rank and fortune, to castles and to cottages, to marquesses and bourgeois" alike.
A further development of the Amis Réunis was the Rite of the Philalèthes, compounded by Savalette de Langes in 1773 out of Swedenborgian, Martiniste, and Rosicrucian mysteries, into which the higher initiates of the Amis Réunis--Court de Gebelin, the Prince de Hesse, Condorcet, the Vicomte de Tavannes, Willermoz, and others--were initiated. A modified form of this rite was instituted at Narbonne in 1780 under the name of "Free and Accepted Masons du Rit Primitif," the English nomenclature being adopted (according to Clavel) in order to make it appear that the rite emanated from England. In reality its founder, the Marquis de Chefdebien d'Armisson, a member of the Grand Orient and of the Amis Réunis, drew his inspiration from certain German Freemasons with whom he maintained throughout close relations and who were presumably members of the Stricte Observance, since Chefdebien was a member of this Order, in which he bore the title of "Eques a Capite Galeato." The correspondence that passed between Chefdebien and Salvalette de Langes, recently discovered and published in France, is one of the most illuminating records of the masonic ramifications in existence before the Revolution ever brought to light. To judge by the tone of these letters, the leaders of the Rit Primitif would appear to have been law-abiding and loyal gentlemen devoted to the Catholic religion, yet in their passion for new forms of Masonry and thirst for occult lore ready to associate themselves with every kind of adventurer and