secrecy, and

practise charity.”–_Lect. of Fel. Craft._ But this is a very meagre

definition, unworthy of the place it occupies in the lecture of the second

degree.

[45] “Animal worship among the Egyptians was the natural and unavoidable

consequence of the misconception, by the vulgar, of those emblematical

figures invented by the priests to record their own philosophical

conception of absurd ideas. As the pictures and effigies suspended in

early Christian churches, to commemorate a person or an event, became in

time objects of worship to the vulgar, so, in Egypt, the esoteric or

spiritual meaning of the emblems was lost in the gross materialism of the

beholder. This esoteric and allegorical meaning was, however, preserved by

the priests, and communicated in the mysteries alone to the initiated,

while the uninstructed retained only the grosser conception.”–GLIDDON,

_Otia Aegyptiaca_, p. 94.

[46] “To perpetuate the esoteric signification of these symbols to the

initiated, there were established the Mysteries, of which institution we

have still a trace in Freemasonry.”–GLIDDON, _Otia Aegyp._ p. 95.

[47] Philo Judaeus says, that “Moses had been initiated by the Egyptians

into the philosophy of symbols and hieroglyphics, as well as into the

ritual of the holy animals.” And Hengstenberg, in his learned work on

“Egypt and the Books of Moses,” conclusively shows, by numerous examples,

how direct were the Egyptian references of the Pentateuch; in which fact,

indeed, he recognizes “one of the most powerful arguments for its

credibility and for its composition by Moses.”–HENGSTENBERG, p. 239,

Robbins’s trans.

[48] Josephus, _Antiq._ book iii. ch. 7.

[49] The ark, or sacred boat, of the Egyptians frequently occurs on the

walls of the temples. It was carried in great pomp by the priests on the

occasion of the “procession of the shrines,” by means of staves passed

through metal rings in its side. It was thus conducted into the temple,

and deposited on a stand. The representations we have of it bear a

striking resemblance to the Jewish ark, of which it is now admitted to

have been the prototype.

[50] “The Egyptian reference in the Urim and Thummim is especially

distinct and incontrovertible.”–HENGSTENBERG, p. 158.

[51] According to the estimate of Bishop Cumberland, it was only one

hundred and nine feet in length, thirty-six in breadth, and fifty-four in

height.

[52] “Thus did our wise Grand Master contrive a plan, by mechanical and

practical allusions, to instruct the craftsmen in principles of the most

sublime speculative philosophy, tending to the glory of God, and to secure

to them temporal blessings here and eternal life hereafter, as well as to

unite the speculative and operative Masons, thereby forming a twofold

advantage, from the principles of geometry and architecture on the one

part, and the precepts of wisdom and ethics on the other.”–CALCOTT,

_Candid Disquisition_, p. 31, ed. 1769.

[53] This proposition I ask to be conceded; the evidences of its truth

are, however, abundant, were it necessary to produce them. The craft,

generally, will, I presume, assent to it.

[54]

“The groves were God’s first temples. Ere man learned

To hew the shaft, and lay the architrave,

And spread the roof above them–ere he framed

The lofty vault, to gather and roll back

The sound of anthems–in the darkling wood,

Amid the cool and silence, he knelt down,

And offered to the Mightiest solemn thanks

And supplication.”–BRYANT.

[55] Theologians have always given a spiritual application to the temple

of Solomon, referring it to the mysteries of the Christian dispensation.

For this, consult all the biblical commentators. But I may particularly

mention, on this subject, Bunyan’s “Solomon’s Temple Spiritualized,” and a

rare work in folio, by Samuel Lee, Fellow of Wadham College, Oxford,

published at London in 1659, and entitled “Orbis Miraculum, or the Temple

of Solomon portrayed by Scripture Light.” A copy of this scarce work,

which treats very learnedly of “the spiritual mysteries of the gospel

veiled under the temple,” I have lately been, by good fortune, enabled to

add to my library.

[56] Veluti pecora, quae natura finxit prona et obedientia

ventri.–SALLUST, _Bell. Catil._ i.

[57] I Kings vi. 7.

[58] In further illustration of the wisdom of these temple contrivances,

it may be mentioned that, by marks placed upon the materials which had

been thus prepared at a distance, the individual production of every

craftsman was easily ascertained, and the means were provided of rewarding

merit and punishing indolence.

[59] “Each of the pagan gods had (besides the _public_ and _open_) a

_secret worship_ paid unto him; to which none were admitted but those who

had been selected by preparatory ceremonies, called Initiation. This

_secret-worship_ was termed the Mysteries.”–WARBURTON, _Div. Leg. I. i.

p. 189_.

[60] It must be remarked, however, that many of the Fellow Crafts were

also stone-cutters in the mountains, _chotzeb bahor_, and, with their

nicer implements, more accurately adjusted the stones which had been

imperfectly prepared by the apprentices. This fact does not at all affect

the character of the symbolism we are describing. The due preparation of

the materials, the symbol of purification, was necessarily continued in

all the degrees. The task of purification never ceases.

[61] The classical reader will here be reminded of that beautiful passage

of Horace, commencing with “Justum et tenacem propositi virum.”–Lib. iii.

od. 3.

[62] “Pallida mors aequo pulsat pede pauperum tabernas Regumque

turres.”–HOR. lib. i. od. 4.

[63] It is worth noticing that the verb _natzach_, from which the title

of the _menatzchim_ (the overseers or Master Masons in the ancient

temple), is derived, signifies also in Hebrew _to be perfected, to be

completed_. The third degree is the perfection of the symbolism of the

temple, and its lessons lead us to the completion of life. In like

manner the Mysteries, says Christie, “were termed [Greek: teletai\],

_perfections_, because they were supposed to induce a perfectness of

life. Those who were purified by them were styled [Greek: teloume/noi],

and [Greek: tetelesme/noi], that is, brought to

perfection.”–_Observations on Ouvaroff’s Essay on the Eleusinian

Mysteries_, p. 183.

[64] Dr. Oliver, in the first or preliminary lecture of his “Historical

Landmarks,” very accurately describes the difference between the pure or

primitive Freemasonry of the Noachites, and the spurious Freemasonry of

the heathens.

[65] The idea of the world, as symbolically representing God’s temple, has

been thus beautifully developed in a hymn by N.P. Willis, written for the

dedication of a church:–

“The perfect world by Adam trod

Was the first temple built by God;

His fiat laid the corner stone,

And heaved its pillars, one by one.

“He hung its starry roof on high–

The broad, illimitable sky;

He spread its pavement, green and bright,

And curtained it with morning light.

“The mountains in their places stood,

The sea, the sky, and ‘all was good;’

And when its first pure praises rang,

The ‘morning stars together sang.’

“Lord, ’tis not ours to make the sea,

And earth, and sky, a house for thee;

But in thy sight our offering stands,

A humbler temple, made with hands.”

[66] “The idea,” says Dudley, “that the earth is a level surface, and of a

square form, is so likely to have been entertained by persons of little

experience and limited observation, that it may be justly supposed to have

prevailed generally in the early ages of the world.”–_Naology_, p. 7.

[67] The quadrangular form of the earth is preserved in almost all the

scriptural allusions that are made to it. Thus Isaiah (xi. 12) says, “The

Lord shall gather together the dispersed of Judah from the _four corners_

of the earth;” and we find in the Apocalypse (xx. 9) the prophetic version

of “four angels standing on the _four corners_ of the earth.”

[68] “The form of the lodge ought to be a double cube, as an expressive

emblem of the powers of darkness and light in the creation.”–OLIVER,

_Landmarks_, i. p. 135, note 37.

[69] Not that whole visible universe, in its modern signification, as

including solar systems upon solar systems, rolling in illimitable space,

but in the more contracted view of the ancients, where the earth formed

the floor, and the sky the ceiling. “To the vulgar and untaught eye,” says

Dudley, “the heaven or sky above the earth appears to be co-extensive with

the earth, and to take the same form, enclosing a cubical space, of which

the earth was the base, the heaven or sky the upper surface.”–_Naology_,

7.–And it is to this notion of the universe that the masonic symbol of

the lodge refers.

[70] “These rocky shrines, the formation of which Mr. Grose supposes to

have been a labor equal to that of erecting the Pyramids of Egypt, are of

various height, extent, and depth. They are partitioned out, by the labor

of the hammer and the chisel, into many separate chambers, and the roof,

which in the pagoda of Elephanta is flat, but in that of Salsette is

arched, is supported by rows of pillars of great thickness, and arranged

with much regularity. The walls are crowded with gigantic figures of men

and women, engaged in various actions, and portrayed in various whimsical

attitudes; and they are adorned with several evident symbols of the

religion now prevailing in India. Above, as in a sky, once probably

adorned with gold and azure, in the same manner as Mr. Savary lately

observed in the ruinous remains of some ancient Egyptian temples, are seen

floating the children of imagination, genii and dewtahs, in multitudes,

and along the cornice, in high relief, are the figures of elephants,

horses, and lions, executed with great accuracy. Two of the principal

figures at Salsette are twenty-seven feet in height, and of proportionate

magnitude; the very bust only of the triple-headed deity in the grand

pagoda of Elephanta measures fifteen feet from the base to the top of the

cap, while the face of another, if Mr. Grose, who measured it, may be

credited, is above five feet in length, and of corresponding

breadth.”–MAURICE, _Ind. Ant._ vol. ii. p. 135.

[71] According to Faber, the egg was a symbol of the world or megacosm,

and also of the ark, or microcosm, as the lunette or crescent was a symbol

of the Great Father, the egg and lunette–which was the hieroglyphic of

the god Lunus, at Heliopolis–was a symbol of the world proceeding from

the Great Father.–_Pagan Idolatry_, vol. i. b. i. ch. iv.

[72] Zoroaster taught that the sun was the most perfect fire of God, the

throne of his glory, and the residence of his divine presence, and he

therefore instructed his disciples “to direct all their worship to God

first towards the sun (which they called Mithras), and next towards their

sacred fires, as being the things in which God chiefly dwelt; and their

ordinary way of worship was to do so towards both. For when they came

before these fires to worship, _they always approached them on the west

side_, that, having their faces towards them and also towards the rising

sun at the same time, they might direct their worship to both. And in this

posture they always performed every act of their worship.”–PRIDEAUX.

_Connection._ i. 216.

[73] “The mysteries of Ceres (or Eleusis) are principally distinguished

from all others as having been the depositories of certain traditions

coeval with the world.”–OUVAROFF, _Essay on the Mysteries of Eleusis_, p.

6.

[74] The dadouchus, or torch-bearer, carried a symbol of the sun.

[75] “Indeed, the most ancient superstition of all nations,” says Maurice,

“has been the worship of the sun, as the lord of heaven and the governor

of the world; and in particular it prevailed in Phoenicia, Chaldaea,

Egypt, and from later information we may add, Peru and Mexico, represented

in a variety of ways, and concealed under a multitude of fanciful names.

Through all the revolutions of time the great luminary of heaven hath

exacted from the generations of men the tribute of devotion.”–_Indian

Antiquities_, vol. ii. p. 91.

[76] Facciolatus thus defines the Phallus: “penis ligneus, vel vitreus,

vel coriaceus, quem in Bacchi festis plaustro impositum per rura et urbes

magno honore circumferebant.”–_Lex. in voc._

[77] The exhibition of these images in a colossal form, before the gates

of ancient temples, was common. Lucian tells us of two colossal Phalli,

each one hundred and eighty feet high, which stood in the fore court of

the temple at Hierapolis. Mailer, in his “Ancient Art and its Remains,”

mentions, on the authority of Leake, the fact that a colossal Phallus,

which once stood on the top of the tomb of the Lydian king Halyattes, is

now lying near the same spot; it is not an entire Phallus, but only the

head of one; it is twelve feet in diameter below and nine feet over the

glands. The Phallus has even been found, so universal was this worship,

among the savages of America. Dr. Arthaut discovered, in the year 1790, a

marble Phallic image in a cave of the island of St. Domingo.–CLAVEL,

_Hist. Pittoresq. des Religions_, p. 9.

[78] Sonnerat (Voyage aux Indes Orient, i. p. 118) observes, that the

professors of this worship were of the purest principles and most

unblemished conduct, and it seems never to have entered into the heads of

the Indian legislator and people that anything natural could be grossly

obscene.–Sir William Jones remarks (Asiatic Researches, i. 254), that

from the earliest periods the women of Asia, Greece, and Italy wore this

symbol as a jewel, and Clavel tells us that a similar usage prevails at

this day among the women in some of the villages of Brittany. Seely tells

us that the Lingam, or Indian Phallus, is an emblem as frequently met with

in Hindostan as the cross is in Catholic countries.–_Wonders of Elora._

p. 278.

[79] Num. xxv. 1-3. See also Psalm cvi. 28: “They joined themselves also

unto Baal-peor, and ate the sacrifices of the dead.” This last expression,

according to Russel, has a distinct reference to the physical qualities of

matter, and to the time when death, by the winter absence of the solar

heat, gets, as it were, possession of the earth. Baal-peor was, he says,

the sun exercising his powers of fecundity.–_Connection of Sacred and

Profane History_

[80] Is there not a seeming reference to this thought of divine

hermaphrodism in the well-known passage of Genesis? “So God created man in

his own image, in the image of God created he him: _male and female_

created he them.” And so being created “male and female,” they were “in

the image of God.”

[81] The world being animated by man, says Creuzer, in his learned work on

Symbolism, received from him the two sexes, represented by heaven and the

earth. Heaven, as the fecundating principle, was male, and the source of

fire; the earth, as the fecundated, was female, and the source of

humidity. All things issued from the alliance of these two principles. The

vivifying powers of the heavens are concentrated in the sun, and the

earth, eternally fixed in the place which it occupies, receives the

emanations from the sun, through the medium of the moon, which sheds upon

the earth the germs which the sun had deposited in its fertile bosom. The

Lingam is at once the symbol and the mystery of this religious idea.

[82] Such was the opinion of some of the ancient sun-worshippers, whose

adorations were always performed in the open air, because they thought no

temple was spacious enough to contain the sun; and hence the saying,

“Mundus universus est templum solis”–the universe is the temple of the

sun. Like our ancient brethren, they worshipped only on _the highest

hills_. Another analogy.

[83] _Asgard_, the abode of the gods, is shaded by the ash tree,

_Ydrasil_, where the gods assemble every day to do justice. The branches

of this tree extend themselves over the whole world, and reach above the

heavens. It hath three roots, extremely distant from each other: one of

them is among the gods; the second is among the giants, where the abyss

formerly was; the third covers _Niflheim_, or hell, and under this root is

the fountain _Vergelmer_, whence flow the infernal rivers.–_Edda, Fab._

8.

[84] Exod. iii. 5.

[85] Commentaries _in loco_.

[86] Commentary on Exod. iii. 5.

[87] Iamblichi Vita Pythag. c. 105. In another place he says, “[Greek:

Thy/ein chrê\ a)nypo/deton, kai pro\s ta i(era\ prostie/nai],”–We must

sacrifice and enter temples with the shoes off. Ibid. c. 85.

[88] “Quod etiam nunc apud plerasque Orientis nationes piaculum sit,

calceato pede templorum pavimenta calcasse.”

[89] Beth Habbechirah, cap. vii.

[90] Histor. Landm. vol. ii. p. 481.

[91] “Non datur nobis potestas adeundi templum nisi nudibus pedibus.”

[92] Commentaries, _ut supra_.

[93] See a paper “on the religious ceremonies of the Hindus,” by H.T.

Colebrooke, Esq. in the Asiatic Researches, vol. vi. p. 357.

[94] A Specimen of the Critical History of the Celtic Religion and

Learning. Letter ii. § xvii.

[95] Dr. Oliver, referring to the “twelve grand points in Masonry,” which

formed a part of the old English lectures, says, “When the candidate was

_intrusted_, he represented Asher, for he was then presented with the

glorious fruit of masonic knowledge, as Asher was represented by fatness

and royal dainties.”–_Hist. Landm._, vol. i. lect. xi. p. 313.

[96] From the Greek [Greek: ay)topsi/a], signifying _a seeing with ones

own eyes_. The candidate, who had previously been called a _mystes_, or a

_blind man_, from [Greek: mi/ô], to _shut the eyes_, began at this point

to change his title to that of an _epopt_, or an _eye-witness_.

[97] _Yehi aur va yehi aur._

[98] Robert William Mackay, Progress of the Intellect, vol. i. p. 93.

[99] “And thou shalt put in the breastplate of judgment the Urim and the

Thummim.”–_Exod._ xxviii. 30.–The Egyptian judges also wore

breastplates, on which was represented the figure of _Ra_, the sun, and

_Thme_, the goddess of Truth, representing, says Gliddon, “_Ra_, or the

sun, in a double capacity–physical and intellectual light; and _Thme_, in

a double capacity–justice and truth.”–_Ancient Egypt_, p. 33.

[100] We owe this interesting discovery to F. Portal, who has given it in

his elaborate work on Egyptian symbols as compared with those of the

Hebrews. To those who cannot consult the original work in French, I can

safely recommend the excellent translation by my esteemed friend, Bro.

John W. Simons, of New York, and which will be found in the thirtieth

volume of the “Universal Masonic Library.”

[101] “The most early defection to Idolatry,” says Bryant, “consisted in

the adoration of the sun and the worship of demons, styled

Baalim.”–_Analysts of Anc. Mythol._ vol. iii. p. 431.

[102] The remarks of Mr. Duncan on this subject are well worth perusal.

“Light has always formed one of the primary objects of heathen adoration.

The glorious spectacle of animated nature would lose all its interest if

man were deprived of vision, and light extinguished; for that which is

unseen and unknown becomes, for all practical purposes, as valueless as if

it were non-existent. Light is a source of positive happiness; without it,

man could barely exist; and since all religious opinion is based on the

ideas of pleasure and pain, and the corresponding sensations of hope and

fear, it is not to be wondered if the heathen reverenced light. Darkness,

on the contrary, by replunging nature, as it were, into a state of

nothingness, and depriving man of the pleasurable emotions conveyed

through the organ of sight, was ever held in abhorrence, as a source of

misery and fear. The two opposite conditions in which man thus found

himself placed, occasioned by the enjoyment or the banishment of light,

induced him to imagine the existence of two antagonist principles in

nature, to whose dominion he was alternately subject. Light multiplied his

enjoyments, and darkness diminished them. The former, accordingly, became

his friend, and the latter his enemy. The words ‘light’ and ‘good,’ and

‘darkness’ and ‘evil,’ conveyed similar ideas, and became, in sacred

language, synonymous terms. But as good and evil were not supposed to flow

from one and the same source, no more than light and darkness were

supposed to have a common origin, two distinct and independent principles

were established, totally different in their nature, of opposite

characters, pursuing a conflicting line of action, and creating

antagonistic effects. Such was the origin of this famous dogma, recognized

by all the heathens, and incorporated with all the sacred fables,

cosmogonies, and mysteries of antiquity.”–_The Religions of Profane

Antiquity_, p. 186.

[103] See the “Bhagvat Geeta,” one of the religious books of Brahminism. A

writer in Blackwood, in an article on the “Castes and Creeds of India,”

vol. lxxxi. p. 316, thus accounts for the adoration of light by the early

nations of the world: “Can we wonder at the worship of light by those

early nations? Carry our thoughts back to their remote times, and our only

wonder would be if they did not so adore it. The sun is life as well as

light to all that is on the earth–as we of the present day know even

better than they of old. Moving in dazzling radiance or brilliant-hued

pageantry through the sky, scanning in calm royalty all that passes below,

it seems the very god of this fair world, which lives and blooms but in

his smile.”

[104] The _Institutes of Menu_, which are the acknowledged code of the

Brahmins, inform us that “the world was all darkness, undiscernible,

undistinguishable altogether, as in a profound sleep, till the

self-existent, invisible God, making it manifest with five elements and

other glorious forms, perfectly dispelled the gloom.”–Sir WILLIAM JONES,

_On the Gods of Greece. Asiatic Researches_, i. 244.

Among the Rosicrucians, who have, by some, been improperly confounded with

the Freemasons, the word _lux_ was used to signify a knowledge of the

philosopher’s stone, or the great desideratum of a universal elixir and a

universal menstruum. This was their _truth_.

[105] On Symbolic Colors, p. 23, Inman’s translation.

[106] Freemasonry having received the name of _lux_, or light, its

disciples have, very appropriately, been called “the Sons of Light.” Thus

Burns, in his celebrated Farewell:–

“Oft have I met your social band,

And spent the cheerful, festive night;

Oft, honored with supreme command,

Presided o’er the _sons of light_.”

[107] Thus defined: “The stone which lies at the corner of two walls, and

unites them; the principal stone, and especially the stone which forms the

corner of the foundation of an edifice.”–Webster.

[108] Among the ancients the corner-stone of important edifices was laid

with impressive ceremonies. These are well described by Tacitus, in his

history of the rebuilding of the Capitol. After detailing the preliminary

ceremonies which consisted in a procession of vestals, who with chaplets

of flowers encompassed the ground and consecrated it by libations of

living water, he adds that, after solemn prayer, Helvidius, to whom the

care of rebuilding the Capitol had been committed, “laid his hand upon the

fillets that adorned the foundation stone, and also the cords by which it

was to be drawn to its place. In that instant the magistrates, the

priests, the senators, the Roman knights, and a number of citizens, all

acting with one effort and general demonstrations of joy, laid hold of the

ropes and dragged the ponderous load to its destined spot. They then threw

in ingots of gold and silver, and other metals, which had never been

melted in the furnace, but still retained, untouched by human art, their

first formation in the bowels of the earth.”–_Tac. Hist._, 1. iv. c. 53,

Murphy’s transl.

[109] As, for instance, in Psalm cxviii. 22, “The stone which the builders

refused is become the head-stone of the corner,” which, Clarke says,

“seems to have been originally spoken of David, who was at first rejected

by the Jewish rulers, but was afterwards chosen by the Lord to be the

great ruler of his people in Israel;” and in Isaiah xxviii. 16, “Behold, I

lay in Zion, for a foundation, a stone, a tried stone, a precious

corner-stone, a sure foundation,” which clearly refers to the promised

Messiah.

[110] In the ritual “observed at laying the foundation-stone of public

structures,” it is said, “The principal architect then presents the

working tools to the Grand Master, who applies the plumb, square, and

level to the stone, in their proper positions, and pronounces it to be

_well-formed, true, and trusty_.”–WEBB’S _Monitor_, p. 120.

[111] “The square teaches us to regulate our conduct by the principles of

morality and virtue.”–_Ritual of the E. A. Degree._–The old York

lectures define the square thus: “The square is the theory of universal

duty, and consisteth in two right lines, forming an angle of perfect

sincerity, or ninety degrees; the longest side is the sum of the lengths

of the several duties which we owe to all men. And every man should be

agreeable to this square, when perfectly finished.”

[112] Aristotle.

[113] “The cube is a symbol of truth, of wisdom, and moral perfection. The

new Jerusalem, promised in the Apocalypse, is equal in length, breadth,

and height. The Mystical city ought to be considered as a new church,

where divine wisdom will reign.”–OLIVER’S _Landmarks_, ii. p. 357.–And

he might have added, where eternal truth will be present.

[114] In the most primitive times, all the gods appear to have been

represented by cubical blocks of stone; and Pausanias says that he saw

thirty of these stones in the city of Pharae, which represented as many

deities. The first of the kind, it is probable, were dedicated to Hermes,

whence they derived their name of “Hermae.”

[115] “Give unto Jehovah the glory due unto His name; worship Jehovah in

the beauty of holiness.”–_Psalm_ xxix. 2.

[116] It is at least a singular coincidence that in the Brahminical

religion great respect was paid to the north-east point of the heavens.

Thus it is said in the Institutes of Menu, “If he has any incurable

disease, let him advance in a straight path towards _the invincible

north-east point_, feeding on water and air till his mortal frame totally

decay, and his soul become united with the Supreme.”

[117] This symbolism of the double position of the corner-stone has not

escaped the attention of the religious symbologists. Etsius, an early

commentator, in 1682, referring to the passage in Ephesians ii. 20, says,

“That is called the corner-stone, or chief corner-stone, which is placed

in the extreme angle of a foundation, conjoining and holding together two

walls of the pile, meeting from different quarters. And the apostle not

only would be understood by this metaphor that Christ is the principal

foundation of the whole church, but also that in him, as in a

corner-stone, the two peoples, Jews and Gentiles, are conjoined, and so

conjoined as to rise together into one edifice, and become one church.”

And Julius Firmicius, who wrote in the sixteenth century, says that Christ

is called the corner-stone, because, being placed in the angle of the two

walls, which are the Old and the New Testament, he collects the nations

into one fold. “Lapis sanctus, i.e. Christus, aut fidei fundamenta

sustentat aut in angulo positus duorum parietum membra aequata moderatione

conjungit, i.e., Veteris et Novi Testamenti in unum colligit gentes.”–_De

Errore profan. Religionum_, chap. xxi.

[118] This permanence of position was also attributed to those cubical

stones among the Romans which represented the statues of the god Terminus.

They could never lawfully be removed from the spot which they occupied.

Hence, when Tarquin was about to build the temple of Jupiter, on the

Capitoline Hill, all the shrines and statues of the other gods were

removed from the eminence to make way for the new edifice, except that of

Terminus, represented by a stone. This remained untouched, and was

enclosed within the temple, to show, says Dudley, “that the stone, having

been a personification of the God Supreme, could not be reasonably

required to yield to Jupiter himself in dignity and power.”–DUDLEY’S

_Naology_, p 145.

[119] Dudley’s Naology, p. 476.

[120] Masonic Discourses, Dis. iv. p. 81.

[121] “The act of consecration chiefly consisted in the unction, which was

a ceremony derived from the most primitive antiquity. The sacred

tabernacle, with all the vessels and utensils, as also the altar and the

priests themselves, were consecrated in this manner by Moses, at the

divine command. It is well known that the Jewish kings and prophets were

admitted to their several offices by unction. The patriarch Jacob, by the

same right, consecrated the altars which he made use of; in doing which it

is more probable that he followed the tradition of his forefathers, than

that he was the author of this custom. The same, or something like it, was

also continued down to the times of Christianity.”–POTTER’S

_Archaeologia Graeca_, b. ii. p. 176.

[122] From the Greek [Greek: tetra\s], four, and [Greek: gra/mma], letter,

because it is composed of four Hebrew letters. Brande thus defines it:

“Among several ancient nations, the name of the mystic number _four_,

which was often symbolized to represent the Deity, whose name was

expressed by four letters.” But this definition is incorrect. The

tetragrammaton is not the name of the number _four_, but the word which

expresses the name of God in four letters, and is always applied to the

Hebrew word only.

[123] Exod. iii. 15. In our common version of the Bible, the word “Lord”

is substituted for “Jehovah,” whence the true import of the original is

lost.

[124] Exod. vi. 2. 3.

[125] “The Jews have many superstitious stories and opinions relative to

this name, which, because they were forbidden to mention _in vain_, they

would not mention _at all_. They substituted _Adonai_, &c., in its room,

whenever it occurred to them in reading or speaking, or else simply and

emphatically styled it _the Name_. Some of them attributed to a certain

repetition of this name the virtue of a charm, and others have had the

boldness to assert that our blessed Savior wrought all his miracles (for

they do not deny them to be such) by that mystical use of this venerable

name. See the _Toldoth Jeschu_, an infamously scurrilous life of Jesus,

written by a Jew not later than the thirteenth century. On p. 7, edition

of Wagenseilius, 1681, is a succinct detail of the manner in which our

Savior is said to have entered the temple and obtained possession of the

Holy Name. Leusden says that he had offered to give a sum of money to a

very poor Jew at Amsterdam, if he would only once deliberately pronounce

the name _Jehovah_; but he refused it by saying that he did not

dare.”–_Horae Solitariae_, vol. i. p. 3.–“A Brahmin will not pronounce

the name of the Almighty, without drawing down his sleeve and placing it

on his mouth with fear and trembling.”–MURRAY, _Truth of Revelation_, p.

321.

[126] The same scrupulous avoidance of a strict translation has been

pursued in other versions. For Jehovah, the Septuagint substitutes

“[Greek: Ky/rios],” the Vulgate “Dominus,” and the German “der Herr,” all

equivalent to “the Lord.” The French version uses the title “l’Eternel.”

But, with a better comprehension of the value of the word, Lowth in his

“Isaiah,” the Swedenborgian version of the Psalms, and some other recent

versions, have restored the original name.

[127] In the Talmudical treatise, _Majan Hachochima_, quoted by Stephelin

(Rabbinical Literature, i. p. 131), we are informed that rightly to

understand the shem hamphorash is a key to the unlocking of all mysteries.

“There,” says the treatise, “shalt thou understand the words of men, the

words of cattle, the singing of birds, the language of beasts, the barking

of dogs, the language of devils, the language of ministering angels, the

language of date-trees, the motion of the sea, the unity of hearts, and

the murmuring of the tongue–nay, even the thoughts of the reins.”

[128] The gamma, [Greek: G], or Greek letter G, is said to have been

sacred among the Pythagoreans as the initial of [Greek: Geômeiri/a] or

Geometry.

[129] Vide Oliver, _Hist. Init._ p. 68, note.

[130] Jamblichus says that Pythagoras passed over from Miletus to Sidon,

thinking that he could thence go more easily into Egypt, and that while

there he caused himself to be initiated into all the mysteries of Byblos

and Tyre, and those which were practised in many parts of Syria, not

because he was under the influence of any superstitious motives, but from

the fear that if he were not to avail himself of these opportunities, he

might neglect to acquire some knowledge in those rites which was worthy of

observation. But as these mysteries were originally received by the

Phoenicians from Egypt, he passed over into that country, where he

remained twenty-two years, occupying himself in the study of geometry,

astronomy, and all the initiations of the gods ([Greek: pa/sas theô~n

teleta/s]), until he was carried a captive into Babylon by the soldiers of

Cambyses, and that twelve years afterwards he returned to Samos at the age

of sixty years.–_Vit. Pythag_, cap. iii., iv.

[131] “The sacred words were intrusted to him, of which the Ineffable

Tetractys, or name of God, was the chief.”–OLIVER, _Hist. Init._ p. 109.

[132] “Hu, the mighty, whose history as a patriarch is precisely that of

Noah, was promoted to the rank of the principal demon-god among the

Britons; and, as his chariot was composed of rays of the sun, it may be

presumed that he was worshipped in conjunction with that luminary, and to

the same superstition we may refer what is said of his light and swift

course.”–DAVIES, _Mythol. and Rites of the Brit. Druids_, p. 110.

[133] “All the male gods (of the ancients) may be reduced to one, the

generative energy; and all the female to one, the prolific principle. In

fact, they may all be included in the one great Hermaphrodite, the

[Greek: a)r(r)enothêlys] who combines in his nature all the elements of

production, and who continues to support the vast creation which

originally proceeded from his will.”–RUSSELL’S _Connection_, i. p. 402.

[134] It is a tradition that it was pronounced in the following seven

different ways by the patriarchs, from Methuselah to David, viz.: _Juha,

Jeva, Jova, Jevo, Jeveh, Johe_, and _Jehovah_. In all these words the _j_

is to be pronounced as _y_, the _a_ as _ah_, the _e_ as a, and the _v_ as

_w_.

[135] The _i_ is to be pronounced as _e_, and the whole word as if spelled

in English _ho-he_.

[136] In the apocryphal “Book of the Conversation of God with Moses on

Mount Sinai,” translated by the Rev. W. Cureton from an Arabic MS. of the

fifteenth century, and published by the Philobiblon Society of London, the

idea of the eternal watchfulness of God is thus beautifully allegorized:–

“Then Moses said to the Lord, O Lord, dost thou sleep or not? The Lord

said unto Moses, I never sleep: but take a cup and fill it with water.

Then Moses took a cup and filled it with water, as the Lord commanded him.

Then the Lord cast into the heart of Moses the breath of slumber; so he

slept, and the cup fell from his hand, and the water which was therein was

spilled. Then Moses awoke from his sleep. Then said God to Moses, I

declare by my power, and by my glory, that if I were to withdraw my

providence from the heavens and the earth for no longer a space of time

than thou hast slept, they would at once fall to ruin and confusion, like

as the cup fell from thy hand.”

[137] I have in my possession a rare copy of the Vulgate Bible, in black

letter, printed at Lyons, in 1522. The frontispiece is a coarsely executed

wood cut, divided into six compartments, and representing the six days of

the creation. The Father is, in each compartment, pictured as an aged man

engaged in his creative task.

[138] Christian Iconography, Millington’s trans., vol. i. p. 59.

[139] The triangle, or delta, is the symbol of Deity for this reason. In

geometry a single line cannot represent a perfect figure; neither can two

lines; three lines, however, constitute the triangle or first perfect and

demonstrable figure. Hence this figure symbolizes the Eternal God,

infinitely perfect in his nature. But the triangle properly refers to God

only in his quality as an Eternal Being, its three sides representing the

Past, the Present, and the Future. Some Christian symbologists have made

the three sides represent the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost; but they

evidently thereby destroy the divine unity, making a trinity of Gods in

the unity of a Godhead. The Gnostic trinity of Manes consisted of one God

and two principles, one of good and the other of evil. The Indian trinity,

symbolized also by the triangle, consisted of Brahma, Siva, and Vishnu,

the Creator, Preserver, and Destroyer, represented by Earth, Water, and

Air. This symbolism of the Eternal God by the triangle is the reason why a

trinitarian scheme has been so prevalent in all religions–the three sides

naturally suggesting the three divisions of the Godhead. But in the Pagan

and Oriental religions this trinity was nothing else but a tritheism.

[140] Noachidae, or Noachites, the descendants of Noah. This patriarch

having alone preserved the true name and worship of God amid a race of

impious idolaters, the Freemasons claim to be his descendants, because

they preserve that pure religion which distinguished this second father of

the human race from the rest of the world. (See the author’s _Lexicon of

Freemasonry_.) The Tyrian workmen at the temple of Solomon were the

descendants of that other division of the race who fell off, at Shinar,

from the true worship, and repudiated the principles of Noah. The Tyrians,

however, like many other ancient mystics, had recovered some portion of

the lost light, and the complete repossession was finally achieved by

their union with the Jewish masons, who were Noachidae.

[141] “A mythis omnis priscorum hominum tum historia tum philosophia

procedit.”–_Ad Apollod. Athen. Biblioth. not._ f. p. 3.–And Faber says,

“Allegory and personification were peculiarly agreeable to the genius of

antiquity; and the simplicity of truth was continually sacrificed at the

shrine of poetical decoration.”–_On the Cabiri._

[142] See Grote, History of Greece, vol. i. ch. xvi. p. 479, whence this

definition has been substantially derived. The definitions of Creuzer,

Hermann, Buttmann, Heyne, Welcker, Voss, and Müller are none of them

Better, and some of them not as good.

[143] Hist. of Greece, vol. i. ch. xvi. p. 579. The idea of the existence

of an enlightened people, who lived at a remote era, and came from the

East, was a very prevalent notion among the ancient traditions. It is

corroborative of this that the Hebrew word _kedem_,

signifies, in respect to place, _the east_, and, in respect to time,

_olden time, ancient days_. The phrase in Isaiah xix. 11, which reads, “I

am the son of the wise, the son of ancient kings,” might just as well have

been translated “the son of kings of the East.” In a note to the passage

Ezek. xliii. 2, “the glory of the God of Israel came from the way of the

East,” Adam Clarke says, “All knowledge, all religion, and all arts and

sciences, have travelled, according to the _course of the sun_, FROM EAST

TO WEST!” Bazot tells us (in his Manuel du Franc-maçon, p. 154) that “the

veneration which masons entertain for the east confirms an opinion

previously announced, that the religious system of Masonry came from the

east, and has reference to the _primitive religion_, whose first

corruption was the worship of the sun.” And lastly, the masonic reader

will recollect the answer given in the Leland MS. to the question

respecting the origin of Masonry, namely, “It did begin” (I modernize the

orthography) “with the first men in the east, which were before the first

men of the west; and coming westerly, it hath brought herewith all

comforts to the wild and comfortless.” Locke’s commentary on this answer

may conclude this note: “It should seem, by this, that masons believe

there were men in the east before Adam, who is called the ‘first man of

the west,’ and that arts and sciences began in the east. Some authors, of

great note for learning, have been of the same opinion; and it is certain

that Europe and Africa (which, in respect to Asia, may be called western

countries) were wild and savage long after arts and politeness of manners

were in great perfection in China and the Indies.” The Talmudists make the

same allusions to the superiority of the east. Thus, Rabbi Bechai says,

“Adam was created with his face towards the east that he might behold the

light and the rising sun, whence the east was to him the anterior part of

the world.”

[144] Strauss makes a division of myths into historical, philosophical,

and poetical.–_Leben Jesu._–His poetical myth agrees with my first

division, his philosophical with my second, and his historical with my

third. But I object to the word _poetical_, as a distinctive term, because

all myths have their foundation in the poetic idea.

[145] Ulmann, for instance, distinguishes between a myth and a legend–the

former containing, to a great degree, fiction combined with history, and

the latter having but a few faint echoes of mythical history.

[146] In his “Prolegomena zu einer wissenshaftlichen Mythologie,” cap. iv.

This valuable work was translated in 1844, by Mr. John Leitch.

[147] Historical Landmarks, i. 53.

[148] See an article, by the author, on “The Unwritten Landmarks of

Freemasonry,” in the first volume of the Masonic Miscellany, in which this

subject is treated at considerable length.

[149] As a matter of some interest to the curious reader, I insert the

legend as published in the Gentleman’s Magazine of June, 1815, from, it is

said, a parchment roll supposed to have been written early in the

seventeenth century, and which, if so, was in all probability copied from

one of an older date:–

“Moreover, when Abraham and Sara his wife went into Egipt, there he taught

the Seaven Scyences to the Egiptians; and he had a worthy Scoller that

height Ewclyde, and he learned right well, and was a master of all the vij

Sciences liberall. And in his dayes it befell that the lord and the

estates of the realme had soe many sonns that they had gotten some by

their wifes and some by other ladyes of the realme; for that land is a

hott land and a plentious of generacion. And they had not competent

livehode to find with their children; wherefor they made much care. And

then the King of the land made a great counsell and a parliament, to witt,

how they might find their children honestly as gentlemen. And they could

find no manner of good way. And then they did crye through all the realme,

if there were any man that could enforme them, that he should come to

them, and he should be soe rewarded for his travail, that he should hold

him pleased.

“After that this cry was made, then came this worthy clarke Ewclyde, and

said to the King and to all his great lords: ‘If yee will, take me your

children to governe, and to teach them one of the Seaven Scyences,

wherewith they may live honestly as gentlemen should, under a condicion

that yee will grant mee and them a commission that I may have power to

rule them after the manner that the science ought to be ruled.’ And that

the Kinge and all his counsell granted to him anone, and sealed their

commission. And then this worthy tooke to him these lords’ sonns, and

taught them the science of Geometric in practice, for to work in stones

all manner of worthy worke that belongeth to buildinge churches, temples,

castells, towres, and mannors, and all other manner of buildings.”

[150] Ancient Egypt under the Pharaohs, vol. I p. 393.

[151] 1 Kings vi. 8.

[152] An allusion to this symbolism is retained in one of the well-known

mottoes of the order–“_Lux e tenebris._”

[153] “An allegory is that in which, under borrowed characters and

allusions, is shadowed some real action or moral instruction; or, to keep

more strictly to its derivation ([Greek: a)/llos], _alius_, and [Greek:

a)gorey/ô], _dico_), it is that in which one thing is related and another

thing is understood. Hence it is apparent that an allegory must have two

senses–the literal and mystical; and for that reason it must convey its

instruction under borrowed characters and allusions throughout.”–_The

Antiquity, Evidence, and Certainty of Christianity canvassed, or Dr.

Middleton’s Examination of the Bishop of London’s Discourses on Prophecy.

By Anselm Bayly, LL.B., Minor Canon of St. Paul’s._ Lond, 1751.

[154] The words themselves are purely classical, but the meanings here

given to them are of a mediaeval or corrupt Latinity. Among the old

Romans, a _trivium_ meant a place where three ways met, and a _quadrivium_

where four, or what we now call a _cross-road_. When we speak of the

_paths of learning_, we readily discover the origin of the signification

given by the scholastic philosophers to these terms.

[155] Hist. of Philos. vol. ii. p. 337.

[156] Such a talisman was the following figure:–

———–

| 8 | 1 | 6 |

|—|—|—|

| 3 | 5 | 7 |

|—|—|—|

| 4 | 9 | 2 |

———–

[157] Anderson’s Constitutions, 2d ed. 1738, p. 14.

[158] Anderson’s Constitutions, 3d ed. 1756, p. 24.

[159] “The hidden doctrines of the unity of the Deity and the immortality

of the soul were originally in all the Mysteries, even those of Cupid and

Bacchus.”–WARBURTON, _in Spence’s Anecdotes,_ p. 309.

[160] “The allegorical interpretation of the myths has been, by several

learned investigators, especially by Creuzer, connected with the

hypothesis of an ancient and highly instructed body of priests, having

their origin either in Egypt or in the East, and communicating to the rude

and barbarous Greeks religious, physical, and historical knowledge, under

the veil of symbols.”–GROTE, _Hist. of Greece,_ vol. i. ch. xvi. p.

579.–And the Chevalier Ramsay corroborates this theory: “Vestiges of the

most sublime truths are to be found in the sages of all nations, times,

and religions, both sacred and profane, and these vestiges are emanations

of the antediluvian and noevian tradition, more or less disguised and

adulterated.”–_Philosophical Principles of Natural and Revealed Religion

unfolded in a Geometrical Order,_ vol. 1, p. iv.

[161] Of this there is abundant evidence in all the ancient and modern

writers on the Mysteries. Apuleius, cautiously describing his initiation

into the Mysteries of Isis, says, “I approached the confines of death, and

having trod on the threshold of Proserpine, I returned therefrom, being

borne through all the elements. At midnight I saw the sun shining with its

brilliant light; and I approached the presence of the gods beneath, and

the gods of heaven, and stood near and worshipped them.”–_Metam._ lib.

vi. The context shows that all this was a scenic representation.

[162] _Aish hakam iodea binah,_ “a cunning man, endued with

understanding,” is the description given by the king of Tyre of Hiram

Abif. See 2 Chron. ii. 13. It is needless to say that “cunning” is a good

old Saxon word meaning _skilful_.

[163]

“Pronaque cum spectent animalia cætera terram;

Os homini sublime dedit: coelumque tueri

Jussit, et erectos ad sidera tollere vultus.”

OVID, _Met._ i. 84.

“Thus, while the mute creation downward bend

Their sight, and to their earthly mother tend,

Man looks aloft, and with erected eyes

Beholds his own hereditary skies.”

DRYDEN.

[164] “[Greek: A)phanismo\s], disappearance, destruction, a perishing,

death, from [Greek: a)phani/zô], to remove from one’s view, to conceal,”

&c.–_Schrevel. Lex._

[165] “[Greek: Ey~resis], a finding, invention, discovery.”–_Schrevel.

Lex._

[166] A French writer of the last century, speaking of the degree of “Très

Parfait Maitre,” says, “C’est ici qu’on voit réellement qu’Hiram n’a été

que le type de Jésus Christ, que le temple et les autres symboles

maçonniques sont des allegories relatives à l’Eglise, à la Foi, et aux

bonnes moeurs.”–_Origine et Objet de la Franchemaçonnerie, par le F.B._

Paris, 1774.

[167] “This our order is a positive contradiction to the Judaic blindness

and infidelity, and testifies our faith concerning the resurrection of the

body.”–HUTCHINSON, _Spirit of Masonry,_ lect. ix. p. 101.–The whole

lecture is occupied in advancing and supporting his peculiar theory.

[168] “Thus, then, it appears that the historical reference of the legend

of Speculative Freemasonry, in all ages of the world, was–to our death in

Adam and life in Christ. What, then, was the origin of our tradition? Or,

in other words, to what particular incident did the legend of initiation

refer before the flood? I conceive it to have been the offering and

assassination of Abel by his brother Cain; the escape of the murderer; the

discovery of the body by his disconsolate parents, and its subsequent

interment, under a certain belief of its final resurrection from the dead,

and of the detection and punishment of Cain by divine vengeance.”–OLIVER,

_Historical Landmarks of Freemasonry_, vol. ii. p. 171.

[169] “Le grade de Maître va donc nous retracer allegoriquement la mort du

_dieu-lumière_–mourant en hiver pour reparaître et ressusciter au

printemps.”–RAGON, _Cours Philos. et Interp. des Init._ p. 158.

[170] “Dans l’ordre moral, Hiram n’est autre chose que la raison

éternelle, par qui tout est pondéré, réglé, conservé.”–DES ETANGS,

_Oeuvres Maçonniques_, p. 90.

[171] With the same argument would I meet the hypothesis that Hiram was

the representative of Charles I. of England–an hypothesis now so

generally abandoned, that I have not thought it worth noticing in the

text.

[172] “The initiation into the Mysteries,” he says, “scenically

represented the mythic descent into Hades and the return from thence to

the light of day; by which was meant the entrance into the Ark and the

subsequent liberation from its dark enclosure. Such Mysteries were

established in almost every part of the pagan world; and those of Ceres

were substantially the same as the Orgies of Adonis, Osiris, Hu, Mithras,

and the Cabiri. They all equally related to the allegorical disappearance,

or death, or descent of the great father at their commencement, and to his

invention, or revival, or return from Hades, at their conclusion.”–_Origin

of Pagan Idolatry,_ vol. iv. b. iv. ch. v. p. 384–But this Arkite

theory, as it is called, has not met with the general approbation of

subsequent writers.

[173] Mount Calvary is a small hill or eminence, situated in a westerly

direction from that Mount Moriah on which the temple of Solomon was built.

It was originally a hillock of notable eminence, but has, in modern times,

been greatly reduced by the excavations made in it for the construction of

the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Buckingham, in his Palestine, p. 283,

says, “The present rock, called Calvary, and enclosed within the Church of

the Holy Sepulchre, bears marks, in every part that is naked, of its

having been a round nodule of rock standing above the common level of the

surface.”

[174] Dr. Beard, in the art. “Golgotha,” in Kitto’s Encyc. of Bib. Lit.,

reasons in a similar method as to the place of the crucifixion, and

supposing that the soldiers, from the fear of a popular tumult, would

hurry Jesus to the most convenient spot for execution, says, “Then the

road to Joppa or Damascus would be most convenient, and no spot in the

vicinity would probably be so suitable as the slight rounded elevation

which bore the name of Calvary.”

[175] Some have supposed that it was so called because it was the place of

public execution. _Gulgoleth_ in Hebrew, or _gogultho_ in Syriac, means _a

skull_.

[176] Quoted in Oliver, _Landmarks_, vol. i. p. 587, note.

[177] Oliver’s idea (_Landmarks_, ii. 149) that _cassia_ has, since the

year 1730, been corrupted into _acacia_, is contrary to all etymological

experience. Words are corrupted, not by lengthening, but by abbreviating

them. The uneducated and the careless are always prone to cut off a

syllable, not to add a new one.

[178] And yet I have been surprised by seeing, once or twice, the word

“Cassia” adopted as the name of a lodge. “Cinnamon” or “sandal wood” would

have been as appropriate, for any masonic meaning or symbolism.

[179] Eclog. ii. 49.

“Pallentes violas et summa papavera carpens,

Narcissum et florem jungit benè olentis anethi:

Tum casia, atque aliis intexens suavibus herbis,

Mollia luteola pingit vaccinia, caltha.”

[180] Exod. xxx. 24, Ezek. xxvii. 9, and Ps. xlv. 8.

[181] Oliver, it is true, says, that “there is not the smallest trace of

any tree of the kind growing so far north as Jerusalem” (_Landm._ ii.

136); but this statement is refuted by the authority of Lieutenant Lynch,

who saw it growing in great abundance at Jericho, and still farther

north.–_Exped. to the Dead Sea_, p. 262.–The Rabbi Joseph Schwarz, who

is excellent authority, says, “The Acacia (Shittim) Tree, Al Sunt, is

found in Palestine of different varieties; it looks like the Mulberry

tree, attains a great height, and has a hard wood. The gum which is

obtained from it is the gum Arabic.”–_Descriptive Geography and

Historical Sketch of Palestine_, p. 308, Leeser’s translation. Phila.,

1850.–Schwarz was for sixteen years a resident of Palestine, and wrote

from personal observation. The testimony of Lynch and Schwarz should,

therefore, forever settle the question of the existence of the acacia in

Palestine.

[182] Calmet, Parkhurst, Gesenius, Clarke, Shaw, and all the best

authorities, concur in saying that the _otzi shittim_, or shittim wood of

Exodus, was the common acacia or mimosa nilotica of Linnæus.

[183] “This custom among the Hebrews arose from this circumstance.

Agreeably to their laws, no dead bodies were allowed to be interred within

the walls of the city; and as the Cohens, or priests, were prohibited from

crossing a grave, it was necessary to place marks thereon, that they might

avoid them. For this purpose the acacia was used.”–DALCHO, _Oration_, p.

27, note.–I object to the reason assigned by Dalcho; but of the existence

of the custom there can be no question, notwithstanding the denial or

doubt of Dr. Oliver. Blount (_Travels in the Levant_, p. 197) says,

speaking of the Jewish burial customs, “those who bestow a marble stone

over any [grave] have a hole a yard long and a foot broad, in which _they

plant an evergreen_, which seems to grow from the body, and is carefully

watched.” Hasselquist (_Travels_, p. 28) confirms his testimony. I borrow

the citations from Brown (_Antiquities of the Jews_, vol. ii. p. 356), but

have verified the reference to Hasselquist. The work of Blount I have not

been enabled to consult.

[184] Antiquities of Greece, p. 569.

[185] Dr. Crucefix, MS., quoted by Oliver, _Landmarks_, ii. 2.

[186] Spirit of Masonry, lect. ix. p. 99.

[187] The Temple of Solomon, ch. ix. p. 233.

[188] It is probable that the quince derived this symbolism, like the

acacia, from its name; for there seems to be some connection between the

Greek word [Greek: kydô/nios], which means _a quince_, and the participle

[Greek: kydi/ôn], which signifies _rejoicing, exulting_. But this must

have been an afterthought, for the name is derived from Cydon, in Crete,

of which island the quince is a native.

[189] Desprez, speaking of the palm as an emblem of victory, says

(_Comment. in Horat. Od._ I. i. 5), “Palma verò signum victoriae passim

apud omnes statuitur, ex Plutarcho, propterea quod ea est ejus natura

ligni, ut urgentibus opprimentibusque minimè cedat. Unde est illud Alciati

epigramma,–

‘Nititur in pondus palma, et consurgit in altum:

Quoque magis premitur, hoc magè tollit onus.'”

It is in the eighth book of his Symposia that Plutarch states this

peculiar property of the palm to resist the oppression of any

superincumbent weight, and to rise up against it, whence it was adopted as

the symbol of victory. Cowley also alludes to it in his _Davideis_.

“Well did he know how palms by oppression speed

Victorious, and the victor’s sacred meed.”

[190] “Rosemary was anciently supposed to strengthen the memory, and was

not only carried at funerals, but worn at weddings.”–STEEVENS, _Notes on

Hamlet_, a. iv. s. 5.–Douce (_Illustrations of Shakspeare_, i. 345) gives

the following old song in reference to this subject:–

“Rosemarie is for remembrance

Betweene us daie and night,

Wishing that I might always have

You present in my sight.”

[191] Ste. Croix (_Recherches sur les Mystères_, i. 56) says that in the

Samothracian Mysteries it was forbidden to put parsley on the table,

because, according to the mystagogues, it had been produced by the blood

of Cadmillus, slain by his brothers.

[192] “The Hindoos,” says Faber, “represent their mundane lotus, as having

four large leaves and four small leaves placed alternately, while from the

centre of the flower rises a protuberance. Now, the circular cup formed by

the eight leaves they deem a symbol of the earth, floating on the surface

of the ocean, and consisting of four large continents and four

intermediate smaller islands; while the centrical protuberance is viewed

by them as representing their sacred Mount Menu.”–_Communication to Gent.

Mag._ vol. lxxxvi. p. 408.

[193] The _erica arborea_ or tree heath.

[194] Ragon thus alludes to this mystical event: “Isis found the body of

Osiris in the neighborhood of Biblos, and near a tall plant called the

_erica_. Oppressed with grief, she seated herself on the margin of a

fountain, whose waters issued from a rock. This rock is the _small hill

_mentioned in the ritual; the erica has been replaced by the acacia, and

the grief of Isis has been changed for that of the fellow crafts.”–_Cours

des Initiations,_ p. 151.

[195] It is singular, and perhaps significant, that the word _eriko_, in

Greek, [Greek: e)ri/kô], whence _erica_ is probably derived, means _to

break in pieces, to mangle_.

[196] Histoire Pittoresque des Religions, t. i. p. 217.

[197] According to Toland (_Works_, i. 74), the festival of searching,

cutting, and consecrating the mistletoe, took place on the 10th of March,

or New Year’s day. “This,” he says, “is the ceremony to which Virgil

alludes, by his _golden branch,_ in the Sixth Book of the Æneid.” No doubt

of it; for all these sacred plants had a common origin in some ancient and

general symbolic idea.

[198] “Under this branch is figured the wreath of myrtle, with which the

initiated were crowned at the celebration of the Mysteries.”–WARBURTON,

_Divine Legation,_ vol. i. p. 299.

[199] “In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread.” Gen. iii. 19. Bush

interprets the decree to mean that “some species of toilsome occupation is

the appointed lot of all men.”

[200] Aristotle says, “He that cannot contract society with others, or

who, through his own self-sufficiency [Greek: ay)ta/rkeian], does not need

it, forms no part of the community, but is either a wild beast or a god.”

[201] “Der Arbeiter,” says Lenning, “ist der symbolische Name eines

Freimaurers”–the Workman is the symbolic name of a Freemason.–_Encyclop.

der Fraumererei._

[202] John iii. 19-21.

[203] I Corinth, iii. 9.

[204] Orbis Miraculum, or the Temple of Solomon, pourtrayed by Scripture

Light, ch. ix. p. 192. London, 1659.

[205] Swedenborg a Hermetic Philosopher, &c., p. 210. The object of the

author is to show that the Swedish sage was an adept, and that his

writings may be interpreted from the point of view of Hermetic philosophy.

[206] Cours Philosophique et Interprétatif des Initiations Anciennes et

Modernes, p. 99.

[207] Ibid., p. 176.

[208] Histoire Générale de la Franc-maçonnerie, p. 52.

[209] Histoire de la Magie, liv. v. ch. vii. p. 100.

[210] Vorlesung über das Symbol des Tempels, in the “Jarbüchern der Gross.

Loge Roy. York zur Freundschaft,” cited by Lenning, Encyc., voc. _Tempel_.

[211] In an Essay on the Masonic Idea of Man’s Destination, cited by

Lenning, _ut supra_, from the Altenburg _Zeitschift der Freimaurerei_.

[212] Cited by Lenning, _ut sup._

[213] Thus Dr. Oliver, while treating of the relation of the temple to the

lodge, thus briefly alludes to this important symbol: “As our ancient

brethren erected a material temple, without the use of axe, hammer, or

metal tool, so is our moral temple constructed.”–_Historical Landmarks_,

lect. xxxi.

[214] System of Speculative Masonry, ch. vi. p. 63.

[215] On the Speculative Temple–an essay read in 1861 before the Grand

Lodge of Alabama.

[216] A portion of this essay, but in a very abridged form, was used by

the author in his work on “Cryptic Masonry.”

[217] Hist. Landmarks, i. 459, note 52.

[218] See the Gemara and Buxtorf Lex. Talm., p. 2541.

[219] Job xxxviii. 4-7.

[220] A New Translation of the Book of Job, notes, p. 196.

[221] In voc. [Hebrew: shint-tav-yod-yod-heh], where some other curious

extracts from the Talmud and Talmudic writers on the subject of the Stone

of Foundation are given.

[222] Sepher Toldoth Jeshu, p. 6. The abominably scurrilous character of

this work aroused the indignation of the Christians, who, in the fifteenth

century, were not distinguished for a spirit of tolerance, and the Jews,

becoming alarmed, made every effort to suppress it. But, in 1681, it was

republished by Wagenselius in his “Tela Ignea Satanae,” with a Latin

translation.

[223] Comment, on Gen. xxviii. 18.

[224] “Ni fallit fatum, Scoti quocunque locatum Invenient lapidem, regnare

tenentur ibidem.”

[225] Old and New Testament connected, vol. i. p. 148.

[226] The Temple of Solomon, pourtrayed by Scripture Light, ch. ix. p.

194. Of the Mysteries laid up in the Foundation of the Temple.

[227] See Pausanias, lib. iv.

[228] The “Disputationes adversus Gentes” of Arnobius supplies us with a

fund of information on the symbolism of the classic mythology.

[229] Naology, ch. iii. p. 119.

[230] Cornut. de Nat. Deor. c. 16.

[231] Essais sur les Fables, t. i. lett. 2. p. 9.

[232] Bosworth (_Aug. Sax. Dict._) defines _treowth_ to signify “troth,

truth, treaty, league, pledge, covenant.”

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