In the Beginning was, that is to say, IS, WAS, and WILL BE, the WORD, that is to say, the REASON that _Speaks_. Εν αρχη ην Ό Λογος! The Word is the reason of belief, and in it also is the expression of the Faith which makes Science a living thing. The Word, Λογος, is the Source of Logic. Jesus is the Word Incarnate. The accord of the Reason with Faith, of Knowledge with Belief, of Authority with Liberty, has become in modern times the veritable enigma of the Sphinx. It is WISDOM that, in the Kabalistic Books of the Proverbs and Ecclesiasticus, is the Creative Agent of God. Elsewhere in the Hebrew writings it is [Hebrew: דבר יהוה], _Debar Iahavah_, the Word of God. It is by His uttered Word that God reveals Himself to us; not alone in the visible and invisible but intellectual creation, but also in our convictions, consciousness, and instincts. Hence it is that certain beliefs are universal. The conviction of all men that God is good led to a belief in a Devil, the fallen _Lucifer_ or _Light-bearer_, Shaitan the Adversary, Ahriman and Tuphōn, as an attempt to explain the existence of Evil, and make it consistent with the Infinite Power, Wisdom, and Benevolence of God. Nothing surpasses and nothing equals, as a Summary of all the doctrines of the Old World, those brief words engraven by HERMES on a Stone, and known under the name of "_The Tablet of Emerald_:" the Unity of Being and the Unity of the Harmonies, ascending and descending, the progressive and proportional scale of the Word; the immutable law of the Equilibrium, and the proportioned progress of the universal analogies; the relation of the Idea to the Word, giving the measure of the relation between the Creator and the Created, the necessary mathematics of the Infinite, proved by the measures of a single corner of the Finite;--all this is expressed by this single proposition of the Great Egyptian Hierophant: _"What is Superior is as that which is Inferior, and what is Below is as that which is Above, to form the Marvels of the Unity."_ XX. GRAND MASTER OF ALL SYMBOLIC LODGES. The true Mason is a practical Philosopher, who, under religious emblems, in all ages adopted by wisdom, builds upon plans traced by nature and reason the moral edifice of knowledge. He ought to find, in the symmetrical relation of all the parts of this rational edifice, the principle and rule of all his duties, the source of all his pleasures. He improves his moral nature, becomes a better man, and finds in the reunion of virtuous men, assembled with pure views, the means of multiplying his acts of beneficence. Masonry and Philosophy, without being one and the same thing, have the same object, and propose to themselves the same end, the worship of the Grand Architect of the Universe, acquaintance and familiarity with the wonders of nature, and the happiness of humanity attained by the constant practice of all the virtues.