Freemasonry connection with occult?

In the Craft, formal adoption of occult practices or "Magnetic Freemasonry" was never accepted, though symbols such as the deacon's wand carry peaceful rather than magical import 12. Albert C. Mackey attributes claims of an intimate connection between Freemasonry and magic primarily to French writers, notably Jean-Baptiste Ragon—who wrote of "Occult Freemasonry"—and Alphonse Louis Constant (Eliphas Levi) 1. Ragon conflated magic with Persian magism, medieval philosophy, and animal magnetism, while Cagliostro incorporated magical superstitions into his spurious Masonic rites 1.

Where mystical connections are studied, they center largely on the power of sacred names 1. In the advanced degrees of higher Freemasonry, onomatology (the science of names) receives light from the dogmas of magic 1. Within the Scottish Rite, the Eighteenth Degree explicitly reflects Rosicrucian influence and symbolism 2, while the degrees above the Eighteenth and below the Thirty-third are designated Philosophic Degrees because they cultivate a system of pure theosophy 1. Hermetic principles were similarly integrated into the Philosophic Scottish Rite in 1775 by disciples of Pernetti's Hermetic Rite 1.

Philosophically, some writers equate the alchemical philosopher's stone with the spiritual temple constructed in Freemasonry 1. A close historical link is also argued between Masonry and Hermeticism, whose later development includes the Rosicrucian Brotherhood 3. Associations between Masons and Rosicrucians appear in English literature as early as 1638 in Henry Adamson's Perth verses 2. Finally, theories of an occult Templar continuity, such as those surrounding the Rite of Strict Observance, were popularized by writers like Cadet de Gassicourt, though Arthur Edward Waite treats such conspiracy claims as historical curiosities 2.