Page:William Blake (IA williamblake00ches).pdf/131

 And second, there was another eighteenth century element that was neither of Christian nor of pagan Rome. It was from the origins; it had been in the world through the whole history of paganism and Christianity; it had been in the world, but not of it. This element appeared popularly in the eighteenth century in an extravagant but unmistakable shape; the element can be summed up in one word—Cagliostro. No other name is quite so adequate; but if anyone desires a nobler name (a very noble one), we may say—Swedenborg. There was in the eighteenth century, despite its obvious good sense, this strain of a somewhat theatrical thaumaturgy. The history of that element is, in the most literal sense of the word, horribly interesting. For it all works back to the mere bogey feeling of the beginnings. It is amusing to remark that in the eighteenth century for the first time start up a number of societies which calmly announce that they have existed almost from the beginning of the world. Of these, of course, the best known instance is the Freemasons; according to their own account they began with the Pyramids; but according to everyone else's account that can be effectively