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also represented the Intelligence

by the figure of the Magical Star adored under the name of Remphan,

2005.

Science under the emblem of Anubis, whose name they changed to Nibbas,

and the vulgar faith or credulity under the figure of Thartac,

a god represented with a book, a cloak, and the head of an ass.

Morals & Dogma CHAPTER SIXTY ONE

Divisions 2006-2040

MORALS & DOGMA 3

2006.

According to the Samaritan Doctors, Christianity was the reign of Thartac,

blind Faith and vulgar credulity erected into a universal oracle,

and preferred to Intelligence and Science.

2007.

Synesius, Bishop of Ptolemais, a great Kabalist, yet of doubtful orthodoxy, wrote:

" The people will always mock at things easy to be misunderstood;

it must needs have impostures. "

2008.

" A Spirit, " he said, " that loves wisdom and contemplates the Trufh close at hand,

is forced to disguise it, to induce the multitudes to accept it....

2009.

Fictions are necessary to the people,

and the Truth becomes [deadly] [error] to those who are not strong enough

to contemplate it in all its brilliance.

2010.

If the sacerdotal laws allowed the reservation of judgments and the allegory of words,

I would accept the proposed dignity on condition that I might be a philosopher at home,

and abroad a narrator of apologues and parables.....

2011.

In fact, what can there be in common between the vile multitude and sublime wisdom?

2012.

The truth must be kept secret,

and the masses need a teaching proportioned to their imperfect reason. "

2013.

Moral disorders produce physical ugliness,

and in some sort realize those frightful faces which tradition assigns to the demons.

2014.

The first Druids were the true children of the Magi,

and their initiation came from Egypt and Chaldaea,

that is to say, from the pure sources of the primitive Kabalah.

2015.

They adored the Trinity under the names of Isis or Hesus, the Supreme Harmony;

of Belerl or Bel, which in Assyrian means Lord, a name corresponding to that of ADONAI;

and of Camul or Camael, a name that in the Kabalah personifies the Divine Justice.

2016.

Below this triangle of Light they supposed a divine reflection,

also composed of three personified rays:

2017.

first, Teutates or Teuth, the same as the Thoth of the Egyptians,

the Word, or the Intelligence formulated;

then Force and Beauty, whose names varied like their emblems.

2018.

Finally, they completed the sacred Septenary by a mysterious image

that represented the progress of the dogma and its future realizations.

2019.

This was a young girl veiled, holding a child in her arms;

and they dedicated this image to " The Virgin who will become a mother;

--Virgini pariturae. "

2020.

Hertha or Wertha, the young Isis of Gaul,

Queen of Heaven,

the Virgin who was to bear a child,

held the spindle of the Fates, filled with wool half white and half black;

because she presides over all forms and all symbols,

and weaves the garment of the Ideas.

2021.

One of the most mysterious pantacles of the Kabalah,

contained in the Enchiridion of Leo III,

represents an equilateral triangle reversed, inscribed in a double circle.

2022.

On the triangle are written, in such manner as to form the prophetic Tau,

the two Hebrew words so often found appended to the Ineffable Name,

and ALOHAYIM, or the Powers,

and TSABAOTH, or the starry Armies and their guiding spirits;

2023.

words also which symbolize the Equilibrium of the Forces of Nature

and the Harmony of Numbers.

2024.

To the three sides of the triangle belong the three great Names

IAHAVEH, ADONAI, and AGLA.

2025.

Above the first is written in Latin, Formatio,

above the second Reformatio,

and above the third, Transformatio.

2026.

So Creation is ascribed to the FATHER,

Redemption or Reformation to the SON,

and Sanctification or Transformation to the HOLY SPIRIT,

answering unto the mathematical laws of Action, Reaction, and Equilibrium.

2027.

IAHAVEH is also, in effect, the Genesis or Formation of dogma,

by the elementary signification of the four letters of the Sacred Tetragram;

2028.

ADONAI; is the realization of this dogma in the Human Form, in the Visible LORD,

who is the Son of God or the perfect Man;

2029.

and AGLA (formed of the initials of the four words Ath Gebur Laulaim Adonai)

expresses the synthesis of the whole dogma and the totality of the Kabalistic science,

clearly indicating by the hieroglyphics of which this admirable name is formed

the Triple Secret of the Great Work.

2030.

Masonry, like all the Religions, all the Mysteries,

Hermeticism and Alchemy,

conceals its secrets from all except the Adepts and Sages, or the Elect,

2031.

and uses false explanations and misinterpretations of its symbols

to mislead those who deserve only to be misled;

to conceal the Truth, which it calls Light, from them,

and to draw them away from it.

2032.

Truth is not for those who are unworthy or unable to receive it, or would pervert it.

2033.

So God Himself incapacitates many men, by color-blindness,

to distinguish colors, and leads the masses away from the highest Truth,

giving them the power to attain only so much of it as it is profitable to them to know.

2034.

Every age has had a religion suited to its capacity.

2035.

The Teachers, even of Christianity,

are, in general, the most ignorant of the true meaning of that which they teach.

2036.

There is no book of which so little is known as the Bible.

2037.

To most who read it, it is as incomprehensible as the Sohar.

So Masonry jealously conceals its secrets, and intentionally leads conceited interpreters astray.

2039.

There is no sight under the sun more pitiful and ludicrous at once,

than the spectacle of the Prestons and the Webbs,

not to mention the later incarnations of Dullness and Commonplace,

undertaking to " explain" the old symbols of Masonry,

and adding to and " improving" them, or inventing new ones.

2040.

To the Circle inclosing the central point, and itself traced between two parallel lines,

a figure purely Kabalistic,

these persons have added the superimposed Bible,

and even reared on that the ladder with three or nine rounds,

and then given a vapid interpretation of the whole,

so profoundly absurd as actually to excite admiration.

Morals & Dogma CHAPTER SIXTY TWO

of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry Divisions 2041-2075

4º – Secret Master

5º - Perfect Master

6º - Confidential Secretary

7º - Provost and Judge

8º - Intendant of the Building

9º - Elu of the Nine

MORALS & DOGMA 4

2041.

Masonry is a succession of allegories,

the mere vehicles of great lessons in morality and philosophy.

2042.

You will more fully appreciate its spirit, its object, its purposes,

as you advance in the different Degrees,

which you will find to constitute a great, complete, and harmonious system.

2043.

If you have been disappointed in the first three Degrees, as you have received them,

and if it has seemed to you that the performance has not come up to the promise,

that the lessons of morality are not new, and the scientific instruction is merely basic,

and the symbols are imperfectly explained,

2044.

remember that the ceremonies and lessons of those Degrees

have been for ages more and more accommodating themselves,

by curtailment and sinking into commonplace,

to the often limited memory and capacity of the Master and Instructor,

and to the intellect and needs of the Pupil and Initiate;

2045.

that they have come to us from an age when symbols were used, not to reveal but to conceal;

when the commonest learning was confined to a select few,

and the simplest principles of morality seemed newly discovered truths;

2046.

and that these antique and simple Degrees now stand

like the broken columns of a roofless Druidic temple, in their basic and mutilated greatness;

in many parts, also, corrupted by time,

and disfigured by modern additions and absurd interpretations.

2047.

They are but the entrance to the great Masonic Temple,

the triple columns of the portico.

2048.

You have taken the first step over its threshold,

the first step toward the inner sanctuary and heart of the temple.

2049.

You are in the path that leads up the slope of the mountain of Truth;

and it depends upon your secrecy, obedience, and fidelity,

whether you will advance or remain stationary.

2050.

Imagine not that you will become indeed a Mason by learning what is commonly called 'the work, ' or even by becoming familiar with our traditions.

2051.

Masonry has a history, a literature, a philosophy.

2052.

Its allegories and traditions will teach you much;

yet much is to be sought elsewhere.

2053.

The streams of learning that now flow full and broad

must be followed to their heads in the springs that well up in the remote past,

and you will there find the origin and meaning of Masonry.

2054.

A few basic lessons in architecture,

a few universally admitted maxims of morality,

a few unimportant traditions, whose real meaning is unknown or misunderstood,

will no longer satisfy the earnest inquirer after Masonic truth.

2055.

Let whoso is content with these, seek to climb no higher.

2056.

He who desires to understand the harmonious and beautiful proportions of Freemasonry

must read, study, reflect, digest, and discriminate.

2057.

The true Mason is an ardent seeker after knowledge;

and he knows that both books and the antique symbols of Masonry are vessels

that come down to us fullfreighted with the intellectual riches of the Past;

2058.

and that in the lading of these argosies is much that sheds light on the history of Masonry,

and proves its claim to be acknowledged the benefactor of mankind,

born in the very cradle of the race.

2059.

Knowledge is the most genuine and real of human treasures;

for it is Light, as Ignorance is Darkness.

2060.

It is the development of the human soul,

and its acquisition the growth of the soul, that at the birth of man knows nothing,

and therefore, in one sense, may be said to be nothing.

2061.

It is the seed, which has in it the power to grow, to acquire,

and by acquiring to be developed, as the seed is developed into the shoot, the plant, the tree.

2062.

" We need not pause at the common argument that by learning man excelleth man,

in that wherein man excelleth beasts;

that by learning man ascendeth to the heavens and their motions,

where in body he cannot come, and the like.

2063.

Let us rather regard the dignity and excellency of knowledge and learning

in that whereunto man's nature doth most aspire, and that is immortality or continuance hereafter.

2064.

For to this tendeth generation, and raising of Houses and Families;

to this buildings, foundations, and monuments;

to this tendeth the desire of memory, fame, and celebration,

and in effect the strength of all other human desires. "

2065.

That our influences shall survive us, and be living forces when we are in our graves;

and not merely that our names shall be remembered;

yet rather that our works shall be read, our acts spoken of,

our names recollected and mentioned when we are dead,

2066.

as evidences that those influences live and rule,

sway and control some portion of mankind and of the world,

--this is the aspiration of the human soul.

2067.

" We see then how far the monuments of genius and learning are more durable

than monuments of power or of the hands.

2068.

For have not the verses of Homer continued twenty-five hundred years or more,

without the loss of a syllable or letter,

during which time infinite palaces, temples, castles, cities, have decayed and been demolished?

2069.

It is not possible to have the true pictures or statues of Cyrus, Alexander, Cæ sar,

no, nor of the Kings or great personages of much later years;

for the originals cannot last, and the copies cannot do anything except lose of the life and truth.

2070.

Yet the images of men's genius and knowledge remain in books,

exempted from the wrong of time, and capable of perpetual renovation.

2071.

Neither are they fitly to be called images,

because they generate still, and cast their seeds in the minds of others,

provoking and causing infinite actions and opinions in succeeding ages;

2072.

so that if the invention of the ship was thought so noble,

which carrieth riches and commodities from place to place,

and consociateth the most remote regions in participation of their fruits,

2073.

how much more are letters to be magnified,

which, as ships, pass through the vast seas of time,

and make ages so distant to participate of the wisdom, illumination, and inventions,

the one of the other. "

2074.

To learn, to attain knowledge, to be wise,

is a necessity for every truly noble soul;

2075.

to teach, to communicate that knowledge, to share that wisdom with others,

and not churlishly to lock up his exchequer,

and place a sentinel at the door to drive away the needy,

is equally an impulse of a noble nature, and the worthiest work of man.

Morals & Dogma CHAPTER SIXTY THREE

Divisions 2076-2110

MORALS & DOGMA 4

2076.

" There was a little city, " says the Preacher, the son of David (Solomon),

" and few men within it;

2077.

and there came a great King against it and besieged it,

and built great bulwarks against it.

2078.

Now there was found in it a poor wise man, and he by his wisdom delivered the city;

yet no man remembered that same poor man.

2079.

Then, said I, wisdom is better than strength:

nevertheless, the poor man's wisdom is despised, and his words are not heard. "

2080.

If it should chance to you, my brother, to do mankind good service,

and be rewarded with indifference and forgetfulness only,

still be not discouraged, yet remember the further advice of the wise King.

2081.

" In the morning sow the seed, and in the evening withhold not thy hand;

for thou knowest not which shall prosper, this or that,

or whether both shall be alike good. "

2082.

Sow you the seed, whoever reaps.

2083.

Learn, that you may be enabled to do good;

and do so because it is right,

finding in the act itself ample reward and recompense.

2084.

To attain the truth, and to serve our fellows, our country, and mankind

--this is the noblest destiny of man.

2085.

Hereafter and all your life it is to be your object.

2086.

If you desire to ascend to that destiny, advance!

2087.

If you have other and less noble objects,

and are contented with a lower flight, halt here!

2088.

Let others scale the heights,

and Masonry fulfill her mission.

2089.

If you will advance, gird up your loins for the struggle!

For the way is long and toilsome.

2090.

Pleasure, all smiles, will beckon you on the one hand,

and Indolence will invite you to sleep among the flowers, upon the other.

2091.

Prepare, by secrecy, obedience, and fidelity,

to resist the allurements of both!

2092.

Secrecy is indispensable in a Mason of whatever Degree.

2093.

It is the first and almost the only lesson taught to the Entered Apprentice.

2094.

The obligations which we have each assumed toward every Mason that lives,

requiring of us the performance of the most serious and onerous duties

toward those personally unknown to us until they demand our aid,

2095.

--duties that must be performed, even at the risk of life,

or our solemn oaths be broken and violated,

and we be branded as false Masons and faithless men,

2096.

teach us how profound a folly it would he to betray our secrets to those

who, bound to us by no tie of common obligation, might, by obtaining them,

call on us in their extremity, when the urgency of the occasion should allow us no time for inquiry,

and the peremptory mandate of our obligation compel us to do a brother's duty to a base impostor.

2097.

The secrets of our brother, when communicated to us, must be sacred,

if they be such as the law of our country warrants us to keep.

2098.

We are required to keep none other, when the law that we are called on to obey is indeed a law,

by having emanated from the only source of power, the People.

2099.

Edicts which emanate from the mere arbitrary will of a despotic power,

contrary to the law of God or the Great Law of Nature,

destructive of the inherent rights of man,

violative of the right of free thought, free speech, free conscience,

it is lawful to rebel against and strive to abrogate.

2100.

For obedience to the Law does not mean submission to tyranny;

nor that, by a profligate sacrifice of every noble feeling,

we should offer to despotism the homage of adulation.

2101.

As every new victim falls, we may lift our voice in still louder flattery.

2102.

We may fall at the proud feet, we may beg, as a boon,

the honor of kissing that bloody hand which has been lifted against the helpless.

2103.

We may do more:

we may bring the altar and the sacrifice,

and implore the God not to ascend too soon to Heaven.

2104.

This we may do,

for this we have the sad remembrance that beings of a human form and soul have done.

Yet this is all we can do.

2105.

We can constrain our tongues to be false,

our features to bend to the semblance of that passionate adoration that we wish to express,

our knees to fall prostrate;

yet our heart we cannot constrain.

2106.

There virtue must still have a voice

that is not to be drowned by hymns and acclamations;

2107.

there the crimes which we laud as virtues, are crimes still,

and he whom we have made a God is the most contemptible of mankind;

if, indeed, we do not feel, perhaps,

that we are ourselves still more contemptible.

2108.

Yet that law which is the fair expression of the will and judgment of the people,

is the enactment of the whole and of every individual.

2109.

Consistent with the law of God and the great law of nature,

consistent with pure and abstract right as tempered by necessity and the general interest,

as contradistinguished from the private interest of individuals,

2110.

it is obligatory upon all,

because it is the work of all, the will of all, the solemn judgment of all,

from which there is no appeal.

Morals & Dogma CHAPTER SIXTY FOUR

Divisions 2111-2145

MORALS & DOGMA 4

2111.

In this Degree, my brother,

you are especially to learn the duty of obedience to that law.

2112.

There is one true and original law,

conformable to reason and to nature,

diffused over all,

invariable, eternal,

2113.

that calls to the fulfillment of duty, and to abstinence from injustice,

and calls with that irresistible voice which is felt in all its authority wherever it is heard.

2114.

This law cannot be abrogated or diminished,

or its sanctions affected, by any law of man.

2115.

A whole senate, a whole people, cannot dissent from its paramount obligation.

2116.

It requires no commentator to render it distinctly intelligible:

nor is it one thing at Rome, another at Athens;

one thing now, and another in the ages to come;

2117.

yet in all times and in all nations, it is, and has been, and will be, one and everlasting;

--one as that God, its great Author and Promulgator,

who is the Common Sovereign of all mankind, is Himself One.

2118.

No man can disobey it without flying, as it were, from his own bosom,

and repudiating his nature;

and in this very act he will inflict on himself the severest of retributions,

even though he escape what is regarded as punishment.

2119.

It is our duty to obey the laws of our country,

and to be careful that prejudice or passion, fancy or affection, error and illusion,

be not mistaken for conscience.

2120.

Nothing is more usual than to pretend conscience

in all the actions of man which are public and cannot be concealed.

2121.

The disobedient refuse to submit to the laws,

and they also in many cases pretend conscience;

2122.

and so disobedience and rebellion become conscience,

in which there is neither knowledge nor revelation, nor truth nor charity, nor reason nor religion.

2123.

Conscience is tied to laws.

2124.

Right or sure conscience is right reason reduced to practice,

and conducting moral actions, while perverse conscience is seated in the fancy or affections

2125.

--a heap of irregular principles and irregular defects--

and is the same in conscience as deformity is in the body, or peevishness in the affections.

2126.

It is not enough that the conscience be taught by nature;

2127.

yet it must be taught by God,

conducted by reason,

made operative by discourse,

assisted by choice,

instructed by laws and sober principles;

and then it is right, and it may be sure.

2128.

All the general measures of justice, are the laws of God,

and therefore they constitute the general rules of government for the conscience;

2129.

yet necessity also hath a large voice in the arrangement of human affairs,

and the disposal of human relations, and the dispositions of human laws;

2130.

and these general measures, like a great river into little streams,

are deduced into little rivulets and particularities,

by the laws and customs, by the sentences and agreements of men,

and by the absolute despotism of necessity,

2131.

that will not allow perfect and abstract justice and equity

to be the sole rule of civil government in an imperfect world;

and that must needs be law which is for the greatest good of the greatest number.

2132.

When thou vowest a vow unto God, defer not to pay it.

2134.

It is better thou shouldest not vow than thou shouldest vow and not pay.

2135.

Be not rash with thy mouth, and let not thine heart be hasty to utter anything before God:

for God is in Heaven, and thou art upon earth;

therefore let thy words be few.

2136.

Weigh well what it is you promise;

yet once the promise and pledge are given

remember that he who is false to his obligation

will be false to his family, his friends, his country, and his God.

2137.

Fides servanda est:

Faith plighted (pledged) is ever to be kept,

was a maxim and an axiom even among pagans.

2138.

The virtuous Roman said,

Either let not that which seems expedient be base,

or if it be base, let it not seem expedient.

2139.

What is there which that so-called expediency can bring,

so valuable as that which it takes away,

if it deprives you of the name of a good man and robs you of your integrity and honor?

2140.

In all ages, he who violates his plighted word has been held unspeakably base.

2141.

The word of a Mason, like the word of a knight in the times of chivalry,

once given must be sacred;

2142.

and the judgment of his brothers, upon him who violates his pledge,

should be stern as the judgments of the Roman Censors against him who violated his oath.

2143.

Good faith is revered among Masons as it was among the Romans,

who placed its statue in the capitol, next to that of Jupiter Maximus Optimus;

2144.

and we, like them, hold that calamity should always be chosen rather than baseness;

and with the knights of old, that one should always die rather than be dishonored.

2145.

Be faithful, therefore, to the promises you make,

to the pledges you give, and to the vows that you assume,

since to break either is base and dishonorable.

Morals & Dogma CHAPTER SIXTY FIVE

Divisions 2146-2165

MORALS & DOGMA 4

2146.

Be faithful to your family,

and perform all the duties of a good father, a good son, a good husband, and a good brother.

2147.

Be faithful to your friends;

for true friendship is of a nature not only to survive through all the vicissitudes of life,

yet to continue through an endless duration;

2148.

not only to stand the shock of conflicting opinions,

and the roar of a revolution that shakes the world,

yet to last when the heavens are no more, and to spring fresh from the ruins of the universe.

2149.

Be faithful to your country,

and prefer its dignity and honor to any degree of popularity and honor for yourself;

consulting its interest rather than your own,

and rather than the pleasure and gratification of the people,

that are often at variance with their welfare.

2150.

Be faithful to Masonry,

and that is to be faithful to the best interests of mankind.

2151.

Labor, by precept and example, to elevate the standard of Masonic character,

to enlarge its sphere of influence,

to popularize its teachings,

and to make all men know it

for the Great Apostle of Peace, Harmony, and Good-will on earth among men;

of Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity.

2152.

Masonry is useful to all men:

2153.

to the learned,

because it affords them the opportunity of exercising their talents

upon subjects eminently worthy of their attention;

2154.

to the illiterate,

because it offers them important instruction;

2155.

to the young,

because it presents them with salutary precepts and good examples,

and accustoms them to reflect on the proper mode of living;

2156.

to the man of the world,

whom it furnishes with noble and useful recreation;

2157.

to the traveller,

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