... cause could be found in the fusion of three different factors. Barruel's thesis stated that an anti-Christian conspiracy, by a Godless intelligentsia found favour among the masses through the network of freemasons lodges, which then resulted in these ideas evolving into a general contempt for the government and religious leaders of the day, the aristocracy.1 Barruel's argument is heavily reliant on the significance of the ideas of the Enlightenment and the importance of the Encyclopedie but it must be said that it is a little unlikely, and could perhaps even be labelled naive. That this explanation is simplistic is clearly the belief of contemporary historian, Alfred Cobban..."conspiracy...is...the easiest way of accounting for any great calamity of which one does not understand the origins."2 The validity of conspiracy as an explanation for anything is obviously beyond the scope of this essay but it is can certainly be said that the simplicity ...

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