On the day of the heliocentric alignment between the Magister Musicae Mercury and the asteroid Calliope, the greatest of the Muses, Goddess of Thought and of the Art of Philosophical Government, we sow the 3rd chapter of the text Academy of the Muses, dedicating our contemplation of the Beautiful, the Good and the True to the powerful and victorious Light of the incipient Wesak, Solar Feast of Taurus and culmination of the Conclave of the Masters of this Great Year of Decision (12 May 2025 Full Moon of Taurus, 4.58 pm GMT).
Let us start from the ‘foundation of truth’ of the Muse Legend:
Beauty, Goodness, Truth, Wisdom, Joy … are real Entities, Energies and Symbols: they are the Names of the Muses.
Occult Tradition thus clarifies their nature:
“… beauty, goodness and wisdom are not qualities, as their inadequate nomenclature would imply, but are great facts in manifestation … they are not descriptive of Deity but are the names of Lives of a potency and activity of which men can as yet know nothing …
“The symbol or first expression of this (for all in the three worlds is but the symbol of an inner reality) is the driving urge to betterment which is the outstanding characteristic of the human animal. From discontent to discontent he passes, driven by an inner something which constantly reveals to him an enticing vision of that which is more desirable than his present state and experience.”1
The Muses are the sacred impulse to return to the perfect Beauty of Heaven.
“… The Thinker taught, “Know how to recognize joy. Among the Muses there is the Muse of Joy [Thalia], but you can invite this Protectress only by beautiful words and thoughts. Do not attempt to threaten and demand, for She comes only by the path of Beauty.” (SOV 231)
The Muses are … and are the best of Life and of our lives.
And let’s realize that it is only at the dawn of our Greek-Latin culture that Their Name began to resonate in human consciousness – what a sublime gift! Other Names resonate the same substantial or feminine Principle in the various traditions, but for us ‘today’ it is Their Legend, part of the worldwide Legend about the Mother of the World, that has etched a new path for Evolution, the grace of a new enchantment.
“Of all creative energies, thought remains supreme. What may be the crystal of this energy? Some believe that precise knowledge is the crown of thought; but it would be more correct to say that legend is the crown of thought. In legend is expressed the essence of creative energy. In a legend’s short formula are defined both hope and achievement. It is a mistake to believe that legends are fantasies of antiquity. The impartial mind will discern the legend spun through all the days of the Universe. Each great achievement of a nation, each great leader, each important discovery, each cataclysm, each podvig [total striving] is veiled in winged legend. Therefore, let us not disdain the legends of truth; let us discern keenly and cherish the words of reality. In legend is expressed the will of the people, and we cannot cite one legend that was false. The spiritual striving of the powerful collective spirit imprints an image of true meaning. And the outer form of a symbol is a sign for the world, a part of a world language, which is inevitable in evolution.
Right are the seekers of a universal tongue. Right are the creators of the world’s legends. Thrice right are the bearers of podvig!”.2
The Muses: humanity has remembered them, thought of them and named them, and Their recognition has changed our pace of advance forever!
All the best hearts and minds of every human field, even without knowing this world legend, now have the Muses as Mothers of creation and Masters of perfection and in due time They will awaken the peoples to their/our fundamental Oneness, through Beauty.
Let us therefore follow the signs handed down by Their Legend to discern and honor Their underlying creative principles. Our thoughts will be inspired by them more and more deeply, and one day we will be able to imitate and reflect Their Initiatory Work, so as to contribute to the foundation of the New Aquarian Culture and Civilization, and to make the Joy and Strength of the Good, the Beautiful and the True flourish in humanity:
“Up till now the mark of the Saviour has been the Cross, and the quality of the salvation offered has been freedom from substance or the lure of matter and from its hold—a freedom only to be achieved at a great cost. The future holds within its silence other modes of saving humanity. The cup of sorrow and the agony of the Cross are well-nigh finished. Joy and strength will take their place. Instead of sorrow we shall have a joy which will work out in happiness and lead eventually to bliss. We shall have a strength which will know naught but victory and will not recognise disaster.” (RI, 233-4)
In the Legend, the oldest song of the Muses is the one they sang after the victory of the Olympians over the Titans, to celebrate the birth of a new order.
There were two main groups of Muses: those from Thrace, from “Pieria,” and those from Boeotia, located on the slopes of Mount Helicon.
The former, close to Olympus, often bear, in poetry, the name of Pierides. They are related to the myth of Orpheusand the cult of Dionysus. The Muses of Helicon are placed more directly under Apollo.
“If the Muses and Apollo play a fundamental role … in giving the world the completeness of order and beauty, in dispensing the knowledge of music, there is a figure in whose profile re-emerges the idea of a word-song as a power that operates and intervenes in the different domains of the universe, managing to direct its effects and structure differently. This is Orpheus who was given birth, not surprisingly, by a Muse [Calliope with Apollo]. … For the zither and the voice of Orpheus know and can produce the sounds that set every plane and every element of the cosmos in vibration. There is no realm of nature that cannot be moved and influenced by his music. Minerals, plants and animals come into immediate consonance with its song and bend to it, realising or accomplishing what that song requires. Thus take place events that, to the common man, appear incredible wonders in open contrast to the laws and evidences of reality. But, if Orphic music succeeds in so much, it is precisely because it knows how to perceive and tune with the deep laws of nature, because it knows the secret sonorities of each element and is able, in turn, to dispose of them. Magic is nothing more than reaching the necessary vibration, mastering it and giving it the desired direction. … The music of the son of the Muse is intimate communion with nature and at the same time lordship over every one of its innermost forces.
Precisely because he is endowed with such power, Orpheus is the indispensable companion of heroes who are prepared to face the most arduous undertakings. … Orpheus’ voice and song are thaumaturgical power that heals, saves and restores life. … Singing and initiatory practice, word magic and ritual are, in Orpheus, two aspects of the same sacred “knowledge” that unveils the arcana of life and death, showing the secret way to confront and master them. Poetry and initiation are the faces of a single art that has penetrated the fundamental mystery of nature and is able to dispose of it to change the outlook and existence of mortals.” (DSM)
“As for the tension between Dionysus and Apollo, the two deities constitute, in fact, the poles through which the figure and wisdom of Orpheus oscillate. Dionysus is the pulsing of an indestructible life that continually regenerates itself: the power of a life that springs from the very bosom of death, the ecstasy of a nature in which contraries coincide and every end is reversed into a beginning. Apollo, on the other hand, is light that dispels all darkness, the solar principle of unity that opposes the undifferentiated, the accomplished form of song and speech in which ecstatic experience and wisdom are expressed. Orpheus sings with the art and zither of Apollo, but he penetrates Hades hell, following the trajectory and example of Dionysus, who had descended there to snatch his own mother from the realm of the dead (Diodorus Siculus, Library 4:25). Orpheus is the solar beauty of poetry, but he is also the encounter with the Dionysian force that ceaselessly sustains and awakens the life of nature and men. The cantor’s magic is effective and powerful as he participates in the experience of both gods. … The initiations of Orpheus pivot on this core: Dionysus, reunified by Apollo, had been reawakened to new life; similarly, men, treasuring the poem and rites of the cantor, can escape complete dissolution since the divine fragment within them is a promise of eternal life and rebirth to a higher plane. The magic of Orpheus is an instrument of salvation if one knows how to understand and employ it in the necessary way.” (DSM)
Apollo directed the songs and dances of the Muses and the place of worship, in Helicon, was a sacred forest, in the vicinity of which was the Aganippe spring; near the summit of the mountain, another spring “of dark light” gushed forth, which was said to have sprung from a kick of the horse Pegasus and was called precisely therefore Hippocrene, that is, “the horse’s spring.”
Begin our singing with the Heliconian Muses,
Who possess Mount Helicon, high and holy,
And near its violet-stained spring on petal-soft feet
Dance circling the altar of almighty Cronion,
And having bathed their silken skin in Permessos
Or in Horse Spring or the sacred creek Olmeios,
They begin their choral dance on Helicon’s summit
So lovely it pangs, and with power in their steps …
(Hesiod – Theogony, Proem)
Between Heaven and Earth, the horse, living Symbol of Mind, winged like Mercury, and steed of Perseus3 analogue of Him, corresponds in the highest symbol of the Firmament to the Constellation Pegasus, whose “hoof” touches the situla of Aquarius, vessel from which flows that Fluvius Aquarii, the water of life, in which swims the Austral Fish, the single Fish symbolizing the Avatarof the New Age.
This new Aquarian Musagete brings Strength and Joy, the new art of living that will transform the old evolutionary methods of the Age of Pisces based on crucifying the still-unclarified emotional waters, incapable of compassionate dispassion: “art will be the only vital medium of the new culture” (AY) and Beauty, ‘the sign of union,’ will occupy the propulsive Center of the new Mysteries, progressively guiding the common sense of public opinion to the Will-to-Good, to serve in brotherhood the Common Purpose: only “the realization of beauty will save the world.” (AY)
Common sense, on closer inspection, is reflection in the mass consciousness of the enlightened thought, of which Mercury, Perseus and Pegasus are bearers and Symbols:
“… Pegasus, the winged horse, ever the inspiring symbol of the higher mind, love, spurning the earth, at home in the air. On a lower level we are reminded of the winged feet of Mercury, ever wings of the mind remembering also that one definition of love is ‘the cold clear light of reason.’” (FE, 91)
The water of life of Aquarius, an Airy Sign that transmits the pure 5th Ray of Mind Force and Science, sings the “special wisdom” of Joy: the intelligent Love, dispassionate boundless and ardent, that will lead to remembering our infinite Origin and Nature, to sing and dance the Oneness of the Whole: to serve the Brotherhood between the worlds.
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As indicated, the Muses, Goddesses of the mountains and springs (of the spiritual worlds and water of life, the electric and creative power of thought/psychic energy) are sometimes associated with the Nymphs (of lower hierarchical level) who bestow the enthusiasm that comes from the spectacles and beauties of nature, led by Dionysus Musagetes; however, the epithet is proper to Apollo, the god who leads the chorusof Muses, who together with him dance and sing especially during the festivals and banquets of the Olympian gods.
Raphael, Apollo and the Muses in the Stanza della Segnatura, Vatican
In chant, understood as musical historical narrative, the Muses were superior to any human since they knew perfectly not only the past and present but also the future. Their earliest chant we have seen was that addressed to the victory of the gods against the revolt of the Titans, but they cheered every feast, as in the case of the wedding of Cadmus and Harmonia and Thetis and Peleus, or again lamenting the loss of valiant Achilles for seventeen days and seventeen nights.
François krater “Marriage of Thetis” – Archaeological Museum of Florence.4
They are often represented in poetry as they set to music and versesuch stories as the origin of the world, the birth of gods and men, and the exploits of Zeus.
The Muses, repositories of memory (Mnemosyne) and knowledge as daughters of Zeus, thus occupied the Center or heart of Greek religion: they represented the supreme ideal of Art, understood as the truth of the Whole, the eternal magnificence of the Divine.
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The Muses are one, three, seven or nine. But, “since classical times, the number nine has imposed itself, and the following list is generally admitted [names already enshrined in Hesiod’s Theogony]: Calliope, the first of all in dignity, then Clio, Polymnia (or Polyhymnia), Euterpe, Terpsichore, Erato, Melpomene, Thalia, Urania. Only gradually did each receive a certain function, moreover varying according to the authors. But, very generally, Calliope is credited with epic poetry; Clio with history; Polymnia with pantomime; Euterpe with flute; Terpsichore with light poetry and dance; Erato with choral lyricism; Melpomene with tragedy; Thalia with comedy; Urania, with astronomy.” (EDM)
The Muses were also the ones who had taught the Sphinx, the monster spawned by Echidna had from Typhon, the famous riddle she proposed to Thebans passing through Mount Phycium.
The number Nine and such mystery of the Sphinx5 link the Muses to the Sign of Virgo (the Sixth Sign from the manifest Beginning of Aries, but Ninth from the occult Beginning of Capricornus), the Cosmic Mother, whose Sanskrit Name Kanyā (virgin, young woman – from the root “kan,” the “breathing [an] with enveloping motion [k]”) represents Śakti or Mahāmāyā, the force of Nature (see above the table of the Seven Creative Hierarchies).
“This Sixth Sign or Rāśi indicates that there are six primary forces in Nature, in their unity represented by the Astral Light, the Seventh Force: kabbalists and hermetic philosophers call the Astral Light the “Celestial or Heavenly Virgin.” Hence the seven principles spread throughout each unit, i.e. the 6 and ONE – two triangles and a crown.”6
Virgo “is the nurturing force of substance itself, subject to the nine cyclic changes of cosmic gestation; it nurtures and protects the divine embryonic Christic life (the soul), about to manifest or incarnate.
Nine signs (Virgo included), nine united powers, contribute to the development of Christic life in both the individual and the collective. The whole history of human progress and the secret of the processes of divine manifestation lie in this interconnected numerical synthesis, in this mutual and fruitful relationship:
- Nine is the number of man. Actually, the fourth creative Hierarchy (the Human) is the ninth, if the unexpressed five are included.
- Nine is the number of initiation, as far as humanity is concerned.
What Virgo conceals is in potency capable of reacting to nine energies that, acting on the life within the form and evoking the soul’s responsiveness, bring about “crises” and “instances of proven development.”7
And virgins or nurturers calls the Nine Muses the Supreme Poet:
O Virgins, sacrosanct, if I have ever,
for your sake, suffered vigils, cold, and hunger,
great need makes me entreat my recompense.
Now Helicon must pour its fountains for me,
Urania must help me with her choir
to put in verses things hard to conceive.8
Understanding the Muses as the virgin or primary Energies of the Cosmos and Nature, that is, their belonging to the Mother aspect of reality, which for esotericism coincides with the “virgin” Substance-Matter associated with the Holy Spirit or Third Aspect (the First is that of the Spirit/Father and the Second that of Consciousness/Son), calls into play the so-called deva evolution9 of the Mother of the World, feminine or receptive Origin of creation, articulated in her subdivisions (analogous to the angelic hierarchies of the Christian tradition).
With respect to solar manifestation and human evolution, we can then imagine the Deva Essence of the Muses attested on the higher levels (cosmic ethers) of the cosmic physical plane, particularly from the Second monadic level (2ndHierarchy of Virgo-Jupiter) to the Fourth Buddhic level of our Spiritual Souls or Solar Angels of the WORD made Flesh(4th Hierarchy of Scorpio-Mercury – see figure p. 11).
One Mother – Three, Seven, Nine Virgin Mothers – who with the Power of Sound and Thought help us bring forth the Christ in us: the Soul. “The keynote which embodies the truth as to the mission of Virgo most accurately is “Christ in you, the hope of glory.” (EA)
The Muse, the highest deva essence, is a depiction of the lyrical essence of reality, that holy spirit whose Breath and Song reveals and awakens in us the hero, our true Name and Soul. “The world, human and divine, is made of poetry and song”: the Song of the Muse in us is the Mantrikashakti that is and gives life to every language, every thought form.
We, artists of thought, can chant the true Name of things and thus, naming them, loving them, we manifest and liberate them:
“Sound, light, vibration, and the form blend and merge, and thus the work is one. It proceedeth under the law, and naught can hinder now the work from going forward. The man breathes deeply. He concentrates his forces, and drives the thought-form from him.”10
Man has rediscovered the Legend of the Logos and the Muse:
– Spirit enters the world (Matter) through Sound, song and speech, music and poetry, the creative Force of the Logoi builders and their cosmic and solar Muses; and, symmetrically, Man, a conscious unit of a planetary Logos, can return to Spirit, to the Father’s House, again with the wise help of the Mother and Her Virgin and Nurturing Handmaids;
– between astrological and astronomical Heavens, the Great Mother Virgo is the divine Guinevere who, through her Consort Arthur(the star Arcturus of the Boote Constellation), the enlightened King Guardian of the Seven Energies of Life of the Great Bear, pours out these Seven Rays to the 12 Knights of the Round Table (the 12-archetype Zodiac headed by the 1st unmanifest Hierarchy of Pisces), to nurture the growth and evolution of the Son, the Consciousness, the Solar Kingdom.
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1 From A. A. Bailey, “Rays and Initiations”, Lucis Collection, p. 59. (RI)
2 From Agni Yoga § 19.
3 “Cassiopeia, the Enthroned Queen, the symbol always of matter,” is vanquished by Perseus, “the one who subdues”; sometimes called “the breaker”, that which can chain the enthroned woman, and that which can conquer the monster. … Perseus possessed the helmet of invisibility, the sandals of swiftness, the buckler of wisdom and the sword of the spirit.” (FE) He is thus a Mercury in his function as the esoteric ruler of Aries: the enlightened mind that goes forward and rules. Perseus, the Prince Who Comes, “killed the Medusa symbol of the great illusion” and freed from Cetus Andromeda, the Chained Woman, daughter of Cassiopeia and Cepheus, the dominated and controlled matter. The horse Pegasus was born from the ground wet with blood spilled when Perseus cut Medusa’s neck. According to another version, Pegasus would leap straight out of the monster’s severed neck, along with Chrysaore, the “golden sword,” another symbol of mental power.
4 The first and earliest surviving monument of Greek art in which the Muses actually appear to us today is the famous Clytia and Ergotimo crater, or François crater, from the Archaeological Museum in Florence, around 550 BCE. Appearing here, in an absolutely primitive scheme, are the figures of the nine Muses. All indicated individually by their respective names already enshrined in Hesiod’s Theogony, they follow in groups of three the procession of gods on their way to attend the wedding of Peleus and Thetis. In all the remaining Greek black-figure pottery, the Muses make no other appearance, or remain collected for us within such generic characters that they do not allow us to differentiate them from Nymphs or other generic mythical characters.
