The part to be assigned to each intrigue in preparing the world-movement of which the French Revolution was the first expression is a question on which no one can speak with certainty. But, as at the present moment, the composite nature of this movement must never be lost to sight. Largely perhaps the work of Frederick the Great, it is probable that but for the Orléanistes the plot against the French monarchy might have come to nought; whilst again, but for his position at the head of illuminized Freemasonry it is doubtful whether the Duc d'Orléans could have commanded the forces of revolution. Further, how far the movement, which, like the modern Bolshevist conspiracy, appears to have had unlimited funds at its disposal, was financed by the Jews yet remains to be discovered. Hitherto only the first steps have been taken towards elucidating the truth about the French Revolution. In the opinion of an early nineteenth-century writer the sect which engineered the French Revolution was absolutely international: The authors of the Revolution are not more French than German, Italian, English, etc. They form a particular nation which took birth and has grown in the darkness, in the midst of all civilized nations, with the object of subjecting them to its domination.[639] It is curious to find almost precisely the same idea expressed by the Duke of Brunswick, formerly the "Eques a Victoria" of the Stricte Observance, "Aaron" of the Illuminati, and Grand Master of German Freemasonry, who, whether because the Revolution had done its work in destroying the French monarchy and now threatened the security of Germany, or whether because he was genuinely disillusioned in the Orders to which he had belonged, issued a Manifesto to all the lodges in 1794, declaring that in view of the way in which Masonry had been penetrated by this great sect the whole Order must be temporarily suppressed. It is essential to quote a part of this important document verbatim: Amidst the universal storm produced by the present revolutions in the political and moral world, at this period of supreme illumination and of profound blindness, it would be a crime against truth and humanity to leave any longer shrouded in a veil things that can provide the only key to past and future events, things that should show to thousands of men whether the path they have been made to follow is the path of folly or of wisdom. It has to do with you, VV. FF. of all degrees and of all secret systems. The curtain must at last be drawn aside, so that your blinded eyes may see that light you have ever sought in vain, but of which you have only caught a few deceptive rays....