[335] Out of a great body of claimants, computed by one writer to have been forty, and by another two hundred in number, there are four who may rank as competitors at least one with another for recognition as the escaped Dauphin: they are the Baron de Richemont, Augustus Mèves, Eleazar Williams and Naündorff.
[336] The work of De Luchet is quite worthless from the evidential standpoint, but the so-called correspondence is cited in a Note on pp. 182-186 of the essay. It appears that the House Magical had been sold to King Frederick William, but the person who assisted at the evocations is called un grand Seigneur, which may or may not veil the royal identity. Moreover, Steinert was the adept who compounded the “magical elixir,” and was pensioned on this account; but it is not stated that he was the magus of the ceremonial proceedings. I have been unable to check the recital of Eckartshausen, which is very difficult to meet with in England.
[337] In the Secret Tradition in Freemasonry I have indicated that Schroepfer is, on the whole, rather likely to have possessed some psychic powers, which notwithstanding his story ran the usual course of imposture. As he practised evocation perpetually, his suicide can be accounted for owing to the conditions which supervened on this account. There seems no real reason to suppose that he killed himself because he doubted his powers; however, the question does not signify.
[338] It is just to say that another side of Lavater is shewn in his Secret Journal of a Self-Observer, which is a very curious memorial—or human document, as it would be termed in our modern language of inexactitude. It contains no suggestion of evocations and dealings with Jewish Kabalists, in or out of the flesh.
[339] Cahagnet is the author of the following works: Arcanes de la Vie Future, 3 vols., 1848-1854; Lumière des Morts, 1851; Magie Magnétique, 2nd Edition, 1858; Sanctuaire du Spiritualisme, 1850; Révélations d’outre Tombe, 1856.
[340] This account is taken from Note XV. appended to the Essai sur la Secte des Illuminés, but the Marquis de Luchet depended on another writer, the latter drawing from Lavater’s Spiritus Familiaris Gablidone, published at Frankfort and Leipsic in 1787.
[341] It is suggested by Clavel that when Charles VI suppressed Masonry in Austria, owing to a Bull of Pope Clement XII, the brethren of certain lodges instituted the Order of Mopses to fill the gap. See Histoire Pittoresque de la Francmaçonnerie, 3rd edition, 1844, p. 154. Ragon reproduces the opinion in his Manuel de l’Initié, 1861, p. 88.
[342] Liber Mirabilis: qui Prophetias: Revelationesque: nec non res mirandas: preteritas: presentes: et futuras aperte demonstrat, 1522. The work is in two parts, of which the first is in Latin and the second in French.
[343] I have used the seventeenth century English translation. The original says: En l’Eglise au plus pire, traiter les prêtres comme l’eau fait l’éponge. I do not quite see how Lévi’s explanation follows, but the point is not worth discussing.
[344] Les Dernières Prophéties de Mlle. Lenormand appeared in 1843 and are joyful reading. She was born at Alençon in 1772 and died on June 25, 1843.