EsoteriaA library of sacred & hidden knowledge
Liber XXV · Secret Societies

Liber XXV · Secret Societies · Chapter IV: Rosicrucianism

Confessio Fraternitatis (1615): The Second Rosicrucian Manifesto

The Confessio Fraternitatis of 1615, the second Rosicrucian manifesto: its content, prophecy and anti-papal tone, and the European pamphlet war it provoked.

6 min read 1,440 words Updated

The Confessio Fraternitatis is the second Rosicrucian manifesto, printed in Latin at Kassel in 1615 as a sequel to the Fama Fraternitatis of the previous year. Written for "the learned of Europe", it gives the dates of Christian Rosenkreutz's life, sharpens the brotherhood's religious and prophetic message, attacks the papacy, and repeats the invitation to seekers. Its appearance, followed by a German edition the same year, turned curiosity about the "Rosy Cross" into a Europe-wide controversy that produced hundreds of pamphlets for and against the invisible order.

Publication of the Confessio Fraternitatis in 1615§

The Confessio Fraternitatis R. C. ad eruditos Europae (Confession of the Fraternity of the Rosy Cross, to the Learned of Europe) was printed by Wilhelm Wessel at Kassel, the same printer who had issued the Fama Fraternitatis in 1614. The Latin text was bound with a treatise entitled Secretioris philosophiae consideratio brevis (A Brief Consideration of the More Secret Philosophy), signed Philippus a Gabella, a pseudonym whose bearer is unknown. That treatise was largely based on John Dee's Monas Hieroglyphica of 1564, a short work explaining a single composite symbol of the planets and elements, so that Dee's ideas entered the Rosicrucian story from the start (see John Dee and Enochian magic).

A German translation was published at Frankfurt later in 1615 together with the Fama, and from then on the two texts usually travelled as a pair. Most scholars ascribe the Confessio, like the Fama, to the Lutheran circle around Johann Valentin Andreae and Tobias Hess in Tübingen, though some see more of Hess's apocalyptic temperament in it.

What the Confessio Says§

The Confessio is arranged in fourteen short chapters. It presents itself as a clarification for readers who had misunderstood the Fama, and it promises nothing to the merely curious.

Rosenkreutz's dates and the meaning of the tomb§

The text supplies the chronology that the Fama lacked. The founder, it says, was born in 1378 and lived for 106 years; since the tomb had been opened 120 years after his death, readers could place his death in 1484 and the discovery of the vault in 1604. These numbers are part of the text's symbolism of cycles and hidden time rather than evidence of a historical person, as explained in our overview of Rosicrucianism.

The secret philosophy and the Book of Nature§

The brothers claim a philosophy that sums up all the arts and sciences, and they compare it to a building whose foundations lie in theology, medicine and mathematics. God, they say, has written his secrets in the "great book of nature" and in letters and characters impressed on creation, which the brotherhood has learned to read and from which it has drawn a "magical writing". Yet the Confessio places the Bible above every other book and praises the reader who makes Scripture the rule of life and study.

False alchemy and false brothers§

Like the Fama, the Confessio attacks those who pursue gold-making for profit. It warns against counterfeit books and impostors who would claim the brotherhood's name, a warning that proved prophetic as pretenders and fraudsters appeared within a few years.

Prophecy, the New Stars and the Papacy§

The Confessio is more openly eschatological than the Fama. It speaks of the approaching end of the world and of a final age of light in which God will restore the knowledge lost since Adam. As signs of this it points to the new stars that had recently appeared in the constellations Serpentarius (Ophiuchus) and Cygnus, which modern readers identify with the nova of 1600 in Cygnus and the supernova of 1604 in Ophiuchus observed by Johannes Kepler. Such celestial events were widely read in the period as messages from God.

Its religious polemic is also sharper. The brothers declare that they condemn the pope and Muhammad as blasphemers against Christ, and they predict the imminent fall of papal power. This anti-Catholic edge placed the manifestos firmly in the world of militant German Protestantism on the eve of the Thirty Years' War, discussed in our article on Protestantism and the Reformation.

The Rosicrucian Furore, 1615–1625§

The two manifestos were read across the Holy Roman Empire and beyond. Within about a decade several hundred printed works responded to them. Some were open letters from readers asking to be admitted, often printed because there was no address to write to. Others offered interpretations, imitations or attacks.

Defenders: Fludd, Maier and Mögling§

The English physician Robert Fludd published an Apologia compendiaria in 1616 and a longer Tractatus apologeticus in 1617, defending the brotherhood against charges of magic and heresy and presenting it as the guardian of a true, Mosaic philosophy. The German physician and alchemist Michael Maier, who had served Emperor Rudolf II, argued in Silentium post clamores (1617) and Themis aurea (1618) that the fraternity was real and wise, while saying he was not himself a member. In 1618 Daniel Mögling, writing as Theophilus Schweighardt, published the Speculum sophicum Rhodostauroticum, whose engraving of a winged building on wheels, the "college" of the brotherhood, has become one of the best-known Rosicrucian images.

Critics: Libavius and the polemicists§

The leading critic was the chemist Andreas Libavius, who examined the Fama and Confessio point by point from 1615 onward. He respected chemistry as a practical art but regarded the manifestos as Paracelsian enthusiasm, subversive of established learning and religion. Lutheran and Catholic theologians attacked the brotherhood as heretical, while satirists treated it as a fraud. In Paris in 1623 placards announcing that the "invisible" brothers were in the city caused a short-lived scare, answered by Gabriel Naudé's sceptical Instruction à la France sur la vérité de l'histoire des Frères de la Roze-Croix (1623).

Andreae's withdrawal§

Andreae himself, by then a rising churchman, distanced himself from the affair. In works such as Turris Babel (1619) he described the Rosicrucian excitement as a confusion of tongues and urged readers to turn to genuine Christian fellowship instead. His utopia Christianopolis (1619) and his plans for a "Christian society" show how the reforming ideals behind the manifestos could be redirected into practical piety. His role in the trilogy is discussed in our article on the Chymical Wedding.

Legacy of the Second Rosicrucian Manifesto§

No member of the brotherhood ever publicly answered a petitioner, and the war that began in 1618 overshadowed the debate. Yet the Confessio fixed the elements of a durable legend: the dates of the founder, the invisible society of reformers, the union of piety and natural philosophy, and the idea of a book of nature written in divine characters. In 1652 it appeared in English beside the Fama, introduced by the Welsh alchemist Thomas Vaughan, and its language of an "invisible" brotherhood fed English talk of an invisible college of natural philosophers in the 1640s and 1650s.

Frequently asked questions§

What is the difference between the Fama and the Confessio?§

The Fama (1614, German) tells the story of Christian Rosenkreutz and the discovery of his tomb. The Confessio (1615, Latin) presupposes that story, supplies dates, defends the brotherhood against misunderstanding, and adds stronger prophetic and anti-papal content.

Why was the Confessio written in Latin?§

Latin was the international language of scholarship, and the Confessio was addressed explicitly to "the learned of Europe". A German translation followed in the same year for a wider readership.

Who answered the Rosicrucian manifestos?§

Hundreds of authors did, including Robert Fludd and Michael Maier, who defended the fraternity, Daniel Mögling, who wrote under a pseudonym, and Andreas Libavius, who attacked it. Many anonymous petitioners also printed letters asking to join.

Sources and further reading§