The Royal Arch.

THE ROYAL ARCH .

FROM THE VOICE OF MASOXEY . ( Continued from page 391 . ) They taught that " Ho who had neglected or refused to save a man ' s life when attacked , if it were in his power to assist him , was punished as vigorously as tho assassin ; but , if the unfortunate person could not bo succoured , the offender Avas at least to be impeached , aud

penalties Avere decreed for any neglect of this kind . ' The Companions who read this can , I presume , perceive tho point of tho moral , and hoAv it affects us in this nineteenth century—thousands of years after being inculcated on tbe banks of tho Nile . We in Royal Arch Masonry have adopted among other symbols the four colours , Blue , Purple , Scarlet and White . The Egyptians used

them to represent the elements , viz ., White for the air ; Blue for water ; Purple for the earth , and Crimson or Scarlet for fire , signifying and typifying the ordeal through which the initiates in the mysteries passed . And as we emblazon the Ox , Lion , Ma ,., and Eagle on our banners , as " having been borne by tho four principal tribes in the wilderness , " so also can Ave see that Moses copied thom from the

Egyptians . We find that tho Ox Avas adored in Egypt , and for Avby ? Because the celestial Taurus , opening the new year , was tho creative Bull as worshipped by the Hindoos and Japanese , breaking with his horn tho egg out of which the world is bom . Hence tbe bull Apis was worshipped by the Egyptians , and reproduced as a golden calf by Aaron , Avho but a short time previous , with bis brother Moses and

those whom they led out of Egypt , had seen that symbol as ono of the types and allegories of Nature's GOD . AS the Ox was the predorainating figure of the Cherubim , so was he also tho most universal symbol of the then known " so-named idolatry , " and was frequently worshipped in a compound form . He Avas looked upon as the great father of Noah , and the ark Avas called Ken Taurus , " the stimulator

of the Bull , " He was worshipped with splendid rites in that season of the year when the sun particularly was in the constellation Taurus . In India , the bull was held in high estimation and veneration , and was honoured with diurnal worship in conjunction with the Linga or Phallus , as an emblem of justice and prolific power . A bull was also the well known symbol of Bacchus , who in the

Coptic hymn is styled " the deity with two horns , having the head of a bull . " The children of Israel , or as then known , the Hebrews , while Mcses Avas in the mountain , gathered themsoves together in a quasi state of rebellion unto Aaron , Avho had previously been set apart as High Priest , and cried out , " Up , make us gods which shall go before us . " And he fashioned the gold with a graving tool after he

had made it a " molten calf , " and they said , These be thy gods , 0 Israel , which brought thee out of the land of Egypt . " They had not forgotten the Apis of that land . To this day the bull is worshipped in the East ; is fed with dainty care , and has his attendant priests , equalling tho allegory and symbolism of centuries long past . The Lion was another animal which entered into the religions

system of the ancients , in tho East as AVCII as tho West . In tho former , by the Egyptians , in the latter , by the ancient Mexicans , as a most powerful divinity . And the same animal was emblematical of the sun in Persia and Tartary , —for a lion was emblazoned with the sun rising from his back , and used as the national banner of Persia . The sovereigns of that country have for many centuries preserved , as the

peculiar arms or escutcheon thereof , the sign or figure of Sol in the constellation Leo , and the device which exhibits a lion couchant , and the sun rising at his back , has not only been sculptured on their palaces and embroidered upon their banners , but has also been converted into an order , Avhich , in the form of gold and silver medals , has been given to those who have distinguished themselves against

the enemies of their country . The Egyptian astronomers taught that the creation of the world took place at the precise period of time when the sun rose in Leo , Avhich zodiacal sign was hence esteemed the peculiar habitation of the sun , and this belief gave an additional stimulus to the veneration which mankind entertained for the king of animals .

The Lion , even as far back as tbe days of Jacob , was considered royal . The blessing be gave Judah , "Thou art he whom thy brethren shall praise , " & c . "Judah is a lion's whelp , " & c , helps to the thought that the Lion of the Tribe of Judah is not forgotten by us as Masons , even to this present day . In the ambition which is ever the role of the warrior , the noble , or the monarch , do we find in

what signification the Lion is held . Go through the books of heraldry and see how they have all used the royal beast for their armorial bearings , from the days of so-callod barbarism up to the full dawn of civilization . The royal animal has been displayed rampant , couchant , cut in two , bound to a unicorn , and in every imaginable position , quartered , lozenged and sandwiched , to gratify the egotism of those

who , by caprice or otherwise , consider themselves " lion-hearted , " and entitled to display it to generations yet unborn . In " Bryant's Plagues of Egypt , " we find he observes in reference to this superstition , " as the chief increase of the Nile was when tbe sun was passing through Leo , the Egyptians made the lion the type of an iuuudation . All effusions of Avater Avere specified by this

characteristic . And from hence has been the custom of making tho water which proceeds from the cisterns and reservoirs , as well as spouts from the roofs of buildings , come through the mouth of a lion . " We find it so used at the present day , as can be seen in the escape water from tho fountain at the north front of tho United States Treasury .

The Eagle was sacred to the Sun in many countries , particularly in some parts of Egypt , Greece and Persia . In our Scriptures the King of Babylon is termed an Eagle . It was reputed to have fed Jupiter with nectar , in the Cretan cave , and was certainly an emblem of his kingdom and dominion , lie is still called " the bird of Jove . " St . John the Evangelist is alway represented as sitting by an eagle .

With tho British Druids it formed a symbolic idea of the Supreme Gon . It Avas embroidered on tho consecrated standard of tho Mexican Princes , and tho common ensign of the Roman Legions was a golden eagle . It is the bird of tbe United States legend , tho motto , " In Goo we trust . " The Man , or idol inhuman shape , was worshipped all over the world ,

for which custom this reason has been assigned by Porphyry , when charged with worshipping Gon under the figure of a man . He allowed the deity to bo invisible , but thought him well represented in that form , not because ho is like man in external shape , but because that which is divino is rational . Tho Cherubim of the Egyptians consisted of the four-faced figures

of a man , an ox , a lion , and an eagle , in which combmationhe represented an awfully sacred and sublime appearance . Moses copied them . Volney , in his Ruins , page 138 , says , " Ye inhabitants of India , in vain yon cover yourselves with tbe veil of mystery , the hawk of your god Vichenou is but one of the thousand emblems of the sun in Egypt , and your incarnations of a god in the fish , the boar ,

the lion , the tortoise , and all the monstrous adventures are only the metamophoses of the sun , Avho , passing through the signs of the twelve animals , was supposed to assume their figures and perform their astronomical functions . " People of Japan ! your bull which breaks the mundane egg is only the bull of the zodiac , which in former times opened tbe seasons

—the age of creation—the vernal equinox . It is the same bull Apis which Egypt adored , and which your ancestors , O Jewish rabbins , worshipped as the golden calf . This is the bull , yon followers of Zoroaster , which , sacrificed in the symbolical mysteries of Mithra , poured out his blood Avhieh fertilized the earth . " It would be supererogatory for me to say in what signification we

use the same symbols . It is very strange that nothing is more significant in tho moral history of the human race than the development of the monotheistic conception of Goo . In tho legends and narratives so ingeniously and undonbtingly related in the Old Testament , we may see , as in an entirely correct mirror , tbe slow ripening of this conception which

was so often in danger of annihilation . Because in early childhood we all imbibed the truth , that the Holy and Eternal must be indivisible , we , on arriving to mature years , overlook the difficulties Avhich necessarily encountered the diffusion of this idea when , in ancient times , it was novel , hesitatingly and vaguely held by a few , and rejected by tbe majority for the sake of other and older concep .

tions . Before reaching a belief in tbe Divine Unity , a people must have passed through long periods of intellectual and moral development , for monotheism has never been met with in a tribe of so-called savages . As to the change which transpired among the people whom Moses led out of Egypt , whether they really Avere the seed of Abraham , or seceding Egyptians , we can place full and implicit

reliance on biblical history from the date when thoy adopted the art of writing , which appears to have been subsequent to tho exodus . The Grand Omnific word was , evidently , not in use before nor near that event , and if used , as we have some right to suppose it was by the Egyptians , it was conveyed by their priests to their higher postulants , as history informs us , in the self-same manner as we

Royal Arch Masons do—in silence , and in the reverence as ordained by the Hi « h Priest . Aaron for the children of Israel , even when permitted to use it , and which was but rarely . In early periods , long before the mission of Moses , the Hebrews made use of other names than Yah-Veh , or Jehovah , for the Supremo Being . It is a curious fact that ono of these , Elohim , is in the plural form , and that in

swearing a solemn oath , three gods were successively addressed , aa in Genesis xxxi . 53 , which says , "The G of Abraham and the GOD of Nabor , tbe Gon of their father , judpo betwixt us . And Jacob swore by the fear of his father Isaac . " If the Egyptians worshipped a Supreme Being under the name of I AH THAT I AM , the conjecture is not entirely to be rejected that Moses being fully initiated into the

mysteries of the Egyptian worship , was the first to attain monothe . istic views , after he had been instructed by GOD . "I AM THAT I Air , " say unto the children of Israel , " I Air , " and further on , "I appeared unto Abraham , Isaac and Jacob as GOD ALMIGHTY ; but by my name JEHOVAH was I not known to them . " Yet almost in the same breath Moses writes , " Say unto the

children of Israel , I am the LOBD . " It is barely credible that a single mind , however ardent and highly gifted as Moses was , and assisted by Aaron and Jethro , could have converted an entire nation , completely unprepared for such a change , to a totally novel interpretation of the word . He had to resort to

many of the workings of the mysteries ho had been educated in , in order to accomplish bis purpose . And while his life , from his departure from Egypt until his death at a good ripe age , was devoted to the service of GOD and founding an empire , he does not appear to have remained fully or entirely unshaken in tho new forms he had established , nor to have quite

forgotten the old . The brazen serpent he set up in the Avildernoss , or desert , as a protection from the snakes Avhich infested the peninsula of Sinai , fully shows that he had retained the representation at PhiljB of a brazen serpent hanging upon a cross , and worshipped by two priests . It was a herculean task to make the effort to institute a new

system of divine Avorship , and antagonizin .. ' , as it did , from that to which the people harl been habituated . And wo see throughout the history of the new nation , that , idolatry was not surrendered up , despite the rigid laws laid down against tho practice thereof . Up to the time of Hczekiah , a very impure conception of GOD had prevailed . The slavery , tho conquests , and the division of the nation prove this .

From tho theories of Moses , in centuries after , the new law became established as Ave now have it ; the grosser acts of the human family tvero eliminated and condemned ; peace and goodwill to all men were proclaimed , and all the theisms gave way before a higher and purer faith . Masonry , coming down to us through centuries past , has been