Who Are the Illuminati?

3. Beliefs of the Illuminati

Weishaupt was the only non-clerical professor in an institution run by Jesuits. The Jesuits tried to discredit non-clerics and anything Protestant or liberal. Weishaupt became very anti-clerical, and the Illuminati sprang from his wish to spread Enlightenment ideals such as reason, philanthropy and the separation of Church and state. He wrote that his thinking offered freedom “from all religious prejudices; cultivates the social virtues; and animates them by a great, a feasible, and speedy prospect of universal happiness.”