Book Description

Excerpt from What Pythian Knighthood Means It had its conception in the friendship existing between Damon and Pythias, and the Order was founded on February 19th, 1864, in the Citv of Washington, D. C., by Justus Henry Rathbone. This was during the Rebel lion, when the country was in the throes of civil war, when the Southern States were arrayed against the Northern States, and the perpetuity of the Nation was in jeopardy. Family ties had been sundered, bloodshed and carnage involved the country in general gloom. It was during this dark period, that the star of Pythian ism rose in the East, shedding the light of friendship and brotherly love into the homes and across the battle fields, strewn with the bones of the valiant sons of the North and the South, who had lost their lives in deadly combat. The proclamation of such friendship at such a time was not unlike that of the heralding of Peace on Earth, Good Will to Men, over the plains of Judea, when the morning stars sang together. The friend ship between Damon and Pythias was of so high an order that it prompted one to offer his life as a ransom for the other, and thus fulfilled the divine idea of our Saviour, who said Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. It may be of interest to inquire into the causes of such friendship at a period, when a large part of the world was ruled by Heathen Nations, engaged in frequent wars and when human life was regarded as of little value. Damon and Pythias were Pythagoreans, who lived in the fourth century B. 0. They drank deeply at the wellsn of this philosophy.' They imbibed its prmciples and were transformed into living exponents of its teachings. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.