40 § Concerning the Two Saint Johns

EVEN though summer is generally considered as a joyful season and winter as a sad one, by the fact that the first represents in a way the triumph of light and the second that of darkness, the two corresponding solstices none the less have an exactly opposite significance. This may seem to be a rather strange paradox, but it is quite easy to understand that it should be so, once one has some knowledge of traditional teaching about the course of the annual cycle. Indeed, what has attained its maximum can thenceforth only diminish; and what has come to its minimum, on the contrary, can only begin to increase forthwith.^[1] This is why the summer solstice marks the start of the descending half of the year, and the winter solstice, conversely, that of its ascending half; and it is also what explains, from the point of view of its cosmic meaning, this saying of St John the Baptist, whose birth coincides with the summer solstice: 'He must increase, but I must decrease'.^[2] It is known that in the Hindu tradition, the ascending phase of the year is related to the _deva-yana_, and the descending phase to the _pitri-yāna_. Consequently, in the Zodiac, the sign of Cancer, corresponding to the summer solstice, is the 'gate of men', which gives access to the _pitri-yāna_; and the sign of Capri- corn, which corresponds to the winter solstice, is the 'gate of the gods', which gives access to the _deva-yāna_. In reality, it is the ascending half of the annual cycle that is the 'joyful' period, that is, benefic or favourable; and it is the des- cending half that is the 'sad', that is, malefic or unfavourable period; and the same may naturally be said of the solstitial gateway which opens each of these periods into which the year is divided by the very direction of the sun's movement.^[3]

In Christianity the feasts of the two Saint Johns are directly related to the two solstices;^[4] and what is rather remarkable, though we have not seen it noted anywhere, is that the descent and ascent that we have just mentioned are in a way expressed by the double meaning of the name John^[5] itself. In fact, the Hebrew word _hanan_ has at the same time the sense of 'benevolence' and of 'mercy', and that of 'praise' (and it is at least curious to note that in French itself words like _grâce_ and _merci_ have exactly the same double meaning). Thus the name _Jahanan_ can mean both 'mercy of God' and also 'praise to God'. Now it is easy to appreciate that the first of these two meanings seems to agree particularly well with St John the Baptist, and the second with St John the Evangelist. Furthermore, it can be said that mercy is obviously descending and that praise is ascending, which brings us again to their correlation with the two halves of the annual cycle.^[6]

In relation to the two Saint Johns and their solstitial symbolism, it is of interest to consider a symbol which seems peculiar to Masonry in the Anglo-Saxon world, or which at least has only been preserved in that Masonry. This is a circle with a point in the centre, placed between two parallel tangents; and these tangents are said to represent the two Saint Johns. In fact, the circle is here the annual cycle, and its solar significance is made more evident by the presence of the central point, for this same figure is also the astrological sign of the sun. The two parallel lines are tangents of the circle at the solstitial points, which they thus define as 'limit points', these points being in fact bounds beyond which the sun can never pass in the course of its journey. It is because the lines thus correspond to the two solstices that they can also be said to represent precisely the two Saint Johns. Nevertheless, there is in this representation an anomaly, at least an apparent one: the solstitial diameter of the annual cycle, as we have explained on other occasions, must be considered as relatively vertical in relation to the equinoctial diameter, and moreover it is only so that the two halves of the cycle, going from one solstice to the other, can really be seen as ascendant and descendant, respectively, the two solstitial points then being the highest and lowest points of the circle. This means that the tangents to the two extremities of the solstitial diameter, since they are perpendicular to it, will necessarily be horizontal. But in the symbol we are now considering, the two tangents are, on the contrary, represented as vertical. In this special case, therefore, a certain modification has been brought to the general symbolism of the annual cycle, one that is moreover easy enough to explain, for it is obvious that it could only have been introduced by an assimilation established between the two parallel lines and another double symbol, that of the two columns. The columns, which by their nature can only be vertical, have thereby, as well as by their being respectively to the North and South, a real relationship with solstitial symbolism, at least from a certain point of view.

This aspect of the two columns is seen with particular clarity in the case of the symbol of the 'pillars' of Hercules. The 'solar hero' aspect of Hercules and the zodiacal correspondence of his twelve labours are too well known to require emphasis; and it goes without saying that it is precisely this solar character that justifies the solstitial significance of the two columns to which^[7][8] his name is attached. This being so, the motto _ne plus ultra_ which is related to these pillars, is seen to have a double meaning. It expresses not only the usual terrestrial interpretation, valid in its own order, to the effect that the pillars mark the limit beyond which, for reasons which might well make an interesting object of research, voyagers were forbidden to pass. But the motto indicates at the same time, and no doubt we should say above all, that from the celestial point of view, these are the limits that the sun cannot overpass and between which, as between the two tangents mentioned just now, its annual journey is accom-plished. These last considerations may seem quite far from our starting point, but it is not really so, for they contribute to the explanation of a symbol that is related expressly to the two Saint Johns. Moreover, in the Christian form of the tradition, one may say that all that concerns solstitial symbolism is also by that fact in more or less direct relationship with these two Saints.

9. A representation of the pillars of Hercules can be seen on ancient Spanish coins, in which they are joined by a kind of streamer on which _ne plus ultra_ is inscribed. Now a fact which seems little enough known, and which we mention here only as a curiosity, is that the usual sign of the American dollar is derived from this figure. But here, all the importance has been given to the streamer, which originally was only an accessory and which has been changed into the letter S whose form it approximated, while the two columns which constituted the essential element were reduced to two parallel strokes, vertical like the two tangents to the circle in Masonic sym-bolism, which we have just now explained. This is not without a certain irony, for in fact it was precisely the discovery of America that annulled the ancient geographical relevance of the _ne plus ultra_.