The deputies accordingly arrived at Paris, and immediately obtained admission into these two Fraternities4. They found both of them in the ripest state for Illumination, having shaken off all the cabalistical, chemical, and mystical whims that had formerly disturbed them, and would now take up too much of their time. They were now cultivating with great zeal the philosophico political doctrines of universal citizenship. Their leaders, to the number of twenty, are mentioned by name in the Berlin Monatschrift for 1785, and among them are several of the first actors in the French Revolution. But this is nothing distinctive, because persons of all opinions were Masons.
The Amis Reunis were little behind the Illuminati in every thing that was irreligious and anarchical, and had no inclination for any of the formalities of ritual, &c. They were already fit for the higher mysteries, and only wanted to learn the methods of business which had succeeded so well in spreading their doctrines and maxims over Germany. Besides, their doctrines had not been digested into a system, nor had the artful methods of leading on the pupils from bad to worse been practised. For hitherto, each individual had vented in the Lodges his own opinions, to unburden his own mind, and the Brethren listened for instruction and mutual encouragement. Therefore, when Spartacus's plan was communicated to them, they saw at once its importance, in all its branches, such as the use of the Mason Lodges, to fish for Minervals—the rituals and ranks to entice the young, and to lead them by degrees to opinions and measures which, at first sight, would have shocked them. The firm hold which is gotten of the pupils, and indeed of all the inferior classes, by their reports in the course of their pretended training in the knowledge of themselves and of other men—and, above all, the provincial arrangement of the order, and the clever subordination and entire dependence on a select band or Pandæmonium at Paris, which