Part 15
But as it is impossible that in so widely diffused a society the members should know one another personally, it became necessary to establish tokens by which a mason may be able to recognize the masonship and the degree of a fellow mason. These tokens consist of a word uttered in a peculiar way, a sign made by various motions of the hand and a peculiar pressure given in shaking hands (the grip). The mason is also recognized by his knock on a door, his way of drinking, etc., provided he cares to make use of these methods of intimating his masonry.
Besides these peculiarities common to all Freemasons there are specialties shared only by particular sections of the masonic body. The whole body of Freemasons, because of its diffusion among diverse nationalities, is divided into a number of “systems” differing one from another in the ceremonies of initiation, of promotion to higher degrees, of the lodge of sorrow, and of other occasions. The differences consist largely in the form and tenor of the solemn addresses and counter-addresses, or questions and answers with which the meetings are opened and closed: these forms are an imitation of the rituals of the ancient stonemason lodges, and of other secret organizations. The ritual for the reception of an applicant into the first degree, that of apprentice, is modeled on the stonemasons’ ritual; and the ceremonies of the higher degrees are amplifications of the same originals, with embellishments. In brief, the ritual of admission is such as was used by the monkish and the knightly orders; but the prototype of all these rituals was undoubtedly the ceremonial of baptism in the Catholic Church.
No doubt many persons are desirous of knowing what takes place on the admission of a would-be Freemason. For the sake of such persons it may be remarked that these ceremonies are different in different systems, and that consequently an exposition of them would require a more than ordinarily voluminous work; that, furthermore, when communicated in writing, they lose all the effect they have when employed in the act of initiation; and that they would be likely to make no impression whatever on one who should desire to know them out of mere curiosity.
In the ceremonial of Freemasonry symbols or emblematic devices hold a prominent place. Of these the most ancient are borrowed from the stonemasons’ lodges, and, therefore, represent masons’ tools and implements; other symbolic devices are reminiscent of various secret societies or of ecclesiastical rites. But both in symbolism and in ceremonial many abuses have, in the course of time, crept in, and innovations have been made which mar the native simplicity of the order and divert it from the pursuit of more useful ends.
The recognition signs, the ceremonial, and the symbols are the only secrets in Freemasonry. Mysteries, that is to say, knowledge of things that are hidden from all other persons, the order has none, and the claims that have been made in that regard are without foundation. Discretion, with respect to the business of the lodges and the membership, Freemasonry enjoins in common with many other societies; and so far the order is a close society, or a private society, and not a secret society. Of secret machinations and intrigues such as are hatched in the Jesuit order and in the secret political associations of our time, there is no trace in Freemasonry.
The masonic organization of each country exists for itself and in entire independence of other countries. A minor union of Freemasons, consisting of members, all of whom, as a rule, attend its meetings, is called a Lodge. The place (city, town, village, etc.,) in which there are one or more lodges is called Orient; the presiding officer of a lodge is the Master, and with him are associated two Wardens besides other officers. The assemblage of the members, as well as the place in which they meet, is called a lodge. A lodge may be an isolated one, that is, entirely independent; but that is rarely the case; as a rule each lodge belongs to a union of lodges, called Grand Lodge, or Grand Orient. The several lodges of such a union work sometimes on one common system, sometimes on different systems. Again, the grand lodges differ greatly in their organization. As a rule they have a Grand Master, with several Grand Officers, and these are either elected by delegates from all the associate lodges, or are named by certain specially privileged lodges. The freest masonic constitution is that of Switzerland, adopted in 1844: there the seat of the Grand Lodge is changed in every five years. In monarchical countries the royal residence city is usually the seat of the Grand Lodge. There are in Germany eight grand lodges, whose jurisdictions overlap one another, so that often there may be in a given city several lodges belonging to as many different grand lodges: but that does no prejudice to fraternal harmony. France, Belgium, Spain, and Brazil have each two grand lodges, each with a distinct system of ritual. But in Holland, Switzerland, Denmark, Sweden, England, Scotland, Ireland, Hungary, Italy, Portugal, and Greece all the lodges of each country belong to one grand lodge. In each of the states of the American Union there is a grand lodge, and the same is to be said of the larger states of Central and South America. In the British colonies and dependencies, India, the Cape, Australasia, etc., the lodges are under the jurisdiction of the Grand Lodge of the United Kingdom: British America, however, has its own Grand Lodge. The grand lodges of the world number more than 90, the subordinate lodges more than 15,000, and the members, perhaps, one million, reckoning only those in good and regular standing; but this is only a rough estimate; precise figures are not obtainable in default of a unitary organization.
3. THE LODGE.
The several lodges are named after persons, virtues, masonic emblems, historic events, etc. In America and England they are often designated by numbers indicative of the time of their foundation. A lodge may be erected wherever a certain number of resident accepted brethren, among them at least three masters, desire to effect an organization, and obtain the approval of the grand lodge having jurisdiction. An indispensable requisite for a lodge is a “well tiled” apartment—one well protected against the intrusion of outsiders, spies, or eavesdroppers. Usually the lodge is a square oblong hall or room, furnished after the manner of the time and country, and decorated with the masonic insignia. The attire of the assembled brethren is usually black, with white gloves (emblematic of hands not soiled by unjust gain) and a short white leather apron, a memento of the stonemasons and of the obligation to labor. The use of other insignia and of tokens to indicate the rank of the officials is left to the discretion of the several lodges. In England and her colonies, in the United States, Belgium and France on festive occasions Freemasons appear in public and on the streets in full masonic regalia, bearing the emblematic insignia of the order: in Germany and Switzerland such parade is frowned upon by Freemasons as unbecoming.
A Freemason lodge is an Apprentice Lodge, a Fellowcraft Lodge, or a Masters’ Lodge, according to the degree of its members. In the Apprentice lodge, masons of all degrees take part: its business is to deliberate upon the affairs of the lodge, and to admit new apprentices. In the Fellowcraft lodge the Fellows and the Masters take part: its function is simply to promote members from the first to the second degree. The Masters’ lodge is for masters exclusively: the masters direct the work of the apprentices and promote Fellowcrafts to the master’s degree. Besides, in each degree there is given instruction upon the symbolism and work of the same—this is called a “Lodge of Instruction.” Each degree has its special meaning, a sum of doctrines and a certain number of symbols. The purport of the Apprentice degree is the seeing of the light in the spiritual sense—the spiritual birth of man: an explanation is given of the nature of the order, its aims and its constitution. The Second degree deals with the life of man, its joys, its griefs, its fears: teaches to withstand passion and temptation, to know oneself, and to form an idea of the model human career. Finally, the teaching of the master’s degree treats of the end of life, death, its inevitableness; proposes for imitation the examples of great men who have given up their life for humanity; suggests thoughts concerning the immortal life. Sometimes, also, the three degrees are explained as the embodiment of the masonic motto: Beauty, Strength, and Wisdom. These degrees are also known as the Saint John degrees, and the lodges as lodges of St. John, the Baptist being the chosen patron of the order, as he was also of the medieval stonemasons and of the Templars. The fact that the masons are under the patronage of Saint John the Baptist is interpreted to mean that the order is the forerunner of a happier condition of mankind, as John was the forerunner of Jesus. On the feast of Saint John (June 24th) or thereabout, in the year 1717, the first meeting of the Grand Lodge of London was held; and on that same day there is held in every masonic lodge throughout the world a festival at once grave and joyful.[3]
Footnote 3:
We make no mention here of the so-called “higher degrees,” which are, in fact, but amateurish fabrications, without any practical aim. They are distasteful forms of the true freemasonry; they differ as to name and number between one system and another; and the true lodges of Saint John freemasons recognize no such “supergraduation.” The higher degrees are considered in another part of this work.
All males who have attained legal majority, and who are of good repute and their own masters, are eligible for admission to the order, without regard to race, station, calling, or creed. Unfortunately, Freemasons have not always and everywhere been free from antiquated prejudices in the admission of new members. Down to this day lodges in the United States shut their doors in the face of men of color, i. e., of those who are not whites; and many German, Danish, and Swedish lodges, both grand and particular, exclude Jews; in consequence, there are very many lodges of colored men and in Germany some Jewish lodges, whereas in the British colonies brethren of all colors and creeds work together in the same lodges.
Women and children are not altogether shut out from Freemasonry everywhere. It is the almost universal custom to admit, before the attainment of majority, masons’ sons, who may have been instructed by their fathers as to the meaning of Freemasonry. There are also special meetings which the wives, the betrothed, the sisters, and the daughters of masons are permitted to attend. But we have an unmasonic excrescence and an abuse when, as in French lodges, with doors open to the public, a masonic baptism and a masonic marriage ceremony are performed with special ritual; still more worthy of reprobation are the Adoption lodges or Women’s lodges, instituted at various times in France: in these women were initiated with a ceremonial adapted to the occasion, and were promoted to various degrees; thus, before the Revolution the luckless Princess de Lamballe, in the time of Napoleon the Empress Josephine, and under the Restoration the Duchess de Larochefoucauld were presidents of lodges. In other quarters also the cry has been raised for the admission of the fair sex: but needless to say that such an innovation would very seriously compromise the gravity, the dignity, and the secrecy of the order, and breed trouble, both in the lodges and in the families of the members. Once a woman was unwittingly admitted to the secrets of Freemasonry. Elizabeth Aldworth, daughter of the Irish viscount Donneraile, in whose house a lodge used to hold its meetings, on one occasion, in her young girlhood, peeped through a crack in a partition and witnessed the admission of a mason. She was caught in the act, and, to prevent betrayal, was herself initiated. In her after life she was noted for her acts of benevolence, and once, wearing the masonic togs, headed a public walk of the brethren. The Empress Maria Theresa also, it is said, dressed in man’s apparel, once stole into a lodge in Vienna, having been informed that her husband, the Emperor Francis, was in the habit of meeting women there; but as she saw no women in the lodge, she withdrew in haste. Quite recently a Hungarian lodge admitted to membership a countess resident in its locality; but the Grand Lodge of Hungary canceled the act.
_PART TENTH._ _Secret Societies of the Eighteenth Century._
1. MISCELLANEOUS SECRET SOCIETIES.
Conditions in the 18th century were specially favorable to the vogue of secret organizations: illuminism was making headway, but at the same time there remained many a relic of medieval barbarism. The manifest contrasts of opinion naturally inclined men of like mind to come together in secret societies for the advancement of their favorite principles. These societies copied the methods of Freemasonry, and were, in a greater or less degree its rivals. Some of them admitted women to membership.
The societies of both sexes were intended to compensate women for their exclusion from the Freemason lodge. The “Order of Woodsplitters” (fendeurs), founded in 1747 by the Chevalier Beauhaine, a distinguished Freemason, took its symbolism entirely from the work of the woodsplitter or woodchopper; the lodges were yards (i. e., woodyards, chantiers), the members were cousins (cousins, cousines; i. e., male and female cousins), the candidate was a Steel (used to strike fire from a flint), and so forth. The “Order of Hope” (esperance) was founded expressly for the behoof of Freemasons’ wives, and they alone were admitted; but masons of the higher degrees could visit the lodges without initiation. The president was a woman. There were Esperance lodges in several cities of Germany; at Goettingen the university students joined the order for the sake of the refinement of manners got from association with the ladies. There is some doubt as to the true character of the “Order of Saint Jonathan” (afterward of Saint Joachim), qualified as “for True and Perfect Friendship,” or “for the Defense of the Honor of Divine Providence.” Its end would seem to have been to propagate belief in the Trinity, to refrain from the dance (especially the waltz), and from games of chance; also (this for the female members) to nurse their own children. It was founded by some German nobles, and its first grandmaster was Christian Francis, Duke of Saxe-Coburg. Though Protestants and Catholics were members of the order, it took on a strongly Catholic character, and in 1785 adopted the style of “the knightly Secular Chapter of the Order of Saint Joachim, the blessed Father of the Holy Virgin Mary, Mother of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” (ritterlich-weltliches ordenskapitel von St. Joachim, etc.) The society passed quietly out of existence. The “Order of the Pilgrims’ Chain” (Kette der Pilgrime), in Germany and Denmark, whose members belonged to the higher classes, had for its motto “Courtesy, Steadfastness, and Silence” (Willfaehrigkeit, Bestaendigkeit, Stillschweigen), and wore in a buttonhole a white ribbon bearing the initial letters of those three words. The members, male and female, were called Favorites (favoriten); to admit a new member was “to add a link to the chain”; and any member could add any “link” whom he might have known for half a year. The symbolism was borrowed from travel. The “Order of Argonauts” was founded in 1772 by Conrad von Rhetz, a Brunswick Freemason. On an islet in a pond leased to him by the state he built a temple in which the members were initiated. They approached the temple in barges and there were entertained by the Grand Admiral, as the founder was styled. There was no fee for admission. The motto was “Long Live Gladness”; the badge of the order was a green-enameled anchor of silver. The officers, besides the Grand Admiral, were the Pilot, the Ship’s Chaplain, and so forth, and the members were Argonauts. After the founder’s death the order went to wreck, and the temple disappeared, leaving no vestige. The renowned Fenelon founded at Douai an order called “the Palladium,” its secret dialect was taken from his romance “Telemasque.”
The “Order of the Mustardseed,” said to have been founded in England in 1708: it spread over Holland and Germany: it assumed the form of a Protestant clerico-knightly order, and concerned itself chiefly with religious affairs: its emblem was a gold cross, with mustard tree in the middle. This society was reputed to be connected with the Herrnhuters (Moravian brethren).
The “Order of the Leal” (Orden der Echten), founded in 1758, at Landeshut, by Bessel, a Prussian military officer, had for its end simply good-fellowship: it labored to win over to Prussia the Silesian nobility.
The “Society of the Ducats” (Dukatensocietat) had for its founder (1746) Count Louis of Neuwied, colonel in the Prussian Army. The members contributed one ducat a month; but when a member induced outsiders to join the society, then for the first outsider his own contribution for the month current was remitted; for the third, fifth and each following odd-numbered new accession procured by him he received a ducat. This vulgar swindle, which was the sole end of the society, worked finely, and the membership grew rapidly: but the Society of the Ducats was suppressed by the government after an existence of two years.
Attempts to establish other fraudulent orders were made by a swindler who understood the foible of his contemporaries for mysteries. Matthew Grossinger, or as he styled himself, Francis Rudolf von Grossing, son of a butcher, born 1752, at Komorn, in Hungary, would seem to have been once a Jesuit. After the suppression of his order, he offered to sell to Frederic the Great some Austrian official documents, but met with a repulse; then he represented himself to Joseph II. as a victim of the reactionary policy of the preceding reign, and in 1784 founded in the interest of his own pocket the “Order of the Rose,” and again in 1788, donning women’s clothes, the “Order of Harmony,” both orders admitting members of either sex. He named “Frau von Rosenwald,” a non-existent personage, as head of the order, with the title Stiftsrose (The Institute’s Rose). The several local societies were known as Roses, and their presiding officers as Rosylords and Rosyladies (Rosenherren, Rosendamen). But in fact Grossing was all in all, and he appropriated to himself the very liberal contributions and all other income: for that end alone were the societies established. He died in wretched circumstances, having always squandered his gains in luxury and extravagance.
2. OBSCURANTIST INFLUENCES.
The daybreak of illuminism in the 18th century gave to the partisans of the ancient despotism of creed and privilege matter of most serious concern. They saw all their contrivances for keeping the people ignorant and submissive baffled. For them, as for the Papacy at the daybreak of the Reformation the question was, To be or Not to be. But theirs was a war with a far more redoubtable foe than Protestantism ever was. Illuminism did not aim merely at separation from the Roman Church: it declared a war of extermination against Rome, it aimed at abolition of all authority that presumed to determine the beliefs of men or to dictate their opinions. To down this hateful spirit of illuminism with one blow—what satisfaction that would afford to the obscurantists of that time! But where should they begin? It was vain to think of silencing the literary champions of illuminism. The age of witch trials and courts of Inquisition was past. The problem was to find an organized institution in which the odious spirit of illuminism was, as it were, incorporated, and that could be no other than the society of the Freemasons. But the experience of the Popes and the Inquisition had shown that Freemasonry was not to be overmastered by persecution, by prisons, or by the stake. Hence, other champions must take the place of the Dominican inquisitors: the Freemasons must be won over to the good cause by flatteries and cajoleries. Among the illuminists of that day the Jesuits were regarded as the agents chosen for carrying out this plan; and though it cannot be demonstrated that they had an actual part in the business, the scheme surely was one quite consonant with the spirit of their order. The plan was shrewdly contrived. It dealt with political considerations affecting England, the native home of freemasonry; and thus the conspiracy aimed, so to speak, at capturing the den of the “dragon” of illuminism. The Stuart dynasty, which had returned to the Catholic fold, was in exile from the end of the 17th century, but, aided by France materially and by Rome intellectually, was ever striving to regain the lost throne. The efforts of kings and kings’ sons in exile possess a poetical and romantic quality. It was possible to win over all sympathetic enthusiasts by exploiting their foibles, the nobles and legitimists (the Tories) by preaching legitimacy, and the whole body of the Catholics by appealing to their loyalty to the Church. Now, the masonic order was a secret society, and as such, of course, was a rallying point for all enthusiasts, mystics, and dreamers. Besides, the nobility was strongly represented in the society: after the first four grandmasters of the Grand Lodge of England, who were all practical masons (architects), all the succeeding grandmasters belonged to the highest nobility of the realm. Among them we find dukes of Montague, Richmond, Norfolk, Chandos, to say nothing of a long series of viscounts, earls, and marquises. As for the Catholic element, it had many things in common with Freemasonry—ceremonies and mysticism, hierarchic degrees, and cosmopolitan extension; hence, with a little Jesuit finesse, the order might gradually and insensibly be made Catholic, as had been done with the Buddhist ceremonial in India: in this way the Society of Saint John might be transformed into a preparatory school for the Society of Jesus. And now, if we consider what a scandal it must have been to the coronetted chiefs of Freemasonry that their order originated among mechanics, we can see how easy it would be, by dishing up a few fables in proof of a nobler origin, to make converts of them for any ends whatever. In the event of success, the stronghold of illuminism would be captured, and with the help of its former champions the most powerful kingdom in Europe, and a great centre of illuminism, would be given back to a Catholic King, and thereby the road to conquest opened for the Church of Rome. Of course, these vast designs could not be carried out all at once. The work had to proceed by stages, as thus: 1. Aristocratic sentiment would be gratified by the institution of higher masonic degrees; 2. These degrees would be connected with the religious orders of knighthood by a chain of fable; 3. Obstinate Protestants would be quieted by the offer of a cryptic Catholicism which apparently would be in accordance with their own beliefs; 4. Persons inaccessible to religious considerations would be influenced by hopes of riches to be acquired through the secret arts of alchemy, and the like; 5. The whole purpose of the order would be directed toward spiritual and Catholic ends; finally, 6. when the process was completed, there would stand forth in all its nakedness the savage fury of the Inquisition.
3. THE “HIGH DEGREES” SWINDLE.