Collected Works (Vol. III)

220 EPILOGUE AND DEDICATION determining factor of the same being Smith’s defeat by Brown maximus behind the chapel, after Brown’s interview with the Head- Master. We are most of us aware that cabinet ministers, bishops, and dons resemble each other in the important particular that all are still schoolboys, and their differences but the superficial one produced by greas- ing, soaping, and withering them respec- tively; so that it will meet with instant general approval if I open this paper by the remark that Christianity, as long as it flourished, was content to assimilate Paganism, never attacking it until its own life had been sapped by the _ insidious heresies of Paul. Time passed by, and they bullied Manes and Cerinthus; history repeated itself until it almost knew itself by heart ; finally, at the present day, some hireling parasites of the decaying faith—at once the origin and the product of that decay—endeavour to take advantage of the ‘‘Greek movement” or the ‘‘ Neo-pagan revival” in the vain hope of diverting the public attention from the phalanx of Rationalism—traitorously admitted by Luther, and now sitting crowned and inexpugnable in the very citadel of the faith —to their own dishonest lie that Paganism was a faith whose motto was ‘Carpe diem,”? and whose methods were drink, dance, and Studio Murder.2. Why is Procopius cleaner than Petronius? Even a Julian could confute this sort of thing; but are we to rest for ever in negation? No: a Robinson minimus ipse will turn, and it is quite time that science was given a chance to measure itself against bulk. I shall not be content with giving Christian apologists the lie direct, but proceed to convict them of the very materialism against which they froth. In a_ word, 1 ‘ Gather ye roses!’ is the masterpiece of a Christian clergyman.—.4. ©. 2 A peculiarly gross «ase of psychonathic crime which occurred in 1906. to-day Christianity is the irreligion of the materialist, or if you like, the sensualist; while in Paganism, we may find the expression of that ever-haunting love— nay, necessity !—of the Beyond which tor- tures and beautifies those of us who are poets. wavTa Kaapa rots Kafapots—and, while there is no logical break between the appa- rently chaste dogma of the Virgin Birth and the horrible grossness of R. P. Sanchez in his De Matrimonio, Lib. ii. Cap. xxi., “Utium Virgo Maria semen emiserit in copulatione cum Spiritu Sancto,” so long as we understand an historical Incarnation; the accomplishment of that half of the Magnum Opus which is glyphed in the mystic aphorism ‘‘ Solve !” enables.an Adept of that standing to see nothing but pure symbol and holy counsel in the no grosser legends of the Greeks. This is not a matter of choice: reason forbids us to take the Swan-lover in its literal silliness and obscenity; but, on the other hand, the Bishops will not allow us to attach a pure interpretation to the precisely similar story of the Dove.} So far am JI, indeed, from attacking Christian symbolism as such, that I am quite prepared to admit that it is, although or rather because it is the lowest, the best. Most others, especially Hinduism and Bud- dhism, lose themselves in metaphysical speculations only proper to those who are already Adepts. The Rosicrucian busies himself with the Next Step, for himself and his pupils; he is no more concerned to discuss Nibbana than a schoolmaster to ‘‘settle the doctrine of the enclitic A#’’ in the mind of a child who is painfully grappling with the declension of Neavias, We can read even orthodox 1 Recently, a certain rash doctor publicly ex- pressed his doubts whether any Bishop of the twentieth century was so filthy-minded a fool. They were, however, soon dispelled by tele- grams from a considerable section of the entire Benciz, couched in emphatic language.