MOSAIC "TABLES OF STONE."

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in front, in large size; the letter "H" (which is feminine, and Greek in its origin, meaning here "Man, as born of Woman") much smaller; and behind, interlacing and combining the first two letters, is the single curved or cursive "S," which stands for "S.S.," the Holy Spirit, or the Third Person of the Trinity. The whole, in another way, is "Jesus Hominum Salvator." Nearly all the sacred monograms, with the intention of making the letter denoting the "Man" prominent, present the letter "I" large; in the heraldic language surtout, or “over all." The monogram of the Saviour is sometimes seen in the Ark," or vesica

Double Lithoi: The "Tables" of Stone.

66

The union of and of— is consequently +, or the "Cross."

piscis," which is a pointed oval figure, familiar in Gothic architecture, and shaped like a boat or a shuttle, counterchanging the letters and the closing arcs, white and black,— the black occupying the left or female side, according to the ideas of the Templars. The standards of these soldiermonks were white and black, either oblong or forked.

There are two columns of that heavy, severe order, however grand and impressive, which distinguishes the early Norman period of architecture in England, in regard to which, though abounding in far-off hermetic suggestions, we have

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seen no notice in antiquarian quarters. These two columns comprise a part of the colonnade in the White Tower, or central tower, of the Tower of London. The capital of the first column is square, but it is rounded at the angles by a cut to the hypotrachelium, or base-ring, of the capital. The tops of these cuts are formed by volutes similar to the horns of the Corinthian and Ionic capitals. The male volute is to the right, and is a spiral volve, from which issues a dependent budding flower, dropping seed. The volve to the left, which is a series of rings enclosing a point, is female. A twisted perpendicular, like a horn, projects from the base on this left side. The capital of the other column presents a not unusual Norman form of two truncated tables or faces rounded below and divided in the middle. These we interpret as meaning the "woman" and the "man," side by side, and left and right. These glyphs in the two capitals of the columns signify "Jachin" and "Boaz,” and stand for the "First Man" and the "First Woman." The mysterious letter "Tau," which is the same as the Runic Hammer of Thor, and which in truth is a "Cross," occupies the centrepoint, or, heraldically, the "honour-point," of the first column to the right. The master-masons were celebrated in their art of concealing myths, or hinting them cautiously in the most difficult and far-off resemblances. The curious reader is referred to our illustration, figs. 119, 120.

The character of the "Head" which the Templars were charged with having worshipped in their secret "encampments," or "mystic lodges," has been the subject of much dispute. Some say it was the head of Proserpine, or of Isis, or of the "Mother of Nature," presented under certain strange aspects. Others assert that the figure was male, and that of Dis or Charon, according to the classic nomenclature. The object was reputed to be a talisman, and it is called by some the head of Medusa, or the snake-haired visage, dropping blood which turned to snakes, and transforming the beholder to stone. It was this head, or one of a similar description, which was supposed to serve as the talisman or recognitive mark of the secret fraternity or

THE TEMPLAR "IDOL" OR "HEAD."

227

society, headed by Pichegru and others, which was suppressed by Napoleon, and the members of which were tried. and condemned as aiming at revolutionary objects. Why Napoleon adopted this mysterious supposed magical head, as he is said to have done, on the suppression and destruction of this revolutionary body, to which we refer elsewhere, and why he chose to place his own head in the centre-place before occupied by this imagined awe-inspiring countenance, and adopted the whole as the star of his newly founded "Legion of Honour," it is very difficult to say. In the East there is a tradition of this insupportable magic countenance, which the Orientals assign to a "Veiled Prophet," similar to the mysterious personage in Lalla Rookh.

"Gorgoneion."

CHAPTER THE TWENTY-SIXTH.

PRESENCE OF THE ROSICRUCIANS IN HEATHEN
AND CHRISTIAN ARCHITECTURE.

QUESTION may here arise whether two corresponding pillars, or columns, in the White Tower, London, do not very ingeniously conceal, masonically, the mythic formula of the Mosaic Genesis, "Male and Female created He them," &c. Refer to the following page, figs. 119, 120.

1. Tor, or "Hammer of Thor," T(au).

2. Corinthian Volutes, or "Ram's Horns."

The crescent moon and star is a Plantagenet badge. It is also the Badge of the Sultan of Turkey. Also, with a

difference, it displays the insignia of Egypt. The flag of Egypt is the ensign of the sect of Ali (the second Mohammedan head of religion), which is "Mars, a Crescent, Luna; within the horns of which is displayed an estoile of the second," abandoning the vert, or green, of the "Hadgi," or of Mecca, the site of the apotheosis of Mohammed. The Mohammedan believers of the sect of Ali rely on the "masculine principle,"-more closely, in this respect, assimi

EARLY CHRISTIAN SYMBOLS.

229

lating with the Jews; and therefore their distinctive heraldic and theological colour is red, which is male, to the exclusion of the other Mohammedan colour, green, which is female.

Figs. 119, 120. Columns to Chapel in the "White Tower," London. Style, Early Norman, 1081. Fig. 119 (1) Mystic "Tau;" (2) Male, Right; (3) Female, Left.

Fig. 123. Castle-Rising Church, Norfolk. Fig. 124. Romsey Abbey, Hants. The "Hadgi," or Pilgrims to Mecca, wear green; the Turkish Mussulmans wear red and green, according to their various titles of honour, and to their various ranks.

Fig. 125. St. Peter's Church, Northampton.

Fig. 126. S-, out of the Arms of the +. (Font, Runic and Saxon, Bridekirk

Church, Cumberland.)

The Hospital of St. Cross, near Winchester, abounds in the earliest Norman mouldings. The architecture of St. Cross presents numerous hermetic suggestions.