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why this confusion in the templeAn Army On Foot - The Hard Way Is The Masonic WayCHAPTER XIIdwight l. smithConcluding "Confusion", the author asserts that in seeking to make Freemasonry large and affluent and easy we also can make it ineffective in present-day society.
"WHAT COME YOU here to do?" the
Entered Apprentice is asked. With an
eagerness as glib as it is unthinking he replies, "To improve
myself in Masonry."
He seeks to improve himself, he says. Not a word about improving
anyone else; no
mention whatever of improving the community, or the government
of the United States,
or that of any other nation in the world, or of the world
itself.
Note in particular that his expressed motive is not to improve Freemasonry, but
rather
to improve a Mason—and not some other Mason, but himself.
As an Entered Apprentice he is admitted into a Lodge of Freemasons for the first
time
to say, in effect, with becoming humility, "Here am I, a rough
ashlar in need of
improvement. Place your working tools in my hands and teach me
their uses, that I may
apply them in my labors to become a perfect ashlar."
As he progresses through the ceremonies of the three degrees, he hears a great
deal
about self-improvement. In the character of a Freemason he is
expected to make his body
a living stone for a spiritual building—his own body. He
receives a gauge, a common
gavel, a square, a plumb, all to be used for the improvement of
his own condition first,
and then, through him, the condition of others.
BUT ONCE RAISED
And then after awhile he hears his restless Brethren saying that
How seldom do we hear the calm voice of dear old Mr. Mason (there is at least
one in
every Lodge), and how desperately do we need to hear his words
of gentle suasion: "My
Brother, you have come here to improve yourself, you say. You
will have countless
opportunities for self-improvement in Freemasonry, yet you may
fail to recognize most
of them. For there is nothing flashy about the erection of a
moral edifice within the heart
of a man. It is so simple that many Masons miss the point
entirely. Neither is there
anything easy about it. On the contrary, the Masonic way is so
difficult it is seldom tried.
It will be a full-time job—the hardest job you have ever
tackled—but of all life's
experiences, few will be richer."
BY NOW THE THEME
That there is confusion in the temple, few will deny. That the state of
confusion is
caused by inferior designs on the trestleboard I, for one,
fervently believe. With a
thoroughly mixed-up sense of values we get all itchy over the
thought of "improvements"
that should be made to modernize our noble Craft. The way to
change human lives is to
change human systems, we try to persuade ourselves, as we parrot
the environmental
philosophy of the Shallow Sixties now being expounded on all
sides by persons who also
are confused.
But when we sort things out in the order of their relative importance, we begin
to see
that the improvement needed so sorely is not in Masonry, but in
A JEREMIAD IS NEVER
No, the message of a Jeremiah is not pleasant, and seldom is it received with
acclaim.
To emphasize the hard way instead of the easy way, the importance of the
individual
instead of the mass, individual responsibility instead of Lodge
responsibility, Lodge
responsibility instead of Grand Lodge responsibility, a
favorable image created by the
lives of Master Masons instead of one manufactured by news
media—this is not soothing
music to the ear. But we cannot escape the fact that such a way
is the
Because there is a tapering off of the membership curve and a dearth of
interest. Ill-gotten
gains of the nineteen-forties are not holding up. Once we rushed
men through the
degrees with reckless abandon; now they are not lining up to be
loaded onto the conveyor
belt. Temples that were humming with activity in the 'forties
are quiet as a tomb in the
'sixties. Then our Lodge rooms and banquet halls were filled to
overflowing with Master
Masons on just about every occasion; now we have to bring in the
ladies and children to
get a crowd large enough to justify the expense of opening the
building. Our sins are
catching up with us. We have found that there is such a thing as
Masonic inflation as well
as inflation of the currency; that the penalty of Masonic
inflation is Masonic devaluation
—and that the penalty must be paid.
If it is consolation we are looking for, there is precious little to be found in
the
knowledge that most human institutions are having like troubles
maintaining a healthy
interest and activity these days, and that even those
institutions which claim to be divine
are fighting the air, uncertain which way to turn or what to try
next.
Ignoring the lessons of our own history, the most discouraging aspect of our era
of
apathy is that, turn wheresoever we may, we are urged to
experiment with just about
everything under the sun except Freemasonry; to discard the
usages and customs and
traditions that have set our Craft apart and made it
distinctive; to pattern the Fraternity
after fleeting fads and fancies as changeable as the model of a
motor car.
WHY SHOULD THERE
The mission of our gentle Craft is not to be another service club, or another
civic
league, or another pseudo-political pressure group. It is not to
be another flag-waving
society of super-patriots, or another agency to alleviate the
physical ills of the human
race, or another co-educational Friendly Neighbors Circle
devoted to cozy and inane "togetherness."
The woods in these parts are filled with such organizations. They are a dime
a dozen. They are doing the work for which they were formed and
doing it very well.
Why cannot Freemasons do likewise? Why can we not content
ourselves with simply
doing the work of our Craft? No other organized society on the
face of the earth can do
the work of Freemasonry except Freemasonry. Why do we not stick
to our knitting?
The reason, I believe, is that we have become victims of a kind of brainwashing
which
protests that our ways are too slow, too quiet, too difficult,
too old-fashioned. "This is the
Twentieth Century," says the New Ideology. "Unless we are
increasing in numbers and
material wealth we are on the decline; we must have the last
word in temples and
institutions; we must make a big noise to call attention to
ourselves and get people to
talking about us; we must devise means whereby we can do things
the quick way, the
easy way, and get on to something else."
But there is no quick way and no easy way to erect temples within the hearts of
men.
There are no mass production methods, no huge conveyor belts on
which men may be
loaded to have the roughness chipped away and the smooth and
perfect ashlar emerge
there from. A great Freemason, General Lew Wallace, in his
IN HIS GREAT NOVEL,
"
There simply is no effortless way for Freemasons to do the work of Freemasonry.
When we are performing the noble tasks to which we have
obligated ourselves our job is
never easy, never popular, never fashionable, and we are never
in the majority. The
reason is plain: the work of a Mason must be done
ONCE BEFORE
And so I come to the end of my explorations in the morass of confusion with no
pat
answers and no sure-cure prescriptions to offer, proposing only
that we do the work of
Freemasonry and that we do it in the manner of Freemasons. That
means, among other
things, an agonizing reappraisal of our worship of bigness and
wealth and material things,
our passion for efficiency and know-how and quick results and
public acclaim. The
philosophy of Freemasonry properly applied is a power that works
as slowly, as quietly
and as irresistibly as a grain of seed sprouting in the earth.
If we have become so busy, so highly organized and centralized and standardized
and
mechanized and institutionalized that the individual Mason no
longer counts for anything,
then let's use the scissors on our rituals and cut out such
obsolete trivia as those promises
to help, aid and assist ... to fly to the relief of a Brother
... to remember a Brother's
welfare ... to stretch forth our hands to assist and support...
to go on foot and out of our
way!
As American Freemasons it is time we were making up our minds what it is we have
come here to do. If we are here for the noble purpose we once
proclaimed so readily, then
we must face the sobering fact that our assignment is the
improvement of
And unless we want our Craft to pass into that limbo where things of no further
use or
necessity are relegated, we had better learn to shift from
overdrive into low gear—to
become interested in men as individuals. Then, logically, the
next step is to pull out to
one side of the road, bring our fast, high-powered vehicle to a
stop, and get out and
walk—to do the work of a Mason
For the "Masonic army" is in precisely the same position as the "Jesus army." As
old
Tiberius so sagely observed, it must travel on foot if it
expects to accomplish anything.
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