{"id":16683,"date":"2012-02-26T09:12:47","date_gmt":"2012-02-26T09:12:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/?p=16683"},"modified":"2026-01-08T19:20:55","modified_gmt":"2026-01-08T19:20:55","slug":"bulwer-lytton-sir-edward-n","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/bulwer-lytton-sir-edward-n\/","title":{"rendered":"Bulwer-Lytton, Sir Edward"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sir Edward<\/strong> Bulwer-Lytton (1803\u20131873)<\/strong> was a British politician and \"Bulwer-Lytton\"<\/a>novelist. He coined a number of phrases that are still in use today; \u2018the great unwashed\u2019, \u2018the pen is mightier than the sword\u2019 and \u2018pursuit of the almighty dollar\u2019(f)<\/sup>.\u00a0 The last is from his 1871 science fiction novel, Vril: The Power of the Coming Race<\/em>[<\/sup>1336<\/sup><\/a>]<\/sup>,\u00a0which describes an underground race of superior beings with advanced powers.<\/p>\n

I have been reminded by Ronan Coghlan, <\/a>that the beef extract, Bovril, developed in the 1870s, had used ‘vril’ as part of its name to imply ‘bull-power’!<\/p>\n

He was adopted by English Rosicrucians <\/a>as their \u2018Grand Patron\u2019. The influence of Bulwer-Lytton extended to Helena Blavatsky<\/span> <\/a>who \u201ccompared Vril with the sidereal force of the Atlanteans, called Mash-Mak.\u201d<\/em> (e)<\/sup><\/p>\n

William Scott-Elliott <\/a>took Bulwer-Lytton\u2019s ideas seriously and has shown their influence in his references to Atlantis. In the early part of the 20th<\/sup> century, this fictional concept of vril<\/em> was incorporated into esoteric Nazism, including the work of Brazilian right-winger, Gustavo Barosso<\/span>.<\/a><\/p>\n

Even today there is a so-called Church of Vrilology<\/a>(b)<\/sup>, which includes belief in a Black Sea <\/a>location for Atlantis!(c)<\/sup><\/p>\n

On a lighter note, Bulwer-Lytton\u2019s name has been given to a competition(d)<\/sup> that \u201cchallenges entrants to compose the opening sentence to the worst of all possible novels.\u201d There have been many worthy winners.<\/p>\n

(b)<\/sup> Church of Vrilology, Robert Blumetti, Balder Rising, Baldur, Odin, Wotan, Woden, Vril (archive.org)<\/a>\u00a0
\n<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

(c)<\/sup> https:\/\/web.archive.org\/web\/20130108091223if_\/http:\/\/www.vrilology.org\/Atlantis_page.htm<\/a>
\n<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

(d)<\/span><\/sup> Home | The Bulwer Lytton Fiction Contest (bulwer-lytton.com)<\/a>
\n<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

(e)<\/span><\/sup> Fortean Times<\/em> No.303 July 2013 p.43<\/p>\n

(f)<\/sup> Edward Bulwer-Lytton – Wikipedia<\/a> *<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sir Edward Bulwer-Lytton (1803\u20131873) was a British politician and novelist. He coined a number of phrases that are still in use today; \u2018the great unwashed\u2019, \u2018the pen is mightier than the sword\u2019 and \u2018pursuit of the almighty dollar\u2019(f).\u00a0 The last is from his 1871 science fiction novel, Vril: The Power of the Coming Race[1336],\u00a0which describes […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[27,3256,597,3634,1811,415,1700,598],"class_list":["post-16683","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-black-sea","tag-church-of-vrilology","tag-edward-bulwer-lytton","tag-gustavo-barosso","tag-helena-blavatsky","tag-rosicrucians","tag-vril","tag-william-scott-elliott"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16683","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16683"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16683\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":65906,"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16683\/revisions\/65906"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16683"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16683"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlantipedia.ie\/samples\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16683"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}