admittedly the author of a series of tracts under the name of
Eugenius Philalethes, also the author of those which bear the name of
Eirenaeus Philalethes? The first question is, I am afraid, insoluble,
until it has been decided whether the Fraternity of R. C. ever had an
actual existence. Anthony a Wood states that Thomas Vaughan was a
zealous Rosicrucian, but probably Anthony a Wood took the term in the
general sense of mystic and alchemist. On the other hand Vaughan
himself, in his preface to the English translation of the Rosicrucian
manifestoes, seems to disavow any personal acquaintance with the members
of the fraternity. Even this is not conclusive, for the Rosicrucian
rule, as given in the _Laws of the Brotherhood_, published by Sincerus
Renatus in 1710,[37] obliges the members to deny their membership.

There is more material for the discussion of the second question, but I
do not know that it is more possible to come to a definite conclusion.
The personality of the anonymous adept who took the name of Eirenaeus
Philalethes was shrouded in mystery even to his contemporaries. The
fullest account given of him on any of his title-pages is on that of the
_Experimenta de Praeparatione Mercurii Sophici_ (1668), which is said to
be "ex manuscripto Philosophi Americani alias Eyrenaei Philalethis,
natu Angli, habitatione Cosmopolitae."[38] We have also the description
given by George Starkey, or whoever it was, in the _Marrow of Alchemy_
(1654-5), p. 25. Starkey says:--

"His present place in which he doth abide
I know not, for the world he walks about,
Of which he is a citizen; this tide
He is to visit artists and seek out
Antiquities a voyage gone and will
Return when he of travel hath his fill.

"By nation an Englishman, of note
His family is in the place where he
Was born, his fortune's good, and eke his coat
Of arms is of a great antiquity;
His learning rare, his years scarce thirty-three;
Fuller description get you not from me."

Starkey gives the age of Eirenaeus Philalethes as 33 in 1654. This
precisely confirms the writer's own statement in the earlier editions of
the _Introitus Apertus_ that he was 23 in 1645, and fixes the birth-date
as 1621 or 1622. Now this agrees remarkably with the birth-date
ascertained from other sources of Thomas Vaughan. But Thomas died in
1666, and it is usually asserted that E