These facts have been widely given out, during the past two years, as the result of the cleansing of the Earth through the medium of the world war (1914-1945) and through the suffering to which humanity has been subjected (with an equally potent purifying effect, which will demonstrate later). It will then be possible for the Hierarchy, the Church of Christ hitherto invisible, to externalize itself and to function openly upon the physical plane. This will indicate a return to the situation which existed in Atlantean days when (to use Biblical symbology, Genesis Chaps. 2 and 3) God Himself walked among men; He talked with them and there was no barrier between the Kingdom of men and the Kingdom of God. Divinity was then present in physical form and the Members of the spiritual Hierarchy were openly guiding and directing the affairs of humanity, as far as man's innate freedom permitted. Now, in the immediate future and on a higher turn of the spiral of life, this will again happen. The Masters will walk openly among men; the Christ will reappear in physical Presence. Another thing that will happen will be that the ancient Mysteries will be restored, the ancient landmarks will again be recognized - those landmarks which Masonry has so earnestly preserved and which have been hitherto securely embalmed in the Masonic rituals, waiting the day of restoration and of resurrection. [122]

It is these Mysteries which Christ will restore upon His reappearance, thus reviving the churches in a new form, and restoring the hidden Mystery which they long have lost through their materialism. Masonry has also lost the true livingness it once possessed but, in its forms and rituals, the truth is preserved and can be recovered. This Christ will do. He will also revive these Mysteries in other ways; not all will seek the church or Masonry for the revitalizing of their spiritual life. The true Mysteries will also reveal themselves through science and [123] the incentive to search for them there will be given by the Christ. The Mysteries contain, within their formulas and teachings, the key to the science which will unlock the mystery of electricity - the greatest spiritual science and area of divine knowledge in the world, the fringes of which have only just been touched. Only when the Hierarchy is present visibly on Earth and the Mysteries of which the disciples of the Christ are the Custodians are given openly to the world, will the true secret and nature of electrical phenomena be revealed.

The Mysteries are, in the last analysis, the true source of revelation; it can only be when the mind and the will-to-good are closely fused and blended and are thus conditioning human behavior that the extent of the coming revelation can be safely grasped. There are planetary energies and forces which men as yet cannot and do not control; they know nothing of them and yet upon them the life of the planet is dependent; they are also closely related to the despised psychic powers (today so stupidly approached and ignorantly used), yet these powers (when correctly assessed and used) will prove of enormous usefulness in the sciences which the Mysteries will reveal.

The Mystery of the Ages is, through the reappearance of the Christ, on the verge of revelation. Through the revelation of the soul that Mystery (which soul knowledge veils) will stand revealed. The Scriptures of the world have ever prophesied that, at the end of the age, we shall see the revelation of that which is secret and the emergence of that which has hitherto been concealed, into the light of day. As we know, our present cycle marks the end of the Piscean age; the next two hundred years will see the abolition of death or rather of our misconceptions as to death and the firm establishing of the fact of the soul's existence; the soul will then be [124] known to be an entity and the motivating impulse and the spiritual force behind all manifested forms. The work of the Christ (two thousand years ago) was to proclaim certain great possibilities and the existence of great powers. His work when He reappears will be to prove the fact of these possibilities and to reveal the true nature and potency of man. The proclamation He made that we were all sons of God and own one universal Father will, in the near future, no longer be regarded as a beautiful, mystical and symbolic statement, but will be regarded as a proved scientific pronouncement. Our universal brotherhood and our essential immortality will be proven to be facts in nature.

"That which has been a mystery shall no longer be so, and that which has been veiled will now be revealed; that which has been withdrawn will emerge into the light and will then enhance that light and all men will see and together will rejoice. The time will come when destruction will have wrought its beneficent work; then men, through suffering, will seek that which they have discarded. In vain pursuit, they sought that which was near at hand and easy of [125] attainment. Possessed, they found that it proved an agency of death. Yet all the time, they sought for life, not death."

There is much talk these days concerning the mysteries of initiation. Every country is full of spurious teachers, teaching the so-called Mysteries, offering spurious initiations (usually at a cost and with a diploma) and misleading the people. Christ Himself taught that just before He came, this state of affairs would be found and that everywhere the false and the spurious would be proclaiming themselves. All this is, however, but indicative of His coming. The counterfeit ever guarantees the true. The talk, the discussions, the silly claim-making, the pseudo-occultism and the futile efforts to "take an initiation" (that undistinguished phrase which ignorant theosophical teachers have coined to express a deep spiritual experience) have been distinctive of the esoteric teaching ever since its modern inception in 1875. Then H. P. Blavatsky brought to the attention of the Western world the fact that great disciples and Masters of the Wisdom were present on the Earth, obedient to the guidance of the Christ. Later she deeply regretted doing this, as some of her papers, issued to her Esoteric Section, proclaimed. Yet what she did was all a part of the great plan and was no mistake. The interpretations and the excited reactions of the theosophists of her time were the mistake - a mistake which they have not yet acknowledged. This stupid reaction was aided and helped by the inquisitive nature of humanity itself, as well as by its aspiration which was undoubtedly aroused thereby. Men also, full of cupidity and commercial greed, exploited the theme and are still doing so. [126]

The total effect of all these stupidities and errors of presentation has nevertheless been good. In all lands, men today are aware of the existence of the Masters and of the possibility offered and the opportunity presented to make scientific spiritual progress and thus become members of the Kingdom of God. This the churches had ignored and had - in the Victorian age particularly - looked upon science as an arch enemy.