booknetsaWebster-secretSocietiesAndSubversiveMovements

CHAPTER X
THE CLIMAX
THE first Masonic body with which the Illuminati formed an alliance was the Stricte Observance, to
which the Illuminati Knigge and Bode both belonged. Cagliostro had also been initiated into the Stricte Observance
near Frankfurt and was now employed as agent of the combined order. According to his own confession
his mission "was to work so as to turn Freemasonry in the direction of Weishaupt's projects "; and
the funds he drew upon were those of the Illuminati.[1] Cagliostro also formed a link with the Martinistes,
whose doctrines, though derided by Weishaupt, were useful to his plan in attracting by their mystical character
those who would have been repelled by the cynicism of the Illuminati. According to Barruel, it was the
Martinistes who-following in the footsteps of the Rosicrucians-had suggested to Weishaupt the device of
presenting Christ as an " Illuminatus " which had led to such triumphant results amongst the Protestant
clergy.
But if Weishaupt made use of the various masonic associations, they on their account found in him a
valuable ally. The fact is that by this time both French and German Freemasons were very much at sea with
regard to the whole subject of Masonry and needed someone to give a point to their deliberations. Thus at
the Congress of Wilhelmsbad convened on July 16, 1782, and attended by representatives of masonic bodies
from all over the world, the first question propounded by the Grand Master of the Templars (i.e. the Stricte
Observance) was: "What is the real object of the Order and its true origin?" So, says Mirabeau in relating
this incident, " this same Grand Master and all his assistants had worked for more than twenty years with incredible
ardour at a thing of which they knew neither the real object nor the origin."[2]
Two years later the Freemasons of France do not appear to have been any less in the dark on this matter,
for we find them writing to General Rainsford, one of the English Masons who had been present at the Congress
of Wilhelmsbad, as follows: Since you say that Masonry has never experienced any variation in its
aim, do you then know with certainty what this unique object is? Is it useful for the happiness of
mankind?... Tell us if it is of an historical, political, hermetical, or scientific nature?... Moral, social, or religious?...
Are the traditions oral or written?[3]
But Weishaupt had a very definite object in view, which was to gain control of all Freemasonry, and
though he himself was not present at the Congress, his coadjutor Knigge, who had been travelling about
Germany proclaiming himself the reformer of Freemasonry, presented himself at Wilhelmsbad, armed with
full authority from Weishaupt, and succeeded in enrolling a number of magistrates, savants, ecclesiastics,
and ministers of state as Illuminati and in allying himself with the deputies of Saint-Martin and Willermoz.
Vanquished by this powerful rival, the Stricte Observance ceased temporarily to exist and Illuminism was
left in possession of the field.
On February 15, 1785, a further congress took place in Paris, convened this time by the Philalèthes, at
which the Illuminati Bode (alias Amelius) and the Baron de Busche (alias Bayard) were present, also-it has
been stated-the " magician " Cagliostro, the magnetiser Mesmer, the Cabalist Duchanteau, and of course the
leaders of the Philalèthes, Savalette de Langes, who was elected President, the Marquis de Chefdebien, and
a number of German members of the same Order. This congress led to no very practical results, and a further
and more secret one was convened in the following year at Frankfurt, where a Grand Lodge had been
established in 1783. It was here that the deaths of Louis XVI and Gustavus III of Sweden are said to have
been decreed.
But already in this same year of 1785 the first act of the revolutionary drama had been played out. The
famous "Affair of the Necklace" can never be understood in the pages of official history; only an examination
of the mechanism provided by the secret societies can explain that extraordinary episode, which, in the
opinion of Napoleon, contributed more than any other cause to the explosion of 1789. In its double attack
on Church and Monarchy the Affair of the Necklace fulfilled the purpose of both Frederick the Great and of
the Illuminati. Cagliostro, we know, received both money and instructions from the Order for carrying out
the plot, and after it had ended in his own and the Cardinal de Rohan's exoneration and exile, we find him
embarking on fresh secret society work in London, where he arrived in November of the same year. Announcing
himself as the Count Sutkowski, member of a society at Avignon, he " visited the Swedenborgians
at their Theosophical Society meeting in rooms in the Middle Temple and displayed minute acquaintance
with their doctrines, whilst claiming a superior knowledge."[4] According to a generally received opinion,
Cagliostro was the author of a mysterious proclamation which appeared at this moment in the Morning Herald
in the cypher of the Rose-Croix.[5]
Nesta H. Webster — Secret Societies and Subversive Movements — Part I
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