booknetsaWebster-secretSocietiesAndSubversiveMovements

und Falk: Gespräche für Freimaurer."[34]
Lessing's friendship with Moses Mendelssohn has led to the popular theory, unsupported however by
any real evidence, that the Jewish philosopher of Berlin provided the inspiration for the character of Nathan,
but might it not equally have been provided by the miracle-worker of Brunswick? However, in the case of
the dialogues less room is left for doubt. Falk is mentioned by name and represented as initiated into the
highest mysteries of Freemasonry. This is of course not explained by Lessing's commentators, who give no
clue to his identity.[35] It is evident that Lessing committed an enormous blunder in thus letting so important
a cat out of the bag, for after the publication of the first three dialogues and whilst the last two were circulating
privately in manuscript amongst the Freemasons, an order from the Duke of Brunswick forbade
their publication as dangerous. In spite of this prohibition, the rest of the series was printed, however
without Lessing's permission, in 1870 with a preface by an unknown person describing himself as a non-mason.
The dialogues between Ernst and Falk throw a curious light on the influences at work behind Freemasonry
at this period and gain immensely in interest when the identity of the two men in question is understood.
Thus Ernst, by whom Lessing evidently represents himself, is at the beginning not a Freemason, and,
whilst sitting with Falk in a wood, questions the high initiate on the aims of the Order. Falk explains that
Freemasonry has always existed, but not under this name. Its real purpose has never been revealed. On the
surface it appears to be a purely philanthropic association, but in reality philanthropy forms no part of its
scheme, its object being to bring about a state of things which will render philanthropy unnecessary. (Was
man gemeinlich gute Thaten zu nennen pflegt entbehrlich zu machen.) As an illustration Falk points to an
ant-heap at the foot of the tree beneath which the two men are seated. " Why," he asks, " should not human
beings exist without government like the ants or bees?" Falk then goes on to describe his idea of a Universal
State, or rather a federation of States, in which men will no longer be divided by national, social, or religious
prejudices, and where greater equality will exist.
At the end of the third dialogue an interval occurs during which Ernst goes away and becomes a Freemason,
but on his return expresses his disappointment to Falk at finding many Freemasons engaged in such futilities
as alchemy or the evocation of spirits. Others again seek to revive the * * *. Falk replies that although
the great secrets of Freemasonry cannot be revealed by any man even if he wished it, one thing,
however, has been kept dark which should now be made public, and this is the relationship between the
Freemasons and the * * *. "The * * * were in fact the Freemasons of their time." It seems probable from
the context and from Falk's references to Sir Christopher Wren as the founder of the modern Order, that the
asterisks denote the Rosicrucians.
The most interesting point of these dialogues is, however, the hint continually thrown out by Falk that
there is something behind Freemasonry, something far older and far wider in its aims than the Order now
known by this name-the modern Freemasons are for the most part only " playing at it." Thus, when Ernst
complains that true equality has not been attained in the lodges since Jews are not admitted, Falk observes
that he himself does not attend them, that true Freemasonry does not exist in outward forms-" A lodge bears
the same relation to Freemasonry as a church to belief." In other words, the real initiates do not appear upon
the scene. Here then we see the role of the " Concealed Superiors." What wonder that Lessing's dialogues
were considered too dangerous for publication !
Moreover, in Falk's conception of the ideal social order and his indictment of what he calls " bourgeois
society " we find the clue to movements of immense importance. Has not the system of the ant-heap or the
beehive proved, as I have pointed out elsewhere, the model on which modern Anarchists, from Proudhon onwards,
have formed their schemes for the reorganization of human life? Has not the idea of the " World
State," " The Universal Republic " become the war-cry of the Internationalist Socialists, the Grand Orient
Masons, the Theosophists, and the world-revolutionaries of our own day?
Was Falk, then, a revolutionary? This again will be disputed. Falk may have been a Cabalist, a Freemason,
a high initiate, but what proof is there that he had any connexion with the leaders of the French Revolution?
Let us turn again to the Jewish Encyclopædia: Falk... is... believed to have given the Duc d'Orleans, to
ensure his succession to the throne, a talisman consisting of a ring, which Philippe Egalité before mounting
the scaffold is said to have sent to a Jewess, Juliet Goudchaux, who passed it on to his son, subsequently
Louis Philippe.
The Baron de Gleichen, who "knew Falc," refers to a talisman of lapis-lazuli which the Duc d'Orléans
had received in England from " the celebrated Falk Scheck, first Rabbi of the Jews," and says that a certain
occultist, Madame de la Croix, imagined she had destroyed it by " the power of prayer." But the theory of
Nesta H. Webster — Secret Societies and Subversive Movements — Part I
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