Page 25 - Amo Amass A-muse is some of the fruit of a lifetimes love of Freemasonry - the Lodge of Nine Muses No. 235

ThE REv. BARON JOhANN AuGuSTuS vON STARCk

HIS TIME I WISH TO TELL YOU about a famous German Mystic who
joined us about the year 1786. His name, to give him his full title was —
T“The Reverend Baron Johann Augustus von STARCK.”
He was born of a Lutheran Minister at Mechlinberg in 1741 and was initiated into
the Ecossais Rite in a French Military Lodge at Gottenberg in 1761. For a time he
taught oriental languages at St. Petersberg and obtained a high reputation as a scholar.
As such, he came under the protection of the Grand Duke of Hesse-Darmstadt and
Mechlinberg-Strelitz. In 1765, he visited England and at Bath he became friendly
with Ruspini, who had just been made a Mason, both being foreigners under the
protection of the Dowager Princess of Wales.
On the Continent, this was the age in which whole series of high Masonic degrees
were being evolved. He joined the Rite of Strict Observance which was then dominating
German Masonic thought. In Paris, studying oriental manuscripts, he took the highest
degree in the French Clermont Rite. He began to write learned treatises on Theology
in German and explained his views on Masonic tenets and history.
In France, the grades in the Clermont Rite had become most elaborate with
high sounding titles and beautiful robes, as befitted their national characteristic. In
Germany, developments had led to organised steps of Knighthood founded upon a
Templar tradition with extravagant claims to powerful secrets to be obtained at each
step leading to a lost secret of how to approach nearer to a perfect union with the
Deity, in a truly heroic German manner. However, no one knew how many degrees it
took to get there or who were the organising council. Everything was ordered from
the degree above and obedience to unknown superiors was strict. Starck was able
to penetrate this system and he succeeded in discovering that Baron von Hund was
its master mind. Subsequently he was authorised to introduce a Clerical or Spiritual
Chapter of Instruction which he ran. Each Lodge and Chapter of each degree had
to have one member who had passed through this Instruction. For a time, this system
spread through Sweden to Russia and through Austria to Italy. He left the Rite of
Strict Observance which collapsed in 1782, although his Clerical or Priestly Order
was still quoted in 1792.