as he Dined with his new Mistress and certain of Us Friends, there was seen in the Air the Loveliest Creature of the World; which was the invisible Lover, that had a mind to let herself be seen by the Friends of her unfaithful Gallant; that they might Judge how little reason he could have to prefer a Woman before her. After which the enraged nymph struck him dead immediately." (Sub Mundanes.)
But popular prejudice regarding the reality of witchcraft died hard. The Rosicrucians were charged with doing as did the witches projecting their astral forms for selfish and lawless purposes. It was believed by the populace, and by many others whose education should have taught them better, that * * * gentle maidens, who went to bed alone, often awoke in the night and found men * * * of shape more beautiful than the Grecian Apollo, who immediately became invisible when an alarm was raised. (Mackay's En. Pop. Delusion.)
But this seems rather unlikely, when we carefully consider the following pronouciamento with which they placarded Paris. "We, the deputies of the principal College of the brethren of the Rose-cross have taken our abode, visible and invisible, in this city by the grace of the Most High towards whom are turned the hearts of the just. We shew and teach without books or signs, and speak all sorts of languages in the countries where we dwell, to draw mankind, our fellows, from error and from death."
"Moreover, the Rosicrucians maintained most positively that the very first vow they took was one of chastity, and that any of them violating that oath would be deprived at once of all the advantages he possessed, and be subject to hunger, thirst, sorrow, disease and death like other men. Witchcraft and sorcery they also most warmly repudiated."
(Mysteries of the Rosie Cross, by A. Reader.)
And the editor of Sub Mundanes, in a footnote, refers to the Rosicrucian marriage with the elementary or Spiritlife, esteemed a duty by the sages and cultivated with fasting, watching, prayer and contemplation and acquiring
