to show "the enormous difference that is
to be found between religious obedience and Illuminist obedience." In
every religious order men know that the voice of their conscience and of
their God is even more to be obeyed than that of their superiors.

There is not a single one who, in the event that his superiors
should order him to do things contrary to the duties of a Christian
or of a good man, would not see an exception to be made to the
obedience which he has sworn. This exception is often expressed and
always clearly announced in all religious institutions; it is above
all formal and positively repeated many times in that of the
Jesuits. They are ordered to obey their superiors, but it is in the
event that they see no sin in obeying, _ubi non cerneretur peccatum
(Constitution des Jesuites_, part 3, chapter I, parag. 2, vol. i.,
edition de Prague).[498]

Indeed, implicit obedience and the total surrender of one's own will and
judgement forms the foundation of all military discipline; "theirs not
to reason why, theirs not to make reply" is everywhere recognized as the
duty of soldiers. The Jesuits being in a sense a military Order,
acknowledging a General at their head, are bound by the same obligation.
Weishaupt's system was something totally different. For whilst all
soldiers and all Jesuits, when obeying their superiors, are well aware
of the goal towards which they are tending, Weishaupt's followers were
enlisted by the most subtle methods of deception and led on towards a
goal entirely unknown to them. It is this that, as we shall see later,
constitutes the whole difference between honest and dishonest secret
societies. The fact is that the accusation of Jesuit intrigue behind
secret societies has emanated principally from the secret societies
themselves and would appear to have been a device adopted by them to
cover their own tracks. No good evidence has ever been brought forward
in support of their contention. The Jesuits, unlike the Templars and
the Illuminati, were simply suppressed in 1773 without the formality of
a trial, and were therefore never given the opportunity to answer the
charges brought against them, nor, as in the case of these other Orders,
were their secret statutes--if any such existed--brought to light. The
only document ever produced in proof of these accusations was the
"Monita Secreta," long since shown to be a forgery. At any rate, the