more likely that the genuine secrets were not given to the breakaway apprentices at that early stage and substituted formats put into place. The masonic movement inherited the vacuum created by the fall of the French aristocracy but whereas it honoured the memory that the Templar lodges had worked hard to forge for themselves, the institutions did not survive and their work was taken up by the formal educational authorities that emerged in different countries and their prolific teachers, The Jesuits.
The different masonic movements do not represent a world power and even lodges are aligned at angles to each other with the further disorder that even its members belong to so called different degrees that make its holders behave with elements of social superiority between themselves. This is not a criticism of the movement as a whole, but a necessity to rectify the false attributions many masons make to those who are unwilling to belong to something so secretive and behind which the ideological masters cannot be seen clearly. But let us go a step further….
Effectively, what Ashmole joined was a Templar lodge supported by the Jesuits in their hidden efforts to spread knowledge in accordance with the teachings of Jesus, whom the Templars classified as one of their ancient Grand Masters (if we are to have any faith in the documents inherited by the 18th.century followers). The basis of knowledge as the essence of freedom was directly related to one of the many concepts that Jesus himself had made clear, was the way forward. The Jesuits therefore were doing just that and they not only had the full support of the hidden and influential Templars at high levels of society, but it is probable that Ignatius of Loyola was well prepared for the