Essentially they had a mission statement that kept going after expired - ie. defeating the oppression of crown, tiara, and torch. That kept going after they got the job done satisfactorily and hence gave us the gift of secular humanism and castrating religion in the public sphere. When the Masons got drowsy we got the Theosophic Society in their stead who took things a bit farther and when they ran out of gas we got we got Lucis Trust, Club of Rome, Trilateral, and all kinds of fun stuff like that.
Something else has been leading a process, typically any organization just ends up functioning as a stage - set up on what seem to be good ideas on their grounds and in response to a violence (in the case of Freemasonry it was all the Voltaire list problems). For most Christians ceremonial magic, Egyptian deity, and Hermeticism usually aren't selling points. The more concrete deliverable though would be secular humanism and an utterly numbing and sterilizing liberalism in the culture that no one has any idea how to reason with. Our culture starts splitting and fraying, apparently individuation is all a huge part of the involution/evolution cycle and with that individuation and customization of the individual is part of keeping the 'great work' on track.
All of this seems like the most responsible thing a person could do if they're a theosophist of one kind or another - ie. assisting the evolution of the earth toward higher level of human development and consciousness. Different theories on that - fixing the fallen astral nature, cultivating the etheric organs, getting people in touch with their higher self (what others would simply call the true self). I'd have to ask them though - with the drug problems, with the juvenile delinquency, when they can't due without locking their doors in the suburbs or can hardly let the kids play outside because of the risk of perverts - how's all that working out? Secularizing was supposed to open the door to forward progress, again sounds great, but it takes something of a pantheistic monist to see things that way.
This is pretty much where a rubbish bill of goods gets sold to people with good intent. Organizations constantly rotate members, the reputation lifts the organization, and if one hundred years later what's happening would make the founders roll over in their grave; the joke is on them.
One thing they did right - they founded the US on the constitution we have and who knows, perhaps all the Hermetic symbolism in Washington DC did pay off. It was a country based on religious morality but under-girded ultimately with reason for the sake of individual liberty where the worst you could get for having a different philosophic opinion is funny looks. It was right the way it was but - the organization flew over its purpose. Francis Bacon thought we'd be the New Atlantis, I think that'll be right on all accounts in full life cycle including the 'Babylon the Great' award.
