Albert Pike
Albert Pike
Albert Pikewas an attorney, soldier, writer, and Freemason. Albert Pike is the only Confederate military officer with an outdoor statue in Washington, D.C...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionWar Hero
Date of Birth29 December 1809
CityBoston, MA
CountryUnited States of America
people rude ignorant
The doctrines of the Bible are often not clothed in the language of strict truth, but in that which was fittest to convey to a rude and ignorant people the practical essentials of the doctrine.
teaching temples dogma
Every Masonic Lodge is a temple of religion; and its teachings are instruction in religion.
light darkness ache
We must pass through the darkness, to reach the light.
forever dies
That which we do for ourselves dies with us … that which we do for others lives forever.
devastation degrees destruction
All the great and beneficent operations of Nature are produced by slow and often imperceptible degrees. The work of destruction and devastation only is violent and rapid.
prayer men two
Man is not to be comprehended as a starting-point, or progress as a goal, without those two great forces , Faith and Love . Prayer is sublime.
blue temples degrees
The Blue Degrees are but the outer court...of the temple. Part of the symbols are displayed there to the initiate, but he is intentionally misled by false interpretation. It is not intended that he shall understand them, but it is intended that he shall imagine that he understands them...The true explanation is reserved for the Adepts, the Princes of Masonry (those of the 32nd and 33rd degrees)
men discovery doubt
Doubt, the essential preliminary of all improvement and discovery, must accompany the stages of man's onward progress. The faculty of doubting and questioning, without which those of comparison and judgment would be useless, is itself a divine prerogative of the reason.
writing echoes leaving
The spoken discourse may roll on strongly as the great tidal wave; but, like the wave, it dies at last feebly on the sands. It is heard by few, remembered by still fewer, and fades away, like an echo in the mountains, leaving no token of power. It is the written human speech, that gave power and permanence to human thought.
soul force soul-force
Will is the dynamic soul-force.
men people curiosity
Nothing excites men's curiosity so much as Mystery, concealing things which they desire to know; and nothing so much increases curiosity as obstacles that interpose to prevent them from indulging in the gratification of their desires. Of this the Legislators and Hierophants took advantage, to attract the people to their sanctuaries, and to induce them to seek to obtain lessons from which they would perhaps have turned away with indifference if they had been pressed upon them.
strong teaching people
Fictions are necessary for the people, and the Truth becomes deadly to those who are not strong enough to contemplate it in all its brilliance. In fact, what can there be in common between the vile multitude and sublime wisdom? The Truth must be kept secret, and the masses need a teaching proportioned to their imperfect reason.
doctrine may sovereign
To you, Sovereign Grand Inspectors General (33rd Degree Masons), we say this, that you may repeat it to the Brethren of the 32nd, 31st, and 30th degrees: 'The Masonic religion should be, by all of us initiates of the high degrees, maintained in the purity of the Luciferian doctrine.'
men artist genius
Almost all the noblest things that have been achieved in the world, have been achieved by poor men; poor scholars, poor professional men, poor artisans and artists, poor philosophers, poets, and men of genius.