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SAINT- MARTIN
THE FRENCH MYSTIC
AND THE STORY OF MODERN MARTIN ISM
ARTHUR EDWARD WAITE
LONDON
WILLIAM RIDER & SON, LTD.
811 PATERNOSTER ROW. E.C.
1922
ZT
022'?
A)
;n
SAINT- MARTIN
THE FRENCH MYSTIC
o
S
'
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
THE GREAT DAY OF SAINT-MARTIN
CHAPTER
rin
7
II
EARLY LIFE OF THE MYSTIO
.17
.
"
CHAPTER
..,'"'
A-
-.:
III
THE SEARCH AFTER TRUTH
37
DOCTRINE OF CORRESPONDENCES
48
62
70
CHAPTER IV
CHAPTER V
THE MAN or DESIRE
CHAPTER VI
LATER LIFE AND WRITINGS
CHAPTER VH
MODERN MARTINISM
SAINT-MARTIN
THE FRENCH MYSTIC

CHAPTER
TOE GREAT BAY OF SAINT-MARTIN
DURING the second
half of the eighteenth

be said without exaggeration
century
may
that the intellectual, historical and political
centre of all things was in the kingdom of
France, The statement obtains not only
because of the great upheaval of revolution
which was to close the epoch, but because of
the activities which prepared thereto. I know
not what gulfs dispart us from the scheme and
order of things signified by the name of
Voltaire, by Diderot and the Encyclopaedists
at large, or what are the points of contact
between the human understanding at this day
and that which was conceived by Condorcet
in his memorable treatise.
But about the
import and consequence of their place and time
I suppose that no one can question. The same
land and the same period were the centre also
of occult activities and occult interests, which I
mention at once because they belong to my
it
SAINT-MARTIN
on the external side, since it

happens quite often that where occultism is
about on the surface there is mysticism somewhere behind. We may remember in this
subject, at least
connection that a Christian mystical influence

had been carried over in France from the last
years of the seventeenth century through
it was that of
certain decades which followed
Port Royal, Fenelon and Madame Guyon^ owing
something almost unawares to the Spanish
school of Quietism, as this in its turn reflected,
without being aware of the fact, from pre:
Reformation sources.
As regards occult activities, if I say that their

seeds were sown prior to 1750, it will be understood that I am speaking of developments
which were characteristic in a particular manner
of the years that followed thereon.
Occultism
is always in tho world, and among the French
people especially there has been always some
disposition to be drawn in this direction. In
the eighteenth century, however, the sources
for the most .part are not to be found in France.
The persuasive illuminations of Swedenborg,
the deep searchings of Jacob Bohme into God,
man and the universe, the combined theosophy
and magic represented by earlier and later
kabalism, and a strange new sense of the
Mysteries coming out from a sleep of the
centuries with the advent of Symbolical Freemasonrythese and some others with a root
of general likeness were foreign in respect of
their origins, but they found their homes in
THE GREAT DAY OP SAINT-MARTIN
France. So also were certain splendid historical

adventurers who travelled in the occult
sciences, as other merchants travel in the wares
of the normal commercial world. I refer of
course to Saint- Germain and Cagliostro, but
they are signal examples or types, for they
did not stand alone. There were men with
new gospels and revelations of all kinds ; there
were alchemists and magi in the byways, as
well as on the public roads and in the King's
Perhaps above all there were those
palaces.
who
travelled in Rites, meaning Masonic Rites,

carrying strange charters and making claims
which had never been heard of previously in
the age-long chronicle of occult things.
When one comes to reflect upon it, the great,
many-sided Masonic adventure may be said
to stand for the whole, to express it in the world
of signs, as actually and historically speaking
there came a day, before the French Revolution,
when it seemed about to absorb the whole.
All the occult sciences, all the ready-made
evangels, all philosophies, the ever-transpiring

births in time ceased to be schemes on
paper and came to be embodied in Grades.
So also the past, though it may be thought
to have buried its dead, began to give them
back to the Rites, and not as sheeted ghosts,
but as things so truly risen and so much
new
that they denied their own death

and even that they had fallen asleep. Of such
was the Rosy Cross. It came about in this
mariner that our Emblematical Institution,
affirming
life
SAINT-MARTIN
10
which was born, so to speak, at an Apple-Tree

Tavern and nursed in its early days at the
Bummer and Grapes or the Goose and Gridiron,
may be said to have passed through a second
birth in France. It underwent otherwise a
great transformation, was clothed in gorgeous
vestments
ment
were
and decorated with magnificent

manner the adorn-
It contracted in like
titles.
of innumerable spiritual marriages,

I
fruitful .in spiritual progeny.
which
have
encomium elsewhere and that

of the Rites and Grades, the memorable Orders
and Chivalries which came thus into being.
More numerous still were the foster sons and
daughters, being things connected with Masonry
pronounced
its
but not belonging thereto, even in the widest

sense of its Emblematic Art. Of illegitimate
children by scores, things of rank imposture
or gross delusion, I do not need to speak. It is
sufficient to say that Holy Houses of Masonry
were everywhere in the land of France, and
everywhere also were its royal standards unrolled.
There
is
no question, from one point of
view, that all the claims belonged to a world of

dreams, that from old-world history they drew
only its fables, from antique science its myths,
that the dignities conferred in proceedings were
delivered in a glass of faerie, and that the
emblazoned programmes of high intent and

purpose were apt to fade strangely and seem
written in invisible ink under the cold light of
1
s.v.
-4
New
Encyclopedia of Frccma3onry
Freemasonry in France.
2 vols., 1921,
11
But the reality behind the dreams must

be sought in the spirit of the dreamers, for
whom something had happened which opened
all the the doors and unfolded amazing vistas
of possibility on eVery side about them.
The man who held the keys and indeed had
forged them was no other than Voltaire, who
fact.
in this connection stands of course for an

intellectual movement at large, which move-
ment meant emancipation from the fetters of

thought and action.. To summarise the situation in a sentence, apart from the Church and
its dogma, all things looked possible for a.
moment. The peculiar Masonic "system of
morality, veiled in allegory and illustrated by
symbols," might lead humanity either back
to the perfection which it had lost or forward
to that which it desired and could in mind
descry dimly, however far away. The new
prophets arid their vaunted revelations might

have God behind their gospels, and the darkness
of the occult sciences might veil unknown
Masters, rather than emissaries of perdition.
Condemned practices, forbidden arts might

lead through clouds of mystery into light of
knowledge, and in this light history might call
to be written out anew. We know at this day
that Map'onic legends are matters of fond
invention, but some of them are old at the root,
and we can understand in the eighteenth
century how they came to pass as fact, more
especially since the root of some was a Secret
Tradition in Israel. When it came about,
12
SAINT-MARTIN
under circumstances which cannot be recited

Masonic attention was drawn to the
old Order of Knights Templar, which had been
brought to the rack and the faggot as possessors
of a strange knowledge drawn from the East, a
Rite or a budget of Rites which claimed that
the Order had never passed. out of being was
like a fortune to those who devised.
It is from this point of view that we must
here, that
survey the amazing growth of Masonry in all its

multitude of forms. We shall conclude that it
was pursued zealously, with a heart turned
towards the truth, and as one who believes that
he may not stand alone, I am not unprepared
to think that some of the traditional histories,
to us. as monstrous growths, represented to the
makers their views on the probability of things
presented in the guise of myth. It was saved
in this manner for them from the common
charge of fraud. This is my judgment of the
time, and there is one thing more on the wonderside of the subject, the expectations and the
vistas seen in front.
As the time drew on for
Voltaire to be called away and when the chief
High Grades of Masonry connoted a reaction
from much that is typified by his name, there
rose up another personality holding one key
only, but it looked like clavis abscond itorum a
This was Anton Mesmer,
consiitutione mundi.
prominent in Parisian circles, a Mason like the
and destined presently to have

more than one Grade enshrining his discovery
and designed for the spread of its tenets.
rest of them,
13
Granting the fact of his unseen but vital fluid,

there was a root of truth at least in the long
past of Magia, in the enhancements of vestal
and pythoness, above all in occult medicine.
So opened some other doors, and when
Puystfgur discovered clairvoyance again as it
might be for a moment*the mystery of all the
hiddenness looked on the point of unveiling.
But the doors shut suddenly, the dreams and
the epoch closed in the carnage of the French
Revolution, and thereafter rose the baleful
cresset of Corsica.
I have dwelt upon French Freemasonry
because it is impossible to pass over it in presenting a picture of the period, but more
especially because the life of the mystic SaintMartin is bound up therewith for a certain
number of years. Among the Rites which
mattered at the moment his name connects
with two, being the glory of the Strict Observance and the problematical Order of Elect
Priesthood. 1 Behind the first there lies the
mystery of its Unknown Superiors, but this,
when reduced to its equivalent in simple fact,
means the circumstances under which and
the people by whom its root-matter waa
communicated in France to Baron von Hund,
who returned with it to his German Fatherland
and there formed it into a Rite, whose advent
marked an epoch for evermore in Masonry. But

1 Z'Ortfre dc* Elu3
CofrtJ, but tho last
word, tho plural of the Hebrew Cohen
CoAcmm,
is
a nonsense*
Priest being
14
SAINT-MARTIN
in respect of the second there lies behind it the

claim of Pasqually's apostolate in that for
which it stood and whence, if from anywhere,
he derived on his own part as, for example, the
Rosy Cross. I cannot trace here the history of
the Strict Observance it claimed to represent
a perpetuation in secret of the Knights Templar
and to be ruled by a hidden headship appertaining to that source. It may almost be said
that it took Masonic Germany by storm, and
planted its banners triumphantly all over
Europe, save only in those British Isles where
the Art and Craft of Emblematic Freemasonry
rose up in 1717 ampng the taverns of London.
It fell to pieces ultimately because it was in no
better position to prove its claims than was the
Craft itself to justify its recurrent appeals to
the hoary past. But the point which concerns
us is that before its karma overtook it the Rite
was domiciled in France and had headquarters
at Lyons under the government of a Provincial
Grand Prior of Auvergne. It was transformed
under these auspices from a Holy Houso of
the Tojuplo into a Spiritual Houso of God, in the
keeping of a sa'cred chivalry pledged to the
work of His glory and the promotion of peace
on earth among all men of goodwill. It ia
the Apex of Masonry or the diadem of this
Daughter of the Mysteries.
As regards Marlines do Pasqually and his
Bite des Elus Coens, or Order of the Elect
Priesthood, ho would seem to have been of
Spanish descent or extraction, though he was
:
15
born in Grenoble, and he is said to have been

a coach-builder by trade a piece of information
which comes, however, from a hostile source.
It may stand at its value and in any case does
not signify, for it must be admitted, I believe,
that he was of comparatively humble origin,
and his extant letters swarm with orthographical
errors,
all
his
intellectual
gifts
notwithstanding and also his spiritual dedications.

Whatever has been, said to the
so far as there is
that he emerged into the
light of his Masonic career for the first time in
1760 and that the place was Toulouse, where
he presented himself at a certain Lodge, bearing
a hieroglyphic charter and laying claim to
occult powers.
year later he emerged again
at Bordeaux, where he appears to have been
recognised on his own terms by another Lodge,
contrary,
it is
quite certain
evidence before us
which he had satisfied in respect of his claims.

In 1766 he proceeded to Paris and there laid
the foundations of a Sovereign Tribunal, which
included several prominent Masons. He was
again at Bordeaux in 1767, and three years
later there nro said to have been Lodges of his
Rite not only at that city but at Montpellier,
Avignon, La Rochelle and Metz, as well as at
Paris and Versailles. The Temple at Lyons
was founded a little later.
Such is the external story of the Rite in bare
purpose
up to the time when for my present

it can be merged in that of Saint-
Martin.
And now as to that for which it stood.
outline,
SAINT-MARTIN
16
I have intimated that Martines do Pasqually

pretended to occult powers, and that there was
at least one Lodge which hejd that ho had proved
his claim.
I shall show later on the extent of
our present knowledge respecting the content
of his Bite. It had a certain ceremonial
procedure, which like all Ritual must have
been sacramental in character, or with a certain
meaning implied by
its
modes and forms
but
only to the least extent was it otherwise veiled

in allegory and illustrated by symbols.
On
the contrary, it was concerned with the
communication of a secret doctrine by way of
direct instructiqn and with a practice which
must be called secret in the ordinary sense
which attaches to the idea of occult art or
The kind of practice was that which
science.
endeavours to establish communication with
unseen intelligence by the observances of
Ceremonial Magic. There was procedure of
this kind in the course of the Grades, or of some
at least among them, and Pasqually, the Grand
Sovereign, was also Grand Magus or Operator,
It will be seen in a. word that the Rite of Elect
Priesthood had a very different undertaking in
hand from anything embraced by the horizon

Masonry or the rank and file of High
Grades. The doctrine embodied a particular
view concerning the Fall of Man and of all
of Craft
animated things belonging to the material

order
it looked for the restoration of all, and
on man as the divinely appointed agent of
that great work to come.
;
CHAPTER
II
EARLY LIFE OF THE MYSTIC

Loins CLAUDE DE SAINT- MARTIN belonged to
the French nobility, as indicated by his armorial
bearings and the coronet superposed thereon,
but I have not come across his genealogy in any
extant memorial. He was described very of ten
in the past, and even by early French
biographers, as the Marquis de Saint-Martin,
but this is a mistake and has been rectified
some time since it does not appear that there
was any title in his branch of the family.
Though he suffered little inconvenience when
the French Revolution came, he was included
among the proscribed, meaning the noble
He was of Touraiue stock, and was
classes.
born at Amboiso in that, district on January
It is said that his mother died soon
18, 1743.
after and that the father married again.
We
was
a
have his own evidence that filial respect
sacred sentiment of his infancy ; that all his
:
happiness was perhaps due to his stepmother ;

that her teaching inspired him with love fclr
God and man and that the intercourse of their
minds took place in perfect freedom. 1 There
are various indications of his delicacy in early
;
1
Portraii de M. de Saint-Martin fait par lui-mtm*.
(Euvrei.Posthume*, 2 voli., 1807, i, 10, 15.
'
"
Set
SAINT-MARTIN
18
years, as when he tells us that he changed skins

seven times in babyhood that his body was a
"
"
rough sketch that he had very little astral,
that he could play
meaning psychic force
the
on
violin, but that owing to
passably
his
physical weakness
fingers could not vibr&te
with sufficient power to make a cadence. 1 I
;
mention these points
^to
show
that,
albeit
Saint-Martin attained a fair age, he seems to
have been always physically frail, amidst

great mental activities. For the rest, there is
no need to dwell upon his youth, as regards
external facts, nor have many transpired*
He was educated; at the college of Pont-Leroy,
was designed for the career of the law and
entered thereupon, but it proved so entirely
distasteful
it
that his father
allowed
him to
for the profession of arms, he being

twenty-two years of age.
exchange
then about
On the inward side, or as regards his early
dedications, we have the benefit of his own
intimations, too brief and few as they are,
There is a work of the past, by a writer named
Abadio, on The Art of Self-Knowledge, and
though on my own part. I have not brought
away -from
it
any
striking recollections,
it
had
a pertain repute in its day. Saint-Martin tells

us that he read it .with delight in his youth,
though he recognised later that it was characterised by sentiment rather than depth of
thought. It was instrumental probably in
disposing him towards the life of contemplation
*
PortrdtV, pp. 4,3, 11.
19
and the following of the mystic path. There

was also Burlamaqui, to whom he Bays that he
owed his love for the natural basis of reason and
human justice, So far as regards books, but
beyond these there were the promptings of his
own spirit, and in respect of these he tells us
that at the age of eighteen, amidst all the
confusions of philosophy, he had attained
certitude ad to God and his own soul ; (2) that
the seeker for wisdom had nêd of nothing
more; (3) that the foundation of all his happiness must be in contentment only with the
truth ; (4) that absorption in material things
was incomprehensible for those who knew
the treasures of reason and the spirit
(5) that
(1)
human
and
science explained matter by matter,

that after its putative proofs there were
other demonstrations needed

inmost prayer of his soul was for
;
(6)
that the
to abide
God
therein to the exclusion of all else, in which
manner he came to see, thus early, that Divine

Union is the true end of man for I find this
;
down
as belonging to his
first spiritual years, namely, (7) that we are
all widowed and that we are called to a second
further thought set
marriage,
The
influence of the
Due do
a commission for Saint-Martin
Choisoul secured
in the regiment
of Foix. The next three years of his life, which

are practically a blank, so far as memorials
are concerned, have been filled up by
biographers, following
*
on obvious
lines
Portrait, pp. 68. 0, 13, 127. 128. 20. 21. 17.
and
20
SAINT-MARTIN
those of least resistance. His occupations, in

a word, were the duties ofJhis profession and
the study of religious philosophy. There is of
course no question, and so far from the life
of a soldier offering any barrier to his
dedications, they opened a path before him
which he followed with advantage for a certain
distance and remembered his experience therein
with unfailing affection and reverence. As we
learn by his correspondence, Martines de Pasqually had married the niece of a retired major
in the regiment of Foix, and he was known
personally by the brother-officers of SaintMartin, De Grainville among others, and in the
end by Saint-Martin himself. De Grainville,
De Balzac and Du Guers were initiates of the
Elect Priesthood, and at some uncertain date
between August 13 and October 2, 1768,

Saint-Martin was received into the Order.
According to his own testimony he had taken
the first three Grades en bloc, apparently by
verbal communication. They were conferred
There is no record
on him by M. de Balzac.
as to how they impressed him, but among
1
several references to the Grand Sovereign of

the Rite on the part of his disciple for a period
there is one which appertains more especially
"
It
to the initial stage of their connection.
is to Martines de Pasqually," says Saint- Martin,
"
that I owe my introduction to the higher
See Saint-Martin's letter to Willermoz, under date of
Louis Claude de Saint- Alar tin,
8,-1771, in Papus
1902, pp. 100 etetq.
1
August
21
This sentence was written either

on the eve of the Revolution or soon after, and
truths.*
having regard to the spiritual distance travelled

already by the witness it is pregnant testimony.
As regards the Ritual-content of the Elect
Priesthood, we know certainly about seven
Elect Priest;
(3) Particular
(2) Companion
Master
Master Elect Priest
Elect Priest
(4)
Grand
Master
otherwise
Grand
Priests,
(6)
Elects
Grand
of
Architects; (6)
Zerubbabel;
and (7) a Grade of Rose Croix, not otherwise
Grades, being
Apprentice
Elect Priest ;
(1)
and more
fully particularised, though it is a

of frequent allusion in the correspondence of Martines de Pasqually and Saint-
subject
Martin. In the year 1895 Papus, otherwise

Gerard Encausse, testified that the
Dr.
"Rituals of the Elect Priests, " with other
numerous and important

transmitted as follows
:'('!)
archives,
To J.
had been
B. Willerinoz,
a merchant of Lyons, circa 1782. He was one

of the successors of Pasqually and Grand
Prior of Auvergne in the Strict Observance.
(2) From Willermoz to his nephew.
(3) From
this nephew to his widow.
(4) From her to
M. Ca vernier, an unattached student of
There are other documents held
occultism.
of M. Jacques Matter, one
descendants
the
by
of the early and most competent biographers
of Saint-Martin.
By the mediation of M.
Elie Steel, a bookseller of Lyons, Papus was
placed in communication with Ca vernier, and

*
Portrait, pp. 58, 59.
SAINT-MARTIN
22
was enabled to copy "the principal documents/ l Whether these included the Rituals
1
does not appear, nor is it possible to indicate

the present locality of the originals. It is
certain, however, that Papus transcribed the
Catechisms attached to six out of the seven
Grades, as he published them at the date
1
mentioned, and I have full evidence also that
he conferred the Grade of Rose Croix on at
one occasion, some years subsequently,

as we shall see more particularly at the close
of the present monograph.
In the absence of the Rituals, which have
never been printed, while I have failed to find
manuscript copies in England, either in private
hands or in any Masonic or other library, our
available knowledge of the Grades is confined
to the Catechisms and to the correspondence
mentioned above. I will take these sources
separately, as the first is concerned with the
doctrine and symbolism of the Rite, and the
least
second with
its
(1) Apprenpeculiar practices.

The instruction of this Grade
imparted perfect knowledge ex hypothesi
on the existence of the Grand Architect of the
Universe, on the principle of man's spiritual
emanation and on his direct correspondence
tice Elect Priest.
with
Master.
his
knowledge
It
in question
is
obvious
that
the
was conveyed dogmatic-
As regards the
origin of the Order, it

derived from the Creator Himself and had been
ally.
Papus
Marlines de Pasqually, Paris, 1895, pp. 11-14.

ZlSeteeq.
Ibid., pp.
EARLY LIFE OP THE MYSTIC
23
perpetuated from the days of Adam, that
from
say,
Adam
is to
to Noah, from Noah to
afterwards to Abraham,
Melchisedek, and
Moses, Solomon, Zerubbabel and Christ. The
meaning is that there has been always a Secret
Tradition in the world, and its successive epochs
are marked by successive custodians. It is in
this sense also that the purpose of the Order
is said to be the maintenance of man in his
primeval virtue, his spiritual and divine powert.
(2)
Companion"
told of our
Elect
first
Priest.
Having
been
" in the
previous
hears in the next
estate
Degree, the Candidate

concerning the Fall of Man and personifies it
He has passed from the perin his own case.
pendicular to the triangle, or from union with
his First Principle to the triplicity of material
The Grade of Companion typifies this

things.
The Candidate is engaged to
transition.
counteract the work of the Fall, in which his
own
spirit
age
has been undone, and his whole
in travail thereupon, to "acquire the

of perfection."
The root of all is in a living
world
is
realisation
of
what
is
implied by the
first
man, his ambition, his lapse and his

punishment. There is one allusion to the
estate of
pouring out of a more than human blood, but

is reserved to some later stage of
advancement in the Order. (3) Particular
Master Elect Priest. In the conventional
symbolism, the Candidate passes from the
he is at work in the
triangle to the circles
circles of expiation, which are said to b* six
this subject
SAINT-MARTIN
24
and in correspondenco with six conceptions

employed by the Great Architect in constructing the Universal Temple. The. symbolism of the Temple of Solomon is explained in
this Degree, and its members, are called to the
practice of charity, good example and all
duties of the Order, for the reintegration of
their individual principles, their Mercury,
Sulphur and Salt, in that unity of Divine
Principles
from which they
first
came
forth.
Here is the only distinct Hermetic reference

found in the memorials of the Rite. (4) Elect
Master. The Candidate enters tho circle of
reconciliation, and in common with his peers
is engaged henceforward in warfare with tho
enemies of Divine Law and of man at large on
We hear also, but vaguely, concerning
earth.
One Who is tho Elect of God, Who has
reconciled earth with man and all with the
Grand Architect of the Universe. It is to be
noted that in references of this kind we are left
to infer that the Reconciler is Christ, for He
The Resurrection
is not mentioned by name.
of Easter morning is referred to in similarly
unprecise terms, and so also the sacrifice on
Calvary. It transpires, however, that the
warfare of the Grade is against the enemies of
the Christian Religion. The initiations and
of Craft Masonry have been
as
apocryphal in the first Grade, and
stigmatised
were
sufficiently essential to be conyet they
ferred invariably in summary form on every
Candidate for the Elect Priesthood pre-
adornments
25
sumably in cases where they had not been

taken previously. In the Grade of Elect
Master he is warned to cut himself off from
clandestine secret societies, communicating
"
apocryphal instructions, which are contrary
to Divine Law and to the Order/* (5) Grand
all
Master
Priests,
surnamcd Grand Architects
The Candidate was thirty-three years old in

the fourth Grade and he has now attained
the age of eighty. It would seem that he
receives some kind of ordination. It is a Grade
of light and the Temple is ablaze with light.
There arc four Wardens, who represent the four
symbolical Angels qf the four quarters of
heaven, recalling the occult mystery of the
Enochian Tablets^ according to the memorials
.
of Dr. John Dec hi The Faithful Relation.

The
ordination whatever its form is said to be
operated by the thought and will of the Eternal,
and by the power, word and intention of His
The members of this Grade are
deputies.
the purification of their physical
with
occupied
senses so that they may participate in the work
of the spirit.
They are engaged otherwise in
constructing new Tabernacles and rebuilding
There are said to bd four kindc of
old.
Tabernacles in the Universal Temple, being
(I) the body of man, (2) the body of woman,
(3) the Tabernacle of Moses, and (4) that
"
"
of the Sun, or the
temporal spiritual
Tabernacle which the Great Architect of the
" has destined to contain the
sacred
Universe
names and words of material and spiritual
26
SAINT-MARTIN
reaction, distinguished by wisdom as by a

torch of universal temporal life." There is no
further allusion to this Spiritual Sun. The
hears the Name of Christ,

first time in his progress
for
the
apparently
the
must be said that the
Bite.
It
through
Candidate
now
Catechisms are rather obscure documents, and

inferences drawn therefrom as to procedure in
the Rituals are therefore precarious, but it
would seem that the Candidate
in this
Degree
begins to take part in those magical operations

which are the chief concern of the Rite, as we
shall see.
(0) Grand Elect of Zenibbabel.T\iQ
Prince of the Pcpplo is represented as a typo
of Christ and his work as typical of redemption.
In the Masonic Grade known as tho Royal

Arch the Candidate testifies that he belongs to
the tribe of Judah, but a Grand Elect on the
contrary protests against such an imputation.
He
is of the tribe of Ephraiin, described as

that
which has always enjoyed freedom,
(1)
and (2) the last of the tribes of Israel but the
first of the Elect.
His earthly age is defined
to be seventy years, while that of his spiritual
The seventy years of capelection is seven.

tivity are those of material life, or life apart
from election and from the ordination of true
The election attained by the
priesthood.
Candidate imposes on him the spirit ua lisa t ion
of his material passions, tho conquest of tho
enemies of truth and those also of liberty.
His rank is friend of God, protector of virtue
and professor of truth. It is to bo noted
27
that he has had no part in the building of the

Second Temple, because it was a type only of
that Temple of our humanity which none but
the Spirit can rebuild. This being so, it is
difficult to see why members of the Grade
are called Grand Elects of ZerubbabeL (7)
Grade of JRose Croix particulars of which are
wanting, as already seen, there being no
Catechism extant. But the true Hose Croix
is of Christ, and without it Pasqually's Rite
would have been left at a loose end, for it looked
through all its Grades to that Divine Event
which ushered in the Christian Era.
,In tho above enumeration respecting the
content of tho Rite I have taken its Catechisms
as my guide, but it remains to add that there is
some confusion on the subject. A letter of the
Grand Sovereign has been quoted under date
of June 16, 1760, in which the Grades are set
out according to the following list: (1) Apprentice, (2)
Companion,
Particular Master,
(3)
(4) Grand Elect Master, (5) Apprentice Priest,

(6)
Companion Priest, (7) Master Priest,
Master Architect.
To these Ragon
Grand
(8)
added a Grade of Knight Commander, 1 which
Papus seeks to identify with that of Rose
Croix. I find no trace of the letter in published
Pasqually memorials, and the date is certainly
wrong. As regards Ragon, his mammoth lists
of Degrees, Rites and Orders are utterly
1
uncritical,
1
but the fact that in this case he
Papua Martinet dt -Pasqually, pp.

M. Ragon Manud d*
a J.
156, 157*
SAINT-MARTIN
28
produces an enumeration which is corroborated

somewhere in the unpublished correspondence
of the Grand Sovereign may justify us in
thinking that there is authority for the ninth
item and that the entire scheme may have
an early state of Pasqually's

There is in any case the fullest
evidence that his Rite was at work when several
of its Ceremonies were only in an embryonic
represented
Masonic plan.
I observe also that in a letter of Saint*

stage.
Martin dated May 20, 177 1, there is reference
to a Dogroo under tho initials G, H t| which
corresponds to no title extant in either scheme,
as it is certainly not Rose Croix, this being
1
always represented by R*J< in Saint-Martin's

correspondence. Amidst variations and uncertainties, we are, I think, justified in regarding
the Grade-Names at tho head of the several
Catechisms as those appertaining to the Rite
in its completed form.
On tho surface of these documents there is
nothing to suggest that the Grades to which
they are attributed wpro connected with
Ceremonial Magic. They belong to the part
of doctrine and the part also of symbolism, the
,
latter including official secrets

signs, tokens,
words and similar accidents of purely Masonic
convention. For the practical part we must

recourse to the correspondence of
and as it may seem, perhaps
Pasqually
The
Saint-Martin*
curiously to that of
have
Papua Saint-Martin^ pp. 02 ct scq.

See Papua Martinet de PasquaUy, chapitre ii, passim.
:
29
both were addressed to Jean-Baptiste

Willennoz, the merchant of Lyons, who appears
to have held the rank of Inspector-General in
1767,t,though more than a year later he is
denominated Apprentice Rose Crobc : it would
letters of
seem therefore that the jurisdiction implied by

the broader title could have been exercised only
over lower Grades of the Order. On August 13,
1768, the Grand Sovereign began to instruct
Willeriuoz in occult or magical procedure, and
continued to do so at long intervals until 1772,
the communications in all being ten in number,
so far as they have become available in published works.
The operations imposed were
to be performed by Willermoz in the solitude
of a private room, and have therefore nothing
to do with ceremonial observance in Lodge or
Temple. The practice in these for it appears
that there was a practice seems to have been
performed by Pasqually himself, looking for*

ward presumably to that time when some of his
diseiples would have developed occult powers
under his tuition and would be qualified to
operate on their own part in public, so to speak,
with some assurance of success.
The Ceremonial Magic was Christian and
presupposed throughout the efficacy of religious
formiuce consecrated from time immemorial by
the usage of the Latin Church. The instructions reduced into
presented thus
(1)
summary form may be

The Novice was coven-
anted to abstain from
flesh meat,
of all kinds, for the rest of his
life.
apparently
(2)
As an
SAIOT-MARTIN
30
Apprentice Rose Croix he was forbidden occult

work except for three days in succession
at the beginning of either equinox, meaning
three days before the full moon of March and
September. (3) As regards spiritual preparation, he must recite the Office of the Holy Spirit
the
every Thursday at any hour of the day
'Miserere imi, standing in tho contro of tho
room at night before retiring, facing Kant
and tho DC l*rofundis on both knees and with
face bowed to tho ground.
(4) Tho clothing
;
prescribed is elaborate, including all insignia

of tho Order that tho Novice was entitled
to wear, but hero it will bo sufficient to say
that, as he must "be deprived of all metals,
,
pins, he removed his ordinary clothing

except vest, drawer's, socks and felt slippers.
even
Over these he placed a. white alb, with broad

flame-coloured borders. (5) He described the
segment of a circle on the East side of the room
and a complete circle of retreat on the West
side, placing the proper inscriptions at the
proper points, with the symbols and wax
These arrangements completed, he
prostrated himself at full length within the
western circle in complete darkness, for a
space of six minutes, after which he arose and
tapers.
(6)
lighted all the tapers belonging to that circle.

the
(7) He then prostrated himself within
eastern segment, pronouncing one of tho
Names inscribed thereon and* supplicating
God, in virtue of .the power given to His
servants here reciting all the inscribed angelic
31
was desired by the

with humble and contrite heart.
(8) The Novice again rose up and performed
other operations, including the use of a
particular kind of incense and the recital
of certain invocations which are not given in
the text. (9) The operation was to last one
hour and a half, onward from midnight, no
food having boon taken sinoo noon, Thorc arc
other directions, not always in harmony with
those which preceded, but the instruction is
names
to grant that which
Novice
unfinished, and as regards these initial

operations we do not know what purpose
they served or what manifestations characterised success therein.
left
About two years later Pasqually supplied

further directions of a more advanced or at least
more elaborate kind, the circle of retreat being
now located in the centre of the room ; but
again the procedure depends on particulars
whichjiave been sent previously and the nature
hear also of visions,
of which is unknown.
described as white, blue, clear ruddy white,
and so forth ; of visible sparks, of goose-flesh
sensations, as of things seen and felt by mere
novices of the Order. As to purpose, however,
and result there is still nothing that transpires,
except indeed the complete failure of Willermoz
to obtain any satisfaction. The letters of
Saint- Mart in to the same correspondent on the
same subject may bo said practically to .begin
as those of Pasqually ended, and they are models
of clear exposition, compared with those of the
We
32
8MNT-MARTTN
Grand Sovereign.
They endeavour in the first

and dissuade
place to encourage Willermoz
him from supposing either that he is himself

to blame or that the occult ceremonies are
At an early stage one of them was

"
the grand ceremonial "
accompanied by
of the Grand Architects, a complete plan of this
Grade and a prayer or invocation for daily use.
invalid.
We hear also of a
"
simple form of ordination
G. B., to which I have
"
under the initials

alluded previously
of extended and reduced
versions of some Grades ; of Elect and Priestly
Grades. There are references to Latin originals
of certain workings
to procedure with
Candidates on their reception as Grand Archiforms
tects, evidently magical in character
of conjuration and exorcism of evil spirits
which do not differ generically from those of
and much on the formation
historical Rituals
;
of circles, with their proper modes of inscripThese things do not extend our knowtion.
ledge, except upon points of detail, and after
midsummer, 1773, the character of the corre-
spondence changes. Saint-Martin had supplied

for a period the place, as it were, of a secretary
to his occult Master, but Pasqually was called
"
to St. Domingo in 1772 on temporal business "
of his own and was destined never to return.
It follows that the Ceremonial Magic of the
Elect Priesthood
is
by no means
fully available
* Tho
Tho letters aro
first is dated March 4, 1771.
printed in cxtetwo by Papua in hia work on Saint- Martin,
already cited.

from published sources
procedure
is
before us
it
33
but so far as the

does not differ, as I
haive intimated, from the common records of

the art except as these records differ one from
another. This being the case, and as most of us

are acquainted with the preposterous concerns
of Art Magic in the past, we have, in the next
place, to account as we can for an opinion on
his early school expressed by Saint Martin
long after he had abandoned it and all its ways

" I will not conceal from
you that in the school
:
which I passed, now more than

twenty-five years ago, communications of all
kinds were numerous and frequent, that I had
my share in these like all the others, and that
every sign indicative of the Repairer was
found therein/' * He said also " There were
through
precious things in our first school, and I am

even disposed to believe that M. Pasqually,
to whom you allude and who, since it must be
was our Master, had the active key of

that our dear B.ohme sets forth in his
theories, but that he did not regard us as fitted
for such high truths." ' In the peculiar
terminology of SaintrMartin, the Repairer
signified Christ, and what therefore were those
" communications "
obtained as the result
of invocations recited in magical circles drawn
with chalk on the floor and inscribed, as in the
said,
all
1 Letter of Saint-Martin to Baron de Liebistorf

(Kirchdated March 6, 1793. See Lcttrcs Intdites de
borgor),
L. O. ae Saint- Martin, Paris, 1862, or E. B. Penny'a translation, entitled Thcosophio Correspondence.
Ibid.. Loiter of July 11, 1700.
SAINT-MARTIN
34
with more or less

After what manner
precisely did they manifest or at least indicate
the presence of Christ ? For an answer to
these questions we depend on the accuracy of a
single witness who was either in possession of
many priceless unpublished documents or had
access thereto as President of the Martinist
Order the late Gerard Encausse, otherwise Dr.
Papus to whom my notes have referred
He presents us with further extracts
already.
from the letters of Martines de Pasqually, who
affirms therein (1) that if the thing La chose
were not as I have certified and had it not
been manifested hs it was, not only in my own
presence but in that of so many others who
desired to know it, I should have abandoned it
myself and should have been in conscience
bound to dissuade those who approached it in
good faith (2) that in respect of the failure of
Willermoz there was no gound for surprise
because "the Thing is sometimes severe
towards those who desire it too ardently before
the time."
One would think that La chose
signified simply the subject or matter in hand,
but according to Papus it was the Intelligence
or Mysterious Being which manifested hi
response to the invocations. Wo are to
interpret the reference in this sense when SaintMartin says, in his communication to Willermoz
"
of March 25, 1771, that he was
convinced
concerning the thing before having received the
devices
of
old
unintelligible
sorcery,
names
Papus
Martinet de Pasqually, pp. 104, 105.

most
35
efficacious of our ordinations."

I do not
satisfied himself respecting
know how Papus
forced and arbitrary construction, but

it is correct or not, there is no question
as to the fact that a Mysterious Being manifested by the evidence of the archives or that
it was called subsequently by other names,
such as " the Unknown Agent charged with the
work of initiation," an expression of Willennoz.
It follows that .we have good ground for
accepting the view of Abbe Fournie, another
disciple of the Rite, when he said that Pasqually
had the faculty of confirming his instructions
"
by means of external visions, at first vague
and passing with the rapidity of lightning, but
afterwards more and more distinct and. pro" l
Having established this point of
longed.
fact, which sufficiently distinguishes the Grand
Sovereign from other purveyors of High
Masonic Grades in Franco of the eighteenth
century, and his Rite also from many scores of
contemporary institutions, we have to ascertain
what characterised the maniif we can
festations, so that they justified Saint-Martin
in the extraordinary view which he held concerning them, not in the first flush of occult
experiences, but at a mature period of life.
this
whether
Meanwhile I have sketched his position and

environment at the beginning of his intellectual
career.
1
As a result of exchanging the profession
See Fournie'd work, 'entitled Ce que nous avons lit,

sommes et ce que noiw viendrona. Londres,
ce que nou*
801.
30
SAINT-MARTIN
of law for that of arms, he had entered a circle

which brought him to the gates of certain
Instituted Mysteries, then at work about him ;
he had been initiated, passed and raised in the
parlance of Blue Masonry ; he had received the
ordination of the Elect Priesthood ; and had
attained its highest Grade, being that of Rose
It remains to add that he had left the
Croix.
army and was now approaching a point where

the road which he had travelled divided
he
had therefore to choose a path.
:
CHAPTER
THE SEARCH AFTER TKUTH
THE
correspondence between Saint-Martin and

Willermoz had continued for two years and
five months, but they had never seen one
another. In the early part of September, 1773,
Saint-Martin repaired to Lyons and was
domiciled in that town for something approach-
during part of which he was

the
apparently
guest of his rich Masonic
ing a year,
His own resources were small, and

brother.
there are indications that he was not on the
best terms with his father, no doubt owing to
the fact that for the second time he had
abandoned a career in life. We have seen
that there was a Temple of the Elect Priesthood at Lyons, which was also an historically
important centre of Freemasonry in France,
and Willermoz was an active member and officer
of all the Rites.
Saint-Martin, on the other
hand, cared little or less than nothing foir
ceremonial procedure, for Ritual which he found
empty and for the hollow pomp of titles. By
his own evidence, the offices of Ceremonial
Magic were only
less distasteful, notwithstandhis

ing
high opinion of the influences at work
in the circle to which he belonged.
them
among
He
affirms that he
had no "
37
virtuality
" in
SAINT-MARTIN
38
that he had little

that he
operations;
at
all
times
so
"experienced
strong an inclination to the intimate secret way that this
external one never seduced me further, oven in
my youth." and that" he exclaimed more than
once to his Master
Can all this be needed
"
to find God ?
Such being the case, there
need be no cause for surprise that Saint-Martin
put on record long after his opinion that the
"first sojourn at Lyons in 1773 "'was not
much more " profitable " than others which he
activities of that
'
'
talent
"
for
kind;
its
made
later
and
especially in
1785.*
It
was
important, however, in another and very

different way, for it marked the beginning of his
It was at Lyons, "-he" tells us,
literary life.
"that I wrote the book DCS Erreurs ct de la
Vtritd, partly by way of occupation and because
I was indignant with the philosophers so called,
having read in Boulangcr that the origin of
religions was to be sought in the terror
occasioned by the. catastrophes of Nature.
1 wrote some thirty pages at first, which I
showed to a circle that 1 was instructing at the
house of M. Willermoz, and they pledged nie to
continue. It was composed towards the end of
1773 and at the beginning of 1774, in the space
of four months and by the kitchen-fire, for there
was no other at which I could warm myself,
ifc
1
Letter of Saint -Martin* to Kirchbergeir, dated July 12,
1792.
* See the Notice
HtV/ar<gt/e prefixed to the French
"" translation of Franz von Bander's Secret Teachings of
de Patqualty*
Paris, 1900,
p.-.slii.
39
One day a saucepan containing the soup overturned on my foot and burned me somewhat
"
seriously.
He was not therefore in residence during those

months with his Masonic friend he was probably en pension somewliere, and not too well
situated because of his means. The task was
:
executed with great expedition, having regard

its subject and the deep searching demanded
to
throughout
its
length
indeed, his application
must have been unremitting, the result comThe next

prising nearly five hundred pages.
point which
which
it is
requisite to note, for reasons
appear immediately, is that it is

written in the first person, which indeed recurs
continually, so that the P/nlosojrie Inconnu
whose name appears on the title is with the
reader from beginning to end; The individual
note was characteristic of Saint-Martin's
will
writings throughout his literary life, but it is

to be observed that though ever present it was
and was never touched by
never insistent
He
spoko from the fullness of the

from an unfailing fountain, and has
even put on record his feeling that there was
not enough paper in the world to contain all
that he had to deliver, qould he only reduce it to
egotisin.
heart, as
He had also a certain sacred tenderwriting.

ness towards the children of his mind, even
when he dwelt on
In a
their imperfections.
a
man
the
he
of
better
was
word,
typical literary
kind, as well as a true mystic.
*
Portrait, p. 23,
40
We
SAINT-MARTIN
are told elsewhere that his works,
and
especially the earliest hi time, were the fruit

of his affectionate attachment to man, and
that as regards Des Erreurs et de la Vrit&9

being concerned only with making war on
materialistic philosophy, he could not permit
the reader to see precisely where he was being
led, because it, would have set him at once hi
*4
the Scriptures having fallen into
opposition,
such discredit among men,"

It follows not
only that they aro not quoted in the workj
but that Christ Himself is referred to in a veiled
manner, as the Active and Intelligent Cause,
the Agent, Guide of Man, etc. It would be easy
to enumerate other points, showing that
*
work was schemed and

and
written
from his own basis,
excogitated
Saint- Martin's first
under one reserve only, that the foot-m&tter

of its doctrine is presented as coming from a
secret source, that he was under pledges
concerning it and that owing to these a
reservation was imposed upon him, so that his
elucidations could be carried only to a certain
Here is a clear issue, and as regards the
point.
source itself we are not in doubt concerning it,
since the year 1899, when Martines de Pasqually's important Traitd de la Rtinttgration
dc3
tre* was published for the first time in
France* It is practically possible to check
every point of reticence registered by Saint*
Martin and to see what lies behind it by
reference to this treatise, it being understood
t
Portrait^ p, 40.
TEE SEARCH AFTER iltM'M
41
that Pasqually on his own part derived from

other teachers, to us unknown, with whom he
seems to have been in personal communication,
but whether in the body or out of the body we
cannot tell,
Having presented the literary history of
Des Erreurs in this manner, I have now to
contrast with it the counter- view put forward
by Dr. Pa pus on the alleged authority of his
He affirms, (l).that tho
Martinistic archives.
book Des Erreurs was due almost entirely to an
"
**
invisible origin
;
(2) that the Being whom
**
in 1895 ho had certified as
always designated
" was
under tho enigmatic name of La chose
called the Unknown Philosopher ; (3) that it
was he who gave forth the work as regards the
major part ; (4) that he dictated 166 cahiers
destruction i (5) that some of these were
"
transcribed by Saint-Martin ; (6) that the Un"
known Philosopher
gave orders for Saintand that (7) the
name
assume
this
Martin to
;
"
"
said
Agent himself destroyed about eighty
cahiers in 1790 to prevent them falling into the
"
hands of Robespierre's emissaries, who were
making Unheard-of efforts to acquire them."
It follows that Saint-Martin has gfiven an
altogether misleading account of his first book,and that in spite of its strong and prevailing
personal note it cannot be called his work.
I have, however, collated his statements, and
those who know him are likely to prefer bis
version of the matter to archives largely
unpublished and not available for inspection,
SAINT4IARTIN
42
as Dr. Papus refers expressly ! to documents

reserved for the sole use of the directing
Committee at the head of his Supreme Council.
When, therefore, he states further that the
archives include various sheets of instructions
communicated by <k the Unknown Agent " and
annotated by the hand of Saint Martin wejiavo
to regard it in the liglit of later revelations
supplied by the President of the Martinist
Order, remembering that in 1899 he promised to
produce proofs in a volume devoted to tho
That volume appeared in 1902 and
mystic.
contained fifty unpublished letters of SaintMartin, to some of \vhich I have referred. They
are prefaced by a biographical summary written
around the documents. In neither one nor the
other is any ray of light cast upon the previous
claims
they are indeed the subject of allusion
only in a single sentence. But we obtain
unexpected enlightenment in other respects.
Whereas there is no evidence whatever of
communications dictated by the Unknown
Agent during the life of Pasqually or for over
ten years after his death, we .are told by Dr.
Papus, though, there is no allusion to the fact
in Saint-Martin's letters, that in 1785, the Agent
in question, who seems to have remained in
abeyance since the death of the Grand
Sovereign, began to manifest at Lyons, where he
dictated "nearly one hundred folios," being
those precisely of which the majority were
:
Papus
Martinesisme, WiUcrmosisme, Murtinisme e
Franc-Maonncrie.
Paris, 1899, .pp< 14-10.
43
The archives of the Order, it

added, include the bulk of those that were
saved. In place, moreover, of having seen,
transcribed and annotated a mass of written
burned in 1700.
is
instructions prior to 1785,

teachings that are likely to
we
are told only of
have been "heard "
and to have been incorporated into his work by

the author of DCS Erreurs^
It will be seen that the ground is changed
completely and that we are getting nearer to
the probable facts of the case, I do not doubt
that Willcrmoz and his circle received psychic
communications in one or another psychic
induced by prolonged operations
inspired by that intent, or with the aid of
condition,
the intervention of whom is adI do not doubt that they were

reduced into writing, and as the news of what
was taking place brought Saint-Martin .to
44
lucids,"
mitted. 1
Lyons with
all possible speed, it is certain that

he read, he may well have transcribed and
annotated, but all this was jêars subsequently
to the publication of DCS Erreur* et de la Verite.

I am preferring no charge whatever against
Dr. Papus, who sealed a laborious life by a
heroic death in the cause of the sick and
wounded during the Great War.

moreover,
personally
acquainted,
We
arid
were,
our
But he was
inaccurate
a
most
writer, and
unfortunately
the present monograph might be extended to
relations were always cordial.
Pupus
Louis Claude de Saint-Martin, pp.
Ibid., p. 31,
15, 25.
SAINT-MABTIN
44
twice its size if I analysed the errors which fill

his three books dealing with Martinistic
As regards the archives, he tells us
subjects.
in 1895 that he had been permitted to see those
which were in the possession of a certain M.
Ca vernier and had transcribed some of them,
1
In 1899 it
devoting one week to the task.
looks as if some originals had come into his
possession, though he does not explain how.
I conceive that in this year he was in confusion
as to the dates, extent and precise nature of the
psychic communications. By 1902 he had
made better progress with them and modified
affirmations 'accordingly, but without
his
overtly withdrawing anything. I conceive that
in this manner the question may be permitted
to rest, unless and until the present custodians
of the archives may decide to proceed further
with the work of their publication. It seems
to me that I have adopted a reasonable and
middle ground which accounts for the facts
without accusing anyone. Under the aegis of
Pasqually the Rite of the Elect Priesthood was
one of occult instruction as well as occult
practice aiid the pageant- such as it may have
been of cumulative Grades. The teaching
was of course under pledges, and that part
of it which Sain t-Mar tin felt permitted to unfold
was -put forward in his first book. La chose
may refer to Pasqually's Guide in the unseen,
howsoever communication was. established
supposing that Papas' is correct in' bis uudor*
r
Marlines de Fasqually 9 p.
14,
45
standing of this term. But the pledges may

have covered also instruction from other
the "Predecessors" about whom
sources,
PasquaHy wrote to Willennoz on April 13,
1768. 1 I take it that the sum of instruction
received from all sources is enshrined in the
Grand Sovereign's Treatise on Reintegration.

We have seen that it is reflected also into the
first work of Saint- Martin, as through the
alembic of an original mind, disposed already
the human soul/

work of collation would bear this fact in mind,
but there is no opportunity to attempt it in
the present place. Saint- Martin's theory of
good and evil is based on the doctrine of two
unequal principles, between which there is no
co-operation and no analogy. Of these two
the inferior became evil by the sole act of its
own will, being one of. opposition to the Eternal
Will of Goodness, wherein is essential unity.
Man in his primal estate is the most ancient of
all beings in that which is understood as Nature,
but he was the last which entered into its
scheme. He came forth from the centre, that
is to say, from the Divind Goodness, but abode
in the presence thereof, and his function was
intended to be that of leading all things
to the higher elections
.of
back into unity. But he fell from this high

estate, was deprived of all his ancient f ighta,
while another Agent was commissioned to take
his place.
This Agent is the Active and
Intelligent Cause, 'and thereunto, as the Great
*
Aforftnw
cte
Pa*guotfy, p, 122,
SAINT-MARTIN
40
Chief
and Guide, is committed the order of the

The inference is that this order was
universe.
intended originally to have been in the hands

man until all that is in separation shall have
been reconciled with its one and only source*
It is to be inferred that He or That which has
been called to rule in substitution for man has
become the Leader into unity, otherwise the
Reconciler and Repairer, while His most
important charge since that which is termed the
Fall is the reconciliation of our fallen race.
of
We have passed from unity into separation by

the work of our own will, have renounced our
own. vocation ar\d forfeited all our titles;
but
He who
repairs restores, in virtue of a

restoration which has always
capacity
remained with us. It follows that at the time
of reintcgration the estate of man will be in
virtual unity with that of the Repairer, AYhoso
true name is Christ, whereas Saint- Martin
says that in respect of our potencies wo are all
1
Saint-Martin's expositions are like
Christs.
"
Craft Freemasonry,
veiled in allegory and
illustrated by symbols."
The nature of the
Fall is clouded in this manner, for it is said that
man descended into the region of fathers and
mothers, -otherwise into the circle of physical
generation, in place of those generations which
are spiritual. It is a parable of original unity and
subsequent divorce, of the separation between
for
1 Des
Erreura et de la Vtritt. \ lidimbourg, 1782.
Seconde Partie, p. 130. The words are: Parce qne tout
lea hornme* aont dea C-H-R.
47
subject and object, or of the lover and beloved

in another form of imagery.
Now, the way of
division is. the way of errors, but that of truth
is the way of union, or this at least is how I
understand Saint-Martin in the testimonies
which he bears to reality. In a sense his first
work is de omnibus rebus, but here is the root
of all.
Having regard to its suggestive
presentation, to its originality of thought and
not least of all to its studied
stylo, and
reservations and allusions to a hidden source of
knowledge, I can understand its extraordinary

upon prepared minds of France in the
year 1775.
effect
CHAPTER IV
A DOCTRINE OF CORRESPONDENCES
WE have seen that Saint-Martin completed
his
in the early part of 1774,
literary experiment
in the autumn of that year he paid a short
visit to Italy, in the company of a brother
and
They returned apparently to

Lyons, where Saint-Martin must have been
occupied for some time in seeing his work
through the press. It appeared in 1775 under
"
the Unknown Philosothe pseudonym of
and
the
pher,'bearing
imprint of Edinburgh,
be
must
understood as Lyons.
which, however,
We do not know when he left that city, but he
was in Paris at the end of July, at Lyons again
in the autumn, at Tours on a flying visit, and
then at Bordeaux in 1776. He had Returned
to Paris in March 1777.
Pasqually had died
at Port-au-Princo on September 20, 1774,
having nominated Cnignet do LcstcVo as his
successor, he also being resident in the West
The Temples of the Elect Priesthood
Indies.
were left to their own devices, and the mighty
pageant of the Strict Observance drew several
under that obedience. Willermoz became as
of Willermoz.
stated previously Grand Prior of Auvergne,

profited nothing in attempting
to follow Pasqually's instructions concerning
and having
48
49
Ceremonial Magio> he was presumably more

and more immersed in Masonry, especially its
High Grades. Whatever sympathy may have

existed originally between him and SaintMartin
when they were merely correspondents
were now dividing, and the born

was
disposing of the occult yoke placed
mystic
him
by his early Master. There is
upon
their paths
evidence of strained relations when SaintMartin wrote from Paris on July 30, 1775,
to dissuade Willermoz from supposing that ho
was seeking the latter's conversion to his
own views or was presuming to pronounce
judgment upon him. At the same time
certain matters, the nature of which does not
emerge in the letter, made it necessary for the
peace of both that he should no longer be a
guest of his friend, though for the sake of the
Order and its members he must return to
Lyons and remain there a given time. It
should not appear, in other words, that there
was estrangement between himself and Willermoz. When, therefore, he took a lodging
in isolation, it would bo explained that he was
following up chemical experiments. Whether
the device served its purpose wo do not know,
but after it reached a term the two correspondents do not seem to have met one another for
ten years. They continued to write occasion-
and they remained friends.

It has been suggested that DCS Erreurs filled
the purse of Saint-Martin, but the evidence of
his improved position cannot be accounted for
ally,
SAINT-MARTIN
50
by
reference to that source
its
considerable
measure of success notwithstanding. On the

contrary, there are indications that he was on
better terms with his father, and I infer that
thenceforward he was not without modest
means. It has been suggested also that the
authorship of the book was kept a profound
secret.
This
is
unlikely in the nature of things,
was obviously well known at Lyons prior

to publication. It has been said by one of his
"
became known widely
biographers that ho
and was in request every where. " His own
memorial notes bear witness to the distinguished
circle of his acquaintance, and so also do his
for
it
It is unnecessary to labour the point,

for
the rest, his life in social and inas,
tellectual circles during the seven
years
letters.
and
between 1775 and 1782 has left little traco

behind it, I pass on to the latter date, to which
his second book belongs.
In one of those unconcCrted intimations
which seem to open for a moment his whole
heart of purpose, Saint-Martin says that his
its fount and course in the Divine. 1
He is alluding to work of life rather than books,
but it is true of all that he wrote, and thd
Tableau Naltcrcl des Rapports qui existent
work has
rUommeêt VUnivcrs was assuredly

undertaken for the justification by means of
their unfoldment of the ways of God to man.
It was written at Paris, as he tells us, partly
in the Luxembourg at the house of the Marquise
entre Dieu,
.Portrait, p;
48
51
de Lusignan and partly in that of the Marquise

de la Croix* 1 Publication took place in two
parts appearing, as previously, in one volume
dated 1782 at the symbolical Edinburgh,
which on this occasion is more likely to mean
Paris than Lyons though the latter place is
understood by bibliographers. We have seen
that Des Erreurs confessed to recurring reservations, and it has all the atmosphere of a truncated document issued from a Temple of the
Mysteries, or at least a Secret College. The
Natural Scheme of Corrcsjwndcnces, on the
surface, withholds nothing, yet it adopts
The entirely anonya prefatory note (1)

that they received the MS. from an unknown
(2) that it hacl numerous marginal
person
additions in a different hand
(3) that they
seemed different from the rest of the work and
(4) that in printing they had been placed in
quotation commas, to distinguish them from
the rest of the text. When taxed on the subject by Baron de Liebistorf, Saint-Martin
admitted (1) that the passages referred to
were his (2) that the publisher regarded them
as out of keeping with the rest of the work;
(3) that he gave the explanation which he did to
prepare readers and (4) that he was allowed
to have his way. It happens that the paragraphs in quotations are the most enigmatical
parts of the work, and suggest derivation from
another air of mystery.
mous
publishers state in
;
Pasqually's occult instructions

1
Portrait, p. 23.
it
happens
SAINT-MARTIN
62
Saint-Martin was replying to a

correspondent who was not initiated ; and if,
therefore, what he says does not quite cover
the fdcts, we may take it as the best that he
In
could do without discovering his source,
any case, the paragraphs were written- i.e.
expressed by himself, and, for the rest, their
consequence is not in proportion to their
also that
obscurity.
The Tableau compares the universe

"
great temple
earth is its altar,
:
the stars are

all
to a
its lights,
corporeal beings are
the
its
holocausts, and man, who is priest of the

Eternal, offers thc sacrifices." It follows from
the logic of the symbolism that ho himself i$
the chief holocaust, and this must be the sense
in which it is said also that the universe is
"'like a great fire lighted since the beginning
of things for the purification of all corrupted
beings." Finally, it is "a great allegory or
fable which must give place to a grand
"
When it is affirmed elsewhere that
morality.
the external world is illusory, the reference
presumably is to its surface sense, apart from
,
the inward meaning. God is the meaning and

God the grand morality creation is not merely
His visible sign, but a channel through which
His thoughts are communicated to intelligent
Here is the only mode of communicabeings.
tion for fallen man, namely, through signs and
emblems. But these and the whole signifying
universe are earnests of God's love for corrupted
creatures and evidence that He is at work un*
;
53
"
to remove the separation so conceasihgly

" As it is certain
to
their
that
felicity.
trary
He does not work in vain, it follows that a
day will come when there shall be no separateness thenceforward. So docs the end emerge,
with all true thought implying when it does
not express the doctrine of unity, all true
paths being paths that lead thereto, and God
Himself One, Immutable and Eternal the

Witness from everlasting to this our end of
Here is the Great Work, and it is to be
being.
"
by restoring in our faculties the
performed
same law, the same order, the same regularity

by which nil beings are directed in Nature,"
or, in other words, by acting no longer in our
own name, but
in that of the living God.

It is
of the will in its redirection, for this is
a work
" the
agent by which alone man and every
free being can efface within them and round
them the traces of error and crime. The
revivification of the will is therefore the chief
work of all fallen creatures. 11

The same lesson is conveyed in symbolical
"
the object of
language when it is said that
is
man on earth to employ all rights and powers
of his being in rarefying as far as possible the
intervening media between himself and tho
true Sun, so that the opposition being practhere may be a, free passage, and
tically none
that the rays of light may reach him without
1*
It will be seen that, as in Des
refraction.
instrument
the
Erreurs,
by which we fall is
that also by which we must rise : the evil in
54
SAINT-MARTIN
man
originated in the will of man, and thereby

must be stamped out. His ."crime 11 is
defined as "the abuse of the knowledge he
it
possessed concerning the union of the principle

of the universe with the universe/* His
penalty was the privation of this knowledge.
The
definition is dogmatic, and it is obvious

that Saint-Martin can thrtfw no light on the
real nature of the alleged knowledge: otherwise he must have undone the crime in his
He is least convincing
person.
discussing the legendary Fall, and most
own
when
when
own* thoughts apart from any
conveying his
formal system. When he tells us that truth
is in God, that it is written in all about us,
that its messages are meant for our reading,
that the light within leads to the light without
that the principle of being and of life is within
us, that it cannot perish, that the regeneration
"
" is
of our
and that we can
virtues
possible
ascend to a demonstration of the Active and
Invisible Principle, from which the universe
we are then
derives its existence and its laws
in the presence of the mystic who is speaking
on the warrants of his proper insight.
;
CHAPTER V
THE MAN OF DESIRE
AFTER the
publication of Le Tableau Naturel

Saint-Martin remained less or more at Paris,
and his intermittent correspondence with
Willermoz is at times scarcely intelligible in
the absence of the latters communications.
Willermoz evidently was passing through a

strenuous period, connected perhaps with
embroilments consequent on the Masonic
Convention of Wilhelmsbad, held in 1782, and
the fate of the Strict Observance. There is
one allusion which suggests vaguely the historical transformation of that Rite at
Lyons
and the creation thereby of the
Knights Beneficent of the Holy City. But
there is no certainty on the subject, and for
the rest we learn only of Saint-Martin's brief
prior to 1778,
interest in the discovery of Mesmer, his connection with a society instituted by that great
comet of a season, and his presence at ceitain
cures operated magnetically by Puysegur.
single remark informs us that he would take
no part in the Convention of Paris, summoned
by the Rite of the Philalethes. We reach in this
manner the month of April, 1785, when SaintMartin had received such news from Willermoz
that in his reply of the 29th (1) he expresses
55
SAINT-MARTIN
56
on learning that the sun has risen

on Israel; (2) he affirms that the man so
chosen is for him henceforward a man of God,
whom he will venerate as the anointed one
of the Saviour
(3) ho entreats him to pardon
whatever wrongs he may bo thought to have
committed against him on his own part ;
(4) he ascribes all differences which have
arisen between them to his own ignorance;
(5) he condemns himself for his temerity in
he asks
having published anything
(6)
Willermoz to intercede for him with something
which appears to be called La chose, w hose
(7) he prays to
place he has takeji unasked
the
on
faults
of his own heart,
be enlightened
the errors of his mind and of his works
(8) he places himself under his orders and
terms him his master, holy friend, father in
God and Christ Jestis.
It looks evident in a word that Saint-Martin
his rapture
stood* ready to set aside all his previous views

and infcrentially those which had always
disposed him towards the inward way of tho
mystics rather than that of his first Master.
\Yhat, therefore, had occurred ? I have forestalled the event unavoidably in
third
to
tho
Dr.
archives
chapter.
According
Papua,
in his possession show that after prolonged
failure Willorm.oz reached tho end of liU
my
labours, that ho obtained
%l
'of tho
culminated
in
highest
"thirteen
or
his
after
the
death
of
1785,
years
More exinitiator, Martines de Pasqually."
phenomena
importance/' which
THE MAN OF DESIRE

plicitly,
the Being
who
is
57
said to be described
"
Agent charged
by WUlermoz as the Unknown
"
with the work of initiation
otherwise, perhaps, La chose materialised at Lyons and
gave instructions which as we have seen
were reduced to writing. 1

Occurrences of this kind being innumerable
at the present day, I suppose that we are
not in a position to
sympathise with the
of
raptures
Saint-Martin,
his
tears
or his
changing front. His next letter, dated May 13,

indicates that he had been reassured and consoled by WUlermoz, for which he praises God.
He waits now on a summons to Lyons, that he
may see and hear for himself. Meanwhile he and
his correspondent will remain united through
time and eternity. On June 30 he has made
preparations for the journey and is looking to
greet WUlermoz soon after the letter under that
Of what followed, we know little and

date.
next to nothing, except that fifteen months
at Paris, bewailing his
having spoken too freely to
imprudence
certain brethren and thus prejudiced the
later
Saint-Martin
is
in
In January,
for
ho
where
remained
London,
some six months, making the acquaintance of
William Law and the astronomer llcrschcl,
tho Court o. do Divimuo, Dutous and the
Russian Prince Galitzin, with whom he was
domiciled. It was in London also, as he tells
"enjoyments"
1787, ho
is
of his friend. 1
in
Marlines cfe Pasqua!ly p. 113.

Soo his letter to \Villerinoz of October 1, 1786.
t
SAINT-MARTIN
58
that he wrote his third book, L'Homine de

Dtsir, though it was not published till 1790,
and then ~at Lyons, It is important not only
in itself, as one of Saint-Martin's most inspired
writings, but as showing beyond debate that,
whatever experiences had awaited him at
Lyons, they cooled the ardour kindled by their
first indications, and he had returned to his
own path with an increased sense of dedication.
I can say only that the hunger and thirst after
God are in all its pages. This is not, however,
to suggest that he is denuded of all interests
his only letter
in the Lyons phenomena
written to Willerinbz while in England offers a
but the interest appears
contrary indication
detached.
In July, 1787, Saint-Martin passed through
Paris on his way to Araboise, where his father
had been stricken with paralysis. In September he was again at Lyons, but it was in the
absence of Willermoz. Thereafter he paid a
second visit to Italy, visiting Siena and Rome.
In the early part of 1788 Papus reports that the
apparitions of the Agent had ceased, according
to a letter of Willermoz. 1 In April of that
year Saint-Martin is at Paris and about to
visit his father, 'who is still alive, at the native
In June ho proceeded to
place of both.
Strasbourg, where he resided for three years,
the happiest of all his life. As I said long ago
" It was
here, under the auspices of Rodolphe
us,
Salzmann, also mystically disposed, and of

.
Saint-Martin, p. 31.
THE MAN OF DESIRE
59
Madame do Boecklin, his most intimate and

woman friend, that he made his
cherished
acquaintance with the writings of Jacob

here he became intimate with the
Chevalier de Silferhiehn, a nephew of Sweden*
borg ; and all his horizon widened under the
influence of the Teutonic theosopher.
On
December 16, 1789, he asked Willerinoz whether
he could participate in the "initiation" attached to the Regime Rectifie without belonging
to its Symbolical Lodge. I do not think that
Pupus knew what this meant, and therefore
wisely offered no word of comment. But the
Regime Ecossais Ancien et Rectifie was the
Strict Observance as transformed at Lyons
first
Bohme;
and ratified at Wilhelmsbad more especially

it was the Craft Degrees of this Rite and their
supplement the Grade of St. Andrew. Beyond
it were the novitiate and chivalry of the Holy
City, and these again beyond were two final
Grades, which I do not propose to specify by
name, as they were and are in the hiddenness.
;
It
is
the
to these that Saint-Martin refers under

4i
He did
initiations."
vague title of
not apparently get a straight answer, and on

July 4, 1790, he asked Willermoz to advise
the proper quarter of his resignation from the
Interior Order i.e., the novitiate and chivalry
and from all lists and registers in which his
name may have been inscribed since 1785. He
points out that in the spirit he had never been
integrated therein. His intention apparently
was to remain among the Coens i.e., the
SAINT-MABTIN
60
Elect Priesthood but how nominally wo can

1
imagine from the utter detachment of lite letter,
the references to his simple mode of life, and
his closing words, in which he
a
hope that he has separated for ever
registers
from those complicated paths which had always
wearied him. It is an eloquent commentary
above
all
on the manifestations of Lyons, the dictated

instructions of La chose, the astral travellings
of D'Hauterive, and the clairvoyances of the
" lucids " who seem to have assisted at the
There are no further letters from
operations.
Saint-Martin to Willermoz, and already during
somd early month, the Agent had

on demand" and had destroyed
" of his dictated
" more than
eighty folios
"
instructions, the same not having been
published," as Willermoz states in a letter quoted
by Pa pus.
" the Unknown
It follows that
Agent charged
" had undone that
with the work of initiation
work, and whether or not, as suggested but
Papus seems doubtful^ the manifestations
continued at intervals till 1790, it would seem
that there is no record of proceedings, and the
whole thing sagged out. The Elect Priesthood
this year, in
received
"
with all his ceremonial, all his

its mark
occult powers, Pasqually scored a failure, and
missed
the Master
who emerged from the
unseen,
* Wo
may compare "that which he wrote to Kirchberger
I cannot answer that the forms
on March 0, 1793:
which showed themselves to mo may not have been
this is what makes these ways so
assumed forms
faulty and suspicious."
.
THE MAN OF DESIRE
61
carrying such high ascribed warrants, permitted

himself, through sheer lack in resources, to
bo circumvented by 4i tho emissaries of
11
Meanwhile the star of Saint*
Robespierre,
'Martin's influence grew from more to more.
ISHomme de D&ir was reprinted several times,
and in the highest circles of society, at Strasbourg and Paris, in the palace of the
Duchesse de Bourbon, amidst the convulsions
of the Revolution, he taught the way of the
mystics.
CHAPTER VI

IT was at Strasbourg and, I think, towards tho
end of his sojourn in this city of blessed memories
that Saint-Martin
wrote another of his
most suggestive treatises, Le Nouvel Homme,

"the aim of which," as he tells Us, "is to de*
scribe what we should expect in regeneration," l
It presents three epochs of symbolism
tho
:
corresponds to the history of Israel,

regarded as that of universal election, man's
own nature being the Promised Land,
whence it is necessary to cast out the wicked
and idolatrous nations that have ruled therein,
after which the altars of the Lord must bo
sot up instead and the Law proclaimed by the
higher part of our nature. The second epoch
is that of the Christ-Life,
which must be
conceived and born within us for the work of
our redemption, All stages of the Divine Life
in Palestine are marshalled to illustrate the
story of the New Man from the moment of His
birth within lis to that of mystical death, and
from the descent into the underworld to the last
and greatest mystery on tho Mountain of
Ascensidn. To the Second Advent belongs the
third epoch of symbolism, being that of the
first
Loiter to Kirchberger,
02
June
8,
1702.
63
Apocalypse, the new heaven and the new earth

declared within us, the tabernacle of God
with men, the Celestial Jerusalem built up into
our spiritual being.
The sojourn at Strasbourg came to an end in
1791, and for perhaps a year Saint^Martin was
chiefly at Paris, where he wrote his next book,
entitled Ecce //owo ;
"to forewarn people
against the wonders and prophecies of the
"
"
time/' to indicate the
degree of abasement
into which man has fallen and of which the
passion for lower marvels, like those of somnambulism, appears to be the prime example.
The thesis in this sense is a strange but pregnant
commentary respecting the transmutation of
interests on the part of one who for a moment
was integrated in a school of Mesmcr and was
a friend or fellow- worker of Puysgur. Ecce
Homo was partly. written as a counsel for the
Duchesso do Bourbon and very likely in her own
house. It appeared prior to Le Nou vel Homme,
though composed Subsequently: both works,
however, were published in 1792, the Reign of
TeiTor notwithstanding,
Saint-Martin was
" The
still in Paris during that dread ordeal.
streets near the house I was in were a field of
battle the house itself was a hospital where th&
wounded were brought and, moreover, was
;
threatened every moment with invasion and

In the midst of all this I had to go,
pillage,
at the risk of my life, to take care of my sister,
11
half a league from my dwelling. 1 It is to be
*
Letter to Kirchberger, August 23, 1792.
64
SAINl^MABTIN
;;.;
inferred from a later record that the
"
"
dwelling
was that of the Duchesse.

There is no space here to speak of Saint*
Martin's
political
theories,
of
his
feelings
towards the French Revolution, of certain

things without importance or consequence
which occurred to him therein. I am concerned
only with the deeper issues of his life and
writer on errors and truths had

thoughts.
obviously something to say on the basis of
governments, the authority of sovereigns and on
jurisprudence, while a searcher of religion and
theosophy, who had passed through the worldcrisis at the end of the eighteenth century at its
very heart and centre, could neither fail to have
his part therein nor to leaye us reflections
thereon. We have Philosophical and Religious
Considerations on the French Revolution, Light on
Human Association and a few other pamphlets
which do not call to be named.
Saint-Martin had also some activities of
another kind imposed upon him, as, e.g., when

he was called to the Ecole Normale, instituted
to train teachers for public instruction. These
things did not last and left no mark behind
them. In September, 1792, the health of his
father called him again to Amboise, where he
remained for a year, or a considerable time after
the father's death. We hear of him then at
Petit Bourg, a country house of the Duchesse
de Bourbon, and afterwards at Paris till the
" a
decree against the
spring of 1794, when
privileged
and proscribed
classes,
amongst

which
it
was
his lot to
return to Amboise
66
be born, enforced Lis
was cancelled in his

in January, 1795, when the work of
respect
L'Ecole Normale brought him back to the
His time appears to have
capital for a period.
been divided between Paris and his native
town till the end of 1799, and I mention this
year because on December 24 Saint-Martin
lost so much by the death of the Baron Kirchtill it
a kindred spirit with

he had maintained for five years what I
" the most
described long ago as
memorable,
berger de Liebistorf,
whom
the most beautiful the most fascinating of all

x
It became
theosophical correspondences."
available in English so far back as 1863, but the
edition has been out of print for decades, and I
question whether there could be a better gift
than an annotated translation at the present
day by one who knows Saint-Martin, his work

and his period. It contains the true marrow,
spirit and quintessence of the French mystic,
and has been referred to often in my notes.
His devotion to Jacob Bohme was the chief
mental characteristic of
ever
in
his
his later life
it
is
correspondence, above
present
described, but I have never been able to see
that it changed his own views : it may be true
to say that it deepened them, but he was on
sure mystic ground already before the Teutonic theosopher gave him his own light.
1 The
and the
Life ofLouti Claude de Saint-Martin
Substance of hie Transcendental Doctrine.
8vo, pp. 464,
.
1901.
SAINT-MARTIN
66
I do not think that it would have helped him

to alter for the better one line of L'Homme de
Desir, though he has left it on record that in
the light of Jacob Bohme ho should have
written Le Nouvel Homme differently, or perhaps not at all. In the year 1800 L* Esprit des
Choses appeared at Paris in two volumes, with
a Latin epigraph on the title in which it was
"
affirmed that man is the mirror of the totality
of things/* Concerning this suggestive work
Saint-Martin has offered three points of in-
formation
under the
from
(2)
:
(1) That it was projected originally
title of Natural Revelations, collected
original notes, with additions thereunto ;

it embraces the whole circle of things
that
physical and scientific, spiritual and Divine ;

(3) that it is a kind of introduction to the
works of Jacob Bohme. The last in its final
reduction must be called indicative of intention,
and Saint-Martin, I do not doubt, was conscious
that his own intimations were in bonds of
espousals with his great German
in their contributions to the higher
but
peer,
literature of the soul there are no two mystics
so utterly unlike each other in all their forms
and modes. It is a question, therefore, of
penetrating below the surface, when that which
we reach is the heart of union common to all
who have followed the great quest of experience
in God.
It is certain that Saint-Martin grew
in
the
consciousness of such union with
daily
and
when he continued in his own
Bohme,
spiritual
manner to
deliver his
own message
it
seemed
67
to him doubtless that he was following the

message of his precursor. For IS Esprit des
Choses, man is the organ of Divine Order, man
is the mirror of all things.
Nature is in
somnambulism and we are involved therein,
whence I suppose it may be inferred that
she waits on our awaking and passes out of
These things and many others
sleep in us.
are notions which were with Saint-Martin
from the beginning. Occasionally there are
higher and deeper things than those which
we have heard previously, but they are not of
Bohme nor of any other than the French
mystic himself as, e.g., that the soul becomes
the Name of the Lord, and the Name is
declared within it.
There are practically no materials for the
external life of Saint-Martin after the year
1799 the Portrait Historique tells us practically
nothing, and we know of him only by his books.
In the closing years of his life he was working
zealously at translations of Bohme, Aurora,
The Three Principles, Forty Questions and
;
Threefold Life of
Man, but he had made a
beginning much earlier.
with
these
versions,
VHomme-Esprit,
We,are not concerned

but Le Ministire de
published in
1802, his last
some respects the most

original work,
of
and
from his own point of
all,
important
view was written more clearly than the rest,
is
though he
1
It
felt
in
its
remoteness from
appeared at Paris as the work of
Inconnu.
le
common
Philosophy
SAINT-MARTIN
68
notions and human interests. It has

been held to illustrate his intention of marrying
" to the Teutonic
"
first school
his
theosopher,
but again the kind of marriage is that of the
unity at the root of all the great mystics and
For the rest, the book is
their great subjects.
built oh the basis of his own anterior writings,
the substance of which he presents in the
opening pages, as he gives also a summary of
human
Bohme and
indicates unawares certain salient

doctrinal
correspondence between
points
the latter and Martine s de Pasqually exhibited
in La Riinttgralion des fitres.
Apart from all
of
systems and all authorities, the Ministry is a

book of innumerable detached lights, some of
which belong to the order of first magnitude.

"
intimations of
is possible to name only its
and
the
of
death
immortality,"
gate of life,
in
is
which
the
of
opened
regeneration,
path
of spiiritual life and its communication, of the
Sabbath attained by Nature, the Sabbath of
the eoul, and the Sabbath of the Word. There
is also the doctrine of the Eternal Word, as it
passed through the alembic of the French
mystic's mind, its relation to the universe and
man, how it is the measure of all things and is
It
the very Word of Life, in opposition to that

which Saint-Martin calls the Word of Death.
The Ministry has been termed his swan's
corig, but.it is rather his last contemplation, in
which he opened many wells of thought and
looked across many paths of vision. On
January 18, 1.803, he recorded in his notes that

this date
69
completed his sixtieth year and that
had opened to him a new world. "My

spiritual hopes proceed in growth continual
I advance, thanks be to God, towards those
great beatitudes which were shown forth to
me long ago, and shall crown all joys with
which I have been encompassed continually in
my earthly life." A note added in the aummer says that he had received certain warnings
of a physical enemy and thought that it would
carry him off as it had done with his father
it
before him. He asked only the help of Providence, that he might hold himself prepared for
the event. 1 On October 13, 1803, at Aulnay,
near Sceaux, in the house of a friend Corate
Lenoir La- Roche after an apoplectic stroke,

he passed painlessly away in a final act of
prayer.
*
Portrait, p. 129.
HM.,
p. 135.
CHAPTER
VII
MODERN MARTINISM
will be seen that I have depended throughout
on printed documents, no others being avail-
IT
able to research in England, but that the

sources of many which have been quoted are
in the archives of the Martinist Order.
They
would appear to form, however, comparatively
a small part of those which have been certified
as eztant at different periods. We are told *
(1) that the archives of the Elect Priesthood were
deposited in 1781 with Sayalctte de Langes,
who was the President of the Philalethes ;
(2) that after his death they were sold indiswith those of the
criminately,
together
Philalethes and the Rite Ecossais Philosophique,
and were purchased for next to nothing by
three Masonic Brethren, who returned them
to the proper quarters, two of them retaining
those of the Elect Priesthood, as they had
been members of the Rite
(3) that this
restitution took place in 1806; (4) that the
two custodians delivered them in 1809 to
;
another
member, named
Destigny,
on
his
1
See Nouvelle Notice Hirtorique, prefaced to the French
translation of von Baader'a Secret Teachings of Pasqually,
pp. clxix-clxxii.
70
MODERN MARTINISM
71
return from St. Domingo, he being a legatee

of Pasqually, and having otherwise a greater
claim upon them
(5) that Destigny was
in
possession of the surviving West
already
Indian archives (6) that in 1812 his collection
was enriched by those of the Orient of Avignon,
which had been taken into Italy prior to the
Revolution
(7) that the whole remained in
;
till
1868, when he transferred
to M. Villafial, a year before his death,
in whose possession they continued at least
the end of 1899. They comprised the
till
records of eleven Orients otherwise Lodges
of the Order, those of Leogana in the West
Indies having been lost in a fire, and those of
Lyons having come into the hands of Papus,
otherwise of the Martinist Order,
As regards the archives of Lyons we are told
by Papus whence and how they or their trans-
his
keeping
them
were derived by him. His account has

been summarised in iny second chapter. I
have specified also the documents in the
.hands of M. Matter's descendants, he being
himself a descendant of Rodolphe de Salzmann, whom I have mentioned previously as
one of the Strasbourg circle. They are said
cripts
to include the correspondence of Saint-Martin
with Salzmann himself, with Mme de Boecklin,

the Comte do Divonne and others, as also that
of Salzuiann. But there are owners of other
collections
who
D'Effinger,
are not even

1
Munier *
Of each and
Tournyer,
names to
us.
Ibid., p. clxxxiii.
SAINT-MARTIN
73
it has to bo said that nothing has been

heard of them for over twenty years and that
the Great War has intervened. We have been
promised for the same period a Histoire
'Gnrale rfe VOrdre des Elus Coins and a study
of Willermoz based on the archives of Lyons,
but they have not appeared and we are not
In view of the wealth of
likely to see them.
it
material
may well be that the definitive
life of Saint-Martin and of his earlier if not
later concerns still remains to be done.
I
have presented a mere outline, and in some
sense a supplement to my former extended
work.
It remains to speak briefly of L'Ordre
We learn from Camille FlamMartiniste.
marion that between 1860 and 1870 he. was
acquainted with a litterateur named Henri
Delaage, who is mentioned also by Eliphas
Lvi that he heard much from Delaage
concerning M. de Chaptal, his grandfather, who
all
knew
Saint-Martin,
apparently fairly
well.
Those are the bare facts, to which it may bo

added that at the beginning of his occult life
Papua seemingly got to know Dckugo and
received from hiin, some months before the
latter's death, what is termed a pauvre d&pot,*
in
covstitui par deux Icttres et quelques points
fact,
which
the modern
is
Martinist
cipher
S:V
!:*.%
rendered Silencieux Inconnus, otherPapua
Martiu&tbtne, eto. t
d, t p. 44.
p. 43.
MODERN MARTINISM
73
wise the Unknown Silent Ones, &ela*ge had

written in his time two or three occult books
which were fantastic in matter and impossible

They do not suggest his connection
with any society for the exposition of Saint-
in style.
Martin's mystical teaching, either secretly or

in public, and so far as Papua is concerned he
fails to explain why the cipher was communicated or what it signified to the previous
custodian. It led him, however, to believe
and proclaim in terms of certitude that SaintMartin had himself initiated M. de Chaptal
and to establish or reconstitute L'OrdreMartin*
Between 1887 and 1890 he proVte in 1884.. 1
duced Rituals for the Order, arranged in three
Degrees, which I have praised on several
occasions for their sincerity, simplicity and
reserve in respect of claims. They were
termed
and
(1) Associate,
(2)
Initiated Martinist,
es implied by its
title
conveying a licence for the propagation
of the Order by all who had attained this its
highest rank. Every person who held the
Third Degree could thus constitute a new
The mode adopted was usually that
centre,
as " communica(3) Initiator,
which
is
known
technically
to say, personally and not in
certain knowledge
or Temple, To
tion," .that
Lodge
the last
is
my
Papua: 3/ar*mta*m, etc., p. 45. It may be noted

that the Chevalier Arson's Appel d fHttmomli, 1818. is
regarded by Papua as affording proof positir* that an
Order of Martiniam was at work in that year. It prove*
nothing whatever, except the imbecility of tht writer
and his orasy dealings with Hcano Wronski.
1
SAINT-MARTIN
74
reception was arranged even
by
It
post.
is
obvious that after this manner a vast member*

ship could bo secured in a very short space,
assuming any reasonable zeal among the
workers and something colourable or attractive
on which they could act. Moreover, there
were no fees of any kind, There is no question
that L'Ordre Afartintete spread rapidly in
Franco, and in addition to the delegates con*
stituted automatically by tho Third Degree
there were Lodges in various towns.
There
was membership also in other countries, England itself not oxpopted, while the, Order was
specially
America.
successful
We
in
North
and
South
hear also of propagation
in
Egypt and even Asia.

In 1801 a Supreme Council was constituted at
Paris and ruled the whole Order. It became a
centre also for numerous collateral interests, all
carefully organised, including esoteric groups
of Science and Philosophy, which
and Faculties
,held
and granted
examinations apparently
degrees at their value.

Papus Was an indefatigable worker, and before the century was
out it must be acknowledged that he was at
the head of a movement which may be almost
called colossal in respect of its magnitude.
Tho reasons arp not far to seek it was a form
of initiation and it made no claim on Masonry ;
it received both sexes;
it had a distinct
from
religious side, apart
dogma and outside
all sectarianism
it was in some sense a Christian thing.
As such, it must have appealed to
:
MODERN MARTINISM
75
multitudes in Franco who had lost faith in the

Latin Church and yet had spiritual interests.
Moreover, it carried the seals and talismans of
occult sciences, which it claimed to teach and
also to reconcile with the regnant science of the
day, As such, its apparent justifications, if not
warrants, were in Spiritism, Psychical
Research, the Schools of Nancy and Salpetrtere,
not to speak of the less recognised though
not less momentous school of Animal
its
Magnetism. But having offered this appreciation I have virtually set L'Ordre Martiniste at
tho poles asunder from Saint-Martin the
mystic. In late and <early writings Papus
affirmed continually that when the disciple of
Pasqually followed his own path, having left
that of his Master, he not only established a
Masonic Rite, as others had said previously,
but also an Order of his own which spread even
into Russia.
Now, his so-called evidences are
out of court in every case, I have examined
them long since and set them utterly aside
there is no need to retrace the ground. The
:
Masonic historians were blundering over terms

titles when they foisted a Rite on Saint*
Martin, and Papus was reading in a glass of
vision when he saw the mystic at the head of an
Order propagated like his own. I leave it at
this, though it is difficult to understand how
he could have deceived himself. He has not
escaped criticism of a rougher kind, but to me
it seems that he had a constitutional incapacity
for pronouncing validly on questions of
and
SAINT-MARTIN
76
evidence, and that anything passed for proof in

respect of his own bias.
The fact remains that in 1899 or thereabouts
L'Ordre Martiniste may be said to have reached
its zenith, but it had sown, I think, already the
seeds of its own destruction. It had begun. to
encroach on (ho Masonic field, and was
approaching perilously the position of an
unauthorised aspect of the Craft. Practically
the entire branch of the Order in North
America, extending to thousands, broke away
from the Supreme Council at Paris and re-
incorporated independently on this account

A few only continued under the old
obedience, among others the novelist Margaret
B. Peeke, who was rewarded by Papus with the
Grade of Rose Croix. 1 There are no statistics
before me, but it seems certain that in France
where Freemasonry, such as it is, must be
called exceedingly strong the course taken
could have been scarcely less than disastrous
yet it was Hot amended in consequence. The
years went On, and I think that L* Initiation, an
official Martinist publication, came to an end
before the War.
But the Great War came,
which broke up everything belonging to occult
interests of the organised kind.
The Grand
Master Papus died in the course of it, in the
heroism of a physician's service. The peace of
Versailles was at last signed, and at no long
alone.
This
is certified
by The Star in
of the period which represented in

of the French Martinista.
the East, a magazine

America the interest*
MODERN MARTINISM
77
time thereafter the old interests began to lift

up their heads it seemed also as if the relaxed
:
gave birth
automatically to
score in thought and
dream. Occultism in Paris was characterised by
new movements, new
activities of every kind
tension
itself
new adventures by the
associations,
new
periodicals, including
many
organs for one or another dedication,

but most of them mushroom growths. We
can imagine that VOrdrt Martinifie did not
remain in abeyance, but it seems now a shadow
of its former self, is split up by rival obediences
and has entered into Union with decried
official
Masonic Rites.
Whether
it
will
emerge into
clearer light no one remote from the centre can

dare to say, but to all appearance at least ita
time is over. Once at the head of most
French movements of the occult kind, it is now
but one of a score ; and I do not know in what
sense the gracious spirit of Saint-Martin can be

said to abide therein. If ever a time shall come
when those who move in its circle and those
who rule at its centre will have realised that he
left for ever the occult and Masonic sanctuaries
for the Church Mystic of Christian Theosophy,
they may find his directing light shining

towards the end of true Mysticism.; but in the
Orients of Memphis never, and nevfcr in those
of Mizraim, or in any substituted form of
Freemasonry which is without God in the world.
Meanwhile I tend to believe that men and
women of spiritual mind in France, who are not
under the obedience of Rome, will remember
SAINT-MARTIN
78
Saint-Martin as one who after his own manner

belongs to that great chain which began in the
Christian world with Dionysius the Areopagite,
and added link to link through all the ages
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UNIVERSITY MICROFILMS INTERNATIONAL

ARTHUR EDWARD WAITE

THE GREAT DAY OF SAINT-MARTIN

EARLY LIFE OF THE MYSTIO

THE SEARCH AFTER TRUTH

THE FRENCH MYSTIC

TOE GREAT BAY OF SAINT-MARTIN

DURING the second

half of the eighteenth

on the external side, since it

connection that a Christian mystical influence

As regards occult activities, if I say that their

THE GREAT DAY OP SAINT-MARTIN

France. So also were certain splendid historical

travelled in Rites, meaning Masonic Rites,

evangels, all philosophies, the ever-transpiring

that they denied their own death

which was born, so to speak, at an Apple-Tree

and decorated with magnificent

of innumerable spiritual marriages,

encomium elsewhere and that

but not belonging thereto, even in the widest

no question, from one point of

view, that all the claims belonged to a world of

emblazoned programmes of high intent and

THE GREAT DAY OF SAINT-MARTIN

But the reality behind the dreams must

in this connection stands of course for an

ment meant emancipation from the fetters of

prophets arid their vaunted revelations might

Condemned practices, forbidden arts might

under circumstances which cannot be recited

survey the amazing growth of Masonry in all its

and destined presently to have

THE GREAT DAY OF SAINT-MARTIN

Granting the fact of his unseen but vital fluid,

marked an epoch for evermore in Masonry. But

in respect of the second there lies behind it the

THE GREAT DAY OF SAINT-MARTIN

born in Grenoble, and he is said to have been

notwithstanding and also his spiritual dedications.

which he had satisfied in respect of his claims.

up to the time when for my present

And now as to that for which it stood.

I have intimated that Martines do Pasqually

modes and forms

only to the least extent was it otherwise veiled

hand from anything embraced by the horizon

animated things belonging to the material

EARLY LIFE OF THE MYSTIC

happiness was perhaps due to his stepmother ;

years, as when he tells us that he changed skins

mention these points

Saint-Martin attained a fair age, he seems to

have been always physically frail, amidst

that his father