The Builder Magazine
November 1918 - Volume IV - Number 11
MASONIC WAR WORK IN ENGLAND
BY BROTHER DUDLEY WRIGHT, ASSISTANT EDITOR "THE FREEMASON," LONDON
BROTHER Dr. Fort Newton has honored me with the request that I should put on paper some particulars of what the brethren in England are doing toward the relief of the distress and suffering brought into being through this terrible war and what steps they are taking to bring about, in an honourable manner, the end toward which all eyes are turned. The task is not an easy one for the very reason that Brother Fort Newton himself gave only a few days since at the City Temple. English people do not advertise, except it be to announce in a loud voice the indiscretions they commit. Particularly is this so of the brethren of the Craft in England. I have frequently met brethren who have almost shuddered when they have seen the report of a Masonic gathering in the secular press. "Oh, how wrong !" has been their exclamation. It is, perhaps, unnecessary for me to say that I make them shudder as often as I can. There are members of the Craft who refuse to subscribe to Masonic journals on the ground that they are unnecessary and ought to be abolished. But possibly there may be another explanation of this refusal.
The beneficence of the Craft in England has, however, and rightly so, been honoured with magnificent advertisements in the English press of late. The extraordinary results achieved by the great Masonic institutions at their recent festivals, when, according to the latest tabulation, sums amounting in the aggregate to considerably over a quarter of a million pounds sterling, or, according to the coinage of New England, a million and a half dollars were collected, have excited not a little wonderment and a good deal of admiration in that large world outside the Craft. This beneficence, however, is but a very small part of the whole that has been, and is being, done by the great Masonic body in this country towards relieving distress, pain and suffering occasioned by the war.
Apart from the great London area, which comprises nearly eight hundred lodges, England and Wales are divided up into forty-five Masonic Provinces, which include in their dominion more than 1,800 lodges. Every one of these Provinces has its own Provincial Benevolent Fund and each of these has reported increased receipts during the year at the annual meetings which have just been held-- East Lancashire has more than doubled its income--and each, following in the wake of the three great institutions, has elected its beneficiaries without ballot. Then, during the past few months, the Freemasons War Hospital has extended its operations by taking over that portion of Fulham Palace, so generously offered by the Bishop of London to the Red Cross Society.
The Provinces, also have been assiduous in other ways. The Wallasey brethren purchased and equipped a six-cylinder, forty-five horsepower motor ambulance which they presented to the local branch of the Red Cross Society. The Nottinghamshire brethren set out to collect the money necessary for the installation of an up-to-date orthopaedic treatment for the wounded soldiers in the local hospital, but the Masonic response to the appeal issued was so spontaneous and hearty that they found themselves in a position to erect a new wing for the apparatus and patients as well as the apparatus. This, apart from the fact that the same brethren have established a hut at Chipstone Camp at a cost of 1,300 pounds and are maintaining five houses for Belgian refugees. In a similar manner the North London Freemasons undertook to provide a motor ambulance for the conveyance of wounded soldiers. The sum contributed enabled them to do this and provide also one year's maintenance. Now they are on the road to supplying a second ambulance.
In the East End of London the brethren, without difficulty, found themselves in possession of more than 1,000 pounds which they needed for the endowment of a bed in Queen Mary's Hospital and so they placed the balance, together with other sums they are still collecting, towards the new wing which is to be erected in commemoration of the brave men of East Ham who have fallen in the conflict. Warwickshire and other Provinces have also provided motor ambulances. Bath-- there are only five lodges in Bath--provided an organ for the local war hospital. These are but a few of the things that have been done, for so much has been done by stealth. One member of the Craft established on his own account a "Smoker's Gift" and spends a great portion of his time collecting the names and addresses of brethren and their sons serving at the front in order that he may send them gifts of tobacco. It is an open secret that one volunteer regiment composed entirely of men over military age, or otherwise disqualified, and performing regular and useful service was really brought into being by members of the Craft by whom it is almost entirely manned. The members of the London Rank Association, all men of middle or mature age, devote time to visiting the hospitals, rendering various services to their fellow Masons or their relatives there.
It would be practically impossible to enumerate the Masonic church services which have been held, at all of which the offertories have been devoted either to the Freemasons War Hospital or to some other fund directly connected with the relief of suffering or distress occasioned by the war.
Many lodges, particularly those peculiarly fitted for such hospitality by their constitution, such as the Royal Colonial Institute Lodge and the Anglo-Colonial Lodge, have made it a special feature to welcome American and Colonial brethren in khaki passing through this country on their way to the front. Handsome contributions have been made to the Interned Prisoners' War Fund-- the Province of Northamptonshire alone gave 1,000 pounds -- the Belgian Relief and other War Funds.
This is but a part of what has been accomplished in England and Wales. The Grand Lodges of Scotland and Ireland have been equally active and generous in proportion to their strength, as have the sister English-speaking Grand Lodges across the seas and the thirty District Grand Lodges working under the United Grand Lodge of England and Wales.
----o----
MATTHEW THORNTON
BY BRO. GEORGE W. BAIRD. P.G.M., DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA
Matthew Thornton, whose memorial is shown as the frontispiece of this issue, was one of the three signers of the Declaration of Independence who were born in Ireland. His ancestry were Scotch, and migrated to the north of Ireland about the year 1650. Thornton was born in 1714, and came to the American Colonies with his parents and other Scotch-Irish families, in 1717.
The Thorntons were Presbyterians. They figured prominently in the Colonial Wars, the Revolution, the War with Mexico and the Civil War and, no doubt, the descendants are now participating in the present World War "Somewhere in France."
Matthew Thornton was a physician, enjoying a good practice in the time of the Colonies. In 1775, as Surgeon of a New Hampshire Regiment, he went with the expedition to Cape Breton, which resulted in the capture of Louisbourg. The town of Thornton was named fol Matthew Thornton, and granted to him and others by the King in 1763.
In 1760 he was married to Hannah Jack, who was considered a great beauty. Five children were the result of the union, all of whom became distinguished.
Dr. Thornton held many public offices. Among them were Representative in the Legislature, selectman of Londonderry and moderator in the town meetings. He was commissioned by the Royal Government as Colonel of the Londonderry Regiment, which he commanded. He was commissioned a Justice of the Peace of the Court of Common Pleas, in which position he served for a number of years and attended the Court in general session.
He was active in church work, and advocated a uniform and equitable system of taxation in the church.
He served in the Second Provincial Congress and represented the Provisional Government in the Watertown Congress, in which body he was chosen president pro tem, and was on the committee to prepare a plan of ways and means to furnish troops, which was at once effective.
He was an excellent Greek and Latin scholar, had a marvelous command of the English language, and was usually the central figure in all assemblies. Though much in love with his medical profession, he was continually persuaded away from it, into public life, by acclamation of the people. In that day of patriotism the office sought the man--but, alas, how times have changed.
In 1775 Thornton was on the committee of safety. The President invited him to consult with Franklin, Lynch and Harrison, in the task of forming an army.
Matthew Thornton was a member of an Army Lodge of the 28th Regiment, Foot, and was initiated at Londonderry. This fact is confirmed by Gould in volume IV of his "Library of Masonic History," and is in accordance with the family traditions, so we are informed by a direct descendant, Mr. Charles F. Adams, who resides in New York City. The records of this lodge were lost and never afterwards found, as was the case of so many of the Revolutionary records.
The picture of the monument tells of the gratitude of New Hampshire. The monument is of dressed granite and is situated at Thornton's Ferry, a town in New Hampshire, near Merrimac, on ground once the property of Dr. Thornton and which is still in the possession of his descendants.
----o----
MASONIC JURISPRUDENCE BY BRO. ROSCOE POUND, DEAN, HARVARD LAW SCHOOL
IV--MASONIC LAW MAKING
NO idea is today more familiar than the idea of making law. Wherever any sort of sovereign authority exists, men take for granted that it will proceed to justify its existence by copious legislation and assume as a matter of course that the quantity of its legislative output is the measure of its efficiency. This was not always true. Indeed conscious law-making on any large scale is a wholly modern phenomenon not only in the state but in those human organizations which exist to conserve other than political values and secure other than political interests, but are organized along lines analogous to those which govern politically organized society. Hence by way of introduction it is worth while to give some account of the development of legislation in the legal systems of modern states.
Five stages may be perceived in the development of legislation as the everyday agency of law-making: (1) unconscious legislation in the period of customary law, (2) declaratory legislation in the period when the traditional law is reduced to writing, (3) selection and amendment when by the political union of peoples with divergent customs it becomes necessary to choose in declaring the custom of the new whole, (4) conscious constructive law-making as an occasional expedient, at first to meet political exigencies, but gradually to effect important changes here and there in the legal system in great emergencies, and (5) habitual legislation as the ordinary agency of development, usually culminating in codification of the law as a whole.
In the first stage of legal development. the stage of traditional modes of decision based upon repeated decisions by supposed divine inspiration, there is not a little unconscious law-making. The case in hand may not be exactly like one which has arisen previously, but those who have the custody of the tradition may assimilate it thereto. Moreover the custodians of the tradition may warp it more or less unconsciously to meet new needs. The laws obeyed are regarded as having always existed. Men are not conscious of the innovations which creep in from time to time and in the best of faith confuse new usages with the old. Thus for a time law-making is a purely subconscious process.
Later we come upon a stage of declaratory legislation. In the beginnings of law all legislation, as such, is of this type. It is not an authoritative making of new law--it is an authoritative publication of law already existing. All the so-called ancient codes are of this type. Indeed the prologue to the laws of Manu, reciting how Bhrigu, who had learned the tradition from Manu, authoritatively dictated them to the sages, the prologue to the Senchus Mor, in the Ancient Laws of Ireland, telling how the bards were brought together and recited the traditional laws to St. Patrick, and the prologue to the Salic Law, telling how chosen men from the different villages were brought together and discussed among themselves the traditions, as they remembered them, till they arrived at an authoritative text to be reduced to writing--such prologues tell the story of primitive legislation.
Conscious law-making begins when it becomes necessary to make choice between conflicting traditions or when conflicting traditions must be harmonized through amendment. This necessity arises whenever attempt is made to reduce the tradition to writing or to compare and re-edit different versions of the written tradition. It becomes acute when attempt is made to declare the common custom of a political unit formed by the union of formerly distinct tribes or peoples with customs of their own. An example is to be seen in the laws of Alfred. He tells us that he had to pick and choose and even amend, but adds "I durst not set down much of my own." From this it is an easy stage, but one taken only gradually and occasionally, to pass to conscious constructive law-making. The first step in this direction comes when men perceive that by changing the written record of the law they can change the law which theretofore had been held eternal and immutable. Even when this discovery is made, however, after a brief law-making ferment, the law settles back to a process of growth through development of tradition, and it is not until the maturity of legal systems that we enter upon a real stage of legislation.
A similar development may be seen in Masonic lawmaking, and it will conduce to sounder appreciation of our written law to look at its history in this way. It is true a wholly different view of the subject became classical in Masonic literature. Thus Mackey, after considering the landmarks, says:
"Next to the unwritten laws, or Landmarks of Masonry, come its written or statutory laws. These are the 'regulations' as they are usually called, which have been enacted from time to time by General Assemblies, Grand Lodges, or other supreme authorities of the Order. They are in their character either general or local." (Jurisprudence, chapter 2.)
We are then told that the "General Regulations are those that have been enacted by such bodies as had at the time universal jurisdiction over the craft," and the year 1721 being fixed as the decisive point beyond which such general regulations were no longer possible because there were no longer general assemblies with general powers, ten authentic and authoritative acts of general Masonic legislation down to 1721 are set forth as follows: (1) The "Old York Constitutions of 926" (for which he gives Oliver's abridged version of the articles and points from the Halliwell MS.); (2) the "Constitutions of Edward III" (taken from Anderson's Constitutions, 2d edition); (3) the "Regulations of 1663"; (4) the "Ancient Installation Charges" (taken from Preston's Illustrations); (5) the "Ancient Charges at Makings" (also from Preston); (6) the "Regulation of 1703" (given on the authority of Preston); (7) the "Regulations of 1717" (given on the same authority); (8) the "Regulations of 1720" (an authentic regulation, adopted at a quarterly communication of the Grand Lodge of England, June 24, 1720); (9) the "Charges Approved in 1722" (presented to the Grand Lodge of England in 1721 by Anderson and Desaguliers, adopted March 25, 1722, and published in the first edition of Anderson's Constitutions, 1723); and (10) the "General Regulations of 1721" compiled by George Payne, Grand Master in 1720, approved by the Grand Lodge of England in 1721, printed in the first edition of Anderson's Constitutions. Thus, it will be noted, we are asked to believe in a series of acts of Masonic legislation, wholly analogous to a codification of the law or the enactment of a new paragraph of the written law by a modern American Grand Lodge, extending from the tenth century to the eighteenth. It is the first step in a proper understanding of Masonic Jurisprudence to discard this idea completely. There were no such assemblies as this conception of the MS. constitutions postulates down to 1717, and it was not till the eighteenth century that men began to think of the wholesale making of laws out of whole cloth as a normal, much less a legitimate process.
Thanks to the studies of Hughan and Gould and Begemann, we know much more about the MS. constitutions than was known in 1859, when Mackey's Jurisprudence was written. Today no serious Masonic scholar believes that constitutions "were framed at the City of York in the year 926" or that the constitutions so framed "were seen approved and confirmed in the reign of Henry VI." The unconfirmed authority of Anderson and Preston, moreover, will not suffice to establish legislation of the first quarter of the eighteenth century. What we find is not a uniform tract of law-making, analogous to that set forth in the statutes of the realm, but rather a written tradition from the end of the fourteenth century, obviously based on an older oral tradition, changing and developing slowly in the course of successive transcripts, and laid hold of on the rise of the Grand Lodge system in the eighteenth century as the basis of Masonic law. In other words, we may see an unconscious development in the (Masonically) pre-historic period of oral tradition, declaratory law-making when in the middle ages the traditional regulations were reduced to writing, selection and amendment from time to time as the MSS. were recopied and re-edited, conscious constructive law-making as an occasional expedient in the fore part of the eighteenth century in the Mother Grand Lodge, and finally an era of habitual legislative law-making in the nineteenth century which has reached its highest development in America. Gould's conclusion that the earliest of our authentic MSS. shows us "a gild or fraternity which commemorated the science without practising the art of masonry" seems well founded. It was as far back as the fourteenth century a "fraternity from whom all but the memory or tradition of its ancient trade had departed." Hence, as Gould puts it, "many of the old laws or disciplinary regulations of the earlier Masons became fossilized or petrified." "They passed out of use, though retaining their hold on the written and unwritten traditions of the society" (Concise History, Am. ed. 308). When, in the eighteenth century, organized Grand Lodge Masonry became a world-wide institution, these traditions had to be put to a new use. Instead of being read to or shown to the initiate, they had to be transformed into a body of law for a society with new values to conserve and new interests to secure. In this respect Mackey's instinct was sound when he fixed upon Payne's General Regulations of 1721 as the turning point.
Why should the Masons of the last half of the eighteenth century and of the first three quarters of the nineteenth century have deceived themselves so completely upon a matter of such consequence? One reason, and perhaps the chief reason, is to be found in eighteenth-century ideas of codes and of law-making. For one thing, the eighteenth century was an age of absolute governments. The local, feudal, decentralized governments of medieval Europe had definitely broken down. In England the Wars of the Roses had demonstrated that the general security called for something stronger and the Tudors and Stuarts had furnished it, howbeit the struggles against the Stuarts had preserved for the modern world the sound kernel of the medieval polity. In France, which in the days of Louis XIV had furnished the model for eighteenth-century politics, centralized royal government had triumphed. The Roman Corpus Iuris, compiled in sixth-century Constantinople, gave us Byzantine ideas of law as the product of the sovereign will, and the Byzantine theory of law, expounded by French publicists in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, accorded so exactly with what men saw before their eyes that it scarcely needed the aid of an idea that Roman law was embodied reason to give it currency. The time was one of codes and legislative programs. Men spoke of the "codes" of the Anglo-Saxon kings and thought of the traditional law of English-speaking peoples as a body of statutes worn down by time. It was the fashion among historians to attribute all legal and political institutions to the deliberate invention of this or that ruler. A sounder view came in with Hegel's philosophy and the rise of the historical school in the nineteenth century. But that view did not reach Anglo-American scholarship at once and did not become significant in American thought till some time after the Civil War.
Again we must remember that the eighteenth century thought of itself as the age of reason. Men had absolute faith in reason. They believed that they could work out everything by their own unaided reason without troubling to do the futile work of investigating details. Moreover they believed firmly in what they called "natural law." They conceived that what ought to be and what was were to be made synonymous; that whenever one could show a moral principle that ought to govern conduct he had thereby shown a legal principle that did govern it. This attitude led naturally to confusion of what ought to be and what was, and it was an easy transition from what one would like to think to what ought to be. Thus much of eighteenth-century historical writing was ultra-subjective. It is a record of what the writer thought a priori must have been the course of history, assuming that to show what ought to have been sufficiently demonstrated what was. When, therefore, Gould says of Preston that he was "a Masonic visionary who--untrammeled by any laws of evidence wrote a large amount of enthusiastic rubbish, wherein are displayed a capacity of belief and capability of assertion which are hardly paralleled at the present day by the utterances of the company promoter, or even of the mining engineer," he is but saying that Preston was a child of his time. The need of fortifying the Grand Lodge system by an appeal to antiquity was strong. Men were not trained in historical method. Rather they relied on their individual reasons for all things, and what they took to be reason was often no more than enthusiasm and desire.
Thus the first five of Mackey's ten forms of the old written law of Masonry take on a wholly different aspect. The sixth and seventh are Preston's generalizations from the result of the establishment of the Grand Lodge system. The principles which he formulates in these so-called regulations were thoroughly established in his day. Characteristically he assumed that they must have resulted from deliberate law-making and, fixing the terms as accurately as he could, he reported them circumstantially as to the time and place of their adoption, exactly as the eighteenth-century historian could report the precise words spoken in a council of war centuries before and report out of his own reason the details of intrigues and conspiracies, of debates of secret councils, and even of the communings of a king or commander with himself. Indeed the apocryphal character of the so-called regulation of 1703, which contradicts all that we know of Masonry from the fourteenth to the eighteenth centuries, suggested itself to Mackey, who sought to avoid the difficulty by interpretation in a footnote. The remaining four are genuine examples of legislative declaration of existing law, with minor emendations, or of legislative innovations to secure new interests and conserve new values.
Today the written law of the craft in any particular Jurisdiction, which Mackey would call its local regulations, is made up commonly of four elements: (1) constitutions of the Grand Lodge, which are usually compiled and edited from time to time and thus kept in organized, systematic form exactly as a state of the Union compiles its legislation, or else after a definite compilation are held in that form by a practice of introducing new legislation in the form of amendments of or additions to this or that paragraph; (2) decisions of the Grand Lodge on appeal from the Masters of subordinate (or constituent) lodges or from the lodges themselves; (3) edicts of the Grand Master; and (4) answers of the Grand Master to inquiries as to the law submitted to him, or decisions of the Grand Master upon questions asked by Masters of lodges with reference to matters pending before them or their lodges. To understand these we must turn to the Roman law where these forms of law developed and got the names which still attach to them not only in the law of the state but in Masonic law.
A Roman emperor made or declared the law by constitution, by decision (decree), by edict, and by rescript or letter. He had this power, in legal theory, because at his accession the Roman people had specially conferred it upon him for his life by a special act of legislation. Down to the reign of Diocletian, at least, in political theory, the Roman state was a republic. Sovereignty was in the Roman people. The emperor was only "princeps," first citizen, a citizen upon whom the Roman people had devolved their sovereignty for the time being by an act of legislative authority upon an extraordinary occasion. Later, in Byzantine times, the emperor came to be thought of as the repository of sovereignty and the source of law. But in classical times he simply wielded the powers of the sovereign Roman people which had been devolved upon him. Accordingly as the Roman people in their legislative assembly could enact a statute (lex) the emperor, wielding the legislative power of the people, could enact a law. What he thus established (constituit) by virtue of the legislative authority devolved upon him, was called a constitution (constitutio). Thus in Roman law a constitution is a rule established by legislative act. And such precisely is a constitution in Masonry. Only with us the legislative power of the fraternity in each jurisdiction has devolved upon the Grand Lodge. Hence what the Grand Lodge establishes and promulgates as a rule of law, by virtue of its legislative authority, is a constitution. At the end of the eighteenth century, when sovereign peoples began to adopt for themselves a fundamental law, fixing the framework of government and imposing limitations upon the several organs of government so set up, the term constitution came to be applied to such enactments of the sovereign people. Thus it has come into use in America, and to a less extent elsewhere, in the sense of a superior fundamental law, to which ordinary acts of the several departments of government or of the agencies of a society must yield, a conception growing out of the circumstances of colonial government in America prior to the Revolution, where executive and legislative acts were subject to the measure of the colonial charter. In Masonic law we preserve the older use of the term, speaking from the fore part of the eighteenth century, when the modern political written constitution was quite unknown.
Another way in which the Roman emperor made or declared law was by his decisions in causes taken to him on appeal or determined by him directly. These were called decrees. For the Roman magistrate had no power to render a judgment of the strict law. This could be done only by judices or arbitrators, chosen for the case in hand, somewhat as the common law demands the verdict of a jury as the foundation of a judgment. But the magistrate could decide certain things extra ordinem and render a decree, and this power, along with the other powers of the Roman magistrates, was specially devolved upon the emperor at his accession. In Masonry, the power of determining appeals, as an attribute of sovereignty--for so it was regarded when men forgot how the Roman emperors came by it-- devolved upon the Grand Lodge, to which in the eighteenth century sovereignty definitely passed.
Still another way in which the Roman emperor made or declared the law was by his edict. The power of issuing an edict belonged originally to the superior magistrates of the Republic and was exercised chiefly by the praetors or judicial magistrates. Strictly the edict was a pronouncement by the magistrate of the course which he proposed to take in the administration of his office. It was a sort of post-election platform from which the citizen might know what to expect from the officer in question. But this easily became a law governing the administration of his office, and when the magisterial power was devolved upon the emperor the power of issuing an edict came to be in substance a power of issuing general orders governing matters of administration. The term was so used in French public law in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and was generally used in this sense at the time when Masonic law was formative. In this same sense we use it in Masonry. An edict is a general administrative, as distinguished from a judicial order, prescribing the conduct of some matter of administration, on prescribing the conduct of Masons in some matter of administrative cognizance. A good example may be seen in the edicts of Grand Masters in different jurisdictions against the use of cipher rituals.
Finally a Roman emperor made or declared the law by means of rescripts. The rescript or letter was an answer which the emperor returned to a question put to him by a judge or magistrate who had a cause pending before him. In the classical Roman polity the judices who had a cause before them were advised as to the law by the expert opinion of a jurisconsult. In the imperial polity the emperor was taken to be the most authoritative jurisconsult and the practice of submitting questions for his authoritative opinion as to the law was a natural result. This practice passed to the canon law, where the Papal rescripts had similar authority, and was well known to the law of continental Europe in the eighteenth century. Naturally it came into Masonic practice along with other institutions of the time when, in the formative period of Grand Lodge Masonry, a universal polity had to be set up rapidly. The decisions of the Grand Master in answer to questions might very well be called rescripts, exactly as his administrative general orders are called edicts. They are not decisions in a judicial sense, they are authoritative opinions of the most authoritative jurisconsult of the craft for the time being. Being mere opinions there is no impropriety in the practice of many Grand Lodges to which the Grand Master regularly reports his opinions for review. His decision is not reviewed. Indeed Mackey seems justified in his position that the decisions of a Grand Master as such are not or at least ought not to be reviewable. In legal theory what happens might be explained thus: The opinion of the Grand Master upon the point of law involved in his answer is considered and the doctrine which it announced is given the force of a constitution by the approval of the Grand Lodge or else the doctrine is rejected as a rule for the future and some other rule given legislative authority.
It will be noted that of the four forms of making or declaring the law which were in use by the Roman emperor, two are appropriate to the Grand Lodge and two to the Grand Master. In the later Roman imperial polity all the powers of sovereignty were in the emperor. As the Institutes put it, his will had the force of law. But along with the imperial Roman conceptions, familiar to the time through the writings of publicists based on Justinian's law books, another set of conceptions were familiar to Englishmen at the time when Masonic legal institutions were formative. The memory of the contests with the Stuart kings was still fresh and in the course of that contest English lawyers had resurrected and furbished up many ideas that belonged to the polity of the Plantagenets. Thus the British constitution in the eighteenth century was a superposition, as it were, of what were then modern ideas and institutions upon the older and radically different ideas and institutions of medieval England. As a result the balance was maintained chiefly by custom and precedent and respect for traditional lines between authorities and magistracies with large potentialities of theoretical jurisdiction. Experience gradually settled the lines and respect for precedent established them. The same phenomenon is to be seen in the development of Anglo-American Masonic polity. Legislation by general regulations or constitutions and the power of judicial decision on appeal, with the incidental power of so declaring the law, became functions of the Grand Lodge. The more nearly administrative functions of issuing edicts and rendering what may fairly be called rescripts became functions of the Grand Master. They can hardly be said to be common-law powers in the same sense as those universally customary prerogatives which Mackey sought to establish as Landmarks. No doubt Grand Lodge legislation may interfere, as it sometimes has done, to abridge or modify them. But it is significant that with the example of the separation of powers in American public law constantly before them, American Masonic lawyers have acquiesced in and developed a system of law-making proceeding on radically different lines and originating in the law books of Rome.
Direct, deliberate law-making by constitutions is the type of Masonic law-making that calls chiefly for our attention. Maine tells us that "the capital fact in the mechanism of modern states is the energy of legislatures." True, the lawyer is somewhat skeptical. He doubts with good reason the possibility of achieving by law more than a small fraction of what the promoters of new laws confidently expect. But the layman's faith in the efficacy of legislative law-making is unbounded and there is no evidence of abatement of the huge annual output of our political law-making machinery. There are many causes behind this phenomenon. But one is of special significance for Masonry and is behind a similar excess of zeal for legislative law-making in too many of our jurisdictions. The theory that law is the will of the sovereign, that a sovereign democracy, or its representatives or delegates in its name, can make law by the simple process of translating its will for the time being into chapters and sections, the magic words "be it enacted" justifying all that follow, arose by applying to sovereign peoples the ideas which had been worked out with reference to absolute personal sovereigns. The will of the emperor had the force of law; hence the will of the people is to have the force of law. But a confusion was involved here. The emperor owed it to his subjects to use his will rationally when willing law. The power to give his declarations of will the force of law did not absolve him from obligation to measure the content of those declarations by reason. Our fathers were conscious of this with good reason and so sought to. limit law-making and give security against arbitrary and capricious action by bills of rights. But these securities are available only within comparatively narrow limits. So long as the theory of law as will prevails, the flood of law-making will continue.
In American Masonry we have very generally a similar situation, as has been said, for a like reason. For one thing, we have all been trained in the theory that what we will collectively or in sufficient mass to make a majority is law in substance and only needs a mechanical process of receiving the legislative guinea stamp to be law in form. It is very easy to transport this conception to every other connection in which the word law appears. Is there Masonic law? Then it is to be made by the will of the Masonic sovereign. Have we a sovereign Masonic body? Go to, let it justify its existence by making laws. Such ideas confuse exercise of the will as a means and exercise of the will as an end. The means of making law is the declared will of the sovereign. But the end of making law is not to enable the sovereign to declare his will. The end is to conserve values and to secure interests. Delicate processes of weighing values and cataloguing, appraising, and balancing interests must be gone through with before the matter is ripe for the declaring will.
Having no bills of rights in Masonry and hence nothing beyond a handful of vaguely defined Landmarks to restrain him, what then are our barriers against the ravages of the zealous, energetic, ambitious Masonic law-maker? Legal barriers there are none. But some of the most sacred interests of life have only moral security and on the whole do not lose thereby. For example, the claims of husband and wife respectively to each other's society and affection are left as between the two with no other security than the moral sense of the community. It is important to ask, therefore, how far there are agencies for focusing the moral sentiment of the craft upon the Masonic legislator and making it an effective moral check. One such agency, which has been of no little service, is the report of the Committee on Correspondence, whereby in so many jurisdictions the law-making of the Masonic world is reviewed, criticized, and adjusted, if possible, to general theories of Masonic law. These reports vary greatly in value. But by and large they are inestimable repositories of Masonic law. Moreover it must needs give the Masonic innovator pause when he reflects that what he does must run the gauntlet of critical scrutiny by veteran reviewers upon the Committees on Correspondence of a majority of our jurisdictions. Another restraining influence is coming forward with the development of Masonic study. Nothing is so dogmatic as ignorance. A better and more general acquaintance with the history, philosophy, and legal traditions of the craft is certain to make our law-makers more cautious, more intelligent, and more effective. Such comparative studies in Masonic legislation as those already begun in THE BUILDER* are likely to do much for intelligent law-making where library facilities are small and law-makers are zealous. But above all things we must rely upon the principles of Masonry. Let us remember Krause's formula: "Law is the sum of the external conditions of life measured by reason." Our measure is to be reason, not will, and all the lessons and symbols of the craft are eloquent of measurement and restraint.
In conclusion, let me repeat the disclaimer with which I began. I have not sought to expound the law of the craft at large or of any jurisdiction in particular. I have sought rather to consider how far there may be said to be such a thing as Masonic jurisprudence, what materials are at hand for an organized body of knowledge that may be called appropriately a science of Masonic law, what general principles may be found for such a science, and in particular how far the problems of legal science generally may be found in and their solutions may be applied to the law of our craft. So studied, the subject of Masonic jurisprudence has great possibilities which are as yet scarcely opened. The ambitious Masonic student who essays any of its problems as he would a problem of the everyday law, going through our Grand Lodge proceedings as he would the legal sources, using our texts as he would a legal text book, reasoning from our traditions as he would from the body of written tradition we call the common law, will not only be abundantly repaid but will do a service in helping to make Masonic jurisprudence a reality.
* Advancement vol. III, p. 60.
Affiliation, vol. III, p. 9.
Ballot for the Degrees, vol. III, p. 70.
Dimits, vol. III, p. 134.
Physical Qualifications for Initiation, vol. III, p. 2~.
----o----
SYMBOLISM OF THE THREE DEGREES
BY BRO. OLIVER DAY STREET, ALABAMA
PART IV--THE SYMBOLISM OF THE MASTER MASON DEGREE--(CONCLUDED)
THE FIVE POINTS OF FELLOWSHIP
THE Five Points of Fellowship are symbolized by the Pentalpha, or five pointed star. The connection of this geometrical figure with the art of building is not at once apparent, but recent researches show that it entered extensively into determining the plans of many of the splendid castles and cathedrals of medieval times. To this fact is probably due its introduction or retention among the symbols of our Speculative Craft. (1)
This figure has, however, from very ancient times borne a moral signification also. Says a recent writer:
"In the more esoteric philosophy, the symbol is used to designate man, and an examination of the shape of the figure will shaw that by a stretch of imagination it may be construed into a crude representation of a human figure." (2)
In this connection it is interesting to note that there exists in England a secret gild of operative Masons who have a ceremony wherein is represented the mock-assassination of one of its three Grand Masters. His body is said to be raised and borne out of the hall on the five points of fellowship in this wise-- each seizing an arm or foot and a fifth under the middle of the body.
The Pentalpha with one of its points elevated, was a symbol of the pure and the virtuous and a harbinger of good, but with two of its points elevated it became the accursed Goat of Mendes, which typified Satan and foreboded evil and misfortune. (3)
In England, the Five Points of Fellowship are h. to h., f. to f., k. to k., b. to b. and h. over b.(4) It is well known that in the United States we substituted m. to e. for h. to h. Mackey thinks this change was made at the Baltimore Conference of Grand Lecturers in 1843, and I am persuaded that the English working is the ancient and correct one.
The winged foot has for ages been the symbol of swiftness, the arm of strength, and the hand of fidelity. In the center of the Pentalpha as employed by us is usually seen two hands clasped. This as we learned in the Entered Apprentice degree is the ancient symbol of the god Fides.(5) It is an appropriate emblem of the fidelity and readiness to aid each other, which would characterize members of the Masonic Fraternity. Let it not be supposed that by assigning symbolical meanings to the persons and incidents of the legend of Hiram Abif, I thereby mean to deny its reality. I see no reason (and such seems to be the opinion of most students of Freemasonry) why this legend may not be based upon a substratum of fact, as probably were those similar legends which characterized the Ancient Mysteries. That it has undergone many alterations and been greatly overlaid with fiction is certain, but that it is founded wholly upon fable is not at all probable.
THE LOST WORD
We next come to consider one of the most abstruse conceptions in Freemasonry. The allegory of a search for a Lost Word is not a search for any particular word; in fact it is not even a search for a word at all. The expression "The Word" had significance to the Jews and other ancient races which is hard for us to comprehend. While not strictly accurate we shall not be far wrong in saying that to the ancient mind "The Word" signified all truth, particularly divine truth. To us the most striking and familiar passage in literature containing this expression is that in St. John, as follows:
"In the beginning was the Word. And the Word was with God, And the Word was God." Ch. 1
John does not here announce any new doctrine, but one that was perfectly familiar to the Jewish thought of his day; only his identification of Jesus of Nazareth with the Word was new. Nor was this expression or this idea by any means confined to the Jews; it belonged to nearly all ancient philosophy. Among the Greeks it was the "Logos" a term derived from the Greek verb "lego", to speak; the same root from which comes our word "Logic", the name of that science by which we determine moral truth.
That noble attribute of man, the power of articulate speech, whereby his wisdom and his most abstract thoughts are made known to his fellows, a power so far as we can see possessed by no other animal, must have in all ages greatly impressed this thoughtful mind. The spoken word seemed an instrument worthy to be employed by Deity himself, not only in promulgating divine truth but even in creating all things that were created. According to ancient ideas Deity v as so omnipotent that he had but to speak and the thing was done; he said "Let there be light" and there was light; and that without "The Word" was not anything made that was made.
Hence "The Word" under the development of philosophy. particularly that of Philo Judaeus, a contemporary of Jesus, became synonymous with every manifestation of divine power and truth, so that finally it was regarded as not only co-existent with but metaphorically as identical with Deity himself. This is clearly the meaning of St. John.
The Masonic search for the "Word", therefore, symbolizes the search for truth, particularly divine truth. The lesson here to us is to search diligently for the truth, never to permit prejudice, passion or interest to blind us, but to keep our minds always open to the reception of truth from whatever source, or however opposed to our preconceived notions it may be; and having seen it and received it, always to act agreeably to its dictates. Hence Masons everywhere are devoted to the doctrines of freedom of thought, freedom of speech and freedom of action.
But we are also cautioned not vaingloriously to imagine that we ever here achieved all truth. The Master Mason is invested not with the True Word, but with a Substitute Word, implying that in this life we may know only in part, that we may approach, we may approximate truth, but that we never attain it in its perfection. This search shall continue as long as this life lasts, but not until we shall have passed on to a higher state of existence will divine truth be disclosed to us in all its fullness and beauty. I may say here that this final disclosure is symbolized in the Royal Arch degree.
The preservation of this extremely ancient conception of "The Word" is not without historic value also as indicating the great antiquity of Masonic symbolism. (6)
THE MARBLE MONUMENT
Incidental to this legend of Hiram Abif are introduced certain other symbols. For example, the virgin weeping over the broken column, an urn in her left hand and a sprig of evergreen in her right, and an old man behind her dressing her hair. Masons are familiar with the explanation of this group given in our ritual, but I am persuaded that it is very superficial to say the least.
In the Egyptian Mysteries, as we have seen, Isis finds her husband's body encased in a tamarisk, or acacia tree, which the King of Byblos converts into a column. This column, still containing the body, is finally carried away and broken by Isis and the body released. We can readily imagine her weeping over this broken column. Apulieus (second century, A. D.) describes her as a "beautiful female, over whose divine neck her long thick hair hung in graceful ringlets," and in a procession depicting her are shown female attendants following who are combing and dressing her hair.
The urn is an ancient sign of mourning. A small urn in which figuratively to catch the tears was worn by the mourners, especially widows. This explanation of the presence of the urn in this emblem, as a symbol of grief, better accords with our tradition as to the disposal of our Grand Master, as well as with history, than does that given in our Master's lecture. We know that it was a well nigh universal custom of the Jews as well as the Egyptians to bury and not to cremate their dead. Likewise from ancient times it was common for the mourner to bear in the hand to the place of interment an evergreen sprig and there to deposit it in the grave as an avowal of belief in a life to come. It seems to me that in these ancient traditions and customs is to be found the true origin of our Marble Monument (7) and that this emblem signifies that, while we mourn for, and cherish the memory of our dead, yet we believe that they shall live and that we shall see them again.
THE SETTING MAUL
The Setting Maul is a wooden instrument used in setting firmly into the wall the polished stone, and is one of those traditionally said to have been used at the building of Solomon's Temple. It would very properly be in the hands of the three Fellow Crafts, who are in the third degree reputed to have made a notable use of it just before the completion of the Temple. From that incident it is employed among us as an emblem the meaning of which is known to every Master Mason.
It has, however, in different forms been employed as a symbol of destruction from prehistoric times. In Norse mythology, Thor, the god of Thunder, was represented as a powerful man armed with a mighty hammer, Miolnir (the smasher). Counterparts of this god and his formidable weapon are found in many of the ancient religions and mythologies.
In the Cabiric Mysteries the seven gods who slew the eighth were called "Paticii", or wielders of the hammer.
THE ACACIA
It was a custom of the Jews to plant at the head of the grave an acacia sprig for the double purpose of intimating their belief in immortality and of marking its location, as to tread on a grave was by them regarded as extremely unlucky. To them, therefore, the acacia was, as it is to us, an emblem of immortality and of innocence. The true acacia is the thorny tamarisk which abounds in Palestine, and we have seen that strangely enough in the legend of Osiris his dead body was said to have been cast ashore at the foot of a tamarisk or acacia tree, and that this circumstance led to its discovery. This tree, owing to its hard-wood quality, its evergreen nature and its exceeding tenacity of life bore to the Egyptian and Jew the same symbolical significance it does to us. Of its wood was constructed the tabernacle, the table for the shew-bread, the ark of the covenant and the rest of the sacred furniture of the Temple, and of its boughs was woven the crown of thorns that was placed upon the head of Jesus of Nazareth.
Each of the Ancient Mysteries possessed a sacred plant which was employed in their initiations and ceremonies for the same purpose and with the same symbolical significance as the acacia is by us. Among the Egyptians it was the Lotus and the Erica, among the Greeks the Myrtle, and among the Scandinavians the Mistletoe. That a tree or plant had life-giving properties was an idea familiar to the Jews in the earliest times, as witness the Tree of Life mentioned in Genesis, and by New Testament writers the immortality of man is likened to the recurrence of plant life. (I Cor. 15; John 12, 24).8
THE POT OF BURNING INCENSE
The Pot of Burning Incense was employed in Solomon's Temple to produce a sweet savor in the Holy of Holies, that is to say, according to the Jewish conceptions, in the actual presence of J H V H. It is not supposable that the intelligent Jew regarded this as other than symbolical of the offer of a pure heart as a sacrifice to the Deity. The bloody sacrifices of bullocks, lambs and goats, as well as the peace and sin offerings, were offered in less sacred precincts of the Temple and probably meant no more than to impress the people that they should be ever generous in dedicating their earthly wealth to the service of God and the hastening of his Kingdom, but the pure, immaterial offering of a delightful incense was to remind them that after all the only sacrifice worthy of Deity himself was the spiritual and immaterial offering of a pure heart.
THE BEE HIVE
To the operative Mason could anything be more important than industry ? By it he lives, and by it were reared those dreams of architectural beauty which excite our wonder and please our fancy.
Is it any less necessary to the speculative Mason in his work of building human character ? Is it not far more so ? The temple of human life is incomplete unless every talent and every virtue is brought to the highest possible state. A few years at most suffice to complete and adorn our greatest structures. If the builder die before it is finished, others can carry it on to completion after him. But the time alloted to no man was ever sufficient for the complete development of all the possibilities of his mind and character. If he die before the work is finished, none can take it up and finish it for him. How important, therefore, is it that not a moment of our time, that most precious gift, should be wasted?
In all nature nothing is more constantly busy than the bee, and from ancient times it has been an emblem of industry. "Busy as a bee" has become an aphorism. A place of great industry we call a hive, and while I do not find it to have been employed in ancient symbolism, no symbol of labor could be more appropriate than a bee hive.
Masonry in every degree, and in none more than the Master's degree, signifies labor. Its very name is synonymous with labor and its very implement reminiscent of labor. Toil is noble, idleness dishonour. Deity himself is recorded as having worked and we see on every hand the Titanic results of his labor. He reared the mountains, He laid down the plains, He made the rivers and the seas; the very smallest of these beyond the capabilities of millions of men. He deposited the rich ore in the bosom of the earth. He stocked the waters with fish and the land with an infinite variety of vegetation and living animals both great and small. Finally He made man; not a single man, but millions, yea billions, of men; about every thirty-five years He makes one and a half billions, four and a half billions to the century, or about ninety billions since the birth of Christ. How many hundreds of thousands of billions he made before we cannot even surmise. But this is a manifestation of only one phase of His unceasing and prodigious activity. In thousands of other forms, it displays itself in equally staggering figures. If anyone ever conceived of God as an idler, let him get that notion out of his head. If He rested on the seventh day, we may be sure that He began work again on the eighth. We can understand the value of the grub and even the boll-weevil, but the utility of the sluggard in the economy of this universe is beyond the perception of man, unless it be to afford us an example of something to be avoided.
SILENCE
The Book of Constitutions guarded by the Tyler's sword may be, as is claimed, a new emblem among us, but the virtue it commemorates, silence, is an old and excellent one. How much better it would be if we thought more and talked less. This virtue seems to have been more prized by the ancients than by us. The disciples of many of the ancient philosophers were required to practice absolute silence for long periods of probation, and so important was it deemed in their religious and philosophical systems that to it was allotted a special deity, Harpocrates, who was represented as full of eyes and ears, signifying that many things are to be seen and heard but little to be spoken. (9)
THE ALL SEEING EYE
The All Seeing Eye is a very old symbol of Deity. The Egyptians represented Osiris, their chief god, by an open eye, which they placed in all his temples. The idea was also familiar to the Jews, for we read in Psalms (xxxiv, 15) that "The eyes of Jehovah are upon the righteous," and (cxxi, 4) that "he that keepeth Israel shall neither sleep nor slumber." In Proverbs (xv, 3) Solomon says "The eyes of Jehovah are in every place watching the evil and the good." This symbol was to the Egyptians and the Jews the same that it is to us, the symbol of Deity manifested in his omnipresence and omniscience. To us it is a warning that things we would not do before the eyes of men, yet do in secret, are nevertheless beheld by an eye that can explore our innermost thoughts and will witness against us before a tribunal where there are no perjured witnesses nor miscarriages of justice. (10)
THE ANCHOR AND THE ARK
The Ark as a symbol in the third degree has been supposed by some to refer to the Jewish Ark of the Covenant, but others with more reason think it refers to the Ark of Noah. All the Ancient Mysteries seem to have contained allusions more or less clear to the Deluge and Noah's Ark. There being so many other symbols common to Masonry and the Mysteries, it is not surprising to find the Ark also employed as a Masonic symbol. To the pre-Christian ages, the idea of a regeneration, or a new birth, was as familiar as it is to us. In the Ancient Mysteries, we are best able to judge, the tradition of the Deluge and the Ark, by which the human race was reputed to have been both purified and perpetuated, was in a variety of forms employed to teach this doctrine of regeneration.
In the Funeral Ritual of the Egyptians, it is by means of he Ark or boat that the deceased passed to Aahlu or the place of the blessed in Amenti. (11) We are all familiar with the Greian myth which represents Charon as ferrying the shades of the departed over the river Styx. Thus it is seen that the Ark has for ages been the symbol of the passage from this world to the next. We attach to it a very similar meaning, it symbolizes to that power or influence by which we are fitted for and raised a higher state of existence in the life that is to come. (12)
The anchor does not seem to have belonged to ancient symbolism. Paul appears first to have employed it as an emblem of hope of immortality and bliss after this life (Heb. i, 19.) Kip, in his Catacombs of Rome, says that the primitive Christians looked upon life as a stormy voyage and that of their safe safe arrival in port the anchor was a symbol. Mrs. Jameson says that the anchor is the Christian symbol of immovable firmness, hope and patience. Though apparently of Christian origin as a symbol, there is nothing narrow or sectarian in its significance, and it may with equal propriety be employed by Jew and Gentile, as well as by all others who share in the belief of a peaceful place of abode hereafter for those who have made a proper use of this life. (13)
In the symbol of the Anchor and Ark we, therefore, see gain pressed upon our attention the doctrines of Deity, the Mediator, regeneration, resurrection and immortartality.
THE FORTY-SEVENTH PROBLEM OF EUCLID
The Forty-Seventh Problem of Euclid is the earliest Masonic symbol we have on record; it appears as the frontispiece to Anderson's "Book of Constitutions," published at London in 1723, accompanied by the word "Eureka" in Greek characters. It will be understood that prior to this date only one book on Freemasonry had been printed, and not till three-quarters of a century later did our Monitors contain illustrations of the emblems and symbols. So it happens that the Forty-Seventh Problem is absolutely, so far as is known, the earliest illustration of Masonic symbol on record.
In the text of the same book it is declared to be "if duly observed, the foundation of all Masonry, sacred, civil and military," (p. 23) and in the second edition of this work (1738), he speaks of it as that "amazing proposition which is the foundation of all Masonry, of whatever materials or dimensions" (p. 26). This figure is known by a variety of names. The Theorem of Pythagoras, the Theorem of the Bride, and the Theorem of the Three Squares. It was also known as the Gnomon, the Greek word for knowledge, and Plato in his Commonwealth, denominates it the "Nuptial Figure." To our fathers in their school days, it was an object of dread, as the "Pons Assinorum," or the Bridge of Asses.
The remarkable properties of the right-angled triangle are well known to those who have studied geometry. Astronomers also are acquainted with its value; with it they measure the universe. Its usefulness is understood by architects and builders. Even those mechanics who are so ignorant that they do not know that a figure whose three sides are to each other as 3, 4 and 5 is a right-angled triangle, yet are aware of its convenience in making corners of a building perfectly square. When they measure three feet along one wall and four feet along the other, if five feet will exactly reach across, they know that the corner is square. These things were well understood by ancient and medieval operative Masons, and they constituted a part of their trade secrets.
But it is equally certain that to this beautiful triangle they ascribed moral and philosophical (not to say religions) meanings which are now little understood by us.
Of this figure Brother G. W. Speth says "it is certain that, while our medieval brethren may have been familiar with its symbolical meaning, we are not." (14) We are merely told in our monitors that "it teaches Masons to be general lovers of the arts and sciences." Perhaps this is true, but we are given no hint as to why or how it does so. The deeper meanings of this symbol are wholly lost except to those who have made it a special study. Much of it I believe is lost beyond the hope of recovery.
GEOMETRICAL FIGURES
It is a curious fact, the psychological reason for which is not known, that dimensions increasing by half (e.g. a rectangle 20x30, a solid 20x30x45), and the ratios of the base, perpendicular and hypothenuse of a right-angled triangle whose sides are as 3, 4, 5, are very pleasing to the eye. The equilateral triangle in ways not now fully understood seems also to enter into the element of proportion in successful architecture.
Odd as it may appear that geometrical figures such as points, lines, superficies and solids, angles, triangles, squares and circles should be invested with such meaning, yet the fact is undoubted. The ancient moral philosophers attached what appears to us an inordinate importance to geometry and geometrical figures.
Plato, the greatest of philosophers, wrote 400 years before Christ on the porch of his academy, "Let no one who is ignorant of geometry enter my doors." He taught that God was "always geometrizing," and that "geometry rightly treated is the knowledge of the Eternal." (15) At his time, geometry was the only exact science (arithmetic being not yet invented); hence, quite naturally a knowledge of this science was deemed indispensable to one in search of philosophical truth. To Pythagoras, all the ancient writers give credit for first having raised geometry to the rank of a science, and Proclus tells us that he "regarded its principles in a purely abstract manner and investigated his theorems from the immaterial and intellectual point of viewed." (16)
In short, "from the earliest times, the knowledge of geometry was looked upon not only as the foundation of all knowledge but even by the Greek philosophers as the very essence of their religion, the knowledge of God." (17)
Numerous echoes of this ancient veneration for geometry are preserved in Freemasonry, thus affording further evidence of its great age. But of all geometrical figures the right-angled triangle, or set-square, was most revered by the ancients. It has from extremely remote ages and among extremely remote peoples borne profound moral significations.
Confucius, the great Chinese teacher, tells us (481 B. C.) that not till he was seventy-five years old "could he venture to follow the inclination of his heart without fear of transgressing the limits of the square." (18)
In a Chinese book written between 500 B.C. and 300 B.C., called "The Great Learning" we are told that a man should not do unto another what he would not should be done to himself; "and this," it is there said, "is called the principle of acting upon the square." (19)
It is, to say the least, a strange coincidence that the Greek word for square, "gnomon," also means knowledge and that the initial of this word, the Greek letter gamma is a perfect setsquare. As said by Brother Sidney T. Klein, a distinguished Mason and architect of England, to the ancients "geometry was the foundation of knowledge and gnomon was the knowledge of the square." (20)
In the symbolical writings of the Egyptians thousands of years ago, the square or right-angled triangle was the standard and symbol of perfection; it was also the symbol of life. (21)
The ancients taught a very peculiar philosophy. According to their ideas Nature was tripartite, masculine, feminine, and offspring. This conception was applied in an endless variety of ways The sun was regarded as masculine or active; the moon as feminine or passive and Mercury as the offspring. So the ancient Egyptian Trinity consisted of Osiris the father, Isis the mother, and Her-ra, or Horus, the son. To represent this conception of Deity they employed a right-angled triangle whose sides were in the proportion of 3, 4 and 5, wherein the shortest side, 3, represented Osiris, 4 represented Isis, and 5, the resulting hypothenuse, represented Her-ra, the son, or the result of the union of the male and the female. This figure, therefore, became an emblem of life.
But as it also represented Nature, and as they were wise enough to see that Nature uninterferred with was perfect, this figure became the recognized symbol of perfection.
This implement so useful among operative Masons in testing the perfection of the work was, therefore, appropriately adopted by them as symbolical of that perfection which should mark the temple of human character. This symbolical square is the instrument by which all mental, moral and religious conduct is tested.
THE HOUR GLASS
Rev. A. F. A. Woodford, a distinguished Masonic scholar of England, expressed the opinion that the Hour Glass is not, strictly speaking, a Masonic symbol. This is probably based upon the fact that evidence is wanting of its ancient employment as a symbol. The antiquity of its use as a measure of time is, however, undoubted, and it is a most fit emblem of the flight of time and of the wasting away of our lives. If it is a recent acquisition to our ritual, we will not quarrel with the monitor maker who introduced it. (22)
THE SCYTHE
In ancient symbolism, the scythe was one of the attributes of Saturn because he was reputed to have taught men agriculture. But Saturn was also the god of Time, and, as by another ancient myth human life was said to be a brittle thread spun by the three Fates, it is natural that this peaceful implement of agriculture should become the symbol of the power that severs the slender thread and puts an end to our existence.
THE COFFIN
To us the coffin is an obvious emblem of death, but it has sometimes been claimed that it would not be so to the Jews, who anciently buried their dead in shrouds and winding sheets only. But in the Ancient Mysteries of those peoples surrounding the Jews the candidate was placed in a coffin or chest as a symbolical representation of death. This custom, as well as the use by Egyptians of the coffin for burial, was undoubtedly well known to the Jews whether they practiced it or not.
The ancient symbolism of the coffin seems to have been intimately connected with that of the Ark. In fact in Hebrew the word aron denoted both. But the subject is too recondite to be entered upon further at this time. (24)
CONCLUSION
Some have questioned whether those engaged in the operative art of building could comprehend such abstruse symbolism as that I have herein attempted to outline. Whether they understood it or not, it is certain that they, at least those of them engaged in temple and church building, employed it. The important structures devoted to purposes of worship, from the most ancient period through medieval to modern times, abound in symbolism. It is doubtless true that many of these operative workmen did not know the meanings of their own symbols, just as many speculative Masons do not now know them. But we must bear in mind that operative Masonry in ancient and medieval times did embrace classes that well may be supposed to have understood them. They were in the closest association with the priestly and monastic orders to whom we are indebted for most of the learning of the ancients which has come down to us. Architecture and its kindred sciences were until comparatively recent times the most honorable of all callings.
Brother Albert Pike claims that "during the splendor of medieval operative Masonry the art of building stood above all other arts, and made all others subservient to it; that it commanded the services of the most brilliant intellects and of the greatest artists." (25)
It must be admitted that men like these were capable of appreciating and preserving the most refined symbolism. Brother Pike further declares that they "reveled in symbolism of the most recondite kind; that geometry was the handmaid of symbolism; that it may be said that symbolism is speculative geometry." (26)
Brother Gould has admitted his belief that the Masons of the fourteenth century, or earlier, were capable of understanding and did understand to a greater extent than ourselves the meaning of a great part of the symbolism which has descended from ancient to Modern Masonry.
In conclusion, permit me to say, that for every statement herein contained there is respectable Masonic authority. It is not claimed, however, that on none of these questions is there difference of opinion. Where this is the case, I have been compelled simply to adopt that new which appeared to me most reasonable, and did not have time always to state the different views and the reasons-for each. This each student must do for himself. My expectation has not been to accomplish more than to arouse in some, if not all, of you, a curiosity to learn more of our beautiful and instructive symbolism.
(1) Yarker's Arcane Schools, pp. 118, 119.
(2) Tyler Keystone, Oct. 5, 1909, p. 161.
(3) Ars Quatuor Coronatorum, vol. 1, pp. 31, 61; vol. VIII, pp. 90, 105: Universal Masonic Library, vol. VI (2), p. 62.
(4) Emulation, pp. 111, 112.
(5) Mackey's Symbolism, pp. 67, 190: Morals and Dogma, p. 88.
(6) Morals and Dogma, pp. 204, 261, 264, 266; 269, 268, 269, 270, 279, 281; Edersheim's Life of Jesus, pp. 46, 66: Mackey's Symbolism, pp. 176, 197, 216, 224, 226, 232, 280, 298, 300.
(7) Morals and Dogma, pp. 17 80 378, 887.
(8) Ars Quatuor Coronatorum vol. I, p. 67; vol. IV, p. 48: vol. VI, pp. 9. 14: Mackey's Encyclopedia, pp. 6, 8, 9: Mackey's Lexicon of Freemasonry, D. 16 Masonic Magazine, vol. I, p. 126; Morals and
Dogma, p. 82; Kenning, p. 4; Tyler Keystone, Aug. 20, 1908, p. 78:
Universal Masonic Library, vol. X, p. 83
(9) Lodge of Research "Masonic Reprints," No, 1, p. 42: Morals and Dogma, pp. 106, 269.
(10) Ars Quatuor Coronatorum, vol. IV, p. 43; Kenning, p. 18; Mackey's Encyclopedia, pp. 9, 67: Mackey's Lexicon of Freemasonry, p. 29.
(11) Ars Quatuor Coronatorum, vol. II, p 24.
(12) Idem, vol. I, p. 31 Mackey's Encyclopedia, p. 64 Mackey's Lexicon of Freemasonry, D. 46, Universal Masonic Library, vol. VIII, p. 7, vol. X, p. 64.
(13) Mackey's Encyclopedia, p. 64.
(14) Ars Quatuor Coronatorum, vol. III, p. 27.
(15) Idem, vol. X, D. 83.
(16) Idem.
(17) Idem p. 91.
(18) Idem vol. XIV, D. 30.
(19) Idem, p. 31.
(20) Idem, vol. X, pp. 84, 92.
(21) Idem, p. 93.
(22) Kenning, p. 318; Mackey's Encyclopedia, p. 700.
(23) Mackey's Encyclopedia, p. 700.
(24) Ars Quatuor Coronatorum, vol. 1, p. 81, vol. III, pp. 59, 40 Mackey's Encyclopedia, p. 64 Mackey's Lexicon of Freemasonry, pp. 93, 641.
(25) Ars Quatuor Coronatorum, vol. III, D. 16.
(26) Idem, p. 16.
----o----
FREEMASONRY AND IMMORTALITY
BY BRO. JOSEPH BARNETT, CALIFORNIA
CONCERNING the Immortality of the Soul, Freemasonry offers no argument. It states the principle as an unquestioned integral part of the Institution. The hope that life does not end with the physical body, but continues through a boundless future, has through past ages been an inspiration to brightness of life, patience, perseverance and process. As a life force it has throbbed through the inertia of savage existence and quickened man to those extraordinary efforts that produced civilization. A shining pillar of cloud by day, of fire by night, the beacon of humanity is Immortality.
Long before the written Word of Revelation, men had seen its prototype in the forces of nature. Eternal life was written on the midnight skies in the constancy of the constellations, on the gracious face of earth in recurring forms of beauty in the springtime, and on the azure deeps of heaven in the daily miracle of the morning sun. And with the dream of eternity quite naturally came to be associated the idea of a physical resurrection.
The Resurrection of the Body is a doctrine dear to human hearts. Through the influence of heredity, it has become an instinctive expectation. Its prototypes still appeal to us, religious sects teach it, literature has engraven it on its pages, love and hope have enshrined it, and human beings probably have a more distinct vision of its meaning than of any strictly spiritual idea.
In ancient times, hierarchies magnified its importance till it became the most impressive element of religious belief. It was taught of old that every soul was to pass through purgatorial processes in the under world; and that the soul found worthy would eventually return to earth, perfected, to re-inhabit the old physical body, and thereafter live under more favorable conditions than in the former life. In order that the returning spirit might have as little trouble as possible in finding and occupying the body, the dead were embalmed and placed in vaults as carefully prepared as homes. This curious idea of the outcome of immortality has its present day counterpart in hierarchical opposition to cremation, and in priestly exercising and blessing of burial places of the faithful. Freemasonry does not discuss re-incarnation of the immortal spirit, except mentioning it as one of Mackey's Landmarks. What Freemasonry asserts is that the spirit is immortal.
It was also taught of old that, if, after repeated opportunities, a soul was not amenable to purgatorial improvement, it was at last annihilated by a flaming ray on the steps of the underworld. Modern priestcraft has built up a doctrinal system of punishments in the spirit world that, to be effective, would logically require a physical body. Burning brimstone and immortal spirits are not co-ordinates. Freemasonry does not speculate on the question. It teaches that men should be good and true, not through fear, but because their claim of Divine relationship makes uprightness of life a natural attitude.
While men may generally allow that the progress made in our lifetime bears some relation to our progress in eternity, priestcraft has urged that it bears an exceptional and disproportionate relation. In ancient Egypt, this idea was so successfully exploited by the priesthood that almost every act in the daily life of the people had its rigid rules established and was constantly scrutinized by the temple authorities. And national life and thought became so crystallized into unchanging, and eventually meaningless, habits and customs, that in the end it checked progress and helped to ruin the nation. In modern times, we see its imitation in the lingering imposition of the Confessional, Friday fasting, and similar petty superstitions. Freemasonry teaches that the hope of immortality should free man from superstition, and encourage him of his own free will and accord so to shape his life that it shall be fitted to be a living stone in the Temple of Life.
Ancient religious systems classed kings with the immortal gods, whose mouthpieces and privileged representatives the priesthood claimed to be. They divided the people into classes, and established a caste system with the priesthood at the head. Today, we see the reflection of this in the Divine Right of kings and the still more audacious pretensions of pontiffs. Freemasonry classes kings, priests and princes with all other men; it strips away the artificial attributes of power, wealth and caste, and declares all men equal because they are all children of the Supreme Father. This has an interesting parallel in the claim of equal civil rights in our Declaration of Independence. Both Freemasonry and our Republic are a constant protest against autocracy.
Priestcraft has declared some of the great and good of the past to be saints, beings with direct and special relations to humanity, and with special influence in Heaven. Freemasonry recognizes the debt we owe to men of the past, men who lived in less favorable times than ours, but still sought the light of knowledge, strove valiantly for progress, and endeavored in their lives to justify their claim of Divine relationship. The aspiring spirit in men today recognizes a similar fervency in men of the past, and holds all such in esteem, not after the superstitious manner of priestcraft, but only in so far as the memory of their example may influence us also to be faithful, just and true.
On the doctrine of the Immortality of the Soul, Freemasonry represents: not a threat, but a promise; not fears, but hopes; not autocracy, but liberty.
----o----
FOR THE MONTHLY LODGE MEETING
CORRESPONDENCE CIRCLE BULLETIN --- No. 22 DEVOTED TO ORGANIZED MASONIC STUDY Edited by Bro. H. L. Haywood
THE BULLETIN COURSE OF MASONIC STUDY FOR MONTHLY LODGE MEETINGS AND STUDY CLUBS
FOUNDATION OF THE COURSE
THE Course of Study has for its foundation two sources of Masonic information: THE BUILDER and Mackey's Encyclopedia. In another paragraph is explained how the references to former issues of THE BUILDER and to Mackey's Encyclopedia may be worked up as supplemental papers to exactly fit into each installment of the Course with the papers by Brother Haywood.
MAIN OUTLINE
The Course is divided into five principal divisions which are in turn subdivided, as is shown below:
Division I. Ceremonial Masonry. A. The Work of a Lodge. B. The Lodge and the Candidate. C. First Steps. D. Second Steps. E. Third Steps.
Division II. Symbolical Masonry. A. Clothing. B. Working Tools. C. Furniture. D. Architecture. E. Geometry. F. Signs. G. Words. H. Grips.
Division III. Philosophical Masonry. A. Foundations. B. Virtues. C. Ethics. D. Religious Aspect. E. The Quest. F. Mysticism. G. The Secret Doctrine.
Division IV. Legislative Masonry. A. The Grand Lodge. 1. Ancient Constitutions. 2. Codes of Law. 3. Grand Lodge Practices. 4. Relationship to Constituent Lodges. 5. Official Duties and Prerogatives. B. The Constituent Lodge. 1. Organization. 2. Qualifications of Candidates. 3. Initiation, Passing and Raising. 4. Visitation. 5. Change of Membership.
Division V. Historical Masonry.
A. The Mysteries--Earliest Masonic Light. B. Studies of Rites--Masonry in the Making. C. Contributions to Lodge Characteristics. D. National Masonry. E. Parallel Peculiarities in Lodge Study. F. Feminine Masonry. G. Masonic Alphabets. H. Historical Manuscripts of the Craft. I. Biographical Masonry. J. Philological Masonry--Study of Significant Words.
THE MONTHLY INSTALLMENTS
Each month we are presenting a paper written by Brother Haywood, who is following the foregoing outline. We are now in "First Steps" of Ceremonial Masonry. There will be twelve monthly papers under this particular subdivision. On page two, preceding each installment, will be given a list of questions to be used by the chairman of the Committee during the study period which will bring out every point touched upon in the paper.
Whenever possible we shall reprint in the Correspondence Circle Bulletin articles from other sources which have a direct bearing upon the particular subject covered by Brother Haywood in his monthly paper. These articles should be used as supplemental papers in addition to those prepared by the members from the monthly list of references. Much valuable material that would otherwise possibly never come to the attention of many of our members will thus be presented.
The monthly installments of the Course appearing in the Correspondence Circle Bulletin should be used one month later than their appearance. If this is done the Committee will have opportunity to arrange their programs several weeks in advance of the meetings and the Brethren who are members of the National Masonic Research Society will be better enabled to enter into the discussions after they have read over and studied the installment in THE BUILDER.
REFERENCES FOR SUPPLEMENTAL PAPERS
Immediately preceding each of Brother Haywood's monthly papers in the Correspondence Circle Bulletin will be found a list of references to THE BUILDER and Mackey's Encyclopedia. These references are pertinent to the paper and will either enlarge upon many of the points touched upon or bring out new points for reading and discussion. They should be assigned by the Committee to different Brethren who may compile papers of their own from the material thus to be found, or in many instances the articles themselves or extracts therefrom may be read directly from the originals. The latter method may be followed when the members may not feel able to compile original papers, or when the original may be deemed appropriate without any alterations or additions.
HOW TO ORGANIZE FOR AND CONDUCT THE STUDY MEETINGS
The Lodge should select a "Research Committee" preferably of three "live" members. The study meetings should be held once a month, either at a special meeting of the Lodge called for the purpose, or at a regular meeting at which no business (except the Lodge routine) should be transacted--all possible time to be given to the study period.
After the Lodge has been opened and all routine business disposed of, the Master should turn the Lodge over to the Chairman of the Research Committee. This Committee should be fully prepared in advance on the subject for the evening. All members to whom references for supplemental papers have been assigned should be prepared with their papers and should also have a comprehensive grasp of Brother Haywood's paper.
PROGRAM FOR STUDY MEETINGS
1. Reading of the first section of Brother Haywood's paper and the supplemental papers thereto.
(Suggestion: While these papers are being read the members of the Lodge should make notes of any points they may wish to discuss or inquire into when the discussion is opened. Tabs or slips of paper similar to those used in elections should be distributed among the members for this purpose at the opening of the study period.)
2. Discussion of the above.
3. The subsequent sections of Brother Haywood's paper and the supplemental papers should then be taken up, one at a time, and disposed of in the same manner.
4. Question Box.
MAKE THE "QUESTION BOX" THE FEATURE OF YOUR MEETINGS
Invite questions from any and all Brethren present. Let them understand that these meetings are for their particular benefit and get them into the habit of asking all the questions they may think of. Every one of the papers read will suggest questions as to facts and meanings which may not perhaps be actually covered at all in the paper. If at the time these questions are propounded no one can answer them, SEND THEM IN TO US. All the reference material we have will be gone through in an endeavor to supply a satisfactory answer. In fact we are prepared to make special research when called upon, and will usually be able to give answers within a day or two. Please remember, too, that the great Library of the Grand Lodge of Iowa is only a few miles away, and, by order of the Trustees of the Grand Lodge, the Grand Secretary places it at our disposal on any query raised by any member of the Society.
FURTHER INFORMATION
The foregoing information should enable local Committees to conduct their Lodge study meetings with success. However, we shall welcome all inquiries and communications from interested Brethren concerning any phase of the plan that is not entirely clear to them, and the services of our Study Club Department are at the command of our members, Lodge and Study Club Committees at all times.
QUESTIONS ON "THE APRON."
From the following questions the Committee should select, some time prior to the evening of the study meeting, the particular questions that they may wish to use at their meeting which will bring out the points in the following paper which they desire to discuss. Even were but a few minutes devoted to the discussion of each of the questions given it will be seen that it would be impossible to discuss all of them in the period of time devoted to the study meeting. The wide variety of questions here given will afford individual committees an opportunity to arrange their program to suit their own fancies and also furnish additional material for a second study meeting each month if desired by the members.
In conducting the study periods the Chairman should endeavor to hold the discussions closely to the text and not permit the members to speak too long at one time or to stray onto another subject. Whenever it becomes evident that discussion is turning from the original subject the Chairman should request the speaker to make a note of the particular point or phase of the matter he wishes to discuss or inquire into, and bring it up when the Question Box period is open.
I Why has the apron been interpreted so variously? Give a list of the interpretations you have heard. Why is it dangerous to seek for symbolisms in the present shape and size of the apron? How long has it had its present shape and size? If the shape and size has changed from time to time is it safe to build any symbolism thereon?
II Can you give any examples of non-Masonic use of the apron not mentioned in the text? Why, do you suppose, has the apron been so widely used ? Why did the Operative Mason wear an apron? What do you imagine its material and size to have been ? If it was once of leather, why ? Why was it changed to its present material ? Why is the apron we usually wear in lodge of material different from that given to us during initiation ? What led Speculative Masons to change its material and shape? Give usual dimensions of aprons as worn in American lodges. Why are they sometimes varied for different degrees and offices ?
III What is a badge? What is the badge of a Mason? What is the difference between a badge and an emblem ? A symbol? Has the Masonic use of the apron done anything to wear down the old prejudice against manual labor? Why were men ever so prejudiced? How long has it been since the prejudice began to break down? What were the causes ? What are the labors of a Mason ? Are they of any great value to society ?
IV In what way is the apron as now used the symbol of sacrifice and innocence? Why have men so frequently thought of white as a symbol of innocence? Give examples of the early use of the color as such symbol. What is the meaning of innocence? How can a grown man be innocent? What is the Masonic meaning of innocence?
V What do you think of Brothel Crowe's argument as given in the text? Why is the lamb the symbol of sacrifice? Can you give examples from the Bible of such a meaning ? What is sacrifice? Why is sacrifice necessary? What is a Mason's sacrifice ?
What was the Golden Fleece? The Roman Eagle? Star and Garter ? Why is the apron more ancient and honorable than these ? How would it affect human society if all men accepted the Masonic meaning of toil, innocence and sacrifice?
SUPPLEMENTAL REFERENCES
Mackey's Encyclopedia: Apron, p. 72.
THE BUILDER: Vol. I--The Apron (poem) p. 222; Meaning of, and Presentation of the Apron, p. 236.
Vol. II--The Master's Apron, (poem) p. 4; Symbolism of the Apron, (poem) p. 360; The Lambskin or White Leather Apron, (poem) p. 215.
Vol. III--On Presenting the Lambskin Apron, (poem) p. 8; The White Leather Apron, (poem) p. 19; The Apron, 74; The Apron Lecture, (poem) p. 128; The Apron, True Clothing of a Mason, Dec. C. C. B. p. 4.
Vol. IV--Symbolism of the Three Degrees--The Apron, p. 239; Symbolism in the Apron, this issue.
FIRST STEPS BY BRO. H.L. HAYWOOD, IOWA
PART X - THE APRON
HAVING been privileged to read a great deal of Masonic literature we may say that on no other one symbol has so much nonsense been written. It has been made to mean a thousand and one things, from the fig leaf worn by Adam and Eve to the last mathematical theory of the Fourth Dimension; and there is little to cause wonder that the intelligent have been scandalized and common men bewildered. If an interpretation can be made that steers a safe course between the folly of the learned and the fanaticism of the ignorant it will have some value, whatever may be said of its own intrinsic worth. Warned by the many who have fallen into the pit of unreason we shall be wise to walk warily and theorize carefully.
Speaking generally, and without the slightest hint of disrespect of our fellow workers in this field, it may be said that a majority of the wildest theories have been based on the shape of the Apron, a thing of comparatively recent origin and due to a mere historical accident. The body of it, as now worn, is approximately square in shape and thus has suggested the symbolism of the square, the right-angle and the cube, and all arising therefrom; its flap is triangular and this has suggested the symbolism of the triangle, the Fortyseventh Proposition, and the pyramid; the descent of the flap over the body of the Apron has also given rise to reasonings equally ingenious. By this method of interpretation men have read into it all manner of things, the mythology of the Mysteries, the metaphysics of India, the dream-walking of the Kabala, and the Occultism of Magic. Meanwhile it has been forgotten that the Apron is a Masonic symbol and that we are to find out what it is intended to mean rather than what it may, under the stress of our lust for fancifulness, be made to mean. When the Ritual is consulted, as it always deserves to be, we find that it treats the Apron (1) as an inheritance from the past, (2) as the Badge of a Mason, (3) as the emblem of innocence and sacrifice.
1. The Apron is an inheritance from the past.
For one purpose or another, and in some form, the Apron has been used for three or four thousand years. In at least one of the Ancient Mysteries, that of Mithras, the candidate was invested with a white Apron. So also was the initiate of the Essenes, who received it during the first year of his membership in that order, and it is significant that many of the statues of Greek and Egyptian gods were so ornated, as may still be seen. Chinese secret societies, in many cases, also used it, and the Persians, at one-time, employed it as their national banner. Jewish prophets often wore Aprons, as did the early Christian candidates for baptism, and as ecclesiastical dignitaries of the present day still do. The same custom is found even among savages, for, as Brother J. G. Gibson has remarked, "wherever the religious sentiment remains-- even among the savage nations of the earth--there has been noticed the desire of the natives to wear a girdle or Apron of some kind."
From all this, however, we must not infer that our Masonic Apron has come to us from such sources, though, for all we know, the early builder may have been influenced by those ancient and universal customs. The fact seems to be that the Operative Masons used the Apron only for the practical purpose of protecting the clothing, as there was need in labor so rough. It was nothing more than one item of the workman's necessary equipment as is shown by Brother W. H. Rylands, who found an Indenture of 1685 in which a Master contracted to supply his Apprentice with "sufficient wholesome and competent meate, drink, lodging and Aprons."
II Because the Apron was so conspicuous a portion of the Operative Mason's costume, and so persistent a portion of his equipment, it was inevitable that Speculatives should have continued its use for symbolical purposes. The earliest known representatives of these, we are informed by Brother J. F. Crowe, who was one of the first of our scholars to make a thorough and scientific investigation of the subject (A.Q.C. vol. V, p. 29), "is an engraved portrait of Anthony Sayer. . . Only the upper portion is visible in the picture, but the flap is raised, and the Apron looks like a very long leathern skin. The next drawing is in the frontispiece to the Book of Constitutions, published in 1723, where a brother is represented as bringing a number of Aprons and gloves into the Lodge, the former appearing of considerable size and with long strings." In Hogarth's cartoon, "Night," drawn in 1737, the two Masonic figures, Crowe points out in another connection (See his "Things a Freemason Should Know") "have Aprons reaching to their ankles." But other plates of the same period show Aprons reaching only to the knee, thus marking the beginning of that process of shortening, and of general decrease in size and change in shape, which finally gave us the Apron of the present day; for since the garment no longer serves as a means of protection it has been found wise to fashion it in a manner more convenient to wear, nor is this inconsistent with its original Masonic significance. It is this fact, as I have already suggested, that has made the present form of the Apron a result of circumstances, and proves how groundless are interpretations founded on its shape.
According to Blue Lodge usages in the United States the Apron must be of unspotted lambskin, 14 to 16 inches in width, 12 to 14 inches in depth, with a flap descending from the top some 3 or 4 inches. The Grand Lodge of England now specifies such an Apron as this for the First Degree, but requires the Apron of the Second Degree to have two sky-blue rosettes at the bottom, and that of the Third Degree to have in addition to that a sky-blue lining and edging not more than two inches deep, "and an additional rosette on the fall or flap, and silver tassels." Grand officers are permitted to use other ornaments, gold embroidery, and, in some cases, crimson edgings. All the evidence goes to show that these ornate Aprons are of recent origin. The Apron should always be worn outside the coat.
2. The Badge of a Mason.
"The thick-tanned hide, girt around him with throngs, wherein the Builder builds, and at evening sticks his trowel," was so conspicuous a portion of the costume of the Operative Mason that it became associated with him in the public mind, and thus gradually evolved into his badge; for a badge is some mark voluntarily assumed as the result of established custom whereby one's work, or station, or school of opinion, may be signified.
Of what is the Mason's badge a mark ? Surely its history permits but one answer to this--it is the mark of honorable and conscientious labor, the labor that is devoted to creating, to constructing rather than to destroying or demolishing. As such, the Mason's Apron is itself a symbol of a profound change in the attitude of society toward work, for the labor of hand and brain, once despised by the great of the earth, is rapidly becoming the one badge of an honorable life. If men were once proud to wear a sword, while leaving the tasks of life to slaves and menials, if they once sought titles and coats of arms as emblems of distinction, they are now, figuratively speaking, eager to wear the Apron, for the Knight of the present day would rather save life than take it, and prefers, a thousand times over, the glory of achievement to the glory of title or name. Truly, the rank has become the guinea's stamp, and a man's a man for a' that, especially if he be a man that can do; and the real modern king, as Carlyle was always contending, is "the man who can."
If this is the message of the Apron, none has a better right to wear it than a Mason, if he be a real member of the Craft, for he is a knight of labor if ever there was one. Not all labor deals with things. There is a labor of the mind, and of the spirit, more arduous, often, and more difficult, than any labor of the hands. He who dedicates himself to the cleaning of the Augean stables of the world, to the clearing away of the rubbish that litters the paths of life, to the fashioning of building stones in the confused quarries of mankind, is entitled, more than any man, to wear the badge of toil!
