John Theophilus Desaguliers (12 March 1683 – 29 February 1744) was a French-born British natural philosopher, clergyman, engineer and freemason who was elected to the Royal Society in 1714 as experimental assistant to Isaac Newton. He is familiar to us as the recipient of Fischer von Erlach's letter describing Bessler's wheel, and for his public lectures decrying the possibility of a perpetual motion machine as constructed by Johann Bessler.
As a Freemason, Desaguliers was responsible for the establishment of the first Grand Lodge formed in London in 1717 and served as their third Grand Master in 1719 and was later three times Deputy Grand Master. He helped James Anderson draw up the rules in the "Constitutions of the Freemasons", published in 1723, and he was active in the establishment of a Masonic charity.
During a lecture trip to the Netherlands in 1731 Desaguliers initiated into Freemasonry Francis, Duke of Lorraine (1708 – 65) who later became Holy Roman Emperor. Desaguliers also presided when Frederick, Prince of Wales, became a Freemason in 1737, and he additionally became a chaplain to the Prince. But there is no record of him approaching Karl the Landgrave, with the intention of initiating him into the brotherhood, and anyway the dates do not support such a conjecture.
Obviously Karl the Landgrave was not involved in Free-masonry, although his grandson Prince Karl, the brother of Wilhelm I of Hessen-Kassel was a Grand Master. Both were the sons of Frederick II of Hessen-Kassel, from his wife, Mary of Hanover, Princess of Great Britain, daughter of George II King of England. His grandson, also named Karl, was the Freemason, not Karl the Landgrave; this has led to the confusion over the Landgrave's alleged membership of this organisation. This was in the 1780s, some forty years after Bessler's death.
The point is that neither Bessler nor his patron, Karl the Landgrave were concerned in any way with the Freemasons.
However Bessler did spend time with a Jesuit priest and a Jewish Rabbi in the ancient city of Prague. There he learned something about Egyptian hieroglyphics, the Book of Nature and the Language of Angels. These subjects have been difficult to identify, but John Dee and his sidekick, Edward Kelley wrote a book supposedly in the language of angels, Enochian, which appears to be a coded document, but it has proved impossible to decipher, that is if it was intended to be. Kelley met an untimely end in Prague when his promise to turn straw into gold failed and he was imprisoned and died a prisoner in late 1597/early 1598 of injuries received while attempting to escape.
What might Bessler have learned in Prague? My personal belief is that he learned something of the religious beliefs of both the Rabbi and the Jesuit priest. He also learned about encoding messages which the Rabbi and the priest used in their communications with each other. The chronogram was a common feature on building and epitaphs in Germany of that period and popular also among the Jews and Romans in both times past and during the early 18th century. Clearly this subject must have been explored during his stay in Prague because it seems as though Bessler became obsessed with the chronogram.
Bessler visited Prague in about 1700, in 1696 Prague’s Jewish community was shaken by the show trial of the alleged murderers of 12-year-old Shim‘on Abeles, which marked the culmination of Jesuit efforts to Christianize Prague’s Jews. Bessler, writing about the Rabbi, relates how "the Jew was a good Christian! He was a great exponent of the teachings of Nicodemus, and all in all I learned more with him in a short time than most people learn in many years." This curious description of the Jew being a good Christian may relate to the comment above which describes the culmination of the Jesuit efforts to Christianize Prague's Jews at roughly the time Bessler was there.
Earlier Bessler describes how "a Jesuit came to see me - perhaps the most learned priest I'd ever met - and soon we were great friends". It is possible that the Jesuit and the Rabbi had been discussing the Christianization of the Jews in Prague and from what Bessler said, perhaps the Rabbi was open-minded about the situation. Their discussions may have influenced Bessler and later led to the publication of his ideas about uniting the Christian religions.
The above comments seem to indicate that Bessler was more than just an inventor hoping for get-rich-quick success. He was a thinker, open-minded about religion, but still a committed Christian. In his list of 141 Bible quotations in Apologia Poetica, many of the references do not come from the Protestant bible either of that time nor currently. Othes refer to books only in the Roman Catholic version and some from the Hebrew bible, which seems to support the idea that he was an interdenominational Christian.
JC
What might Bessler have learned in Prague? My personal belief is that he learned something of the religious beliefs of both the Rabbi and the Jesuit priest. He also learned about encoding messages which the Rabbi and the priest used in their communications with each other. The chronogram was a common feature on building and epitaphs in Germany of that period and popular also among the Jews and Romans in both times past and during the early 18th century. Clearly this subject must have been explored during his stay in Prague because it seems as though Bessler became obsessed with the chronogram.
Bessler visited Prague in about 1700, in 1696 Prague’s Jewish community was shaken by the show trial of the alleged murderers of 12-year-old Shim‘on Abeles, which marked the culmination of Jesuit efforts to Christianize Prague’s Jews. Bessler, writing about the Rabbi, relates how "the Jew was a good Christian! He was a great exponent of the teachings of Nicodemus, and all in all I learned more with him in a short time than most people learn in many years." This curious description of the Jew being a good Christian may relate to the comment above which describes the culmination of the Jesuit efforts to Christianize Prague's Jews at roughly the time Bessler was there.
Earlier Bessler describes how "a Jesuit came to see me - perhaps the most learned priest I'd ever met - and soon we were great friends". It is possible that the Jesuit and the Rabbi had been discussing the Christianization of the Jews in Prague and from what Bessler said, perhaps the Rabbi was open-minded about the situation. Their discussions may have influenced Bessler and later led to the publication of his ideas about uniting the Christian religions.
The above comments seem to indicate that Bessler was more than just an inventor hoping for get-rich-quick success. He was a thinker, open-minded about religion, but still a committed Christian. In his list of 141 Bible quotations in Apologia Poetica, many of the references do not come from the Protestant bible either of that time nor currently. Othes refer to books only in the Roman Catholic version and some from the Hebrew bible, which seems to support the idea that he was an interdenominational Christian.
JC
