Though Gnosticism long preceded Christianity, the Gnostics were the first Christians; they accepted Christ in the full realization of the word; his life, not his death, was the keynote of their doctrine and their practice. Thousands of years before the Egyptian Seers prognosticated the spiritual evolution of the soul in the seven stages of probation in the life beyond the grave. They conceived of a mystical Christos, a divine type of character that could only be attained through the soul's conflict with evil in the spiritual spheres of nebulous idealism. The Gnostics welded the ancient mythos...