d that the Rosicrucians interpreted the initials
on the cross INRI by the sentence "Igne Nitrum Roris Invenitur."[251]
Supposing this derivation to be correct, it would be interesting to know
whether any connexion could be traced between the first appearance of
the word Rosie Cross in the _Fama Fraternitatis_ at the date of 1614 and
the cabalistic treatise of the celebrated Rabbi of Prague, Shabbethai
Sheftel Horowitz, entitled _Shefa Tal_, that is to say, "The Effusion of
Dew," which appeared in 1612.[252] Although this book has often been
reprinted, no copy is to be found in the British Museum, so I am unable
to pursue this line of enquiry further. A simpler explanation may be
that the Rosy Cross derived from the Red Cross of the Templars.
Mirabeau, who as a Freemason and an Illuminatus was in a position to
discover many facts about the secret societies of Germany during his
stay in the country, definitely asserts that "the Rose Croix Masons of
the seventeenth century were only the ancient Order of the Templars
secretly perpetuated."[253]

Lecouteulx de Canteleu is more explicit:

In France the Knights (Templar) who left the Order, henceforth
hidden, and so to speak unknown, formed the Order of the Flaming
Star and of the Rose-Croix, which in the fifteenth century spread
itself in Bohemia and Silesia. Every Grand officer of these Orders
had all his life to wear the Red Cross and to repeat every day the
prayer of St. Bernard.[254]

Eckert states that the ritual, symbols, and names of the Rose-Croix were
borrowed from the Templars, and that the Order was divided into seven
degrees, according to the seven days of creation, at the same time
signifying that their "principal aim was that of the mysterious, the
investigation of Being and of the forces of nature."[255]

The Rosicrucian Kenneth Mackenzie, in his _Masonic Cyclopaedia_, appears
to suggest the same possibility of Templar origin. Under the heading of
Rosicrucians he refers enigmatically to an invisible fraternity that has
existed from very ancient times, as early as the days of the Crusades,
"bound by solemn obligations of impenetrable secrecy," and joining
together in work for humanity and to "glorify the good." At various
periods of history this body has emerged into a sort of temporary light;
but its true name has never transpired and is only known to the
innermost adepts and rulers of the society. "The Rosicrucians of the
sixt