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Lucie Page Borden
It would seem that a consideration of the salient features of the various departments of the Koreshan System ought to establish its claims to investigation, at the hands of the intelligent and fair-minded. Its reasonable and convincing solution of one problem alone, —that of the source of the sun's heat, certainly ought to procure it a hearing from present day scientists. As every one knows, this is a question that has heretofore baffled the human intellect, no doubt because being one of the central truths of existence, the scientific region of the brain had not hitherto developed sufficiently to reach such a conception. Conjectures are rife, and new theories on the subject are constantly propounded. The eeneral tendencv has been to vibrate from one extreme to the other, one theory predicting such an increase of temperature as would produce a general conflagration in the solar system, the other affirming that the loss of heat arising from so rapid a radiation of the solar energies must eventually render this earth a frozen planet, void of light and warmth where all life has perished.
Now Koreshan Science, as it would seem, very reasonably, declares that the cosmos is self-perpetuating, since waste and supply in it are equal; that there is a reciprocal interchange of energies between the sun and flu1 earth, as between centre and circumference, by which an equilibrium is maintained so that just as the earth receives light and heat from the sun, so the latter is supplied with fuel for the solar fires from the magnetic and electric energies sent up by the earth.
In Koreshan Science, the physical cosmos is not considered as a thing apart, complete in itself, but rather as furnishing by correspondences the key to the anthropostic or mental world. It is a system of types; and whereas it has been shown that the physical universe is governed by absolute, unvarying law, Koreshanity further declares that every law is the exponent of a princi- ple inhering in mind.
General ignorance in regard to the source of the sun's heat and the relation of centre to circumference, would naturally imply a corresponding ignorance concerning the nature of the Divine man, or the anthropostic center, and the relations existing between God and man as centre and circumference of the anthropostic world. Is it not a fact that this age is avowedly agnostic, confessing its lack of knowledge in just this direction? Dean Worcester in his book on the allimportant islands whose destiny is just now a subject of national interest, relates that certain devout Filipinos caught sight of a caricature of Ex-president Cleveland in ;i copy of Judge that some one had sent him. Cleveland, then in office, was represented as a saint in an ill fitting nimbus, weeping over the sins of his fellow countrymen; the innocent natives begged this caricature, hung it up and worshiped it.
It seems that there are many persons today, worshiping as absurd caricatures of the DivineReing as this
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distorted image of one whom his warmest admirers never qualified as Godlike. The need of the age is a scientific idea of God and a religious system that, as the logical outcome of science, is strictly reasonable. According to the Koreshan concept of Deity, the divine man is perfected out of the common humanity, through processes of involution and evolution extending over ages of experience. His manifestation is periodical, recurring at intervals ordained by law. and he renews the spiritual life of humanity by imparting his own to the race,—spiritual force which he previously draws up from the race and returns in higher and purer form. Hence there is a reciprocal relation between God and man, precisely analogous to that existing between the sun and the earth.
The Cellular Cosmogony, which to some minds appears so startling as to border upon absurdity, is in reality in strict conformity with that dictum of modern research which asserts that all life develops ah ovo. And it rests also upon a definite mathematical premise demonstrable bv anv one with sufficient courage and interest to undertake the experiment of running an air line.
No student of sociology who scans intelligently the signs of the times, can fail to apprehend a dee]) and widespread dissatisfaction with existing conditions. The statistics from German schools for the ten years from 1887 to 1897, show that 407 school children under fifteen years of age committed suicide. Now while it is cowardly, suicide on the part of those who have ad- vanced in life far enough to see their fondest hopes wither and the blight of disappointment spread over every joy, may not be altogether without excuse; but when the very young shrink back on the threshold of existence and refuse to carry the burden of life, the phe- nomenon is felt to be both unnatural and appalling. Child-suicide is one of the saddest and most startling symptoms of modern social life.
What manner of civilization have we been fostering, that even the children find its conditions impossible at the outset? The remedy proposed by Koreshanity,is a return to the communistic relations of the early Christians. The figure of Jesus Christ stands as the exemplar of a Christian world that professes to see in him the Divine man. If it be possible to establish orderly and harmonious relations among men, and to inaugurate a social system calculated to provide the best possible opportunity for the advancement of humanity to a higher plane of moral and intellectual activity, it is reasonable to suppose that Jesus would supply the model for this form of government. Clergymen and students of church history are beginning of late to emphasize the fact, attested by secular records as well as by the Bible narrative, that the early church was communistic in its aims and methods.
The Koreshan Unity is a practical attempt in modern times to return to early communistic and co-oper- ative ideals, but it meets with persistent hostility aud opposition from the competitive world. The lives of the great reformers furnish pathetic reading, aud the homage of succeeding generations cannot recall the calumny that wounded the sensitive spirit, or the insults that sank dl'ep into the noble heart. No unprejudiced observer can study this socialistic experiment ab intra, mingling with its exponents in their home life, listening to their daily conversation and watching their efforts, without discovering that in devotion to principle, in selfsacrifice and in patient endeavor,that little community in Chicago offers an example of practical, every-day heroism unequaled since the days of the primitive church.
Let those who tire themselves unwilling to put off the shackles of self-interest that bind men to the competitive world, at least do honor to those who bravely take the initiative in a, movement designed for the comfort and relief of suffering humanity.
It is a mistaken idea that the object of Koreshanity is to detach men from the human brotherhood by shutting them up in communities according to the old monastic schemeof life. Its aim and scopeare broad enough to embrace the whole world, and its avowed purpose is to inauguratea system that shall overspread the earth, In the Editorial Perspective. T HE FUNDAMENTAL, principle of republicanism is a fal- lacy ; it is the idea expressed in the declaration of American independence, the hobby ofthe politician and the individualist, and the germ of anarchy—the idea that "all men are created equal, " and that their rights should be conceded accordingly. No one has ever thought of applying such a principle to the practical affairs of life, yet the American government is supposed to be founded upon the idea; it is founded upon a fallacy. Hon. A. Lawrence Lowell questions whether the doctrine is near enough the truth to be consistently and safely acted upon ! The ideal democracy, as an element in the attainment of human beings in the adjustment of all the relations of mankind, has never been and can never be, fulfilled. No society has ever existed where its members were equal, or practically considered •to be so. No army has ever been organized, disciplined, and ordered to the field of action on the basis of such an hypothesis. The scope of the rights of a man is circumscribed by the border lines of his mental attainments and by his field of usefulness. The territory of his aspirations, the size of his orbit of liberty in the anthropostic world, depends entirely upon his mental and moral altitude and the consequent area of his mental perception and breadth of comprehension of himself and man. The inequalities existing between men are becoming more and more apparent; the mental, religious, and social conditions are multiplying, and the extremes of human thought and ability are widening. The human system is not constructed on the basis of equality ; the universe has center and circumference, demonstrating the laws of organic unit}-. Koreshanity involves the science of construction of the mental, economic, social, political, and religious domains. The divine governmentwill be a kingdom or theocracy, the government of the Gods of the Golden Age. When the individuals of the human family are socially related,—as the individual cells of the human brain The Flaming Sword, —a system founded in love to the neighbor. Community life iu the restricted sense is a necessary phase pertaining to the development of a new socialism, only so long as its idea,s are shared by the few.
"Food and drink, roof and clothes," writes that master of delicate prose, the author of "The Story of My Heart," "are the inalienable right of every child born info tin'light. If the world does not provide it fully— not as a grudging gift but as a right, as a son of the house sits down to breakfast—then is the world mad.
But the world is not mad, only in ignorance—,-/// interested ignorance, kejtt up by strenuous exertions, from which infernal darkness it will, in course of time, emerge, marveling at the past as a man wonders at and glories in the light, who has escaped from blindness." He goes on to express the hope that future generations may have leisure to enjoy their days and the earth and the beauty of this beautiful world; t h a t they may rest by the sea. and dream. "I will work toward t h a t end with all my heart," lie adds fervently.
This is oneof theends t h a t Koreshanity has in view, toward which its advocates are toiling ardently, ennobled by the power of a great aijn, whether the meed of their efforts be praise or blame from the world at large.
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are mentally and alchemically related,—with centers of elaboration and circumferences obedient to the laws of order and the general government of the central ego ; or as the stars in the liberty of their orbits in subordination to the controlling central positive pole or sun of the physical universe, the world will enter upon an age of universal peace!
We are a little amused at the expressions of Prof. Wm. James in the Atlantic Monthly, in a series of articles on psychology. He is writing on the functions of consciousness entirely from a theoretical standpoint, because he says it is impossible to scientifically explain the mind. We want to show from his own words just how much the modern psychologists know about human mentality, and let the reader judge for himself whether we are right in our assertions that modern scientists do not understand man. "It must be frankly confessed that in no fundamental sense do we know where our successive fields of consciousness come from, or why they have the precise inner constitutions which they do. The}7 certainly follow or accom- pany our brain states (!!), but if we ask just how the brain conditions them, we have not the remotest inkling of an answer to give. The truth is, that we really don't know the answers to the problems on the explanatory level." These admissions reveal the condition of the modern "scientific world." It is full of "scientists" who do not know, including astronomers, physicists, chemists, geologists, clergymen, and political economists ; but such men are posing as the world's educators! - Knowledge is below zero in the modern schoolrooms, lecture halls, pulpits, observatories, libraries, newspapers, Congress halls, saloons, and lunatic asylums ! We do not say this because we like to, but because it is a palpable fact!
The fiat of Ingersoll provides for the futility of all modern scientific research; the agnostic has taken his stand that mystery is eternal and that solution never comes. He says that "man must give up searching for the origin of anything. No one knows the origin of life, nor of matter, nor what we call mind. The whence and the whither are questions no man can answer.
In the presence of these questions, all intellects are upon a level. The barbarian knows exactly the same as the scientist, the fool as the philosopher. Only those who think they have had some supernatural information, pretend to answer these questions; and the unknowable and unfathomable is the realm occupied wholly by the inspired." Ingersoll knows that the mental chaos in the church and university is too great to characterize knowledge; he acknowledges the inadequacy of modern education and the failure of all modern systems. The modern world is drifting toward the conclusions of Ingersoll; the dogmas of the church have failed to satisfy the people, and the scientist cannot prove his assumptions. In the light of these admissions, where is the boasted progress of the world ? Where is its advanced thought ? Where is the positive mental pole in the age of reason ? It is not in the chaos of modern systems, but in the discovery of universal form and function, the science of cellular life, the revelations and inspirations of demonstrated premise, analogy, and reason.
1'rof. Gilbert, of the United States Geological vSurvey, predicts that in 2,000 years from now Chicago will be deluged by the waters of the great Lakes. From the basis of observations, he concludes that the continent of North America is changing its level, rising in the north and sinking in the south, and that the tilting causes a shifting of the water in the lake basins. The earth is changing its shape; the continents are gradually changing level in accordance with unquestionable observations.
If the earth rotated once in twenty-four hours, the tendency would be to bulge convexly more and more at the equator, and consequently to rise or swell away from the center, forcing the water to change its level and gradually recede to the regions of the poles. Hut the opposite is true; land at the poles is rising, and the water is gradually rising at the equator. The earth is bulging in the equatorial zone, but the earth is concave, and as it gradually bulges it becomes lower and lower, as to the water level. The earth is in the shape of an egg or prolate spheroid, and is gradually evolving into the form of a sphere. The facts of geology demonstrate the Koreshan Cosmogony, while for the old system they create insurmountable difficulties and problems.
The chaos of the modern city is an infallible index to the character of modern civilization. Cities have not developed in an orderly or a systematic manner; city builders have been altogether unprepared to meet the requirements of rapid developments and the demands of sanitation and rapid transit. At the cost of millions of dollars the streets are paved; soon they are torn up for a new sewer system and relaid; taken up again for cables for street cars, and then rearranged for underground wires, which in turn necessitate changes in the sewer mains. Then come the elevated roads and underground cars, with numerous scaffoldings and excavations. Theories and systems of reform have developed in the same haphazard, unscientific, chaotic, ancl spasmodic manner, with the results adapted to the conditions of the competitive system. The entire modern world is made up of patches. The cities of the future will be built according to system. Koreshanity involves the elements of all future progress and civilization. The plan of its capital city provides for all future developments, without changing or disturbing the lasting structures, streets, ancl parks. It is located scientifically, and will be constructed according to the laws of order.
A number of men who have contributed large sums of money in the interest of the Keely motor, without realizing The Flaming Sword, 9 immediate returns from the application of what Keely endeavored to discover, are finding many things about the Keely works since the inventor's death, which they cannot comprehend ; ancl these things they are endeavoring to expose as constituting a gigantic fraud. The transmutation of the energies of sound to the energies of motion is possible, demonstrated in the simple sympathetic vibrations of violin strings and by particles of sand upon a vibrating disc. The Keely motor is a possibility ; but when materialized it will be known by another name. If Keely resorted to the trick of the water-motor to enable him to carry out a scheme for money while developing his vibrator, he was only on a par with the millionaires who steal millions to run their machines! The "monumental frauds" of the nineteenth century are those involving billions, not thousands of dollars! The machinery of modern government has more secret wires, tubes, ancl frauds than Keely could ever dream of!
It is said that sun worship is the oldest religion, the origin of all worship. Thousands of years ago, it was the prevailing idea in all the world. Heliopolis of Kgypt was the city of the Sun, and Potiphera was the priest of the sun. The religion of the sun prevailed in the land of Zoroaster; it was the religion of the Peruvians and of the Aztecs; the religion of Noah, Moses, and Jesus; the religion of Koreshanity. It is the religion of all peoples of all ages where the divine light has shone. It is the worship ofthe Sun of Righteousness, the anthropostic Sun of humanity, of which the physical sun, the center of the universe, is the analogue and symbol. Jesus was the Sun, the Son of man, the God-man, the Light of the world. He has appeared billions of times in ages past, and the worship of him'is the oldest religion, the only true religion possible to exist in the world. The Hebrew word KORKSII means sun, and is identical with the Egyptian Horos, the Greek Kuros, the Persian Surya, and the Hindu Svarya.
The astronomers are puzzled over the problems of the shifting of the earth's axis, and the consequent shifting of latitude in all parts of the world. How it is that the earth can change its poles never so little without changing the time of its rotation according to the Copernican hypothesis, is more than can be solved by the "shifting" theory. Year after year the day's length is the same, and century after century the time of sidereal revolution is the same definite period to the fraction of a second. The earth changes its shape; but the earth is not in motion. The earth's poles or magnetic axes change with the shifting of the axis of revolution of the heavens; the shifting is in the heavens, not in the revolution of the ponderous earth. Scores of astronomical and geological problems which confront the modern scientist, find ready solution in the Koreshan System; it is in agreement with every fact, and the latest researches confirm its conclusions.
It has been advocated in the United .States Senate, that no government should be forced upon a people without the consent of the governed. This is supposed to be the very foundation sentiment of republicanism, but it has not been so in America. The United States expended about $6,000,000,000 in forcing the government of the Union upon the southern states, not only against the will of the South, but against its armed protest in the great five-years' struggle for southern independence. Of course, America never asked the Indian if he desired to be ruled by the whites, nor its citizens of the present century if they desire to be governed by an ancient constitution, or whether they would submit to the plutocracy of the money power. Nothing of the kind ! The suggestion might have thwarted the scheme; the octopi have quietly invaded the premises and swelled to enormous proportions.
The Flaming Sword · Vol. 13, No. 14 · February 1899 · PDF pp. 7-9