These promises, the proper meaning of which is quite intelligible to true adepts, are recorded substantially, if not in the words here given, by the anonymous author of a _History of Secret Societies in Germany_,[307] and they are evidence as to the school of initiation with which the Comte de Saint-Germain was connected. The following details have been so far unknown concerning him. The Comte de Saint-Germain was born at Lentmeritz in Bohemia, at the end of the seventeenth century. He was either the natural or an adopted son of a Rosicrucian who called himself _Comes Cabalicus_—the Companion Kabalist—ridiculed under the name of Comte de Gabalis by the unfortunate Abbé de Villars.[308] Saint-Germain never spoke of his father, but he mentions that he led a life of proscription and errantry in a world of forest, having his mother as companion. This was at the age of seven years, which, however, is to be understood symbolically and is that of the initiate when he is advanced to the Grade of Master. His mother was the science of the adepts, while the forest, in the same kind of language, signifies empires devoid of the true civilisation and light. The principles of Saint-Germain were those of the Rosy Cross, and in his own country he established a society from which he separated subsequently when anarchic doctrines became prevalent in fellowships which incorporated new partisans of the Gnosis. Hence he was disowned by his brethren, was charged even with treason, and some memorials on illuminism seem to hint that he was immured in the dungeons of the Castle of Ruel. On the other hand, Madame de Genlis tells us that he died in the Duchy of Holstein, a prey to his own conscience and terrors of the life beyond.[309] It is certain in any case that he vanished suddenly from Paris, no one exactly knowing where, and that his companions in illumination permitted the veil of silence and oblivion to fall as far as possible upon his memory. The association which he had formed under the title of Saint-Jakin—which has been turned into Saint Joachim—continued till the Revolution, when it dissolved or was transformed, like so many others. A story is told concerning it in a pamphlet against illuminism; it is derived from a correspondence in Vienna and, though it is worth reproducing, there is nothing that can be termed certain or authentic therein.