The Tradition of the GWB

The Tradition of

The Great White Brotherhood

On Account of the A.^·.A.^·.

Frater Zephyros

Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law

It has become necessary to provide a clear and concise description of the structure of the College of the Rosy Cross and of that illuminated assembly of Adepts scattered throughout the world, but who are collectively governed by One truth and united in One spirit. This community composes a college in which all who thirst for wisdom are instructed directly by the spirit of wisdom itself as revealed in generation. All the mysteries of nature are preserved in this School for the Children of the Sun. Knowledge of the perfection of nature and humanity is unveiled in this School. And from it, all truths penetrate into the world. It is the most hidden of communities, yet its faculty contains members from many circles known as the Secret Chiefs; nor is there any center of thought whose activity is not due to the presence of one of its delegates.

From time immemorial, this hidden assembly, a society of the Elect and of those who sought and beheld the Mystery of the Grail convened sub rosa within the outer sanctuary of the many cultures of the world. All that any external order possesses in symbol, ceremony, or rite is the letter expressed outwardly of that ineffable Logos, which emanates from within the interior Sanctuary of the Gnosis by way of this august and eternal assembly. Nor is the disharmony amongst any of the exterior orders any bar to the harmony of the College of the Rosy Cross.

Hence this Sanctuary, composed of members widely scattered but united by the spirit of perfect Love, has been occupied from the earliest ages in building the Grand Temple (through the evolution of humanity) by which the reign of L.V.X. manifests. This society is in the communion of those who have the greatest capacity for Light, Life, Love and Liberty as it is united in truth. Its herald is Thoth-Hermes (Thrice-Great), the Light of the world, Aten of the one Sun, and of this regal lineage that has maintained Guardianship of the Threshhold of this sacred wisdom.

The College of the Rosy Cross gathered immediately after the first perception of humanity’s greater heritage had dawned upon the first of its Adepts. This thrice-great teacher received the lightening flash of Gnosis and learned of the means by which humanity could be raised to its heights and delivered from its ignorance by way of the Fire Serpent. It received the primitive charge of all revelation and mystery; it received the key of the true science and divine Alchemy, composed both of natural and divine Law.

But as humanity burgeoned to even greater numbers, the frailty of human society necessitated an exterior society, which veiled the interior one, and concealed the spirit and the truth in the letter, because many proved incapable of comprehending great interior truth. Accordingly, truths were wrapped in external and perceptible ceremonies, so that humans, by the perception of the outer, which is the symbol of the interior, might by degrees be enabled safely to approach the interior spiritual truth. It was then that exterior worship began. And the symbol of the Rosy Cross was instituted as the symbol of the true and secret Sacrament. Yet it came to pass that for the general weakness of the human, the spirit in the letter became forgotten and the word of the Logos was lost in the outer.

All exterior societies subsist only by virtue of this interior one. As soon as external societies wish to transform a temple of wisdom into a political edifice, the interior society retires and leaves only the letter without the spirit. This is why secret external societies of wisdom devolve into nothing but hieroglyphic housings, the truth remaining inviolable in the Sanctuary of the Gnosis. We must not, however, imagine that this society resembles any secret society, meeting at certain times, choosing leaders and members, united by special objects. This society knows none of the formalities that belong to the outer vicissitudes, the work of humanity. In the heart of power all outward forms cease.

But the Great White Brotherhood is vigilant to note in every nation those who are able to behold the L.V.X. Such Adepts are employed as lamps in the darkness and beacons to human attainment and the generational renewal of the spirit of the Logos. Each generation is committed to forging its own link and to demonstrate its own virtue. Yet through certain instruments, the interior truths of the Sanctuary were taken into every nation, and modified symbolically according to their customs, capacity for instruction, climate, and receptiveness. In the midst of all these, the One truth conceals itself inviolable in silence, but in real activity.

It has never been exposed to the accidents of time and to the weakness of humanity, because only the most capable were chosen for it, and those who were selected made no error. This illuminated and Rosicrucian community has been forever most secretly hidden from the world, though it disseminated the germs of all the sublime sciences, which were first received by the external schools, then clothed in other forms, and hence degenerated. Yet, according to time and circumstances, the society of sages and prophets communicated unto the exterior societies their charged hieroglyphs, in order to attract humans to the great truth of the Sanctuary of the Gnosis.

The Adept, living in truth, the chief self of self, does not always know all the members, but the moment when it becomes necessary to accomplish any object, that one will find his or her kindred in the world with certainty ready at hand. No one member can choose another; unanimous choice is required. Many are called, yet of those, only a few are chosen, and that as soon as they become fit for their office. Any one can look for the entrance and any one who is within must teach another who seeks for it; but only the one who is fit can arrive within. The one who may be chosen is as the first; and that one presents him or herself amongst the others without presumption, and is received by the others without jealousy, but with unbridled joy.

If it were necessary that real members should meet together in a gray council of Secret Chiefs, they readily find and recognize each other with the most perfect and splendid certainty. No disguise can be used; neither hypocrisy nor dissimulation could hide the characteristic qualities, which distinguish the members of this society. Unprepared ones may occasion disorder in an outer community, but such disorder is not compatible with the Sanctuary of the Gnosis. Thus it is impossible to profane the Sanctuary, since admission is not formal but real, forged in heart and deed.

Worldly intelligence seeks this Sanctuary in vain; fruitless also will be the efforts of malice to penetrate these great mysteries; all is indecipherable to the one who is not ready. The one who is fit is joined to the chain as he or she is plucked from the garden, perhaps often where least likely thought, and at a point previously unknown. To become fit should be the sole effort of the one who seeks wisdom. But there are methods by which fitness is proved, attained and fortified; the unfit are immediately spurned and weeded out. The sanctity of this unique and really illuminated community, which is absolutely in possession of the Key of the Mysteries, must consistently be renewed generation unto generation by that power which lies at the center and source of all nature. Thus is formed a true and secret society, which unites superior strength to its own, and counts its members from more than one world. It is the society whose members form the Republic of Genius, the College of the Holy Ghost in the Sanctuary of the Gnosis.

Love is the law, love under will.

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