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German Union
and The French Revolution
Dr. Charles
Frederick Bahrdt (1741-1793), an Illuminati member, Mason, and German
theologian, who was the professor of Sacred Philogy at the University of
Leipzig, took advantage of the Illuminati's apparent demise by
recruiting several of its members for his so-called 'German Union' in
1787. Bahrdt, the son of a minister, called his group the German Union
for Rooting Out Superstition and Prejudices and Advancing True
Christianity.
In 1785, Bahrdt had received an anonymous letter, containing the plans
for the German Union, which was signed, "From some Masons, your great
admirers." That same year, he was visited by an Englishman who urged him
to establish the Union, promising to link it with the British Masonic
structure. In 1787, he received another letter containing more details
and organizational details.
Bahrdt had done some religious propaganda work for Weishaupt, "to
destroy the authority of the Scriptures," and it was commonly believed
that it was Weishaupt who was directing the activities of the
organization behind the scenes in order to carry on the goals of the
Illuminati.
The German Union appeared to be a Reading Society, and one was set up in
Zwack's house in Landshut. Weishaupt wrote: "Next to this, the form of a
learned of literary society is best suited to our purpose, and had
Freemasonry not existed, this cover would have been employed; and it may
be much more than a cover, it may be a power engine in our hands. By
establishing reading societies, and subscription libraries, and taking
these under our direction, and supplying them through our labors, we may
turn the public mind which way we will ... A literary society is the
most proper form for the introduction of our Order into any State where
we are yet strangers." They planned about 800 such Reading Rooms.
The membership initially consisted of 17 young men, and about five of
Bahrdt's friends. Knigge helped him to develop the organizational
structure, which was divided into six grades:
1) Adolescent
2) Man
3) Elder
4) Mesopolite
5) Diocesan
6) Superior
The 'Society of the 22' or the 'Brotherhood' was its inner circle.
In a pamphlet entitled To All Friends of Reason, Truth and Virtue,
Bahrdt wrote that the organization's purpose was to accomplish the
enlightenment of people in order to disseminate religion, remove popular
prejudices, root out superstition, and restore liberty to mankind. They
planned to have magazines and pamphlets, but by 1788, Bahrdt had sunk
over $1,000 into the group, and was spending all of his time working on
it. Despite his efforts, they still only had 200 members.
Near the end of 1788, Frederick Wilhelm, the King of Prussia, worried
about the growth of the organization, had Johann Christian von Wollner,
one of his ministers, write an opposing view to Bahrdt's pamphlet,
called the Edict of Religion. Bahrdt responded by anonymously writing
another pamphlet of the same name to satirize it. In 1789, a bookseller
by the name of Goschen, wrote a pamphlet called More Notes Than Text, on
the German Union of XXII, a New Secret Society for the Good of Mankind,
in which he revealed that the group was a continuation of the
Illuminati.
The German Union, which represented Weishaupt's "corrected system of
Illuminism," never really got off the ground because of its openness,
which provoked hostile attacks from the government and members of the
clergy. Bahrdt left the group and opened up a tavern known as 'Bahrdt's
Repose.' The German Union ceased to exist after he died in 1793.
THE FRENCH REVOLUTION
The Illuminati had secretly spread to France by 1787 (five years after
they had planned), through French orator and revolutionary leader Count
Gabriel Victor Riqueti de Mirabeau (1749-1791, Order name 'Leonidas')
who had been indoctrinated by Col. Jacob Mauvillon while he was in
Berlin on a secret mission for King Louis XVI of France in 1786.
Mirabeau introduced Illuminati principles at the Paris Masonic Lodge of
the Amis Reunis (later renamed 'Philalethes'), and initiated Abbé
Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand-Perigord (1754-1838, a court cleric in the
House of Bourbon).
The most trusted members were brought into the 'Secret Committee of
United Friends' (it is interesting to note that a group of the same name
originated in 1771 as an occult group). The initiations took place at
the Illuminati's Grand Lodge, about 30 miles from Paris, in the
Ermenonville mansion owned by the Marquis de Gerardin. The famous
impostor Saint Germain (1710-1780, or 1785) presided over the initiation
ceremonies.
Germain was believed to be a Portuguese Jew, who was a member of the
Philalethes Lodge. He was a Mason, a Rosicrucian, and belonged to
several other occult brotherhoods. He spoke Italian, German, English,
Spanish, French, Greek, Sanskrit, Arabic, and Chinese. He was said to be
the son of Prince Rakoczy of Transylvania; raised by the last Medici,
Gian Gastone; and was educated at the University of Siena. He told
people that he had lived for centuries, and knew King Solomon. He was
arrested in London in 1743 for being a Jacobite spy, and he took credit
for establishing Freemasonry in Germany. As an impostor, he posed as
Comte Bellamarre, Marquis de Montferrat, and Chevalier Schoening.
During the initiation, new members were sworn to "reveal to thy new
chief all thou shalt have heard, learned and discovered, and also to
seek after and spy into things that might have otherwise escaped thy
notice ... (and to) avoid all temptation to betray what thou has now
heard. Lightning does not strike so quickly as the dagger which will
reach thee wherever thou mayest be."
Count Alessandro de Cagliostro (also known as Giuseppe Balsamo), a Jew
from Sicily, who was said to be one of the greatest occult practitioners
of all time, was initiated into the Illuminati at Mitau (near Frankfurt)
in 1780, in an underground room. He later said, that an iron box filled
with papers was opened, and a book taken out. From it, a member read the
oath of secrecy, which began: "We, Grand Masters of Templars..." It was
written in blood. The book was an outline of their plans, which included
an attack on Rome. He discovered that they had money at their disposal
in banks at Amsterdam, Rotterdam, London, Genoa, and Venice. He found
out that the Illuminati had 20,000 lodges throughout Europe and America,
and that their members served in every European court. Cagliostro was
instructed to go to Strasbourg, France, to make the initial contacts
necessary for the instigation of the French Revolution. Identified as a
Grand Master of the Prieuré de Sion, it is believed that he was the
liaison between them and the Illuminati. He was arrested in 1790, in
Rome, for revolutionary activities.
The French Masons had committed themselves to a plan for overthrowing
the government, under the guise of liberty and equality; ending the
autocratic regimes, in order to have government by and for the people.
Jeremy Bentham and William Petty (Earl of Shelburne) planned and
directed the French Revolution, then later directed the plot towards
America.
In 1788, at the request of Mirabeau and Talleyrand, Johann Joachim
Christoph Bode (1730-1793, 'Amelius'), a lawyer at Weimar, and a Mason,
was summoned to France. He had been initiated into the Illuminati at the
Congress of Wilhelmsbad, and later took over the Order in the absence of
Weishaupt. Bode and Baron de Busche ('Bayard'), a Dutch military officer
in the service of the Landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt, in order to conceal
the purpose of their presence in France, said they were there to
investigate the influence of the Jesuits on the secret societies.
However, the real reason for them being there, was to further the goals
of the Illuminati in France. They operated out of the Lodge of the Amis
Reunis, changing its name to 'Philalethes,' which means, 'searchers
after the truth.'
The Marquis de Luchet, a friend of Mirabeau, wrote in his Essay on the
Sect of the Illuminati in January, 1789: "Deluded people. You must
understand that there exists a conspiracy in favor of despotism, and
against liberty, of incapacity against talent, of vice against virtue,
or ignorance against light! ... Every species of error which afflicts
the earth, every half-baked idea, every invention serves to fit the
doctrines of the Illuminati ... The aim is universal domination."
Intellectuals known as 'encyclopedists' were instrumental in spreading
Illuminati doctrine. Soon other lodges become aligned with the
Philalethes, such as the Nine Sisters; the Lodge of Candor, which
included members like Laclos, Sillery, D´Aiguillon; the Lameth Brothers,
Dr. Guillotine, and Lafayette; and the Propaganda, which was established
by Condorcet, Abbé Sieyes, and Rochenfoucault.
Revolutionary leaders in France, such as Maximilien Francois Marie
Isidore de Robespierre (1758-1794), who was made head of the Revolution
by Weishaupt; Marquis Antoine Nicholas Condorcet (1743-1794),
philosopher and politician; Duke de la Rochenfoucault; George Jacques
Danton (1759-1794); Marquis Marie Joseph de Lafayette (1757-1834),
General and statesman; Jerome Petion de Villeneuve (1756-1794),
politician; Philippe, Duke of Orleans, Grand Master of French
Freemasonry; de Leutre; Fauchet; Cammille Benoit Desmoulins (1760-1794),
D´Alembert; Denis Diderot (1713-1784), encyclopedist; and Jean-Francois
de la Harpe (1739-1803), critic and playwright, all joined the
Illuminati, who had eventually infiltrated all 266 Masonic lodges by
1789, even though the Masons weren't aware of it.
The Illuminati created situations in order to create dissention among
the people. For instance, the Duke of Orleans instructed his agents to
buy up as much grain as they could, then the people were led to believe
that the King intentionally caused the shortage, and that the French
people were starving. Fellow conspirators in the government helped
create runaway inflation. Thus the people were manipulated into turning
against a king whose reign had strengthened the middle class. The
monarchy was to be destroyed, and the middle class oppressed. God was to
be replaced by the Illuminati's religion of reason that "man's mind
would solve man's problems."
During the first two years of the French Revolution, which started in
April, 1789, the Illuminati had infiltrated the Masonic Lodges to such
an extent, that they had ceased operation, and instead rallied under the
name, "The French Revolutionary Club." When they needed a larger meeting
place, they used the hall of the Jacobin's Convent. This revolutionary
group of 1300 people emerged on July 14, 1789 as the Jacobin Club. The
Illuminati controlled the Club, and were directly responsible for
fermenting the activities which developed into the French Revolution.
Lord Acton wrote: "The appalling thing in the French Revolution is not
the tumult but the design. Through all the fire and smoke, we perceived
the evidence of calculating organization. The managers remain studiously
concealed and masked; but there is no doubt about their presence from
the first."
In the playing out of a plan which called for the population to be cut
down by one-third to one-half, over 300,000 people died, including the
execution of King Louis and his family. This was done to insure the
stability of the new French Republic. In August, 1792, after the
overthrow of the government, the tri-colored banner was replaced by the
red flag of social revolution, while the cry of "Vive notre roi
d´Orleans" gave way to the Masonic watchword, "Liberty, Equality,
Fraternity!" Those who responded with the proper Masonic handsigns, had
their lives spared. By November, 1793, as the massacres had spread all
over France, the churches had been reorganized along the lines of
Weishaupt's contention that "reason should be the only code of man."
Talleyrand, who became the bishop of Autin in 1788, because of his
radical reorganization of the Church, was excommunicated by the Pope. He
became a deputy to the National Assembly. The Jacobins controlled the
National Assembly, and for all intents and purposes, Mirabeau became
France's leader. In true Democratic spirit, he said: "We must flatter
the people by gratuitous justice, promise them a great diminution in
taxes and a more equal division, more extension in fortunes, and less
humiliation. These fantasies will fanaticize the people, who will
flatten all resistance." The Revolution was considered at an end on July
28, 1794, when Robespierre was guillotined.
Thomas Jefferson, who served as minister to France for three years
(1785-89), described the events as "so beautiful a revolution" and said
that he hoped it would sweep the world. Treasury Secretary Alexander
Hamilton said that Jefferson helped start the French Revolution, and
wrote in a letter to a friend, dated May 26, 1792, that Jefferson "drank
freely of the French philosophy, in religion, in science, in politics.
He came from France in the moment of fermentation, which he had a share
in inciting." Jefferson wrote to Brissot de Warville in Philadelphia, in
a letter dated May 8, 1793, that he was "eternally attached to the
principles of the French Revolution." In 1987, during a trip to the
United States by Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev and his wife, where
they visited the Jefferson Memorial, she referred to Jefferson as "one
of the world's greatest thinkers."
It is interesting to note, that during the Communist revolution, Nikolai
Lenin said: "We, the Bolsheviks, are the Jacobins of the Twentieth
Century..."
An Illuminist, and member of the revolutionary French National Assembly,
Vicomte de Barras, witnessed a 24 year old Napoleon repelling a siege at
Toulon in 1793 by English and Spanish military forces. Barras, appointed
by the Assembly as the Commander-in-Chief of the French military, in
1795 became a member of the five-man Directorate, which began to govern
France, and soon became the most powerful political figure in the
country. He chose Napoleon to lead the military forces. However, in
1799, Napoleon (a Knights Templar) broke his ties with Barras, because
he feared Barras was attempting to restore the Monarchy. Napoleon
eliminated the Directorate, and in 1804, with the support of Talleyrand
(who served as his foreign minister), became Emperor. Unwittingly, as a
puppet of the Illuminati, his reign brought about the total disruption
of Europe, which was needed for the Illuminati to get control and unify
it. He ended the Holy Roman Empire, and made his brother Joseph, the
King of Naples in 1806. Joseph was replaced by Napoleon's brother-in-law
Murat, when Joseph became the King of Spain in 1808. His brother Louis
was made the King of Holland, and another brother Jerome, the King of
Westphalia.
In 1810, Napoleon confiscated the contents of the Vatican archives,
which amounted to 3,000 cases of documents, and took it to Paris.
Although most were later returned to Rome, some were kept. By this time,
Napoleon had changed the face of Europe, but, he settled his warring
ways and ultimately the French Revolution had failed, because Europe had
not been fully conquered. The Illuminati immediately took steps to
dethrone him, which took five years. In order to get money to
Wellington's English forces, Nathan Rothschild funneled money to his
brother James (who handled financial transactions for the French
government), in Paris, who got it to Wellington's troops in Spain. In
addition, the Illuminati secretly worked to make agreements that shifted
national alliances against France.
Upon his defeat at Waterloo, Napoleon was again exiled, this time, to
the island of Saint Helena in the south Atlantic, which is where he died
in 1821. He had written in his will: "I die before my time, killed by
the English oligarchy and its hired assassins."
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