In 1995, to honor the role of Central Europe in the spiritual history of the West and to celebrate the work of the English scholar of Renaissance Hermeticism Dame Frances Yates, the New York Open Center (in association with Gnosis Magazine and Oibibio in Amsterdam) invited students of Rosicrucianism and the Western Mystery traditions to Cesky Krumlow in the Czech Republic to discuss the historical backgrounds of Rosicrucianism. Two years later a second meeting was held in Prague to celebrate the Hermetic world of Rudolf II. The result is this book: in which John Matthews addresses the relationship between the Grail and the Rose; Christopher Bamford speaks of the prehistory of the Rosicrucian reformation in the late Middle Ages -- among women mystics, alchemists, Cathars, Franciscan spirituals, as well as in Luther and the great Paracelsus; Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke tells the wild tale of John Dee's mission to central Europe; Joscelyn Godwin unfolds the paradigmatic Rosicrucian life of Michael Maier; Claire Goodrick-Clarke recounts influence of Comenius; Paul Bembridge speaks of Rosicrucian Resurgence at the Court of Cromwell; Robert Sardello speaks on the alchemy of the senses; Rafal Prinke tells the story of the Polish alchemist, Sendivogius; and Christopher McIntosh speaks of the Rosicrucian Legacy. Also included are the texts of the two Rosicrucian Manifestos -- the Fama and the Confessio -- as well as the Consideratio brevis of Philip of Gabella, and the Speculum sophicum rhodostauricum of Theophilus Schweighardt. Illustrated.