e 
THE eae 
MONTHLY MAGAZINE 

No. XLIX.] 

SEPTEMBER 1, 1799. 

—— Sa 
[ No.2. OF NGLIVITE. 


ORIGINAL COMMUNICATIONS. 
To the Editor of the Monthly Magazine. 
SIR, 
T is quite aftonifhing, and beyond all 
conception, how Mr. Barruel the far 
renowned bell-man and crier of all the 
conipiracies and wicked defigns, plotted 
many years ago by the free-mafons and 
illuminates of Germany, was enabled to 
difcover all thefe deep-laid {chemes, and 
to unfold a tale 

whofe lighteft word 

Mutt harrow up our foul, and freeze our 
blood. 
There are men, indeed, who are impu- 
dent enough to make a laugh of the whole, 
calling it a goffip’s ftory, invented only 
to affricht children, or thofe who refemble 
them in credulity. But let thofe people 
be awareof the ill confequences of fuch 
impudence.. Mr. Barruel will take it 
amilfs, and raife a hue and cry after them. 
They will be ranked amongft the pro- 
moters of thofe detefted aflociations, and 
branded with infamy. But I fhall not 
trifle now with a matter which demands 
the moft ferious exertions of all thofe 
who thudder at that fyftem of defamation 
fet up by Barruel and all his abettors, in 
order to delude the unguarded feelings of . 
your generous countrymen, and roufe in- 
dignation and hatred againft all the lite- 
rary characters of Germany. : 
To give you only one inftance of his 
deep knowledge of the matter, and how 
ingenioufly he deals with his poor deluded 
readers he dares call me (tom. iv. p. 245,) 
wery famous amongft the Iluminates of 
Germany. Now, let me inform you, Sir, 
that in the walk of a fequeftered life, 
wholly dedicated to the purfuits of an- 
tient literature, I never enlifted in that 
order, nor wrote a fingle line in defence of 
it.. Nay, I never had any knowledge of 
that order, before I fettled at Weimar; 
and when that took place, the order had 
been extinguifhed already, never to re- 
vive again. All the knowledge I have 
now, I derived from Mr. Bode, a gentle- 
man generally efteemed and beloved by 
men of every defcription, a true down- 
right plain dealer, who has been cruelly 
abufed in Mr. Barruel’s libelling Me- 
MonTuiy Maga. No. xix. 
moirs, and whofe honour, in fpite of all 
thefe afperfions, ftands unblemifhed in the 
eyes of many of our fovereign princes, - 
the Dukes of Weimar and Gotha, and the 
Landgrave of Hefle- Darmftadt*. ~ During 
the lait three years. of his life, I hada 
familiar intercourfe with that venerable 
old man, and heard many a tale of former- 
times. For he fpoke always of his ma- 
fonic tranfa&tions with the intereft of an 
‘old lover, but confefled openly and re- 
peatedly thar all was over, and no con- 
nection at all did fubfift now; which I 
found perfeétly true, when after his death 
I was engaged with fome other gentlemen 
of the higheft- reputation, who are ftill 
living, to revife and pack up all his papers, 
now in the pofieffion of his Serene High- 
nefs the Duke of Gotha, and which, being 
then.in the beft prefervation, can be in- 
{fpeéted, with the Duke’s permiffion, by 
every one who fhall feel any doubt of my 
relation. When I compofed feveral years 
ago the literary life of my deceafed friend, 
Mr. Bode, to be found at the head of the 
fixth and Jaft volume of his excellent Tranf— 
lation of Montaigne’s Eflays, I did not 
_ chufe to touch upon his dealing with free- 
mafons and fecret orders, not for fear of - 
ftamping a difprace upon the memory of 
my friend by revealing ail that 1 knew of 
his mafonic concerns—for all that I knew 
would have reflected great honour on him 
—but becaufe I did not think it worth 
_the while to tell over and over again a dull 
infipid tale, which, but for fome croaking 
ravens, always hovering over the tombs 
of the deceafed, would have been busied 
already in oblivion. Accordingly I give 
the fecret-hunting Barruel a folermn de- 
fiance to prove that I have been a member 
or a promoter of the order of Illuminates, 
“which needs muft. be an eafy tafk indeed 


* The life of Mr. Bode has been publifhed 
_by Mr. Schlichtegroll, Profeffor and Under- 
Library-keeper at Gotha, in the ufeful col- 
le€tion called The German Necrofozue. Lwould 
with it to be tanflated into Englifh, as it 
would ferve highly to undeceive- the Britith 
readers, and Jet them know how they are 
cheated by thofe alarmifts, who impofe fhame- 
fully on their credulity. 
4G for 
