MARTINISTS. The members of a philosophical and mys tical form of Freemasonry were called by this name, from the founder of the rite, the Marquis de Saint Martin.* The adepts of this order were earnest, pious, and remarkably modest men, and, although they promulgated ideas, startling in that material and skeptical age, were never fanatical in their advocacy of them, nor ill-tempered when ridiculed. Like the Rosicrucians, the Illuminati, and some other similar societies, they aspired to a higher and more positive philosophy, and sought a foundation for the ideas of religion and morality in the eternal fitness of things, and the interior experiences of the soul, rather than in tradition. They believed that the very existence of religious ideas in the human mind demonstrated their eternal truthfulness; for all subjective notions must be the reflex of an objective reality. Thus the vast orb of the sun is mirrored in the tiny dew drop. The reflected image of the sun is a demonstration of the sun's existence. In like manner the notion of God that exists in the mind is a reflex of God himself, and could no more exist in the mind were there no God than the image of the sun could be found in the dew-drop if there were no sun. Like Goethe, they believed that " Die geistericelt ist
nicht versch/o.s.3an"—"the world of spirits is not shut." It was their belief that an invisible sphere—a world of superior intelligence—environs man; that beneficent spirits are always near him, the constant companion of his actions, and wit nesses of his thoughts; that the higheSt science all the ideas of religion, art, and philosophy—are revelations of this over world, whose ineffable splendors are ever streaming down ward to meet humanity, which, impelled by its immortal needs, is aspiring upward to the fountain of light. The Order of St. Martin was a modification of a society founded by Paschalis, at Marseilles, 1754. It had ten degrees, divided into two divi4ions, called "Temples." Those of the 1st tem ple were Apprentice, Fellow-Craft, Master, Ancient-Master Elect, Grand Architect, and Mason of the Secret. Those of the 2d temple were the Prince of Jerusalem, Knights of Palestine and Kadosch. The object of the initiation was the regeneration of men, and the instructions to neophytes embraced the whole circle of human knowledge.