A
NEW AND REVISED EDITION
AN ENCYCLOPAEDIA
OF
FREEMASONRY
AND
ITS KINDRED SCIENCES
COMPRISING
THE WHOLE RANGE OF ARTS, SCIENCES AND LITERATURE AS CONNECTED WITH THE INSTITUTION
BT
ALBERT G. MACKEY, M.D., 33°
AUTHOR OP "THIS HISTORY OF FREEMASONRY," * 4 LEXICON OF FREEMASONRY," "A TEXT-BOOK OF MASONIC JURISPRUDENCE," " SYMBOLISM OF FREEMASONRY," ETC., ETC.
THIS NEW AND KE VISED EDITION
PREPARED UNDER THE DIRECTION, AND WITH THE ASSISTANCE, OP THE LATE
WILLIAM 3. HUGHAN, 32'
PAST GRAND DEACON (ENGLAND), PAST GRAND "WARDEN (EGYPT), PAST GRAND WARDEN (iOWA), PAST ASSISTANT GRAND SOJOURNER (ENGLAND), ONE OF THE FOUNDERS QUATUOR CORONATI LODGE (LONDON); AUTHOR OF "ENGLISH MASONIC RITE," "OLD CHARGES," ETC.
BT
EDWARD L. HAWKINS, M.A., 30*
PROV. S. G. W. (SUSSEX), P. PROY. S. G. W. (OXFORDSHIRE), MEMBER QUATUOR CORONATI LODGE (LONDON), AUTHOR OF " CONCISE CYCLOPEDIA OF FREEMASONRY"
PROFUSELY ILLUSTRATED
VOLUME I
PUBLISHED BY
THE MASONIC HISTORY COMPANY
NEW YORK AND LONDON
1914.
Copyright, 1873 and 1878, by Moss & Co. and A. G. Mackey
Revised Edition, with Addendum, Copyright, 1884, by L. H. Everts & Co.
Pronouncing Dictionary, Copyright, 1898, by L. H. Everts
Copyright, 1906, by Louis H< Everts & Co.
Copyright, 1909. by The Masonic History Company
Copyright, 1912, by The Masonic History Company
PREFACE
I once delivered an address before a Lodge on the subject of the external changes which Freemasonry had undergone since the period of its revival in the commencement of the eighteenth century. The proper treatment of the topic required a reference to German, to French, and to English authorities, with some of which I am afraid that many of my auditors were not familiar. At the close of the address, a young and intelligent brother inquired of me how he could obtain access to the works which I had cited, and of many of which he confessed, as well as of the facts that they detailed, he now heard for the first time. It is probable that my reply was not altogether satisfactory; for I told him that I knew of no course that he could adopt to attain that knowl- edge except the one that had been pursued by myself, namely, to spend his means in the purchase of Masonic books and his time in reading them.
But there are few men who have the means, the time, and the inclination for the purchase of numerous books, some of them costly and difficult to be ob- tained, and for the close and attentive reading of them which is necessary to master any given subject.
It was this thought that, years ago, suggested to me the task of collecting materials for a work which would furnish every Freemason who might consult its pages the means of acquiring a knowledge of all matters connected with the science, the philosophy, and the history of his Order.
But I was also led to the prosecution of this work by a higher considef a- tion. I had myself learned, from the experience of my early Masonic life, that the character of the Institution was elevated in every one's opinion just in proportion to the amount of knowledge that he had acquired of its symbolism, philosophy, and history.
If Freemasonry was not at one time patronized by the learned, it was because the depths of its symbolic science and philosophy had not been sounded. If it is now becoming elevated and popular in the estimation of scholars, it owes that elevation and that popularity to the labors of those who have studied its intellectual system and given the result of their studies to the world. The scholar will rise from the perusal of Webb's Monitor, or the Hieroglyphic Chart of Cross, with no very exalted appreciation of the literary character of
iv
PREFACE
the Institution of which such works profess to be an exponent. But should hd have met with even Hutchinson's Spirit of Masonry, or Town's Speculative Masonry, which are among the earlier products of Masonic literature, he will be conscious that the system which could afford material for such works must be worthy of investigation.
Oliver is not alone in the belief that the higher elevation of the Order is to be attributed " almost solely to the judicious publications on the subject of Freemasonry which have appeared during the present and the end of the last century." It is the press that is elevating the Order ; it is the labor of its scholars that is placing it in the rank of sciences. The more that is pub- lished by scholarly pens on its principles, the more will other scholars be at- tracted to its investigation.
At no time, indeed, has its intellectual character been more justly appre- ciated than at the present day. At no time have its members generally culti- vated its science with more assiduity. At no time have they been more zealous in the endeavor to obtain a due enlightenment on all the topics which its system comprehends.
It was the desire to give my contribution toward the elevation of the Order, by aiding in the dissemination of some of that light and knowledge which are not so easy of access, that impelled me years ago to commence the preparation of this work — a task which I have steadily toiled to accomplish, and at which, for several years, I have wrought with unintermitted labor that has permitted but little time for other occupation, and none for recreation.
And now I present to my brethren the result not only of those years of toil, but of more than thirty years of study and research — a work* which will, I trust, or at least I hope, supply them with the materials for acquiring a knowl- edge of much that is required to make a Masonic scholar. Encyclopedic learn- ing is not usually considered as more than elementary. But knowing that but few Freemasons can afford time to become learned scholars in our art by an entire devotion to its study, I have in important articles endeavored to treat the subject exhaustively, and in all to give that amount of information that must make future ignorance altogether the result of disinclination to learn.
I do not present this work as perfect, for I well know that the culminating point of perfection can never be attained by human effort But, under many adverse circumstances, I have sought to make it as perfect as I could. Ency- clopedias are, for the most part, the result of the conjoined labor of many writers. In this work I have had no help. Every article was written by myself. I Bay this not to excuse my errors — for I hold that no author should wilfully permit an error to pollute his page*— but rather to account i or thoaa
PREFACE v
that may exist. I have endeavored to commit none. Doubtless there are some. If I knew them, I would correct them; but let him who discovers them remem- ber that they have been unwittingly committed in the course of an exhaustive and unaided task.
For twelve months, too, of the time in which I have been occupied upon this work, I suffered from an affection of the sight, which forbade all use of the eyes for purposes of study. During that period, now happily passed, all authorities were consulted under my direction by the willing eyes of my daugh- ters-r-all writing was done under my dictation by their hands. I realized for a time the picture so often painted of the blind bard dictating his sublime verses to his daughters. It was a time of sorrow for the student who could not labor with his own organs in his vocation; but it was a time of gladness to the father who felt that he had those who, with willing hearts, could come to his assistance. To the world this is of no import ; but I could not conscien- tiously close this prefatory address without referring to this circumstance so gratifying to a parent's heart. Were I to dedicate this work at all, my dedi- cation should be— To Filial Affection.
Albert G. Maokey, M. D.
REVISER'S PREFACE
The revision of this most comprehensive Encyclopedia has been a most anxious and laborious task. I have endeavored to preserve as much as possible of Dr. Mackey's work untouched, but at the same time to correct statements which later investigations have shown to be unfounded; thus I have left all of Dr. Mackey's opinions and theories unaltered.
All completely new articles, or old ones with many alterations, I. have marked with my initials and I must take all responsibility for them, though as far as possible they were submitted to Bro. Hughan for his approval.
I have to return hearty thanks for kind aid to the late Bro. Henry Sadler, Librarian of the Grand Lodge of England; to Bro. W. J. Songhurst, Secretary of the Quatuor Coronati Lodge, No. 2076, London, England, for valuable ad- vice and assistance on many points; to Bro. the Rev. M. Rosenbaum, P. Prov. G. Chaplain of Northumberland, for help with Hebrew words; to Bro. John Yarker, P. G. Warden of Greece, for information about the Antient and Primi- tive Rite; and to Bro. A. C. Powell, P. Prov. G. Sup. of Works of Bristol, for the article on the Baldwyn Encampment.
Edward L. Hawkins, M. A.
St. Leonards-on-Sea, England, 1912.
PUBLISHERS' NOTE
In presenting to the Fraternity this new and revised edition of The En- cyclopedia of Freemasonry, we, also, wish to return hearty thanks to Bro. Ed- ward E. Cauthorne, A. B., A. M., Brooklyn, N. Y., for his articles on Aitchi- son's-Haven Lodge, Catacombs, Comacine Masters, Como, etc., and to Bro. A. G. Pitts, P. M. Detroit, Michigan; Bro. Eobert A. Shirrifs, 33°, of Elizabeth, K J.; Bro. ¥m. J. Allen, G. H. G. L. of New York; Bro. Charles A. Brocka- way, P. M. New York City, for their articles on Freemasonry in the United States and Mexico; and to Bro. Will H. Whyte, 33°, P. G. M. of Canada, for his articles on Freemasonry in Canada.
T. M. H. Co.
A
A. (X, Aleph.) In the Accadian, Greek, Etruscan, Pelasgian, Gallic, Samaritan, and Egyptian or Coptic, of nearly the same forma- tion as the English letter. It originally meant with or together, but at present signifies one. In most languages it is the initial letter of the alphabet; not so, however, in the Ethi- opian, where it is the thirteenth. The sacred Aleph has the numerical value of one, and is composed of two Yods, one on either side of an inclined Vau. It is said to typify the Trinity in Unity. The word Aleph signifies "ox," from the resemblance to the head and horns of that animal. The Divine name in Hebrew connected with this letter is rPHK, A H IE
Aaron. Hebrew pHX, Aharon, a word of doubtful etymology, but generally supposed to signify a mountaineer. He was the brother of Moses; and the first high priest under the Mo- saic dispensation, whence the priesthood es- tablished by that lawgiver is known as the " Aaronic." He is alluded to in the English lectures of the second degree, in reference to a certain sign which is said to have taken its origin from the fact that Aaron and Hur were present on the hill from which Moses surveyed the battle which Joshua was waging with the Amalekites, when these two supported the weary arms of Moses in an upright posture, because upon his uplifted hands the fate of the battle depended. See Exodus xvii. 10-12. Aaron is also referred to in the latter section of the Royal Arch degree in connection with the memorials that were deposited in the ark of the covenant. In the degree of " Chief of the Tabernacle," which is the 23d of the An- cient and Accepted Rite, the presiding officer represents Aaron, and is styled " Most Excel- lent High Priest." In the 24th degree of the
AB
same Rite, or " Prince of the Tabernacle," the second officer or Senior Warden also person- ates Aaron.
Aaron's Band. A degree instituted in 1824, in New York City, mainly for social purposes, and conferred in an independent body. Its ceremonies were not dissiimilar to those of High Priesthood, which caused the Grand Royal Arch Chapter of the State to take um- brage, and the small gathering dispersed.
Aaron's Rod. The method by which Moses caused a miraculous judgment as to which tribe should be invested with the priesthood, is detailed in the Book of Numbers (ch. xvii.). He directed that twelve rods should be laid up in the Holy of Holies of the Tabernacle, one for each tribe; that of Aaron, of course, repre- sented the tribe of Levi. On the next day these rods were brought out and exhibited to the people, and while all the rest remained dry and withered, that of Aaron alone budded and blossomed and yielded fruit. There is no mention in the Pentateuch of this rod having been placed in the ark, but only that it was put before it. But ai St. Paul, or the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews (Hebrews ix. 4), asserts that the rod and the pot of manna were both within the ark, Royal Arch Masons have followed this later authority. Hence the rod of Aaron is found in the ark; but its import is only historical, as if to identify the substitute ark as a true copy of the original, which had been lost. No symbolical instruction accom- panies its discovery.
Ah. 2K. 1. The 11th month of the He- brew civil year and corresponding to the months July and August, beginning with the new moon of the former. 2. It is also a He- brew word, signifying father, and will be read- ily recognized by every Mason as a compo-
1
2 ABACISCUS
nent part of the name Hiram Abif, which literally means Hiram his father. (See Abif.)
Abaciscus. The diminutive of Abacus, and, in architecture, refers to the squares of the tessellated pavement or checkered flooring of the ground floor of the Solomonian Temple.
Abacus. A term which has been errone- ously used to designate the official staff of the Grand Master of the Templars. The word has no such meaning; for an abacus is either a table used for facilitating arithmetical calcu- lations, or is in architecture the crowning plate of a column and its capital. The Grand Mas- ter's staff was a baculus, which see.
Abaddon. A Hebrew word \TOH9 signify- ing destruction. By the Rabbis it is interpreted as the place of destruction, and is the second of the seven names given by them to the region of the dead. In the Apocalypse (ix. 11) it is rendered by the Greek word 'AiroAAtW, ApoU- yon, and means the destroyer. In this sense it is used as a significant word in the high de- grees.
Abazar. The title given to the Master of Ceremonies in the Sixth Degree of the Modern French Rite.
Abbreviations. Abbreviations of technical terms or of official titles are of very extensive use in Masonry. They were, however, but rarely employed in the earlier Masonic publi- cations. For instance, not one is to be found in the first edition of Anderson's Constitu- tions. Within a comparatively recent period they have greatly increased, especially among French writers, and a familiarity with them is therefore essentially necessary to the Masonic student. Frequently, among English and al- ways among French authors, a Masonic ab- breviation is distinguished by three points, , in a triangular form following the letter, which peculiar mark was first used, according to Ragon, on the 12th of August, 1774, by the Grand Orient of France, in an address to its subordinates. No authoritative explanation of the meaning of these points has been given, but they may be supposed to refer to the three lights around the altar, or perhaps more gen- erally to the number three, and to the triangle, both important symbols in the Masonic sys- tem.
Before proceeding to give a list of the prin- cipal abbreviations, it may be observed that the doubling of a letter is mtended to express the plural of that word of which the single let- ter is the abbreviation. Thus, in French, F.'. signifies " Frere," or "Brother" and FF.\ "Freres," or "Brothers." And in English. L.\ is sometimes used to denote "Lodge, and LL.\ to denote " Lodges." This remark is made once for all, because I have not deemed it necessary to augment the size of the list of abbreviations by inserting these plurals. If the reader finds S.\ G.\ I.*, to signify " Sover- eign Grand Inspector," he will be at no loss to know that SS.\ GG.\ II/. must denote " Sov- ereign Grand Inspectors."
A.*. Dep.*. Anno Depositionis. In the Year of the Deposit. The date used by Royal and Select Masters.
ABBREVIATIONS
A.', and A.*. Ancient and Accepted.
A/, and A/. S.\ R.\ Ancient and Ac- cepted Scottish Rite.
A.*, and A.'. R.\ Ancient and Accepted Rite as used in England.
A/. F.\ M.\ Ancient Freemasons.
A.'. F.\ and A.*. M.\ Ancient Free and Accepted Masons.
A.*. Inv.'. Anno Inventionis. In the Year of the Discovery. The date used by Royal Arch Masons.
A.\ L.\ Anno Lucis. In the Year of Light. The date used by Ancient Craft Masons.
A/. L.\ G.\ £>.*. G.\ A/. D.\ L'U.\ A la Gloire du Grand Architecte de V Univers. To the Glory of the Grand Architect of the Universe. (French.) The usual caption of French Masonic documents.
A.\ L'O.v A rOrient. At the East. (French.) The seat of the Lodge.
A,\ M.\ Anno Mundi. In the Year of the World. The date used in the Ancient and Accepted Rite.
A.*. 0.\ Anno Ordinis. In the Year of the Order. The date used by Knights Templars.
A. *. Y.\ M.\ Ancient York Mason.
B. *. A.\ Buisson Ardente. Burning Bush. B.\ Bruder. (German for Brother.)
B. \ B.\ Burning Bush.
B'n.\ Brudern. (German for Brethren.)
C. * . C . • . Celestial Canopy.
C. \ H.\ Captain of the Host.
D. \ Deputy.
D.\ G.\ G.\ H.\ P.\ Deputy General Grand High Priest.
D.\ G.\ H.\ P.*. Deputy Grand High Priest.
D.\ G.\ M.\ Deputy Grand Master. D.\ Prov.\ G.\ M.\ Deputy Prov. Grand Master.
Dis.\ D.\ G.\ M.\ District Deputy Grand Master. (England.)
D. D.G.M. (America.)
E. *. Eminent; Excellent.
E.\ A.*. Entered Apprentice or E.\ A.\ P.*. E.\ C.'. Excellent Companion. Ec.\ Ecossaise. (French.) Scottish; be- longing to the Scottish Rite. E.\ G.\ C.\ Eminent Grand Commander.
E. \ V/. Ere Vulgaire. (French.) Vulgar Era; Year of the Lord.
F. \ Frbre. Brother. (French.) F.\ C.\ Fellow-Craft.
F. \ M.\ Freemason. Old Style.
G. \ Grand.
G.\ A.*. S.\ Grand Annual Sojourner. G.\ A/. 0.\ T.\ U.\ Great Architect of the Universe.
G. * . C. * . Grand Chapter ; Grand Council.
G.\ Com/. Grand Commandery; Grand Commander.
G.\ D.\ Grand Deacon.
G.\ D.\ C.\ Grand Director of Cere- monies.
G.\ E.\ Grand Encampment: Grand East. G.\ G.\ C.\ General Grand Chapter. G.\ G.\ H.\ P.*. General Grand High Priest.
ABBREVIATIONS
ABDIEL
G.\ H.\ P.\ Grand High Priest.
G.\ L.*. Grand Lodge.
G.\ M.". Grand Master.
G.\ N.\ Grand Nehemiah.
G.\ O.*. Grand Orient; Grand Organist.
G.\ P.*. Grand Pursuivant.
G.\ P.*. S.\ Grand Past Sojourner.
G.\ R.\ Grand Registrar.
G.\ R.\ A.\ C.\ Grand Royal Arch Chap-
G,\ S.\ Grand Scribe; Grand Secretary. G.\ S.\ B.\ Grand Sword Bearer; Grand Standard Bearer.
G. \ T.\ Grand Treasurer.
H. \ A/. B.\ Hiram Abif. H.\ E.\ Holy Empire.
H.\ K.#. T.\ Hiram, King of Tyre.
H. \ R.\ D.\ M.\ Heredom. 111.*. Illustrious.
L\ N.\ R.\ I/. lesus Nazarenus, Rex Iudceorum. (Latin.) Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews.
I. \ P.\ M.\ Immediate Past Master. (English.)
L\ T.\ N.\ O.v T.\ G.\ A/. 0.\ T.\ U.\ In the Name of the Great Architect of the Universe. Often forming the caption of Masonic documents.
J/. W.*. Junior Warden.
K.\ King.
K — H.\ Kadosh, Knight of Kadosh.
K.\ H.\ S.'. Knight of the Holy Sepulcher.
K.\ M.\ Knight of Malta.
K.\ S.\ King Solomon.
K.\ T.\ Knights Templar.
L.\ Lodge.
LL.\ Lodges.
L.\ R.\ London Rank. A distinction in- troduced in England in 1908. M.\ Mason.
M.\ C.\ Middle Chamber.
M.\ E.*. Most Eminent; Most Excellent.
M.\ E.\ G.\ H.\ P.". Most Excellent Grand High Priest.
M.\ E.*. G.\ M.\ Most Eminent Grand Master (of Knights Templar).
M.\ L.\ Mere Loge. (French.) Mother Lodge.
M.\ M.\ Master Mason.
M.\ M.\ Mois Magonnique. (French.) Masonic Month. March is the first Masonic month among French Masons.
M.". W.'. Most Worshipful.
M.\ W.\ S.\ Most Wise Sovereign.
0.*. Orient.
OB.'. Obligation.
P.'. Past.
P.-. G.\ M.\ Past Grand Master.
P.*. M.*. Past Master.
Prov.\ Provincial.
Pro/. G.\ M.\ Pro-Grand Master.
Prov.". G.\ M.\ Provincial Grand Master.
P.\ S.\ Principal Sojourner.
R.*. A/. Royal Arch.
R.\ C*. or R.\ t-*- Rose Croix. Appended to the signature of one having that degree.
R.\ E.\ Right Eminent.
R.\F.\ Respectable Frere. (French.) Wor- shipful Brother.
R.\ L.\ or R.\ CU .*. Respectable Loge. (French.) Worshipful Lodge.
R.\ S.\ Y.\ C.\ S.\ Rosy Cross (in the Royal Order of Scotland).
R.\ W.\ Right Worshipful.
S.\ Scribe.
S.\ C.\ Supreme Council. S.\ G.\ I.'. G.\ Sovereign Grand Inspector General.
S.\ P.\ R.\ S.\ Sublime Prince of the Royal Secret.
S.\-S.\ Sanctum Sanctorum or Holy of Holies.
S.\ S.\ S.\ Trots fois Salut. (French.) Thrice greeting. A common caption to French Masonic circulars or letters. S.\ W.\ Senior Warden. T.'. C.\ F.\ Tres Ckere Frere, (French.) Very Dear Brother.
T.\ G.\ A.\ 0.\ T.\ U.\ The Great Archi- tect of the Universe.
V.4. or Ven.#. Venerable. (French.) Wor- shipful.
V.\ D.\ B.\ Very Dear Brother. V.'. D.\ S.\ A/. Veut Dieu Saint Amour, or Vult Dei Sanctus Animus. A formula used by Knights Templar.
V/. L.\ Vraie lumiere. (French.) True light.
V.*. W.\ Very Worshipful.
W.\ Worshipful.
W.\ M.\ Worshipful Master.
□ /. Lodge.
r~Ep .*. Lodges.
f Prefixed to the signature of a Knights Templar or a member of the A. and A. Scottish Rite below the Thirty-third Degree. fiXi Prefixed to the signature of a Grand 77 or Past Grand Commander of Knights Templar or a Mason of the Thirty-third Degree in the Scottish Rite. jJL Prefixed to the signature of a Grand J-i or Past Grand Master of Knights Templar and the Grand Com- mander of the Supreme Council of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite.
Abda. A word used in some of the high degrees. He was the father of Adoniram. (See 1 Kings iv. 6.) Lenning is wrong in say- ing that he is represented by one of the officers in the degree of Master in Israel. He has con- founded Abda with his son. (Encyc. der Freimaur.)
Abda in on. The name of the orator in the Fourteenth Degree of the Rite of Perfection, or the Sacred Vault of James VI. It means a ser- vant, from abady " to serve," although some- what corrupted in its transmission into the rituals. Lenning says it is the Hebrew Hab- damon, " a servant ; but there is no such word in Hebrew.
Abdiel. (Heb., Servant of God.) The name of an angel mentioned by the Jewish Kabbalists. He is represented in Milton's Paradise Lost, Book V., as one of the sera- phim, who, when Satan tried to stir up a re- volt among the angels subordinate to his authority, alone and boldly withstood his traitorous <"
4 ABDITORIUM
Among the faithless, faithful only he; Among innumerable false, unmoved, Unshaken, unseduced, unterrified, His loyalty he kept, his love, his zeal. (894-7.)
The name Abdiel became the synonym of honor and faithfulness.
Abditorlum. A secret place for the deposit of records — a Tabularium.
Abelites. A secret Order which existed about the middle of the 18th century in Ger- many, called also " the Order of Abel." The organization was in possession of peculiar Bigns, words, and ceremonies of initiation, but, according to Gadicke (Freimaurer Lexi- con), it had no connection with Freemasonry. According to Clavel the order was founded at Grief swald in 1745.
Abercorn, Earl of. James Hamilton, Lord Paisley, was named Grand Master of England by the retiring G. Master, the Duke of Rich- mond, in 1725. He was at that time the Master of a Lodge, and had served on the Committee of Charity during that year. He succeeded his father as Earl of Abercorn in 1734.
Abercorn, Duke of. Grand Master of Ire- land 1874-85.
Aberdour, Lord. Grand Master of Scot- land, 1755-6. Also of England 1757-61.
Ablb. The original name of the Hebrew month Nisan, nearly corresponding to the month of March, the first of the ecclesiastical year. Abib is frequently mentioned in the Sacred Scriptures, and signifies green ears of corn or fresh fruits.
Abl bale. The name of the first Assassin in the Elu of the Modern French Rite.
Derived most probably from the Hebrew abi and balah, and 3>V3, which mean father of destruction, though it is said to mean " le meuririer du Pere"
Abide by. See Stand to and abide by.
Ablf (or Ablff, or perhaps more correctly Ablv). An epithet which has been applied in Scripture to that celebrated builder who was sent to Jerusalem by King Hiram, of Tyre, to superintend the construction of the Temple. The word, which in the original Hebrew is TDK, and which may be pronounced Abiv or Abif, is compounded of the noun in the con- struct-state Abi, meaning "father,"
and the pronominal suffix 1, which, with the preceding vowel sound, is to be sounded as iv or if, and which means " his" ; so that the word thus compounded Abif literally and gram- matically signifies " his father." The word is found in 2 Chronicles iv. 16, in the following sentence: "The pots also, and the shovels, and the flesh hooks, and all their instruments, did Huram his father make to King Solomon." The latter part of this verse is in the original as follows:
nt&v ^ vok mm nro
Shelomoh lamelech Abif Huram gnasah
Luther has been more literal in his version of this passage than the English translators, and appearing to suppose that the word Abif
ABIF
is to be considered simply as an appellative or surname, he preserves the Hebrew form, his translation being as follows: " Machte Huram Abif dem Konige Salomo." The Swedish ver- sion is equally exact, and, instead of " Hiram his father," gives us " Hyram Abiv." In the Latin Vulgate, as in the English version, the words are rendered " Hiram pater ejus." I have little doubt that Luther and the Swedish translator were correct in treating the word Abif as an appellative. In Hebrew, the word ab, or " father," is often used, honoris causa, as a title of respect, and may then signify friend, counselor, wise man, or something else of equivalent character. Thus, Dr. Clarke, commenting on the word abrech, in Genesis xli. 43, says: " Father seems to have been a name of office, and probably father of the king or father of Pharaoh might signify the same as the king's minister among us." And on the very passage in which this word Abif is used, he says: " 3K, father, is often used in He- brew to signify master, inventor, chief operator. " Gesenius, the distinguished Hebrew lexi- cographer, gives to this word similar signifi- cations, such as benefactor, master, teacher, and says that in the Arabic and the Ethiopic it is spoken of one who excels in anything. This idiomatic custom was pursued by the later Hebrews, for Buxtorf tells us, in his " Tal- mudic Lexicon," that " among the Talmudists abba, father, was always a title of honor," and he quotes the following remarks from a treatise of the celebrated Maimonides, who, when speaking of the grades or ranks into which the Rabbinical doctors were divided, says: " The first class consists of those each of .whom bears his own name, without any title of honor; the second, of those who are called Rabbanim; and the third, of those who are called Rabbi, and the men of this class also receive the cognomen of Abba, Father."
Again, in 2 Chronicles ii. 13, Hiram, the King of Tyre, referring to the same Hiram, the widow's son, who is spoken of subse- quently in reference to King Solomon as " his father," or Abif in the passage already cited, writes to Solomon: " And now I have sent a cunning man, endued with understanding, of Huram my father's." The only difficulty in this sentence is to be found in the prefixing of the letter lamed b, before Huram, which has caused our translators, by a strange blunder, to render the words I Huram abi, as meaning " of Huram my father's," * instead of ' ' Huram my father. ' ' Luther has again taken the correct view of this subject, and translates the word as an appellative: " So sende ich nun einen weisen Mann, der Berstand hat, Huram Abif"; that is, " So now I send you a wise man who has understanding, Huram Abif." The truth, I suspect, is, although it has. escaped all the commentators, that the lamed in this passage is a Chaldaism which is some- times used by the later Hebrew writers, who
* It may be remarked that this could not be the true meaning, for the father of King Hiram was not another Hiram, but Abibal.
ABIBAM
incorrectly employ h, the sign of the dative for the accusative after transitive verbs. Thus, in Jeremiah (xl. 2), we have such a con- struction: vayikach rob tabachimVYremyahu; that is, literally, " and the captain of the guards took for Jeremiah," where the h, I, or for, is a Chaldaism and redundant, the true rendering being, " and the captain of the guards took Jeremiah." Other similar pas- sages are to be found in Lamentations iv. 6, Job v. 2, etc. In like manner I suppose the 7 before Huram, which the English translators have rendered by the preposition " of," to be redundant and a Chaldaic form, the sentence should be read thus: " I have sent a cunning man, endued with understanding, Huram my father"; or, if considered as an appellative, aa it should be, " Huram Abi."
From all this I conclude that the word Ab, with its different suffixes, is always used in the Books of Kings and Chronicles, in reference to Hiram the Builder, as a title of respect. When King Hiram speaks of him he calls him " my father Hiram." Hiram Abi; and when the writer of the Book of Chronicles is speaking of him and King Solomon in the same passage, he calls him "Solomon's father ,r— " his father " Hiram Abif. The only difference is made by the different appellation of the pro- nouns my and his in Hebrew. To both the kings of Tyre and of Judah he bore the honor- able relation of Ab, or " father," equivalent to friend, counselor, or minister. He was ' 'Father Hiram." The Masons are therefore perfectly correct in refusing to adopt the translation of the English version, and in preserving, after the example of Luther, the word Abif as an appellative, surname, or title of honor and dis- tinction bestowed upon the chief builder of the Temple, as Dr. James Anderson suggests in his note on the subject in the first edi- tion (1723) of the Constitutions of the Free- masons. [E. L. H.J
Abiram. One of the traitorous craftsmen, whose act of perfidy forms so important a part of the Third Degree, receives in some of the high degrees the name of Abiram Akirop. These words certainly have a Hebrew look; but the significant words of Masonry haye? in the lapse of time and in their transmission througn ignorant teachers, become so cor- rupted in form that it is almost impossible to trace them to any intelligent root. They may be Hebrew or they may be anagrammatized (see Anagram); but it is only chance that can give us the true meaning which they undoubt- edly have. The word "Abiram" means " father of loftiness," and may have been chosen as the name of the traitorous crafts- man with allusion to the Biblical story of Korah, Dathan and Abiram who Conspired against Moses and Aaron. (Numbers xvi.) In the French ritual of the Second Elu it is said to mean murderer or assassin, but this would not seem to be correct etymologically.
Able. There is an archaic use of the word able to signify suitable. Thus, Chaucer says of a monk that " he was able to ben an abbot,"
ABORIGINES
5
that is, suitable to be an abbot. In this sense the old manuscript Constitutions constantly employ the word, as when they say that the apprentice should be " able of Birth that is f free borne." (Lansdowne MS.)
Ablution. A ceremonial purification by washing, much used in the Ancient Mysteries and under the Mosaic dispensation. It is also employed in some of the high degrees of Masonry. The better technical term for this ceremony is lustration, which see.
Afonet. The band or apron, made of fine linen, variously wrought, and worn by the Jewish priesthood. It seems to have been borrowed directly from the Egyptians, upon the representations of all of whose gods is to be found a similar girdle. 3Like the zennaar, or sacred cord of the Brahmans, and the white shield of the Scandinavians, it is the analogue of the Masonic apron.
Aborigines. A secret society which existed in England about the year 1783, and of whose ceremony of initiation the following account is contained in the British Magazine of that date. The presiding officer, who was styled the Orig- inal, thus addressed the candidate:
Original. t Have you f aifch enough to be made an Original? Candidate. I have.
Original. Will you be conformable to all honest rules which may support steadily the honor, reputation, welfare, and dignity of our ancient undertaking? Candidate. I will.
Original. Then, friend, promise me that you will never stray from the paths of Honor, Freedom, Honesty, Sincerity, Prudence, Mod- esty, Reputation, Sobriety, and True Friend- ship.
Candidate. I do.
Which done, the crier of the court com- manded silence, and the new member, being uncovered, and dropping on his right knee, had the following oath administered to him by the servant, the new member laying his right hand on the Cap of Honor, and Nimrod hold- ing a staff over his head:
" You swear by the Cap of Honor, by the Collar of Freedom, by the Coat of Honesty, by the Jacket of Sincerity, by the Shirt of Pru- dence, by the Breeches of Modesty, by the Garters of Reputation, by the Stockings of Sobriety, and by the Steps of True Friendship, never to depart from these laws."
Then rising, with the staff resting on his head, he received a copy of the laws from the hands of the Grand Original, with these words, " Enjoy the benefits hereof."
He then delivered the copy of the laws to the care of the servant, after which the word was given by the secretary to the new mem- ber, viz.: Eden, signifying the garden where Adam, the great aboriginal, was formed.
Then the secretary invested him with the sign, viz.: resting his right hand on his left side, signifying the first conjunction of har- mony. # . , _
It had no connection with Freemasonry, but was simply one of those numerous unit*-
6
ABRAC
ABRAXAS
tive societies to which that Institution has
given rise.
Abrac. In the Leland MS. it is said that the Masons conceal " the wey of wynninge the faculfcye of Abrac." Mr. Locke (if it was he who wrote a commentary on the manu- script) says, " Here I am utterly in the dark." It means simply " the way of acquiring the science of Abrac." The science of Abrac is the knowledge of the power and use of the mystical abraxas, which see; or very likely " Abrac " is merely an abbreviation of Abrac- adabra.
Abracadabra* A term of incantation which was formerly worn about the neck as an amu- let against several diseases, especially the ter- tian ague. It was to be written on a triangu- lar piece of parchment in the following form:
ABRACADABRA ABRACADABR ABRACADAB ABRACADA ABRACAD ABRACA ABRAG ABRA ABR AB A
It is said that it first occurs in the Carmen de Morbis et Remediis of Q. Serenus Sammon- icus, a favorite of the Emperor Severus in the 2d and 3d centuries, and is generally supposed to be derived from the word abraxas.
Abraham. The founder of the Hebrew na- tion. The patriarch Abraham is personated in the degree or Order of High Priesthood, which refers in some of its ceremonies to an interesting incident in his life. After the amicable separation of Lot and Abraham, when the former was dwelling in the plain in which Sodom and its neighboring towns were situated, and the latter in the valley of Mamre near Hebron, a king from beyond the Eu- phrates, whose name was Chedorlaomer, in- vaded lower Palestine, and brought several of the smaller states into a tributary condition. Among these were the five cities of the plain, to which Lot had retired. As the yoke was borne with impatience by these cities, Ched- orlaomer, accompanied by four other kings, who were probably his tributaries, attacked and defeated the kings of the plain, plundered their towns, and carried their people away as slaves. Among those who suffered on this occasion was Lot. As soon as Abraham heard of these events, he armed three hundred and eighteen of his slaves, and, with the assist- ance of Aner, Eshcol, and Mamre, three Amoritish chiefs, he pursued the retiring in- vaders, and having attacked them near the Jordan, put them to flight, and then returned with all the men and goods that had been re- covered from the enemy. On his way back he was met by the King of Sodom, and also by Melchizedek, King of Salem, who was, like Abraham, a worshiper of the true God. Melchizedek refreshed Abraham and his peo-
ple with bread and wine, and blessed him. The King of Sodom wished Abraham to give up the persons, but retain the goods that he had re- covered; however, Abraham positively refused to retain any of the spoils, although, by the customs of the age, he was entitled to them, and declared that he had sworn that he would not take " from a thread even to a shoe- latchet." (Genesis xiv.) Although the conduct of Abraham in this whole transaction was of the most honorable and conscientious charac- ter, the incidents do not appear to have been introduced into the ritual of the High Priest- hood for any other reason except that of their connection with Melchizedek, who was the founder of an Order of Priesthood.
Abraham, Antoine Firmln. A Mason who made himself notorious at Paris, in the be- ginning of the present century, by the manu- facture and sale of false Masomc diplomas and by trading in the higher degrees, from which traffic he reaped for some time a plentiful har- vest. The Supreme Council of France de- clared, in 1811, all his diplomas and charters void and deceptive. He is the author of UArt du Tuileur, dedit a tous les Magons des deux hemispheres, a small volume of 20 pages, 8vo, printed at Paris in 1803, and he published from 1800 to 1808 a periodical work entitled Le Miroir de la veWiU, dedi6 a tous les Magons, 3 vols., 8vo. This contains many interesting details concerning the history of Masonry in France. In 1811 there was pub- lished at Paris a Circulaire du Supreme Con- seil du 88e degre*, etc., relative d la vente, par leSieur Abraham de grades et cakiers Magon- nigues (8vo, 15 pp.), from which it is evident that Abraham was nothing else but a Masonic charlatan.
r Abraxas. Basilides, the head of the Egyp- tian sect of Gnostics, taught that there were seven emanations, or aeons, from the Supreme God; that these emanations engendered the angels of the highest orderj that these angels formed a heaven for their habitation, and brought forth other angels of a nature inferior to their own; that in time other heavens were formed and other angels created, until the whole number of angels and their respective heavens amounted to 365, which were thus equal to the number of days in a year; and, finally, that over all these an omnipotent Lord — inferior, however, to the Supreme God — pre- sided, whose name was Abraxas. Now this word Abraxas, in the numerical force of its letters when written in Greek, ABPAHA5, amounts to 365, the number of worlds in the Basilidean system, as well as the number of days in the year, thus: A, 1.., B, 2.., P, 100.., A 1.., E, 60.., A, 1.., 5 200 = 365. The god Abraxas was therefore a type or symbol of the year, or of the revolution of the earth around the sun. This mystical reference of the name of a god to the annual period was familiar to the ancients, and is to be found in at least two other instances. Thus, among the Persians the letters of the name of the god Mithras, and of Belenus among the Gauls, amounted each to 365.
ABRAXAS
|
M |
40 |
B |
2 |
||
|
E |
5 |
H |
8 |
||
|
I |
10 |
A |
30 |
||
|
0 |
9 |
E |
5 |
||
|
P |
100 |
N |
50 |
||
|
A |
1 |
O |
70 |
||
|
5 |
200 - 365 |
2 |
200 - 365 |
The word Abraxas, therefore, from this mystical value of the letters of which it was composed, became talismanic, and was fre- quently inscribed, sometimes with and some- times without other superstitious inscriptions, on stones or gems as amulets, many of which have been preserved or are continually being discovered, and are to be found in the cabinets of the curious.
There have been many conjectures among the learned as to the derivation of the word Abraxas. Beausobre (Histoire du Maniche- isme, vol. ii.) derives it from the Greek, fA&(pos Saw, signifying "the magnificent Sav- iour, he who heals and preserves. Bellermann (Essay on the Gems of the Ancients) supposed it to be compounded of three Coptic words signifying " the holy word of bliss. Pignorius and Vandelin think it is composed of four Hebrew and three Greek letters, whose numer- ical value is 365, and which are the initials of the sentence: " saving men by wood, i. e. the cross."
Abraxas Stones. Stones on which the word Abraxas and other devices are engraved, and which were used by the Egyptian Gnos- tics as amulets.
Absence* Attendance on the communica- tions of his Lodge, on all convenient occasions, is considered as one of the duties of every Mason, and hence the old charges of 1722 (ch. iii.) say that " in ancient Times no Master or Fellow could be absent from it [the Lodge] especially when warn'd to appear at it, with- out incurring a severe censure, until it ap- pear'd to the Master and Wardens that pure Necessity hinder'd him." At one time it was usual to enforce attendance by fines; and the By-Laws of the early Lodges contain lists of fines to be imposed for absence, swearing and drunkenness, but that usage is now discon- tinued, so that attendance on ordinary com- munications is no longer enforced by any sanc- tion of law. It is a duty the discharge of which must be left to the conscientious con- victions of each Mason. In the case, how- ever, of a positive summons for any express purpose, such as to stand trial, to show cause, etc., the neglect or refusal to attend might be construed into a contempt, to be dealt with according to its magnitude or character in each particular case.
Acacia. An interesting and important symbol in Freemasonry. Botanically, it is the acacia vera of Tournefort, and the mimosa nilotica of Linnaeus, called babul tree in India. It grew abundantly in the vicinity of Jerusa- lem, where it is still to be found, and is famil- iar m its modern use as the tree from which the gum arabic of commerce is derived.
Oliver, it is true, says that " there is not the
ACACIA 7
smallest trace of any tree of the kind growing so far north as Jerusalem" ( Landman. , 149); but this statement is refuted a by the authority of Lieutenant m a Lynch, who saw it growing in mm M great abundance in Jericho, H « and still farther north. (Ex- B| * tm ped. to Dead Sea, p. 262. ) The M | 5 A M Rabbi Joseph Schwarz, who Wli m Bf is excellent authority, says: ^ffl jL W "The Acacia (Shittim) tree, ^immA Al Sunt, is found in Palestine \\aVm of different varieties; it looks \krM like the Mulberry tree, attains \mT a great height, and has a hard Wr wood. The gum which is ob- m tained from it is the gum ' arabic. ' ' ( Descriptive Geography and Historic col Sketch of Palestine, p. 308, Leeser's trans- lation. Phila., 1850.) Scnwarz was for sixteen years a resident of Palestine, and wrote from personal observation. The test imony of Lynch and Schwarz should, therefore, forever settle the question of the existence of the acacia in Palestine.
The acacia is called in the Bible Shittim, which is really the plural of Shitta^ which last form occurs once only in Isaiah xli. 19. It was esteemed a sacred wood among the Hebrews, and of it Moses was ordered to make the tabernacle, the ark of the covenant, the table for the shewbread, and the rest of the sacred furniture. (Exodus xxv.- xxvii. ) Isaiah ( I . c . ) in recounting the promises of God's mercy to the Israelites on their return from the captivity, tells them that, among other things, he will plant in the wilderness, for their relief and refreshment, the cedar, the acacia (or, as it is rendered in our common version, the shittah), the fir, and other trees.
The first thing, then, that we notice in this symbol of the acacia, is that it had been always consecrated from among the other trees of the forest by the sacred purposes to which it was devoted. By the Jew, the tree from whose wood the sanctuary of the tabernacle and the holy ark had been constructed would ever be viewed as more sacred than ordinary trees. The early Masons, therefore, very naturally appropriated this hallowed plant to the equally sacred purpose of a symbol, which was to teach an important divine truth in all ages to come.
Having thus briefly disposed of the natural history of this plant, we may now proceed to examine it in its symbolic relations.
First. The acacia, in the mythic system of Freemasonry, is preeminently the symbol of the immortality of the soul — that impor- tant doctrine which it is the great design of the Institution to teach. As the evanescent nature of the flower, which "cometh forth and is cut down," reminds us of the transitory na- ture of human life, so the perpetual renovation of the evergreen plant, which iminterruptedly presents the appearance of youth and vigor, is aptly compared to that spiritual life in which the soul, freed from the corruptible compan- ionship of the body, shall enjoy an eternal spring and an immortal yout-h. F^nce. in
8 ACACIA
the impressive funeral service of our Order, it is said that " this evergreen is an emblem of our faith in the immortality of the soul. By this we are reminded that we have an im- mortal part within us, which shall survive the grave, and which shall never, never, never die." And again, in the closing sentences of the monitorial lecture of the Third Degree, the same sentiment is repeated, and we are told that by "the ever-green and ever-living sprig " the Mason is strengthened " with con- fidence and composure to look forward to a blessed immortality." Such an interpretation of the symbol is an easy and a natural one; it suggests itself at once to the least reflective mind; and consequently, in some one form or another, is to be found existing in all ages and nations. It was an ancient custom — which is not, even now, altogether disused — for mourners to carry in their hands at funerals a sprig of some evergreen, generally the cedar or the cypress, and to deposit it in the grave of the deceased. According to Dalcho,* the Hebrews always planted a sprig of the acacia at the head of the grave of a departed friend. Potter tells us that the ancient Greeks " had a custom of bedecking tombs with herbs and flowers." t All sorts of purple and white flow- ers were acceptable to the dead, but princi- pally the amaranth and the myrtle. The very name of the former of these plants, which sig- nifies " never fading," would seem to indicate the true symbolic meaning of the usage, al- though archeologists have generally supposed it to be simply an exhibition of love on the part of the survivors. Ragon says that the ancients substituted the acacia for all other plants be- cause they believed it to be incorruptible, and not liable to injury from the attacks of any kind of insect or other animal — thus symbo- lizing the incorruptible nature of the soul.
Hence we see the propriety of placing the sprig of acacia, as an emblem of immortality, among the symbols of that degree, all of whose ceremonies are intended to teach us the great truth that " the life of man, regulated by mo- rality, faith, and justice, will be rewarded at its
♦"This custom among the Hebrews arose from this circumstance. Agreeably to their laws, no dead bodies Were allowed to be interred within the walls of the City; and as the Cohens, or Priests, were prohibited from crossing a grave, it was necessary to place marks thereon, that they might avoid them. For this purpose the Acasia was used." (Dalcho, 2nd Oration, p. 23, note.) I object to the reason assigned by Dalcho, but of the existence of the custom there can be no question, notwithstanding the denial or doubt of Dr. Oliver. Blount (Travels in the Levant, p. 197) says, speaking of the Jewish burial cus- toms, "those who bestow a marble stone over any [grave} have a hole a yard long and a foot broad, in which they plant an evergreen, which seems to grow from the body and is carefully watched." Hasselquist (Travels, p. 28) confirms his testimony. I borrow the citations from Brown (Antiquities of the Jews, vol. ii., p. 356), but have verified the reference to Hasselquist. The work of Blount I have not been enabled to consult.
t Anttopitie* of Greece, p. 569.
ACACIA
closing hour by the prospect of Eternal Bliss/7 * So, therefore, says Dr. Oliver, when the Master Mason exclaims " my name is Acacia," it is equivalent to saying, " I have been in the grave — I have triumphed over it by rising from the dead — and being regener- ated in the process, I have a claim to life ever- lasting." (See Landmarks, ii.,151, note 27.)
The sprig of acacia, then, in its most ordi- nary signification, presents itself to the Master Mason as a symbol of the immortality of the sold, being intended to remind him, by its ever-green and unchanging nature, of that better and spiritual part within us2 which, as an emanation from the Great Architect of the Universe, can never die. And as this is the most ordinary, the most generally accepted signification, so also is it the most important; for thus, as the peculiar symbol of immortal- ity, it becomes the most appropriate to an Order all of whose teachings are intended to inculcate the great lesson that " life rises out of the grave.' ' But incidental to this the acacia has two other interpretations which are well worthy of investigation.
Secondly, then, the acacia is a symbol of innocence. The symbolism here is of a pe- culiar and unusual character, depending not on any real analogy in the form or use of the symbol to the idea symbolized, but simply on a double or compound meaning of the word. For dita«fa, in the Greek language, signifies both the plant in question and the moralqual- ity of innocence or purity of life. In this sense the symbol refers, primarily, to him over whose solitary grave the acacia was planted, and whose virtuous conduct, whose integrity of life and fidelity to his trusts have ever been presented as patterns to the craft, and conse- quently to au Master Masons, who, by this interpretation of the symbol, are invited to emulate his example.
Hutchinson? indulging in his favorite theory of Christianizing Masonry, when he comes to this signification of the symbol, thus enlarges on the interpretation: " We Masons, describ- ing the deplorable estate of religion under the Jewish law, speak in figures: — 'Her tomb was in the rubbish and filth cast forth of the tem- ple, and acacia wove its branches over her monument; ' atcvucla being the Greek word for innocence, or being free from sin; implying that the sins and corruptions of the old law, and devotees of the Jewish altar, had hid relig- ion from those who sought her, and she was only to be found where innocence survived, and under the banner of the divine Lamb; and as to ourselves professing that we were to be distinguished by our acact, tor as true acacians in our religious faith and tenets." f
But, lastly, the acacia is to be considered as the symbol of initiation. This is by far the most interesting of its interpretations, and was, we have every reason to believe, the primary and original; the others being but incidental.
* Dr. Crucefix, MS, quoted by Oliver. Land- marks, ii., 2.
t Hutchinson's Spirit of Masonry, Iiect. IX.; p. 180, ed. 1775.
ACACIAN
It leads us at once to the investigation of the significant fact that in all the ancient initia- tions and religious mysteries there was some plant peculiar to each, which was consecrated by its own esoteric meaningj and which occu- pied an important position in the celebration of the rites, so that the plant, whatever it might be, from its constant and prominent use in the ceremonies of initiation, came at length to be adopted as the symbol of that initiation.
Thus, the lettuce was the sacred plant which assumed the place of the acacia m the mys- teries of Adonis. (Bee Lettuce.) The lotus was that of the Brahmanical rites of India, and from them adopted by the Egyptians. (See Lotus.) The Egyptians also revered the erica or heath; and the mistletoe was a mystical plant among the Druids. (See Erica and Mis- tletoe.) And, lastly, the myrtle performed the same office of symbolism in the mysteries of Greece that the lotus did in Egypt or the mis- tletoe among the Druids. (See Myrtle.)
In all of these ancient mysteries, while the sacred plant was a symbol of initiation, the initiation itself was symbolic of the resur- rection to a future life, and of the immortality of the soul. In this view, Freemasonry is to us now in the place of the ancient initiations, and the acacia is substituted for the lotus, the erica, the ivy, the mistletoe, and the myrtle. The lesson of wisdom is the same — the medium of imparting it is all that has been changed.
Returning, then, to the acacia, we find that it is capable of three explanations. It is a sym- bol of immortality, of innocence, and of initi- ation. But these three significations are closely connected, and that connection must be ob- served, if we desire to obtain a just interpre- tation of the symbol. Thus, in this one sym- bol, we are taught that in the initiation of life, of which the initiation in the Third Degree is simply emblematic, innocence must for a time lie in the grave, at length, however, to be called, by the word of the Great Master of the Universe, to a blissful immortality. Combine with this the recollection of the place where the sprig of acacia was planted— Mount Calvary — the place of sepulture of him who " brought life and immortahty to light," and who, in Christian Masonry, is designated, as he is in Scripture, as " the lion of the tribe of Judah and remember, too, that in the mys- tery of his death, the wood of the cross takes the place of the acacia, and in this little and apparently insignificant symbol, but which is really ana truly the most important and sig- nificant one in Masonic science, we have a beautiful suggestion of all the mysteries of fife and death, of time and eternity, of the present and of the future.
Acacian. A word introduced by Hutchin- son, in his Spirit of Masonry, to designate a Freemason m reference to the akahia, or in- nocence with which he was to be distinguished, from the Greek word wcaaeta. (See the pre- ceding article.) The Acacians constituted an heretical sect in the primitive Christian Church, who derived their name from Aca- cias, Bishop of Csesarea; and there was sub-
ACADEMY 9
sequently another sect of the same name Acacius, Patriarch of Constantinople. But it is needless to say that the Hutchinsonian ap- plication of the word Acacian to signify a Freemason has nothing to do with the theo- logical reference of the term.
Academle des Illumines <T Avignon. A Hermetic system of philosophy, created in 1785.
Academy. The Fourth Degree of the Rectified Rose Croix of Schroeder.
Academy of Ancients or of Secrets* (Academie des Secrets. ) A society instituted at Warsaw, in 1767, by M. Thoux de Salverte, and founded on the principles of another which bore the same name,, and which had been established at Rome, about the end of the 16th century, by John Baptiste Porta. The object of the institution was the advance- ment of the natural sciences and their appli- cation to the occult philosophy.
Academy of Sages. An order which ex- isted in Sweden in 1770, deriving its origin from that founded in London by Elias Ashmole, on the doctrines of the New AUoMis of Bacon. A few similar societies were subsequently founded in Russia and France, one especially noted by Thory (Act. Lot.) as having been established in 1776 by the mother Lodge of Avignon.
Academy of Secrets. Bee Academy of A. rtcieTbts
Academy of Sublime Masters of the Lu- minous Blng. Founded in France, in 1780, by Baron Blaerfindy, one of the Grand Officers of the Philosophic Scotch Rite. The Academy of the Luminous Ring was dedicated to the philosophy of Pythagoras, and was divided mto three degrees. The first and second were principally occupied with the history of Free- masonry, and the last with the dogmas of the Pythagorean school, and their application to the highest grades of science. The historical hypothesis which was sought to be developed in this Academy was that Pythagoras was the founder of Freemasonry.
Academy of True Masons. Founded at Montpelier, in France, by Dom Pernetty in 1778, and occupied with instructions in her- metic science, which were developed in six degrees, vi*.: 1. The True Mason: 2. The True Mason in the Right Way; 3. Knight of the Golden Key; 4. Knight of Iris: 5. Knight of the Argonauts; 6. Knight of the Golden Fleece. The degrees thus conferred constituted the Philosophic Scotch Rite, which was the system adopted by the Academy. It afterward changed its name to that of Russo- Swedish Academy, which circumstance leads Thory to believe that it we\& connected with the Alchemical Chapters which at that time existed in Russia and Sweden. The entirely hermetic character of the Academy of True Masons may readily be perceived in a few par- agraphs cited by Clavel (p. 172, 3d ed.f 1844) from a discourse by Goyer de Jumilly at the installation of an Academy in Martinique. " To seise," says the orator, " the graver of Hermes to engrave the doctrines of natural philosophy on your columns; to call Flamel, the Philalete, the Cosmopolite, and our other
10 ACADEMY
masters to my aid for the purpose of unveiling the mysterious principles of the occult sci- ences,— these, illustrious knights, appear to be the duties imposed on me by the ceremony of your installation. The fountain of Count Trevisan, the pontifical water, the peacock's tail, are phenomena with which you are fa- miliar."
Academy, Platonic* Founded in 1480 by Marsilius Ficinus, at Florence, under the pa- tronage of Lorenzo de Medicis. It is said by the Masons of Tuscany to have been a secret society, and is supposed to have had a Masonic character, because in the hall where its mem- bers held their meetings, and which still re- mains, many Masonic symbols are to be found. Clavel (p. 85, 3d ed., 1844) supposes it to have been a society founded by some of the hon- orary members and patrons of the fraternity of Fi -eemasons who existed in the Middle Ages, and who, having abandoned the mate- rial design of the institution, confined them- selves to its mystic character. If his sugges- tion be correct, this is one of the earliest instances of the separation of Speculative from Operative Masonry.
Acanthus. A plant, described by Dios- corides, with broad, flexible, prickly leaves, which perish in the winter and sprout again at the return of spring. It is found in the Gre- cian islands on the borders of cultivated fields or gardens, and is common in moist, rocky sit- uations. It is memorable for the tradition which assigns to it the origin of the foliage carved on the capitals of Corinthian and Com- posite columns. Hence, in architecture, that part of the Corinthian capital is called the Acanthus which is situated below the abacus, and which, having the form of a vase or bell, is surrounded by two rows of leaves of the acan- thus plant. Callimachus, who invented this ornament, is said to have had the idea sug- gested to him by the following incident. A Corinthian maiden who was betrothed, fell ill, and died just before the appointed time of her marriage. Her faithful and grieving nurse placed on her tomb a basket containing many of her toys and jewels, and covered it with a flat tile. It so happened that the basket was placed immediately over an acanthus root, which afterward grew up around the basket and curled over under the superincumbent resistance of the tile, thus exhibiting a form of foliage which was, on its being seen by the architect, adopted as a model for the capital of a new order; so that the story of affection was perpetuated in marble. Dudley (N oology, p. 164) thinks the tale puerile, and supposes that the acanthus is really the lotus of the Indians and Egyptians, and is symbolic of laborious but effectual effort applied to the support of the world. With him, the symbolism of the acan- thus and the lotus are identical. See Lotus.
Accepted. The Worshipful Company of Masons of the City of London — a flourishing Guild at the present day — possesses as its ear- liest document now existing an account book
ACCEPTED
The Accompte of James Gilder Mr (Mas- ter) William Ward & John Abraham wardens of the Company of ffremasons wthin the Citie of London beginninge the first day of Julie 1619 And endinge the day of Julie J620
of all receite & payment for & to the use the same company as ffolloweth, viz."
From the entries in this book it appears that besides the ordinary Freemen and Livery- men of this Company there were other mem- bers who are termed in the books the " Ac- cepted Masons," and that they belonged to a body known as the " Accepcon," or Accep- tion, which was an Inner Fraternity of Specu- lative Masons.
Thus in the year 1620 the following entry is found:
" They charge themselves also w*11 Money Receyued of the Psons hereafter named for theyr gratuitie at theyr acceptance into the Lyvery viz" (here follow six names); and among the accounts for the next year (1621) there is an entry showing sums received from several persons, of whom two are mentioned in the entry of 1620, " Att the making ma- sons," and as all these mentioned were already members of the Company something further must be meant by this.
In 1631 the following entry of the Clerk's expenses occurs: " Pd in goeing abroad & att a meeteing att the hall about ye Masons yt were to bee accepted VIs VId."
Now the Company never accepted its mem- bers; they were always admitted to the free- dom either by apprenticeship, patrimony, or redemption. Thus the above entries suggest that persons who were neither connected with the trade nor otherwise qualified were re- quired, before being eligible for election on the livery of the Company, to become " Accepted Masons," that is, to join the Lodge of Specu- lative Masonry that was held for that purpose in the Company's Hall. *
Thus in the accounts for 1650, payments are entered as made by several persons " for com- ing on the Liuerie & admission uppon Accept- ance of Masonry," and it is entered that Mr. Andrew Marvin, the present warden, and an- other paid 20 shillings each " for coming on the Accepcon"; while two others are entered as paying 40 shillings each " for the like," and as the names of the last two cannot be found among the members of the Masons Company it would seem as if it was possible for strangers to join "the Accepcon" on paying double fees.
Unfortunately no books connected with this Acception, or Lodge, as it may be called, have been preserved: but there are references to it in several places in the account books which show that the payments made by newly accepted Masons were paid into the funds of the Company, that some or all of this amount was spent on a banquet and the attendant expenses, and that any further sum required was paid out cf the ordinary funds of the Company, proving that the Company had entire control of the Lodge and its funds.
Further evidence of the existence of this
ACCEPTED
Symbolical Lodge within the Masons Com- pany is given by the following entry in an in- ventory of the Company's property made in 1665:
"Item, The names of the Accepted Ma- sons in a faire inclosed frame with lock and key"; and in an inventory of 1676 is found:
"Item. One book of the Constitutions of the Accepted Masons. *
"A faire large table of the Accepted Ma- sons." And proof positive of its existence is derived from an entry in the diary of Elias Ashmole — the famous antiquary— -who writes:
"March 10th. 1682. About 5 p.m. I re- ceived a summons to appear at a Lodge to be held next day at Masons Hall London.
March 11th. Accordingly I went and about noon were admitted into the Fellowship of Free Masons: Sir William Wilson Knight, Capt. Rich Borthwick, Mr Will Woodman, Mr Wm Grey, Mr Samuell Taylour, and Mr William Wise.f
I was the Senior Fellow among them (it being 35 years since I was admitted)."
He then mentions the names of nine others who were present and concludes: "We all dyned at the halfe Moone Taverne in Cheape- side, at a noble dinner prepaired at the charge of the New-Accepted Masons."
All present were members of the Masons Company except Ashmole himself, Sir W. Wilson and Capt. Borthwick. and this entry
S roves conclusively that side by side with the lasons Company there existed another or- ganization to which non-members of the Com- pany were admitted and the members of which were known as "Accepted Masons."
It may here be mentioned that Ashmole has recorded in his diary that he was made a freemason at Warrington in Lancashire on October 16, 1646. In that entry the word "Accepted" does not occur.
No mention is made of the Accepted Masons in the accounts of the Masons Company after 1677, when £6 — the balance remaining of the last Accepted Masons' money— was ordered to be laid out for a new banner; and it would seem that from that time onward the Lodge kept separate accounts, for from the evidence of Ashmole's diary we know it was at work in 1682; but when and why it finally ceased no evidence is forthcoming to show. However, it may fairly be assumed that this Masons Hall Lodge had ceased to exist before the Re- vival of Freemasonry in 1717, or else Ander- son would not have said in the Constitutions of 1723 (p. 82): "It is generally believ'd that the said Company (i.e. the London Company of Freemen Masons) is descended of the an-
* No doubt this was a copy of one of the Old Charges.
tin the edition of Ashmole's diary published in 1774 this was changed into "I went, and about noon was admitted . . . by Sir William Wilson Ac." an error which has misled many Masonic historians. See Ars Quatuor Coronatorum , vol . xi . , p. 6, for a facsimile of the entry as in the original diary.
ACCEPTED u
cient Fraternity; and that in former Times no Man was made Free of that Company until he was installed in some Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons, as a necessary Qualifica- tion. But that laudable Practice seems to have been long in Desuetude," which passage would indicate that he was aware of some tra- dition of such a Lodge as has been described attached to the Masons Company admitting persons in no way operatively connected with the craft, who were called "Accepted Ma- sons" to distinguish them from the Operative or Free Masons. (Conder's Hole Craft and Fellowship of Masonry and Ars Quatuor Cor- onatorum, vol. ix.)
Anderson in the 1738 Constitutions quotes from a copy of the old Constitutions some regu- lations which he says were made in 1663, and in which the phrases accepted a Free Mason and Acceptation occur several times. These regulations are found in what is known as the Grand Lodge MS. No. 2, which is supposed to have been written about the middle of the 17th century, so that Anderson's date in which he follows the Roberts Old Constitution* printed in 1722 as to the year, though he changes the day from December 8th to Decem- ber 27th, may quite possibly be correct. And Bro. Conder (Hole Craft{ p. 11) calls special at- tention to these regulations on account of the singular resemblance that one of them bears to the rules that govern the Masons Company.
The extracts given above from the books of the Masons Company, the 16>63 Regulations (if that date be accepted), and the quotation from Ashmole's diary, are the earliest known instances of the term "Accepted" Masons, for although the Inigo Jones MS. is headed "The Antient Constitutions of the Free and Accepted Masons 1607," yet there is a consen- sus of opinion among experts that such date is impossible and that the MS. is really to be referred to the end of the 17th century or even the beginning of the 18th; and the next in- stance of the use of the term is in 1686 when Dr. Plot in The Natural History of Stafford- shire wrote with reference to the secret signs used by the Freemasons of his time "if any man appear, though altogether unknown, that can shew any of these signes to a Fellow of the Society, whom they otherwise call an Ac- cepted Mason, he is obliged presently to come to him from what company or place soever he be in, nay, though from the tcp of steeple."
Further, in 1691, John Aubrey, author of The Natural History of Wiltshire, made a note in his MS. "This day (May 18, 1691) is a great convention at St. rauls Church of the fraternity of the free Masons," in which he has erased the word free and substituted ac- cepted, which, however, he changed into adopted in his fair copy.
In the "Orciers to be observed by the Com- pany and Fellowship of Freemasons att a Lodge held at Alnwick, Septr. 29, 1701. being the Gen« Head Meeting Day,"we find:" There shall noe apprentice after he have served seaven years be admitted or accepted but upon the Feast of St. Michael the Archangell."
12 ACCLAMATION
And from that time onward the term Ac- cepted Masons becomes common, usually in connection with Free : the term Free and Ac- cepted Masons thus signifying both the Oper- ative members who were free of their guild and the Speculative members who had been accepted as outsiders. Thus the Roberts Print of 1722 is headed, " The Old Constitutions be- longing to the Ancient and Honourable So- ciety of Free and Accepted Masons," and in the Constitutions of 1723 Anderson speaks of wearing " the Badges of a Free and Accepted Mason " (p. 48) and uses the phrase in Rule 27, though he does not use the phrase so fre- quently as in the 1738 edition in which " the Charges of a Free-Mason " become " the old Charges of the Free and Accepted Masons," the " General Regulations " oecome " The General Regulations of the Free and Ac- cepted Masons, and regulation No. 5." " No man can be made or admitted a Member " becomes " No man can be accepted a Mem- ber," while the title of the book is " The new book of Constitutions of the Antient and Honourable Fraternity of Free and Accepted Masons " instead of " The Constitutions of the Free-Masons," as in the earlier edition.
[E. L. HJ <
Acclamation* A certain form of words used in connection with the battery. In the Scottish rite it is hoshea; in the French mat; in Adoptive Masonry it was Eva; and in the rite of Misraim, hallelujah. (See Battery.)
Accolade* From the Latin ad and collumt around the neck. It is generally but incor- rectly supposed that the accolade means the blow given on the neck of a newly created knight with the flat of the sword. The best authorities define it to be the embrace, accom- panied with the kiss of peace, by which the new knight was at his creation welcomed into the Order of Knighthood by the sovereign or lord who created him. (See Knighthood.)
Accord. We get this word from the two Latin ones ad cor, to the heart, and hence it means hearty consent. Thus in Wiclif 's trans- lation we find the phrase in Philippians, which in the Authorized Version is " with one ac- cord," rendered "with one will, with one heart." Such is its signification in the Masonic formula, " free will and accord," that is, " free will and hearty consent." (See Free Will and Accord.)
Accuser. In every trial in a Lodge for an offense against the laws and regulations or the principles of Masonry any Master Mason may be the accuser of another, but a profane can- not be permitted to prefer charges against a Mason. Yet, if circumstances are known to a profane upon which charges ought to be predi- cated, a Master Mason may avail himself of that information, and out of it frame an accu- sation to be presented to the Lodge. And such accusation will be received and investi- gated, although remotely derived from one who is not a member of the Order.
It is not necessary that the accuser should be a member of the same Lodge. It is suffi- cient if he is an affiliated Mason; butitisgen-
ACHISHAR
erally held that an unaffiliated Mason is no more competent to prefer charges than a pro- fane. 9
In consequence of the Junior Warden being placed over the Craft during the hours of re- freshment, and of his being charged at the time of his installation to see " that none of the Craft be suffered to convert the purposes of refreshment into those of intemperance and excess," it has been very generally supposed that it is his duty, as the prosecuting officer of the Lodge, to prefer charges against any mem- ber who, by his conduct, has made himself amenable to the penal jurisdiction of the Lodge. We know of no ancient regulation which imposes this unpleasant duty upon the Junior Warden } but it does seem to be a very natural deduction, from his peculiar preroga- tive as the custos morum or guardian of the conduct of the Craft, that in all cases of vio- lation of the law he should, after due efforts toward producing a reform, be the proper officer to bring the conduct of the offending brother to the notice of the Lodge.
Aceldama, from the Syro-Chaldaic, mean- ing field of bloody so called because it was pur- chased with the blood-money which was paid to Judas Iscariot for betraying his Lord. It is situated on the slope of the hills beyond the valley of Hinnom and to the south of Mount Zion. The earth there was believed, by early writers, to have possessed a corrosive quality, by means of which bodies deposited in it were quickly consumed; and hence it was used by the Crusaders, then by the Knights Hospital- ers, and afterward by the Armenians, as a place of sepulture, and the Empress Helena is said to have built a charnel-house in its midst. Dr. Robinson {Biblical Researches, i., p. 524) says that the field is not now marked by any boundary to distinguish it from the rest of the field, and the former charnel-house is now a ruin. The field of Aceldama is referred to in the ritual of the Knights Templars.
Acerrellos, E. S. A nom de plume assumed by Carl RGssler, a German Masonic writer. (See Rossler.)
Achad. One of the names of God. The word TIN, Achady in Hebrew signifies one or unity. It has been adopted by the Masons as one of the appellations of the Deity from the passage in Deuteronomy (vi. 4): " Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God is (Achad) one Lord"; which the Jews wear on their phylac- teries, and pronounce with great fervor as a confession of their faith in tne unity of God. Speaking of God as Achadt the Rabbis say, " God is one (Achad) and man is one ( Achad). Man, however, is not purely one, because he is made up of elements and has another like him- self ; but the oneness of God is a oneness that has no boundary." ,
AcharonSchllton. InHebrewpTO ynnN, signifying the new kingdom. Significant words in some of the high degrees.
Achlas. A corruption of the Hebrew Achi- jah, the brother of Jah; a significant word in some of the high degrees.
Achlshar. Mentioned in 1 Kings (iv. 6)
ACHTARIEL
under the name of Ahishar, and there de- scribed as being "over the household " of King Solomon. This was a situation of great importance in the East, and equivalent to the modern office of Chamberlain. The Steward in a Council of Select Masters is said to rep- resent Achishar.
Achtarlel. A Kabbalistic name of God be- longing to the Crown or first of the ten sephi- roth; and hence signifying the Crown or God.
Acknowledged. When one is initiated into the degree of Most Excellent Ma ter. he is technically said to be " received and acknowl- edged " as a Most Excellent Master. This expression refers to the tradition of the degree which states that when the Temple had been completed and dedicated, King Solomon re- ceived and acknowledged the most expert of the craftsmen as Most Excellent Misters. That is, he received them into the exalted rank of perfect and acknowledged workmen, and acknowledged their right to that title. The verb to acknowledge here means to own or admit, to belong to, as, to acknowledge a son.
Acousmatfcl. The primary class of the disciples of Pythagoras, who served a five years' probation of silence, and were hence called acousmatici or hearers. According to Porphyry, they received only the elements of intellectual and moral instruction, and, after the expiration of their term of probation, they were advanced to the rank of Mathematici. (See Pythagoras.)
Acquittal* Under this head it may be proper to discuss two Questions of Masonic law. 1. Can a Mason, having been acquitted by the courts of the country of an offense with which he has been charged, be tried by his Lodge for the same offense? And, 2. Can a Mason, hav- ing been acquitted by his Lodge on insuffi- cient evidence, be subjected, on the discovery and production of new and more complete evidence, to a second trial for the same of- fense? To both of these questions the correct answer would seem to be in the affirmative.
1. An acquittal of a crime by a temporal court does not relieve a Mason from an in- quisition into the same offense by his Lodge; for acquittals may be the result of some tech- nicality of law, or other cause, where, although the party is relieved from legal punishment, his guilt is still manifest in the eyes of the com- munity; and if the Order were to be controlled by the action of the courts, the character of the Institution might be injuriously affected by its permitting a man, who had escaped without honor from the punishment of the law, to remain a member of the Fraternity. In the language of the Grand Lodge of Texas, " an acquittal by a jury, while it may, and should, in some circumstances, have its influ- ence in deciding on the course to be pursued, yet has no binding force in Masonry, We de- cide on our own rules, and our own view of the facts." ( Proc. (?. L. Tex., vol. ii., p. 273.)
2. To come to a correct apprehension of the second question, we must remember that it is a long-settled principle of Masonic law, that every offense which a Mason, commits is an
ACTA 13
injury to the whole Fraternity, inasmuch as the bad conduct of a single member reflects discredit on the whole Institution. This is a very old and well-established principle of the Institution; and hence we find the Ota Consti- tutions declaring that Masons " should never be thieves nor thieves' maintainers." (Cooke MS., 1. 916.) The safety of the Institution requires that no evil-disposed member should be tolerated with impunity in bringing dis- grace on the Craft. And, therefore, although it is a well-known maxim of the common law — nemo debet bis jmniH pro uno delicto^—th&t is, " that no one should be twice placed in peril of punishment for the same crime," yet we must also remember that other and fundamental maxim — salus populi suprema lex — which may, in its application to Masonry, be well translated, " the well-being of the Order is the first great law." To this everything else must yield; and, therefore, if a member, hav- ing been accused of a heinous offense and tried, shall, on his trial, for want of sufficient evi- dence, be acquitted, or, being convicted, shall, for the same reason, be punished by an inad- equate penalty — and if he shall thus be per- mitted to remain in the Institution with the stigma of the crime upon him., " whereby the Graft comes to shame," then, if new and more sufficient evidence shall be subsequently dis- covered, it is just and right that a new trial shall be had, so that he may, on this newer evidence, receive that punishment which will vindicate the reputation of the Order. No technicalities of law, no plea of autrefois acquit, nor mere verbal exception, should be allowed for the escape of a guilty member; for so long as he lives in the Order, every man is subject to its discipline. A hundred wrongful acquit- tals of a bad member, who still bears with him the reproach of his evil Hfe, can never dis- charge the Order from its paramount duty of protecting its own good fame and removing the delinquent member from its fold. To this great duty all private and individual rights and privileges must succumb, for the well- being of the Order is the first great law in Masonry.
Acta Latomorum,ou Chronologie de l'His- toire de la FrancherMagonnerie francaise et e*trangere, etc. That is: "The Acts of the Freemasons, or a chronological history of French and Foreign Freemasonry, etc." This work, written or compiled by Claude Antoine Thory, was published at Paris, in 2 vols., 8vo, in 1815. It contains the most remarkable facts in the history of the Institution from ob- scure times to the year 1814: the succession of Grand Masters; a nomenclature of rites, de- grees, and secret associations in all the coun- tries of the world: a bibliography of the prin- cipal works on Freemasonry published since 1723; and a supplement in which the author has collected a variety of rare and important Masonic documents. Of this work, which has never been translated into English, Lenning says (Encycl. der Freimaurerei) that it is, without dispute, the most scientific work on Freemasonry that French literature has ever
14
ACTING
produced. It must, however, be confessed that in the historical portion Thory has committed many errors in respect to English and Ameri-
can jYeemasonry, and therefore, if ever trans- lated, the work will require much emendation (See Thory.)
Acting Grand Master. The Duke of Cum- berland (grandson of George II., brother of George UL) having in April, 1782, been elected Grand Master of England, it was re- solved by the Grand Lodge " that whenever a prince of the blood did the society the honour to accept the office of Grand Master, he should be at liberty to nominate any peer of the realm to be the acting Grand Master." (Con- stitutions ofG, L, of England, ed. 1784, p. 341.) The officer thus provided to be appointed was subsequently called in the Constitutions of the G. Lodge of England, ed. 1841, and is now called the Pro Grand Master,
In the American system, the officer who per- forms the duties of Grand Master in case of the removal, death, or inability of that officer, is known as the Acting Grand Master. For the regulations which prescribe the proper person to perform these duties see Grand Master, , . . , j t
Active Lodge- A Lodge is said to be active when it is neither dormant nor suspended, but regularly meets and is occupied in the labors of Masonry.
Active Member, An active member of a Lodge is one who, in contradistinction to an honorary member, assumes all the burdens of membership, such as contributions, arrears, and participation in its labors, and is invested with all the rights of membership, such as speaking, voting, and holding office.
Actual Past Masters, This term is some- times applied to those who have actually served as Master of a Craft Lodge in order to distinguish them from those who have been made " Virtual Past Masters," in Chapters of the United States, or "Past Masters of Arts and Sciences," in English Chapters, as a pre- liminary to receiving the Royal Arch degree. (See Past Master.)
Adad. The name of the principal god among the Syrians, and who, as representing the sun, had, according to Macrobius (Sa- tumal, L, 23), an image surrounded by rays. Macrobius, however, is wrong, as Selden has shown (De JHis Syris, i., 6), in confounding Adad with the Hebrew Achad, or one-^-a name, from its signification of unity, applied to the Great Architect of the Universe. The error of Macrobius, however, has been perpet- uated by the inventors of the high degrees of Masonry, who have incorporated Adad, as a name of God, among their significant words.
Adam* The name of the first man. The Hebrew word ADaM, signifies man in a generic sense, the human species collectively, and is said to be derived from iTOlK, ADaMaH, the around, because the first man was made out of the dust of the earth, or from ADaM, to be red, in reference to his ruddy complexion. It is most probably in this col- lective sense, as the representative of the whole
ADAM
human race, and, therefore, the type of htt* manity , that the presiding officer in a Council of Knights of the Sun. the Twenty-eighth Degree of the Ancient ana Accepted Scottish Rite, is called Father Adam, and is occupied in the in- vestigation of the great truths which so much concern the interests of the race. Adam, in that degree, is man seeking after divine truth. The Kabbalists and Talmudists have invented many things concerning the first Adam, none of which are, however, worthy of preservation. (See Knight of the Sun.)
Adam. * The Entered Apprentice degree symbolizes the creation of man and his first perception of light. In the Elohist form of the Creation we read, " Elohim said, ' Let ua make man in our image, according to our like- ness, and let him have dominion over the fishes of the sea, over the fowls of the air, over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every reptile that creeps upon the earth! ' And Elo- him created man in his image; in the image of Elohim he created him; male and female he createdthem. . . . AndYahveh Elohim formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed in his nostrils the breath of life, and man was made a living being." Without giving more than a passing reference to the speculative origin and production of man and to his spon- taneous generation (Principe Generateur) as set forth by the Egyptians, when we are told that " the fertilizing mud left by the Nile, and exposed to the vivifying action of heat induced by the sun's rays, brought forth germs which spring up as the bodies of men," accepted cos- mogonies only will be hereinafter mentioned; thus in that of Peru, the first man, created by the Divine Omnipotence, is called Alpa Cam- asm, " Animated earth.7* The Mandans, one of the North American tribes, relate that the Great Spirit molded two figures of clay, which he dried and animated with the breath of his mouth, one receiving the name of First Man, and the other that of Companion. Taeroa, the god of Tahiti, formed man of the red earth, say the inhabitants; and so we might continue. But as Francois Lenormant remarks in the Beginnings of History, let us confine ourselves to the cosmogony offered by the sacred traditions of the great civilized nations of antiquity, " The Chaldeans call Adam the man whom the earth produced. And he lay without movement, without life, and without breath, just like an image of the heavenly Adam, until his soul had been given him by the latter." The cosmogonic account peculiar to Babylon, as given by Berossus, says: " Belos, seeing that the earth was unin- habited, though fertile, cut off his own head, and the other gods, after kneading with earth the blood that flowed from it, formed men, who therefore are endowed with intelligence, and share in the divine thought," etc. The term employed to designate "man," in his connection with his Creator, is admit, the Assyrian counterpart of the Hebrew Adam. (G. Smith, Chaldean Account of Genesis.)
* This article is by C. T. McClenachan.
adam!
ADAR
15
Lenormant further says, that the fragments of Berossus give Adoros as the name of the first patriarch, and Adiuru has been discovered on the cuneiform inscriptions.
Zoroaster makes the creation of man the voluntary act of a personal pod, distinct from primordial matter, and his theory stands alone among the learned religions of the an- cient world.
According to Jewish tradition in the Targu- mim and the Talmud, as also to Moses Mai- monides, Adam was created man and woman at the same time, having two faces, turned in two opposite directions, and that during a stupor the Creator separated Hawah, his fem- inine half, from him, in order to make of her a distinct person. Thus were separated the pri- mordial androgyn.
With Shemites and Mohammedans Adam was symbolized in the Lingam, whilst with the Jews Seth was their Adam or Lingam, and suc- cessively Noah took the place of Seth, and so followed Abraham and Moses. The worship of Adam as the God-like idea, succeeded by Seth, Noah, Abraham, and Moses, through the symbolism of pillars, monoliths, obelisks, or Matsebas (images), gave rise to other sym- bolic images, as where Noah was adored under the emblems of a man, ark, and serpent, sig- nifying heat, fire, or passion.
Upon the death of Adam, says traditional history, the pious Gregory declared that the " dead body should be kept above ground, till a fulness of time should come to commit it to the middle of the earth by a priest of the most high God." This traditional prophecy was ful- filled, it is said, by the body of Adam having been preserved in a chest until about 1800 B.C., when " Melchizedek buried the body in Salem (formerly the name of Jerusalem), which might very well be the middle of the habitable world.
The Sethites used to say their prayers daily in the Ark before the body of Adam. J. G. R. Forlong, in his Rivers of Life, tells us that " It appears from both the Sabid Aben Batric and the Arabic Catena, that there existed the fol- lowing ' short litany, said to have been con- ceived by Noah/ Then follows the prayer of Noah, which was used for so long a period by the Jewish Freemasons at the opening of the Lodge:
" O Lord, excellent art thou in thy truth, and there is nothing great in comparison of thee. Look upon us with the eye of mercy and compassion. Deliver us from this deluge of waters, and set our feet in a large room. By the sorrows of Adam, the first made man; by the blood of Abel, thy holy one; by the righteousness of Seth, in whom thou art well pleased; number us not amongst those who have transgressed thy statutes, but take us into thy merciful care, for thou art our Deliv- erer, and thine is the praise for all the works of thy hand for evermore. And the sons of Noah said, Amen, Lord.7 "
The Master of the Lodge would omit the reference to the deluge and add the following to the prayer: " But grant, we beseech thee.
that the ruler of this lodge may be endued with knowledge and wisdom to instruct us and explain his secret mysteries, as our holy brother Moses did (in his lodge) to Aaron, to Eleazar, and to Ithamar (the sons of Aaron), and the several elders of Israel."
Adam Kadnion. In the Kabbalistic doc- trine, the name given to the first emanation from the Eternal Fountain. It signifies the first man, or the first production of divine energy, or the son of God, and to it the other and inferior emanations are subordinate.
Adams, John Quincy, the sixth President of the United States, who served from 1825 to 1829. Mr. Adams, who has been very prop- erly described as " a man of strong points and weak ones, of vast reading and wonderful memory, of great credulity and strong preju- dices," became notorious in the latter years of his life for his virulent opposition to Free- masonry. The writer already quoted, who had an excellent opportunity of seeing intimately the workings of the spirit of anti-MasOnry, says of Mr. Adams: " He hated Freemasonry, as he did many other things, not from any harm that he had received from it or person- ally knew respecting it, but because his cre- dulity had been wrought upon and his preju- dices excited against it by dishonest and selfish politicians, who were anxious, at any sacrifice to him, to avail themselves of the influence of his commanding talents and position in public life to sustain them in the disrepu- table work in which they were enlisted. In his weakness, he lent himself to them. He united his energies to theirs in an impractica- ble and unworthy cause." (C. W. Moore, Freemasons* Mag.,vol. vii.,p.314.) The result was a series of letters abusive of Freemasonry, directed to leading politicians, and published in the public journals from 1831 to 1833. A year before his death they were collected and
Sublished under the title of Letters on the fasonic Institution, by John Quincy Adams. (Boston, 1847, 8vo, pp. 284.) Some explana- tion of the cause of the virulence with which Mr. Adams attacked the Masonic Institution in these letters may be found in the following paragraph contained in an anti-Masonic work written by one Henry Gassett, and affixed to his Catalogue of Books on the Masonic Institution. (Boston, 1852.) "It had been asserted in a newspaper in Boston, edited by a Masonic dignitary, that John Q. Adams was a Mason. In answer to an inquiry from a per- son in New York State, whether he was so, Mr. Adams replied that 'he was not, and never should be.' These few words, undoubt- edly, prevented his election a second time as President of the United States. His competitor. Andrew Jackson, a Freemason, was elected. Whether the statement contained in the ital* icized words be true or not, is not the ques- tion. ^ It is sufficient that Mr. Adams was led to believe it, and hence his ill-will to an asso- ciation which had, as he supposed, inflicted this political evil on him, and Daffled his am- bitious views. Adar. Hebrew, "HX; the sixth month of
16
ADAREL
the civil and the twelfth of the ecclesiastical | year of the Jews. It corresponds to a part of February and of March. .
Adarel. Angel of Fire. Referred to in the Hermetic degree of Knight of the Sun. .Prob- ably from TIN, Adr, splendor, and ?«, M9 God, i. e., the splendor of God or Divine splen-
d°Addresses, Masonic. Dr. Oliver, speaking of the Masonic discourses which began to be published soon after the reorganization of Masonry, in the commencement of the eigh- teenth century, and which he thinks were in- stigated by the attacks made on the Order, to which they were intended to be replies, says: " Charges and addresses were therefore de- livered oy brethren in authority on the funda- mental principles of the Order, and they were printed to show that its morality was sound, and not in the slightest degree repugnant to the precepts of our most holy religion. These were of sufficient merit to insure a wide circu- lation among the Fraternity, from whence they spread into the world at large, and proved decisive in fixing the credit of the In- stitution for solemnities of character and a taste for serious and profitable investiga- tions."
There can be no doubt that these addresses, periodically delivered and widely published, have continued to exert an excellent effect in behalf of the Institution, by explaining and defending the principles on which it is founded.
The first Masonic address of which we have any notice was delivered on the 24th of June, 1721, before the Grand Lodge of England, by the celebrated John Theophilus Desaguliers, LL.D. and F.R.S. The Book of Constitu- tions (ed. 1738, p. 113), under that date, says " Bro. Desaguliers made an eloquent oration about Masons and Masonry." Dr. Oliver {Revelations of a Square, p. 22) states that this address was issued in a printed form, but no copy of it now remains— at least it has es- caped the researches of the most diligent Ma- sonic bibliographers. ,
On the 20th of May, 1725, Martin Folkes, then Deputy Grand Master, delivered an ad- dress before the Grand Lodge of England, which is cited in the Freemason's Pocket Com- panion for 1759, but no entire copy of the ad- dress is now extant. ,
The third Masonic address of which we nave any knowledge is one entitled "A Speech de- livered to the Worshipful and Ancient Society of Free and Accepted Masons, at a Grand Lodge held at Merchants' Hall, in the city of York, on St. John's Day, Dec. 27, 1726, the Right Worshipful Charles Bathurst, Esq., Grand Master. By the Junior Grand Warden. Olim meminisse juvabiL York: Printed by Thomas Gent, for the benefit of the Lodge. ' The author was Francis Drake, M.D., F.R.S., who was appointed Junior Grand Warden of the Grand Lodge of All England at York on De- cember 27, 1725. (See Drake, Francis.) The first edition of the speech bears no date, but was probably issued in 1727, and it was again published at London in 1729, and a second
ADDRESSES
London edition was published in 1734, which has been reprinted in Hughan's Masonic Sketches and Reprints (American edition, p. 106). This is, therefore, the earliest Ma- sonic address to which we have access. It contains a brief sketch of the history of Ma- sonry, written as Masonic history was then written. It is, however, remarkable for ad- vancing the claim of the Grand Lodge of York to a superiority over that of London, and for containing a very early reference to the three degrees of Craft Masonry.
The fourth Masonic address of whose exist- ence we have any knowledge is "a Speech Deliver'd to the Worshipful Society of Free and Accepted Masons, at a Lodge, held at the Carpenters Arms in Silver-Street, Golden Square, the 31st of December, 1728. By the Right Worshipful Edw. Oakley, Architect, M.M., late Provincial Senior Grand Warden in Carmarthen, South Wales." This speech was reprinted by Cole in his Ancient Consti- tutions at London in 1731. ,
America has the honor of presentmg the next attempt at Masonic oratory. The fifth address, and the first American, which is ex- tant, is one delivered in Boston, Mass., on June 24, 1734. It is entitled "A Dis- sertation upon Masonry, delivered to a Lodge in America, June 24th, 1734. Christ's Regm." discovered by Bro. C. W. Moore in the
It
archives of the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts^ and published by him in his magazine in 1849. This address is well written, and of a symbolic character, as the author allegorizes the Lodge as a type of heaven.
And, sixthly, we have " An Address made to the body of Free and Accepted Masons as- sembled at a Quarterly Communication, held near Temple Bar, December 11, 1735, by Mar- tin Clare, Junior Grand Warden." Martin Clare was distinguished in his times as a Mason, and his address, which Dr. Oliver has inserted in his Golden Remains, has been con- sidered of value enough to be translated into the French and German languages.
Next, on March 21, 1737, the Chevalier Ramsay delivered an oration before the Grand Lodge of France, in which he attributed the origin of Freemasonry to the Crusaders and traced an imaginary history of its course through Scotland and England into France, which was to become the center of the re formed Order. The best report of this speed is to be found in the Histoire &c. de la tr. ven. ConfraterniU des F. M . <fec. Traduit pat le Fr. de la Tierce. Francfort2 1742; and an English version of it is given m Gould's His* tory of Freemasonry (iii., 84r-9). (See Ram- say.)
After this period, Masonic addresses rapidly multiplied, so that it would be impossible to record then: titles or even the names of their authors.
What Martial (L, 17) says of his own epi- grams, that some were good, some bad, and a great many middling, may, with equal pro- priety and justice, be said of Masonic ad dresses. Of the thousands that have been de
ADELPH
livered, many have been worth neither printing nor preservation.
One thing, however, is to be remarked: that within a few years the literary character of these productions has greatly improved. For- merly, a Masonic address on some festal oc- casion of the Order was little more than a hom- ily on brotherly love or some other Masonic virtue. Often the orator was a clergyman, se- lected by the Lodge on account of his moral character or his professional ability. These clergymen were frequently among the young- est members of the Lodge, and men who had no opportunity to study the esoteric construc- tion of Masonry. In such cases we will find that the addresses were generally neither more nor less than sermons under another name. They contain excellent general axioms of con- duct, and sometimes encomiums on the laud- able design of our Institution. But we look in vain in them for any ideas which refer to the history or to the occult philosophy of Ma- sonry. They accept the definition that " Free- masonry is a science of morality, veiled in alle- gory and illustrated by symbols, only in part. They expatiate on the science of morality, but they say nothing of the symbols or the alle-
gones. But, as has been already said, there as been an evident improvement within a few
Crs, in America especially, for the reform not equally extended to England. Many of the addresses now delivered are of a higher order of Masonic literature. The subjects of Masonic history, of the origin of the Institu- tion, of its gradual development from an operative art to a speculative science, of its symbols, and of its peculiar features which distinguish it from all other associations, have been ably discussed in many recent Masonic addresses, and thus have the efforts to enter- tain an audience for an hour become not only the means of interesting instruction to the hearers, but also valuable contributions to the literature of Freemasonry.
It is in this way that Masonic addresses should be written. All platitudes and old truisms should be avoided; sermonizing, which is good in its place, is out of place here. No one should undertake to deliver a Masonic address unless he knows something of the subject on which he is about to speak, and unless he is capable of saying what will make every Mason who hears him a wiser as well as a better man, or at least what will afford him the opportu- nity of becoming so.
Adelph. From the Greek &S*\<t>As (a brother). The first degree of the order of the Palladium (o. v.). Reghellini says that there exists in the Masonic archives of Douai the rit- ual of a Masonic Society, called Adelphs. which has been communicated to the Grand Orient, but which he thinks is the same as the Primitive Rite of Narbonne.
Adept. One fully skilled or well versed in any art; from the Latin word "Adeptus," having obtained, because the Adept claimed to be in the possession of all the secrets of his peculiar mystery. The Alchemists or Her- metic philosophers assumed the title of Adepts.
ADJOURNMENT 17
(See Alchemy .) Of the Hermetic Adepts, who were also sometimes called Rosicrucians, Spence thus writes, in 1740, to his mother: " Have you ever heard of the people called Adepts? They are a set of philosophers supe- rior to whatever appeared among the Greeks and Romans. The three great points they drive at, are, to be free from poverty, distempers, and death; and, if you believe them, they have found out one secret that is capable of freeing them from all three. There are never more than twelve of these men in the whole world at a time; and we have the happiness of having one of the twelve at this time in Turin. I am very well acquainted with him, and have often talked with him of their secrets, as far as he is allowed to talk to a common mortal of them." (Spenee's Letter to his Mother, in Singer's An* ecaotes, p. 403.) In a similar allusion to the possession of abstruse knowledge, the word is applied to some of the high degrees of Ma- sonry.
Adept, Prince. One of the names of the 28th degree of the Ancient and Accepted Scot- tish Rite. (See Knight of the Sun.) It was the 23d degree of the System of the Chapter of Emperors of the East and West of Clermont.
Adept, the. A Hermetic degree of the col- lection of A. Viany (o. v.). It is also the 4th degree of the Rite of Relaxed Observance, and the 1st of the high degrees of the Rite of Elects of Truth. " It has much analogy/' says Thory, " with the degree of Knight of the Sun." It is also called " Chaos disentan- gled."
Adeptus Adoptatus. The 7th degree of the Rite of Zinnendorf, consisting of a kind of chemical and pharmaceutical instruction.
Adeptus Coronatus. Called also Templar Master of the Key. The 7th degree of the Swedish Rite (q. v.).
Adeptus Exemptus. The 7th degree of the system adopted by those German Rosicru- cians who were known as the " Gold und Ros- enkreutzer," or the Gold and Rosy Cross, and whom Lenning supposes to have been the first who engrafted Rosicrucianism on Ma- sonry.
Adhering Mason* Those Masons who, during the anti-Masonic excitement in Amer- ica, on account of the supposed abduction of Morgan, refused to leave their Lodges and renounce Masonry, were so called. They embraced among their number some of the wisest, best, and most influential men of the country.
Adjournment. C. W. Moore (Freemasons' Mag.t xii., p. 290) says: "We suppose it to be generally conceded that Lodges cannot, prop- erly be adjourned. It has oeen so decided by a large proportion of the Grand Lodges in America, and tacitly, at least, concurred in by all. We are not aware that there is a dis- senting voice among them. It is, therefore, safe to assume that the settled policy is against adjournment." The reason which he assigns for this rule, is that adjournment is a method used only in deliberative bodies, such as legis- latures and courts, and as Lodges do not par-
18
ADMIRATION
ADMONITION
take of the character of either of these, ad- journments are not applicable to them. The rule which Bro. Moore lays down is undoubt- edly correct, but the reason which he assigns for it is not sufficient. If a Lodge were per- mitted to adjourn by the vote of a majority of its members, the control of the labor would be placed in their hands. But according to the whole spirit of the Masonic system, the Master alone controls and directs the hours of labor. In the 5th of the Old Charges, approved in 1722, it is declared that " All Masons shall meekly receive their Wages without murmur- ing or mutiny, and not desert the Master till the Lord's work is finished" Now as the Master alone can know when "the work is finished," the selection of the time of closing must be vested in him. He is the sole judge of the proper period at which the labors of the Lodge should be terminated, and he may suspend business even in the middle of a debate, if he supposes that it is expedient to close the Lodge. Hence no motion for adjournment can ever be admitted in a Masonic Lodge. Such a motion would be an interference with the prerogative of the Master, and could not therefore be en- tertained.
The Earl of Zetland, when Grand Master of England, ruled on November 19, 1856, that a Lodge has no power to adjourn except to the next regular day of meeting. He said: "I may . . . say that Private Lodges are gov- erned by much the same laws as Grand Lodges, and that no meeting of a Private Lodge can be adjourned; but the Master of a Private Lodge may. and does, convene Lodges of Emergency." (Freemasons9 Magazine, 1856,
P- 848.) . ■ .
This prerogative of opening and closing his Lodge is necessarily vested in the Master, be- cause, by the nature of our Institution, he is responsible to the Grand Lodge for the good conduct of the body over which he presides. He is charged, in those questions to which he is required to give his asBent at his installa- tion, to hold the Landmarks in veneration, and to conform to every edict of the Grand Lodge; and for any violation of the one or disobedi- ence of the other by the Lodge, in his pres- ence, he would be answerable to the supreme Masonic authority. Hence the necessity that an arbitrary power should be conferred upon him, by the exercise of which he may at any time be enabled to prevent the adoption of resolutions, or the commission of any act which would be subversive of, or contrary to, those ancient laws and usages which he has sworn to maintain and preserve.
Admiration, Sign of. A mode of recogni- tion alluded to in the Most Excellent Master's Degree, or the Sixth of the American Rite. Its introduction in that place is referred to a Ma- sonic legend in connection with the visit of the Queen of Sheba to King Solomon, which states that,moved by the wide-spread reputation of the laraelitish monarch, she had repaired to Jerusalem to inspect the magnificent works of which she had heard so many encomiums. Upon arriving there, and beholding for the
first time the Temple, which glittered with gold, and which was so accurately adjusted in all its parts as to seem to be composed of but a single piece of marble, she raised her hands and eyes to heaven in an attitude of admiration, and at the same time exclaimed, " Rabboni! " equivalent to saying, " A most excellent master hath done this! " This action has since been perpetuated in the ceremonies of the degree of Most Excellent Master. The legend is, however, no doubt apocryphal, and is really to be considered only as allegorical, like so many other of the legends of Masonry. (See Sheba, Queen of.)
Admission. Although the Old Charges, approved in 1722, use the word admitted as applicable to those who are initiated into the mysteries of Freemasonry, yet the General Regulations of 1721 employ the term admis- sion in a sense different from that of initiation. By the word making they imply the reception of a profane into the Order, but by admission they designate the election of a Mason into a Lodge. Thus we find such expressions as these clearly indicating a difference in the meaning of the two words. In Reg. v. — " No man can be made or admitted a member of a particular Lodge." In Reg. vi. — " But no man can be entered a brother in any particular Lodge, or admitted to be a member thereof." And more distinctly in Reg. viii. — " No set or number of brethren shall withdraw or separate them- selves from the Lodge in which they were made brethren or were afterwards admitted mem- bers." This distinction has hot always been rigidly preserved by recent writers; but it is evident that, correctly speaking, we should always say of a profane who has been initiated that he has been made a Mason, and of a Mason who has been affiliated with a Lodge, that he has been admitted a member. The true definition of admission is, then, the re- ception of an unaffiliated brother into member- ship. (See Affiliated Mason.)
Admonition* According to the ethics of Freemasonry, it is made a duty obligatory upon every member of the Order to conceal the faults of a brother, that is, not to blazon forth his errors and infirmities, to let them be learned by the world from some other tongue than his, and to admonish him of them in pri- vate. So there is another but a like duty or obligation, which instructs him to whisper
CI counsel in his brothers ear and to warn of approaching danger. And this refers not more to the danger that is without and around him than to that which is within him; not more to the peril that springs from the concealed foe who would waylay him and covertly injure him, than to that deeper peril of those faults and infirmities which he within his own heart, and which, if not timely crushed by good and earnest resolution of amendment, will, like the ungrateful serpent in the fable, become warm with life only to sting the bosom that has nourished them.
Admonition of a brother's fault is, then, the duty of every Mason, and no true one will, for either fear or favor, neglect its perf onnance,
ADONAI
But as the duty is Masonic, so is there a Ma- sonic way in which that duty should be dis- charged. We must admonish not with self- sufficient pride in our own reputed goodness—- not in imperious tones, as though we looked down in scorn upon the degraded offender— not in language that, by its harshness, will wound rather than win, will irritate more than it will reform; but with that persuasive gen- tleness that gains the heart— with the all- subduing influences of " mercy unrestrained — with the magic might of love — with the lan- guage and the accents of affection, which min- gle grave displeasure for the offense with grief and pity for the offender. t
This, and this alone, is Masonic admoni- tion. I am not to rebuke my brother in anger, for I, too, have my faults, and I dare not draw around me the f olds of my garment lest they should be polluted by my neighbor's touch; but I am to admonish in private, not before the world, for that would degrade him; and I am to warn him, perhaps from my own exam- ple, how vice ever should be followed by sor- row, for that goodly sorrow leads to repen- tance, and repentance to amendment, and amendment to joy. ,
Adonai. In Hebrew, NHK, being the plural of excellence for Adon, and signifying the Lard. The Jews, who reverently avoided the pronunciation of the sacred name Jehovah, were accustomed, whenever that name oc- curred, to substitute for it the word Adonai in reading. As to the use of the plural form in- stead of the singular, the Rabbis say, " Every word indicative of dominion, though singular in meaning, is made plural in form." This is called the " pluralis excellent^." The Tal- mudists also say (Buxtroff. Lex, Talm.) that the tetragrammaton is called Skem hamphor- ash, the name that is explained, because it is explained, uttered, and set forth by the word Adonai. (See Jehovah and Shem Hamp- horasch.) Adonai is used as a significant word in several of the high degrees of Masonry, and may almost always be considered as allusive to or symbolic of the True Word. ■
Adonhiram* This has been adopted by tfo_ disciples of Adonhiramite Masonry as the Spelling of the name of the person known in Scripture and in other Masonic systems as Adoniram (which see). They correctly de- rive the word from the Hebrew Adon and kitam, signifying the master who is exalted, which is tnetrue meaning of Adoniram, the PI or h being omitted in the Hebrew by the coal- escence of the two words. Hiram Abif has also sometimes been called Adonhiram, the Adon having been bestowed on him by Solomon, it is said, as a title of honor.
Adonhiramite Masonry* Of the numerous controversies which arose from the middle to near the end of the eighteenth century on the Continent of Europe, and especially in Prance, among the students of Masonic philosophy, and which so frequently resulted in the in- vention of new degrees and the estabhshment of new rites, not the least prominent was that which related to the person and character ot
ADONHIRAMITE
19
the Temple Builder, The question, Who was the architect of King Solomon's Temple? was answered differently by different theo- rists, and each answer gave rise to a newsyfr- tern, a fact by no means surprising in those times, so fertile in the production of new Ma- sonic systems. The genenil theory was then, as it is now, that this architect was Hiram Abif, the widow's son, who had been sent to King Solomon by Hiram, King of Tyre, as a precious gift, and " a curious and cunning workman. This theory was sustained by the statements of the Jewish Scriptures, so far as they threw any light on the Masonic legend. It was the theory of the English Masons from the earliest times; was enunciated as his- torically correct in the first edition of the Book of Constitutions, published in 1723 (p. 11); has continued ever since to be the opinion of all English and American Masons; and is, at this day, the only theory entertained by any Mason in the two countries who has a theory at all on the subject. This, therefore, is the orthodox faith of Masonry. t
But such was not the case in the last cen- tury on the Continent of Europe. At first the controversy arose not as to the man him- self, but as to his proper appellation. All par- ties agreed that the architect of the Temple was that Hiram, the widow's son, who is de- scribed in the 1st Book of Kings, chapter vii.. verses 13 and 14, and in the 2d Book of Chronicles, chapter ii., verses 13 and 14, as having come out of Tyre with the other work- men of the Temple who had been sent by King Hiram to Solomon. But one party called him Hiram Abif, and the other, admitting that his original name was Hiram, supposed thak in consequence of the skill he had displayed in the construction of the Temple, he had re- ceived the honorable affix of Adon, signifying Lord or Master, whence his name became Adonhiram,
There was, however, at the Temple another Adoniram, of whom it will be necessary in passing to say a few words, for the better un- derstanding of the present subject.
The first notice that we have of this Adon- iram in Scripture is in the 2d Book of Samuel, chapter xx., verse 24, where, in the abbreviated form of his name. Adoram, he is said to have been "over the tribute " in the house of David; or. as Gesenius translates it, " prefect over the tribute service," or, as we might say in modern phrase, principal collector of the taxes. # Seven years afterward, we find him exercising the same office in the household of Solomon; lor it is said in 1 Kings iv. 6 that Adoniram, " the son of Abda, was over the tribute." And lastly, we hear of him still occupying the same sta- tion in the household of King Rehoboam, the successor of Solomon. Forty-seven years after he is first mentioned in the Book of Samuel, he is stated under the name of Adoram (1 Kings xii. 18), or Hadoram (2 Chron. x. 18), to have been stoned to death, while in the discharge of his duty, by the people, who were justly in- dignant at the oppressions of his master. The legends and traditions of Masonry
20 ADONHIRAMITE
which connect this Adoniram with the Temple at Jerusalem derive their support from a single passage in the 1st Book of Kings (v. 14). where it is said that Solomon made a levy of thirty thousand workmen from among the Is- raelites; that he sent these in courses of ten thousand a month to labor on Mount Leb- anon, and that he placed Adoniram over these as their superintendent.
The ritual-makers of France, who were not all Hebrew scholars, nor well versed in Biblical history, seem, at times, to have confounded two important personages, and to have lost all distinction between Hiram the Builder, who had been sent from the court of the King of Tyre, and Adoniram. who had always been an officer in the court of King Solomon. And this error was extended and facilitated when they had prefixed the title Adon, that is to say, lord or master, to the name of the former, making him Adon Hiram, or the Lord Hiram.
Thus, in the year 1744, one Louis Travenol published at Paris, under the pseudonym of Leonard Gabanon, a work entitled Catechisme des Francs Magons, on Le Secret des Magons, in which he says: " Besides the cedars of Leba- non, Hiram made a much more valuable gift to Solomon, in the person of Adonhiram, of his own race, the son of a widow of the tribe of Naphtali. His father, who was named Hur, was an excellent architect and worker in met- als. Solomon, knowing his virtues, his merit, and his talents, distinguished him by the most eminent position, intrusting to him the con- struction of the Temple and the superinten- dence of all the workmen." (Recueil Pre- cieux, p. 76.)
Prom the language of this extract, and from the reference in the title of the bookto Adoram, which we know was one of the names of Solo- mon's tax-collector, it is evident that the au- thor of the catechism has confounded Hiram Abif , who came out of Tyre, with Adoniram, the son of Abda, who had always lived at Jeru- salem; that is to say, with unpardonable igno- rance of Scripture history and Masonic tra- dition, he has supposed the two to be one and the same person. Notwithstanding this liter- arv blunder, the catechism became popular with many Masons of that day, and thus arose the first schism or error in relation to the : legend of the Third Degree. In Solomon in : au His Glory, an English exposure published in 1766, Adoniram takes the place of Hiram, ! but this work is a translation from a similar ! French one, and so it must not be argued that ' English Masons ever held this view.
At length, other ritualists, seeing the incon- sistency of referring the character of Hiram, the widow's son, to Adoniram. the receiver of ] taxes, and the impossibility oi reconciling the ] discordant facts in the life of both, resolved to 1 cut the Gordian knot by refusing any Masonic 1 position to the former, and making the latter, < alone, the architect of the Temple. It cannot - be denied that Josephus (viii. 2) states that J Adoniram, or, as he calls him, Adoram, was, ■ at the very beginning of the labor, placed over the workmen who prepared the materials on <
ADONHIRAMITE
> Mount Lebanon, and that he speaks of Hiram, 5 the widow's son, simply as a skilful artisan, , especially in metals, who had only made all the mechanical works about the Temple ac-
• cording to the will of Solomon, (viii. 3.) This apparent color of authority for their opinions
• was readily claimed by the Adoniramites, and i hence one of their most prominent ritualists,
Guillemain de St. Victor {Recueil Precieux de la MaQonnerie Adonhiramite, pp. 77, 78), propounds their theory thus: " We all agree that the Master's degree is founded on the ar- chitect of the Temple. Now, Scripture says very positively, in the 14th verse of the 5th chapter of the 3d Book of Kings,* that the person was Adonhiram. Josephus and all the sacred writers say the same thing, and un- doubtedly distinguish him from Hii ram the Tyrian, the worker in metals. So that it is Adonhiram, then, whom we are bound to honor."
There were, therefore, in the eighteenth century, from about the middle to near the end of it, three schools among the Masonic ritualists, the members of which were divided in opinion as to the proper identity of this Temple Builder:
1. Those who supposed him to be Hiram, the son of a widow of the tribe of Naphtali, whom the King of Tyre had sent to King Sol- omon, and whom they designated as Hiram Abif. This was the original and most popu- lar school, and which we now suppose to have been the orthodox one.
2. Those who believed this Hiram that came out of Tyre to have been the architect, but who supposed that, in consequence of his ex- cellence of character, Solomon had bestowed upon him the appellation of Adon, " Lord " or " Master," calling him Adonhiram. As this theory was wholly unsustained by Scripture history or previous Masonic tradition, the school which supported it never became prom- inent or popular, and soon ceased to{ exist, although the error on which it is based is repeated at intervals in the blunder of some modern French ritualists.
3. Those who, treating this Hiram, the widow's son, as a subordinate and unimpor- tant character, entirely ignored him in their ritual, and asserted that Adoram, or Adoni- ram, or Adonhiram, as the name was spelled by these ritualists, the son of Abda, the col- lector of tribute and the superintendent of the levy on Mount Lebanon, was the true archi- tect of the Temple, and the one to whom all the legendary incidents of the Third Degree of Masonry were to be referred. This school, in consequence of the boldness with which, un- like the second school, it refused all compro- mise with the orthodox party and assumed a wholly independent theory, became, for a time, a prominent schism in Masonry. Its disciples bestowed upon the believers in Hirarn Abif the name of Hiramite Masons, adopted as their own distinctive appellation that of
* In the LXX the two books of Samuel are called the 1st and 2d of Kings.
ADONHIRAMITE
ADONIRAM
21
Adonhiramites, and, having developed the sys- tem which they practised into a peculiar nte, called it Adonhirarniie Masonry.
Who was the original founder of the rite of Adonhiramite Masonry, and at what precise time it was first established, are questions that cannot now be answered with any cer- tainty. Thory does not attempt to reply to either in his Nomenclature of Rites, where, if anything was known on the subject, we would be most likely to find it. Ragon, it is true, m his Orthodoxie Magonnique, attributes the rite to the Baron de Tschoudy. But as he also as- signs the authorship of the RecueU Precieux (a work of which we shall directly speak more fully) to the same person, in which statement he is known to be mistaken, there can be but little doubt that he is wrong in the former as well as in the latter opinion. The Chevalier de Lussy, better known as the Baron de Tschoudy, was, it is true, a distinguished rit- ualist. He founded the Order of the Blazing Star, and took an active part in the operations of the Council of Emperors of the East and West; but we have met with no evidence, out- side of Ragon's assertion, that he established or had anything to do with the Adonhiramite Rite.
We are disposed to attribute the develop- ment into a settled system, if not the actual creation, of the rite of Adonhiramite Masonry to Louis Guillemain de St. Victor, who pub- lished at Paris, in the year 1781, a work en- titled RecueU Precieux de la Magonnene Adon- hiramite. etc. /
As this volume contained only the ritual of the first four degrees, it was followed, in 1785, by another, which .embraced the higher de- grees of the rite. No one who peruses these volumes can fail to perceive that the author writes like one who has invented, or, at least, materially modified the rite which is the sub- ject of his labors. At all events, this work fur- nishes the only authentic account that we pos- sess of the organization of the Adonhiramite system of Masonry.
The rite of Adonhiramite Masonry con- sisted of twelve degrees, which were as fol- lows, the names being given in French as well as in English:
1. Apprentice— A pprentif.
2. Fellow-Craft— Compagnon.
3. Master Mason— Maitre.
4. Perfect Master— Maitre Parfait.
5. Elect of Nine— Premier Elu, ou L Elu des Neuf. M , _ ,
6. Elect of Perignan— Second Elu nommt Elu de Perignan.
7. Elect of Fifteen— Tromeme Elu nomme Elu des Quinze. t
8. Minor Architect— Pert* Archiecte.
9. Grand Architect, or Scottish Fellow Crsdt— Grand Architect, ou Compagnon Ecos- sois.
10. Scottish Master— Maitre Ecossots.
11. Knight of the Sword, Knight of , the East, or of the Eagle— Chevalier de VEpie surnommt Chevalier de VOrient ou de VAigle.
12. Knight of Rose Croix— Chevalier Rose Croix.
This is the entire list of Adonhiramite de- grees. Thory and Ragon have both erred in living a thirteenth degree, namely, the Noach- fte, or Prussian Knight. They have fallen into this mistake because Guillemain has in- serted this degree at the end of his second volume, but simply as a Masonic curiosity, having been translated, as he says, from the German by M. de Berage. It has no connec- tion with the preceding series of degrees, and Guillemain positively declares that the Rose Croix is the ne plus ultra (8nde Ptiex p. 118), the summit and termination, of his nte.
Of these twelve degrees, the first ten are oc- cupied with the transactions of the first Tem- ple; the eleventh with matters relating to the construction of the second Temple: and the twelfth with that Christian symbolism of Freemasonry which is peculiar to the Rose Croix of every rite. All of the degrees have been borrowed from the Ancient and Accepted Rite, with slight modifications, which have seldom improved their character. On the whole, the extinction of the Adonhiramite Rite can scarcely be considered as a loss to Ma- sonry. * i_
Before concluding, a few words may be said on the orthography of the title. As the rite derives its peculiar characteristic from the fact that it founds theThird Degree on the assumed legend that Adoniram, the son of Abda and the receiver of tribute, was the true architect of the Temple, and not Hiram, the widow's son, it should properly have been styled the Adoniramite Rite, and not the Adonhiramite; and so it would probably have been called if Guillemain, who gave it form, had been ac- quainted with the Hebrew language, for he would then have known that the name of his hero was Adoniram and not Adonhiram. The term Adonhiramite Masons should really have been applied to the second school described in this article, whose disciples admitted that Hiram Abif was the architect of the Temple, but who supposed that Solomon had be- stowed the prefix Adon upon him as a mark of honor, calling him Adonhiram. But Guille- main having committed the blunder in the name of his Rite, it continued to be repeated by his successors, and it would perhaps now be inconvenient to correct the error. Ragon, however, and a few other recent writers, have ventured to take this step, and in their works the system is called Adoniramite Masonry.
Adoniram. The first notice that we have of Adoniram in Scripture is in the 2d Book of Samuel (xx. 24), where, in the abbreviated form of his name Adoram, he is said to have been "over the tribute" in the house of David, or, as Gesenius translates it, " prefect over the tribute service, tribute master," that is to say, in modern phrase, he was the chief receiver of the taxes. Clarke calls him "Chan- cellor of the Exchequer." Seven years after- ward we find him exercising the same office in the household of Solomon, for it is said (1 Kings iv. 6) that "Adoniram the son of Abda was over the tribute." And lastly, we hear of him still occupying the same station in the
22 ADONIRAM
household of King Rehoboam, the successor of Solomon. Forty-seven years after he is first mentioned in the Book of Samuel, he is stated under the name of Adoram (1 Kings xii. 18), or Hadoram (2 Chron. x. 18), to have been stoned to death, while in the discharge of his duty, by the people, who were justly indignant at the oppressions of his master. Although commentators have been at a loss to determine whether the tax-receiver under David, under Solomon, and under Rehoboam was the same person, there seems to be no rea- son to doubt it; for, as Kitto says, " It ap- pears very unlikely that even two persons of the same name should successively bear the same office, in an age when no example occurs of the father's pame being given to his son. We find, also, that not more than forty-seven years elapse between the first and last men- tion of the Adoniram who was ' over the trib- ute'; and as this, although a long term of service, is not too long for one life, and as the person who held the office in the beginning of Rehoboam's reign had served in it long enough to make himself odious to the people, it ap- pears, on the whole, most probable that one and the same person is intended throughout." (Mneyc.Bib.lM.)
Adoniram plays an important rdle in the Masonic system, especially in the hich de- grees, but the time of action in which ne ap- pears is confined to theperiod occupied in the construction of the Temple. The legends and traditions which connect him with that edifice derive their support from a single pas- sage in the 1st Book of Kings (v. 14), where it is said that Solomon made a levy of thirty thousand workmen from among the Israelites; that he sent these in courses of ten thousand a month to labor on Mount Lebanon, and that he placed Adoniram over these as their super- intendent.^ From this, brief statement the Adoniramite Masons have deduced the theory, as may be seen in the preceding article, that Adoniram was the architect of the Temple; while the Hiramites, assigning this important office to Hiram Abif, still beheve that Adoni- ram oocupied an important part in the con- struction of that edifice. He has been called " the first of the Fellow Crafts'' ; is said in one tradition to have been the brother-in-law of Hiram Abif, the latter having demanded of Solomon the hand of Adoniram' s sister in marriage; and that the nuptials were honored by the lungs of Israel and Tyre with a public celebration; and another tradition, preserved in the Royal Master's degree, informs us that he was the one to whom the three Grand Mas- ters had intended first to communicate that knowledge which they had reserved as a fitting reward to be bestowed upon all meritorious craftsmen at the completion of the Temple. It is scarcely necessary to say that these and many other Adoniramic legends, often fanci- ful, and without any historical authority, are but the outward clothing of abstruse sym- bols, some of which have been preserved, and others lost in the lapse of time and the igno- rance and corruptions of modern ritualists.
ADONIS
Adoniram, in Hebrew, D1S FlN, compounded of pK, ADON,Lord, and CVl, HiRaM, altitude, signifies the Lord of altitude. It is a word of great importance, and frequently used among the sacred words of the high degrees in all the Rites.
Adoniramite Masonry. See Adonhiram-
ite Masonry,
Adonis, Mysteries of. An investigation of the mysteries of Adonis peculiarly claims the attention of the Masonic student: first, be- cause, in their symbolism and in their esoteric doctrine, the religious object for which they were instituted, and the mode in which that object is attained, they bear a nearer analogi- cal resemblance to the Institution of Free- masonry than do any of the other mysteries or systems of initiation of the ancient world; and, secondly, because their chief locality brings them into a very close connection with the early history and reputed origin of Free- masonry. For they were principally cele- brated at Byblos, a city of Phoenicia, whose Scriptural name was Gebal, and whose inhab- itants were the Giblites or Gebalites, who are referred to in the 1st Book of Kings (chap. v. 18) as being the " stone-squarers " employed by King Solomon in building the Temple. See Gebal and Giblim. Hence there must have evi- dently been a very intimate connection, or at least certainly a very frequent intercommuni- cation, between the workmen of the first Tem- ple and the inhabitants of Byblos. the seat of the Adonisian mysteries, and the place whence the worshipers of that rite were disseminated over other regions of country.
These historical circumstances invite us to an examination of the system of initiation which was practised at Byblos, because we may find in it something that was probably suggestive of the symbolic system of instruc- tion which was subsequently so prominent a feature in the system of Freemasonry.
Let lis first examine the myth on which the Adonisiac initiation was founded. The myth- ological legend of Adonis is, that he was the son of Myrrha and Cinyras, King of Cyprus. Adonis was possessed of such surpassing beauty, that Venus became enamored of him, and adopted him as her favorite. Subse- quently Adonis, who was a great hunter, died from a wound inflicted by a wild boar on Mount Lebanon. Venus flew to the succor of her favorite, but she came too late. Adonis was dead. On his descent to the infernal regions, Proserpine became, like Venus, so at- tracted by his beauty, that, notwithstand- ing the entreaties of the goddess of love, she refused to restore him to earth. At length the prayers of the desponding Venus were listened to with favor by Jupiter, who recon- ciled the dispute between the two goddesses, and by whose decree Proserpine was com- pelled to consent that Adonis should spend six months of each year alternately with her- self and Venus.
This is the story on which the Greek poet Bion founded his exquisite idyll entitled the Epitaph of Adonis, the beginning of which has
ADONIS
been thus rather inefficiently " acme into Eng- lish":
"I and the Loves Adonis dead deplore: The beautiful Adonis is indeed Departed, parted from us. Bleep no more In purple, Cypris! but in watchet weed, All wretched 1 beat thy breast and all aread — 1 Adonis is no more.' The Loves and I Lament him. 'Oh! her grief to see him bleed, Smitten by white tooth on whiter thigh, Out-breathing life's faint sigh upon the moun- tain high.'"
It is evident that Bion referred the contest of Venus and Proserpine for Adonis to a period subsequent to his death, from the concluding lines, in which he says: "The Muses, too, lament the son of Cinyras, and invoke him in their song; but he does not heed them, not be- cause he does not wish, but because Proser- pine will not release him." This was, indeed, the favorite form of the myth, and on it was framed the symbolism of the ancient mystery.
But there are other Grecian mythologues that relate the tale of Adonis differently. Ac- cording to these, he was the product of the incestuous connection of Cinyras and his daughter Myrrha. Cinyras subsequently, on discovering the crime of his daughter, pursued her with a drawn sword, intending to Kill her. Myrrha entreated the gods to make her in- visible, and they changed her into a myrrh tree. Ten months after the myrrh tree opened, and the young Adonis was born. This is the form of the myth that has been adopted by Ovid, who gives it with all its moral horrors in the tenth book (298-559) of his Metamorphoses. t
Venus, who* was delighted with the extraor- dinary beauty of the boy, put him in a ooffer, unknown to all the gods, and gave him to Pros- erpine to keep and to nurture in the under world. But Proserpine had no sooner beheld him than she became enamored of him and refused, when Venus applied for him, to sur- render him to her rival. The subject was then referred to Jupiter, who decreed that Adonis should have one-third of the year to himself, should be another third with Venus, and the remainder of the time with Proserpine. Adonis gave his own portion to Venus, and lived hap- pily with her tillj having offended Diana, he was killed by a wild boar.
The mythographer Pharnutus gives a still different story, and says that Adonis was the grandson of Cinyras, and fled with his father, Ammon, into Egypt, whose people he civilized, taught them agriculture, and enacted many wise laws for their government. He subse- quently passed over into Syria, and was wounded in the thigh by a wild boar while hunting on Mount Lebanon. His wife, Ibis, or Astarte, and the people of Phoenicia and Egypt, supposing that the wound was mortal, profoundly deplored his death. But he after- ward recovered, and their grief was replaced by transports oi joy. All the myths, it will be seen, agree in his actual or supposed death by violence, in the grief for his loss, in his recov- ery or restoration to life, and in the conse-
ADOPTION
28
quent joy thereon. And on these facts are founded the Adonisian mysteries which were established in his honor.
While, therefore, we may grant the possi- bility that there was originally some connec- tion between the Sabean worship of the sun and the celebration of the Adonisian festival, we cannot forget that these mysteries, in com- mon with all the other sacred initiations of the ancient world, had been originally established to promulgate among the initiates the once hidden doctrine of a future life. The myth of Adonis in Syria, like that of Osiris in Egypt, of Atys in Samothrace, or of Dionysus in Greece, presented, symbolically, the two great ideas of decay and restoration: sometimes figured as darkness and light, sometimes as winter and summer, sometimes as death and life, but al- ways maintaining, no matter what was the framework of the allegory, the inseparable ideas of something that was lost and after- ward recovered, as its interpretation, and so teaching, as does Freemasoiuy at this day, by a similar system of allegorizing, that after the death of the body comes the eternal life of the soul. The inquiring Freemason will thus read- ily see the analogy in the symbolism that exists between Adonis in the mysteries of the Gebalites at Byblos and Hiram the Builder in his own institution.
Adoption, Masonic. The adoption by the Lodge of the child of a Mason is practised, with peculiar ceremonies, in some of the French and German Lodges, and has been re- cently introduced, but not with the general approbation of the Craft, into one or two Lodges of this country. Clavel, in his Hi** toire Pittoresgue de la Franc-Magonnene (p. 40, 3d ed.) , gives the following account of the ceremonies of adoption.
" It is a custom, in man}' Lodges, when the wife of a Mason is near the period of her con- finement, for the Hospitaller, if he is a physi- cian, and if not, for some other brother who is, to visit her, inquire after her health, in the name of the Lodge, and to offer her his pro- fessional services, and even pecuniary aid if he thinks she needs it. Nine days after the birth of her child, the Master and Wardens call upon her to congratulate her on the happy event. If the infant is a boy, a special com- munication of the Lodge is convened for the purpose of proceeding to its adoption. The hall is decorated with flowers and foliage, and censers are prepared for burning incense. Before the commencement of labor, the child and its nurse are introduced into an anteroom. The Lodge is then opened , and the Wardens, who are to act as godfathers, repair to the in- fant at the head of a deputation of five breth- ren. The chief of the deputation, then ad- dressing the nurse, exhorlra her not only to watch over the health of the child that has been intrusted to her care, but also to culti- vate his youthful intellect, and to instruct ton with truthful and sensible conversation. The child is then taken from the nurse, placed by its father upon a cushion, and earned by the deputation into the Lodge room. The pro-
24 ADOPTIVE
cession advances beneath an arch of foliage to the pedestal of the east, where it stops.
" ' Whom bring you here, my brethren? ' says the Master to the godfathers.
" 1 The son of one of our brethren whom the Lodge is desirous of adopting/ is the reply of the Senior Warden.
" ' What are his names, and what Masonic name will you give him? '
" The Warden replies, adding to the bap- tismal and surname of the child a charac- teristic name, such as Truth, Devotion, Be- nevolence, or some other of a similar nature.
" The Master then descends from his seat, approaches the louveteau or lewis (for such is the appellation given to the son of a Mason) , and extending ms hands over its head, offers up a prayer that the child may render itself worthy of the love and care which the Lodge intends to bestow upon it. He then casts incense into the censers, and pronounces the Apprentice's obligation, which the godfathers repeat after him in the name of the louveteau. Afterwards he puts a white apron on the infant, proclaiming it to be the adopted child of the Lodge, and causes this proclamation to be received with the honors.
"As soon as this ceremony has been per- formed, the Master returns to his seat? and having caused the Wardens with the child to be placed in front of the north column, he re- counts to the former the duties which they have assumed as godfathers. After the Ward- ens have made a suitable response, the depu- tation which had brought the child into the Lodge room is again formed, carries it out, and restores it to its nurse in the anteroom.
" The adoption of a louveteau binds all the members of the Lodge to watch over his edu- cation, and subsequently to aid him, if it be necessary, in establishing himself in life. A circumstantial account of the ceremony is drawn up, which having been signed by all the members is delivered to the father of the child. This document serves as a dispensation, which relieves him from the necessity of passing through the ordinary preliminary examina- tions when, at the proper age, he is desirous of participating in the labors of Masonry. He is then only required to renew his obligations."
In the United States, the ceremony has been recently practised by a few Lodges, the earliest instance being that of Foyer Macon- nique Lodge of New Orleans, in 1859. The Supreme Council for the Southern Jurisdic- tion. Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite, has published the ritual of Masonic Adoption for the use of the members of that rite. This ritual under the title of " Offices of Masonic Baptism, Reception of a Louveteau and Adop- tion," is a very beautiful one, and is the composition of Brother Albert Pike. It is scarcely necessary to say that the word Bap- tism there used has not the slightest reference to the Christian sacrament of the same name. (See Lewis.)
Adoptive Masonry* An organization which bears a very imperfect resemblance to Freemasonry in its forms and ceremonies, and
ADOPTIVE
which was established in France for the initia- tion of females, has been called by the French " Magonnerie d1 Adoption, 99 or Adoptive Ma- sonry, and the societies in which the initiations take place have received the name of "Loges d' Adoption," or Adoptive Lodges. This ap- pellation is derived from the fact that every female or Adoptive Lodge is obliged, by the regulations of the association, to be, as it were, adopted by, and thus placed under the guar- dianship of, some regular Lodge of Freema- sons.
As to the exact date which we are to as- sign for the first introduction of this system of female Masonry, there have been several theo- ries, some of which, undoubtedly, are wholly untenable, since they have been founded, as Masonic historical theories too often are, on an unwarrantable mixture of facts and fictions — of positive statements and problematic con- jectures. Mons. J. S. Boubee, a distinguished French Mason, in his Etudes Maconnigues, places the origin of Adoptive Masonry in the 17th century, and ascribes its authorship to Queen Henrietta Maria, the widow of Charles I. of England; and he states that on her re- turn to France, after the execution of her hus- band, she took pleasure in recounting the secret efforts made by the Freemasons of England to restore her family to their position and to establish her son on the throne of his ancestors. This, it will be recollected, was once a prevalent theory, now exploded, of the origin of Freemasonry — that it was established by the Cavaliers, as a secret political organiza- tion, in the times of the English civil war be- tween the king and the Parliament, and as an engine for the support of the former. M. Bou- bee adds, that the c-ueen made known to the ladies of her court, in her exile, the words and signs employed by her Masonic friends in England as their modes of recognition, and by this means instructed them in some of the mysteries of the Institution, of which, he says, she had been made the protectress after the death of the king. This theory is so full of absurdity, and its statements so flatly con- tradicted by well-known historical facts, that we may at once reject it as wholly apocryphal.
Others have claimed Russia as the birth- place of Adoptive Masonry; but in assigning that country and the year 1712 as the place and time of its origin, they have undoubtedly confounded it with the chivalric Order of Saint Catharine, which was instituted by the Czar, Peter the Great, in honor of the Czarina Catharine, and which, although at first it consisted of persons of both sexes, was subsequently confined exclusively to females. But tne Order of Saint Catharine was in no manner connected with that of Freemasonry. It was simply a Russian order of female knighthood.
The truth seems to be that the regular Lodges of Adoption owed their existence to those secret associations of men and women which sprang up in France before the middle of the 18th century, and which attempted in all of their organization, except the
ADOPTIVE
ADOPTIVE
25
admission of female members, to imitate the Institution of Freemasonry. Clavel, who, in his Histoire PiUoreaque de la Franc-Magon- nerie, an interesting but not always a trust- worthy work, adopts this theory, says that female Masonry was instituted about the year 1730) p. hi., 3d ed.) ; that it made its first ap- pearance in France, and that it was evidently a product of the French mind. No one will be disposed to doubt the truth of this last senti- ment. The proverbial gallantry of the French Masons was most ready and willing to extend to women some of the blessings of that. Insti- tution, from which the churlishness, as they would call it, of their Anglo-Saxon brethren had excluded them.
But the Masonry of Adoption did not at once and in its very beginning assume that pe- culiarly imitative form of Freemasonry which it subsequently presented, nor was it recog- nized as naving any connection with our own Order until more than thirty years after its first establishment. Its progress was slow and gradual. In the course of this progress it affected various names and rituals, many of which have not been handed down to us. It was evidently convivial and gallant in its na- ture, and at first seems to have been only an imitation of Freemasonry, inasmuch as that it was a secret society, having a form of initia- tion and modes of recognition. A specimen of one or two of these secret female associations may not be uninteresting.
One of the earliest of these societies was that which was established in the year 1743, at Paris, under the name of the "Ordre des Felicitaires," which we might very appropri- ately translate as the 'r Order of Happy
ately
Folks." The vocabulary and all the# em- blems of the order were nautical. The sisters made symbolically a voyage from the island of Felicity, in ships navigated by the brethren. There were four degrees, namely, those of Cabin-boy, Captain, Commodore, and Vice- Admiral, and the Grand Master, or presiding officer, was called the Admiral. Out of this society there sprang in 1745 another, which was called the " Knights and Ladies of the Anchor," which is said to have been somewhat more refined in its character, although for the most part it preserved the same formulary of reception.
Two years afterward, in 1747, the Cheva- lier Beauchaine, a very zealous Masonic ad- venturer, and the Master for life of a Parisian Lodge, instituted an androgynous system under the name of the " Ordre des Fendeurs," or the " Order of Wood-Cutters," whose cere- monies were borrowed from those of the well- known political society of the Carbonari. All parts of the ritual had a reference to the sylvan vocation of wood-cutting, just as that of the Carbonari referred to coal-burning. The place of meeting was called a wood-yard, and was supposed to be situated in a forest; the presiding officer was styled Fere MaUre, which might be idiomatically interpreted as Goodman Master; and the members were designated as cousins, a practise evidently bor-
rowed from the Carbonari. The reunions of the " Wood-Cutters " enjoyed the prestige of the highest fashion in Paris; and the society became so popular that ladies and gentlemen of the highest distinction in France united with it, and membership was considered an honor which no rank, however exalted, need disdain. It was consequently succeeded by the institution of many other and similar an- drogynous societies, the very names of which it would be tedious to enumerate. (Clavel, pp. Ill, 112.)
Out of all these societies — which resembled Freemasonry only in their secrecy, their be- nevolence, and a sort of rude imitation of a symbolic ceremonial — at last arose the true Lodges of Adoption, which so far claimed a connection with and a dependence on Masonry as that Freemasons alone were admitted among their male members — a regulation which did not prevail in the earlier organiza- tions.
It was about the middle of the 18th cen- tury that the Lodges of Adoption began to attract attention in France, whence they speedily spread into other countries of Europe — into Germany, Poland, and even Russia; England alone, always conservative to a fault, steadily refusing to take any cognizance of them. The Masons, says Clavel (p. 112), embraced them with enthusiasm as a prac- ticable means of giving to their wives and daughters some share of the pleasures which they themselves enjoyed in their mystical as- semblies. And this, at least, may he said of them, that they practised with commendable fidelity and diligence the greatest of the Masonic virtues, and that the banquets and balls which always formed an important part of their ceremonial were distinguished by numerous acts of charity.
The first of these Lodges of which we have any notice was that established in Paris, in the year 1760, by the Count de Bernouville. Another was instituted at Nimeguen, in Hol- land, in 1774, over which the Prince of Wal- deck and the Princess of Orange presided. In 1775, the Lodge of Saint Antoine, at Paris, organized a dependent Lodge of Adoption, of which the Duchess of Bourbon was installed as Grand Mistress and the Duke of Chartres, then Grand Master of French Masonry, con- ducted the business. In 1777, there was an Adoptive Lodge oiLaCandeur, over which the Ducness of Bourbon presided, assisted by such noble ladies as the Duchess of Chartres, the Princess Lamballe, and the Marchioness de Genlis; and we hear of another governed by Madame Helvetius, the wife of the illustrious philosopher; so that it will be perceived that fashion, wealth, and literature combined to give splendor and influence to this new order of female Masonry.
At first the Grand Orient of France appears to have been unfavorably disposed to these pseudo-Masonic and androgynous associa- tions, but at length they became so numerous and so popular that a persistence in opposi- tion would have evidently been impolitic, if it
26 ADOPTIVE
did not actually threaten to be fatal to the interests and permanence of the Masonic Institution. The Grand Orient, therefore, yielded its objections, and resolved to avail itself of that which it could not suppress. Ac- cordingly, on the 10th of June, 1774, it issued an edict by which it assumed the protection and control of the Lodges of Adoption. Rules and regulations were provided for their gov- ernment, among which were two: first, that no males except regular Freemasons should be permitted to attend them; and, secondly, that each Lodge should be placed under the charge and held under the sanction of some regularly constituted Lodge of Masons, whose Master, or, in his absence, his deputy, should be the presiding officer, assisted by a female President or Mistress: and such has since been the organization of all Lodges of Adoption.
A Lodge of Adoption, under the regulations established in 1774, consists of the following officers: a Grand Master, a Grand Mistress, an Orator (dressed as a Capuchin), an In- spector, an lnspectress, a Male and Female Guardian, a Mistress of Ceremonies. All of these officers wear a blue watered ribbon over the shoulder, to which is suspended a golden trowel, and all the brothers and sisters have aprons and white gloves.
The Rite of Adoption consists of four de- grees, whose names in French and English are as follows:
1. Apprentice, or Female Apprentice.
2. Compagnone, or Craftswoman.
3. M aitresse, or Mistress.
4. Parfaite MaQonne, or Perfect Mason.
It will be seen that the degrees of Adoption, in their names and their apparent reference to the gradations of employment in an operative art, are assimilated to those of legitimate Free- masonry; but it is in those respects only that the resemblance holds good. In the details of the ritual there is a vast difference between the two Institutions.
There was a fifth degree added in 1817— by some modern writers called " Female elect " — Sublime Dame Ecossaise, or Sovereign Illus- trious Dame Ecossaise; but it seems to be a recent and not generally adopted innovation. At all events, it constituted no part of the original Rite of Adoption.
The first, or Female Apprentice's degree, is simply preliminary in its character, and is intended to prepare the candidate for the more important lessons which she is to receive in the succeeding degrees. She is presented with an apron and a pair of white kid gloves. The apron is given with the following charee, in which, as in all the other ceremonies of the Order, the Masonic system of teaching by symbolism is followed:
" Permit me to decorate you with this apron; kings, princes, and the most illustri- ous princesses have esteemed, and will ever esteem it an honor to wear it, as being the sym- bol of virtue."
On receiving the gloves, the candidate is thus addressed:
" The color of these gloves will admonish
ADOPTIVE
you that candor and truth are virtues insep- arable from the character of a true Mason. Take your place among us, and be pleased to listen to the instructions which we are about to communicate to you."
The following charge is then addressed to the members by the Orator:
" My dear Sisters: — Nothing is better calcu- lated to assure you of the high esteem our society entertains for you, than your admission as a mem- ber. The common herd, always unmannerly, full of the most ridiculous prejudices, has dared to sprinkle on us the black poison of calumny: but what judgment could it form when deprived of the light of truth, and unable to feel all the blessings which result from its perfect knowledge?
14 You alone, my dear sisters, having been re- pulsed from our meetings, would have the right to think us unjust; but with what satisfaction do you learn to-day that Masonry is the school of propriety and of virtue, and that by its laws we restrain the weaknesses that degrade an honour- able man, in order to return to your side more worthy of your confidence and of your sincerity. However whatever pleasure these sentiments have enabled us to taste, we have not been able to fill the void that your absence left in our midst ; and I confess, to your glory, that it was time to invite into our societies some sisters who, while rendering them more respectable will ever make of them pleasures and delights. We call our Lodges Temples of Virtue, because we endeavor to practise it. The mysteries which we cele- brate therein are the grand art of conquering the passions and the oath that we take to reveal noth- ing is to prevent self-love and pride from entering at all into the good which we ought to do.
" The beloved name of Adoption tells you suf- ficiently that we choose you to share the happi- ness that we enjoy, in cultivating honour and charity; it is only after a careful examination that we have wished to share it with you, now that you know it we are convinced that the light of wisdom will illumine all the actions of your life, and that you will never forget that the more valuable things are the greater is the need to pre- serve them; it is the principle of silence that we observe, it should be inviolable. May the God of the Universe who hears us vouchsafe to give us strength to render it so."
It will be seen that throughout this charge there runs a vein of gallantry ? which gives the true secret of the motives which led to the or- ganization of the society, and which, however appropriate to a Lodge of Adoption, would scarcely be in place in a Lodge of the legiti- mate Order.
In the second degree, or that of Compa- gnone, or " Craftswoman," corresponding to our Fellow-Craft, the Lodge is made the sym- bol of the Garden of Eden, and the candidate passes through a mimic representation of the temptation of Eve, the fatal effects of whioh, culminating in the delude and the destruction of the human race, are impressed upon her in the lecture or catechism. m ^
Here we have a scenic representation of the circumstances connected with that event, as recorded in Genesis. The candidate plays the rdle of our common mother. In the center of the Lodge, which represents the garden, is placed the tree of lif e, from which ruddy apples are suspended. The serpent, made with the-
ADOPTIVE
ADOPTIVE 27
atrical skill to represent a living reptile, em- braces in its coils the trunk. An apple plucked from the tree is presented to the recipient, who is persuaded to eat it by the promise that thus alone can she prepare herself for receiving a knowledge of the sublime mysteries of Free- masonry. She receives the fruit from the tempter, but no sooner has she attempted to bite it, than she is startled by the sound of thunder; a curtain which has separated her from the members of the Lodge is suddenly withdrawn, and she is detected in the commis- sion of the act of disobedience. She is sharply reprimanded by the Orator, who conducts her before the Grand Master. This dignitary reproaches her with her fault, but finally, with the consent of the brethren and sisters pres- ent, he pardons her in the merciful spirit of the Institution, on the condition that she will take a vow to extend hereafter the same clem- ency to the faults of others.
All of this is allegorical and very pretty, and it cannot be denied that on the sensitive imag- inations of females such ceremonies must pro- duce a manifest impression. But it is need- less to say that it is nothing like Masonry.
There is less ceremony, but more symbol- ism, in the third degree, or that of " Mistress." Here are introduced, as parts of the ceremony, the tower of Babel and the theological ladder of Jacob. Its rounds, however, differ from those peculiar to true Masonry, and are said to equal the virtues in number. The lecture or catechism is very long, and contains some very good points in its explanations of the symbols of the degree. Thus, the tower of Babel is said to signify the pride of man — its base, his folly — the stones of which it was composed, his passions — the cement which united them, the poison of discord — and its spiral form, the devious and crooked ways of the human heart. In this manner there is an imitation, not of the letter and substance of legitimate Freemasonry, for nothing can in these respects be more dissimilar, but of that mode of teaching by symbols and allegories which is its peculiar characteristic.
The fourth degree, or that of " Perfect Mis- tress," corresponds to no degree in legitimate Masonry. It is simply the summit of the Rite of Adoption, and hence is also called the " De- gree of Perfection." Although the Lodge, in this degree, is supposed to represent the Mo- saic tabernacle in the wilderness, yet the cere- monies do not have the same reference. In one of them, however, the liberation, by the can- didate, of a bird from the vase in which it had been confined is said to symbolize the libera- tion of man from the dominion of his pas- sions; and thus a far-fetched reference is made to the liberation of the Jews from Egyptian bondage. On the whole, the ceremonies are very disconnected, but the lecture or cate- chism contains some excellent lessons. Espe- cially does it furnish us with the official defini- tion of Adoptive Masonry, which is in these words:
i ' It is a virtuous amusement by which we recall a part of the mysteries of our religion;
and the better to reconcile humanity with the knowledge of its Creator, after we have incul- cated the duties of virtue, we deliver ourselves up to the sentiments of a pure and delightful friendship by enjoying in our Lodges the pleasures of society— pleasures which among us arc always founded on reason, honor, and innocence."
Apt and appropriate description of an asso- ciation, secret or otherwise, of agreeable and virtuous well-bred men and women, but hav- ing not the slightest application to the design or form of true Freemasonry.
Guillemain de St. Victor, the author of Manuel des Franches-Mawnnes, on La Vraie Magonnerie d' Adoption (which forms the 3d part of the Recueil Precieux), who has given the best ritual of the Rite and from whom the preceding account has been taken, thus briefly sums up the objects of the Institution:
" The first degree contains only, as it ought, moral ideas of Masonry; the second is the in- itiation into the first mysteries, commencing with the sin of Adam, and concluding with the Ark of Noah as the first favor which God granted to men; the third and fourth are merely a series of types and figures drawn from the Holy Scriptures, by which we explain to the candidate the virtues which she ought to practise." (P. 13, ed. 1785.)
The fourth degree, being the summit of the Rite of Adoption, is furnished with a " table- lodge," or the ceremony of a banquet, which immediately succeeds the closing of the Lodge, and which, of course, adds much to the social pleasure and nothing to the instructive char- acter of the Rite. Here, also, there is a con- tinued imitation of the ceremonies of the Masonic Institution as they are practised in France, where the ceremoniously conducted banquet, at which Masons onlv are present, is always an accompaniment of the Master's Lodge. Thus, as in the banquets of the regular Lodges of the French Rite, the members always use a symbolical language by which they designate the various implements of the table and the different articles of food and drink, calling, for instance, the knives " swords," the forks "pickaxes," the dishes " materials," and bread a "rough ashlar";* so, in imitation of this custom, the Rite of Adoption has established in its banquets a technical vocabulary, to be used only at the table. Thus the Lodge room is called " Eden," the doors " barriers, the minutes a " ladder," a wineglass is styled a " lamp," and its con- tents oil" — water being " white oil " and wine " red oil," To fill your glass is " to trim your lamp," to drink is "to extinguish your lamp," with many other eccentric expres- sions, f
Much taste, and in some instances2 mag- nificence, are displayed in the decorations of the Lodge rooms of the Adoptive Rite. The apartment is separated by curtains into dif- ferent divisions, and contains ornaments and decorations which of course vary in the differ-
* Clavel, Hist Pitt., p. 30. t Clavel, p. 34.
28 ADOPTIVE
ent degrees. The orthodox Masonic idea that the Lodge is a symbol of the world is here re- tained, and the four sides of the hall are said to represent the four continents — the entrance being called " Europe," the right side " Af- rica, the left "America," and the extremity, in which the Grand Master and Grand Mis- tress are seated, "Asia." There are statues representing Wisdom, Prudence, Strength, Temperance, Honor, Charity, Justice, and Truth. The members are seated along the sides in two rows, the ladies occupying the front one, and the whole is rendered as beau- tiful and attractive as the taste can make it.*
The Lodges of Adoption flourished greatly in PVance after their recognition by the Grand Orient. The Duchess of Bourbon, who was the first that received the title of Grand Mistress, was installed with great pomp and splendor, in May, 1775, in the Lodge of St. Antoine, in Paris. She presided over the Adoptive Lodge Le Candeur until 1780, when it was dissolved. Attached to the celebrated Lodge of the Nine Sisters, which had so many distinguished men of letters among its members, was a Lodge of Adoption bearing the same name, which in 1778 held a meeting at the residence of Ma- dame Helvetius in honorof Benjamin Franklin, then our ambassador at the. French court. During the reign of terror of the French Revo- lution, Lodges of Adoption, like everything that was gentle or humane, almost entirely disappeared. But with the accession of a regular government they were resuscitated, and the Empress Josephine presided at the meeting of one at Strasburg in the year 1805. They continued to flourish under the imperial dynasty, and although less popular, or less fashionable, under the Restoration, they subse- quently recovered their popularity, and are still in existence in France.
As interesting appendages to this article, it may not be improper to insert two accounts, one, of the installation of Madame Cesar Moreau, as Grand Mistress of Adoptive Ma- sonry, in the Lodge connected with the regu- lar Lodge La Jerusalem des Valines Egyp- tiennes, on the 8th of July, 1854, and the other, of the reception of the celebrated Lady Mor- gan, in 1819, in the Lodge La Belle et Bonne, as described by her in her Diary.
The account of the installation of Madame Moreau, which is abridged from the Franc- Magon, a Parisian periodical, is as follows:
The fete was most interesting and admira- bly arranged. After the introduction in due form of a number of brethren and sisters, the Grand Mistress elect was announced, and she entered, preceded by the five lights of the Lodge and escorted by the Inspectress, De- positress, Oratrix, and Mistress of Ceremo- nies. Mons. J. S. Boubee, the Master of the Lodge La Jerusalem des ValUes Egyptiennes, conducted her to the altar, where, having in- stalled her into office and handed her a mallet as the symbol of authority, he addressed her in a copy of verses, whose merit will hardly
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claim for them a repetition. To this she made a suitable reply, and the Lodge then proceeded to the reception of a young lady, a part of the ceremony of which is thus described:
" Of the various trials of virtue and forti- tude to which she was subjected, there was one which made a deep impression, not only on the fair recipient, but on the whole assembled company. Four boxes were placed, one before each of the male officers; the candidate was told to open them, which she did, and from the first and second drew faded flowers, and soiled ribbons and laces, which being placed in an open vessel were instantly consumed by fire, as an emblem of the brief duration of such objects; from the third she drew an apron, a blue silk scarf, and a pair of gloves; and from the fourth a basket containing the working tools in silver gilt. She was then conducted to the altar, where, on opening a fifth box, sev- eral birds which had been confined in it es- caped, which was intended to teach her that liberty is a condition to which all men are entitled, and of which no one can be deprived without injustice. After having taken the vow, she was instructed in the modes of rec- ognition, and having been clothed with the apron, scarf, and gloves, and presented with the implements of the Order, she received from the Grand Mistress an esoteric explana- tion of all these emblems and ceremonies. Addresses were subsequently delivered by the Orator and Oratrix, an ode was sung, the poor or alms box was handed round, and the labors of the Lodge were then closed."
Madame Moreau lived only six months to enjoy the honors of presiding officer of the Adoptive Rite, for she died of a pulmonary affection at an early age, on the 11th of the succeeding January.
The Lodge of Adoption in which Lady Morgan received the degrees at Paris, in the year 1819, was called La Belle et Bonne. This was the pet name which long before had been bestowed by Voltaire on his favorite, the Mar- chioness de Villette,t under whose presidency and at whose residence in the Faubourg St. Germaine the Lodge was held, and hence the name with which all France, or at least all Paris, was familiarly acquainted as the popu- lar designation of Madame de Villette.
Ladjr Morgan, in her description of the Masonic f^te, says that when she arrived at the Hotel la Villette, where the Lodge was held, she found a large concourse of distin- guished persons ready to take part in the cere- monies. Among these were Prince Paul of Wurtemberg, the Count de Cazes, elsewhere distinguished in Masonry, the celebrated Denon, the Bishop of Jerusalem, and the illus- trious actor Talma . The business of the even- ing commenced with an installation of the officers of a sister Lodge, after which the candidates were admitted. Lady Morgan de- scribes the arrangements as presenting, when the doors were opened, a spectacle of great magnificence. A profusion of crimson and
* Recueil Precieux, p. 24.
t Clavel, p. 114.
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gold, marble busts, a decorated throne and altar, an abundance of flowers, and incense of the finest odor which filled the air, gave to the whole a most dramatic and scenic effect. Music of the grandest character mingled its harmony with the mysteries of initiation, which lasted for two hours, and when the Lodge was closed there was an adjournment to the hall of refreshment, where the ball was opened by the Grand Mistress with Prince Paul of Wurtemberg. Lady Morgan, upon whose mind the ceremony appears to have made an impression, makes one remark worthy of consideration: " That so many women," she says, " young and beautiful and worldly, should never have revealed the secret, is among the miracles which the much distrusted sex are capable of working." In fidelity to the vow of secrecy, the female Masons of the Adoptive Rite have proved themselves fully equal to their brethren of the legitimate Order.
Notwithstanding that Adoptive Masonry has found an advocate jn no less distinguished a writer than Chemin Dupontes, who, in the Encyclopedic Magonnique* calls it " a luxury in Masonry, and a pleasant relaxation which cannot do any harm to the true mysteries which are practised by men alone," it has been very generally condemned by the most celebrated French, German, English, and American Masons.
Gaedicke, in the Freimaurer Lexicon, speaks slightingly of it as established on insufficient grounds, and expresses his gratification that the system no longer exists in Germany.
Thory, in his History of the Foundation of the Grand Orient (p. 361), says that the intro- duction of Adoptive Lodges was a consequence of the relaxation of Masonic discipline; and he asserts that the permitting of women to share in mysteries which should exclusively belong to men is not in accordance with the essential principles of the Masonic Order. The Abbe* Robin, the author of an able work entitled Recherches sur les Initiations An- ciennes et Modernes, maintains (p. 15) that the custom of admitting women into Ma- sonic assemblies will perhaps be, at some future period, the cause of the decline of Masonry in France. The prediction is not, however, likely to come to pass; for while legitimate Masonry has never been more pop- ular or prosperous in France than it is at this day, it is the Lodges of Adoption that appear to have declined.
Other writers in other countries have spoken in similar terms, so that it is beyond a doubt that the general sentiment of the Fraternity is against this system of female Masonry.
Lenning is, however, more qualified in his condemnation, and says, in his Encyclopadie der Freimaurerei, that while leaving it unde- cided whether it is prudent to hold assemblies of women with ceremonies which are called Masonic, yet it is not to be denied that in these female Lodges a large amount of charity has been done.
* Published in Paris in 4 vols., 1819-25.
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Adoptive Masonry has its literature, al- though neither Extensive nor important, as it comprises only books of songs, addresses, and rituals. Of the latter the most valuable are: 1. La Magonnerie des Femmes, published in 1775, and containing only the first three de- grees, for such was the system when recog- nized by the Grand Orient of France in that year. 2. La Vraie Magonnerie d" Adoption, printed in 1787. This work, which is by Uuille- main de St. Victor, is perhaps the best that has been published on the subject of the Adop- tive Rite, and is the first that introduces the Fourth Degree, of which Guillemain is supposed to have been the inventor, since all previous rituals include only the three degrees. 3. Ma- gonnerie d" Adoption pour les Femmes, con- tained in the second part of E. J. Chappron's Necessaire Magonnique, and printed at Paris in 1 8 1 7. This is valuable because it is the first ritual that contains the Fifth Degree. 4. La Franc-Magonnerie des Femmes, This work, which is by Charles Monselet, is of no value as a ritual, being simply a tale founded on circumstances connected with Adoptive Ma- sonry.
In Italy, the Carbonari, or " Wood- Burners," a secret political society, imitated the Freemasons of France in instituting an Adoptive Rite, attached to their own associa- tion. Hence, an Adoptive Lodge was founded at Naples in the beginning of this century, over which presided that friend of Masonry, Queen Caroline, the wife of Ferdinand II. The members were styled Giardiniere, or Fe- male Gardeners; and they called each other Cugine, or Female Cousins, in imitation of the Carbonari, who were recognized as Buoni Cugini, or Good Cousins. The Lodges of Giardiniere flourished as long as the Grand Lodge of Carbonari existed at Naples.
Adoptive Masonry, American. The Rite of Adoption as practised on the continent of Europe, and especially in France, has never been introduced into America. The system does not accord with the manners or habits of the people, and undoubtedly never would be- come popular . But Rob. Morris attempted, in 1855; to introduce an imitation of it, which he had in vented, under the name of the " Amer- ican Adoptive Rite." It consisted of a cere- mony of initiation, which was intended as a preliminary trial of the candidate, and of five degrees, named as follows: 1. Jephthah's Daughter, or the daughter's degree. 2. Ruth, or the widow's degree. 3. Esther, or the wife's degree. 4. Martha, or the sister's degree. 5. Electa, or the Christian Martyr's degree. The whole assemblage of the five degrees was called the Eastern Star.
The objects of this Rite, as expressed by the framer, were " to associate in one common bond the worthy wives, widows, daughters, and sisters of Freemasons, so as to make their adoptive privileges available for all the pur- poses contemplated in Masonryj to secure to them the advantages of their claim in a moral, social, and charitable point of view, ana from them the performance of corresponding
30
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ADORATION
duties." Hence, no females but those holding the above recited relations to Freemasons were eligible for admission. The male members were called " Protectors the female, " Stel- he"; the reunions of these members were styled " Constellations "; and the Rite was presided over and governed by a " Supreme Constellation." There is some ingenuity and even beauty in many of the ceremonies, al- though it is by no means equal in this respect to the French Adoptive system. Much dis- satisfaction was, however, expressed by the leading Masons of the country at the time of its attempted organization; and therefore, notwithstanding very strenuous efforts were made by its founder and his friends to estab- lish it in some of the Western States, it was slow in winning popularity. It has, however, within a few years past, gained much growth under the name of "The Eastern Star." Bro. Albert Pike has also recently printed, for the use of Scottish Rite Masons, The Masonry of Adoption. It is in seven degrees, and is a translation from the French system, but greatly enlarged, and is far superior to the original.
The last phase of this female Masonry to which our attention is directed is the system of androgynous degrees which are practised to some extent in the United States. This term " androgynous " is derived from two Greek words, M/> (fotyos), a man, and yvyfi, a woman, and it is equivalent to the English compouna, mascvlo-feminine. It is applied to those " side degrees " which are conferred on both males and females. The essential reg- ulation prevailing in these degrees, is that they can be conferred only On Master Masons (and in some instances only on Royal Arch Masons) and on their female relatives, the peculiar relationship differing in the different degrees.
Thus there is a degree generally called the " Mason's Wife," which can be conferred only on Master Masons, their wives, ^ unmarried daughters and sisters, and their widowed mothers. Another degree, called the "Heroine of Jericho," is conferred only on the wives and daughters of Royal Arch Masons; and the third, the only one that has much pretension of ceremony or ritual, is the " Good Samari- tan," whose privileges are confined to Royal Arch Masons and their wives.
In some parts of the United States these degrees are very popular, while in other places they are never practised, and are strongly condemned as modern innovations. The fact is, that by their friends as well as their ene- mies these so-called degrees have been greatly misrepresented. When females are told that in receiving these degrees they are admitted into the Masonic Order, and are obtaining Masonic information, under the name of " Ladies' Masonry," they are simply deceived. When a woman is informed that, by passing through the brief and unimpressive ceremony of any one of these degrees, she has become a Mason, the deception is still more gross and inexcusable. But it is true that every woman
who is related by ties of consanguinity to a Master Mason is at all times and under all circumstances peculiarly entitled to Masonic protection and assistance. Now, if the recip- ient of an androgynous degree is candidly instructed that, by the use of these degrees, the female relatives of Masons are put in pos- session of the means of making their claims known by what may be called a sort of oral testimony, which, unlike a written certificate, can be neither lost nor destroyed ; but that, by her initiation as a " Mason s Wife " or as a " Heroine of Jericho," she is brought no nearer to the inner portal of Masonry than she was before — -if she is honestly told all this, then there can hardly be any harm, and there may be some good in these forms if prudently be- stowed. But all attempts to make Masonry of them, and especially that anomalous thing called " Female Masonry," are reprehensible, and are well calculated to produce opposition among the well-informed and cautious mem- bers of the Fraternity.
Adoptive Masonry, Egyptian. A system invented by Cagliostro. (See Cagliostro.)
Adoration. The act of paying divine wor- ship. The Latin word odor are is derived from ad, "to," and os, oris, " the mouth," and we thus etymologically learn that the primitive and most general method of adoration was by the application of the fingers to the mouth. Hence we read in Job (xxxi. 26) : " If I beheld the sun when it shined, or the moon walking in brightness, and my heart hath been secretly enticed, or my mouth hath kissed my hand, this also were an iniquity to be ounished by the judges; for I should have denied the God that is above." Here the mouth kissing the hand is an equipollent expression to adoration, as if he had said, " If I have adored the sun or the moon." This mode of adoration is said to have originated among the Persians, who, as wor- shipers of the sun, always turned their faces to the east and kissed their hands to that lumi- nary. The gesture was first used as a token of respect to their monarchs, and was easily transferred to objects of worship. Other ad- ditional forms of adoration were used in vari- ous countries, but in almost all of them this reference to kissing was in some degree pre- served. It is yet a practice of quite common usage for Orientals to kiss what they deem sacred or that which they wish to adore — ex- ample, Wailing Place of the Jews at Jerusalem. The marble toes of the statue of St. Peter in the Cathedral of St. Peter's at Rome have been worn away by the kissings of Catholics and have been replaced by bronze. Among the an- cient Romans the act of adoration was thus performed: The worshiper, having his head covered, applied his right hand to his Hds, thumb erect, and the forefinger resting on at, and then, bowing his head, he turned round from right to left. And hence Apuleius (Apolog.) uses the expression "to apply the hand to the lips," manum labris admovere, to express the act of adoration. The Grecian mode of adoration differed from the Roman in having the head uncovered, which practise
ADVANCED
was adopted by the Christians. The Oriental nations cover the head, but uncover the feet. They also express the act of adoration by pros- trating themselves on their faces and applying their foreheads to the ground. The ancient Jews adored by kneeling, sometimes by pros- tration of the whole body, and by kissing the hand. This act, therefore, of kissing the hand was an early and a very general symbol of adoration. But we must not be led into the error of supposing that a somewhat similar gesture used in some of the high degrees of Freemasonry has any allusion to an act of worship. It refers to that symbol of silence and secrecy which is figured in the statues of Harpocrates, the god of silence. The Ma- sonic idea of adoration has been well depicted by the medieval Christian painters, who rep- resented the act by angels prostrated before a luminous triangle.
Advanced. This word has two technical meanings in Masonry.
1. We speak of a candidate as being ad- vanced when he has passed from a lower to a higher degree; as we say that a candidate is qualified for advancement from the Entered Apprentice's degree to that of a Fellow-Craft when he has made that " suitable proficiency in the former which, by the regulations of the Order, entitle him to receive the initiation into and the instructions of the latter." And when the Apprentice has thus been promoted to the Second Degree he is said to have advanced in Masonry.
2. However, this use of the term is by no means universal, and the word is peculiarly applied to the initiation of a candidate into the Mark Degree, which is the fourth in the modi- fication of the American Rite. The Master Mason is thus said to be " advanced to the honorary degree of a Mark Master," to indi- cate either that he has now been promoted one step beyond the degrees of Ancient Craft Ma- sonry on his way to the Royal Arch, or to ex- press the fact that he has been elevated from the common class of Fellow-Crafts to that higher and more select one which, according to the traditions of Masonry, constituted, at the first Temple, the class of Mark Masters. (See Mark Master.)
Advancement Hurried* Nothing can be more certain than that the proper qualifica- tions of a candidate for admission into the mysteries of Freemasonry, and the necessary proficiency of a Mason who seeks advance- ment to a higher degree, are the two great bulwarks which are to protect the purity and integrity of our Institution. Indeed, we know not which is the more, hurtful — to admit an applicant who is unworthy, or to promote a candidate who is ignorant of his first lessons. The one affects the external, the other the in- ternal character of the Institution. The one brings discredit upon the Order among the profane, who already regard us, too often, with suspicion and dislike; the other intro- duces ignorance and incapacity into our ranks, and dishonors the science of Masonry in our own eyes. The one covers our walls with im-
ADVANCEMENT 31
perfect and worthless stones, which mar the outward beauty and impair the strength of our temple; the other fills our interior apartments with confusion and disorder, and leaves the edifice, though externally strong, both ineffi- cient and inappropriate for its destined uses.
But, to the candidate himself, a too hurried advancement is often attended with the most disastrous effects. As in geometry, so in Ma- sonry, there is no " royal road " to perfection. A knowledge of its principles and its science, and consequently an acquaintance with its beauties, can only be acquired by long and diligent study. To the careless observer it seldom offers, at a hasty glance, much to at- tract his attention or secure his interest. The gold must be deprived, by careful manipula- tion, of the dark and worthless ore which sur- rounds and envelops it, before its metallic luster and value can be seen and appreciated.
Hence, the candidate who hurriedly passes through his degrees without a due examina- tion of the moral and intellectual purposes of each, arrives at the summit of our edifice with- out a due and necessary appreciation of the general symmetry and connection that per- vade the whole system. The candidate, thus hurried through the elements of our science, and unprepared, by a knowledge of its funda- mental principles, for the reception and com- prehension of the corollaries which are to be deduced from them, is apt to view the whole system as " a rude and indigested mass " of frivolous ceremonies and puerile conceits, whose intrinsic value will not adequately pay him for the time, the trouble, and expense tliat he has incurred in his forced initiation. To him, Masonry is as incomprehensible as was the veiled statue of Isis to its blind worship- ers, and he becomes, in consequence, either a useless drone in our hive, or speedily retires in disgust from all participation in our labors.
But the candidate who by slow and painful steps has proceeded through each apartment of our mystic Temple, from its porch to its sanctuary, pausing in his progress to admire the beauties and to study the uses of each, learning, as he advances, " line upon line, and precept upon precept/' is gradually and al- most imperceptibly imbued with so much admiration of the Institution, so much love for its principles, so much just appreciation of its design as a conservator of divine truth, and an agent of human civilization, that he is in- clined, on beholding, at last, the whole beauty of the finished building, to exclaim, as did the wondering Queen of Sheba: " A Most Excel- lent Master must have done all this! "
The usage in many jurisdictions of the ' United States, when the question is asked in the ritual whether the^ candidate has made suitable proficiency in his preceding degree, is to reply, " Such as time and circumstances would permit." We have no doubt that this was an innovation originally invented to evade the law, which has always required a due pro- ficiency. To such a question no other answer ought to be given than the positive and un- equivocal one that " he has." Neither " time
32
ADVANCEMENT
nor circumstances " should be permitted to interfere with his attainment of the necessary knowledge, nor excuse its absence. This, with the wholesome rule, very generally existing, which requires an interval between the con- ferring of the degrees, would go far to remedy the evil of too hurried and unqualified ad- vancement, of which all intelligent Masons are now complaining.
After these views of the necessity of a care- ful examination of the claims of a candidate for advancement in Masonry, and the neces- sity, for his own good as well as that of the Order, that each one should fully prepare him- self for this promotion, it is proper that we should next inquire into the laws of Masonry, by which the wisdom and experience of our predecessors have thought proper to guard as well the rights of those who claim advance- ment as the interests of the Lodge which is called upon to grant it. This subject has been so fully treated in Mackey's Text Book of Ma- sonic Jurisprudence (b. iii., ch. i., p. lo5 et tea.) that we shall not hesitate to incorporate the views in that work into the present article.
The subject of the petition of a candidate for advancement involves three questions of ereat importance: First, how soon, after re- ceiving the First Degree, can he apply for the Second? Secondly, what number of black balls is necessary to constitute a rejection c And thirdly, what time must elapse, after a nrst rejection, before the Apprentice can renew his application for advancement?
1. How soon, after receiving a former degree, can a candidate apply for advancement to the next? The necessity of a full comprehension of the mysteries of one degree, before any at- tempt is made to acquire those of a second, seems to have been thoroughly appreciated from the earliest times; thus the 13th Article in the Regius MS., which is the oldest Masonic document now extant, provides that if the master a prentice have, he shall teach mm thoroughly and tell him measurable points, that he may know the craft ably, wherever he goes under the sun.'' Similar direction is found in most all the MS. But if there be an obligation on the part of the Master to instruct his Apprentice, there must be, of course, a correlative obligation on the part of the latter to receive and profit by those in- structions. Accordingly, unless this obliga- tion is discharged, and the Apprentice makes himself acquainted with the mysteries of the degree that he has already received, it is, by general consent, admitted that he has no right to be entrusted with further and more im- portant information. The modern ritual sus- tains this doctrine, by requiring that the can- didate, as a qualification in passing onward, shall have made " suitable proficiency m the preceding degree." This is all that the general law prescribes. Suitable proficiency must have been attained, and the period in which that condition will be acquired must necessarily depend on the mental capacity of the candi- date. Some men will become proficient in a shorter time than others, and of this fact the
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Master and the Lodge are to be the judges. An examination should therefore take place in open Lodge, and a ballot immediately follow- ing will express the opinion of the Lodge on the result of that examination, and the qualifica- tion of the candidate. [Such ballot, however, is not usual in Lodges under the English Con- stitution.]
Several modern Grand Lodges, looking with disapprobation on the rapidity with which the degrees are sometimes conferred upon candi- dates wholly incompetent, have adopted spe- cial regulations, prescribing a determinate period of probation for each degree. [Thus the Grand Lodge of England requires an in- terval of not less than four weeks before a higher degree can be conferred.] This, how- ever, is a local law, to be obeyed only in those jurisdictions in which it is in force. The general law of Masonry makes no such deter-
minate provision of time, and demands only that the candidate.shall give evidence of suit- able proficiency.' '
2. What number of black balls is necessary to constitute a rejection? Here we are entirely without the guidance of any express law, as all the Ancient Constitutions are completely silent upon the subject. It would seem, how- ever, that in the advancement of an Appren- tice or Fellow-Craft, as well as in the election of a profane, the ballot should be unanimous. This is strictly in accordance with the prin- ciples of Masonry, which require unanimity in admission, lest improper persons be in- truded, and harmony impaired. Greater quali- fications are certainly not required of a pro- fane applying for initiation than of an initi- ate seeking advancement; nor can there be any reason why the test of those qualifications should not be as rigid in the one case as in the other. It may be laid down as a rule, there- fore, that in all cases of balloting for advance- ment in any of the degrees of Masonry, a sin- gle black ball will reject.
3. What time must elapse, after a first rejec- tion, before the Apprentice or Fellow-Craft can renew his application for advancement to a higher degree? Here, too, the Ancient Consti- tutions are silent, and we are left to deduce our opinions from the general principles and analogies of Masonic law. As the application for advancement to a higher degree is founded on a right enuring to the Apprentice or Fellow- Craft by virtue of his reception into the pre- vious degrees — that is to say, as the Appren- tice, so soon as he has been initiated, becomes invested with the right of applying for ad- vancement to the Second— it seems evident that, as long as he remains an Apprentice m good standing," he continues to be invested with that right. Now, the rejection of his petition for advancement by the Lodge does not impair his right to apply again, because it does not affect his rights and standing as an Apprentice; it is simply the expression of the opinion that the Lodge does not at present deem him qualified for further progress in Masonry. We must never forget the differ- ence between the rightof applying for advance-
ADYTUM
ment and the right of advancement. Every Apprentice possesses the former, but no one can claim the latter until it is given to him by the unanimous vote of the Lodge. And as, therefore, this right of application or petition is not impaired by its rejection at a particular time, and as the Apprentice remains precisely in the same position in his own degree, after the rejection, as he did before, it seems to fol- low, as an irresistible deduction, that he may again apply at the next regular communica- tion, and, if a second time rejected, repeat his applications at all future meetings. The En- tered Apprentices of a Lodge are competent, at all regular communications of their Lodge, to petition for advancement. Whether that petition shall be granted or rejected is quite another thing, and depends altogether on the favor of the Lodge. And what is here said of an Apprentice, in relation to advancement to the Second Degree, may be equally said of a Fellow-Craft in reference to advancement to the Third.
This opinion has not, it is true, been uni- versally adopted, though no force of author- ity, short of an opposing landmark, could make one doubt its correctness. For instance, the Grand Lodge of California decided, in 1857, that " the application of Apprentices or Fellow Crafts for advancement should, after they have been once rejected by ballot, be governed by the same principles which regu- late the ballot on petitions for initiation, and which require a probation of one year."
This appears to be a singular decision of Masonic law. If the reasons which prevent the advancement of an Apprentice or Fellow- Craft to a higher degree are of such a nature as to warrant the delay of one year, it is far better to prefer charges against the petitioner, and to give him the opportunity of a fair and impartial trial. In many cases, a candidate for advancement is retarded in his progress from an opinion, on the part of the Lodge, that he is not yet sufficiently prepared for promotion by a knowledge of the preceding degree — an objection which may sometimes be removed before the recurrence of the next monthly meeting. In such a case, a decision like that of the Grand Lodge of California would be productive of manifest injustice. It is, therefore, a more consistent rule, that the candidate for advancement has a right to apply at every regular meeting, and that whenever any moral objections exist to his taking a higher degree, these objections should be made in the form of charges, and their truth tested by an impartial trial. To this, too, the candidate is undoubtedly entitled, on all the principles of justice and equity.
Adytum. The most retired and secret part of the ancient temples, into which the people were not permitted to enter, but which was accessible to the priests only, was called the adytum. And hence the derivation of the word from the Greek privative prefix a, and 5<W, to enter = thai which is not to be entered. In the adytum was generally to be found a Tdfos, or tomb, or some relics or sa-
APPILIATED 33
cred images of the god to whom the temple was consecrated. It being supposed that temples owed their origin to the superstitious reverence paid by the ancients to their de- ceased friends, and as most of the gods were men who had been deified on account of their virtues, temples were, perhaps, at first only stately monuments erected in honor of the dead. Hence the interior of the temple was originally nothing more than a cavity regarded as a place for the reception of a person in- terred, and in it was to be found the <rop6s, or coffin, the Tctyos, or tomb, or, among the Scandinavians, the barrow or mound grave. In time, the statue or image of a god took the place of the coffin; but the reverence for the spot as one of peculiar sanctity remained, and this interior part of the temple became, among the Greeks, the <njKbs, or chapel, among the Romans the adytum, or forbidden place, and among the Jews the kodesh hakodashim, the Holy of Holies. (See Holy of Holies.) " The sanctity thus acquired/ ' savs Dudley (Naol- ogy, p. 393), " by the cell of interment might readily and with propriety be assigned to any fabric capable of -containing the body of the departed friend, or the relic, or even the sym- bol, of the presence or existence of a divine personage." And thus it has happened that there was in every ancient temple an adytum or most holy place. The adytum of the small temple of Pompeii is still in excellent preserva- tion. It is carried some steps above the level of the main building, and, like the Jewish sanctuary, is without light.
^neid. Bishop Warburton (Div. Leg.) has contended, and his opinion has been sus- tained by the great majority of subsequent commentators, that Virgil, in the sixth book of his immortal Epic, has, under the figure of the descent of Mneas into the infernal regions, described the ceremony of initiation into the Ancient Mysteries.
Mon* This word, in its original Greek, aioiVy signifies the age or duration of anything. The Gnostics, however, used it in a peculiar mode to designate the intelligent, intellectual, and material powers or natures which flowed as emanations from the Kvebs, or Infinite Abyss of Deity, and which were connected with their divine fountain as rays of light are with the sun. (See Gnostics.)
Mm Architectonics. This is used in some modern Masonic lapidary inscriptions to designate the date more commonly known as annus lucis, the year of light.
Affiliate, Free. The French gave the name of " free affiliates " to those members of a Lodge who are exempted from the payment of dues, and neither hold office nor vote. Known among English-speaking Masons as "honor- ary members."
There is a quite common use of affiliate in Lodges of the United States to designate one who has joined a Lodge by demit.
Affiliated Mason. A Mason who holds membership in some Lodge. The word affili- ation is derived from the French affilierf which Richelet (Diet, de la langue Frangaise) defines,
34
AFFIRMATION
AFRICA
to communicate to any one a participation in the spiritual benefits of a religious order/' and he says that such a communication is called an " affiliation." - The word, as a tech- nical term, is not found in any of the old Ma- sonic writers, who always use admission in- stead of affiliation. There is no precept more explicitly expressed in the Ancient Constitu- tions than that every Mason should belong to a Lodge. The foundation of the law which imposes this duty is to be traced as far back as the Regius MS., which is the oldest Masonic document now extant, and of which the " Se- cunde poynt " requires that the Mason work upon the workday as truly as he can in order to deserve his hire for the holiday, and that he shall " truly labour on his deed that he may well deserve to have his meed." (Lines 269- 274.) The obligation that every Mason should thus labor is implied in all the subsequent Constitutions, which always speak of Masons as working members of the Fraternity, until we come to the Charges approved in 1722, which explicitly state that "every Brother ought to belong to a Lodge, and to be subject to its By-Laws and the General Regulations."
Affirmation. The question has been mooted whether a Quaker, or other person having peculiar religious scruples in reference to taking oaths, can receive the degrees of Masonry by taking an affirmation. Now, as the obligations of Masonry are symbolic in their character, and the forms in which they are administered constitute the essence of the symbolism, there cannot be a doubt that the prescribed mode is the only one that ought to be U3ed, and that affirmations are entirely in- admissible . The London Freemason's Quarterly (1828, p. 286) says that "a Quaker's affirma- tion is binding." This is not denied: the only question is whether it is admissible. Can the obligations be assumed in any but one way, unless the ritual be entirely changed? And can any " man or body of men " at this time make such a change without affecting the universal- ity of Masonry? Bro. Chase (Masonic Digest, p. 448) says that " conferring the degrees on affirmation is no violation of the spirit of Free- masonry, and neither overthrows nor affects a landmark." And in this he is sustained by the Grand Lodge of Maine (1823); but the only other Grand Lodges which have expressed an opinion on this subject — namely, those of Missouri, Tennessee, Kentucky, Delaware, Virginia, and Pennsylvania — have made an opposite decision. The entire practise of Lodges in America is also against the use of an affirmation. But in England Quakers have been initiated after affirmation, the principle being that a form of OB;, which the ■ candidate accepts as binding will suffice.
Africa. Anderson {Constitutions, 1738, p. 195) has recorded that in 1735 Richard j Hull, Esq., was appointed " Provincial Grand j Master at Gambay in West Africa," that in 1 1736 David Creighton, M.D., was appointed " Provincial Grand Master at Cape Coast Castle in Africa," and that in 1737 Capt. Will- iam Douglas was appointed "Provincial
Grand Master on