Arthur Edward Waite 
Saint-Martin, the French Mystic, and the Story of Modern Martinism [PDF ebook] 

Whilst the greatest effort has been made to ensure the quality of this text, due to the historical nature of this content, in some rare cases there may be minor issues with legibility. When one comes to reflect upon it, the great, many-sided Masonic adventure may be’ said to stand for the whole, to express it in the world of signs, as actually and historically speaking there came a day, before the French Revolution, when it seemed about to absorb the whole. All the occult sciences, all the ready-made; evangels, all philosophies, the ever-transpiring new births in time ceased to be schemes on paper and came to be embodied in Grades.