Solemn Historical Dissertation on the Rosicrucians

III. When, therefore, some defenders—being a little wiser and more sagacious—saw that these things were entirely concocted and devoid of all historical force and truth, whatever is spread about the founder of their order, and that the imposition of the name had thus been poorly derived, they became anxious, I would say by prudence or perhaps by cunning, to provide another reason for this imposition by which they could render the society lovable. Hence, others thought this term was born by chance, or because it was quite common among Catholics in monasteries, and is accustomed to be attributed to those who have drunk together, and one of whom has offered a cup to another as a sign of brotherhood, or because "Brother" and "Companion" are very often used as synonyms. See Neuhusius, in his Admonition on the Brethren, p. 50. Others, as M. Grißmann has it in his Getreuer Eckhart, p. 58, repeating from the same Kromaier, Caroli, and many others in the books cited below, claim that the denomination was taken from the oracle of the Prophet Hosea, Chapter XIV, 6: Israel shall flourish like the rose, and his root as Lebanon. For they pronounce, far too boldly and ineptly, that this prophecy pertains to the said society. Others, and not a few, say the reason for this appellation was drawn through a certain allusion to the insignia of Dr. Luther, which bore a heart pierced by a cross and enclosed in a rose, to which our Megalander A term often used for a great man or leader always used to append the following words, which also served for him as a symbol:

The Christian's heart walks upon roses /
When it stands in the midst under the cross.

To the allusion, imitation, and glory of this, therefore—as some of them pretend—they also use, in the place of a token and seal, a rose cross, that is, a rose pierced by a cross; this they did, however, perhaps more to the disgrace of our Hero, and so that they might cast cataracts a clouding of the eyes/deception upon other men and cover up their own frauds and perizomata girdles/coverings and tricks, as Grißmann not badly conjectured in the same place.