Thursday, January 6, 2022

Part 9 : The Gods of Eden...The World Afire..Master Smith and the Angel ...Apocalypse of Marx...Funny Money Goes International

The Gods of Eden
by William Bramley
29 
The World Afire 
ONE SIGNIFICANT BY-PRODUCT of the American Revolution was a philosophical reshaping of how people viewed revolution. When Benjamin Franklin was in France to win French military support for the American cause, he engaged in an intensive public relations campaign. He vigorously promulgated the idea of "virtuous revolution"—a concept which had already found increasing favor in the Masonic lodges. The public at that time tended to view violent revolution as a crime against society. Franklin was successful in changing this perception by encouraging people to accept violent revolutions as steps in the progress of mankind. Revolutionaries were no longer to be frowned upon as criminals, he argued, because they were idealists righting for freedom and justice. A new motto was coined: "Revolution against tyranny is the most sacred of duties."1 These bold ideas electrified Paris and helped to win open French support for the American cause, but at a terrible long-term cost to human society. The ideas expressed by Franklin have helped to stimulate endless bloody revolutions ever since. 

The American Revolution was followed by many other revolutions and/or the establishment of republican-style governments throughout the western world and South America. The success of the American Revolution had made it easy to rally people to fight. We witness during this era the French Revolution, the creation of the Batavian Republic in the Netherlands (1795-1806), the Helvetic Republic in Switzerland (1798-1805), the Cisalpine Republic in northern Italy (1797-1805), the Ligurian Republic in Genoa (1797-1805), and the Parthenopean Republic in southern Italy. Between 1810 and 1824, the Spanish colonies in South America took up arms and won their political independence. In 1825, the Decembrist revolt broke out in Russia. A second revolution erupted in France in 1830. In that same year, a revolt in Holland brought about the sovereignty of Belgium. A Polish revolution in 1830 and 1831 was successfully stamped out by Russia. In 1848, a major wave of revolutionary activity swept Europe spurred by an international collapse of credit caused in good part by the new inflatable paper money system, bad harvests, and a cholera epidemic. 

In nearly all of those revolutions, we continue to see important revolutionary leadership positions held by Freemasons. During the first French Revolution, a key rebel leader was the Duke of Orleans, who was the Grand Master of French Masonry before his resignation at the height of the Revolution. Marquis de Lafayette, the man who had been initiated into the Masonic fraternity by George Washington, also played an important role in the French revolutionary cause. The Jacobin Club, which was the radical nucleus of the French revolutionary movement, was founded by prominent Freemasons. According to Sven Lunden's article, "The Annihilation of Freemasonry": 

Herbert, Andre Chenier, Camille Desmoulins and many other "Girondins" [moderate French republicans supporting republican government over monarchy] of the French Revolution were Freemasons.2

Freemasons were the primary leaders of the 1825 Decembrist revolt in Russia. Some of the planning for that revolt took place within their lodges. 

In South America, according to Richard DeHaan, writing in Collier's Encyclopedia: 

The order [Freemasonry] played an important role in the spread of liberalism and the organization of political revolution in Latin America. Like French Freemasonry, the Latin American movement was also generally anticlerical. In Mexico and Colombia, Masons helped win independence from Spain, while in Brazil they worked against Portuguese domination.

Mr. Lunden agrees: 

In Latin America, too, the process of liberation from the Spanish yoke was the work of Freemasons, in large measure. Simon Bolivar was one of the most active of Masonry's sons, and so were San Martin, Mitre, Alvear, Sarmiento, Benito Juarez—all hallowed names to Latin Americans.4 

Regarding other revolutions, Mr. Lunden adds: 

Many of the leaders in the great year 1848, which saw so many uprisings against feudal rule in Europe, were members of the Order; among them was the great Hungarian hero of democracy, Louis Kossuth, who found a temporary refuge in America.5 

The 1800's also witnessed the wars of Italian unification led by Giuseppe Garibaldi (1807-1882), who was a thirty-third degree Mason and the Grand Master of Italy. The victorious Garibaldi placed Victor Emmanuel, another Freemason, on the throne. [all toward the tyranny of a state eventually dc]

The Italian wars of unification left two important legacies: a united Italy and the modern Mafia. The Mafia was a loosely-knit secret society founded in Sicily in the mid 1700's. At first, the Mafia was a resistance movement  formed to oppose the foreign rulers who controlled Sicily at the time. The early Mafiosi were popular heroes who specialized in criminal acts against the hated foreigners. The Mafia built an underground government in Sicily and held power by extortion. The Mafia assisted Garibaldi when he invaded Sicily in 1860 and declared himself dictator of the island. After the foreign rulers were ousted and Italy was unified, the Mafia became the violent criminal network we know today. 

Freemasonry was clearly an important catalyst in the creation of modern Western-style government. The vast majority of Freemasons who participated in the revolutions were well-intended. The representative form of government they helped to create was certainly an improvement over some of the governments they replaced.* Regrettably, the lofty ideals of those Freemasons were in the process of a speedy betrayal by sources within the Brotherhood network itself. 
*This is not to say that monarchy is always bad. History has seen a few benevolent monarchs who ruled well, who could act for peace, and who were popular with their people. Hereditary or life-term leadership has the advantage of stability. It can work if the monarch is accountable for his or her actions and' can be removed for chronic incompetence or abuse of power. Monarchies have rarely functioned well on Earth because monarchs have usually ruled by so-called "divine right" and have therefore not been accountable to the people they governed. 
One consequence of the French Revolution was a severe disruption of the French economy. Food production had dropped severely and the new regime was in deep political trouble because the majority of Frenchmen were still loyal to the monarchy. Under this cloud, the revolutionary government decided to solve the problems of political opposition, hunger and distribution of wealth by reducing the human population of France. Rather than increase food production to meet the demand, it was decided to reduce the demand to match the lessened amount of food. Throughout the French nation, a program of mass murder was launched as an official program of the revolutionary council. This program was known as the Reign of Terror. People were put to death by all means available, including guillotine, mass drowning, bludgeoning, shooting, and starvation. Although not as many people were murdered as the council had planned, it has been estimated that over 100,000 people died. [how silly that number sounds Reign of Terror & a hundred thousand dead, something lost somewhere in the translation dc]

We have noted that genocides are committed by grouping people into superficial categories usually based upon race, religious belief, or nationality. The victims are then targeted for slaughter even though they may be guilty of no crimes against their murderers. The French revolutionaries took the process to an extreme. During the Reign of Terror, people were grouped simply according to their economic and vocational standing. Those who fell into the wrong categories were deemed members of an undesirable social class and were killed. This was certainly as superficial a distinction as one can make, yet grouping people in this fashion has been extremely successful in factionalizing human beings. [in a covid 19 ? vaxxed, unvaxxed way? dc]

The French Revolution dragged nearly all of the major powers of Europe into a war. Initially benefiting from this was William IX, the prince who had inherited the immense Hesse-Kassel fortune. William IX rented out, at a handsome fee, 8,000 soldiers to England to fight against the French during the first half of the 1790's. When Napoleon Bonaparte later became emperor of France, William IX seemed to gain even more. After Napoleon's troops occupied German regions west of the Rhine River, including some Hessian properties, Napoleon compensated William IX by awarding him a large section of Mainz and by conferring upon William the title of Elector—a status higher than prince. The cordiality between Napoleon and Elector William did not last very long, however. William IX tried to play the old trick of courting both sides of the conflict in order to make a fortune by renting soldiers. William foolishly leased mercenaries to the Prussian king for a quarter of a million Pounds to fight Napoleon and then tried to claim "neutrality." True to the warning of Machiavelli, this double-dealing finally caught up and backfired on the House of Hesse. Hesse-Kassel was soon annexed and made part of Napoleon's "Kingdom of Westphalia." It was not until after Napoleon's defeat at the Battle of Leipzig in 1813 that William IX was able  to regain Hesse-Kassel. Hesse-Kassel remained under the control of his dynasty until 1866, when it was taken over by Prussia. Although the Hessian royal family has remained influential in German society until well into the twentieth century, it never regained exclusive rule over its territory. Hesse merged into what has become modern Germany— a country that was unified in large part by the Prussian Hohenzollern dynasty. 

Despite the reversals suffered by Hesse-Kassel, the upheavals in France proved to be a boon for one of William IX's financial agents: Mayer Amschel Rothschild (1743-1812), founder of one of the most influential banking houses of Europe. 

Mayer Amschel was an ambitious and hard-working merchant who began his career in the Jewish ghetto of Frankfurt-am-Main in Hesse. In 1765, two decades before the French Revolution, Rothschild managed to gain a hardwon audience with Prince William IX, who was still at that time living in Hesse-Hanau. Mayer Amschel strove to ingratiate himself with the Hessian prince by selling antique coins to William at extremely low prices. William, who always had an eye open to increasing his material fortunes in any way possible, was delighted to take advantage of Rothschild's generous bargains. As a reward, William granted Rothschild's request to be appointed a "Crown Agent to the Prince of Hesse-Hanau." This appointment, made in 1769, was more honorary than substantial, but it gave Mayer Amschel a big boost in his community standing and aided his efforts to create a successful banking house. 

During the twenty years following his appointment, Mayer Amschel continued to keep in close contact with Prince William IX. Rothschild's goal was to become one of the Prince's personal financial agents. Rothschild's perseverance finally paid off. In 1789, the year in which the French Revolution began and four years after William IX inherited the wealth of Hesse-Kassel, Mayer was given his first financial assignment on behalf of Prince William. This, in turn, led to the coveted position as a personal financial agent to the Prince. 

Rothschild made a fortune from various activities while serving under William IX. The French Revolution and the wars it triggered created many shortages throughout Hesse. Rothschild capitalized on this situation by Sharply raising the prices of the cloth he was importing from England. Rothschild also struck a deal with another of William IX's chief financial agents, Carl Buderus. The deal enabled Rothschild to share in the profits from the leasing of Hessian mercenaries to England. Virginia Cowles, writing in her excellent book, The Rothschilds, A Family of Fortune, described the arrangement: 

At this point Mayer made a proposition to the enterprising Carl Buderus. England was paying the Landgrave [ William IX] large sums of money for the hire of Hessian soldiers; and the Rothschilds were paying England large sums of money for the goods they were importing. Why not let the two-way movement cancel itself out, and pocket the commissions both ways on the bills of exchange? Buderus agreed, and soon this extra string to the Rothschild bow was producing an impressive revenue.6 

Out of those beginnings rose the House of Rothschild, named after the red shield ("roth" [red] and "schild" [shield]) used as its emblem. The Rothschild family soon became synonymous with wealth, power, and banking. For generations, the Rothschild house was Europe's most powerful banking family and it remains influential in the international banking community today. Sharing the Rothschild house in Frankfurt during its early days was the Schiff family. The Schiff's also became a major banking family and they have done business with the Rothschilds all the way up until our own time. 

Control of the Rothschild house, as well as many other banking houses, passed from father to son(s) over the generations. The Rothschilds, Schiffs, and other banking families were truly part of a hereditary "paper aristocracy" to which Brotherhood revolutionaries had given a great deal of power when they established the inflatable paper money system and its attendant central banks.

Many historians writing about the Rothschild family focus on the fact that Mayer Amschel was Jewish. The Rothschilds have been important supporters of Jewish causes throughout the family's history. Less frequently mentioned is the fact that the Rothschilds were also associated with German Freemasonry. This association apparently began with Mayer Amschel, who accompanied William IX on several trips to the Masonic lodges. Whether or not Mayer actually became a member is uncertain. It is known that his son, Solomon (founder of the Rothschild bank in Vienna), had become a Freemason. According to Jacob Katz, writing in his book, Jews and Freemasons in Europe, 1723-1939, the Rothschilds were one of the rich and powerful Frankfurt families appearing on a Masonic membership list in 1811. 

The Scottish degrees used in the German lodges were Christian in nature. This created problems for Jewish men like Rothschild who may have wanted to participate. To solve the dilemma, efforts were made in Jewish communities to change certain rituals in order to make Freemasonry acceptable to Jews. Special Jewish lodges were created, such as the "Melchizedek" lodges named in honor of the Old Testament priest-king whose importance we discussed in an earlier chapter. Those who belonged to the Melchizedek lodges were said to be members of the "Order of Melchizedek." This was an extremely interesting development, for across the Atlantic Ocean the name of Melchizedek was about to be resurrected on the American continent during what some people believe to have been a series of significant UFO episodes. Those episodes gave the world a new religion: the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, better known as the Mormon Church. 

30 
Master Smith and the Angel 
WE HAVE SEEN many instances in which religious agitation and revivalism were associated with the UFO phenomenon: the Hebrew rebellions in Egypt under Moses, the Christian agitations under Jesus, the Islamic militancy under Mohammed, and the religious activism during the UFO plagued years of the Black Death. 

In the early 20th century, a particularly interesting bout of intense religious fever overtook some communities in British Wales. This incident is known as the Welsh Revival of 1904-1905, in which a preacher driven by "inner voices" electrified the countryside with his sermons. People were reporting all manner of unusual phenomena during the Revival years, including bright moving lights in the sky that we would today label UFOs. For example, we read the following personal eyewitness accounts gathered by the Society for Psychical Research (SPR) and published in its Proceedings of 1905:* 
*"For the SPR's complete report on the Welsh Revival, please see "Psychological Aspects of the Welsh Revival" by A. T. Fryer, which was published in the Society for Psychological Research, Proceedings, 19:80, 1905. A copy of the complete article may be ordered from The Sourcebook Project. (Please see Bibliography for address.)

First of all my attention was drawn to it by a person in the crowd, and I looked and saw a block of fire as it was rising from the mountain side, and it followed along the mountain side for about 200 to 300 yards, before it gradually rose to heaven. Then a star, as it were, shot out to meet it, and they clapped together and formed a ball of fire. It also grew brighter as it rose higher, and then it seemed to sway about a lot; then it seemed to form into something like the helm of a ship. The size of it at this time would be about the size of the moon, but very much brighter, and lasted about a quarter of an hour.

. . . the star appeared, like a ball of fire in the sky, glittering and sparkling, and as it went up it seemed to be bubbling over. This continued for about 20 minutes . . .2 

Firstly, there appeared in the heavens a very large and bright ball of fire. It was of a much more brilliant lustre than an ordinary star—very much the colour of a piece of iron white-heated. It had two brilliant arms which protruded towards the earth. Between these arms there appeared a further light or lights resembling a cluster of stars, which seemed to be quivering with varying brightness ___ It lasted for ten minutes or more.

It is interesting that in some regions of Wales, the lights arrived at the very same time as the Revival. The Proceedings report: 

In reply to questions about his experiences, Mr. M. stated that he had never seen such lights before the Revival, nor before he had heard of others seeing them. . . . They [the lights] were seen "high up in the sky, where no houses or anything else could lead us to make any mistake" (i.e. to mistake ordinary lights for them); they were seen both on very dark nights and also when the moon and stars were visible.

The lights were seen at least once near a chapel, and also leaving an area where a prominent preacher lived, thereby hinting at a direct UFO involvement with some of those people who were responsible for the Revival: 

We happened to reach Llanfair about 9:15 P.M. It was a rather dark and damp evening. In nearing the chapel, which can be seen from a distance, we saw balls of light, deep red, ascending from one side of the chapel, the side which is in a field. There was nothing in this field to cause this phenomenon—i.e. no houses, etc. After that we walked to and fro on the main road for nearly two hours without seeing any light except from a distance in the direction of Llanbedr. This time it appeared brilliant, ascending high into the sky from amongst the trees where lives the well-known Rev. C. E. The distance between us and the light which appeared this time was about a mile. Then about eleven o'clock, when the service which Mrs. Jones conducted was brought to a close, two balls of light ascended from the same place and of similar appearance to those we saw first. In a few minutes afterwards Mrs. Jones was passing us home in her carriage, and in a few seconds after she passed, on the main road, and within a yard of us, there appeared a brilliant light twice, tinged with blue. In two or three seconds after this disappeared, on our right hand, within 150 or 200 yards, there appeared twice very huge balls of similar appearance as that which appeared on the road. It was so brilliant and powerful this time that we were dazed for a second or two. Then immediately there appeared a brilliant light ascending from the woods where the Rev. C. E. lives. It appeared twice this time. On the other side of the main road, close by, there appeared, ascending from a field high into the sky, three balls of light, deep red. Two of these appeared to split up, whilst the middle one remained unchanged. Then we left for home, having been watching these last phenomena for a quarter of an hour.5 

Included among the Welsh aerial phenomena were music and sound effects coming from out of the sky. It seems that the sound effects were designed to more firmly implant the Revivalist message in people by making them believe that they were witnessing visitations from heaven: 

E. B., on Wednesday previous, heard about four o'clock what appeared to him to be a thunder clap, followed by lovely singing in the air. 

E. E., on Saturday evening, between seven and eight, while returning home from his work, heard some strange music, similar to the vibration caused by telegraph wires, only much louder, on an eminence, the hill being far from any trees and wires of any kind, and it was more or less a still evening. 

J. P. heard some lovely singing on the road, about half a mile from his home, on Saturday evening, three weeks ago, which frightened him very much.6 

It is interesting that these UFO phenomena were debunked in 1905 in an identical way that modern UFOs are debunked today, revealing that debunking is by no means a late 20th century phenomenon. One investigator, in his report of February 21, 1905, dismissed all of the Welsh phenomena as farm lanterns, marsh gas, the planet Venus, and "phantasies of overwrought brains." Such explanations were no more helpful in 1905 than they are today in shedding light on some genuinely remarkable phenomena. 

The Welsh Revival was not an isolated event. It followed a similar occurrence in New York state almost a century 306 William Bramley earlier. The events in New York included a vision leading to the founding of the Mormon Church by a teenaged youth named Joseph Smith. His story is worth looking at. 

Joseph Smith described it as a beautiful clear day in the • spring of 1820. Master Joseph was 14 or 15 years of age and his mind was in a state of confusion. In his hometown of Manchester, New York, intense quarreling had broken out between various Christian sects, all of which were vying for members. To sort out the controversies in his mind, Joseph climbed a lonely hill near his home, prayed aloud, and hoped that God would answer him. What happened next was probably more than he had bargained for: 

.. . immediately I was seized upon by some power which entirely overcame me, and had such an astonishing influence over me as to bind my tongue so that I could not speak. Thick darkness gathered around me, and it seemed to me for a time as if I were doomed to sudden destruction. JOSEPH SMITH 2:15*
*The words of Joseph Smith are quoted from the book, Pearl of Great Price. 

Just as Joseph was about to give in to despair, he saw: 

. . . a pillar of light exactly over my head, above the brightness of the sun, which descended gradually until it fell upon me. 
It no sooner appeared than I found myself delivered from the enemy which held me bound. When the light rested upon me I saw two Personages, whose brightness and glory defy all description, standing above me in the air. One of them spake unto me, calling me by name, and said, pointing to the other—This is My Beloved Son. Hear Him! JOSEPH SMITH 2:16-17 

So began a series of appearances by an "angel" whose reported dictates and pronouncements are the foundation of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, also known as the Mormon Church. This church is, without doubt, an important institution. Its membership in 1985 totaled approximately 5.8 million people and the Church has extensive business and land holdings. Beginning with a teenaged boy on a hill in New York State, the Church has grown to influence the lives of many people. 

Joseph's vision on the hill was the first of several visits that he would receive from his "angel" friend. The second visit occurred three and a half years after the first. Joseph Smith had just gone to bed, was in the act of praying, when: 

I discovered a light appearing in my room, which continued to increase until the room was lighter than at noonday, when immediately a personage appeared at my bedside, standing in the air, for his feet did not touch the floor. 

He had on a loose robe of most exquisite whiteness beyond anything earthly I had ever seen; nor do I believe that any earthly thing could be made to appear so exceedingly white and brilliant. JOSEPH SMITH 2:30-31 

The figure in Joseph's room had naked hands, wrists, feet and ankles. It also had a bare head, neck and exposed chest. The figure introduced itself as Moroni, the angel of a man who had lived centuries earlier. The resurrected "Moroni" imparted a message to Joseph consisting of quotes from Final Judgment prophecies in the Old Testament. Moroni stated that the prophecies were about to be fulfilled. Moroni also informed Joseph about the existence of ancient metal plates which contained some of the history of the early North American continent. Joseph was told that he must later dig up the plates, have them translated, and present the translation to the world. After this message, the image of Moroni vanished in a unique way: 

. . . I saw the light in the room begin to gather immediately around the person of him who had been speaking to me, and it continued to do so until the room was again left dark, except just around him; when, instantly I saw, as it were, a conduit open right up into heaven, and he ascended till he entirely disappeared . .. JOSEPH SMITH 2:43 

Joseph did not have long to ponder the curious phenomenon. The mysterious light and visitor soon re-entered his room. Of this second visit that night, Joseph relates: 

He [the angel] commenced, and again related the very same things which he had done at his first visit, without the least variation; which having done, he informed me of great judgments which were coming upon the earth, with great desolations by famine, sword, and pestilence; and that these grievous judgments would come on the earth in this [Joseph Smith's] generation. Having related these things, he again ascended as he had done before. JOSEPH SMITH 2:45 

The apparition in Joseph's bedroom came and went repeatedly the full night. On the following day, while he was out in the field, the exhausted young Smith abruptly lost his strength while trying to climb a fence and he fell unconscious to the ground. Upon regaining awareness, Joseph observed above him the same angel repeating the same message. A new postscript had been added, however: the angel instructed Joseph to tell his father of the visions. 

Some critics dispute the accuracy of Joseph Smith's stories, pointing out that Smith did not record his first vision on paper until nineteen years after it had happened. Under the circumstances at the time, this delay is understandable when we consider Joseph's youth and minimal education. 

To the degree Smith's accounts are accurate, they are worth looking at. Did he have a true religious vision as his followers believe, or was he, as others suggest, a victim of UFO tampering? 

Joseph's angel, Moroni, was different than the angels described by Ezekiel and John in the Bible. Smith's angel did not wear items that could be interpreted as a helmet and boots. Moroni was a figure in a true robe. However, Joseph appears to have been looking at a recorded image projected through the window into his room. The clue to this lies in Joseph's words that Moroni had repeated the second message "without the least variation." This suggests a recorded message. The manner in which Moroni disappeared indicates a projected light image from a source in the sky outside the house. When Moroni returned for a third time that same night, Smith "heard him rehearse or repeat over again . .. the same things—as before...." {Joseph Smith 2:48-49). 

If Smith's account is accurate and UFO-related, there would be tremendous humor in it. Today we can go to Disneyland and marvel at remarkable, lifelike, projected images of talking heads in the Haunted House ride. A similar projection viewed by a young country bumpkin in the 19th century would no doubt be considered nothing less than a true vision from God. Certainly young Smith's narrative resembles earlier Custodial encounters in many respects: a bright light descends from the sky followed by the appearance of "angels." Joseph's testimony that he felt seized and unable to move is identical to several modern UFO close encounters in which eyewitnesses report being immobilized, especially before an abduction. 

Other Mormon writings also tend to support the likelihood that Joseph Smith had had a UFO encounter. The Mormon doctrines revealed by Smith state that there are many inhabited planets in the universe. This was quite a daring idea for an uneducated man of the nineteenth century. Smith added that God inhabits a human flesh-and-bones body (see, e.g., Doctrines and Covenants 130:22) and that God lives near a star called Kolob (see Abraham 3:1-3). In other words, God is a humanlike extraterrestrial living on another planet. What we seem to clearly have in Joseph Smith's experience is another appearance of our Custodial friends pretending that  they are God and meddling in human affairs by implanting yet another apocalyptic religion on Earth. 

Harsh criticism is often aimed at the "bible" of Smith's religion: the Book of Mormon. The Book of Mormon is said to be a translation of the ancient metal plates that Smith had dug up at the command of his angel. The stories contained in the Book of Mormon are remarkable, and to many, unbelievable. 

The Book of Mormon is written in a style of prose resembling the Old Testament. It ties the history of ancient North America to the history described in the Old Testament. According to Mormon, people from Palestine were transported in saucer like submarines to the Americas under the guidance of "God" in the year 600 B.C. "God" was sending them to the New World largely because of the Tower of Babel incident. Somewhere in the Americas (perhaps Mexico or Central America) the refugees built magnificent cities rivaling those of the Old World. They fought wars and were obedient to the same "God" and "angels" worshipped in the Middle East. 

The Book of Mormon tells of regular visits by "angels" and of their deep involvement in the affairs of ancient America. The angels encouraged their human servants to practice important virtues, the foremost being, of course, obedience. The Book of Mormon tells us that many other remarkable events took place in ancient America as time went by. In the first century A.D., Jesus Christ reportedly made an appearance in the Americas immediately following his crucifixion on the other side of the world. The Christ vision described in Mormon is complete with glorious rays of light in the sky from which Jesus emerged. 

Although many scholars take the Old Testament seriously as an historical record, little such deference is given the Book of Mormon. Mormon stories seem so outrageous, and the manner in which Joseph Smith reportedly obtained and translated the plates appears so suspect, that scant academic heed is paid to them. The question is: should the Book of Mormon be dismissed out of hand? 

In truth, the Book of Mormon may well be one of the most significant historical records to come out of the Custodial  religions. Based upon all that we have already studied in this book, the history of ancient America as told in Mormon is precisely the type of history we would expect. Earth is small. We would anticipate that an "ancient astronaut" (i.e., the Custodial) race would rule human society in the same fashion everywhere, on every continent. We would expect them to exhibit the same brutality and to promote identical religious fictions. The dates extrapolated from the Book of Mormon for the arrival of the Palestinians to America are especially interesting because they coincide with the dates that historians have assigned to the emergence of the ancient civilizations of Mexico and Central America. The Book of Mormon might therefore explain why those civilizations abruptly arose in North and Central America so long after similar civilizations had already come and gone on the opposite side of the world. 

This still leaves a puzzle unsolved. 

If Mormon is at least partially true, where are the ruins of the cities it names? Many magnificent American ruins have been found, of course, but not all of the key cities identified in the Book of Mormon. Mormon offers a chilling answer: some were utterly destroyed by "God" in a frightening cataclysm. 

As elsewhere, it was very difficult for humans in ancient America to please their Custodial masters. Mormon tells us that some ancient Americans did an especially poor job of it. As a result, a massive punishment was inflicted upon a large American region reportedly around the year 34 A.D., coincident with the crucifixion of Jesus on the other side of the world. The Mormon account of this American cataclysm is extraordinary. It accurately describes a nuclear holocaust:

.-. . in the thirty and fourth year, in the first month, on the fourth day of the month, there arose a great storm, such an—one as never had been known in all the land. 

And there was also a great and terrible tempest [violent wind]; and there was terrible thunder, insomuch that it did shake the whole earth as if it was about to divide asunder. 

And there were exceeding sharp lightnings, such as never had been known in all the land. 

And the city of Zarahemla did take fire: 

And the city of Moroni did sink into the depths of the sea, and—inhabitants thereof were drowned. 

And the earth was carried up upon the city of Moronihah that in the place of the city there became a great mountain. 

And there was a great and terrible destruction in the land southward. 

But behold there was more great and terrible destruction in the land northward; for behold, the whole face of the land was changed, because of the tempest and the whirlwinds and the thunderings and the lightnings, and the exceeding great quaking of the whole earth; 

And the highways were broken up, and the level roads were spoiled, and many smooth places became rough.'

And many great and notable cities were sunk, and many were burned, and many were shaken till the buildings thereof had fallen to the earth, and the inhabitants thereof were slain, and the places were left desolate. 

And there were some cities which remained; but the damage thereof was exceeding great, and there were many of them who were slain. 

And there were some who were carried away in the whirlwind; and whither they went no man knoweth, save they know that they were carried away. 

And thus the face of the whole earth became deformed, and because of the tempests, and the thunderings, and the lightnings, and the quaking of the earth. 

And behold, the rocks were rent in twain; they were broken up upon the face of the whole earth, insomuch that they were found in broken fragments, and in seams and in cracks, upon all the face of the land. 

And it came to pass that when the thunderings, and the lightnings, and the storm, and the tempest, and the quakings of the earth did cease--for behold, they did last for about the space of three hours; and it was said by some that the time was. greater; nevertheless, all these great and terrible things were done in about the space of three hours—and then behold, there was a darkness upon the face of the land. 

And it came to pass that there was thick darkness upon all the face of the land, insomuch that the inhabitants thereof who had not fallen [died] could feel the vapor of darkness; 

And there could be no light, because of the darkness, neither candles, neither torches; neither could there be fire kindled with their fine and exceedingly dry wood, so that there could not be any light at all; 

And there was not any light seen, neither fire, nor glimmer, neither the sun, nor the moon, nor the stars, for so great were the mists of darkness which were upon the face of the land. 

And it came to pass that it did last for the space of three days that there was no light seen; and there was great mourning and howling and weeping among all the people continually; yea, great were the groanings of the people, because of the darkness and the great destruction which had come upon them. 3 NEPHI 8:5-23, BOOK OF MORMON 

The rumblings, flashes of lightning, rapid incineration of cities, all within three hours, followed by three days of thick heavy darkness combine to accurately depict a nuclear strike followed by the inevitable thick lingering cloud of soot and debris. The above passage is especially remarkable when we remember that it was first published over a century ago—long before nuclear weapons were developed by man. It gives added credence to the Mormon Church's claim that Joseph Smith had not invented the Book of Mormon as some critics have charged. It is highly unlikely that any person in Smith's day could have accidentally imagined an event so closely mirroring a nuclear holocaust. 

Some Mormons stress that the spiritual teachings found in Mormon texts are more important than the historical  information. Mormon spiritual beliefs are indeed significant because they are quite forthright about Custodial intentions. 

The basic spiritual beliefs of the Mormon Church can be summarized as follows: 

Humans are immortal spiritual beings occupying human bodies. The spirit is the true source of intelligence and personality, not the body. As spiritual beings, we existed before birth and will continue to exist after death. The true goal of life is to improve spiritually, and everyone can eventually achieve a rehabilitated spiritual state that mirrors the state of a Supreme Being. Ethics are an important step to achieving such a state. Everyone is endowed with free will. 

These beliefs sound like the teachings of a maverick religion. We can at once understand why so many people are drawn to Mormonism and remain devoted adherents. Members are told important truths. When we read further into Mormon works, however, we find that the above truths are given many fatal twists which actually prevent people from ever attaining their spiritual salvation. 

Mormon texts state that people are actually immortal spirit bodies which inhabit human bodies. Spirit bodies are made of matter and look just like human bodies. Joseph Smith said that "spirit is a substance; that it is material, but that it is more pure, elastic and refined matter than the body." (HC, IV. p. 575.) A Supreme Being (God) is said to be a similar material being who inhabits a perfect and immortal flesh-and-bones body. The ultimate goal of Mormonism is to achieve the same state as "God" and dwell in a perfect immortal human body for the rest of eternity. Mormon teachings, which are alleged to have come from ancient plates and Custodial "angels," therefore encourage humans to welcome the grim fate of endless entrapment in human bodies. The Book of Mormon expresses that objective this way: 

The spirit and the body shall be reunited again in its perfect form;. . . their spirits united with their bodies, never to be divided;. . . ALMA 11:43, 45 

Ancient Mesopotamian texts told us that mankind's Custodial "gods" wanted to permanently join spiritual beings to human bodies so that the Custodians would have a slave race. Maverick religions have argued that a spirit's enmeshment in a human body is the primary cause of suffering. To counteract this maverick teaching and to promote Custodial aims, Mormonism falsely declares that a spiritual being can only achieve ultimate happiness and Godliness when it has been permanently joined to matter: 

For man is spirit. The elements are eternal, and spirit and element, inseparably connected, receive a fulness of joy; And when separated, man cannot receive a fulness of joy. DOCTRINES AND COVENANTS 93:33-34 

Only where true spiritual understanding has been lost can such a teaching take hold, as it has on a widespread scale on Earth. Mormonism teaches that everyone lived with the Heavenly Father (God) before coming to Earth. As part of God's grand plan, people are sent to Earth in order to learn right from wrong, and to demonstrate to God that they prefer doing good over evil. However, something is done to all spiritual beings who are sent to Earth: they are induced with amnesia about their pre birth existences. According to a pamphlet published by the Mormon Church: 

. . . though we might sometimes sense intimations of our premortal existence [spiritual existence before taking on a body] as "through a glass darkly" [vaguely], it would be effectively blocked from our memory.7 

This is a remarkable claim, for it suggests that memory of pure spiritual existence is in some way deliberately blocked from human memories by the Custodial society as part of its effort to weld spiritual beings to human bodies. The Custodial society does seem to have effective methods 316 William Bramley for occluding memory, as demonstrated in modern UFO abduction cases where human victims are apparently caused to suffer almost complete amnesia regarding their abduction experiences. 

The forced amnesia described in Mormon had several purported purposes, one of which was: 

... to ensure that our choice of good or evil would reflect our earthly desires and will, rather than the remembered influence of our All-Good Heavenly Father.8 

This is also an astonishing admission. It alleges that spiritual memory is dimmed so that people will base their actions on their concerns as material beings rather than upon their knowledge and remembrance of spiritual existence. This can only hamper the ability of individuals to attain a high level of ethics because true ethics must ultimately take into account a person's spiritual nature when confronted with an ethical dilemma. By reducing all questions of ethics to strictly earthly concerns, people are prevented from fully resolving those ethical questions that will start them on the road to full spiritual recovery. This restriction is precisely what the Custodians wanted, as revealed in the Old Testament: "God" did not want Adam and Eve to "eat" from the "tree of knowledge of good and evil" because it would lead to knowledge of how to regain spiritual immortality. 

The above passage further suggests that there exists a Custodial intention to block human remembrance of a Supreme Being. The implication is that people not only have buried memories of prior spiritual existence, but they also hold hidden recollections of contact with a Supreme Being. If such memory exists, we can at once understand why the Custodians would try to veil it. By blocking such memory, the Custodial society further deepens spiritual ignorance and is better able to promote its religious pretenses and fictions. 

This is not to say that the Custodial society would alone be guilty of causing spiritual deterioration and amnesia. Such deterioration would have probably begun long before the formation of the Custodial civilization. Mormon writings would only suggest that Custodians took advantage of such deterioration and hastened it to suit their own ends. 

We have noted the use of breeding war as a Custodial tool for maintaining control over the human population. According to the Book of Mormon, this tool was used in the ancient American civilizations where "God" was held responsible for the outbreak of many wars: 

And it came to pass that I beheld that the wrath of God was poured out upon the great and abominable church [Satan's church], insomuch that there were wars and rumors of wars among all the nations and kindreds [families] of the earth. 1 NEPHI 14:15 

Mormon states that wars would continue to be bred over the generations as "God's" tool for maintaining control: 

Yea, as one generation passeth to another there shall be bloodsheds, and great visitations [disasters] among them; wherefore, my sons, I would that ye would remember; yea, I would that ye would hearken to my words. 2 NEPHI 1:12-13 

In light of the above, it is not surprising to discover that Mormonism is another branch of the Brotherhood network, even though the Mormon Church has traditionally been opposed to other secret societies, such as Freemasonry. Mormon opposition to Freemasonry is based upon passages in the Book of Mormon which seem to suggest that God opposes secret societies. For example, we read in 2 Nephi 26:22-23: 

And there are also secret combinations, even as in times of old, according to the combinations of the devil, for he is the foundation of all these things . . . 

Many people object to interpreting the above passage as being directed against societies like Freemasonry. After all, did not Joseph Smith himself create a multileveled priesthood patterned after Freemasonry, complete with secret ceremonies and a ceremonial apron? 

The Mormon priesthood is divided into two sections: the Priesthood of Aaron (named after Moses' brother) and the High Priesthood, better known as the Priesthood of Melchizedek (named after the Biblical king Melchizedek). According to Alma 13:1-14, the Mormon high priesthood is precisely the same one over which Melchizedek had reigned many centuries earlier. The Mormon Priesthood today continues to follow the step-by-step initiation process of other Brotherhood organizations. Its highest ceremonies are performed in secret and initiates are required to take vows of silence. During such ceremonies, initiates often wear ceremonial aprons as various "mysteries" are revealed to them through the use of symbols and allegory. 

Joseph Smith claimed that he patterned the Mormon priesthood according to the dictates of an angel. He did not rely entirely on his extraterrestrial friend, however. Smith also became a Freemason for a short period of time in order to borrow from the Craft. According to Thomas F. O'Dea, writing in his book, The Mormons: 

Joseph went to Masonry to borrow many elements of ceremony. These he reformed, explaining to his followers that the Masonic ritual was a corrupted form of an ancient priesthood ceremonial that was now being restored.9 

Joseph Smith was made a Master Mason on March 16, 1842 at a lodge in Illinois. That same lodge was joined by other top Mormons. Perhaps the most famous Mormon Freemason was Brigham Young—the man who led the Mormon exodus across America to Utah and established the headquarters of the Church in that state, where it remains today. 

The above facts do not mean that Mormonism was a branch of Freemasonry. Organizational ties between the  Mormon Church and Freemasonry were severed quite early on. Smith and the early Mormons went to Freemasonry to borrow, not truly to join. The Mormon Church was but another faction at war with other Brotherhood factions. Mormons were told that their religion was "the only true and living church upon the face of the whole earth, with which I, the Lord, am well pleased. ..." (Doctrines and Covenants 1:30.) This proclamation naturally conflicts with every other Custodial religion which declares the same thing, thereby setting in motion more senseless "religious" disputes to keep people fighting and disunited. Some people are still fighting the Mormons now. Joseph Smith suffered for it when he was murdered by an angry mob in 1844. 

Throughout the Church's embattled history, Mormons have found solace in the future Judgment Day promised by Smith's angel. Smith's writings clearly indicated that the Judgment Day was to arrive during his own generation. Perhaps the predicted Great Conflagration did arrive: the American Civil War broke out in 1861. Many of Smith's personal followers were still alive to witness that brutal conflict which must have seemed like an Armageddon to many Americans.* As always, the promised millennium of peace and spiritual salvation did not follow that Armageddon, so Mormons did what so many other apocalyptic religions have done: they reinterpreted their Judgment Day prophecy to keep it alive even though it had clearly failed. 
* Interestingly, the Southern secessionist and pro-slavery movements which had caused the Confederacy to split from the Union, and thereby set the stage for the Civil War, were greatly influenced by the Brotherhood network. We see this, for instance, in two of the many proposed flag designs for the new Confederacy: the designs prominently feature the Brotherhood's "All-Seeing Eye" of God. Before the outbreak of the War, a group of Southerners had created an influential pro-slavery secret society called the Knights of the Golden Circle. Those fraternal Knights were committed to the preservation of slavery in the lands bordering the Caribbean Sea—the so-called "Golden Circle." The seal of the Knights featured a cross similar to the Maltese cross used by the old Knights of Malta. The Knights of the Golden Circle eventually vanished and were replaced by the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan. The Klan was a crude Brotherhood-style secret society which arose in the turbulence of the postwar South. Reportedly founded as a joke, the Klan quickly grew and became a powerful social and political force in the South. Klan teachings are deeply racist and rooted in Aryanism.


One great project of the Mormon Church today is the maintenance of a vast genealogical library—the world's largest. "Genealogy" is the study of family lineage and ancestry. It tells who gave birth to whom, as well as the racial and social characteristics of a person's family tree. The Mormon genealogical vaults are housed in a mountain in the Rocky Mountains about twenty miles south of Salt Lake City. The vaults are protected by 700-foot thick mountain granite and a 14-ton steel door. The library is clearly meant to survive almost anything. According to a Mormon pamphlet, ongoing record collection produces more than 60,000 rolls of microfilm each year containing data from deeds, marriage licenses, family Bibles, registers, cemetery lists, and other sources. 

This remarkable activity began during the first half of the twentieth century. It is ostensibly carried out because Mormons believe that families go on forever. Mormons are taught that they need to trace family lines so that all those who lived and died in the past can be blessed in ceremonies performed in the present by modern Mormons. The Mormons, however, do not limit their genealogical research to just Mormon families. Their goal is to "perform the necessary genealogical research so that all those now or ever in the spirit world can be vicariously baptized."10 

Since every human being who has ever lived fits the above category, we must conclude that the Mormon objective is a complete genealogical record of the entire human race! According to the Mormon Church, that is precisely the goal of the project, to the degree that it can be accomplished. 

This activity understandably concerns some people. Many individuals living today witnessed the racial madness of the German Nazis and might shudder at the devastating impact that the Mormon genealogical collection could have in the hands of racists. This unease is increased by early Mormon doctrines which had placed dark-skinned people in a greatly inferior position to whites. Aryanism was an important element of early Mormon philosophy. In 2 Nephi 5:21-24, we read that dark skin was created by "God" as a punishment for sin: 

. . . wherefore, as they (those being punished) were white, and exceeding fair and delightsome, that they might not be enticing unto my people the Lord God did cause a skin of blackness to come upon them. 
And thus saiih the Lord God: I will cause that they shall be loathsome unto my people, save they shall repent of their iniquities. 
And cursed shall be the seed [sperm] of him that mixeth with their seed; for they shall be cursed even with the same cursing. And the Lord spake it, and it was done. 
And because of their cursing which was upon them they did become an idle people, full of mischief and subtlety, and did seek in the wilderness for beasts of prey. 

Much to their credit, Mormons have recently dropped these racist beliefs and now admit black people to the priesthood. Mormons must nevertheless be alert to ensuring that their genealogical records are never permitted to fall into the hands of those who might desire them for racial "purification" purposes. 

Modern Mormon activities do exhibit many humanitarian leanings. The Church, for example, encourages strong family units. In 1982, I was gratified to see a television advertisement produced by the Mormon Church that expresses the importance of not ignoring a child's accomplishments. This brings up a very important point: 

No individual or organization is purely good or purely bad. In our crazy universe, "absolute" good and "absolute" evil just do not appear to exist. In the worst of people one will always find a tiny ember of good {e.g., the psychopath Adolf Hitler was kind to children), and in the best of individuals there is always at least one thing that should change. The majority of people who join a group or follow a leader do so for the right reasons: they have heard an element of truth or they seek the solution to a genuine 322 William Bramley problem. The real trick in judging a person or group is to determine whether more good is being done than bad, and how the bad may be corrected without destroying whatever good there might be. The task is not usually an easy one. Mormon writings declare that "God" (i.e., Earth's Custodial management) intends to eventually eliminate the "spirit world" entirely as part of "God's" great Utopian plan for mankind. In other words, nothing but the material universe is to ever exist as far as the people of Earth are concerned. This can be translated to mean total spiritual entrapment in physical matter. Such intentions would require that philosophies of strict materialism be created and imposed upon the human race so that humans do not look beyond the material universe. Such philosophies would teach that there is no spiritual reality and that all life, thought, and creation arise solely out of physical processes. Such ideas have become very fashionable and they are, sadly, helping to push the human race into an ever-deepening spiritual sleep. Leading this trend for many years was a political philosophy which had gained its initial momentum in 19th-century Germany. I am speaking, of course, of "communism"— that ever-so-curious mix of apocalypticism, materialism, and Protestant work ethic which was such a significant force in the 20th century. 

31 
Apocalypse of Marx 
THE FIRST FRENCH Revolution of 1789 marked the beginning of a long series of uprisings in France. A new Duke of Orleans, Louis-Philippe, became the figurehead of a July 1830 revolt which placed him on the throne of France as the ruler of a constitutional monarchy. Assisting him was the Marquis de LaFayette. Another of Louis-Philippe's important backers was a man named Louis-Auguste Blanqui, who was decorated by the new government for helping to make the 1830 revolution a success. 

Blanqui remained an active revolutionary after 1830 and provided significant leadership for a long string of uprisings. According to Julius Braunthal, writing in his book, History of the International, "Blanqui was the inspiration of all uprisings in Paris from 1839 to the Commune* in 1871."1 *The Commune was a revolutionary group which governed Paris from March 18 to May 28, 1871  

Blanqui belonged to a network of French secret societies which organized and planned the revolutions. Nearly all of those secret societies were outgrowths of Brotherhood activity and were patterned after Brotherhood organizations. Each society had a different function and ideological foundation for drawing people into the revolutionary cause. Although the revolutionary societies sometimes differed in matters of ideology and tactics, they had one objective in common: to bring on the revolution. Many revolutionary 
leaders participated in several of these organizations simultaneously. 

One of the most effective of the secret French revolutionary groups was the Society of the Seasons, over which Blanqui shared leadership. This society was designed explicitly for the purpose of hatching and carrying out political conspiracies. One of the Society's allied organizations was the "League of the Just." The League of the Just was founded in 1836 as a secret society and it aided Blanqui and the Society of the Seasons in at least one revolt: the uprising of May 1839. A few years after that uprising, the League was joined by a man who would later become the revolutionaries' most famous spokesperson: Karl Marx. 

Karl Marx was a German who lived from 1813 until 1883. He is considered by many to be the founder of modern communism. His writings, especially the Communist Manifesto, are an important cornerstone of communist ideology. As some historians have pointed out, however, Karl Marx did not originate all of his ideas. He was acting largely as a spokesperson for the radical political organization to which he belonged. It was during his membership in the League of the Just that Marx penned the Communist Manifesto with his friend, Friedrich Engels. Although the Manifesto contained many of Marx's own ideas, its true accomplishment was to put into coherent form the communist ideology which was already inspiring the secret societies of France into revolt. 

Because of his intellect, Marx gained considerable power within the League of the Just, and his influence caused a few changes within that organization. Marx did not like the romantic conspiratorial character of the secret society network to which he belonged and he was able to do away with some of those traits within the League. In 1847, the name of the League was changed to "Communist League." Associated with the Communist League were various "workers" organizations, such as the German Worker's Educational Society (GWES). Marx founded a branch of the GWES in Brussels, Belgium. 

At this point, we can see the extraordinary irony in these events. The same network of Brotherhood organizations which had given us the United States and other "capitalist" countries through revolution, was now actively creating the ideology (communism) which would oppose those countries! It is crucial that this point be understood: both sides of the modern "communist vs. capitalist" struggle were created by the same people in the same network of secret Brotherhood organizations. This vital fact is almost always overlooked in history books. Within a short one hundred year period, the Brotherhood network had given the world two opposing philosophies which provided the entire foundation for the so-called "Cold War": a conflict that lasted nearly half a century. 

Considering the affiliation of Karl Marx to the Brotherhood network, it should come as no surprise that Marx's philosophy follows the basic pattern of Custodial religion. Marxism is strongly apocalyptic. It teaches a "Final Battle" creed involving forces of "good" and "evil" followed by a Utopia on Earth. The primary difference is that Marx molded those beliefs into a nonreligious framework and tried to make them sound like a social "science" rather than a religion. In Marx's scheme, the forces of "good" are represented by the oppressed "working classes," and "evil" is represented by the ownership classes. Violent conflict between the two classes is portrayed as natural, inevitable, and ultimately healthy because such conflict will eventually result in the emergence of a Utopia on Earth. Marx's idea of inevitable class tension reflects the Calvinist belief that conflict on Earth is healthy because it means that the forces of "good" are actively battling the minions of "bad." 

Marx tried to make his "inevitable conflict" idea sound scientific by fitting it into a concept known as the "dialectic." The "dialectic" was a notion espoused by another German philosopher, Hegel (1770-1831). Hegel's idea of the "dialectic" can be explained this way: from a thesis (an idea or concept) and an antithesis (a contradictory opposite) one can derive a synthesis (a new idea or concept which is different than the first two, but is a product of them). Marx took this seemingly scientific idea and incorporated it into his theory of social history. In the communist model of "dialectical materialism," social, economic, and political change arises out of the clash of contradictory, and often violent, opposites. In this way, the endless wars of history and the unceasing array of opposing factions on Earth are said to be a natural part of existence out of which all social change must occur. This makes endless social conflict seem desirable, and that is precisely the illusion Marx tried to convey in his "class struggle" theory. 

The communist vision of Utopia is a curious, but significant one. In it, everyone is a worker equal to every other worker. No one owns anything but everyone together owns everything; everybody gets everything they need but not necessarily everything they want; but before this Utopia occurs, everyone must first live in a dictatorship. Whew! This bizarre vision of Utopia seems clearly designed to maintain mankind as a work race and to encourage humans to accept conditions of social repression (i.e., dictatorship). 

By Marx's lifetime, spiritual knowledge had reached a severe state of decay. The "quickie salvation" of the Protestants and the embarrassing rituals practiced by nearly all religions were understandably driving many rationally-minded people out of religion altogether. It is not surprising that the validity of all spiritual reality began to be questioned. This questioning led many people to lean towards a strictly materialist outlook on life, and Marx provided a philosophy for many of those people to step into. Although Marx acknowledged the reality of spiritual existence, he erroneously stated that spiritual existence was entirely the product of physical and material phenomena. In this way, Marx's teachings helped promote the Custodial aims expressed in the Book of Mormon and in ancient Sumerian tablets of bringing about a permanent union between spiritual beings and human bodies. Marx's  writings gave this union "scientific" acceptability by suggesting that spirit and matter could not be separated at all. Marxist philosophy added that "supernatural" reality (i.e., reality existing outside the bounds of the material universe) is not possible. Marx's Utopia therefore amounts to a Biblical Eden: a materialistic paradise in which everyone is a worker with no route to spiritual knowledge and freedom; in other words, a pampered spiritual prison. 

During the same era in which communism was being shaped into an organized movement, the practice of banking was undergoing important developments. By the late 19th century, the new system of inflatable paper money was the established norm throughout the world. This money system was not adequately organized on an international scale, however, and that was the next step: to create a permanent worldwide central banking network which could be coordinated from a single fixed location. 

One scholar to write about this development was the late Dr. Carroll Quigley, professor at Harvard, Princeton, and the Foreign Service School of Georgetown University, Dr. Quigley's book, Tragedy and Hope, A History of the World in Our Time, achieved a degree of fame because it was used by some members of the John Birch Society to prove their "Communist Conspiracy" ideas. Putting this notoriety aside, we find that Dr. Quigley's book is exhaustively researched and well worth reading. Dr. Quigley was not a "conspiracy buff," but was a highly-respected professor with outstanding academic credentials. Dr. Quigley's book describes in great detail the development and workings of the international banking community as it established the inflatable paper money system throughout the world. 

Let us take a brief look at what Dr. Quigley had to say. 

32 
Funny Money Goes International 
IN HIS BOOK, Tragedy and Hope, Dr. Quigley divides the history of "capitalism" into several stages. The third stage, which is described as the period from 1850 until 1931, is defined by Dr. Quigley as the stage of Financial Capitalism. Dr. Quigley states: 

This third stage of capitalism is of such overwhelming significance in the history of the twentieth century, and its ramifications and influences have been so subterranean and even occult, that we may be excused if we devote considerable attention to its organizations and methods. Essentially what it did was to take the old disorganized and localized methods of handling money and credit and organize them into an integrated system, on an international basis, which worked with incredible and well-oiled facility for many decades.1 

Dr. Quigley described the overall intent of the new integrated system: 

... the powers of financial capitalism had another far reaching aim, nothing less than to create a world system of financial control in private hands able to dominate the political system of each country and the economy of the world as a whole. This system was to be controlled in a feudalist fashion by the central banks of the world acting in concert, by secret agreements arrived at in frequent private meetings and conferences. The apex of this system was to be the Bank for International Settlements in Basel, Switzerland, a private bank owned and controlled by the world's central banks which were themselves private corporations. Each central bank.. . sought to manipulate foreign exchanges, to influence the level of economic activity in the country, and to influence cooperative politicians by subsequent economic rewards in the business world.

In the English-speaking world, the newly-organized central banks exerted significant political influence through an organization they supported known as the Round Table. The Round Table was a "think tank" designed to affect the foreign policy actions of governments. 

The Round Table was founded by an Englishman named Cecil Rhodes (1853-1902). Rhodes had created a vast diamond and gold-mining operation in South Africa and in the two African nations named after him: Northern and Southern Rhodesia (today Zambia and Zimbabwe, respectively). Rhodes, who was educated at Oxford, did the most of any Englishman to exploit the mineral resources of Africa and to make the southern African continent a vital part of the British Empire. 

Rhodes was more than a man driven to make a personal fortune. He was very concerned with the world and where it was headed, especially in regard to warfare. Although he lived almost a century ago, he envisioned a day when weapons of great destruction could destroy human civilization. His farsightedness inspired him to channel his considerable talents and personal fortune into building a world political system under which it would be impossible  for a war of such magnitude to occur. Rhodes intended to create a one-world government led by Britain. The world government would be strong enough to stamp out any hostile actions by any group of people. Rhodes also wanted to unify people by making English the universal language. He sought to diminish nationalism and to increase awareness among people that they were part of a larger human community. It was with these goals in mind that Rhodes established the Round Table. In his last will, Rhodes also created the famous "Rhodes Scholarship"—a program still in operation today. The Rhodes scholarship program is designed to promote feelings of universal citizenship based upon Anglo-Saxon traditions. 

Rhodes' heart was clearly on the right track. If successful, he would have undone many of the harmful effects caused by purported Custodial actions and by the corrupted Brotherhood network. A universal language would have undone the damaging effects described in the Tower of Babel story of dividing people into different language groups. Promoting a sense of universal citizenship would help overcome the types of nationalism which help generate wars. Something went wrong, however. Rhodes committed the same error made by so many other humanitarians before him: he thought that he could accomplish his goals through the channels of the corrupted Brotherhood network. Rhodes therefore ended up creating institutions which promptly fell into the hands of those who would effectively use those institutions to oppress the human race. The Round Table not only failed to do what Rhodes had intended, but its members later helped create two of the 20th century's most heinous institutions: the concentration camp and the very thing that Rhodes had dedicated his life to preventing: the atomic bomb. 

Rhodes' idea for the Round Table had begun in his early twenties. At the age of 24, while a student at Oxford, Rhodes wrote his second will, which described his plans by bequeathing his estate for: 

.. . the establishment, promotion and development of a Secret Society, the true aim and object whereof shall be the extension of British rule throughout the world . ..  and finally the foundation of so great a power as to hereafter render wars impossible and promote the best interests of humanity.

Rhodes' secret society, the Round Table, was finally born in 1891. It was patterned after Freemasonry with its "inner" and "outer" circles. Rhodes's inner circle was called the Circle of Initiates and the outer was the Association of Helpers. The organization's name, the Round Table, was an allusion to King Arthur and his legendary round table. By implication, all members of Rhodes' Round Table were "knights." 

It was inevitable that Rhodes' success and political influence would bring him into contact with other "movers and shakers" of English society. Among them, of course, were the major financiers of Britain. One of Rhodes' chief supporters was the English banker, Lord Rothschild, head of the powerful Rothschild branch in England. Lord Rothschild was listed as one of the proposed members for the Round Table's Circle of Initiates. Another Rhodes associate was the influential English banker, Alfred Milner. 

After Rhodes died in 1902, the Round Table gained increased support from members of the international banking community. They saw in the Round Table a way to exert their influence over governments in the British Commonwealth and elsewhere. In the United States, for example, according to Dr. Quigley: 

The chief backbone of this [Round Table] organization grew up along the already existing financial cooperation running from the Morgan Bank in New York to a group of international financiers led by the Lazard Brothers.4 

From 1925 onward, major contributions to the Round Table came from wealthy individuals, foundations, and companies associated with the international banking fraternity. They included the Carnegie United Kingdom Trust, organizations associated with J. P. Morgan, and the Rockefeller and Whitney families.

After World War I, the Round Table underwent a period of expansion during which many subgroups were created. The man responsible for getting many of the subgroups started was Lionel Curtis. In England and in each British dominion, Curtis established a local chapter (in Quigley's words, a "front group") of the Round Table called the Royal Institute of International Affairs. In the United States, the Round Table "front group" was named the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR). 

Many Americans today are familiar with the New York based Council on Foreign Relations. The CFR is usually thought of as a "think tank" from which come a great many political appointees at the Federal level. Under the Presidential administration of Ronald Reagan, for example, more than seventy administration members belonged to the Council, including a number of top cabinet members. The CFR has dominated earlier Presidential administrations as well, and it dominates the present administration. The chairman of the CFR for many years has been banker David Rockefeller, former chairman of the Chase Manhattan Bank. Another Chase executive chaired the CFR before that. The warning of Thomas Jefferson has come true. The banking fraternity has exercised a strong influence on American politics, notably in. foreign affairs, and the Council on Foreign Relations is one channel through which it has done so. Regrettably, that influence has helped to preserve inflation, debt and warfare as the status quo. 

When Cecil Rhodes was alive, he gained considerable power in South Africa and served for a number of years as colonial governor there. He had a unique and effective way of delegating power. According to one of Rhodes' closest friends, Dr. Jameson, Rhodes gave a great deal of autonomy to his trusted men. Dr. Jameson once wrote: 

. .. Mr. Rhodes left the decision [on what to do in a situation] to the man on the spot, myself, who might be supposed to be the best judge of the conditions. This is Mr. Rhodes' way. It is a pleasure to work with a man of his immense ability, and it doubles the pleasure when you find that, in the execution of his plans, he leaves all to you; although no doubt in the last instance of the Transvaal business he has suffered for this system, still in the long run, the system pays. As long as you reach the end he has in view he is not careful to lay down the means or methods you are to employ. He leaves a man to himself, and that is why he gets the best work they are capable of out of all his men.5 

This can be an effective style of leadership, except when the means used to achieve an end create their own problems. Some of the methods used by Rhodes' men did more long-term harm than immediate good. In South Africa, for example, a struggle between Dutch settlers (the "Boers") and the English erupted into the Boer War. During that conflict, one of the British officers under Rhodes, Lord Kitchener, established concentration camps to hold captured Boers. The camps were decreed by Kitchener on December 27, 1900 and over 117,000 Boers were eventually imprisoned within forty-six camps. Conditions were so inhumane that an estimated 18,000 to 26,000 people died, primarily from disease. It was tantamount to mass murder. Today we associate concentration camps with Nazi Germany and communist Russia, but their 20th-century usage actually began with the English under Lord Kitchener. 

Perhaps the greatest irony in the story of the Round Table was the role of that organization in creating the atomic bomb. After Rhodes' death, the Round Table groups went on to establish other organizations. One of them was the Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) located in Princeton, New Jersey. The IAS greatly assisted the scientists who were developing the first atomic bomb for the United States. Institute members included Robert Oppenheimer, who has been dubbed the "Father of the A-Bomb," and Albert Einstein, to whom the Institute was like a home. 

As we have seen, the world was. undergoing many important developments as it entered the 20th century. Central banking was being organized into an international network. Bankers gained great influence in British and American foreign affairs through such groups as the Round Table  and the Council on Foreign Relations. Meanwhile, the communist movement was gaining increasing momentum in Europe. This momentum bore fruit in 1917 when communist revolutionaries established their first "dictatorship of the proletariat" in Russia. 

Once again, the world was on the road to a Biblical Utopia. 

NEXT
The Workers' Paradise 175S

Notes
CHAPTER 29: The World Afire 
1. Fay, Bernard, Revolution and Freemasonry, 1680-1800 (Boston, Little, Brown, & Co., 1935), p. 259. 
2. Lunden, op. cit., p. 189. 
3. DeHaan, Richard, "Fraternal Organizations," Colliers Encyclopedia, Halsey, op. cit., vol. 10, p. 338. 
4. Lunden, op. cit., p. 190. 
5. Ibid. 
6. Cowles, Virginia, The Rothschilds, A Family of Fortune (New York, Alfred A. Knopf, 1973), p. 22. THE GODS OF EDEN 463 

CHAPTER 30: Master Smith and the Angel 
1. Fryer, A. T., "Psychological Aspects of the Welsh Reviv al," Society of Psychical Research, Proceedings, 19:80, 1905 (republished by the Sourcebook Project, Glen Arm), p. 158. 
2. Ibid., p. 159. 
3. Ibid. 
4. Ibid., p. 149. 
5. Ibid., p. 148-149. 
6. Ibid., p. 134. 
7. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, "Granite Mountain—Where a Billion People 'Live' " (advertising pamphlet, undated), p. 7. 
8. Ibid. 
9. O'Dea, Thomas F., The Mormons (Chicago, The University of Chicago Press, 1957), p. 57. 
10. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, op. cit., p. 5. 

CHAPTER 31: Apocalypse of Marx 
1. Braunthal, Julius (trans. H. Collins and K. Mitchell), History of the International, vol. I: 1864-1914 (New York, Frederick A. Praeger, 1967), p. 

46. CHAPTER 32: Funny Money Goes International 
1. Quigley, Carroll, Tragedy and Hope, a History of the World in Our Time (MacMillan Co., New York, 1966), p. 50. 
2. Ibid., p. 324. 
3. Plomer, William, Cecil Rhodes (Edinburgh, Peter Davis, Ltd., 1933), p. 25-26. 
4. Quigley, op. cit., p. 951. 5. Imperialist, Cecil Rhodes, a Biography and Appreciation (New York, The MacMillan Company, 1897), p. 401-402. 

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