the Atlantean epoch, the Lords of Venus and the Lords of Mercury came to the earth for the purpose of giving a further impulse to the mental and emotional development. It was the task of Venus to combat the lower emotions and raise the brutish animal passion of Mars to the softer and more beautiful Venus-love, She was to add beauty to strength, and to attain that ideal the Lords of Venus fostered the plastic arts, painting and sculpture, these were not taught men of the general public at that time; the ideals which are to be developed in a race are always first taught to the most advanced ones in a mystery temple, and at that time initiation included no spiritual instruction, but consisted of an education in the liberal arts. Sculpture taught how the beautiful may be incorporated in physical form. It called attention to the body and idealized the softly curved lines, The result is now incorporated in our own race body, for it should be thoroughly understood that in a mystery school an ideal is not taught today simply to be forgotten tomorrow or the next generation, but ideals are inculcated so that in time they may become a part of the very life, soul and body of the race. Compare the race body of the Indian, the Bush-man, the Hottentots, etc. with that of the modern civilized man, and you will find that there is indeed beauty added to strength.
It may he objected that we are degenerating compared with what is shown in the Hellenic Arts, but that is positively not so, it is rather that we
