By twenty years later, in 1376, the
masons had won recognition as one of forty-seven "mysteries" in London. They
were to elect four men of the trade to serve on the Common Council. This is the
earliest British Masonic craft guild of which we have record. Not many others
are known. In England they are mentioned at Norwich and Lincoln. In Edinburgh
the masons and wrights petitioned the city jointly in 1475, and were granted
self‑government as an incorporation.
Masons’
Lodges
The
guilds and incorporations were town bodies. There were also jobs for masons
outside the towns, building castles, churches, or fortifications. If the site
was isolated, the builders would have to live on location, sometimes for years
on end. In time the name "lodge" came to be applied to such a group of masons,
probably from the lodge or hut in which the craftsmen worked, kept their tools,
and rested. "Lodges" of masons are mentioned at York Minster in 1352, at
Canterbury Cathedral in 1429, at the Church of St. Nicholas, Aberdeen, in 1483,
and at St. Giles, Edinburgh, in 1491. When in due course the task was finished,
the lodge would be disbanded, and its members would have to seek work elsewhere.
One may readily imagine how they would have modes of recognition to attest their
status when they came to another lodge where they were not
known.
From these temporary lodges are derived
the Manuscript Constitutions or Old Charges, a series of documents which contain
among other things the rules of the Craft. They also include, somewhat
unexpectedly, moral regulations (see below, p. VII-5), reminders of religious
duties, and instructions in good manners. The Old Charges further give a history
of the Craft drawn largely from the Volume of the Sacred Law, the only book ever
seen by most people in the Middle Ages.
The term
"lodge", which was originally restricted to impermanent non‑urban bodies of
masons, ultimately was extended to include "territorial" lodges in the cities.
Their earliest mention is in Edinburgh in 1598. By then the lodge had already
assumed certain duties formerly assigned to the incorporation.The
Operative Mason of the Later Middle Ages
In the
fourteenth and fifteenth centuries the official in charge of the technical side
of a large building project was known as the Master Mason or Master of the
Works. Usually he was the architect who designed the edifice. For this he had a
"tracing board", which served as a drafting table. Most of his workmen were
journeymen masons who had given proof of their skill and had been certified as
fellows of the craft. On large jobs there would be a few apprentice masons,
learning the trade by working with the fellows. Normally they were engaged by
the Master or by the institution that employed him. The journeymen themselves
had too little job security, and not enough money, to maintain an
apprentice.
In Scotland
by 1598 a new stage had come into being, probably to restrict the number of
fully qualified masons on the pay roll.
A journeyman who had completed his apprenticeship was to serve a further
term of from two to seven years, according to location, before he was admitted a
fellow of the craft. In the meantime he was called an "entered
apprentice".
In most
localities there would also be men who had learned to build walls or dikes
without being apprenticed to the trade or being admitted to a lodge. In Scotland
a "dry-diker" was known as a "cowan", which is defined as "a mason without the
word". The Schaw Statutes of 1598 ordered "that no Master nor Fellow of the
Craft receive any Cowans to work in his society or company, nor send none of his
servants to work with cowans". In a matter of bread and butter, however,
expediency could take precedence over doctrinaire principle. Cowans could be
employed by Master Masons for any kind of work provided that no regular
craftsman could be found within fifteen miles. Originally the word was not
necessarily derogatory. Today it means an impostor or eavesdropper who has not
been regularly admitted to lodge. A Masonic catechism of 1730 asks, "If a cowan
(or listener) is catched, how is he to be punished?" Answer, "To be placed under
the eaves of the houses (in rainy weather) till the water runs in at his
shoulders and out at his shoes" (Early Masonic Catechisms, p. l63).
Many sets of
regulations survive which were laid down for the governance of operative masons
by craft guilds, by incorporations, and by both non-permanent and territorial
lodges. Certain clauses recur repeatedly in these codes, above all those which
maintained the quality of the work and protected the rights of the employer. The
term of apprenticeship was fixed, usually at seven years. The competence of
apprentices or other applicants for admission was to be supervised, tested, and
certified. Masters were to respect the integrity of other Masters, and not take
work over their heads, nor employ nor entice their workmen. Disputes between
Masters and workmen were to be settled. Some rules were appropriate only to
municipalities: the provision for periodic "searches", that is, inspections of
work already completed, and trade restrictions on those who were not full
fellows of the craft. One rule, from the Old Charges, was applicable only to the
transitory lodges: a travelling mason who arrived was either to be given work
or, if that was not possible, money enough to see him to the next
lodge.
As well as regulating the trade some of
the Masonic bodies also filled religious functions and collected funds for pious
uses and for benevolence. Throughout the whole period from 1376 to 1650 or even
later, operative masons were known sometimes as freemasons. There is no clear
distinction between "mason" and "freemason", and at times they clearly mean the
same thing. The latter came to have certain distinct connotations. Originally it
was simply an abbreviation of "freestone-mason", a mason who worked in freestone
(a kind of English limestone). Later, after the name became established it was
misunderstood. A freemason was thought of as "free" because he had the "freedom"
(membership) of a company, guild, or lodge. Still later it was taken to mean a
mason who was free by birth, that is, who was not a bondsman. Gradually the word
came to be associated with non-operative masons. About 1655 it was dropped from
the title of the London Company of Masons.
Decline
of Operative Masonry
As
we have seen, mediaeval masons' organizations exercised a restrictive trade
control, partly to protect the brethren, but largely to serve the bosses. In
order to enforce regulations they needed exclusive supremacy over all masons
within their reach. So long as access to the area under jurisdiction of a guild
could be controlled, its authority was unchallenged. Once the monopoly was
cracked, it could no longer police the trade. In Scotland at least, the downfall
of operative masonry came as the cities expanded and work became available
outside the old city walls. Cowans or alien masons could now enter and be hired
without let or hindrance.
Perhaps
the last straw came with the Great Fire of London in 1666, and with a disastrous
series of fires in Edinburgh culminating in 1674. A vast amount of stone rebuilding was
required, too much by far for the local masons to undertake. Masons from
elsewhere were encouraged to contribute their skills. In 1667 the freedom of
London was granted for seven years to anyone who could hold a hammer and nail.
To those who completed the seven years the grant was extent for life. These
benefits had formerly been available to craftsmen only through the
guilds.
The Masons'
Company had lost the chief incentive it formerly offered for new members, and
its domination of the trade was effectually smashed. It could no longer finance
its activities by admission fees alone, and it reverted to the old custom of
collecting a "quarterage", a levy of sixpence per member every three months.
Quarterages were continued by the premier Grand Lodge; hence derives our
practice of submitting an annual return of members to Grand Lodge, together with
a per capita appropriation.
Now
that their original objectives were unattainable, the lodges had to find other
ways to justify their continued existence. At first they became, to a large
extent, benevolent societies. A preoccupation with the relief of distressed
brethren begins to appear in masonic documents of the 1670's and 1680's. Once
the aims were changed it became possible to have more than one lodge in a city,
or even to hold lodge where there had not previously been a stonemasons'
guild.
Acceptance
of Non-Operatives
This decline
of the guilds heralded another important innovation. By 1621 the London Masons'
Company was using the words "making of Masons" in connection with men who had
already reached the highest ranks of operative masonry. The company apparently
had within it a more exclusive body which one could enter by paying a required
fee and "being made a Mason". By 1631 it was "making Masons", or accepting, men
who had no connection with the building trade. "Accepting" is used as a
technical term, meaning "receiving non-operatives into the Craft". This
particular segment of the company was at first called The Acception. By 1682 it
was The Lodge. It had no function
in regulating trade.
Elsewhere
too, we find non‑operatives being accepted or adopted as masons. Often they were
members of the upper classes. For them the rule fixing the term of an E.A. was
suspended, so that they could be advanced to F.C. immediately. Otherwise the
nature of the lodge remained unchanged for them. The earliest certain example of
a non-operative mason is on June 8, 1600, when John Boswell, Laird of
Auchinleck, attended the Lodge at Edinburgh. In July, 1634, the same Lodge
admitted Lord Alexander of Menstrie, Viscount Canada, and two other noblemen as
F.C. In 1646 the diaries of the antiquarian Elias Ashmole record how he was made
a Mason at Warrington, in Cheshire. Other names can be cited, later than these,
in both England and Scotland.
The reasons
that led the gentry to interest themselves in an artisans' craft are obscure. It
seems likely that the lodges benefited financially. In Scotland higher fees were
charged to gentlemen masons than to operatives. Men of distinction were perhaps
encouraged to enter in order to promote contributions to charity. They may have
consented for antiquarian reasons—curiosity about the history and mystery of
cathedral building; or perhaps "the meetings of the lodge provided a convenient
opportunity for that compound of refreshment, smoking and conversation, in
circumstances of ease rather than elegance, and undisturbed by the society of
women, in which many men can take a rational pleasure" (Knoop‑Jones, Genesis of
Freemasonry, p. l41).
In due
course there came to be lodges in which the number of non‑operatives outweighed
the operatives. This was already the case at Ashmole's lodge at Warrington in
1646, at Chester about 1673, at Dublin in 1688, at Chichester in 1695, and at
several locations in London and Yorkshire between 1693 and 1717.
The Premier
Grand Lodge and its Imitators
The
stage was now set. The craft lodges were in eclipse, or were eking out a
precarious existence, with the support of non‑operatives, as social and
charitable clubs. Against this background the first Grand Lodge came into being.
Whether it was a symptom of the turning tide, or whether it caused it to turn,
we cannot say. All that is really known is told in the oldest version of the
story. Late in 1716, "the few lodges at London, finding themselves neglected by
Sir Christopher Wren, thought fit to cement together under a Grand Master, as
the center of Union and Harmony, viz.: the lodges that
met:
1.At the Goose and Gridiron
Ale-House, in St. Paul's Churchyard. [This lodge is still working, under the
name of Antiquity, No. 2, English Registry]
2.
At the Crown Ale-House, in Parker's Lane, near Drury Lane. [It lapsed in
1736.]
3. At the
Apple-tree Tavern, in Charles Street, Covent Garden [now Fortitude and Old
Cumberland, No. 12, E R.]
4. At the
Rummer and Grapes Tavern, in Channel Row, Westminster [now Royal Somerset House
and Inverness, No. 4, E.R.]
They, and
some older brothers, met at the Apple-tree Tavern. [This was late in 1716 or
early in 1717.] And, having put into the chair the oldest Master Mason (now the
Master of a Lodge), they constituted themselves a Grand Lodge pro tempore, in
due form, and forthwith revived the Quarterly Communication of the officers of
Lodges (the Grand Lodge), resolved
to hold the Annual Assembly and then to choose a Grand Master from among
themselves, till they should have the honor of a noble brother at their
head.
Accordingly,
on St. John the Baptist's Day [June 24], in the year of King George I, A.D.
1717, the assembly and feast of the Free and Accepted Masons was held at the
aforesaid Goose and Gridiron Ale‑House. Before dinner the oldest Master Mason
(now the Master of the Lodge) in the chair proposed a list of proper candidates;
and the brethren by a majority of hands elected Mr. Anthony Sayer [1672‑1742 ],
Gentleman, Grand Master of Masons."
This date
marks the formal beginning of modern Freemasonry. From the first meeting we
derive our traditions of a regular Annual Communication to choose the officers,
and of the Grand Master’s Banquet. At this time the most distinguished brother
was the Rev. Dr. John Theophilus Desaguliers (1683‑1744), a noted scientist. It
has been surmised that he engineered the preliminary meeting of 1716/17. In 1719 he became the third Grand
Master.
In 1721 the
Order got its first noble Grand Master, John Montagu, 2nd Duke of Montagu
(1690‑1749). His tenure made membership in the Masons more fashionable. Ever
since, the premier Grand Lodge has been headed by none but peers of the realm or
princes of the blood royal. During Montagu's year in office the task of
perusing, correcting, and digesting the "Old Gothic Constitutions" was assigned
to a Presbyterian clergyman, the Rev. Dr. James Anderson (1679-1739). Two
years later he published his Constitutions, which contained a fanciful history
of the Craft, a series of charges which are reprinted basically unaltered to
this day, and thirty‑nine articles to regulate lodges and Grand Lodge. Anderson
is sometimes charged with wholesale innovation, but surely the members of Grand
Lodge would not have consented to radical departure from existing practice, or
betrayal of their collective wishes. Among the ancient customs which are
endorsed is the practice of charity "for the relief of indigent and decayed
brethren.”
The Old
Charges had enjoined staunch devotion to the established church, and even after
1717 the ritual was resolutely Trinitarian. Thus, in a Masonic exposure
published in London in 1724, we read, How many lights? Three.... What do they
represent? The three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost" (Early Masonic
Calechisms, p.78). Here Anderson's Constitutions did break new ground in leaving
Masons' particular opinions to themselves, "by whatever Denominations or
Persuasions they may be distinguished". One effect of this was seen in 1732,
when the Master of a London lodge was Daniel Delvalle or Dalvalle, "an eminent
Jew snuff merchant.”
Even though
the number of lodges increased rapidly, the Grand Lodge was confined to London
for several years. There were certainly old lodges meeting outside London which
did not place themselves under it. As late as November, 1723, the fifty-two
constituent lodges were all situated within ten miles of Charing Cross. But once
expansion began it was dramatically swift; by 1725 there were lodges at Bath,
Bristol, Norwich, Chichester, and Chester. At the same time English Freemasonry
began to spread throughout Europe (lodges at Paris, 1725; Madrid and Gibraltar,
1728; The Hague, 1731; Bordeaux and Valenciennes, 1732; Florence and Hamburg,
1733), and even beyond (Calcutta, 1728; Boston, 1733). In 1735 the Grand Lodge
first claimed jurisdiction over the whole of England.
The notion
of a grand lodge seems to have been contagious, for in 1725 an old lodge in the
city of York - independent of course of the London Grand Lodge - constituted
itself as the "Grand Lodge of All England". (It was never a missionary lodge,
and eventually withered away in 1792.) About the same year, the Grand Lodge of
Ireland was instituted. And in 1736 the Scottish lodges organized the Grand
Lodge of Scotland. Both bodies were active far beyond the homeland. In 1756 the
Grand Lodge of Scotland founded lodges at Boston, Massachusetts, and Blandford,
Virginia. In the following year Colonel John Young was named Provincial Grand
Master over all the lodges in America under the Scottish Constitution. The Grand
Lodge of Ireland was less prompt to institute lodges overseas. The first warrant
issued for America seems to have been to a lodge at New York in 1763. Long
before this, however, lodges under the Irish Constitution had been active all
over the world. These were the military lodges - regiments of the British army
with travelling warrants. They were a peculiarly Irish development; though the
other Grand Lodges eventually followed suit, most military warrants
continued to be Irish. The earliest was issued in 1732, to the First British
Foot Regiment.
Back in
England, in 1738 a second much expanded edition of Anderson's Constitutions was
published. It is the source of the story of the formation of Grand Lodge quoted
in a modernized form above.
Relationship
with the Roman Catholic Church
When the
Pope proclaims an official ruling which is binding on all Roman Catholics, his
edict is called a Papal bull (from the Late Latin bulla, "a lead seal"). On the
subject of Freemasonry, Pope Clement XII in 1738 issued a bull which is usually
called by the title In eminenti apostolatus specula ("In the lofty watch-tower
of apostleship"), from the Latin words which begin it. Under pain of excom-
munication it forbade all Catholics to join Freemasonry, or to do anything to
help or encourage it. The following reasons are given. (l) In lodges, "men who
are attached to any form at all of religion or sect are associated together".
(2) "Whatever goes on at their meeting. they are bound by a strict oath taken on
the Bible, and by the accumulation of heavy penalties, to veil in inviolable
silence." (3) Because of this secrecy, "they have aroused suspicions in the
minds of the faithful, . . . and won the name of wickedness and perversion; if
they were not doing wrong, they would not be afraid of the light". (4) Lodges
inflict very serious injuries "not only upon the tranquillity of the temporal
state, but even on the spiritual health of souls.... They pervert the hearts of
the simple". (5) "For other just and reasonable causes known to us."
Terms of
this bull were renewed, amplified, and confirmed by a number of subsequent
Popes. The fullest exposition is in the encyclical letter Humanum Genus ("The
Human Race") of Leo XIII, in 1884. He charges that Masons "deny that anything
has been taught by God"; that they accept into their ranks men who deny the very
existence of God, and the immortality of the soul; that they work officially
against the Catholic church; that they teach that citizens may despise the
authority of their rulers; and that they favour the designs of the communists.
Whatever was the target of Pope Leo's thunder-bolts, it was clearly not
Freemasonry as we know it. Actually some of his accusations are deserved by
"irregular" or "Latin" masonry, which is practiced in a number of grand lodges
of the French, Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese tongues. The encyclical tars
"regular" or "English" masonry with the same brush.
The ban is
still in effect against Masons and "other associations of the same type, which
plot against the church or the lawful civil power (Code of Canon Law of 1917,
No. 2335). The authority of the church has naturally fostered a venomous
hostility towards Freemasonry on the part of many Catholics. The lack of
substance in the accusation has roused sorrow in the hearts of many Masons. No
doubt some have tired of turning the other cheek, and have lashed out with equal
intolerance. English Masonry's official response has always been, "Let a man's
religion, or mode of worship, be what it may, he is not excluded from the Order,
provided he believe in the Architect of Heaven and Earth. . ..”
Since the
Second Vatican Council in 1962‑65, a new spirit of ecumenism has been abroad in
the Roman Catholic church. There are encouraging signs of a softening in the
traditional attitude to Freemasonry. Most tangible, several books sympathetic to
"regular" Masonry, and drawing a clear distinction between it and "irregular"
Masonry, have been published with the doctrinal sanction (nihil obstat and
imprimatur) of the church: one by a Parisian lawyer, Alec Mellor, Our Separated
Brethren: The Freemasons (published in French 1961 and in English 1964); and
another by a Jesuit priest, a specialist in canon law, Father Jose Antonio
Ferrer Benimeli, Masonry since the Council (in Spanish 1968).
Speculative
Masonry
In the
phrase, “speculative Masonry", the word "speculative" probably means
"contemplative, reflective, thoughtful". Freemasons are thoughtful masons rather
than operative ones. They contemplate the Working Tools rather than employing
them. They apply these tools to themselves rather than to the rude mass. That
is, "speculative Masonry" refers to Masonry as a "system of morality veiled in
allegory and illustrated by symbols".
"Non-operative"
does not automatically connote "speculative". The lodges of acceptance in the
seventeenth century were non-operative, but their primary activities seem to
have been convivial and charitable. In like manner, it can be established that
the ritual used in 1717 was almost entirely non-speculative. The actual term
"speculative Mason" is first found in 1757. It seems likely that the emphasis on
the philosophical side was brought in about 1730, after the evolution of the
Master Mason Degree. Naturally this aspect was much enhanced about 1770, with
the work of the three great expounders of the ritual (Calcutt, Hutchinson and
Preston).
The
"Antients"
Between 1723
and 1730 six exposés of Masonic ceremony were published, varying in detail and
accuracy. The latest of them, Samuel Prichard's Masonry Dissected, was very
reliable. Within a year it passed through four editions, making the ritual
easily accessible to anyone who was interested. Enterprising charlatans began to
initiate Masons for a much smaller fee than the duly constituted lodges
required. Grand Lodge felt that the situation was getting out of control. At
some time between 1730 and 1739 it arbitrarily interchanged the words of the
first two degrees. The thinking behind this was that news of the change would be
passed on to the brethren by their lodges, whereas irregular Masons would at
once betray themselves by their ignorance of the alteration.
The measure
generated a good deal of bad feeling from brethren
who felt that this was an
unwarranted violation of ancient tradition. To add to the problem, soon
afterwards the premier Grand Lodge was subjected to a sequence of indifferent or
incompetent leaders, and a good many lodges were erased. Some independent lodges
were still meeting by immemorial right, and others had been established by
brethren who had come over from Ireland. In 1751 six such groups formed
themselves into the Grand Lodge of England According to the Old Institutions.
They claimed to preserve the ancient practices pure and unsullied, whereas the
premier Grand Lodge had introduced innovations. And so, by a masterful stroke of oneupmanship, they fastened upon the appellation of the
"Antients" for themselves, and succeeded in affixing to the older body the name
of the "Moderns”. From 1771, when
the Duke of Atholl was elected Grand Master, the Antients were also known as
"Atholl Masons". (Actually a Duke of Atholl headed the Antients from 1771 to
1774, from 1775 to 1781, and from 1791 to 1813.)
Among the
accusations leveled at the Moderns by the Antients were the following: (1)
interchanging the modes of recognition; (2) de‑christianizing the ritual; (3)
preparing candidates improperly; (4) abbreviating or omitting lectures and
ancient charges; (5) abbreviating or omitting the ceremony of installation; (6)
placing officers incorrectly, and introducing variations in opening and closing
the lodge. (Masonry of today is
influenced by both sides. For example, from the Moderns is derived the
acceptance into lodge of men who profess religions other than Christianity. The
existence of the office of Deacon, on the other hand, was a hallmark of the
Antients.) The Grand Lodges of Ireland and Scotland were much more sympathetic
to the Antients than to the Moderns.
The real
founder of the Antients was Laurence Dermott (1720‑1791), who became Grand
Secretary, and later Deputy Grand Master. It was he who in 1756 produced their
book of constitutions, which bore the curious name of Ahiman Rezon; or a Help to
a Brother. The first part of the title is apparently intended to be Hebrew, and
is supposed to mean "Brother Secretary".
The Grand
Lodge of the Moderns had fallen on evil days, as we have seen, partly because of
a lack of vitality. It was largely revitalized through the agency of one
remarkable man, Thomas Dunckerley (1724‑1795), said to have been a bastard son
of King George II. He was at different times Provincial Grand Master of eight
counties, and he re-established Masonry in several counties of southern England
where it had died out altogether. He worked hard to recruit converts from the
Antients, and to make them feel at home.
Rivalry
between the two English grand lodges was fierce. Both were active in the New
World. The Antients issued a warrant to the Provincial Grand Lodge of Nova
Scotia in 1758; the Moderns, apparently through the mediation of Dunckerley, to
that of Quebec in 1760. The situation became very difficult. Attempts were made
to effect a reconciliation, but the mechanical obstacles seemed to be
insuperable. In 1809 a first step was made, when the Moderns rescinded the
change they had made three‑quarters of a century earlier in the modes of
recognition. The same year they established a Lodge of Promulgation, to study
the differences between the practices followed by the two grand lodges, and to
make recommendations.
Finally, in
1813 the Duke of Sussex, son of King George III, was chosen Grand Master of the
Moderns. Later in the same year his older brother, the Duke of Kent, was chosen
Grand Master of the Antients. The time was ripe, and the Royal brethren moved
quickly to accomplish the reconciliation. On the Festival of Saint John the
Evangelist, December 27, 1813, the two grand lodges amalgamated, to form "The
United Grand Lodge of England"; the Duke of Sussex was elected as Grand Master
on nomination of the Duke of Kent.
Conclusion
We have now
traced the main developments in Freemasonry from its origin until the Union of
1813. Incidentally we have shed some light on those enigmatic words from which
we set out, "Ancient Free and Accepted Masons". Of necessity our survey has been
concerned chiefly with the British Isles. We have noted in passing how the four
British grand lodges disseminated the Craft over the face of the whole globe.
One particular region to which Freemasonry spread, North America, is of such
concern to us that it merits special and more detailed treatment.
Selected
References
J.A. Ferrer Benimeli, La Masoneria después del Concilio (Barcelona,
1968).
A.S. Frere, editor, Grand Lodge 1717‑1967.
Bernard E. Jones, Freemasons' Guide and Compendium.
Douglas Knoop and G.P. Jones, The Genesis of
Freemasonry.
Alec Mellor, Nos Frères séparés: Les Francs‑Maçons (Paris,
196l).
Douglas Knoop, G.P. Jones, and Douglas Hamer, Early Masonic Catechisms, 2nd ed. by Harry Carr.
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