I Rosacroce d Oro/en
The Golden Rosicrucians (in German Gold- und Rosenkreuzer) were the most influential alchemical-hermetic initiatic society of German-speaking Freemasonry in the 18th century. Documented in the work of Alessandro Boella and Antonella Galli L'Ascesa all'Olimpo — Cagliostro e la tradizione ermetica nella massoneria, they constitute one of the main junctions between the hermetic-alchemical tradition and the thread of angelic magnetism that also runs through the magnetic tradition.
Profile of the Order
The Order presented itself as the guardian of an alchemical and magical wisdom transmitted by «sages from the East». One of its highest dignitaries, Johann Christoph von Wöllner (1732–1800) — future Prussian minister — was, as Boella documents, a firm supporter of the value of magical and occult arts, and openly declared that the time was not far when the brothers could be instructed by those «sages from the East» they awaited, and be led «to a relationship with invisible superior beings».
The Order cultivated practices of spirit evocation: Boella recounts the episode in which a dignitary revealed to the publisher Nicolai — moreover a bitter opponent of the Golden Rosicrucians — the existence in the Order of «a magic bottle prepared by a spirit of the air», in which prophetic images appeared.
The Secret: the Enigma of Nostoc and the Astral Powder
The most reserved doctrinal core of the Order concerned the alchemical prime matter, identified by Boella as the «astral powder», i.e., nostoc. According to the secret texts of the Clericato and the Golden Rosicrucians, this was considered «a part of the fundamental secret of the Order».
Boella reconstructs the tradition of this substance:
- Paracelsus named it nostoc, also calling it caerefolium or coelifolium.
- Jan Baptista Van Helmont (1580–1644) wrote in 1621 that sometimes there precipitates from the sky «that sort of mucilage which is also called the sperm of the stars», and that from sidereal spaces descends «a white and at the same time bituminous substance». These entities, participating «primarily in the substance of the air», were called «flowers of the sky».
- In hermetic cosmology, the coarse parts of this matter, «engulfed by a mucilaginous mercurial water and ignited by the rays of the Sun», shone at night like stars until their sulfur was consumed, then falling to earth: they were the «shooting stars» of the common people.
- Eugenius Philalethes, alias Thomas Vaughan (1621–1666), called this substance «a river of pearls» and defined it as «the Demogorgon animated by the manifestation of its own inner light».
Boella also documents the surprising coincidence with the Eastern tradition: nostoc — a gelatinous cyanobacterium that grows without roots or stems — was compared by the Chinese to Taoist Immortals, was used as a medicine since the Jin dynasty (317–420 AD), and is listed among the remedies of the Pen-Ts'ao-Kang-Mu, the great Chinese pharmacopoeia in 52 volumes completed in 1578.
The Withdrawal of the Order
Boella records the historical moment when, «when heads heat up and hearts cool down», the Society of the Golden Rosicrucians decided to withdraw and suspend activity, also because its path «was blocked by the French Revolution and the wars». From that moment, the Order's teaching was transmitted through more hidden and indirect channels.
Connections with Cagliostro and Magnetism
The Golden Rosicrucians intertwine with the story of Cagliostro: Boella documents how the foundation of Egyptian Freemasonry in Lyon (1778) and the Lodge La sagesse triomphante (December 24, 1784) occur in the same initiatic milieu in which the Golden Rosicrucians operated, some of whose adepts were sent even «to Fez in Morocco to consult ancient Arabic manuscripts».
The thread connecting this tradition to magnetism passes through angelic magnetism: the doctrine according to which, in a state of magnetic crisis, the soul freed from matter can communicate with spiritual beings, takes up the same framework of «relationship with invisible superior beings» pursued by the Golden Rosicrucians through alchemical-ritual means rather than magnetic ones.
Primary Sources
OCR text for instant verification of citations: Boella — native OCR text (archive OCR_FONTI_WIKI).
- Alessandro Boella, Antonella Galli, L'Ascesa all'Olimpo — Cagliostro e la tradizione ermetica nella massoneria (ISBN 978-88-96052-97-6, 172 pp.) — PDF Drive (copy: PDF Drive 2)
The citations on this page derive from the native text of the volume (direct extraction, without OCR). The passages are traced back to the sections «I Rosacroce d'Oro», «L'enigma del Nostoc e il segreto della Polvere Astrale» and the erudite notes of the work.