PAST MASTER, JOINING.
Any Past Master upon joining another Lodge in England becomes a Past Master in the Lodge he joins. He ranks immediately after the then Immediate Past Master and in later lists of the Past Masters his name is placed before that of the Worshipful Master presiding in the East when he affiliates.
PASTOPHORI.
Couch or shrine bearers. The company of Pastophori constituted a sacred college of priests in Egypt, whose duty it was to carry in processions the image of the god. Their chief, according to Apuleius (Metamorphoses xi), was called a Scribe. Besides acting as mendicants in soliciting charitable donations from the populace, they took an important part in the Mysteries.
PASTOS.
The Greek word, meaning a couch. The pastos was a chest or close cell, in the Pagan Mysteries, among the Druids, an excavated stone, in which the aspirant was for some time placed, to commemorate the mystical death of the god. This constituted the symbolic death which was common to all the mysteries. In the Arkite Rites, the pastos represented the ark in which Noah was confined. It is represented among Masonic symbols by the coffin (see Coffin)..
PATENTS.
Diplomas or Certificates of the advanced Degrees in the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite are called Patents. The term is also sometimes applied to Commissions granted for the exercise of high Masonic authority. Literae patented w aperture that is, letters patent or open letters, was a term used in the Middle Ages in contradistinction to literae clausae, or closed letters, to designate those documents which were spread out on the whole length of the parchment, and sealed with the public seal of the sovereign; while the secret or private seal only was attached to the closed patents. The former were sealed with green wax, the latter with white. There was also a difference in their heading; letters patent were directed "universis tum praesentibus quam futuris," that is, to ad present or to come; while closed letters were directed "universis praesentibus literas inspecturis," that is, to all present who shad inspect these letters. Masonic Diplomas are therefore properly called Letters Patent, or, more briefly, Patents.
PATIENCE.
In the instructions of the Third Degree according to the American Rite, it has been said that "time, patience, and perseverance will enable us to accomplish all things, and perhaps at last to find the true Master's Word." The idea is similar to one expressed by the Hermetic philosophers. Thus Pernetty tells us (Dictionary of Hermetic Mythology), that the alchemists said: "The work of the philosopher's stone is a work of patience, on account of the length of time and of labor that is required to conduct it to perfection; and Geber says that many adepts have abandoned it in weariness, and others, wishing to precipitate it, have never succeeded." With the alchemists, in their esoteric teaching, the philosopher's stone had the same symbolism as the Word has in Freemasonry.
PATRIARCHAL FREEMASONRY.
The theory of Doctor Oliver on this subject has, we think, been misinterpreted. He does not maintain, as has been falsely supposed, that the Freemasonry of the present day is but a continuation of that which was practised by the Patriarchs, but simply that, in the simplicity of the patriarchal worship, unencumbered as it was with dogmatic creeds, we may find the true model after which the religious system of Speculative Freemasonry has been constructed. Thus (in his Historical Landmarks i, page 207) he says: "Nor does it, Freemasonry, exclude a survey of the patriarchal mode of devotion, which indeed forms the primitive model of Freemasonry. The events that occurred in these ages of simplicity of manners and purity of faith, when it pleased God to communicate with his favoured creature, necessarily, therefore, form subjects of interesting illustration in our Lodges, and constitute legitimate topics on which the Master in the chair may expatiate and exemplify, for the edification of the Brethren and their improvement in morality and the love and fear of God." There is here no attempt to trace a historical connection, but simply to claim an identity of purpose and character in the two religious systems, the Patriarchal and the Masonic.
PATRIARCH, GRAND.
The Twentieth Degree of the Couneil of Emperors of the East and West. The same as the Twentieth Degree, or Noachite, of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite.
PATRIARCH OF THE CRUSADES.
One of the names formerly given to the degree of Grand Scottish Knight of Saint Andrew, the Twenty-ninth of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite. The legend of that Degree connects it with the Crusades, and hence the name; which, however, is never used officially, and is retained by regular Supreme Councils only as a synonym.
PATRIARCH OF THE GRAND LUMINARY.
A Degree contained An the nomenclature of Le Page.
PATRON.
In the year 1812, the Prince of Wales, becoming Regent of the Kingdom, was constrained by reasons of state to resign the Grand Mastership of England, but immediately afterward accepted the title of Grand Patron of the Order in England, and this was the first time that the title was officially recognized.
George IV held it during his life, and on his death, William IV, in 1830, officially accepted the title of Patron of the United Grand Lodge. On the accession of Queen Victoria, the title fell into abeyance, because it was understood that it could only be assumed by a sovereign who was a member of the Craft, but King Edward VII became Protector of English Freemasons on his accession to the throne in 1901. The office is generally not known in other countries, though on the Continent similar positions have been occupied (see Protector).
PATRONS OF FREEMASONRY.
Saint John the Baptist and Saint John the Evangelist. At an early period we find that the Christian church adopted the usage of selecting for every trade and occupation its own patron saint, who is supposed to have taken it under his especial charge. The selection was generally made in reference to some circumstance in the life of the saint, which traditionally connected him with the profession of which he was appointed the patron. Thus Saint Crispin, because he was a shoemaker, is the patron saint of the Gentle Craft, and Saint Dunstan, who was a blacksmith, is the patron of blacksmiths. The reason why the two Saints John were selected as the patron saints of Freemasonry will be seen under the head of Dedication of Lodges.
PAUL, CONFRATERNITY OF SAINT.
In the time of the Emperor Charles V there was a secret community at Trapani, in Sicily, which called itself La Confraternita di San Paolo. These people, when assembled, passed sentence on their fellow-citizens; and if anyone was condemned, the waylaying and putting him to death was allotted to one of the members, which office he was obliged, without murmuring, to execute (Stolberg's Travels, volume iii, page 472). In the travels of Brocquire to and from Palestine in 1432, page 328, an instance is given of the power of the association over its members. In the German romance of Hermunn of Unna, of which there are an English and French translation, this tribunal plays an important part.
PAUL I.
This Emperor of Russia was induced by the machinations of the Jesuits, whom he had recalled from banishment, to prohibit in his domains all secret societies, and especially the Freemasons. This prohibition lasted from 1797-1803, when it was repealed by his successor. Paul had always expressed himself an enthusiastic admirer of the Knights of Malta; in 1797 he had assumed the title of Protector of the Order, and in 1798 accepted the Grand Mastership. This is another evidence, if one was needed, that there was no sympathy between the Order of Malta and the Freemasons.
Dr. Ernest Friedrichs' Die Freimaurerei in Russland und Polen, Freemasonry in Russia and Poland 1907, has an interesting account of Masonic conditions under Paul I of Russia, who reigned from 1796 to 1801. He tells us that Catherine's son, Paul I, was himself a Freemason. It is said that he was introduced to Freemasonry during a journey which he made through Europe, when he was still the Czare witch, in company of his wife, and of Prince Kurakin who was a most devoted son of Freemasonry. Was it not natural then that the Association which had been outlawed and banished by his mother should look forward to being reinstalled and rehabilitated?
And this expectation seemed as though it were perfectly justified, for immediately after his coronation Paul summoned to Moscow the Freemasons of that city, with Professor Matthai, the Master in the Chair of the former Lodge To the Three Swords at their head, and took counsel with them "in a brotherly spirit and without ceremony" as to what should be done.
At the conclusion of the negotiations "he embraced each single one as a Freemason and gave
him the Masonic shake of the hands.
" This promised very well, and that "a Committee was now appointed to examine the documents, to collect the ruins of Freemasonry and to organize the whole," was but logical. After so much recognition and so much encouragement on the part of the sovereign, followed in 1797—the prohibition of Freemasonry, which "was carried out with great strictness." This sudden change in his manner of looking at things and in his attitude to Freemasonry would cause surprise in a man of ordinary capacity, but Paul was mentally deranged, and it was just his acting by fits and starts that was characteristic of his disease. But does such an explanation clear up everything? No, for Paul was not so ill as to be unable to grasp what would be the consequences of his action. On the contrary, as soon as it was a question of an advantage for his own person, or something that added to his lustre, he was suddenly quite normal in the choice of his means. This change of attitude was, therefore,
perhaps, preceded by well-weighed considerations; nay, we may add that they were considerations with a real genuine background.
It was about this time that the Knights of Malta who were hard-pressed by Napoleon Bonaparte turned to the Czar Paul for protection. According to the information conveyed to Paul by Count Litter, a Knight of Malta, Freemasonry was a hindrance and even a danger to the aims of this Order. He was, therefore, obliged to decide in favor of the one or the other. The Maltese Order was something definite; it was a power, whereas Freemasonry was really
nothing, or at any rate something altogether indefinite which might perhaps have a future, but perhaps it might not.
Could Paul find the choice hard to make? In addition there was a something which, though altogether unpolitical, has often decided questions in politics, namely: Paul's principal mis tress, the extremely beautiful Anna Lopuchin. It was possible for him to make her a Grand Cross Lady of the Order of the Knights of Saint John, but "pretty Annie" among Freemasons was no longer conceivable after the famous "Egyptian Masonry"!
Thus it was that Paul became the Grand Master of le Order of the Knights of Saint John at Malta, end Freemasonry was prohibited. Further, it is said that the Jesiuts set going every imaginable and unimaginable expedient against Freemasonry. Nor does this seem to have been impossible.
PAUL, SAINT, THE APOSTLE , A FREEMASON.
In the Transactions of the Lodge Quatuor Coronati Volume i, page 74) there is a translation by Brother G. W. Speth of a paper by Brother Carl Herman Tendler, a member of the United Lodges, zu den drei Schwertern und Astrea zur grunenden Raute, im Dresden (at the Three Swords and Astrea, and at the blossoming Twig at Dresden). This Brother claims that, "There are many not unimportant grounds of suspicion that Paul was a member of the buildersociety at Damascus, and a master thereof, perhaps even a Chairmaster." His argument is principally Leased upon certain Significant words found in the writings of Saint Paul. For instance, the following statement is a fair example of his line of thought:
The virtue which the builder-societies impressed upon their members as the most edifying the most conducive to edification, and which Saint Paul recommends to Christian builders as the dower and crown of humanity, the highest aspiration of Christian builder-societies, is
agape, love, union in love. In his epistle to the Corinthians, amongst whom Saint Paul worked and taught eighteen months, the word is repeated twenty-three times. Most remarkable is the distinction (I Corinthians viii 1) between gnosis, wisdom of the mysteries, and agape, Christian union. "Knowledge puffeth up, but charity edifieth, ' i.e., the speculations of the mysteries induce pride, but the Christian union produces amelioration.
The original meaning of agape is not love, charity, but union, unity: thus asapai (usually translated love feasts are originally unions for Christian edifieation, mutual culture associations. The constant use of all these words points to the supposition that Saint Paul was a member of a builder-society, Mason Lodge. In this sense the fraternity of Masons is thus as old as mankind itself, and the most energetic and active apostle of Christianity was a Mason. The agreement of the principles of Freemasonry with those of Christianity can only be denied by the malevolent or those totally unacquainted with the Craft.
PAUPERES COMMILITONES JESU CHRISTI.
See Poor Fellow Soldiers of Jesus Christ.
PAVEMENT, THE.
There is almost nothing anywhere in the early records of Speculative Lodges to suggest either a history or an interpretation of the Pavement, which is represented bv a series of black and white squares inside a rectangular frame; nor does there anywhere appear an explanation of why a Blazing Star was set in the middle of it, or whv a rope with a tie and tassels in the corners was combined with it. By general consent Masonic symbologists have treated these as separate svmbolisms, yet there must belong together or they would not have been shown together on old Traeing Boards.
Despite this paucity of data the Pavement is one of the most interesting of Masonic symbols, and that interest is heightened with each discover) of news facts. As a design the Pavement itself, whether set from the sides in a system of squares or from a corner in a system of diamonds, is one of the oldest and most universally liked of decorative designs—old as Egypt, or as China, and found at the ends of the earth; and especially beloved by Indians in both N orth and South America w ho have found numberless adaptations of it; checker-work w as one of the favorite motifs of Byzantine artists; and from early Roman times has been so much used in Italy that walls as w ell as floors are decorated with it, outside as w ell as inside. It is one of the few symbols in which nonMasonic meanings and uses correspond with or are identical with Masonic meanings; and it also is one of the few symbols which is Operative and Speculative at one stroke, because Operative builders used a board of floor or tracing paper (or cloth) divided into squares in laying out plans—as architects and engineers still do. In it many types of symbolism converge.
"The Pavement," writes Pike in his Morals and Dogma, " alternately black and white, symbolizes, whether so intended or not, the Good and Evil Principles of the Egyptian and Persian creed. It is the warfare of Michael and Satan . . . " (Perhaps Pike should have written " a creed " because both Egyptians and Persians had many creeds; nevertheless, and apropos of the latter, the dualism was a cardinal doctrinein Zoroastrianism. htithraism, Manicheeism,etc.?
The Pavement also suggests the correct position of the feet; and the fact that in Circumambulation the turns are at right angles, w hich in itself impresses upon a Candidate the fact that in a Lodge no member can run to and from at will, and that goings and comings are ordered.
The checkered design may be thought of as inlay work or as mosaic work, but in Masonry it is described by the latter word. "Mosaic" is believed by some etymologists to derive from the Latin, by others from the Greek mousa, muse; in either event it passed from Latin into Italian, thence into French, and finally into English (it had no reference to Moses). The Greek artisans of the Byzantine Period used mosaic 60 extensively and so skilfully that it also came to be called in memory of them opus alexandrium, and opus graecanicum; and occasionally it was called opus sedile. But as a Greek art it died out in the Seventh Century, a short time before Charlemagne, and when the Western Empire was about to sever its last ties with the Eastern. In the Eleventh Century it was revived in Italy, and in the great Twelfth Century (which has a better right than the Thirteenth to the title of "greatest of centuries"—granted that there ever was a "greater"!) the extraordinarily talented Cosmati family made their mosaic work so famous that it came to be called Cosmati work.
If, as the majority of Masonic symbologists believe, the black and white squares symbolize day and night, the Pavement is a member of a recurrent theme—the Twenty-four Inch Gage represents the twenty-four hours, the Sun and Moon are day and night, the East is the place of light and the North is the place of darkness, the Master's station is at the beginning of the day and the Junior Warden's is at the end, the postulant is brought from darkness to light, there are High Twelve and Low Twelve. Masons are to know each other in the dark as well as in the light; in the dark a man needs a g ude, in the daylight he can guide himself; a man hexes, or buries, his secrets in the dark where no other can find them. These meanings cluster around the symbolism of the Pavement; perhaps the sun is meant by the Blazing Star (as it was once called) and is in the center because it makes the day by its shining and the night by the shadow it casts; and perhaps the rope around the perimeter reminds men that while for the world day and night go on endlessly they do not for him, and only a few days are going to be tied together in his span of them, so that it is good for him, as is the Masons' creed, to work while it is called of day for soon the night cometh when no man can work.
(For an interesting account of the mosaic work of the Cosmati family see Cathedral Builders, by Leader Scott; p. 314 and p.406. Goodyear, in his Roman and Medieval Art, says "The Siena Cathedral is famous for its pavement, the most remarkable in Europe." For a crowded and learned essay on mosaics see page 95 ff of Vol. I, of Porter's Medieval Architecture. There is a chapter on "Italy and Mosaic," in Arts and Crafts of the Middle Ages, by Julia De Wolf Addison. Kugler writes with authority on Cosmati work in Part I, p. 11 ff., of his The Italian Schools of Painting.)
PAVEMENT, MOSAIC.
See Mosaic Pavement.
PAX VOBISCUM.
A Latin phrase meaning Peace be with you! Used in the Eighteenth Degree, Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite.
PAYENS, HUGH DE.
In Latin, Hugo de Paganis. Founder and the first Grand Master of the Order of Knightg Templar. He was born at Troyes, in the kingdom of Naples. Having, with eight others, established the Order at Jerusalem, in 1118 he visited Europe, where, through his representations, its reputation and wealth and the number of its followers were greatly increased. In 1129 he returned to Jerusalem, where he was received with great distinction, but shortly afterward died, and was succeeded in the Grand Mastership by Robert de Craon, surnamed the Burgundian.
PAYNE, GEORGE.
An English Freemason, who lived at New Palace Yard, Westminster, England, where he died January 23, 1757, leaving very little record of his personal life outside of the fact that he seas at the time secretary to the Tax Office with a 300d social and financial position.
A biographical
note in the Freemason, June 6, 1925, quotes the Gentlexnan's Maganne, 1757, that among the various bequests in his will were legacies to two of his nieces, Francis, Countess of Northampton, and Catherine, Lady Francis Seymour. From 1718-9 he acted as the second Grand Master of Freemasons, being again elected for the year 172s1. The General Regulations, which were subsequently rearranged and published by Doctor Anderson in 1723, were originally eompiled by Brother Payne during his second term of office as Grand Master. Payne was also Master of the original No. 4 Lodge, at the Horn Tavern, now the Royal Somerset House and Inverness Lodge; Senior Grand Warden, 1724-5; Deputy Grand Master in 1735; Master of the Old King's Arms Lodge, No. 28, an active member of Grand Lodge up until 1754, being appointed a member of the Committee to revise the Constitutions on June 27, 1754. These revisions were finally brought to a conclusion and published by Entick in 1756.
P. D. E. P.
Letters placed on the ring of profession of the Order of the Temple, being the initials of the Latin sentence, Pro Deo et Patria, that is, For God and Country.
PEACE.
The spirit of Freemasonry is antagonistic to war. Its tendency is to unite all men in one brotherhood, whose ties must necessarily be weakened by all dissension. Hence, as Brother Albert Pike says, "Freemasonry is the great Peace Society of the world. Wherever it exists, it struggles to prevent international difficulties and disputes, and to bind republics, kingdoms, and empires together in one great band of peace and amity."
"PEACE AND HARMONY."
The universality of Freemasonry which is everywhere accepted as a Landmark in principle is as yet unrealized in practice. Great Britain admits Negroes to membership in its Lodges in the Western Atlantic but in China its Lodges do not admit Chinese. American Lodges admit Jesvs, who have long been debarred by a number of European Grand Bodies, but does not accept Negroes. Some Lodges in the Near East admit Mohammedans, others do not. These " discrepaneies, " or apparent inconsistencies, are found in every Masonic country, and they are made the more glaringly evident by the fact that in none of the Landmarks or Constitutions or Charters of regularlyeonstituted Masonic Bodies are racial, social, or religious exclusions incorporated.
The solution of the paradox is found in another Landmark, indubitably coeval with Freemasonry, to the effect that it is the first duty of Brethren when in Lodge assembled, and the paramount duty of the Worshipful Master, to maintain the peace and hair mony of the Ctaft. This has been universally understood to refer not only to quarrels, schisms, cabals, etc., inside the Lodge, but also to such controversies, customs, or general social movements outside the Lodge that would, if introduced into it, disturb its peace and harmony.
A Lodge being not in a vacuum, and being composed of men who cannot wholly divest themselves of their feelings or even of their prejudices, is unable to act with absolute independence of its milieu, but must for sake of its own peace and harmony so act, at least for a time, as to exclude disturbing factors; if for this reason a Lodge in a given community excludes men of some race, language, or religion it is not because Freemasonry is antipathetic to them in principle, but because they are disturbing at a given place and time.
Moreover the Craft never from its earliest years has admitted that any non-Mason has a right to demand membership; the non-Mason must petition, that is, pray for, the Degrees, and appeals to the grace of the Body to which he prays; the Body can refuse to grant that prayer for any reason of its own, and is therefore not responsible to demands set up in the world outside itself. American Grand Jurisdictions do not in fact (whether in principle or not) accept petitions from Negroes; this is solely because for the time being the Lodges are working amidst a social problem which is not of its making and which it cannot as a Masonic body alter among non-Masons; it is not because Negroes are not white; and it may easily come to pass in the future that when the "race issue" has ceased to be disturbing, Negroes will be admitted. Nothing in the Landmarks or in any Grand Lodge Constitution discriminates against them.
PEARY, REAR ADMIRAL ROBERT EDWIN.
Famous discoverer of the North Pole, born May 6, 1856, at Cresson Springs, Pennsylvania; died on February 20, 1920. Entered civil engineer corps, United States Navy, 1881; made his first expedition north, with one companion, 1886; again in 1891, 1893, 1898, 1905, and for a sixth time in 1908, reaching the North Pole at last, April 6, 1909. He was a Freemason, Raised March 3, 1896, in Kane Lodge No. 454, New York City (see New Age, March, 1925).
PECTORAL.
Belonging to the breast; from the Latin pectus, meaning the breast. The heart has always been considered the seat of fortitude and courage, and hence by this word is suggested to the Freemason certain symbolic instructions in relation to the virtue of fortitude. In the earliest lectures of the eighteenth century it was called one of the "principal signs," and had this hieroglyphic, X; but in the modern instructions the hieroglyphic has become obsolete, and the word is appropriated to one of the Perfeet Points of Entrance.
PECTORAL OF THE HIGH PRIEST.
The breastplate worn by the High Priest of the Jews was so called from pectus, meaning the breast, upon which it rested (see Breastplate and Pectoral).
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