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Article ON THE HISTORY OF INITIATION. ← Page 3 of 5 →
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On The History Of Initiation.
When the tribes had moved off from Shinar , and became settled in their new localities , the mysterious system of Polytheism branched off into two great sects , which have been distinguished by mycologists under the names of Buddhism and Brahmenism , each professing its own peculiarities , which marked its distinctive character ; separating their professors from each other by conflicting ordinances , and often producing inextinguishable hatred and sanguinary hostility . The mixed
tribes , who emigrated under the direction of a Cuthite priesthood and nobility , adopted the latter system , while the unmixed tribes adhered to the former . The Indians , the Greeks , ( except Pythagoras , who practised a modification of Buddhism ) , and the Britons were Brahmenists ; while the Chinese , the Japanese , the Persians , and the Saxons , were Buddhists . The Buddhists were Magians , the Brahmenists were Sabeans ; and how abhorrent soever it may appear , from the mild and
bloodless character of the primitive Buddha , the former maintained their superiority by the sword , while the latter were peaceable and addicted to the arts of civil and social life . In some nations the two systems became , in subsequent ages , so intimately blended , that the minute distinctions of each were swallowed up in the broad outline of the general scheme . Of these , the Indians and the Britons may be marked out as the chief .
The mysteries , termed by our author , the spurious Freemasonry of ancient times , in subsequent ages , became the depositories of every valuable truth , religious or political . They were the only avenue to honour , wealth , or fame ; and the peculiar blessings of immortality were restricted to those alone who had borne without shrinking or complaint
the privations and actual terrors of the rigorous ordeal . To despise the mysteries , or to omit the process of initiation , were to relinquish all title to preferment ; and even the comforts and charms of domestic life were scarcely attainable without this indispensable qualification , which was supposed to restore the fallen soul to its original state of perfection ; for the uninitiated person was virtually an object of suspicious jealousy , an outcast from society , and almost without the pale of legal protection ; hence the extreme utility in these times of superior light of investigating
a subject of such high importance towards elucidating many abstruse points in the history and mythology of the ancient world , which are at present wrapped up in the mantle of obscurity , and need tin ' s master-key to bring them into light . To preserve the secret mysteries of their order from all except their own class , the priests invented symbols and hieroglyphics to embody sublime truths , which in the end became so complicated , as sometimes
to puzzle even the hierophant himself . These hieroglyphics were of several kinds , and in the successive degrees the same symbols had a different interpretation . The dispensers of the mysteries became at length so strangely excited that , trembling for their secret , they substituted a new hieroglyphic or sacred symbolical character , which was exclusively appropriated to the hi ghest degree of their Order , in which it is probable that nearlthe same characters were made use ofbut the hidden
y , meaning attached to each was entirely changed ; so that even those who had been initiated into the preliminary degrees , and made acquainted with the common curiologic and tropical hieroglyphics , were as completely ignorant of the nature and secrets of the ineffable degrees , as the uninitiated themselves . Thus , if in the common hieroglyphic , a HAWK signified the human soul , in the sacred hieroglyphic it would stand for
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
On The History Of Initiation.
When the tribes had moved off from Shinar , and became settled in their new localities , the mysterious system of Polytheism branched off into two great sects , which have been distinguished by mycologists under the names of Buddhism and Brahmenism , each professing its own peculiarities , which marked its distinctive character ; separating their professors from each other by conflicting ordinances , and often producing inextinguishable hatred and sanguinary hostility . The mixed
tribes , who emigrated under the direction of a Cuthite priesthood and nobility , adopted the latter system , while the unmixed tribes adhered to the former . The Indians , the Greeks , ( except Pythagoras , who practised a modification of Buddhism ) , and the Britons were Brahmenists ; while the Chinese , the Japanese , the Persians , and the Saxons , were Buddhists . The Buddhists were Magians , the Brahmenists were Sabeans ; and how abhorrent soever it may appear , from the mild and
bloodless character of the primitive Buddha , the former maintained their superiority by the sword , while the latter were peaceable and addicted to the arts of civil and social life . In some nations the two systems became , in subsequent ages , so intimately blended , that the minute distinctions of each were swallowed up in the broad outline of the general scheme . Of these , the Indians and the Britons may be marked out as the chief .
The mysteries , termed by our author , the spurious Freemasonry of ancient times , in subsequent ages , became the depositories of every valuable truth , religious or political . They were the only avenue to honour , wealth , or fame ; and the peculiar blessings of immortality were restricted to those alone who had borne without shrinking or complaint
the privations and actual terrors of the rigorous ordeal . To despise the mysteries , or to omit the process of initiation , were to relinquish all title to preferment ; and even the comforts and charms of domestic life were scarcely attainable without this indispensable qualification , which was supposed to restore the fallen soul to its original state of perfection ; for the uninitiated person was virtually an object of suspicious jealousy , an outcast from society , and almost without the pale of legal protection ; hence the extreme utility in these times of superior light of investigating
a subject of such high importance towards elucidating many abstruse points in the history and mythology of the ancient world , which are at present wrapped up in the mantle of obscurity , and need tin ' s master-key to bring them into light . To preserve the secret mysteries of their order from all except their own class , the priests invented symbols and hieroglyphics to embody sublime truths , which in the end became so complicated , as sometimes
to puzzle even the hierophant himself . These hieroglyphics were of several kinds , and in the successive degrees the same symbols had a different interpretation . The dispensers of the mysteries became at length so strangely excited that , trembling for their secret , they substituted a new hieroglyphic or sacred symbolical character , which was exclusively appropriated to the hi ghest degree of their Order , in which it is probable that nearlthe same characters were made use ofbut the hidden
y , meaning attached to each was entirely changed ; so that even those who had been initiated into the preliminary degrees , and made acquainted with the common curiologic and tropical hieroglyphics , were as completely ignorant of the nature and secrets of the ineffable degrees , as the uninitiated themselves . Thus , if in the common hieroglyphic , a HAWK signified the human soul , in the sacred hieroglyphic it would stand for