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68 INTERIOR VISION.
“To the guardians of the more reconditeand secret philosophical knowledge, of whom, in the societies — abroad and at home — there are a greater number, even in these days, than the uninitiated might suppose, it will be sufficient to observe that in no part of his book (though every reader will find —it is presumed —abundance of entertainment in it) is there approach, by the author, to disclosures which, in any mind, might be considered too little guarded.”
‘¢ Respecting the real meaning and purpose of the extraordinary philosophy of the Rosicrucians —some slender portion of which this book contains, as also do all of Dr. P. B. Randolph’s works —indeed they are, from first to last, wholly Rosicrucian —there is the profoundest general ignorance. All that is supposed of them is that they were a mighty sect, whose acquirements — and, indeed, practice-— were involved in so much mystery that the comprehension of them was scarcely possible. And this famous secret society has been not only the problem, but the amusement, and converted into the romance, of modern times. On the principle — usually a very true one — that all of the unkown must, therefore, be imposing, the story of these Cabalists has served the turn of those who sought to impress. If modern writers have made use of their history, it has been to weave up the materials into romance. The name of the Rosicrucians has been a word of might with charlatans; they have been the means of exciting, with the dealers in fiction. The character of the mystic fraternity — its designs and objects —have been a potent charm with all those who thought that they possessed, through it, a power of stimulating curiosity. Members of the Society of the Rosy Cross have been introduced, as heroes, in novels; have mysteriously flitted as the deus ex machind, through tales of the imagination. From want of knowledge of what they were, they have been supposed everything. They have been wondered at— laughed at — feared — set down as magicians, and as exempted from the common lot of the children of men. Fanaticism, dreaming, imposture, and, in the milder form of accusation, self-delusion; all this has been assumed of them. From the curious forms in which they chose to invest their knowledge; because of the singular fables which they elected as the medium in which their secrets should be hidden, they have been looked upon as quite of another race —as scarcely men. But they have been much mistaken.
‘Justice is so late of arrival to all original thinkers —the terms of prejudice, and of astonishment (not in the good sense), are so long in falling off from profound searchers — that, even now, the Rosicrucians — in other words, the Paracelsians, or Magnetists — are totally ignored as the arch-chemists to whose deep thoughts and unrelaxing labors modern science is indebted for most of its truths. As astrology (not the juggles of the stars, but the true exploration, seeking the method of being, and of working, of the glittering habitants of space); as astrology was the mother of astronomy, so is the lore of the Hermetic Brethren (miscalled in
“To the guardians of the more reconditeand secret philosophical knowledge, of whom, in the societies — abroad and at home — there are a greater number, even in these days, than the uninitiated might suppose, it will be sufficient to observe that in no part of his book (though every reader will find —it is presumed —abundance of entertainment in it) is there approach, by the author, to disclosures which, in any mind, might be considered too little guarded.”
‘¢ Respecting the real meaning and purpose of the extraordinary philosophy of the Rosicrucians —some slender portion of which this book contains, as also do all of Dr. P. B. Randolph’s works —indeed they are, from first to last, wholly Rosicrucian —there is the profoundest general ignorance. All that is supposed of them is that they were a mighty sect, whose acquirements — and, indeed, practice-— were involved in so much mystery that the comprehension of them was scarcely possible. And this famous secret society has been not only the problem, but the amusement, and converted into the romance, of modern times. On the principle — usually a very true one — that all of the unkown must, therefore, be imposing, the story of these Cabalists has served the turn of those who sought to impress. If modern writers have made use of their history, it has been to weave up the materials into romance. The name of the Rosicrucians has been a word of might with charlatans; they have been the means of exciting, with the dealers in fiction. The character of the mystic fraternity — its designs and objects —have been a potent charm with all those who thought that they possessed, through it, a power of stimulating curiosity. Members of the Society of the Rosy Cross have been introduced, as heroes, in novels; have mysteriously flitted as the deus ex machind, through tales of the imagination. From want of knowledge of what they were, they have been supposed everything. They have been wondered at— laughed at — feared — set down as magicians, and as exempted from the common lot of the children of men. Fanaticism, dreaming, imposture, and, in the milder form of accusation, self-delusion; all this has been assumed of them. From the curious forms in which they chose to invest their knowledge; because of the singular fables which they elected as the medium in which their secrets should be hidden, they have been looked upon as quite of another race —as scarcely men. But they have been much mistaken.
‘Justice is so late of arrival to all original thinkers —the terms of prejudice, and of astonishment (not in the good sense), are so long in falling off from profound searchers — that, even now, the Rosicrucians — in other words, the Paracelsians, or Magnetists — are totally ignored as the arch-chemists to whose deep thoughts and unrelaxing labors modern science is indebted for most of its truths. As astrology (not the juggles of the stars, but the true exploration, seeking the method of being, and of working, of the glittering habitants of space); as astrology was the mother of astronomy, so is the lore of the Hermetic Brethren (miscalled in
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