On the other hand, mysticism and alchemy flourished. For instance in 1767 the supposed “Clerical branch” of the Order revealed its existence and started to practise a very esoteric interpretation of Christianity. The involvement in particular of a substantial part of the German functional elite in the SO was repeatedly discussed. In 1782, a convent was established in Wilhelmsbad that abolished the supposed connection to the Knights Templar. In the aftermath of this event, several books were published such as St. Nicaise (1786) and Anti-St. Nicaise (1786–1788), Versuch über die Beschuldigungen, welche dem Tempelherrenorden gemacht worden, und über dessen Geheimniß (1788), or Noch etwas über Geheime Gesellschaften im protestantischen Deutschland (Berlinische Monatsschrift, 1786). It was also during this timethat the famous Order of Illuminatibeganto beactive in Germany, dedicated to a rational reform of society and on the other hand “Count Cagliostro” hypnotising the educated drawing rooms of Europe with his “egyptomanian” metaphysical science. Secrecy, whether involving rationality or irrationality, was always on the agenda. Orders, their history, and their organisations were discussed and questioned. With this context as a background, a semantic field was laid open for use by a mind like Wieland’s. References to a general discourse of the time could easily be made and, as we have seen already, there are plenty. In particular when Wieland talks about the qualities of true cosmopolitans, he uses well- established terminology from the discourse of secret societies such as “warrant”, “instruction”, “degrees”, “secret plan”, “secret connections”, “defunct Order”, “unification of churches”, “common interest of an Order”, “honourable supreme”, “secret chancellery”, “commontreasure”, “Shibboleth”andcertain“signs”. In the preface to his treatise, Wieland describes how


Carl Gothelf von Hund Gran Maestro della Stretta Osservanza


a person who was raising funds believed the Order of Cosmopolitans was real when he addressed his request to them. This already seemed to prove their existence, Wieland writes satirically, and it fuelled misuse by others. “Pseudo-cosmopolitans” now seized the name for their purposes, and awarded themselves the cosmopolitan title. They believed that being a cosmopolitan meant achieving world dominance, the “Imperium orbis”. Yet, to be a cosmopolitan is not a label, and requires no organisation: “the invisibility of cosmopolitans follows from the nature of the thing [my Italics]”. However, the misuse of the word and of the pretended organisation forcesWieland to both, explain and reveal its real purposes. “Invisibility” is a concept in several contexts, and worth to elaborate upon further. Jesus is known as the “representation of the invisible God” and the “invisible church”, and Ecclesia invisibilis refers to the universal Christian community as a whole, united through its shared faith. The article on “Unsichtbare Kirche” in Zedler’s aforementioned encyclopaedia states that:


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