Pike recaps a topic discussed earlier, which are the stars (heavenly bodies) in relationship to the elements, and than reminds us of our failures when he wrote, “He in every case makes God after his own image” and afterwards, “He at first deifies nature, and afterward himself.” In short, in our attempts to understand God, we may in fact have been simply glorifying ourselves?
God was first recognized in the heavenly bodies and in the elements. When man’s consciousness of his own intellectuality was matured, and he became convinced that the internal faculty of thought was something more subtle than even the most subtle elements, he transferred that new conception to the object of his worship, and deified a mental principle instead of a physical one. He in every case makes God after his own image; for do what we will, the highest efforts of human thought can conceive nothing higher than the supremacy of intellect; and so he ever conies back to some familiar type of exalted humanity. He at first deifies nature, and afterward himself.
The eternal aspiration of the religious sentiment in man is to become united with God. In his earliest development, the wish and its fulfillment were simultaneous, through unquestioning belief. In proportion as the conception of Deity was exalted, the notion of His terrestrial presence or proximity was abandoned; and the difficulty of comprehending the Divine Government, together with the glaring superstitious evils arising out of its misinterpretation, endangered the belief in it altogether. (Albert Pike, Morals and Dogma, 1871, p. 652).
Also, if you enjoyed this blog, you might want to take a look at my other blogs, Masonry and the Three Little Pigs and Gnosismasonry, which have a variety of other Masonic topics to discover.
PIKE QUOTES: Redeeming Pike One Post At A Time 