If what Barruel has suggested of our institution is true; if it is among US that Jesus Christ is daily sacrificed, and all religion scoffed at; if our principles and doctrines, either in theory or practice, have a tendency to destroy the bonds of nature and of government; how could Washington, that Perfect Man, when his feet were stumbling upon the dark mountains of death, say, “I am ready to die,” until he had warned the world to beware of the Masonic institution and its consequences? He was a thorough investigator, and a faithful follower of our doctrines.[924]
To this must be added the somewhat different apologetic of a prominent Massachusetts Mason. Speaking at Dorchester, at a Masonic service in Washington’s memory, the Reverend Thaddeus Mason Harris acknowledged the value of Washington’s connection with American Freemasonry in these words:
The honor thus conferred upon us has been peculiarly serviceable at the present day, when the most unfounded prejudices have been harbored against Freemasonary, and the most calumnious impeachments brought forward to destroy it. But our opposers blushed for the censures when we reminded them that Washington loved and patronized the institution.[925]
Washington’s Masonic career, Masonry’s uncontested claim to the right to be first among those who mourned at his burial,—these constituted a part, and a very substantial part of the demurrer which Freemasonry offered at the bar of public judgment in answer to its accusers. It is very certain that after the reinstatement in public favor which American Masonry was accorded when Washington was buried, the voice of censure was less and less disposed to be heard.[926]
NOTE.—The fiction of an alliance between American Freemasonry and the Illuminati had a curious revival in connection with the antimasonic excitement which swept the United States from 1826 to about 1832. The mysterious abduction of William Morgan had the effect of arousing the country to the peril of secret societies, the Masons particularly. The Antimasonic party for this and other reasons sprang into existence, and an elaborate political propaganda and program were attempted. See McCarthy, Charles, The Antimasonic Party: a Study of Political Antimasonry in the United States, 1827–1840. In Annual Report of the American Historical Association, 1902, vol. i, pp. 365–574. In connection with the Antimasonic conventions that were held in various states, efforts were made to establish a connection between American Masonry and Illuminism. Thus, in the state convention held in Massachusetts in 1828–1829, a committee was appointed “to inquire how far Freemasonry and French Illuminism are connected.” This committee brought in a report establishing to the satisfaction of the convention that there was a direct connection between the two systems, and resulting in the passing of the following resolution: “Resolved, on the report of the Committee appointed to inquire how far Free Masonry and French Illuminism are connected, That there is evidence of an intimate connexion between the higher orders of Free Masonry and French Illuminism.” Cf. An Abstract of the Proceedings of the Anti-Masonic State Convention of Massachusetts, held in Faneuil Hall, Boston, Dec. 30 and 31, 1829, and Jan. 1, 1830. Boston, 1830, p. 5. On the ground that the length of the committee’s report made it inadvisable, the publishing committee deemed it inexpedient to print the “evidence.”
The Vermont Antimasonic state convention of 1830 wrestled with the same question. Its committee brought in a report so naively suggestive as to merit notice. Citing the agitation that arose on account of the literary efforts of “Robison and Barruel in Europe, and Morse, Payson, and others in America,” the committee expressed its judgment that those works “called Masonry in question in a manner which if assumed on any other topic, would have called forth disquisition and remark on the subject matter of these writings from every editor in the union; yet the spirit of inquiry, which these able performances were calculated to raise, was soon and unaccountably quelled—the press was mute as the voice of the strangled sentinel and the mass of the people kept in ignorance that an alarm on the subject of Masonry had ever been sounded, or even that these works had ever existed.” See Proceedings of the Anti-Masonic State Convention, holden at Montpelier, June 23, 24, & 25, 1830. Reports and Addresses. Middlebury, 1830.
An exploration of the literature of the Antimasonic party yields nothing more significant. This literature as listed by McCarthy may be found on pp. 560–574 of the Report of the American Historical Association for 1902, vol. i.
5. ATTEMPTS OF DEMOCRATS TO FIX THE COUNTERCHARGE OF ILLUMINISM UPON THE FEDERALISTS
By 1798 and 1799 the alignment of political parties in New England had arrived at such a stage that the suspicion of political jockeying to obtain party advantage was well grounded in the minds of leaders in both camps. This self-conscious and determined party spirit had been greatly promoted by the employment of electioneering methods.[927] The general public had not yet become accustomed to the precise significance of the broadside, the political pamphlet, and the newspaper canard; and these all, in a copious stream, had begun to flow from the country’s presses. Party leaders, however, who knew the purposes of their own minds if not those of the opposition, were quick to scent anything that savored of political buncombe.