Lectures on ancient philosophy : an introduction to practical ideals

525 Pages·1984·11.49 MB·English

by  Hall

Lectures on
Ancient Philosophy
COMPANION TO
The Secret Teachings of All Ages
Manly P. Hall
Digitized by Vlaud Illustrated by Howard W. Wookey
Jeremy P. Tarcher/Penguin
a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc,
New York
PREFACE
In spite o f its rather unglamorous title, Lectures on Ancient
Philosophyhas been continuously in print since 1929 and the
new edition is urgently required. It has always been my effort
to present the essential principles of philosophy in a manner
understandable to all thoughtful persons. While gathering
material for my Encyclopedic Outline, it was necessary to
explore many areas of the esoteric traditions. All of the world’s
beliefs and doctrines were intended to assist individuals in
the enrichment of their daily living. There is no religion or
philosophy that does not emphasize the improvement of
personal conduct. It seemed appropriate, therefore, that these
aspects of our research should be made available to all who
might benefit from them.
Having set forth the symbols of ancient wisdom, it seemed
advisable to interpret these symbols as they apply to the
enlargement of human understanding and the enrichment of
individual character. In this volume, we also include oriental
teachings which assist in clarifying doctrines of worldwide
significance. There is ample precedence for this in the records
of antiquity which prove beyond doubt that Eastern truths
helped to enrich Western beliefs long before the beginning
of the Christian Era.
There is considerable confusion in matters of terminology.
Different teachings have divergent definitions which are apt
to prove confusing. Therefore, the definitions, of such basic
terms spiritt s oul, mind, wisdom, knowledge insight, and
understandinghave been enlarged. Unless definitions are mu­
tually acceptable, discussion is comparatively useless. Most of
these definitions have been derived from reliable and respect­
ed sources of ancient scholarship. We claim no originality,
nor are we indebted to mysterious sources for our beliefs,
Every effort has been made to perpetuate the knowledge
which has descended to us from the sages of earlier times.
However, more recent findings are also included where they
seem to contribute useful insights in obscure matters.
The information set forth in this book should be useful to
any person interested in comparative religion. In my earlier
days, this was a small, but dedicated group receiving very
little public encouragement. In recent years, however, there is
much greater interest and emphasis upon the spiritual con­
victions of oriental peoples. Perhaps the recognition of asiatic
art has made it desirable to understand the motives which
inspired the productions of the sacred symbolism of Asia. A
larger literature is also available, and famous museums proudly
display collections which a century ago would have been con­
sidered as productions of heathenism.
The discussion of the moral arithmetic of Pythagoras is a
gentle introduction to the philosophic arithmetic of Theon of
Smyrna and leads immediately to an inspiring contemplation
of universal mysteries. It also helps us to appreciate the debt
that is owed to the wisdom of the Greeks and Egyptians, and
the mathematical speculations of oriental sages. There is no
way in which to more rapidly release our own internal
potentials than through the discovery of the wonders of the
Universal Plan and the parts that each of us must play in the
perfection of our world.
The discussion of reincarnation in this book should remove
all reasonable doubt concerning the benevolence of Provi­
dence. Rebirth does not go on forever as in a tedium of crime
and punishment. It is a constant opportunity to grow through
the improvement of character and the gentle service to those
in need of our sympathy and insight.
A small section of this book is devoted to the solution of
world conflicts. The labors of righteousness are not in vain,
and it is ordained beyond human control that we shall build a
better world than we know today, and that the individual
shall unfold from within himself all that is necessary to his
citizenship in the Divine Commonwealth.
This book was first written over fifty years ago. Since then,
my studies have continued, sustained by a wide variety of
constructive experiences. I still firmly believe the basic teach­
ings of this volume and have found no reasons to modify or
change the principles contained therein. This new edition,
therefore, is not a rewriting, merely a reprinting, and I trust
it may continue to serve the purpose for which it was original-
ly intended. MANLY P. HALL
Los Angeles, California
August, 1984
THERE IS NOTHING BETTER THAN THOSE MYS­
TERIES BY WHICH, FROM A ROUGH AND FIERCE
LIFE, WE ARE POLISHED TO GENTLENESS AND
SOFTENED. AND INITIA, AS THEY ARE CALLED, WE
HAVE THUS KNOWN AS THE BEGINNINGS OF LIFE
IN TRUTH; NOT ONLY HAVE WE RECEIVED FROM
THEM THE DOCTRINE OF LIVING WITH HAPPINESS,
BUT EVEN OF DYING WITH A BETTER HOPE.
-CICERO
PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION
Although complete in itself, this book is primarily designed
to complement and amplify the larger volume on Symbolical
Philosophy published last year. During the spring and fall of
1928 I delivered two series of lectures on Symbolism and the
Ancient Mysteries—one in San Francisco and the other in Los
Angeles—to groups largely composed of subscribers to An En­
cyclopedic Outline of Masonic, Qabbcdistic and Rosicrucian Sym­
bolical Philosophy. These lectures were carefully taken down
in shorthand, and form the basis of the present work.
A considerable portion of my larger book is devoted to the
rituals and figures of the Greek Mysteries, and this treatise is an
effort to clarify the subject of classical pagan metaphysics. In
his Miscellanies, published at the beginning of the last century,
Thomas Taylor, the eminent Platonist, predicted that the
“sublime theology which was first obscurely promulgated by
Orpheus, Pythagoras and Plato, and was afterwards perspicu­
ously unfolded by their legitimate disciples; a theology which,
though it may be involved in oblivion in barbarous, and derided
in impious ages, will again flourish for very extended periods,
through all the infinite revolutions of time.”
Our civilization has not yet learned to value appreciation for
the beautiful as the very foundation of an enduring culture.
Unless we respond to the harmonious, the elegant, the sym­
metrical, and the rhythmic, we are recreant to past good, a
menace to present integrity, and an obstacle to future effort.
This truth is well made in the Merchant of Venice:
“The man that hath no music in himself
Nor is not moved with concord of sweet sounds,
Is fit for treasons, stratagems and spoils.”
For lack of aesthetics man lives the life of a Caliban, and in
death receives the reward of a Thersites. It is not enough that
our codes be true; they must also be beautiful. If learning does
not teach us to love, we learn without understanding. We have
shackled the Titans and bound the elements to our service.
Like proud Bellerophon we have bridled Pegasus, but already
the gadfly of Zeus is at work. By concentrating all our energies
upon temporal concerns we have builded an empire, moving
each stone into place at terrific cost. We have heaped up in­
stitutions as the Pharaohs piled up pyramids, yet our monu­
ments, like those along the Nile, shall become the tombs of
their own builders. We have paid a frightful price for our
boasted success, for our strength has taught us to hate, our
power to kill, and our thought to reason away our souls.
We must seek for that sufficient code which guided the wise
through every generation. We must again establish those per­
fect Mysteries through which alone, as Plato declared in the
Phaedrus, man becomes truly perfect. Ares was burned up by
his own flame, and his host of evil spirits consumed with him.
Man, tired of vain wrangling and contending for power, longs
for those quiet groves where olden sages communed with their
familiars.
Neoplatonism forms the basis for this exposition. Never in
the history of metaphysics, since that great Alexandrian day,
has the mind of man contemplated so rationally and lucidly the
riddle of Abiding Destiny. The fruitage of noble endeavor can
never die, nor is truth to be lightly cast aside. Unmoved by the
calumny of ungrateful ages and the anathemas of a bigoted
theology, the Platonic philosophers sit upon their golden
thrones, awaiting with philosophic patience the day when an
unbelieving world shall comprehend.
Manly Palmer Hall
Los Angeles, California, June 1, 1929.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE.
The Nature of the Absolute ......................................................1
CHAPTER TWO.
God, the Divine Foundation ................................................25
CHAPTER THREE.
Illumined Mind, the Universal Savior...............................49
CHAPTER FOUR.
The Inferior Creation and Its Regent................................73
CHAPTER FIVE.
The Annihilation of the Sense of Diversity....................97
CHAPTER SIX.
The Disciplines of Salvation........ .............. ...................121
CHAPTER SEVEN.
The Doctrine of Redemption Through Grace .... 145
CHAPTER EIGHT.
The Mission of Aesthetics......................... .....................169
CHAPTER NINE.
The Cycle of Necessity.......................................... *..........193
CHAPTER TEN.
Pagan Theogony and Cosmogony.......................................217
CHAPTER ELEVEN.
Mathematics, the Master Science .........................— 241
CHAPTER TWELVE.
Demigods and Supermen .................................. 265
CHAPTER THIRTEEN.
Emerson’s Concept of the Oversoul..................................289
CHAPTER FOURTEEN.
Exoteric and Esoteric Knowledge.........................................313
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Symbolism, the Universal Language......................................337
CHAPTER SIXTEEN.
Ancient Mystery Rituals..................................................................361
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.
A Philosophic Consideration of Man...................................385
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.
The Ladder of the Gods................................................................409
CHAPTER NINETEEN.
Rosicrucian and Masonic Origins...........................................433
CHAPTER TWENTY.
The Goal of Philosophy.................................................................457
INDEX...............................................................................................480
About the Author.............................................................................514
Books by Manly P. Hall ....................................................................515
THE VOICE OF THE WORLD
“But since the generated world is a collective whole, if we apply the
cars of our intellect to the world we shall, perhaps, hear it thus address­
ing us:
“'There is no doubt but I was produced by divinity, from whence I
am formed perfect, composed from all animals, entirely sufficient to
myself, and destitute of nothing; because all things are contained in
my ample bosom, the nature of all generated beings, gods visible and
invisible, the illustrious race of daemons, the noble army of virtuous souls,
and men rendered happy by wisdom and virtue. Nor is earth alone
adorned with an endless variety of plants and animals, nor docs the power
of universal soul alone diffuse itself to the sea and become bounded by
its circumfluent waters, while the wide expanse of air and a:ther is
destitute of life and soul; but the celestial spaces are filled with illustrious
souls, supplying life to the stars and directing their revolutions in ever­
lasting order. Add too, that the celestial orbs, in imitation of intellect
which seeks after nothing external, are wisely agitated in a perpetual
circuit round the central sun. Besides, whatever I contain desires good,
all things collectively considered, and particulars according to their
peculiar ability; for that general soul by which I am enlivened, and the
heavens, the most illustrious of my parts, continually depend on good
for support, together with the gods which reign in my parts, every
animal and plant, and whatever I contain which appears destitute of
life. While some things are seen participating of being alone, others
of life, and others besides this arc indeed with sentient powers, some
possess the still higher faculty of reason, and lastly others are all life
and intelligence; for it is not proper to require every where equal things
among such as are unequal, nor to expect that the finger should see,
but to assign this as the province of the eye, while another purpose is
desired in the finger, which can, I think, be no other than that it remains
as a finger and performs its peculiar office.’ ” —(Plotinus On Providence.)
THE HOMERIC CHAIN
The order of the gods of the three worlds, grouped in Chaldean triads, is here
set forth according to the doctrines of Orpheus. This mystery was concealed by the
first symbolists under the figures of the dot, the line, and the circle. To the mystic,
the fables of the ancients are indeed resplendent with unsuspected truths.