booknetsaWebster-secretSocietiesAndSubversiveMovements

1. " Their meetings were held in the most convenient spot, often on mountains or in valleys; the only essentials
were a table, a white cloth, and a copy of the Gospel of St. John, that is, their own version of it."-Dr.
Ranking, op. cit., p. 15 (A.Q.C., Vol. XXIV.). Cf. Gabriele Rossetti, The Anti-Papal Spirit, I. 230, where it
is said " the sacred books, and especially that of St. John, were wrested by this sect into strange and perverted
meanings."
2. Michelet, Histoire de France, III. 18, 19 (1879 edition).
3. Michelet, op. cit., p. 10. " L'élément sémitique, juif et arabe, était fort en Languedoc." Cf. A.E. Waite,
The Secret Tradition in Freemasonry, I. 118: " The South of France was a centre from which went forth
much of the base occultism of Jewry as well as its theosophical dreams."
4. Michelet, op. cit., p. 12.
5. Ibid., p. 15.
6. Graetz, History of the Jews, III. 517.
7. Thus Hastings' Encyclopædia of Religion and Ethics omits all reference to Satanism before 1880 and observes:
" The evidence of the existence of either Satanists or Palladist consists entirely of the writings of a
group of men in Paris." It then proceeds to devote five columns out of the six and a half which compose the
article to describing the works of two notorious romancers, Léo Taxil and Bataille. There is not a word of
real information to be found here.
8. Précis of Eliphas Lévi's writings by Arthur E. Waite, The Mysteries of Magic, p. 215.
9. Jewish Encyclopædia, article on Cabala.
10. Dogme et Rituel de la Haute Magie, II. 220 (1861). It is curious to notice that Sir James Frazer, in his
vast compendium on magic The Golden Bough, never once refers to any of the higher adepts-Jews, Rosicrucians,
Satanists, etc., or to the Cabala as a source of inspiration. The whole subject is treated as if the cult of
magic were the spontaneous outcome of primitive or peasant mentality.
11. Histoire de la Magie, p. 289.
12. Talmud, treatise Berakhoth, folio 6. The Talmud also gives direction on the manner of guarding against
occult powers and the onslaught of disease. The tract Pesachim declares that he who stands naked before a
candle is liable to be seized with epilepsy. The same tract also states that " a man should not go out alone on
the night following the fourth day or on the night following the Sabbath, because an evil spirit, called
Agrath, the daughter of Ma'hlath, together with one hundred and eighty thousand other evil spirits, go forth
into the world and have the right to injure anyone they should chance to meet."
13. Talmud, treatise Hullin, folios 143, 144.
14. Hastings' Encyclopædia of Religion and Ethics, article on Jewish Magic by M. Gaster.
15. Margaret Alice Murray, The Witch Cult in Western Europe, and Jules Garinet, Histoire de la Magie en
France, p. 163 (1818).
16. Hastings' Encyclopædia, article on Jewish Magic by M. Gaster. See the Zohar, treatise Bereschith, folio
54b, where it is said that all men are visited in their sleep by female devils. " These demons never appear under
an other form but that of human beings, but they have no hair on their heads... In the same way as to
men, male devils appear in dreams to women, with whom they have intercourse."
17. The Rev. Moses Margoliouth, The History of the Jews in Great Britain, I. 82. The same author relates
further on (p. 304) that Queen Elizabeth's Hebrew physician Rodrigo Lopez was accused of trying to poison
her an died a victim of persecution.
18. The Rev. Moses Margoliouth, The History of the Jews in Great Britain, I. 83.
19. Hastings' Encyclopædia, article on Teutonic magic by F. Hälsig.
20. Talmud, tract Sabbath.
21. Hermann L. Strack, The Jews and Human Sacrifice, Eng. Trans., pp. 140, 141 (1900).
22. See pages 215 and 216 of The Mysteries of Magic, by A.E. Waite.
23. See also A.S. Turberville, Medi val Heresy and the Inquisition, 111-12 (1920), ending with the words: "
The voluminous records of the holy tribunal, the learned treatises of its members, are the great repositories
Nesta H. Webster — Secret Societies and Subversive Movements — Part I
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