190 lines
11 KiB
Plaintext
190 lines
11 KiB
Plaintext
SHORT TALK BULLETIN - Vol.X December, 1932 No.12
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THE ALL-SEEING EYE
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by: Unknown
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In the modern Masonic ritual the All-Seeing Eye is combined with the
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Sword, pointed at a Naked Heart; which latter emblem apparently came
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to American Freemasonry through Webb. The quotation from his Monitor
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(1797) is as follows:
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“The Sword pointing to a Naked Heart demonstrates that justice will
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sooner or later overtake us, and although our thoughts, words and
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actions may be hidden from the yes of man, yet the All Seeing Eye,
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whom the Sun, Moon and Stars obey, and under whose watchful care even
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comets perform their stupendous revolutions, pervades the whole, and
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will reward us according to our merits.”
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The Sword and Naked Heart were probably adopted by Preston from early
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initiation ceremonies of the Continent, probably French, in which
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even today we find some degrees of some rites dressed with swords
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which are pointed at the candidate. But the essential part of this
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symbol, the All-Seeing eye, is hoary with antiquity, and, in one form
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or another, has been identified with early religions and mysteries
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from their beginnings.
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It seems natural for men to personify his members in order to
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symbolize a virtue. The foot is universally a symbol of swiftness;
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the arm, of strength; the hand, of fidelity. The hand we extend to
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clasp that of a friend must be open, showing it contains no weapon;
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the knight of old removed his mailed gauntlet before offering his
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hand, to indicate that he greeted a friend from whom he feared no
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attack. From this we get our modern concept that it is good manners
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to remove a glove before shaking hands.
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The eye was adopted early as a symbol of watchfulness, for reasons
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too obvious to set forth. By a natural transition, the watchful eye
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never slept, and which thus saw everything, speedily became the
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symbol of Deity.
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Hear the Psalmist (XXXIV): “The eyes of the Lord are upon the
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righteous, and his ears are open unto their cry.”
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Again (CXXI), “He that keepeth thee will not slumber.
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Behold, he that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep.”
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A Proverb reads: “The yes of the Lord are in every place, beholding
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the evil and the good.”
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Egypt symbolized her God and King, Osiris, by a open eye; it was in
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all the Temples, and is frequently found sculptured in stone together
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with a throne and a square, symbolic of Osiris’ power and rectitude.
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One of the great curiosities of the world is the similarity, often
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identity, of ideas, inventions, discoveries, conceptions of peoples
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far removed, the one from the other, both in time and geographical
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location. The primitive loom, for instance, is strikingly similar in
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Egypt, India, South America, Africa and among the Esquimaux. The
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Swastika (symbol made of four joined squares), often termed the
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oldest of symbols, is to be found literally all over the world. So
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is the point within a circle, and the square as an emblem is found in
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early Egypt, Rome and China, to mention only three.
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It is not surprising, therefore, to find so obvious a symbol as a
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watchful eye typifying Deity in the uttermost ends of the earth.
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That it was called the “All-Seeing Eye” in Vedic hymns a thousand
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years older than Christianity, and in a land as far as India from
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that we are wont to consider the cradle of Masonry, is a fact to make
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any student think.
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Forty years ago the Reverend J.P. Oliver Minos drew Masonic attention
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to one of the Ric-Veda Hymns especially addressed to “Surya,” or the
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Sun:
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“Behold, the rays of dawn, like heralds, lead on high.
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The Sun, that men may see the great all knowing God.
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The Stars slink off like thieves, in company with Night,
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Before the All-Seeing Eye, whose beams reveal his presence,
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Gleaming like brilliant flames, to nation after nation.”
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In the religions of India the eye is of high importance and
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prominence. Suva; one of the most important of the Gods of India, is
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pictured with three eyes, one more brilliant than the other two.
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Drawings are for sale in the market places of Benares and other
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Indian cities which visiting Masons often think are Masonic, merely
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because they portray the All-Seeing Eye. Indian religious devotees
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consider the peacock a sacred bird because of the resemblance of the
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feathers to an eye.
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As a symbol of Deity the eye is a natural hieroglyph.
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The connotation of sleeplessness, vision, knowledge is easily grasped
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by even a child-like intellect. But it is also, and for the same
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reason, a symbol of the sun; indeed, sun worship antedated almost
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all, if not all, other forms of worship.
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The sun was worshipped by too many peoples in too many lands and ages
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to attempt to catalog here. Shamash was sun God to Assyrians,
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Merodach to the Chaldees, Ormuzd to the Persians, Ra to the
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Egyptians, Tezzatlipoca to the Mexicans, Helios to the Greeks and Sol
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to the Romans to mention only a few.
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The sun is the source of a hundred myths; familiar is that of Helios,
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who drove his chariot daily across the sky. The Scandinavian God
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Sunna was in constant dread of being devoured by the wolf Fenris
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(symbol of the eclipse); Phaeton was the son of Phoebus, the sun, and
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stole his fathers chariot to drive across the heavens. Unable to
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control the fiery steeds, he came to near the earth and parched Libya
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into a land of barren sands, blackening the inhabitants of Africa and
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so heating that continent that it never recovered normal temperature!
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Had not Zeus transfixed him with a thunderbolt, he would have
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destroyed the world.
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Modern poets and ancient have sung of the sun as thee eye of day; we
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recall:
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“The night has a thousand eyes And the day but one
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But the light of the whole world dies When the day is done.”
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Diogenes Laeritus thought of the sun as an incorruptible heavenly
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being when he wrote:
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“The sun, too shines into cesspools and is not polluted.”
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Dryden translated Ovid to read:
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“The glorious lamp of heaven, The radiant sun, Is nature’s eye.”
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Hear Milton:
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“Thou sun! Of this great world both eye and soul!”
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Freemasonry does not make of the eye a symbol of the sun. Her All-
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Seeing Eye is one emblem, her sun another, each with a distinct
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meaning. One of the Lesser Lights represents the sun; the sun shines
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out from between the legs of the compasses, open sixty degrees on a
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quadrant, in the Past Master’s Jewel, all symbolic of the Masonic
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light which must come from the East from which comes all truth.
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It has been written: “The sun is the symbol of sovereignty, the
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hieroglyphic of royalty, it doth signify absolute authority,: By
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analogy, if the lodge is the symbol of the world, then the Master,
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who controls the time of opening and closing, may well have one of
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the Lesser Lights as his symbol. Mackey goes further to say that the
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Master is “himself” a symbol of the rising sun , the Junior Warden of
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the sun at meridian, and the Senior Warden of the setting sun, just
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as the Mysteries of India the three chief priests symbolize Bramha,
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the rising sun, Siva, the meridian, and Vishnu the setting sun.
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In the Orphic mysteries the sun was thought to generate, as from an
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egg, and come forth with power to triplicate himself; triple power
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(such as is found in a Lodge under a Master, Senior and Junior
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Warden) is an idea as old as mythology, as may be seen in the trident
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of Neptune, the three-forked lightning of Jove, the three-headed
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Cerebus of Pluto.
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See how fitly the sun, as a symbol of authority, the sun, as man’s
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earliest deity, and the sun, as origin of the eye as a symbol of God,
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can be united. In his “Symbolic Language” Wemyss wrote:
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“The sun may be considered to be an emblem of Divine truth because
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the sun, or the light of which it is the source, is not only manifest
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in itself, but makes other things manifest; so one truth detects,
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reveals and manifests another, as all truths are dependent on and
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connected with each other, more or less.”
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So does the Master make Masonic truth manifest to the brethren; so
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does the Great Architect manifest His Divine truth to all men.
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If it is further necessary to show a connection between eye and sun,
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sun and God, and thus eye and God; refer again to the passage from
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Webb, which couples the All-Seeing Eye with the sun, moon and stars.
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Sufficient has been said to make it evident that the All-Seeing Eye
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is not a modern symbol, or one lightly to be regarded or passed over
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in silence, merely because modern ritual makes comparatively little
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of it. Alas, many brethren are so ill-instructed in the ancient
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Craft that it is a matter of some wonder to them why officer’s
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aprons, when decorated with emblems so often have the All-Seeing Eye
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upon the flap; why that pregnant symbol is so frequently engraved
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upon working tools, or the square and compasses which lie upon the
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Altar.
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Throughout the Craft emphasis is put upon the number three; three
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Light (greater and lesser); three steps on the Master’s carpet; three
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steps at the beginning of the Winding Stairs; three principal
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officers; three degrees; three due guards; etc. ,etc. The number
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three is but another way of expressing the idea of a triangle, one of
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man’s earliest, if not the earliest symbol for Deity, inasmuch as it
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is the simplest closed figure (signifying endlessness) which can be
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formed with straight lines.
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The emphasis upon three, then, is Freemasonry’s symbol of omneity of
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Deity - His being without beginning or ending.
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The letter “G” as a symbol of Deity particularly speaks of the
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reverence we owe to the supreme architect; His omniglory.
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Lodges are opened and closed with prayer, symbol of the loving
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omnipresence of the Great Architect; Freemasons believe that where
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two or three are gathered together in His name. there His is also, in
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the midst of them.
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On our Altar lies His Holy Book, rule and guide of our faith, symbol
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of His Omnipotence, since in it are the prophecies and histories of
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the powers of the Most High.
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The All-Seeing Eye is significant of His Omniscience; that the
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Supreme Architect sees all and knows all, even the hidden secrets of
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the human heart.
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Here, indeed. is the kernel of the nut, the inner meaning of the
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symbol which has come down to us from so many diverse ages, so many
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religions, which has been interwoven with sun and pagan gods and
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myths, nature religion and many kinds of worship, which was old when
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Egypt was young and ancient when India was new.
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The All-Seeing Eye is to Freemasons the cherished symbol not only of
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the power but of the mercy of God - since, as has been beautifully
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said to comfort us who cannot always do as we know we should, or even
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as we want - “to see all is to know all; to know all is to understand
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all; to understand all is to forgive all.”
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Therefore the thinking Freemason has reverence for this symbol. He
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treats it not as one of many; rather as among those to be held in
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tenderest thought and most precious memory. The Sword pointing to
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the Naked Heart may thunder of justice, but the All-Seeing Eye
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whispers of justice tempered with complete understanding, which is
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man’s most lovely conception of Him who judges erring men.
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