Eco: Foucalt's Pendulum eco foucault (highly illogical behavior txt) 📖

reexaminationsof obsolete rituals, and for me the Luciferine Church and the Orderof Satan are equally to be respected above and beyond theirdemonological differences. You know my skepticism in this matter.But, in the end, we all belong to the same spiritual knighthood,and I urge you to show a minimum of solidarity. After all,gentlemen, to involve the Prince of Darkness in a personal spat!How very childish! Come, come, these are occultists' tales. You arebehaving like vulgar Freemasons. To be frank, yes, Boutroux is adissident, and perhaps, my dear Bramanti, you might suggest to himthat he sell to some junk dealer all that paraphernalia of his,like the props for a production of Boito'sMefistofele..."

"Ha, c'est bien dit,ca," the Frenchman snickered. "C'est de labrocanterie..."

"Let's try to see thisin perspective. There has been a debate on what we will callliturgical formalisms, tempers have flared, but we mustn't makemountains out of molehills. Mind you, my dear Pierre, I am not forone moment denying the presence in your house of alien entities;it's the most natural thing in the world, but with a little commonsense it could all be explained as a poltergeist."

"Yes, I wouldn't excludethat possibility," Bramanti said. "The astral conjuncture at thistime..."

"Well then! Come, shakehands, and a fraternal embrace."

We heard murmurs ofreciprocal apologies. "You know yourself," Bramanti was saying,"sometimes to identify one who is truly awaiting initiation, it isnecessary to indulge in a bit of folklore. Even those merchants ofthe Great Orient, who believe in nothing, have aceremony."

"Bien entendu, lerituel, ah ca..."

"But these are no longerthe days of Crowley. Is that clear?" Aglie said. "I must leave younow. I have other guests."

We quickly went back tothe sofa and waited for Aglie with composure andnonchalance.

47

Our exalted task then isto find order in these seven measures, a pattern that is distinctand will keep always the sense alert and the memory clear...Thisexalted and incomparable configuration not only performs thefunction of preserving entrusted things, words, and arts...but inaddition it gives us true knowledge...

¡XGiulio CamilloDelminio, L'idea del Theatre, Florence, Torrentino, 1550,Introduction

A few minutes later,Agile came in. "Do forgive me, dear friends, I had to deal with adispute that was regrettable, to say the least. As my friendCasaubon knows, I consider myself a student of the history ofreligions, and for this reason people not infrequently come to mefor illumination, relying perhaps more on my common sense than onmy learning. It's odd how, among the adepts of sapiential studies,eccentric personalities are sometimes found...I don't mean theusual seekers after transcendental consolation, I don't mean themelancholy spirits, but men of profound knowledge and greatintellectual refinement who nevertheless indulge in nocturnalfantasies and lose the ability to distinguish between traditionaltruth and the archipelago of the prodigious. The people with whom Ispoke just now were arguing about childish conjectures. Alas, ithappens in the best families, as they say. But do come into mylittle study, please, where we can converse in more comfortablesurroundings."

He raised the leathercurtain and showed us into the next room. "Little study" is not howI would have described it; it was spacious, with walls of exquisiteantique shelving crammed with handsomely bound books all ofvenerable age. What impressed me more than the books were somesmall glass cases filled with objects hard to identify¡Xthey lookedlike stones. And there were little animals, whether stuffed,mummified, or delicately reproduced I couldn't say. Everything wasbathed in a diffuse crepuscular light that came from a largedouble-mullioned window at the end, with leaded diamond panes oftransparent amber. The light from the window blended with that of agreat lamp on a dark mahogany table covered with papers. It was oneof those lamps sometimes found on reading tables in old libraries,with a dome of green glass that could cast a white oval on the pagewhile leaving the surroundings in an opalescent penumbra. This playof two sources of light, both unnatural, somehow enlivened thepolychrome of the ceiling. The ceiling was vaulted, supported onall four sides by a decorative fiction: little brick-red columnswith tiny gilded capitals. The many trompe 1'oeil images, dividedinto seven areas, enhanced the effect of depth, and the whole roomhad the feeling of a mortuary chapel, impalpably sinful,melancholy, sensual.

"My little theater,"Aglie said, "in the style of those Renaissance fantasies wherevisual encyclopedias were laid out, syl-loges of the universe. Notso much a dwelling as a memory machine. There is no image that,when combined with the others, does not embody a mystery of theworld. You will notice that line of figures there, painted inimitation of those in the palace of Mantua: they are the thirty-sixdecans, the Masters of the Heavens. And respecting the tradition,after I found this splendid reconstruction¡Xthe work of an unknownartist¡XI went about acquiring the little objects in the glasscases, which correspond to the images on the ceiling. Theyrepresent the fundamental elements of the universe: air, water,earth, and fire. Hence the presence of this charming salamander,the master-work of a taxidermist friend, and this delicatereproduction in miniature, a rather late piece, of the aeolipile ofHero, in which the air contained in the sphere, were I to activatethis little alcohol stove, warming it, would escape from theselateral spouts and thereby cause rotation. A magic instrument.Egyptian priests used it in their shrines, as so many texts informus. They exploited it to claim a miracle, which the massesvenerated, while the true miracle is the golden law that governsthis secret and simple mechanism of the elements earth and fire.Here is learning that our ancients possessed, as did the men ofalchemy, but that the builders of cyclotrons have lost. And so Icast my gaze on my theater of memory, this child of so many vastertheaters that beguiled the great minds of the past, and I know. Iknow better than the so-called learned. As it is below, so it isabove. And there is nothing more to know.''

He offered us Cubancigars, curiously shaped¡Xnot straight, but contorted,curled¡Xthough they were thick. We uttered cries of admiration.Diotallevi went over to the shelves.

"Oh," Aglie said, "aminimal library, as you see, barely two hundred volumes; I havemore in my family home. But, if I may say so, all these have somemerit, some value. And they are not arranged at