[407] Writing of the condition of the order at the hour of its apogee, in 1784, Forestier says: “La situation de l’Ordre à cette époque paraît donc des plus prospères. Solidement établi en Bavière, il s’étend sur toute l’Europe Centrale, du Rhin à la Vistule et des Alpes à la mer du Nord et à la Baltique. Il compte au nombre de ses membres des jeunes gens qui appliqueront plus tard les principes qu’il leur a inculqués, des fonctionnaires de tout ordre qui mettent leur influence à son service, des membres du clergé auxquels il enseigne la tolérance, des princes dont il peut invoquer la protection et qu’il espère diriger. Il semble que le Grand Architecte de l’Univers ait spécialement veillé sur lui….” (Op. cit., p. 401.)
[408] The term was no longer in official use, but the men remained. In other words, Weishaupt’s Areopagites were Knigge’s Provincials.
[409] Forestier, op. cit., pp. 411–413.
[410] Engel asserts that the chief apple of discord was the grade of Priest. Weishaupt believed that Knigge had injected into the ritual of the order at that point expressions of radical religious sentiment which, if once discovered to the public, would be found extremely injurious to the order. Cf. ibid., pp. 133 et seq. Cf. Forestier op. cit., p. 415. But this was only one of many bones of contention. At bottom the two men were inordinately jealous, both as to their positions in the order and the systems which they had worked out.
[411] Knigge withdrew from the order April 20, 1784. In July of the same year he put his name to an agreement, pledging himself to restore such papers of the order as he possessed and to maintain silence concerning what he knew of the order’s affairs. Cf. Forestier, p. 428. Freed from his responsibilities to the order, Knigge resumed his work as a writer, by which he managed to maintain himself very indifferently in funds. He was finally accorded a government post, as inspector of schools, at Bremen, where he died. Cf. ibid., pp. 549–551.
[412] Carl Theodore, successor to Maximilian Joseph, as Elector Palatinate had been ruler of the provinces of the Rhine since 1742. When he became duke of Upper and Lower Bavaria in 1777, he had established a reputation as a liberal-minded sovereign. The first two years of his rule in Bavaria gave promise of a tolerant reign; but reactionaries, in the persons of his confessor, the ex-Jesuit Frank, a certain Baron Lippert, who was devoted to the cause of ultramontanism, and the duchess dowager of Bavaria and sister of the duke, Maria Anna, worked upon his spirit and easily persuaded the well-meaning but weak-willed monarch to reverse his former policy and come to the defence of the cause of clericalism. See the comments of Professor August Kluckhohn, quoted by Engel, p. 4.
[413] Cf. Engel, op. cit., p. 161, where the edict in full may be found. Cf. Forestier, p. 453. The Bavarian monarch’s bold and, at first blush, precipitate action is explained by the following facts: Flushed with a sense of their growing influence and power, the Bavarian Illuminati for some time past had been guilty of extremely imprudent utterances which had excited the public mind. To certain of their critics, notably the priest Frank and the canon Dantzer, director of the schools of Bavaria, they had not deigned to make a specific reply. (Dantzer, not wholly unfairly, charged the members of the order with interference in the affairs of the public school system of the country). A lofty tone of assumed indifference characterized the leaders; but a spirit of boasting which led the members to profess the exercise of a controlling influence in civil affairs, together with less guarded expressions respecting the extreme religious and political ideals of the order, served to arouse public suspicion. To this extent the Bavarian Illuminati had themselves to blame for the ruin of the order. Cf. Forestier, pp. 430–438. On the part of the government, the situation in its main outlines developed somewhat as follows: Early in October, 1783, the duchess dowager, Maria Anna, was made the recipient of a document that contained detailed accusations against the Illuminati of Bavaria, charging them with holding such vicious moral and religious sentiments as that life should be controlled by passion rather than reason, that suicide is justifiable, that one may poison one’s enemies, and that religion should be regarded as nonsense and patriotism as puerility. Finally, and much more seriously from the particular point of view of the duchess, the Bavarian Illuminati were accused of being in the service of the government of Austria, whose efforts at the time to extend its hegemony over Bavaria had created considerable tension in the latter country. For a copy in full of the famous letter, cf. Engel, pp. 183–187. Cf. Forestier, pp. 440 et seq. The author, or at least the inspirer of the document seems to have been one Joseph Utzschneider (Engel disallows this; see op. cit., pp. 187 et seq.) who, discontented on account of his slow advancement and enraged by exactions imposed upon him to prove his loyalty, had withdrawn from the Order of the Illuminati, in August, 1783. Later, Utzschneider persuaded several other members, among them Grünberger and Cosandey, fellow professors with him in the Academy of Santa Maria, to follow him in the course he had taken. Obtaining from his associates the ritual of the higher grades of the order, he prepared and despatched his presentment to the duchess. Cf. Forestier, pp. 444 et seq. The latter, greatly alarmed by the document, carried the accusations, particularly the charge of intrigues in the interests of Austria, to the duke, who thus far had manifested an attitude of indifference to the suspicions that had been engendered concerning the order. His fear being awakened by the considerations of danger to his person and throne that were urged, the duke resolved to bring matters to an immediate crisis. Cf. ibid., p. 452.
[414] Engel, op. cit., p. 161. The leaders of the order in Bavaria exerted themselves to disarm the suspicions of the government with reference to any lack of loyal submission to the interdict. Circular letters containing copies of the edict and commanding the lodges to suspend their labors were addressed to the brethren. A lack of sincerity showed itself, however, in the efforts of the leaders to convey the impression to their subordinates that the sudden tempest would soon pass and that care therefore must be observed to preserve the cohesion of the order. In one important particular this effort to allay suspicion over-reached itself. In July, 1784, certain members of the order inserted an article in a Bavarian journal, the Realzeitung of Erlangen, of the nature of a counter-attack upon the Jesuits, and claiming that the latter, in defiance of the government, were continuing their secret associations. To this a recriminating answer was promptly made, and a war of newspaper articles and pamphlets was soon on. All of this tended, of course, to lend color to the suspicion that the operations of the order continued unabated. Cf. Forestier, pp. 454 et seq. Cf. Engel, pp. 240 et seq. The duchess, Maria Anna, moreover, continued her efforts to strengthen the purpose of the duke. Cf. Forestier, p. 467.
[415] The precise occasion, if any existed, for the launching of the second edict remains wholly in doubt. In a final effort to clear the order from the suspicions and calumniations raised against it, an appeal was made to Carl Theodore, in February, 1785, to permit representatives of the order to appear before him and furnish proofs of its innocence. This last desperate device failed. Cf. Engel, pp. 283–290, for a copy of this letter. Cf. Forestier, pp. 465 et seq.
[416] Engel, as in the former instance, copies the second edict in full. Cf. op. cit., pp. 161–164. Cf. Forestier, pp. 468, 469. The terms of the second interdict provided that, in view of the alleged degenerate character of the Order of the Illuminati, as well as of the disorders it had occasioned, all its financial resources should be confiscated, half to be given to the poor and half to the informer against the order, “wenn er gleich selbst ein Mitglied wäre … und solcher keineswegs geoffenbart, sondern in Geheim gehalten werden solle.” (Engel, p. 164.)