Louis Claude de Saint Martin (1743-1803) discovered the
Masonic and theurgic mysteries of the Order of élus coens
among his comrades of the regiment of Foix-Infanterie,
stationed at Bordeaux at the time, in 1765. His note book
shows how advanced and persuaded he already was in 1768. In
1769, he was received in Martines’ entourage and in 1771 he
left the military in order to devote himself entirely to the
quest, and to Martines’ work by becoming his personal
secretary.
As such, he helped writing the famous Treatise on the
Reintegration of Beings, and was ordained reau-croix
April 17th 1772, a few days before his master left France. In
1774 and 1775, Saint-Martin taught his brothers in
Lyon[1] and in 1776 he
went to visit those of Toulouse, where a family he was fond
of lived, to continue his teachings. Whilst amongst the élus
coens Louis-Claude de Saint Martin scrupulously followed the
way of ceremonial theurgy. And just as his brothers, he
tasted its effects.
The attraction of the inner path gradually drew Saint-Martin
away from an order that was disintegrating. It has been said,
and written, that Saint-Martin tried, and managed, to destroy
the Order of élus coens to the advantage of his own
teachings. One has also often tried to oppose Saint-Martin
and Martines. However, until his very last day, the Unknown
Philosopher preserved, and likely consulted, all the coen
documents he had copied by hand, including the inestimable
Treatise. He continued to consider Martines as his first
master and to consider himself a coen and initiate.
Saint-Martin internalised ceremonial theurgy by choosing the
inner path – that Papus referred to as the cardiac path – a
path just as methodical but less dangerous according to him.
Still, his rejection of the external path does not oppose him
to Martines, as the latter himself knew the inner path, but
considered it to be too narrow, or even closed, whereas
Saint-Martin believed he could succeed through it.
Considering he had to do with what he had at hand, Martines
taught external, ceremonial theurgy. Saint-Martin raised that
theurgy to an intra-cardiac practice. However, the Unknown
Philosopher is not a mystic in the strict sense. Saint-Martin
is an illuminist and a gnostic. His theosophy joins knowledge
to love.
In 1788, the Unknown Philosopher discovered the works of
Jacob Boehme (1575-1624), of whom he translated several
books. He deepened his own sophiology, the doctrine of divine
wisdom, that Martines, he believed, knew as well. From then
onwards, Saint-Martin worked at uniting Boehme, his second
master, and Martines, who remained his first.
Martines and Saint-Martin are Judaeo-Christian theurgists,
but Saint-Martin is more Christian than Martines, and
Martines more Jewish than Saint-Martin. In martinesist
theurgy, the angels have a prime importance, and they serve
Hely, God’s wisdom. In saint-martinist theurgy, the Christ
becomes the only indispensable mediator. The desire of the
Word-Wisdom, of which we are all widowers, attracts Sophia,
who returns when purity, or adequate virginity is restored.
After the annunciation of the holy guardian angel, and his
marriage with Wisdom, the new man will be born: an inner
Christ. The Scriptures and the holy gospels in particular,
symbolise and draw out the stages of that spiritual
regeneration of man.
The writings of Saint-Martin encourage the man of desire to
generate within himself the new man. The Unknown Philosopher
offers that work in complete charity, but warns us against
books, which will always be superfluous. The only real book
is man. We must, as Saint-Martin says, explain things through
man, and not man through things. In other words, beware of
books. But also beware of too much haste, as not to lose
sight of books altogether. It would be to explore a world
alone in which men too easily get lost. Before one can do
away with books, one must understand them.
Whatever might be said, Louis-Claude de Saint-Martin did not
transmit a personal ritual initiation, and founded no
society, nor any order of any kind. For the Unknown
Philosopher, ritual initiation is always expendable, never
indispensable, because true initiation unfolds within the
heart of the new man, organ of superior love and knowledge.
In 1882, a young medical student, Gérard Encausse
(1865-1916), who would soon be known as Papus, received, he
says, the martinist repository which he then transmitted as
from 1884 as a very simple three-step ritual initiation
(associate, initiate, unknown superior). In that form, that
ritual filiation, called “martinist”, or “of Saint-Martin”,
goes no further back than Papus.
Saint-Martin did not found the Martinist Order either, which
was in fact created by Papus in 1887-1891, as an initiatory
society. However, the ritual filiation that comes from Papus
should not be neglected, no more than the Martinist Order
that Papus placed under the patronage of the Unknown
Philosopher.
[1]See Robert Amadou (with the
collaboration of Catherine Amadou), Les Leçons de Lyon aux
élus coens. Un cours de martinisme au XVIIIe siècle par
Louis-Claude de Saint Martin, Jean-Jacques Du Roy
D’Hauterive, Jean-Baptiste Willermoz, 1st complete edition
published following the original manuscripts, Paris, Dervy,
1999.