The History of Initiation - The Masonic Trowel

174 HISTORY OF INITIATION
blind man, shall inflict wounds producing instant death.
The candidate, pressing onwards, soon heard the cries
and bewailings for the death of Balder, 34 who was bitterly
lamented by the deities who had been the innocent cause
of his destruction. He was then confined within the
Pastos, 35 a cell composed of three sharp-edged stones,
tice of evil. He married the daughter of the giantess Anger-Bode
(Messenger of Evil), by whom he had three children of portentous
character, who were doomed to destroy the whole host of deities,
when the ship Naglefara should be completed from the nails of dead
men. The first-born was a gigactic wolf, called Fenris, who was
destined to devour the supreme god Odin, and swallow the Sun.
This monster was bound by the gods to a rock in indissoluble chains
until the much-dreaded twilight of the gods shall arrive, and all nature
be consumed in a general conflagration. The next offspring of these
two evil beings was an enormous serpent, called Midgard, who was
the destined destroyer of the god Thor. He was precipitated by Odin
to the bottom of the sea, where he attained so vast a bulk, that he
was able to coil himself round the globe, and repose with his tail in
his mouth. The third dreadful issue of Loke and Anger-Bode, was
Hela, or Death, who was cast into hell by the gods, there to await
the appointed time of destruction, and to receive into her dismal
abode all such as died of sickness or of old age.
34
It appears that Balder, who was esteemed invulnerable, had placed
himself in sport as a mark in the general assembly, at which the gods
respectively exercised their skill and dexterity, in casting darts and
missiles for ; Odin and Friga had previously exacted an oath of safety,
in favour of this god, from everything in nature, except the misletoe,
which was omitted 011 account of its weak and contemptible qualities.
(Edda. Fab. 28.) Loke, always bent on mischief, discovered the
exception ; and, privately procuring a sprig of this herb, placed it in
the hands of Hoder, who was bereft of sight, and persuaded him to
cast it at the devoted victim, who fell, pierced through with mortal
wounds. His body was then placed in a ship or boat, and set afloat
on the waters, while all the gods mourned for his decease. The fable
of Balder and Loke, with the lamentations of the gods for the death of
Balder, bears such an obvious relation to those of Osiris and Typhon,
Bacchus and the Titans, Cama, Iswara, &c., &c., that I entertain no
doubt but it constituted the legend of initiation as ; it
is, indeed, the
exact counterpart of all other systems of mysterious celebration. It
is
true, the legend of Odin and Freya, including the wanderings of the
latter, as related in the Edda of Snorro, bears some resemblance to the
wanderings of Ceres, and Isis, and Rhea ; but I think the preceding
fable
unquestionably contains the identical incidents which were per-
petuated in the Gothic mysteries.
35 The Pastos was a representation of the Ark of Noah. "And God
said unto Noah. . . . make thee an ark of Gopher wood. . . . the door of
the ark shalt thou set in the side thereof. ... In the self same day
entered Noah into the ark and the Lord shut him in." ( Gen.
vi., 13, 14, 16; vii., 13, 16.) The account in the text, in connection
with the Rainbow, evidently relates to the Deluge.