How Big Oil conquered the World.

 In a move that would transform the American economy, Rockefeller set out to replace a world of independent oilmen with a giant company controlled by him. In 1870, begging bankers for more loans, he formed Standard Oil of Ohio. The next year, he quietly put what he called “our plan” — his campaign to dominate the volatile oil industry — into devastating effect. Rockefeller knew that the refiner with the lowest transportation cost could bring rivals to their knees. He entered into a secret alliance with the railroads called the South Improvement Company. In exchange for large, regular shipments, Rockefeller and his allies secured transport rates far lower than those of their bewildered competitors.

Ida Tarbell, the daughter of an oil man, later remembered how men like her father struggled to make sense of events: “An uneasy rumor began running up and down the Oil Regions,” she wrote. “Freight rates were going up. … Moreover … all members of the South Improvement Company — a company unheard of until now — were exempt. … Nobody waited to find out his neighbor’s opinion. On every lip there was but one word and that was ‘conspiracy.'”

Ron Chernow, Biographer: By 1879, when Rockefeller is 40, he controls 90 percent of the oil refining in the world. Within a few years, he will control 90 percent of the marketing of oil and a third of all of the oil wells. So this very young man controls what is not only a national but an international monopoly in a commodity that is about to become the most important strategic commodity in the world economy.

SOURCE: The Rockefellers

Read full transcript @ the following link
The Corbett Report

Part Two - Why Big OIL CONQUERED THE WORLD

The Oil Ship called the Murex
Source Ship Stamps

She was designed by Fortescue Flannery, and would be used for the transport of oil from the Black Sea mostly to Far Eastern ports. 26 July 1892 the MUREX was completed and set sail under command of Capt. John R. Coudon in ballast for Batum in the Black Sea. After loading there a cargo of kerosene she headed for the Far East. 24 August 1892 she passed the Suez Canal, she was the first tanker, which sailed through the canal, and arrived 16 September 1892 at Singapore with 4.720 tons of kerosene, the first tanker who arrived at this port.

Midwinter's Eve: YULE

BY MIKE NICHOLS

Our Christian friends are often quite surprised at how enthusiastically we Pagans celebrate the ‘Christmas’ season. Even though we prefer to use the word “Yule”, and our celebrations may peak a few days before the twenty-fifth, we nonetheless follow many of the traditional customs of the season: decorated trees, caroling, presents, Yule logs, and mistletoe. We might even go so far as putting up a ‘Nativity set’, though for us the three central characters are likely to be interpreted as Mother Nature, Father Time, and the baby Sun God. None of this will come as a surprise to anyone who knows the true history of the holiday, of course.

In fact, if truth be known, the holiday of Christmas has always been more Pagan than Christian, with its associations of Nordic divination, Celtic fertility rites, and Roman Mithraism. That is why John Calvin and other leaders of the Reformation abhorred it, why the Puritans refused to acknowledge it, much less celebrate it (to them, no day of the year could be more holy than the Sabbath), and why it was even made illegal in Boston! The holiday was already too closely associated with the birth of older Pagan Gods and heroes. And many of them (like Oedipus, Theseus, Hercules, Perseus, Jason, Dionysus, Apollo, Mithra, Horus, and even Arthur) possessed a narrative of birth, death, and resurrection that was uncomfortably close to that of Jesus. And to make matters worse, many of them predated the Christian Savior.

Ultimately, of course, the holiday is rooted deeply in the cycle of the year. It is the winter solstice that is being celebrated, seedtime of the year, the longest night and shortest day. It is the birthday of the new Sun King, the Son of God–by whatever name you choose to call him. On this darkest of nights, the Goddess becomes the Great Mother and once again gives birth. And it makes perfect poetic sense that on the longest night of the winter, “the dark night of our souls”, there springs the new spark of hope, the Sacred Fire, the Light of the World, the Coel Coeth.

That is why Pagans have as much right to claim this holiday as Christians. Perhaps even more so, since the Christians were rather late in laying claim to it, and tried more than once to reject it. There had been a tradition in the West that Mary bore the child Jesus on the twenty-fifth day, but no one could seem to decide on the month. Finally, in 320 C.E., the Catholic fathers in Rome decided to make it December, in an effort to co-opt the Mithraic celebration of the Romans, the Yule festival of the Saxons, and the midwinter revels of the Celts.

There was never much pretense that the date they finally chose was historically accurate. Shepherds just don’t “tend their flocks by night” in the high pastures in the dead of winter! But if one wishes to use the New Testament as historical evidence, this reference may point to sometime in the spring as the time of Jesus’ birth. This is because the lambing season occurs in the spring and that is the only time when shepherds are likely to “watch their flocks by night”–to make sure the lambing goes well. Knowing this, the Eastern half of the church continued to reject December 25, preferring a “movable date” fixed by their astrologers according to the moon.

Thus, despite its shaky start (for over three centuries, no one knew when Jesus was supposed to have been born!), December 25 finally began to catch on. By 529, it was a civic holiday, and all work or public business (except that of cooks, bakers, or any that contributed to the delight of the holiday) was prohibited by the Emperor Justinian. In 563, the Council of Braga forbade fasting on Christmas Day, and four years later the Council of Tours proclaimed the twelve days from December 25 to Epiphany as a sacred, festive season. This last point is perhaps the hardest to impress upon the modern reader, who is lucky to get a single day off work. Christmas, in the Middle Ages, was not a single day, but rather a period of twelve days, from December 25 to January 6. The Twelve Days of Christmas, in fact. It is certainly lamentable that the modern world has abandoned this approach, along with the popular Twelfth Night celebrations.

Of course, the Christian version of the holiday spread to many countries no faster than Christianity itself, which means that “Christmas” wasn’t celebrated in Ireland until the late fifth century; in England, Switzerland, and Austria until the seventh; in Germany until the eighth; and in the Slavic lands until the ninth and tenth. Not that these countries lacked their own midwinter celebrations. Long before the world had heard of Jesus, Pagans had been observing the season by bringing in the Yule log, wishing on it, and lighting it from the remains of last year’s log. Riddles were posed and answered, magic and rituals were practiced, wild boars were sacrificed and consumed along with large quantities of liquor, corn dollies were carried from house to house while caroling, fertility rites were practiced (girls standing under a sprig of mistletoe were subject to a bit more than a kiss), and divinations were cast for the coming spring. Many of these Pagan customs, in an appropriately watered-down form, have entered the mainstream of Christian celebration, though most celebrants do not realize (or do not mention it, if they do) their origins.

For modern Witches, Yule (from the Anglo-Saxon yula, meaning “wheel” of the year) is usually celebrated on the actual winter solstice, which may vary by a few days, though it usually occurs on or around December 21. It is a Lesser Sabbat or Low Holiday in the modern Pagan calendar, one of the four quarter days of the year, but a very important one. Pagan customs are still enthusiastically followed. Once, the Yule log had been the center of the celebration. It was lighted on the eve of the solstice (it should light on the first try) and must be kept burning for twelve hours, for good luck. It should be made of ash. Later, the Yule log was replaced by the Yule tree but, instead of burning it, lighted candles were placed on it. In Christianity, Protestants might claim that Martin Luther invented the custom, and Catholics might grant St. Boniface the honor, but the custom can demonstrably be traced back through the Roman Saturnalia all the way to ancient Egypt. Needless to say, such a tree should be cut down rather than purchased, and should be disposed of by burning, the proper way to dispatch any sacred object.

Along with the evergreen, the holly and the ivy and the mistletoe were important plants of the season, all symbolizing fertility and everlasting life. Mistletoe was especially venerated by the Celtic Druids, who cut it with a golden sickle on the sixth night of the moon, and believed it to be an aphrodisiac. (Magically–not medicinally! It’s highly toxic!) But aphrodisiacs must have been the smallest part of the Yuletide menu in ancient times, as contemporary reports indicate that the tables fairly creaked under the strain of every type of good food. And drink! The most popular of which was the “wassail cup”, deriving its name from the Anglo-Saxon term waes hael (be whole or hale).

Medieval Christmas folklore seems endless: that animals will all kneel down as the Holy Night arrives, that bees hum the 100th psalm on Christmas Eve, that a windy Christmas will bring good luck, that a person born on Christmas Day can see the Little People, that a cricket on the hearth brings good luck, that if one opens all the doors of the house at midnight all the evil spirits will depart, that you will have one lucky month for each Christmas pudding you sample, that the tree must be taken down by Twelfth Night or bad luck is sure to follow, that “if Christmas on a Sunday be, a windy winter we shall see”, that “hours of sun on Christmas Day, so many frosts in the month of May”, that one can use the Twelve Days of Christmas to predict the weather for each of the twelve months of the coming year, and so on.

Remembering that most Christmas customs are ultimately based upon older Pagan customs, it only remains for modern Pagans to reclaim their lost traditions. In doing so, we can share many common customs with our Christian friends, albeit with a slightly different interpretation. And, thus, we all share in the beauty of this most magical of seasons, when the Mother Goddess once again gives birth to the baby Sun God and sets the wheel in motion again. To conclude with a long-overdue paraphrase, “Goddess bless us, every one!”

MOST RECENT TEXT REVISION: TUESDAY, MAY 3, 2005 C.E.
TEXT EDITING COURTESY OF ACORN GUILD PRESS.
DOCUMENT COPYRIGHT © 1986, 1995, 2005 BY MIKE NICHOLS.

PERMISSION IS GIVEN TO RE-PUBLISH THIS DOCUMENT ONLY AS LONG AS NO INFORMATION IS LOST OR CHANGED, CREDIT IS GIVEN TO THE AUTHOR, AND IT IS PROVIDED OR USED WITHOUT COST TO OTHERS. THIS NOTICE REPRESENTS AN EXCEPTION TO THE COPYRIGHT NOTICE FOUND IN THE ACORN GUILD PRESS EDITION OF THE WITCHES’ SABBATS AND APPLIES ONLY TO THE TEXT AS GIVEN ABOVE. OTHER USES OF THIS DOCUMENT MUST BE APPROVED IN WRITING BY MIKE NICHOLS.

The Peacocks tail ... What hinders men from seeing and hearing God?

Image @ Flickr - bootleg3346

"What hinders men from seeing and hearing God...

It is their own hearing, seeing and willing; by their own wills they separate themselves from the will of God. They see and hear within their own desires, which obstructs them from seeing and hearing God. Terrestrial and material things overshadow them, and they cannot see beyond their own human nature. If they would be still, desist from thinking and feeling with their own self-hood, subdue the self-will, enter into a state of resignation, into a divine union with Christ, who sees God, and hears God, and speaks with him, who knows the word and will of God; then would the eternal hearing seeing and speaking become revealed to them. "

Jacob Boehme (1575-1624 C.E.)

‘Cauda Pavonis’, the peacock’s tail, or the peacock itself, is a phase in which many colors appear. Many alchemists place this phase before albedo, whiteness, although some of them place it after albedo. Gerhard Dorn (16th century): "This bird flies during the night without wings. By the first heavenly dew, after an uninterrupted process of cooking, ascending and descending, it first takes the shape of a raven’s head, then of a peacock’s tail; its feathers becoming very white and good smelling, and finally becoming fiery red, indicating its fiery character." The colors refer to the three stages of the Great Work, with rubedo, or redness, being the last one.

(18th century manuscript from the Collection of Dr.C.Rusch, Appenzell)
The drawing represents Distillatio, 'distillation'. At a certain point in the distillation the peacock('s tail) will appear.

The symbol of the peacock’s tail was chosen because of the many colorful and brilliant ‘eyes’. It is said that originally they were the eyes of the Greek Argus, whose name means ‘he who sees everything’. Argus was a very strong giant with a hundred eyes, of which at all times fifty were open and fifty were sleeping. He was decapitated by Hermes. Hera, the mother goddess, placed the eyes on the tail of her favorite bird, the peacock.

The phase of the many colors was also symbolized by the rainbow, or the goddess of the rainbow: Iris, the messenger of the gods, especially between Zeus and the mortals.

The peacock’s tail can have two meanings in the Great Work. It can be the collection and totality of all colors in the white light. Remember, the white light refers to the second stage, albedo, or whiteness. In this sense the peacock was seen as a royal bird in ancient times, and it corresponded with the phoenix.

The second meaning is that it represents the failure of the alchemical process. When the conscious enters the unconscious "each part of a thought can take shape and become visible in color and form", according to a Chinese text about yoga exercises. One starts seeing all kinds of forms which look real and which look like they have an independent life. But one cannot go into it as it leads to discord of the mind, and possibly to schizophrenia. The alchemist is seeking unity, expressed in the white light.

It is know that during meditation exalted feelings and unusual observations can happen. In essence there are two kinds of observations. The first one is wanting to escape the discipline of meditation, which Zen practitioners call makyo. Makyo are illusions we project onto reality in order to escape the guidelines of meditation. For example, the object of meditation is starting to radiate with a wonderful light or color, or it expands and contracts rhythmically. One starts to feel lighter or heavier, or one feels pleasant energies going through the body. All kinds of sensations can happen. Many meditators are readily distracted by these phenomena, and even take great interest in them, thereby neglecting the real purpose of their meditation. One needs to be aware of this.

A second cause of distraction is a change in consciousness whereby we look at the world in a different way than we did in the past. It can be quite a shock reverberating on the psychic or bodily level. The accompanying feelings can be quite wonderful. But the advice is: enjoy it, do not take it seriously, and continue with the meditation.

Visions are also distracting. Many wise men and mystics have pointed to this kind of danger. "We should not long for or expect visions. With all our power we should refrain from them and look at them with suspicion." (Ignatius of Loyola). They always stress that visions of lights, of angels, yes even of the great masters, should be neglected, because they block inner progress.

Source: House of the Sun

Fly Free...

Images @ Eminpee Fotography

Tablet Seven - The Seven Lords!

The Seven Lords .. Tablet Seven. (Thoth)
Hark ye O man, and list to my Voice.
Open thy mind-space and drink of my wisdom.
Dark is the pathway of LIFE that ye travel.
Many the pitfalls that lie in thy way.
Seek ye ever to gain greater wisdom.
Attain and it shall be light on thy way.

Open thy SOUL, O man, to the Cosmic
and let it flow in as one with thy SOUL.
LIGHT is eternal and darkness is fleeting.
Seek ye ever, O man, for the LIGHT.
Know ye that ever as Light fills thy being,
darkness for thee shall soon disappear.

Open thy souls to the BROTHERS OF BRIGHTNESS.
Let them enter and fill thee with LIGHT.
Lift up thine eyes to the LIGHT of the Cosmos.
Keep thou ever thy face to the goal.
Only by gaining the light of all wisdom,
art thou one with the Infinite goal.
Seek ye ever the Oness eternal.
Seek ever the Light into One.

Hear ye, O man, list to my Voice
singing the song of Light and of Life.
throughout all space, Light is prevalent,
encompassing ALL with its banners of flames.
Seek ye forever in the veil of the darkness,
somewhere ye shall surely find Light.
Hidden and buried, lost to man's knowledge,
deep in the finite the Infinite exists.
Lost, but existing,
flowing through all things,
living in ALL is the INFINITE BRAIN.

In all space, there is only ONE wisdom.
Through seeming decided, it is ONE in the ONE.
All that exists comes forth from the LIGHT,
and the LIGHT comes forth from the ALL.

Everything created is based upon ORDER:
LAW rules the space where the INFINITE dwells.
Forth from equilibrium came the great cycles,
moving in harmony toward Infinity's end.

Know ye, O man, that far in the space-time,
INFINITY itself shall pass into change.
Hear ye and list to the Voice of Wisdom:
Know that ALL is of ALL evermore.
Know that through time thou may pursue wisdom
and find ever more light on the way.
Know that through time thou may pursue wisdom
and find ever more light on the way.
Aye, thou shall find that ever receding,
thy goal shall elude thee from day unto day.

Long time ago, in the HALLS OF AMENTI,
I, Thoth, stood before the LORDS of the cycles.
Mighty, THEY in their aspects of power;
mighty, THEY in the wisdom unveiled.

Led by the Dweller, first did I see them.
But afterwards free was I of their presence,
free to enter their conclave at will.
Oft did I journey down the dark pathway
unto the HALL where the LIGHT ever glows.

Learned I of the Masters of cycles,
wisdom brought from the cycles above.
Manifest THEY in this cycle
as guides of man to the knowledge of ALL.
Seven are they, mighty in power,
speaking these words through me to men.
Time after time, stood I before them
listening to words that came not with sound.

Once said THEY unto me:
O man, wouldst thou gain wisdom?
Seek for it in the heart of the flame.
Wouldst thou gain knowledge of power?
Seek ye it in the heart of the flame.
Wouldst be one with the heart of the flame?
Seek then within thine own hidden flame.

Many the times spoke THEY to me,
teaching me wisdom not of the world;
showing me ever new paths to brightness;
teaching me wisdom brought from above.
Giving knowledge of operation,
learning of LAW, the order of ALL.

Spoke to me again, the Seven, saying:
From far beyond time are WE, come, O man,
Traveled WE from beyond SPACE-TIME,
aye, from the place of Infinity's end.
When ye and all of thy brethren were formless,
formed forth were WE from the order of ALL.
Not as men are WE,
though once WE, too, were as men.
Out of the Great Void were WE formed forth
in order by LAW.
For know ye that which is formed
truly is formless, having form only to thine eyes.

And again, unto me spoke the Seven, saying:
Child of the LIGHT, O THOTH, art thou,
free to travel the bright path upward
until at last ALL ONES become ONE>

Forth were WE formed after our order:
THREE, FOUR, FIVE, SIX, SEVEN, EIGHT--NINE.
Know ye that these are the numbers of cycles
that WE descend from unto man.
Each having here a duty to fulfill;
each having here a force to control.

Yet are we ONE with the SOUL of our cycle.
Yet are WE, too, seeking a goal.
Far beyond man's conception,
Infinity extends into a greater than ALL.
There, in a time that is yet not a time,
we shall ALL become ONE
with a greater than ALL.
Time and space are moving in circles.
Know ye their law, and ye too, shall be free.
Aye, free shall ye be to move through the cycles--
pass the guardians that dwell at the door.

Then to me spoke HE of NINE saying:
Aeons and aeons have I existed,
knowing not LIFE and tasting not death.
For know ye. O man, that far in the future,
life and death shall be one with the ALL.

Each so perfected by balancing the other
that neither exists in the Oneness of ALL.
In men of this cycle, the life force is rampant,
but life in its growth becomes one with them ALL.

Here, I manifest in this your cycle,
but yet am I there in your future of time.
Yet to me, time exists not,
for in my world time exists not,
for formless are WE.
Life have WE not but yet have existence,
fuller and greater and freer than thee.

Man is a flame bound to a mountain,
but WE in our cycle shall ever be free.
Know ye, O man, that when ye have progressed
into the cycle that lengthen above,
life itself will pass to the darkness
and only the essence of Soul shall remain.

Then to me spoke the LORD of the EIGHT saying:
All that ye know is but part of little.
Not as yet have ye touched on the Great.
Far out in space where LIGHT beings supreme,
came I into the LIGHT.
Formed was I also but not as ye are.

Body of Light was my formless form formed.
Know I not LIFE and know I not DEATH,
yet master am I of all that exists.
Seek ye to find the path through the barriers.
Travel the road that leads to the LIGHT.

Spoke again to me the NINE saying:
Seek ye to find the path to beyond.
Not impossible is it to grow
to a consciousness above.
For when TWO have become ONE
and ONE has become the ALL,
know ye the barrier has lifted,
and ye are made free of the road.
Grow thou from form to the formless.
Free may thou be of the road.

Thus, through ages I listened,
learning the way to the ALL.
Now Lift I my thoughts to the ALL-THING.
List ye and hear when it calls.

O LIGHT, all pervading,
One with ALL and ALL with ONE,
flow thou to me through the channel.
Enter thou so that I may be free.
Make me One with the ALL-SOUL,
shining from the blackness of night.
Free let me be of all space-time,
free from the Veil of the night.
I, a child of LIGHT, command:
Free from the darkness to be.

Formless am I to the Light-Soul,
formless yet shining with light.
Know I the bonds of the darkness
must shatter and fall before light.

Now give I this wisdom.
Free may ye be, O man,
living in light and in brightness.
Turn not they face from the Light.
Thy soul dwells in realms of brightness.
Ye are a child of the Light.

Images @ Eminpee Fotography