THE MAGNETISM OF EVIL 135
The serpent as a symbol of the grand fluidic agent can be a sacred sign when it represents the magnetism of good, as did the serpent of brass of Moses. There are two serpents in Hermes’ caduceus.
The magnetic fluid is subject to the will of spirits svhich can attract or project it with different degrees of force, depending on their state of exaltation or equilibrium.
It has been called the light bearer or Lucifer, because it is the distributor and specializer of the astral light.
It is also called the angel of darkness, because it is the messenger of obscure as well as of luminous thoughts, and the Hebrews, who called it Samal, gave it a double character — white Sama1 and black Samaël, the Samaél of Israel and the Samaël of the uncircumcized.
This allegory is obvious1 To be sure, as Christians, we believe in the immortality of the soul; like all civilized people, we believe in punishments and rewards proportional to our works. We believe that spirits can be miserable and tormented in the next life; therefore we admit the possible existence of reprobates.
We believe that the chains of sympathy are not broken, but are, on the contrary, drawn tighter after death. However, this is only as far as the righteous are concerned. The only communication between the wicked is by emanations of hatred.
Therefore, the magnetism of evil may receive impressions from beyond the graves but only through the perverse desires of the living; the dead who are punished by God have neither the power nor the effective will to do evil any mores Beneath the hand of God’s justice one does not go on sinning, one pays the price.
What we deny is the existence of a powerful genie, a kind of black god, a dark monarch who is able to do evil after God has reproved him. To our mind, King Satan is an impious fiction, in spite of the poetry and grandeur with which it is expressed in Milton’s epic. The guiltiest of the fallen spirits should have been cast down lower than the others and more securely chained by God s justice. It is true that prisons have their barons who still exercise a certain influence over the criminal world, but this is a reflection on the inadequate means of surveillance or repression employed by human justice. Divine justice is not cheated.
In tIe apocryphal book of Enoch, we read that these black
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