“All right,” I said, “let’s suppose a connection can be established. But how do we go from Saint Albans to the Pendulum?”
I was to learn how in the space of a few days.
“So then, the prior of Saint Albans is the abbot of Saint-Martin-des-Champs, which therefore becomes a Templar center. Bacon, through his property, establishes a contact with the Druid followers of Saint Albans. Now listen carefully: as Bacon is beginning his career in England, Guillaume Postel in France is ending his.”
An almost imperceptible twitch on Belbo’s face. I recalled the dialog at Riccardo’s show: Postel made Belbo think of the man who, in his mind, had robbed him of Lorenza. But it was the matter of an instant.
“Postel studies Hebrew, tries to demonstrate that it’s the common matrix of all languages, translates the Zohar and the Bahir, has contacts with the cabalists, broaches a plan for universal peace similar to that of the German Rosicrucian groups, tries to convince the king of France to form an alliance with the sultan, visits Greece, Syria, Asia Minor, studies Arabic—in a word, he retraces the itinerary of Christian Rosencreutz. And it is no accident that he signs some writings with the name of Rosispergius, ‘he who scatters dew.’ Gassendi in his Examen Philosophiae Fluddanae says that Rosencreutz does not derive from rosa but from ros, dew.
In one of his manuscripts he speaks of a secret to be guarded until the time is ripe, and he says: ‘That pearls may not be cast before swine.’ Do you know where else this gospel quotation appears? On the title page of The Chemical Wedding. And Father Marin Mersenne, in denouncing the Rosicrucian Fludd, says he is made of the same stuff as atheus magnus Postel. Furthermore, it seems Dee and Postel met in 1550, but perhaps they didn’t yet know that they were both grand masters of the Plan, scheduled to meet thirty years later, in 1584.
“Now, Postel declares—hear ye, hear ye—that, being a direct descendant of the oldest son of Noah, and since Noah is the founder of the Celtic race and therefore of the civilization of the Druids, the king of France is the only legitimate pretender to the title king of the world. That’s right, he talks about the King of the World—but three centuries before d’Alveydre. We’ll skip the fact that he falls in love with an old hag, Joanna, and considers her the divine Sophia; the man probably didn’t have all his marbles. But powerful enemies he did have; they called him dog, execrable monster, cloaca of all heresies, a being possessed by a legion of demons.
All the same, even with the Joanna scandal, the Inquisition doesn’t consider him a heretic, only amens, a bit of a nut, let’s say. The truth is, the Church doesn’t dare destroy the man, because they know he’s the spokesman of some fairly powerful group. I would point out to you, Diotallevi, that Postel travels also in the Orient and is a contemporary of Isaac Luria. Draw whatever conclusions you like. Well, in 1564, the year in which Dee writes his Monas Hieroglyphica, Postel retracts his heresies and retires to… guess where? The monastery of Saint-Martin-des-Champs! What’s he waiting for? Obviously, he’s waiting for 1584.”
“Obviously,” Diotallevi said.
I went on: “Are we agreed, then? Postel is grand master of the French group, awaiting the appointment with the English. But he dies in 1581, three years before it. Conclusions: First, the 1584 mishap took place because at that crucial moment a keen mind was missing, since Postel would have been able to figure out what was going on in the confusion of the calendars; second, Saint-Martin was a place where the Templars were safe, always at home, where the man responsible for the third meeting immured himself and waited. Saint-Martin-des-Champs was the Refuge!”
“It all fits, like a mosaic.”
“Stick with me. At the time of the failed appointment Bacon is only twenty-three. But in 1621 he becomes viscount St. Albans. What does he find in the ancestral possessions? A mystery. Note that this is the year he is accused of corruption and imprisoned for a while. He had unearthed something that caused fear in someone. In whom? This is when Bacon understood that Saint-Martin should be watched; he conceived the idea of putting his House of Solomon there, the laboratory in which, through experimental means, the secret could be discovered.”
“But,” Diotallevi asked, “how do we find the link between Bacon’s followers and the revolutionary groups of the late eighteenth century?”
“Could Freemasonry be the answer?” Belbo said.
“Splendid idea. Actually, Agliè suggested it to us that night at the castle.”
“We should reconstruct the events. What exactly was going on then in those circles?”
The only ones who elude … the eternal sleep … are those who in life are able to orient their mind toward the higher way. The initiates, the Adepts, are at the edge of that path. Having achieved memory, anamnesis, in the expression of Plutarch, they become free, they proceed without bonds. Crowned, they celebrate the “mysteries” and see on earth the throng of those who are not initiated and are not “pure,” those who are crushed and pushing one another in the mud and in the darkness.
—Julius Evola, La tradizione ermetica, Rome, Edizioni Mediterranee, 1971, p. III
Rashly I volunteered to do some quick research. I soon regretted it. I found myself in a morass of books, in which it was difficult to distinguish historical fact from hermetic gossip, and reliable information from flights of fancy. Working like a machine for a week, I drew up a bewildering list of sects, lodges, conventicles. I occasionally shuddered on encountering familiar names I didn’t expect to come upon in such company, and there were chronological coincidences that I felt were curious enough to be noted down. I showed this document to my two accomplices.
1645 London: Ashmole founds Invisible College, Rosicrucian in inspiration.
1660 From the Invisible College is born the Royal Society; and from the Royal Society, as everyone knows, the Masons.
1666 Paris: founding of Académie Royal des Sciences.
1707 Birth of Claude-Louis de Saint-Germain, if he was really born.
1717 Creation of the Great Lodge in London.
1721 Anderson drafts the constitutions of English Masonry.
Initiated in London, Peter the Great founds a lodge in Russia.
1730 Montesquieu, passing through London, is initiated.
1737 Ramsay asserts the Templar origin of Masonry. Origin of the Scottish rite, henceforth in conflict with the Great Lodge of London.
1738 Frederick, then crown prince of Prussia, is initiated. Later he is patron of Encyclopedists.
1740 Various lodges created in France around this year: Ecossais Fidèles of Toulouse, Souverain Conseil Sublime, Mère Loge Ecossaise du Grand Globe Français, Collège des Sublimes Princes du Royal Secret of Bordeaux, Cour des Souverains Commandeurs du Temple of Carcassonne, Philadelphes of Narbonnne, Chapitre des Rose-Croix of Montpellier, Sublimes Elus de la Vérité…
1743 First public appearance of Comte de Saint-Germain. In Lyon, the degree of chevalier kadosch originates, its task being to vindicate Templars.
1753 Willermoz founds lodge of Parfaite Amitié.
1754 Martínez Pasqualis founds Temple of the Elus Cohen (perhaps in 1760).
1756 Baron von Hund founds Templar Strict Observance, inspired, some say, by Frederick II of Prussia. For the first time there is talk of the Unknown Superiors. Some insinuate that the Unknown Superiors are Frederick and Voltaire.
1758 Saint-Germain arrives in Paris and offers his services to the king as chemist, an expert in dyes. He spends time with Madame Pompadour.
1759 Presumed formation of Conseil des Empereurs d’Orient et d’Occident, which three years later is said to have drawn up the Constitutions et Règlement de Bordeaux, from which Ancient and Accepted Scottish rite probably originates (though this does not appear officially until 1801).
1760 Saint-Germain on ambiguous diplomatic mission in Holland. Forced to flee, arrested in London, released. Dom J. Pernety founds Illuminati of Avignon. Martínez Pasqualis founds Chevaliers Maçons Elus de l’Univers.
1762 Saint-Germain in Russia.
1763 Casanova meets Saint-Germain, as Surmont, in Belgium. Latter turns coin into gold. Willermoz founds Souverain Chapitre des Chevaliers de l’Aigle Noire Rose-Croix.
1768 Willermoz joins Pasqualis’s Elus Cohen. Apocryphal publication in Jerusalem of Les plus secrets mystères des hauts grades de la maçonnerie devoilée, ou le vrai Rose-Croix: it says that the lodge of the Rosicrucians is on Mount Heredon, sixty miles from Edinburgh. Pasqualis meets Louis Claude de Saint-Martin, later known as Le Philosophe Inconnu. Dom Pernety becomes librarian of king of Prussia.
1771 The Duc de Chartres, later known as Philippe-Egalité, becomes grand master of the Grand Orient (then, the Grand Orient de France) and tries to unify all the lodges. Scottish rite lodge resists.
1772 Pasqualis leaves for Santo Domingo, and Willermoz and Saint-Martin establish Tribunal Souverain, which becomes Grand Loge Ecossaise.
1774 Saint-Martin retires, to become Philosophe Inconnu, and as delegate of Templar Strict Observance goes to negotiate with Willermoz. A Scottish Directory of the Province of Auvergne is born. From this will be born the Rectified Scottish rite.
1776 Saint-Germain, under the name Count Welldone, presents chemical plans to Frederick II. Société des Philathètes is born, to unite all hermeticists. Lodge of the Neuf Soeurs has as members Guillotin and Cabanis, Voltaire and Franklin. Adam Weishaupt founds Illuminati of Bavaria. According to some, he is initiated by a Danish merchant, Kolmer, returning from Egypt, who is probably the mysterious Altotas, master of Cagliostro.
1778 Saint-Germain, in Berlin, meets Dom Pernety. Willermoz founds Ordre des Chevaliers Bienfaisants de la Cité Sainte. Templar Strict Observance and Grand Orient agree to accept
