Welcome to our newest issue of the Monday Masonic Minute!

Each week we will attempt to bring you a few Masonic interest, educational or discussion topics that we hope will inspire thought, contemplation and ultimately begin discussion that will strengthen and deepen the influence Freemasonry has on each of our lives.

Before we begin, a few disclaimers. The information provided has been culled from many different sources and time periods, including Short Talk Bulletins, Masonic blogs, etc., and credit will be given where due, wherever applicable, to the original source. Even though some of these postings may be dated, please note how well most all of the information stands as well today as it did in its original time period. Also, the topics discussed here in no way express the personal thoughts and policies of myself nor are they endorsed or supported by the Grand Lodge of Tennessee nor of any subordinate body thereof. The topics here are offered for consideration of each reader of their own accord and may be accepted or refuted accordingly. I also have taken no liberty to correct any punctuation, spelling or grammatical errors of any kind. All topics are presented precisely as received, without manipulation.

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Without further ado, let's dive into the topics for this week. I hope you enjoy

Tim Roberson, PM

Symbolical Masonry - THE FIRST STEP

by H.L. Haywood [1923]

H.L Haywood is one of the fraternity’s most prolific writers of the 20th century. His several works have provided Freemasons with better knowledge of the fraternity, its history, philosophy and aims.

You won’t find this book on the shelves of Borders or Barnes and Noble because unlike Knight, Lomas, Robinson and others, Haywood sticks to the facts and the majority of books on Freemasonry at walk-in retail stores are coincidental history at best. In this book there is no fluff, no spectacular historical fantasies about knights, Egyptians or a long lost secret knowledge. Haywood addresses the many facets of the fraternity that go unchecked a lot of the time. From officer duties, politics, revenue/resources, structure, jurisdiction, jurisprudence and a slew of other topics essential to a Freemasons repertoire of knowledge, Haywood gives the reader a factual account of how the fraternity works, what its purpose is and the documented history of the fraternity we have today. John A. Nichols – Acacia Lodge No. 42, GLAZ

In the days before 1717, when the first Grand Lodge of modern Speculative Freemasonry was organised, the First Degree—it was called the "Apprentice's Part" then—must have been a less elaborate ceremony than it is now. In Scotland one Mason could, and often did, make another merely by communicating the "Mason's word." (What it was we do not know now.) In England the ceremony was richer than this, but even so was doubtless very bald as compared with the work as we of the twentieth century have come to know it. There are many scholars who believe that the old Freemasonry of Ireland was more complete than that of England (by this fact they help to explain the famous so-called "schism," and which was "healed over" in 1813), but even if it was it could not have compared with the ritual of to-day which has grown to such proportions as would require a man years of study in order to master its history and meaning.

It appears that the great revival of Freemasonry which occurred in 1717, and out of which grew the first Grand Lodge mentioned above, was in reality a very complete reorganisation of Freemasonry, though it may well be that no such radical changes were made as some of our more extreme scholars have believed. The Fraternity prior to that date had become very much demoralised and divided; lodges had lost touch with each other; and many Masons had no understanding at all of the meaning of the ceremonies they performed. After the Fraternity began to make a new start a centre was established about which Masons could rally and to which they could all furnish their own traditions and records. In consequence of this it seems that the ritual grew with such rapidity that after a few years it became necessary to fabricate more degrees. What had been the First was divided into the new First and the new Second; what had been the Third was continued as such, though much amplified. This division was completed by 1738, since which time and by the addition of Preston's lectures, etc., the machinery of the degrees has reached its present perfection.

It is impossible to know exactly how the candidate was given the "Apprentice's Part" in the old days when Freemasons were still operatives engaged in the construction of actual buildings, but many hints have been left us embedded in the Old Charges, as the ancient Manuscript constitutions and traditions are usually called. E. L. Hawkins, who edited a well-known Encyclopedia of Freemasonry, collated all these references and out of them composed a mosaic picture of the old-time ceremony:

"The meeting was opened with prayer—the legendary history of the Craft was then read—then the candidate was led forward and instructed to place his hand on the Volume of the Sacred Law, which was held by one of the 'Seniors,' while the articles binding on all Masons alike were read, at the conclusion of which a brief obligation was imposed upon the candidate, all present joining in it; then followed the special charges for an apprentice, concluding with a longer obligation by which the candidate specially bound himself to secrecy with regard to what was about to be communicated to him; then the secrets, whatever they were (modes of recognition), were entrusted to him, and the proceedings terminated."

Before receiving the First Degree the youth was obliged to prove himself well qualified, of lawful age, free-born, sound in mind and limb, of clean habits, and in good repute. At the same time he was compelled to bind (or "indenture") himself to a Master Mason for a term of years, usually seven: this master set him his tasks, taught him the methods of the trade, and saw to it that he faithfully observed the rules and regulations of the Order and kept inviolate the secrets of the Craft and of his fellow workmen. At first the Apprentice was little more than a servant, performing menial tasks; but as his skill increased he was given more important duties. Meanwhile, "he must be obedient to the Master without argument or murmuring, respectful to all Freemasons, courteous, avoiding obscene or uncivil speech, free from slander, dissension, or dispute. He must not haunt or frequent any tavern or ale-house, or so much as go into them except it be upon an errand of the Master or with his consent, using neither cards, dice, or any unlawful game, 'Christmastime excepted.' He must not steal anything even to the value of a penny, or suffer it to be done, or shield any one guilty of theft, but report the fact to the Master with all speed. After seven long years the Apprentice brought his masterpiece to the lodge—or, in earlier times, to the Annual Assembly ('bodies not unlike the Grand Lodges of to-day')—and on strict trial and due examination was declared a Master. Thereupon he ceased to be a pupil and a servant, passed into the ranks of Fellowcrafts, and became a free man, capable, for the first time in his life, of earning his living and choosing his own employer." (See The Builders, by Dr. J. F. Newton, page 129.)

The Apprentice was a learner in those old days; he is a learner still. The word itself is found in many languages: "apprenti" in French; "apprendenti" in Italian; "Lehrling" in German; etc.: but whatever its form it means, at bottom, a "learner." Being a learner he is said to be in the Porch, and his Apprentice Lodge is said symbolically to be in the Porch of King Solomon's Temple. Time was when all business was transacted in a lodge on the First Degree, but now the Apprentice is not considered a full member of a lodge, and is not entitled to vote, to hold office, to walk in a funeral procession, or to receive Masonic burial, though it is true that Grand Jurisdictions differ somewhat among themselves in these last-mentioned details.

In a symbolical sense the Apprentice may be likened to a human embryo about to be born into a new world; he does not have power over himself, and he does not know anything about the new life upon which he is entering, and therefore it is necessary that he follow his guides with implicit and unquestioning obedience, for not otherwise can he advance a step.

From one end to another, accordingly, the great note struck in the First Degree is Obedience, and this virtue—it is a virtue in all strict senses of the word, though many young men of to-day have grown to dislike that fact—is impressed upon his heart by every device of symbolism, by every art of ceremony.

In learning any art Obedience must come first, Obedience to the teachers and Obedience to the rules. The boy who learns to ride a bicycle must obey the laws of equilibrium with slavish carefulness; a girl must abjectly follow the laws of music if she would become the mistress of her piano; and so is it in every trade and in every accomplishment, for he who would master an art must begin as a servant of its regulations, whether it be moulding iron, planting corn, or writing poems. This is not the slavery that leads to slavery; it is the slavery that leads to freedom, for after one has mastered the technique of his art his mind is set loose to work with power. If the vice of our day is slipshod work and slovenly art it is because our young people are lacking in the patience and in the perseverance to win mastership. But the young man who passes through the First Degree learns differently; the Craft causes the great importance and necessity of obedience to bite deeply into his heart, and he is made to know that no man can ever become a master who scamps his work.

If obedience must come first in order to master an art or a craft so it is the first of virtues in that which is the most difficult of all the greater arts—LIFE itself. This is the truth which the First Degree emphasises above all else. If the candidate is to be a builder in the speculative (that is, in the moral, intellectual, and spiritual) sense, building and built upon, he must learn to serve the laws of that difficult architecture. If he thinks of himself as a student learning a Royal Art he must obey the rules of that Art. If he considers himself a babe passing into birth and into a new world, he must place himself under the laws according to which that life can alone fulfill itself. If he pictures himself as a type of "the natural man" (if one may thus use the old theological expression) in his ignorance, his raw untutored condition, seeking to live the life of the spirit which rises above ignorance as a temple rises above the crown of a hill, above all he must learn to know and to obey the awful but benignant statutes of the soul.

Of all the various interpretations—they vary as much in value as in theory—of the First Degree, one of the noblest that I have ever discovered is that given by Dr. J. D. Buck in an essay published in The New Age (Volume VII, page 161): "Reflect a moment on the condition of the candidate on first entering the lodge room. He is not only in darkness, going he knows not where, to meet, he knows not what, and guided solely by the J.D., but he bears the mark of abject slavery. He is spared the shame of nakedness and the pride of apparel, and his feet are neither shod nor bare. He is poor and penniless, no external thing to help or recommend him. The old life with all its accessories has dropped from him as completely as though he were dead. He is to enter on a new life in a new world. His intrinsic character alone is to determine his progress and his future status. If he is worthy and well qualified, and duly and truly prepared for this, and, if he understands and appreciates what follows in symbols, ceremonies, and instruction, the old life in him will be dead forever."

These eloquent sentences make abundantly clear the importance of the First Degree, which is the Drama of Beginnings; for, though the Apprentice himself is but a babe, a beginner, a learner, not for that reason is the ceremony to be made easy or careless, but quite the opposite, for it carries within itself all the dignity and the mystery of birth. Therefore should a lodge see to it that the "Apprentice's Part" is conducted with solemnity and with beauty; its impressions are the candidate's first experience of Masonry, and they will consequently remain with him the longest and influence him the most.

SYMBOLICAL  MASONRY - THE PETITION FOR MEMBERSHIP

H. L. Haywood

The first step toward seeking admission into the membership of a Masonic lodge is to file with the Worshipful Master of the lodge nearest one's residence a petition, which is a printed form fundamentally the same in all jurisdictions; this form sets forth the petitioner's answers to the usual constitutional questions and solemnly asserts that he has not been "improperly solicited," but that he has sought the portals of the Fraternity of his own free will and accord. Before this petition can be presented to the lodge, which is usually done at the next regular monthly communication, or business meeting, it must bear the signatures of at least two Masons by way of recommendation; and then, after an interval, usually of one month, is put to the ballot. If the prayer for membership is then granted the petitioner is instructed to present himself for initiation: if the prayer is denied the fee, which has accompanied the petition, is returned, and the petitioner is notified of his rejection. In a majority of American jurisdictions (by "jurisdiction" is meant the territory over which a Grand Lodge holds sway: in the United States it is almost always coincident with the political boundaries of a state) the man is permitted to enter another petition after a certain fixed interval, after which second application the procedure is substantially the same as outlined above.

The manner and details of making application for membership in a Masonic lodge have changed somewhat from country to country and from century to century but for the most part the custom has remained the same in fundamentals. The points to be noted in the petition are (1) that the candidate makes application of his own initiative, and not after having been solicited; (2) that he holds himself to be in accord with the Order's own teachings concerning the "constitutional questions"; (3) that he voluntarily and at the beginning places himself entirely under the authority and laws of the Fraternity, pledging himself the while to a full obedience to the officers as well as to the laws; (4) and that he seeks admittance, not for any gain to himself, but out of having heard the good repute of the Order these many years.

In older times it was often permitted a man to shape the wording of his own petition within certain limits: one of the most beautiful petitions of this type of which there is any record is that presented by the first great American naval hero, John Paul Jones, to the Lodge of St. Bernard, Kirkcudbright, Scotland, under date of November 27, 1770 (see The Builder, August, 1920, page 221):

"To the Worshipful, the Master, the Wardens and Permanent Brethren of Free and Accepted Masons of the Lodge of St. Bernard held at Kirkcudbright. The petition of John Paul, Commander of the 'John' of Kirkendal, humbly sheweth—that your petitioner, for a considerable time past, hath entertained a strong and sincere regard for your most noble, honourable, and ancient Society of Free and Accepted Masons, but hitherto not meeting with reasonable opportunity, do now most humbly crave the benefit of receiving and admitting me into your Fraternity as an Entered Apprentice, promising, assuring and engaging to you that I shall in all rules and orders of your Lodge be most obsequient and observant. The complyance of you, Right Worshipful Wardens and rest of the Brethren, will singularly oblige and very much honour, Right Worshipful, your most humble petitioner and most humble servant.

John Paul." It is worthy of note in passing, and merely as an item of information, that Brother John Paul, afterwards known as John Paul Jones, was entered and passed in the St. Bernard Lodge No. 122, Kilwinning, Scotland, November 27th, 1770, and that his petition was endorsed by one Brother James Smith as follows: "I do attest the petitioner to be a good man and a person whom I have no doubt will in due time become a worthy brother."

In the days of John Paul Jones towns and cities were very small as compared with the great urban centres of our day, and men did little moving about from community to community, so that it was usually the case that nearly all the members of a lodge would be personally acquainted with a petitioner; under such conditions it was quite easy to determine his fitness or unfitness. With us it is different. Our country villages have grown to be towns of five to ten thousand population. Our cities are deemed small if they contain not at least one hundred thousand persons. Families live next door to each other without ever becoming acquainted, and men work in the same shop, factory, or offices without coming to know each other. Accordingly it is the rule rather than the exception that a petitioner is not personally known to the members of the lodge to which he submits his petition, and to meet this situation it has become the custom for the Worshipful Master to appoint a committee to investigate into the character and record of the man.

If it be true—as it undoubtedly is—that Freemasonry's future usefulness and present welfare depends upon the quality of membership admitted, then it is instantly apparent that in the whole structure of the Order there is not another office of more urgent importance than that of the investigating committee. The Worshipful Master should make it one of the first of his duties to use great caution in naming such a committee, and he should follow up his appointment by seeing that the committee carefully perform their functions as are necessary. In the old days of Operative Masonry the Master of the Works stood by with a watchful eye to see that no rotten stone was incorporated into the walls of the edifice over which he was superintendent: so should it be to-day with the Worshipful Master, the Master of the Works in a Speculative Lodge. In the long run his Mastership is judged, not by the number of initiations he has given, or by the elaborateness of his ceremonials, or the amount of money received during his administration, but by the quality of the members he has permitted to enter Freemasonry during the days of his authority. For if ever the walls of Freemasonry go down—which God prevent—it will be due to no failure in the Order itself, but to the defective and illy qualified men who are received within its portals.

Many of the larger lodges, and in some instances Grand Lodges themselves, are requiring a petitioner to fill out a questionnaire in which he makes records of all the salient facts about himself, his life, and his connections. This document duly signed and attested is, after it has served its immediate purpose with the investigating committee, filed in the archives of the lodge for future reference.

In some quarters opposition has developed to the questionnaire system, why it is difficult to discover, because the same conditions that have made an investigating committee necessary operate also to make it good sense to use a questionnaire; the information therein entered is merely a substitute for the personal knowledge men had of each other in earlier times when communities were small and men were known to each other. Moreover, modern society has grown very complicated, like the vision Ezekiel had of wheels within wheels, and the Masonic institution has had to readapt itself to changing conditions, so that now a lodge performs functions it did not dream of in older days. Consider how relief work has been organised and systematised; how employment bureaus have been instituted; social clubs formed; and all of that: it is immediately apparent that it is necessary to have "a line" on the men who must be adjusted to and controlled by all this complicated machinery. The information contained in a questionnaire has become necessary, and how that information is to be obtained and preserved is a mere matter of detail, but it is difficult to think of any other method more effectual than the printed questionnaire.

In the petition which a man presents to a lodge no statement is more important than that he has not been solicited. This question of solicitation, why it is an evil, and why it must be strictly forbidden is a subject which, if there were space to go into it with the thoroughness it deserves, would let us into some of the inmost truths about Freemasonry, because it would help us to see, as by a kind of internal illumination, something of the very soul of Freemasonry. As things are in this book it is only possible to touch upon one of the most superficial of the many matters that hinge upon it.

Solicitation is an evil, whenever practised, and utterly condemned by the public opinion as well as by the laws of the Fraternity. Why is this so? Because solicitation is an injustice to the petitioner and a danger to the Craft, and that for many reasons, one or two of which may be suggested.

Solicitation is wrong to a petitioner because at the door of the lodge, when he for the first time presents himself there, he must solemnly swear that he has not been solicited; but if he has been solicited, how is he truthfully to make such a solemn declaration? See in what an embarrassment the man's own friends have placed him!

Furthermore, those that solicit—supposing there are such for the sake of the discussion—would usually be the men least qualified to present the nature and claims of Freemasonry to a man with accuracy, and without misleading misinterpretations: and the chances are that they would hold out some kind of an appeal in order to win the man over, and tell him that he will gain such and such a thing for himself if he will submit his petition. But Freemasonry offers no rewards for membership except itself; it does not offer emoluments, prestige, fame, position, commercial advantages or any other such thing, and they who so interpret it do it a wrong, and mislead the man that is persuaded by such means to seek its doors.

Solicitation is quite as great a wrong to the Order itself, for it needs not great numbers but sincere and devoted members, and your solicited member—as every one knows who belongs to a society that encourages solicitation—usually assumes the attitude that something is owing to him, that the promises that were made of the advantages that would accrue must be now fulfilled and consequently he is not useful at all, and becomes not a Mason but a mere member, which is only so much dead timber weighing down the Craft. Unless a man is willing to work, to endure hardships, and to make sacrifices, he should stay outside the Order; his name and his dues are valueless if they are not accompanied by his willingness ever to serve as a loyal son of Freemasonry. It is of his own "free will" that he comes, and that means "willingness" if it means anything, and not otherwise will a man progress far in the attainment of the Royal Art.

"But suppose," a Mason may here interject, "that I have a friend who would, I am certain, make a genuine Mason; but he knows so little about Freemasonry that he may never become enough interested in it voluntarily to apply: this would be a loss to the lodge as well as to himself, would it not? Therefore would it not be proper for me to seek to persuade him to become a Mason?" This is a fair and honest question and it has been answered often and often by the wise heads of the Order, which answer may be put into my own words as follows: "Explain to him as best you are able the principles of Freemasonry; acquaint him (as much as your obligations will permit) with its spirit and its aims; give him Masonic literature to read; but do not once, directly or indirectly, ask him to submit a petition for membership, else you will violate your own obligation and make it necessary for him to lie, if ever he stands at a lodge door." Just as one may explain astronomy to a man without urging him to become an astronomer so is it lawful to explain Masonry to men, as is done times without number in publicly circulated books; but solicitation is another matter, for its aim is not to instruct a man but to persuade him to take a step which he must take, if he takes it at all, on his own initiative.

A few of our authorities—Albert Pike for example—have discouraged Masons from going even this far, and they have argued that Masonry's teachings are Masonry's secret and belong only to the initiated: but this, surely, is carrying the matter too far, for Masonry has obligations to the world as well as to its own membership. One might refute Pike's contention out of his own mouth, for no other Mason has ever written more eloquently, or to more effect, of the social mission of the Craft, as when he says: "Masonry cannot in our age forsake the broad ways of life. She must walk in the open street, appear in the crowded square, and teach by her deeds, her LIFE, more eloquent than any lips."

THE BALLOT

By H. L. Haywood

Freemasonry is a social and moral institution that undertakes to build a symbolic Temple of which its members are the living stones; inasmuch as the stability of the structure depends upon the materials of which it is composed it is obvious that the Craft must exercise every precaution lest unfit men weaken its walls. To guard against this it makes use of the secret ballot as an instrument of selection. Because of this most important use the ballot-box may well be described, as one writer has phrased it, "a bulwark of the Order. It is no exaggeration to say that ninety per cent of the trouble and lack of harmony in our lodges arises from the improper use of the ballot." I believe that this statement is an exaggeration, for I have observed that many troubles have their origin elsewhere, but for all that there is much sense in it. The ballot is to the Order what the sentinel is to an army, what the tyler is to a lodge.

Performing as it does a function of such major importance it is natural that the ballot should be the storm-centre of no end of controversies and arguments. One brother has been led to exclaim that "the ballot question is the most irritating of all subjects relating to lodge government and discipline." He had in mind the abuses that creep in through the employment of the secret unanimous ballot. Such abuses are evil enough, but it is a question whether they would not be as bad or worse under any other system, because it would be manifestly impossible to devise any method for the election of members that would not at some point or other or in some hands or other lend itself to misuse.

In the great majority of American jurisdictions a petition is put to the ballot one month after first reading, though a few shorten the interval to two weeks. In less than half the jurisdictions no separate ballot is required for the Second and Third Degrees; and in almost all jurisdictions a re-ballot is permitted if only one blackball has been cast: it is almost an invariable rule (and a just one) that a ballot cannot be reconsidered after the result has been declared. In about half the states a rejected petitioner may submit another application in six months: the other states require a year. In no case is a member exempted from voting save in a few jurisdictions where he may be excused by the Worshipful Master or by vote of the lodge.

It is almost a landmark in American Freemasonry that no petitioner can be accepted for membership save by a unanimous ballot. It is at this particular point that many brethren—some of whom have been among the leaders of the Craft—have directed their faultfinding, because it appears to them that such a usage places altogether too much power into the hands of an individual, so that if a member feel some personal slight against a petitioner, or has had a private quarrel with him, such things in no wise militating against the petitioner's real fitness for membership, it would be unjust that a good man be prevented from Freemasonry because of such trivial circumstances. English lodges have long practiced the custom of requiring three blackballs, and there is much to be said in favour of that custom. Others there are who go to the opposite extreme and demand that a petitioner be elected by a majority merely; while others go so far as to ask the return of the ancient custom of a viva voce vote.

My own opinion is that the three blackballs rule is a good one, for it would appear to steer a middle course between extremes, but for all that I am quite contented with the system as it now operates in our land. One may agree with Brother J. G. Gibson (see his "Masonic Problems," page 26) when he says that "the lodge certainly owes more Masonic consideration to a member than to a petitioner, no matter how prosperous, popular and prominent the latter may be." If a member believes that a certain petitioner would be unwelcome to sit with him in lodge, or would prove disagreeable in Masonic society, the member has the first rights in the premises, not the petitioner.

The whole question as to how many blackballs should reject is one that must be decided by experience or expediency. There are no landmarks to go by, no ancient usages to bind the Order. On the contrary very different rules apply in different countries, and in the same country different rules have applied at different times, as is the case with England where the three blackball rule is now in force, though there was a time when a unanimous ballot was required. French lodges generally require one-fifth of the votes cast in order to reject. In other countries still the grand governing body sets up a minimum requirement—as, for example, that one-fifth of the ballots are required to reject—and then leaves it to each subordinate lodge to vary its practices at will inside that sine qua non.

There may be room for argument as to how many blackballs should be required for rejection but on one matter there would appear to be little ground for dispute: I refer to secrecy. Secrecy of ballot is in keeping with the genius of the Order as a whole, and Dr. Albert Mackey was well advised in putting secrecy among his famous twenty-five landmarks. It is true "that the use of the secret ballot had not even yet begun in 1720," but it must be remembered that the rapid growth of, and the many changes in, the Society since those early years has made secrecy a necessity. If voting were done openly from the floor it would often happen that a member, having just but private reasons for believing a petitioner unworthy, would be driven by the tyranny of numbers to vote with the crowd. Besides, a negative oral vote might be reported to a rejected petitioner and bitter and unnecessary feelings be thereby engendered. Taking it up one side and down the other the present system is as good a method of balloting as can be devised: it is kind to the petitioner himself, it is kind to the voter, and it is fair to the lodge.

At the time of writing (1923) the Fraternity is inundated by petitions. Never before in the entire history of the institution has it been so snowed under by applications as now; one is reminded of the old complaint of Dr. Stukely "that the Order ran itself out of breath through the folly of the members." We are now running ourselves out of breath. Lodges that once were put to it to reach three hundred members are now mounting to one thousand or two thousand and in a few cases more still. In such great bodies it is becoming necessary to devise new methods for balloting in order to expedite business, and in many cases the problem has come before  Grand Lodges with the result that new ballot legislation, hitherto undreamed of, has been adopted. It is impossible to go into detail regarding these new usages, or to deal with them critically, because there are too many experiments now being tried, and space does not avail. It would be richly worthwhile for an individual student, or for a Study Club, to go into this matter thoroughly; it would prove a rewarding field of research in present-day jurisprudence, and many other subjects of cognate interest and importance would be meanwhile encountered, for the whole ballot system is one that insinuates itself into the very core of Freemasonry.

One more word needs to be said. "Be careful how you vote." If you are a member of a board of directors of a business corporation and you are balloting on a new member or on the selection of a new cashier or president your ballot means nothing necessarily more than that you believe that the candidate is not technically qualified; your blackball would under no circumstances be considered an insult. If you vote against a political candidate it may mean, and usually is so considered, that you disagree with his policies, not that you deem him morally unfit for office. But when you vote against a petitioner for membership in our Fraternity it is a different matter, in almost every case, and far more serious, so far as the man's reputation is concerned, because almost all the requirements of membership in the Order are of the moral type; you pass upon the man's CHARACTER. It is unfair to him to blackball him on mere hearsay; or because you chance to entertain a merely private grudge against him, or for any reason less substantial than that he is unfit fundamentally for membership. The thing to be decided is not whether the petitioner is prosperous, or popular, but whether he will make a true Mason, a helpful brother, a desirable associate in the lodge room. If you have valid reasons for believing that a petitioner would not thus qualify it is your duty to vote against him; but you should not vote against him, if he be recommended by the committee on investigation, for any lesser reasons.

"WORTHY AND WELL-QUALIFIED"

H.L. Haywood

To many outsiders it may seem that Freemasonry demands too much of a petitioner by way of qualifications, as if it were actuated by some exclusive or aristocratic motive. Masons themselves, occasionally, ask that the bars be let down a little. But those who know the Fraternity FROM THE INSIDE, and who understand well its purposes, are of the opposite opinion, many of them, and believe that the bars should be put up higher still. The Fraternity is not a social club, an insurance society, or a charitable institution, but a body of picked men consecrated to a certain set purpose; therefrom it follows that only those who possess the qualifications for such a fellowship and the abilities for such a work should be permitted membership. The receiving of unfit candidates foredooms the temple now building to future collapse, as was the fate of so many buildings erected by the old Norman architects in England which went down because "they used poor stone, and scamped with the trowel." A wise business manager will not employ inefficient help. A sensible church will not accept unworthy members. For like reasons Freemasonry must guard well its own portals else it fail of its high mission, which God forfend! In his "War and Peace"—a great work that every Mason should read—Tolstoy makes the old Mason say:

"The first and foremost aim and chief foundation of our order, upon which it rests, and which no human

power can destroy, is the preservation of a certain mystery and its transmission to posterity, a Mystery which has reached us from the most remote times, even from the first man, and on which, perhaps, the fate of the human race depends. But since this Mystery is of such character that nobody can know it or make use of it who has not been prepared by a prolonged and thorough purification of himself, not everybody may hope to come into its possession."

The earliest of the Old Charges, or Manuscript Constitutions, is the Regius, sometimes called, after its discoverer, the Halliwell, believed to have been written late in the fourteenth century, and to have been based on yet older materials: it specifies that the "apprentice be of lawful blood [I modernise the spelling] and have his limbs whole"; and, that the lodge "shall no thief accept, lest it would turn the Craft to shame." It would be of interest to us in this connection, did space permit, to make a careful analysis of the qualifications required by this and other ancient constitutions; fortunately they were embodied, in substance at least, and for the most part, in the Constitution published by James Anderson in 1723. This Andersonian document, one of the most famous of all Masonic productions of any kind whatsoever, has been employed as a model by nearly all our Grand Lodges in writing their own Constitutions. It is important to study carefully the list of qualifications laid down in it. They are as follows:

"The Persons admitted members of a Lodge must be good and true men, free-born, and of mature and discreet age, no Bondmen, no Women, no immoral or scandalous men, but of good Report."

Note first in this catalogue the DISQUALIFICATIONS.

1.—"No Bondmen."

In the earlier days of Operative Masonry, slavery, or some form of serfdom, was common in all countries where Masonry flourished. Inasmuch as these slaves or serfs were uneducated and had no legal status and were not permitted to move away from their place of bondage, they were unfit for membership in such a society. As the old Greeks were wont to say, "A slave has slave manners"; such manners could not be tolerated in a Masonic lodge.

2.—"No Women."

Women were freely admitted to a majority of the old craft guilds, of which, says Robert Freke Gould, "not one out of a hundred but recruited their ranks from both sexes"; but to this the Freemason's Guild was an exception, many tales to the contrary notwithstanding. There is one case on record in which the widow of an operative Mason was permitted to carry on her husband's trade, but she was given none of the secrets of the Craft. "Some writers have expressed the opinion," writes Brother A. S. MacBride, in his "Speculative Masonry"—a most noble work—"that women were admitted into the old operative lodges, but so far they have not advanced a single proof of their theory."

3.—"No immoral or scandalous men." On this there is no need to make comment; a child can see that an immoral man cannot qualify for adeptship in a moral art.

Note in the next place what QUALIFICATIONS are demanded.

1.—"Good and true men." How simple yet how profound are these time-worn adjectives! they are not qualities that glitter but they are, in their completeness, as rare as many that do! If it be asked why Masonry does not accept bad men in order to make them good, it replies that such is not its function, for it has a unique purpose of its own to carry out, and its demands are made with that in view. One organisation cannot attempt everything. The reformation of men is left to other agencies.

2.—"True men." Many a Mason has been troubled by the question, If I am fit to be a Mason why not also my wife? Freemasonry had its origin in guilds of men engaged in erecting buildings, a work for which women were not fitted. The customs, laws, traditions, regulations, and ritual evolved by these men continue to form the core of Freemasonry. Modern constitutions are modelled on the ancient constitutions; the ritual of to-day is in outline the ritual of many centuries ago; our laws are of long standing; and so are the usages and customs inside the tyled lodge. To admit women, the entire organisation, from the spire to the basement, would need to be torn down and built anew and in a manner wholly different. Freemasons do not object to women as such: they object to the revolutionising changes that would have to be made in the Craft in order to admit them.

The exclusion of women has offered opportunities for the Masonic humourist times without number and often, one is happy to remark, tempted our heaviest writers to a lighter vein. (Why do so many writers make Freemasonry so funereal and so solemn!) An old French author facetiously remarked that the presence of "the sex" would distract men from the work of the lodge: whilst the old London "Pocket Companion and History of Freemasons" (1764) furnished reasons which may sometimes be in a Mason's mind but which (except behind the Tiler) he wouldn't dare express!

"The Ladies claim right

  To come to our Light,

Since the apron they say is their bearing;

  Can they subject their will,

  Can they keep their tongues still,

And let talking be changed into hearing?

"This difficult task

  Is the least we can ask,

To secure us on sundry occasions;

  When with this they comply,

  Our utmost we'll try

To raise Lodges for Lady Freemasons!"

3.—"Free born."

After slavery had been abolished in England by Act of Parliament the old demand that a candidate be "free born" was changed to "free man." In this country, and owing to the longer continuance of slavery, "free born" has been longer retained, and is still found, I believe, in several Constitutions. But now the term is given a more liberal interpretation and is made to mean that the man is not an inmate of a penal institution, and that his mind is free from enslaving superstitions. As we may read in Gibson's "Masonic Problem": "Is he free? Not free in common law only, but also free from hostile and absorbing interests subversive to Masonic influence?" Of this, more anon.

4.—"Of mature and discreet age."

"Regarding the question of age," remarks MacBride, "the old Manuscripts do not, so far as we have noticed, particularise. They, in some cases, use the phrase 'of full age,' but nothing beyond that. Each lodge, in the old days, evidently settled this point for itself." As the operative custom varied in England, so has the speculative. The Grand Lodge Regulations made it 25 years in 1721; this was changed to 18 and thus remained "until a very recent period"; it is now 21, though some other countries have clung to 18. "Under these circumstances," MacBride comments, "the practice of obligating a candidate not to be present at the initiation of any one under the age of 21 years, is most reprehensible. It debars him while visiting a lodge working under a constitution in which the full age is 18, from remaining during the ceremony of initiation, if the candidate is under 21 years." The point is well taken. It would be well if Grand Lodges were to specify that by "full age" is meant the minimum age required of a candidate by any given Grand Lodge, and thus the member of one jurisdiction, while visiting in another, would not be put to the annoyance described by Brother MacBride; and the Grand Lodge itself could set its own minimum at the age declared legal by the state in which it operates. It must be remembered in these premises that a lodge sustains legal relations with a candidate; this makes it absolutely necessary that a candidate be of legal age.

The matter of physical qualifications has long been a storm-centre, and that for the reason that the "doctrine of the perfect youth" appears to be a landmark, and Masons are obligated to maintain inviolate the ancient landmarks.

Since the ancient builders performed difficult manual labour it is easy to understand why they found it necessary to demand of a candidate soundness of limb; besides, an infirm member was supported usually out of "the common chest" and that worked a hardship on his fellows. Accordingly, one may read in the Regius Manuscript—it was cast in poetic form—as follows:

To the craft it were great shame,

To make a halt man and a lame,

For an imperfect man of such blood

Should do the craft but little good.

Thus you may know every one,

The craft would have a mighty man;

A maimed man he hath no might,

You must it know long ere night.

After the speculative régime came into full blast in England these physical qualifications were greatly modified, so that we find lodges initiating the blind, deaf, and dumb, and persons otherwise defective or maimed. In this land, on the contrary, a majority of the jurisdictions still cling to the ancient doctrine of "the perfect youth," for what reason it is difficult to understand, seeing that what was so necessary in operative days is no longer needed in a symbolic Craft which requires of its members work with head and heart rather than with hands and feet. "It would be better for us," as Brother Louis Block, P.G.M., of Iowa, once exclaimed, "to admit a man with a wooden leg than with a wooden head!"

It would be quite easy to fill a book with quotations from eminent Masonic leaders and from Grand Lodges which have argued in behalf of a modification of the ancient rule. Three such quotations will suffice as being typical:

In 1875 the Board of General Purposes of the Grand Lodge of England issued a circular in which the writer said: "I am directed to say that the general rule in this country is to consider a candidate eligible for election who although not perfect in limbs is sufficiently so to go through the various ceremonies." It was left to the masters and members of subordinate lodges to determine whether the candidate was thus able.

Dr. George Oliver, who was once the mightiest influence in Masonic literature and whose influence is still felt everywhere, and who was always conservative, writes to this effect in his "Treasury": "It would indeed be a solecism in terms to contend that a loss or partial deprivation of a physical organ of the body could, by any possibility, disqualify a man from studying the sciences, or being made a Mason in our own times, while in possession of sound judgment, and the healthy exercise of his intellectual powers."

The veteran Masonic scholar of Iowa, Theodore Sutton Parvin, was of similar opinion, as when he contended that "it is the sole right of each and every lodge to act upon these qualifications, even as it is universally conceded that they are the sole judges of the 'moral' qualifications of all candidates."

Such other qualifications as are required will receive consideration in later connections; there remains here only to remark that perhaps, after all, the chief essential qualification in any candidate is a right motive; that is, a full and sincere inward determination to take Freemasonry seriously. "The vast increase of late years," wrote Brother W. J. Hughan, one of the giants of modern Masonic scholarship, "both of lodges and members, calls for renewed vigilance and extra care in selecting candidates, that numbers may not be a source of weakness instead of strength." The man who enters out of mere curiosity, or to gain social standing, or business advantages, the "watch-fob Mason," he is the real cowan, and a subtle source of weakness inside the body of the Craft, which will surely sap the life from the Fraternity if we do not have a care!