St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1912-07-03
SECRET SOCIETIES
The Earliest Ones Had Strenuous
Initiation Rites.
SEVERE TESTS or COURAGE.

The Egyptians Subjected Candidates
to ThreefoId Trial by Fire, by Wa
ter and by Air-The Order of Assas-
sins and Their Sham Paradise.
Among primitive communities In
which might is right and the tyranny
Of superstition is absolute minorities
have always been treated with scant
consideration. and overt dissent from
the opinions of the majority had a
tendency to initiate against the sur
vival of the dissenter. Liberty of
thought and action, qualified only by
the rights of others, is comparative
~ late growth. But thought dies hard
and when denied open expression lives
in secret impaired to a few chosen as
sociates until the times are ripe for it
to be divuIged. Thus a few thinkers
and their disciples would band them
selves together into a secret society.
and the instinct OF self preservation
would cause them to guard against
their secret being revealed to the I'M
initiated.
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religious rather than political. In the
mysteries of Persia, India and Egypt
an inner ring of priests formed an ex-
elusive association whose members
gradually became the repositories of
the bulk of the learning of the COM
munity. Severe tests Of courage and
nerve were imposed upon all aspirants
for admission to the order. Among the
Egyptians the neophyte was taken
down deep shaft in one of the pyra-
mids and subjected to a threefold trial
by fire. by water and by air.
He had to walk across a grating of
redhot iron bars. with narrow inter
stfces wherein he might tread in safe
ty, to swim a wide and dark channel
communicating with the Nile and to
hang suspended by two iron rings over
an abyss in the blast of two swiftly
revolving wheels. Even then he had to
undergo prolonged fasting and silence
and to take an oath of secrecy ere his
initiation was complete. A secret
brotherhood Of mobiles. partly religious
and partly political, which aimed at
the concentration of knowledge and
power in the hands of its members, was
established by Pythagoras at Crotona,
In the south of Italy. For a time it
succeeded in gaining the supreme di-
rection of affairs, but after the Syba-
rites had succumbed to the Spartan
discipline Of the order it was suppress
ed by a rising of the Discontinued.
During the middle ages the unset
tied and lawIess condition of many
countries engendered by the weakness
or the absence of their nominal rulers
was especially favorable to the growth
of secret societies. Toward the close
of the eleventh century Hasan-ben-
Sabah, a Mohammedan fanatic who
had been a fellow student with Omar
Khayyam at Naishapur. seized the cas-
tie Of Alamut and founded the sect of
the assassins. 1t is still moot point
whether the word which their evil
deeds have given permanent place in
the languages of Europe as a synonym
for murderers be derived from the
founders name or from the hemp OPT
ate hashish wherewith they were
wont to fiddle their brains to a pitch
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eler Marco Polo tells of an ingenious
plan adopted by their chieftain to in
sure the unquestioning devotion of his
dupes. This was no less than the
creation of a sham paradise with lux
urious gardens. rivers of honey and
wine and houris, all complete. Thither
the man selected for any dangerous
exploit was transported in a state of
lntoxication and on his return was
told that he had been given a foretaste
Of his life after death.
The terror of their name soon spread
through Europe. No potentate was
safe from the vengeance of a sect
which regarded death in the execution
Of their lords DEGREES as the gate Of
paradise. King Philip Augustus of
France. contemporary and foe of Rich
ard Occur de Lion. having incurred
their enmity. was so afraid of them
that he dared not stir abroad without
his guards around him. and perhaps
his fear appeased the ruthless sheik,
for their plans rarely miscarried- The
order was ultimately crushed in 1856
by an Eruption OF Mongols under Hu-
laku Khan.
In Germany the violence and an
archy that prevailed after the outlaw
~ of Henry the Lion. when every pet
ty baron tyrannized without let or
hindrance over all whom his power
could reach. led to the institution of
a very different secret society. whose
functions were purely judicial. The
''vehmgericht' was an attempt to
check the license Of the feudal lords
and to secure the due chastisement Of
crime. 1t was the proud boast of this
court that it judged in secret and pun
fshed in secret Every member was
sworn to reveal all crimes that came
to his notice. even If committed by
those nearest and dearest to him;
hence 1t became a maxim Of the Ju-
rists of the time. Mon frater fratre.
non hospes alb hospite. TITUS" The