“I vow (ich gelobe) an eternal silence, an inviolable obedience and fidelity to all my superiors and to the statutes of the Order. With respect to what may be the object of the OrderI fully and absolutely renounce my own penetration and my own judgment.
“I promise to look upon the interests of the Order as my own; and as long as I shall be a Member of it, I promise to serve it with my life, my honour, and my estates. Should I ever, through imprudence, passion, or wickedness, act contrary to the laws or to the welfare of the Serene Order, I then subject myself to whatever punishment it may please to inflict upon me.
“I also promise to help the Order, to the best of my power, and according to my conscience, with my counsels and my actions, and without the least attention to my personal interest; also, to look upon all friends and enemies of the Order as my own, and to behave to them as the Order shall direct. I am equally disposed to labour with all my might and all my means at the propagation and advancement of the Order.
p. 438
“In these promises I renounce every secret reservation, and engage to fulfill them all, according to the true purport of the words, and according to the signification attached to them by the Order when it prescribed the Oath—
“So help me God.” N. N.
The oath being signed by the Novice, and enregistered in the minutes of the Order, the Initiator declares his admission, telling him at the same time that he is not to expect to know all the members, but those only who, being of the same degree, are under the same Superior.—From that moment advanced to the degree of Minerval, he is instructed in the signs of his new degree, which are much of the same nature as those of Masonry. He is then enjoined to give an exact list of all his books, particularly of those which might be precious or useful to the Order. He also receives the following questions which he is to answer in writing.
I. What should you wish to be the object of our Order?
II. What means, either primary or secondary, do you think most conducive to the attainment of that object?
III. What other things would you wish to find among us?
IV. What men do you either hope to meet, or not to meet, among us? 28
The answers given to these questions will enable the Superiors to judge how far the young adept has imbibed the principles of the Order. But other helps are preparing for him, that he may be able to demonstrate by his answers both the progress he has made and that which he may be expected to make.
Thus admitted to the degree of Minerval, he will find himself in future a Member of the Academy of the Sect. Let us then observe well both the Scholars and their Masters; for they still belong to the class of preparation.
p. 439
Footnotes
438:1 The Statutes reformed, No. 7.
438:2 The Statutes reformed, No. 16.
438:3 Original Writings, Statutes, No. 20. Statutes reformed, No. 27. True Illuminism, General Statutes, No. 31, 32.
438:4 Summary of the Statutes, No. 15. B.
438:5 Original Writings, and the true Ilium. Art. Reverse.
438:6 Institutes of the Insinuated, No 8. Orig. Writ. the real Illuminee No. 7.
438:7 Statutes of the Minerval, No. 12.
438:8 Original Writings, Vol. I. Instructions for the Insinuated, No. 7, and Vol. II. Let 13.
438:9 Original Writings, Vol. I. Sec. 4.
438:10 Original Writings, Sect. 2 and 3.
438:11 See the real Illuminee first degree.
438:12 The common cypher of the Illuminees consist in numbers corresponding to letters in the following order:
12.
11.
10.
9.
8.
7.
6.
5.
4.
3.
2.
1.
a.
b.
c.
d.
e.
f.
g.
h.
i.
k.
l.
m.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
14.
n.
o.
p.
q.
r.
s.
t.
u.
w.
x.
y.
z.
p. 439
Illuminati Cryptogram The hieroglyphics are contained in the opposite Plate, and are copied from those published at the end of the degree of Scotch Knight or Directing Illuminee. There is a third cypher, but that has never been published.
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