CARDINAL VIRTUES.
The pre-eminent or principal virtues on which all the others hinge or depend.
They are temperance, fortitude, prudence, and justice.
They are referred to in the ritual of the Entered Apprentice Degree, and will be found in this work under their respective heads. Oliver says (Revelations of a Square, chapter 1) that in the eighteenth century the Freemasons delineated the symbols of the four cardinal virtues by an acute angle variously disposed.
Thus, suppose you face the east, the angle symbolizing temperance will point to the south, .
It was called a Guttural.
Fortitude was denoted by a saltire, or Saint Andrew's Cross, X.
This was the Pectoral.
The symbol of prudence was an acute angle pointing toward the southeast, and was denominated a Manual; and justice had its angle toward the north, and was called a Pedestal or Pedal.
The possession of cardinal virtues is no special distinction of Freemasons, for other societies have had them.
They are in evidence in the Christian church.
The fifteen cardinal virtues, in mosaic, in the dome of Ascension of Saint Mark's at Venice is a famous example.
CARIBBEE ISLANDS OR LESSER ANTILLES.
A name sometimes applied to the whole of the West Indies, strictly comprising only the chain of islands from Porto Rico to the Venezuelan coast of South America. Three Lodges were at work in 1739 at Antigua. Others had been chartered and were on the Grand Lodge Books but they had ceased to exist and were dropped from the Register.
In 1738 Governor Matthews was appointed by the Grand Lodge of England Provincial Grand Master of the Leeward Islands. A Masonic Province was also established by Scotland in 1769.
A Provincial Grand Lodge was opened at the Windward Islands in 1740 and Brother Thomas Baxter was first Provincial Grand Master.
In the same year the "Moderns" Grand Lodge of England authorized Lodge No. 186.
The Grand Lodge of Ireland established another Provincial Grand Lodge at Barbados, but it was soon abandoned.
A Lodge, Albion, was opened at Bridgetown, Barbados, in 1790 by the "Antients" and it remained in existence although three others warranted by the same authority' soon ceased work.
Other Lodges were chartered in the Islands by the Grand Lodges of England, Holland, France, Pennsylvania, ete.
CARLILE, RICHARD.
A printer and bookseller of London, who in 1819 was fined and imprisoned for the publication of Paine's Age of Reason, and Palmer's Light of Nature.
He also wrote and published several pretended expositions of Freemasonry, which, after his death, were collected, in 1845, in one volume, under the title of a Manual of Freemasonry, in three parts.
Carlile was a professed atheist, and, although a fanatical reformer of what he supposed to be the errors of the age, was a man of some ability.
His Masonic works are interspersed with considerable learning, and are not as abusive of the Order as expositions generally are. He was bornin 1790, and died in 1843, in London.
For ten years before his death his religious opinions had been greatly modified.
CARMELITES.
Monks of an Order established on Mount Carmel, in Syria, during the twelfth century.
They wore a brown scapular passing over the shoulder and diagonally across the back and body, thus crossing the gown from right to left.
CARNARVON, MARQUIS OF.
Grand Master of England, March, 1754, to May 18, 1757.
Afterwards known as Duke of Chandos.
CARPENTERS, ORDER OF.
An organized body in Holland and Belgium, with central point of assembly at Antwerp.
Their gatherings were at night in some neighboring forest.
CARPET.
The chart or Tracing Board on which the emblems of a degree are depicted for the instruction of a candidate.
Carpets were originally drawn on the floor with chalk or charcoal, and at the close of the Lodge obliterated by the use of a mop and pail.
To avoid this trouble, they were subsequently painted on cloth, which was laid on the floor ; hence they were called carpets.
Carpets, or charts, as they are at the present time commonly designated, are now generally suspended from the wall, or from a framework in the Lodge (see Steps on Master's Carpet).
CARSON, ENOCH TERRY.
Initiated in 1846 and became Past Master of Cynthia Lodge No. 155, as well as founder and First Worshipful Master of Kilwinning Lodge, No. 356, warranted in 1865, both Lodges being at Cincinnati, Ohio, and he was active and scholarly in all branches of the Fraternity. He printed at his own expense several important works of interest and value to the Fraternity.
The first facsimile of the Book of Constitutions of 1723 was published by him in 1855 from the copy in his own library and in the same year he had a catalog of his collection printed in the American Freemason at Louisville.
Doctor Oliver's Historical Landmarks was also issued in like manner in 1855.
He established the Masonic Archeological Society, of wich he was really the whole organization and mainspring and which did good work, producing the very rare works, the Grand Mystery of1724 and Prichard's Masonry Dissected, of 1730, and publishing them iu 1868.
Eight years later, what is known as Mrs. Dodds Manuscripts of 1739 was issued. In 1889 an artistic facsimile reproduction of the very valuable engraved list of 1736 by Pine was published by him and from 1872 he was at work on the production of a sumptuous catalog of his Masonic library, which was begun in the Masonic Review of Cincinnati and then reprinted in book forrn from 1874.
It was not completed, however, much to the regret of his many friends, the important bibliography ending with No. 1134 Picart, pages 1 to 224.
Brother Carson also wrote and published much other material respecting the Craft, and, as with the previously mentioned books, all was at his own expense; the whole of the works being presented to his literary friends and Brethren.
He died on February 23, 1899.
His fine library is now, through the generosity of General Lawrence, possessed by the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts.
CARSON, KIT.
Famous American scout, born in Madison County, Kentucky, December 24, 1809. In his childhood, his parents moved to Missouri.
Carson became guide and hunter, accompanied the Fremont expeditions, took part in the Mexiean War, and become Indian Agent at Taos, New Mexico, in 1854.
Made a Master Mason on December 26, 1854, in Montezuma Lodge at Santa Fe, in what was then a Territory but is now the State of New Mexico, Montezuma Lodge was No, 109 on the roster of the Grand Lodge of Missouri and was one of the Lodges organizing the Grand Lodge of New Mexico in 1877.
He demitted from this Lodge on April 30, 1860, but affiliated again a few years later and remained a member until his death which occurred, May 24, 1868, at Santa Fe, New Mexico. The Grand Lodge of Arizona has taken charge of the grave lot and the monument which was erected to this early American, pioneer (see also New Age Magazine, May, 1925).
CARTHUSIANS.
A religious Order founded by Bruno in 1080, and named from Chartreux, in France, the place of their institution.
They were noted for their austerity.
CARTULARY.
An officer who has charge of the register or other books of record.
CARYSFORT, JOHN PROBY, LORD.
Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of England, March 10, 1752, to 1754
CASANOVA DE SEINGALT, GIOVANNI JACOPO.
Usually mentioned by the word Casanova.
An Italian adventurer, born at Venice, 1725, died in Bohemia 1798, noted particularly for his Memoirs, a spirited boastful autobiography so romantic and improbable in his numerous detailed successes among the opposite sex that doubt attaches to almost all his claims. Allowing freely for the widespread social evils of his day, we shall the better understand his sneering frankness about vice. Several reliable authorities agree that his elever writings are trustworthy accounts of the morals and manners of the society he usually frequented.
Among his acquaintances were the most notable people, Rousseau, D'Eon, Frederick the Great, Suvaroff, Empress Catherine of Russia, Voltaire, Cagliostro, and as a prominent Roman Catholic, he received from the Pope the distinction of the Order of the Golden Spur.
Expelled from school, he entered the service of Cardinal Acquavisa, began his travels; returning to Venice in 1755, was denounced as a spy and imprisoned; escaped to Paris and gained a fortune directing the State Lotteries, again travelled to Florence; whence he was banished, thence to Rome.
After further journeys he was. forced to flee from. Poland.
Arriving at Paris he found a warrant for his arrest awaiting him and he took refuge in Spain, but was ejected from Madrid in 1769, and going again to Italy was exiled from Venice, ending his turbulent career as librarian from 1785 to his death in 1798 at Dux in Bohemia. Here he wrote his famous Memoirs, published first in twelve volumes at Leipzig and then in eight at Paris.
Brilliant as any romantic fiction, their worth as sober truth has not been above suspicion and his acknowledged exploits in knavery demonstrate that anything he said or did was subject to question.
Casanova claims to have been initiated in the latter part of 1750 at Lyons, on his way to Paris, where he was made a Master Mason.
At Venice in 1755 he was arrested on charges of sorcery and of being a Freemason, his Masonic clothing being found by police and deemed incriminating.
Not only does he tell of meeting prominent Freemasons in various countries but in Rome itself he asserts that several prelates and cardinals were secretly members of the Craft.
References to the Craft are sprinkled freely through his Memoirs, one of them (pages 276-9, Librarie Garnier Freres edition in French, Paris, tome II, chapter xiii) we translate as follows :
At Lyons there was an estimable personage with whom I became acouainted through M. de Rochebaron, and who obtained the favor for me of being admitted to participate in the sublime trifles of Freemasonry. Arriving as an Apprentice at Paris, some months afterwards, I there planned to become a Fellow Craft and Master.
The Master is certainly the supreme degree of Freemasonry, for all the others that are in the series taken by me are only pleasing inventions which, good enough in symbolism, add nothing to the dignity of Master.
There is no one person in the world who may succeed in knowing everything, but men sensible of their faculties and who know how to take account the more closely of their moral powers, should seek to know all that is possible. A young man, well born, who plans to travel and acquaint himself with the world, and what we call society, who does not wish to find himself in certain circumstances the inferior of his equals and to be excluded from participation in all their pleasures, ought to have himself initiated into what they call Freemasonry, even though it would only be to know superficially what it is.
Freemasonry is an Institution of Benevolence which, in certain times and in certain places, may serve as a pretext for plots criminal and subversive of good order; but good God, what has not been abused? Have not the Jesuits been seen, under the sacred guise of religion, to furnish weapons for the parricidal arms of blind enthusiasts to strike Kings'? All men of some importance, I wish to say those whose socialexistance is marked by merit, knowledge or fortune, should be Freemasons, and a great number are ; why infer that the democratie communications, where the members impose on themselves the law of never speaking intra muros (within the walls in a tiled place) neither of politics, religion, nor government, who only converse about emblems, or morals, or puerilities; why infer, I say, that these reunions where the governments may have their creatures, can offer such dangers that Sovereigns forbid thein and that popes entertain themselves by excommunicating?
Besides that it is a failure of purpose and the Pope, notwithstanding his infallibility, trips up himself by the persecutions, giving only to Freemasonry an importance that it would never perhaps have acquired without them. Mystery is in the nature of man, and all that presents itself to the crowd under a mysterious aspect always excites curiosity and will be sought, many convinced that there something substantial awaits them. though the veil often hides but a zero.
After all, I advise every well-born young man who wishes to see the world to be accepted a Freemason, but I urge him to choose well the Lodge ; for, although bad company cannot work in the Lodge, it may however be found there, and the candidate ought to guard himself from dangerous associations.
Men who only plan to be accepted as Freemasons, with the purpose of coming to know the secret of the Order, run great risk of growing old under the trowel without ever attaining their object. However, there is a secret but it is so inviolable that it has never been told nor confided to anyone.
Those who grasp at the superficiality of things believe that the secret consists in words, signs and grips, or that in the final allalysis it is the grand word of the last degree. A mistake!
He who discovers the secret of Freemasonry, for they never know where they are finding it, will not arrive at that knowledge by reason of frequenting Lodges.
He gains it only by the strength of reflecting, of reasoning, of comparing, and of deducing. He will not confide it to his best friend in Freemasonry, for he knows that if that brother does not find it for himself as did he, the friend will not have the talent to extract the means to do so from what shall be said in the ear.
He who has it remains silent and this secret is always secret.
All that is done in the Lodge ought to be secret; but those who by dishonest indiscretion make no scruple of revealing what is done there, have never revealed the essential: they do not know. it; and if they have not known, truly they cannot reveal the ceremonies.
The sensation experienced today by the profane, that is to say by those who are not Freemasons, is of the same kind as that experienced in times of yore by those who were not admitted to the mysteries that were celebrated at Eleusis in honor of the goddess Cérés. But the mysteries of Eleusis interested all Greece, and all they had there of eminence then in society aspired to be made a party to them : so it is with Freemasonry., in the midst of a great number of men of premier merit, enclosed by a crowd of scamps that no society would acknowledge, because they are the rubbish of the human species under the moral accounting.
In the mysteries of Cérés they long kept an impenetrable silence to cause the reverence of which these mysteries were the object.
Moreover, what could they reveal? The three words that the hierophant said to the initiates! But to what would that lead? To the dishonor of the indiscreet, because he would only reveal barbarous language unknown by the vulgar, the common herd.
I have read somewhere what is meant by the three sacred and secret words of the mysteries of Eleusis : Be watchful and do nu evil.
The sacred and secret words of the several Masonic degrees are nearly all as criminal!
The Eleusian initiation lasted nine days; the ceremonies very impressive, and the company very respectable. Plutarch informs us that Alcibiades was condemned to death and all his goods confiscated for having dared in company with Polition and Theodore against the Eumolpides to turn into ridicule the great mysteries.
They even intended that Alcibiades should be cursed by the priests and priestesses.
But the curse was never uttered because a priestess opposed it, saying. " I am a priestess for blessing, not cursing." Sublime words!
Here is a lesson of morality and of wisdom that the Pope despises, but the Gospels taught and the Savior of the world ordained.
There is an allusion (page 286, tome VIII, chapter xi) to the prominent Roman Catholics of the eighteenth century ignoring privately in practise what they said publicly and olficially against Freemasonry.
Of course there are instances of Roman Catholics of prominence being admitted openly into Masonic Lodges during that century- and later. Daniel O'Connell, the Liberator, as he was called, also active in the Grand Lodge of Ireland, found the two pursuits, Roman Catholicism and Freemasonry, were deemed inconsistent and he eventually resigned his membership in the Craft.
But others, as the Abbe Cordier at Paris, a leader in the famous Lodge of the Nine Sisters, and with Benjamin Franklin, supporting Voltaire when he was initiated, paid little or no heed to the threats from the head of the Roman Catholic Church against Freemasonry.
'What Casanova says gives a hint as to the position of those attempting to be on both sides of the fence and his introduction of a Prince of the Roman Catholic Church as a Freemason is a curious commentary on the situation in question:
The first day of the year 1772, I presented myself to the Cardinal Brancafarte, Legate of the Pope, who I had known at Paris twenty years previously when he was sent by Benoit (Benedict XIV) to carry the blessed linen clothes to the new-born Duke de Bourgoyne.
We had been together in a Lodge of Freemasons, for the members of the Sacred College who thundered against the Freemasons knew well that their anathemas (solemn curses) impressed only the weak, whom a too lively light might dazzle.
CASMARAN.
The Angel of Air. Referred to in the Degree of Scottish Knight of Saint Andrew. The etymology is uncertain.
CASSIA.
A corruption of acacia, which undoubtedly arose from the common habit, among illiterate people, of sinking the sound of the letter A in the pronunciation of any word of which it constitutes the initial syllable, as pothecary for apothecary, and prentice for apprentice, The word prentice, by the way, is almost altogether used in the old records of Freemasonry, which were, for the most part, the productions of uneducated men. Unfortunately, however, the corruption of acacia into cassia has not always been confined to the illiterate; but the long employment of the corrupted form has at length introduced it, in some instances, among a few of our writers.
Even Doctor Oliver has sometimes used the objectionable corruption, notwithstanding he has written so much upon the symbolism of the acacia.
He refers to the Sprig of Cassia in Revelations of a Square (page 113).
There is a plant which was called by the ancients cassia, but it is entirely- different from the acacia.
The acacia was a sacred plant; the casia an ignoble plant, having no sacred character. The former is in Freemasonry profoundly symbolic; the latter has no symbolism whatever.
The cassia is only three times mentioned in Scripture, but always as an aromatic plant forming a portion of some perfume.
There is, indeed, strong reason for believing that the cassia was only a coarse kind of cinnamon, and that it did not grow in Palestine, but was imported from the East.
Casia, therefore, has no rightful place in Masonic language, and its use should be avoided as a vulgar corruption.
CASTELLAN.
In Germany, the Superintendent or Steward of a Lodge building, in which he resides.
He is either a serving brother or an actual member of the Lodge, and has the care of the building and its contents.
CASTING VOICE or VOTE.
The twelfth of the thirty-nine General Regulations prescribes that "All matters are to be determined in the Grand Lodge by a majority of votes, each member having one vote and the Grand Master having two votes" (see Constitutions, 1723, page 61). From this law has arisen the practise of giving to the Master of the Lodge a costing vote in addition to his own when there is a tie.
"The custom is so universal, and has been so long practised, that, although I can find no specific law on the subject, the right may be considered as established by prescription" says Doctor Mackey'.
But there are exceptions.
These are given in the revised edition of Doctor Mackey's Jurisprudence of Freemasonry (chapter iii).
It may be remarked that the Masonic usage is probably' derived from the custom of the London Livery Companies or Gilds, where the casting vote has always been given by the presiding officers in all cases of equality, a rule that has been recognized by Act of Parliament.
|
