ds of all who come to understand it, is terribly
iconoclastic. It drives out before it everything else in the shape of
religious belief. It leaves no room for any conceptions belonging even
to the groundwork or foundation of ordinary religious faith. And what
becomes then of all rules of right and wrong, of all sanctions for
morality? Most assuredly there are rules of right and wrong thrilling
through every fibre of occult philosophy really higher than any which
commonplace theologies can teach; far more cogent sanctions for
morality than can be derived at second-hand from the distorted doctrines
of exoteric religions; but a complete transfer of the sanction will be
a process involving the greatest possible danger for mankind at the
time. Bigots of all denominations will laugh at the idea of such a
transfer being seriously considered. The orthodox Christian--confident
in the thousand of churches overshadowing all western lands, of the
enormous force engaged in the maintenance and propagation of the faith,
with the Pope and the Protestant hierarchy in alliance for this broad
purpose, with the countless clergy of all sects, and the fiery Salvation
Army bringing up the rear--will think that the earth itself is more
likely to crumble into ruin than the irresistible authority of Religion
to be driven back. They are all counting, however, without the progress
of enlightenment. The most absurd religions die hard; but when the
intellectual classes definitively reject them, they die, with throes of
terrible agony, may be, and, perhaps, like Samson in the Temple, but
they cannot permanently outlive a conviction that they are false in the
leading minds of the age. Just what has been said of Christianity may
be said of Mahomedanism and Brahminism. Little or no risk is run while
occult literature aims merely at putting a reasonable construction on
perverted tenets--in showing people that truth may lurk behind even the
strangest theologic fictions. And the lover of orthodoxy, in either of
the cases instanced, may welcome the explanation with complacency. For
him also, as for the Christian, the faith which he professes--
sanctioned by what looks like a considerable antiquity to the very
limited vision of uninitiated historians, and supported by the
attachment of millions grown old in its service and careful to educate
their children in the convictions that have served their turn--is
founded on a rock which has its base in t