The twelve great constellations of the zodiacal belt which forms
the Earth's orbit and the Sun's shining pathway around the celestial
universe have been considered as mere imaginary figures, or emblems,
invented by an early, primitive people to distinguish the monthly
progress of the Sun and mark out, in a convenient manner, the twelve
great divisions, or spaces, of the solar year. To this end, it is
thought,
the various star groups, termed constellations, were fancifully imagined
to represent the various physical aspects of the month, under, or into,
which they were consecrated by the Sun's passage during the annual
journey, so that, in some sense, the, twelve signs or constellations were
symbolical, not only of the seasons, but also of the labors of the year.
That such a system seems perfectly natural to the learned mythologist,
and that granting the ancients so much is a very great concession
toward this childish knowledge is, of course, quite excusable
when we are constantly told, or reminded, that actual science—that is
to say, "exact science,'' does not date backward more than a couple of
centuries at most.
Even the modern astrologer, much as be descants upon the influence
of the twelve signs, has but little, if any, real knowledge of
this matter above and beyond the purely physical symbolism above
mentioned. And perhaps it is as well that such a benighted condition
prevails, and that the Divine, heavenly goddess is unsought and
comparatively unknown. The celestial Urania, at least, in such isolation
remains pure and undefiled. She is free from the desecrating influence
of polluted minds.
Such, in brief outline, is the general conception of mankind
regarding the shining constellations that bedeck, like fiery jewels, their
Maker's crown, and illumine with their celestial splendor the wondrous
canopy of our midnight skies. Is there no more than a symbol of
rural work in the bright radiance of the starry Andromeda, the harbinger
of gentle spring? Nothing, think you, but the fruit harvest and the
vintage is in the fiery, flushing luster of Antares and the ominous
Scorpion? Are men so spiritually blind that they can perceive nothing
but the symbol of maturing vegetation and the long summer's day in the
glorious splendor of Castor and his starry mate and brother, Pollux?
It would, indeed, seem so, so dead is the heart and callous the
spiritual understanding of our own benighted day. To the initiate of
Urania's mysteries, however, these dead, symbolic pictures become
endowed with life; these emblems of rural labor or rustic art transform
themselves from the hard, chrysolitic shell and expand into the
fully developed spiritual flowers of spiritual entities, revealing in
their bright, radiating lines the awful mystery of the soul's genesis,
its evolution and eternal progressive destiny amid the mighty, inconceivable
creations yet to come; pointing out each step and cycle in
the soul's involution from its differentiation as a pure spiritual entity,
a ray of Divine intelligence, to the crystallization of its spiritual forces
in the realms of matter and its evolution of progressive life; the same
eternal symbols of the springtime, the glorious summer, the autumn
and winter of its eternal being.
In making this attempt, probably the very first within the era,
to convey in plain and undisguised terms the interior mysteries of
the twelve constellations, the reader and student is advised to ponder
deeply upon the outlines presented. The subject is too vast to present
in one or two chapters. Therefore we hope that this revelation may
incite the student to further research. The real significance, the true,
spiritual importance of such mysteries, can only be realized and fully
appreciated after prolonged meditation and careful study.
With this brief digression, which we consider needed advice, we
will resume our task, and attempt to usher our student into the weird
labyrinth of Solomon's starry temple—"the house not made with hands,
eternal in the heavens.''
