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Updated: June 29, 2025
Returning, however, to the symbol of the cross, as the first and simplest representation of that union of the Male and Female Principles which alone produces what we mortals call life, it is extremely curious that the selection of the figure of the cross in comparatively modern times as the simplest and most natural symbol both of addition and of multiplication, should have led no one to perceive that, being for these very reasons also the simplest and most natural symbol of Life, a probable solution of the mystery surrounding the origin of the pre-Christian cross as a symbol of Life, as it were stared them in the face.
There is much to show that the early Church took this line with regard to pre-Christian saviours; and in later times the same policy is remarkably illustrated by the treatment in the sixteenth century of the writings of Sahagun the Spanish missionary to whose work I have already referred.
Nothing which Pike has or is known to have written has any Luciferian complexion. He has collected into his lectures a mass of mystical material from rites like Memphis and Misraïm, but it is alchemical, theosophical, or dealing with ancient symbolism, the mysteries, pre-christian theology, &c.
In urging that all great moral duties were taught by pre-Christian thinkers, we do not mean that Christ took his moral sayings from the books of these great Eastern teachers; there was no necessity that he should go so far in search of them, for in the teachings of the Rabbis of his nation he found all of which he stood in need.
The Apostle of Ireland showed far more urbanity, far more humane and liberal wisdom, far more gentleness, humor and good feeling, in his treatment of the pre-Christian institutions and ideals of Ireland than warring Christian sects have generally been willing to show to each other.
In the Musee Guimet, in Paris, we have seen specimens of pre-Christian crosses. In the Louvre Museum one of the "heathen" gods carries a cross on his head. During his second journey to New Zealand, Cook was surprised to find the natives marking the graves of their dead with the cross. We saw, in the Museum of St.
Just as they wisely took the Christmas tree from the Roman Saturnalia, so they took the date of their festival from the universal pre-Christian festival of the winter solstice, Yule, when mankind celebrated the triumph of the sun over the powers of darkness, when the night begins to decrease and the day to increase, when the year turns, and hope is born again because the worst is over.
The Milesians, the De Dananns, and other pre-Christian colonists were musical. Certain it is that, even before the coming of St. Patrick, the Irish were a highly cultured nation, and the national Apostle utilized music and song in his work of conversion.
Of course, it may be claimed that the arrangement of old texts in a new form constitutes a kind of originality; as one might say that he who took flowers from a score of gardens and arranged them into one bouquet produced a new effect of harmony and beauty. But this credit must be given to the compilers of the gospels' version of the Sermon on the Mount. Let us take a few pre-Christian morals.
Returning however to our consideration of the cross as a symbol of Life of pre-Christian date and origin, and having already dealt with the lands now known as Britain, France, Italy, and Switzerland, let us now consider the evidence of Greece. At Mycenae and elsewhere Dr.
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