Foucault's pendulum - Umberto Eco [273]
The dialog proceeded in bad French, on both sides. Then Bramanti said: “Brothers, we are gathered here in the name of the One Order, the Unknown Order, to which Order, until yesterday, you did not know that you belonged, and yet you have always belonged to it! Let us swear. Anathema on all profaners of the Secret. Anathema on all sycophants of the occult. Anathema on all those who have made a spectacle of the Rites and Mysteries!”
“Anathema!”
“Anathema on the Invisible College, on the bastard children of Hiram and the Widow, on the operative and speculative masters of the lie of the Orient and the Occident, Ancient, Accepted, or Revised, on Mizraim and Memphis, on the Philalethes and the Nine Sisters, on the Strict Observance and on the Ordo Tem-pli Orientis, on the Illuminati of Bavaria and of Avignon, on the Kadosh Knights, on the Elus Cohen, on the Perfect Friendship, on the Knights of the Black Eagle and of the Holy City, on the Rosicrucians of Anglia, on the cabalists of the Rose + Cross of Gold, on the Golden Dawn, on the Catholic Rosy Cross of the Temple and of the Grail, on the Stella Matutina, on the Astrum Argentinum and Thelema, on Vril and Thule, on every ancient and mystical usurper of the name of the Great White Fraternity, on the Guardians of the Temple, on every college and priory of Zion and of Gaul!”
“Anathema!”
“Whoever out of ingenuity, submission, conversion, calculation, or bad faith has been initiated into any lodge, college, priory, chapter, or order that illicitly refers to obedience to the Unknown Superiors or to the Masters of the World, must this night abjure that initiation and implore total restoration in spirit and body to the one and true observance, the Tres, Templi Re-surgentes Equites Synarchici, the triune and trinosophic mystical and most secret order of the Synarchic Knights of Templar Rebirth!”
“Sub umbra alarum tuarum!”
“Now enter the dignitaries of the thirty-six highest and most secret degrees.”
As Bramanti called the elect, they appeared in liturgical vestments, wearing the insigne of the Golden Fleece on their chest.
“Knight of the Baphomet, Knight of the Six Intact Seals, Knight of the Seventh Seal, Knight of the Tetragrammaton, Knight Executioner of Florian and Dei, Knight of the Atha-nor... Venerable Naometer of the Turns Babel, Venerable Naometer of the Great Pyramid, Venerable Naometer of the Cathedrals, Venerable Naometer of the Temple of Solomon, Venerable Naometer of the Hortus Palatinus, Venerable Naometer of the Temple of Heliopolis...”
As Bramanti recited the titles, those named entered in groups, so I was unable to assign to each his individual dignity, but among the first twelve I saw De Gubernatis, the old man from the Librairie Sloane, Professor Camestres, and others I had met that evening in Piedmont. And I saw Signer Garamond, I believe as Knight of the Tetragrammaton, composed and hieratic, very much absorbed in his new role, with hands that trembled as they touched the Fleece on his chest. Meanwhile, Bramanti went on: “Mystical Legate of Karnak, Mystical Legate of Bavaria, Mystical Legate of the Barbelognostics, Mystical Legate of Camelot, Mystical Legate of Montsegur, Mystical Legate of the Hidden Imam... Supreme Patriarch of Tomar, Supreme Patriarch of Kilwinning, Supreme Patriarch of Saint-Martin-des-Champs, Supreme Patriarch of Marienbad, Supreme Patriarch of the Invisible Okhrana, Supreme Patriarch in partibus of the Rock of Alamut...”
The patriarch of the Invisible Okhrana was Salon, still gray-faced but, without his smock, now resplendent in a yellow tunic edged in red. He was followed by Pierre, the psychopomp of the Eglise Luciferienne, who wore on his chest, instead of the Golden Fleece, a dagger in a gilded sheath. Meanwhile, Bra-manti went on: “Sublime Hierogam of the Chemical Wedding, Sublime Rodostauric Psychopomp, Sublime Referendarium of the Most Arcane Arcana, Sublime Steganograph of the Hieroglyphic Monad, Sublime Astral Connector Utriusque Cosmi, Sublime Keeper of the Tomb of Rosencreutz... Imponderable Archon of the Currents, Imponderable