Author Description

THE subject which I am about to approach is one having certainobvious difficulties, because it is outside the usual horizon ofMasonic literature, and requires, therefore, to be put withconsiderable care, as well as with reasonable prudence. Moreover,it is not easy to do it full justice within the limits of a singlelecture. I must ask my Brethren to make allowance beforehand forthe fact that I am speaking in good faith, and where the evidencefor what I shall affirm does not appear in its fullness, andsometimes scarcely at all, they must believe that I can produce itat need, should the opportunity occur. As a matter of fact, somepart of it has appeared in my published writings.I will introduce the question in hand by a citation which isfamiliar to us all, as it so happens that it forms a good point ofdeparture:- "But as we are not all operative Masons, but ratherFree and Accepted or speculative, we apply these tools to ourmorals." With certain variations, these words occur in each of theCraft Degrees, and their analogies are to be found in a fewsubsidiary Degrees which may be said to arise out of the Craft-as, for example, the Honorable Degree of Mark Master Mason. Thatwhich is applied more specially to the working implements ofMasonry belongs to our entire building symbolism, whether it isconcerned with the erection by the Candidate in his ownpersonality of an edifice or "superstructure perfect in its partsand honorable to the builder, " or, in the Mark Degree, with ahouse not made with hands, eternal in the heavens, or again withSolomon's Temple spiritualized in the Legend of the Master Degree.