Chapter VIII

, verse 1.

[248] The _Book of Nicholas Flamel_ describes the symbols as follows: (1) A Wand and serpents devouring one another; (2) a Cross, on which a serpent was crucified; (3) Deserts, in the midst of which were many fair fountains, whence issued a number of serpents that glided here and there.

[249] Mercury and Saturn—as Flamel supposed them to be—were depicted on the obverse side of this leaf and the symbolic flower was on the reverse side. It is not said to be a rose, but simply a fair flower. The rose-tree was on the obverse side of the fifth leaf.

[250] The original has no reference to solidified air.

[251] Otherwise, Arisleus, who figures prominently in the discourses of the _Turba Philosophorum_.

[252] There is an old story that he translated the _Sepher Ha Zohar_ into Latin, but the manuscript has never been found.

[253] It was first published at Basel and afterwards at Amsterdam in 1646. In 1899 the second edition was rendered into French. It deserves and will repay careful reading from the mystic point of view.

[254] This promise represents another unfulfilled intention of Éliphas Lévi.

[255] See _Les Six Voyages de Jean Baptiste Tavernier, en Turquie, en Perse et aux Indes_, Paris, 1676. There were five French editions, and the work was also translated into English.

[256] This is really the title of a particular treatise, but as it is exceedingly long and may be said to be _de omnibus rebus_, it may not be taken unjustly to represent his philosophy at large.

[257] The latest and most successful apologist of Paracelsus says that the charge of intemperance was invented by his enemies. See the _Life of Paracelsus_, by Miss Anna M. Stoddart, 1911.

[258] Éliphas Lévi, who rather misquotes Dante, held that he had performed the same kind of mental pilgrimage, and had escaped in the same manner—by reversing dogma. He says elsewhere: “It was after he had descended from gulf to gulf and from horror to horror to the bottom of the seventh circle of the abyss ... that Dante ... rose consoled and victorious to the light. We have performed the same journey, and we present ourselves before the world with tranquillity on our countenance and peace in our heart ... to assure mankind that hell and the devil ... and all the rest of the dismal phantasmagoria are a nightmare of madness.”

[259] The interpretation of the _Divine Comedy_ as embodying an act of war against the papacy was begun by Gabriele Rossetti, about 1830, in his _Disquisitions on the Anti-Papal Spirit which produced the Reformation_. For the obscure and dubious tenets to which Éliphas Lévi gives the name of Johannite, he substitutes the doctrines of Albigenses and Waldenses. The same thesis, taken over from its Italian deviser, was maintained in the same interest by Eugène Aroux, firstly in _Les Mystêres de la Chevalerie_, and afterwards in the great body of annotation attached to his translation of Dante. The latter work appeared in 1856. The interpretation of Lévi is a variant of that of Aroux. The disquisitions of the French writer are a fountain of joy for criticism. He produced yet another monument, being _Dante, Hérétique, Revolutionnaire et Socialiste_, 1854. He was a devoted member of the Latin Church, though I think that there would have been joy among the faithful had his books been burnt at Rome.

[260] The authority is the demonographer Bodin. Trois-Échelles confessed to the King that he had given himself over to a spirit who enabled him to perform prodigies. He was forgiven on condition that he denounced others who were guilty of sorcery. It is supposed that his subsequent condemnation was the consequence of new operations on his own part.

[261] That is, Pierre de l’Étoile. See _Véritable Fatalité de Saint Cloud_, art. 8.

[262] This account is drawn from Garinet, who cites two pamphlets of the period: (A) _Les Sorcelleries de Henri de Valois, et les Oblations qu’il faisait au Diable dans le Bois de Vincennes_, 1589; (B) _Remonstrances à Henri de Valois sur les choses horribles envoyées par un enfant de Paris_, 1589.

[263] Compare Aroux: _La Comédie de Dante_, vol. ii., p. 33 of his _Clef de la Comédie_. The Rose is “the Albigensian Church and its doctrines ... transformed into a mystic flower.” Hence the immense vogue of the romance of William of Lorris, despite the anathemas of Gerson.

[264] The words of Flamel are as follows: “On the fifth leaf was a fair rose-tree, flowered, in the midst of a garden, growing up against a hollow oak, at the foot whereof bubbled forth a fountain of pure white water, which ran headlong down into the depths below. Yet it passed through the hands of a great number of people who digged in the earth, seeking after it, but, by reason of their blindness, none of them knew it, except a very few, who considered its weight.” _Le Livre de Nicolas Flamel._

[265] It will be seen that this is the counter-thesis to the explanation of the spiritual world by means of natural law; it is the explanation of the natural world by means of spiritual law. So also Éliphas Lévi is right when he goes on to affirm in substance that the religion of supernatural grace is the font of natural religion. It is in the light of the instituted sacraments that we find the hidden grace of those in Nature.

[266] “We do now securely call the Pope Antichrist, which was formerly a capital offence.... We do hereby condemn the East and the West, meaning the Pope and Mahomet.... He (the Pope) shall be torn in pieces with nails, and a final groan shall end his ass’s braying.... The judgment due to the Roman impostor who now poureth his blasphemies with open mouth against Christ.... The mouth of this viper shall be stopped.” See _Confessio Fraternitatis_, R.C., 1616.

[267] The Masonic title of Sovereign Princes Rose-Croix ascribed in France to the members of the Eighteenth Degree, under the obedience of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite, has been changed in England to Excellent and Perfect Princes. The old Rosicrucian title was that of _Frater_, and the head of the Order was termed _Imperator_.

[268] I have let this date stand, as it is difficult to say what Éliphas Lévi is driving at. Khunrath was born in 1559 or 1560, and he died early in the seventeenth century.

[269] This is a mistake. The _Amphitheatrum_ appeared in 1609, the licence having been obtained previously.

[270] The work contains (_a_) 365 versicles drawn from _Proverbs_ and the apocryphal _Book of Wisdom_, the Latin Vulgate being printed side by side with a new translation by Khunrath. These versicles are divided into seven grades. (_b_) An interpretation at length of each versicle. (_c_) An introduction to the first engraved plate; (_d_) to the second; (_e_) to the third; (_f_) to the fourth; and (_g_) an epilogue or conclusion to the whole work.

[271] Éliphas Lévi has misplaced most of the plates, and it is difficult to follow his descriptions. No. 1 is the laboratory and oratory of the adept. No. 2 is apparently that which he calls the Path of Wisdom. No. 3 is the Philosophical Stone. No. 4 is that which Lévi describes as the Dogma of Hermes, because the sentences of the Emerald Tablet are inscribed on a Rock of Ages or Mountain of Initiation. No. 5 is the Gate of the Sanctuary, but it is enlightened by three rays. No. 6 is that which Lévi terms a Rose of Light, but it is really the sun with Christ in the centre. Nos. 7 and 9 correspond to the descriptions given; but No. 8 is scarcely a doctrine of equilibrium: it is the doctrine of regeneration through Christ, in Whom the law is fulfilled.

[272] The _Basilica Chymica_ was translated into French by J. Marcel de Boulene and published at Lyons in 1624. It was reprinted at Paris in 1633. The third part is the _Book of Signatures_. The Latin edition appeared at Frankfort in 1608.

[273] Some of these names are exceedingly obscure, and no importance attaches to their literary remains. Philip Muller wrote _Miracula et Mysteria Medico-Chymica_, 1614. It was printed eight times at various places. Of John Torneburg I have no record. Ortelius was a commentator on Sendivogius; Michael Poterius or Potier was the author of ten alchemical tracts, but I have never heard that they were in estimation among lovers of the art. The Baron de Beausoleil was still more voluminous and is better known. The works of David de Planis Campe were collected into a folio in 1646; he is regarded as an alchemical dreamer. Duchesne was _Sieur de la Violette_, and his writings are in six volumes. Benjamin Mustapha, or rather Mussaphia, wrote on potable gold. The other names are known to science, as Lévi would express it, and are famous therein.

[274] The sum of this intimation is a little obscure. See my _Real History of the Rosicrucians_, pp. 388-390, for various versions of the proclamation.

[275] I have been unable to find the authority for this discourse, as a whole, but some fragments of it are cited by Gabriel Naudé.

[276] There does not appear to be a story with this title either in _The Phantasus_ or elsewhere in the works of Tieck.

[277] See Pierre De Lancre: _Tableau de l’Inconstance des Démons_, Book VI., Discourse 4. But Éliphas Lévi seems to have followed the summary account of Garinet.

[278] The account is in Bodin and in the record of Henri Boguet. Her physical peculiarity is described as _un trou qu’elle avait au dessous de sa parti gorrière_. The work of Boguet is entitled _Discours Exécrables des Sorciers_, 1602. It is exceedingly rare.

[279] The prosecution and execution of secular priests and monks recur frequently throughout the annals of sorcery.

[280] The names appear to have been Madeleine de Mandol, daughter of the Seigneur de la Palud and Louise Capel.

[281] The actual charges were (_a_) that Madeleine was seduced by Gaufridi when she was nine years old, (_b_) that he had taken her to the Sabbath, (_c_) that he had sent her 666 devils. To Louise he had sent four only.

[282] See _L’Histoire Admirable de la Possession et de la Conversion d’une Pénitente séduite par un Magicien_, by the Inquisitor Michaëlis, 1612.

[283] He was a priest of Marseilles and curé of Accoules.

[284] The confession included: (1) Visions of Lucifer, (2) compact with him, (3) obtaining the love of women by breathing upon them, (4) visiting the Black Sabbath, (5) celebration of Black Masses, &c.

[285] Louise is heard of no further in the history of the period. Madeleine was cast out by her family and lived on alms at Avignon, till in 1653 the Parliament of Aix condemned her to perpetual seclusion.

[286] The historical facts are that Grandier insisted on one occasion in taking precedence of Richelieu, then Bishop of Luçon and in disgrace at Coussay. It is not even quite clear that the priest appealed to the King, but he was involved in much litigation on charges of immorality. It is just, however, to add that, according to Garinet, Grandier went to Paris and pleaded his cause before the King.

[287] The first victim of the phenomena appears to have been the Lady Superior.

[288] The director of the convent was named Mignon, and he called to his assistance not only certain Carmelites but a secular priest of the district, who was a great believer in diabolical interventions.

[289] This letter is quoted by Garinet, pp. 218, 219.

[290] Notwithstanding the application of what was called the ordinary and extraordinary torture, no confession of guilt in respect of the charges was ever extracted from Grandier, who indeed refused to reply. Éliphas Lévi’s picture of his deportment is throughout accurate as well as admirably told.

[291] This took place as stated and, moreover, the inhabitants of the town, after a meeting in the town hall, wrote to the King complaining of the pretence, absurdity and vexation of the process. See Garinet, _Pièces Justificatives_, No. XVI.

[292] This remark, in which I concur unreservedly, may be noted by students of Masonic history as an offset against the pretentious nonsense which has been talked on the subject by French makers of fable and especially by J. M. Ragon, the dullest and most imbecile of all.

[293] This opinion is showing signs of recrudescence at the present day, and it is well to say that there is no evidence to support it.

[294] It may be mentioned that Masonry, wheresoever established, is elective and not hierarchical.

[295] The Legend of Hiram has been told after several manners. English Masons will see that the present version is utterly incorrect, and it may be added further that it incorporates reveries borrowed from old High Grades.

[296] The names ascribed to the three assassins are High Grade inventions, and so also is all that follows concerning them.

[297] It is understood that Éliphas Lévi entered Masonry in the ordinary way, but it is quite true that vital integration therein and real understanding thereof are consequences of personal work.

[298] It has been called the most ancient of all the Chinese books, being ascribed to the year 3468 B.C. It consists of 10 chapters.

[299] See my translation of this work: _Transcendental Magic: Its Doctrine and Ritual_, 1896.

[300] It will be observed and appreciated at its proper value that Éliphas Lévi does not attempt to elucidate the Chinese puzzle of which he claims to possess the key, and the explanation is that if he had known his subject critically he would not have attempted to create Zoharic analogies which in the nature of things are non-existent.

[301] The _Book of Concealed Mystery_ is not a key to the _Zohar_; it is one of the tracts inserted therein and its influence on the text at large is almost _nil_.

[302] It will be noticed that this remark is not borne out by the instance which is supposed to illustrate it and that the lucubration on China is a curious preamble to a study of remarkable authors of the eighteenth century, who had nothing to do with China.

[303] Emmanuel Swedenborg never gave expression to this view, and in respect of the criticism as a whole, it must be remarked that the communications which came to him came unawares, his psychic states not being self-induced.

[304] The Kabalah has no principle of the hierarchy; its one counsel is the study of the Doctrine and that study continually brought forward new developments of the deep meanings which lay behind (_a_) the Law, (_b_) the prophets and (_c_) the historical books of the Old Testament. The _Zohar_ presupposes throughout a widely diffused knowledge of its Secret Doctrine, as already intimated.

[305] He was the recipient of a revelation and was not concerned with assisting those whom he addressed to attain the interior states into which he entered himself. He was bent only on delivering the message which he had received.

[306] Éliphas Lévi refers to a work entitled: _Mesmer—Mémoires et Aphorismes Suivis des Procédés d’Eslon_, 1846. The Aphorisms of Anton Mesmer have been frequently reprinted.

[307] The reference is probably to a French work, which in the absence of date and fuller description cannot be identified with certainty.

[308] The writer in question certifies (_a_) that the Comte de Gabalis was a German, (_b_) that he was a great nobleman and a great Kabalist, (_c_) that his lands were on the frontiers of Poland, (_d_) that he was a man of good presence who spoke French with a foreign accent. Saint-Germain testified on his own part to Prince Karl of Hesse that he was the son of Prince Ragoczy of Transylvania. Perhaps the latter place will be regarded as sufficiently in proximity to Poland to make the story of Éliphas Lévi a little less unlikely than it appears on the surface. But the prince in question was Franz-Leopold Ragoczy, who spent his life in conspiracies against the Austrian Empire, “with the object of regaining his independent power” and the freedom of his principality. No more unlikely person can be thought of as the original of the ridiculous Comte de Gabalis, and the Comte de Saint-Germain never intimated that he belonged to a line of Kabalists, least of all such a Kabalist and occultist as is depicted by the Abbé de Villars. See Mrs. Cooper Oakley’s _Monograph on the Comte de St. Germain_, Milan, 1912.

[309] See Madame la Comtesse de Genlis: _Mémoires Inédites pour servir à l’Histoire des XVIII^{me} et XIX^{me} Siècles_.

[310] See the _Essai sur la Secte des Illuminés_, which appeared anonymously in 1789, the author being the Marquis de Luchet. The story here reproduced is given in Note XV to the essay in question. It affirms that the Order of Initiated Knights and Brethren of Asia became the Order of St. Joachim about 1786. There is no mention of Saint-Germain in this Note.

[311] Éliphas Lévi explains in a note that the neophyte whose experience is related, and who was mistaken for a corpse, was in a state of somnambulism induced by magnetism. In respect of the green arbour, and the effects produced by the harmonica, he refers to Deleuze: _Histoire Critique du Magnétisme Animal_, 2nd edition, 1829. It contains curious accounts of the magnetic chain and trough, magnetised trees, music, the voice of the mesmerist and the instruments employed by him. Lévi adds that the author was a partisan of mesmerism which does not leave his opinions open to suspicion. I do not know what this is intended to convey, but the work of Deleuze was of authority in its own day and is still worth reading.

[312] It will be observed that Éliphas Lévi is taking the story more seriously than he proposed to do at the beginning. If therefore I may on my own part take the Marquis de Luchet for a moment in the same manner and assume that he was right in saying that the Order of Saint Joachim was a transformation of the Knights and Brethren of Asia, it seems certain that the latter did not owe their origin to Saint-Germain and that their connection with Rosicrucianism was of the Masonic kind only, members of the fifth degree being called True Brothers Rose Croix, otherwise Masters of the Sages, Royal Priests, and Brothers of the Grade of Melchisedek.

[313] Compare the ribaldries of the Marquis de Luchet respecting the Harmonica and his supplementary account of its use in the evocations of Lavater.

[314] _Jachin_ is connected in Kabalism with the _Sephira Netzach_, because it is the right hand pillar, and on account of _Netzach_, _Jachin_ is in correspondence with צבאוה ידוד and צבאוה. The Divine Name _Tetragrammaton_ cannot be said on Kabalistical authority to be veiled in _Netzach_. It was really veiled in Adonai because of _Shekinah_, and the cohabiting glory between the cherubim was the manifestation, vestment and concealment of Jehovah.

[315] There is no secret as to the authorship of the tract on Illuminism, and Lévi could have been enlightened on the subject by his friend, J. M. Ragon. So far from being imbecile, the monograph of the Marquis de Luchet is entertaining if it is not brilliant. As to the transmutations of Saint-Germain, it is meant that there is no evidence of gold being produced by his methods, but it is otherwise in respect of precious stones. For the exoneration of De Luchet it does not signify that the evidence is bad.

[316] See _L’Alchimie et les Alchimistes_, by Louis Figuier, pp. 320 _et seq._ I have intimated that it is very difficult to trust this writer in matters of historical fact, but he represents Lascaris as appearing in Germany at the end of the seventeenth century, being then about fifty years old, and in any case it is a mistake to say that he was in evidence when the Comte de Saint-Germain was making a sensation in Paris. Lascaris had long since vanished from the theatre of Hermetic events.

[317] It was in the presence of the rack that the testimony of his wife was extracted, and I suppose that there is no one at this day who will count it as infidelity on her part.

[318] This device is inscribed on the symbolic bridge which is mentioned in the Grade of Knight of the East, or of the Sword.

[319] According to the account of himself which Cagliostro gave at the famous trial arising out of the Diamond Necklace affair, Acharat was the name which he bore in the years of childhood which he spent at Medina. His “governor” was Althotas, who has been sometimes identified with Kölmer, the instructor of Weishaupt in Magic.

[320] In his _Lexicon Alchimiae_, 1612, Martinus Rulandus explains that, according to the system of Paracelsus, Azoth was the Universal Medicine, though for others it is one of the names ascribed to the Philosophical Stone. It was evidently neither in the process of Cagliostro, but—if questioned—he might have identified it with Philosophical Mercury, a substance which can be extracted from any metallic body.

[321] It is interesting to note that Mr. W. R. H. Trowbridge, who has made the latest attempt to exonerate Cagliostro, has omitted all reference to the regeneration processes and the alleged attempt to renew thereby the youth of Cardinal de Rohan.

[322] As seen already, Menander was the successor of Simon Magus, and the baptism which he performed was claimed to confer immortality.

[323] This story has been altered from the original narrative to make it appear that Cagliostro escaped. He did nothing of the sort, for the monk proved the stronger of the two. Prince Bernard of Saxe-Weimar is the authority for the account, and he is said to have guaranteed its accuracy.

[324] Saint-Martin did not continue the school of theurgic Masonry founded by Martines de Pasqually. He abandoned the school and all

## active connection with Rites and Lodges. The evidence for his

acquaintance with the Tarot rests on the fact that his _Tableau Natural des Rapports qui existent entre Dieu, l’Homme et l’Univers_ happens to be divided into 22 sections, and there are 22 Tarot Trumps Major. On the same evidence the same assertion is made in respect of the Apocalypse. That which seemed adequate for Éliphas Lévi continues to be found sufficient for the school of Martinism to-day and for its Grand Master, Papus.

[325] See Deleuze: _Mémoires sur la Faculté de la Prévision_, 1836.

[326] The reader who is in search of romances may also consult P. Christian: _Histoire de la Magie_, published about 1871. It pretends that Court de Gebelin left an account in MS. of the interrogation of Count Cagliostro in the presence of many Masonic dignitaries, including Cazotte, at the Masonic Convention of Paris. The date was May 10, 1785. Cagliostro on that occasion predicted the chief events of the French Revolution, and, at the suggestion of Cazotte, gave the name, then unknown, of the Corsican, Napoleon Bonaparte.

[327] _The Tractatus de Revolutionibus Animarum_ was the work of R. Isaac de Loria, a German Kabalist. It is contained in the second volume of _Kabbala Denudata_. It is not allegorical and it has no Talmudic or Zoharic authority. As it was translated into French in 1905, most people can judge for themselves on the subject.

[328] The reference is here to the latest development of Templary under the ægis of Fabré-Palaprat. It came into public knowledge about 1805, and its invention is not much earlier. Its documents were fictitious, like its claims.

[329] Éliphas Lévi mentions in a note that he quotes these words as they were given to him by an old man who heard them. They are cited differently in the _Journal_ of Prudhomme.

[330] I have failed to trace this story to its source, but Éliphas Lévi was curiously instructed in the byways of French occult history, and though he could seldom resist the decoration and improvement of his narratives, they had always a basis in fact.

[331] Christian Antoine Gerle was born in 1740 and died in 1805. He was a Carthusian, who came into some prominence under the Constituent Assembly. On April 10, 1790, Dom Gerle proposed a decree that “the Catholic, Apostolic and Roman Church was and should remain always the religion of the nation, and that its worship should be alone authorised.” See Albert Sorel: _L’Europe et la Révolution Française_, vol. ii. p. 121. He was imprisoned at the Conciergerie but was liberated, and during the reign of Napoleon he was appointed to an office in the Home Department.

[332] She is said to have been imprisoned in the Bastille, but this seems to be an error, for it is certain that she died in the Conciergerie at the age of 70. She called herself the mother of God, prophesied the speedy advent of a Messiah and promised that eternal life would then begin for the elect.

[333] See my _Studies in Mysticism_, pp. 99-111, for a summary account of the Saviours of Louis XVII.

[334] St. Hildegarde died in 1179 at the age of 81. She wrote three books of Revelations, which were approved by the Council of Trèves, and Latin authorities have termed her one of the most illustrious mystics of Germany. In the fifteenth century the Council of Basle approved the Revelations of St. Bridget, who was born about 1307 and she died on July 23, 1373. A translation in full of her memorial was published at Avignon in four small volumes, dated 1850.

[335] Out of a great body of claimants, computed by one writer to have been forty, and by another two hundred in number, there are four who may rank as competitors at least one with another for recognition as the escaped Dauphin: they are the Baron de Richemont, Augustus Mèves, Eleazar Williams and Naündorff.

[336] The work of De Luchet is quite worthless from the evidential standpoint, but the so-called correspondence is cited in a Note on pp. 182-186 of the essay. It appears that the House Magical had been sold to King Frederick William, but the person who assisted at the evocations is called _un grand Seigneur_, which may or may not veil the royal identity. Moreover, Steinert was the adept who compounded the “magical elixir,” and was pensioned on this account; but it is not stated that he was the magus of the ceremonial proceedings. I have been unable to check the recital of Eckartshausen, which is very difficult to meet with in England.

[337] In the _Secret Tradition in Freemasonry_ I have indicated that Schroepfer is, on the whole, rather likely to have possessed some psychic powers, which notwithstanding his story ran the usual course of imposture. As he practised evocation perpetually, his suicide can be accounted for owing to the conditions which supervened on this account. There seems no real reason to suppose that he killed himself because he doubted his powers; however, the question does not signify.

[338] It is just to say that another side of Lavater is shewn in his _Secret Journal of a Self-Observer_, which is a very curious memorial—or human document, as it would be termed in our modern language of inexactitude. It contains no suggestion of evocations and dealings with Jewish Kabalists, in or out of the flesh.

[339] Cahagnet is the author of the following works: _Arcanes de la Vie Future_, 3 vols., 1848-1854; _Lumière des Morts_, 1851; _Magie Magnétique_, 2nd Edition, 1858; _Sanctuaire du Spiritualisme_, 1850; _Révélations d’outre Tombe_, 1856.

[340] This account is taken from Note XV. appended to the _Essai sur la Secte des Illuminés_, but the Marquis de Luchet depended on another writer, the latter drawing from Lavater’s _Spiritus Familiaris Gablidone_, published at Frankfort and Leipsic in 1787.

[341] It is suggested by Clavel that when Charles VI suppressed Masonry in Austria, owing to a Bull of Pope Clement XII, the brethren of certain lodges instituted the Order of Mopses to fill the gap. See _Histoire Pittoresque de la Francmaçonnerie_, 3rd edition, 1844, p. 154. Ragon reproduces the opinion in his _Manuel de l’Initié_, 1861, p. 88.

[342] _Liber Mirabilis: qui Prophetias: Revelationesque: nec non res mirandas: preteritas: presentes: et futuras aperte demonstrat_, 1522. The work is in two parts, of which the first is in Latin and the second in French.

[343] I have used the seventeenth century English translation. The original says: _En l’Eglise au plus pire, traiter les prêtres comme l’eau fait l’éponge_. I do not quite see how Lévi’s explanation follows, but the point is not worth discussing.

[344] _Les Dernières Prophéties de Mlle. Lenormand_ appeared in 1843 and are joyful reading. She was born at Alençon in 1772 and died on June 25, 1843.

[345] I have failed to verify the statement that this person had access to the Emperor Alexander.

[346] It should be understood that _Valérie_ appeared at Paris in 1803, when the writer was thirty-nine years old. Her acquaintance with the Russian Emperor was eleven years later, and it was during the intervening period that her spiritual development took place. She was no longer an amiable coquette, though the description may once have applied to her. There is no question that the portrait of _Valérie_ was, and was intended to be, her own portrait. As to the identity of her hero, he was her husband’s secretary and there was no intimacy between them in the evil sense of the term, though she was not of unblemished reputation in other respects.

[347] It was the Empress Elizabeth, wife of Alexander, who first brought Madame de Krudener to the notice of her husband. She shewed him some of her letters to draw him under religious influence. The King and mystic met, under singular circumstances, on June 4, 1815. Madame de Krudener was 13 years older than the Emperor, with pale, emaciated and drawn features. The story repeated by Éliphas Lévi, whencesoever it may come, is an execrable calumny. The acquaintance began at Würtemberg and continued during the Emperor’s residence in Paris, or till September 28, 1815. Those were the days which ended in the proclamation of the Holy Alliance, and Madame de Krudener’s part in that work is a matter of history.

[348] Thomas Ignatius Martin is said to have foretold the revolution of 1830, but the fact is dubious. In his interview with Louis XVIII he is said also to have told the French King that he was not the rightful occupant of the French throne, but this is more than dubious. The

## particular legitimacy which he supported was that of Naündorff.

[349] See _La France Mystique_, by Alexandre Erdan, vol. ii. p. 135 _et seq._ for notices of four chief disciples of Fourier, the maddest being Victor Hennequin.

[350] He was the prophet of a third and final alliance between God and man.

[351] It is said that after the rupture of his relations with Wronski, M. Arson instituted a kind of humanitarian religion on his own account, and combined it with some aspect of metempsychosis speculations.

[352] The discourses of St. Michael with Vintras are said to have concerned (_a_) the destinies of France, (_b_) the future of religion, (_c_) the reform of the clergy. The Blessed Virgin, St. Joseph and Christ Himself also visited the seer, according to his own testimony.

[353] _L’Œuvre de la Miséricorde prit une teinte fleur-de-lys très prononcée._—Alexandre Erdan.

[354] See my _Mysteries of Magic: a Digest of the Writings of Éliphas Lévi_.

[355] The charges are contained in a pamphlet entitled _Le Prophète Vintras_, published by Gozzoli in 1851. I do not think that Geoffroi wrote anything.

[356] Vintras was arrested at Tilly-sur-Seules in 1842 on a charge of roguery; he was tried at Caen and condemned to five years’ imprisonment. After his release in 1848, he found an asylum in England.

[357] See _La France Mystique_, vol. i. p. 36 _et seq._ for a contemporary account of Du Potet and of the periodical magnetic _séances_ which took place _au dessus du restaurant des Frères Provençaux, au Perron du Palais-Royal_.

[358] According to another account, the Magic Mirror was an ordinary circle of evocation drawn with charcoal. Wandering spirits were supposed to be conjured therein.

[359] His madness is said otherwise to have been partial, or characterised by many lucid intervals. His second work was _Religion_, and it preached the doctrine of reincarnation, with periodical changes of sex. It described the Deity as an infinite substance in which circulated myriads of soul-entities.

[360] His other works include the _Gospel of the People_, 1840, to which Éliphas Lévi refers subsequently. For this he was imprisoned. In 1847 he published a _Histoire des Montagnards_. At the end of 1851 he was compelled to leave France, and seems to have lived in England. Henri Alphonse Esquiros was born in 1814.

[361] Henri Delaage seems to have taken the question of physical beauty rather seriously to heart. In 1850, under the title of _Perfectionnement physique de la Race Humaine_, he made a collection of processes and methods for acquiring beauty, drawn—as he claimed—from Chaldean Magi and Hermetic Philosophers.

[362] The Église Française was forcibly closed about 1840, but in 1848 an attempt was made to reopen it in a small room. A particular kind of Mass was celebrated in the French language, and it appears that the church had fixed festivals of its own. In doctrinal matters, Abbé Châtel regarded the relation between God and the universe as comparable to that between the soul and body, “but in an infinitely more excellent manner.” Paradise, Purgatory and Hell were alike abolished, and in their place two states were substituted, one of glory and felicity, the other of reparation.

[363] See the appendix to _Essai sur le Secte des Illuminés_, by the Marquis de Luchet, already quoted.

[364] Joseph Pitton de Tournefort: _Relation d’un Voyage du Levant_, 1717, 2 vols. It was translated into English and published in 3 vols., 1741.

[365] I wish that it were possible to quote the moving panegyric on Ganneau in a letter addressed by Éliphas Lévi to Alexandre Erdan and printed by him in _La France Mystique_, vol. ii. p. 184-188. He is described as one of the _élite_ of intelligence, an artist, a poet of original and inexhaustible eloquence. He was sometimes bizarre but never absurd or wearisome. He was, finally, one of those hearts under the inspiration of which the zealous will crucify themselves with joy for the ungrateful. Erdan once saw Ganneau addressing a crowd in the Place de la Concorde, “uplifting his great arms and raising to heaven his beautiful Christ-like head.”

[366] I suppose that this would be a St. Andrew’s cross with the addition of a vertical branch, on which would rest the head of the crucified person.

[367] There was a son of this marriage, and in 1855 M. Alexandre Erdan was inquiring what had become of him.

[368] To suggest that the _Zohar_ exists to propound and interpret a thesis of equilibrium is like saying that the vast text is written about the legend of the Edomite Kings or that it is a violent attack on Christianity, because there is a reference to each of these subjects. The symbolism of the Balance is practically confined to a single tract imbedded in the _Zohar_.

[369] “God stretched forth His right hand and created the world above, and He stretched forth His left hand and created the world below.... God created the world below on the model of the world above, for the image is found beneath of all that abides on high.”—_Zohar_, Part II., fol. 20a.

[370] Joseph de Maistre: _Soirées de St. Pétersbourg_, 1821, p. 308.

[371] For the sake of completeness, I have included this preface, though from some points of view it might have been reasonably omitted altogether.