The Hebrew is pronounced, Mem, which signifies
water in motion, having for its hieroglyph a waving line, referring
to the surface of the water. As a numeral, M stands for 1000.
In Hebrew its numerical value is 40. The sacred name of Deity,
applied to this letter, is Meborach, and in Latin Benedictus,
meaning that Blessed One.
MAACHA
In the Tenth Degree of the Ancient and Accepted
Scottish Rite we are instructed that certain traitors fled to
"Maacha, King of Cheth," by whom they were delivered
up to King Solomon on his sending for them. In First Kings ii,
39, we find it recorded that two of the servants of Shimei fled
from Jerusalem to "Achish, son of Maachah king of Gath."
There can be little doubt that the carelessness of the early copyists
of the Ritual led to the double error of putting Cheth for Gath
and of supposing that Maacha was its king instead of its king's
father.
The manuscripts of the Ancient and Accepted
Scottish Rite, too often copied by unlearned persons, show many
such corruptions of Hebrew names, which modern researches must
eventually correct. Delaunay, in his Thuileur, 1813, makes him
King of Tyre, calls him Mahakah, and adds a Latin word, Compressus,
as further explanation, the meaning evidently being to bring together.
MAC
Masonic writers have generally given to
this word the meaning of "is smitten," deriving it probably
from the Hebrew verb macha, to smite. Others, again, think it
is the word mak, rottenness, and suppose that it means "he
is rotten." Both derivations are, in Brother Mackey's opinion,
incorrect. Mac is a constituent part of the word macbenac, which
is the substitute Master's Word in the French Rite, and which
is interpreted by the French ritualists as meaning "he lives
in the son." But such a derivation can find no support in
any known Hebrew root. Another interpretation must be sought.
Doctor Mackey believed there is evidence, circumstantial at least,
to show that the word was, if not an invention of the Sentient
or Dermott Freemasons, at least adopted by them in distinction
from the one used by the Moderns, which latter is the word now
in use in the United States of America.
Brother Mackey was disposed to attribute
the introduction of the word into Freemasonry to the adherents
of the House of Stuart, who sought in every way to make the Institution
of Freemasonry a political instrument in their schemes for the
restoration of their exiled monarch. Thus the old phrase, "the
Widow's Son," was applied by them to James II, who was the
son of Henrietta Maria, the widow of Charles I. So, instead of
the old Master's word which had hitherto been used, they invented
macbenac out of the Gaelie, which to them was, on recount of their
Highland supporters, almost a sacred language in the place of
Hebrew. Now, in Gaelic, Mac is son, and benach is blessed, from
the active verb oeannaichy to bless.
The latest dictionary pushed by the Highland
Society give this example:
"Benach De Righ Albane, Alexander, Mac Alexander," etc.,
that is, Bless the King of Scotland, Alexander, son of Alexander,
etc. Therefore we find, without any of those distortions to which
etymologists so often recur, that macbenac means in Gaelic the
blessed son. This word the Stuart Freemasons applied to their
idol, the Pretender, the son of Charles I.
MACBENAC
This word is capable of at least two interpretations.
1. A significant word in the Third Degree according to the French
Rite and some other Rituals (see Mac).
2. In the Order of the Beneficent Knights of the Holy City, the
Recipiendary, or Novice, is called Macbenac.
MACCABEES
A heroic family, whose patriotism and valor
form bright pictures in the Jewish annals. The name is generally
supposed to be derived from the letters M. C. B. I. which were
inscribed upon their banners being the initials of the following
words in the Hebrew sentence, Mi Camocha, Baalim, Jehovah, meaning,
Who is like unto thee among the gods, O Jehovah. The Hebrew sentence
has been appropriated in some of the advanced Degrees as a significant
term.
MACCALLA, CLIFFORD P.
Initiated in Concordia Lodge No. 67 at Philadelphia,
1869; was Worshipful Master in 1874; accepted position of Secretary
in 1876 and served twelve years. Brother MacCalla was elected
Junior Grand Warden of Pennsylvania in 1882, Senior Grand Warden
in 1884, Deputy Grand Master in 1886 and Grand Master in 1888.
For many years he was Editor of the Keystone, a Masonic journal.
He wrote a historical sketch of Concordia Lodge in Philadelphia,
a Life of Daniel Coxe and many essays on Freemasonry in America.
He discovered the Secretary's ledger of Saint John's Lodge dating
from June 24, 1731, to June, 1738 (see Transactions, Quatuor Coronati
Lodge, volume iii, page 134).
MACAULAY'S THEORY OF MASONRY
Thomas Babington Macaulay wrote a distort
of England which has been read more often than any other English
history, and in the United States has enjoyed a double fame: first,
as a text book or as required reading in high schools and colleges
almost since its publication; second, as a masterpiece of literature
which in conjunction with his Essays and his poems has been used
in the English Departments of Colleges in every State of the Union,
is in every public library, and once was required reading for
each well-read man. His biographer says of him that he had read
everything, knew more than he had read, and forgot nothing.
A carefully considered remark Macaulay once
made on Freemasonry must for such reasons carry more weight than
if it had been made by a man less thoroughly acquainted with England
from the Norman Conquest to Queen Victoria. In a conversation
with Harriet Beecher Stowe her notes show that he said: "I
believe that all the cathedrals of Europe came into existence
nearly contemporaneously, and were built by traveling companies
of Masons under the direction of systematic organization."
MACERIO
Du Cange (in his Glossarium) gives this
as one of the Middle Age Latin words for orison, deriving it from
maceria, a wail The word is now never employed.
MacGREGOR, DAVID
Bro. David McGregor holds for the second
quarter of this Century in the United States a record for the
brilliancy of his coups in Masonic research, two or three of them
of fundamental importance. He was born in Dunfermline, Scotland,
September 7, 1864; was educated in Lisburn, Ireland; came to New
York City in 1889; was for thirty years chief engineer in the
Sprague Electric Company and helped set up electric street car
systems in New Jersey. He was raised in Union Lodge, No. 11 (N.
J.), Dec. 22, 1916; was Master in 1931; Grand Historian after
1928; Chairman of Committee on Foreign Correspondence from 1935;
was 3 member of the National Masonic Research Society, and published
reports of his first discoveries in The Builder.
Among his discoveries: That John Skene,
who came to Jersey in 1682, was a Freemason, a member of the Aberdeen
Lodge in Scotland. (See under ABERDEEN 1'e', LODGE OF; see also
New York Masonic Outlook; September, 1926; page 13). That Earl
Perth, Jersey Proprietor, was a Freemason; and that a number of
members of Aberdeen Lodge came to Jersey at same time as Skene
but did not remain. That a pre 1730 Lodge met in New York in the
Black Horse Tavern. That the New York Weekly Journal announced
on Jan. 24, 1737 (N. S. 1738) that Mr. Provost, about to move
away, at a Lodge on January 19, 1737, had resigned as Master,
and Cap. Matthew Norris, son of Admiral Norris, had been elected
in his place. That on November 26, 1737, the New York Gazette
published a letter to the effect that a "new and unusual
sect of society at last has extended to these parts," etc.
(See Gould's History of Freemasonry; New York; 1936; Vol. 6; page
41.)
Most important was Bro. McGregor's discovery
of the records of Col. Daniel Coxe. In 1730 this eminent citizen
of New Jersey was by the Grand Lodge of England appointed to be
Provincial Grand Master of New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania.
But since no documents could be found to show that he had put
his authority into effect, save an entry in the Minutes of the
Grand Lodge of England to show that he visited it in 1731 as Prov.
Grand Master, it was generally believed that he had been inactive,
and had "been out of the country."
In old court and other civil records of
New Jersey Bro. McGregor found abundant evidences of the presence
and great activity of Coxe in America during the years in question.
(See Early Freemasonry in Pennsylvaniaa magnificent bookby
Henry S. Borneman; Grand Lodge of Pa; Philadelphia; 1931; page
56. See Chapters in Gould's History, above cited, Vol. VI, on
New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. History of Freemasonry
in New Jersey, by David McGregor; cloth; 164 pages; contains chapters
on Pre-Grand Lodges in New Jersey; chapter on Daniel Coxe; Military
Lodges; the Morristown Convention.)
MACHIO
See Macio
MACIO
Du Cange, Slossarzum, defines Macio, Mario,
or Machio, on the authority of Isidore, as Maçon, latomus,
a mason, a constructor of walls, from machina, the machines on
which they stood to work on account of the height of the walls.
He gives Maço also.
MACKENZIE, KENNETH R. H.
His favorite pen name was Cryptonymus, a
Latin word meaning One whose name is hidden. Editor of The Royal
Masonic Cyclopedia of History, Rites, Symbolism, and Biography,
published in London in 1877, by Brother John Hogg, Paternoster
Row. He was one of the founders of the Rosicrucian Society in
England (see Rosicrucianism).
MACKEY, ALBERT GALLATIN
The American Masonic historian. He was born
at Charleston, South Carolina, March 12, 1807. This scholarly
Brother lived to the age of seventy-four years. He died at Fortress
Monroe, Virginia, June 20, 1881, and was buried at Washington,
District of Columbia, Sunday, June 26, with all the solemnity
of the Masonic Rites wherein he had long been an active leader.
From 1834, when he was graduated with honors at the Charleston
Medical College, until 1854 he gave attention to the practice
of his profession, but from that time on literary and Masonic
labors engrossed his efforts. Doctor Mackey was a Union adherent
during the Civil War and in July, 1865, President Johnson appointed
him Collector of the Port. In a contest for senatorial honors
Brother Mackey was defeated by Senator Sawyer. Doctor Mackey removed
to Washington. District of Columbia, in 1870.
Doctor Mackey was Initiated, Passed and
Raised in Saint Andrews Lodge No. 10, Charleston, South Carolina,
in 1841. Shortly thereafter he affiliated with Solomon's Lodge
No. 1, also of Charleston, and was elected Worshipful Master in
December, 1842. From 1842 until 1867 he held the office of Grand
Secretary and during this period prepared all the reports of the
Foreign Correspondence Committee of the Grand Lodge. In 1851 he
was a founder member of Landmark Lodge No. 76. During the winter
of 1841-2 he was advanced and exalted in Capitular Freemasonry;
elected High Priest in December, 1844; and also elected Deputy
Grand High Priest in 1848 and successively re-selected until 1855.
From 1855 to 1867 he was each year elected as Grand High Priest
of his State. Elected in 1859 to the office of General Grand High
Priest, he continued in that position until 1868. Created a Knight
Templar in South Carolina Commandery No. 1, in 1842, he was elected
Eminent Commander in 1844, later being honored as a Past Grand
Warden of the Grand Encampment of the United States. Crowned a
Sovereign Grand Inspector General of the Thirty-third and last
Degree in 1844, he was for many years Secretary-General of the
Supreme Council, Southern Jurisdiction of the Ancient and Accepted
Scottish Rite.
As a contributor to the literature and science
of Freemasonry, Doctor Mackey's labors have been more extensive
than those of any other in America or in Europe. In 1845 he published
his first Masonic work, entitled A Lexicon of Freemasonry; in
1851 he published his second work entitled Tame True Mystic Tie.
Then followed The Aihman Rezon of South Carolina, 1852; Principles
of Masonic Laun, 1856; Book of tile Chapter, 1858; Text-Book of
Masonic Jurisprudence; 1859; History of freemasonry in South Carolina,
1861, Manual of the Lodge, 1869; Cryptic Masonry, 1877; Symbolism
of Freemasonry, and Masonic Ritual, 1869; Encyclopedia of Freemasonry,
1874; and Masonic Parliamentary Law, 1875. Doctor Mackey also
contributed freely to Masonic periodicals and edited several of
them with conspicuous ability. In 1849 he established and edited
the Southern and Western Masonic Miscellany for five years. In
1857 he undertook the publication of the Masonic Quarterly Review
which continued for two years. Then he was invited to assume editorial
charge of a department in the American Freemason which he accepted
in July, 1859, and he held this position for one year. He was
solicited to take charge of a department in the Masonic Trowel,
his first article appearing in the September number of 1865, and
he wrote for this publication for nearly three years. In October,
1871, Doctor Mackey again published a Masonic magazine of his
own, Mackey's National Freemason. Although a periodical of great
merit, after three years it was discontinued. In January, 1875,
Doctor Mackey became one of the editors of the Voice of Masonry,
and for over four years was a constant contributor to that periodical,
when failing health necessitated his giving up this work.
After Doctor Mackey located at Washington,
District of Columbia, he affiliated with Lafayette Lodge No. 19,
Lafayette Chapter No. 5, and Washington Commandery No. 1.
The funeral services in Washington in 1881
were begun at All Souls Church, Unitarian, of which Doctor Mackey
was a member, by the pastor and were followed by the ceremonies
of a Lodge of Sorrow, Rose Croix Chapter, Ancient and Accepted
Scottish Rite, Southern Jurisdiction, and were in charge of the
venerable General Albert Pike and his associate officers. General
Albert Pike wrote a touching and apprecative message at the
time of the death of Doctor Mackey, which was sent out officially
by the Sovereign Grand Commander of the Southern Jurisdiction
in which the various Masonic Bodies were instructed to "drape
in black the altars and working tools and the Brethren will wear
the proper badge of mourning during the space of sixty days."
The following Memorial was presented by
a Committee headed by Brother Charles F. Stansbury at a Special
Communication of the Grand Lodge of the District of Columbia:
Our illustrious Brother, Albert Gallatin
Mackey, is no more! He died at Fortress Monroe, Virginia, on the
20th day of June, 1881, at the venerable age of 74, and was buried
at Washington on Sunday June 26, 1881, with the highest honors
of the Craft, ah Rites and Orders of Masonry uniting in the last
sad services over his remains. The announcement of his death has
carried a genuine sentiment of sorrow wherever Freemasonry is
known. His ripe scholarship, his profound knowledge of Masonic
law and usage, his broad views of Masonic philosophy, his ceaseless
and invaluable literary labors in the service of the Order, his
noble ideal of its character and mission, as well as his genial
personal qualities and his lofty character, had united to make
him personally known and vividly respected and beloved by the
Masonic world. While this Grand Lodge shares in the common sorrow
of the Craft everywhere at this irreparable loss she can properly
lay claim to a more intimate and peculiar sense of bereavement,
inasmuch as our illustrious Brother had been for many years an
active member of this Body Chairman of the Committee on Jurisprudence,
and an advisor ever ready to assist our deliberations with his
knowledge and counsel. In testimony of our affectionate respect
for his memory the Grand Lodge jewels, and insignia will be appropriately
draped, and its members near the usual badge of mourning for thirty
days.
A memorial page of our proceedings will
also be dedicated to the honor of his name. We extend to his family
the assurance of our sincere and respectful sympathy, and direct
that an attested copy of this Minute be transmitted to them.
In the eulogy over Doctor Mackey, delivered
by Past Grand Master Henry Buist, of Georgia, before the Supreme
Council for the Southern Jurisdiction, he said of the Doctor:
He was a fearless and gifted speaker; his language was courteous
and manner dignified; and occasionally, in his earnestness to
maintain what he conceived to be right, he became animated and
eloquent. Positive in his convictions, he was bold in their advocacy.
His course of action once determined on, supported by an approving
conscience no fear or disfavor or discomfiture could swerve him
from his fixed purpose. Whatever was the emergency, he was always
equal to it. Where others doubted. he was confident; where others
faltered, he was immovable; where others queried, he affirmed.
He was faithful to every public and Masonic duty. Treachery found
no place in his character. He never betrayed a trust. He was eminently
sincere and loyal to his friends, and those who were most intimately
associated with him learned to appreciate him the most. He was
generous and frank in his impulses, and cherished malice toward
none, and charity for all. His monument is in the hearts of those
who knew him longest and best. He is no longer of this earth.
His work among men is ended; his earthly record is complete.
MACKEY'S HISTORY OF FREEMASONRY
In his bibliography of the principal works
of Dr. Albert G. Mackey on page 608 Bro. Robert I. Clegg inadvertently
omitted the work which Mackey himself would have placed at the
head of the list, his seven-volume History of Freemasonry; perhaps
the Freudians would have said that this was an unconscious slip
of memory occasioned by a sense of humbleness, because at the
time (1921) Bro. Clegg had only recently edited and revised and
in some chapters wholly re-written the famous History which had
long been (and continues to be) the most widely read long history
of the Craft ever published. Bro. Clegg based his work of revision
primarily on the edition current in 1898. He received his reward
by having the new work go out with the new title Mackey's Revised
History of Freemasonry, by Robert Ingham Clegg.
When Mackey began a work the scope of which
for a man of less learning would have meant a life-work, he had
little to go on; Findel was not suited to American readers, and
already was obsolete in part; Fort's Antiquities dealt too much
with antiquities; Oliver's "historical" works were better
entitled romances; Gould's History had not yet been published;
except for his own private library, his years of hard study and
his erudition (of which there was much more than his readers may
guess), and the assistance of a few friends like T. Parvin,
Mackey had to blaze a new road through the wilderness. He succeeded
in blazing it; and while some hundreds of students and scholars
have, as a body, blazed a better one since, no one man has ever
approached the measure of his achievement.
His principal weakness (and granting that
he did not possess data not discovered until afterwards) was a
certain lack of reality, so that his book becomes at times too
smooth, too static, with pages here and there like a drowsy sermon.
This may be because he habitually thought of Freemasonry as an
"institution" (one of his favorite words), a system,
a collection of generalities and abstractions; and did not sufficiently
see that there never had been such a thing as abstract Freemasonry,
a thing separate and apart, but always that it had consisted of
men, actual, in flesh and blood, and that Freemasonry never had
been anything more than a name for certain of the things those
men were doing.
How does Mackey's History compare with Gould's
Many Masons, and even many beginning students, can read one long
History but they haven't the time to read two; which is the better
for them? The question is therefore not an academic one; nor is
it, at least on this page, a national one, as if one were to choose
a national champion. As for this last point, a large fact stands
out in full view, before which the point is lost: there is no
such thing as English Freemasonry nor American Freemasonry; it
is only Freemasonry, and belongs to no country; there is Freemasonry
as it is in England and the same Freemasonry as it is in America.
The Grand Lodge of 1717, though it was erected
in London, is as much the Mother Grand Lodge of Freemasonry in
America as it is of Freemasonry in England; and until about 1800,
and which means for two generations, Lodges and Provencal Grand
Lodges here belonged as much to its Jurisdiction as any Lodge
or Provincial Grand Lodge in England; when we American Masons
study the history of that Grand Lodge, or of Freemasonry in Eighteenth
Century England, or the history of Freemasonry prior to 1717,
we are studying our own Masonic history, and it matters not if
the settings of any of those chapters of it were in other lands
or not.
St. Paul's remark about two stars differing
in glory applies here. Mackey was far more erudite than Gould;
had not only studied more, and read more, but had studied and
read more widely. His knowledge was his own; overflowed; and he
did not have to "get it up" for any subject. He had
a sense for literature, and was master of a literary style, whereas
Gould had neither.
Mackey had a grasp of the whole of Freemasonry,
including the four modern Rites, and this unity was ever in his
mind; there is a continuity from chapter to chapter; his history
is a work of art in the true and original sense which has been
lost to present-day literary cynicism. And since he knew that
no one work (nor any thousand volumes) could contain each and
every fact in one history, he had to select; and while selecting
he knew from first-hand knowledge of what his American readers
wished most to learn.
Gould, and other things being equal, had
the advantage of being at the headquarters of Masonic research;
had access to Grand Lodge archives; could visit old Lodges; could
use the British Museum, and a half hundred other collections of
original sources; and had about him a circle of learned Masons
to collaborate with him. His History has an effect of massiveness
and power; is full of courage; and he had in him the new spirit
of Masonic researchwas himself one of its originators, and
felt no reverence for any book merely because it was old, nor
for any belief merely because generations of Masons had held it.
His literary faults were a lack of a sense
of proportionas when, though he had only one of his six
volumes for a history of general Freemasonry properly so called,
he used up fifty pages of it arguing over Sir Christopher Wren;
and he was given to harsh, unjust judgments, as in his caricatures
of Anderson and Preston. Also, he committed himself to the dogma
that the Ancient had been a "schistnatic" Grand Lodge,
and refused to surrender it when it was proved that they had not
In the plan of his history he gave a disproportionate amount of
space and attention to the Grand Lodge of 1717 as if it, and not
hundreds of Lodges and tens of thousands of Masons, had made Speculative
Masonry prosper around the world. AB against Mackey, he is preferred
by students and researchers; and, as is natural, by Brethren in
Great Britain.
As against both of them Begemann is of more
massive technical erudition, but of narrower scope, and was guilty
of ignoring Freemasonry in North America, where it has had as
large a history as England had; and, if the four modern Rites
be included, a larger one. Crawley stands apart, for his Cemenkria
Hibernico is more than one half composed of documents, but he
was, it is agreed, the most brilliant prose writer of any. There
is a possibility that the writing of general, or "complete"
histories is at an end and is to be replaced by books on single
subjects or by special treatises, unless they may be written to
serve as a framework or outline, or as a guide to special fields.
MACO
See Macio
The following is substantially from Renning's
Cydopedia of Freemasonry: The Norman-French word for mason as
the Operative Mason in early days was called "le rnaçon
and this was corrupted into maccon, maccouyn, masoun, masouyn,
messouyn, and even mageon. The word seems to come from maçonner,
which had both its operative meaning and derivative meaning of
conspiring, in 1238, and which again comes from mansio, a word
of classic use. The word mason, as it appears to us, is clear
evidence of the development of the operative Gilds through the
Norman-French artificers of the Conquest, who carried the Operative
Gilds, as it were, back to Latin terminology, and to a Roman origin.
In addition to the above paragraph by the
Rev. A. F. A. Woodford, see Mason, Macemo and Macio.
MAÇON DANS LA VOIE DROITE
French, meaning The Mason in the Right Way.
The second grade of the Hermetic system of Montpellier (Thory,
ActaLatomorum i, page 321).
MAÇON DU SECRET
French, meaning The Mason of the Secret.
The sixth grade of the reformed Rite of Baron Tschoudy, and the
seventh in the reformed rite of Saint Martin (Thory, ActaLatomorum
i, page 321).
MAÇON, ECOSSAIS, MAITRE
These French words are explained under their
English equivalents (see Mason, Scottish Master).
MAÇONETUS
Low Latin, signifying a Mason, and found
in documents of the fourteenth century.
MAÇONNE
A French word signifying a Female Mason,
that is to say, a woman who has received the Degrees of the Rite
of Adoption. It is a very convenient word. The formation of the
English language might permit the use of the equivalent word Masoness,
if custom would sanction it.
MAÇONNE EGYPTIENNE
The Third Degree in Cagliostro's Egyptian
Rite of Adoption.
MAÇONNE MAITRESSE
Third grade of the Maçonnerie d'
Adoption.
MAÇONNER
Du Cange gives citations from documents
of the fourteenth century, where this word is used as signifying
to build.
MAÇONNERIE ROUGE
French for Red Freemasonry. The designation
of the four advanced grades of the French Rite. Bazot says that
the name comes from the color worn in the fourth grade.
MAÇONNIEKE SOCIETEITEN
Dutch Masonic Clubs, somewhat like unto
the English Lodges of Instruction with more, perhaps, of the character
of a Club. Renning's Cyclopedia says "there were about nineteen
of these associations in the principal towns of Holland in 1860."
MACOY'S CYCLOPEDIA
"A General History, Cyclopedia, and
Dictionary of Freemasonry," containing some 300 engravings,
by Robert Macoy, 33 , published in New York, which has passed
through a number of editions. It was originally founded on A Dictionary
of Symbolical Masonry, by Dr. George Oliver. Brother Macoy has
occupied the prominent position of Deputy Grand Master of the
Grand Lodge of New York, and that of Grand Recorder of the State
Grand Commandery of the Order of the Temple, Knights Templar.
MACOY, ROBERT
Robert Macoy was born in Ireland, October
4, 1816, but from the time he was four years old lived in New
York City, where, at an early age, he apprenticed himself in the
printing and publishing business, and continued in it for nearly
forty years, first as printer and bookseller, and then as a Masonic
publisher. During his generation he made a large place for himself
in the American Craft, along with Mackey, McClenachan, Drummond,
Morris, etc., with whom he was closely associated He won a success
in four separate spheres of Masonic labors:
1. In the Order of the Eastern Star. Rob
Morris had conceived the idea of it, had written rituals, had
filled it with his inspiration, but was a failure at the work
of organization. ". . . Upon his departure for the Holy Land,
in 1868, Brother Morris transferred to Brother Macoy all the authority
he had assumed and exercised in regard to the Order. Bro. Macoy
immediately set about arranging the work more systematically....
Under his guiding hand the Supreme Grand Chapter. a self instituted
body, was organized in December, 1868. . ."
2. In the work of Grand Bodies of Masonry.
He held the high office of Deputy Grand Master of New York, and
was Grand Recorder of the Grant Commandery, E. T.
3. As author. He wrote an unknown number
of articles for the Masonic press; wrote much in a number of Monitors
and Manuals, and was author of The Worshipful Masters' Assistant
which for half a century was to the office of Master what Mackey's
Encyclopedia was to the whole of the Craft.
4. As a publisher. He published (and oftentimes
either edited or helped to write) a long list of Masonic books,
among them The Master Workmen, 1849;The Masonic Manual 1852;
The Book of the Lodge, 1855, a work of immense national influence
which American Masonic historians have overlooked; Vocal Manual,
1853; Masonic Minstrel, 1857; Worshipful Master Assistant, 1885;
Rise of Adoption, 1868, and in 1890; and the General History,
Cyclopedia, and Dictionary of Freemasonry which is described under
ENCYCLOPEDIA, Mackey's etc., elsewhere in this Supplement.
During the productive period of Bro. Macoy's
published and writing the one demand everywhere was for Monitors
and Handbooks, and Macoy was but one of a number who supplied
them, from Webb to Mackey A detailed, exhaustive bibliography
of Macoy by an expert would open up a path for historians into
one of the most important fields of either American Masonic history
or American Masonic Jurisprudence.Grand Lodges (and other Grand
Bodies) now prepare and publish their own Monitors. In the period,
of almost three-quarters of a century, when it was left to private
members to prepare and publish Monitors not a few of them (as
was inevitable, and it is not to their discredit) insinuated into
Craft practice more than one element of the Esoteric work which
represented nobody's idea but their own, and in some instances
was a mistaken idea. Certain of the small discrepancies, anomalies,
inconsistencies which Grand Lodges find in the Monitorial sections
of their Uniform Work, and sometimes in Lodge practice, could
be traced back to a private Monitorialist.
MACROCOSM
Greek, she great world. The visible system
of worlds; the outer world or universe. It is opposed to Microcosm,
the little world, as in man. It has been used as the Macric soul
in opposition to the Micric animal life, and as the soul of the
universe as opposed to the soul of a single world or being. A
subject of much note to the Rosicrucians in the study of the Mysterium
Magnum.
MACZO
Latin of the Middle Ages for a mason. Du
Cange quotes a Computum of the year 1324, in which it is said
that the work was done "per manum Petri, maczonis de Lagnicio,"
meaning "by the hand of Peter, a mason of Lagnicio,"
MADAGASCAR
L'Action Républicaine Lodge, from
June 25,1913, at Diego Suarez, and La France Australe, from July
20, 1903, at Tananarivo, are subject both to the Grand Orient
of France. Three others, La Fraternite Universale, from 1917,
at Ambositra, Imerina, from 1903, at Tananarivo and Les Trois
Freres, The Three Brothers, at Majungo, are controlled by the
Grand Lodge of France. Madagascar is an island, under the French
Government, is 975 miles long, with some three million inhabitants,
and is in the Indian Ocean, 230 miles from the east coast of Africa.
MADE
A technical word signifying initiated into
Freemasonry (see Make).
MADMAN
Madmen are specially designated in the oral
law as disqualified for initiation (see Qualifications).
MADRAS
A presidency of British India. The first
Lodge in Southern India was established at Madras. Others were
opened in 1765 and in the following year Captain Edmond Pascal
was appointed Provincial Grand Master for Madras and its Dependencies.
A Provincial Grand Lodge was established in 1781 by the Athol
Grand Lodge of England but after about seven years the state of
warfare round about Madras caused its decline. Unity among the
Brethren in Southern India was finally achieved by the appointment
of Brigadier-General Horn as "Provincial Grand Master for
the Coast of Coromandel, the Presidency of Madras and parts adjacent."
The older Lodges had all ceased work when in 1786 the Carnatic
Military Lodge was established at Arcot. The early attempts of
the Freneh to plant Freemasonry in Madras were even less successful
than those of the English. The first Lodge, La Fraternite Cosmopolite,
meaning in French World wide Fraternity, was chartered in 1786,
but after Iaying dormant for some time finally ceased to exist.
The Grand Lodge of Scotland has chartered many surviving and successful
Lodges in Madras and other parts of India (see Bombay and India).
MAFIA
Sometimes spelled Maffia, a name for a Sicilian
secret society active early in the nineteenth century, perhaps
more usually the title is employed to mean the persons impatient
and contemptuous of constitutional processes of law who reserve
vengeance for execution by themselves. The Chief of Police of
New Orleans was killed, following the severity of his course in
hunting the murderers of an Italian. Several Mafiusi were implicated,
six were acquitted but the verdict was credited to the fears of
the jury, and the gaol was entered by a mob and eleven prisoners
were lynched, March 14, 1891 (see Carbonari, Camorra, and Secret
Societies).
MAGAZINE, MASONIC
The earliest Masonic magazine was published
at Leipsic in 1738 and named Der Freimaurer. The second, in 1742,
was Der bedachtiae Frei7naurer, at Hamburg, and then the Aufmerksamn
Freimaurer, 1743, at Gorlitz, according to Brother Woodford (Renning's
Cyclopedia). In 1783 the Freimaurerzeitung appeared at Berlin,
having only a short existence of six numbers. The Journal fur
Freimaurer, which appeared in 1784 at Vienna, had a longer life
of some three years. In England, the first work of this kind was
The Freemasons Magazine or General and Complete Library, begun
in 1793, and continued until 1798. In Ireland, in 1792, the Sentimental
and Masonic Magazine appeared and ran to seven volumes (1792-5).
In France the Miroir de laverite seems to have been issued 1800-2,
followed by Nermes in 1808. In England the Freemasons Quarterly
Review commenced in 1834 and was continued until 1849, followed
by the Freemasons Quarterly Magazine in 1853, which lived until
1858. In 1873 a new Masonic Magazine was issued, but it had not
a very long existence. Of American Masonic magazines the earliest
is the Freemasons Magazine and General Miscellany, published at
Philadelphia in 1811. An old and constant periodical devoted to
Freemasonry was the Freemasonry's Monthly Magazine, published
by Charles W. Moore, at Boston. It was established in the year
1842 (see Literature).
MAGI
The ancient Greek historians so term the
hereditary priests among the Persians and Medians. The word is
derived from mog or amp, signifying Priest in the Pehlevi language.
The Illuminati first introduced the word into Freemasonry, and
employed it in the nomenclature of their Degrees to signify men
of superior wisdom.
MAGI, THE THREE
The "Wise Men of the East" who
came to Jerusalem, bringing gifts to the infant Jesus. The traditional
names of the three are Melchior, an old man, with a long beard,
offering gold; Jasper, a beardless youth, rho offers frankincense;
Balthazar, a black or Moor, with a large spreading beard, who
tenders myrrh. The patron saints of travelers. "Tradition
fixed their number at three, probably in allusion to the three
races springing from the sons of Noah. The Empress Helena caused
their corpses to be transported to Milan from Constantinople.
Frederick Barbarossa carried them to Cologne, the place of their
special glora as the Three Kings of Cologne." Yonge. The
three principal officers ruling the Society of the Rosicrucians
are styled Magi.
MAGIC
The idea that any connection exists between
Freemasonry and magic is to be attributed to the French writers,
especially to Ragon, who gives many pages of his Masonic Orthodozy
to the subject of Masonic magic; and still more to Alphonse Louis
Constant, who has written three large volumes on the History of
Magic, on the Ritual and Dogma of the Higher Magic, and on the
Key of the Grand Mysteries, in all of which he seeks to trace
an intimate connection between the Masonic mysteries and the science
of magic (see Levi, Eliphas). Ragon designates this sort of Freemasonry
by the name of Occult Freemasonry But he loosely confounds magic
with the magism of the ancient Persians, the medieval philosophy
and modern magnetism, all of which, as identical sciences, were
engaged in the investigation of the nature of man. the mechanism
of his thoughts, the faculties of his soul, his power over nature,
and the essence of the occult virtues of all things.
Magism, he says, is to be found in the Sentences
of Zoroaster, in the Hymns of Orpheus, in the Invocations of the
Hierophants, and in the Symbols of Pythagoras; it is reproduced
in the Philosophy of Agrippa and of Cardan, and is recognized
under the name of Magic in the marvelous results of magnetism.
Cagliostro, it is well known, mingled with his Spurious Freemasonry
the Superstitions of Magic and the Operations of Animal Magnetism.
But the writers who have sought to establish a scheme of Magical
Freemasonry refer almost altogether to the supposed power of mystical
names or words, which they say is common to both Freemasonry and
magic. It is certain that on omatology, or the science of names,
forms a very interesting part of the investigations of the higher
Freemasonry, and it is only in this way that any connection can
be created between the two sciences. Much light, it must be confessed,
is thrown on many of the mystical names in the advanced Degrees
by the dogmas of magic; and hence magic furnishes a curious and
interesting study for the Freemason (see Magic Squares and Alchemy).
MAGIAN SOCIETY
Founded in New York City on September 29,
1913, by Brother Frank C. Higgins, for the study of Masonic symbolism
(see American Freemason, November, 1913, and Miscellanea Latomorum,
volume i, pages 63 and 128, new series).
MAGICIANS, SOCIETY OF THE
A society founded at Florence, which became
a division of the Brothers of Rose Croix. They wore in their Chapters
the habit of members of the Inquisition. This must not be confused
with a society of the same na ne but not claiming to be exclusively
Masonic in the United States.
MAGIC SQUARES
A magic square is a series of numbers arranged
in an equal number of cells constituting a square figure, the
enumeration of all of whose columns, vertically, horizontally
and diagonally, wilt give the same sum. The Oriental philosophers,
and especially the Jewish Talmudists, have indulged in many fanciful
speculations in reference to these magic squares, many of which
were considered as talismans. The accompanying figure of nine
squares containing the nine digits so arranged as to make fifteen
when counted in every way, was of peculiar import.
There was no talisman more sacred than this
among the Orientalists, when arranged as in Figure 1-6. Thus designed,
they called it by the name of the planet Saturn, ZaHaL, because
the sum of the 9 digits in the square was equal to 45 (1+2+3+4+5+6+7+8
+g) which is the numerical value of the letters in the word ZaHaL,
in the Arabic alphabet. The talmudists also esteemed it as a sacred
talisman because 15 is the numerical value of the letters of the
word JaH, which is one of the forms of the Tetragrammaton.
The Hermetic Philosophers called these magic
squares Tables of the Planets, and attributed to them many occult
virtues. The Table of Saturn consisted of 9 squares, and has Just
been given. The Table of Jupiter consisted of 16 squares of numbers,
whose total value is 136, and the sum of them added, horizontally,
perpendicularly, and diagonally, in rows, is always 34; as in
Figure 3. So the Table of Mars consists of 25 squares, of the
Sun of 36, of Venus of 49, of Mercury of 64, and of the Moon of
81. These magic squares and their values have been used in the
symbolism of numbers in some of the advanced Degrees of Freemasonry.
This subject should not be dismissed as
a purely imaginative study. The matter has for many years engaged
the attention of mathematicians of the highest quality. The Magic
Square has been worn as an emblem or talisman insuring good luck
to the possessor and evidently it formed an essential part in
the early symbolism connected with the Craft. That singular picture
by Albrecht Durer of the sixteenth century, Malancolia, shows
a Magic Square with many other symbols easily recognized by members
of the Masonic institution. The history of the Magie Square goes
back hundreds of years and there has been undoubtedly through
this period a superstitious, as well as a scientific, esteem
for this device. They have not been worked out to their present
perfection in any other than by systematic methods. The earliest
known writer on the subject was a Greek, Emanuel Moscopulus, who
flourished in the fourth or fifth century. Since that time there
have been many laborers upon this work.
One of the very interesting of these Magic
Squares is referred to above by Doctor Mackey. This occurs in
a book by Agrippa (De Occulta Philosophie, logo) and is quoted
on page 279 of George Falkener's Gaines Ancient arid Moderns By
first arrangement the numerals from 1 to 16 in four rows as in
Figure 4 it will be seen that by leaving the numerals unchanged
at each corner of the large square, namely 1, 4, 16, and 13, and
also at the inner square of 6, 7, 10, and 11, and substituting
the other pairs of numerals, reversing them at the time, we have
in Figure 5, this remarkable Magic Square reversed, which Brother
Mackey has called the Table of Jupiter. The combinations of this
figure are surprising, amounting to fifty-six arrangements, each
totaling thirty-four. The four horizontals, as 1+15+14+4=34, 12+6+7+9=34,
etc; and the four perpendicular columns, as 1+12+8+13 = 34, and
15+6+10+3=34, etc.; the diagonals,1+6+11+16= 34, and 4+7+10+13=34;
the diamonds, 1+7+16+ 10=34, and 4+11+13+6=34; the squares, 1+4+
16+13=34, and 6+7+11+10=34; the oblongs, 15+ 14+2+3 =34, 12+9+5+8=34,
and the romboids, 1+15+16+2=34, and 4+9+13+8=34, etc.
The method of working out a Magic Square
with an uneven number of cells was suggested by De la Loubere.
The several steps may be considered as follows: In assigning consecutive
numbers, proceed in an oblique direction up and to the right as
4, 5, 6, as in Figure 6. When this would carry a number out of
the Magic Square, write that number in the cell at the opposite
end of the column or row, as shown by the numbers in the margin
of Figure 6. When the application of the first of these rules
in the present paragraph would place a number in a cell already
occupied, write the new number in the cell beneath the one last
filled. For instance, the cell above and to the right of 3 being
occupied, 4 is written under 3. Treat the marginal square at the
upper right-hand corner marked x as an occupied cell and apply
the rule given in the last sentence. Begin by putting 1 in the
top cell of the middle column. A comparison of Figure 6 will show
that it is a reflection of Figure 1 given by Doctor Mackey.
One of the most successful of all students
of the subject unquestionably was Brother Benjamin Franklin. Two
of his efforts, an 8 x S and a 16 x 16, are today unsurpassed as purely
remarkably successful attempts at the making of Magic Squares.
A communication to an English friend by Brother Franklin appears
in the work entitled Letters and Papers on Philosophical Subjects
by Benjamin Franklin, printed in 1769. This letter is in part
as follows:
According to your request I now send you
the arithmetical curiosity of which this is the history. Being
one day in the country at the house of our common friend, the
late learned Mr. Logan, he showed me a folio French book filled
with magic squares, wrote, if I forget not by one Mr. Frenicle,
in which he said the author had discovered great ingenuity and
dexterity in the management of numbers; and though several other
foreigners had distinguished themselves in the same way, he did
not recollect that any one Englishman had done anything of the
kind remarkable.
I said it was perhaps a mark of the good
sense of our mathematicians that they would not spend their time
in things that were merely domiciles novae, incapable of any useful
application. He answered that many of the arithmetical or mathematical
questions publicly proposed in England were equally trifling and
useless. Perhaps the considering and answering such questions,
I replied, may not be altogether useless if it produces by practice
an habitual readiness and exactness in mathematical disquisitions,
which readiness may, on many occasions be of real use. In the
same way, says he, may the making of these squares be of use.
I then confessed to him that in my younger days, having once some
leisure (which I still think I might have employed more usefully)
I had amused myself in making this kind of magic squares, and,
at length had acquired such a knack at it, that I could fill the
cells of any magic square of reasonable size with a series of
numbers as fast as I could write them, disposed in such a manner
that the sums of every row, horizontal, perpendicular, or diagonal,
should be equal; but not being satisfied with these, which I looked
on as common and easy things, I had imposed on myself more difficult
tasks, and succeeded in making other magic squares with a varietal
of properties, and much more curious. He then showed me several
in the same book of an uncommon and more curious kind, but as
I thought none of them equal to some I remembered to have made,
he desired me to let him see them; and accordingly the next time
I visited him, I carried him a square of 8 which I found among
my old papers, and which I will now give you with an account of
its properties Figure 7-9. The properties are:
1. That every straight row, horizontal
or vertical, of 8 numbers added together, make 260, and half of
each row, half of 260.
2. That the bent row of 8 numbers ascending
and descending diagonally, viz., from 16 ascending to 10 and from
23 descending to 17 and every one of its parallel bent rows of
8 numbers make 260, etc., etc. And lastly the four corner numbers
with the four middle numbers make 260. So this magical square
seems perfect in its kind, but these are not all its properties,
there are five other curious ones which at some time I will explain
to you.
This Magic Square by Franklin is given here
as Figure 7.
Brother Paul Carus has investigated the
means by which Brother Franklin may have worked out his system
of Magic Squares but it is really somewhat a question even now
with all the later studies that have been given to the subject
whether any one has perfected an ability capable of preparing
a means of producing these designs with the facility that Brother
Franklin mentions. Those who wish to examine the subject further
will find it discussed in the Encyclopedia Britannica, in Magic
Squares and Cubes, by W. S. Andrews, containing chapters by Brother
Paul Carus and others, and in a Scrap Book of Elementary Mathematics
by William F. White, as well as in Mathematical Recreations by
Professor W. W. R. Ball.
This subject is somewhat allied as a mathematical
curiosity with two other figures which come down to us through
the Middle Ages, the Magic Pentagon or the Five Pointed Star,
as a symbol of the School of Pythagoras, as in Figure 8, and the
Magic Hexagram, Figure 9, commonly called the Shield of David
and frequently used on synagogues, as Brother Carus points out.
these two designs, Figures 8 and 9, have a peculiarity that is
not perhaps noticed at the first glance- They can be drawn by
one stroke of the pencil, beginning at any point. If they be compared
in this respect with any square having two diagonals the difference
can soon be tested as the square is not capable of being drawn
as a complete figure, including the two diagonals, with one stroke.
In order to better illustrate the operation of drawing Figures
8 and 9, numerals have been attached to illustrate the movement
of the pencil in tracing them out. Of course, they can be begun
at any place in any one of the lines composing the figures.
MAGISTER CAEMENTARIORUM
A title applied in the Middle Ages to one
who presided over the building of edifices, and means Master of
the Masons.
MAGISTER HOSPITALIS
See Master of the Hospital
MAGISTER LAPIDUM
Du Cange (Glossiarum) defines this as Master
Meson; and he cites the statutes of Marseilles as saying: "Tres
Magistros Lapidis bonos et legates, " that is, three good
and lawful Master Masons "shall be selected to decide on
all questions about water in the city."
MAGISTER MILITIAE CHRISTI
Latin, meaning Master of the Chivalry or
Knight of Christ which see under this title.
MAGISTER PERRERIUS
A name given in the Middle Ages to a Mason;
literally, a Master of Stones, from the French pierre, a stone.
MAGISTER TEMPLI
See Master of the Temple
MAGISTRI COMACINI
SeeComacxneMasters; bo Como
MAGNA EST VERITAS ET PRAEVALEBIT
Istin, meaning The Truth is mighty, and
will prevail. The motto of the Red Cross Degree, or Knights of
the Red Cross.
MAGNAN, B. P.
A Marshal of France, nominated by Napoleon
III, Emperor, as Grand Master of the Grand Orient of France, in
1862, and, though not a member of the great Fraternity at the
time, was initiated and installed Grand Master, February 8, 1862,
and so remained until May 29, 1865.
MAGNANIMOUS
The title applied in modern usage to the
Order of Knights Templar. Well does John Ruskin say (sesame and
Lilies, 1865, page 65), "Mighty of heart, mighty of mind
-magnanimous to be this, is indeed to be great in life."
The word is compounded from the Latin magnus, great, and animus,
soul, signifying Great of Soul.
MAGNETIC FREEMASONRY
This is a form of Freemasonry which, although long ago practiced
by Cagliostro as a species of charlatanism, in the opinion of
Brother Mackey was first introduced to notice as a philosophic
system by Ragon in his treatise on Uafonnerie Occulte.
"The occult sciences," says this
writer, "reveal to man the mysteries of his nature, the secrets
of his organization, the means of attaining perfection and happiness;
and, in short, the decree of his destiny. Their study was that
of the high initiations of the Egyptians; it is time that they
should become the study of modern Masons." And again he Id
"A Masonic society which should establish in its bosom a
magnetic academy would soon find the reward of its labors in the
good that it would do, and the happiness which it would create."
There can be no doubt that the Masonic investigator has a right
to search everywhere for the means of moral, intellectual, and
religious perfection; and if he can find anything in magnetism
which would aid him in the search, it is his duty and wisest policy
to avail himself of it. But, nevertheless, Magnetic Freemasonry,
as a special regime, or Rite, will hardly ever be adopted by the
Fraternity.
MAGUS
This word has at least two important references.
1. The Fourteenth Degree, and the first of the Greater Mysteries
of the system of Illuminism.
2. The Ninth and last Degree of the German
Rosicrucians. It is the singular of Magi, which see.
MAH
The Hebrew interrogative pronoun me, signifying
What? It is a component part of a significant word in Freemasonry.
The combination Mahhah, literally "Thatt the," is equivalent,
according to the Hebrew method of ellipsis, to the question, "What!
is this the ?"
MAHABHARATA
A Sanskrit poem, recounting the rivalries
of the descendants of King Bharata, and occupying a place among
the Masters of the Hindus. It contains many thousand verses, written
at various unknown periods since the completion of the Ramayana.
MAHADEVA
Meaning the great god. one of the common
names by which the Hindu god Siva is called. His consort, Durga,
is similarly styled MahAdevi, the great goddess. In Buddhistic
history, Mahadeva, who lived two hundred years after the death
of the Buddha Sakyamuni, or 343, is a renowned teacher who caused
a schism in the Buddhistic Church.
MAHAKASYAPA
The renowned disciple of Buddha Sakyamuni,
who arranged the metaphysical portion of the sacred writings called
Abhidharma.
MAHER-SHALAL-HASH-BAZ
Hebrew. Four Hebrew words which the prophet
Isaiah was ordered to write upon a tablet, and which were afterward
to be the name of his son. They signify, "make haste to the
prey, fall upon the spoil," and were prognostic of the sudden
attack of the Assyrians. They may be said, in their Masonic use,
to be symbolic of the readiness for action which should distinguish
a warrior, and are therefore of significant service in the system
of Masonic Templarism.
MAIER, MICHAEL
A celebrated Rosicrucian and interpreter
and defender of Rosicrueianism. He was born at Resinsburg, in
Holstein, in 1568, and died at Magdeburg in 1620, Spence says
1622 (EncycZopsedia of Occultism, 1920) though the former figure
is usually given. He is said to have been the first to introduce
Rosicrucianism into England. He wrote many works on the system,
among which the most noted are Atlanta Fugiens, 1618; Septimana
Philosophica, 1620; De Fraternitate Rosoe Crucis, 1618; and Lusus
Serius, 1617. Some of his contemporaries having denied the existence
of the Rosicrucian Order, Maier in his writings has refuted the
calumny and warmly defended the Society, of which, in one of his
works, he speaks thus: "Like the Pythagoreans and Fgyptians,
the Rosicrucians exact vows of silence and secrecy. Ignorant men
have treated the whole as a fiction; but this has arisen from
the five years probation to which they subject even well-qualified
novices before they se admitted to the higher mysteries, and within
this period they are to learn how to govern their own tongues."
MAIMONIDES
Maimonides has been described "as the
greatest Jewish figure since Old Testament times." Measured
by any standard, and whether by a Jewish or a Gentile one, he
was one of the towering men of the Middle Ages; in manhood, in
learning, in power of mind, in his accomplishments for good, he
was a greater man than Charlemagne, Thomas Aquinas, or Pope Gregory
because he accomplished as much as any one of them did, but did
it solely by means of his own greatness, and had no vast machinery
of government, or church, or armies to make use of. The whole
Jewish people of his time were not only widely separated but were
bewildered, and often in despair; the final bitterness of the
Diaspora had become almost too great for them to endure.
It was to them as well as for them that
he wrote "their Bible next to the Bible," The Guide
for the People. In it he advised them to discard ancient superstitions;
to cease to attempt to carry out into minute detail regulations
originally designed for Palestine; to cease to bewail and to lament
a past which now was too far in the past to keep alive; and since
they were excluded from the land, church, government, and army
to turn to and to make their own the countries of the mind, to
become scholars, artists, physicians (as he was himself), linguists,
scientists, philosophers, because these terms of work were owned
by neither pope nor king and knew of no difference between Jew
and Gentile "is geometry," he asked, "Jew
or Gentile? is scholarship? is medicine?"
There is no discoverable connection in history
between Maimonides and Freemasonry at any point, yet, paradoxically,
he is one of the subjects Masonic students must study. A school
of Masonic writers, small but influential, has for half a century
been trying to show that one of the roots or sources of Freemasonry
was in the Kabbala In his great History of Jews, and speaking
as a representative of a large school of Jewish historians, Graetz
sets forth at length evidence to prove:
(1) that the Kabbala consisted of three
or four books written by Spanish Jews in the Thirteenth Century;
(2) that the rationalism (used in no sectarian sense) of Maimonides
had won over the Jews of Spain;
(3) that the Kabbala was a reaction to it;
(4) that the occultism, mysticisms, and supposedly secret sciences
in the Kabbalistic books concealed a superficial kind of thinking,
not as profound as it may appear to be;
(5) that the claims made in them for the antiquity of their jargon
and their doctrines were groundless, and in some instances were
consciously false;
(6) and finally that there was no unity of thought among the Kabbalists
themselves, and that if they had written their books in intelligible
language, as they easily could have done, they had little to say.
To do justice to himself a Masonic student must therefore study
Maimonides and the Cabbala together, because the former is the
key to the latter.
Maimonides was a Spanish Jew, of immense
learning in many fields; he was born in 1135, died in 1204.
When in the Thirteenth Century Thomas Aquinas
wrote his Summa, afterwards declared to be the orthodox Roman
Catholic theology, his purpose at the time was to make a reply
for his Church as against the science and philosophy coming out
of Spain, the one European country in which learning flourished;
it is significant that he selected as his adversaries Avicenna
and the Arab philosophers; he probably was afraid to attempt to
encompass Maimonides because his own learning was too meager,
too wholly local and theological, to cope with the encyclopedic
learning of the great Jew. It was for this reason that while Thomas
found the machinery of argument by which to incorporate the Arabic
scholars' Greek learning (what of it he knew) into his Summa he
left out of it the whole scope of Jewish learning, though his
own Church had officially declared the Old Testament to be infallibly
inspired. This failure, or lack, on the part of Thomas was not
the least of the ultimate sources of much antisemitism centuries
later.
MAINE
Jeremy Gridley, Provincial Grand Master
for Massachusetts, granted authority to Alexander Ross to constitute
the first Lodge in Maine at Falmouth, afterwards Portland. Ross
died November 24, 1768, and a petition signed by eleven Brethren
was sent to John Rowe who succeeded Gridley. On March 30, 1769,
he granted a new Charter, deputizing William Tyng to act as Master.
In 1772 this Lodge resolved, as there was some dispute about the
matter, to use the Ancient and Modern Rituals on alternate evenings.
Maine was admitted into the Union of the States in 1819, at which
time there were thirty-one Lodges in the new State. Twenty-nine
of these at a meeting called by Simon Greenleaf agreed to constitute
a Grand Lodge. On June 1, 1820, twenty-four Bodies were represented
and chose their Grand Officers.. William King, Governor of the
State, was elected the first Grand Master. The disappearance of
Morgan in 1826 and the consequent anti-Masonic feeling caused
a great number of the Lodges in Maine as in New York and Pennsylvania
to cease work for a considerable period. In 1870, however, the
Craft had grown so strong again that there were one hundred and
fifty-four Lodges at work in the State.
The Grand Chapter of Massachusetts granted
a Warrant to organize a Chapter in Portland, February 13, 1805,
as Mount Vernon Chapter. Montgomery, New Jerusalem, Jerusalem
and Mount Vernon Chapters met in convention at Portland on February
7, 1821, and adopted provisionally the Constitution of the Grand
Chapter of Massachusetts. Companion Charles Fox of Portland was
elected Grand High Priest and Companion James Lorin Child of Augusta,
Grand Secretary. The Grand Royal Arch Chapter of Maine, thus constituted,
was incorporated by special Act of the State Legislature, approved
by the Governor, January 22, 1822.
In the early days of Select Freemasonry
in Maine a Council was organized, and worked under the General
Grand Chapter. Later, when the General Grand Chapter gave up control
of the Degrees, the Brethren organized three Councils King Solomon,
Mount Vernon and Jerusalem all chartered by the Grand Council
of Massachusetts and Rhode Island. Three representatives of each
of these Councils with twenty other Companions met in Convention
at Portland, May 3, 1855, to organize a Grand Council. Companion
Robert P. Dunlap of Brunswick was chosen chairman and elected
Grand Puissant.
The date of Maine Commandery, No. 1, at
Gardiner, is recorded in the Proceedings of 1856 as March 17,
1827, but in the Proceedings of 1916 it appears as May 14, 1821.
Maine, No. 1; Portland, No. 2, and Saint John's, No. 3, met in
Convention and constituted on May 5, 1852, the Grand Commandery
of Maine.
Portland saw the first introduction of the
Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite to the State. On May 14, 1857,
were chartered the Yates Lodge of Perfection, the Portland Council
of Princes of Jerusalem. and the Dunlap Chapter of Rose Croix.
The Maine Consistory, Portland was chartered May 22, 1862.
MAINWARING, COLONEL
Initiated into Freeze masonry at Warrington,
1646, with his brother-in-law, Elias Ashmole.
MAISTRE, JOSEPH DE
Born at Chamberg, France, April 1, 1754;
died February 26, 1821. Diplomat and man of letters. A Roman Catholic
of orthodox extremes against the Revolution in France and supporting
the infallibility of the Pope. He is mentioned in Albert Lantoine's
Histoire de la Franc-Magonnerie, 1925, as a Freemason (see page
179 and other references in above work; also Joseph de Maistre,
franc-mason, Paul Vulliaud, Paris, 1926).
MAITRE
The French word meaning Master and freely
used as a part of many names of Degrees (see Master) .
MAITRE MAÇON
The name of the Third Degree in French
MAITRESSE AGISSANTE
French, meaning Ading Mistress. The title
of the presiding officer of a female Lodge in the Egyptian Rite
of Cagliostro.
MAITRESSE MAÇON
The Third Degree of the French Rite of Adoption.
We have no equivalent word in English. It signifies a Mistress
in Freemasonry.
MAÎTRISE
This expressive word wants an equivalent
in English, Preeman's Right and Mastership come nearest. The French
use La Maîtrise to designate the Third or Master's Degree.
MAJOR
The Sixth Degree of the German Rose Croix.
MAJOR ILLUMINATE
The Latin term is Illuminatus Major. The
Eighth Degree of the Illuminati of Bavaria.
MAJORITY
Elections in Masonic Bodies are as a general
rule decided by a majority of the votes cast A plurality vote
is not admissible unless it has been provided for by a special
by-law.
MAKE
"To make Masons" is a very ancient
term; used in the oldest Charges extant as synonymous with the
verb to initiate or receive into the Fraternity. It is found in
the Larnsdowne Manuscript, whose date is the latter half of the
sixteenth century. "These be all the charges . . . read at
the making of a Mason."
MAKING AT SIGHT
With the publication of the Minutes and
histories of early Eighteenth Century Lodges of England, Canada,
and the United States the widely discussed question of "making
a Mason at Sight" has been set in a new frame-work of facts,
and given a new meaning (See page 941.)
More data will be discovered but in the
light of present knowledge it appears that while the phrase is
apparently of American origin, and perhaps came first into use
in Pennsylvania, the conferring of the Three Degrees in a condensed
form on a Candidate in one evening (consisting, therefore, of
little more than the OB's and the Modes of Recognition) was not
only permitted among early English Lodges, but was in universal
practice among them, and they considered it a Lodge prerogative.
It continued in some American Lodges as late as 1860. A meeting
for "making at sight" was called an "Emergency
Meeting" (or Communication); during it a Candidate was Entered,
Passed, Raised, and elected to membership in about two hound of
time. Records of these Emergency Meetings stud the Minutes of
at least 200 Eighteenth Century English and American Lodges.
It has been an accepted theory that Making
at Sight was a prerogative seized or created by Grand Masters
in order to enlarge the powers of their office; it is now plain
that the-opposite-occurred; that so many Lodges took to "Emergent
Makings" that Grand Masters were forced to reserve the right
of such makings to their own office in order to put a stop to
what had become an evil. These facts are fraternally called to
the attention of those British Brethren who have criticized and
even satirized "Making at Sight" as an "Americanism";
except that it is now (fortunately) reserved to Grand Masters
it is a Briticism, and one in practice since the first half of
the Eighteenth Century among nearly all English Lodges. Moreover,
English Masons continue even now a constituted custom of "making
at sight" in principle though it refers to Lodges rather
than to Masons; for it is considered that to "make"
a new Lodge is the Grand Master's prerogative. In the beginning
Grand Masters first consented to the forming of a new Lodge and
then appeared in person to constitute it, or else sent a personal
deputy; what were called Warrants were not legal documents but
personal communications which gave Grand Master's consent.
In the United States a Grand Master can
issue a temporary Dispensation to form a Lodge, in order that
for a period the Lodge can work on probation; a Charter can be
issued only by a Grand Lodge at its Regular Annual Communication.
In constitutional principle the making of Lodges by the Grand
Master's personal act could be identical with making a Mason "at
sight" by his own personal act. If English Brethren reply
that we are inconsistent in recognizing the Grand Master's prerogative
to make Masons while refusing him the prerogatives to make Lodges,
many American authorities on jurisprudence will agree with them.
Even so, there is something to be said in favor of Making at Sight,
regardless of how inconsistent it may be, be cause once in a long
while a Petitioner finds himself in circumstances where he must
receive in one night the Degrees he has been elected to, or can
receive none of them.
Those who have sought in times immemorial
for some origin or authorization for the Grand Master's prerogative
to Make at Sight need never have looked far afield, because
it was recognized as legal by the Ancient Grand Lodge of 1751,
from which so much of our Work and so many of our practices are
derived. In the Records of that Grand Lodge, under date of April
16, 1777, a Minute shows that Dermott discussed the subject, admitted
the Grand Master's right, but expressed it as his opinion that
a Grand Master ought not to Make at Sight except when he can make
a sufficient number to form a Lodge. (The Minute is quoted in
full in Gould's History of Freemasonry; Scribner's; 1936; page
176.)
A paragraph may be quoted as one specimen
from many others in Lodge histories to show that for years after
the date of the Dermott Minute the Lodge custom continued; it
is from Some Memorials of the Globe Lodge, No. if; by Henry Sadler;
London; Spencer & Company; 1904; page 45: "The 3rd of
May, 1810, was the last occasion in this Lodge when the three
degrees were conferred on candidates on the same evening, but
it was only in case of emergency that the three degrees were given
...."
MALACH
Hebrew word, meaning an angel. A significant
word in the advanced Degrees. Lenning gives it as Melek or Melech.
MALACHI or MALACHIAS
The last of the prophets. A significant
word in the Thirty-second Degree of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish
Rite.
MALAY PENINSULA
The most southern part of continental Asia.
The Grand Lodges of England and Scotland have each chartered several
Lodges in this district, and Freemasonry flourishes in Singapore,
Selangor, Penang, Ipoh, Malacca, Seremban, Taiping Perak, and
Teluk Anson. The first Lodge ever established here was the Neptune
Lodge at Penang, warranted September 6, 1809, but, after becoming
dormant and then reviving, it finally became extinct in 1862.
MALCOLM CANMORE CHARTER
See Manuscripts, Aprocriphal
MALCOLM III
King of Scotland. Reported to have chartered
the Lodge of Saint John of Glasgow in the year 1051.
MALLET
One of the Working-Tools of a Mark Master,
having the same emblematic meaning as the Common Gavel in the
Entered Apprentice's Degree.
It teaches us to correct the irregularities
of temper, and, like enlightened reason, to curb the aspirations
of unbridled ambition, to depress the malignity of envy, and to
moderate the ebullition of anger. It removes from the mind all
the excrescences of vice, and fits it, as a well-wrought stone,
for that exalted station in the great temple of nature to which,
as an emanation of the Deity, it is entitled.
The Mallet or Setting Maul is also an emblem
of the Third Degree, and is said to have been the implement by
which the stones were set up at the Temple. It is often improperly
confounded with the Common Gavel.
The French Freemasons, to whom the word
Gavel is unknown, uniformly use maillet, or mallet, in its stead,
and confound its symbolic use, as the implement of the presiding
officer, with the mallet of the English and American Mark Master.
MALTA
Anciently known as Melita (see Acts xxviii,
1). A small island in the Mediterranean Sea, which, although occupying
only about 91 square miles, possessed for several centuries a
greater degree of celebrity than was attached to any other territory
of so little extent. It is now a possession of the British Government,
but was occupied from 1530 to 1798 by the Knights Hospitalers,
then called Knights of Malta, upon whom it was conferred in the
former year by Charles V.
The Saint John's Lodge of Secrecy and Harmony is claimed to "have
assembled as a Lodge since 30 June 1788" (see Lane's Masonic
Record, page 220).
On July 2, 1788, Secrecy and Harmony Lodge
was reopened and on March 30 the following year it was warranted
as No. 539 by the Grand Lodge of England. In 1815 Brother Waller
R. Wright was appointed Provincial Grand Master.
Gibraltar was at one time part of the Malta
Masonic territory and in 1914 there were five English Lodges located
there.
Tunis became part of the Malta District
in 1869.
MALTA, CROSS OF
See Cross, Maltese
MALTA, KNIGHT OF
See Knight of Malta
MALTA, KNIGHTS OF
The history of the Knights of Malta (nee
Knights of Hospital, Knights of St. John, etc.) was until recent
years written by itself, that is, from its own records and reports
of itself; or else by its enemies, who have not always been scrupulous;
it is now possible to re-write its whole history in terms of modern,
impartial scholarship. One of the results of that scholarship
has been to break the one history of this Order into four or five
almost separate histories, because the Order transformed, or at
least transmogrified itself that many times.
As regards Freemasonry it may be said in
general that the Knights were antipathetic to it, or to any such
teachings or truths as Masons held at any period. In particular,
the Order was twice used in attempts to destroy Freemasonry, and
it therefore has at one time or another belonged to that long
chapter of the history of the Fraternity which is called Anti
Masonry.
It had become an open and confessed military
arm of the Vatican before the Popes issued their first Bull against
Freemasonry in 1738, and it was ordered to oppose Freemasonry
wherever it could. In about 1800 it was instrumental in thriving
Freemasonry out of Russia. When Metternich after 1815 and the
Congress of Vienna became the dictator of Europe he made the complete
elimination of the Fraternity one of his open and principal aims;
and to a large extent he succeeded for some years, and may be
described as the most powerful Anti-Mason of the Nineteenth Century.
The Knights of Malta were one of the agencies
employed by him. (See page 539.) (Complete, detailed, fair, modern
histories of the Order are On the Trail of the Eight-Pointed Cross
1G. P. Putman's; View York; 1940]; and Malta of the Knights, by
E. W. Schermerhorn; Houghton, Mifflin; New York 1929; full bibliographies
in both. For a more condensed account see House of the Temple;
Study of Malta and its Knights in the French Revolution, by Frederick
W. Ryan; Burns Oates and Washburn; London; 1930; bibliographies.
Fifty Years in the Malts Order, by R. E. A. Land; two volumes;
Toronto; Can.; 1928; contains also a detailed account of the Masonic
Knights of Malta.)
After the first dissolution of the Order
in Malta, an attempt was made to revive it in France to help the
Greeks in their war with the Turks, after the latter had shocked
Europe by a massacre of Christians on the Island of Scio; and
they appealed to such Knights as were in England to assist them.
In consequence, the English branch of the
Order was re established -it and in this action English members
were permitted to be members of the Anglican Church. The English
Knights based their rights on a Charter which had been granted
by Queen Mary, but on grounds that were legally insecure. To remove
this uncertainty Queen Victoria granted a new Charter in 1888.
After this reincorporation, "the method of government of
the Order was framed, as far as possible, on the precedents of
the old Order.... The Sovereign of the Realm is the Sovereign
Head and Patron, and no admission can be made to the Order except
with his Majesty's sanction." From 1910 until his death the
Duke of Connaught (Grand Master, the United Grand Lodge of England
at the time) was Grand Prior.
The Order organized and maintained the St.
John Ambulance Association and St. John Ambulance Brigade, with
a highly efficient and very large membership of members expertly
trained in First Aid. "In June, 1912, as a special mark of
their appreciation of the work of the Brigade, the King and Queen
inspected in Windsor Great Park, 11,000 men and 3,000 Nursing
Sisters, including many representatives from Overseas." It
furnished over 17,000 Hospital Orderlies in World War I; maintains
a hospital; carries on relief work abroad; and carried on very
extensive relief work in World War II.
Notes. The above is in correction of one
or two statements made in last paragraph on page 541. The indispensable
reference work on the modern Order is The Order of the Hospital
of St. John and its Grand Priory of England, by H. W. Fincham;
W. H. ,& L. Collingridge; 148 Oldersgate St., E. C., London;
1915. Beginning on page 78 it gives a list of the Grand Priors
of England from Walter, 1143, to William Weston, who was Prior
when Henry VIII dissolved the Order in 1540, and Thomas Tresham
who held office of the revived Priory under Queen Mary in 1557;
and for the period when English Priors were stationed in Malta
under Richard Shelley, in 1566, to Girolamo Layarelli in 1806;
and from Sir Robert Peat, first Prior after revival of Order in
England, in 1831, to the Duke of Connaught, in 1910.
MALTESE CROSS
See Cross, Maltese
MAN
Among the several significance of word are
the following:
1. Man has been called the Microcosm, or
little world, in contradistinction to the Macrocosm, or great
world, by some fanciful writers on metaphysics, by reason of a
supposed correspondence between the different parts and qualities
of his nature and those of the universe. But in Masonic symbolism
the idea is borrowed from Christ and the Apostles, who repeatedly
refer to man as a symbol of the Temple.
2. A man was inscribed on the standard of
the Tribe of Reuben, and is borne on the Royal Arch banners as
appropriate to the Grand Master of the Second Veil. It was also
the charge in the third quarter of the arms of the Atholl Grand
Lodge.
3. Der Mann, or the man, is the Second
Degree of the German Union.
4. To be "a man, not a woman," is one of the qualifications
for Masonic initiation. It is the first, and therefore the most
important, qualification mentioned in the ritual.
MAN or PERFECTED CREATION
The symbol representing perfected creation,
which is very common on ancient Hindu monuments in China,"
embraces so many of the Masonic emblems, and so directly refers
to several of the elementary principles taught in philosophic
Freemasonry, that it is here introduced with its explanations.
Forlong, in his Faiths of Man, gives this arrangement:
Ais the Earth, or foundation on which
all build.
WaWater, as in an egg, or as condensed fire and ether.
RaFlie, or the elements in motion.
KaAir, or windJuno. or Io ni; a condensed element.
ChaEther, or Heaven, the cosmical Fermer
The accompanying illustration shows a design
that is frequently found in India. As these symbols are readily
interpretable by those conversant with Masonic hieroglyph it may
be seen that the elements, in their ascending scale, show the
perfected creation. Forlong remarks that:
As it was difficult to show the All-pervading
Ether Egypt for this purpose. surrounded her figures with a powder
of stars instead of flame, which on Indra's garments were Yonis.
This figure gradually developed, becoming in time a very concrete
man, standing on two legs instead of a square basethe horns
of the crescent Air, being outstretched. formed the arms, and
the refulgent Flame. the head, which, with the Greeks and Romans,
represented the Sun, or Fire, and gives Light to all. To this
being, it was claimed, there were given seven senses; and thus,
perfect and erect, stood Man, rising above the animal state.
A discussion of the subject is to be found
in Chinese Thought, by Brother Paul Carus, a treatise of decided
interest.
The seven senses were seeing, hearing, tasting,
feeling, smelling, understanding, and speech (see Ecclesiasticus,
in the Apocrypha xvii, 1-5):
"The Lord created man," and "They
received the use of the five operations of the Lord; and in the
sixth place he imparted (to) them understanding, and in the seventh
speech, an interpreter of the cogitations thereof."
The words "seven senses" also
occur in the poem of Taliesin, called Y Bid Mavrr, or the Macrocosm
(British Magazine, volume xxi, page 30). See further the Mysterium
Magnum of Jacob Boehmen, which teaches "how the soul of man,
or his inward holy body," was compounded of the seven properties
under the influence of the seven planets:
I will adore my Father,
My God, my Supporter,
Who placed, throughout my head,
The soul of my reason,
And made for my perception
My seven faculties
Of Fire, and Earth, and Water, and Air
And mist, and flowers, And the southerly wind,
As it were seven senses of reason
For my Father to impel me:
With the first I shall be animated
With the second I shall touch,
With the third I shall cry out,
With the fourth I shall taste
With the fifth I shall see,
With the sixth I shall hear,
With the seventh I shall smell.
MANDATE
From the Latin, meaning That which is commanded.
The Benedictine editors of Du Cange define mandatum as "Breve
aut Edictum Regium," that is, a Royal Brief or Edict, and
mandamentum as "literae quibus magistratus aliquid mandat,"
meaning, letters in which a magistrate commands anything. Hence
the orders and decrees of a Grand Master or a Grand Lodge are
called Mandates, and implicit obedience to them is a Masonic obligation.
There is an appeal, yet not a suspensive one, from the Mandate
of a Grand Master to the Grand Lodge, but there is none from the
latter.
MANGO
The branches of this tree are a prominent
feature in all Eastern religious ceremonies. The mango is the
apple-tree of India, with which man, in Indian tale, tempted Eve.
MANGOURIT, MICHELANGE BERNARD DE
A distinguished member of the Grand Orient
of France. He founded in 1776, at Rennes, the Rite of Sublimes
Elus de la Vérité, or Sublime Elects of Truth, and
at Paris the androgynous, both sexes, society of Dames of Mount
Thabor. He also created the Masonic Literary Society of Free Thinkers,
which existed for three years. He delivered lectures which were
subsequently published under the title of Cours de Philosophic
Maçonnique, in 500 pages, quarto. He also delivered a great
many lectures and discourses before various Lodges, several of
which were published. He died, after a long and severe illness,
February 17, 1829.
MANICHAEANS
Also termed Gnostics. A sect taking its
rise in the middle of the third century, whose belief was in two
eternal principles of good and evil. They derived their name from
Manes, a philosopher of Persian birth, sometimes called Manichaeus.
Of the two principles, Ormudz was the author of the good, while
Ahriman was the master spirit of evil. The two classes of neophytes
were, the true, siddi kun; the listeners, Samma un.
MANICHEENS, LES FRERES
A secret Italian Society, founded, according
to Thory (Acta Latomorum i, 325), and Clavel (Histoire Pittoresque,
page 407) in the eighteenth century, at which the doctrines of
Manes were set forth in several grades.
MANITOBA
Northern Light Lodge was granted a Dispensation
in 1864 by Brother A. T. Pierson, then Grand Master in Minnesota.
The new Lodge was organized at Fort Garry (Winnipeg) with Brother
Dr. John Schultz as Worshipful Master but it ceased to exist after
a few years' work. When Red River Settlement, as it was then called,
became the Province of Manitoba the Grand Lodge of Canada assumed
Jurisdiction and chartered Prince Rupert's Lodge, Winnipeg, in
December, 1870. Prince Rupert, Lisgar, and Ancient Landmark Lodges
held a Convention on May 12, 1875, and formed the Grand Lodge
of Manitoba with the Rev. Dr. XV. C. Clarke as Grand Master. Until
the Provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan were established and
created Grand Lodges of their own the Grand Lodge of Manitoba
controlled the Craft in the Northwest Territories and the Yukon
Territory as well as in Manitoba
MANN, DER
German, meaning the Man, the second grade
of the Deutsche Union.
MANNA, POT OF
Among the articles laid up in the Ark of
the Covenant by Aaron was a Pot of Manna. In the Substitute Ark,
commemorated in the Royal Arch Degree, there was, of course, a
representation of it. Manna has been considered as a symbol of
life; not the transitory, but the enduring one of a future world.
Hence the Pot of Manna, Aaron's Rod that budded anew, and the
Book of the Law, which teaches Divine Truth, all found together,
are appropriately considered as the symbols of that eternal life
which it is the design of the Royal Arch Degree to teach.
MANNINGHAM, THOMAS
Dr. Thomas Manningham was a physician, of
London, of much repute in the eighteenth century. He took an active
interest in the concerns of Freemasonry, being Deputy Grand Master
of England, 1752-6. According to Oliver ( Revelations of a Square,
page 86), he was the author of the prayer now so well known to
the Fraternity, which was presented by him to the Grand Lodge,
and adopted as a form of prayer to be used at the initiation of
a candidate. Before that period, no prayer was used on such occasions,
and the one composed by Manningham, Oliver says with the assistance
of Anderson, which is doubtful, as Anderson died in 1739, is here
given as a document of the time. It will be seen that in our day
it has been somewhat modified, Preston making the first change;
and that, originally used as one prayer, it has since been divided,
in this country at least, into two, the first part being used
as a prayer at the opening of a Lodge, and the latter at the initiation
of a candidate.
Most Holy and Glorious Lord God, thou Architect
of Heaven and Earth, who art the Giver of all good Gifts and Graces-
and hath promised that where two or three are gathered together
in thy Name, thou wilt be in the Midst of them- in thy Name we
assemble and meet together, most humbly beseeching thee to bless
us in all our Undertakings: to give us thy Holy Spirit to enlighten
our minds with Wisdom and Understanding- that we may know and
serve thee aright, that all our Doings may tend to thy Glory and
the Salvation of our Souls. And we beseech thee, O Lord God, to
bless this our present Undertaking, and to grant that this our
Brother may dedicate his Life to thy Service, and be a true and
faithful Brother amongst us. undue him with Divine Wisdom, that
he may, with the secrets of Masonry, be able to unfold the Mysteries
of Godliness and Christianity This we humbly beg, in the Name
and for the Sake of Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior, Amen
Doctor Manningham rendered other important
services to Freemasonry by his advocacy of healthy reforms and
his determined opposition to the schismatic efforts of the Ancient
Freemasons. He died February 3, 1794. The third edition of the
Boot; of Constitutions (1756, page 258) speaks of him in exalted
terms as "a diligent and active officer." Two interesting
letters written by Doctor Manningham are given at length in Gould's
Concise History of Freemasonry (pages 328-34); one dated December
3, 1756, and addressed to what was then the Provincial Grand Lodge
of Holland, refusing leave for the holding of Scotch Lodges and
pointing out that Freemasonry is the same in all parts of the
world; and another dated July 1, 1757, also dealing with the so-called
Scotch Freemasonry, and explaining that its orders of Knighthood
were unknown in England, where the only Orders known are those
of Masters, Fellow Crafts, and Apprentices.
We may add to the above article, written
by Brother Hawkins, retarding the prayer, a further comment upon
its age with the addition of the word new preceding Brother it
is found in the edition of the Constitutions printed at Dublin,
1730, and reprinted by Brother Richard Spencer, 1870. This seems
to antedate the activity of Doctor Manningham.
MANTLE
A dress placed over all the others. It is
of very ancient date, being a part of the costume of the Hebrews,
Greeks, and Romans. Among the Anglo-Saxons it was the decisive
mark of military rank, being confined to the cavalry. In the medieval
ages, and on the institution of chivalry, the long, trailing mantle
was especially reserved as one of the insignia of knighthood,
and was worn by the knight as the most August and noble decoration
that he could have, when he was not dressed in his armor.
The general color of the mantle, in imitation
of that of the Roman soldiers, was scarlet, which was lined with
ermine or other precious furs. But some of the Orders wore mantles
of other colors. Thus the Knights Templar were clothed with a
white mantle having a red cross on the breast, and the Knights
Hospitaler a black mantle with a white cross. The mantle is still
worn in England and other countries of Europe as a mark of rank
on state occasions by peers, and by some magistrates as a token
of official rank.
MANTLE OF HONOR
The mantle worn by a knight was called the
Mantle of donor. This mantle was presented to a knight whenever
he was made by the king.
MANU
By reference to the Book of the Dead, it
will be found that this word covers an ideal space corresponding
to the word West, in whose bosom is received the setting sun (see
Truth).
MANUAL
Relating to the hand, from the Latin manus, a hand. see the Masonic
use of the word in the next two articles.
MANUAL POINT OF ENTRANCE
Freemasons are, in a peculiar manner, reminded,
by the hand, of the necessity of a prudent and careful observance
of all their pledges and duties, and hence this organ suggests
certain symbolic instructions in relation to the virtue of prudence.
MANUAL SIGN
In the early English lectures this term
is applied to what is now called the Manual Point of Entrance.
MANUSCRIPTS
Anderson tells us, in the second edition
of his Constitutions, that in the year 1717 Grand Master Payne
"desired any Brethren to bring to the Grand Lodge any old
writings and records concerning Masons and Masonry, in order to
show the usages of ancient times, and several old copies of the
Gothic Constitutions were produced and collated" (constitutions
1738, page 110); but in consequence of a jealous supposition that
it would be wrong to commit anything to print which related to
Freemasonry, an act of Masonic vandalism was perpetrated.
For Anderson further informs us (page 111),
that in 1720, "at some private Lodges, several very valuable
manuscripts, for they had nothing yet in print, concerning the
Fraternity, their Lodges, Regulations, Charges, Secrets, and Usa
yes, particularly one written by Mr. Nicholas Stone, the Warden
of Inigo Jones, were too hastily burnt by some scrupulous Brothers,
that those papers might not fall into strange hands." The
recent labors of Masonic scholars in England, among whom the late
William James Hughan deserves especial notice, have succeeded
in rescuing many of the old Masonic manuscripts from oblivion,
and we are now actually in possession of more of these heretofore
unpublished treasures of the Craft than were probably accessible
to Anderson and his contemporaries (see Records, Old, and Manuscripts,
Old).
MANUSCRIPTS, APOCRYPHAL
There are certain documents that at various
times have been accepted as genuine, but which are now rejected,
and considered to be fabrications, by most, if not by all, critical
Masonic writers. The question of their authenticity has been thoroughly
gone into by Brother R. F. Gould History of Freemasonry, chapter
xi and he places them all "within the category of Apocryphal
Manuscripts."
The first is the Leland-Locke Manuscript
(see Leland Manuscript) .
The second is the Steinmetz Catechism, given
by Krause as one of the three oldest documents belonging to the
Craft, but of which Gould says, "there appears to me nothing
in the preceding 'examination' (or catechism) that is capable
of sustaining the claims to antiquity which have been advanced
on its behalf."
The third is the Malcolm Canmore Charter,
which came to light in 1806, consequent upon the "claim of
the Glasgow Freemen Operatinc Saint John's Lodge to take precedence
of the other Lodges in the Masonic procession, at the Saving of
the foundation-stone of Nelson's Monument on Glasgow Green, although
at that time it was an independent organization According to the
Charter, the Glasgow Saint John's Lodge was given priority over
all the other Lodges in Scotland by Malcolm III, King of Scots,
in 1051. The controversy as to the document was lively, but finally
it was pronounced to be a manufactured parchment, and the Grand
Lodge of Scotland declined to recognize it of value.
The fourth is that of Krause, known as Prince
Edwin's Constitution of 926. Upon this unquestioned reliance had
for decades been placed, then it came to be doubted, and is now
little credited by inquiring Freemasons. Brother Gould closes
with the remark:
The original document, as commonly happens
in forgeries of this description, is missing; and how, under all
the circumstances of the case Krause could have constituted himself
the champion of its authenticity, it is difficult to conjecture.
Possibly, however, the explanation may be, that in impostures
of this character, credulity, on the one part, is a strong temptation
to deceit on the other, especially to deceit of which no personal
injury is the consequence and which flatters the student of old
documents with his own ingenuity.
These remarks, says Brother Hawkins, who
prepared this article, are specially quoted as relating to almost
all apocryphal documents.
The fifth is the Charter of Cologne, a document
in cipher. bearing the date June 24, 1535, as to which see Cologne,
Charter of.
The sixth is the Larmenius Charter, or The
Charter of Transmission, upon which rests the claims of the French
Order of the Temple to being the lineal successors of the historic
Knights Templar, for which see Temple, Order of the.
MANUSCRIPTS, OLD
The following is a list, arranged as far
as possible in sequence of age, of the old Masonic Manuscripts,
now usually known as the Old Charges. They generally consist of
three parts first, an opening prayer or invocation; secants,
the legendary history of the Craft; third, the peculiar statutes
and duties, the regulations and observances, incumbent on Freemasons.
There is no doubt that they were read to candidates on their initiation,
and probably each Lodge had a copy which was used for this purpose.
The late Brother W. J. Hughan made a special study of these old
Manuscripts, and was instrumental in discovering a great many
of them; and his book The Old Charges of British Freemasons published
in 1895, has long been a standard work on the subject.
No |
Name |
Date |
Owner |
Published |
1 |
Regius (also Halliwell) |
About 1390 |
British Museum |
By James O. Halliwell in 1849 By H.J. Whymper in 1889 By the Quator Coronati Lodge in 1889 |
2 |
Cooke |
About 1450 |
British Museum |
By Matthew Cooke in 1861
by the Quatuor Coronati Lodge in 1890 |
3 |
Dowland |
1550 |
Unknown |
By James Dowland, in Gentleman's Magazine,
May, 1815, W. J. Hughan, Old Charges, 1872. |
4 |
Grand Lodge No 1 |
1583 |
Grand Lodge of England |
By W. J. Hughan,
in Old Charges,1872; by H. Sadler, in Masonic Facts and Fictions
1887; in History of Freemasonry and Concordant Orders, 1891; by
the Quatuor Coronati Lodge in 1892. |
5 |
Lansdown |
About 1600 |
British Museum |
In Freemasons' Quarterly Retried 1848 in Freemasons' Magazine, l558; in Hughan's Old Charges, 1872 by the Quatuor Coronati Lodge in 1890.
|
6 |
York, No 1 |
About 1600 |
York Lodge No 236 |
In Hughan's Old Charges, 1872; in Masonic Magazine, 1873; in Ancient York Masonic Rolls 1894
|
7 |
Wood |
1610 |
Prov. G. Lodge Worcester |
In Masonic Magazine, 1881 by the Quatuor Coronati Lodge in 1895
|
8 |
John T Thorp |
1629 |
J.T. Thorp, Leicester |
In Ars Quatuor Coronatorum, volume ix, 1898, in Lodge of Research Transactions, 1898-99
|
9 |
Sloane, 3848 |
1646 |
British Museum |
In Hughan's Old Charges 1872 in Masonic Magazine, 1873; by the Quatuor Coronati Lodge in 1891
|
10 |
Sloane 3323 |
1659 |
British Museum |
In Hughan's Masonic Sketches and Reprints, 1871; by the Quatuor Coronati Lodge in 1891. |
11 |
Sloane, 3329 |
1640-1700 |
British Museum |
Voice of Masonry, 1872
|
12 |
Grand Lodge No 2 |
About 1650 |
Grand Lodge of England |
By the Quatuor Coronati Lodge in 1892. |
13 |
Harleian, 1942 |
About 1650 |
British Museum |
In Freemasons' Quarterly Review, 1836, in Hughan's Old Charges, 1872; by the Quatuor Coronati Lodge in 1890.
|
14 |
G.W. Bain |
About 1650 |
R Wilson, Leeds |
In Ars Quatuor Coronatorum, volume xx, 1907.
|
15 |
Harleian, 2054 |
About 1660 |
British Museum |
In Hughan's Masonic Sketches and Reprints, 1871; in Masonic Magazine, 1873; by the Quatuor Coronati Lodge in 1891.
|
16 |
Phillips, No 1 |
About 1667 |
Rev J Fenwick, Cheltenham |
By the Quatuor Coronati Lodge in 1894.
|
17 |
Phillips, No 2 |
About 1667 |
Rev J Fenwick |
In Masonic Magazine, 1876, in Archaelogical Library, 1878; by the Quatuor Coronati Lodge in l594.
|
18 |
Lochmore |
1650-1700 |
Prov G. Lodge of Worcester |
In Masonic Magizine, 1882 |
19 |
Buchanan |
1650-1700 |
Grand Lodge of England |
ln Gould's History of Freemasonry, by Quatuor Coronati Lodge in 1892.
|
20 |
Kilwinning |
About 1665 |
Kilwinning Lodge, Scotland |
In Hughan's Masonic Sketches and Reprints, 1871; in Lyon's History of the Lodge of Edinburch, 1873.
|
21 |
Ancient Sterling |
1650 - 1700 |
Ancient Sterling Lodge, Scotland |
By Hughan in 1893
|
22 |
Taylor |
About 1650 |
Prov. G. Lodge of West Yorkshire |
In Ars Quatuor Coronatorum, volume xxi, 1908
|
23 |
Atcheson Haven |
1666 |
G. Lodge of Scotland |
In Lyon's History of the Lodge of Edinburph. 1873
|
24 |
Aberdeen |
1670 |
Aberdeen Lodge No 1 tris |
In Voice of Masonry, Chicago, U. S. A., 1874 in Freemason, 1895.
|
25 |
Melrose No 2 |
1674 |
Melrose Saint John Lodge No 1 bis, Scotland |
In Masonic Magazine, 1880 in Vernon's History of FreeMasonry in Roxburgh etc., 1893.
|
26 |
Henry Heade |
1675 |
Inner Temple Library, London |
In Ars Quatuor Coronatorum, volume xxi
|
27 |
Stanley |
1677 |
West Yorkshire Masonic Library |
In West Yorkshire Masonic Reproductions, Freemason's Chronicle , 1893
|
28 |
Carson |
1677 |
E.T. Carson, Cincinati |
In Masonic Review (Cincinnati), 1890; in Freemasons' Chronicle, 1890.
|
29 |
Antiquity |
1686 |
Lodge of Antiquity, No 2, London |
In Hughan's Old Charges, 1872.
|
30 |
Col. Clarke |
1686 |
Grand Lodge of England |
In Freemason, 1888; in Conder's Hole Crafte, etc., 1894.
|
31 |
William Watson |
1687 |
West Yorkshire Masonic Library |
In Freemason, 1891; in West Yorkshire Masonic Reprints, 1891; by the Quatuor Coronati Lodge in 1895.
|
32 |
T.W. Dow |
About 1680 |
West Yorkshire Masonic Library |
In Christmas Freemason, 1888; in West Yorkshire Masonic Reprints, 1889 and 1892
|
33 |
Inigo Jones |
About 1680 |
Worcester Masonic Library |
In Masonic Magazine, 1881; by the Quatuor Coronati Lodge in 1895.
|
34 |
Dumfries No 1 |
1675 - 1700 |
Dumfries, Killwinning Lodge No 53, Scotland |
In Smith's History of the Old Lodge of Dumfries, 1892
|
35 |
Dumfries No 2 |
1675 - 1700 |
Dumfries Killwinning Lodge No 53 Scotland |
In Christmas Freemason, 1892; by Hughan 1892
|
36 |
Beaumont |
1675 - 1700 |
Prov. G. Lodge, West Yorkshire |
In Freemasons 1894.
|
37 |
Dumfries No 3 |
1675 - 1700 |
Dumfries, Kilwinning Lodge No 53, Scotland |
In Smith's History of the Old Lodge of Dumfries 1892
|
38 |
Hope |
1675 - 1700
|
Lodge of Hope, No 302, Bradford, Yorkshire |
In Hughan's Old Charges. 1872; in West Yorkshire Masonic Reprints, 1892
|
39 |
T.W. Embleton |
1675 - 1700 |
West Yorkshire Masonic Library |
In Christmas Freemason, 1889; In West Yorkshire Masonic Reprints, 1893.
|
40 |
York No 5 |
About 1670 |
York Lodge No 236 |
In Masonic Magazine, 1881; In Ancient York Masonic Constitutions, 1894
|
41 |
York No 6 |
1675 - 1700 |
York Lodge No 236 |
In Masonic Magazine, 1880; In Ancient York Masonic Constitutions, 1894
|
42 |
Colne No 1 |
1675 - 1700 |
Royal Lancashire Lodge No 116, Colne, Lancashire |
In Christmas Freemason, 1887.
|
43 |
Clapham |
About 1700 |
West Yorkshire Masonic Library |
In Freemason, 1890; In West Yorkshire Masonic Reprints, 1892.
|
44 |
Hughan |
1675 - 1700 |
West Yorkshire Masonic Library |
In West Yorkshire Masonic Reprints, 1892; In Freemason, 1892 and 1911
|
45 |
Dauntesey |
About 1690 |
R. Dauntesey, Manchester |
In Keystones Philadelphia, 1886.
|
46 |
Harris No 1 |
About 1690 |
Bedford Lodge No 157, London |
In Freemasons' Chronicle, 1882.
|
47 |
David Ramsey |
About 1690 |
The Library, Hamburg |
In Freemason, 1906
|
48 |
Langdale |
About 1690 |
G.W. Bain, Sunderland |
In Freemason, 1895
|
49 |
H.F. Beaumont |
1690 |
West Yorkshire Masonic Library |
In Freemason, 1894; In West Yorkshire Masonic Reprints, 1901.
|
50 |
Waistell |
1693 |
York Lodge No 236 |
In West Yorkshire Masonic Reprints, 1892.
|
51 |
York No 4 |
1693 |
York Lodge No 236 |
In Hughan's Masonic Sketches and Reprints, 1871; In Ancient York Masonic Rolls, 1894.
|
52 |
Thomas Foxcroft |
1699 |
Grand Lodge of England |
In Freemason, 1900
|
53 |
Newcastle College Roll |
About 1700 |
Newcastle College of Rosicrucians |
By F. F. Schnitger in 1894
|
54 |
John Strachan |
About 1700 |
Quatuor Coronati Lodge No 2076, London |
In the Transactions of the Lodge of Research 1899-1900
|
55 |
Alnwick |
1701 |
Formerly Edwin Turnbull, Alnwick, now Newcastle College |
In Hughan's Masonic Sketches and Reprints, 1871; and Old Charges, 1872; By the Newcastle College of Rosicrucians in 1895
|
56 |
York No 2 |
1704 |
York Lodge No 236 |
In Hughan's Masonic Sketches and Reprints, 1871; In Ancient York Masonic Rolls, 1894.
|
57 |
Scarborough |
1705 |
Grand Lodge of Canada |
In Philadelphia Mirror and Keystone, 1860; In Canadian Masonic Record, 1874; In Masonic Magazine, 1879; By the Quatuor Coronati Lodge in 1894; In Ancient York Masonic Rolls, 1894
|
58 |
Wallace Heaton |
1695 - 1715 |
Grand Lodge of England |
In Masonic Record, London, July, 1927.
|
59 |
Colne No 2 |
1700 - 1725 |
Royal Lancashire Lodge No 116, Colne, Lancashire |
Has not been reproduced
|
60 |
Papworth |
About 1720 |
W. Papworth, London |
In Hughan's Old Charges, 1872
|
61 |
McNab |
1722 |
West Yorkshire Masonic Library |
In West Yorkshire Masonic Reprints, 1896.
|
62 |
Haddon |
1723 |
J.S. Haddon, Wellington |
ln Hughan's Old Charges, 1895.
|
63 |
Phillipe, No 3 |
1700 - 1725 |
Rev J. Fenwick, Cheltenham |
By the Quatuor Coronati Lodge in 1894
|
64 |
Dumfries No 4 |
1700 -1725 |
Dumfries Kilwinning Lodge, No 2076, Scotland |
In Ars Quatuor Coronatorum, volume v, 1893.
|
65 |
Cama |
1700 - 1725 |
Quatuor Coronati Lodge No 2076, London |
By the Quatuor Coronati Lodge in 1891.
|
66 |
Songhurst |
About 1725 |
Quatuor Coronati Lodge No 2076, London |
Has not been reproduced.
|
67 |
Spencer |
1726 |
E.T. Carson, Cincinnati |
In Spencer's Old Constitutions, 1871.
|
68 |
Thomas Carmick |
1727 |
P.F. Smith, Pennsylvania |
In Ars Quatuor Coronatorum, volume xxii,1909. |
69 |
Woodford |
1728 |
Quatuor Coronati Lodge No 2076, London |
A copy of the Cooke Manuscript.
|
70 |
Supreme Council |
1728 |
Supreme Council, 33°, London |
A copy of the Cooke Manuscript
|
71 |
Gateshead |
About 1730 |
Lodge of Industry, No 48, Gateshead, Durham |
In Masonic Magazine, 1875
|
72 |
Rawlinson/td>
|
1725 - 1750 |
Bodleian Library, Oxford |
ln Freemasons' Monthly Magazine, 1855; In Masonic Magazine, 1876; In Ars Quatuor Coronatorum, volume xi, 1898
|
73 |
Probity |
About 1736 |
Probity Lodge No 61, Halifax, Yorkshire |
In Freemason, 1886; In West Yorkshire Masonic Reprints, 1892.
|
74 |
Levander-York |
About 1740 |
F.W. Levander, London |
In Ars Quatuor Corornatorum, volume xviii, 1905.
|
75 |
Thistle Lodge |
1756 |
Thistle Lodge No 62, Dumfries, Scotland |
Has not been reproduced.
|
76 |
Melrose No 3 |
1762 |
Melrose Saint John No 1 bis, Scotland |
Has not been reproduced.
|
77 |
Crane No 1 |
1781 |
Cestrian Lodge No 425, Chester |
In Freemason, 1884.
|
78 |
Crane No 2 |
1775 -1800 |
Cestrian Lodge No 425, Chester |
In Freemason, 1884.
|
tr>
79 |
Harris No 2 |
About 1781 |
British Museum |
By the Quatuor Coronati Lodge in 1892.
|
80 |
Tunnah |
About 1828 |
Quatuor Coronati Lodge No 2076, London |
Has not been reproduced.
|
81 |
Wren |
1852 |
Unknown |
In Masonic Magazine, 1879.
|
There are a number of manuscripts not included
in the above list but which will be found under their respective
titles elsewhere in this Encyclopedia. Some of these manuscripts
are known only by copies or by references of one kind or another
in various documents and publications. Of these we may here enumerate
the Wilson, Nos. 1 and 9, of either the sixteenth or seventeenth century;
the Dermott and Morgan of the sixteenth century;
the York, No. 3,
Doctor Plot,
Supreme Council, No. 1,
Hargrove,
Masons Company,
Roberts, Briscoe,
Baker,
Cole,
Dodd, of probably the seventeenth century, and the
Batty Langley and the Krause of the eighteenth.
MARCHESHVAN
The second month of the Jewish civil year.
It begins w ith the new moon in November, and corresponds, therefore,
to a part of that month and of December.
MARCONIS, GABRIEL MATHIEU
More frequently known as De Negre, from
his dark complexion, was the founder and first Grand Master and
Grand Hierophant of the Rite of Memphis, brought by Sam'l Honis,
a native of Cairo, from Egypt, in 1814, who with Baron Dumas and
the Marquis de la Rogne, founded a Lodge of the Rite at Montauban.
France, on April 30, 1815, which was closed March 7, 1816. In
a work entitled The Sanctuary of Memphis, by Jacques Etienne Marconis,
the author presumptively the son of G. M. Marconis who styles
himself the founder of the Rite of Memphis, thus briefly gives
an account of its origin: "The Rite of Memphis, or Oriental
Rite, was introduced into Europe by Ormus, a seraphic priest of
Alexandria and Egyptian sage, who had been converted by Saint
Mark, and reformed the doctrines of the Egyptians in accordance
with the principles of Christianity. The disciples of Ormus continued
until 1118 to be the sole guardians of ancient Egyptian wisdom,
as purified by Christianity and Solomonian science. This science
they communicated to the Templars. They were then known by the
title of Knights of Palestine, or Brethren Rose Croix of the East.
In them the Rite of Memphis recognizes its immediate founders."
The above, coming from the Grand Hierophant
and founder, should satisfy the most scrupulou6 as to the conversion
of Ormus by Saint Mark, and his then introducing the Memphis Rite.
But Marconis continues as to the main object and the underlying
intention of his Rite: The Masonic Rite of Memphis is a combination
of the ancient mysteries; it taught the first men to render homage
to the Deity. Its dogmas are bared on the principles of humanity;
its mission is the study of that wisdom which serves to discern
truth; it is the beneficent dawn of the development of reason
and intelligence; it is the worship of the qualities of the human
heart and the impression of its aces: in fine, it is the echo
of religious toleration. the union of all belief, the bond between
all men, the symbol of sweet illusions of hope, preaching the
faith in God that saves, and the charity that blesses.
We are further told by the Hierophant founder
that:
The Rite of Memphis is the sole depository
of High Masonry the true Primitive Rite. the Rite par excellence
which has come down to us without any alteration, and is consequently
the only Rite that can justify its origin and the combined exercise
of its rights by constitutions the authenticity of which cannot
be questioned. The Rite of Memphis. or Oriental Rite, is the veritable
Masonic tree and all systems, whatsoever they be, are but detached
branches of this institution, venerable for its great antiquity,
and born in Egypt. The real deposit of the principles of Freemasonry,
written in the Chaldee language. is preserved in the sacred ark
of the Rite of Memphis and in part in the Grand Lodge of Scotland
at Edinburgh, and in the Maronite Convent on Mount Lebanon....
Brother Marconis de Negre, the Grand Hierophant, is the sole consecrated
depositary of the traditions of this Sublime Order.
The above is enough to reveal the character
of the father and reputed son for truth, as also of the institution
founded by them, which, like the firefly, is seen now here, now
there, but with no steady beneficial light (see Memphis, Rite
of ).
MARCONIS, JACQUES ETIENNE
Born at Montauban, January 3, 1795; died
at Paris, November 21, 1868 (see the preceding article, also Memphis,
Rite of).
MARDUK
A victorious warrior-god, described on one
of the Assyrian clay tablets of the British Museum, who was said
to have engaged the monster Tiamat in a cosmogonic struggle. He
was armed with a namzar, grappling-hook; ariktu, lance; shibbu,
lasso; qashtu, bow; zizpau, club; and kabab, shield, together
with a dirk in each hand.
MARIA ORDER
A Norwegian secret society exclusively for
women. The avowed purpose is to bind the members in a strong faithful
body, to improve the consciousness of self, and to use familiar
symbols for the furtherance of common ideals. The Freemasonry
of Norway has had a friendly attitude toward this organization
which was started officially in January, 1917, when the first
Lodge was consecrated in Christiania; the second was dedicated
in Bergen in April, 1922, and the third in Stavenger, in October,
1924. above translated from the Norwepan, for Palmer Templegram,
Milwaukee, Wisconsin, March, 1925.
MARIA THERESA
Empress of Austria, who showed great hostility
to Freemasonry, presumably from religious leanings and advisers.
Her husband was Francis I, elected Emperor of Germany in 1745.
He was a zealous Freemason, and had been initiated at The Hague
in 1731, at a Special Lodge, at which Lord Chesterfield and Doctor
Desaguliers were present. He was raised at Houghton Hall, the
same year, while on a visit to England. He assisted to found the
Lodge Drei Kanonen, at Vienna, constituted in 1742. During the
forty years' reign of Maria Theresa, Freemasonry was tolerated
in Vienna doubtless through the intercession of the Emperor. It
is stated in the Pocket Companion of 1754, one hundred grenadiers
were sent to break up the Lodge, taking twelve prisoners, the
Emperor escaping by a back staircase. He answered for and freed
the twelve prisoners. His son, Emperor Joseph, inherited good-will
to Freemasonry. He was Grand Master of the Viennese Freemasons
at the time of his death.
MARK
The appropriate jewel of a Mark Master.
It is made of gold or silver, usually of the former metal, and
must be in the form of a keystone. On the obverse or front surface,
the device or Mark selected by the owner must be engraved within
a circle composed of the following letters: H. T. W. S. S. T.
K. S. On the reverse or posterior surface, the name of the owner,
the name of his Chapter, and the date of his advancement, may
be inscribed, although this is not absolutely necessary. The Mark
consists of the device and surrounding inscription on the obverse.
The Mark jewel, as prescribed by the Supreme Grand Chapter of
Scotland, is of mother-of-pearl. The circle on one side is inscribed
with the Hebrew letters fast n, and the circle on the other side
with letters containing the same meaning in the vernacular tongue
of the country in which the Chapter is situated, and the wearer's
mark in the center. The Hebrew letters are the initials of a Hebrew
sentence equivalent to the English one familiar to Mark Masons.
It is but a translation into Hebrew of the English mystical sentence.
It is not requisite that the device or Mark
should be of a strictly Masonic character, although Masonic emblems
are frequently selected in preference to other subjects. As soon
as adopted it should be drawn or described in a book kept by the
Chapter for that purpose, and it is then said to be "recorded
in the Mark Book or Book of Marks," after which time it can
never be changed by the possessor for any other, or altered in
the slightest degree, but remains as his Mark to the day of his
death.
This Mark is not a mere ornamental appendage
of the Degree, but is a sacred token of the rites of friendship
and brotherly love, and its presentation at any time by the owner
to another Mark Master, would claim, from the latter, certain
acts of friendship which are of solemn obligation among the Fraternity.
A Mark thus presented, for the purpose of obtaining a favor, is
said to be pledged; though remaining in the possession of the
owner, it ceases, for any actual purposes of advantage, to be
his property; nor can it be again used by him until, either by
the return of the favor, or with the consent of the benefactor,
it has been redeemed; for it is a positive law of the Order, that
no Mark Master shall "pledge his Mark a second time until
he has redeemed it from its previous pledge. " By this wise
provision, the unworthy are prevented from making an improper
use of this valuable token, or from levying contributions on their
hospitable Brethren.
Marks or pledges of this kind were of frequent
use among the ancients, under the name of tessera hospitals and
arrhabo. The nature of the tessera hospitalis, or, as the Greeks
called it, XuSoXor, cannot be better described than in the words
of the Scholiast on the Medea of Euripides (v 613), where Jason
promises Medea, on her parting from him, to send her the symbols
of hospitality which should procure her a kind reception in foreign
countries. It vas the custom, says the Scholiast, when a guest
had been entertained, to break a die in two parts, one of which
parts was retained by the guest, so that if, at any future period
he required assistance, on exhibiting the broken pieces of the
die to each other, the friendship was renewed.
Plautus, about two hundred years before
Christ, in one of his comedies, gives us an exemplification of
the manner in which these tesseroe or pledges of friendship were
used at Rome, whence it appears that the privileges of this friendship
were extended to the descendants of the contracting parties. Poenulus
is introduced, inquiring for Agorastocles, with whose family he
had formerly exchanged the tessera.
Ag. Siquidem Antidimarchi quaeris adoptatitium.
Ego sum ipsus quem tu quaeris.
Poen. Hem! quid ego audio?
Ag. Antidamae me gnatum esse.
Poen. Si its est. tesseram Conferre Ei vis hospitalem, eccam,
attuli.
Ag. Agedum huc ostende; est par probe; nam habeo domum.
Poen. O mi hospes, salve multum; nam mihi tuus pater
Pater tuus ergo hospes, Antidamas fuit:
Haec mihi hospitalis tessera cum illo fuit.
Poenul., act. v, sc. 2, rer. 85.
Ag. Antidimarchus' adopted son,
If vou do seek, I am the vers man.
Poen. Ah! Do I hear aright?
Ag. I am the son oi old Antidamus.
Poen. If so, I pray you Compare with me the hospitable die I've
brought this with me.
Ag. Prithee, let me see it.
It is, indeed, the very counterpart
of mine at home.
Poen. All hail, my welcome guest
Your father was my guest, Antidamus.
Your father was my honored guest, and then
This hospitable die with me he parted.
These tesseroe, thus used, like the Mark
Master's Mark, for the purposes of perpetuating friendship and
rendering its union more sacred, were constructed in the following
manner: they took a small piece of bone, ivory, or stone, generally
of a square or cubical form, and dividing it into equal parts,
each wrote his own name, or some other inscription, upon one of
the pieces; they then made a mutual exchange, and, lest falling
into other hands it should give occasion to imposture, the pledge
was preserved with the greatest secrecy, and no one knew the name
inscribed upon it except the possessor.
The primitive Christians seem to have adopted
a similar practice, and the tessera was carried by them in their
travels, as a means of introduction to their fellow Christians.
A favorite inscription with them were the letters II. T. A. II.,
being the initials of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. The use of
these tessarae, in the place of written certificates, continued,
says Doctor Harris (Dissertations on the Tesserae Hospitalis),
until the eleventh century, at which time they are mentioned by
Burchardus, Archbishop of Worms, in a visitation charge.
The arrhabo was a similar keepsake, formed
by breaking a piece of money in two. The etymology of this word
shows distinctly that the Romans borrowed the custom of these
pledges from the ancient Israelites, for it is derived from the Hebrew arabon, meaning a pledge.
With this detail of the customs of the ancients
before us, we can easily explain the well-known passage in Revelation
ii, 17: "To him that overcometh will I give a white stone,
and in it a new name written, which no man knoweth saving he that
receiveth it." That is, to borrow the interpretation of Harris,
"To him that overcometh will I give a pledge of my affection,
which shall constitute him my friend, and entitle him to privileges
and honors of which none else can know the value or the extent."
The White Storze of Revelation ii, 17, has been understood as
perhaps referring to the Tessara Gladiatoria given to the victor
in the arena.
MARKHAM, EDWIN
Poet, born at Oregon City, Oregon, April
23, 1852, initiated, passed and raised in Acacia Lodge, No. 92,
at Coloma, California, was in 1924 nominated in the Grand Lodge
of Oregon for the position of Poet Laureate of the United States.
Brother Markham has been farmer, sheep-herder, blacksmith, and
superintendent of public schools. His splendid poem, The Man with
the Hoe, made him internationally famous in 1899 though he already
had written verses for years and has published books of poetry,
essays, and other works.
MARK MAN
According to Masonic tradition, the Mark
Men were the Wardens, as the Mark; Masters were the Masters of
the Fellow Craft Lodges, at the building of the Temple. They distributed
the marks to the workmen, and made the first inspection of the
work, which was afterward to be approved by the overseers. As
a Degree, the Mark Man is not recognized in the United States.
In England it is sometimes, but not generally, worked as preparatory
to the Degree of Mark Master. In Scotland, in 1778, it was given
to Fellow Crafts, while the Mark Master was restricted to Master
Masons. It was not recognized in the regulations of the Supreme
Grand Chapter of Scotland. Much of the esoteric ritual of the
Mark Man has been incorporated into the Mark Master of the American
System.
MARK MASTER
The Fourth Degree of the American Rite.
The traditions of the Degree make it of great historical importance,
since by them we are informed that by its influence each Operative
Mason at the building of the Temple was known and distinguished,
and the disorder and confusion which might otherwise have attended
so immense an undertaking was completely prevented. Not less useful
is it in its symbolic signification. As illustrative of the Fellow
Craft, the Fourth Degree is particularly directed to the inculcation
of order, regularity, and discipline. It teaches us that we should
discharge all the duties of our several stations with precision
and punctuality; that the work of our hands and the thoughts of
our hearts should be good and true not unfinished and imperfect,
not sinful and defective but such as the Great Overseer and Judge
of heaven and earth will see fit to approve as a worthy oblation
from his creatures.
If the Fellow Craft's Degree is devoted
to the inculcation of learning, that of the Mark Master is intended
to instruct us how that learning can most usefully and judiciously
be employed for our own honor and the profit of others. And it
holds forth to the desponding the encouraging thought that although
our motives may sometimes be misinterpreted by our erring fellow
mortals, our attainments be underrated, and our reputations be
traduced by the envious and malicious, there is one, at least,
who sees not with the eyes of man, but may yet make that stone
which the builders rejected, the head of the corner. The intimate
connection then, between the Second and Fourth Degrees of Freemasonry,
is this, that while one inculcates the necessary exercise of all
the duties of life, the other teaches the importance of performing
them with systematic regularity. The true Mark Master is a type
of that man mentioned in the sacred parable, "Well done,
thou good and faithful servant: thou hast been faithful over a
few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou
into the joy of thy lord" (Matthew xxv, 21).
In America, the Mark Master's is the first
Degree given in a Royal Arch Chapter. Its officers are a Right
Worshipful Master, Senior and Junior Wardens, Secretary, Treasurer,
Senior and Junior Deacons, Master, Senior and Junior Overseers
The Degree cannot be conferred when less than six are present,
who, in that case, must be the first and last three officers above
named. The working tools are the Mallet and Indenting Chisel,
which see. The symbolic color is purple. The Mark Master's Degree
is now given in England under the authority of the Grand Lodge
of Mark Masters, which was established in June, 1856 and is a
Jurisdiction independent of the Grand Lodge. The officers are
the same as in America, with the addition of a Chaplain, Director
of Ceremonies, Assistant Director, Registrar of Marks, Inner Guard
or Time Keeper, and two Stewards. Master Masons are eligible for
initiation. Brother Hughan says that the Degree is virtually the
same in England, Scotland, and Ireland. It differs, however, in
some respects from the American Degree.
In a letter to the Masonic Home Journal,
Louisville, Kentucky (see Proceedings, Grand Chapter, Royal Arch
Masons, Michigan, 1920), Companion Alfred A. A. Murray offers
the following note to correct an error relating to the Mark Degree
in Scotland
As regards the Mark Degree itself it was
not worked in the Fellow Craft Lodges, but there were really two
Degrees, namely, that of Mark Man, which was given to a Fellow
Craft, and that of Mark Master, which was given to a Master Mason.
The Degree of Mark Man was worked down to within fifty years ago
by various Craft lodges, and given to Fellow Crafts. The Degree
of Mark Master was conferred as a separate Degree in the same
way as the Royal Arch, and was expressly cut off by the Grand
Lodge of Scotland, about 1800, in the same way that the Royal
Arch and the Temple were cut off. Before that date they used to
be worked by an inner circle of the Lodge as a sort of side issue
not under the Grand Lodge of Scotland at all.
The Royal Arch and the Temple were, after
1800, organized as governing Bodies, and then the Mark Master
Degree was taken under the sole control of the Supreme Grand Chapter,
and continued so 'til, as I say, about fifty years ago, then an
agreement was made between the Grand Lodge and the Supreme Chapter
that the two Degrees of Mark Man and Mark Master were to be amalgamated,
and were to be conferred under the authority of either Body but
only upon Master Masons. It is wise to get a clear statement made
upon this point, because I observe a very large amount of mistaken
information is being granted from time to time, which is derived
from conuson. of thought and want of knowledge, and results roanetunes
in mistaken action
Brother W. J. Hughan (Trestle Board, California, volume xxnii,
No. 4, October, 1919) wrote:
During the centuries which immediately preceded
the establishment of the premier Grand Lodge of England and the
World, the mark was directly connected with operative and speculative
Freemasonry, and from time immemorial, it has been the custom
for the skilled Craftsman to chisel his distinctive Mark on the
stones he fashioned, so as to indicate his workmanship. It is
this fact that differentiates the Mark Degree from all other ceremonies
additional to the first three, and justified the formation of
the Mark Grand Lodge, nearly fifty years ago, so as to take under
its wing those lodges which worked with interesting and suggestive
ceremony the English Craft agreement excluding it from the formally
recognized series, according to the Articles of Union of A.D.
1813-4.
The antiquity of Mark Masonry cannot be
doubted. Operatively considered and even speculatively, it has
enjoyed special prominence for centuries; records of the custom
being followed by speculative Brethren, according to existing
records, dating back to 1600, in which year, on June 8, "Ye
principal warden and chief master of maisons, Wm. Schaw, master
of work to ye Kingis Maistie," met members of the Lodge of
Edinburgh-- now No. 1--at Holyrood House, at which meeting the
Laird of Auchinleck was present, and attested the Minutes of the
Assembly by his Mark as did the Operatives, in accordance with
the Schaw Statutes of December 28, 1598, which provided: "That
the day of reassauying, or receiving, of said fallow of craft
or master be ord'lie buikit and his name and Mark insert in the
said buik."
That theoretical Masons selected their Marks
just as the Operatives did. during the seventeenth century is
abundantly manifest, by an examination of the old Scottish records
of that period. One of the most noteworthy instances out of many
is the Mark Book of the Lodge of Aberdeen--now No. 1 tri-which
started in l670 A.D., and is signed by forty-nine members, all
of whom but two have their Marks inserted opposite their names.
The Master of the 'Honorable Lodge of Aberdeen' in that year was
Harrie Elphingston, Tutor of Airth and Collector of the King's
Customs, and only a fourth part of the members were Operative
Masons, the roll of Brethren including the Earl of Findlater,
the Earl of Dumferline, Lord Pitsligo, the Earl of 'Errolle, a
professor of mathematics, several ministers, doctors and other
professional men and tradesmen, such as wrights, or carpenters,
plaiters, glaziers, ete. The names of the apprentices were entered
in another list, the Marks chosen by such being evidently similar
to the fathers in several instances (see Marks of the Craft).
When the special and elaborate ceremony,
with a distinctive legend, was first used it is not possible to
decide, but probably about the middle of the eighteenth century,
soon after the arrangement of the Royal Arch as a separate Degree.
The oldest preserved records date from the year 1769, and there
is no lack of evidence as to the observance of the custom in Speculative
Lodges during that century and later either in separate Lodges
or under the wing of the Royal Arch. The Mark continued to be
worked in England as an unauthorized ceremony until the year 1856,
when the Mark Grand Lodge was founded and has proved a conspicuous
success, having ultimately secured the support of all the ' time
immemorial ' and other Lodges in the country, besides having warranted
several hundreds of Lodges to work the Degree in England and the
Colonies and dependencies of the British Crown.
The ceremony is very popular, especially
in North America, and is recognized by all Grand Chapters of Royal
Arch Masons there and elsewhere, excepting in England. The Grand
Lodge of Ireland includes it with the additional Degrees belonging
to the other Masonic Grand Bodies recognized in it and acting
in union with it, and the Grand Lodge of Scotland authorizes the
Mark to be conferred on Master Masons. and the secrets only to
be communicated in presence of those who have taken the step in
a Lodge entitled to grant it. The Mark Grand Lodge in recent years
has incorporated the Mark Man with the Mark Master; and wisely
so, as it was the former that was conferred on yellow Crafts,
and the latter on Master Masons during the eighteenth century.
MARK MASTER'S WAGES
Companion George W. Warvelle commented thus
upon the long established custom of a penny a day paid as the wages
of a Mark Master:
This ridiculously low wage scale seems to
have been the work of the early American Titualists. I have in
my possession two old English rituals, of Mark Man and Mark Mason,
in both of which there is a specification of wages. In the former
the rate was ' nine shekels, equal to one pound, two shillings,
six pence of our money,' and in the latter it gas 'twenty-five
shekels, equal to three pounds, two shillings, six pence of our
money.' What the present rate may be in England I am unable to
say, but no Englishman would work for the beggarly stipend paid
in the American Mark Lodges. I am inclined to believe, however,
that our English Brethren have fixed these abnormally high prices
to make up for the actual wages formerly paid in England to the
Operative Craft. As late as the year 1689 the wages of Freemasons
were prescribed by law at one shilling and four pence a day. To
demand more subjected them to severe penalties. In fact, it was
really the passing of restrictive laws commencing say, about 1356,
that led to the present speculative institution, and Masonic scholars
of eminence assign the year 1424 as the cessation of English Freemasonry
as a strictly operative association (from Tyler Keystone, Michigan,
December, 1914) .
MARK OF THE CRAFT, REGULAR
In the Mark Degree there is a certain stone
which is said, in the instructions, not to have upon it the regular
mark of the Craft. This expression is derived from the following
tradition of the Degree. At the building of the Temple, each workman
placed his own mark upon his own materials, so that the workmanship
of every Freemason might be readily distinguished, and praise
or blame be justly awarded. These marks, according to the lectures,
consisted of mathematical figures, squares, angles, lines, and
perpendiculars, and hence any figure of a different kind, such
as a circle, would not be deemed "the Regular Mark of the
Craft." Of the three stones used in the Mark Degree, one
is inscribed with a square and another with a plumb or perpendicular,
because these were marks familiar to the Craft; but the third,
which is inscribed with a circle and certain hieroglyphics, was
not known and was not, therefore, called regular (see also Marks
of the Craft).
Companion Alfred A. A. Murray, submitted
a Memorandum in 1919 to the Supreme Grand Royal Arch Chapter of
Scotland, which was in part as follows:
A clear statement has frequently been requested
as to the exact rules governing the form of Marks. In particular,
a prominent Chapter has specially asked to be provided with a
definite rule. In consequence the following Memorandum was submitted
to Supreme Grand Committee for the purpose of information so that
they might consider the subject and, if so advised, give an official
ruling on the meaning of the Committee on Marks, and in the interval
the Memorandum has been revised and corrected.
In Ireland there are no definite rules,
and the Marks are accepted just as they are sent in. No attention
is paid practically to the matter, and not one Mark Mason in twenty
adopts a Mark of any kind. Those who do frequently select designs
quite unsuitable for the purpose, such as crests or monograms,
but they are all registered in Grand Chapter books without question.
I am informed that by a resolution of the
Grand Mark Lodge of England, on 14th December, 1864, the regulation
confining Speculative Masons' Marks to any specified number of
points was abrogated. But straight lines are imperative.
In America, so far as can be ascertained,
there is no rule specifying what should be selected as a Mark,
this being left entirely to the candidate himself to determine,
The Grand Lodge of Scotland has never, so far as can be ascertained,
laid down any rule whatever, and disclaims any responsibility
for any ritual on the subject.
The way, therefore, appears to be quite
open to this Committee to suggest a definite ruling for themselves
and to let others follow it or not as they choose. The instructions
as they stand at present substantially consist of a direction
that any Mark adopted by a candidate and member must consist of
any number of odd points connected by lines, with the exception
of one special figure containing three points. The old manuscript
copy of the working, in the possession of Supreme Grand Chapter,
says, "3, 5, 7, 9 or 11 points joined together to form any
figure they please except, etc." It may be interesting to
add, in parenthesis, that according to the old independent Yorkshire
working early last century, the members present had also to be
3, 5, 7, 9, etc., and the fee was "one mark, Is lHd., neither
more nor less."
The theory held by some is that the Mark
was, and is still supposed to be, made by the workman with the
edge of a chisel, not by its corner point, so that each stroke
therefore will make nothing but a straight line. This would apply
to the Mark on the blade of the chisel, but I should rather think
the Mark cut on a stone would be made by a pointed chisel, and
therefore that so far it would be conveniently possible to form
a curved figure. As the Mark was reproduced on the hewn stones,
it should have been the same as that which was struck on the blade
of the Mason's own tools to identify them in the boxes, or when
returned from sharpening, or for any other necessary purposes.
While the actual wording of the instructions do not expressly
say straight lines this is commonly understood to be implied.
The old ritual of Chapter Esk, No. 42, however,
expressly says, "straight or curved lines." There may
be others giving the same reading. Among the Operative Masons
of Scotland for centuries genuine curved Marks are by no means
unknown, but are very few. For instance, at Fortress Cathedral
out of 265 Marks there is only one with curved lines--representing
a vessel. A heart is also an emblem not uncommon. But, on the
whole, out of the many thousand specimens from the thirteenth
century downwards, it is almost unusual to find a Mark with curved
lines. The Speculative Masons are lineal descendants of the Operative
Craft, though not the only branch, and theoretically they are
subject to the same rules of work and interpretation as the Body
from which they sprang.
The first question which arises is as to
the regulation about the number of points. This regulation may
hold with the present speculative systems, but it has nothing
whatever to do with King Solomon's Temple, where not a single
Mason's Mark has ever been found. Indeed there are no Mason's
Marks on any known historic and ancient Jewish building, or at
least if so I am not aware of it. The story about a Mark of approval
made by an equilateral triangle and about juxtaposition Marks
is apocryphal. The regulation has no sanction or foundation in
the practice of the Operative Craft. No system of counting will
ever prove that such a rule existed operatively. Numberless specimens
prove the contrary.
There used to be a story current in the
Craft some thirty years ago that there was a distinction between
the Mark of a Fellow of Craft and that of a Master Mason, the
former having an even number of points and the latter an odd number.
The idea was a fad of some theorists and had no foundation in
fact, except that when the agreement between the Grand Lodge of
Scotland and the Supreme Grand Chapter of Scotland regarding the
Mark Degree was entered into, it evidently ignored the fact that
the Stark Man and the Mark Master were two separate Degrees--the
former worked after the second Degree and the latter after the
third. But the Mark was chosen by the Mark Man, and the indiscriminate
use of any number of Points for a Mark, odd or even, is therefore,
according to the basis of the theory mentioned, correct. Incidentally.
it may be added that the part of our present ritual referring
to the infliction of the penalty is incorrectly expressed. It
was the Entered Apprentice who suffered. because he had no Mark
to present, not the Fellow Craft who presented his own Mark. It
is absurd to suppose that he suffered because he used the triangle
instead of his proper Mark.
The American ritual I have seen solves this
difficulty by making the Mark Master present and withdraw his
hand in a different way to that of his workmen. Assuming, however,
that the rule according to the ritual is to be observed, a difficulty
arises as to what precisely is meant by a point which has to be
counted.
The instruction is that the Mark must have
a certain number of odd points connected by straight lines. Now
every straight line consists of an innumerable number of points.
Logically, therefore, the definition means and implies that every
point in a straight line is not to be counted solely because it
is in that line. Any point to be counted must be Selected for
some other reason. Now, according to the definition it is quite
clear that the end points of a straight line must be and are intended
to be counted because they are the points which are connected
by a straight line. It is therefore beyond question that any point
which is the beginning, or ending, of one or more straight lines
must be a point to be counted according to the rules of the Degree.
The difficulty arises as to the counting
when two straight lines intersect, or rather when they not merely
intersect but cross one another. In such a case is the point of
intersection a point within the meaning of the instructions for
the Degree? Varying opinions have for the past half-century been
held among Freemasons about this, but the old records rather support
the rule that a mere intersection or crossing does not constitutes
a point. The point is and must be the end of a line and not merely
a part of it in the middle.
In the petition to Lodge Mother Kilwinning
in 1677 on which the Warrant to Lodge Canongate Kilwinning was
granted, nine out of the twelve petitioners append their Marks.
They are all composed of straight lines connected together. If
crossings are not counted, there were eight even and one odd.
If crossings are counted, there were three even and six odd. one
of them was even and had no crossing point. In the first Minute-Book
of the Lodge of Edinburgh, if crossings are not counted, about
two-thirds of the Marks are odd and the remaining one-third even.
If crossings are counted, there is a slight preponderance of odd
points. Robert Burns' Mark had eleven points, but if the crossing
is counted it had twelve.
In the Mark Book of Chapter Edinburgh for
the first fifty years or so, if crossings are not counted, there
are thirty-three odd and forty even. If crossings are counted,
the same proportion remains. But one hundred and thirty-four out
of two hundred and thirty-three Marks transgress the rules that
straight lines only must be counted. The use of curved lines has,
however, in this case ceased for several decades. As in the case
of the Roman Eagle Lodge, when the Mark Degree was intro duced
in 1785, a large number of the transgressing Marks are not Marks
at all, but representations of Masonic symbols and emblems such
as the hive, the irradiated sun, the ladder, the skull and cross-bones,
the heart, and so on. There are Jewish and other letters, a hand
grasping an arrow, or a sword, or a pen, or a musket. There is
a horse vaulting a gate, and a lion passant, a clam shell a stag's
head, a man in the moon, a harp, the Volume of the Sacred Law,
an irradiated star, and a laurel branch, etc., all drawn illustratively.
There are also several Marks with points alone and no lines at
all.
There are also instances of, say, a shield
with a triangle or a cross, or some entirely separate figure within
it Latterly, it is only too common to find puerile attempts to
combine initials. To sum up, the main points for decision are:
1. Whether a point—a mere dot—can be counted
if it is shown alone and not as part of a line.
2. Whether a point means the end of a separate and distinct line
or a free salient angle.
3. Whether the lines must be straight or may be curved.
4. Whether the lines must all be connected or whether they may
he disconnected as, for example, a triangle within a shield, or
dots or a small or large circle.
5. Whether the points must be odd in number.
6. Whether in this case a crossing point must be counted.
7. Whether in the same ease n crossing point need not be counted
unless desired, and, if one is counted, must all in the same figure
be counted.
8. Whether the points may be odd or even in number. In this case
it is not necessary to trouble about crossing points, because
they can make no difference to the ultimate result
As a closing remark it ought to be added
that, looking at the number of different Marks required for the
large number of members now being admitted, if any mere point
of intersection is allowed to be counted it will make it greatly
easier to multiply the available number of possible Marks. If
such a point of mere intersection is not to be counted and is
ruled out, the number of available Marks with a reasonable number
of lines will be cut down probably by one-fourth. This is admittedly
an argument ad conrenientiam, but in certain eases expedience
rises to the height of principle. The rule suggested is simply
that ah Marks in future must be composed of straight lines joined
together, and the counting of points be discontinued. If this
rule be adopted no further question can apparently arise, and
the simplicity of the rule is greatly in its favour. It would
involve, however, that the ritual should be subject to a slight
correction to bring it into conformity with the rule, but this
can easily be done.
Further information will be found in Doctor
Mackay's revised History of Freemasonry, some sixty-five items
being indexed. Many valuable references to the subject are in
the Appendix to the Proceedings (Grand Chapter, Royal arch Masons,
Michigan, 1920), contributed by Companion Charles A. Conover,
General Grand Secretary. Additional references are in a paper
read by Professor George Godwin, Royal Institute of British Architects,
1868; four articles by John E. Dove, Builder, London, April 4
and 18, June 6, and July 11, 1863, also a paper on Masonry and
Masorls Marks, Brother T. Hayter Lewis, Transactions, Quatuor
Coronati Lodge (volume iii, 1890).
MARK TWAIN
The pen name of Samuel Langhorne Clemens,
famous American humorist, born November 30, 1835, at Florida,
Missouri. He petitioned Polar Star Lodge No. 79 of St. Louis under
date of December 26, 1860, as follows:
The subscriber, residing in Saint Louis,
of lawful age and by occupation a Pilot, begs leave to state that
unbiased by friends and uninfluenced by mercenary motives he freely
and voluntarily offers himself as a candidate for the mysteries
of Masonry and that he is prompted to solicit this privilege by
a favorable opinion conceived of the Institution, a desire of
knowledge and sincere wish of being serviceable to his fellow
creatures. Should his petition be granted he will cheerfully conform
to all the ancient established usages and customs of the Fraternity.
Recommended by John M. Leavenworth, Tom Moore.
Committee: H. T. Taylor, Defreiz, Wannall.
(Signed) Sam L. Clemens.
The petition was received on the same day and the Committee made
a favorable report February 18, 1861. He was Initiated May 22,
1861, Passed, June 12, 1861, and Raised July 10, 1861. On June
12, he paid the Lodge $20 cash and made a further payment of $10
on July 10. During a trip that he made to Palestine he sent his
Lodge at St. Louis a mallet accompanied by the following memorandum:
This Mallet is of Cedar cut in the Forest
of Lebanon, whence Solomon obtained the Timbers for the Temple.
The handle was cut by Brother Clemens himself from a cedar planted
just outside the walls of Jerusalem by Brother Godfrey DeBoullion,
the first Christian Conqueror of that City, nineteenth of July,
1099.
This gavel in its present form was made
at Alexandria Egypt, by order of Brother Clemens.
From Brother Sam'l L. Clemens
(Mark Twain)
to J. H. Pottenger, M.D.
March 25, 1868
Presented to Polar Star Lodge No. 79
By J. H. Pottenger, W. M.
April 8, 1868.
In 1869 he asked for a dimit but this is
not known to have ever been presented to any Lodge. Mark Twain
has many racy books of travel and adventure, as well as a number
of humorous autobiographical novels to his credit. He received
the degree of Doctor of Literature from Oxford. For many years
he was considered the most outstanding and popular American personality
in the world of letters. During the later years of his life he
was able to amass a considerable fortune although most of his
life was harassed by a constant struggle against poverty. He died
at Redding, Connecticut, on April 21, 1910.
MARES OF THE CRAFT
In former times, Operative Masons, the Steinmetzen,
or Stone Cutters, of Germany, were accustomed to place some mark
or sign of their own invention, which, like the monogram of the
painters, would seem to identify the work of each. They are to
be found upon the cathedrals, churches, castles, and other stately
buildings erected since the twelfth century, or a little earlier,
in Germany, France, England, and Scotland. As Professor George
Godwin has observed in his History in Ruins, it is curious to
see that these marks are of the same character, in form, in all
these different countries. They were principally crosses, triangles,
and other mathematical figures, and many of them were religious
symbols. Specimens taken from different buildings supply such
forms as are here illustrated.
The last of these is the well-known vesica
pisces, the symbol of Christ among the primitive Christians, and
the last but one is the Pythagorean pentalpha. A writer in the
London Times (August 13, 1835) is incorrect in stating that these
marks are confined to Germany, and are to be found only since
the twelfth or thirteenth centuries. More recent researches have
shown that they existed in many other countries, especially in
Scotland, and that they were practiced by the builders of ancient
times. Thus Ainsworth, in his Travels (ii, 167), tells us, in
his description of the ruins of Al-Hadhy in Mesopotamia, that
"every stone, not only in the chief building, but in the
walls and bastions and other public monuments, when not defaced
by time, is marked with a character which is for the most part
either a Chaldean letter or numeral."
M. Didron, who reported a series of observations
on the subject of these Masons' Marks to the Comity Historique
des Arts et Monuments of Paris, believes that he can discover
in them references to distinct schools or Lodges of Freemasons.
He divides them into two classes: those of the overseers, and
those of the men who worked the stones. The marks of the first
class consist of monogrammatic characters; those of the second
are of the nature of symbols, such as shoes, trowels, mallets,
etc.
A correspondent of the Freemasons Quarterly
Revieto states that similar marks are to be found on the stones
which compose the walls of the fortress of Allahabad, which was
erected in 1542, in the East Indies. He says:
The walls are composed of large oblong blocks
of red granite, and are almost everywhere covered by Masonic emblems
which evince something more than mere ornament. They are not confined
to one particular spot, but are scattered over the walls of the
fortress, in many places as high as thirty or forty feet from
the ground. It is quite certain that thousands of stones on the
walls, bearing these Masonic symbols, were carved, marked and
numbered in the quarry previous to the erection of the building.
In the ancient buildings of England and
France, these marks are to be found in great abundance. In a communication,
on this subject, to the London Society of Antiquaries, Professor
George Godwin states that, "in my opinion, these marks, if
collected and compared might assist in connecting the various
bands of operatives, who, under the protection of the Church--mystically
united--spread themselves over Europe during the Middle Ages,
and are known as Freemasons." Professor Godwin describes
these marks as varying in length from two to seven inches, and
as formed by a single line, slightly indented, consisting chiefly
of crosses, well-known Masonic symbols, emblems of the Trinity
and of eternity, the double triangle, trowel, square, etc. The
same writer observes that, in a conversation, in September, 18U,
with a mason at work on the Canterbury Cathedral, he "found
that many Masons, all who were Freemasons, had their mystic marks
handed down from generation to generation; this man had his mark
from his father, and he received it from his grandfather."
They're traced in lines on the Parthenon
Inscribed by the subtle Greek
And Roman legions have carved them on
Walls, roads and arch antique
Long ere the Goth, with vandal hand
Gave scope to his envy dark
The Mason Craft in many a land
Has graven its Mason Mark.
The obelisk old and the pyramids,
Around which a mystery clings,--
The hieroglyphs on the coffin lids
of weird Egyptian kings,--
Syria. Carthage and Pompeii
buried and strewn and stark,
Have marble records that will not die,
Their primitive Mason Mark.
Upon column and frieze and capital,
In the eye of the chaste volute--
On Scotia's curve, or an astrologicalal,
()r in triglyp's channel acute--
Cut somewhere on the entablature,
Old oft, like a sudden spark,
Flashing a light on a date obscure,
Shines many a Mason Mark.
These Craftsmen old had a genial whim,
That nothing could e'er destroy
With a love of their art that naught could dim,
They toiled with a chronic joy;
Nothing was too complex to essay,
In aught they dashed to embark;
They triumphed on many an Appian Way,
Where they'd left their Mason Mark.
Crossing the Alps like Hannibal,
Or skirting the Pyranees
On peak and plain, in crypt and cell
On foot or on bandaged knees,--
From Tiber to Danube, front Rhine to Seine,
They needed no "letters of marque ";--
Their art was their passport in France and Spain,
And in Britain their Mason Mark.
The monolith gray and Druid chair,
The pillars and towers of Gael,
In Ogham occult their age they bear,
That time can only reveal.
Live on, old monuments of the past,
Our beacons through ages dark!
In primal majesty still you'll last
Endeared by each Mason Mark.
--Anonymous.
MARQUESAS ISLANDS
See Oceania
MARROW IN THE BONE<
An absurd corruption of a Jewish word, and
still more absurdly said to be its translation. It has no appropriate
signification in the place to which it is applied, but was once
religiously believed in by many Freemasons, who, being ignorant
of the Hebrew language, accepted it as a true interpretation.
It is now universally rejected by the intelligent portion of the
Craft.
MARSEILLES, MOTHER LODGE OF
A Lodge was established in 1748, at Marseilles,
in France, Thory says, by a traveling Freemason, under the name
of Saint Jean d'Ecosse. It afterward assumed the name of Mother
Lodge of Marseilles, and still later the name of Scottish Mother
Lodge of France. It granted Warrants of its own authority for
Lodges In France and in the Colonies.
MARSHAL
An officer common to several Masonic Bodies,
whose duty is to regulate processions and other public solemnities.
In Grand Bodies he is called a Grand Marshal. In the American
Royal Arch System, the Captain of the Host acts on public occasions
as the Marshal. The Marshal's ensign of office is a baton or short
rod. The office of Marshal in State affairs is very ancient. It
was found in the court of the Byzantine emperors, and was introduced
into England from France at the period of the conquest. Isis badge
of office was at first a rod or verge, which was afterward changed
to the baton, for, its an old writer has observed, Thinne, "the
verge or rod was the ensign of him who had authority to reform
evil in ware and in peace, and to see quiet and order observed
among the people."
MARSHALL, JOHN
Born in Virginia, September 24, 1755; died
July 6, 1835. Secretary of State, 1800, then first Chief Justice
of the United States, serving for thirty-four years, and had been
an officer, lieutenant and then captain, in the American Revolution.
He was a famous Freemason, a member of Lodge No. 13 at Richmond
and instrumental with Edmund Randolph, Governor of Virginia, 1786,
and also Grand Master, in establishing the two Lodges, Richmond
No. 10, and Richmond Randolph No. 19, the latter Lodge performing
the Masonic rites at Brother Marshall's funeral. He served as
Deputy Grand Master of Virginia and from October 8, 1793, was
Grand Master for two terms during which nine Communications were
held (see Washington, the Man and the Mason, Charles H. Callahan,
1913, pages 961-9, and New Age, July, 1924).
MARTEL
Charles Martel, or Charles the Hammer, born
in 688, died in 741, although not actually King, was the ruler
and reigned over France under the title of Mayor of the Palace.
He was a notable soldier, defeating the Saracens at Poitiers in
732, and again in 737 driving them from Languedoc. Rebold (History,
page 69) says that "at the request of the Anglo-Saxon lings,
he sent workmen and Masters into England." The Operative
Masons of the Middle Ages considered him as one of their patrons,
and give the following account of him in their Legend of the Craft
(see Grand Lodge Manuscript No. 1, Quatuor Coronati Lodge Reprints,
volume iv).
Curious Crafts men walked about full wyde
in Dyu's Countries some to learn more Craft and conning &
some to teach them that had but little conning and so yt befell
that their was on Curious Masson that height Naymus grecus that
had byn at the making of Solomons Temple & he came into fraunce
anal there he taught the Science of masonry to men of fraunce
And there was one of the Regal lyne of fraunce that height Charles
Martell. And he was A man that Loved well such A Craft and Drew
to this Naymus grecus and Learned of him the Craft And to Nippon
him the (Chardges & ye mann's. And afterward by the grace
of god he was elect to be liyng of fraunce. And when he was in
his Estate he took Masons and did help to make men Masons yt wear
none & sett them A work and gave them both the Charges &
mann's and good pay that he had learned of other Masons And confirmed
them A Charter from year to year to hold their assembly whear they
boulder And cherish them right much And thus came the Craft into
fraunce.
MARTHA
The Fourth Degree of the Eastern Star; a
Rite of American Adoptive Freemasonry.
MARTINISM
The Rite of Martinism, called also the Rectified
Rite, was instituted at Lyons, by the Marquis de Saint Martin,
a disciple of Martinez Paschalis, of whose Rite it was pretended
to be a reform. Martinism was divided into two classes, called
Temples, in which were the following Degrees:
First Temple.
1. Apprentice
2. Fellow Craft
3. Master Mason
4. Past Master
5. Elect
6. Grand Architect
7. Freemason of the Secret
Second Temple
8. Prince of Jerusalem
9. Knight of Palestine
10. Kadosh
The Degrees of Martinism abounded in the
reveries of the Mystics (see Saint Martin).
MARTINISM
Louis Claude de Saint-Martin was born in
Amboise, France, January 18, 1743; he was therefore fifty-six
years of age in the Revolution year of 1799; and since he was
in ill health much of the time he was unable to take any active
part in the French Revolution during the four years he continued
to live (he died in 1803) except in private circles; and it is
certain that he did not have any part in planning or preparing
for it. He was sensitive, aristocratic, a warm friend to a chosen
few, a mystic. (See page 901.)
It is probable that Martin would have played
no part in Freemasonry had it not been for Martines de Pasqually,
his early teacher and for many years his friend and colleague.
Pasqually was a Rosicrucian, though it is impossible to use that
adjective as in any sense a descriptive one because it was so
loosely employed in France, and often had no connection with Rosicrucianism
properly so calledindeed Rosicrucianism properly so called
was little understood at any time and ever will be because there
is in the Pama Fraternitatu, its bible, no clear, consistent system
of teachings but only a congeries of visions, legends, cloudy
pictures which can easily accept what meanings an occultist chooses
to attribute to them. In his capacity as a Rosicrucian, Pasqually
compiled a Degree, or Rite, which he called Elect Cohens ("cohen"
meaning priest); and it is believed that Pasqually had some connection
with the founding of the Rite of Swedenborg but not that he was
in any sense its creator.
In Martin's eyes, and after Pasqually had
died, his old teacher's Pite had been conceived as a ritualistic
mystery of a mystical Christianity but being such it had, he felt,
certain defects and lacks; therefore he contrived a Rite of his
own, which he called the Rectified Rite.
Both St. Martin and Pasqually, as well as
the author (or authors) of the Swedenborgian Rite, are typical
of the Frenchmen, of whom over a century there may have been a
hundred or so, who were Masons in their own special sense only;
which was a sense the true and ancient Fraternity could not have
recognized as even remotely like itself;
they swept six or seven centuries of Masonic
history aside, cutting their own "Masonry" off from
its roots, acknowledged no Ancient Landmarks, concocted private
"Rites" out of their private theories, used them as
a vehicle for teachings which often regular Freemasonry would
have wholly repudiated, constructing them eclectically out of
scraps of text, or symbolism, or legend to which they had taken
a fancy in various obscure works of occultism, metaphysics, and
theology. Pasqually's Rite and Martin's Rectified Rite are interesting
for themselves, as a book by either of them might be interesting
(they were in essence little more than books in the form of ceremonies),
but they have no discoverable connection with Freemasonry, which
never was a cult of aristocracy, or of occultism, or of mysticism.
Martin signed a few of his small books by
the pseudonym Philosophe Inconnu, the Unknown Philosopher. Because
of this, because his Rite has in it certain references to or traces
of Kabbalism and other little-known sources, and because no biography
was written in English, he was for American Masons a vague, mysterious
figure, and a number of American writers have placed him somewhere
back in the late Middle Ages, along with Raymund Lully.
Martin was on the contrary a modern man;
younger than Benjamin Franklin, whom he could have known; and
moved in a circle about whom whole libraries of memoirs have been
written. The achievement by which he is better known is not his
Rite (in which he himself took little interest) but a number of
slender books or treatises in which he set forth his own difficult
and private version of religious mysticism, and which was, though
such a generalization is hazardous, an attempt to describe the
universe from within; seen, as it were, through the eyes of God.
An account of this work, and a portrait of the man, by an author
who admired him much and who, in part and at a distance, was his
disciple, is The Life of Louis Claude de Saint-Martin: The Unknown
Philospher, by Arthur Edward Waite; William Rider 45c Sons; London.
MARTINIST ORDER, AMERICAN RECTIFIED
See American Rectified Martinist Order
MARTIN, LOUIS CLAUDE DE SAINT
See Saint Martin
MARTYR
A title bestowed by the Templars on their
last Grand Master, James de Molay. If, as Du Cange says, the Church
sometimes gives the title of martyr to men of illustrious sanctity,
who have suffered death not for the confession of the name of
Christ, but for some other cause, being slain by impious men,
then De Molay, as the innocent victim of the malignant schemes
of an atrocious Pope and King, was clearly entitled to the appellation.
MARTYRS, FOUR CROWNED
See Four Crowned Martyrs
MARTYRS, MASONIC
If Freemasonry had a Foxe to write for it
its own Book of Martyrs the larger number of Brethren would be
horrified to find that men had been tortured, blinded, mutilated,
hanged & burned, sent to the galleys, put into dungeons to
starve dragged through streets, beaten by mobs, and in each instance
for no other crime than that they were Free masons; they would
next be astounded by the number of these martyrs, for if the latter
were to be gathered together out of the past 200 years, and from
each of almost fifty countries, and were to meet in a single throng,
it would not number hundreds; it would not number thousands; it
would number hundreds of thousands.
Thus:
In 1735 a Scotsman named George Gordon fathered a Lodge in Portugal
under a Charter granted by the Duke of Montage, London. For ten
years the work of this and of other Lodges, purely cultural and
strictly Masonic, was unmolested. Then, almost unannounced, and
on representations (greatly falsified) of a Dominican monk named
Bonnet de Meantry, the French Ambassador's confessor, the Lodge
Virtud at Lisbon was raided; three of its members, Damiao de Andrade
and Manoel de Revelhos, aristocrats, and a Brother named Christoph
Diego were hanged, March 8, 1743. Thomas Brasle and Jacques Mouton,
Frenchmen, and John Coustos, a Swiss by birth, but a British subject,
were tortured again and again by the Inquisition; the French Brothers
died, Coustos was sent to the galleys. This was the beginning
of a long red chapter, first in Portugal, later in Spain; in Spain
it came to a fiery end when Franco had hundreds of men hanged,
shot, mobbed, mutilated, and burned for being Masons.
And thus:
General Luigi Capello commanded an Italian army corps at Gorz
in World War I. When Mussolini ordered Italy to destroy Freemasonry
he gave every Italian Mason of whatever station, rank, or dignity
in the country an either-or: renounce Freemasonry and embrace
Fascism; renounce Fascism and remain loyal to Freemasonry on peril
of life. General Capello remained loyal to Freemasonry, was accused
of having given 500,000 lira to conspirators to assassinate Mussolini;
after a trial which dragged on month after month to give Fascist
newspapers time to scream insults and threats against the Order,
was found guilty and sentenced to "thirty years imprisonment,
with solitary confinement for the first six years"a
death sentence at has age. Almost at once the secret police arrested
Grand Master Torrigiani, and in two hours the Confinement Commission
banished him without charge, hearing, or trial to the Lepari Islands
to starve to death. How many hundreds of other Italian Brothers
were dispossessed of their property, beaten and mobbed, sent to
concentration camps, thrown into prison, or killed there is no
way of knowing. It was however only the beginning of the slaughter
of men for being Masons from 1925 until the Allied Armies liberated
European countries; and from the Russian border to Ireland only
Switzerland, Sweden, and Britain were exemptand even in
England it was in Mosley's plans for his Fascist party to destroy
the Fraternity and to assassinate its leaders. Between the two
extremes of 1925 and 1944 there was a long succession of men,
in thousands which have never been counted, who suffered martyrdom
for their loyalty to Freemasonry; and outside of Europe in every
Latin country from Mexico south, and in Japan, China, and the
Philippine Islands.
NOTE:
The almost complete lack of knowledge of these martyrdoms by three
millions or so of American Masons is one of the most extraordinary
phenomena in the whole history of the Craft. One explanation is
found in "the sabotage of history." This also is almost
unknown among American Masons and among American citizens at large
though professional historians are familiar with it to excess.
and must everlastingly battle with it.
This "sabotage of history" consists
of destroying documents, altering documents. forging documents
creating false legends, the assassination of character of men
long deadas was done with Cromwell, and the writing
of books consisting of open and brazen lies. It was the discovery
that monuments to heroes of the Revolutionary and Civil War were
being systematically defaced or destroyed in order to erase the
only existing proofs of their having been Masons which started
Admiral George W. Baird on his years Of research and produced
Great Men Who Were Masons. Two recent attempts at obligate were
made in the cases of Kit Carson and William E. Cody [' Buffalo
Bill"], the former in the year 1943. Another explanation
is the fact that American Masonry has almost no national journalism.
and in consequence possesses no means to publish general information.
MARYLAND
There are no known records from the earliest
Lodge in Maryland but a reference to it among the documents of
the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts states that it was chartered
by Thomas Oxnard, Provincial Grand Master, on August 12, 1750,
at Annapolis. On June 17, 1783, the Lodges on the Eastern Shore
met at Talbot Court House and determined to petition the Grand
Lodge in Philadelphia for a Warrant to open the Grand Lodge of
Maryland. Five Lodges were represented by Deputies and the meeting
was adjourned until July 31. On that date the same Lodges attended
with the exception of No. 37, of Somerset County, which was not
represented, and No. 6, of Georgetown, which appeared for the
first time. Grand Officers were elected and the meeting was adjourned
until December 18, 1783. The next meeting was not until nearly
three years later but the subordinate Lodges maintained their
allegiance and were not represented at any other Grand Lodge.
Royal Arch Chapters were probably attached
to most of the Lodges in Maryland, but the first known was Washington
Chapter instituted in 1787 by Warrant of Lodge No. 7, at Chestertown,
and attached to Lodge No. 15, afterwards Washington, No. 3. The
first Independent Grand Chapter in the United States was organized
on June 24, 1897. It became inactive in 1803, but was revived
in 1807, when a Convention was held in the City of Washington
on January 21 of representatives of Washington, Concordia, Saint
John's, Federal, Washington Naval and Potomac Chapters. It was
resolved unanimously to organize a Grand Chapter for the State
of Maryland and the District of Columbia, and this was opened
in Ample Form. On May 9, 1814, Chapters Nos. 1, 2, and 3 met at
Baltimore, adopted a Construction and elected Grand Officers..
On August 30, 1822, by the authority of the General Grand Chapter,
the Chapters in the District of Columbia, with the exception of
Potomac, No. 8, at Georgetown, withdrew from the Jurisdiction
of Maryland. For the next twenty years these Columbia Chapters
had no grand authority From 1841 until May 7, 1867, they were
put under the control of the Grand Chapter of Maryland. On that
date the Grand Chapter of the District of Columbus was duly constituted.
Until 1872 the Select Degrees were conferred
by Chapters, but in that year the Grand Chapter made this illegal
and independent Councils were formed. Six of these Councils, Concordia,
Jerusalem, Adoniram, Salem, Tadmor, and Druid were represented
at a Convention which met on May 12, 1874, at Baltimore to organize
a Grand Council.
The first Commandery was Maryland, No. 1,
at Baltimore, to which a Charter of Recognition was issued on
May 2, 1814, admitting the year 1790 to be the date of the complete
organization of the Encampment. It was resolved on July 12, 1870,
to organize a Grand Commandery for the State. Delegates from Maryland,
No. 1; Baltimore, No. 2, and Monumental, No. 3, met in Baltimore,
Maryland, on December 12, 1870, for this purpose. A Warrant was
issued by the Grand Master dated January 3, 1871, and on January
23, the Grand Commandery was dedicated in Ancient Form to Saint
John the Almoner.
A Lodge of Perfection was established at
Baltimore in 1792 by Henry Wilmans, Master of Concordia Lodge
in 1793. On December 9, 1882, the Meredith Chapter of Rose Croix,
No. 1, and the Maryland Council of Kadosh, No. 1, were constituted,
and on May 15, 1885, the Chesapeake Consistory, No. 1, was opened
under the Supreme Council, Southern Jurisdiction.
MASON CROWNED
The French expression is Maçon Couronne.
A Degree in the nomenclature of Fustier.
MASON, DERIVATION OF THE WORD
The search for the etymology or derivation
of the word Mason has given rise to numerous theories, some of
them ingenious, but many of them very absurd. Thus, a writer in
the European Magazine for February, 1792, who signs his name as
"George Drake," Lieutenant of Marines, attempts to trace
the Masons to the Druids, and derives Mason from May's on, May's
being in reference to May-day, the great festival of the Druids,
and on meaning men, as in the French on dit, for homme dit. According
to this, May's on therefore means the Men of May. This idea is
not original with Drake, since the same derivation was urged in
1766 by Cleland, in his essays on The Way to Things in Words,
and on The Real Secret of Freemasons.
Hutchinson, in his search for a derivation,
seems to have been perplexed with the variety of roots that presented
themselves, and, being inclined to believe that the name of Mason
"has its derivation from a language in which it implies some
strong indication or distinction of the nature of the society,
and that it has no relation to architects," looks for the
root in the Greek tongue. Thus he thinks that Mason may come from
Mao Soon, "I seek salvation," or from Mystes, "an
initiate"; and that Masonry is only a corruption of Mesouraneo,
"I am in the midst of heaven"; or from Mazourouth, a
constellation mentioned by Job, or from Mysterion, "a mystery."
Lessing says, in his Ernst und Falls, that
Masa in the Anglo-Saxon signifies a table, and that Masonry, consequently,
is a society of the table.
Nicolai thinks he finds the root in the
sow Latin word of the Middle Ages Massonya, or Masonia, which
signifies an exclusive society or club, such as that of the Round
Table.
Coming down to later times, we find Brother
C. W. Moore, in his Boston Magazine, of May, 1844, deriving Meson
from Lithotornos, a Stone Cutter. But although fully aware of
the elasticity of etymological rules, it surpasses our ingenuity
to get Mason etymologically out of Lithotomos.
Brother Giles F. Yates sought for the derivation
of Mason in the Greek word Mazones, a festival of Dionysus, and
he thought that this was another proof of the lineal descent of
the Masonic Order from the Dionysiac Artificers.
Brother William S. Rockwell, who was accustomed
to find all his Freemasonry in the Egyptian Mysteries and who
was a thorough student of the Egyptian hieroglyphic system, derives
the word Mason from a combination of two phonetic signs, the one
being Mai, and signifying to love, and the other being Son, which
means a brother. Hence he says, "this combination, Mason,
expresses exactly in sound our word Masons and signifies literally
loving brother, that is, philadelphust brother of an association,
and thus corresponds also in sense."
But all of these fanciful etymologies, which
would have terrified Bopp, Grimm, or Muller, or any other student
of linguistic relations, forcibly remind us of the French epigrammatist,
who admitted that alphna came from equus, but that, in so coming,
it had very considerably changed its route."
What, then, is the true derivation of the
word Mason? Let us see what the orthoepists, who had no Masonic
theories, have said upon the subject.
Webster, seeing that in Spanish masa means
mortar, is inclined to derive Mason, as denoting one that works
in mortar, from the root of mass, which of course gave birth to
the Spanish word. In Low or Medieval Latin, Mason was machio or
memo, and this Du Cange derives from the Latin maceria, a long
wall. Others find a derivation in machinoe, because the builders
stood upon machines to raise their walls. But Richardson takes
a commonsense view of the subject.
He says, "It appears to be obviously
the same word as maison, a house or mansion, applied to the person
who builds, instead of the thing built. The French Maisoner is
to build houses; Masonner, to build of stone. The word Mason is
applied by usage to a builder in stone, and Masonry to work in
stone."
Carpenter gives Massom, used in 1225, for
a building of stone, and Massonus, used in 1304, for a Mason;
and the Benedictine editors of Du Cange define Massoneria "a
building, the French Maconnerie, and Massonerius," as Latomus
or a Mason, both words in manuscripts of 1385. Doctor Murray,
in the New English Dictionary, says of the word Mason: "the
ulterior etymology is obscure, possibly the word is from the root
of Latin maceria, a wall.
As a practical question, we are compelled
to reject all those fanciful derivations which connect the Freemasons
etymologically and historically with the Greeks, the Egyptians,
or the Druids, and to take the word Mason in its ordinary signification
of a worker in stone, and thus indicate the origin of the Order
from a society or association of practical and operative builders.
We need no better root than the old French and Latin Maçonner,
to build, or Maçonetus, a builder (see Freemason and Maçon)
.
MASONRY
Used in the Strassburg Constitutions, and
other German works of the Middle Ages, as equivalent to the modern
Freemasonry. Kloss translates it by Masonhood. Lessing derives
it from mosa, Anglo Saxon, a table, and says it means a Society
of the Table. Nicolai deduces it from the Low Latin masTanya,
which means both a club and a key, and says it means an exclusive
society or club, and so, he thinks, we get our word Masonry. Krause
traces it to mas mase, food or a banquet. It is a pity to attack
these speculations, but we are inclined to look at Masonry as
simply a corruption of the English Masonrie.
MASONIC ARCHEOLOGICAL INSTITUTE
This was the title of a Society founded
in England about 1871. Brother Walter Besant was the Secretary
though he was not an original member of the Society which was
probably founded by Brother William Smith, C. E., once Editor
of the Freemason or Freemasons Magazine. The objects of the Society
were the advancement of those branches of archeological knowledge
and research which either directly or indirectly bear upon Freemasonry.
Besides the study of Freemasonry proper, the Institute was to
have papers read and discuss subjects connected with mysticism
and allegorical teachings in literature and philosophy; symbolism
in religion and art; the development and progress of architecture;
the history of secret sects, associations and brotherhoods; and
similar subjects. It was understood that no papers would be published
whose subjects rendered them unsuitable for the reading of those
who were not Freemasons. Later on Brother Besant became Treasurer
and R. G. Haliburton the Secretary.
The latter was a Freemason of Saint John's
Lodge, Nova Scotia, and was the son of Judge Haliburton, author
of Sam Slick. The Society was not of long life but is particularly
noteworthy because several of its early members were connected
with the founding of Quatuor Coronati Lodge.
MASONIC BAPTISM
See Bapttsm, Masonic, Clean Hands, and Lustration
MASONIC CIPHER MESSAGE
At Cawnpore, India, in July, 1857, occurred
the massacre of hundreds of men, women and children. Of this butchery
there is a pathetic record in the message of a Masonic character
that was written on the wall of the Chamber of Blood. This inscription
appearing in a recent issue of the Controlling Officers' Journal,
was reprinted in the Transactions, Leicester Lodge of Research,
1912-3 (page 107) and as the Masonic cipher was not understood
an invitation was extended the Craft to submit a clue to its meaning
(see Cipher Writing).
Brother W. John Songhurst offered in reply
the comment that the reproduction corresponded fairly with a photograph
in his possession. But there were one or two small differences
proving that they were not taken direct from the same original.
For instance, the photograph shows that a blot had been erased
at the word hands, and that an alteration had been made at the
word Post which looks as though it had been first written Past.
It is headed "The writing on the Wall in Sir H. Wheeler's
Room." Brother Songhurst had been able to trace other copies,
all having many features in common, but none corresponding exactly,
and with some the differences are important. He proceeded in Transactions,
19134 (pages 71 - 83) to discuss the circumstances thus:
At the
outbreak of the Mutiny in May, 1857, Major General Sir Hugh Wheeler
was in command of the Cawnpore division of the Indian Army. He
at once ordered entrenchments to be constructed, and by the 21st
of May these were occupied by the women and nonconubatants. It
is stated that there were about one thousand Europeans in the
town, of whom n ore than half were women and children. In a letter
written by General Wheeler on 1st June, he says, "I have
left my house, and am residing day and night in my tent."
On the 6th of June the siege commenced,
and the defenders gallantly held out for three weeks. The attack
was led by the adopted son of the former chief of the Mahrattas,
known in history as Nana Sahib, whose claims to succession the
British Government had refused to recognize. General Wheeler had
with him his wife, who was of mixed blood, his son and two daughters.
The son, Lieutenant Wheeler, was his Aide-de-Camp, and being severely
wounded during the siege, he was carried to a room in the barracks.
Here, in the presence of the whole family--father, mother and
sisters--he was killed by a cannon-ball, winch, entering the building,
took off his head.
On the 26th of June, Captain Moore, Captain
Whiting and Mr. Roche, the postmaster, went from the trenches
to arrange for capitulation, and eventually received the promise
of safe conduct for all to Allahabad. Preparations were quickly
made. Sepoys accompanied the fugitives to the banks of the river,
but even before all were embarked in the boats, a murderous musket-fire
was opened upon them, and according to one account, only four
men escaped. It seems certain that General Wheeler, his wife and
elder daughter were among the killed. About one hundred and twenty-five
women and children were carried back to Cawnpore, including the
general's youngest daughter, who was taken by one of Nana's troopers
some say by Nana himself, and died a natural death in Nepal some
years afterwards. The others were put into two rooms, about twenty
feet by ten feet each, in a small building formerly occupied by
a native clerk, close to Nana's house. Meanwhile General Havelock
was hurrying to the relief.
He arrived on the 16th of July, only to
find that all the prisoners had been massacred by Nana's orders,
and hurled, dead and dying, into a well. sir George Trevelyan
in his Cawnpore, published in 1865, says that this took place
"within call of the theater, the assembly-rooms and the Masonic
Lodge." Other accounts from which I have taken these particulars
are The Story of Cawnpore, London, 1859, by Captain Mowbray Thomson,
and A Personal Narrative of the Outbreak and Massacre at Cawnpore,
Lucknow, 1879, by W. J. Shepherd. Both of these men escaped from
the garrison. Thomson swam from the boats and managed to land
lower down the river; Shepherd went out disguised during the siege,
and was not able to return until after Havelock's occupation of
the town. The cipher inscription is not mentioned in either of
these narratives but Shepherd says that during the siege both
he and Captain Seppings wrote messages upon the walls of the barracks
in pencil. There were two barracks within the entrenchments. One
is described as the Thatched Barrack, and it was burned down by
the rebels. The other was called the Masonry Barrack, or the Flat-roofed
Barrack, and it seems that it was in this building General Wheeler
had his quarters, and in which his son was killed. Seppings was
also in the Masonry Barrack, and wrote as follows:
"The following were in this barrack
on 11th June, 1857, Captain Seppings, Mrs. Ditto, 3 children,
Mrs. Wainwright, Ditto infant, Mr. Cripps, Mrs. Halliday."
Shepherd's inscription in the Thatched barrack
was: " Should this meet the eves of any who were acquainted
with us, in case we are all destroyed, be it known to them that
we occupied this room for eight days under circumstances so distressing
as have no precedent. The destruction of Jerusalem could not have
been attended with distress as severe as we have experienced in
so short a time. W. J. Shepherd (wounded in the back), his wife
and two children, Rebecca and her infant, Elnelina, Martha, old
Mrs. Frost, Mrs. Osborne, Daniel, The Khoorranee, Conductor Bethell,
his wife and daughter, together with other friends. 11th June,
1857."
The writing in cipher was first brought
to Masonic notice in May, 1862, by a copy in the Indian Freemason's
Friend, the correspondent asking if any reader could furnish an
explanation. This brought a letter signed " Tatnai,"
dated from Lucknow, 27th July, in which it is said, that the inscription
is "in many parts a string of characters devoid of significance."
This fact " Tatnai" attributes to errors made by the
original writer, to errors made by the copyist, and to chips of
whitewash having fallen from the wall, before the copy was made.
He then gives the cipher portion of the writing as it had appeared
in the Journal, and adds a suggested restoration. The letter mentions
"the few lines signed by J. W. Roche, just above R. A. B.
Johnstone " written in plain English, and says that these
include the words "nasty wound," which in a copy of
his possession were written " mortally wounded." These
particulars about Roche (called also Roach and Roache) do not
appear in the photograph, but we find them in a copy made by R.
MacCrea, of the 0. and R. Railway dated 20th July, 1887. Shepherd
mentions that Roche had been wounded four times in the entrenchments,
but they were only flesh wounds. He was killed on 27th of June.
The same journal also printed a translation of the cipher, made
by Colonel E. K. Money, which is as follows:
"Dear Jesus send His help soon and
deliver us not into
the enemy's hands.
The General's daughter is in this corner.
May God reward them according to the bloody deeds
done to this innocent girl.
This is the corner General Wheeler occupied in his distress.
The General's wife is in this corner.
The P.M. in this.This is the place where two soldiers (unintelligible)
Remember the innocent."
As both of the General's daughters survived
the siege there must be some mistake in this translation, on which
a critic, possibly " Tatnai " himself, writes: "
Colonel Money has misinterpreted the gender of the symbol, it
was the general's son who was wounded, when a cannonball. in passing
through the room, carried away the head of lieutenant Wheeler
in the presence of his parents and sisters. Colonel Mowbray Thomson
states this . . . and Colonel Williams, the special Commissioner,
states that Lady Wheeler and her two daughters were brought down
to the Ghaut on an elephant. One of the daughters was carried
away by a Sowar. The remark 'unintelligible' . . . must refer
to the spot where the two soldiers laid Lieutenant Wheeler down.
Mr. Shepherd says that the two daughters occupied the adjoining
room when he saw the General on the 24th June, 1857."
I have mentioned that MacCrea's printed
leaflet is dated July 1887- It purports to have been "copied
by W. J. Shepherd in July, 1858," and it contains the following
which I have not found elsewhere, though in part it is referred
to by "Tatnai":
"T. B. Roach wounded in right foot,
shin bone fractured by shell, knee cap fractured, musket shot
behind, nasty wound, musket shot in right breast. 9 th June, 1857.
Adjutant Halliday, With N. I., killed by a round shot, 9th June,
1857."
Only three lines of cipher are given, and
these with all else which could not be printed in type, are inserted
with pen and ink. Some notes are added, but they are not reliable
as they contain, for instance, the statement that the translation
by (Colonel Money appeared in the Masonic Herald for 1808, while
as a matter of fact that periodical was not in existence until
about 1870, and as I have said, the translation was printed in
the Indian Freemasons Friend in 1862. While I cannot say that
I am satisfied with Colonel Money's translation, I am not able
to supply another. The absence of the original writing, or an
authoritative copy, renders any serious attempt at deciphering
practically impossible. We do not even know for certain where
it was written. If, as seems most likely, it was on a wall in
the Thatched Barrack, it could scarcely have referred to General
Wheeler and his family, and we know that this building was burned
during the siege; while the Masonry Barrack in which General Wheeler
had his quarters, was destroyed soon after Havelock's entry. "Tatnai,"
writing within five years of the massacre, says that the building
was not then in existence, and his suggestion is that the writer
had concealed something in a certain place, and hoped that after
his death some Brother might be able to recover it.
There were two English Lodges at Cawnpore
at the time--Sincerity, constituted in 1819 and erased in 1858
and Harmony, constituted in 1836, which still exists as No. 438.
It seems likely that Johnston may have been the Master of Sincerity,
but unfortunately no names were registered at Grand Lodge after
1845. Shepherd mentions a Mr. A. R. Johnston, of the E. I. Railway,
who with his wife and children was killed during the siege. James
Williamson Roche, postmaster, was initiated in Harmony in December,
1806, and his is the only name I am able to trace in the lists
at Freemasons' Hall. It is quite possible that the Brother who
wrote the cipher was a Scotch Mason. The device at the head undoubtedly
indicates the Red Cross of Babylon, which the second line ends
with letters referring to the same Degree (Red Cross Knight),
and one would not expect this to have been put forward prominently,
in an English Lodge, at so late a date.
On the other hand a Scotch Master would
probably have been described as R.W.M. The interlaced triangles
which appear sometimes at the foot, and sometimes in the center
of the copies, may be taken as referring to the Royal Arch, but
it is not impossible that they may also indicate the key to the
cipher. Colonel Money's translation seems to imply that the prayer
was also written in cipher, while MacCrea's version points to
a sense of inscriptions in the form of a diary, or record of events,
during the siege, and Shepherd's statements rather bear out this
view. It may be merely a coincidence that on the 17th of June,
the date given on the photograph, a daughter of Shepherd was killed
by a chance musket shot. If Colonel Money was right in his translation
of "daughter" there is just a possibility that this
u the incident referred to. In any case it seems that the mystery
will not be cleared up, unless and until we have before us a correct
copy of the writing as it originally appeared. Only one thing can
be stated with certainty: that it had no reference whatever to
either of the two massacres but to occurrences which took place
before the attempted escape by the boats.
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