Albert Pike to Mazzini, August 15, 1871: Three World Wars?

The Devil in the 19th-century, by Dr. Bataille, Volume 2, Chapter XXXV, pages 594-606.

[p. 594]

“The Plan of the Secret Chiefs”

At the beginning of August 1871 the “learned Luciferian Pontiff” Albert Pike received an important letter from Mazzini, political action leader for Universal Freemasonry, who invited Pike, the supreme dogmatic leader of the sect, to draw up a clear plan with a view toward the destruction of Roman Catholicism.

“The unity of Italy, he said, was never considered a goal, rather a means.” (note, this refers to when Napoleon ended the sovereignty of the Papal states, subordinating it to 'Unified Italy.' This wrong would not be undone until the arrival of Mussolini almost a century later.)

In the solemn hours, Albert Pike assembles his ten advisers, members of the Most Serene Grand College of Emerited Masons, and submitted for their consideration the question raised by the very illustrious brother Giuseppe Mazzini. (i.e., the destruction of Roman Catholicism)

This meeting of the eleven highest lumières of the infernal sect, this evil cabal which lasted seven days (from August 9th to 15th), after careful [p. 595] deliberation, inspired no doubt by Satan himself, left the following document (translated from the original Latin text):

“The Serene Grand College of Emerited Masons, convened under the chairmanship of the Most Illustrious, Most Powerful and Most Divinely Enlightened Brother LIMMUD-ENSOPH, Custodial Grand Master of the Sacred Palladium, Sovereign Pontiff of Universal Freemasonry, received with respect the Noble and Dignified Arch from the most illustrious, Most Powerful and Most Enlightened Brother EMOUNAH-SHEMED, Head of Political Action, Great Dictator and President of the Supreme Executive Directorate, dated the first day of the Moon Ab, eighteenth day of the fifth month of the year of the True Light 000871, and under the eye of the Almighty Divine Master EXCELSUS EXCELSIOR, all things considered, exposed and discussed issues of supreme interest, and after deliberation, has determined the legitimate requirements that today will become law.

“Rihab Sabba, Ahta Ahtnanoc Malog Hcsorem, Lucifer. Alleluia!”

“The destruction of feeble Catholicism, cannot be accomplished all at once, and erecting good Catholicism also requires a lot of labour, working in tandem, which should be pursued simultaneously, so that, when the temple of Adonai, undermined on all sides, is ready to collapse in total ruin, the same impulse that annihilates will discover the temple, hitherto hidden from our Divine Master, properly prepared in the eyes of mankind.

“God-King Lucifer will have the whole world consecrated and worshipping him;...

“The title of Catholic does not, in fact, belong to Roman superstition. Through revelation, it is certain that its number will never reach, at its apogee, a quarter of the world’s population; it is written in The Book of the Heavens. On the other hand, the religion of Adonai achieved that domination, and it is obvious that she is declining.

“It is necessary that we consider the religious situation of humanity, if we want to safely proceed with the work of twice-over destroying the temple of Adonai and building the temple of Lucifer. This preliminary look will give us courage and hope in the realization of our divine plight; for we show that the future is ours, and the title Catholics is reserved for ourselves. [p. 596]

“One billion, four hundred million inhabitants, this is the population of the globe. Of these, Roman Catholicism has only two hundred and ten million followers.

“However, we must classify religious followers by groups.

“The Christian group is to be subdivided as follows: Roman Catholics, two hundred and ten million; Protestants, one hundred and twenty million; Orthodox, whom the pope of superstition called schismatics, eighty million.

“The Indian group is subdivided as follows: Buddhists, four hundred and twenty million; Brahmanists, one hundred and sixty million.

“We must put aside for the Mohammedans, two hundred million.

“Observe that the truth is known to the priests of Vedism (Indian Group), and the Mohammedans, without knowing the truth, have had a large number of their priests inspired by it.

“Two hundred and thirty-three million idolaters, fetishists or worshipers of various idols, will disappear along with civilization, not individually but as religionists. The Roman Catholic missionaries want to win them over; yet it will be Roman Catholicism itself that disappears even before it attempts the conquest in a meaningful way.

“The Jewish religion has seven million adherents; this small group has no tendency toward conversion to Roman Catholicism; revelation has promised it to us.

“Finally, statisticians estimate that twenty-eight million deistic freethinkers are scattered throughout the globe, while atheists have two million. All others are mostly defectors from other Christian groups.

“But it is not appropriate to consider the whole Christian group as being alienated from true light to the same degree. Protestantism, its various factions, except a tiny minority, are composed of followers of reason, who understand and continuously seek truth, and, therefore, find it; is from them that we find the most numerous followers of the God-Good. On the other hand, the Orthodox schismatics fell prey to the promised Evil-God, as written in the Book of the Heavens. But when Orthodoxy is reunited with Roman Catholicism, they number less than three hundred million adherents.

“The conversion of Protestants to the Temple of True Light (i.e., Lucifer) will be gradual, sayeth the revelation; the fate of the Mohammedans will be entirely determined by a large and unexpected event occurring under the sixth sovereign pontificate of good Catholicism. It will follow from this that – far from being doomed to the cursed darkness of superstition – three hundred twenty million souls will be enlightened.

“According to the revelation, Roman Catholicism will always be in decline; [p. 597] either desertions or conquest of souls will increase the number of free-thinking deists, and we know that they are in a state of transition while we are finally promised.

“On the other hand, we needn’t worry about transitioning the state of the Indian group, for its priests already possess true light.

“Therefore, at the appointed hour in the Book of the Heavens, that is to say, when Roman Catholicism reaches its maximum number of followers through by uniting with Orthodoxy or schismatics, more than one billion Luciferian Catholics will be found in opposition.

“Consequently, the issue boils down to this: we must be ready when we find ourselves a billion or more, finally with our banners flying high, producing an explosion that will topple the Temple of Adonai; so, in other words, superstition should be weakened and ruined, so much so that its followers will themselves merge into our ranks, – we are promised that dazzling miracles will open their eyes – and that, if at that time some obstinate priests are left still insisting upon preaching the [word of the] Evil-God, their extermination can be accomplished without difficulty.

“How, then, should this unavoidable end-date, be directed and arrived at gradually and peacefully?

“To speak here of the Christian group, tactics will vary as we maneuver in countries dominated by the Roman Catholic element or in countries dominated by the Protestant element.

“The main work is one that aims to transform the Roman Catholics into freethinking Deists. We need to apply all our strength, and with that, persuade many. Experience has shown that too-few are the privileged souls who leap from the abyss of obscurantism to take their bold flight into the ether of divine and invigorating light.

“For this he must conquer the seats of government of his people; this is everything. Whether in the republics or the monarchist states, we must enact laws, destroying everywhere the influence of the priests of the superstition and their auxiliaries, the monks who mingle with the people and the nuns who maintain the soul in error, by the cloak of false charity. It will, first, be through the press that we inspire writers, demonstrating how the almsgiving of the Evil-Catholics is degrading to human dignity, and this by showing that the individual has the right to well-being through social reforms and not by routine charity; and, secondly, that for parliaments or legislatures to disperse unpopular congregations, to skillfully destroy those prejudices [p. 598] requires still, in a word, first the removal of every monk or nun.

“In the intellectual sphere, especially, the neutrality of the public schools must be secured so that it is no longer pervaded by priests, nor any of their agents; then, early in the stages of neutralization, we divert any thoughts the parents may have to give their children a Roman Catholic education outside of the neutralized schools. Indeed, keeping new generations from having their intelligence obliterated by the lies of evil dogma is crucial. But at the same time we must take serious steps to ensure that formal education is neutral and does not fall into atheism; neutrality is sufficient, that is to say the suppression of any tendency to insinuate young minds into the false dogma of adonaites. In fact, their exists in the human soul an innate sense that pushes the individual toward a divine ideal, which makes him instinctively understand the existence of a Supreme Being, the supernatural factor, the organizer and driving force of the universe. We’ll let this sentiment develop freely, that is to say, without criminally directing them against superstition, the religion of the Evil-God, but imported from abroad in the half-light of a vague deism, but uncontaminated by the pestiferous breath of Roman Catholicism; and when the hour of the Good-God (Lucifer) manifests, truly worthy of humanity’s worship, the children turned men will address their aspirations to Him; and so, by removing the childhood and adolescence of Adonai, we devote ourselves to Lucifer, simply by natural inclination alone, and the maturity of new generations. It is therefore absolutely necessary that the atheist teacher clearly be removed from school, lest he try to introduce [his own dogma] after we have already driven out the adonaite priest, and the instruction books, placed in the hands of children after being purged of the lying dogmas of Roman Catholicism, posit, but without precise definition, the existence of a Supreme Being.

“While the new generations haven’t yet been moulded, adonaism must be fought intellectually by all sorts of publications demonstrating how monstrous and ridiculous the idea of the divinity of the priests of superstition is. In this struggle, we must not overlook the pamphlet, satire, and mockery, which affect the masses easier than learned dissertations. We must never forget the good that Voltaire did for our cause, by covering the ridiculousness of Roman Catholicism. But it is not for fun and laughs that we’ve adopted this perfect tactic: in discrediting false doctrines and the cult of the adonaites, we discredit the ministers of this detestable religion; we arrive gradually to the desertion of its churches. [p. 599]

“In effect, we should not rely solely on the outcome of enacted laws; for if we managed to totally deprive the Roman Catholic clergy of state-granted subsidies, they would obtain financial compensation extracted directly from the fanatics wallowing in an incurable credulity. However, by discrediting all the Roman Catholic institutions, it does decrease the number of these unfortunate exploits; it is necessary for individuals with any sense to realize that, recourse to superstition sacraments is ridiculous; in this way, for fear of mockery, they may break the habit of consorting with impostor priests. It is therefore good to give latitude to charlatans of the worst sort, the dregs of false prophets, whose business is an obvious scam; inspired by us, the press will make comparisons between them and the priests of Adonai, confounding the two with reprobation and ridicule.

“On the other hand, through legislative means or otherwise, recruitment of the Roman Catholic priesthood must be restrained. It would be beneficial to give young priests actual knowledge of social life, falsely portrayed by their teachers. It will be necessary to have confident woman who devote themselves to the benefits and initiations of the Good-God (Lucifer). The results obtained in this way will be fruitful; for one of two things will happen: either the adonaite priest, once he has tasted the sweet joys papal barbarism forbade, will resign from the clergy, thus demonstrating to the public that nature condemns, absolutely, systematic celibacy; or he will remain in the priestly caste, secretly with us, not as an ally but entirely ours, rendering the most valuable service toward undermining the Temple of Adonai.

“In any case and in all circumstances, we must create a vacuum around the Roman Catholic priest, and it is also necessary that the clergy, after becoming more and more despised, hated, and scorned, be diminished in number, and to stop at nothing to obtain this result. First, we increase societies, circles, non-religious festivals, etc., for the pleasure of urban and rural townspeople; and secondly, we advocate boldly and everywhere, like a doctrine, the anti-Roman Catholic motto: ‘No priest at birth! no priest at marriage! no priest at death!’ while favouring the creation of any association established in solidarity with this program.

“Finally, we should point out, scandalously, ready-made facts authored by a priest of Adonai, which might be liable to discredit the priesthood; that is, a fact not detrimental by itself, but in as much as it [p. 600] contradicts the cruel law of chastity so pretentiously asserted by Papism, who claim their clergy are above nature, and in this case, it will be advisable not to make a noise about it unless the offender is considered incapable of becoming our secret agent.

“And that will be the way forward throughout all countries of the Christian group.

“In particular, we must pause a moment and concentrate on Italy. Here, the Freemasons, while following to the letter the policies we have outlined, will have a duty to work tirelessly with the greatest zeal, to repeal the law that passed three months ago on which the Chief of Political Action has called our attention. We begin by attacking at the outset the system of two sovereignties in one country, in one capital; we will highlight the difficulties resulting from a dual diplomatic corps, half of which is the Italian crown in a state of permanent conspiracy against their own homeland. This campaign of Italian masonry should be supported by masons of other countries through an ambassador to the superstitious Roman Pontiff; to file motions for the removal of their embassies; and on this point, we would emphasize the fact that the existence of said papal embassies depends only on the magnanimity of the Italians who were willing to recognize a cult leader, now without a land, and the nature and prerogatives of the sovereign. Then we attack the imprudently granted sanctity of the ecclesiastical congregations forming the high spiritual administration of the Supreme Headquarters of the Roman superstition. It will provoke conflicts between the political authorities and any leaders under papal authority. We will spare no opportunity to arouse the populace against this person, even of the occupant of that cursed seat, so that, if he dared leave the Vatican, there would be unrest. It should become the habitual public opinion of Italy to regard as a dangerous embarrassment the presence of the Pope in their country.

“When public opinion is ripe to accept the Pope’s expulsion passed by a parliament comprised of a Masonic majority, we should propose a bill akin to something like following:

“Art. 1 – Italy recognizes no state religion.

“Art. 2 – To continue to have the right to exercise its cult, the Christian Church, formerly known as Catholic, shall be in Italy exclusively Italian. [p. 601]

“Art. 3 – Its bishops are authorized to meet in the national council and appoint someone as the Patriarch for the Peninsula, Sardinia and Sicily.

“Art. 4 – The present pope is eligible for this dignity, provided he relinquishes all superior authority other than the Church in Italy.

“Art. 5 – The Christian Patriarch of Italy has no sovereign status, and no foreign ambassador can be accredited to him.

“Art. 6 – The Sacred College of Cardinals will cease to exist, and the Congregations called the Holy Office, the Council, of Propaganda, of Rites, of the Index, of Indulgences, and, in a word, all ecclesiastically superior Church committees with a view toward universal administration, either spiritual or financial.

“Art. 7 – The titles of Cardinal and Archbishop are abolished; vis-à-vis the civil power, all the Bishops are on an equal footing, with the exception of the Patriarch, who is the first Italian bishop and who, in official state ceremonies, takes his place among the Presidents of Supreme Courts and the President of the Court of Auditors.

“Art. 8 – Each bishop administers his diocese under state control; [p. 602] the Bishops must refer to the Patriarch in issues purely of a spiritual or liturgical nature.

“Art. 9 – Any act of the Patriarch, committed in violation of the present law, will result in immediate dismissal and banishment.

“Art. 10 – Every bishop who is found complicit in violating the law with the Patriarch, shall incur a penalty of imprisonment in a fortress, five to ten years, and is also humiliated in the presence of people assembled on the public square or the courts of the cathedral of his diocese.

“Art. 11 – The Central Commission of Cults, composed of the secular members of the diocese, and whose members are appointed by the Parliament, centralize all reports of the civilian authorities on administrative actions or other documents related to the dioceses and form a permanent Superior Council to settle all disputes between the bishops and their ecclesiastical subordinates, except for spiritual or liturgical matters which are subject to the exclusive supreme jurisdiction of the Patriarch.

“Art. 12 – Through secret ballot, Priests will be elected by the faithful who remain irremovably attached to their parish; current priests, declared eligible by this Act, though not imposed on the faithful, will submit within six months from this date a confirmation of their position and title, voted on freely by their parishioners.

“Art. 13 – The Bishops are appointed by the Patriarch upon presentation of the government’s chosen three candidates; nevertheless, the present bishops who accept this religious regulation, will remain in office; those bishops not accepted will remain simple priests, and will be provided with a rural parish in the vicariate by his successor as head of the diocese, but his own vicarage will forever remain out of reach.

“At the same time the bill is tabled at the Chamber of Deputies of Italy, a copy, which would have previously been sent to all infected countries of Roman Catholicism, and to newspapers written by us, will soon be published everywhere, and accompanied by high praise. A concert of articles will celebrate the wisdom of Italian liberals, crediting them for having found a good solution to the religious question. We’ll attempt to illuminate the absurdity of the situation up until now: how wrong it is for Italy to have one of its citizens conspiring against the homeland, while at the same time the holdout is the head of a religion claiming to be universal and professing to place himself above the country’s legitimate authorities; how wrong it is for other nations to have allowed a veritable state within a state, with an entire staff of priests who are in reality servants of a foreign sovereign. Newspapers will call upon progressive deputies from other countries to promptly submit a similar bill, externally emancipating them from the national clergy of this cult called catholic, to constitute a liberal priesthood of a religion which the faithful have nothing in common [p. 603] with those practicing the same creed in another country. Great unrest will occur in various countries with numerous followers of Roman Catholicism, and, by legal means, through a general agreement emanating from Freemasonry, we proceed with the disintegration of the religion of evil.

“These events will not be fulfilled in twenty nor thirty years; we bring it about when Roman Catholicism has been totally discredited, when old women and a few incurable fools are its sole supporters, and when we have secretly acquired a significant portion of its clergy. When circumstances are favourable, due to increased legal restrictions in one country or another, having already completely abolished the finances of the cults and reduced the income of the priests of superstition to mere offerings of the faithful, in this case, it will be useful in such country or countries, to restore state funding to members of various clergy, even to the point of being generous toward the priests of Adonaism who accept the new situation. We’ll then proclaim loudly that the State, trying to protect religion at the moment when it ceases to be an excuse for a foreign conspiracy, only serves to magnify the sacerdotal body. No means should be overlooked to ensure the disintegration of the religion of Adonai and to weaken its international character. This, in effect, is what will empower us to extirpate it completely and permanently. Thus it is not possible to be overzealous in the struggle to achieve this important result, without ever being discouraged by the difficulties of the enterprise.

“Moreover, we must nurture in our hearts not only hope, but even the certainty that the successful disintegration of adonaism is not a chimera; for it is promised to us by the revelation in the book On Redemption in the Apadno.

“It is also said that the Pope of superstition, based in Rome at the time of its disntegration, refused to acquiesce to the new situation in his Church; and he will launch his now powerless thunderbolts against governments participating in this great work of social salvation. In those days a multitude of priests in various countries will abandon the church, owing to the fact that many have already been won over [to our cause]; and having been expelled in Italy, the Papacy will be cursed, wandering, and forced to fall into darkness; because governments will impose harsh sentences against those who show continued support and who conspire with her.

“But it is also written that, the Wandering Pope, pastor of a scattered flock, [p. 604] the helpless vessel of Cephas [Peter], and sixth successor of human self-pride, which collapsed under the temporal power of the infamous pontificate, will be saved, after numerous expulsions, by the Slavic autocrats who will bestow upon him great honours. Adonaism will then attempt to reconstitute itself; the Wandering Pope being close to death in Russia, with the imperial autocrat prostrate at his feet, the nations will convert to orthodoxy, that is to say, the schismatic Eastern religion, rallying quickly to the cause of old Roman Catholicism purged from Italy. On his deathbed, the Wandering Pope will be happy to witness these new believers replace the Westerners who had only recently separated from his church, and within the nations who’ve taken part in the disintegration of adonaism, some of the faithful remain, hidden from view so as to engage in the condemned practices of superstition; before dying, he will convene an Episcopate with the bishops of the Eastern schismatics, and establish among them Greek and Russian Cardinals. His successor will be a Slav; the seat of the adonaite Papacy will be established in the northern city of Pierre, with the intention of reconquering Rome. But it will be in vain that the imperial autocrat, in the hopes of extending his rule, becomes a crusader for adonaism; his efforts unsuccessful, the former Roman Church will remain fragmented in the nations of Western Europe. Thus, Russia is the last refuge and bastion of adonaism claiming to be catholic.

“In Western nations, once the new religious regime will be legalized, it will drastically suppress these dangerous propagandists who call themselves missionaries and preach to our brothers in Asia, and among the heathen in Africa and Oceania whom we must convert, carrying falsehoods and poisonous sermons. Governments shall prohibit, under severe penalties, these detestable emigrations, which are liable to provoke incessant conflicts with Asian nations, whose faith has become so perfectly illuminated by the efforts of the wise Tibetan priests, united with our auxiliary masonry in India and China, and deserving of respect. And without waiting for the appointed time of these events, every Mason has a duty to fight, through the pen and the word, the so-called Catholic missionaries, and trumpet throughout the secular world contempt and inextinguishable hatred. These missionaries are our mortal enemies. Any Freemason, who refuses to fight, will be deemed a traitor; whosoever joins them or supports such action with public praise, will be beaten to death.

“Finally, it is useful to maintain in the lower classes of any nation, the ferment of revolutionary ideas, even those socialists prone to extreme violence. Atheism is bad in itself and to hijack its true purpose and work toward humane antichristian restoration, [p. 605] we need to channel it and mix it with the most exaggerated social doctrines, which are destined for failure, occasioned by a momentary disruption, immediately followed by an energetic reaction.

“In the last stage, however, first we discredit the superstitious theory of divinity in such a way that those steeped in adonaisme detach gradually and eventually no longer believe at all, the last priests of adonaisme eroded and fragmented will be entirely won in the era of the new religious regime, which will be a state of transition, like free-thinking deism; secondly, we’ll take care to not suddenly wrest from the multitudes the belief in the supernatural God, but, at every opportunity, we’ll remain content to proclaim the existence of a Supreme Being, without announcing publicly yet our traditions and our mystic revelations. So sayeth the God-Good.

“Therefore, when the autocratic Empire of Russia will become the citadel of papist adonaism, we shall unleash the revolutionary nihilists and atheists, and provoke a formidable social cataclysm, which will demonstrate clearly to the nations, in all its horror, the effect of absolute unbelief, mother of savagery and of the bloodiest disorder. Then everywhere, the citizens, obliged to defend themselves against the mad minority of revolutionaries, will exterminate these destroyers of civilization; and the countless disillusioned adonaites, whose deist soul have up until that time remained without a compass, thirsting for an ideal, but not knowing which God is worthy of tribute, will receive the True Light, by the universal manifestation of the pure Luciferian doctrine, at last made public, an event that will arise from a reactionary movement following the destruction of atheism and adonaism, together at the same time vanquished and exterminated.

“The birth of the religion of the Good-God Lucifer, established and unrivalled on the earth, cannot be an instantaneous operation, neither in one year nor a century. A lasting achievement is that which is created by slow progression. The nineteenth century saw the conception of true and good Catholicism; the twentieth century will be the century of gestation, and climaxing with parturition at a fixed end in the Book of the Heavens (September 29th, 1996 AD when completed).

“Written and delivered under the Solemn Arch, and signed at the foot of the Sacred Palladium, by the Sovereign Pontiff of Universal Freemasonry, and by the ten elders who comprise the Most Serene Grand College of Emerited Masons, at the Supreme Orient of Charleston, in the cherished valley of the Divine Master, the 29th and last day of the Moon Ab, year 000871 of the True Light (August 15th, 1871, era vulgaris [Vulgar Era])

[p. 606]

This is the secret plan and formula which summarizes the tactics and the aspirations of the Masonic and Luciferian sect.

Is there no better way to conclude than to pronounce the mysterious response of the sacred word of the Knights of Kadosh? “Pharasch-Chol” Everything is explained.

Exactly what William Guy Carr was trying to pull, I’ll never know. If you’ve bared it until the end, perhaps you’re disappointed to have found nothing about a prediction of three world wars, Communism, Nazism and Zionist Illuminati – or anything of the sort. A search through the entire book, utilizing relevant word combinations, turns up nothing either. Instead, what it truly represents is the scurrilous fantasies, and militant anti-Catholicism of its author: the impostor Leo Taxil aka Dr. Bataille, who profited handsomely while having a million laughs at the expense of both Christians and Masons; who confessed that his entire corpus of anti-Masonic works – spanning twelve years and representing thousands of pages (including the translated excerpt above) – were a complete and utter fraud; a colossal yet ridiculously farcical hoax.

It is enough having shown that the so-called Pike/Mazzini letter came from the Taxil hoax and to have provided a full translation of it. However, if the reader is so inclined, there are plenty of resources to become familiar with all facets of the Leo Taxil case in the above embedded links.

Taxil benefited from the atmosphere in France at that time, which was indeed rife with anti-clericalism, occultism, and outright Satanism. The poets and authors of Romanticism had also looked upon Satan and Lucifer as a hero, and became more outspoken as anti-clericalism became the norm.

“The Devil had a curious rebirth in the nineteenth century,” writes historian Jeffrey Burton Russell.

Conservative Christians of all denominations continued to believe in him, but he was also revived by Romantic writers, sometimes as a figure of horror, but more often of sympathy, or even a hero. Romantics who supported popular revolutions from 1789 onward made Satan a symbol of liberty. If revolutions were against kings and priests, Romantics admired Satan as the enemy of the greatest king and Priest of all, Christ himself. Permutations were nearly infinite. In one great poem, Victor Hugo portrays Satan as a lonely hero, cast out from the world, full of love and longing, thrust out beyond the planets and stars into the empty coldness of space. At last he can see only three stars; he strains his wings and courage to reach a refuge, but one by one the stars die out and he is left in utter darkness. For some Romantics, Satan was a redeemer who bought human liberty at the cost of his own ruin.

– in The Satanism Scare, Bromley, Best and Richardson (eds.), Aldine Transaction, 1991, p. 47

The late historian of the occult, James Webb, has a detailed chapter on the conditions in France during the period, which is highly recommended: The Occult Underground, “Visions of Heaven and Hell,” (Open Court, 1990), pp. 153-190; there’s also a succinct overview of the Taxil affair, pp. 144-7.

Professor Stefan-Ludwig Hoffmann describes Taxil’s fortuitous situation quite well:

It is only possible to understand the hysteria caused by Taxil’s “revelations” in Germany, France, Italy, and Belgium if we take into account the contemporary political conflicts between church and the state. Taxil’s horror stories were well suited for an era in which people yearned for otherworldly experiences beyond the disenchanted modern world. During the final third of the nineteenth century, European societies vacillated between modern occultism and the belief in miracles, on the one hand, and the belief in Bildung and progress, on the other. Taxil’s writings initially satisfied the needs of anticlerics and subsequently those of the clerics. In this way, he popularized the conflict between liberalism and political Catholicism, appropriating many ideas that had long circulated among the Catholic population about “satanic” lodges, as well as ideas about sinister Catholicism held by the secular and Protestant Bürgertum in Masonic lodges. In occupying both liberal and Catholic positions, Taxil mobilized and intensified the prejudices of both sides. Only in this way can we explain his enormous success, as well as the general popularity of anti-Masonic and anti-Catholic pamphlet literature between the 1880s and the First World War.

– The Politics of Sociability: Freemasonry and German Civil Society, 1840-1918 (University of Michigan Press, 2007), p. 143

Taxil, for his part, had admitted in typical form:

“The public made me what I am; the arch-liar of the period,” confessed Taxil, “for when I first commenced to write against the Masons my object was amusement pure and simple. The crimes I laid at their door were so grotesque, so impossible, so widely exaggerated, I thought everybody would see the joke and give me credit for originating a new line of humor. But my readers wouldn’t have it so; they accepted my fables as gospel truth, and the more I lied for the purpose of showing that I lied, the more convinced became they that I was a paragon of veracity.

“Then it dawned upon me that there was lots of money in being a Munchausen of the right kind, and for twelve years I gave it to them hot and strong, but never too hot. When inditing such slush as the story of the devil snake who wrote prophecies on Diana’s back with the end of his tail, I sometimes said to myself: ‘Hold on, you are going too far,’ but I didn’t. My readers even took kindly to the yarn of the devil who, in order to marry a Mason, transformed himself into a crocodile, and, despite the masquerade, played the piano wonderfully well.

“One day when lecturing at Lille, I told my audience that I had just had an apparition of Nautilus, the most daring affront on human credulity I had so far risked. But my hearers never turned a hair. ‘Hear ye, the doctor has seen Nautulius,’ they said with admiring glances. Of course no one had a clear idea of who Nautilus was I didn’t myself but they assumed that he was a devil. Ah, the jolly evenings I spent with my fellow authors hatching out new plots, new, unheard of perversions of truth and logic, each trying to outdo the other in organized mystification. I thought I would kill myself laughing at some of the things proposed, but everything went; there is no limit to human stupidity.”

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Click here to show/hide the 4,200 word preface by the compiler of this data, Terry Melanson, who insists it is a hoax; of course I, the reposter of this data, believe the words implicate themselves far too well (and match what has taken place since 1871) to call "all this a hoax."

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