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Article THE ANCIENT MYSTERIES.—If. (Continued f ... ← Page 3 of 8 →
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
The Ancient Mysteries.—If. (Continued F ...
for their virtues by grateful posterity , v When the whole rabble of pagan divinities was thus discarded , the First Great Cause was introduced with suitable dignity , and was revealed to the illuminated epoptce as the reAvarder of virtue and as the piinisher of vice . During the process of initiation , much pageantry , aided by machinery the
most elaborate , as related in Moore ' s " Epicurean , " Avas introduced , but the sum and substance of the whole matter was the exploding of hero worship and the revelation 01 the Divine Unity . Warburton , in order to support the above theory , adduces what he conceives to have been the identical formuhe used in the ritual ; as for instance , he makes the revealing hierophant to say— - . ¦ u I will declare a secret to the initiated ; but let the doors be shut against the profane . Do thou , 0 Miisanis , the offspring of the bright moon , attend carefully to my song ; for I shall deliver the truth Avithout disguise . Suffer not , therefore , thy former prejudices to debar thee of that happy life which the knowledge of these sublime truths Avill procure unto thee : but carefully contemplate this divine oracle , and preserve it in purity of mind and heart .
Go on in the right Avay , and contemplate the sole Governor of the Avorld . He is one , and of Himself alone ; and to that One all things OAve their being . He operates through all , Avas never seen by mortal eye , but does Himself see everyone . ' "
We may here observe that , though there is no occasion for us , as Freemasons , to be in any degree ashamed of tracing our history up to a heathen origin ( for Avhatever the origin may have been , the ritual and other necessary forms have been modified so as to agree with the prevailing faith in the God revealed to us , and in whom we believe ) , yet even if there were causes for shame as to other forms of heathen worship , it need not be so in the instance before us ; for here Warburton has , without perhaps intending it , presented to us the principal
attributes of the true God . But Avithout noAv attempting to reconcile the differences which we find to have existed so numerously between him and Faber and the other " mystics / ' let us proceed to throAv Avhat further light Ave caln , for the information of our readers , on the ancient mysteries themselves " ; and without pledging ourselves to the particular theories or speculations of any one , and Avithout attempting uoav to determine the question Avhethcr or not the object of the mysteries Avas to supplant hero-worship , take what historical facts or traditions Ave can find
which bear on the subject . A talented work by John FelloAvs , M . A ., published in New York in 1835 , and now reprinted , has an account of an initiation , extracted from Bishop Warburton ' s " Divine Legation of Moses , " of Avhieh Ave give the substance .
Antiquity considered initiation into the mysteries as a delivery from a living death of vice , brutality , and misery , and tlie beginning of a ncAv life of virtue , reason , and happiness . And as in the mysteries their moral and divine truths were represented in sIioavs and allegories , so , in order to comply with this method of instruction , the author i > °
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
The Ancient Mysteries.—If. (Continued F ...
for their virtues by grateful posterity , v When the whole rabble of pagan divinities was thus discarded , the First Great Cause was introduced with suitable dignity , and was revealed to the illuminated epoptce as the reAvarder of virtue and as the piinisher of vice . During the process of initiation , much pageantry , aided by machinery the
most elaborate , as related in Moore ' s " Epicurean , " Avas introduced , but the sum and substance of the whole matter was the exploding of hero worship and the revelation 01 the Divine Unity . Warburton , in order to support the above theory , adduces what he conceives to have been the identical formuhe used in the ritual ; as for instance , he makes the revealing hierophant to say— - . ¦ u I will declare a secret to the initiated ; but let the doors be shut against the profane . Do thou , 0 Miisanis , the offspring of the bright moon , attend carefully to my song ; for I shall deliver the truth Avithout disguise . Suffer not , therefore , thy former prejudices to debar thee of that happy life which the knowledge of these sublime truths Avill procure unto thee : but carefully contemplate this divine oracle , and preserve it in purity of mind and heart .
Go on in the right Avay , and contemplate the sole Governor of the Avorld . He is one , and of Himself alone ; and to that One all things OAve their being . He operates through all , Avas never seen by mortal eye , but does Himself see everyone . ' "
We may here observe that , though there is no occasion for us , as Freemasons , to be in any degree ashamed of tracing our history up to a heathen origin ( for Avhatever the origin may have been , the ritual and other necessary forms have been modified so as to agree with the prevailing faith in the God revealed to us , and in whom we believe ) , yet even if there were causes for shame as to other forms of heathen worship , it need not be so in the instance before us ; for here Warburton has , without perhaps intending it , presented to us the principal
attributes of the true God . But Avithout noAv attempting to reconcile the differences which we find to have existed so numerously between him and Faber and the other " mystics / ' let us proceed to throAv Avhat further light Ave caln , for the information of our readers , on the ancient mysteries themselves " ; and without pledging ourselves to the particular theories or speculations of any one , and Avithout attempting uoav to determine the question Avhethcr or not the object of the mysteries Avas to supplant hero-worship , take what historical facts or traditions Ave can find
which bear on the subject . A talented work by John FelloAvs , M . A ., published in New York in 1835 , and now reprinted , has an account of an initiation , extracted from Bishop Warburton ' s " Divine Legation of Moses , " of Avhieh Ave give the substance .
Antiquity considered initiation into the mysteries as a delivery from a living death of vice , brutality , and misery , and tlie beginning of a ncAv life of virtue , reason , and happiness . And as in the mysteries their moral and divine truths were represented in sIioavs and allegories , so , in order to comply with this method of instruction , the author i > °