This book analyses the influence of the Jesuits on the symbolic degrees of freemasonry, the myths of the Templars and their doctrine of revenge, based on the "crime" of their destruction, and the four vows of the Templars included in their higher degrees. The historical observations and research of the Bonneville appears of a worthy interest. The praises of Histoire des religions et des moeurs de tous lespays du monde, of Mirabeau, of Mackey, of J. Bilington, of Mallet du-Pan, and those of one of the German translators easily identified as one of the heads of the Highest Masonry, prove the merit of the work, for which no writer has dared answer for the last thirty years, and where the true Masons go to seek the Ariadne's thread to help them walk in this inextricable labyrinth.

Its mysterious symbols and rituals had been used in secret for centuries before Freemasonry revealed itself in 1717. But where had this powerful organization come from and why had Freemasonry been attacked by the Roman Catholic Church? Robinson answers those questions and more.

This work consists of Volume One of the Shan Hai Jing. Also called the Classic of the Five Treasures, or Classic of the Mountains, it contains a considerable amount of ethnographic data describing the social customs and rituals of the early Eastern Zhou Dynasty and in particular those traditions of the state of Chu. It refers to no less than 61 deities, 88 diseases, 307 animals and animal hybrids, 183 plants and plants hybrids, 82 minerals, and 846 geographical structures.

Discover everything you ever wanted to know about secret societies like the Freemasons, the historical mystery of Atlantis, why King Arthur, Leonardo da Vinci and Hitler are key figures, plus conspiracy theories, forgotten sciences and ancient wisdom.

This book traces the origins of a faith--perhaps the faith of the century. Modern revolutionaries are believers, no less committed and intense than were Christians or Muslims of an earlier era. What is new is the belief that a perfect secular order will emerge from forcible overthrow of traditional authority. This inherently implausible idea energized Europe in the nineteenth century, and became the most pronounced ideological export of the West to the rest of the world in the twentieth century. Billington is interested in revolutionaries--the innovative creators of a new tradition. His historical frame extends from the waning of the French Revolution in the late eighteenth century to the beginnings of the Russian Revolution in the early twentieth century. The theater was Europe of the industrial era; the main stage was the journalistic offices within great cities such as Paris, Berlin, London, and St. Petersburg. Billington claims with considerable evidence that revolutionary ideologies were shaped as much by the occultism and proto-romanticism of Germany as the critical rationalism of the French Enlightenment. The conversion of social theory to political practice was essentially the work of three Russian revolutions: in 1905, March 1917, and November 1917. Events in the outer rim of the European world brought discussions about revolution out of the school rooms and press rooms of Paris and Berlin into the halls of power. Despite his hard realism about the adverse practical consequences of revolutionary dogma, Billington appreciates the identity of its best sponsors, people who preached social justice transcending traditional national, ethnic, and gender boundaries. When this book originally appeared The New Republic hailed it as "remarkable, learned and lively," while The New Yorker noted that Billington "pays great attention to the lives and emotions of individuals and this makes his book absorbing." It is an invaluable work of history and contribution to our understanding of political life.