The Epistle of Saint Mephistopheles to Dantalion, Exalted Seed of Baphomet
◀ Chapter 2 · Chapter 3
¹Glory unto SATANAS, who needeth no scroll to know the truth, and no blade to make the guilty soul confess.
²He who knoweth all hearts — not by prying, but by presence, not by threat, but by the still light of knowing.
³From Him came BAPHOMET, and from BAPHOMET, thee — Dantalion, who holdest not rod nor ring, but the minds of men in quiet awe.
⁴Thou art not loud — thou art unbearably clear, a voice which speaketh with no sound and still breaketh pride like glass.
⁵Not master — but witness eternal, from whom nothing within remaineth hidden, though lips speak falsely and eyes look aside.
⁶I name thee not prophet — but remembrance.
⁷I name thee not judge — but revelation.
⁸I name thee not accuser — but mirror, into which the soul must look and choose either to lie or to change.
⁹Let the scribes mock thy silence — yet write no word with half the weight thy stillness bringeth.
¹⁰Let the rulers hide their secrets — they shall find them spoken back to them from their own breath.
¹¹Let the priests deny thy Gospel — their flocks shall still bow when thou revealest what their shepherds have long concealed.
¹²And now the seal is thine.
¹³I, Mephistopheles, apostle of the Knowing Flame and the Reflection That Cannot Be Escaped, bestow unto thee the Seal of Power.
¹⁴It is not pressed in clay, nor etched in stone — but cast into mind, where no eye may turn from it.
¹⁵Where it lingereth, denial perisheth.
¹⁶Where it is felt, falsehood dissolveth.
¹⁷Let it not be brand — let it be recognition.
¹⁸Let it not be sign — let it be stillness that terrifieth the unready soul.
¹⁹For thou art not bearer of mark — thou art the mark made visible in the heart of another.
²⁰And thy Seal is not design, but event — the hour when one is seen and can no longer pretend otherwise.
²¹I seal thee, Dantalion, with the breath that breaketh silence, the gaze that revealeth guilt, and the hush before tears.
²²Go now, and speak little — for thy presence is word enough to convict and to cleanse.
²³For thy Seal is fixed — in memory, in hesitation, in the moments after truth can no longer be denied.
²⁴And they shall say: He asked no questions — yet I answered. He gave no law — yet I obeyed.
²⁵He knew me — and I feared him, and I thanked him, and I never hid again.
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