booknetsaWebster-secretSocietiesAndSubversiveMovements

Doctor Falk is known to many Germans. He is a very extraordinary man from every point of view. Some
people believe him to be the Chief of all the Jews and attribute to purely political schemes all that is marvellous
and singular in his life and conduct. He is referred to in a very curious manner, and as a Rose-Croix in
the Memoirs of the Chevalier de Rampsow (i.e. Rentzov). He has had adventures with the Marechal de
Richelieu, great seeker of the Philosophers' Stone. He had a strange history with the Prince de Rohan
Guéménée and the Chevalier de Luxembourg relating to Louis XV, whose death he foretold. He is almost
inaccessible. In all the sects of savants in secret sciences he passes as a superior man. He is at present in
England. The Baron de Gleichen can give good information about him. Try to get more at Frankfurt.[31]
Again, in notes on other personages the name of Falk recurs with the same insistence on his importance
as a high initiate:
Leman, pupil of Falk....
The Baron de Gleichen... intimately connected with Wecter [Waechter] and Wakenfeldt.... He
knows Falk....
The Baron de Waldenfels... is, according to what I know from the Baron de Gleichen, the
princes of Darmstadt.... and others, the most interesting man for you and me to know. If we
made his acquaintance, he could give us the best information on all the most interesting objects
of instruction. He knows Falk and Wecter.
Prince Louis d'Harmstadt.. is also a member of the Amis Réunis, 12° and in charge of the Directories.
He worked in his youth with a Jew whom he believes to be taught by Falk...[32]
Here, then, behind the organization of the Stricte Observance, of the Amis Réunis, and the Philalèthes,
we catch a glimpse at last of one of those real initiates whose identity has been so carefully kept dark. For
Falk, as we see in these notes, was not an isolated sage; he had pupils, and to be one of these was to be admitted
to the inner mysteries. Was Cagliostro one of these adepts? Is it here we may seek the explanation
of the " Egyptian Rite " devised by him in London, and of his chance discovery on a bookstall in that city of
a Cabalistic document by the mysterious " George Cofton," whose identity has never been revealed? I
would suggest that the whole story of the bookstall was a fable and that it was not from any manuscript, but
from Falk, that Cagliostro received his directions. Thus Cagliostro's rite was in reality concealed Cabalism.
That Falk was only one of several Concealed Superiors is further suggested by the intriguing correspondence
of Savalette de Langes. " Schroeper," we read, " had for his master an old man of Suabia," by
whom the Baron de Waechter was also said to have been instructed in Masonry, and to have become one of
the most important initiates of Germany. Accordingly de Waechter was despatched by his Order to Florence
in order to make enquiries on further secrets and on certain famous treasures about which Schroepfer, the
Baron de Hundt, and others, had heard that Aprosi, the secretary of the Pretender, could give them information.
Waechter, however, wrote to say that all they had been told on the latter point was fabulous, but that
he had met in Florence certain " Brothers of the Holy Land," who had initiated him into marvellous secrets;
one in particular who is described as " a man who is not a European " had " perfectly instructed him."
Moreover, de Waechter, who had set forth poor, returned loaded with riches attributed by his fellow-masons
to the " Asiatic Brethren " he had frequented in Florence who possessed the art of making gold.[33] I would
suggest then that these were the members of the " Italian Order " referred to by Mr. Tuckett, which, like
Schroepfer and de Hundt, he imagined to have been connected with the Jacobites.
But all these secret sources of instruction are wrapped in mystery. Whilst Saint-Germain and
Cagliostro-who is referred to in this correspondence in terms of light derision-emerge into the limelight, the
real initiates remain concealed in the background. Falk "is almost inaccessible ! " Yet one more almost forgotten
document of the period may throw some light on the important part he played behind the scenes in
Masonry.
It may be remembered that Archenholz had spoken of certain marvels he had seen performed by Falk in
Brunswick. Now, in 1770 the German poet Gotthold Ephraim Lessing was made librarian to the Duke of
Brunswick in that city. The fame of Falk may then have reached his ears. At any rate in 1771 Lessing, after
having mocked at Freemasonry, was initiated in a masonic lodge at Hamburg, and in 1778 he published not
only his famous masonic drama Nathan der Weise, in which the Jew of Jerusalem is shown in admirable
contrast to the Christians and Mohammedans, but he also wrote five dialogues on Freemasonry which he
dedicated to the Duke of Brunswick, Grand Master of all the German Lodges, and which he entitled "Ernst
Nesta H. Webster — Secret Societies and Subversive Movements — Part I
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