Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
On Freemasonry. The Spurious Freemasonry Of Ancient Times,
ceremonies of Spurious Freemasonry ; and was honoured with an unfeigned veneration . In one of Lucian ' s dialogues , where an assembly of the dead are supposed to have entered on the confines of Tartarus , one of them exclaims— " Bless us , how dark it is ! Give me your hand . Is not this very similar to the blind march which the candidates make when
they are initiated into the Eleusinian mysteries ? " Darkness was embodied in these imitative systems in allusion to the Creation and Deluge ; and formed a part of the cosmogonies which were recited to the aspirant when his initiation was completed . It was an attribute of Jupiter according to Pausaniuswho " on descending from Hermae there
, says , is a place full of oaks , which is called Scotitas , or the dark . This name , however , does not originate from the nearness of the trees to each other , ancl the darkness produced by this means ; but from Jupiter , who is surnamed Scotias . " The Egyptians styled their greatest deity SKOTOS ayvaa-rov ,
Darkness unknown . Hence Black was a sacred colour ; and Hecate skotia was adored at Memphis as the lord of the creation . *' From this general estimation of darkness , Night had the precedence in all the Gentile calculations ; and the most sacred rites were celebrated under its influence . Hence one complete revolution of the earth on its own axis , was denoin accord
minated by the Greeks , Nuchthemeron . This was - ance with ancient tradition , for Moses says " the evening and the morning . " And we still designate seven or fourteen days , a sennight or a fortnight . It is indeed a well attested fact that Darkness preceded Light ; for at a specific period , viz . the creation of that portion of God ' s works which we
inhabit , he said , " Let there be Lig ht—and there was Light . " In the Orphic fragments , which were repeated during the initiations , Chaos and Cupid conjointly are denominated the father , and Darkness the mother of Night ; and Night was celebrated as the parent of gods and men , and the origin of all things
. It was in reference to the above application of darkness in the mysteries of Egypt , that God inflicted his wrath upon that people in a characteristic plague before the deliverance of the children of Israel from bondage , which deprived them of light for three days , introducing a variety of apparitions ,
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
On Freemasonry. The Spurious Freemasonry Of Ancient Times,
ceremonies of Spurious Freemasonry ; and was honoured with an unfeigned veneration . In one of Lucian ' s dialogues , where an assembly of the dead are supposed to have entered on the confines of Tartarus , one of them exclaims— " Bless us , how dark it is ! Give me your hand . Is not this very similar to the blind march which the candidates make when
they are initiated into the Eleusinian mysteries ? " Darkness was embodied in these imitative systems in allusion to the Creation and Deluge ; and formed a part of the cosmogonies which were recited to the aspirant when his initiation was completed . It was an attribute of Jupiter according to Pausaniuswho " on descending from Hermae there
, says , is a place full of oaks , which is called Scotitas , or the dark . This name , however , does not originate from the nearness of the trees to each other , ancl the darkness produced by this means ; but from Jupiter , who is surnamed Scotias . " The Egyptians styled their greatest deity SKOTOS ayvaa-rov ,
Darkness unknown . Hence Black was a sacred colour ; and Hecate skotia was adored at Memphis as the lord of the creation . *' From this general estimation of darkness , Night had the precedence in all the Gentile calculations ; and the most sacred rites were celebrated under its influence . Hence one complete revolution of the earth on its own axis , was denoin accord
minated by the Greeks , Nuchthemeron . This was - ance with ancient tradition , for Moses says " the evening and the morning . " And we still designate seven or fourteen days , a sennight or a fortnight . It is indeed a well attested fact that Darkness preceded Light ; for at a specific period , viz . the creation of that portion of God ' s works which we
inhabit , he said , " Let there be Lig ht—and there was Light . " In the Orphic fragments , which were repeated during the initiations , Chaos and Cupid conjointly are denominated the father , and Darkness the mother of Night ; and Night was celebrated as the parent of gods and men , and the origin of all things
. It was in reference to the above application of darkness in the mysteries of Egypt , that God inflicted his wrath upon that people in a characteristic plague before the deliverance of the children of Israel from bondage , which deprived them of light for three days , introducing a variety of apparitions ,