The initiates of the flame
Few realize that even at the present stage of civilization in this world, there are souls who, like the priests of the ancient temples, walk the earth and watch and guard the sacred fires that burn upon the altar of humanity.
Purified ones they are, who have renounced the life of this sphere in order to guard and protect the Flame, that spiritual principle in man, now hidden beneath the ruins of his fallen temple.
As we think of the nations that are past, of Greece and Rome and the grandeur that was Egypt, we sigh as we recall the story of their fall; and we watch the nations of today, not knowing which will be the next to draw its shroud around itself and join that great ghostly file of peoples that are dead. But everywhere, even in the rise and fall of nations, we see through the haze of materiality, justice; everywhere we see the reward, not of man but of the invincible One, the sternal Flame
A great hand reaches out from the unseen and regulates the affairs of man. It reaches out from that great spiritual Flame which nourishes all created things, the never-dying fire that burns on the sacred altar of the Cosmos — that great fire which is the spirit of God.
If we turn again to the races now dead, we shall find the cause of their destruction if we look again. The light had gone out. When the flame within the body is withdrawn, the body is dead.
When the light was taken from the altar, the temple was no longer the dwelling place of a living God. Degeneracy, lust, and passion, hates and fears, crept into the souls of Greece and Rome, and Black Magic overshadowed Egypt; the light upon the altar grew weaker and weaker. The priests lost the Word, the name of the Flame. Little by little the Flame flickered out, and as the last spark grew cold, a mighty nation died, buried beneath the dead ashes of its own spiritual fire. But the Flame did not die. Like the spirit of which it is the essence, it cannot die, because it is life, and life cannot cease to be. In some wilderness of land or sea, it rested once again, and there rose a mighty nation around that flame. So history goes on through the ages.
As long as a people are true to the Flame, it remains, but when they cease to nourish it with their lives, it goes on to other lands and other worlds. Those who worship this Flame are now called heathens. Little do we realize that we are heathen ourselves until we are baptized of the Holy which is Fire, for fire is Light, and the children of the Flame are the Sons of Light, even as God is Light. There are those who have for ages labored with man to help him to kindle within himself this spark, which is his divine birthright. It is these who by their lives of self-sacrifice and service have awakened and tended this fire, and who through ages of study have learned the mystery it contained, that we now call the "Initiates of the Flame. ,,
For ages, they have labored with mankind to help him to uncover the light within himself, and on the pages of history, they have left their seal, the seal of Fire. Unhonored and unsung they have labored with humanity, and now their lives are used as fairy stories to amuse children, but the time will yet come when the world shall know the work they did, and realize that our present civilization is raised upon the shoulders of the mighty demigods of the past. We stand as Faust stood, with all our lore, a fool no wiser than before, because we refuse to take the truths they gave us and the evidence of their experiences. Let us honor these Sons of the Flame, not by words, but by so living that their sacrifice shall not/BeGn vain. They have shown us the way, they have led man to the gateway of the unknown, and there in their robes of glory passed behind the Veil. Their lives were the key to their wisdom, as it must always be. They have gone, but in history, they stand, as milestones on the road of human progress.
Author: | Manly P. Hall |
Publication date: | 1922 published by Los Angeles |
| Manly Palmer Hall was a Canadian-born author, lecturer, astrologer and mystic. He is best known for his 1928 work The Secret Teachings of All Ages. Over his 70-year career, he gave thousands of lectures, including two at Carnegie Hall, and published over 150 volumes. |