Page:Star Lore Of All Ages, 1911.pdf/330

234 "The Bull, Lion, and Man are three of the four Cherubic forms frequently referred to in the Bible, and so often an object of worship in early idolatries. The fourth form, the Eagle, is so closely associated with the Scorpion, that it is an evident fact that the guardianship, as it were, of the four quarters of the heavens had been allotted to these four mysterious forms."

The Medes, who dwelt in the vicinity of Babylon early in the fourth millennium, invented an astronomic monogram in which, some claim, there may be clearly read an allusion to these four constellations of the zodiac, which at that date marked the four seasons.

This monogram was used as a standard thousands of years later by the Semitic Assyrians. The principal stars in these four constellations were known to the ancients as "the four Royal Stars."

The Persians had a tradition that four brilliant stars marked the four cardinal points, i. e., the colures, and these Royal Stars were Regulus, in Leo, Aldebaran, in Taurus, Antares, in Scorpius, and Fomalhaut, in the Southern Fish. These four stars were celebrated throughout all Asia. The brilliant star in the Eagle, Altair, has been suggested as the fourth Royal Star instead of Fomalhaut. Thus, as in the vision of Ezekiel, so in the constellation figures, the Lion, the Ox, the Man, and the Eagle stood as the upholders of the firmament, as "the pillars of heaven." They looked down like sentinels upon all creation, and seemed to guard the four quarters of the sky.

Leo is for many reasons significant to Masons. In the four Royal Stars, the four great Elohim, or Decans, gods ruling the signs, were believed to dwell. The four Decans who ruled the four angles of the heavens were the most important and most powerful.

To these four stars divine honours were paid, and sacred images were erected in which the Lion, Eagle, Ox, and Man were variously combined. These figures appear on the