lights, magic mirrors, and possibly of electricity, Schroepfer contrived to produce apparitions which his disciples--under the influence of strong punch--took to be visitors from the other world. In the end Schroepfer, driven crazy by his own incantations, blew out his brains in a garden near Leipzig.
According to Lecouteulx de Canteleu, it was Schroepfer who indoctrinated the famous "Comte de Saint-Germain"--"The Master" of our modern co-masonic lodges. The identity of this mysterious personage has never been established; by some contemporaries he was said to be a natural son of the King of Portugal, by others the son of a Jew and a Polish Princess. The Duc de Choiseul on being asked whether he knew the origin of Saint-Germain replied: "No doubt we know it, he is the son of a Portuguese Jew who exploits the credulity of the town and Court." In 1780 a rumour went round that his father was a Jew of Bordeaux, but according to the Souvenirs of the Marquise de Créquy the Baron de Breteuil discovered from the archives of his Ministry that the pretended Comte de Saint-Germain was the son of a Jewish doctor of Strasburg, that his real name was Daniel Wolf, and that he was born in 1704. The general opinion thus appears to have been in favour of his Jewish ancestry.
Saint-German seems first to have been heard of in Germany about 1740, where his marvellous powers attracted the attention of the Maréchal de Belle-Isle, who, always the ready dupe of charlatans, brought him back with him to