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nydus/Secret Societies and Subversive MovementsPublic
Page 251 of 900
Table of Contents

PREFACE

of ideas full of enlightenment and feeling."

Might not this be the process which Ramsay aimed at introducing into Freemasonry--the process which in fact does form part of the masonic system in England to-day, where the Atheist must become, at least by profession, a Deist before he can be admitted to the Craft Degrees, whilst the Rose-Croix degree is reserved solely for those who profess the Christian faith? Such was undoubtedly the idea of the men who introduced the Rose-Croix degree into France; and Ragon, who gives an account of this "Ancien Rose-Croix Francais"--which is almost identical with the degree now worked in England, but long since abandoned in France--objects to it on the very score of its Christian character.

In this respect the Rose-Croix amongst all the upper

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