The spirits of centuries gone by are never far away. One of them, Rudolf II, Holy Roman Emperor from 1576 to 1612, was celebrated last summer with a remarkable series of exhibitions relating to his life and reign. One contained objects from his famous cabinet of curiosities. Others were devoted to his patronage of scientists (Kepler, Tycho Brahe) and the arts, both visual and occult - there were probably more alchemists, cabalists and hermeticists in Rudolfine Prague than anywhere else in history. The occult aspects of Prague's history were also the subject of a magnificent exhibition entitled Opus Magnum, mounted under the initiative of Vladislav Zadrobílek, a publisher specialising in esoteric subjects, whose firm, Trigon, also issued the lavish book accompanying the exhibition.
    Appropriately coinciding with these exhibitions was a conference on "Prague, Alchemy and the Hermetic Tradition", organised by the New York Open Centre, which I attended as one of the speakers. Morning plenary sessions were held in the imperial splendour of the Zofin Palace on an island in the Moldau river. Afternoon workshops were held in various locations dotted around the city. Speakers included Joscelyn Godwin on "Alchemy and the Pagan Imagination", Robert Powell on "Tycho Brahe, Kepler, Rudolf II and the Prague Hermetic Renaissance", Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke on "John Dee and Renaissance Magic" and the Czech philosopher Zdenek Neubauer, on "Cartesian Mysteries" : a startling new mystical interpretation of Descartes' thought.
    It was pleasing to find a large number of Czechs at the conference, as well as participants from other central and eastern European countries. The Czechs are heirs to an immensely rich heritage of esoteric thought, which was suppressed during the Nazi and Communist eras but is now enjoying a new flourishing. Symptomatic of this is the revival of a group called Universalia, or the Association of Czech Hermeticists, which was one of the co-sponsors of the conference. In addition to organising lectures, Universalia issues a magazine in Czech entitled Logos, edited and published by Vladislav Zadrobílek.
    In the earlier decades of this century, the members of Universalia and other esoteric circles in the Czech territory formed a remarkable constellation of writers, thinkers, scholars and artists influenced by the inner traditions. Among them were many Freemasons, including the artist Alfons Mucha (1860-1938). Best known for the sensuous art nouveau posters of his Paris period, Mucha also designed some beautiful masonic jewellery. In 1932 he gave a stirring address to his lodge in Pilsen, in which he stated his views on what Masonry is and is not. "A masonic lodge", he said, "is not a club where precious time and brotherly togetherness are wasted in chattering about everyday things, social matters and the like, which could be just as well discussed elsewhere. Nor is Masonry a monastery where every monk builds his own salvation in sombre secrecy and isolation from the world ... No! Our work is strictly and entirely a form of strong self-discipline, so that we may set a shining example to others in our land whom we wish to draw towards our light." (Mucha's address is reproduced in Logos 2, 1994, pp 38-41).
    Today, Freemasonry, along with the other currents I have mentioned, is enjoying a vigorous revival. In the Czech Republic there are now at least five masonic governing bodies of different affiliations, including one recognised by the United Grand Lodge of England. Masonry featured prominently in the Opus Magnum exhibition where there were reconstructions of parts of a masonic temple, portraits of leading Czech masons and a 33-rung ladder placed in the well of a spiral staircase, where the rungs bore the names of the degrees of the Ancient and Accepted Rite. It is inspiring that, despite more than half a century of prohibition, Freemasonry is once again alive and well in this remarkable place.
    Christopher McIntosh