On a rainy July afternoon I stood on the Promenade at Rockefeller Plaza and beheld Prometheus unbound. There he was, his golden self sprawled against the wall of the erstwhile skating rink (in summer it is transformed into an outdoor cafe), holding the flame in his right hand, his gift to mankind. Above him is a most fitting inscription provided by Aeschylus: “Prometheus, teacher in every art, brought the fire that hath proved to mortals a means to mighty ends.”

Suddenly, a deranged man (or prophet) walked by, muttering how Prometheus was really Lucifer in shining disguise—and mine eyes beheld a glory which quickly faded. Golden Prometheus began to look sinister, with a mocking expression upon his beautiful face, which put me in mind of the gilded figures so often seen in the degenerate, cruel, and opulent fetes associated with the ancien regime during the so-called Age of Reason. The fire in his hand was Reason—the cynical, critical, destructive sort—and he was about to bestow it upon mankind, so men could be as gods. It was the advent of a perverted Pentecost, with a fiery orb plucked and hurled from the Tree of Knowledge and Life.

Appropriately enough, Prometheus and a host of other seemingly benevolent characters adorn the walls of the buildings and structures comprising Rockefeller Center, a site familiar to most Americans and tourists at large. It is no mere coincidence that this plaza happens to house the offices and studios of one of the major broadcasting networks, the National Broadcasting Company, whose very name brings to mind the “nationalization” of other institutions during the Age of Dictators.

The buildings in the plaza have a distinct totalitarian flavor about them as well. They are built of solid concrete with a dull-gray hue, giving an Atlantic Wall appearance. The main building, which rises above the rest, is the most prominent of the group and resembles one of the massive flak towers constructed in Berlin during World War II to provide shelter from the destructive air raids. It has a distinct Art Deco, New Age look (like many of the new, sinister structures in Atlanta or the infamous “Batman” building in Nashville, to name but a few); at any moment, I expected to see Skeletor himself emerge from this tower of darkness, to boast of his prowess before the good guy He-man (or perhaps even Buck Rogers). If not Skeletor, then why not such real-life characters as Hitler, Stalin, or Mussolini—or even Prometheus?

Unfortunately, evil rarely assumes such obvious, outward forms. As so aptly illustrated by C.S. Lewis in the preface to The Screwtape Letters, it resides within and “is conceived and ordered (moved, seconded, carried and minuted) in clean, carpeted, warmed, and well-lighted offices, by quiet men with white collars and cut fingernails and smooth-shaven cheeks who do not need to raise their voice.”

To mask this subtlety, heroic-looking figures adorn several of the buildings comprising the plaza. In their Art Deco forms, with square features and a plethora of muscles, they represent either gods or goddesses, or the common man; the implication being that perhaps they are both one and the same—we are as gods.

On one building we see them as the guardians of the portal. Over the main entrance stand two muscular he-men, the one on the left grasping a sledgehammer facing another on the right who wields a sickle (note where they stand). The guardians of the gate are the proletarian and the farmer, laborers now united and situated so as to protect the straight and narrow way to eternal life within the Soviet paradise. Thus is manifested the proletarianization of society, a popular trend culminating in a golden era during the 1930’s, when, incidentally. Rockefeller Center was constructed.

As an example of how serious this trend had become, one only needs to view the statue of General Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson atop Henry House Hill on the Manassas battlefield in Virginia. Here, “Old Blue Light” himself is square-featured and so abounding in muscles that he seems about ready to burst out of his uniform. “Old Tom Fool” had been transformed into a superman, able to leap tall buildings in a single bound (even those in Rockefeller Center), faster than the speeding bullets fired at his Virginians, and more powerful than the locomotives which brought them there. The pious and modest Jackson, who stood like a stone wall at First Manassas and thus encouraged others to rally around him, would hardly have recognized himself in such a light, as a superman of the people. It comes as no surprise that this statue of Stonewall was sculpted and cast in New York City, then dispatched to the battlefield park, during the 1930’s.

Those who prefer the Cult of Reason would naturally be encouraged by the inscription over the entrance of the main building in Rockefeller Center: “Wisdom and knowledge shall be the stability of thy time.” To give sanction to this creed, Zeus in his muscular form presides over the inscription, the law-giver who bestows wisdom upon mankind, in this case through the medium of two lesser deities who bear it directly to mortals. The lesser gods on either side of the inscription assume the standard muscular forms; the one at the right hand of Zeus is a typical he-man god, while the other at this left is a voluptuous she-man goddess. They symbolize the absolute equality of the sexes in this totalitarian Olympus, their status sanctified and ordained by a benevolent supreme being. By extension, both sets of mortals have the ability to perform the same tasks, regardless of their true capabilities, since these words of wisdom and knowledge from on high are now made flesh. No ribs are missing here.

For those who might be intimidated by this pantheon of musclebound messiahs, another building has a more comfortable array of feminine figures carrying vases of water (living water, no doubt), in the most blissful and happy state imaginable. Upon closer inspection, they turn out to be boys, similar to the types seen on ancient Greek pottery, yet these perform the tasks assigned to women and slaves in most ancient civilizations. The wall of yet another building has a frieze of figures resembling a pictograph found within an ancient Egyptian pyramid; some of these laborers are carrying vases of water as well. Happy servants all, the true stability of the people in a new-ordered society.

For the entertainment of these contented servants (ostensibly to distract their minds from their true condition), still another building contains the ground-level studios where such programs as the Today Show are brought to the people, albeit graciously, at their own level. Great icons of Katie and Bryant adorn its wall, although a Plexiglas veil separates the worshippers from the high priests within. The faithful behind the barriers rise early in the morning (braving the most hostile elements at times) to join the nation in paying homage to the Today Show. The media gods often emerge from their studio-temple to bestow a measure of grace upon the crowd outside; they speak to them, anoint them, and at times even permit them to address the nation. Then the grateful assemblage beholds as the gods ascend back into their studio, because as we all know, the show must go on.

And quite a spectacle it is. Later, after these devotions had long ceased, I walked over to the studio and peered through the Plexiglas window. The temple was a fraud and not what it appeared to be on television. It looked cheap. The furniture is so modest that one might have thought it came from an estate sale; a corrugated metal bookshelf houses an array of books which might easily have been bought at a rummage sale; the photographs in the background of the interview living rooms, which depict the fairest scenes in nature, are mere plastic panels of the type sold in Wal-Mart. And to think, all this time, I and the nation stood in awe of this studio brought to our level and the larger-than-life figures within.

All of these subtle and not-so-subtle messages are the real voices of the media mouthpiece which herald the arrival of the New World Order. They are the living symbols of a real presence where worldly knowledge is praised unceasingly and the accomplishments and refinements of Western Christian civilization are continually distorted by merciless, blaring propaganda. All of this has been happily subsidized by the managerial elites who serve at the Altar of Reason, determine church policy at the Council on Foreign Relations, and sing the praises of Prometheus, who has ironically deceived the deceivers. That is why he just sprawls there, shining and smiling.

Prometheus has so blinded the world that his true nature cannot be seen in the light (which would normally dispel him), even when the sun is shining. The multitudes who flock to Rockefeller Center cannot see his true nature on the fairest of days because they are busy admiring the awe-inspiring temples in the complex, places he calls home. It takes the gloom of adversity, manifested by a rainy day, to look within ourselves first, so that we might see Prometheus laughing at us in our pride and folly. When our eyes are thus opened, we will know true wisdom and knowledge, and see that Prometheus, so godlike, is chained to a rock for all eternity for calling himself God. But like the dragon in the Book of Revelation, he has been let loose to breathe the flames of wisdom and knowledge, deceive the multitudes, and bring us all down into the lake of fire with him.