Chapter XII (3)

“Look west ... toward the third pole of the yourta,” pronounced the Tartar in his natural voice, though it sounded hollow, and as if coming from afar. “Her _thought_ is here.”

Then with a convulsive jerk, the upper portion of the Shaman’s body seemed raised, and his head fell heavily on the writer’s feet, which he clutched with both his hands. The position was becoming less and less attractive, but curiosity proved a good ally to courage. In the west corner was standing, life-like but flickering, unsteady and mist-like, the form of a dear old friend, a Roumanian lady of Valachia, a mystic by disposition, but a thorough disbeliever in this kind of occult phenomena.

“Her thought is here, but her body is lying unconscious. We could not bring her here otherwise,” said the voice.

We addressed and supplicated the apparition to answer, but all in vain. The features moved, and the form gesticulated as if in fear and agony, but no sound broke forth from the shadowy lips; only we imagined--perchance it was a fancy--hearing as if from a long distance the Roumanian words, “_Non se póte_” (it cannot be done).

For over two hours, the most substantial, unequivocal proofs that the Shaman’s astral soul was travelling at the bidding of our unspoken wish, were given us. Ten months later, we received a letter from our Valachian friend in response to ours, in which we had enclosed the page from the note-book, inquiring of her what she had been doing on that day, and describing the scene in full. She was sitting--she wrote--in the garden on that morning[1165] prosaically occupied in boiling some conserves; the letter sent to her was word for word the copy of the one received by her from her brother; all at once--in consequence of the heat, she thought--she fainted, and remembered distinctly _dreaming_ she saw the writer in a desert place which she accurately described, and sitting under a “gypsy’s tent,” as she expressed it. “Henceforth,” she added, “I can doubt no longer!”

But our experiment was proved still better. We had directed the Shaman’s inner _ego_ to the same friend heretofore mentioned in this chapter, the Kutchi of Lha-Ssa, who travels constantly to British India and back. _We know_ that he was apprised of our critical situation in the desert; for a few hours later came help, and we were rescued by a party of twenty-five horsemen who had been directed by their chief to find us at the place where we were, which no living man endowed with common powers could have known. The chief of this escort was a Shaberon, an “adept” whom we had never seen before, nor did we after that, for he never left his _soumay_ (lamasery), and we could have no access to it. But _he was a personal friend of the Kutchi_.

The above will of course provoke naught but incredulity in the general reader. But we write for those who will believe; who, like the writer, understand and know the illimitable powers and possibilities of the human astral soul. In this case we willingly believe, nay, we know, that the “spiritual double” of the Shaman did not act alone, for he was no adept, but simply a medium. According to a favorite expression of his, as soon as he placed the stone in his mouth, his “father appeared, dragged him out of his skin, and took him wherever he wanted,” and at his bidding.

One who has only witnessed the chemical, optical, mechanical, and sleight-of-hand performances of European prestidigitateurs, is not prepared to see, without amazement, the open-air and off-hand exhibitions of Hindu jugglers, to say nothing of fakirs. Of the mere displays of deceptive dexterity we make no account, for Houdin and others far excel them in that respect; nor do we dwell upon feats that permit of confederacy, whether resorted to or not. It is unquestionably true that non-expert travellers, especially if of an imaginative turn of mind, exaggerate inordinately. But our remark is based upon a class of phenomena not to be accounted for upon any of the familiar hypotheses. “I have seen,” says a gentleman who resided in India, “a man throw up into the air a number of balls numbered in succession from one upwards. As each went up--and there was no deception about their going up--the ball was seen clearly in the air, getting smaller and smaller, till it disappeared altogether out of sight. When they were all up, twenty or more, the operator would politely ask which ball you wanted to see, and then would shout out, ‘No. 1,’ ‘No. 15,’ and so on, as instructed by the spectators, when the ball demanded would bound to his feet violently from some remote distance.... These fellows have very scanty clothing, and apparently no apparatus whatever. Then, I have seen them swallow three different colored powders, and then, throwing back the head, wash them down with water, drunk, in the native fashion, in a continuous stream from a _lotah_, or brass-pot, held at arm’s length from the lips, and keep on drinking till the swollen body could not hold another drop, and water overflowed from the lips. Then, these fellows, after squirting out the water in their mouths, have spat out the three powders on a clean piece of paper, dry and unmixed.”[1166]

In the eastern portion of Turkey and Persia, have dwelt, from time immemorial, the warlike tribes of the Koordistan. This people of purely Indo-European origin, and without a drop of Semitic blood in them (though some ethnologists seem to think otherwise), notwithstanding their brigand-like disposition, unite in themselves the mysticism of the Hindu and the practices of the Assyrio-Chaldean magians, vast portions of whose territory they have helped themselves to, and will not give up, to please either Turkey or even all Europe.[1167] Nominally, Mahometans of the sect of Omar, their rites and doctrines are purely magical and magian. Even those who are Christian Nestorians, are Christians but in name. The Kaldany, numbering nearly 100,000 men, and with their two Patriarchs, are undeniably rather Manicheans than Nestorians. Many of them are Yezids.

One of these tribes is noted for its fire-worshipping predilections. At sunrise and sunset, the horsemen alight and, turning towards the sun, mutter a prayer; while at every new moon they perform mysterious rites throughout the whole night. They have a tent set apart for the purpose, and its thick, black, woolen fabric is decorated with weird signs, worked in bright red and yellow. In the centre is placed a kind of altar, encircled by three brass bands, to which are suspended numerous rings by ropes of camel’s hair, which every worshipper holds with his right hand during the ceremony. On the altar burns a curious, old-fashioned silver lamp, a relic found possibly among the ruins of Persepolis.[1168] This lamp, with three wicks, is an oblong cup with a handle to it, and is evidently of the class of Egyptian sepulchral lamps, once found in such profusion in the subterranean caves of Memphis, if we may believe Kircher.[1169] It widened from its end toward the middle, and its upper part was of the shape of a heart; the apertures for the wicks forming a triangle, and its centre being covered by an inverted heliotrope attached to a gracefully-curved stalk proceeding from the handle of the lamp. This ornament clearly bespoke its origin. It was one of the sacred vessels used in sun-worship. The Greeks gave the _heliotrope_ its name from its strange propensity to ever incline towards the sun. The ancient Magi used it in their worship; and who knows but Darius had performed the mysterious rites with its triple light illuminating the face of the king-hierophant!

If we mention the lamp at all, it is because there happened to be a strange story in connection with it. What the Koords do, during their nocturnal rites of lunar-worship, we know but from hearsay; for they conceal it carefully, and no stranger could be admitted to witness the ceremony. But every tribe has one old man, sometimes several, regarded as “holy beings,” who know the past, and can divulge the secrets of the future. These are greatly honored, and generally resorted to for information in cases of theft, murders, or danger.

Travelling from one tribe to the other, we passed some time in company with these Koords. As our object is not autobiographical, we omit all details that have no immediate bearing upon some occult fact, and even of these, have room but for a few. We will then simply state that a very expensive saddle, a carpet, and two Circassian daggers, richly mounted and chiselled in gold, had been stolen from the tent, and that the Koords, with the chief of the tribe at the head, had come, taking Allah for their witness that the culprit could not belong to their tribe. We believed it, for it would have been unprecedented among these nomadic tribes of Asia, as famed for the sacredness in which they hold their guests, as for the ease with which they plunder and occasionally murder them, when once they have passed the boundaries of their _aoûl_.

A suggestion was then made by a Georgian belonging to our caravan to have resort to the light of the _koodian_ (sorcerer) of their tribe. This was arranged in great secrecy and solemnity, and the interview appointed to take place at midnight, when the moon would be at its full. At the stated hour we were conducted to the above-described tent.

A large hole, or square aperture, was managed in the arched roof of the tent, and through it poured in vertically the radiant moonbeams, mingling with the vacillating triple flame of the little lamp. After several minutes of incantations, addressed, as it seemed to us, to the moon, the conjurer, an old man of tremendous stature, whose pyramidal turban touched the top of the tent, produced a round looking-glass, of the kind known as “Persian mirrors.” Having unscrewed its cover, he then proceeded to breathe on it, for over ten minutes, and wipe off the moisture from the surface with a package of herbs, muttering incantations the while _sotto voce_. After every wiping the glass became more and more brilliant, till its crystal seemed to radiate refulgent phosphoric rays in every direction. At last the operation was ended; the old man, with the mirror in his hand, remained as motionless as if he had been a statue. “Look, Hanoum ... look steadily,” he whispered, hardly moving his lips. Shadows and dark spots began gathering, where one moment before nothing was reflected but the radiant face of the full moon. A few more seconds, and there appeared the well-known saddle, carpet, and daggers, which seemed to be rising as from a deep, clear water, and becoming with every instant more definitely outlined. Then a still darker shadow appeared hovering over these objects, which gradually condensed itself, and then came out, as visibly as at the small end of a telescope, the full figure of a man crouching over them.

“I know him!” exclaimed the writer. “It is the Tartar who came to us last night, offering to sell his mule!”

The image disappeared, as if by enchantment. The old man nodded assent, but remained motionless. Then he muttered again some strange words, and suddenly began a song. The tune was slow and monotonous, but after he had sung a few stanzas in the same unknown tongue, without changing either rhythm or tune, he pronounced, _recitative_-like, the following words, in his broken Russian:

“Now, Hanoum, look well, whether we will catch him--the fate of the robber--we will learn this night,” etc.

The same shadows began gathering, and then, almost without transition, we saw the man lying on his back, in a pool of blood, across the saddle, and two other men galloping off at a distance. Horror-stricken, and sick at the sight of this picture, we desired to see no more. The old man, leaving the tent, called some of the Koords standing outside, and seemed to give them instructions. Two minutes later, a dozen of horsemen were galloping off at full speed down the side of the mountain on which we were encamped.

Early in the morning they returned with the lost objects. The saddle was all covered with coagulated blood, and of course abandoned to them. The story they told was, that upon coming in sight of the fugitive, they saw disappearing over the crest of a distant hill two horsemen, and upon riding up, the Tartar thief was found dead upon the stolen property, exactly as we had seen him in the magical glass. He had been murdered by the two banditti, whose evident design to rob him was interrupted by the sudden appearance of the party sent by the old Koodian.

The most remarkable results are produced by the Eastern “wise men,” by the simple act of breathing upon a person, whether with good or evil intent. This is pure mesmerism; and among the Persian dervishes who practice it the animal magnetism is often reinforced by that of the elements. If a person happens to stand facing a certain wind, there is always danger, they think; and many of the “learned ones” in occult matters can never be prevailed upon to go at sunset in a certain direction from whence blows the wind. We have known an old Persian from Baku,[1170] on the Caspian Sea, who had the most unenviable reputation for _throwing spells_ through the timely help of this wind, which blows but too often at that town, as its Persian name itself shows.[1171] If a victim, against whom the wrath of the old fiend was kindled, happened to be facing this wind, he would appear, as if by enchantment, cross the road rapidly, and breathe in his face. From that moment, the latter would find himself afflicted with every evil--he was under the spell of the “evil eye.”

The employment of the human breath by the sorcerer as an adjunct for the accomplishment of his nefarious purpose, is strikingly illustrated in several terrible cases recorded in the French annals--notably those of several Catholic priests. In fact, this species of sorcery was known from the oldest times. The Emperor Constantine (in Statute iv., _Code de Malef._, etc.) prescribed the severest penalties against such as should employ sorcery to do violence to chastity and excite unlawful passion. Augustine (_Cité de Dieu_) warns against it; Jerome, Gregory, Nazianzen and many other ecclesiastical authorities, lend their denunciation of a crime not uncommon among the clergy. Baffet (book v., tit. 19, chap. 6) relates the case of the curé of Peifane, who accomplished the ruin of a highly-respected and virtuous lady parishioner, the Dame du Lieu, by resort to sorcery, and was burned alive for it by the Parliament of Grenoble. In 1611, a priest named Gaufridy was burned by the Parliament of Provence for seducing a penitent at the confessional, named Magdelaine de la Palud, _by breathing upon her_, and thus throwing her into a delirium of sinful love for him.

The above cases are cited in the official report of the famous case of Father Girard, a Jesuit priest of very great influence, who, in 1731, was tried before the Parliament of Aix, France, for the seduction of his parishioner, Mlle. Catherine Cadière, of Toulon, and certain revolting crimes in connection with the same. The indictment charged that the offence was brought about by resort to sorcery. Mlle. Cadière was a young lady noted for her beauty, piety, and exemplary virtues. Her attention to her religious duties was exceptionally rigorous, and that was the cause of her perdition. Father Girard’s eye fell upon her, and he began to manœuvre for her ruin. Gaining the confidence of the girl and her family by his apparent great sanctity, he one day made a pretext to blow his breath upon her. The girl became instantly affected with a violent passion for him. She also had ecstatic visions of a religious character, stigmata, or blood-marks of the “Passion,” and hysterical convulsions. The long-sought opportunity of seclusion with his penitent finally offering, the Jesuit breathed upon her again, and before the poor girl recovered her senses, his object had been accomplished. By sophistry and the excitation of her religious fervor, he kept up this illicit relation for months, without her suspecting that she had done anything wrong. Finally, however, her eyes were opened, her parents informed, and the priest was arraigned. Judgment was rendered October 12th, 1731. Of twenty-five judges, twelve voted to send him to the stake. The criminal priest was defended by all the power of the Society of Jesus, and it is said that a million francs were spent in trying to suppress the evidence produced at the trial. The facts, however, were printed in a work (in 5 vols., 16mo), now rare, entitled _Recueil Général des Pièces contenues au Procez du Père Jean-Baptiste Girard, Jesuite_, etc., etc.[1172]

We have noted the circumstance that, while under the sorcerous influence of Father Girard, and in illicit relations with him, Mlle. Cadière’s body was marked with the _stigmata_ of the _Passion_, viz.: the bleeding wounds of thorns on her brow, of nails in her hands and feet, and of a lance-cut in her side. It should be added that the same marks were seen upon the bodies of six other penitents of this priest, viz.: Mesdames Guyol, Laugier, Grodier, Allemande, Batarelle, and Reboul. In fact, it became commonly remarked that Father Girard’s handsome parishioners were strangely given to ecstasies and _stigmata_! Add this to the fact that, in the case of Father Gaufridy, above noted, the same thing was proved, upon surgical testimony, to have happened to Mlle. de Palud, and we have something worth the attention of all (especially spiritualists) who imagine these _stigmata_ are produced by pure spirits. Barring the agency of the Devil, whom we have quietly put to rest in another chapter, Catholics would be puzzled, we fancy, despite all their infallibility, to distinguish between the stigmata of the sorcerers and those produced through the intervention of the Holy Ghost or the angels. The Church records abound in instances of alleged diabolical imitations of these signs of saintship, but, as we have remarked, the Devil is out of court.

By those who have followed us thus far, it will naturally be asked, to what practical issue this book tends; much has been said about magic and its potentiality, much of the immense antiquity of its practice. Do we wish to affirm that the occult sciences ought to be studied and practiced throughout the world? Would we replace modern spiritualism with the ancient magic? Neither; the substitution could not be made, nor the study universally prosecuted, without incurring the risk of enormous public dangers. At this moment, a well-known spiritualist and lecturer on mesmerism is imprisoned on the charge of raping a subject whom he had hypnotized. A sorcerer is a public enemy, and mesmerism may most readily be turned into the worst of sorceries.

We would have neither scientists, theologians, nor spiritualists turn practical magicians, but all to realize that there was true science, profound religion, and genuine phenomena before this modern era. We would that all who have a voice in the education of the masses should first know and then _teach_ that the safest guides to human happiness and enlightenment are those writings which have descended to us from the remotest antiquity; and that nobler spiritual aspirations and a higher average morality prevail in the countries where the people take their precepts as the rule of their lives. We would have all to realize that magical, _i.e._, spiritual powers exist in every man, and those few to practice them who feel called to teach, and are ready to pay the price of discipline and self-conquest which their development exacts.

Many men have arisen who had glimpses of the truth, and fancied they had it all. Such have failed to achieve the good they might have done and sought to do, because vanity has made them thrust their personality into such undue prominence as to interpose it between their believers and the _whole_ truth that lay behind. The world needs no sectarian church, whether of Buddha, Jesus, Mahomet, Swedenborg, Calvin, or any other. There being but ONE Truth, man requires but one church--the Temple of God within us, walled in by matter but penetrable by any one who can find the way; _the pure in heart see God_.

_The trinity of nature is the lock of magic, the trinity of man the key that fits it._ Within the solemn precincts of the sanctuary the SUPREME had and has no name. It is unthinkable and unpronounceable; and yet every man finds in himself his god. “Who art thou, O fair being?” inquires the disembodied soul, in the _Khordah-Avesta_, at the gates of Paradise. “I am, O Soul, _thy good and pure thoughts_, thy works and thy _good law_ ... thy angel ... and thy god.” Then man, or the soul, is reunited with ITSELF, for this “Son of God” is one with him; it is his own mediator, the _god_ of his human soul and his “Justifier.” “_God not revealing himself immediately to man, the spirit is his interpreter_,” says Plato in the _Banquet_.

Besides, there are many good reasons why the study of magic, except in its broad philosophy, is nearly impracticable in Europe and America. Magic being what it is, the most difficult of all sciences to learn experimentally--its acquisition is practically beyond the reach of the majority of white-skinned people; and that, whether their effort is made at home or in the East. Probably not more than one man in a million of European blood is fitted--either physically, morally, or psychologically--to become a practical magician, and not one in ten millions would be found endowed with all these three qualifications as required for the work. Civilized nations lack the phenomenal powers of endurance, both mental and physical, of the Easterns; the favoring temperamental idiosyncrasies of the Orientals are utterly wanting in them. In the Hindu, the Arabian, the Thibetan, an intuitive perception of the possibilities of occult natural forces in subjection to human will, comes by inheritance; and in them, the physical senses as well as the spiritual are far more finely developed than in the Western races. Notwithstanding the notable difference of thickness between the skulls of a European and a Southern Hindu, this difference, being a purely climatic result, due to the intensity of the sun’s rays, involves no psychological principles. Furthermore, there would be tremendous difficulties in the way of _training_, if we can so express it. Contaminated by centuries of dogmatic superstition, by an ineradicable--though quite unwarranted--sense of superiority over those whom the English term so contemptuously “niggers,” the white European would hardly submit himself to the practical tuition of either Kopt, Brahman, or Lama. To become a neophyte, one must be ready to devote himself heart and soul to the study of mystic sciences. Magic--most imperative of mistresses--brooks no rival. Unlike other sciences, a theoretical knowledge of formulæ without mental capacities or soul powers, is utterly useless in magic. The spirit must hold in complete subjection the combativeness of what is loosely termed educated reason, until facts have vanquished cold human sophistry.

Those best prepared to appreciate occultism are the spiritualists, although, through prejudice, until now they have been the bitterest opponents to its introduction to public notice. Despite all foolish negations and denunciations, their phenomena are real. Despite, also, their own assertions they are wholly misunderstood by themselves. The totally insufficient theory of the constant agency of disembodied human spirits in their production has been the bane of the _Cause_. A thousand mortifying rebuffs have failed to open their reason or intuition to the truth. Ignoring the teachings of the past, they have discovered no substitute. We offer them philosophical deduction instead of unverifiable hypothesis, scientific analysis and demonstration instead of undiscriminating faith. Occult philosophy gives them the means of meeting the reasonable requirements of science, and frees them from the humiliating necessity to accept the oracular teachings of “intelligences,” which as a rule have less intelligence than a child at school. So based and so strengthened, modern phenomena would be in a position to command the attention and enforce the respect of those who carry with them public opinion. Without invoking such help, spiritualism must continue to vegetate, equally repulsed--not without cause--both by scientists and theologians. In its modern aspect, it is neither a science, a religion, nor a philosophy.

Are we unjust; does any intelligent spiritualist complain that we have misstated the case? To what can he point us but to a confusion of theories, a tangle of hypotheses mutually contradictory? Can he affirm that spiritualism, even with its thirty years of phenomena, has any defensible philosophy; nay, that there is anything like an established method that is generally accepted and followed by its recognized representatives?

And yet, there are many thoughtful, scholarly, earnest writers among the spiritualists, scattered the world over. There are men who, in addition to a scientific mental training and a reasoned faith in the phenomena _per se_, possess all the requisites of leaders of the movement. How is it then, that, except throwing off an isolated volume or so, or occasional contributions to journalism, they all refrain from taking any active part in the formation of a system of philosophy? This is from no lack of moral courage, as their writings well show. Nor because of indifference, for enthusiasm abounds, and they are sure of their facts. Nor is it from lack of capacity, because many are men of mark, the peers of our best minds. It is simply for the reason that, almost without exception, they are bewildered by the contradictions they encounter, and wait for their tentative hypotheses to be verified by further experience. Doubtless this is the part of wisdom. It is that adopted by Newton, who, with the heroism of an honest, unselfish heart, withheld for seventeen years the promulgation of his theory of gravitation, only because he had not verified it to his own satisfaction.

Spiritualism, whose aspect is rather that of aggression than of defense, has tended toward iconoclasm, and so far has done well. But, in pulling down, it does not rebuild. Every really substantial truth it erects is soon buried under an avalanche of chimeras, until all are in one confused ruin. At every step of advance, at the acquisition of every new vantage-ground of FACT, some cataclysm, either in the shape of fraud and exposure, or of premeditated treachery, occurs, and throws the spiritualists back powerless because they _cannot_ and their invisible friends _will_ not (or perchance can, less than themselves) make good their claims. Their fatal weakness is that they have but _one_ theory to offer in explanation of their challenged facts--the agency of _human disembodied spirits_, and the medium’s complete subjection to them. They will attack those who differ in views with them with a vehemence only warranted by a better cause; they will regard every argument contradicting their theory as an imputation upon their common sense and powers of observation; and they will positively refuse even to argue the question.

How, then, can spiritualism be ever elevated to the distinction of a science? This, as Professor Tyndall shows, includes three absolutely necessary elements: observation of facts; induction of laws from these facts; and verification of those laws by constant practical experience. What experienced observer will maintain that spiritualism presents either one of these three elements? The medium is not uniformly surrounded by such test conditions that we may be sure of the facts; the inductions from the supposed facts are unwarranted in the absence of such verification; and, as a corollary, there has been no sufficient verification of those hypotheses by experience. In short, the prime element of accuracy has, as a rule, been lacking.

That we may not be charged with desire to misrepresent the position of spiritualism, at the date of this present writing, or accused of withholding credit for advances actually made, we will cite a few passages from the London _Spiritualist_ of March 2, 1877. At the fortnightly meeting, held February 19, a debate occurred upon the subject of “Ancient Thought and Modern Spiritualism.” Some of the most intelligent Spiritualists of England participated. Among these was Mr. W. Stainton Moses, M.A., who has recently given some attention to the relation between ancient and modern phenomena. He said: “Popular spiritualism is not scientific; it does very little in the way of scientific verification. Moreover, exoteric spiritualism is, to a large extent, devoted to presumed communion with personal friends, or to the gratification of curiosity, or the mere evolution of marvels.... The truly esoteric science of spiritualism is very rare, and not more rare than valuable. To it we must look to the origination of knowledge which may be developed exoterically.... We proceed too much on the lines of the physicists; our tests are crude, and often illusory; we know too little of the Protean power of spirit. Here the ancients were far ahead of us, and can teach us much. We have not introduced any certainty into the conditions--a necessary prerequisite for true scientific experiment. This is largely owing to the fact that our circles are constructed on no principle.... We have not even mastered the elementary truths which the ancients knew and acted on, _e.g._, the isolation of mediums. We have been so occupied with wonder-hunting that we have hardly tabulated the phenomena, or propounded one theory to account for the production of the simplest of them.... We have never faced the question: What is the intelligence? This is the great blot, the most frequent source of error, and here we might learn with advantage from the ancients. There is the strongest disinclination among spiritualists to admit the possibility of the truth of occultism. In this respect they are as hard to convince as is the outer world of spiritualism. Spiritualists start with a fallacy, viz.: that all phenomena are caused by the action of departed human spirits; _they have not looked into the powers of the human spirit_; they do not know the extent to which spirit acts, how far it reaches, what it underlies.”

Our position could not be better defined. If Spiritualism has a future; it is in the keeping of such men as Mr. Stainton Moses.

Our work is done--would that it were better done! But, despite our inexperience in the art of book-making, and the serious difficulty of writing in a foreign tongue, we hope we have succeeded in saying some things that will remain in the minds of the thoughtful. The enemies of truth have been all counted, and all passed in review. Modern science, powerless to satisfy the aspirations of the race, makes the future a void, and bereaves man of hope. In one sense, it is like the Baital Pachisi, the Hindu vampire of popular fancy, which lives in dead bodies, and feeds but on the rottenness of matter. The theology of Christendom has been rubbed threadbare by the most serious minds of the day. It is found to be, on the whole, subversive, rather than promotive of spirituality and good morals. Instead of expounding the rules of divine law and justice, it teaches but _itself_. In place of an ever-living Deity, it preaches the Evil One, and makes him indistinguishable from God Himself! “Lead us not into temptation” is the aspiration of Christians. Who, then, is the tempter? Satan? No; the prayer is not addressed to him. It is that tutelar genius who hardened the heart of Pharaoh, put an evil spirit into Saul, sent lying messengers to the prophets, and tempted David to sin; it is--the _Bible_-God of Israel!

Our examination of the multitudinous religious faiths that mankind, early and late, have professed, most assuredly indicates that they have all been derived from one primitive source. It would seem as if they were all but different modes of expressing the yearning of the imprisoned human soul for intercourse with supernal spheres. As the white ray of light is decomposed by the prism into the various colors of the solar spectrum, so the beam of divine truth, in passing through the _three-sided_ prism of man’s nature, has been broken up into vari-colored fragments called RELIGIONS. And, as the rays of the spectrum, by imperceptible shadings, merge into each other, so the great theologies that have appeared at different degrees of divergence from the original source, have been connected by minor schisms, schools, and off-shoots from the one side or the other. Combined, their aggregate represents one eternal truth; separate, they are but shades of human error and the signs of imperfection. The worship of the Vedic _pitris_ is fast becoming the worship of the spiritual portion of mankind. It but needs the right perception of things objective to finally discover that the only world of reality is the subjective.

What has been contemptuously termed Paganism, was ancient wisdom replete with Deity; and Judaism and its offspring, Christianity and Islamism, derived whatever of inspiration they contained from this ethnic parent. Pre-Vedic Brahmanism and Buddhism are the double source from which all religions sprung; Nirvana is the ocean to which all tend. For the purposes of a philosophical analysis, we need not take account of the enormities which have blackened the record of many of the world’s religions. True faith is the embodiment of divine charity; those who minister at its altars, are but human. As we turn the bloodstained pages of ecclesiastical history, we find that, whoever may have been the hero, and whatever costumes the actors may have worn, the plot of the tragedy has ever been the same. But the Eternal Night was in and behind all, and we pass from what we see to that which is invisible to the eye of sense. Our fervent wish has been to show true souls how they may lift aside the curtain, and, in the brightness of that Night made Day, look with undazzled gaze upon the UNVEILED TRUTH.

THE END.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] These figures are copied from the “Religious Statistics
of the United States for the year 1871.”

[2] These are: The _Baptists_, _Congregationalists_,
_Episcopalians_, Northern _Methodists_, Southern
_Methodists_, Methodists _various_, Northern
_Presbyterians_, Southern _Presbyterians_, _United
Presbyterians_, _United Brethren_, _Brethren in
Christ_, _Reformed Dutch_, _Reformed German_, _Reformed
Presbyterians_, _Cumberland Presbyterians_.

[3] H. Maudsley: “Body and Mind.”

[4] “Boston Sunday Herald,” November 5, 1876.

[5] See the self-glorification of the present Pope in the
work entitled, “Speeches of Pope Pius IX.” by Don
Pascale de Franciscis; and the famous pamphlet of that
name by the Rt. Hon. W. E. Gladstone. The latter quotes
from the work named the following sentence pronounced
by the Pope: “My wish is that all governments should
know that I am speaking in this strain.... And I have
_the right_ to speak, _even more than Nathan the
prophet_ to David the king, _and a great deal more than
St. Ambrose had to Theodosius_!!”

[6] See King’s “Gnostics,” and other works.

[7] Des Mousseaux: “La Magie au XIXme Siècle,” chap. i.

[8] Hargrave Jennings: “The Rosicrucians,” pp. 228-241.

[9] Des Mousseaux: “Hauts Phénomenes de la Magie.”

[10] Don Pasquale di Franciscis: “Discorsi del Sommo
Pontefice Pio IX.,” Part i., p. 340.

[11] “Speeches of Pius IX.,” p. 14. Am. Edition.

[12] Vide “Speeches of Pope Pius IX.,” by Don Pasq. di
Franciscis; Gladstone’s pamphlet on this book; Draper’s
“Conflict between Religion and Science,” and others.

[13] The fact is given to us by an eye-witness who has visited
the church several times; a Roman Catholic, who felt
perfectly _horrified_, as he expressed it.

[14] Referring to the seed planted by Jesus and his Apostles.

[15] “Chips,” vol. i., p. 26, Preface.

[16] Mallet: “Northern Antiquities.”

[17] Ether is both _pure_ and _impure_ fire. The composition
of the latter comprises all its visible forms, such as
the “correlation of forces”--heat, flame, electricity,
etc. The former is the _Spirit_ of Fire. The difference
is purely alchemical.

[18] See “Inquiry into the Nature and Place of Hell,” by
Rev. T. Surnden.

[19] Revelation xvi. 8-9.

[20] Aristotle mentions Pythagoreans who placed the sphere of
fire in the sun, and named it _Jupiter’s Prison_. See
“De Cœlo,” lib. ii.

[21] “De Civit. Dei,” 1, xxi., c. 17.

[22] “Demonologia and Hell,” p. 289.

[23] “Les Hauts Phénomènes de la Magie,” p. v., Preface.

[24] Dr. Stanley: “Lectures on the Eastern Church,” p. 407.

[25] In the government of Tambov, a gentleman, a rich landed
proprietor, had a curious case happen in his family
during the Hungarian campaign of 1848. His only and
much-beloved nephew, whom, having no children, he had
adopted as a son, was in the Russian army. The elderly
couple had a portrait of his--a water-color painting--
constantly, during the meals, placed on the table in
front of the young man’s usual seat. One evening as the
family, with some friends, were at their early tea, the
glass over the portrait, without any one touching it,
was shattered to atoms with a loud explosion. As the
aunt of the young soldier caught the picture in her hand
she saw the forehead and head besmeared with blood. The
guests, in order to quiet her, attributed the blood to
her having cut her fingers with the broken glass. But,
examine as they would, they could not find the vestige
of a cut on her fingers, and no one had touched the
picture but herself. Alarmed at her state of excitement
the husband, pretending to examine the portrait more
closely, cut his finger on purpose, and then tried to
assure her that it was his blood and that, in the first
excitement, he had touched the frame without any one
remarking it. All was in vain, the old lady felt sure
that Dimitry was killed. She began to have masses said
for him daily at the village church, and arrayed the
whole household in deep mourning. Several weeks later,
an official communication was received from the colonel
of the regiment, stating that their nephew was killed by
a fragment of a shell which had carried off the upper
part of his head.

[26] Executions for witchcraft took place, not much later than
a century ago, in other of the American provinces.
Notoriously there were negroes executed in New Jersey by
burning at the stake--the penalty denounced in several
States. Even in South Carolina, in 1865, when the State
government was “reconstructed,” after the civil war, the
statutes inflicting death for witchcraft were found to
be still unrepealed. It is not a hundred years since
they have been enforced to the murderous letter of their
text.

[27] _Vide_ the title-page on the English translation of
Mayerhoff’s “Reuchlin und Seine Zeit,” Berlin, 1830.
“The Life and Times of John Reuchlin, or Capnion, the
Father of the German Reformation,” by F. Barham, London,
1843.

[28] Lord Coke: 3 “Institutes,” fol. 44.

[29] _Vide_ “The Life of St. Gregory of Tours.”

[30] Translated from the original document in the Archives of
Orleans, France; also see “Sortes and Sortilegium;”
“Life of Peter de Blois.”

[31] “Miracles and Modern Spiritualism.”

[32] There were two chairs of the titular apostle at Rome. The
clergy, frightened at the uninterrupted evidence
furnished by scientific research, at last decided to
confront the enemy, and we find the “Chronique des Arts”
giving the cleverest, and at the same time most
_Jesuitical_, explanation of the fact. According to
their story, “The _increase_ in the number of the
faithful decided Peter upon making Rome henceforth the
centre of his action. The cemetery of Ostrianum was too
distant and would _not suffice for the reünions of the
Christians_. The motive which had induced the Apostle to
confer on _Linus and Cletus_ successively the episcopal
character, in order to render them capable of sharing
the solicitudes of a church whose extent was to be
without limits, led naturally to a multiplication of the
places of meeting. The particular residence of Peter was
therefore fixed at Viminal; and there was established
that mysterious Chair, the symbol of power and truth.
The august seat which was venerated at the Ostrian
Catacombs was not, however, removed. Peter still visited
this cradle of the Roman Church, and often, without
doubt, exercised his holy functions there. A _second_
Chair, expressing the same mystery as the first, was set
up at Cornelia, and it is this which has come down to us
through the ages.”

Now, so far from it being possible that there ever were
two genuine chairs of this kind, the majority of critics
show that Peter never was at Rome at all; the reasons
are many and unanswerable. Perhaps we had best begin by
pointing to the works of Justin Martyr. This great
champion of Christianity, writing in the early part of
the second century _in Rome_, where he fixed his abode,
eager to get hold of the least proof in favor of the
truth for which he suffered, seems _perfectly unconscious
of St. Peter’s existence_!!

Neither does any other writer of any consequence mention
him in connection with the Church of Rome, earlier than
the days of Irenæus, when the latter set himself to
invent a new religion, drawn from the depths of his
imagination. We refer the reader anxious to learn more
to the able work of Mr. George Reber, entitled “The
Christ of Paul.” The arguments of this author are
conclusive. The above article in the “Chronique des
Arts,” speaks of the _increase_ of the faithful to such
an extent that Ostrianum could not contain the number of
Christians. Now, if Peter was at Rome at all--runs Mr.
Reber’s argument--it must have been between the years A.
D. 64 and 69; for at 64 he was at Babylon, from whence
he wrote epistles and letters to Rome, and at some time
between 64 and 68 (the reign of Nero) he either died a
martyr or in his bed, for Irenæus makes him deliver the
Church of Rome, together with Paul (!?) (whom he
persecuted and quarrelled with all his life), into the
hands of _Linus_, who became bishop in 69 (see Reber’s
“Christ of Paul,” p. 122). We will treat of it more
fully in chapter iii.

Now, we ask, in the name of common sense, how could the
_faithful_ of Peter’s Church _increase_ at such a rate,
when Nero trapped and killed them like so many mice
during his reign? History shows the few Christians
fleeing from Rome, wherever they could, to avoid the
persecution of the emperor, and the “Chronique des Arts”
makes them increase and multiply! “Christ,” the article
goes on to say, “willed that this visible sign of the
doctrinal authority of his vicar should also have its
portion of immortality; one can follow it from age to
age in the documents of the Roman Church.” Tertullian
formally attests its existence in his book “De
Præscriptionibus.” Eager to learn everything concerning
so interesting a subject, we would like to be shown when
did _Christ_ WILL anything of the kind? However:
“Ornaments of ivory have been fitted to the front and
back of the chair, but only on those parts repaired with
acacia-wood. Those which cover the panel in front are
divided into three superimposed rows, each containing
six plaques of ivory, on which are engraved various
subjects, among others the ‘Labors of Hercules.’ Several
of the plaques were wrongly placed, and seemed to have
been affixed to the chair at a time when the remains of
antiquity were employed as ornaments, without much
regard to fitness.” This is the point. The article was
written simply as a clever answer to several facts
published during the present century. Bower, in his
“History of the Popes” (vol. ii., p. 7), narrates that
in the year 1662, while cleaning one of the chairs, “the
‘Twelve Labors of Hercules’ unluckily appeared engraved
upon it,” after which the chair was removed and another
substituted. But in 1795, when Bonaparte’s troops
occupied Rome, the chair was again examined. This time
there was found the Mahometan confession of faith, in
Arabic letters: “There is no Deity but Allah, and
Mahomet is his Apostle.” (See appendix to “Ancient
Symbol-Worship,” by H. M. Westropp and C. Staniland
Wake.) In the appendix Prof. Alexander Wilder very
justly remarks as follows: “We presume that the Apostle
of the Circumcision, as Paul, his great rival, styles
him, was never at the Imperial City, nor had a successor
there, not even in the ghetto. The ‘Chair of Peter,’
therefore, is _sacred_ rather than apostolical. Its
sanctity proceeded, however, from the esoteric religion
of the former times of Rome. The hierophant of the
Mysteries probably occupied it on the day of initiations,
when exhibiting to the candidates the _Petroma_ (stone
tablet containing the last revelation made by the
hierophant to the neophyte for initiation).”

[33] Joshua xxiv. 15.

[34] One of the most surprising facts that have come under our
observation, is that students of profound research
should not couple the frequent recurrence of these
“unexpected and almost miraculous” discoveries of
important documents, at the most opportune moments, with
a premeditated design. Is it so strange that the
custodians of “Pagan” lore, seeing that the proper
moment had arrived, should cause the needed document,
book, or relic to fall as if by accident in the right
man’s way? Geological surveyors and explorers even as
competent as Humboldt and Tschuddi, have not discovered
the hidden mines from which the Peruvian Incas dug their
treasure, although the latter confesses that the present
degenerate Indians have the secret. In 1839, Perring,
the archæologist, proposed to the sheik of an Arab
village two purses of gold, if he helped him to discover
the entrance to the hidden passage leading to the
sepulchral chambers in the North Pyramid of Doshoor. But
though his men were out of employment and half-starved,
the sheik proudly refused to “sell the secret of the
dead,” promising to show it _gratis_, when _the time
would come for it_. Is it, then, impossible that in some
other regions of the earth are guarded the remains of
that glorious literature of the past, which was the
fruit of its majestic civilization? What is there so
surprising in the idea? Who knows but that as the
Christian Church has unconsciously begotten free thought
by reaction against her own cruelty, rapacity, and
dogmatism, the public mind may be glad to follow the
lead of the Orientalists, away from Jerusalem and
towards Ellora; and that then much more will be
discovered that is now hidden?

[35] “Chips from a German Workshop,” vol. i., p. 373; Semitic
Monotheism.

[36] An after-thought has made us fancy that we can understand
what is meant by the following sentences of _Moses of
Chorenè_: “The ancient Asiatics,” says he, “five
centuries before our era--and especially the Hindus, the
Persians, and the Chaldeans, had in their possession a
quantity of historical and scientific books. These works
were partially borrowed, partially translated in the
Greek language, mostly since the Ptolemies had established
the Alexandrian library and encouraged the writers by
their liberalities, so that the Greek language became
the deposit of all the sciences” (“History of Armenia”).
Therefore, the greater part of the literature included
in the 700,000 volumes of the Alexandrian Library was
due to India, and her next neighbors.

[37] Bonamy says in “Le Bibliotheque d’Alexandrie,” quoting,
we suppose, the Presbyter Orosius, who was an
eye-witness, “_thirty_ years later.”

[38] Since the above was written, the spirit here described
has been beautifully exemplified at Barcelona, Spain,
where the Bishop Fray Joachim invited the local
spiritualists to witness a formal burning of spiritual
books. We find the account in a paper called “The
Revelation,” published at Alicante, which sensibly adds
that the performance was “a caricature of the memorable
epoch of the Inquisition.”

[39] E. Pococke gives the variations of the name Buddha as:
Bud’ha, Buddha, Booddha, Butta, Pout, Pote, Pto, Pte,
Phte, Phtha, Phut, etc., etc. See “India in Greece,”
Note, Appendix, 397.

[40] The tiara of the Pope is also a perfect copy of that of
the Dalaï-Lama of Thibet.

[41] It is the traditional policy of the College of Cardinals
to elect, whenever practicable, the new Pope among the
oldest valetudinarians. The hierophant of the Eleusinia
was likewise always an old man, and unmarried.

[42] This is not correct.

[43] “Le Spiritisme dans le Monde,” p. 28.

[44] Translated by Prof. Draper for “Conflict between Religion
and Science;” book xii.

[45] “Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.”

[46] “Sohar Comment.,” Gen. xl. 10; “Kabbal. Denud.,” i., 528.

[47] “The beings which the philosophers of other peoples
distinguish by the name ‘Dæmons,’ Moses names ‘Angels,’”
says Philo Judæus.--“De Gigant,” i. 253.

[48] Deuteronomy xxxiii. 2., אשדת is translated “fiery
law” in the English Bible.

[49] See Rees’s “Encyclopædia,” art. Kabala.

[50] “Histor. Manich.,” Liv. vi., ch. i., p. 291.

[51] “The altogether mystical coloring of Christianity
harmonized with the Essene rules of life and opinions,
and it is not improbable that Jesus and John the Baptist
were initiated into the Essene Mysteries, to which
Christianity may be indebted for many a form of
expression; as indeed the community of Therapeutæ, an
offspring of the Essene order, soon belonged wholly to
Christianity” (“Yost,” i., 411--quoted by the author of
“Sod, the Son of the Man”).

[52] A. Franck: “Die Kabbala.”

[53] “Le Spiritisme dans le Monde.”

[54] “Asiàt. Trans.,” i., p. 579.

[55] Louis Jacolliot: “The Initiates of the Ancient Temples.”

[56] Franck: “Die Kabbala.”

[57] See “Conflict between Religion and Science,” p. 224.

[58] See “Sohar;” “Kab. Den.;” “The Book of Mystery,” the
oldest book of the kabalists; and Milman: “History of
Christianity,” pp. 212, 213-215.

[59] Milman: “History of Christianity,” p. 280. The _Kurios_
and _Kora_ are mentioned repeatedly in “Justin Martyr.”
See p. 97.

[60] See Olshausen: “Biblischer Commentar über sammtliche
Schriften des Neuen Testaments,” ii.

[61] There is a wide-spread _superstition_ (?), especially
among the Slavonians and Russians, that the _magician_
or wizard cannot die before he has passed the “word” to
a successor. So deeply is it rooted among the popular
beliefs, that we do not imagine there is a person in
Russia who has not heard of it. It is but too easy to
trace the origin of this superstition to the old
Mysteries which had been for ages spread all over the
globe. The ancient _Variago-Rouss_ had his Mysteries in
the North as well as in the South of Russia; and there
are many relics of the by-gone faith scattered in the
lands watered by the sacred Dnieper, the baptismal
Jordan of all Russia. No _Znâchar_ (the knowing one) or
_Koldoun_ (sorcerer), male or female, can die in fact
before he has passed the mysterious word to some one.
The popular belief is that unless he does that he will
linger and suffer for weeks and months, and were he even
finally to get liberated, it would be only to wander on
earth, unable to quit its region unless he finds a
successor even after death. How far the belief may be
verified by others, we do not know, but we have seen a
case which, for its tragical and mysterious _dénoument_,
deserves to be given here as an illustration of the
subject in hand. An old man, of over one hundred years
of age, a peasant-serf in the government of S----,
having a wide reputation as a sorcerer and healer, was
said to be dying for several days, and still unable to
die. The report spread like lightning, and the poor old
fellow was shunned by even the members of his own
family, as the latter were afraid of receiving the
unwelcome inheritance. At last the public rumor in the
village was that he had sent a message to a colleague
less versed than himself in the art, and who, although
he lived in a distant district, was nevertheless coming
at the call, and would be on hand early on the following
morning. There was at that time on a visit to the
proprietor of the village a young physician who,
belonging to the famous school of _Nihilism_ of that
day, laughed outrageously at the idea. The master of the
house, being a very pious man, and but half inclined to
make so cheap of the “superstition,” smiled--as the
saying goes--but with one corner of his mouth. Meanwhile
the young skeptic, to gratify his curiosity, had made a
visit to the dying man, had found that he could not live
twenty-four hours longer, and, determined to prove the
absurdity of the “superstition,” had taken means to
detain the coming “successor” at a neighboring village.