Saint-Martin, the French Mystic, and the Story of Modern Martinism, by Arthur Edward Waite

Review of "Saint Martin The French Mystic And The Search After Truth" by Arthur Edward Waite.This landmark treatise outlines the life of Louis Claude de Saint-Martin and his philosophies regarding the human soul, intellect or spirit, the spirit of the universe, and the elements (matter) which comprise the four stages of man's divine emanation. Saint-Martin believed that man is the immediate reflection of God, and nature in turn is a reflection of man. Saint-Martin continued that man, however, has fallen from his high estate, and the existence of matter is one of the consequences of his fall. He believed that divine love, united to humanity in Christ, will work the final regeneration.His chief works are Lettre à un ami, ou Considérations philosophiques et religieuses sur la révolution française (Letter to a Friend, or Philosophical and Religious Considerations on the French Revolution), Éclair sur l'Association humaine, L'Esprit des choses ou Coup d'aeil philosophique sur la nature des êtres et sur l'objet de leur existence, and Le Ministère de l'Homme-Esprit. Other treatises appeared in his uvres posthumes (1807). Saint-Martin regarded the French Revolution as a sermon in action, if not indeed a miniature of the last judgment. His ideal society was a natural and spiritual theocracy, in which God would raise up men of mark and endowment, who would regard themselves strictly as divine commissioners to guide the people. All ecclesiastical organization was to disappear, giving place to a purely spiritual Christianity, based on the assertion of a faculty superior to the reason moral sense, from which we derive knowledge of God. God exists as an eternal personality, and the creation is an overflowing of the divine love, which was unable to contain itself.Well done at five stars.JP