A flyer from the Platonist Press

Found - a publisher's flyer loosely inserted in a copy of Kenneth Sylvan Guthrie's  Mithraic Mysteries (Platonist Press, Alpine, N.J 1925.) The Platonist Press seems to have flourished between 1900 and 1930 publishing books on philosophy, occult speculation, mysticism and the occasional work of fantasy fiction (including Guthrie's Bleiler listed A Romance Of Two Centuries. A Tale of the Year 2025 which appeared in 1919.) This flyer is eccentric, oddly surreal and now politically slightly  dubious. It was probably the work of Guthrie. There is little on the Platonist Press and some of these works may be 'ghosts' (i.e they were never published.) They appear to have moved from Alpine, New Jersey to North Yonkers, NY -which puts this advert some time in the 1920s...

SPICY SITUATIONS, and Dr Kenneth Guthrie's REMEDIES
The Board of Education's Examiner had Just turned down the blushing Miss Teacher Candidate. Weeping, she wailed, Is there no hope at all for me? Oh yes; purred he. Try again next year! What could I study in the meanwhile? Dr Guthrie's TEACHERS' PROBLEMS & HOW TO SOLVE THEM, $1.25; 'Value and Limits of the History of Education,' and 'The Mother-Tongue Method of Teaching Modern Languages,' each 30 cents. Will that pass me? Really, Miss, you are too pretty to teach school. Get his Progressive Complete Eduction, or Marriage as the Supreme School of Life, $1.25. And if I pass examination on it? Then I will marry you, Thanks, kind sir!
How a Pessimist Became an Optimist. The theological student had just been preparing a thesis by cribbing the wittiest passages from Discoveries & Insights. Essays Theological, Literary, and of Character-Study, $1. Nettled at the undeserved praise, he blushed at the second-handedness of his religion.
So at midnight he went to the Bishops study, and said that he would leave the Church because he was honest. 'Ignorant, you mean!' corrected the martyr. I can't hunt the manuscripts! Unnecessary nowwadays!' soothed the Bishop. 'I know of a wizard who can summon to your room for conference all the greatest but neglected philosophers of antiquity. Shall I have him send them to you? Oh yes, please! gasped the theolog. All my life I have dreamed of those sublime leaders of the race, but who were inaccessible. 'Very well, the wizard shall send you Zoroaster teacher of purity and angels. $3; Pythagoras the Sage. & Philosopher, $3; Numenius Comparative Religionist, $2; Plotinus, Greek Combiner, $12 cl, $9 pp; Plotinus, Outline $2; Philo Judaeus, Outline, $2' Stop! If they came all at once, it would be tragic. Is there no guide to all this? 'Write for a free copy of Names to Conjure With which will open the whole subject.'
This is what occurred at the Masonic Club after last night's Lodge-Meeting
The Master was entertaining the just initiated Candidate who asked him, Where could I read up on the meaning and historic origins of initiations such as ours? Well, said the Master, the best book is The Pagan Bible an Anthology of the Soul and its Helpers, Gathered from Ethnic Sources $1. That sounds good, said the novice. But I would like the see the original rituals. You can, explained the Master, by reading The Modernized Mithraic Mysteries, Dramatic Sketches of Historic Initiation, $3. But are the Christians entirely excluded? No, no! laughed the Master; whatever exclusion there is, is of their own making. Good; but are there any Christian Mysteries accessible? Certainly, and the good ones! Get the Angelic Mysteries of the Nine Heavens, a Drama of Interior Initiation, $3. But how do you advise all this, when you yourself are a Rosicrucian? retorted the persistent Candidate. 'Nothing is easier,' comforted the suave Master. 'You need only get the Modern Mysteries, $1, alluring and thrilling Mystical Playlets of Experiential Religion: also the glorious Shakesperean Mysteries, $1. Thanks!
Savanarola's Ghost met Giordano Bruno's, still reeling from the fire's agony
'Cheer up, friend: look!' As he waved his hand, there appeared a glistering Temple. What's that building? gasped Bruno. 'Your home!' comforted Savanarola. But the door is locked, and I want to get a look in! 'It's your own fault,' rebuked the FlorentIne: 'didn't you while on earth read Temple-Gates Ajar, $1? But a look-in is not enough; I would want my whole body in. 'Very well: I shall send for you a copy of Temple-Gates Opened, $1.' But in the meanwhile? whined Bruno, 'I'll lend you Prayers, Visions & Aspirations, $2.' Please, I don't want merely to aspire, I want to DO something! 'Then I will lend you Regeneration the Gate, Applied, and Special Methods, $2 each, $5 all three,' Oh thank you! Then I won't lose any time.
A Fundamentalist-Modernist Fracas. In a recent rail-road wreck near Albany the Modernist Rev. I. Catchem, of St Shark's-in-the-Mill-pond for hours lay waiting for rescue, cheek by jowl with the renowned Fundamentalist Rev. U. Cheatem. Fellow-misery broke down the barriers of orthodoxy, and I Catchem said, My injuries are due to over-fascination while reading occult stories entitled Hurrah for God, $1. 'My fatuous friend,' in shocked tones tones retorted self-righteous U, Cheatem, 'you better sober up by exchanging books, for the faith strengthening What Happened to Kitchener, $1, whose hypnotic charm immobilized me during the accident.' Conversation revealed they were both about to be ousted, and a flash of genius bade them exchange: but this flop implied two reeducations, betraying secret tricks of the craft, So U. Cheatem babbled, 'To be a Fundamentalist all you need to do is to keep people distracted by anything absorbing, such as Romance of Two Centuries, $2. Reuniting Pilgrimage, $1, Stories for Young People $1.25, eerie Volive Garlands, $3: and then you can fulminate from Why You Really Want to be a Churchman, $1.25'---'Thanks.' chortled I, Catchem. 'Now I will tell you how to succeed as a Modernist. Shed tears while haranging over your honesty, and the inability to be convinced by any reasonable arguments, in the meanwhile cribbing from The Ladder of God, $1.25. Then you can make a reputation as a pundit by judiciously using The Spiritual Message of Literature, $2.50, it's convenient. But shouldn't I seem somewhat saintly? 'Transcribe Of Communion with God, 50 cts, and Of the Presence of God, $1.25. Pray? That was the only point where Fundamentalist and Modernist agreed: Let us prey on the PLATONIST PRESS, Teocalli, 1177 Warburton Ave, No. Yonkers, N.Y.