XPost: rec.arts.books.tolkien, alt.books.cs-lewis   
   From: hayesstw@telkomsa.net   
      
   On Mon, 29 Mar 2010 10:43:36 -0700, Paul S. Person   
    wrote:   
      
   >In a desperate attempt to move this closer to something like being   
   >on-topic, I must ask: does Charles William's order, by any chance,   
   >match that of Gregory rather than that of Dionysius?   
      
   Oh, I think it's close enough to being on topic, though I doubt that we shall   
   determine exactly which order the Maiar correspond to, since, as you point   
   out, the Church Fathers  themselves differ over the precise order.   
   >   
   >Not that I would be surprised to learn of other orders being promoted   
   >by other Church Fathers. No, I would not be surprised at all.   
      
   For what it's worth, here's the passage from Williams's "The place of the   
   lion":   
      
   === begin quote ===   
   Richardson leaned forward and picked up from the table a very old bound   
   book and a very fat exercise book. He again settled himself in his   
   chair, and said, looking firmly at Anthony--"This is the _De Angelis_ of   
   Marcellus Victorinus of Bologna, published in the year 1514. at Paris,   
   and dedicated to Leo X."   
      
   "Is it?" Anthony said uncertainly.   
      
   "Berringer picked it up in Berlin--it's not complete, unfortunately--and   
   lent it to me when he found I was interested to have a shot at   
   translating. There's nothing to show who our Marcellus was, and the book   
   itself, from what he says in the dedication, isn't so much his own as a   
   version of a work by a Greek--Alexander someone--written centuries   
   before 'in the time of Your Holiness's august predecessor, Innocent the   
   Second.' In the eleven hundreds about the time of Abelard. However, that   
   doesn't matter. What is interesting is that it seems to confirm the idea   
   that there was another view of angels from that ordinarily accepted. Not   
   very orthodox perhaps, but I suppose orthodoxy wasn't the first   
   requisite at the Court of Leo."   
      
   He paused and turned the pages. "I think I'll read you a few extracts,"   
   he said. "Most of the dedication is missing; the rest is the usual   
   magniloquence.   
      
   "'For it may rightly be said that Your Holiness both roars as a lion   
   and rides as an eagle, burdens as an ox, and governs as a man, all in   
   defence of the Apostolic and Roman Church: in this singularly uniting   
   the qualities of those great angels, so that Your Holiness is   
   justly'--his adverbs are all over the place--'to be called the Angel of   
   the Church.' Well, we can miss that; probably Leo did. The beginning of   
   the text is missing, but on page 17 we get down to it. You'll have to   
   excuse the English; it amused me to do it in a kind of rhetoric--the   
   Latin suggests it.   
      
   "'These orders then we have received from antiquity, and according to   
   the vision of seers, who nevertheless reserved something from us, that   
   by the devotion of our hearts and the study of the Sacred Word we might   
   ourselves follow in their footsteps and enlarge the knowledge of those   
   secret things which are laid up in heaven. For by such means the Master   
   in Byzantion'--that's the Greek, of course--'expounded to us certain of   
   the symbols and shapes whereby the Divine Celestials are expressed, but   
   partly in riddles lest evil men work sorcery, not certainly upon those   
   Celestials themselves--for how should the propinquity of the Serene   
   Majesty be subject to such hellish markings and invocations?--but upon   
   that appearance of them which, being separated from the Beatific Vision,   
   is dragon-like flung forth into the void. As it is written: _Michael and   
   his angels fought against the dragon and his angels, and the dragon was   
   cast out_. Which is falsely apprehended by many of the profane vulgar,   
   or indeed not at all, for they...'"   
      
   "Half a second," said Anthony. "I've a feeling for the profane vulgar.   
   What _is_ he talking about?"   
      
   "'They'," Richardson read rapidly, "'suppose that the said dragon is   
   himself a creation and manifest existence, and not rather the power of   
   the Divine Ones arrogated to themselves for sinful purpose by violent   
   men. Now this dragon which is the power of the lion is accompanied also   
   by a ninefold order of spectres, according to the hierarchy of the   
   composed wonders of heaven.'"   
      
   "The what?" Anthony exclaimed.   
      
   "'The composed wonders of heaven,'" Richardson repeated; "'and these   
   spectres being invoked have power upon those who adore them and   
   transform them into their very terrible likeness, destroying them with   
   great moanings; as they do also such as inadvisedly set themselves in   
   the way of such powers, wandering without guide or intelligential   
   knowledge, and being made the prey of the uncontrolled emanations.'"   
      
   "Do stop a moment," Anthony said. "Who _are_ the uncontrolled   
   emanations?"   
      
   Richardson looked up. "The idea seems to be that the energies of these   
   orders can exist in separation from the intelligence which is in them in   
   heaven; and that if deliberately or accidentally you invoke the energy   
   without the intelligence, you're likely eventually to be pretty   
   considerably done for."   
      
   "O!" said Anthony. "And the orders are the original Dionysian nine?"   
      
   "Right," Richardson agreed. "Well, the next few pages are mostly   
   cursing, and the next few are about the devotion of the Eastern doctor   
   who found it all out. Then we get a little aesthetic theory. 'For albeit   
   those who paint upon parchment or in churches or make mosaic work of   
   precious metals have designed these holy Universals in human shape,   
   presenting them as youths of beautiful appearance, clothed in candid   
   vestures, and this for the indoctrination of the vulgar, who are thereby   
   more easily brought to a humble admiration of such essence and dare to   
   invoke them worthily under the protection of the Blessed Triune, yet it   
   is not to be held by the wise that such human masculinities are in any   
   way even a convenient signification of their true nature; nay, these   
   presentations do in some sense darken the true seeker and communicate   
   confusion, and were it not written that we should have respect to the   
   eyes of children and cast no stone of offence in the way of little ones,   
   it would have been better that such errors should have been forbidden by   
   the wisdom of the Church. For what can the painting of a youth show of   
   those Celestial Benedictions, of which the first circle is that of a   
   lion, and the second circle is that of a serpent, and the third circle   
   is--'   
      
   "The next eight pages are missing."   
      
   "Damn!" Anthony said heartily. "Doesn't he tell you anywhere else?"   
      
   "He doesn't," Richardson said. "When we pick him up he has got right on   
   to the ninth circle which is that of goodness only knows what and is   
   attributed to the seraphim, and he dithyrambs on about the seraphim   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
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