I just ended a few weeks in the company of the occultist Éliphas Lévi (1810-75). This was meant to be a break from my usual subjects: he is known above all else for his drawing of Baphomet and for books like The Dogma and Ritual of High Magic; he also loves a good quip at the expense of atheists, materialists, and pantheists.

But Lévi was also a lifelong left-wing political radical who paid for his early writings with jail time. His grand religio-political vision anticipated a universal religion in a future age of peace and love.

He was also a rationalist of a sort; his personal faith was based on a comparative philosophy of religion, similar to Huston Smith and Joseph Campbell.

Also, as it turns out, one of my earliest translations, Flora Tristan's "Emancipation of Woman" was edited by Lévi, under his given name (Adolphe Constant).

The new books are The Catechism of Peace and The Book of Sages.