In keeping with the professedly humanitarian scope of the order are those articles of the statutes which regulate the admission of new members: “If the end of the institution [pg 724] is the perfection of mankind, it is indispensable that the Freemason should practise true morality, which supposes the knowledge and practice of the duties and rights of man. He ought, accordingly, to be upright, humane, sincere, beneficent to every sort of persons, and, above all, a good father, a good son, a good brother, a good husband, and a good citizen. A Freemason must be a citizen in full enjoyment of his civil rights, of acknowledged probity, and of at least ordinary intelligence. No one is admitted who has not the age required by the statutes. No one may be admitted or may remain in the order who has once been employed or engages in servile, mean, and dishonorable trades or professions, or who has been condemned to suffer punishment for crime. The expiation of any such sentence gives no claim for readmittance.”
The retiring warden, handing over the keys of the Masonic temple to the warden-elect, admonishes the latter to exclude from its precincts all who have not laid aside every profane distinction, and who do not seek to enter solely by the path of virtue. Every precaution is taken to prevent the admission of unworthy subjects. The age for reception is fixed at twenty-one, but the son of a Freemason may be initiated at eighteen, or even at fifteen if his father is of the upper grades of the order. The candidate must be proposed in the lodge by a member. Three commissioners are secretly appointed to separately inquire into the antecedents of the postulant, each inquisitor concealing his mandate from his fellow-commissioners.
“The investigation,” it is prescribed, “should chiefly turn on the constant integrity of the profane in his habitual conduct, on the exact discharge of the duties of his position, on the rectitude and safeness of his principles, on the firmness of his character, on his activity and ability to penetrate, develop, and fully understand the profound sciences which the mystic Masonic institute offers to the consideration of its followers.”
The three reports of the inquisitors must agree in recommending the candidate; otherwise the subject drops. But even when the commissioners unanimously approve of the proposal, the question is put to the secret votes of the lodge in three several meetings. Two negative votes in the first ballot are sufficient to delay the next trial for three months, while after three negatives it is put off for nine; and if at the end of that time three black balls are again found in the urn, the candidate is definitively rejected, and communication is made of the result to the Grand Orient, which informs all the dependent lodges of the exclusion, to prevent the admission of the rejected candidate among the brethren of its jurisdiction.
Having secured by these stringent regulations the purity of selection, and put the mystic temple beyond the risk of contamination by unworthy neophytes, it is not surprising that the statutes should tell us (paragraph 444) “that the character of Freemason does not admit the supposition that he can commit a fault.” Nevertheless, considering the weakness of human nature and the force of old habits imperfectly subdued, certain violations of decorum are contemplated in the statutes which constitute Masonic faults, and are enumerated with the penalties attached to each. Among these peccadilloes are mentioned perjury and treason against the order, the revelation of its mysteries, embezzlement of its funds, insubordination and rebellion against [pg 725] its authority, duelling among brethren, and breaches of hospitality.
Out of the lodges the conduct of the brethren is to be closely watched. It is the duty of the president to admonish any one whose conduct is reprehensible. This he must do in secret, and with due fraternal tenderness endeavor to bring back the wanderer to the path of virtue. Every corporation has to see that its individual members do nothing to forfeit the good opinion and confidence of the world at large. When, therefore, a brother is subjected to a criminal prosecution and proved guilty, the lodge is to take immediate steps for his expulsion.
Promotion from the lower to the higher grades of Masonry is regulated on the same principles of meritorious selection that govern the first admission of members. Irreprehensible conduct, both in his civil and Masonic capacity, are requisite in the aspirant; and he must have acquired a thorough knowledge of the grade which he possesses before he can be advanced to greater light. Certain intervals must pass between each successive step, that the spirit and devotedness of the brother may be fully ascertained and his promotion justified.
Minute rules are laid down in the statutes to regulate the proceedings in lodge. The arrangement of the seats, the order of business, the method of discussion, all is provided for in a way to promote harmony and social feeling. Unbecoming behavior and offensive language are severely punished. “Among Freemasons everything must breathe wisdom, kindness, and joy.” Any brother may signify his dissent from a proposal while it is under discussion; but when it has received the approbation of the majority, he must applaud the decision with the rest, “and not be so foolishly vain as to think his own opinion better than that of the greater number.” When the ritual practices have been observed, and necessary business despatched, the presiding dignitary may invite the brethren to suspend their labors and engage without formality in conversation or amusement. After this relaxation the ceremonial is resumed for the remainder of the meeting, and the lodge is closed in the usual manner.
Prominent among the observances instituted for the cultivation of Masonic feeling are the Agapæ of Masonic banquets. Some are de rigeur, as those on the Feasts of S. John the Baptist and S. John the Evangelist, and on the anniversary of the foundation of the various lodges. Others may be given according to circumstances. In the regulation banquets the lodge orator makes an appropriate address. Toasts and songs enliven the entertainment, and dancing is not prohibited. Between the toasts a poet, if there be one, may offer some of his productions. “Mirth, harmony, and sobriety are the characteristics of a Masonic feast.” Officials are charged to maintain order and decorum in these reunions. They are instructed to observe a “moderate, fraternal austerity” in their superintendence. Venial slips may be corrected on the spot, and a trifling penance imposed, which must be accepted with the best grace. A brother who more gravely offends against any of the social decencies is to be rigorously chastised at the first subsequent meeting.
After the claim of Freemasonry to represent a universal brotherhood, and its professed purpose to effect a general diffusion of its principles and influence, we are not surprised to find the statutes enjoin the most absolute [pg 726] respect for all political opinions and all religious beliefs. The 325th article says: “It is never permitted to discuss matters of religion or affairs of state in the lodges.”[177] We are not, however, to interpret toleration into a denial of the foundation of religious truth, or into a wicked connivance at subversive agencies in the body politic. Every Masonic temple is consecrated to the “Great Architect of the Universe.” In the name of him, “the purest fountain of all perfection,” the election of the office-bearers is proclaimed on S. John's day. By him they swear when, with their hands on S. John's Gospel, they promise fidelity to the order. All their solemn deeds are inscribed “to the glory of the Great Architect of the Universe” in the name of S. John of Scotland (S. John the Baptist), or of S. John of Jerusalem (S. John the Evangelist), according to the rite. The Bible is always reverently placed on the warden's table when the lodges meet, and the proceedings are always opened with an invocation of the Deity. If the craft admits among its adepts men of all persuasions, it professes to do so because it does not search consciences. Its toleration, it declares, does not proceed from atheism, but from enlightened liberality. Nor has the state anything to apprehend from the brethren, if we believe the admonition addressed to a novice at his initiation. “Masons are forbidden to mix themselves up in conspiracies.” The first toast in all Masonic banquets is to the head of the nation. It would be strange indeed if, notwithstanding the enlightened scope of the institution and the jealous care with which it professes to exclude all those who are troublesome to society or have given cause of complaint in their civil conduct, any government should find that the Masonic body was not one of the firmest stays of order. Virtue, philanthropy, benevolence, brotherhood—these are the watchwords of Masonry, and its statutes appropriately terminate in the following paragraph: