THE BABYLONIAN WOE Chapters XII-XIV
by David Astle
CHAPTER
XII. Sparta, the Pelanors, Wealth and Women
XIII. Money Creators and the Political Control
XIV. Man Proposes but God Disposes
CHAPTERS XII: SPARTA, THE PELANORS, WEALTH AND WOMEN
Page 175
Sparta, of all Greek states, is one that resisted most of all the
encroachments of international money power and the circulation of
precious metals. However, from those laws promulgated by Lycurgus of
Sparta, reputedly during the ninth century B.C. but it would seem that
all those evils deriving from giving such international money power
free rein had already been experienced and had brought about that
reaction amongst the people generally that enabled Lycurgus to take
those measures by which he expunged forever the main causes of the
sickness of greed and self-interest which gnawed at the heart of the
Doric overlord class of the Peloponnese. To him are ascribed the laws
directed towards this purpose such as are described by Plutarch:
Page 176
"Not contented with this redistribution of land, he commanded
that all gold and silver should be called in and that only a sort of
money of iron should be current, a great weight and quantity of which
was very little worth. So that to lay up twenty or thirty pounds,
there was required a pretty large closet, and to remove it, nothing
less than a yoke of oxen. With the diffusion of this money, at once a
number of vices were banished for who would rob another of such coin?
Who would unjustly detain or take by force or accept as a bribe a
thing which was not easy to hide or a credit to have, or indeed of any
use to cut in pieces? For when it was red-hot, they quenched it in
vinegar and by that means spoilt it and made it almost incapable of
being worked.
So now there was no means of purchasing foreign goods. No
itinerant fortune teller nor harlot monger, or gold or silver smith,
engraver or jeweler set foot in a country which had no money. For the
rich had no advantage here over the poor as their wealth and abundance
had no road to come abroad by, but were shut up at home doing
nothing."
Plutarch, of course, lived in a city in an age when all wealth
was assessed in terms of precious metals by weight. Needless to say,
in order to have the cooperation of the real ruler, local money
creative power, towards the publication of his works, he wisely
followed that trend of making a mockery of Spartan customs, a trend
which is still followed to this day by many so-called scholars.
Page 177
Sparta, early in the Millennium had come to understand the real
significance of precious metals money as being part of an
international confidence game. Sparta also realized the destructive
forces inherent in the activities of its controllers.
The so-called Spartan way of life derived from the necessity of
the Spartans to always be prepared for total war from abroad, as their
final rejection of international money power made certain would come,
and to be always prepared for war from within, i.e. insurrection; and
equal certainty deriving from the same causes.
The first Messenian War (736-716 B.C.) was entered into by King
Theopompus of Sparta for the usual reasons for any war in a state
indicated by archaeological findings as being under the thumb of
Šinternational money power; instigation of that money power in favor of
its arms industry and its other long range purposes. The long drawn
out character of the war indicated that the Messenians had equal
access to international arms industry with Sparta. Armies are not
raised and maintained in long drawn out wars without finances
acceptable in international trade and ready access to the best of
weapons and equipment; and it is clear the Messenians were not short
of such. This war served that purpose most desirable to money power of
reducing the power of kings followed by constitutional crises. The
first settlement was a victory of the Spartan peers over the kings and
curbing of royal prerogatives and powers. Such would have been typical
of the progress of international money power in its usual insidious
takeover of any state or civilization.
Page 178
The final edicts of Lycurgus as a result of the constitutional
crisis that followed the second Messenian war certainly indicate he
was aware of the loss of sovereignty that came to any state that based
its money system on the product of the international bullion brokers,
and which meant dependence on their good graces, the more especially
if such state had no mines of its own.
Of the reforms of Lycurgus, their cause, and those forces they
were directed against, there is no doubt whatsoever.
Page 179
There is no doubt that early in the sixth century B.C., the
Spartans totally excluded the international money market such as
controlled the rest of Greece through silver and gold money and the
bankers' practices relating to.
The notion created by Plutarch of that national currency of iron
as being something ridiculous and requiring also an ox-cart may be
dismissed as part of the steady stream of propaganda no doubt being
created in Athens against the customs of Sparta. If it is true that
the "pelanors" were of such weight as ruled out their being readily
passed from hand to hand, then it may reasonably be assumed that they
denoted wealth in much the same manner as the stone rings of Uap and
the ancient Indus Valley civilization; more in the nature of a
reserve, the circulating money being the leather notes referred to by
Suidas, just as the circulating money of Uap was shell strings,
similar to Tekaroro of the Gilbert Islands.
Sparta was indeed fortunate to possess considerably reserves of
iron ore. Thus both for her money and for her arms, she was therefore
independent and needed no assistance from abroad.
Page 180
The very fact that the power of the kings had been undermined
became a blessing in disguise. History has shown that the point to
which international money power immediately gravitates when
penetrating any people is the top, the king himself, either directly
or through the priesthood. Given his sanction and connivance with
respect to their schemes, then peoples are easily subdued and their
minds filled with arithmetical calculations and obsession with their
animal needs.
One of the first steps of such money power towards total
assumption of rule has been the eradication of kings for even though a
king might be lead into connivance with their schemes through lack of
understanding, he always could still awaken and discover his mistake
and realizing the sword was still in his hand, take measures to regain
his prerogative. Therefore he had to be disposed of or reduced to paid
and willing servant.
In Sparta there seems to have been another obstacle to
international money power, namely, the Ephorate, whose existence was
Šlinked to that national money power of Sparta as instituted under the
protection of Lycurgus. Of the Ephors, it may be said their main
objectives were: "first the maintenance of home defence and limiting
of Spartan dominion to Messenia and Laconia (i.e. no imperial
entanglements) and an unrelenting hostility to the pretensions of
royal power in the state. The Ephorate was a profoundly democratic
institution that feared and fought against tyranny both within and
without the borders of Lacedaemon."
Accepting the tyrant as the front man of those alien agents of
international money power, the trapezitae, then the meaning of their
policies becomes clear: establishment of an area from which Spartans
could derive total economic freedom, sufficient to maintain themselves
and that which above all maintained their way of life and its source,
their national monetary system.
Page 181
The intervention at Athens was obvious policy in view of of the
unrelenting pressure of Athenian money power as a branch of
International Money Power against Sparta, city that had made a
mockery of the power of the counting houses of the world financial
centers and had set up example in the world which would become
inspiration to others. The Ephorate made sure that kings in no way had
the power to surrender themselves and the people they represented to
the blandishments of international money power whose opportunity alas,
has always been a weak and ill-instructed king. However the remark of
Archidamos, King of Sparta reveals even in 428 B.C. how the corruptive
forces outpouring from Babylonia, with its immediate agents, had
certainly re-entered Sparta to some degree:
"And war is not so much a matter of armaments as of the money
that makes armaments effective."
In his speech to his own people, Archidamos also warns them of
the 6000 talents war chest supposedly held by the Athenians in the
Acropolis. Both of these statements show no understanding of that in
which a king should above all be instructed, National Monetary
Emission, and prove how right were the Ephors in the controls with
which they surrounded his kingship. Archidamos privately was close
friend of Pericles, scion of the Alkmeonidae, whose destiny Greek
history shows to have always been closely linked to that international
money power.
During the period when the national currency of Sparta maintained
its integrity, it might be safe to say that the Spartan, in so far as
it is possible for true freedom to exist, was a free man. Indeed, the
helots were more than likely more free by a long way than are the
laboring classes of this day; and certainly more free than those
classes of semi-mass production lines of the other Greek cities whose
monetary systems were almost all at the mercy of the bankers, the
manipulators of the value of bullion and slaves.
Page 182
A monetary system, simple, inviting neither peddlers or luxury,
issued and regulated by a benevolent state and undoubtedly its units
paid into circulation with care and attention to the result on the
national well-being and strength, bred a sturdy independent people
completely contemptuous of the gold madness raging elsewhere. They
were an example by which other great peoples came to profit,
outstandingly, the Romans.
History gives much information about the means whereby money was
collected and raised and spent but nothing as to those shadowy figures
who institute its units in the first place and inject them into
circulation.
As to when international money power re-entered Sparta, there is
little enough evidence. But the outlook of King Archidamos suggested
Šit had made quite some progress by the date of the commencement of the
Peloponnesian war, and it may be safely said that to win that war, out
of which could come nothing but gain to international money power,
Sparta had to make almost total concession. The final victory over
Athens achieved the purposes of the international bullion and slave
traders as surely as final defeat would so have done.
As it will remembered, the relaxation and luxury that inundated
Rome after the second Punic War as a result of concessions that had
been made to international bullion and slave traders in order to be
able to re-arm after Cannae, and ultimately drive Hannibal out of
Italy and defeat him in his own territory, within 25 years dragged the
Romans down to a debauched money mad mob.
Page 183
Similarly, after the Peloponnesian War, like causes had done the
same for Sparta, and it was but 25 years later, in 371 B.C. the
Spartan Phalanx crumbled into bloody ruin at Leuctra and never again
recovered for the Spartans were now consumed by the corrupting
diseases of money madness and its attendant liberalism. That by 360
B.C. the ancient money system was little more than a memory is
revealed by the quotation from Alexander Del Mar:
"The crime of Gylipus, B.C. 360, and the decree offered upon its
exposure, viz. "That no coin of gold or silver be admitted into
Sparta, but that they should use the money that had formerly obtained"
shows that as this decay of the state and weakening of credit went on,
gold and silver coins, at or near their bullion value, gradually crept
into circulation as money. The failure of the decree to pass is
conclusive that the iron numerical system was no longer practicable."
In other words, the damage to that which had been Sparta done by
the ruler who first of all turned a blind eye to dealings in precious
metals, the regrowth of international trade, and no doubt the holding
of deposits in Athenian banks, was irreparable. It seemed this time
that the clock could not be turned back.
Page 184
Athens, as with Rome by the time of the Civil Wars, its original
people had disappeared into that mass of freed slaves and immigrants
from elsewhere.
Of Spartan money as reinstituted under the patronage of Lycurgus,
Ernest Babelon wrote:
"A long time after the use of money had been spread throughout
the Hellenic world, Sparta continued to make use of ingots of iron as
a means of exchange. These bars were known as "pastry cakes" weighing
an Aeginetic Mina, that is to say 756 Kg, required a wagon to carry.
All kinds of stories circulated on the subject of the famous
"Pelanors" of Sparta that seem to have remained in use until the
Persian Wars...
In the 7th century, King Pheidon of Argos, when he struck the
first silver money of Aegina, withdrew the former iron spits from
circulating that had served as money until then."
Page 186
Babelon, most learned scholar as he was, however reflects the
complacent attitude of the bankers that money was precious metal and
precious metal was money. Though over 2000 years have gone by,
precious metal money and its promoters still ruled, despite a dozen
great kingdoms and empires having risen at its behest and having
fallen at its behest. Did Babelon see the shadow which lurked behind
the throne, he closed his eyes and turned his head away.
Lycurgus was without doubt inspired to re-establish this national
monetary system by the clear understanding he must have come to have
of the evil effects of this gold and silver madness and its disastrous
Šeffects as a result of the operations of the trapezitae or bankers
relative to the destruction of national morale and being. Precious
metal coinage was currency whose total circulation the state could in
no way control because of the desirability of its material
internationally. Its value was dictated by the arbitrary decision of
that international fraternity who controlled its mining and the slaves
that mined it, and out of manipulation of that pyramid of abstract
money they created thereon, controlled the political affairs of
states.
The money that had been established at Sparta was of value to
Spartans alone. Although no record exists of such matter, it may be
safely assumed that the Pelanors, the leather multiples or divisible of
Suidas, entered the circulation as against state indebtedness; thus
reducing taxation, that vicious destroyer of peoples, to relatively
negligible amounts. Their pitted and otherwise worthless appearance
deriving from their being immersed in vinegar when red hot made them
of no value for any other purpose than that for which they were
intended. The use of this national money was the force that gave
Sparta the leadership of Hellas until the end of the Peloponnesian War
and was that which necessarily dictated the policy of extirpation of
the tyrannies, the tyrant always being representative for the agent of
international money creative power through precious metal control.
Page 187
There might be the temptation to assume the Pelanors were a
system of "Iron Greenbacks" but while they resembled the Greenbacks in
this that they were the total will to be of the Spartans, assuming the
truth of their great weight, they may have been more in the character
of that monetary system of very ancient days of which the stone rings
of Uap are a last remaining evincement.
(According to Del Mar, the iron currency of the Pelanors was
strictly a numerical system confined to Sparta, it was a national
system having no relationship to International Standards or ratios
with other metals; thus being identical in character to the
"Greenback" paper money issued by President Abraham Lincoln during the
American Civil War and by which means the schemes of the international
bullion broking fraternity were temporarily frustrated.)
A healthy wholesome people who controlled totally their state and
existence would have little reason to accumulate money fortunes, and
wealth as distinct from the land which was their patrimony; and as
such money fortunes begin and end as little more than figures in the
banker's ledger, nor could they be guided into becoming mouthpieces
for the policies of the bankers. A genuine contempt for luxury
existed.
Page 188
Although it was said of the monetary reforms of Lycurgus that
precious metals seized in war were deposited with the Arcadians, of
later days, Augustus Boeckh wrote of gold and silver in Sparta:
"Sparta swallowed up large quantities of precious metals. The
principal cause of this stagnation was that the state kept the gold
and silver in store and only re-issued them for war and foreign
enterprise; although there were instances of individuals who amassed
treasures according to the law.
Xenophon stated that Lycurgus made the privilege of citizenship
equally available to all who observed the laws which would mean that
no Spartan suffered in respect to the mess to which he was entitled to
belong on account of economic condition. Xenophon had lived in Sparta
before the loss of Messenia. Aristotle after Messenia in 370 B.C. and
the certain penetration and assumption of control of Spartan fiscal
affairs by the bankers. The final military collapse at Leuctra rose
from that weakened condition that followed the apparent victory of the
ŠGreat Peloponnesian War and those concessions that would have already
been made to the international bankers as a result of the desperate
need of the Spartans for ships. The loan of 5000 talents towards the
building of ships which was granted to Sparta by Persia in 412 B.C.
would not have been granted without major concessions being exacted.
It would not take long for them to undermine the morale of Sparta by
the spreading of money madness. Of this situation, Polybius, as quoted
by Humphrey Michell, wrote the following:
Page 189
"Once they began to undertake naval expeditions and to make
military campaigns outside the Peloponnese, it was evident that
neither their iron currency nor the exchange of their crops for
commodities which they lacked, as permitted by the laws of
Lycurgus, would suffice for their needs. These enterprises demanded a
currency in universal circulation so they were compelled to beg from
the Persians and exact taxes from all the Greeks. For they recognized
that under the legislation of Lycurgus, it was impossible to aspire, I
will not say to supremacy in Greece, but to any position of
influence." "
The fact is however Sparta, while following the laws of Lycurgus,
had dominated in more or less degree. As soon as she lost sight of the
meaning and purpose of such laws, she became just another petty state;
an agency for the subterranean control by international banking
through manipulation of the silver and gold bullion basis of her
currency; each man, concerned with his own need and greed, aimlessly
following the pretty bubble which was the illusion of banker's
"wealth." The old order which had given them strength was soon
destroyed.
The later age of Aristotle was the age of the triumph of those
international interests whose arming and instigation of the Messenian
helots in an earlier age decided Spartans to accept the structure of
law as advocated by Lycurgus which meant surrender of so much ease of
living, rather than become the same as most Greek states, an alien
money manipulators' paradise.
Page 190
As the earliest finds of the clay facsimiles of precious metals
coinage at Athens seem to date around the middle of the fifth century
B.C., it may be assumed that one way or another, the lust for having,
one man more than his neighbor, slowly became injected into them.
Perhaps Spartan mercenaries who always required to be paid in those
international currencies of silver and gold had been inveigled into
depositing their pay with the bankers of the Piraeus with whom it
might "grow" with interest; taking home the baked clay coins as
evidence of their account and thus evading contravention of the
Spartan laws in respect of possession of gold and silver.
With the resumption of the rule of international money power in
later Spartan history, one of the most outstanding instances of that
sickness rotting the fibers of their racial morale was the tale of
those "Homoioi" who seemed to have fallen in the social scale and were
no longer able to take their places in those great messes. Scholars
gave various reasons for these "disenfranchised" Spartans apparently
known as the "hypomeiones." The reason for their coming to be is more
than clear. They are the direct result of the power to discriminate
which is the natural outcome in favor of the banker of that actual
god-power he exercises once installed as local money creator.
More than likely, the re-established bankers would have taken
care that certain families who might yet create opposition to them
were dispossessed by one means or another. With that banker created
money as being now necessary qualification for membership, it was a
small matter to make sure that those they wished to dispossess never
Šhad enough.
Page 191
Clearly, the mess charges being assessed in silver money whose
issue the bankers controlled, those to whom such alien bankers
extended no favors and therefore ultimately dispossessed through
mortgage and foreclosure, not having any longer the wherewithal to
pay, no longer belonged.
The Spartan, whether poor or rich, in the days of national
currency had been the social equal of any other Spartan, however the
slow decay of the Spartan principle derived from a most outstanding
omission in the constitution which was total lack of provision for the
redistribution of wealth at certain intervals, and the cancellation of
debt as in the Hebrew custom of the 49th year.
Page 192
The control of wealth passed substantially into the hands of
women. Concern for the growth of money, no doubt, just as in this day,
replaced care for their men and the growth of their children.
CHAPTER XIII: MONEY CREATORS AND THE POLITICAL CONTROL
Page 193
In their inception, so-called political parties were other
expression of the principle of rule of tyrant, or dictator. Though
apparently instituted in opposition to each other, such societies were
the very natural outcome of complete usurpation of the essence of
sovereign power through conspiracy in respect to interference with the
issue of the unit of exchange. Such front organizations are the
natural result of semi-secret societies arrogating to themselves that
privilege which formerly belonged to the god alone, of the creation of
exchange units, abstract or otherwise. The only limit would be the
limit dictated by caution against over-saturation of that money market
being interfered with.
Naturally it was usually borne in mind that the (silly) goose
that laid the golden eggs must not be altogether destroyed and care
was taken that the real meaning of these activities was deeply
concealed for fear that ruler and people might come to realize the
true nature of the forces at work in their midst.
(In respect to money creation and issuance, Dr. Paul B. Trescott
in his work: Money, Banking and Economic Welfare in which the process
of deposit creation (which would be known as money creation if more
direct language were used), is briefly but aptly summarized.
According to Dr. Trescott, in order to make a loan of $1,000 to a
customer, "a bank needs only to credit his account with 1,000 in its
books by a stroke of the pen." This process by which deposits are
created consequently causes increase in the total money supply. Dr.
Trescott further remarks:
"The process of creating deposits is obviously a simple and
painless one for the banks."
Page 194
Each of these political parties could not but be instrument of
private money creative power. Such establishment of conflicting groups
was a very efficient device of such private money creative power
towards the maintenance of its own hegemony. Herein was venality and
corruption enthroned. Such "Politicians" as turned to look a little
too closely at the hand that fed them promptly found their "Perks" or
"Political Rewards" cut off. Should any government begin to be
restless and unwilling to accept the axiom that it should have no real
say in that most serious matter of all, monetary emission, then it
would be but a short time before private money creative power
Štransferred its favors to the so-called opposition. Funds would be
made available sufficient to guarantee their winning the "Election."
At the same time, funds would be withdrawn from the "Political Party"
previously in control of government; which would very likely means
that in the following confusion, men more suitable and pliable would
force their way to the top; so that even if that particular government
was re-elected, private money creative power would have no further
fears. The price was always continuance of those policies most needed
by such private money creative power necessary for its own real
purposes and therefore the continuance of its own hegemony.
The greater part of the units of exchange as emitted by private
money creative power are of no intrinsic value other than those
denoted by precious metal symbols and with which the confidence of
peoples and rulers was gained. Therefore, the cost of instituting that
control of any state so "captured" by private money creative power,
the bankers, was virtually nil, since clearly such state financed its
own lamentable condition!
Page 195
It is clear that each unit issued into circulation, of fraudulent
origin or otherwise, reduced by an exact valuation the worth of
previous units transferring such loss of worth to the holder of the
new unit. If later, with growth of industry deriving from the creation
of such unit, all circulating units increased in worth, such increase
in worth rarely caught up with the original decline in worth, or
purchasing power of those previously existing units.
The steady decline in worth of the unit of exchange at any place
in any period of history will be sufficient proof in itself of the
existence of secret creation and manipulation of abstract units of
exchange by a relatively invisible force. Only under most unusual
circumstances would even a sharp rise in the number of precious metal
units circulating cause distinct and disturbing inflation of values
without an accompanying fraudulent and secret expansion of the total
number of working units through issuance of false receipts against
non-existing valuables or warehoused goods, or by creation of
transferable ledger credit page entry money against assignment
collateral. Previous metals themselves soon wear out, disappear for
purposes of speculation abroad or are hoarded.
Thus the creation and issuance of money constitutes free gift to
the issuer when such issuer be private person. It automatically and
immediately despoils he who thinks himself to have money or to be a
person of worth. It is an indirect and hidden form of taxation no less
than any other such indirect or hidden tax.
(Hence the existing situation in what is left of Anglo-Saxon
governments: As their (unnecessary) expenditure beyond tax income is
financed by the creation of debt directly to private persons which
indeed are the Banks (that everyone so unquestioningly accepts these
days as an established feature in living) under incredible conditions,
units of exchange in circulation automatically suffer increase and
consequently there is a steady fall in their purchasing power.
Such fall in purchasing power immediately and arbitrarily
constitutes a hidden tax on all who hold monetary units in one way or
another. Levied in an unseen manner by those private persons who
supposedly make the so-called loan to the government, its effects are
not understood by the people, nor its origin.
x Further than this hidden tax imposed with dubious legality, there
is the absurdity of an interest rate, parallel to that of previous so-
called loans, which creates a yearly interest bill which in itself
necessitates further such borrowing, without ever thinking of paying
off the principal; such system necessarily compels a government that
has been trained to unquestioned acceptance of its financial
liabilities to be servant in some considerable degree of those private
Špersons, its supposed benefactors.
For a clear statement of the workings of this unbelievable system
in Canada, see "Brief submitted to the Royal Commission on Banking and
Finance" by Mel Rowatt, Ottawa, 1964.)
Page 196
If in ancient times, such units of money, fraudulent or
otherwise, were accepted by the simple folks as money, and seemed to
serve equally well as had served that lawful money of earlier times
yet again, which had been an order on the treasury or warehouses of
the god of the city, then indeed, such units were money to all intents
and purposes of the immediate needs of exchange. The fact of their
legal issuance as a loan at interest against goods and services as
collateral pledges, placed in the hands of their creator and issuer
the power of total discrimination formerly recognized as being the
sole and absolute prerogative of the god. As time went on, the fact of
their creation, issue, acceptance, once the people had resigned
themselves to slow inflation of values, placed in the hands of this
private creator of these original fraudulent exchange units All-Power!
Whatever the material on which the units of exchange were
recorded, the customer still thought in terms of silver, as even today
most still think in terms of gold, though none to speak of has
circulated for thirty five years or so. So long as the ruler concurred
in the conspiracy to denominate these exchange units as being as
acceptable as those previously issued by the god and his people, then
the power of preferment or rejection was soon in the hands of the
banker as agent for what corresponded in that day to the international
bankers of today; totally in opposition to that natural order of life
in which the unit of exchange represents the will of the benevolent
god.
Page 197
Needless to say, this person would not extend his preferment to
those who instinct told him might be able to come to understand the
real truth of the emptiness of those shadowed vaults from which his
hand reached forth. It might safely be assumed that discrimination
would be exercised against those whose obliteration was included in
the overall plans of those mystic, if not satanic, figures that lurked
in the inner sanctuaries of the temple, mint, or counting house; in
which secret places were formulated those policies that decided the
promotion or otherwise of kings, tyrants, dictators, or political
parties.
The extraordinary wealth and power according to the standards of
the day of this secretive and apparently humble money power is shown
clearly by the following extract from Babelon:
"We know that the Greek bankers were money changers; all the more
important financial transactions were negotiated through their agency.
Their counters were the meeting place of businessmen and the stock
market. They controlled at the same time the sea-borne trade and the
affairs of caravans, above all, in Asia Minor. The exploitation of
mines was often in their hands. These guardians of treasure received
the precious metal deposits belonging to private persons or traders,
keeping open account for their clients, thus accumulating enormous
amounts; they hoarded, they loaned to Princes as well as private
individuals. Listen then to the story of Nicholas of Damascus more
eloquent than any commentary:
"Wishing to carry the war into Caria, Alyatte, King of Lydia,
(610-561 B.C.) gave the order to his commanders to bring him their
contingents at Sardis, by a certain day. Amongst the generals chosen
was Croesus, the oldest son of the King, at that time Governor of
Adramyttium and the plain of Thebes. Negligent and prodigal, ill
regarded by his father on account of his dissipations, very desirous
Šof being received back into his father's good graces, and of
confounding his calumniators, but not having the wherewithal to raise
and hire mercenaries, the young Prince, in order to overcome his
embarrassment, resolved to contract a loan. With this purpose in mind
he sought out Dadyattes, the richest merchant of Lydia. This person,
occupied with his ablutions, firstly let Croesus wait impatiently at
his door. Then he agreed to receive him but this was only to refuse
him money; "If I must lend to all the sons of Alyattes," he cried,
"there will not be enough."
Rebuffed, Croesus proceeded to Ephesus. There, an Ionian friend,
Pamphaes, learning the reason of his visit, obtained a sum of a
thousand gold staters from his father, Theocharides, who was possessed
of considerable fortune, and which he hastened to bring to the
necessitous prince. Thanks to these subsidies, Croesus, furnished with
troops, was the first of all at the rendez-vous and regained the favor
of his father who took him in as a partner in this expedition.
Croesus later on revenged himself on Sadyattes who had turned him
away, confiscating his treasure. The plunder taken from the unhappy
banker was large enough to make two pillars of gold and the golden
calves with which the temple of the Goddess was adorned.
Later we see a banker of Caelenae, Pythas, of Lydian extraction,
make a gift to King Darius of a plane tree in gold and a vine in gold.
While afterwards, doubtless in fear that his immense fortune
might only come to excite the covetousness of the prince, Pythias made
up his mind to ward off the danger by making a concession.
Spontaneously he offered Xerxes subsidies for the war."
Page 199
The above excerpt illustrates a clear cut case of effort by money
power to control political succession; for the real reason of the
refusal by Sadyattes of the loan to Croesus was that he had already
pledged himself to the support of Panteleon, Croesus's half-brother
who was clearly more "suitable" and "pliable" than the strong-minded
Croesus who, Sadyattes probably knew via his spies, would be his
enemy; although his offensive conduct towards a royal son would
suggest he considered his position inviolable.
Page 200
His surly arrogance in causing young Croesus to wait at the door,
and then refusing him his request in no pleasant manner, so typical of
this class of person today as much in Croesus's day, undoubtedly
caused Croesus to enquire a little deeply into this precious metal
money "Racket" when he did become king, a "racket" which allowed low
and unsavory persons to make a mockery of kingship. The results of his
enquiry undoubtedly showed him that above all, for his kingship to be
meaningful, monetary emission had to be removed from the control of
private persons. Further evidence of history would suggest, in Lydia,
Croesus destroyed the arrogance and power to subversion of this class
of persons, not the most noble amongst this subjects, by the
institution of the issue of equal weights of precious metal or coin,
as state prerogative; thus he thought, returning to himself that
essential power, the total control of monetary emission.
That the reputed fate of Croesus after conquest by Cyrus was
influenced by the longing for revenge of those leaders of finance at
City, the main force behind Cyrus and his conquests.
Hence the real source of the so rapid decay of all relatively
recent civilizations and so-called empires of the last 5000 years,
whose establishment was so often due to the behind the scenes
activities of bankers as agents for an internationally spread network
of bullion interests was the complete dearth of clean and noble men in
places of control and power.
Such natural and truly dedicated leadership had been destroyed,
Šeither by the planned discriminatory activities of the bankers or by
the never dying fires of war that maintained these so-called Empires.
Page 201
Clearly in that day almost all money in circulation arrived there
created and issued by private persons of a class stranger to the whole
world, and whose only guide was never more than their indifference to
the miseries of mankind. Today, despite the continuance of the naive
belief of those who toil from day to day that this money is created
and injected by the state, it is the same as in the days of the
corruption and crumbling of the god-given distribution systems of the
Ancient Orient, in the face of the attack on their integrity, by the
privately issued commodity currencies of silver. This attack later
having been intensified when that silver apex to the inverted pyramid
of abstract money by which the great banking houses were manipulating
the exchanges became further augmented by gold.
The apparent beneficiaries of such systems were front men for a
wider and more international system extending from China to Great
Britain. The evidence of this world-wide financial system in Britain
exists in the gold staters of the Iceni, Cassivellauni, Brigantes,
etc. still existing, and which circulated long before Julius Caesar.
Although gold was obtained in Wales and in Ireland, its use as
money could only have been inspired from that central point where the
original staters were minted, the Near East and the cities wherein
dwelt the controllers of international trade and mining.
Page 202
Amongst other principles of political control by money power used
in ancient times, just as much as today, was that which is known as
liberalism. Liberalism meaning that he who hath shall give to him who
hath not; not so much out of proper charity, but so that he who hath
not may come to put his foot on the neck of him who (formerly) hat,
and who now foolishly gives him his own strength. Thus money power
made sure that Permanent Revolution would prevent any power group from
having control long enough to see the true source of that which is the
power of the ruler, if he is to be in the saddle, namely, monetary
emission.
Money Power, then as today, fully understood the necessity
towards the continuance of its hegemony of the promotion of persons
basically corrupt who possessed the wealth of kings though at the same
time having the natural outlook of a slave, truly strange combination.
One such family identified in ancient times was that Athenian
family known as the Alkmeonidae, who, although suspected at the time
of the Battle of Marathon as being the source of the heloigraph that
sent information across the bay of Marathon to the Persian commanders,
strangely enough continued to maintain power and place at Athens.
Equally strange had been the awarding of the contract for the
rebuilding of the temple at Delphi to this same family in exile from
Athens.
Page 203
Pericles, scion of this notorious family, while being the front
man for those forces driving Athens into war with Sparta, was the
instigator of the Donatives and later, of theorica which allowed two
oboli per person to the lessee of the Oratorium serving two corrupt
purposes:
1. It made sure all the citizenry attended the plays thus keeping
their minds off more serious matters as do cinema and television
today.
2. It assure the lessee a certain profit.
A third purpose would have been the maintenance of an unbalanced
budget and consequent stimulation of government indebtedness to
Šprivate money creative power, the bankers. If the sophistication of
the Sales Tax was known to Periclean Athens, it may be assumed were
also known the sophisticated practices in relation to government
indebtedness as practiced particularly in Anglo-Saxon countries today.
Page 204
The establishment of theorica was to further increase necessity
of government borrowing in time of war and so strengthen the hold of
that so-called National Debt almost certainly held by themselves.
Thus the principles of the total hegemony of private money
creative power were as clearly understood by its masters yesterday as
much as they are today.
If in any way kings had understood the malignance of this growth
that had penetrated the sub-structure of life it would have been short
shrift for its controllers. Hence the necessity for an absolute
secrecy most restrictive in its effects. Clay, the material on which
records were kept throughout Babylonia at least, did not have any of
the potential of paper so far as went the keeping of records.
Page 205
The City of Athens itself, its monetary system based directly on
their internationally required products, silver and gold, was clearly
under their immediate control. If the state owned the mints, it would
make no difference. The states own the mints today for what it means;
which is little or nothing so far as goes control of Monetary
Emission.
Where copper and bronze fiduciaries, as at Rome, circulated at
values many times more than their value by weight of metal on the
international bullion markets, clearly such bullion such as came on
the market as military scrap would have been more useful towards the
counterfeiting of such currencies than sold at its bullion value.
Page 207
Just as the copper rouble of Czarist Russia, issued at an
overvaluation of 800% according to the value of copper bullion,
brought into Russia a very inundation of counterfeits minted in
Western Europe, thus international money power would have succeeded in
diminishing the beneficial effects of such national currency,
continuing to use Rome as the example, by mass counterfeiting which
would have seen rapid increase once gold and silver commenced to
circulate alongside the Aes after the Second Punic War.
Clearly, the main purpose of the counterfeiters, as agents of the
international silver bullion traders, would be to inject their
counterfeits into circulation at the best overvaluation possible.
Hence the steady disappearance of the precious metals from the
circulation. This disappearance seems to have been a factor inspiring
the vehemence of Cicero in his Oration: Pro Flaccus.
Page 208
Of Roman banking,Mommsen and Marquardt wrote:
"The conduct of banking was done for the most part through the
intermediary of the argentarii and of numularii: these last were known
under the name of collectarii mensularii. In countries of Greek origin
there was a kind of state bank as at Tenos; they were also in Egypt.
Among the Romans, on the contrary, it was only in the most
extraordinary circumstances that public banks were organised under the
direction of state functionaries.
It is through the intermediary of the argentarii that most
payments were made, as also they were entrusted with the collection of
moneys due, the placing of capitals at interest, the sale of
merchandise, the liquidation of estates, investments of all kinds and
the changing of foreign moneys.
Š
Page 212
Just as in today 95% of money in circulation is checks and
assignments in transit, often written against credits granted by
bankers where no actual funds previously existed but however
without which the drive and turmoil of this civilization could not
have come to be, so it was in Rome and in Greece. Indeed, for all
those movements of vast armies, and movements of peoples through the
consequent sale of slaves, and for the erection of all those great
works in stone, the instigative factor was the same as the instigative
factor behind all the mighty works and mysteries of today. It was none
other than the driving force of that abstract money that none can see
but that functions just the same as that which can be seen, the
mysterious "Credit" of the banker; an instrument towards the willful
redesign and enslavement of mankind.
In the late Roman Commonwealth and early Empire, the assignments
and checks in transit may not have equalled 95% of all money in
circulation and it is by no means impossible that they were even more,
taking into account the fact that today's high speed printing presses
and coining machines, the fount of the 5% of the circulation that can
be seen, can create these visible units on which the inverted pyramid
of the invisible units is erected, at a hundred thousand or more times
the speed of slaves striking and finishing metal units of money by
hand.
In Harper's Dictionary of Classified Literature and Antiquities,
Roman banking is dealt with as follows:
"The Argentarius thus did almost the same sort of business as a
modern banker. Many persons entrusted all their capital to them and
instances in which the argentarii made payments in the name of those
whose money they had in their hand are mentioned very frequently. We
also find that argentarii made payments for persons who had not
deposited any money with them: this was equivalent to lending money;
which in fact they often did for a certain percentage of interest."
Page 213
Thus banking was carried on in almost the same manner in the
Roman world as in our world of today and to those who understand the
significance of the practices of modern banking, nothing could be
clearer. Even the ostentatious display of a metal safety deposit vault
is recorded by the antiquarian Lanciana, doubtless to encourage people
to leave their valuables with the bank and so strengthen their
"confidence."
Until the end of the numerical currency, with the resumption of
the striking of silver money and therefore reentry into the orbit of
the silver bullion brokers, mining of the precious metals had been
forbidden in Italy and copper mining had been state monopoly, clearly
indicating the futility of any discussion of whether the striking of
coinage had been free or otherwise. Where the policy of the state had
been to maintain an overvaluation of its bronze coinage relative to
bullion prices, it is quite clear that it could in no way permit
private individuals the privilege of the mints, free or otherwise. To
do so would be to concede to them the power to manipulate prices
levels and so, confounding the economy, dismay the rulers. Thus it was
not until the time of Cicero that evidence appears of private persons
bring bullion to the mints.
Page 214
Such matters of state finance seem to have been well understood
during the middle commonwealth. However, as a result of the second
Punic War and the desperate need to rearm quickly that followed these
unfortunate battles, Rome had been obliged to allow the whole currency
system to become based on the international valuation of silver as
Šcommon denominator of values.
It follows that it was only after Rome had thus surrendered her
sovereign prerogative in money matters to the international silver
bullion brokers that the growth of liberalism finally gave rise to the
warlords known as the Triumvirate.
With reckless abuse of the power of their Imperium through those
bankers who supported them, particularly in relation to their right to
strike money in the field, the warlords derived virtual independence
from the auctoritas of an already corrupted senate.
Thus with the rise of the warlords who were in effect tyrants
under arms, each with his own Money Power, was the triumph of the
empire concept.
Page 215
In the case of Caesar, his supporting bankers appear to have been
the L. Cornelius Balba for whom the A. Hirtius of Caesar's "aes"
coinage as issued in the country of the Treveri in Gaul, seems to have
been agent with H. Clovius, emittor of Ceasar's brass issues.
Clearly moneyers and bankers reigned supreme behind Caesar or
Anthony or Octavian.
Sosius, moneyer and financial organizer to Anthony, who also came
from a banking family, when governor of Syria, dethroned Antigonus in
37 B.C. replacing him with Herod "The Great."
Page 216
The name of the bankers behind Augustus does not appear to be
known but the extent of their massive operations is revealed by the
widespread circulation of their heavy weight "aes" coinage right
across the Empire.
The question would be: was this excellent and adequate coinage
emitted by an organization of similar character to the Bank of England
or recent world power or the Federal Reserve? Both of which, though
apparently state departments, in reality private international
organizations set up international circle of bullion traders, or, as
they are now generally known, the International Bankers.
That which seems to be clear out of the fragments of information
existing is that there was no such thing as a permanent interest
bearing state indebtedness until the period which may mark the
beginning of the decline of imperial Rome; the significance of which
is that no Roman Government ever entirely lost control of that power
so essential to the maintenance of its sovereignty, the power to
directly inject the unit of exchange into circulation as according to
its own needs.
Of this period until the 3rd Century A.D., Professor Heichelheim
wrote:
"There were regular lending associations while usury constituted
quite an important item in the legal provisions of the Corpus Iuris
and the Talmud. Only State Usury was rare for the Roman State was
still in a supreme position. Large interest-free loans advanced to the
state by individual citizens for reward in the form of honors were
quite frequent up to the 3rd Century A.D."
Page 217
Though Roman Government had endeavored to monopolize all sources
of the material of its tangible currency and had prevented as much as
possible the circulation of precious metal which clearly would
undermine the integrity of the state issued unit of exchange, the
grandiose aes, it still could not prevent counterfeits from entering
circulation. It could not prevent the corrupt practices of oriental
banking after the extensive re-entry of silver into circulation as a
result of concessions made to the international bullion traders during
the 2nd Punic War, nor thereafter, the functioning of Gresham's Law
Šwhich such entailed. "Bad money drives out the good" which of course,
depends on what is bad and what is good! Nor, therefore, could it
control the activities of that underground that garnered the precious
metal from the circulation of more profitable use elsewhere.
As a consequence of the rejection by growing and powerful states
of the claim of silver bullion interests that all tangible money
should be founded on their product as base and common denominator of
values and the creation and paying into circulation of their own
tangible money, with value deriving from its scarcity or otherwise,
using copper or bronze as the material on which its numbers were
recorded, much copper or bronze that came the way of the international
bullion brokers would have been used in an extensive industry devoted
to counterfeiting of these fiduciary currencies.
Page 218
Thus would be created the conditions in which foreign money
lenders would be better able to flourish and secure the establishment
of their own peculiar systems of private money emission based usually
on the fiction of valuables on deposit for safe-keeping. Under such
systems, when fully under way, the next step would be political
control through so-called political parties that such money power
would bring into being, each necessarily dedicated to some "cause"
through a so-called "leader," also chosen through the agency of such
money power and by those forces it controlled. Such leaders would be
"suitable" men and would be chosen because they were pliable too often
naturally corrupt. Raised as likely as not from the lower ranks of
society and therefore dazed by the dizzy heights to which fortune had
lifted them, such men would be most likely to carry out without
question the policies required for the fulfillment of their master's
purposes and dreams; principally that of World Government; which
should raise such masters to the position of world rulers, and
therefore heirs of the god-kings of ancient days, in their own eyes;
although to the eye of any clear-seeing man, they might better have
been called the anti-god, or in the language of the naive Christians
of a somewhat later time to the god-kings, demons.
CHAPTER XIV: MAN PROPOSES BUT GOD DISPOSES
Page 219
So speaking of ONE WORLD and of World Rule, a vision stirs of a
distant past and of efforts towards World Rule in a smaller world of
another day; a past of which so little remains other than shattered
columns, cracked vases, a few precious metal coins and baked clay
facsimiles thereof, and the writings of relatively a handful of the
best of a former day, amongst which, strangely enough, still exist the
works of the propagandists for money power such as Xenophon, and, as
some say, Thucydides.
Behind these scattered fragments and the unseen but still
existing remains of millions of dead consumed in the constant wars of
those ancient days, is the enigmatic vision of those half-Greek men
amongst their records in the counting houses of Athens and the clear
picture of them and their boy, Pericles, scion of that line of shifty
Alkmeonidae, preparing under their guidance, plans for that Great War
which would extend their financial hegemony across the whole Grecian
world. If events proceeded along those lines, who knows, perhaps
spread across the whole world. ONE WORLD might be brought to reality.
After Klearchos and the edict of 432 B.C., the Athenian Empire
must have fallen totally under the control of the banks. The edict
ordering the subject allies to contribute money instead of ships meant
that they were to be drained of silver. When the silver was gone, they
would be obliged to come hat in hand to the Piraeus for that which the
Great Bankers were now lending as money against real collateral;
Šentries in the credit page of their ledger, or clay facsimiles
of silver and gold money which once had been.
This war would give the bankers complete control of Greece and
all that such could bring about through their financial guidance.
Page 220
None would flourish from Colchis to Illyria except they so willed
it. The instrument which was Athens and its allies would finally and
forever destroy that Spartan hegemony that had so long denied them
entry and had refused to accept their control through trade and money.
All that proud Dorian aristocracy would be exterminated as these
bankers had arranged long since for the aristocracy of so many other
states and cities of the world. Their own future as a people destined
to be lord over all would be secure. Gone forever would be that iron
and leather money over issues they had no control.
So with this vision before them, the war would commence and from
that blood and fire that they, the bankers, would see to it would
sweep the land could come nothing but good for them as they planned in
the shadows of the counting houses. Under the stress of war, Sparta,
through the agency of its aging king Archidamos, who was privately
friend of the banker's boy, Pericles, would secretly accept their
terms and permit the circulation of that which they loaned as money
and permit private persons to possess and hoard silver and gold which,
through the principles of banking, would soon be theirs in any case.
However, it seemed as if even in that day, it could be said: "The
best laid schemes of mice and men aft a'gley! A well planned stratagem
that should have established forever the banker's dream of world
empire through the creation of common money market would have removed
all remaining resistance towards the realization of such dream could
they but settle once and for all the problem of Sparta, was
frustrated.
Page 221
Those precious metal pieces, those copper fiduciaries, those clay
facsimiles, all those ledger entries, credits against no funds, money
created out of think air as by the hand of the gods, all these were
the secret of that endless urge and turmoil of the city states of
Greece and of the tumult which finally culminated in the dark years of
that miniature "World War" out of which could come no winner but the
International Money Power, the Great Peloponnesian War, just as did
these last two so-called "Great" world wars of our time.
Page 222
One thing stands out clearly from the fitting together of these
tattered fragments relating to man and his money in very ancient days
and that is ONE WORLD! Through the whole web of confusion, this faint
design grows clearly more distinguishable concept of those who by
nature of their secret trade, money, think they know all the paths of
men and life; and because of the international character of that which
they now control, delude themselves into believing that they, as
designers of it all, rising into the firmament as gods, shall be heirs
to it all.
These secret classes who live shut in by the four walls of their
exclusivity had originally believed that one more step would place
them forever on the now empty thrones of the god-kings through the
devious paths of knowledge of precious metal money creation and
emission and all the deceits against mankind to which it loaned
itself.
With the establishment of the United Nations complex via the
International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, otherwise
designated "The World Bank," knowing no master on this earth other
than God or the Devil as the case may be, and with the advent of the
Šsettlement of international trade balances by transfer of Ledger
Credit Page Entry Money, evinced by Paper Gold, as the final deceit,
these secret classes behind it all well might believe that the total
of human activity, whether towards War or Peace, depended on their
instigation alone. With such triumphs resulting from the long years of
planning and waiting, well might they have been justified in
concluding that the end of a long and weary way towards WORLD RULE had
been reached; perhaps the only question remaining being: "Who should
be the Ruler?"
Page 223
Where in the fatuity of their vain imaginings was to have been a
money changer's World Kingdom, and for them and theirs, are in reality
the desolate ways of the gulf of time and infinity, no less for them
as for all.
And even should this ONE WORLD come to be, what of INTERNATIONAL
MONEY POWER itself and its fatuous dream of a money changer's world
dominion? And what will happen to it when the Indo-European who was
its unwitting host and protector for so long is gone?
The present day Chinese, for instance, who very well may be
strong in the competition for the throne of the gods from whence ONE
WORLD would be ruled, in the event of their accession to such throne,
either by election or by force of arms, would not be likely to
tolerate this finance core, privately and irresponsibly controlled,
and from which has been drawn the threads of evil that have so long
tormented the Indo-European world which long since has been totally
entrapped in the web that has been woven. No more did the Chinese of
ancient imperial days extend toleration to such activities throughout
their long history.
But it may not be doubted; little if anything will be left
anyway. Even should this world we know be spared total obliteration,
after the pestilence of decay, once again will be just shattered
columns, crumbling concrete, paper that turns to dust with the touch
and ruin over all. Life's urgent clamor will be followed by the
silence of its extinction. The brief and fading evidence of all this
turmoil will be but faint shadows on the accumulating dust.
Page 224
Revelations xvii 1. to xviii.21
"...And there came one of the seven angles which had the seven
vials, and talked with me, saying unto me, Come hither; I will show
unto thee the judgment of the great whore that sitteth upon many
waters: With whom the kings have committed fornication...
So he carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness: and I
saw a woman sit upon a scarlet beast, full of names of blasphemy...
And upon her forehead was a name written, a mystery, BABYLON THE
GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND OF ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.
And he saith unto me, The waters which thou sawest where the
whore sitteth are peoples, and multitudes, and nations and tongues.
And the woman which thou sawest is that great city, which
reigneth over the kings of the earth.
And the kings of the earth who have committed fornication and
lived deliciously with her, shall bewail her, and lament for her, when
they shall see the smoke of her burning.
For in one hour so great riches is come to nought. And every
shipmaster and all the company in ships, and sailors, and as many as
trade by the sea stood afar off.
And they cast dust on their heads and they cried weeping and
wailing, saying, Alas, alas that great city wherein were made rich all
that had ships in the sea by reason of her costliness! for in one hour
is she made desolate.
End of book.
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