roportions as to warrant the august interference;
it seemed much as if Her Majesty's government should think it worth
while to suppress the League of the White Rose. But when it transpired
that the Question of Lucifer was a new aspect of the old question of
Catholic hostility to Masonry, the astonishment evaporated; it was at
once seen that Modern Diabolism had acquired an extrinsic importance
because it was alleged to be connected with that Fraternity which the
Church has long regarded as her implacable enemy. I must be permitted to
register clearly the general conviction that if black magic, sorcery,
and the Sabbath up to date had been merely revived demonomania, had been
merely concerned with the black paternoster, the black mass, or even
with transcendental sensualism and the ordeal of the pastos, the Roman
hierarchy would not have taken action as it has, nor would the witnesses
concerning these things have been welcomed with open arms; as a fact,
no interest whatsoever is manifested in the doings of diabolists who
operate apart from Masonry. Now, the hostility of Continental Masons
towards Catholicism, in so far as it provably exists, has been largely
or exclusively created by the hostility of the Church, and we know that
he hates most who hates the first. In so far, therefore, as the Church
has concerned herself by encouragement, which has something of the
aspect of incitement, in the recent revelations, we shall have to bear
in mind her attitude, while the history of forged decretals and bogus
apostolic epistles will reveal to us that she does not invariably
exercise a searching criticism upon documents which serve her purpose.

The sorcery of the nineteenth century is under no circumstances likely
to justify the faggots of the fifteenth; it might be easier to justify
the sorcery. As much by mystics as by the Church Catholic, modern black
magic may be left to perish of its own corruption. But an attempt on the
part of the Church to fasten the charge of diabolism on the Masonic
Fraternity has credibly another motive than that of political hostility,
which seems held to justify almost any weapon that comes to hand. At the
bottom of her hatred of Masonry there is also her dread of the mystic.
Transcendental science claims to have the key of her doctrines, and
there is evidence that she fears that claim. Black magic, which, by the
hypothesis, is the use of the most evil forces for the most evil
purposes, she does not