THE EQUINOX
place of giving the infant adept a simple magic rag doll to
play with, intrust to his care, with dire prognostication and
portent of disaster, a gargoyle torn from the very roof of that
temple on the floor of which he, as a little child, is as yet but
learning to crawl. The result being, as it proved in most
cases, as disastrous as it was lamentable.
There is a time and a place for everything, and there is a
right use for the affectation of knowledge just as there is a
wrong one. When a child has learnt the simple rules of
addition, subtraction, multiplication and division; it is
legitimate to ask it to solve some simple little problem ; but it
is sheer waste of time to ask it: “ If twenty-four sprats cost
a shilling, and one sprat will make a meal for two children,
how many children can you feed for twopence halfpenny
?”
before it knows that one plus one equals two. Ifa child is
never taught to add one to one it is possible that even when
grown up, the man to his dying day will look upon the setter
of the twopenny-halfpenny sprat question as an advanced
mathematician, perhaps even as an “advanced occultist.” But
when he has learnt the meaning of one plus one equals two,
he will find this vast unthinkable problem to be after all but
as simple as adding one to one or two to two.
The affectation of knowledge and the piling on of symbols
is only legetimate to the ignorant when the purpose is to
bewilder by a flashing image and not to instruct. In the
present case the seeker after Truth is called the Child of Earth
and Darkness, and instead of being shown the beautiful
garment of light he will one day be called upon to wear, is
at once rolled in a heap of tinselled draperies, in mummy
wrappings, outgrown togas and the discarded underwear of
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