There is a curse
that persecutes ’’Free Spirits’’.
They are exceptional and praised when dead. But when alive and active –
therefore uncontrollable – they usually bother. They bother because they set
the person in front of dilemmas, challenging the Neo-Luddites to throw their ’’wooden
sabot” (clogs) in the gears of
the machine.
Today we do not
intend to ’’bear an owl to Athens”[(idiomatic)
To undertake a pointless venture mean], neither “re-discover
the Americas”. Contrariwise, we will follow the mind path of our predecessors “Free
Spirits”.
So, behold the
questions we are about to examine;
Does the progress
of science and technology make better and more convenient everyday life for
people?
And if it does,
what is the cost we are willing to pay?
We wonder how we
can let the Fire of Mind of the mentioned above thinkers to warm us, enduring
the smoke that comes from it? How can we criticize, or furthermore renounce the
Light and the warmth of flame, just because it creates toxic smoke?
How do we Sisters
and Brothers, dare to do it? Should we judge or criticize Science, Technology
and Reason today, in front of you? In front of the members of an ancient
Fraternity dedicated in progress, reason and Light?
But first, let’s
start from the beginning. It is commonly accepted that the western world and
our contemporary way of living and thinking is founded on the European Age of
Enlightment. Basic characteristics of the Enlightment Tradition, as the
absolute cold reason, the faith in the continuous and unstoppable progress of
technology, the request for man’s supremacy, the absolute submission of nature
and the extravagant scientism, were those who shed ’’Dark Light”, distorted the
very foundations and finally trapped mankind into a structure of instrumental
relationship, one dimensional, unconditional pursuit of profit and cold blooded
-sometimes to the end- common sense.
This is exactly
the phenomenon that in our Lodge (“Social Circle”), agreeing with
the thinking of Brother’s Lessing, is named as ’’Paradox of Light’’. Because,
as we are about to see, the Light deterministically creates shadow-darkness,
the unity leads to division, goodness can be surprisingly easily transformed to
evil. And as Brother Goethe correctly points out:
’’The
bolder and brighter the light, the darker the shadow’’.
As it seems, it
is obvious that perpetual movement of life submits to the coexistence of Pure
and Evil. Even when the inventive mind of Daedalus was inventing gigantic wings
made of wicker branches and cloth, binding them with wax, in order to free
himself and his son from the misery of despotism, he surely wouldn’t expect
that he was about to live the biggest tragedy of a parent.
Although Daedalus
himself advised his son how to use properly the flying machine and fly away
from slavery, cross the infinite blue sky and conquer the celestial paths,
Icarus, as he was inexperienced and ignorant, but in the same time arrogant, he
flew high and got closer to the Sun. Soon enough the poor young man fell into
the sea and vanished… In the same vast sea that every day the
"innocent" victims of the leaps and bounds of the arts, science and
technology fall. Thus, every day we see mankind conquering grandiose and
virtuous - at least at their conception - ideas, but also being destroyed by
them and sinking deserted into the debris that leaves behind.
That same majestic
conquest but desolation as well was experienced by and in the end destroyed the
famous to everyone - not by accident - graduate of Ingolstadt University
doctor…. Victor Frankenstein. The famous literary hero of Mary Shelley, who,
even though he was created in 1816, tried, through the pages of the first book
worldwide referring to Bioethics, to open new paths, explore unknown to man
potentials and reveal in front of the whole world the deepest mysteries of creation.
In a moment of furor, he mentioned:
...’’I shall satiate my
ardent curiosity with the sight of a part of the world never before visited,
and may tread a land never before imprinted by the foot of man’’...
But the outcome
indicates that scientist Frankenstein himself didn’t know how to handle his
marvelous creature. Thus, it became a ’’monster’’, repellent and dangerous for
all the people, including himself.
These are two
thunderous samples of dead ends that scientists themselves confront when they march
into uncharted and “deep waters”. And these, like many others, confirm the
weakness of mankind to arrange all the paths of comprehension and phantasy. The
weakness of mankind to answer, through positive over-regulation, to the
numerous cases of ethical dilemmas and meaning inaction in front of the social
and technological rapidity.
Because every
field is growing at such speeds that people often cannot watch, let alone
manage them and make decisions that will determine the fate of this very world.
And in this frenzied flow, he forgets the sound of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, who
made the first world criticism of the sciences and the arts, saying:
“the benefits of arts and sciences are
counterbalanced by the defects”.
Hyperbolic
wording, indeed. But not arbitrary. It is based and supported, just like
Charles Dickens highlighted in “Oliver Twist”, many decades later, emphasizing
practically a special idealism in contrast to mechanisms of social control and
hypocrisy. And that’s because several times have we seen scientific evolution
disconnecting from society, not acting in favor of the total of its members,
and not succumbing to brutality.
And although industries
were made to make live easy and in the end make people happy, Charles Dickens
had to remind us that during 19th century under aged children of
five, six and seven years old… like tiny living brushes cleaned with their own body the internal of the
narrow chimneys of the factories. Finally the Human Rights of children were
crushed by the lawless birth of industrial revolution and the unethical chase
of profit, having as a result the man serving the factory, instead of the
factory serving the man.
Almost one
hundred years ago before Dickens, Jean-Jacques Rousseau was the first to take a
step behind and observed the situation. Between his comments, he expressed his
fear for man’s estrangement from his natural self. He indicated to all the
intoxicated by unjudged and endless progress, the traps and the caging to a
world of means. Swiss philosopher first rang the bell:
...’’While
the government and the laws care for the security and the prosperity of people
in the society, sciences, education and arts, less despotic but possibly more
powerful, they hang flower garlands on the iron chains that crush people, they
smother inside the feeling of the primitive freedom whom they are born for,
they make them love slavery and transform them in what we name civilized people’’...
Almost 70 years
after Rousseau, Shelley reminds humanity what the Civilian of Geneva had said:
...”It is a great and
beautiful spectacle to see a man somehow emerging from oblivion by his own
efforts, dispelling with the light of his reason the shadows in which nature
had enveloped him, rising above himself, soaring in his mind right up to the
celestial regions, moving, like the sun, with giant strides through the vast
extent of the universe”...
But M. Shelley
outlined that man can “turn loose into the world a depraved wretch’’, as very wisely Frankenstein pointed out in a moment of despair,
clear reference to Rousseau’s reminder about how outdated is the naïve faith in
unconditional progress. It is true that we were deceived by the view of good (Decipimur specie recti - Horace, The Art of
Poetry). Because good... creates bad, Light brings darkness within,
social union brings division. This is the contradiction, as mentioned before,
of Enlightment and progress of sciences and technology.
It is a vicious circle.
Every step of progress isolates man from his Natural State. It expands this
breach that‘s being replaced by evil. Submitted to the illusion of good and
slaves of the guise of progress, we let ourselves in the charm of a fake image
of reality. Thus, the benefits are being counterbalanced by the defects.
Is it possible
though that scientists are capable of breaking this vicious circle, penetrate
the secrets of nature and reveal how its hidden sides of it work, without
confronting the dangers mentioned above?
Is there really a
way, so that the Square of rational thought doesn’t mangle the sentiment? Is
there a way that ensures the pleasure of the gifts of sciences and technology
that at the same time protects the man from all these paths of monsters that
alongside are going to be created?
Can the knowledge
traveler enjoy the pleasures and bounce between the black and white squares of
life’s chessboard securely?
Sciences and
technology cannot be good or evil by themselves. But the way the man creates
and uses their applications can cause joy or progress, misery or destruction. It
can divide humanity, confirming Brother G. E. Lessing, who’s in his book “Ernst
and Falk”, which is characterized as ‘‘the
Bible of authentic Freemasonry”, mentions:
...”That every means
invented by man are not infallible. That they not only frequently fail to match
their intention, but may well achieve the exact opposite. (...). So it is then also true that the means which
unites people in order to assure them of their happiness through this union
simultaneously creates a division between them.”...
This quote brings
in our minds an emblematic French Masonic saying which mentions that the
mission of Freemasonry is ‘‘to unite what
has been divided”. Because the Royal Art is the one that can fill the empty
space of time that intervenes to the new ethical dilemma and the legislative
protection of society. Because it doesn’t just have passive role, but also
gives real form to ethical arguments. Inside it, we will find all the meaning,
the value, the highest necessity of ethical square, produced by the Natural
Law, in order to keep the principles of society, even as long as the Positive
Law takes care of its protection. Because civil society obeys the Positive Law,
while Freemasonry casts with Natural Law.
Freemasonry is
even today the most precious worldwide armory of ethic, as it gives the answers
to all the disorders of the times. It makes us known that the meaning of
morality isn’t just an intellectual venture or experiment. Its form is
connected to peoples’ relationships and the quality of their life. It is, like
Kant stated lyrically:
...”the
veiled goddess, in front of whom we bow, the ethical law inside us in its
invulnerable majesty”...
It reminds us of our
powers and limits, and overall, the responsibility of our decisions. It is
something more than just a picture or a vision of a fantastic world in which
scientific discoveries and human dignity are in harmony. It is about a field of
practice that answers to problems and occasions of moral perplexity.
Because Freemasonry
knows very well that they can’t handle the normative models of mastery. Human
reason can’t operate in normative frame of absolutism. The Square - Symbol of
Reason and Wisdom - teaches that we must be fair and direct. The Compass is the
symbol of thoughtfulness and spherical thinking. Both combined lead to Justice
and Truth, Virtues that Freemasonry tries with all her means to spread to
Humanity.
Every experienced
Freemason knows very well that ‘‘cold blood” reason and by the book - fair in
other respects - Law, can transform into lethal weapons in the hands of
inexperienced or scheming people. That is why it gives freely its way and
perspectives, without enforcing behaviors. As guidepost shows an affordable
path that anyone can follow in order to understand the moment of human purity
and why its continuous reminder is the body that supports and will support
human achievements forever.
The target is not
negotiable; the curving of rough-raw ashlar and the realization that Man can
get perfect to all the fields of internal and external world and avoid the
delusion of arrogance.
In conclusion,
progress of Knowledge, of sciences and technology may not improve automatically
morality and behavior of people but, without question it creates a fertile
ground, where Good Seed can grow. Knowledge, Technology and Progress of
Sciences are not a luxury, but a daily ‘‘food of spirit”. What Sculpture
represents for a formless piece of marble, education does equally for human
spirit.
This is why no
science must remain unknown to man, because all of them, always with the
condition that they have as foundation Virtue, constitute the antidote against
ignorance, superstition and fanatism, and they set free. A nation is considered
slaved when they ignore Truth and their own infinite powers and they get deeper
in the darkness and bigotry. But at the same time we repeat and must not forget
that sciences without the support of Virtue have the same result that a gun has
in the hands of a child!
Like Charles
Dickens, through his left behind work, we can see that he searched and made it
to highlight somehow the archetypal dimension of Purity/Kindness, which will
overtake evil. Despite whatever adversities he managed to show that the purest
good can be taught by the most hideous evil, while in an intelligent way, he
turned even the character of the prostitute in his book, into a pure soul.
Like Frankenstein
conceived the idea and tried to give life to a natural form, willing to be
beautiful. But his arrogance and sloppiness created something ugly. He wanted
to be well-meaning, but because of his recklessness, he did something bad and
in the end the ‘‘monster” mirrored the form of the man, highlighting the moral
perplexity in what concerns the way people must confront existence and overall
KNOWLEDGE (Gnosis).
And all these
people who aspire or expect to be part of the History, the need to be more
careful and righteous. The bridge to pure is virtue. Without it, ‘‘man is the
wildest and most unsacred animal”, as Aristotle mentions in his book ‘‘Politics”.
Because there are
no man actions that can be politically or morally correct. And we do not know
for real what this, which most times should frighten us, is. Control and
prohibition of a scientific research, or much worse and more frightening for
our society consequences, that will be cause by not prohibiting it?
We will not
profane any secret knowledge if we answered, allegorically, in the above question
with an excerpt from a Masonic Ritual (‘‘Scottish
Brother” Degree of the Illuminati Masonic System) inactive for two
and a half centuries but always timely, in which the Privy Secretary of the Lodge
says to the Candidate:
… “Here, the scales must be tipped in favour of
virtue. One must seek to bring it
about that the just man can safely expect to find reward for his righteousness
in this world. In this endeavour we
are hampered by the clergy, the princes, and today’s political constitutions. What are we to do then? Promote revolutions? Turn everything
upside down? Expel violence with violence? Exchange one tyrant for another? Certainly not!
Any
violent reform is reprehensible because it does not improve things as long as
men with their passions remain unchanged, and because wisdom does not need to
be coerced. The Order’s entire plan
is based on educating men, not through declamation but by promoting and
rewarding virtue.
We
must secretly tie the hands of those who promote vice and govern them without
oppressing them. In a word, a general regimen of morality must be introduced, (…) without dissolving the civil bonds”…
R∴ L∴ “Social Circle” Or∴ Athens
Under
the aegis of International Masonic Order
“DELPHI”
