386 ANNUAL REGISTER, 179%. 
quids, and where a good fong was 
confidered as a firft rate qualifica- 
tion; but a fociety of learned men, 
whofe lodge was a place of rendez- 
vous for the literati of the capital. 
No doubt the obftacles thefe gen- 
tlemen would find to the progrefs 
of {cience and ufeful knowledge, in 
the church hierarchy, and in the 
cabals of courtiers, would draw their 
attention to political fubjeéts ; and 
fubjeéts were really difcuffed here 
which the church had forbid to be 
fpoken of, and whichthe government 
muft have wifhed not to be thought 
of. Attheir meetings, differtations 
on fome fubject of hiftory, ethics, or 
moral philofophy, were read by the 
members; and commonly fome- 
thing on the hiftory of ancient and 
modern myfteries, and fecret focie- 
ties. Thefe were «‘terwards pub- 
lifhed in the Diary for Free Ma- 
fons, for the ufe of the initiated, 
and not for public fale. In the 
winter they met occafionally, and 
held more public difcourfes, to 
which the members of the other 
lodges were allowed accefs. As 
molt of the learned of Vienna be- 
longed to this lodge, it was very na- 
tural to fuppofe that many of the 
differtations read here were not 
quite within the limits of the origi- 
nal plan of the fociety. It was 
thefe differtations, I believe, which 
gaverife to another periodical work, 
entitled, Plyfcalifche Arbeiten der ein- 
trachtigen Freunde in Wien, which was 
continued for fome time by the 
Baron and his brother mafons. He 
was likewife active in extirpating 
fuperititions of various kinds which 
had crept into the other lodges, and 
equally zealous in giving to thefe 
focieties fuch an organization as 
might render them ufeful to the 
public. 
The Baron, and many others of 
his lodge, belonged to the fociety of 
the Hluminated. This was no dif- 
honour to him: the views of this 
order, at leaft at firft, feem to have 
been commendable; they were the 
improvement of mankind, not the 
deftruétion of fociety. Such infti- 
tutions are only ufeful or dange- 
rous, and to be approved of or con~ 
demned, according to the ftate of 
fociety ; and this was before the 
French revolution, and in a coun- 
try lefs enlightened than almoft any 
other part of Germany. So zea- 
lous a friend was he to them, that 
when the Ele&tor of Bavaria order- 
ed all thofe in his fervice to quit 
this order, he was fo difpleafed that 
he returned the academy of Municlr 
the diploma they had fent him om 
their receiving him amongft thems 
publicly avowed his attachment to 
the order, and thought it proper to: 
break off all further conne¢tion with 
Bavaria as a member of its literary 
fociety. The free mafons did not 
long retain the patronage of their — 
fovereign : the Emperor Jo‘zph 
foon became jealous of their influ- 
ence, and put them under fuch ree 
ftrictions, and clogged them with 
fuch incumbrances, as to amount 
almott to a prohibition; and as fuch 
they ¢éted, for the fociety found it 
neceflary to diffolve. 
What raifed the Baron fo high 
in the public opinion, was his know~ 
ledge of mineralogy, and’ his fuc- 
cef{sful experiments in metallurgy, 
and principally in the procefs of 
amalgamation. The ufe of quickfil- 
ver in extracting the noble metals 
from their ores, was-not a difcovery 
of the Baron’s, nor of the century 
in which helived; yet he extended 
fo for its application in metallurgy, 
as to form a brilliant epoch in rex 
mo 
