A large portion of the Egyptian philosophy and religion seems to have been constructed almost wholly upon the science of numbers; and we are assured by Kircher that everything in nature was explained on this principle alone. The Pythagoreans had so high an opinion of it, that they considered it to be the origin of all things, and thought knowledge of numbers to be equivalent to knowledge of God. The founder of the sect received his instructions in this science from the Egyptian priests; who taught him that, while the monad possesses the nature of the efficient cause, the dyad is merely a passive matter. A point corresponds with the monad, both being indivisible; and as the monad is the principle of numbers, so is the point of lines. A line corresponds with the dyad, both being considered by transition. In expressing their opinion of the Regular or Platonic bodies, the followers of Pythagoras argued that the world was made by God "in thought, and not in time;" and that He commenced His work in fire and the fifth element; for there are five figures of solid bodies which are termed mathematical. Earth was made of a cube, Fire of a pyramid, Air of an octahedron, Water of an icosahedrons, the Sphere of the Universe of a Dodecahedron. And the combinations of the monad, as the principle of all things, are thus deduced. From the monad came the indeterminate dyad; from them came numbers; from numbers, points; from points lines; from lines, superficies; from superficies, solids; from these, solid bodies whose elements are four, viz., fire, water, air, earth; of all of which, under various transmutations, the world consists.
About the Author: George Oliver, D.D., was the eldest son of the Rev. Samuel Oliver, rector of Lambley, Nottinghamshire. He believed that the Order was to be found in the earliest periods of recorded history. It was taught by Seth to his descendants, and practiced by them under the name of Primitive or Pure Freemasonry. It passed over to Noah, and at the dispersion of mankind suffered a division into Pure and Spurious. Pure Freemasonry descended through the Patriarchs to Solomon, and thence on to the present day. Oliver was initiated in 1801 at the age of 19 by his father, in Saint Peter's Lodge No. 442 in the city of Peterborough. He entered Holy Orders in the Church of England in 1813, and in 1835 the Archbishop of Canterbury conferred upon him the degree of Doctor of Divinity. He read with great attention every Masonic book he could obtain, and began to collect a store of knowledge which he afterward used with so much advantage to the Craft. His first contribution to Masonic literature was a work titled "The Antiquities of Freemasonry" which was published in 1839. His next work titled "The Star in the East", intended to show the connection between Freemasonry and religion. In 1841 he published his lectures on "The Signs and Symbols of Freemasonry", in which he went into detail of the history and signification of all the recognized symbols of the Order. This was followed by lectures on "The History of Initiation", comprising a detailed account of the Rites and Ceremonies, Doctrines and Discipline, of all the Secret and Mysterious Institutions of the Ancient World. The professed object of the author was to show the resemblances between these ancient systems of initiation and the Masonic, and to trace them to a common origin. His "Institutes of Masonic Jurisprudence", was a book in which he expressed views of law that did not meet with the universal concurrence of his English readers. Besides these elaborate works, Oliver was a constant contributor to the early volumes of the London Freemasons Quarterly Review In 1815 he became a member of the AASR in England and in 1845 was promoted by the SC to the 33rd Degree while in the same year was appointed Lieutenant Grand Commander, being advanced in 1850 to the highest dignity, that of Most Puissant Sovereign Grand Commander. In 1846 the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts conferred upon him the honorary rank of Deputy Grand Master.