CHAPTER XVII

THE ROSICRUCIANS
" The Rosicrucians are a people I must bring you acquainted
with."
— Dedication to the Rape of the Lock. ALEXANDER POPE, 1712.
ISTORICAL writing, so say both Carlyle and Ruskin, is made delightful through "disentangling various trace- able small threads of rela- tion," by finding interesting " reciprocities and mutabili- ties," in discovering the be- ginnings of things. That gratification I have had in tracing the curious and intimate relation of Rosi- crucianism to the two subjects of my book, sun-dials and Roses ; or tracing, too, these threads through winding by-ways to America. I find in Carlyle's masterly searching out of a Rosicrucian quack, " A Grand Master of the Egyptian Mason Lodge of High Science, Spirit Summoner, Thaumaturgical Metallurgist, Swindler, and Gold-Cook," words literally true of my own searches after similar " Gold- Cooks " ; so amusingly like in that I, too, have been
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The Rosicrucians 367
unable to obtain a desired book " Which all Libra- rians make a point of denying that they possess."
The Rosicrucians as a sect have been but little known, though scores of ancient and mystical books and the scattered references in encyclopaedias and histories have been followed within a few years with a number not over-satisfactory modern books upon their doctrines. Wild and absurd as were their teachings, they left a distinct trace upon the poetical and legendary literature of Europe. Their beliefs became public in the early part of the seventeenth century, a time when all Europe was seething with religious excitement, when our own country was being settled through these religious controversies. A belief in the baleful possession of foul, malignant spirits, in witches, seemed almost universal, whether these were the spiteful elves of superstitious peasants or the plain devils of the pious Puritans. The new sect claimed that the four elements are inhabited by good spirits which they called sylphs, gnomes, nymphs, and salamanders. Pope says of them in his Dedica- tion to the Rape of the Lock : —
" The sylphs whose habitation is in the air are the best- conditioned creatures imaginable ; for they say any mortal may enjoy the most intimate familiarities with these gentle spirits upon a condition very easy to all true adepts — an inviolate preservation of chastity."
The name Rosicrucian was first heard in 1604, though it is said that the sect had existed since the death of the founder, Christian Rosencreutz, in 1484. It is, however, deemed by many careful students
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very doubtful whether any such person really lived. When it was known that this brotherhood could subsist without eating or drinking; were not subject to disease themselves, and could cure it in others by application of helpful thought; could render them- selves invisible ; could work miracles ; and above all could draw gold and jewels from the earth by incantation, it created great excitement.
It was asserted that Rosencreutz learned the " sub- lime science" in the East; that while travelling in Arabia he was greeted by some philosophers, called by name at first sight, and claimed by them. From them he learned the secret of prolonging life. It is gravely asserted that he lived to be one hundred and fifty years old, and then died solely because he was tired of living. There were five simple fundamental laws to which the Rosicrucians subscribed: I. To heal the sick gratuitously. 2. To wear the costume of the country in which they lived. 3. To attend a meeting of the Order at least once annually. 4. To preserve the secret a hundred years. 5. When think- ing of dying, to choose a successor. These laws have been observed by Rosicrucian followers to the present day. A few years ago a young friend of mine, who was cheerfully attending balls and dinner- parties in blissful ignorance even of the word Rosi- crucian, was accosted in a Parisian drawing-room by an entire stranger who abruptly announced that he had chosen her as his successor in the Society of the Rosy Cross, and would call upon her and explain her duties, as he intended soon to die. She promptly fled from him as from a madman ; and after meet-
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ing him a second time at a reception, where he gazed upon her without speaking in such an offen- sively mysterious man- ner, she left Paris indignantly, simply frightened away ; and she has ever since had a tirnid dread of en- countering her Rosi- crucian predecessor.
There came a time in Germany of frantic speculation and investi- gation on all sides with but little tangible re- sults, for there was little to ascertain ; ap- parently the true Rosi- crucians always kept silent. Of course much obloquy came to them ; some simply from dis- appointed curiosity. One writer settled at The Hague after being kicked out of the Soci- ety, with the assurance that he would be mur- dered if he revealed their secrets : " Which secrets," he writes, "I have faithfully kept, for the same reason that women keep secrets — there is nothing to tell." I doubt whether any one living can very
Dial-pillar at Wimborne Minster, Dorsetshire.
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370 Sun-dials and Roses of Yesterday
lucidly explain and define the Rosicrucian teachings and philosophy. I doubt if the teachers desired
lucidity.
They believed in a distinct harmony of the process of nature and the doctrines of religion, and so used chemical terms to express religious truths ; they talked of the signatures of things, of the influence of the stars, of magic, of the orders of friendly spirits. Whether the Rosicru- cians were all alchemists, or whether the alchemists were a physical branch of the Rosicrucians, mat- ters little. The art and mystery of alchemy formed an important part of this as of all the mys- tic religions. When scoffers say in triumph that the Rosicrucians could never have turned base metal into gold, else they would have transformed the world with their wealth, the true " grooms " answer that when they had acquired the power of transmutation into gold, these adepts had ceased to desire wealth.
South Dial at Wimborne Minster, Dorsetshire.
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One alchemist, Sir Edward Kelley, turned a brass warming-pan into silver, and gave away gold wire rings to the value of four thousand pounds at the marriage of a maid-servant, so readily could he make gold. Sir George Ripley gave a hundred thousand pounds to the Knights of Malta for main- taining the war against the Turks — gave it, so it was asserted, because he had found the philosopher's stone in 1470. His works were published by Ash- mole. "Robert the Searcher," another great mathe- matician, could make gold "as easily as he could make salt from sea-water/'
Out of all the absurdity and nonsense, the confu- sion and superstition, of the reports of the Rosicru- cians which I have read, there stands out therefrom something which attracts me. I am inclined to sus- pect that the charm comes largely from the beauty and significance of the Rosicrucian emblem. Old Thomas Fuller in his Worthies wrote thus of it : —
" Sure I am that a Rose is the sweetest of flowers and a cross accounted the sacredest of forms or figures, so that much of eminency must be imparted in their composition."
This simple thought must be shared by many: that the blending of two such significant forms, the Rose and the Cross, must in itself confer dignity on the order. The Rose is almost a universal emblem. A mystic Rose in an allegorical garden is met with in religious traditions of the Orient ; there is a Silver Rose in the Garden of Heaven, which is the Brah- man paradise. Buddha and the Hindoo god Indra both suffered for robbing a paradisaical garden of a
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flower. The garden of King Midas, who turned all to gold that he touched, was filled with Roses of sixty petals ; the Peruvian Eve of the Garden of Eden sinned not for plucking an apple but a Rose ; and the Mexican Eve also gathered a Rose. Into the
Beautiful symbolic his- tory of the Cross 1 will not enter. It is a hiero- gram of even greater antiquity than the Rose. All " persons of sensi- bility," as the old novel- writers said, have a curious and persistent interest in Rosicrucian- ism, when once they know of it ; or at least a persistent curiosity. Of course I believe that this is also part of the mysterious influence of the Rose, — an influ- ence which exists, though, like all magic, inexplicable, whether this magic be that of the ancient religious mysteries or the simple charm of beauty. We feel this magic of the Rose as we are sensible of the quality entitled "fascination" in our friends; the old Puritan, Cotton Mather, wrote of it, "Of Fascination Man hath more Comprehen- sion than Understanding."
Sun-dial at Talbot, near Bourne- mouth, England.
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A strongly backed derivation of the word Rosi- crucian is Roed and Crux, cross, which I wholly reject through sentiment, and because all the beauty of the story — the hundreds of allusions to the Rose — is thereby lost ; the emblematic significance of the Rose as Silence in this most silent of societies, too, cannot be given up.
Rosicrucianism had a unique, an almost comic history in France. The name appeared there in 1623, through a short and mysterious placard which suddenly was in every street in Paris. The name Rosy Cross was as speedily in every mouth. These placards stated that deputies of the Rosy Cross Society Masters were in the city, and were prepared to wel- come and teach recruits, but no place was given where they could be seen; no indication of their whereabouts. A burning curiosity was thus awakened in volatile French minds, which was never satisfied. Frantic inquiries in public and private through all channels failed to find any one who had ever seen a Rosicru- cian or the teachers. Yet the placards were con- stantly renewed; and it was told that followers flocked around the teachers somewhere, but became abso- lutely silent as soon as they became Rosicrucians.
Abuse of the new society was in every speaking mouth ; in news-letters, books, pamphlets, and the pulpit was it denounced. The most widespread was a ridiculous bogey book, entitled Frightful Compact between the Devil and the so-called Invisibles. Soon the abuse became a crusade of baffled and shocked Roman Catholics against an ultra-Protestantism which was denounced as blasphemy and devil-worship. But
374 Sun-dials and Roses of Yesterday
it is a poor battle when the fighting is all on one side, and after two years of this noisy but bootless war-
Market Cross with Dials, Woodstock, England. From an Old Print.
fare the Rosicrucian placards vanished as suddenly as they came, and the name even was forgotten for a century.
The Rosicrucian emblems have ever proved so pleasing to the public eye, and the beliefs so alluring
The Rosicrucians 375
to the mystery-loving nature of many people, that they have been often revived by adventurers and swindlers as a romantic surrounding for their quack- ery and impostures. One of the most interesting of those adventurers was that quack of quacks, Count Cagliostro.
All my notions of Count Cagliostro and the Af- fair of the Diamond Necklace are founded on Carlyle's brilliant essays which, named Flights^ were printed in Frasers Magazine in 1833. I read them in my early childhood, and in the form in which they were furnished to me they form a curious side glimpse upon the subject of my chapter. These three Flights were one of a set of little volumes; the others being Undine, a tale entitled The Holy Hermit in three volumes ; and Pbantasmion, also in three volumes. This last wonderful book was by Sara Coleridge. It contains some exquisite turns of fancy, but I never knew any one. who had read it save myself. These books all had a fine binding, but a greater charm was in the end-papers which, with the marbled leaf-edges, bore a beautiful and singular design; the colors of the prism in little lines formed the background, with a gold Rose pattern stamped upon it, --an heraldic Rose. Not a vestige of these end-papers remain in any of the volumes, the leaf-edges alone tell the story of the pattern. These were the only books I ever wantonly misused ; these lovely end-papers of fairy colors were too obviously fit for garments for paper dolls to be left unmolested. The grouping of these books was so significant, and the symbolism of the end-papers so plain, that I am sure they had
376 Sun-dials and Roses of Yesterday
been thus bound by some one who had, in connec- tion with them, some notion of mysticism, perhaps of Rosicrucianism.
We all know in our own day, in the winters of 1892 and 1893, wnat nonsense there was in Paris over a revival of interest in this apparently vanished sect. Matinees of the Rosy Cross proved vastly amusing to the volatile Parisians. The high priest of all this was a man prosaically named Josephin, but known to Angels and his followers as Sar Peladan, Grand Master of the Rosy 4- Cross of the Temple. A description of the meeting of the faithful, " grooms ' they are called, does not seem very alluring in the re- cital, though I think one might get considerable fun at the initiation, when asked by the rigid examiner : " Enumerate thy attractions and thy repulsions." Though Sar Peladan was no end of a farceur^ he deemed himself the ally of Ruskin, Rossetti, and Burne-Jones, and he was fortunate enough to. in- terest and annex another very great painter, Puvis de Chavannes, whose temperament, as shown in his work, must have made him a ready listener; still, he did not linger long a groom. A less-known but charming French painter, M. Aime Jean, was also a convert, and contributed to the Rosicrucian Salon his exquisite Reverie. M. Khnopffjoined the band and gave his painting of beauty and mystery, / lock my Door upon Myself. Besides the picture exhibition, lecture courses were given --dull, of course ; and plays also. One, Le Fils des Etolies, was called a wagnerie, and I am sure I know not what that was, Concerts, too, at which a woman, whose
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377
Queen Eleanor's Cross, Northampton. From an Old Print, 1760.
name was seriously given as Mme. Corrylange Mogenboom, performed what were termed "incan- tations " on the piano.
378 Sun-dials and Roses of Yesterday
It is held by the believers in Rosicrucianism that Edward I was initiated into the mysteries of the society in 1296; that the degree of Rose Croix was conferred on him by Raymond Lully (the friend of John Cremer, Abbot of Westminster, and that delightful old English alchemist, Roger Bacon). Edward made the crusade to Palestine and brought back to England with him Guido dalla Colonna and this same Raymond Lully, who coined six millions of nobles for him, as I have recounted at length in another chapter. Lully was a contemporary of Dante and of Arnold of Villanova. All were perse- cuted exiles. Lully was accused of heresy, and at last took recourse in the language of conventional hypocrisy, and, as did Dante, pretended to be re- united with the Church of Rome.
Many things in Edward's reign can be twisted to hint of Rosicrucianism ; for instance, over the door of the Chapter House at York Minster, built in his reign, is this couplet : —
" Ut rosa flos florum
Sic est domus is fa domorum"
thus Englished and rhymed by Thomas Fuller : —
"Of flowers that grow
The flower's the Rose, All houses so
This house out-goes."
This house is eight-sided, like the Buddhist cross of the Templars.
Another act of King Edward, which has been claimed as indicative of his knowledge of mysticism
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and symbolism, was his erection of the wonderful series of funeral crosses to the memory of his wife. Holinshed writes : —
" In the nineteenth yeare of King Edward, Queen Elia- nore, King Edward's wife, died, upon Saint Andrew's Even, at Hirdibie near to Lincoln. In everie town and place where the corpse rested by the waie, the King caused a crosse of cunning workmanship to be erected in remem- brance of her. Two of the like crosses were set up in Lon- don ; the one at West cheape, and the other at Charing."
Twelve or thirteen of these splendid crosses were erected. On page 377 is a view of the Northamp- ton cross, copied from an old print of the year 1760. It had at one time four sun-dials on the four faces of the cross.
The cost of these magnificent crosses cannot be known, as so many persons had a hand thereat, it being held both a sacred and a loyal duty. In the upper arches were enclosed four statues of the dead queen. They were the work of William de Ireland, " imaginator " — or sculptor.
This first Edward was certainly a dominant crea- ture with a mind out of the common run of kings of those times. We have heard much of him dur- ing these English coronation days, of the Scotch sacred stone with its oracular gifts, vulgarly called Jacob's Pillow, which he bore off incontinently to England, and placed in the Coronation Chair at Westminster Abbey. Its Biblical name rests upon the tradition that this very block of sandstone is one on which Jacob laid his head on that memorable
380 Sun-dials and Roses of Yesterday
night in Bethel when he saw " angels ascending and descending." From thence it came to Egypt, then to Spain, and then to Ireland, where it was known as the Stone of Destiny. It was borrowed for a Celtic coronation and never returned. Poor Ireland's luck went with it. A succession of Scotch kings were crowned seated upon it, and an old rhyme runs : —
" Where'er this stone is placed, the Fates decree The Scottish race shall there the sovereigns be."
Prosaic geologists report the suspicious fact that it is made of a sandstone abundant near the Scotch town where it was kept so long, and which does not exist in the places named as having prior claims on it. The English regard it with superstitious awe, yet across the broad seat of the chair is carved this inscription in sprawling schoolboy fashion, " Peter Abbott slept in this chair July 4, 1801." It is said that Peter was a Westminster schoolboy, but the date and name sound truly American. One miracu- lous power of this Jacob's stone was that it groaned aloud if a pretender was seated upon it ; but I pre- sume it was speechless with amazement and indigna- tion at naughty Peter's deed.
When the English gave up Rosicrucianism, they took up Free Masonry ; the English kings were all interested in it; Charles II is said to have been initiated in France. A dignified follower of both sects was Elias Ash mole, the antiquary, who wrote on the philosopher's stone, and thus became one of Carlyle's " Gold-Cooks." As founder of the Ashmolean Museum, this antiquary must receive
The Rosicrucians
some credit and attention. Feasts of astrologers were held, which De Quincey asserts started this English society of Free Masons. Oughtred, the sun-dial maker, whose interesting personality is described in another chapter of this book, was an- other member. Sir Christopher Wren, who also made sun-dials, was first Grand Master. The Rosicrucians held that all things visi- ble and invisible were produced by the contention of light and shade; and a sun-dial would have been as appropriate an emblem as a Rose and Cross for these English di- allers who were so many of them Rosicrucians. The transition
Pillar-dial at Martock, Somerset, England.
from Rosicrucianism to Free Masonry was very easy ; I shall not attempt even to indicate it. The Fraternity of the Rosy Cross in England is still chosen from the Masonic body ; the same terms are used by the Masons as by the older society. The inquisitive " searcher after mys- teries " may gather somewhat of the resemblances, associations, and derivations common to both socie-
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ties by reading De Quincey's indifferent account of the Rosicrucians ; and a much more accurate presentation, Mr. Waite's Real History of the Rosi- crucians, which I presume is as fair a story of this greatest of all mystic societies as can ever be written.
That curious figure in English history, Friar Roger Bacon, is claimed as a Rosicrucian ; as the greatest mind of the thirteenth century, an age rich in great minds, his name certainly would cast honor on any class or society or sect. His manner of thought and his ideas were of the sixteenth century rather than his own, hence he was naturally unappreciated by his contemporaries. His writings were so vast that his biographer said it would be easier to collect the leaves of the Sibyl than the titles even of Bacon's books. He held, as did Frankenstein in our own day, that all the sciences rest on mathematics, even theology ; his sketches of geography and astronomy written in this connection are interesting to us because they were the text-books used by Columbus.
Bacon certainly described a method of construct- ing a telescope, and he is assigned the invention of the barometer; he knew about gunpowder and burning-glasses. He was a firm believer in astrol- ogy, in the doctrine of signatures, the philosopher's stone ; and he knew that the circle had been squared. He made some curious prophesies held to apply to steam-engines, balloons, etc. I have been inquisitive enough about Friar Bacon to examine his book, The Cure of Old Age, to see what he says of Roses, his loved Emblem, and I find he barely refers to them.
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He has as sapless a biography as ever was written. He is not called a Rosicrucian, but, "the vulgar called him a conjurer, and even some Learned men,
Sun-dial at Branksea Castle, Poole Harbour, England.
likewise." In the book are some wholesome rules of health and some shocking ones, but what with con- forming everything to the planets, and with wisely quoting of the classics, Friar Bacon contrives to tell as little as I ever knew in a book of a hundred and
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fifty pages. One Rose reference, of a Rose which would come to life when placed in water, is evi- dently to the Rose of Jericho with which impostor monks often deluded " poor silly women."
There were many remarkable old fellows in Eng- land, call them Rosicrucians, cabalists, alchemists, philosophers, what you will, who cannot be set aside as ignorant dupes or wilful liars. Perhaps the most important after Friar Bacon was Dr. Flood or Fludd,.who wrote fifteen or twenty great books and was deemed of enough importance to have his works formally refuted by Kepler. He had become infat- uated with the teachings of Paracelsus, and endeav- ored to form on them a philosophy which should prove spiritual and physical birth identical, — a notion which has proved so luring to scores of great thinkers. He was a great mathematician and maker of mathe- matical instruments, sun-dials, and the like, and he also is said to have invented the barometer. The magic events of his life are interesting to read about, but in the dry-as-dusts which I have ploughed through in emulation of Carlyle, I could not make myself read his long defences of Rosicrucianism. He is described by old Fuller in his Worthies, though the doctor knew but little of what he called Rose-Crucians; saying with his usual shrewd- ness, " Perchance none know it but those that are of it." He wrote somewhat quizzically of Dr. Flood's learning and medical skill : —
" His books written in Latin are great, many, and mysti- cal. The last some impute to his Charity, clouding his
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High Matter with Dark Language, lest otherwise the lustre thereof should dazzle the understanding of the reader. The same phrases he used to his patients. And seeing that Con- ceit is very contributive to the Well working of Physic, their Fancy or Faith natural was much advanced by his elevated expressions."
I think it would interest some of the believers and " healers ' of " Christian Science " and the " Mind Cure ' to-day to see the frequent hints of similar beliefs among the Rosicrucians. Dr. Flood healed bv what he called a " Faith Natural," in which
j
it was asserted that the influence of his mind added to the well-working of his drugs. A total cutting- off of dosing would have been too startling a reform in those days of drugs and dosing. He held that St. Luke was his " physicall and theosophicall patron." Perhaps a diligent reading of the first books of the New Testament with a thought of this discovery in view may show why Luke was chosen.
I have just had a pleasure such as is seldom given to folk of mature years who have ever been greedy readers, undeterred by quality or quantity. Seldom does there remain unread any of the great pieces of literature ; but to-night I have read a new and great work, Chaucer's Romaunt of the Rose, not literally for the first time, for I recall that I worried through it when a schoolgirl in my study of rhetoric, gulping it down in "required readings," as blissfully ignorant of its meaning as if it were old Sanscrit instead of old English.
Oh, how fine is this Romaunt of the Rose ! what a picture of youth and chivalry ! what a picture of
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a garden ! So plainly worded, so fully described, such " a garden that I love " ; as frankly disclosed in every detail as if symbolism had never been in- vented ; and yet it all had a deep meaning ; for
Lynn Market Cross, Cheshire, England.
the garden was but a setting to hold the Rose. And the significance of the whole allegory was : —
" La Rose f est d* amour le guerdon gracieux."
We can glance into the magic crystal so vividly described in the Romaunt, and see every detail of the exquisite Rose arbor, the Roser with its varied inflorescence.
The Romaunt of the Rose was deemed by the Rosicrucians the allegorical masterpiece of the sect,
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as it was one of the perfect specimens of Prove^al literature. It was written originally about 1282, to satirize the monks ; in the double language of Love and Alchemy, it is 'a complete specimen of Hermetic philosophy.
Throughout Chaucer's works are many veiled allusions which can readily be twisted to alchemical meanings. The poet John Gower, the friend of Chaucer, is another who is claimed as a Rosicrucian. His monument at St. Saviour's, Southwark, shows him crowned with Roses, and with the " three virtues" at his feet.
A Gnostic branch, headed by Lollard with his twelve apostles, united with the followers of Wyclif, and Chaucer was of their number, and left England on account of his belief. Sir Walter Raleigh was also claimed as a Rosicrucian. Spenser's allegorical poetry naturally is claimed by the searchers after proofs of Rosicrucianism ; they interpret Una to mean the one true church ; the Red Cross Knight can be either the Christian Militant or the Sacred Order of Templars.
The Rosicrucians ingeniously discovered similar emblems and proofs in Dante's Divina Commedia. One of the high prophets wrote : " The Paradise consists of a series of Kabbalistic circles divided by a Cross like Ezekiel's pentacle. A Rose blossoms in the centre of this Cross." It was held that in Dante was for the first time the Rosy Cross of the Rosicrucians publicly categorically revealed.
Dante's age was fertile in secret societies and mys- tical works. If vou choose to examine the Diction-
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ary of Heresies you may learn how many forms a hatred of Rome could take, and how many of these forms were secret societies ; the art of speaking
secretly, of expressing a thing by means of two meanings, was called grammar ; the word is found in variant forms, gramary, glamary, glamer, and the word glamour is therefrom.
A wonderful exposi- tion of the secret mean- ings of the works of Petrarch, Boccaccio, and Dante, of their relations to mysticism, is found in a book written by Ga- briel Rossetti, the father of the great artist bearing the same name with the prenomen Dante ; this