Page 80 - Dragon Flood

The Hellfire Club for a time met in caves dug deep in a hill. Their chambers lay some 200
feet under a church which was atop the hill. The innermost chamber was called “the Inner
temple.” This seems to be a form of religious mockery. The man responsible for digging the
caves and overseeing the activities of the Hellfire Club was Sir Francis Dashwood who had
a known hatred for religion, especially that of the Roman Catholic Church. The members
were all from the upper class aristocracy. When Franklin was in England he joined in the
activities of this club. A website on this organization reveals the following about the evil
works engaged in there.

At the entrance, there was a statue of Venus, stooping to pull a thorn out of her foot. There
is also an inscription from Virgil:

Hic locus est, partes ubi se via findit in ambas;
Hac iter Elyzium nobis; at laeva malorum
Exercet poenas, et ad impia Tartara mittit.

“Here is the place where the way divided into two; this on the right is our route to Heaven,
but the left-hand path exacts punishment from the wicked, and sends them to pitiless
Hell.”

They were, after all, the Hellfire club.

Most prominent is a statue of Priapus. In myth, Priapus was the son of Pan and Venus,
and was born with constant erection. The phallus of the statue was tipped with a flame,
underlining the “fire” aspect of the club. And if anyone was left in any doubt, there was
another inscription:

PENI TENTO
non
PENITENTI

“A tense penis, not penitence,” suggesting the club is not a Christian penitent movement…
but a sex club. That sex was on the agenda, is no longer in any doubt. Next to the chapel
in Medmenham were some cells which, according to Horace Walpole, were fitted with cots
and the “brothers take their women there.” “Among the amusement,” John Wilkes said,
“they had sometimes a mock celebration of the more ridiculous rites of the foreign
religious orders, of the Church of Rome, of the Franciscans in particular…”

Dashwood had a daughter, Rachel Fanny Antonina, who after her father’s death got a
reputation as being a “magnificent witch.” She studied the occult books her father had left
her...

It is clear that the Club practiced sexual activity, but perhaps there was also a magical
dimension to it. This may have been why the caves were later believed to be “evil.”
[Source: http://www.philipcoppens.com/hellfire.html]

This debauched and profane club hosted orgies, engaged in drunkenness, and very likely