Châtenay-Malabry), from October 13 to October 14, 1803. Works He was the first to translate the writings of Jakob Böhme from German into French. His later years were devoted almost entirely to the composition of his chief works and to the translation of Böhme. His published letters show that he was interested in spiritualism, magnetic treatments, magical evocation and the works of Emanuel Swedenborg. His chief works are Lettre à un ami, ou Considérations philosophiques et religieuses sur la révolution française (Letter to a Friend, or Philosophical and Religious Considerations on the French Revolution), Éclair sur l'Association humaine, L'Esprit des choses ou Coup d'œil philosophique sur la nature des êtres et sur l'objet de leur existence and Le Ministère de l'Homme-Esprit. Other treatises appeared in his Œuvres posthumes (1807). Saint-Martin regarded the French Revolution as a sermon in action, if not indeed a miniature of the last judgment. His ideal society was a natural and spiritual theocracy, in which God would raise up men of mark and endowment, who would regard themselves strictly as divine commissioners to guide the people. All ecclesiastical organization was to disappear, giving place to a purely spiritual Christianity, based on the assertion of a faculty superior to the reason moral sense, from which we derive knowledge of God. God exists as an eternal personality, and the creation is an overflowing of the divine love, which was unable to contain itself. The human soul, the human intellect or spirit, the spirit of the universe and the elements or matter, are the four stages of this divine emanation, man being the immediate reflection of God, and nature in turn a reflection of man. Man, however, has fallen from his high estate, and matter is one of the consequences of his fall. But divine love, united to humanity in Christ, will work the final regeneration. Influence Admirers of his works formed groups of Friends of St. Martin, which later became known as Martinists. References Attribution External links Louis Claude de Saint-Martin Detailed biography (Eleazar Institute) “The Mystery of Truth: Louis-Claude de Saint-Martin’s Enlightened Mysticism,” Journal of the History of Ideas 61:4 (October 2000): 623-655 1743 births 1803 deaths People from Amboise 18th-century Christian mystics 19th-century Christian mystics Martinism French philosophers Roman Catholic mystics French male non-fiction writers 18th-century occultists