Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry: First Three Degrees

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there is no information relating to the individual degrees - just repetitive gibberish and sublime/supreme this and that. A free people, forgetting that it has a soul to be cared for, devotes all its energies to its material advancement.

It encompasses a study of Freemasonry, wise philosophy, ancient mysteries, mythology, ritual, and religion.The information and explanations provided in the annotated footnotes helped with my understanding of some the more challenging chapters. A través de la síntesis de doctrinas que provienen tanto de Oriente como de Occidente, Albert Pike describe los principios y el contenido de un grado cuyo origen se pierde en la noche de los tiempos. Men and nations will always sell themselves into slavery, to gratify their passions and obtain revenge.

The perfect Ashlar, or cubical stone, symbol of perfection, is the STATE, the rulers deriving their powers from the consent of the governed; the constitution and laws speaking the will of the people; the government harmonious, symmetrical, efficient,—its powers properly distributed and duly adjusted in equilibrium. We learn this from Celsus, in Origen, who says that the symbolic image of this passage among the stars, used in the Mithraic Mysteries, was a ladder reaching from earth to Heaven, divided into seven steps or stages, to each of which was a gate, and at the summit an eighth one, that of the fixed stars. Although Morals and Dogma is an esoteric book, it was not a secret one; Pike's original preface was clear that any Mason could own the book, but only Scottish Rite Masons would be encouraged to own one. They were already in essentials the same ideas that I take up again in the present treatises—let us hope the long interval has done them good, that they have become riper, clearer, stronger, more perfect!These chapters generally consist of comparative religion, philosophy, comparative etymologies, symbolism, and numerology. Safe to say, if you want to read this book, this is one of the best editions to get in print, as it will last long and be a good addition to a personal library. First published from 1872 to 1969, Morals and Dogma is one of the most insightful works ever prepared for Freemasonry. So a people willingly submits to despotism, and its workmen submit to be despised, and its soldiers to be whipped; therefore it is that battles lost by a nation are often progress attained. The performance is excellent and the annotations add an element of context to the work that make it more accessible and understandable.