tections have been set up against fictitious prodigies, by which people were formerly greatly affrighted; and the boundless perfections of the supreme Being, especially his wisdom and his power, have been most solidly demonstrated, from the character and the structure both of the universe at large and of individual parts of it. § 27. The far better knowledge of history in general, and especially of the ancient christian church, which men of great diligence in one place and another acquired and imparted to others, removed much darkness from the minds of christians. For the origin and causes of a great number of opinions, which antiquity and custom had rendered sacred, being laid open; numerous errors, which had before occupied and enslaved men's minds, now lost their authority; and in this way, light and peace arose upon the minds of many, and their lives were rendered more blameless and more happy. This knowledge restored reputation to very many whom the malice or the ignorance of former ages had branded with the name of heretics; which served as a protection to many pious and good men against the malevolent and the ignorant. It showed, that various religious disputes, which formerly embroiled nations and involved states in bloodshed, rebellion, and crimes, arose from very trivial causes; from the ambiguity of terms, from ignorance, superstition, envy, and emulation, or from the love of pre-eminence. It traced back many rites and ceremonies, which were once regarded as of divine origin, to polluted sources; to the customs of barbarous nations, to a disposition to practise imposition, to the irrational fancies of half-educated men, and to a foolish desire of imitating others. It taught that the rulers of the church had, by base arts, possessed themselves of no small share of the civil power; and by binding kings with religious terrors, divested them of their wealth. It evinced that the ecclesiastical councils, whose decrees were once regarded as divine oracles, were often conventions of quite ignorant men, nay sometimes of arrant knaves. Several other things of the like nature might be mentioned. How salutary all this was to the cause of christianity, how much gentleness towards those of different sentiments, how much caution and prudence in deciding upon the opinions of others, how much relief to the innocent and the good against the ill-disposed grew out of it, and how many pernicious artifices, frauds, and errors, it has banished from human society, we may learn from our own daily experience of our happy condition. § 28. Those christians, who gave attention to Hebrew and Greek literature, and to the languages and antiquities of the eastern nations, (and very many prosecuted these studies with great success,) threw much light on numerous passages of the holy Scriptures, which were before, either dark and obscure, or misunderstood, and erroneously adduced in support of opinions rashly taken up, nay made to teach error and false doctrine. And the consequence was, that the patrons of many vulgar errors and groundless opinions, were deprived of the best part of their armour. Nor will the wise and the good maintain, that there was no advantage to religion from the labours of such as either kept Latin eloquence from becoming extinct, or in imitation of the French, laboured to polish and improve the vernacular languages of their respective nations. For it is of great importance to the welfare and progress of the christian community, that it should not lack men, who are able to write and to speak properly, fluently, and elegantly, on all religious subjects; so that they may bring the ignorant, and those opposed to religion, to listen with pleasure to what they ought to learn, and readily to comprehend what they ought to know. § 29. The moral doctrines inculcated by Christ and his apostles, received a better form, and more support against various abuses and perversions, after the law of nature or of right reason, had been more carefully investigated and more clearly explained. The incomparable Hugo Grotius, stood forth a guide to others in this department, by his work on the Rights of War and Peace (de Jure Belli et Pacis): and the excellence and importance of the subject, induced a number of the best geniuses to follow him with alacrity. How much aid the labours of these men afforded to all those who afterwards treated of the life and duties of a christian, will be manifest to any one, that shall take the trouble to compare the treatises on this See Adam Fred. Glafey's History of the Law of Nature, written in German, and subjoined to a Bibliotheca of the law of nature and nations; Lips. 1739, 4to. subject composed after their times, with those which were previously in estimation. It is certain, that the boundaries of christian and natural morality were more accurately determined; some christian duties, the nature of which was not well understood by the ancients, were more clearly defined; the great superiority of the divine laws, to the dictates of mere reason, was more lucidly shown; those general principles and solid grounds, by which all the christian's doubts and conflicts respecting right and wrong in action, may be easily settled, were established; and finally, the folly of those who audaciously maintained, that the precepts of christianity were at variance with the dictates of sound reason, that they subverted nature, were calculated to undermine the prosperity of nations, rendered men effeminate, diverted them from the proper business of life, and the like, was vigorously chastised and refuted. § 30. But it is proper to make some particular remarks on the state of philosophy among christians. At the commencement of this century, nearly all the philosophers were distributed into two sects: namely, that of the Peripatetics, and that of the Fire-Philosophers, or the Chemists. And these two sects, during many years, contended warmly for pre-eminence, in a great number of publications. The Peripatetics held nearly all the professorial chairs, both in the universities and the inferior schools; and they were furious against all that thought Aristotle should either be corrected or abandoned; as if all such had been traitors to their country, and public enemies of mankind. Most of this class, however, if we except the professors at Tubingen, Helmstadt, Altorf, and Leipsic, did not follow Aristotle himself, but rather his modern expositors. The Chemical or Fire Philosophers roamed over nearly every country of Europe; assumed the obscure and deceptive title of Rosicrucian Brethren (Rosæcruciani Fratres)', which had some apparent respectability, as it seemed to be derived from It is abundantly attested, that the title of Rosicrucians was given to the Chemists, who united the study of religion with the search after chemical secrets. The term itself is chemical; nor can its import be understood, without a knowledge of the style used by the chemists. It is compounded, not 9 as many think, of rosa and crux (a rose and the cross), but of ros (dew) and crux. Dew is the most powerful of all natural substances to dissolve gold. And a cross, in the language of the fire-philosophers, is the same as Lux (light); because the figure of a cross +exhibits all the three letters of the the arms of Luther, which were a cross upon a rose; and in numberless publications, some of them more and some of them word Lux at one view. Moreover, this sect applied the term Lux to the seed or menstruum of the Red Dragon, or to that crude and corporeal light, which being properly concocted and digested, produces gold. A Rosicrucian, therefore, is a philosopher, who, by means of dew, seeks for light, that is, for the substance of the philosopher's stone. The other interpretations of this name, are false and deceptive; and were invented and given out by the chemists themselves, who were exceedingly fond of concealment, for the sake of imposing on others that were hostile to their religious views. The true import of this title was perceived by the sagacity of Peter Gassendi, Examen Philosophic Fluddana, § 15, in his Opp. tom. iii. p. 261. But it was more lucidly explained, by the celebrated French physician, Eusebius Renaudot, Conférences Publiques, tom. iv. p. 87. Very much, though ill arranged, respecting these Rosicrucian brethren, who made so much noise in this century, their society, institutes, and writings, may be found in Godf. Arnold's Kirchen- und Ketzerhistorie, pt. ii. book xvii. ch. xviii. p. 1114, &c. [According to most of the writers on the subject, the name Rosicrucians was not assumed by all the Fire-Philosophers; nor was it first applied to men of that description; but it was the appropriate name of an imaginary association, first announced about the year 1610, into which a multitude of Fire-Philosophers, or alchymists, eagerly sought admission. The earliest writing professedly from them, was either published or republished at Frankfort, A. D. 1615, in German; and afterwards in Danish, Dutch,_and Latin; and bore the title of "Fama Fraternitatis, or Discovery of the Brotherhood of the praise-worthy order of the Rosy-cross; together with the Confession of the same Fraternity; addressed to all the learned heads in Europe: also some answers, by Mr. Haselmeyer and other learned persons, to the Fama; together with a Discourse concerning a general refor mation of the whole world." The next year, 1616, David Mederus wrote, "that the Fama Fraternitatis and the Confession had then been, for six years, printed and dispersed in five languages." In the Fama, p. 15, &c. the founder and head of the fraternity is said to have been one Christopher RosenCreutz, a German, born in the year 1388; who became a pilgrim, visited the holy sepulchre, and Damascus, where he was instructed by the wise men, and afterwards learned magic and the Cabala, at Fez, and in Egypt; on his return to Germany, he undertook to improve human knowledge, and received several into his fraternity, in order to commence the business; and lived to the age of 100 years, a sage far in advance of the men of his age. This fraternity, it was said, continued down to the time of these publications. A vast excitement was produced by this publication in 1615. Some declared in favour of the fabled Rosicrucian society, as a body of orthodox and learned reformers of the world; and others charged them with errors and mischievous designs. But in the year 1619, Dr. Jo. Valentine Andreæ, a famous Lutheran divine, published his "Tower of Babel, or chaos of opinions respecting the Fraternity of the Rosy-cross;" in which he represents the whole history as a farce; and gave intimations that he was himself concerned in getting it up. But many enthusiastic persons, especially among the Fire Philosophers, continued to believe the fable; and professed to know many of the secrets of the society. Much continued to be written about them, for a long time; and indeed the whole subject is involved in great obscurity. See Godf. Arnold, loc. cit. vol. ii. p. 244–258. ed. Schaffhausen, 1741. H. P. K. Henke's Gesch. der christl. Kirche, vol. iii. p. 509-511; and the authors there cited. For the origin and character of the Theosophists or Fire Philosophers, see above, on the preceding century, vol. iii. p. 335, &c. Tr.] less able and severe, charged the Peripatetics with corrupting and perverting both reason and religion. The leaders of the band were Robert Fludd, an Englishman, of a singular genius; Jacob Boehmen, a shoemaker of Gorlitz; and Michael Mayer'. These were afterwards succeeded by Jo. Bapt. Helmont, and his son, Francis Mercurius'; Christian Knorr, of Rosenroth2; Quirin Kuhlman; Henry Noll; Julius Sperber3; and numerous others, but of unequal rank and fame. Harmony of opinion, among this sort of people, no one would expect. For, as a great part of their system of doctrine depends on a kind of internal sense, on the imagination, and on the testimony of the eyes and the ears, than which nothing can be more fluctuating and fallacious, this sect, of course, had almost as many disagreeing teachers, as it had writers of much note. There 8 For an account of this singular man, to whom our Boehmen owed all his wisdom, see Anth. Wood's Athena Oxoniens. vol. i. p. 610. and Historia et Antiq. Acad. Oxoniensis, lib. ii. p. 390, &c. Concerning Helmont the father, see Henn. Witte, Memoria Philosophorum; and others. Respecting Helmont the son, see Joach. Fred. Feller, Miscellanea Leibnitianea, p. 226. and Leibnitz's Epistles, vol. iii. p. 353, 355. Concerning Boehmen, see Godfr. Arnold, and various others. Respecting the rest, various writers must be consulted. 9 See Jo. Möller's Cimbria Literata, tom. i. p. 376, &c. [He was a learned physician and chemist, wrote much, and ranked high as a physician and a good man. He died at Magdeburg, A.D. 1622, aged 54. Tr.] 1 [Concerning him, see Brucker's Hist. Critica Philosophia, tom. iv. pt. i. p. 709, &c. Schl.] 2 [As Brucker, who gives account of the preceding Fire Philosophers, is in every body's hands; while the history of Knorr of Rosenroth, must be derived from the more rare Nova Litteraria of Krause, Lips. 1718, p. 191. we shall here offer the reader a brief notice of him. Christian Knorr of Rosenroth was a Silesian nobleman; who, together with no ordinary knowledge of medicine, philology, and theology, possessed a particular acquaint ance with chemistry and the Kabbala ; and was privy counsellor and chancellor to Christian Augustus, the palsgrave of Sulzbach. He was born in 1636, and died in 1689. His most important work was his Kabbala denudata, in 2 vols. 4to. printed, vol. i. Sulzb. 1678. and vol. ii. Francf. on Mayn, 1684. He also aided the publication of many Rabbinical works: and particularly of the book Sohar, at the Hebrew press in Sulzbach, 1684. fol. Schl.] 3 [See, concerning him, Brucker, loc. cit. p. 706. Arnold's Kirchen- und Ketzerhist. pt. iii. ch. 19. p. 197, &c. and Bayle's Dictionnaire, art. Kuhlmann. Schl.] 4 [He belonged to the gymnasium of Steinfort in Westphalia, was afterwards professor of philosophy at Giessen, and at last, preacher at Darmstadt. He applied himself also to chemistry and medicine, and was a follower of Paracelsus. He wrote, among other things, Systema Hermetica Medicina, and Physica Hermetica; in which there are very many paradoxical propositions. Schl.] 5 [This man also belonged among the Rosicrucians. He was a counsellor at Anhalt-Dessau; and composed many Theosophic tracts, which were published at Amsterdam, in 1660 and 1662. 8vo. He died A. d. 1616. Schl.] |