The Builder Magazine 

April 1923 - Volume IX - Number 4 

TABLE OF CONTENTS 

FRONTISPIECE PRESIDENT - WARREN G. HARDING 

HOW MASONIC EDUCATION ADMITS ONE TO THE GLORY AND 
GREATNESS OF MASONRY - By Bro. Joseph Fort Newton, New York 

DR. NEWTON ASKS FOR MATERIALS CONCERNING ALBERT PIKE 

THE STORY OF THE FOUNDING OF THE HARVARD LODGE - By Bro. Guy H. 
Holliday, Massachusetts 

TO TEACH HUMANS WHAT HUMANS ARE IS THE HIGHEST DUTY OF 
HOMES AND SCHOOLS - By Dr. Cassius J. Keyser, New York 

HOW TO EDUCATE MASONS IN MASONRY - By Seven Grand Masters 

"THEN THEY TOOK HIM, AND SLEW HIM AT THE PASSAGES OF THE 
JORDAN!" - By Bro. Walter Booth Adams, M. A., M. D., Syria 

WAS DR. JOHNSON A FREEMASON? SOME PHASES OF HIS LIFE - By Bro. 
Arthur Heiron, England 

MEMORIALS TO GREAT MEN WHO WERE MASONS - ROBERT E. PEARY - 
By Bro. Geo. W. Baird, P. G. M., District of Columbia 

THE STUDY CLUB - Chapters of Masonic History - Part II, Freemasonry and the 
Men's House - By Bro. H. L. Haywood 

EDITORIAL - Lack of Trained Leaders is a Danger to Masonry 
THE BUILDER is One Hundred Months Old 



THE LIBRARY - The Hermetic Mystery 
An Important Work on the Kabbalah 
Speech Making Made Easy 

WHAT IS FREEMASONRY ? 

T'HE QUESTION BOX - Concerning Scottish Rite Blue Lodges 
Brother Kress Wants Information about Thomas Smith Webb 
Quatuor Coronati Lodge No. 2076, of London 
How to Deal with an Atheist Member of a Lodge 
Can Eastern Star Chapter Refuse any Applicant? 

CORRESPONDENCE - An Inquiry Concerning Dr. Robert Talifferro Lively 

Robert Morris as the Father of Uniform Work 

Some Lutherans are not Opposed to Public Schools or to Masonry 

The Italian National Grand Lodge 

Lodge Presents Bible to Public School 

Poem on Letters of the Keystone 

YE EDITORS CORNER 


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VOLUME IX NUMBER 4 


TWO DOLLARS FIFTY CENTS THE YEAR 
TWENTY-FIVE CENTS THE COPY 


Published Monthly by The National Masonic Research Society 


APRIL - 1923 


How Masonic Education Admits One to the Glory and Greatness of Masonry 


BY BRO. JOSEPH FORT NEWTON, NEW YORK 


The following address was delivered before A great company of Masons in Chicago, 
on the evening of March 21, 1917, at a reception accorded the speaker just before he 
sailed to begin his ministry at the City Temple, in London, Grand Master Wheeler 
presiding. The Editor of THE BUILDER has unearthed it from somewhere and asks 
me to allow him to publish it. If I hesitate, it is for two reasons: it reads like ancient 
history today, and it has too much of the personal element in it. Yet perhaps my 
experience of losing interest in Masonry, and then regaining it, may be of value as a 
warning to lodges to give young men something more than the Ritual of the Order. 


Since these words were uttered the Great War and the Little Peace have swept over 
us, leaving desolation and disillusionment in their wake. They have gone, those years, 
dark, dreadful, and confused; but the ideals of this address still glow and abide in the 



heart of the speaker, and he makes bold once more to commend them to his brethren. 
In a day when the brotherhood of the world is broken, our great and gentle Craft has 
an opportunity, the like of which it has never known before, to use its influence and 
power to spread that fraternal righteousness without which the future will be as dark 
as the past. - J.F.N. 


WHEN I was a little child about seven years of age, I came to know several men who 
were wont to visit the home of my mother about once a month. She was a widow, and 
had a little family to look after, and we lived in the South in the midst of the poverty 
that followed in the wake of the Civil War. At first I did not know the purpose that 
these men had in mind in visiting our home. But one day I asked my mother, and she 
told me that they were members of the Masonic Order. They had just come to learn if 
there was any way in which they might help her in her struggle to keep her family 
together. Happily, aid was not needed, but every month, and sometimes more than 
once a month, those men would come with a quiet and kindly knock to see if we 
wanted anything. 


As I grew older, I learned to know these men, and I learned also to know the story of 
my father who had been a member of their lodge - had, 1 believe, been a Master of it - 
and I learned something in connection with his Masonic experience that would 
perhaps interest you if I recite it very briefly. He was a soldier of the South, as some 
of you, or your fathers, were no doubt soldiers of the North in our Civil War. He wore 
the gray uniform, and you wore the blue. He was captured at one of the battles in the 
State of Arkansas, and as a young captain in the army of the South was brought up the 
Mississippi River to Rock Island, where he was detained as a prisoner of war for quite 
a while. The northern climate was very severe on southern men in prison. How 
severe, you may learn by looking into the archives of the War Department. My father 
fell ill, desperately ill. He made himself known as a Mason to an officer of the prison 
at Rock Island. The officer took that young brother Mason out of the prison to his 
home, and nursed him back to life. When the War closed, and his freedom had again 
come, that officer, his brother Mason, put money into his hand, and a little pearl- 
handled pistol in his pocket, that he might find his way back home midst unsettled 
conditions following the war. 



Such was the spirit of Masonry in our Civil War, and if the real story of its service in 
softening the horrors and terrors of war, in sweetening to some degree its bitterness, is 
ever told, it will be a volume that men will open with trembling hands, and close with 
weeping eyes. Indeed, at a time when churches were rent in twain, when states were 
tom asunder, the only tie that remained unbroken in the hour of the Civil War, was 
the tie of Masonic Fellowship. 


Having this tradition of the beauty and service of Masonry in my own family, is it a 
wonder that when I grew to be a man I had a desire to be a Mason? And it so 
happened that the son of this soldier of the South was initiated into the Order of 
Freemasonry not very far from where his father had been a prisoner of war, under the 
Grand Jurisdiction of Illinois, in old Friendship Lodge No. 7. Now, that was a night 
that I can never forget. While I was in college I suffered from a lightness of purse that 
was so painful that I did not belong to any fraternities. I had no time to waste, no 
money to spend on anything but bare necessities of life - and sometimes they were 
rather bare, so that I came into this Order to receive my first impression of a secret 
fraternity, and it was profound and lasting. Somehow, as I have further discovered the 
many beauties in Masonry, all of them benign and exalting, I still think that perhaps 
the most beautiful thing in all Masonry is its First Degree. 


The other degrees followed, and at the close of the Third Degree there was a little 
banquet, as was the custom of that lodge, and the candidate of the evening was asked 
to express his impressions of Masonry. Well, they were so many, so vivid, and so 
deeply spiritual, that I found difficulty in putting into words what was in my mind. 
But I did manage to ask if there was any little book that would tell a young man 
entering the Order the things that he would most like to know about Masonry - what 
is it? whence it came, and what it is trying to do in the world ? No one present that 
evening knew of any such little book. So I began to ask questions of the Master of the 
lodge, as to what the meaning of the lodge was, of what it was a symbol, what was 
the meaning of the exercises in the preparation room, the knocks at the door, the 
movements about the lodge, and the different symbols that I became aware of when I 
entered the Light? I asked him why he did this, why he did that, and why he did the 
other? "Well," he said, "we do it because that is the way Masons have always done 
things." Which is only saying that we do it because we do it. 



Not satisfied with such an answer, I asked, "Why ? What do you mean by it?" Alas, 
he could not tell me. 1 did not blame him then, and 1 do not blame him now; but I was 
full of innumerable questions, because I came into old Friendship Lodge fresh from 
Harvard University, and it seemed to me that a thing so impressive and so stately 
must have a long history, must have a deep meaning; and I wanted to know both. I 
had made some study of Egyptology, and I saw about me certain signs and symbols 
that brought echoes from a long past. And so, receiving no satisfaction from the 
Master of the lodge in answer to those questions, I ventured to ask a member of the 
Grand Lodge of Illinois. While he told me of the moral suggestions of the symbolism 
of the Order, and gave me very briefly and in vague outline the story of modem 
Masonry, from the founding of the Mother Grand Lodge of England down to our day; 
back of that he could not go; deeper than that he did not dig. 


WHY I LOST INTEREST IN THE CRAFT 


After a time, while I enjoyed the ceremonies of the various degrees, I lost some of my 
interest in the Order. Years later I went to live in Iowa, and I found there, as Grand 
Master at that time, a remarkable man, as big in body as he is in mind, who had 
appointed a committee to investigate the literature of the Order, if perchance he might 
discover such a little book as I had asked on the night on which I received the Third 
Degree in Masonry. He was looking 


DR. NEWTON ASKS FOR MATERIALS CONCERNING ALBERT PIKE 


"I am preparing a biography of Albert Pike, inasmuch as the Pike family has 
authorized me to undertake this work, and the proper Scottish Rite authorities have 
given me most cordial encouragement, 1 shall Cope in the course of time to prepare a 




volume that will be more or less authentic. May 1 ask you to co-operate with me? I 
should like f or you to make the request through your columns that your readers 
supply me with any literature, letters, diaries, books, or any other matter that may 
throw any light whatever on the career of our great and distinguished brother. 1 shall 
take pains to preserve any such material in good condition and return it promptly." 


for such a book in order that he might put it into the hands of all young men who 
were received into the fellowship of Masonry in Iowa. Unable to find just what he 
wanted, it fell to my lot, after fourteen years, to prepare the little book that I felt the 
need of years before; and that is the story of The Builders. If I have done nothing else, 
I hope I have made it a little easier for young men entering the Masonic Fraternity, 
and whose minds are filled with so many questions that lead into so many interesting 
fields of study, to find such a little book; and I hope my labor is not in vain. 


One of the first things that impressed me when I entered old Friendship Lodge was 
the fact that it contained in its fellowship men of every political party; and, later, 
when looking into the history of the Order, and its principles, I learned that questions 
of politics that divided men and sometimes estranged and embittered them, were not 
permitted in a Masonic lodge. To me that was a very eloquent fact. Knowing 
something of the bitter partisan spirit in the history of American politics, it seemed to 
me a wonderful thing that there should be a great, kindly fellowship that eliminated 
such questions, and permitted men of all parties to meet as man to man in the simple, 
fundamental fellowship of humanity without regard to party. 


As I looked further into the history and philosophy of the Order, 1 learned the deep 
reason why the ancient Masons prohibited political discussions in their lodge rooms, 
and it seems to me that time has only confirmed the wisdom of our fathers in that 
regard, as in so many other regards. Just now there is a tendency in some parts of the 
country, under one pretext or another, in one form or another, to bring political issues 
within the Masonic fellowship. It would be a great blunder; it would make our 




Masonry something different, something dangerously different from the Masonry of 
our fathers. It will cease to be an Order which unites men, and will become only a 
tiny atom in an indistinguishable blur of partisan feuds. So, brethren, let us use words 
in their right meanings, and not try to stretch or twist the word "politics" so as to 
bring in under any kind of excuse the thing which our fathers so wisely excluded 
from our lodges. 


Another thing that impressed me that night in old Friendship Lodge, was the presence 
of men of nearly all the religious persuasions represented in the community. There is 
a certain stage in the growth of a town - a certain gosling stage, as I sometimes 
describe it - when it is neither a town nor a city; when it is divided up into cliques and 
parties, and when sectarian rivalry is very acute. It was so in that community at that 
time, whatever may be its state of mind now. In that lodge room were gathered men 
who were supposed to be rivals on the outside of the room, and yet they met in a 
spirit of fraternity and good will. As I passed through the degrees, I found that the 
Order placed emphasis only upon those profound, fundamental things that underlie all 
religions, over-arch all creeds, and that upon that platform, these men, however they 
might differ in the details of dogma and ceremony, stood together man to man, 
brother to brother, in the spirit of fellowship. 


MASONRY ASKS, "WHAT IS YOUR NEED?” 


Later, when I studied the story of the Order, and particularly the founding of the 
Mother Grand Lodge of England, and looked at the background of sectarian 
bitterness, confusion and bickerings, which marked that time, and against that dark 
background saw the men who founded the Mother Grand Lodge, and the fundamental 
principles of religion which they enshrined into their constitution, it seemed to me 
that such an event was forever memorable and prophetic. 


But I am letting the hounds get ahead of the hare. As I pondered over my initiation 
that night, it seemed to me that I had come into an Order which was prophetic of a 
time when men would discover outside the lodge, as they discovered inside, that the 
things that they have in common, the things upon which they do agree, are of so much 



greater importance that they will overshadow the things about which they have 
debated so long. It seemed to me that I stood at an altar which was prophetic of a time 
when the estranged religious units of the world would be brought closer together, and 
men would ask not, "What is your creed?" but, "What is your need?" And when they 
thus arrive, the scene will be presided over by the beautiful genius of Freemasonry, 
which has prophesied it for centuries. 


Naturally, I wished to know something of the story of such an altar, and so I went 
back into the past as far as literature and records would take me. Perhaps you will let 
me tell you a few of the things that I discovered. I found that primitive society had 
three great institutions with which we are familiar, and one that we need to 
rediscover. First, it had the home, crude indeed, as all things were in the beginning of 
the world, yet that rude home had in it the prophecy of the home in which you were 
bom, with its tenderness, its beauty, and its memories. It had the church, not then a 
church, nor a great temple, but only an altar of unhewn stone, its rites cmde, its - 
smoke of incense ascending in a cloud of fear. Yet in the darkness of it all was a 
gleam of that light which and never was on land or sea. Third, there was the state or 
tribal form of government - very mde at first, very imperfect, but the basis and 
prophecy of this great republic in which we live. 


But there was another institution, of which I had known nothing at all, and the very 
existence of which I had not guessed. It was called the "men's house." It stood at the 
center of every village, and was really the center of the life of primitive society. It 
was the secret house of initiation, in which every man of the tribe, when he became of 
age, was initiated, trained, sworn, and then entmsted with the law, legend, history and 
religion of his people. Here is the origin of all secret orders, of whatever kind, and 
this is what our Masonic fathers meant when they said that Masonry is as old as the 
race. Certainly the idea, necessity and practice of initiation goes back to the 
beginning. For years I have followed the different ceremonies of initiation used in 
different primitive secret societies, and I have found that while they differed, each 
having a certain local color of its own, they had certain basic things in common; that 
the purpose was always the same, the spirit was always the same, and that nearly 
always the climax was the same. Nearly always there was a degree which represented, 
in a dramatic form, the death and the resurrection of the candidate. 



Those early initiations were frightful, brethren. Men were exposed not only to 
physical dangers, but to spiritual terrors, in order to test their physical courage, their 
mental power, and their moral trustworthiness. When they were so proved, they were 
admitted into the secret order of primitive society, and given certain words and tokens 
and grins and signs whereby they could make themselves known everywhere; and I 
was much interested in discovering how universal are the signs and tokens which we 
use in our lodges. If you think about it, they are the natural gestures of greeting, of 
distress or of brotherliness, and because they are so natural they have been used the 
world over. For Masonry has as a part of its genius the wisdom to use what is old and 
wise and human. 


Continuing my study, I have followed the history of this men's house of primitive 
society down the years until it became associated with the art of building, because of 
the importance of architecture. I traced the Order of Builders out of Egypt into Asia 
Minor, where they built the Temple of King Solomon; then westward into Rome and 
the College of Architects up to the time when the Roman Empire reeled to its ruin. 
Then they seem to have taken refuge on an island in Lake Como, and from there-I 
traced them to the great Order of the Cathedral Builders who uplifted those shrines of 
beauty and prayer which the great war has destroyed. After the cathedrals were built 
the Order began to decline. They were called Freemasons because they were 
permitted to go wherever their work called them; because they were free from 
taxation; because they enjoyed many legal privileges not granted to other bodies; 
because of their exceeding importance as master builders. Free, also - to distinguish 
them from guild Masons - because a guild Mason could not go outside the town in 
which he lived, whereas Freemasons could journey far and near. 


THE ACCEPTED MASON ENTERS THE CRAFT 


When the Order began to decline, men who were scholars and thinkers and students, 
but not architects, began to ask to be received in its membership; men like Ashmole, 
who founded the Museum at Oxford, England. They were accepted, and hence the 
name, "Free and Accepted" Masons. These men sought membership in the Order 
because they found in it a rich deposit of symbolism which was worth their study, and 
in some lodges the Accepted Masons were in the majority. Such was the feet in 1717 
- a date which will be celebrated in every jurisdiction of the world - the founding of 



the Grand Lodge of England. That date, June 24, 1717, gave a new impetus and a new 
emphasis to Masonry, and it spread rapidly all over the world. 


And so Masonry came to our shores, very early, long before our Republic was 
founded, before even the name “United States" was ever spoken. It was a great day 
when this kindly and friendly Order, with its spirit of justice, liberty, tolerance, 
intellectual courtesy, brotherly love and spiritual refinement, put its foot upon our 
shores. To tell the story of the connection of Masonry with the history of this country, 
and particularly with the history of our Republic, would be to repeat ma romance. It 
was not an accident that the Tea Party in Boston Bay was planned in a Masonic lodge 
and executed by the members of that lodge. It was not a mere coincidence that the 
first President of this Republic was also a Master Mason, and that so many of those 
who united in forming the organic law of this Republic were Master Masons. And, 
because the spirit of Masons had become a part of their thinking and living, they 
wrote it into the fundamental law of our land. So it has been all down our history. 

This Republic has never had a better friend than the Ancient Order of Freemasonry, 
and it never will have. In every great hour of national trial in the past, our Order has 
stood true to our Republic, as it will stand true today in the crisis through which we 
are now passing - perhaps the greatest crisis in all our history - when the flag will 
need the love and loyalty of every true American. Masons from one end of the land to 
the other will insist that the flag shall protect every citizen, and that every citizen shall 
protect the flag. 


Naturally my study of Masonry increased my zeal for promoting an interest in the 
study of it among my brethren; and hence my association with this movement in 
behalf of Masonic education. What is education? Let me put together two famous 
definitions, one by Huxley and the other by Milton, and they will tell us what it is. 
Education is the training of the intellect in the law of nature, and the fashioning of the 
affections and of the will into an earnest loving desire to live in harmony with those 
laws, that a man may be fitted, justly, skillfully and magnanimously to perform every 
office, both private and public, of peace or of war. 


If you would sum it up all in one word, it could not be better described than by the 
one word used by that mighty German genius - the greatest man Germany has known, 
except Luther - Goethe, when he used the word "Reverence." Reverence first, for that 



which is below us, for the tiny, teeming, swarming forms of life at our feet. Such 
reverence led a poet to say that he would not count among his friends a man who 
would needlessly put his foot upon a worm, or wantonly and cruelly take life from 
any living creature. Reverence, in the second place, for that which is on the level with 
ourselves, for the human, for all that wears the human shape, however deformed or 
sin-bespotted, or far fallen; the insight to see behind every face, however scarred or 
blackened, something noble and divine. And reverence, in the third place, for that 
which is above us, which out-tops our knowledge, and upon which we are every 
moment dependent. That one word, so expounded, might be used as a synonym for 
education - Reverence. 


What do we mean by a profane? Why do we so describe a man who is not a Mason? 
What is the difference between this lodge room and the street? Answer that question, 
and it will describe the difference between a mind that is reverent and one that is 
irreverent. Anything and anybody can go through the street, a cow or a cat or a dog; 
but not so in our lodge room. Here certain thoughts and things are excluded. Just so, a 
man who is profane will allow any kind of thought, no matter hove slimy, to go 
wiggling and squirming through his mind; but if he is a Mason in the true sense, his 
mind is a place of reverence, and there are some thoughts that will not be permitted to 
enter when they knock, no matter how many knocks they give at the door. Some 
sentiments will be put out as cowans and eavesdroppers, and not be permitted to 
pollute the sancity of his mind and of his heart. 


MAX MULLER'S PARABLE OF EDUCATION 


Perhaps a description of education is better than a definition, and there is a story 
translated from the literature of the Ancient East by Max Muller which is a perfect 
parable of what I have in mind. The gods, so runs this story, having stolen from man 
his divinity, met to decide where they should hide it. 


It was a long, solemn, secret council. One suggested that it be buried in the earth, but 
the caution was expressed that man might dig there and find that pearl of great price. 
Another suggested that it be taken and dropped into the depths of the sea, but the 



same fear was expressed that man, being a great wanderer, and having an insatiable 
curiosity, might go even to the depths of the sea to find the lost treasure. Finally the 
oldest and wisest of the gods said in a whisper, lest it be heard outside the council 
chamber, "Let us hide it in man himself, as that is the last place he will ever thi nk to 
look for it." And it was so agreed. Man did dig into the earth, bringing up gold and 
silver and precious ore, and he did go over the sea and down under the sea, seeking 
high and low, and far and near, before he thought to look within himself to find the 
God whom he sought. Evermore the Lost Word is near us, even in our hearts, and 
happy is the man who finds it. It is more precious than all the gold in all the tempted 
hills. 


Education, then, in the Masonic sense, as I understand it, is this discovery of whence 
we came, who we are, and where we are going. What is the first question that 
Masonry asks you at the door ? Is it not just this question ? She wishes to know 
whence you came, and what is your purpose here on earth. Without waiting to receive 
your answer, for you are not then truly qualified to give an answer, she admits you 
into her Temple, tells you whence you came and why you are here upon earth - the 
reason for your life, its excuse for being. She helps you towards that self-discovery 
which is the awakening of the soul, the beginning of its advance, morally, 
intellectually, and spiritually. Moreover, in the First Degree she trained you in the 
simple, old, homely, fundamental morality which underlies not only individual 
character, but is also the strength and support of society. 


In the Second Degree she asks you who you are, and adds another lesson, another 
step, in that process of self-discovery by teaching you that you are an intellectual 
being, that you have intellectual powers that must be developed and put to the highest 
uses. Hence her recommendation that you look into the arts and sciences and master 
the great problems of life, climbing up slowly but surely to wider intellectual 
outlooks, where there are longer vistas and lifting skies. For this reason, as in the 
olden time, every lodge is a school for the training of the mind in the moral Geometry 
of God - training us to think truly, clearly, justly, kindly. For as a man thinketh in his 
heart, so is he, and so is the world to him - luminous and lovely, or dark and dreadful. 


Finally, in the Third Degree, Masonry asks that most solemn of all questions, which 
every man who thinks asks his own heart again and again: "Whither goest thou?" 



What is the meaning of all this stream of human beings pouring in upon the earth, 
passing swiftly across it - some sadly, some gladly - and vanishing into the beyond? 
Whither do they go? What is the destiny of this endless procession? Masonry seeks, 
in her Third Degree) to make you realize, my brother, that you are an immortal spirit 
hereto now, upon the earth. It initiates us, symbolically, into the Eternal Life in Time. 
If we are immortal at all, we are as immortal now as we ever can be, and to know that 
fact, and to govern ourselves accordingly, is the supreme human experience. It takes 
away the fear of death. It makes you a Master of life and time. For surely there is no 
tyranny like the tyranny of time. Give a man one day in which to live, and how 
cramped he is. The tick of a watch sounds like a gong. Give him a week and you have 
liberated him, insofar, and he can breathe more easily. Give him a year, and he can 
move with more leisure and more amplitude. But let him know that he is divine; that 
above him there hovers and waits an infinite time; let him know that he is an 
immortal being and he is free! He can spread his wings and think as far and as fast as 
his mind can go. He can lay out great plans, and labor for their fulfilling; he can 
dream great dreams. It adds to the dignity, worth and glory of life. And this is the 
great insight, prophecy and experience which Masonry would awaken in our hearts - 
the master truth of the Master’s Degree. And so, while teaching us how to live, 
Masonry would fortify us against the Shadow that waits for every man - teaching us, 
as Dante said, "how to make our lives eternal." 


MASONRY ASKS A YOUNG MAN GREAT QUESTIONS 


How beautiful it is that an Ancient Order, coming down to us from the earliest time, 
should win elect young men to its fellowship, and ask them such great questions. And 
as they bow at its altar, upon the Bible which their mothers read, it exacts from them 
high and solemn vows of chastity, of charity, of brotherly love, relief and truth. What 
is it that makes a man great? It is a great faith and a great idea. Ideas rule the world. 
Above the battle lines in Europe, if you have eyes to see, you can discover two wars 
now raging, as long ago Homer saw two battles above the city of Troy - one between 
the Greeks and Trojans, and one in the viewless air between gods and goddesses. Just 
so, above the long battle lines you can now see a battle of ideas. Ideas migrate like 
birds. They hide in crooked lines on a printed page. They force us into the arena to 
fight for them. Ideas rule the world. Get a right and true idea into the mind of a young 
man, and you have done more for him than by giving him any treasure of silver or 
precious stones. When Masonry brings a young man to an altar of prayer, in an 
atmosphere of reverence, and before the open Book which is the moral manual of 



civilization, and plants in his mind great, simple, luminous and valid ideas of what it 
is to be a man, and what life means, it has rendered to him the highest service that any 
institution can render to a man. 


This is what I mean, brethren, by Masonic education, not some dry digging into dusty 
old documents which have no practical relation to the human life of today. I mean 
that we should study the story of this Order, its origin and growth, its uses, its great 
principles and their expression in ritual; but still more the expression of those 
principles in character and their application to every day life. Truth is for life, and we 
know as much as we do. I believe that this is worth while for the future of Masonry, 
for its increased efficiency, and for a deepening of interest in it. Numbers do not 
count. Size does not signify. It is quality of manhood, quality of thinking and feeling 
that counts in the long result of time. And Masonry, by bringing men together and 
teaching them to be friends, without regard to creed, or sect, or party, and training 
them in the service of great ideals, in loyalty to the great truths, is doing more for the 
safety and sanctity of this great Republic than both its army and its navy. 


"Oh! the cedars of Lebanon glow at our door, 
And the quarry is sunk at our gate; 

And the ships out of Ophir, with golden ore, 
For our summoning mandate wait; 

And the word of a Master Mason 
May the house of our soul create! 

While the day hath light let the light be used, 
For no man shall the night control! 

Or ever the silver cord be loosed, 

Or broken the golden bowl, 

May we build King Solomon's Temple 



In the true Masonic Soul!" 


— o — 


THE STORY OF THE FOUNDING OF THE HARVARD EODGE 


BY BRO. GUY H. HOEEIDAY. MASSACHUSETTS 


AT HARVARD University, there was instituted, on May 18, 1922, a lodge to be 
known as "The Harvard Lodge." This is a lodge of a new type in the United States, a 
"college" lodge; a lodge with great possibilities for future usefulness to Harvard and 
to the Craft. 


Harvard University with its many graduate schools brings together student brethren 
from every State in the Union, and, in fact, from nearly every part of the world. These 
men find little opportunity to enjoy the fellowship of their home lodges during the 
whole period of their academic and professional courses, and they hesitate to visit to 
any extent the local lodges in Cambridge and Boston, so that at the very time when 
they should enjoy the pleasant association with their brethren the most, and improve 
themselves in Masonry, they are to all intents and purposes masonically dead. For 
such men, and from the moment they enter the University, The Harvard Lodge will 
furnish a common meeting place; it will furnish for them, through its special 
committees, a place to turn to for advice and help in all matters relating to the life and 
work of the University. More important still, they will learn at once that they have 
friends by the score in their new surroundings. 


It is expected that the men who have known Harvard Masonry, those who have taken 
their degrees in, or who have affiliated with the new lodge, and those who have 
known the lodge only as welcome guests, will eventually spread over the country, and 



wherever they may find their lot cast take up Masonic work with renewed interest and 
earnestness. 


The establishment of a lodge at Harvard has been the subject of discussion for some 
years, but until now no steps have been taken to accomplish it. In March of last year, 
however, an amendment to the Massachusetts Grand Constitutions was unanimously 
adopted, providing for "college" lodges, which should be relieved of the burden of 
obtaining releases, as other lodges are required to do, on candidates residing beyond 
the limits of the city or town where the lodge is situated, but on the other hand 
limiting their held for candidates to the college itself. This amendment was to the 
section relating to local or territorial jurisdiction of lodges, and reads as follows: 


"If, however, the jurisdiction named in the charter shall be a college, university or 
other institution of like character and standing, such jurisdiction shall be limited to 
and include only, the following; viz., concurrent jurisdiction with the lodge or lodges 
having regular territorial jurisdiction over any candidate who, at the time of 
application is an officer, instructor, student, or employee in, and who in addition to 
having a Masonic residence in Massachusetts, shall have been on the rolls of such 
college, university, or institution for six months continuously preceding the date of 
his application. The special jurisdiction conferred by this section shall not be subject 
to waiver on the part of the lodge enjoying it." 


Following this action by the Grand Lodge, the Harvard Masonic Club, an association 
of Masons in the University numbering some 120 members, took up the question of a 
Harvard lodge at its Annual Meeting in April. As a result, and with the advice and 
active assistance of Rt. Wor. George B. Colesworthy, (A. B. 1901) District Deputy 
Grand Master for the Second Masonic District, a petition for a dispensation to 
establish a lodge was prepared and presented to the Grand Master, who in May 
ordered that the lodge be instituted. 


The petition was headed by the District Deputy, and there followed the names of his 
two immediate predecessors in office, both Harvard graduates; those of Professor 
Roscoe Pound, Dean of the Law School, Past Deputy Grand Master in Massachusetts, 



of Professor Kirsopp Lake of the Divinity School, of a Presiding Master, and of 
several Past Masters and other officers of the Cambridge lodges. The petitioners were 
in all one hundred and twenty in number, of whom thirty were graduates, sixty 
students, twelve from the Faculty members and instructors, and eight officers or 
employees of the University. 


The petitioners named as their Master Rt. Wor. Guy H. Holliday (A. B., '89, LL. B., 
'92), Past District Deputy Grand Master of the Second, or Cambridge, Masonic 
District, and an honorary member of the Harvard Masonic Club; as Senior Warden, 
Milo G. Roberts, a Junior in the College; and as Junior Warden, Jess H. Jackson, an 
Instructor in the College. 


The officers appointed later were: Treasurer, Assistant Professor Edwin A. Shaw, of 
the Graduate School of Education; Secretary, James E. Bagley, a special student in 
the College, Senior Deacon of Euclid Lodge of Boston; Chaplain, Professor Kirsopp 
Lake, of the Divinity School; Marshall, W. Arnold Hosmer, Instructor of the 
Graduate School of Business Administration; Senior Deacon, Dr. Donald V. Baker, 
'08; Junior Deacon, Dr. Frank A. Hamilton, Instructor in the Medical School; Senior 
Steward, E. Stanton Russell, T9; Junior Steward, Albert A. Schaefer, '06; Inside 
Sentinel, David W. Wainhouse, '24; Organist, Charles A. Young; Tyler, Arthur E. 
Conant, College Bell Ringer. 


This "line" of officers is in accord with the democratic character of the new lodge, 
which includes not only men coming from widely separated places, but also 
represents every grade and variety of academic rating. 


The reception of The Harvard Lodge by the other Cambridge Lodges has been most 
cordial. It has been received into the family of lodges occupying the beautiful 
Cambridge Temple, and is at present using regalia loaned by Charity Lodge. The 
youngest of these lodges, "Richard C. Maclaurin" ("The Tech. Lodge") instituted in 
1920 and by an amendment of its charter in June, also a "college" lodge, has 
presented the new lodge with a gavel; and the oldest, "Amicable," dating from 1805, 
has given the Great Lights. 



It has been well said that a University is a place of opportunities: Harvard University 
is peculiarly a place of opportunities for this newly added School of Friendship and 
Brotherly Love - The Harvard Lodge. 


— o — 


TO TEACH HUMANS WHAT HUMANS ARE IS THE HIGHEST DUTY OF 
HOMES AND SCHOOLS 


BY DR. CASSIUS J. KEYSER 


Adrain Professor of Mathematics, Columbia University, New York 


(All publication rights reserved by author.) 


Aside from winning a place as the dean of American mathematicians, loved and 
revered for his ability in teaching teachers a most difficult science, Dr. Keyser has 
long been a pioneer in that region where mathematics merges into logic or into 
philosophy. His great work, Mathematical Philosophy: A Study of Fate and Freedom, 
was reviewed by Ye Editor on page 319 of THE BUILDER for October last. A 
similar review of Korzybski's Manhood of Humanity, referred to in the following 
paper, was published on page 256 of THE BUILDER for August. Dr. Keyser's article 
does not have an immediate reference to Freemasonry as such, but it throws so much 
light on some problems that arise out of our Masonic thinking and activities, that it 
has been published here as offering much help to Craftsmen who take their Masonry 
seriously, and desire to see it win its way in the world. 



IN OUR education there is much that is good and much that is bad. What is good in it 
is due to human nature - to what man is. Much of what is bad in it is primarily due to 
our thinking and teaching that man is what man is not, and to our not knowing and 
not teaching what man is. 


To teach boys and girls to understand and to feel what they as humans really are, is 
the highest duty of the home and the school. But the home and the school have not 
kept that obligation. Why not? Because parents and teachers have themselves never 
been taught to understand and to feel what they as humans really are. 


In a recent bulletin of the Cora L. Williams Institute for Creative Education, Miss 
Williams has said that "time-binding should be made the basis of all instruction" and 
that Alfred Korzybski's book, The Manhood of Humanity, should be a textbook in 
every college throughout the world. These fine brave words are just. Why? Because 
that book, which all fathers and mothers and all other teachers should read, reread and 
digest, tells us for the first time in the history of the world what that is in virtue of 
which we humans are human. 


What is that thing ? The answer is that humans are human because they are by nature 
"time-binders." But what does Korzybski mean by "time-binding?" Nothing can be 
more important than to get the meaning of that mighty term into the heads of men and 
women, for when it gets into their heads it will get into their hearts also; and once it 
begins to work in the heads and hearts of men and women everywhere, there will be 
at hand a great new epoch, not only in education, but in all the cardinal concerns of 
our human kind. 


Let me try to make the meaning of the term clear, for, strange to say, some of those 
who have read the book (or think they have) have missed the term's meaning and yet 
that meaning is the book's very lifeblood and core. Please be Food enough to meditate 
upon the following considerations. They are simple and obvious, but very significant: 


A BEAVER AND A MAN 



Think of a beaver and a man. The beaver makes a dam; the man makes a bridge. Both 
the dam and the bridge embody three factors - raw material, toil and time. I- draw 
special attention to the factor, time, because it has never been duly considered in the 
study of civilization, nor in the philosophy of human education and human nature, 

For by fathers, mothers, and other teachers of the young or the old. We shall suppose 
the dam and the bridge to outlast their makers, so that the dam is present to the next 
generation of beavers, and the bridge to the next generation of men. That means that a 
new beaver is confronted by an oldtime factor (embodied in the dam) and that a new 
man is similarly confronted by an old-time factor (embodied in the bridge). What 
happens? What are the effects, upon the new beaver and the new man, of the old-time 
factors ? The importance of the question cannot be exaggerated, for the answer 
discloses an infinite chasm between beaver ’’mind” and man "mind" - an infinite 
difference, not in degree merely, but in kind. And what is the answer? The reader 
knows what it is. It is that the new beaver makes a dam, but it is no better than the old 
one, while the new man makes a bridge that is better than the old one, or he perhaps 
invents a ship or a flying machine. That is a fact. Do not fail to think about it again 
and again. 


What does it teach us? It teaches us the vast difference between the relation of animal 
’’mind" to time and the relation of human mind to time. It teaches us, if we will but 
open our eyes to the lesson, (1) that the "mind" of animals is such that the presence of 
old-time factors in the surviving achievements of the dead does not enable the living 
to make improvement, and (2) that the human mind is such that the presence of old- 
time factors in the achievements of bygone generations does enable the living to 
surpass the deeds of the dead. Does this ability to surpass the dead mean that the 
living have more native ability than the dead possessed? No. It means that human 
beings have the power to add to their native ability by absorbing the intelligence 
embodied in past achievements and so to do greater things than they could do if their 
native ability were not thus reinforced. The capacity for thus making the past live and 
work in the present, the capacity for making the intelligence and talent and genius of 
the dead cooperate with the living so that humanity can go foreward as if each 
generation had native ability equal to the combined native abilities of all past 
generations - it is that strange familiar human capacity which Korzybski calls time- 
binding capacity. 



I am writing this article for such readers and only such as are both able and willing to 
pause and reflect. Those who reflect upon what "time-binding" means will see more 
and more clearly that they are here in the presence of an idea that is truly momentous. 
No idea in the literature of science or philosophy is or can be more momentous, for 
the time-binding capacity of man is the most precious thing in the world. It is the 
power that has created civilization and goes on creating it more and more rapidly. 
And that power belongs to man and man only; animals do not have it. That is why 
Korzybski has defined "Humanity" as "the time-binding class of life," and it is also 
why he denies that humans are animals. 


Above I spoke of an infinite chasm between human mind and animal "mind". It is the 
chasm between having time-binding power and not having it; it is the chasm that 
yawns between endless progressibility in humans and the utter lack of it in animals; it 
is the immeasurable difference between a human world clad in a great and growing 
civilization and a non-human world where there is, rightly speaking, no civilization at 
all; for what I said respecting the making of a better bridge applies equally to all the 
elements and forms of both material and spiritual wealth. Wherever we see art or 
science or invention or philosophy or wisdom or ethics or institutions of justice or 
education or religion, we behold something that owes, not only its existence, but the 
possibility of improving it, to the time-binding capacity of our human kind. 


MAN IS NOT AN ANIMAL 


A few weeks ago I discussed this matter with a biologist. He agreed that humans are 
"time-binders." He agreed that time-binding power is the power that makes 
civilization and makes it progress. But, said he, humans are animals, time-binding 
animals. "Please tell me," I said, "why you say that humans are animals." Notice his 
answer, for he said: "I call humans animals because humans have certain animal 
organs and certain animal propensities." "You know," I replied, "that animals have 
certain organs and properties that plants have - they take food, for example, and grow 
and die. Why, then," I asked, "do you not say that animals are plants or that plants are 
animals ? And a cube," I said, "has surfaces and some surface properties, but you do 
not say that a cube is a surface. Why not ?" The questions are questions of logic. My 
friend, the zoologist, had not considered them, and I am still waiting for his answer. 



Another biologist, an eminent one, came to me and said that Korzybski's conception 
of man is "crazy." "What," I asked, "is his conception of man?" "1 don't know," he 
replied impatiently, "and I don't believe Korzybski knows." "Korzybski," I replied, 
"knows precisely what he means; so do I, and I can make the meaning perfectly clear 
to any intelligent inquirer." But that eminent biologist did not wish to understand the 
idea; he wished to call it crazy. From which the reader will rightly infer that even an 
eminent biologist may be a bigot. 


Happily not all biologists are so contemptuous of ideas that did not happen to 
originate with them. For example, in his presidential address (Science, December 30, 
1922) at the last annual meeting (Toronto) of the American Association for the 
Advancement of Science, Dr. L. O. Howard, eminent entomologist, said: "Count 
Korzybski, in his recent remarkable book, The Manhood of Humanity, gives a new 
definition of man, departing from the purely biological concept on the one hand and 
from the mythological-biological-philosophical idea on the other, and concludes that 
humanity is set apart from other things that exist on this globe by its time-binding 
faculty or power or capacity." Dr. Howard adds that "it is indeed this time-binding 
capacity which is the principal asset of humanity." 


And what, pray, is the "principal asset" of animals? It is their ability to move about in 
space. For this ability, (which plants have not) to run or crawl or creep or fly, enables 
the animals to gather the natural fruits of the earth in many different localities. That is 
why Korzybski defines animals to be "the space-binding class of life." Like humans, 
animals can bind space but, unlike humans, animals cannot bind time (in the sense 
explained). To teach that humans are animals is just as stupid as to teach that animals 
are humans. And it is not merely stupid; it is very harmful, harmful to ethics, and 
every one knows that to teach bad ethics is the worst possible kind of education. For 
bad ethics means bad economics, bad politics, bad industrial management, bad 
government, bad individual life, and bad community life. 


Some people have said that ethics can not be taught. They are mistaken. Ethics is 
something that we can not avoid teaching. All persons and especially fathers, mothers 
and teachers are teachers of ethics. And the kind of ethics they teach depends upon 



their conception of humanity, upon their philosophy of human nature. Every home 
and every school in which humans are regarded as animals is, consciously or 
unconsciously, a nursery of animalistic ethics, space-binding ethics, the ethics of 
tooth and claw, of combat, violence, -and war. It is the brutal ethics of survival of the 
fittest where fittest means strongest, not best. This is zoological ethics. There is 
another kind that is Just as bad. I mean mythological ethics, the selfish and insolent 
ethics of Gott mit uns. . So long as individuals or states are fashioned and controlled 
by zoological ethics or by mythological ethics or by the two combined, we may 
expect individuals and states to leap upon their neighbors like infuriated beasts. 


THIS IS A MOMENTOUS IDEA 


Let us glance at the other side of the shield. I wish to ask the reader a very important 
question. Suppose that everywhere throughout the world the home, the school and the 
press were to unite in teaching boys and girls and men and women to understand and 
to feel that they are neither animals nor mysterious hybrids of animals and angels, but 
that they are by nature humans and that the proper life of humans is the life of 
civilizers, not the animalistic life of mere space-binders, but time-binding life - Life- 
in-Time. The question I wish to ask the reader is, "What would be the effect of such 
world-wide instruction?" It is one of the questions I have dealt with in my new book 
of lectures for educated laymen, (Mathematical Philosophy, E. P. Dutton and Co.), 
but a full answer cannot be given in a word. For the answer must be given in terms of 
a new ethics - the ethics of time-binding, the ethics of civilization-building - And the 
effect of such human ethics upon the welfare of our humankind. Some competent 
person ought to write a book upon this great subject for the use of fathers, mothers, 
and teachers. A little reflection enables one to see pretty clearly some of the things 
which such a book of ethics would teach. 


It would teach that human history (the life-history of our race) has depended and 
depends upon three fundamental factors: (1) what we call environment; (2) human 
nature (what man is); (3) knowledge or ignorance of human nature (what humans 
have thought, and now think man is). It would teach that nothing can be more 
important than to make our conception of human nature agree with what human 
nature is; it would teach that the class of humanity is infinitely separated from the 
class of animals by the capacity which humans have for binding time, for thus 



creating and-more and more advancing civilization; it would teach that the zoological 
conception of man as a kind of animal tends to foster the brutal ethics of lust and 
might; it would teach that the conception of man as a hybrid of angel and beast tends 
to promote the irrational ethics of magic and myth. It would teach that a sound human 
ethics must be a natural ethics based upon human nature - upon the laws, that is, of 
those time-binding energies of man that produce civilization; it would teach that it is a 
sovereign duty to discover those laws and to disseminate a knowledge of them 
throughout the world, for conduct that conforms to them is ethically good and that 
which does not is bad. It would teach us that the civilization which we (of a given 
generation) have was not created by us but is the product of the time and toil of the 
dead; that it is, therefore, just as natural a resource as land or sea or sun or sky of the 
common air, and that for us to quarrel and fight for possession of its goods is to 
descend from the proper estate of humans to the level of beasts fighting for the fallen 
nuts of a tree. A sound human ethics would teach us that by studying the works we 
have inherited from the past we can understand them; that by understanding them we 
absorb the intelligence and genius embodied in them; and that we are thus enabled to 
produce things in the form of wisdom or material wealth which we could not produce 
by our own merely native ability even if that ability were multiplied a million fold. It 
would thus teach us that even what we call our own achievements is in the main not 
our own but is mainly the work of intelligence which we have absorbed from the 
achievements of the dead and which still lives in us literally and works through us. 
Human ethics would teach us that we are not only, heritors of the civilization 
produced by the past generations, that we are not only organs for enabling the creative 
intelligence of the past still to live and work, but that we are the trustees of the great 
and growing inheritance for future man. The supreme law of human ethics is the law 
of co-operation, for the time-binding ethics of our human race is, not the ethics of 
brutal combat, but the ethics of cooperation of the dead and the living for all the 
living and the yet unborn. 


If, by home and school, boys and girls were everywhere bred in ethics thus based 
upon the time-binding laws of our human nature, what would be the effect of it upon 
conduct and upon the ways and institutions of human society ? I submit the question 
for the reader's meditation. 


— o — 



HOW TO EDUCATE MASONS IN MASONRY 


BY SEVEN GRAND MASTERS 


In order that this Society might be the better enabled to keep in touch with Masonic 
educational activities and needs throughout this nation, we recently addressed to all 
the Grand Masters the following question: "What in your opinion is the best way in 
which to educate Masons in Masonry?" Nearly all the replies made thereto were 
interesting to a degree and some were of great value, so that if there were room it 
would be a pleasure to publish them all in these pages: but the limitations of space are 
such that we have instead selected seven typical replies as representing various 
sections of the land and varying shades of opinion. It is worthy of note that it has 
come to be taken for granted in every Grand Jurisdiction that some form of Masonic 
education is a practical necessity. It is respectfully suggested to chairmen and 
members of new Grand Lodge educational committees that it might be wise to 
borrow a leaf from the experiences of committees long in the field. This Society will 
give all interested in such matters cordial and immediate cooperation. 


Applied Masonry is Needed in this New Day 


The quest for light and more light has ever been the Freemason's chief aim. The 
ancient Operative Masters were students and teachers, as well as architects and 
builders. The medieval guild of Freemasons conserved, developed, and transmitted 
from ancient to modern times the higher mathematics and the technique of the 
building arts. The Operative lodge is a vocational school, as well as a school of 
morals, a self-governing community, a trades-union and a social brotherhood. When 
the Operative lodges, after the Reformation, broke away from the medieval church, 
amalgamated with the local guilds of Stone Masons, and began freely to "accept" 
non-operative members, they inherited, conserved, and have since transmitted in 
large measure to modern times and customs and teachings of the ancient Anglo- 
Saxon guilds. 



Later, the group of philosophers who organised the British Royal Society interpreted 
the Masonic quest for light terms of that free spirit of inquiry, with which the names 
of Roger Bacon and Francis Bacon are associated and which has given rise to modem 
science. Desaguliers and his associates organized the British Royal Society as a 
research group. They revived the Masonic lodge as an agency for the dissemination 
of the results of research among the people. From this viewpoint also Preston, 
himself a self-made man and a private student, developed his celebrated lectures 
which, as modified and embellished by Webb, Cross, and others, are the basis of our 
present monitorial work. 


The Masonic lodge, in other words, while consistently maintaining through the ages 
the quest for tmth, has modified both the subject matter it has taught and its method 
of presentation to conform to the progress of knowledge and to the conditions of 
every age. 


The World War has shaken to its foundations the entire stmcture of civilization. New 
social thmsts and tensions have been brought about to which every human institution 
must readjust itself. The Craft in New York believes that the time is opportune to 
expand the content of its teachings to embrace the full circle of knowledge, including 
the discoveries of modern science, in application to the needs of modem life. 


Our Committee on Educational Service has made the following declaration: 


"The period of Operative Masonry has passed. The period of purely Speculative 
Masonry is passing. May we not hope that the Fraternity is about to enter a new 
period which shall combine the past teachings of both Operative and Speculative 
Masonry in what may be called APPLIED MASONRY, when every member shall be 
assigned by the Master to some definite task and all, in their stations, shall cooperate 
in helpful, stimulating, constructive service for the common weal?" 


To this end, we are endeavouring (without in anywise modifying our regular 
ritualistic work or infringing the ancient landmarks) gradually to convert our entire 



lodge system into a great, modem, popular university wherein brethren of expert 
knowledge in all fields of learning and activity will lecture on their respective 
specialties as applied to the needs of individual, family, community, state and nation. 


We are now using, and intend further to develop, the use of all kinds of projection 
apparatus, including slides, films and opaque projectors, for visual education. 


We are promoting the formation of Masonic libraries and book, periodical, and study 
clubs. 


Later we hope to revive the ancient relationship of Master and Apprentice. We intend 
to place in the hands of the Entered Apprentice a list of recommended readings and 
put him in the relation of an apprentice to some Master Mason of expert knowledge 
and practical experience, whose obligation shall be to supervise and assist him in 
becoming a Master Workman in his chosen field. 


According to returns from my questionnaire, some twenty-seven hundred addresses 
were given in New York lodges last year on a variety of subjects. Among these were 
more than one hundred illustrated lectures on the part played by our Masonic 
forebears in the formative days of the Republic. Our lodges have also celebrated with 
appropriate patriotic exercises the Masonic birthday of George Washington and Flag 
Day and interested themselves actively in the support of the public schools. 


The ideal to which we look forward is the installation in every lodge of a library of 
Masonic and other appropriate books; a full equipment in each lodge of projection 
apparatus for visual education; regular lectures in lodges interpreting the problems of 
modern life in terms of Masonic tmth; the formation of book, periodical, and study 
clubs; and the enrolment of every apprentice in a course of vocational reading and 
study under the guidance of one or more of his elder brethren. 



We believe the day has come when our young men may and should see visions and 
our old men dream dreams. We have in mind, moreover the classic aphorism of 
Thoreau. "If you have been building castles in the air, your work need not be lost. 
That is where they should be. Now build the foundations under them." These are the 
designs upon our Trestle Board and the work of laying the foundations is well in 
hand. 


Arthur S. Tompkins, Grand Master, New York. 


* * * 


The Subordinate Lodge Should Take the Initiative 


To my mind the education of the Craftsman in Masonic principles can come only 
from the Fraternity. The Fraternity is primarily the Masonic subordinate lodge. It is 
in the subordinate lodge that the Mason learns of his duties to God, his country, his 
fellow man and himself. Every Grand Jurisdiction is only as strong as its subordinate 
organizations. Therefore the problem of education rests with its constituent lodges. 

A Grand Lodge can make its plans for education, but the inspiration for and the 
attainment of knowledge can come and must come from its lodge leaders. 


When our lodges shall learn that a ritual is only for interpretation, that symbols are 
merely for explanation, and that true Masonry lies solely in the proper application of 
the emblems, then shall the pregnant possibilities of learning be put into realities. 


When the ritual and ceremonies are employed for the above purposes, and discarded 
as simply a dramatic performance, we shall approach the full opportunity that awaits 
us. 



In Georgia, we are endeavouring to get away from the grinding out of candidates and 
conferring of degrees. At our 1922 annual communication in October last, our 
General Welfare Committee brought in a resolution, which was adopted, creating a 
Committee on Masonic Education. This committee is headed by our Past Grand 
Master, N.H. Ballard, a prominent Masonic student and superintendent of the Georgia 
State Department of Education. 


The committee will arrange a series of study courses for the various lodges. It will 
present a plan that will endeavour to make Masons as contrawise to the recent desire 
on the part of lodges to make members. In our Jurisdiction we have annual 
conventions of districts and counties. The state is divided into districts, and each year 
there are the district and county conventions. It has been a custom to confine these 
conventions mostly to the "rendition of the work." Our Committee on Masonic 
Education will also prepare educational programs for these conventions, so that the 
Craftsman may learn of the hidden truths and principles of the Fraternity, that he may 
become more than a mere poll-parrot to recite the ritual "letter perfect." 


In other words, our Masonic Educational Committee, better knowing the needs of our 
Georgia Craftsmen, will endeavour to provide for Georgia Masons what the Masonic 
Service Association of the United States is doing through its program. 


The plan is young with us, but Georgia Masons are determined to make Masonry a 
system for the development of its members along the best and broadest lines of 
knowledge. 


My idea is, if I may take the liberty of quoting, summed up in a paragraph of the 
introduction to the review of Georgia's Foreign Correspondence report of 1920, as 
follows: 


"Out of all the chaos, readjustment and confusion, there is being awakened in 
American Masonry the ideal of a bigger, broader and better education. We cannot 
say it is the birth of a new ideal; it is more of a resurrection of the old principles of 



our forefathers as written in the Declaration of Principles of our nation. It is the re- 
application of Masonic tenets to social and political creeds (not through organization 
as a Fraternity, but by individualistic preparedness); it is the education of the 
Craftsman to the highest plane of citizenship through his Masonic ideals. This new 
education, thank God, has no reference to the worn-out bromidic platitude of a 'more 

beautifully rendered letter-perfect ritual The education that is to be urged is an 

American Masonic education, having for its three-fold purpose the conservation of 
the Republic, the cooperation of pure citizenship, and the Americanization of the 
people " 


Joe P. Bowdoin, Grand Master, Georgia. 


* * * 


The Wisdom of Freemasonry Is in Its Ritual 


This question has demanded the attention of a great many of our thoughtful and 
constructive brethren for years and their conclusions are so satisfactory, pleasing and 
practical, that I deem it a privilege to pass on the result of their labours with the hope 
and prayer that they may find a place in the lives of our brethren everywhere. 


Looking at the Masonic situation of today and yesterday, our future is assured while 
Masons continue God-fearing, intelligent, reputable and law-abiding and absolutely 
loyal to the teachings of the Masonic Ritual. 


The Masonic Ritual is a wonderfully comprehensive ceremonial and includes all the 
instruction bestowed by lodges upon candidates and brethren. 



Freemasonry is the wisdom of the Masonic Ritual when at work in the world, a 
wholesome, lively vital force for good. Masonic ceremonies were never intended as 
mere entertainment nor as furnishing materials only for sages or philosophers to dilate 
upon, but as educational agencies which, when acquired and applied, become potent 
factors of daily usefulness in the lives of the brethren. The function of any 
educational plan within the lodge is to enable the assimilation of "those useful rules 
and maxims" inculcated in the ceremonies. 


A hearty welcome has always been held out to any and all trustworthy information of 
a genuinely Masonic character. Our Ohio Code of jurisprudence provides that the 
several subordinate lodges shall be enjoined to introduce as often as it is feasible in 
their meetings, lectures and essays upon Masonic polity, our permanent system of 
Craft control and government, and the arts and sciences connected therewith. 


The same section of our Code recommends that lodges should be supplied with 
libraries of useful and practical books. Much tactful persuasion must be used with the 
brethren to persuade them to read and study these books. The great advantage of the 
personal ownership and use of reliable text-books must be made apparent to all. 


Our Grand Lodge not only recognizes and adopts "The Charges of a Freemason" as 
containing the fundamental laws of Freemasonry, but also declares that they should 
be frequently read and perused by Masters and other Craftsmen, as well within the 
subordinate lodges as without, to the end that none may be ignorant of the excellent 
principles and precepts which they inculcate. 


The provisions of our Masonic Code in Ohio prompts a rendition of the Masonic 
Ritual with all possible accuracy of head and all attainable warmth of heart, that the 
principles of our Institution may be deeply and indelibly impressed upon all who 
come within their legal scope. 


Our state is conveniently divided into districts and each lodge is visited at least once a 
year and examined in no perfunctory way. Our District Lecturers also hold group 



meetings of several lodges at a time, particularly of the officers. Every practicable 
means that the progress of the Institution and the repute of our profession may require 
is employed that we may thereby sustain and promote the common welfare, 
prosperity, unity and happiness of the Craftsmen in all their undertakings. 


It is unnecessary to dwell upon the splendid Masonic Home that is maintained or treat 
of any other past or present activity of ours for the Fraternity. Prompt has always 
been the response to any call for service in behalf of a brother either in or out of the 
state. 


Any system of education should be conservatively directed at the individual. Singly 
we initiate and singly we propose, and our initiates should be competent to do their 
personal duties among their fellow men. An initiate shall be held to no allegiance for 
any particular creed of party or church, but we do seek to educationally impress our 
Masonic principles upon him, that no worthy work shall lack his earnest interest nor 
shall the distressed lose his loving care. 


While parties are many and associations of men are increasingly manifold, and world 
perplexities are rapidly multiplying, there is the greater need of all practicable 
insistence on Masonic instruction that the Fatherhood of God and the Brotherhood of 
Man may be our individually personal pursuits; that the symbolic reminders by 
simple tools and ages-old precepts be not forgotten by any one of us; and that there 
shall never be lacking among us the sage counsel of competent and faithful Masters - 
these are some of the legitimate educational labours of our Craft in Freemasonry and 
to these high and exalted ideals with great sincerity of prayer and purpose the Masons 
of Ohio pledge their untiring zeal and constant and utmost endeavors. 


Harry S. Johnson, Grand Master, Ohio. 



Freemasonry Is in Itself an Education 


I believe Masonic membership too easily and cheaply acquired. In "cheaply" I do not 
allude to the amount of the fee charged, for aside from the necessity of having funds 
for our work, I regard Masonry as God-given, open for all "qualified men even if they 
have not the price of the fee. I hold that no man should be advanced, even from an 
Entered Apprentice, until he has made suitable proficiency, and that proficiency 
should consist not wholly and solely in memorizing a formula, but that he should live 
and act as a good man and true, performing real service in his community, loved and 
respected by all. Rather than a quiz in open lodge on a formula, his quiz should be on 
his understanding of Masonry, its history, its symbolism, its philosophy. 


His attendance at lodge, his ready response the call of duty, his interest in civic life, 
devoid of selfish gain, would be a more suitable evidence of his worthiness to receive 
and have the rights, lights and benefits of advancement, until when he was 
proclaimed a Master Mason, he would be truly such - a Master -one who knows, one 
who has attained. 


Masonry is education, an education covering every phase of life's activity. The great 
professions in their higher aspect, are included in this understanding, philosophy, 
science and art, and yet how many Master Masons have studied the seven liberal arts 
and sciences? 


I appreciate your question and I believe your publication can do an invaluable service 
to the Craft in an educational campaign with pointed suggestions for the brethren, as I 
am fully convinced that the great majority of Masons are really and truly praying for 
the Light. 


I suggest that where possible, lecturers of the right kind should be in the field, not 
only preaching but teaching. These should be men who are not seeking to build a 
following or subtly playing polities for some crafty one who wears a Masonic pin; 
men who talk love and by example stimulate others to love; practical men, not 



dreamers. Men who would encourage the lodges visited, to devote half the time in 
study and discussion of the real teachings of Masonry and make it worth while for the 
brethren to attend lodge. 


What a wonderful world this would be if the Masonic Fraternity were living and 
practising Masonry, "dwelling together in unity" - then would the Turk sheath his 
sword, for the light of the ages would have been placed on a hill, and Intolerance and 
Ignorance would slink back into the pit. 


G.G. Brown, Grand Master, Oregon. 


* * * 


We Need Teachings That Are Strictly Masonic 


Our brethren must be taught that Masonry can not drift from its clearly defined 
moorings. In these days when insidious propaganda is attempting to undermine the 
very foundations of our Government as laid by our Colonial forefathers, many of 
whom were Masons, every member of the Fraternity owes the duty to practice in his 
daily life those principles inculcated by Masonic precepts and instilled into each of us 
in our Masonic journey. 


Too often, I fear, Masons lose sight of the beacons that clearly mark the Masonic 
highway and wander afield, only to find that a will-o'-the-wisp is leading them more 
and more into remote regions that are far removed from the Masonic highway to 
which there can be no return except in retracing the steps to the point where these first 
diverged. 



No public glamour must make us forget our duties as Masons. Public opinion is of a 
changeable character. Masonic teachings, besides being wise, are centuries old, and 
are fundamental in their truths and texts. Masons who have permitted their visions to 
be obscured and have in their anxiety "to do things," followed prophets whose 
teachings are not strictly Masonic, must rend asunder the obscuring mist and renew 
their allegiance to Masonry in its purest and noblest conception. 


In our Jurisdiction there is a Grand Lodge standing Committee on Masonic 
Education. This Committee is of recent origin and little opportunity has been had to 
disseminate such teaching as is implied by its name. It is fully expected that the 
Committee will function successfully without undue delay, and that this will result in 
the true principles of Masonry not only being better understood by the brethren, but 
that the example set by each Mason because of his clearer conception of his duty to 
God, his country, his neighbour, and himself, will be reflected in the entire 
Jurisdiction so that it will redound to the benefit of all of the people of our state, and 
thereby make our Institution, through the public activities of our brethren, as 
individuals, better understood and more highly honoured. 


Charles A. Bamberger, Grand Master, Delaware. 


* * * 


We Must Teach All to Love and Practice Masonry 


The education of Masons in Masonry is one of the greatest problems confronting the 
Craft today. There is no limit to education in any sphere, and Masonry embraces 
such a world wide field that we almost despair of trying to comprehend it. 


Many Masons consider themselves educated if they can repeat the lectures, confer a 
degree or read the signs and symbols, and believe they graduated when they received 



the Master Mason's Degree, proudly pointing to their apron as their diploma and the 
square and compasses that they wear as their class pin. 


But the real Mason, the man who was made a Mason in his heart, the intelligent man, 
the Masonic student, realizes that this is only the beginning of a course of study that 
will end only when the word Finis is written on the pages of his life. He realizes that 
it means research, study, work, an every day effort to make better men, better homes, 
better morals, better government and higher ideals. He realizes that it means 
educating himself and his associates to be not only better husbands, better neighbours 
and friends, not only to be hardworking, upright and God-fearing, but that they have a 
duty to perform to themselves, their neighbours, their families, their state and their 
nation. 


As Masons we are in honour bound to strive earnestly to bring nearer the day when 
Truth, Justice and Honour shall prevail in both our private and public life. 


We cannot hope to maintain our high standard of Brotherly Love, Relief and Truth, or 
command the respect and deference the world now gives us if we do not retain pride 
in our citizenship and strive day by day to improve ourselves. Today the world needs 
Masonry and its teachings more than ever. 


The eyes of the profane are upon us, on those who are in authority, and those high in 
the councils of the nation - as well as those of us in the humbler walks of life, and it 
becomes us therefore "To walk worthily of the vocation wherein we are called," and 
realize that it is not all of Masonry to wear a Masonic pin, or know some letters, signs 
and symbols, better than we know the Ten Commandments. 


The day has come when we must teach, not only our Craft, but the people, 
something. This intelligent age demands it. Take the thinking man of today and 
confer the degrees upon him as some lodges do, in the old time way and he is often 
not only disappointed but disgusted with Masonry. He expected something out of the 
ordinary; he paid his money and he is entitled to all that Masonry professes to teach. 



We need Masters who can teach, Masters who read, who study, who dig, and delve in 
Masonic literature, and Masonic lore: Masters who know, understand, love, and 
practice Masonry, 


"For heart to heart, can only teach 
That which unto them was taught." 


That is my conception of educating Masons in Masonry; it is a stupendous task, a 
difficult problem, but it can be done and will be done. For as a pebble dropped in a 
pool of water causes the ripples to expand and expand until they reach the shore, go, 
will the teachings of Masonry continue to expand the souls of men until they touch 
the shores of Eternity. 


We have divided our state into five districts and have a Board of Custodians, 
consisting of five members - one for each district. This Board has authority to 
appoint as many District Deputy Lecturers as may be necessary to supervise the work 
in the different lodges. These Deputies must pass an examination before the Board of 
Custodians and must be well versed not only in ritualistic work but in lodge 
procedure. 


The Custodians from time to time arrange for district meetings or conventions, which 
are attended by all lodges 'nearby, at which time matters of civil, patriotic, and 
Masonic nature are discussed, as well as providing for a social hour. 


This year has been devoted to a consideration of our Public School System and our 
public schools. 



We find these conventions well attended and great interest taken and we feel that we 
are getting results. 


We are also working in harmony with, and along the lines suggested by, the Masonic 
Service Association. 


At our Grand Lodge meetings we have had speakers of note address the Grand Lodge 
and our last one was unusually interesting and instructive. 


The coming year will see a still greater effort along these lines, as we find the 
brothers are waking up to the necessity of doing something more than conferring 
degrees, and having a social session. 


Theorus R. Stoner, Grand Master, South Dakota. 


— o — 


Real Masons, Not Members, Are Required 


If Masonry in the large centers of population had less diversified interests it would be 
easier to educate Masons in Masonry. Many never get into the real spirit of the 
institution so that their duties and obligations rest lightly upon them. Connecticut has 
undertaken this year to make use of two of the Masonic Service Association's 
lectures, namely, "The Fatherhood of God" and "The Brotherhood of Man" in 
connection with its educational work, and has tried to impress upon the membership 
that it is Masons, not members, that is required. The activity of Masons in all great 
crises of our country's history has also been featured. 



Frank L. Wilder, Grand Master Connecticut 


— o — 


"THEN THEY TOOK HIM, AND SLEW HIM AT THE PASSAGES OF THE 
JORDAN!" 


BY BRO. WALTER BOOTH ADAMS, M.A., M.D., SYRIA 


Brother Adams is Professor of Pharmacology and Dermatology in American 
University, Beirut, Syria, and a member of Amos Beecher Lodge No. 121, of 
Hartford, Conn. He wrote the article which follows at our express request, and its 
freshness and novelty was such that we have asked him for others like it, and are glad 
to announce his consent. Readers of THE BUILDER will be interested to know that 
it was through Dr. Adams that Brother Joseph Fort Newton's The Builders is now 
being translated into Arabic. It is doubtful if any book on Freemasonry has ever 
enjoyed that distinction. Does the reader chance to know of such a thing? 
Freemasonry is active in Syria. A Masonic periodical is published at Damascus. 


WHO IS NOT familiar with the story in the twelfth chapter of Judges and the terrible 
punishment meted out on the unbrotherly Ephraimites by the men of Gilead at the 
fords of the Jordan? Having been myself at the very place perhaps adds interest to the 
story for me: but I wish to record a most interesting double repetition of history. 


It will be recalled that Jephthah, the strong man in Israel in his day, was the leader, 
Sheikh, we would say in these days in Arabic. Jepthah won a notable victory over the 
people of Ammon, who lived to the south of his tribe. When he was threatened, the 
Ephraimites would not come to the help of their brother tribe, the Gileadites: but 



when the battle was won and there was spoil to be gathered in and divided, the 
Ephraimites were right there for the division and threatened Jephthah with burning his 
house over his head for not summoning them to share in it. This was a bit too strong, 
and Jephthah took up the challenge and a civil war or battle took place and the bullies 
and boasters "got their come-uppance," as the old New England phrase so graphically 
puts it. 


Not only were the Ephraimites "scattered and peeled," but Jephthah stationed a force 
at the fords of the Jordan to intercept the Ephraimites fleeing west to their homes. 
"And the Gileadites took the passages of the Jordan before the Ephraimites: and it 
was so, that when those Ephraimites which escaped said, Let me go over; that the 
men of Gilead said unto him, Art thou an Ephraimite? If he said Nay; Then said they 
unto him, Say now Shibboleth (which signifieth a, stream): and he said Sibboleth: for, 
he could not frame to pronounce it right. Then they took him, and slew him at the 
passages of the Jordan: and there fell at that time of the Ephraimites forty and two 
thousand." A truly terrible punishment for unfraternal acts and threats! This is 
reckoned by chronologists to have taken place about 1140 years before Christ. Three 
thousand years is a long stretch! 


In the year 1840 Muhammad Ali, the Viceroy of Egypt and the founder of the royal 
house that now reigns in the Valley of the Nile - first as Khedive, then Sultan, and 
now as King - rebelled against the Turkish government and made his able son, 
Ibrahim Pasha, his commander-in-chief. He swept through Palestine and Syria, 
driving the Turkish forces before him, and impressing into his army, the Syrians. The 
Syrians greatly resented this forced drafting into the Egyptian army as much as they 
resented and did their best to evade the Turkish draft in the Great War, but the 
conscription was very thorough and the more hated on that account. 


Ibrahim Pasha drove the Turks well into Asia Minor and was threatening 
Constantinople; and indeed, the Turks were unable to stop him. But it was contrary 
to the policy of the European powers to have the Turks conquered by the Egyptians, 
and the allied fleet, mostly British with some French and a few Russian ships, 
bombarded Beirut - we have some of the solid shot cannon balls in the museum of the 
American University of Beirut as a memento of it. They captured the city, drew their 
ships up on the sands of St. George's Bay, cut down some of the best remaining of the 



Cedars of Lebanon, but not all of them, to make tar, and then proceeded to calk the 
seams of their wooden ships. Holding Beirut, they threatened Ibrahim Pasha's line of 
communication with Egypt. He turned about and retreated, coming down through 
Aleppo and Damascus and crossing the Jordan at the same fords that the Ephraimites 
had crossed, and met with such disaster in mispronouncing a word. Now, in all 
retreating armies there are stragglers, and many of them. As I have intimated, the 
Syrians hated the Egyptians, and when the soldiers, the stragglers, came to the ford 
the Syrians would ask them: "Are you a Shami (Syrian)?" "Yes, indeed," the Egyptian 
would slay to gain favour and perhaps food. "Then say Jamel (camel)." "Gamel," the 
Egyptian would inadvertently say. Now there is no "J" sound in the Egyptian dialect 
of Arabic. The letter that is written the same is in the Syrian dialect sounded like a 
soft "J," really like the French "J," whereas the Egyptians always pronounce it like a 
hard "G," and accordingly said "Gamel." In fact, the English language got its name 
for, that ugly brute, the pet of the "Shriners," from the Egyptian dialect, but we have 
substituted a "C" and for the "G." So the Syrian soldiers said "Jamel," they said, 

"Pass on, my brother"; but when the Egyptians said "Gamel," they said, "Iktul 
'ameru," (cut off his life!) and they killed them just as the Gileadites slew the 
Ephraimites, three thousand years before at the same place. 


But that is not all. The Turks in the Great War drafted the Syrians into their army and 
most of them were very unwilling soldiers. They were not in sympathy with the 
Germano-Turkish aims and plans. When Allenby made that wonderfully complete 
crumpling up of the Ottoman army in Palestine and across the Jordan in September, 
1918, many who did not get caught in the net at first tried to escape by crossing from 
the east of the Jordan to the west side by these same fords of the famous river. There 
they met many Syrians, some soldiers and some civilians, and each fleeing soldier 
was asked whether he were Syrian or a Turk. If he said he was a Syrian, they said to 
him: "Say Buzszle" (onion); and if he were a Turk he would say "bussel," for the 
Turkish language makes no difference in pronouncing the "Sod" and the "Seen," both 
varieties of the letter "S." The "Sod" is a heavy "S" sounded with the tip of the tongue 
down below the roots of the front teeth and the Turks pronounce it just like an 
ordinary "S." The Syrian ear is very discriminating to these sounds; and when they 
heard the word for onion come hissing out instead of lisping out like a tongue-tied 
child, they said "Iktul 'ameru" (cut off his life), and they slew many Turks at the fords 
of the Jordan. 


— o — 



WAS DR. JOHNSON A FREEMASON? SOME PHASES OF HIS LIFE 


BY BRO. ARTHUR HEIRON, ENGLAND 


CONCLUDED FROM MARCH NUMBER 


With this instalment Brother Arthur Heiron concludes his examination of the famous 
Dr. Johnson's possible connections with Freemasonry, and brings to end as interesting 
an essay as one has read in many a day, especially in the sidelights it throws on the 
doings of Freemasons in eighteenth century England. The pages now following have 
a peculiar interest in that they set forth evidence to show that David Garrick, Edmund 
Burke, and Sir William Forbes were Masons. It is clearly proved that Boswell 
himself was made a member before 1770, which is a fact that excites our curiosity, 
see-thanks for his essay. May he find it possible to publish the lodges of those early 
days. Brother Heiron has our thinking that he was of a type which we seldomly 
associate with same in book form! 


ENOUGH has certainly now been said (perhaps too much) to demonstrate that 
whatever other good qualities the learned doctor possessed, he was indeed a lover of 
fun and humour, at times a real "Bohemian," a frequenter of taverns, very partial to 
club life, and just the type of man who could appreciate the jovial good fellowship 
that was to be found in a leading and important Masonic lodge. The "Dundee Lodge" 
No. 9, undoubtedly was such a lodge, and met in its own freehold at Wapping from 
1763 to 1820, a unique experience for a lodge in those days. 


Even if the critical student does not accept the evidence as sufficient to make the 
identity clear, surely it is most reasonable to believe that Dr. Johnson did indeed join 
the Craft at some period or other, even if we may never know the actual name of his 
lodge; if he did do this, he would only be following the example of certain of his most 



intimate acquaintances. And now let us turn our thought for a few moments to his 
biographer and close personal friend "James Boswell." 


BOSWELL'S MYSTERIOUS SILENCE 


We arrive now at the strangest feature of this little story namely, that while Boswell's 
"Life of Johnson contains about 1300 pages, yet the important and very interesting 
subject of Freemasonry is never even alluded to. Johnson and Boswell were both 
inveterate gossips and this book is full of discussions of nearly every subject under 
the sun, both grave and gay, including such items as "Religion"; "Life and 
Immortality"; "Marriage and Divorce"; "Polities"; "Ghosts"; "Various methods of 
shaving"; "Hours of sleep needed for health"; etc., etc., etc. Boswell once asked his 
hero; "If, Sir, you were shut up in a castle and a new-born child with you, what would 
you do?" "Why, Sir, I should not much like my company," was Dr. Johnson's sage 
reply. 


At first one might believe that Boswell's strange silence on the subject of the Craft 
was because he was not himself a Freemason, but this proves erroneous, for "James 
Boswell" had been "Made a Mason" before 1770 in Edinburgh, in "Canongate 
Kilwinning" Lodge (No. 2), of which he became the Master; was elected Senior 
Grand Warden of the Grand Lodge of Scotland in 1773, and was afterwards "Raised 
to the Dais as Depute Grand Master" (of Scotland) in 1776-77. 


Several other of Johnson's most intimate friends were also Freemasons; viz., (1) Sir 
William Forbes of Pitsligo, who was actually Grand Master of Scotland in 1776 and 
1777. He was a well known and respected banker, often in London and at one time 
associated with "Courts," also an author. (2) David Garrick, the famous actor, who 
had actually been a pupil at Dr. Johnson's school in 1737; and, (3) Edmund Burke, the 
renowned orator and statesman. There may be a slight doubt as to the last two names, 
but none as regards Boswell and Forbes. 



Now all these friends of Johnson were also members of his famous "Literary Club" 
and they often met together for friendly discussion. Dr. Johnson was perhaps the 
greatest talker the world has ever known; Mrs. Thrale says "that conversation was all 
that Johnson required to make him happy"; even Burke, England's greatest orator, 
was content to say but little when Dr. Johnson was present, stating, "It is enough for 
me to have rung the bell to him." Surely Boswell, the "babbling and loquacious 
Boswell," vain and loving praise, would have informed Johnson of the great honour 
conferred upon him (Boswell) when the Grand Master of Scotland appointed him his 
Deputy in 1776, and it is almost certain that discussions would have taken place 
between these two on the merits or demerits of an Order that had existed certainly 
back to medieval times, when the Operative Craft Guilds were in full sway; and 
which in 1769 was described in a history by Wellins Calcott, a Past Master, as "the 
most Ancient and Honourable Society of Free and Accepted Masons," of which book 
Boswell himself was one of the original subscribers. Freemasons also in those days 
constantly made charitable gifts to deserving objects quite outside the Craft; as an 
instance, the "Dundee Lodge" No. 9, (not a wealthy lodge) in 1766 subscribed thirty 
pounds sterling for the "Unhappy Sufferers by the Great Fire at Barbadoes," which 
was far distant from our brethren at Wapping. 


Could the reason possibly be that Dr. Johnson (not desiring any enquiry being made 
as to his wanderings and researches at Wapping in 1767), personally requested 
Boswell never to allude to the subject of the Craft when writing his Life? It will be 
remembered that Johnson never referred to "Wapping" till 1783, the year before his 
death, and how surprised Boswell was when his hero's acquaintance with this locality 
was for the first time thus revealed. The reader must however decide for himself the 
true motive for Boswell's strange silence on a subject that certainly merited discussion 
much more than many of the trifling themes he and Johnson used to argue about. 


JOHNSON'S FRIENDS AS MASONS 


Bro. James Boswell (1740-1795) 

Bro. David Garrick (1716-1779) 

Bro. Sir William Forbes (1739-1806) 



Bro. Edmund (?) Burke (1730-1797) 


The evidence as to these friends of Dr. Johnson being members of the Craft is as 
follows: As regards Boswell and Forbes, an extract taken from the History of the 
Lodge of Edinburgh (Mary's Chapel) No. 1, by David Murray Lyon, second edition, 
1900, states on page 55: 


"James Boswell of Auchinleck, son and heir of the Scottish Judge, Lord Auchinleck, 
and himself the well known author of 'Corsica,' and the biographer of Dr. Johnson, 
was made a member by honourary affiliation in February, 1777. Previous to this he 
had been elected Senior Grand Warden in the Grand Lodge of Scotland and was 
subsequently raised to the dais as Depute Grand Master, which post he held during 
the years 1776-77 and 1777-78. Canongate Kilwinning was his mother lodge, of 
which he became Master. His uncle, John Boswell, M. D., Censor of the Royal 
College of Physicians in Edinburgh, was Senior Grand Warden in 1753-54. James' 
son, Alexander (afterwards Sir Alexander) Boswell, was also a member of the Craft, 
and at the time of his death by the hand of a duellist, was Master of Lodge Kilwinning 
and an ex-officio Provincial Grand Master of Ayrshire." 


A further extract on page 361 states: "1776, December 10: Sir William Forbes of 
Pitsligo, Baronet. The Grand Master, who was accompanied by his Depute, James 
Boswell, the biographer of Johnson, was made 'an honourary brother of the Lodge, as 
a mark of the sense the Brethren had of his high and distinguished merit in every 
department of life.' Sir William Forbes was initiated in Canongate Kilwinning in 
1759. He held the post of Junior Grand Warden from 1765 to 1769 and, as 31st 
Grand Master, presided in the Grand Orient during the two years ending November, 

1778 He was a member with Johnson, Burke, Garrick, Reynolds and other 

notables of the celebrated literary Club of London." (Substantially the same accounts 
can be found on pages 53 and 328-330 of the original edition of Lyon's History, 
printed in 1873.) 


[Note: Sir William Forbes, bom in 1739, died in 1806; he was a friend of Sir Walter 
Scott, who dedicated to his memory the fourth canto of "Marmion."] 



A further reference is to be found in Gould's "History of Freemasonry," Volume V, 
Chapter XXIII, p. 63: "Sir William Forbes .... the latter - whose Depute was James 
Boswell of Auchinleck - laid the foundation stone of the High School of Edinburgh, 
June 24th, 1777." 


A further reference is to be found in A Candid Disquisition of the Principles and 
Practices of the most Ancient and Honourable Society of Free and Accepted Masons, 
by Wellins Calcott, P.M., printed in London, 1769, where on page IV the list of 
subscribers to that Masonic history includes: "James Boswell Esq; Author of the 
History of Corsica"; Boswell having visited Corsica and in 1768 written a history of 
that country. 


And a final reference appears in The History of Free Masonry and the Grand Lodge 
of Scotland, by W. A. Laurie, Secretary to the Grand Lodge of Scotland: printed in 
1859. An extract from the Table of Grand Office-bearers in Grand Lodge of Scotland 
from 1736 to 1858, gives "Boswell, James, (the biographer of Johnson)" as S.G.W. in 
1773, and D.G.M. in 1776-1777. 


[Note: The writer is personally indebted to Bro. J.E. Shum Tuckett, M.A. (Cantab.), 
P.Pr.G.R., Wilts., P.M. "Quatuor Coronati Lodge" No. 2076, a well known, keen and 
ardent Masonic student, for this interesting information thus clearly proving James 
Boswell and Sir William Forbes to be Freemasons.] 


BRO. DAVID GARRICK'S SNUFF-BOX 


The evidence as to David Garrick (1716-79) being a Mason is not so strong but still 
fairly circumstantial, for one of the old lodges in London, known as "St. Paul's 
Lodge" No. 194, constituted in 1790, preserves as one of its cherished relies a silver 
snuff-box, and engraved on the inside of the lid is a statement that the box is a 
duplicate of one that originally belonged to "Bro. David Garrick"; this souvenir has 



been in the possession of this lodge for so many years that the oldest member can 
assign no date as to when it was first acquired. 


BRO. BURKE (EDMUND?) (1730-1797) 


This great writer and statesman was a member of "Jerusalem Lodge," No. 44, 
Clerkenwell, London. 


1769, March 3. "Burke's Lodge"; when the members went to the King's Bench Prison 
and made John Wilkes a Mason, (see Ars Quatuor Coronatorum, Volume III, page 
61.) 


(Note: The writer is indebted for this item to Bro. W. Wonnacott, A.G. Supt. Wks., 
Assistant Librarian to the Grand Lodge of England.) Here seems reasonable evidence 
that Edmund Burke, England's greatest orator, was a freemason; his impassioned 
speech of three days duration delivered on the "Impeachment of Warren Hastings" 
was perhaps his greatest effort. 


In the "Old Charges" approved by Grand Lodge in 1722, the brethren are enjoined to 
"Cultivate Brotherly Love, the foundation and Cape-stone, the Cement and Glory of 
this Ancient fraternity"; surely such lofty and unselfish sentiments should have 
appealed to both Johnson and Boswell who were so constantly talking of their 
religious principles; yet it almost appears as if Boswell by his contemptuous silence 
(and certainly by his indifference) was willing to cast a kind of slur upon our noble 
Craft as though the subject was not even worthy of discussion by a man of his 
eminence; therefore acting in defense of our Order, the following observations were 
added: 


James Boswell 



Description and Character 


Lord Macaulay evidently did not hold a very high opinion of the biographer of Dr. 
Johnson, for writing in September 1831, in the Edinburgh Review, he said: "Boswell 
was one of the smallest men that ever lived, and yet, he has beaten them all." He was 
"a man of the meanest and feeblest intellect," servile and impertinent, shallow and 
pedantic, a bigot and a sot, bloated with family pride, .... stooping to be a tale bearer, 
an eavesdropper." "That such a man should have written one of the best books in the 
world is strange enough." "If he had not been a great fool he would never have been a 
great writer." "He was a dunce, a parasite, and a coxcomb," "but his book has made 
him immortal." "His fame is great; and it will we have no doubt be lasting," and yet, 
"While edition after edition of his book (viz., Boswell's "Life of Johnson") was 
coming forth, his son (Sir Alexander Boswell), as Mr. Croker tells us was ashamed of 
it, and hated to hear it mentioned." 


CARLYLE ON "BOSWELL" 


Let us now read a few statements from an essay by Thomas Carlyle, the sage of 
Chelsea, who, writing in Eraser's Magazine of 1832, said: "Boswell was a person 
whose mean or bad qualities lay open to the general eye, visible, palpable to the 
dullest.... That he was a wine-bibber and good liver, .... is undeniable enough. That 
he was vain, heedless, a babbler, had much of the sycophant, alternating with the 
braggadocio, curiously spiced too with an all-pervading dash of the coxcomb, ... that 
he appeared at the Shakespeare Jubilee with a riband imprinted 'Corska Boswell' 
round his hat .... is evident as the sun at noon. The very look of Boswell seems to 
have signified so much. In that cocked nose, cocked partly in triumph over his 
weaker fellow-creatures, partly to snuff up the smell of coming pleasure and scent it 
from afar, in those big cheeks, hanging like half-filled wine-skins, still able to contain 
more, in the coarsely-protruded shelf mouth, that fat dew-lapped chin; in all this who 
sees not sensuality, pretension, boisterous imbecility enough? The underpart of 
Boswell's face is of a low almost brutish character." These are the comments made by 
one Scotsman on a brother Scot! 



These criticisms thus made by Macaulay and Carlyle on Boswell seem to us in 1922 
rather unduly severe, but as they wrote their remarks only about thirty-seven years 
after Bosell's death, they doubtless received some of their information from various 
people who knew him personally and were well able to judge. It will be noted also 
that Boswell in his own private letters, written by him to his intimate friend Rev. W.J 
Temple (published for the first time in 1857), does not spare himself but practically 
confirms the rather severe verdict above recorded. 


It may now we think fairly be said that the following points have been sufficiently 
demonstrated; viz., 


SUMMARY 


1. Dr. Samuel Johnson's admitted acquaintance with Wapping. 

2. A "Samuel Johnson" "Made a Mason" at Wapping in 1767. 

3. Rarity and scarcity of this name. 

4. Dr. Johnson's great love of London, fondness for club life, a frequenter of taverns. 

5. His partiality for dancing: most probably he attended the "Wapping Assembly" 
(1763-1820). * 

6. Masonic references. Dr. Johnson gives a Charge to Boswell. 

7. "James Boswell" and "David Garrick," both Freemasons. "James Boswell," Depute 
Grand Master of Scotland (1776 - 1777). 

8. His strange silence as to the Craft 

9. Macaulay and Carlyle on Boswell. 

10. William Preston. 


11. Various "pros" and "Cons." 



It may be remarked and truthfully that after all, the above statements seeking to prove 
that Dr. Johnson was a Freemason are merely based on "circumstantial evidence"; this 
is admitted, although the chain of evidence is fairly strong, but nearly all criminal 
trials of modern days depend on testimony. 


The Hon. Mr. Justice Darling, a lawyer of repute and wide experience, in summing 
up the facts in a recent sensational trial for murder, (where the prisoner was convicted 
of poisoning his wife by arsenic) remarked, "It has been said that the evidence in this 
case is only circumstantial; well, in my opinion circumstantial evidence is the best 
evidence you can get provided there is plenty of it." 


It is now humbly suggested that the "circumstantial evidence" concerning Dr. 
Johnson's alleged connection with the Craft (even if the name of his lodge be not a 
certainty) is sufficiently strong to deserve acceptance, but the responsibility for the 
final verdict is left to each individual reader, who by this time is fully qualified to 
decide for himself And now having in a very halting and inefficient manner brought 
these few facts to the notice of the Craft, the writer wishes his brethren "Adieu," and 
retires into, his former obscurity. 


REFERENCES 


Boswell's Life of Johnson, 1791. 

Hawkin's Life of Johnson, 1787. 

Dr. Johnson's Prayers and Meditations, 1785. 
Macaulay's Essay in the Edinburgh Review, 1831. 
Carlyle's Essay in Fraser's Magazine, 1832. 

Diary of Madame D'Arblade (Fanny Burney), 142. 



Heiron's Ancient Freemasonry and the Old Dundee Lodge No. 18, 1722-1920. 


o — 


MEMORIALS TO GREAT MEN WHO WERE MASONS- - ROBERT E. PEARY 


BY BRO. GEO. W. BAIRD, P. G. M., DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA 


ROBERT E. PEARY, arctic explorer and discoverer of the North Pole, was a member 
of Kane Lodge of New York City. Shortly after his birth in Pennsylvania in 1854 his 
parents moved to Maine, and there it was that Robert spent his boyhood. He was 
graduated from the Van Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute at Troy, New York, with the 
degree of Civil Engineer. In 1881 he entered the United States Naval Service as a 
civil engineer with the rank of lieutenant, and served his corps with faithfulness and 
zeal. In much of the work under his charge, as in the docking improvements at Key 
West, he almost always managed t o keep his work at a cost underneath the estimates 
and appropriations, a thing that is somewhat rare. He was always exacting and 
particular in his work and usually managed to have his own way, which was always 
very much to the interest of the Service. 


My first acquaintance with Peary was about 1885, at which time he was constructing 
a patent sled for the purpose of using it on the ice-cap of Greenland, which is the 
farthest north of any land. He believed that Greenland might extend to the Pole and 
that by going across its ice-cap he would be enabled to make that much coveted 
discovery. His purpose was to use a sail to help the dogs pull the load. This was the 
first time that an explorer had planned to use Greenland as a highway to the Pole. 


It required no argument to enable me to see and appreciate his methods. Snow falls on 
high places in the arctic regions as it does in the tropics, but the winds pile it up on 
the lower levels so that after the lapse of thousands of centuries this vast deposit of 



unthawed snow approaches a general level. The weight of the snow (snow is really a 
very heavy material when packed) at last transforms it into solid ice, which at the 
edge of the land falls over into the sea as icebergs. The depth of these icebergs, a s 
they lie in the cold water, is an indication of the depth of the snow and ice in 
Greenland, and its bulk is sometimes mountainous. 


I doubted Peary's ability to reach the top of the Greenland ice-cap, but he said he 
would find a way or make it, an expression that he frequently used. 1 doubted still 
more his ability to get from the Navy Department a leave of absence to make his 
experiment, and I was even more skeptical of his ability to secure an outfit or an 
appropriation for the same, because neither Congress nor the Navy Department had 
shown much liberality in such matters for several years. Dr. Kane's expedition to the 
arctic, as I have already explained in these pages, was financed by Mr. Grinnell. 


But Peary was confident and he at last succeeded. His excursion over the ice-cap of 
Greenland was much as he expected and he made wonderful speed over that rolling 
surface. But alas! 


"The best laid plans of mice and men 
Gang aft agley." 


Peary at last came to a ravine as deep and wide as t h e Grand Canon of the Colorado, 
but more jagged and frozen, in the bottom of which moved a great mass of sluggish 
water and ice. It was impossible to cross this but it proved that Greenland was an 
island, which was a great discovery in geography and alone entitles Peary to an ever 
enduring crown of fame. 


His next plan - like a good engineer he learned from experience and did not repeat 
mistakes - was entirely different. He conceived the idea of establishing food depots 
along the trail, a day's travel apart, in order that the party making the final dash might 
travel with lighter load and thus stand a better chance. It was by this means that he 



succeeded in realizing what had been the fond dream of arctic explorers for a hundred 
years. Peary's method of establishing food denote at intervals was adopted by Captain 
Roald Amundsen, the famous Norwegian who discovered the South Pole. Captain 
Scott of the Royal Navy, who died during his attempt to reach the South Pole, also 
used the same method. 


Peary had grit, daring and endless perseverance. On one voyage he broke his leg, but 
refused to turn back. He had his leg put in splints and he recovered. Neither did he 
falter when three of his toes were so badly frozen that they had to be amputated. It 
was while he had to lie by with his broken leg in winter quarters that his wife joined 
him, and their daughter, famous as the "snow baby," was born at that time. 


It happened that Peary, the discoverer of the North Pole, and Amundsen, the 
discoverer of the South Pole, were entertained together at a dinner given in 
Washington, D. C., by the National Geographic Society. A gold medal was given to 
each of these great men by the President of the United States. One of the speakers of 
the occasion was Sir James Bryce, the then Ambassador from Great Britain, who, in a 
very happy speech said: "Something has happened here tonight which never 
happened before and which can never happen again. There meet with us the 
discoverer of the North Pole and the discoverer of the South Pole." 


The beautiful memorial shown in the illustration is a granite sphere resting on four 
bronze feet, upon a rectangular base, also of granite. The outline of the continent is 
sculptured on the sphere and at the extreme north of it is a five pointed star. Few 
observers know that this star is a Masonic emblem, the pentalpha, which is 
emblematic of the five points of fellowship, as beautifully explained in the lecture of 
the second section of the Third Degree. 


This memorial was planned by the widow of Peary, but the National Geographic 
Society secured not only the privilege of assuming the cost, but also of having charge 
of the dedication. The dedication took place on the sixth day of April, 1922, at the 
National Cemetery of Arlington, Virginia, near the capital of the nation. It was 
originally planned that the Grand Lodge of the District of Columbia should perform 



the ceremony, and a large deputation from Kane Lodge came from New York to 
assist, but for some reason unknown to me the Masonic service was omitted. The 
famous Marine Band furnished the music. The Secretary of the Navy, the Assistant 
Secretary of the Navy, and the President of the National Geographic Society made 
eloquent addresses. The stoppers which held the Union Jack over the memorial were 
broken by Peary's daughter, Mrs. Stafford. As the flag slid down from the sides of the 
memorial, the Marine Band rendered the national air. President and Mrs. Harding, the 
Chief Justice of the United States, the Secretary of State, and many senators and 
members of the Diplomatic Corps and officers of the Army and Navy were among the 
guests. Congress enacted that Peary should be promoted to the rank of Rear Admiral 
in recognition of his services and he was retired with that rank in 1909. He was much 
broken in health, but he never referred to that and concealed his misfortunes, and 
gamely assumed a happy air. We have always thought that it was the devoted 
attention that he received from his brave little wife that kept him alive so long. He 
died in Washington in 1920. 


o — 


THE STUDY CLUB 


FREEMASONRY AND THE MEN'S HOUSE 


BY BRO. H.L. HAYWOOD 


EDITOR THE BUILDER 


I - ANTHROPOLOGISTS DISCOVER THE MEN'S HOUSE 



EVER SINCE Heinrich Schurtz published his Altersklassen und Maennerbunde in 
1902, anthropologists have become more and more interested in the part played by 
secret societies among primitive peoples. Herr Schurtz discovered that secret 
societies were not by any means a private thing, of little interest and less 
consequence, as former anthropologists had believed them to be, but that they were of 
equal importance in primitive life with other social institutions. He found that "in 
intimate connection with the age-classes, and more particularly with the dominant 
role played by the organized bachelors, there develops the men's house. It is 
characteristic as a structure in which the adult but single men cook their meals, work, 
play and sleep, while the married men dwell apart with their families. Women and 
children are usually barred from the premises, while the mature young girls may 
freely consort with the inmates." 


Prof. Hutton Webster, of the University of Nebraska, working independently and 
without knowledge of the findings of Schurtz, arrived at the same conclusion, and 
wrote a treatise on the subject that has proved of the utmost importance to students of 
secret societies. This was published in 1908 under the title of Primitive Secret 
Societies: A Study in Early Politics and Religion. The central conception of this book 
is that of the men's house. Prof. Webster describes this at some length on the first 
page of this book as follows: 


"The separation of the sexes which exists in civilized societies is the outcome, in part, 
of natural distinctions of sex and economic function; in part it finds an explanation in 
those feelings of sexual solidarity to which we owe the existence of our clubs and 
unions. Sexual solidarity itself is only another expression for the working of that 
universal law of human sympathy, or in more modern phrase, of consciousness of 
kind, which lies at the foundation of all social relations. But in primitive societies, to 
these forces bringing about sexual separation, there is added a force even more potent, 
which originates in widespread beliefs as to the transmissibility of sexual 
characteristics from one individual to another. Out of these beliefs have arisen many 
curious and interesting taboos designed to prevent the real or imagined dangers 
incident to the contact of the sexes. Sexual separation is further secured and 
perpetuated by the institution known as the men's house, of which examples are to be 
found among primitive peoples throughout the world. 



"The men's house is usually the largest building in a tribal settlement. It belongs in 
common to the villagers; it serves as council-chamber and town hall, as a guest-house 
for strangers, and as the sleeping resort of the men. Frequently, seats in the house are 
assigned to elders and other leading individuals according to their dignity and 
importance. Here the precious belongings of the community, such as trophies taken 
in war or in the chase, and religious emblems of various sorts are preserved. Within 
its precincts, women and children, and men not fully initiated members of the tribe, 
seldom or never enter. When marriage and the exclusive possession of a woman do 
not follow immediately upon initiation into the tribe, the institution of the men's 
house becomes an effective restraint upon the sexual proclivities of the unmarried 
youth. It then serves as a clubhouse for the bachelors whose residence within it may 
be regarded as a perpetuation of that formal seclusion of the lads from the women, 
which it is the purpose of the initiation ceremonies in the first place to accomplish. 
Such communal living on the part of the young men is a visible token of their 
separation from the narrow circle of the family, and of their introduction to the duties 
and responsibilities of tribal life. The existence of such an institution emphasizes the 
fact that a settled family life with a private abode is the privilege of the older men, 
who alone have marital rights over the women of the tribe. For promiscuity, either 
before or after marriage, is the exception among primitive peoples, who attempt not 
only to regulate by complicated and rigorous marriage systems the sexual desires of 
those who are competent to marry, but actually to prevent any intercourse at all of 
those who are not fully initiated members of the community. 


"An institution so firmly established and so widely spread may be expected to survive 
by devotion to other uses, as the earlier ideas which led to its foundation fade away. 
As guard posts where the young men are confined on military duty and are exercised 
in the arts of war, these houses often become a serviceable means of defence. The 
religious worship of the community frequently centers in them. Often they form the 
theatre of dramatic representations. In rare instances these institutions seem to have 
lost their original purpose and to have facilitated sexual communism rather than 
sexual separation. Among some tribes men's house is used as the centre of the 
puberty initiation ceremonies. With the development of secret societies, replacing the 
earlier tribal puberty institutions, the mens house frequently becomes the seat of these 
organizations and forms the secret 'lodge.' The presence then in a primitive 
community of the men's house in any form of its numerous forms points strongly to 
the existence, now, or in the past, of secret initiation ceremonies." (Primitive Secret 
Societies, pages 1, 2, 3) 



One may doubt the accuracy of Prof. Webster when he says that "examples are to be 
found among primitive people throughout the world." There are not many examples 
to be found in Asia and it may very well be that in certain parts of that continent the 
primitive secret society has never been known: some authorities are of that opinion, 
Schurtz for example, who was not able to discover traces of men's secret societies 
over large portions of the continent. In his chapter on "Diffusion of Ancient 
Ceremonies," Webster has himself furnished no Asiatic examples but has confined 
himself to Australia, Tasmania, Melanesia, Polynesia, South America, Central 
America and North America. 


It is impossible in the present limitations of space to set down very many examples of 
the primitive secret cult: a few specimens will suffice. Among the Andaman 
Islanders there are three kinds of huts, for bachelors, spinsters and married couples, 
respectively. In their eleventh year boys and girts are subjected to various ordeals and 
in every case must participate in elaborate ceremonies upon passing from one age 
grade to another. Women participate in these mysteries as well as men. Most 
Australian tribes have initiation ceremonies at or near the time of puberty. In most 
cases these ceremonies are very severe; men only are admitted; and the rite appears 
usually to be a form of preparation for matrimony. The Masai divide their male 
members into three grades of boys, warriors, and elders; their ceremony is 
accompanied by circumcision. Among the Banks Islanders the males constitute a 
kind of triple secret society but this group is entered not by initiation but by paying a 
fee. Men live in the village club house, which is a lounging place and eating place by 
day and dormitory by night: they are divided into grades with power and prestige 
accordingly, and only men of wealth can reach the higher positions. This same 
people have "Ghost Societies" which are very secret in their nature and have 
headquarters in the most secluded places. Among the Pueblo Indians the Zunis had a 
"Mask Dancer" society, in which there were degrees, initiations, and much primitive 
mummery: each society had its own lodge building in which were apartments 
representing the four quarters of the compass, the zenith, and the nadir. The Hopi 
Indians had similar secret fraternities and so also the Crows, who had a "Tobacco 
Society" with initiation ceremonies, degrees, etc. The Hidatsas had many social clubs, 
entrance to which was gained through purchase: their women had similar 
organizations. On the other hand the Shoshoneans of the Great Basin have apparently 
never had anything that may be properly classed as a secret society. These cases are 
but typical of the countless instances in which primitive people - or savages as we call 
them - have made use of secret organizations. 



II - TRIBAL INITIATION IS A SEVERE ORDEAL 


In most cases the initiation ceremonies are in the nature of ordeals and many times 
are so severe that death or permanent crippling is not unknown. "The diversity of the 
ordeals is most interesting. Thus, depilation, head biting, evulsion of teeth, sprinkling 
with human blood, emersion in dust or filth, heavy flogging, scarification, smoking 
and burning, circumcision and subincision, are some of the forms in which the 
ordeals appear, among the Australians alone.... Of all these ordeals circumcision has 

the greatest prominence Almost universally initiation rites include a mimic 

representation of the death and resurrection of the novice. The new life to which he 
awakes from initiation is one utterly forgetful of the old; a new name, a new 

language, and new principles are its natural accompaniment A new language is 

closely associated with the new name. The possession of an esoteric speech known 
only to initiated members is highly useful as lending an additional mystery to the 

proceedings The various ceremonies which take place on the arrival of girls at 

puberty are distinctly less impressive than those of the boys. As a rule there is no 

admittance at a formal initiation possessing tribal aspects and secret rites No 

doubt various beliefs arising from many different sources have united to establish the 
necessity of secluding boys and girls at puberty. 


"Isolation from the things of flesh and sense has been a device not infrequently 
employed by people of advanced culture for the furtherance of spiritual life, and we 
need not be surprised to find uncivilized man resorting to similar devices for more 
practical purposes. The long fasts, the deprivation of sleep, the constant excitement 
of the new and unexpected, the nervous reaction under long-continued torments, 
result in a condition of extreme sensitiveness - hyper - aesthesia- which is certainly 
favourable to the reception of impressions that will be indelible. The lessons learned 
in such a tribal school as the puberty institution constitutes, abide through life. 


"Another obvious motive dictating a period of seclusion is found in the wisdom of 
entirely separating the youth at puberty from the women until lessons of sexual 
restraint have been learned. New Guinea natives, for instance, say that 'when boys 
reach the age of puberty, they ought not to be exposed to the rays of the sun, lest they 
suffer thereby; they must not do heavy manual work, or their physical development 
will be stopped, all possibility of mixing with females must be avoided, lest they 



become immoral, or illegitimacy become common in the tribe.' Where the men's 
house is found in a tribal community, this institution frequently serves to prolong the 
seclusion of the younger initiated men for many years after puberty is reached." 
(Primitive Secret Societies, pages 36, 37, 38, 41, 45, 47.) 


"Puberty institutions for the initiation of young men into manhood are among the 
most widespread and characteristic features of primitive life. They are found among 
peoples considered the lowest of mankind: among Andamanese, Hottentots, Fuegians, 
and Australians; and they exist in various stages of development among peoples 
emerging from savagery to barbarism. Their foundation goes back to an unknown 
antiquity; their mysteries, jealously guarded from the eye of all save the initiated, 
preserve the religion and morality of the tribe. Though varying endlessly in detail, 
their leading characteristics reproduce themselves with substantial uniformity among 
many different peoples and in widely separated areas of the world. The initiation by 
the tribal elders of the young men of the tribe, their rigid seclusion, sometimes for a 
lengthy period, from the women and children; their subjection to certain ordeals and 
to rites designed to change their entire natures; the utilization of this period of 
confinement to convey to the novices a knowledge of the tribal traditions and 
customs, and finally, the inculcation by most practical methods of habits of respect 
and obedience to the older men - all these features are well described in the quaint 
and vigorous account by an old writer of the ceremonies once practised by the 
Tuscarora Indians of North Carolina." (Ibid, page 32.) 


These initiations differ strikingly among themselves, nevertheless they one and all 
have certain fundamental features in common. In one paragraph of a brilliant treatise 
on Initiation, in Hasting's Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics (Vol. VII, p. 317), 
Count Goblet d'Alvielia, who stands so high among European Masonic scholars, 
furnishes a list of these features: 


"The formalities of initiation, whether its dominant function is magical or religious, 
present striking resemblances. Andrew Lang notes the following general 
characteristics: (a) mystic dances; (b) the use of the turndun, or bull-roarer; (c) 
daubing with clay and washing this off; (d) performance with serpents and other 'mad 
doings.' To these we might add: (e) a simulation of death and resurrection; (f) the 
granting of a new name to the initiated; (g) the use of masks or other disguises. In 



any case, we may say that initiation ceremonies include: (1) a series of formalities 
which loosen the ties binding the neophyte to his former environment; (2) another 
series of formalities admitting him to the superhuman world; (3) an exhibition of 
sacred objects and instruction on subjects relating to them; (4) re-entry or 
reintegration rites, facilitating the return of the neophyte into the ordinary world. 
These rites, especially those of the first three divisions, are found fulfilling a more or 
less important function in all initiation ceremonies, both savages and among the 
civilized." 


Whence came these secret clubs? Did they all originate from one center? N.W. 
Thomas, writing in Volume XI of Hasting's Encyclopedia, page 297, offers a reply 
with which most authorities would agree: 


"We may perhaps sum up the position by saying that to trace all secret societies to a 
single origin, is probably as mistaken as to trace all forms of religion to a single 
source or to seek to unlock all the mythologies by a single key. It seems clear that 
age grades, burial clubs, initiation schools, religious confraternities, occupation 
groups, and magical societies have all contributed to the mass of diverse elements 
grouped under secret societies; it cannot be definitely laid down that any one of these 
took an earlier type as a model; as we find all in their rudimentary stages in various 
parts of Africa, we must, unless we suppose that these rudiments are derived from the 
fully developed societies of other tribes, suppose that they are the seed from which, in 
other areas, secret societies have been evolved and that all are equally primitive, 
though not necessarily equally old." 


Ill - DID FREEMASONRY EVOLVE FROM THE MEN'S HOUSE? 


When secret societies appear among barbarian and half civilized peoples they retain 
many of the fundamental features described in the above pages, but at the same time 
become strikingly different and often are used for entirely different purposes. All 
readers of Masonic literature are familiar with the story of the Druids, the Druses, the 
Culdees, the Assassins, etc. etc.: also the numberless secret societies of China, which, 
it appears in the majority of cases, are political in character rather than moral or 



religious. These barbarian, or semi-civilized organizations, have their grades, signs, 
secrets, pass-words and initiation ceremonies, as have all the others, and there is no 
need in this connection that we particularize among them or pay them any further 
attention. 


The reader will already have noted a certain similarity between some of these 
associations and our own. In some cases these similarities are so striking that they 
almost amount to identity, as when one of our Masonic signs is found in the 
possession of some savage cult. Tales of how Masons have saved their lives or gained 
other advantages among savage peoples through use of one of the Masonic signs, 
have been among the stock stories of our literature for many years. 


A sensational use of these facts has been recently made by Brother J.S.M. Ward in his 
Freemasonry and the Ancient Gods, published in 1921. Brother Ward boldly takes 
the position that the primitive secret societies such as those described above are to be 
considered an integral part of Freemasonry, or vice versa. He makes this position 
plain in the following words: "Boldly this is my contention, that our present system is 
derived originally from the primitive initiatory rites of our prehistoric ancestors. I 
base this contention on the fact that many of our most venerated signs and symbols, 
grips and tokens, are used today by savage races with precisely the same meaning as 
with us. I cannot agree with those who would contend that it is either a matter of 
coincidence or else that they are purely natural signs which express simple 
elementary sentiments." This statement appears on page 119 of his book. On 123 he 
repeats it in other words: "My contention, then, is that Freemasonry derives originally 
from those primitive rites which first taught a boy whence he came, then prepared 
him to be a useful member of society, and finally taught him how to die and that 
death did not end all. On these primitive rites, I consider, man built up the mysteries 
and the various religious faiths of the ancient world some of which have survived to 
the present day, while others have developed into other religions, Christianity 
included." The thesis is developed in still other words on page viii of his Preface 
where he says: "Briefly, the theory I venture to propound is that Freemasonry 
originated in the primitive initiatory rites of prehistoric man, and from those rites 
have been built up all the ancient mysteries, and thence all the modem religious 
systems. It is for this reason that men of all religious beliefs can enter Freemasonry; 
and, further, the reason we admit no women is that these rites were originally 
initiatory rites of men; the women had their own. These, for sociological reasons 
perished, while those of the men survived, and developed into the mysteries." 



If Brother Ward could make good his thesis, he would bring about a complete 
revolution in anthropology. A secret society that has existed in all parts of the world 
through all the many centuries of history, would be the most stupendous facts known 
to sociology and would necessitate a complete revision of our social theories. The 
thing is too stupendous to have happened. In order to make out that Freemasonry as 
we now know it is in solidarity with all these other secret fraternities, it is necessary 
to stretch the facts at almost every point; to fill in the gaps with guesses and 
hypotheses; and to read into the ceremonies of the primitive tribes many meanings 
and purposes that they have never been capable of entertaining. 


It was made abundantly plain in the quotations given above from various authorities 
that all secret societies have a culture in common and in the nature of the case 
inevitably make use of signs, symbols, ceremonies, degrees, lodges, initiations, etc., 
so that if a new secret society comes into existence, created ab initio by its own 
members, it will necessarily have many features in common with other similar 
organizations, so that always a little imagination will make it easy for men to believe 
that what has been recently created has existed elsewhere for many centuries. 

Nothing is easier than to create traditions and ancient history for a secret cult; and that 
because it is furnished with the many usages that other secret cults have employed in 
past times. Freemasonry is no exception to this rule. Almost everything in it can be 
paralleled in the possessions of similar societies that existed hundreds of years ago 
and always there is the temptation to borrow the authority and prestige of antiquity. 
Oftentimes one finds attributed to a very ancient day symbols that were created, 
according to our positive knowledge in recent times. "The Virgin Weeping Over A 
Broken Column is a case in point here. It was devised by American Mason about one 
hundred years ago, but only recently I read a learned article which sought to show 
that this symbol had been borrowed by Freemasonry from the Ancient Mysteries. 


Brother Ward tries to prove that the Higher Grades are as ancient as the Craft 
Degrees. To an American reader, familiar with the history of the Scottish Rite, his 
case is not fortunate. We know that Albert Pike himself, alone and unaided created a 
great deal of the lofty and beautiful structure of the Scottish Rite ritual, so that it has 
been said of him that he found the Scottish Rite a log cabin and left it a marble 
palace. But there are many things in the Scottish Rite ceremonies older than history, 
someone may argue. Truly enough, but we know how they came there: Albert Pike 



took them from his own great learning of the ancient books. Much of the material is 
very old but the structure into which it is built and the use to which it is put, date from 
the labours of Albert Pike, or else from his immediate predecessors. 


The real crux in all this discussion may be thrown into the form of the question, How 
old is Masonry? This question never loses its vitality and seems to hold an 
inexhaustible fascination for Masons. The answer depends upon the meaning we 
attribute to the word Masonry. If by Masonry we mean any kind of secret 
organization, then it is as old as the world. If it is used of any secret society that 
employs some of our signs or symbols, then it may be traced here and there into many 
lands and through many centuries. If it is used in the strictest sense to indicate a man 
that has been initiated into a regular lodge of symbolical Freemasonry working under 
the authority of a regular Grand Lodge, then Freemasonry is only two hundred years 
old. If it is to be used of organizations with which this modern speculative 
Freemasonry can trace an undeniable historical continuity, then it may be dated from 
the twelfth or thirteenth centuries. Of one thing we can be sure, the men's house, a 
lodge in which brethren meet behind tiled doors, is not a modern, artificial thing but 
springs out of human nature itself, to satisfy the needs that have been felt ever since 
man began to be 


SUPPLEMENTAL REFERENCES THE BUILDER: 


Vol. I (1915) - Ancient Evidences, p. 18; The Golden Bough, p.22; The Men's 
House, p. 308. 


Vol. 11 (1916) - Masonic Tradition, p. 189; Indian Masonry, p. 190; The Meaning of 
Initiation, p. 205; Masonic Signs, p. 253; Indian Freemasonry, p. 371. 


Vol. Ill (1917) - A Central African Mystery, p. 15; The Origin of Druidism, p. 22; 
The Initiatory Rites of Druidism, p. 35; Masonry Among Primitive Peoples, p. 38; 
Secret Societies of Islam, p. 84; Aboriginal Races and Freemasonry, p. 96; Chinese 
Signs, p. 156; The Men's House, p. 209. 



Vol. IV (1918) - Definitions of Masonry, p. 125; The Voice of the Sign, October, 
C.C.B., p. 4; The Divine Mystery, p. 334; The Mysteries of the Art of the Caverns 
and Early Builders, p. 366. 


Vol. V (1919) - Legendary Origin of Freemasonry, p. 297, 


Vol. VI (1920) - A Bird's-Eye View of Masonic History, p. 236; The Purposes of 
Legends and Myths, p. 258; Freemasonry Among the American Indians, p. 295. 


Vol. VII (1921) - Whence Came Freemasonry, p. 90; Little Wolf Joins the Metawin, 

p. 281. 


Vol. VIII (1922) - American Indians and Freemasonry, P. 71; Freemasonry and the 
Ancient Gods, pp. 88, 151, 152, 153; Masonry Among the Chippewa Indians, p. 126; 
A Mediating Theory, p. 318; Traces of Masonry Among Indians and Worth 
Americans, p. 354. 


Mackey's Encyclopedia - (Revised Edition): 


Albert Pike, p. 563; Assassins, p. 82; China, p. 147; Chinese Secret Societies, p. 148; 
Civilization and Freemasonry, p.153; Culdees, p. 191; Degrees, p. 203; Druidical 
Mysteries, p. 220; Druses, p. 221; Initiation, p. 353; Man, p. 461; Primitive 
Freemasonry, p. 584; Scottish Rite, p. 671; Secret Societies, p. 677; Woman, p. 855. 


BOOKS CONSULTED IN PREPARING THIS ARTICLE: 



Lowie, Primitive Society. J.S.M. Ward, Freemasonry and the Ancient Gods. 

Webster, Primitive Secret Societies. Frazer, Golden Bough. Hasting's Encyclopedia 
of Religion and Ethics, Vol. VII, p. 314; XI, p. 287. Smith, Religion of the Semites. 
Heckethorn, Secret Societies. Lang, Myth, Ritual, and Religion. Thomas, Source 
Book For Social Origins. Rivers, The Todas. Tyler, Primitive Culture. Wallace, The 
Malay Archipelago. Coote, The Western Pacific. Upward, The Divine Mystery. 
Capart, Primitive Art. Evans, Tree and Pillar Cult. Harrison, Ancient Art and Ritual. 
Maspero, Dawn of Civilization. Wright, Indian Masonry. Giles, Freemasonry in 
China. 


— o — 


EDITORIAL 


LACK OF TRAINED LEADERS IS A DANGER TO MASONRY 


THOSE WHO ARE familiar with the pages of the V. S. L. will recall how difficult a 
thing it was for the old Jewish tribes to lay aside their differences, their jealousies, 
and their deeply rooted feuds in order to unite under one leader. But the thing became 
necessary and it was accordingly done. The Canaanites who continued powerful in 
the great central valleys and who - with justice, as we would now think - believed 
themselves the rightful owners of the land, determined to gather all their power 
together in order to deal one last and fatal blow against the loosely knit tribes of the 
immigrant invaders. It was then that the Jewish tribesmen discovered how helpless 
they would be against such a foe as Sisera and his well drilled regiments and how 
necessary it would be for them to choose leaders and to learn to obey. Deborah saw 
all this very clearly, and she brought Barak to see it also, along with many other less 
popular and less powerful chiefs. Had the Jews not thus discovered the function and 
necessity of leadership, and had they not learned the wisdom to follow their leaders, 
they would have been swept out of existence by Sisera, and the subsequent history of 
the world would have been a very different tale. 



So much for the episode, which is here offered as a parable wherefrom to draw a 
lesson that evermore needs to be learned anew. Our own nation is supposed to be a 
democracy; and we are supposed to be democrats - the reader is requested to 
dissociate the word from its partisan connections - but our democracy appears to be in 
danger, and we democrats are becoming perturbed lest it be not able to surmount that 
danger. The thought I wish to apply to the problem is that we must learn anew the 
lesson Deborah learned long ago; we must rediscover the lost philosophy of 
leadership, and learn how to select, to develop, and to follow leaders. 


THE BUILDER IS ONE HUNDRED MONTHS OLD 


When this Society was organized some nine years ago in order to serve in behalf of 
Masonic education and kindred interests, a few brethren - influential in the Craft and 
themselves very much in favor of the project - expressed fears lest the undertaking 
fail for lack of support. The Fraternity, so they thought, was not sufficiently interested 
in such matters, which was only another way of saying that it was not interested in 
itself, for Masonic education is nothing other than an attempt to put Masons into more 
complete possession of their Masonry. Time has happily proved these men unduly 
pessimistic. This Society has never been so flourishing as now, and as for Masonic 
education, it is everywhere and without exception completely in the ascendant. 


With this issue THE BUILDER has come to its one hundredth month. It is an event 
worth signalizing by a new dedication to the old cause, by a larger determination to 
accomplish more in the future, and by a sincere prayer that T.S.G.A.O.T.U. may 
continue richly to bless our beloved Craft in all its undertakings. This CENTURY 
NUMBER is dedicated to that end, and as an earnest of still better things to come. 



More and more it has become the custom among; speakers and publicists to describe 
democracy in such a wise as to ignore altogether the whole principle of leadership as 
though it were something entirely foreign to, or even antagonistic to, democracy. 


The fallacy is an easy one to fall into. The word "democracy" means, so it may be 
asserted, that The masses of the people rule themselves: if they must rule themselves 
then they need no rulers; if they need no rulers in government then they need none, in 
business, or in industry, or anywhere else. Therefore - thus runs this species of 
reasoning - we should have "direct democracy"; which is only another way of saying 
that the people as a whole should decide on all large questions concerning everything 
of a public character; the people should not have representatives or leaders; they 
should be left "free" to run themselves ~ and to manage their own affairs. 


This kind of logic, which should be easily riddled by every high school sophomore if 
high school sophomores were taught to think at all, is: being used with much success 
by demagogues the country over. Those who do not wish entirely to overthrow 
everything in the present system, but who desire to see the people own and manage 
all their own public utilities, and direct and control by their own mass action all 
public affairs, such as the declaration of war, the making of treaties and all that, 
describe all this as "direct democracy," which may be defined as mass action by the 
people without the intermediary action of representatives. Those who do not care a 
straw about our present system of civilization, and who would rejoice to see it utterly 
demolished, with the Constitution abandoned and Congress destroyed, would have 
every detail of public affairs immediately managed by the mass action of the whole 
population. They are the Communists strictly so-called and, like their fellow theorists 
in Russia, would, if they were to be consistent, cast aside not only all leaders but even 
those classes who supply most of our leaders, the professional groups who have what 
is called a higher education. 



I think the reply to these theorists should be that democracy in itself is a thoroughly 
conservative form of civilization, and that by its very nature it implies leadership as 
one of its necessary and most important -functionings. It is wrong to suppose that a 
democracy can function without leaders. It is equally wrong to suppose that leaders 
are in any wise a contradiction of democracy. Democracy implies leaders and the 
following of leaders; so is it now, and so will it ever be, for that is the way things are 
made. 


TO FOLLOW A LEADER IS NOT A DISGRACE 


At the back of all this anti-leadership reasoning is the half formulated feeling that 
somehow or other it is a kind of disgrace to fall in behind a leader. It appears to 
betoken inferiority on the part of those who suffer themselves to be led. Those who, 
wittingly or unwittingly, harbor this feeling should look more carefully into the 
matter; if they do, they will discover how groundless is their objection. To follow the 
rightful leader is an act of intelligence and usually reveals good sense and superiority, 
rather than the opposite. 


For consider: When the brainiest men in the world get together in order to perfect a 
plan of mass action what do they do? They organize themselves, they elect officers, 
they formulate constitutions and regulations, and then the rank and file of them fall 
into line and keep step with the procession. The scientists who make up the Royal 
Society or the literati who comprise the membership of the French Academy do not 
reveal any mental inferiority merely because they all have leaders, and frankly 
recognize those leaders as such. When the biggest business men of the nation set out 
to accomplish a thing, they choose their guides and their organizers and the mass of 
them suffer themselves to be led. Leadership is a fact as well as a factor in every 
concerted movement ever undertaken even though that movement be communism 
itself, for it should be recalled (as seldomly it is) that Lenine and Trotsky are leaders 
of Communism in exactly the same sense that Harding and Coolidge are political 
leaders with us. 



Democracy does not imply leaderlessness; it implies leadership. It should be 
remembered that the forefathers who laid so wisely the foundations of this United 
States understood full well that there can be no such thing as an automatic action of 
the human mass. No, and per contra! for they revealed their very genius in the plan 
they devised whereby the masses of us can select and control our leaders. It was in 
THAT, rather than in what Brooks Adams miscalls "the democratic dogma" of direct 
action, that these forefathers showed their sagacity as politicians and their greatness 
as statesmen. 


When we come to decide questions of national policy, what other course can be 
followed save that of selecting representatives or delegates and empowering them 
with the prerogatives of action? Consider the posture of affairs at this present 
moment. This nation is trying to decide as a matter of policy what course to follow on 
the proposed cancellation of war debts; it is trying to decide what policy to pursue 
with regard to the reorganization of agriculture; it is undertaking to deal with a dozen 
major problems that have arisen as aftermath of the Great War; it must somehow 
learn anew how to regulate railways so as not to destroy their efficiency and 
prosperity; these and many other questions of policy are before this nation, and these 
questions must somehow be settled. But who is there among the rank and file of us 
that is capable of understanding all these matters? Would we not as a people bungle 
these matters up beyond untangling were we to decide them all by direct vote? Under 
such circumstances but one course is possible: we must select representative men of 
good character and high ability and set them to solving these problems for us. 


But the deciding of matters of policy is less than half the battle. After the policy has 
been agreed upon it becomes necessary to set up the machinery of administration 
whereby the policy is to be made effective. If, for example, Congress should decide 
upon an entirely new policy regarding immigration we could not all, as a mass of 
people, take our stations at Ellis Island in order to see that the machinery of control is 
operative; the mere thought is ridiculous. But the same thing is true of every other 
matter of similar import. We must have leaders capable of threshing out pubic 
problems; able to decide them wisely; and we must also have leaders, and by an equal 
necessity, capable of putting policies into effective operation. 



Other examples of other ways in which leadership is necessary could easily be given 
were there need, which there is not, because the subject needs but to be faced in order 
to be understood. 


FREEMASONRY MUST HAVE TRAINED LEADERS 


I think it would be well to apply all this to our Fraternity which is organized on the 
same ground plan as our government. It is a democracy that exists in a republican 
form, which carries on its activities by means of leaders constitutionally chosen 
according to law, and therefore the very fabric of its organization implies not a direct 
action by the mass of the membership but an indirect action through properly chosen 
representatives and leaders. Just as there are leaders in Grand Lodge politics (I use 
that word here in its accurate sense) so must there be leaders of Masonic thought, and 
leaders in the ventilation and settlement of Masonic policies. For us to make light of 
our leaders, or refuse our leaders support, or to spread among our membership a 
cynicism that would call the whole system of leadership into question, that would be 
folly of a suicidal kind. 


Of course there are plenty of false leaders in our midst. Crooks and blockheads make 
their way into every organization once it grows to a respectable size and begins to 
wield influence; and they make trouble. 


In every organization there are men who pull wires in order to have themselves 
advanced to positions for which they are not fitted, merely in order to bask in the light 
that beats upon a throne. Others, and often they have not a shred of right to such 
places, get to the top by dint of scheming and philandering merely to satisfy the 
ambition of place; for fame, as we say! And others there are who sometimes rise to 
positions of leadership, in spite of profound ignorance as to what Masonry itself is 
and what the Fraternity as an organization is trying to do in the world. 


There are these and other types of false or unfit leaders in our midst, but what of it? 
Not for such a reason can we leap to the conclusion that leadership itself is an evil. 



The cure for false leadership lies in a Masonic education that will build itself into the 
whole rank and file of the membership, from the top down, so that everywhere 
members will know what Freemasonry is and what it is doing, and what it is going to 
do, and how it. is to be done. To the extent that such a thing is done our members will 
know whom to select for their leaders; when to approve the action of their leaders; 
how to remove false leaders; and whom to train to become future leaders. 




THE LIBRARY 


HERMETIC MYSTERY 


THE HERMETIC MYSTERY AND ALCHEMY, by M. A. Atwood. A suggestive 
inquiry into Hermetic Philosophy and Alchemy, published by William Tait, Belfast, 
Ireland, £1 -1-0. 


THE DOCTRINE OF Hermes, the Egyptian, comprises at once a religion, a 
philosophy and an art. That doctrine, and those of the Sephiroth, the Ain Soph, and 
the Kabala are practically identical - that from nothing there came the Great Monad, 
Deity, by whom and from whom everything was created and in everything is He. This 
is the beginning, the base of the doctrine. Pythagoras, who sojourned many years in 
the East, preached the same doctrine. Hermes made no claim to being the author but 
on the contrary maintained that it was ancient. By philosophizing on this point and 
studying nature, Hermes realized that man was of an entirely different character to all 
else on earth in that he possessed reasoning power, that he was endowed with an 
intellect, that he was created in the image of God, and that he must have been created 
for a divine purpose, that man is divine in that he has a dual personality, and that the 
spiritual body died not with the physical. This dual personality was not realized by 
the vast majority of mankind, and this latent personality was capable of great 
development. "Know thyself," says he. The development of the latent powers of man 
could not be accomplished by simple faith but by absolute conviction. 



It was for the development of spirituality that the Mysteries were practiced. The 
author quotes many authorities in regard to just what the Mysteries consisted of. The 
Lesser Mysteries were open to almost all and taught certain truths and the necessity of 
a moral life as the prerequisite for reformation, regeneration and the perfection of 
man, even as we Masons do. The Greater Mysteries were only for the very few, and a 
long period - many years - elapsed after being initiated in the Lesser Mysteries. The 
aspirant had to cast aside all worldly desires in the cultivation of the spiritual and 
psychic. "The doctrine of the Greater Mysteries," says Clemens Alexandrinus, 

"related to the whole universe; here all instruction ended; nature and all things she 
contains were unveiled." Nor were the visions of gods attending on those Mysteries 
dead images, nor mere symbols, nor impotent, nor idle, nor invisible, though unseen. 
That the aspirant was put under the influence of what is termed Mesmerism is evident 
but in the Hermetic Greater Mysteries the evidence points to his acquiring the power 
temporarily to disassociate his spiritual body from the physical and to travel in 
"foreign countries," where he beheld something of the life hereafter. Was not this the 
power held by Emanuel Swedenborg in the eighteenth century and has it not been in 
the power of certain persons from time to time that they might bring spiritual matters 
before the multitude? The disciples of Hermes, by their mode of life, by their 
mentality, by their convictions, by their virtue, acquired the power of healing by the 
laying on of hands. It is this side - the religious, the philosophic - of the Hermetic 
doctrine, which, however much some may so declare it, is not contrary to 
Christianity, and should most appeal to us. 


The greater part of the book, which comprises 600 pages, is given up to an "enquiry" 
in the Hermetic art of producing the "philosopher's stone" that transformed the baser 
metals into the purest gold; and the "elixir of life" that will prolong human life. Being 
an enquiry and not just an essay, there are long quotations from old books showing 
what a searching enquiry had been made, and it is these quotations that rather break 
the thread and irritate one trying to obtain an understanding on this very abstruse 
subject. 


Everyone must admit that there is a fascination about the idea of the transmutation of 
the baser metals into gold and it was doubtless due to this that the first edition, which 
was published in 1918, was soon exhausted and the present edition made. The work 
was written some seventy years before by a young woman barely thirty years of age 



who delved exhaustively into the subject with her father. The book was actually 
printed and a few copies sold when the father, moved by a change of religious 
thought, bought in the whole issue, because he deemed that he had divulged 
knowledge which was sacred. The fear that anyone by this book alone could discover 
the art was certainly groundless, for the whole doctrine as quoted from the various 
authors is closely veiled in language not understandable by moderns unless specially 
trained. 


The Hermetics in expounding their doctrine used the technics of their art as allegories 
and it is difficult at times to distinguish when they were expatiating on their art, and 
when propounding doctrine. 


I imagine that few would care to wade through it as I-had to do in order to review it. 
That the assembly of-all the authorities as has been done in the book was well worth 
while will be admitted. The philosophy - should be studied; it is not a book for casual 
reading. Masons of the Scottish Rite, who are well versed in the degrees 
(unfortunately they are few) will have certain of the degrees recalled to them as they 
read, particularly the seventh, eighteenth, and thirty-second: while our English 
brethren, working the Emulation ritual, will find that the Hermetic doctrine is quoted- 
in the third degree. 


Ernest E. Murray. 


* * * 


AN IMPORTANT WORK ON THE KABBALAH 


THE KABBALAH, ITS DOCTRINES, DEVELOPMENT, AND LITERATURE, by 
Christian D. Ginsburg; The Bloch Publishing Company, 26 East Arid Street, New 



York City. For sale by National Masonic Research Society, Cedar Rapids, Iowa: 
$2.35, postpaid. 


In his admirable treatise on the subject in Hasting's Encyclopaedia of Religion and 
Ethics, Mr. H. Loewe gives his readers a list of "the chief Kabbalists" which 
comprises no fewer than twenty names. The first is that of Aaron teen Samuel, a Jew 
of Italy who lived in the ninth century: the last is that of Baer of Meseritz: a Jewish 
ascetic bom in 1710. Mr. Loewe also gives a list of the Kabbalistic works, the oldest 
of which he dates in the sixth century. One glance at the great scope of the Kabbalah 
as thus indicated is sufficient to set one on his guard against any cheap or rapid 
generalizations on the subject, either as to its history or its teachings. 


A tendency to occultism developed among the Jews long before the beginning of our 
era, and this became the source of many bizarre forms of religion, some of which 
were similar to the Kabbalah, the most famous literary expression of which is known 
as the "Zohar." For a long time it was the custom to attribute to the Kabbalah a great 
antiquity, but this has been now abandoned by almost all competent scholars, 
especially since the appearance of Graetz's History of the Jews, in which famous 
work that trenchant writer dealt literalistic believers in the Kabbalah a savage blow. 
The custom now is to hold that the Kabbalah had its rise among Spanish Jews in the 
thirteenth century who, of a mystical turn of mind, reacted against the “philosophical” 
movement headed by Maimonides, the great savant and thinker that tried to drain all 
supematuralism out of the Holy Scriptures in order to give a "naturalistic" account of 
Jewish history. There was much fakery and chicanery among the early Kabbalists - 
the Zohar itself is described by Graetz as a pious fraud - but for all that they created a 
powerful movement, and one that has not yet by any means expended all its force. 


It is doubtful if the Kabbalah would ever have made itself felt outside a limited circle 
of Jewish enthusiasts had not a condition developed in Germany of great moment. In 
the face of an attempt made by the Jesuits to drive the Jews out of North German 
communities Reuchlin, who ranked with Luther as a great religious leader, astonished 
the world by stoutly championing the cause of the Jews, and that in the face of almost 
universal opposition, especially from Rome. Through Reuchlin's advocacy - he 
believed himself to have discovered a secret movement toward Christianity in 
Kabbalistic literature - the Kabbalah became a kind of fashion. Pico Mirandola, the 



prodigy of his time, also defended it; and it is said that Pope Sixtus embraced it. In 
the course of time its literature found its way to the study table of every important 
theologian, Protestant as well as Catholic. 


Once "in the atmosphere" Kabbalism took many forms and poured its influence into 
many unexpected channels. As an example of this last, it very doubtless had much to 
do with the secret teachings and symbolism of early Speculative Freemasonry. There 
are the best of reasons for believing that such all-important features of our esoteric 
work as the Temple of Solomon and the Lost Word ultimately were derived from that 
source. This may be so or it may not; in either case the subject is one that cannot be 
ignored by any Masonic reader. 


Dr. Ginsburg's book is not new. It was first pub dished in London in 1865 along with 
an essay on The Essenes. Subsequent historical discoveries have robbed the latter 
essay of much of its value, but the treatise on The Kabbalah continues to be the best 
and most widely used brief work in our language. George Routledge & Sons of 
London, have made photostatic plates of the Kabbalistic portion of the original 
edition and thus guaranteed that the new edition (handled in this country by the Bloch 
Publishing Company) is like the former down to the least detail. The volume has been 
added to THE BUILDER'S Book List. It is absolutely essential to every Masonic 
library. 


* * * 


SPEECH MAKING MADE EASY 


SPEECHES, THEIR PREPARATION AND DELIVERY, by Alexander Burton. 
Published by Edward J. Clode, 156 Fifth Avenue, New York City. 



There is the same difference between the speech maker and the orator that there is 
between the mother who croons a child to sleep and the prima donna who thrills a 
great audience at the Metropolitan Opera. Oratory is a fine art, for which few are 
equipped: the making of speeches is a more humdrum acheivement. Any man of 
normal vocal powers and an average intellect can learn the trick. All he needs is a 
little practice and a little coaching. 


Speeches, Their Preparation and Delivery book that can do the coaching. It is not a 
heavy text for use in college classes but a fresh readable bit of counsel by an 
experienced speaker, who knows what he is talking about and how to say it. Officers 
who often address a lodge, and other brethren who are called on at lodge social 
functions, will find this volume well worth owning. 


The author devotes most of his attention to after dinner speeches, for which the 
demand always exceeds the supply. He tells the tyro how to make his speech simple, 
so as to avoid flowery rhetoric; how to deliver it with geniality and with wit and 
humor so as to please an audience in gastronomic mood; and how to relate a 
humorous yam. Toasts, poems, quotations and such other speech supplies are 
furnished as speakers find themselves in need of. The book is composed of 25 1 pages 
and is well bound in red cloth. It may be whispered under the breath that a number of 
good Ample speeches are included. 


— o — 


WHAT IS FREEMASONRY? 


Freemasonry is a science which is engaged in the search after divine tmth, and which 
employs symbolism as its means of instmction. - Albert G. Mackey. 


— o — 



In every clime, from age to age, 
Masons performed their mystic rite; 
Craftsmen, scholar, poet, sage, 

Met, and beheld Masonic light 


— o — 


THE QUESTION BOX 


THE BUILDER is an open forum for free and fraternal discussion. Each of its 
contributors writes over his own name, and is responsible for his own opinions. 
Believing that a unity of spirit is better than a uniformity of opinion, the Research 
Society, as such, does not champion any one school of Masonic thought as over 
against another, but offers to all alike a medium for fellowship and instruction, 
leaving each to stand or fall by its own merits. 


The Question Box and Correspondence Column are open to all members of the 
Society at all times. Questions of any nature on Masonic subjects are earnestly invited 
from our members, particularly those connected with lodges or study clubs which are 
following our Study Club course. The Society is now receiving from fifty to one 
hundred inquiries each week: it is manifestly impossible to publish many of them in 
this Department. 


CONCERNING SCOTTISH RITE BLUE LODGES 



Is there such a thing as a Scottish Rite Blue Lodge in this country? Is there such a 
thing in other countries? How do they differ from York Rite Blue Lodges, and do 
they learn the same lectures as we do? Are they recognized by our Grand Lodges? H. 
E. Y., Arizona. 


1 . Is there such a thing in this or any country? 


There are no Symbolic lodges in the United States which confer the first three degrees 
of Masonry, and which derive their authority from either the Northern or the Southern 
Jurisdiction of the Scottish Rite. There is an exception in California where a lodge 
composed of French speaking brethren confers the First Degree of the Scottish Rite, 
under special dispensation of the Grand Lodge of California. There is a similar case in 
Louisiana, but I cannot now supply details. 


2. Is there such a thing in other countries? 


Yes. The first three degrees of the Scottish Rite are used in all countries where 
Masonry exists except in the United States, Canada, Mexico, England, Wales, 
Scotland, and Ireland. 


3. How do they differ from York Rite Blue Lodges, and do they learn the same 
lectures as we do. 


It would be impossible to tell you on paper the differences. While complete data is 
lacking, it is safe to say that you would not recognize the lectures they use. They 
differ entirely from what you have learned. Your lectures would be of little value to 
you if you were attempting to work your way in to visit. The signs differ somewhat, 
but your words and grips would prove you a Mason. Even here, you would probably 
find a word in the First and Third Degree you had never heard of before. Each 
Supreme Council, though, has the right to fix its own ritual. 



4. Are they recognized by our Grand Lodges? 


Some are by some Grand Lodges and others are not. It all depends on whether our 
Grand Lodges have adopted the policy that Blue Lodges, to be entitled to recognition, 
must trace their origin back to the Grand Lodge of England. That is, Symbolic lodges 
will not be recognized which derive their authority from Supreme Councils. Each 
Grand Lodge in this country has its own ideas and policies when it comes to 
recognition. There is much absurdity connected with this question of recognition. 


In connection with the ritual used where the Scottish Rite Symbolic degrees are 
conferred, from the evidence at hand, it is the writer’s opinion that the Scottish Rite 
ritual for the First, Second, and Third Degrees, has largely been adapted from the 
ritual used in The French Rite. 


A.L. Kress. 


* * * 


BROTHER KRESS WANTS INFORMATION ABOUT THOMAS SMITH WEBB 


"I should like to ask every reader of THE BUILDER to furnish me whatever 
information he may have, based on contemporary sources, relative to the life and 
activates of Thomas Smith Webb. Also I should like to be placed in touch with any of 
Webb's descendants." 


A. L. Press, 



830 Center Street, 
Williamsport, Pa. 


* * * 


QUATUOR CORONATI LODGE NO. 2076, OF LONDON 


Can you please explain to me how I may become able to affiliate with the 
Correspondence Circle of the Quatuor Coronati Lodge, No. 2076, London, so often 
referred to in THE BUILDER? H. J. M., Ohio. 


We have received from an American representative of the Quatuor Coronati Lodge 
permission to publish the printed application blank now in use: it fully explains all the 
things about which you inquire. If desired, applications for membership will be sent 
through the National Masonic Research Society. 


QUATUOR CORONATI LODGE NO. 2076, OF LONDON 
(Warrant granted on the 28th November, 1884). 


Objects 


1. - To provide a centre and bond of union for Masonic Students. 


2. - To attract intelligent Masons to its Meetings, in order to imbue them with a love 
for Masonic research. 



3. - To submit the discoveries or conclusions of students to the judgment and 
criticism of their fellows by means of papers read in Lodge. 


4. - To submit these communications and the discussions arising thereon to the 
general body of the Craft by publishing, at proper intervals, the Transactions of the 
Lodge in their entirety. 


5. - To tabulate concisely, in the printed Transactions of the Lodge, the progress of 
the Craft throughout the World. 


6. - To make the English-speaking Craft acquainted with the progress of Masonic 
study abroad, by translations (in whole or part) of foreign works. 


7. - To reprint scarce and valuable works on Freemasonry, and to publish 
Manuscripts, etc. 


8. - To form a Masonic Library and Museum. 


9. - To acquire permanent London premises, and open a reading-room for the 
members. 


Correspondence Circle 


The-members of our Correspondence Circle Of whom there are now nearly 3500) are 
placed on the following footing: - 



The summonses convoking the MEETINGS are posted to them regularly. They are 
entitled to attend all the meetings of the Lodge whenever convenient to themselves. 
When present they are entitled to take part in the discussions on the papers read 
before the Lodge, and to introduce their personal friends. They are not visitors at our 
Lodge meetings, but rather associates of the Lodge. The stated meetings are the first 
Lriday in January, March, May, and October, St. John’s Day (in Harvest), and the 8 th 
November (Least of the Quatuor Coronati). At every meeting an original paper is 
read, which is followed by a discussion. The funds are wholly devoted to Lodge and 
literary purposes, and no portion is spent in refreshment. The members of the Lodge 
and Correspondence Circle usually dine together after the meetings, but at their own 
individual cost. Visitors, who are cordially welcome, enjoy the option of partaking - 
on the same terms - of a meal at the common table. 


They have the privilege of using the READING ROOM and Library of the Lodge at 
27, Great Queen Street, London, W. C. 2. 


The printed TRANSACTIONS of the Lodge and the St. John's Card (with list of 
members) are posted to them as issued. Three parts of the Transactions are published 
each year. They contain a summary of the business of the Lodge, the full text of the 
papers read in Lodge together with the discussions, many essays communicated by 
the brethren, biographies, historical notes, reviews of Masonic publications, notes and 
queries, obituary, and other matter. They are profusely illustrated and handsomely 
printed. 


Papers from Correspondence Members are gratefully accepted, and as far as possible, 
recorded in the Transactions. 


A Candidate for Membership in the Correspondence Circle is subject to no 
qualification, literary, artistic, or scientific. His election takes place at the Lodge- 
meeting following the receipt of his application. 



The JOINING FEE is 21s., which includes one year's subscription to the following 
30 th November. 


The ANNUAL SUBSCRIPTION is only 10s. 6d., and is renewable each December 
for the year next following. Brethren joining us late in the year suffer no 
disadvantage, as they receive all the Transactions previously issued in the same year. 
By the payment in one sum of Twelve years' Subscription in advance, i. e., Six 
guineas, individual Brethren may qualify as LIFE MEMBERS of the Correspondence 
Circle. 


It will be seen that the members of the Correspondence Circle enjoy all the 
advantages of the full members except the right of voting in Lodge matters and 
holding office. 


Every Master Mason in good standing throughout the Universe, and all regular 
Masonic Lodges, Chapters, and Libraries or other corporate bodies are eligible as 
Members of the Correspondence Circle. W. J. Songhurst, P. G. D., Secretary. 


* * * 


HOW TO DEAL WITH AN ATHEIST MEMBER OF A LODGE As a member of 
the National Masonic Research Society, I would like to be informed how to handle 
such a case as the following: 


In the place of business where I am employed, there is an employee who is a member 
of a lodge in another jurisdiction. This man was conversing with another employee 
who is a strict Catholic. I overheard this man express himself that there is no such 
thing as a "Supreme Being." He also remarked that the Bible is a collection of foolish 
stories. I told him that I would never sit in a lodge room with a man of his type and 



that I would never recognize him as a "Mason." Since that day this man has tried his 
utmost to undermine my position. 


I would like to be informed, through the columns of the "Question Box," how this 
party could be brought before a Masonic tribunal, so that he may receive the penalty 
due to him. S. S., New Jersey. 


Take the matter up with your Worshipful Master. Have him ascertain this brother's 
views on the question. If he finds that the brother frankly confesses himself an atheist, 
he can then be brought to trial. There is no other way of handling such a case. If the 
brother is in strict truth an atheist he has no place in such a Fraternity as ours, and he 
should too much scorn to play the part of a hypocrite to remain in it. However, it is 
necessary to use caution because there is a great difference in men's conception of 
God, and it may well happen that what would be faith in God in one case would be 
deemed atheism by others who hold a different conception. 


* * * 


CAN EASTERN STAR CHAPTER REFUSE ANY APPICANT? 


I am in search of information to settle a recent argument that has been brought before 
our lodge during the past month. One brother contends that a chapter of the O.E.S. 
cannot refuse to admit to membership any brother who is in good standing in his Blue 
Lodge. Another argues that any chapter of the O.E.S. has a right to reject or black ball 
any brother it they choose to do so. 


A. J. N., Colorado. 



Mrs. Minnie Evans Keyes, Right Worthy Grand Secretary O. E. S., International 
Headquarters, Washington, D.C., has replied to your query. She quotes Landmark 11, 
page 4, of the Ritual of the O.E.S.: 


"The right of every Chapter to decide, from among eligible candidates, who shall be 
admitted to membership." 


This clearly proves that a chapter has a perfect right to reject any candidate 
whatsoever, even though he be in good standing in his lodge. 


— o — 


CORRESPONDENCE 


AN INQUIRY CONCERNING DR. ROBERT TALIFFERRO LIVELY 


There is legend in my family that about 1865 or 1866 my grandfather, Dr. Robert 
Talifferro Lively, of Pilot Grove, Grayson County, Texas, was invited to address an 
open meeting of Masons in New Orleans, and that he killed his sheep, prepared the 
parchment and wrote his address thereon, and that he rode from Pilot Grove (about 16 
miles S 30 E from the present site of Sherman, Texas,) to New Orleans on horseback, 
delivered his address and then rode home. The story, as I understand it, is that it was 
his wish that this Masonic Parchment should go to his youngest son, and so on down 
each time to the youngest, in the event the youngest was not a Mason to the next 
youngest, et cetera. My father, Robert Morris Lively, of Whitewright, Grayson 
County, Texas, being the youngest, fell heir to this parchment (as my grandfather died 
about 1866 or 1867 from the best accounts that I can get), he being a Master Mason 
with membership at Whitewright, Texas. My father died in 1906, at which time I was 
eleven years old. After the death of my father, my mother used to show me a roll of 
paper that she said was my grandfather's address and that it should become my 



property when I was made a Master Mason, to be kept by me until my younger 
brother, bom 1905, should become a Master Mason. In the event that he was never a 
Master Mason it would then become my permanent possession. This parchment was 
preserved and kept for me, but, in 1910 we moved from Whitewright, Texas, to 
Durant, Oklahoma, and this treasured parchment was lost at that time and in some 
manner during the move. My mother died in February, 1922, and she always told me 
that she was forever looking for that paper that by rights belonged to me at the 
present; but it was never found prior to her death, and as our home in Durant has been 
broken up, and with mother and father both dead, and with my grandfather having 
died years before I was bom, 1 don't suppose that I shall ever be able to see this 
treasured Masonic Paper, and further I only know of two (very old) men who are 
alive today who knew my grandfather, and they were very young men at the time of 
his death and were in all probability not Master Masons at that time. 


For the reasons stated above I am asking you to publish this letter with the hopes that 
some elderly brother in New Orleans, or who was at the meeting mentioned above, 
may remember this circumstance and will write me the particulars and possibly give 
me a summary of what my grandfather's address consisted of. And I am also in hopes 
that some secretary who now has the records of the old lodges in New Orleans will 
have some record of this address and will be able to advise me, and possibly to send 
me a certified copy of the same. 


Morris U. Lively, Texas. 


* * * 


ROBERT MORRIS AS THE FATHER OF UNIFORM WORK 


I write to add some notes to your reply to J.C.D. on page of THE BUILDER for 
February last. 



As far back as 1822 there was a Masonic Convention held at Washington, D.C., 
primarily to consider the formation of a General Grand Lodge, but which expressed 
the opinion that Uniformity of Work was a most desirable attainment. 


Thereafter followed the anti-Masonic excitement, from which the Craft did not really 
begin to recover until about 1840. One consequence of it was that the knowledge of 
the ritual and the work became sadly deficient and all sorts of additions and 
subtractions were introduced. 


The result was that many members of the Craft felt it advisable to meet together to 
determine what the old work was. So, on the initiative of the Lodge of Alabama, a 
convention was called at Washington in 1842, which later recommended another 
convention which was held at Baltimore in 1843. The primary purpose of this latter 
was to agree upon a Uniform Work for national adoption. There were fifteen 
jurisdictions officially represented at this last convention. They met and adopted a 
Uniform Work, then termed "the Baltimore Work." 


But "uniform work" in those days had a different meaning from what it has today. 
Then it only implied a general uniformity in essentials. Grand Lodges did not have 
the mechanism or the desire to know whether uniformity of work actually existed 
within their own jurisdiction or not. It was by no means unusual for each new Grand 
Master to promulgate the version he knew as the "official work" for that year. Such a 
course could only result in confusion in the Temple. 


While there is point to the comments of Bro. J. F. Brennan which you quoted, and it 
is the spirit and not the letter which counts, still Masonry is an organized institution 
and the methods of organization which might meet the requirements of a small 
membership would hardly answer for a large one. Then too, it is an unfortunate 
(often) trait of men to want to leave their personal mark on things by "improving" 
them. So it simply evolved, this necessity for one definite standard within a 
jurisdiction. 



We may well term Rob Morris the father of "uniform work," using the term as we do 
to-day implying strict verbal accuracy. He was the first to set forth that doctrine and 
to preach it, through his "Conservators" Association of Symbolic Masonry. Here is 
his own language: 


"This harmony shall consist in the most perfect uniformity amongst ourselves and our 
pupils, and the Craft at large, so far as we can honorably influence them. It shall reach 
to the strictest minutiae - to words, syllables, and letters - to official matters - to times 
and seasons - to modes of inculcation. To this end the Conservators must resign every 
preconceived habit or notion that conflicts with the standard of Preston and Webb and 
must sacrifice every variation of word, syllable and letter upon the common altar of 
National Uniformity." 


The above was written in 1 860 and it is not too much to attribute all that has since 
occurred along the line of uniformity of work to Rob Morris, the Conservators, and 
the above policy laid down by him in 1860. 


In many states at present uniformity of work probably exists in theory only. Then too, 
there are exceptions made in the cases of some old lodge which has preserved its 
ritual for perhaps one hundred years. There is such an exception in J.C.D.'s own state 
of Connecticut. 


A. L. Kress, Pennsylvania. 


* * * 


SOME LUTHERANS ARE NOT OPPOSED TO PUBLIC SCHOOLS OR TO 
MASONRY 



In looking over THE BUILDER of last August I have come upon a statement on page 
238 that needs replying to. It was made by Bro. Lewis E. Smith, writing as Grand 
Master of Nebraska, and stated the following: 


"In our state the Lutherans and the Roman Catholic churches have joined hands, after 
fighting each other for four hundred years, and are carrying a case to the Supreme 
Court of the United Yes in an endeavor to invalidate our language law.” 


Brother Smith does not say which Lutherans he refers to. I am Lutheran, but the 
church I belong to is not opposed to public schools, but endorses them. The Lutherans 
are divided on that question. If I am not mistaken, the Missouri Synod members are 
the only ones in favor of the language law. Our church teaches Sunday School in the 
language of the land. 


Julius Hoga, Nebraska, 


Brother Smith has welcomed your correction, Bro. Hoga, as do we. You might have 
added that there are many Lutheran churches that are not opposed to freemasonry, 
either. We have in our files letters from Missouri Masons who are members of the 
Lutheran fellowship. There is no reason under the blue skies why any great church 
should oppose freemasonry, which is the friend and aider of all who would live the 
spiritual life. 


* * * 


THE ITALIAN NATIONAL GRAND LODGE 



In No. 9, Vol. VI, (Sept. 1920) of your beautiful magazine, THE BUILDER, you 
published the Report presented by the Committee on Foreign Lodges to the Grand 
Lodge of the State of Alabama. 


By the resolution adopted at that time by the above mentioned Grand Lodge, there 
was recognized as a regular Masonic Body the Grand Orient of Italy: and our 
National Grand Lodge of A. F. & A. Masons of Italy was declared an irregular one. 


I enclose you the copy of a new Report presented by the President of the Committee 
on Foreign Lodges to the Grand Lodge of the State of Alabama which approved the 
proposed resolutions on the Assembly held in Montgomery on the 7th of December, 
1921. 


I hope you will publish in your magazine the new report and that you will call the 
attention of your readers not only to the new resolutions of the Grand Lodge of 
Alabama, but also to the fact that our National Grand Lodge is now recognized by the 
majority of the regular Grand Lodges of U.S.A. 


With many thanks and best regards, I am 


Sincerely and fraternally yours, 


Raoul V. Palermi, Grand Master, 
Italian National Grand Lodge. 


The report referred to in the above is here given in full, and thanks to the courtesy of 
Oliver D. Street, of the Grand Lodge of Alabama: 



TO THE M. W. GRAND LODGE A.F.&A.M.OF ALABAMA: 


At the 1919 Communication of this Grand Lodge recognition of the National Grand 
Lodge of Italy was refused because no showing was made by it in response to 
repeated requests as to the circumstances and purpose of its formation. We have been 
furnished with this information. From it we learn that in March, 1919, the lodges then 
adhering to one of the Supreme Councils of the Scottish Rite of Italy, completely 
severed their relations with their mother Supreme Council, with the full consent and 
acquiescence of the latter body; that these lodges by this action became entirely 
independent of any control by the Scottish Rite bodies. 


These lodges thereupon proceeded to hold an assembly or convention with the result 
that they formed themselves into the National Grand Lodge of Italy. This Grand 
Lodge is completely independent of any superior governing power and conforms to 
those principles and practices which are recognized and practiced by all American 
Grand Lodges. 


A belief in Deity is exacted of its initiates and the Bible is displayed upon the altar of 
the lodge. Only the first three degrees are practiced or controlled by it. 


The reason for the formation of said Grand Lodge was that there was not then (and is 
not now) in Italy any other independent Grand Lodge of Masons. The motive was to 
place Blue or Symbolic Masonry in Italy on that basis which has proved so successful 
and satisfactory in our own and other countries. This step has already proved its 
wisdom: the National Grand Lodge now has 560 lodges and more than 60,000 
Masons and is still increasing rapidly in numbers. 


At the same time, in 1919, that the above action was taken with regard to the National 
Grand Lodge of Italy, the Grand Lodge of Alabama recognized the Grand Lodge of 
Italy as an independent Supreme governing body of Symbolic Masonry. In this we 



now find that we were mistaken. We have favored with a copy of some of the laws 
and regulations of the Grand Orient. From them we learn, among other things, that 
the Grand Orient cannot issue a charter for a lodge without the approval of the 
Sovereign Grand Commander of another Supreme Council of the Scottish Rite which 
exists in Italy, or in certain cases, the approval of the President of the Council of the 
Italian Rite. The Masters and officers of the subordinate lodges also take oath "to 
obey with alacrity, precision and zeal the supreme authority of our Ritual Hierarchy"; 
i. e., of the Supreme Council of the Scottish Rite, or of the Grand Council of the 
Italian Rite, as the case may be. The General Assembly is the legislative body for the 
lodge; it also elects the Grand Master. Its members include not only the delegates 
from the lodges, but ten delegates from the Scottish Rite Supreme Council, ten from 
the Grand Council of the Italian Rite, the presidents of the chapters and councils of 
Kadosh of the Scottish Rite and the presidents of the District Councils of the Italian 
Rite. 


It is perfectly manifest that the Grand Orient is not an independent sovereign body but 
is strongly under the domination and control of the Scottish Rite Supreme Council 
and of the Grand Council of the Italian Rite. 


We, therefore, recommend the adoption of the following resolutions: 


1. RESOLVED, That the Grand Lodge A. F. & A. M. of Alabama recognize the 
National Grand Lodge of Italy as an independent sovereign governing body of 
Symbolic Masonry and the Grand Master is hereby requested to arrange an exchange 
of Representatives. 


2. RESOLVED FURTHER, That the Grand Lodge of Alabama does not recognize 
the Grand Orient of Italy as an independent governing body of Symbolic Masonry, 
but finds that it is under the control of the governing bodies and authorities of the 
Scottish and Italian Rites. 


Fraternally submitted, 



Oliver D. Street, Chairman. 


* * * 


LODGE PRESENTS BIBLE TO PUBLIC SCHOOL 


I wish to call your attention to what seems to be an entirely new idea in the activities 
of Masonic Lodges, and that is the presentation of a copy of The Great Light to the 
Public Schools. This is described in our Lodge Bulletin, in which there is a photo- 
engraving of the Bible which was presented to a new High School in Hempstead, L. 

I., under date of May 8th. It has been stated on several occasions that this is the first 
time that this has ever been done in this Jurisdiction. I am wondering whether you can 
cite any other occasions when this was done by a Masonic Lodge? 


I might add that the occasion of this presentation was a wonderful success. About 
twelve hundred Masons accompanied the Lodge while it went from "Labor to 
Refreshment," escorted by two hundred Knights Templar in full uniform and the 
Kismet Temple Band of Brooklyn, N. Y. Masons came from far and near to assist us 
in this celebration and the enthusiasm which was shown was simply wonderful. The 
Bible was carried from the Masonic Temple to the School House by four High School 
boys, sons of Past Masters, and for a town of only about ten thousand inhabitants, you 
can imagine that it created quite a stir. 


I am writing you as I am with the idea in mind that other lodges throughout the 
United States, feeling that they would like to take a strong stand on the question of 
the free Public School, would be delighted to have this thought brought to their 
attention, as it really is an activity which Masons can enter into and I believe would 
create great enthusiasm everywhere among the members of any lodge. A. H. Phillips, 
New York. 



POEM ON LETTERS OF THE KEYSTONE 


I saw an inquiry in the Question Box in the December number on page 385 asking for 
a poem based on the letters on the Keystone and beginning with “H.” 

This poem is copyrighted by Bro. Henry L. Brown, who is my uncle. 

I with pleasure forward the same to you for the benefit of the Craft. 

Happy the man whose every act shall bear 
The rigid test of the unerring square; 

Who, while times level he unswerving trod, 

Stands firm before his fellow and his God, 

Seeking by deeds of charity and love 
To gain admittance to that Lodge above, 

Knowing the stone among the rubbish cast 
Shall be, regained, the comer stone at last. 


William L. Cooper, Past High Priest of Franklin Chapter No 2, New Haven, Conn. 



More than a score brethren replied to F.H.C.'s inquiry. The variations noted among all 
the versions submitted shows that the poem has been preserved by memory in the 
great majority of cases. The above version was selected for publication in order to 
record the possible authorship. To show the nature and extent of variation another 
version is added: 


Happy is the man whose thoughts can bear 
The rigid test of the unerring square. 

Who through this world unswervingly doth trod 
Steadily advancing toward his Maker and his God. 
Seeking by acts of charity and love 
To gain admission to that lodge above. 

Knowing the stone in the rubbish cast, 

Shall crown our Master's work at last. 


— o — 


YE EDITOR'S CORNER 


A darky asked for an afternoon off on the ground that he was an officer in a lodge. 
"What office do you hold," inquired his employer. "I is the Supreme Sovereign 
Judicious Omnipotent Omnipresent Exalted Grand Ruler," meekly explained the 
supplicant for a half holiday. "Well! Well! You must be at the head of it." "No, boss, 
there is eight above me." 



Does your Grand Lodge have a library of its own? If not, why not start one? This 
Society is now installing one very large Masonic library in a new temple. Our service 
is at your command, and we are not in it for money. 


* * * 


If you don't receive a prompt reply to a letter addressed to us write again. Many 
letters are relayed to associates in different parts of the country, and hitches may very 
well occur. 


* * * 


A large publishing house is looking for a man to prepare a book of designs and 
suggestions for Masonic buildings. A good chance for the right man. 


* * * 


Have you a library in your lodge room or Masonic club room? If so, let us know. We 
are compiling a list of Masonic libraries. 



The Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry, Richmond, Virginia, have 
published a booklet entitled Virginia Schools, Their Progress and Their Needs that is 
a model of its kind, and richly worth reading by others than Virginians. Copies may 
be secured from P. O. Box 1523, Richmond, Va. 


* * * 


Evans Lodge No. 524, Evanston, Illinois, has this for THE MASONIC CREED: 
"BELIEVE in God's Infinite Benevolence, Wisdom and Justice: HOPE for the final 
triumph of Good over Evil, and for Perfect Harmony as the final result of all the 
concords and discords of the Universe: and be CHARITABLE as God is, toward the 
unfaith, the errors, the follies, and the faults of men: for all make one great 
brotherhood." 


* * * 


A dozen or so have written to ask if Brother Baird won't bring out his “Memorials” 
series in book form. So mote it be. Brother Baird, it is up to you.