The Society of the Elect (Feb 1891) — Inner Circle, Outer Circle

Carroll Quigley's own account, from the text of The Anglo-American Establishment: 'One wintry afternoon in February 1891, three men were engaged in earnest conversation in London... these men were organizing a secret society.' The three were Cecil Rhodes, the journalist William T. Stead, and Reginald Baliol Brett (later Lord Esher). Quigley: 'The plan of organization provided for an inner circle, to be known as "The Society of the Elect," and an outer circle, to be known as "The Association of Helpers." Within The Society of the Elect, the real power was to be exercised by the leader, and a "Junta of Three." The leader was to be Rhodes, and the Junta was to be Stead, Brett, and Alfred Milner. In accordance with this decision, Milner was added to the society by Stead shortly after the meeting.' His transcribed 'ideal arrangement' also lists a Circle of Initiates including Cardinal Manning, General Booth, Albert Grey and Arthur Balfour. WHAT THIS DOES TO THE ENGINE'S EXISTING RECORD: canon's round_table dates the movement to 1909 under Lionel Curtis. Quigley's text places that formation as the OUTER ring of an older body — 'The Milner Kindergarten and the Round Table Group, for example, were two different names for The Association of Helpers and were thus only part of the society, since the real center of the organization, The Society of the Elect, continued to exist and recruited new members from the outer circle as seemed necessary.' The engine records the two-ring structure as Quigley describes it and adopts no claim about what the inner ring did after its founding; the persistent-directorate reading stays where canon already holds it, at rhodes_trust, contested and not collapsed. Bears on the named-power-as-shield question: the visible, named bodies are on this account the outer circle. Apex (b) documented organisational form; name no holder.