contends that it is abundantly attested that the title of Rosicrucians was given to the chemists who united the study of religion with the search after chemical secrets, the term itself being chemical, and not to be understood without a knowledge of the style used by the chemists. We shall give some extracts from very old Rosicrucian works presently which will enlighten our readers in such matters.

A cross in the language of the fire philosophers is the same as Lux (light), because the figure of a + exhibits all the three letters of the word Lux at one view. Moreover, this sect applied the term Lux to the seed or menstruum of the Red Dragon, or to that crude and corporeal light which, being properly concocted and digested, produces gold. A Rosicrucian, therefore, is a philosopher who, by means of dew seeks for light—that is, for the substance of the philosopher’s stone.

Mosheim declares the other interpretations of this name to be false and deceptive, being the inventions of the chemists themselves, who were exceedingly fond of concealment, for the sake of imposing on others who were hostile to their religious views. The true import of this title, he says, was perceived by the sagacity of Peter Gassendi, Examen Philosophiæ Fluddanæ, sec. 15, in his Opp. iii, 261; though it was more lucidly explained by the celebrated French physician Eusebius Renaudot, Conférences Publiques, iv. 87.

In 1619 Dr. Jo. Valentine Andreæ, a celebrated Lutheran divine, published his Tower of Babel, or Chaos of Opinions respecting the Fraternity of the Rosy-Cross, in which he represents the whole history as a farce, and gave intimations that he was himself concerned in getting it up.

Brucker says to the class of Theosophists has been commonly referred the entire society of Rosicrucians, which, at the beginning of the seventeenth century, made so much noise in the ecclesiastical and literary world. The history of this society, which is attended with some obscurity, seems to be as follows:—“Its origin is referred to a certain German, whose name was Rosencreuz who, in the fourteenth century, visited the Holy Sepulchre; and, in travelling through Asia and Africa, made himself acquainted with many Oriental secrets; and who, after his return, instituted a small fraternity, to whom he communicated the mysteries he had learned, under an oath of inviolable secrecy. This society remained concealed till the beginning of the seventeenth century, when two books were published, the one entitled, Fama Fraternitatis laudabilis Ordinis Rosæcrusis: “The report of the laudable Fraternity of Rosicrucians;” the other, Confessio Fraternitatis, “The Confession of the Fraternity.” In these books the world was informed that this fraternity was enabled, by Divine revelation, to explain the most important secrets, both of nature and grace; that they were appointed to correct the errors of the learned world, particularly in philosophy and medicine; that they were possessed of the philosopher’s stone, and understood both the art of transmuting metals and of prolonging human life; and, in fine, by their means the golden age would return. As soon as these grand secrets were divulged, the whole tribe of the Paracelsists, Theosophists and Chemists flocked to the Rosicrucian standard, and every new and unheard-of mystery was referred to this fraternity. It is impossible to relate how much noise this wonderful discovery made, or what different opinions were formed concerning it. After all, though the laws and statutes of the society had appeared, no one could tell where the society itself was to be found, or who really belonged to it. It was imagined by some sagacious observers, that a certain important meaning was concealed under the story of the Rosicrucian fraternity, though they were wholly unable to say what it was. One conjectured that some chemical mystery lay hid behind the allegorical tale; another supposed that it foretold some great ecclesiastical revolution. At last Michael Breler, in the year 1620, had the courage publicly to declare that he certainly knew the whole story to have been the contrivance of some ingenious persons who chose to amuse themselves by imposing upon the public credulity. This declaration raised a general suspicion against the whole story; and, as no one undertook to contradict it, this wonderful society daily vanished, and the rumours, which had been spread concerning it, ceased. The whole was probably a contrivance to ridicule the pretenders to secret wisdom and wonderful power, particularly the chemists, who boasted that they were possessed of the philosopher’s stone. It has been conjectured—and the satirical turn of his writings, and several particular passages in his works, favour the conjecture—that this farce was invented and performed, in part at least, by John Valentine Andrea of Wartenburg.”[2]

Pope, in the dedication of his Rape of the Lock to Mrs. Arabella Fermor, wrote:—“I know how disagreeable it is to make use of hard words before a lady; but it is so much the concern of a poet to have his works understood—and particularly by your sex—that you must give me leave to explain two or three difficult terms.

“The Rosicrucians are a people I must bring you acquainted with. The best account I know of them is in a French book called Le Comte de Gabalis, which, both in its title and size, is so like a novel, that many of the fair sex have read it for one by mistake. According to these gentlemen, the four elements are inhabited by spirits, which they call sylphs, gnomes, nymphs and salamanders. The gnomes, or demons of earth, delight in mischief; but the sylphs, whose habitation is in the air, are the best conditioned creatures imaginable; for they say any mortals may enjoy the most intimate familiarities with these gentle spirits, upon a condition very easy to all true adepts, an inviolate preservation of chastity.”

On the lines (verse 20, canto 1):—

“Belinda still her downy pillow prest,
Her guardian sylph prolonged the balmy rest.”

in Pope’s Rape of the Lock, Warburton thus comments:—

“When Mr. Pope had projected to give the Rape of the Lock its present form of a mock-heroic poem, he was obliged to find it with its machinery. For, as the subject of the Epic consists of two parts, the metaphysical and the civil; so this mock epic, which is of the satiric kind, and receives its grace from a ludicrous mimicry of other’s pomp and solemnity, was to have the like compounded nature. And as the civil part is intentionally debased by the choice of a trifling action; so should the metaphysical by the application of some very extravagant system. A rule which, though neither Boileau nor Garth had been careful enough to attend to, our author’s good sense would not suffer him to overlook. And that sort of machinery which his judgment informed him was only fit for use, his admirable invention soon supplied. There was but one systematic extravagance in all nature which was to his purpose, the Rosicrucian Philosophy; and this by the effort of a well-directed imagination, he presently seized. The fanatic Alchemists, in the search after the great secret, had invented a means altogether to their end: it was a kind of Theological Philosophy, made up in a mixture of almost equal parts of Pagan Platonism, Christian Quietism and the Jewish Cabbala; a mixture monstrous enough to frighten reason from human commerce. This system, he tells us, he took as he found it in a little French tract called, La Comte de Gabalis. This book is written in dialogue, and is a