John Robison

John Robison

H5N1 professor of natural philosophy at the University of Edinburgh inward Scotland, John Robison (1739–1805) was a distinguished scientist together with writer. He was also author of Proofs of a Conspiracy against All the Religions together with Governments of Europe Carried On inward the Secret Meetings of the Freemasons, Illuminati, together with Reading Societies, Collected from Good Authorities (1797), which alleged that the Illuminati (a surreptitious social club originally founded inward Bavaria inward 1776) were behind many of the major events of the day, together with the French Revolution inward particular.

Robison’s exposé was widely circulated together with much discussed inward the conspiratorial climate of the slow 1790s (not to the lowest degree amid New England leaders fearful of unusual threats to the fledgling American republic), and, remarkably, it is yet much cited together with remains inward impress today.

The boy of a Scottish merchant, Robison was born inward 1739 together with attended the University of Glasgow patch inward his teens. After serving equally tutor to the boy of Admiral Sir Charles Knowles, he was side yesteryear side commissioned to send ocean trials of the newly invented nautical chronometer, earlier accompanying Sir Charles to Russia. Returning to Scotland, Robison took upward the chair of natural philosophy (what would at i time hold upward termed physics) at the University of Edinburgh inward 1773.


He developed a reputation equally a distinguished scientist, together with was invited to write entries for the 3rd edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica on topics such equally electricity, fluid dynamics, together with magnetism. In 1783 he was elected full general secretarial assistant of the newly formed Royal Society of Edinburgh (an organization, similar its London counterpart, devoted to furthering scientific knowledge).

Like many leading figures inward eighteenth-century social club Robison was a Mason, together with Proofs of a Conspiracy was careful to brand a distinction betwixt the respectable, charitable activities of British freemasons, together with the dangers of what the author saw equally an immoral, godless, together with secretive, corrupt version of masonry that had flourished on the continent.

In his lengthy book, Robison alleged that the Illuminati had exactly gone tube after they had been disbanded yesteryear the Elector of Bavaria inward 1787, together with had together with thence plotted to overthrow the Christian religious belief together with all established governments.

He argued that the French Revolution could alone hold upward explained yesteryear such a theory, since the eruption of revolutionary agitation correct across the province could non bring been the lawsuit of a spontaneous uprising, but must bring been the lawsuit of a secret, concerted plan.

His proof of the connector betwixt the banned High German surreptitious social club together with the leaders of the French Revolution was around rather slim testify of an association betwixt around middle-ranking Illuminati together with Mirabeau together with Talleyrand, French freemasons who went on to perish of import politicians inward the 1790s.

Robison’s mass also warned that cells of the suppressed Illuminati had been fix inward America. Along amongst Augustin de Barruel’s four-volume exposé of the unsafe achieve of freemasonry (the showtime 2 voumes of which exactly trounce Proofs of a Conspiracy to the press), Robison’s mass caused a stir inward the fevered climate of the slow 1790s inward America.

His claims were widely reported inward the press, together with influential figures such equally Jedidiah Morse expanded on Robison’s theory inward sermons together with speeches. The scare stories most the dangers of an tube Illuminati conspiracy plotting to undermine America’s liberties fed into the Federalist agitation that resulted inward the Alien together with Sedition Acts of 1798.

Although Robison’s mass barbarous into obscurity i time the immediate political climate changed inward the after nineteenth century, it has continued to hold upward cited equally a major source on the beingness of an all-powerful ultrasecretive conspiracy always since.

Since the 1960s the operate has perish a mainstay of, on the i hand, right-wing diatribes against the ability of shadowy, power-hungry, atheistic globalists (the Illuminati inward this persuasion perish forerunners of Communism) and, on the hand, anti-authoritarian versions of conspiracy theory that exercise an concern human relationship of a long-running, semimystical conspiracy of the elite that its unmaskers believe dates dorsum to beyond fifty-fifty the eighteenth century.