9. The Ceremonial Of Initiatesc

Life is a warfare in which we must give proofs if we would advance; power does not surrender of itself; it must be seized. Initiation by contest and ordeal is therefore indispensable for the attainment of the practical science of Magic. We have indicated after what manner the four elementary forms may be vanquished and will not repeat it here; we refer those of our readers who would inquire into the ceremonies of ancient initiations to the works of Baron Tschoudy, author of the Blazing Star, Adonhiramite Masonry and some other most valuable masonic treatises. We must insist, however, upon one reflection, namely, that the intellectual and social chaos in the midst of which we are perishing has been caused by the neglect of initiation, its ordeals and its mysteries. Men, whose zeal was greater than their science, carried away by the popular maxims of the Gospel, came to believe in the primitive and absolute equality of men. A famous hallucine, the eloquent and unfortunate Rousseau, propagated with all the magic of his style the paradox that society alone depraves men - much as if he had said that competition and emulation in labour render workmen idle. The essential law of Nature, that of initiation by effort and of voluntary and toilsome progress, has been misconstrued fatally. Masonry has had its deserters, as Catholicism its apostates. What has been the consequence? The substitution of a cast-iron level for the intellectual and symbolical level. To preach equality to what is beneath, without instructing it how to rise upward, is not this condemning us to descend ourselves? And hence we have stooped to the reign of the Carmagnola, the Sanscullotes and Marat. To restore tottering and distracted society, the hierarchy and initiation must be again established. The task is difficult, but the whole intelligent world feels that it is necessary to undertake it. Must we pass through another deluge before succeeding? We trust earnestly not, and this book, perhaps the greatest but not the last of our audacities, is an appeal unto all that is yet alive for the reconstitution of life in the very midst of decomposition and death.