Spartacus had been eyeing him for some time, and at last communicated this honour to him through the intermedium of Mauvillon, another Frenchman, Lieutenant-Colonel in the service of the Duke of Brunswick. This person had been most active during the formal existence of the Order, and had contributed much to its reception in the Protestant states—he remained long concealed. Indeed his Illumination was not known till the invasion of Holland by the French. Mauvillon then stepped forth, avowed his principles, and recommended the example of the French to the Germans. This encouragement brought even Philo again on the stage, notwithstanding his resentment against Spartacus, and his solemn declaration of having abjured all such societies.—These, and a thousand such facts, show that the seeds of licentious Cosmopolitism had taken deep root, and that cutting down the crop had by no means destroyed the baneful plant.—But this is not all—a new method of cultivation had been invented, and immediately adopted, and it was now growing over all Europe in another form.
I have already taken notice of the general perversion of the public mind which co-operated with the schisms of Free Masonry in procuring a listening ear to Spartacus and his associates. It will not be doubted but that the machinations of the Illuminati increased this, even among those who did not enter into the Order. It was easier to diminish the respect for civil establishments in Germany than in almost any other country. The frivolity of the ranks and court-offices in the different confederated petty states made it impossible to combine dignity with the habits of a scanty income.—It was still easier to expose to ridicule and reproach those numberless abuses which the folly and the vices of men had introduced into religion. The influence on the public mind which naturally attaches to the venerable office of a moral instructor, was prodigiously diminished by the continual disputes of the Catholics and Protestants, which were carried on with great heat in every little