THE MEANING AND PURPOSE OF FREEMASONRY
"We must, then, demonstrate that ours is a Hierarchy of
inspired, divine and deifying science, of efficacy and of consecration for those
initiated with the initiation of the revelation derived from the hierarchical
mysteries".
Dionysius Aeropagiticus, De Eccles. Hierarch, 1, 1-3,
Although Freemasonry is in its essence a ceremonial method of approach to
Truth, the meaning and purpose of its Ritual is now but little understood by the
majority of our Brethren. The Ceremonies of the different Degrees are too often
regarded as nothing more than beautiful and interesting survivals of an earlier
age, to be carried out efficiently, of course, for the honour of the Lodge, but
as having no great significance in themselves save as the vehicle for a few
elementary moral precepts, taught openly by every great Religion of the World.
So many of our Brethren treat the Lodge as a mere social club, in which they can
meet their friends and enjoy themselves, rather than as an hallowed Shrine of
Wisdom in which the deeper Mysteries of Nature and of Life are unveiled to the
earnest seeker. The, ancient wisdom, the Gnosis, once the heart of Freemasonry,
has almost departed from our midst; and in the practice of Brotherly Love and
Relief we are ap t today to forget the Third Grand Principle upon which our
Order is founded - the study and knowledge of the Truth. For while Freemasonry
in this Age is perhaps the only true and living Brotherhood known in the outer
world, and while its Charities are renowned, it must be confessed that, as far
as a knowledge of the inner meaning of Life is concerned, most of our Brethren
are in a lamentable state of darkness.
Now Freemasonry, although it has undoubtedly been transmitted to us through
the Operative Guilds of the Middle Ages, has a spiritual lineage that can be
traced back to the Ancient Mysteries, which once formed the heart of every great
religion of the world, including Christianity. The goal of the Mysteries was
nothing less then Deification - a startling term to our modern ears - whereby
man was led step by step from the ordinary life of the world until finally he
became raised into conscious union with the Author and Giver of Life Himself.
Plotinus, the great Initiate of Alexandria, states, this unequivocally in hit
first Ennoad:
"Therefore we must ascend again towards the Good, the desired
of every Soul. Anyone that has seen this knows what I intend when I say that it
is beautiful. Even the desire of it is to be desired as a Good. To attain it is
for those that will take the upward path, who will set all their forces towards
it, who will divest themselves of all that we have put on in our descent:- so,
to those that approach the Holy Celebrations of the Mysteries, there are
appointed purifications and the laying aside of the garments worn before, and
the entry in nakedness - until, passing, on the upward Way, all that is other
than God, each in the solitude of himself shall behold that solitary - dwelling
Existance, the Apart, the Unmingled, the Pure, That from, Which all things
depend, for Which all look and live and act and know, the Source of life and of
Intellectation, and of Being."
(Ennoad 1, 6, 7; translation, Stephen McKenna) .
The parallel to Masonic Initiation Ritos which is disclosed in this statement
of Plotinas will be appreciated by all serious students of our Craft, while a
fresh light is here thrown upon the Preparation of the Candidate. It is clearly
indicated that the true Candidate for our Mysteries must indeed needs be, as the
word "candidus" implies; a "white man", white within as symbolically he is
white-vestured without, so that no inward stain or soilure may obstruct the dawn
within his soul of that Light which he professes to be the predominant wish of
his heart; whilst, if really desirous of learning the secrets and mysteries of
his own being, he must be prepared to divest himself of all past preconceptions
and thought-habits and, with childlike meekness and docility, surrender his mind
to the reception of some perhaps novel and unexpected truths which Initiation
promises to impart and which will more and more unfold and justify themselves
within those, and those only, who are, and continue to keep themselves, properly
prepared for them. "Know thyself!" was the in junction inscribed over the
portals of ancient temples of Initiation, for with that knowledge was promised
the knowledge of all secrets and all mysteries. And Freemasonry was designed to
teach self-knowledge. But self-knowledge involves a knowledge much deeper,
vaster and more difficult than is popularly conceived. It is not to be acquired
by the formal passage through three or four degrees in as many months; it is a
knowledge impossible of full achievement until knowledge of every other kind has
been lai d aside and a difficult path of life long and strenuously pursued that
alone fits and leads its followers to its attainnent. So high, so ideal an
attainment, it may be urged, is beyond our reach; we are but ordinary men of the
world sufficiently occupied already with our primary civic, social and family
obligations and following the obvious normal path of natural life. Granted.
Nevertheless to point to that attainment as possible to us and as our destiny,
to indicate that path of self-perfecting to those who care and dare to follow
it, modern Speculative Freemasonry was instituted. For Freemasonry means this or
it means nothing worth the serious pursuit of thoughtful men; nothing that
cannot be pursued as well outside the Craft as within it. It proclaims the fact
that there exists a higher and more secret path of life than that which we
normally tread, and that when the outer world and its pursuits and rewards lose
their attractiveness for us and prove insufficient to our deeper needs, as
sooner or later they will, we are compelled to turn back upon ourselves, to seek
and knock at the door of a world within; and it is upon this inner world, and
the path to and through it, that Freemasonry promises light, charts the way, and
indicates the qualifications and conditions of progress. This is the sole aim
and intention of Freemasonry. Behind its more elementary and obvious symbolism,
its counsels to virtue and conventional morality, there exists the framework of
a scheme of initiation into that higher path of life where alone the secrets and
mysteries of our being are to be learned; a scheme moreover that produces for
the modern world the main features of the Ancient Mysteries, for the Mysteries
were based upon the knowledge that man is a Spark of the Divine Fire, evolving
from latency to potency, and that by long-continued training and discipline that
evolution might be quickened, the Spark more swiftly famed to flame and thus the
Divine be made manifest through the waking consciousness of man. That this ideal
of the Ancient Mysteries was no empty dream is demonstrated by the conclusions
of the most advanced exponents of modern Psychology. Twentieth century
Psychologists - basing their inductions upon the demonstrable facts of science -
describe how the Individual Soul, the Self in man, which is itself an
individualized part on of the Universal Life, evolves from Unconsciousness to
Consciousness through a series of successive incarnations. They lay stress upon
the abnormal psychic powers which have been scientifically studied - lucidity,
transcendental knowledge and perception, which apparently function outside the
limitations of Time and Space as we know them, - as well as upon the marvelous
faculties of Creative Genius, and show that although in the majority of men in
our present race these powers are subconscious and outside the con trol of the
Will, in time they will become the inheritance of every human being. Dr. Gustave
Geley, in his valuable work, "From the Unconscious to the Conscious," shows that
the so-called supernormal powers belong to the Self in man, and are limited in
their expression partly by the early stage of evolution reached by the majority
of mankind today, and partly by the physical brain of man, which can express
only a very small fragment of the tot al Consciousness. Our progress, therefore,
consists in unfolding more and more of the latent powers of our being, and
bringing those powers down into waking consciousness, until, in due time, we
shall have realised directly the Source from which we spring. All this is
clearly expressed in the Symbolism of the Craft. In the First Degree the
Apprentice is concerned with the shaping of the rough stone, which has been hewn
out of the living rock, has become an individualized portion of the Universal
Life. In the din and turmoil of the stone-yard, he has to knock off all
superfluous knobs and excrescences from his own rude nature until he is fit for
the more delicate work of the Second Degree. The Apprentice in the workshops of
the world has now become the cultured Fellow-Craftsman, polishing and adorning,
with the refinements of Philosophy, Science and Art, the stone that he has
rough-hewn in the preceding grade, until it is squared to fit in with other and
similar stones for the building of the great Temple of Perfected Humanity. No
longer isolated and proudly separate, but now realizing his essential unity with
all that lives, understanding the inner meaning of Brotherhood, he will "when
time and circumstances permit" attain to the Sublime Degree of a Master Mason,
and become a Designer and a Builder of the Temple in his turn, a conscious
Worker under the Will of T.G.A.O.T.U., in the great Plan of rebuilding the
Temple of "fallen" Humanity. And finally, as a Companion of the Holy Royal Arch
he will find within his own heart the blazing glory of the Divine Life, and will
be caught up into ineffable and conscious Union with the Heart of God. Thus he
attains to the Deification of the Ancient Mysteries, to the Exaltation of Modern
Speculative Freemasonry, to the Sovereign Consciousness of present day
Psychology, to a Love and a Power and a Knowledge that pass man's understanding
to fathom.
In a brief Paper like this it is hopeless to attempt to deal at all
adequately with what obviously are deficiencies in our knowledge of the system
we belong to. The most one can hope to do is to offer a few hints or clues,
which those who so desire may develop for themselves in the privacy of their own
thought. For in the last resource no one can communicate the deeper things of
Freemasonry to another. Every man must discover and learn them for himself,
although a friend or brother may be able to conduct him acertain distance on the
path of understanding. We know that even the elementary and superficial secrets
of the Order must not must not be communicated to unqualified persons, and the
reason, for this injunction is not because those secrets of themselves have any
special value, but because such silence is intended to be typical of that which
applies to the greater, deeper secrets, some of which, for appropriate reasons,
must not be communicated, and some of which indeed are not communicable at all,
because they transcend the power of communication. It is well, then, to
emphasize the fact that Freemasonry is a sacramental system, possessing, like
all sacraments, an outward and visible side consisting of its ceremonial, its
doctrine and its symbols which we can see and hear, and an inward, intellectual
and spiritual side, which is concealed behind the ceremonial, the doctrine and
the symbols, and which is available only to the Freemason who has learned to u
se his spiritual imagination and who can appreciate the reality that lies behind
the veil of outward symbol. Anyone, of course, can understand the simpler
meaning of our symbols, especially with the help of the explanatory lectures;
but he may still miss the meaning of the scheme as a vital whole. The Ceremonies
of Freemasonry are, as it were, shadows of mighty Realities which belong to the
invisible worlds of the Soul and the Spirit; for they reflect, as far as it is
possible to reflect in physical drama, the central features of those worlds that
form man's true dwelling-place. Freemasonry is like a map of an undiscovered
country, conventional in its outlines, yet offering a sure and certain guide to
the ignorant explorer. The Masonic Initiate is thus taught first in glyph and
symbol the main outlines of the task that lies before him; and later on, in the
Greater Mysteries, he learns to enter those invisible realms for himself, to
lift the Veil of Isis, and to behold the dazzling beauty of the Truth face to
face. That Truth is infinite; and as the Freemason ascends the Winding Staircase
of evolution, he will realise ever new and higher meanings in the familiar
symbols, until his knowledge of the Mysteries of Freemasonry widens out into a
knowledge of the Mysteries of the Universe itself. Thus, there is literally no
end to the Knowledge hidden in our Craft; only T.G.A.O.T.U., Himself can know
the full splendour of His Divine Plan; and as His Craftsmen progress in their
studies, as slowly bu t surely they grow in to His Likeness, He will throw open
before their eyes mine after mine, treasure-chamber after treasure-chamber,
richly strewn with the gold and gems of the many-coloured Wisdom of the True and
Living God Most High.
From time immemorial methods have existed whereby the process of the
development and exteriorisation of the subconscious powers belonging to the Soul
and the Spirit within man might be quickened; and through which he might be
enabled to contact in full waking consciousness those worlds invisible wherein
lie the keys of the problems of Life and of Death. For the invisible worlds,
which are the true home of man, are round about us here and now, although
composed of matter in a subtler and more rarified state than can be cognised by
the physical senses; and they may be perceived and studied by those who have
awakened and trained the supranormal faculties that are dormant in every man.
Such methods, which consist in the living of a controlled and ascetic life,
illumined and directed by the practice of certain forms of Meditation, formed
part of the discipline of the Mysteries, and were taught to candidates under
solemn pledges of secrecy. It was to preserve inviolate these genuine secrets of
Initiation that the tremendous oaths perpetuated in Freemasonry were institued,
and not just to guard a few s..s and w..s from public curiosity. Knowledge
confers power, power over the forces of Nature, power to destroy as well as to
build and to bless; and therefore the Sacred Veil which ever covers the Portal
of the Holy of Holies was only raised when the Neophyte had satisfied the
Hierophant of the Mysteries that the power acquited would be used solely for the
service of Humanity, and not for selfish ends, and had pledged himself
irrevocably to secrecy, fidelity, and obedience to his Superiors in the Royal
Art. In all periods of the world's history, and in every part of the globe,
secret orders and societies have existed outside the limits of the official
churches for the purpose of teaching what we have referred to as "the
Mysteries": for imparting to suitable and prepared minds certain truths of human
life, certain instructions about divine things, about human nature and human des
tiny, which it was undesirable to publish to the multitude who would but profane
those teachings and apply the esoteric knowledge that was communicated to
perverse and perhaps to disastrous ends. These Mysteries were formerly taught,
we are told, "on the highest tills and in the lowest valleys", which is merely a
figure of speech for saying, first, that they have been taught in circumstances
of the greatest seclusion and secrecy and secondly that they have been taught in
both advanced and simple forms according to the understanding of their disciples
. It is, of course, common knowledge that the great secret systems of the
Mysteries (referred to in our Craft Lectures as "noble orders of architectures,
i.e., of soul building) existed in the East, in Chaldea, Assyria, Egypt, Greece,
Italy, amongst the Hebrews, amongst Mahommedans and amongst Christians. All the
great teachers of Humanity - Socrates, Plato, Pythagoras, Moses, Aristotle,
Virgil (author of the Homeric poems), and the great Greek tragedians, along with
St. John, St. Paul and innumerable other great names - were initiates of the
Sacred Mysteries. The form of the teaching communicated has varied considerably
from age to age; it has been expressed under different veils; but since the
ultimate truth the Mysteries aim at teaching is always one and the same, there
has always been taught, and can only be taught, one and the same doctrine.
Behind all the official religious system of the world, and behind all the great
moral movements and developments in the history of humanity, have stood what St.
Paul called the keepers or "stewards of the Mysteries." From that source
Christianity itself came into the would. From them originated the great school
of Kabalism, that marvallous system of secret, oral tradition of the Hebrews, a
strong element of which has been introduced into our Masonic system. From them,
too, also issued many fraternities, such as, for instance, the great orders of
Chivalry and of the Rosicrucians, and the school of spiritual alchemy. Lastly,
from them issued, in the seventeenth century, modern Speculative Freemasonry. At
this stage it is advisable to stress the fact that our present Masonic system is
not one that comes to as from remote antiquity: that there is no direct
continuity between us and the Egyptians, or even those ancient Hebrews who
built, in the reign of King Solomon, a certain Temple at Jerusalem. What is
extremely ancient in Freemasonry is the spiritual doctrine concealed within the
architectual phraseology; for this doctrine is an elementary form of the
doctrine that has been taught in all ages, no matter in what garb it his been
expressed. The ancient Knowledge of the invisible worlds still remains hidden as
a priceless heritage in the Masonic Craft, and is therefore available for the
study of every true and lawful Brother among us; although but few indeed today
avail themselves of the privileges of their degree; the genuine secrets of
Freemasonry have never been lost; they are locked up with in the very ritual and
symbolism itself, which has been carefully handed down unchaged throughout the
ages. It only needs the right method of interpretation to reveal to the gaze of
the Initiate the Hidden Wisdom that was once the secret of Egypt and Greece, the
knowledge and understanding of the true mysteries of life - "Nil nisi clavis
deest" (Nothing is wanting but the key).
It is our purpose in the present Paper to give only a general survey of the
ground, and to discuss the whole matter in greater detail in a series of later
Essays. We may, however, briefly touch upon the threefold method of
interpretation which was applied in the early Church by Origen, himself an
initiate of the Mysteries, to the Volume of the sacred Law. This threefold
interpretation belongs to the threefold nature of Man - Body, Soul and Spirit;
it is threefold Medicine of the Brothers of the Rosy Cross , and the whole
method is one that has ever been applied to the mystic teachings. The grades of
interpretation may be respectively termed literal, allegorical and mystical.
Freemasonny, it must be realised, is intended to help men in all stages of
evolution, and for this reason the symbolism of the ceremonies of all Degrees
bears the same three-fold interpretation, and the system forms a wonderfully
connected Whole, containing a vast amount of knowledge upon the inner
constitution of man and the Universe. We have first, then, the BODILY or
CORPOREAL teaching, which belongs to the Outer Court of the Temple of Wisdom, to
the Entered Apprentice of the Grand lodge of Humanity. The average man of the
world, still engaged in the work of the First Degree, does not need an abstruse
and detailed Philosophy of life. He requires a few concrete principles by which
to live, simple ethical precepts upon which he can mould his life, and direct
his Working Tools - his Will, his imagination, his dawning Intellect. Here he is
taught a few simple facts about the Nature of God, learns that He is a loving
Father, Who is seeking to evolve His children into His own Divine Likeness, and
that by living up to the highest that he knows at this early stage, he will be
fulfilling the Plan of T.G.A.O.T.U. The ideal set before him in the Outer Court
is but elementary. Fair dealing, uprightness of life, honour and integrity must
be cultivated to some extent; a purifying and a regulation of feeli ng and
thought are necessary, if the Apprentice is to progress into the Holy Place;
those are the subjects for instruction in the First and Second Degrees. In the
Third Degree he learns that he need have no fear of death, that it is but the
portal into a higher and happier life, and that by living on the square with all
mankind during his earthly days, he will ensure happiness and peace in that
state which he must enter after laying aside the physical body. Thus, in the
Outer Court, the lessons are those of right conduct in the physical world, an d
the fact of man's immortality. To this grade of interpretation the ordinary
teaching of our Modern Craft belongs, the moral and literal view of Freemasonry
that is stressed so strongly in the eighteenth Century Charges, still delivered
to every Brother of the Craft. Many of our Brethren think that this is all that
Freemasonry contains; but in truth such teachings belong only to the Outer
Court, and there is more, far more, within the Temple itself.
The second great layer of interpretation, intended for the cultered
Fellow-Craftsman, for him who is engaged in polishing and refining the rough
stone, is what we may term PHILOSOPHIC, which is taught in the Holy Place of the
Temple of Wisdom. The interests of the Craftsman are no longer centered upon
selfish pleasures, the crude delights of the outer world, but rather upon Art,
Philosophy, or science; and because of his general intellectual and moral
advance in evolution, very much more knowledge concerning the inner worlds and
the Divine Plan can profitably be given to him. Indeed, the Craftsman has
ascended to a higher level of the Winding Staircase, and will now find that in
the Holy Place the symbols of Freemasonry can be applied to the nature of the
Universe and the constitution and development of man. The student in this Second
Degree learns that the Lodge is built upon the exact proportions and plan of the
Universe itself, and that each of the Officers and symbols bears a definite
relation to a living Reality behind; so that in contemplating a Lodge he is, in
truth, contemplating the Universe of which it is the reflection. He learns that
T.G.A.O.T.U., although One in essence, is yet Three in function, and that He
descends for the purposes of evolution into the Sq...e of Matter, vivifying it
and making it to glow with His Hidden Life, until it expresses to the highest
possible degree a fragment of His Divine beauty. The detailed method of His
unfoldment, the sequence of events in that mighty Ceremonial of the Universe,
the passing from Labour to Refreshment, and from Refreshment to Labour again,
the systole and diastole of the great Heart of the World, all is reflected with
amazing accuracy in the ritual enacted in the Masonic Lodge. And the initiate
will find, too, that a complete picture of the constitution of man, the
microcosm, is also hilden in the Ritual, the Three Chief Officers representing
the reflection of the Holy Trinity within his hoart, the WIIL, the WISDOM ( or
Intuition), the CREATIVE INTELLIGENCE, which form the Soul of man, and are made
in the image and Likeness of God. And behind this manifestation of the Divine
Life within himself, he will grasp the Nature of the Spirit, of which the soul
is likewise the reflection, the Divine Spark, the Son in Bosom of His Father,
entirely Unconscious as far as waking life is concerned in our present stage of
evolution and represented in our Lodges by the I.P.M., who silently watches the
progress of the Work. He sees that the sacred Triangle within himself also
manifests through a material sq...e, the INTELLECT, the EMOTIONS, the BODILY
VITALITY, and the PHYSICAL FORM that he wears in the outer world, symbolised by
the S.D., the J.D., the I.G. and the O.G., or T., through whom all
communications within the outer world are given and received. In the Outer Court
the last lesson taught to the Apprentice was that death is but the entrance into
a higher life, and not a thing of terror, to be feared and shunned. Now in the
Holy Place the Craftsman must learn further details about the life that awaits
him beyond the grave, in this Philosophic interpretation, the very doorway of
the Temple represents the gateway of death, and the First Deg ree is a picture
of the INTERMEDIATE WORLD into which the Soul passes after leaving the physical
body, whether in sleep or in death, in that vehicle through which emotions and
feelings are expressed it the waking consciousnoss of the ordinary man. Its true
powers may by long training be awakened and exteriorised, and then the
Intermediate World is perceived and known, as we perceive the physical world in
which we live. A clear and definite account of this stage is contained in the
progressive events of the Initiation Ceremony, and the Craftsman is thus taught
what lies on the other side of death. In the Second Degree the Craftsman will
find a picture of that state which all Religions have termed HEAVEN, that Middle
Chamber into which all must pass to receive, without scruple and without
diffidence, their wages for the deads and aspirations accomplished while on
earth. And then, by entering the deep but dazzling darkness of the Third Degree,
he learns to rise above the transitory personality, the sq...e of the one
incarnation; u ntil he blends with that permanent part of his being, the
Triangle or Soul within him, which passes from personality to personality, from
life to life, assimilating the lessons of the lower worlds, and building them
into character and faculty. Thus the Initiate in the Holy Place is taught the
details of his life upon the other side of death, learns that he is not the
physical body, nor the emotions, nor yet the intellect; for oven those which are
his instruments can obscure the Divine light which burns wit hin him. But he is
taught to know himself as the soul which never dies, but lives immortal
throughout the ages. Finally, in the Degree of the Holy Royal Arch, he learns
that the Life within him is the Life of God, that His flaming Splendour dwells
within the vault in all its loveliness, and that only by plunging into the
mysterious and glorious depths of his own inmost being, will he find the Reality
he seeks.
Thirdly, the Spiritual Teaching, which is given only in the Holy of Holies,
hidden behind the Veil that the God within man alone can pierce, reveals, as it
were, at a higher level, the glory that was but barely hinted at in the holy
Place. It belongs only to the true Master-Builder, to him who has united his
will with the Great Will, and who seeks to attain to conscious Union with the
SUPREME. He has ascended to a yet higher spiral of the Winging Staircase, and
will begin again as an E.A., of those True Mysteries of which Freemasonry is but
the shadow. Now he must do in fact what heretofore he has but done in symbol,
and must live out in the world the mysterious Life of the Initiate. Before him
lie the Four Great Stages, which every Disciple must pass through on his way to
the Light - PURGATION, ILLUMINATION, PERFECTION, and DEIFICATION; - and these
are like wise symbolised by the Three Degrees of Blue Masonry and the Holy Royal
Arch. He will now experience that state of consciousness which has ever been
termed the New Birth, will mystically receive the Light, symbolised in the
Christian Mysteries by the Birth of the Christ in the cave of the Heart. He must
pass onwards to Illumination, being baptised in the river of the world's sorrows
with the Holy Ghost and with Fire; and be transfigured by the Light of the
Awakened Spirit within him, till he glows with a glory that is not of earth. He
now goes forth into the world as a leader and a teacher of mankind, working
under the personal direction of the Masters of the Wisdom, in Whose strong hands
lie the ruling and guiding of the destinies of earth. And eventually, after
these preliminary disciplines, the Initiate must suffer that "last and greatest
trial", by which means alone he can be admitted to a participation in the
secrets of the Sublime Degree to which he aspires. He has to learn the great
truth embodied in the Third Degree; that he who would be raised to perfection
and regain what he has long realised has been lost to himself, may do so only by
utter self-abnegation, by a dying to all that to the eyes and the reason of the
uninitiated outer world is precious and desirable. Hence the Third Degree is
that of mystical death, of which bodily death is taken as figurative, just as
bodily birth is taken in the First Degree as figurative of entrance upon the
path of regeneration. In all the Mystery-systems of the past will be found this
degree of mystical death as an outstanding and essential feature prior to the
final stage of perfection or regeneration. The title of admission communicated
to the candidate for the Third Degree is noteworthy, and as the Craftsman fits
himself for the teachings of this higher, spiritual grade he clearly perceives
the reason for it. It is a Hebrew name, said to be that of the first Artificer
in metals and to mean "worldly possessions". Now it is obvious that the name of
the first man who worked at metal-making in the ordinary sense has no bearing
upon the subject of human regeneration. It is obviously a veil of allegory
concealing some relevant truth. Such it is found to be upon recognising that
Hebrew Biblical names represent not persons, but personifications of spiritual
principles, and that Biblical history is not the history of temporal events but
a record of eternally true spiritual facts. In order to interpret the allegory
we must clearly understand from the teaching of the Entered Apprentice Degree
what "money and metals" are in the Masonic sense, and realise that they
represent the attractive power of temporal possess ions, and earthly belongings
and affections of whatever description. We must appreciate too that from the
attraction and seductiveness of these things, and even from the desire for them,
it is essential to be absolutely free if one desires to attain that Light and
those riches of Wisdom for which the candidate professes to long. Not that it is
necessary for him to become literally and physically dispossessed of his worldly
possessions, but it is essential that he should be so utterly detached from them
th at he cares not whether he owns any or not and is content, if need be, to be
divested of them entirely if they stand in the way of his finding "treasure in
heaven;" for so long as he clings to them or they exercise control over him, so
long will his initiation into anything better be deferred. It follows then that
it is the personal soul of the candidate himself which is the artificer in
metals" referred to by the Pass-Word, and which during the whole of its physical
existence has been engaged in trafficking with "metals". Desire for worldly
possessions, for sensation and experience in this outward world of good and
evil, brought the soul into this world. There it has woven around itself its
present body of flesh, every desire and thought being an "artificer" adding
something to or modifying its natural encasement. If, then, desire for physical
experience and material things brought the soul into material conditions, the
relinguishing of that desire is t he first necessary step to ensure its return
to the condition whence it first emanated. The First and Second Degrees of
Freemasonry, therefore, imply that the candidate has undergone lengthy
discipline in the renunciation of external things and the cultivation of desire
for those that are within. But, notwithstanding that he has passed through all
the discipline of those Degrees, he is represented at the end of them as being
still not entirely purified and to be still in "worldly possessions" in the
sense that a residue of attraction by them lingers in his hea rt; and it is
these subtle elements of "base metal" in him that need to be eradicated if
perfection is to be attained. The ingrained defects and tendencies of the soul,
which are the result of all its past habits and experiences, are not suddenly
eliminated or easily subdued; self-will and pride, for instance are very subtle
in their nature, and may continue to deceive their victim long after he has
purged himself of grosser faults, However , all must be renounced, died to, and
transmuted in the crucial pro cess of the Third Degree. In view of the fact that
much has been said about the Ceremony of the Third Degree in other Papers issued
by the Circle, it is not necessary to give a further exposition here, but it is
advisable to emphasise once more that the Third Degree alone constitutes the
Masonic Initiation. The First and Second Degrees are, strictly, but preparatory
stages leading up to Initiation; they are not the initiation itself, and only
prescribe the purification of the of bodily and mental nature necessary to
qualify the candidate for the end which crowns the whole work. Only one more
stage remains, that which is typified in our symbolism by the Exaltation to the
Supreme Degree of the Holy Royal Arch, for Freemasonry, under the English
Constitution, reaches its climix and conclusion in the Ordor of the Holy Royal
Arch of J rusalam. There exists a variety of other degrees ramifying from the
main stem of the Masonic teaching, which either elaborate side-points of its
doctrine or re-express its theme in alternative symbolism, but these, while of
greater or less merit and interest, are beyond our present consideration. It is
a fallacy to suppose that the multiplying of degrees will result in the
discovery of important arcane secrets which one has failed to find in the rites
of the Craft and the Royal Arch. The Royal Arch is the natural conclusion and
fulfilment of the Third Degree. The latter inculcates the necessity of mystical
death and dramatisas the process of such death and the revival there-from into
nowness of life. The Royal Arch carries the process a stage farther, by showing
its fulfilment in the "exaltation" or apotheosis of him who has undergone it.
The Master Mason's Degree might be said to be represented in the terms of
Christian theology by the formula; "He suffered and was buried and rose again",
whilst the equivalent of the exaltation ceremony is, "He ascended into heave n".
The Royal Arch Degree seeks to express that new and intensified life to which
the candidate can be raised and the exalted degree of consciousness that comes
with it. From being conscious merely as a natural man and in the natural
restricted way common to every one born into this world, he becomes exalted
(whilst still in his natural flesh) to consciousness in a supernatural and
illimitable way. As we have endeavoured to portray in previous papers, the
purpose of all initiation is to lift human consciousness from lower to higher
levels by quickening the latent spiritual potentialities in man to their full
extent through appropriate discipline. No higher level of attainment is possible
than that in which the human merges with the Divine consciousness and knows as
God knows. And that being the level of which the Order of the Royal Arch treats
ceremonially, it follows that Freemasonry as a sacramental system reaches its
climax and conclusion in that Order. But, as the Third Degree ceremony so
dramatically illustrates, to attain that level involves as its essential
prerequisite the total abnegation, renouncement and renovation of one's original
nature, the surrender of one's natural desires, tendencies and preconceptions,
and the abandonment and nullifying of one's natural self-will, by such a
habitual discipline and self-denial and gradual but vigorous opposition to all
these as will cause them gradually to atrophor and die down. In words familiar
to us all it is elsewhere declared, "Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground
and die, it abideth alone; but if it die it bringeth forth much fruit". As with
a seed of wheat, so with man. If he persists in clinging to the present natural
life he knows, if he refuses to recognise that a higher quality of life is here
and now possible to him, or is unwilling to make the necessary effort to attain
it, he "abideth alone", gets nowhere, and only frustrates his own spiritual
evolution. But if he is willing to "die" in the sense indicated, if he will so
re-orientate his will and silence his natural energies and desires as to give
the Vital and Immortal Principle within him the chance to assert itself and
supersede them, then from the disintegrated material of his old nature that germ
of true life will spring into growth in him and bear much fruit, and by the
stepping-stones of initiation will rise from his dead self to higher things than
he can otherwise experience. Since, however, this is a process involving a "most
serious trial of fortitude and fidelity" and a grapple with oneself from which
the timorous and self-diffident may well shrink, the Mystery-systems have always
exhibited an example for the instruction, encouragement and emulation of those
prepared to make the attempt and the necessary sacrifice. To hearten them to the
task the Initiatory Colleges have held up a prototype in the person of some
great soul who has already trodden the same path and emerged triumphant there
from. It matters nothing whether the prototype be one whose historic actuality
and identity can be demonstrated, or whether he can be regarded only as
legendary or mythical; the point being not to teach a merely historical fact,
but to enforce a spiritual principle. In Egypt the prototype was Osiris, who was
slain by his malignant brother Typhon, but who se mangled limbs were collected
in a coffer from which he emerged reintegrated and divinised. In Greece the
prototype was Bacchus, who was torn to pieces by the Titans. Baldur in
Scandinavia and Mithra in Graeco-Roman Europe were similar prototypes. In
Freemasonry the prototype is Hiram Abiff, who met his death as the result of a
conspiracy by a crowd of workmen of whom there were three principal ruffians. In
the Christian and chief of all systems, since it comprehends all the others, the
greatest of the Exemplars died at the ha nds of the mob, headed also by three
chief ruffians, Judas, Caiaphas and Pilate. If in Freemasonry the mystical death
is dramatised more realistically than the resurrection that follows upon it,
that resurrection is nevertheless shown in the "raising" of the candidate to the
rank of Master Mason and his "reunion with the companions of his former toils",
implying the reintegration and resumption of all his old faculties and powers in
a sublimated state, just as the limbs of the risen Osiris were said to reunite
into a new whole, and as the Christian Master withdrew his mutilated body from
the tomb and reassumed it, transmuted into one of supernatural substance and
splendour.
Here we must bring to an end our brief survey of the true meaning and purpose
of Freemasonry. It will, we trust, now be evident to the student that our
Masonic teaching is purposely veiled in allegory and symbol, and that its deeper
import does not appear upon the surface of the ritual itself.
This is partly in correspondence with human life and the world we live in,
which are themselves but allegories and symbols of another life and the veils of
another world; and partly intentional also, to ensure that only those who have
reverent and understanding minds may penetrate into the more hidden meaning of
the doctrine of the Craft. The deeper secrets of Freemasonry, like the deeper
secrets of life, are heavily veiled and closely hidden. They exist concealed
beneath a great reservation; but those of o ur Brethren who know anything of
them, know also that they are in truth "many and valuable", and that they are
only disclosed to members of the Craft who act upon the hint given them in the
Instruction Lectures, "Seek and ye shall find; ask and it shall be given; knock
and it shall be opened unto you". The search may be long and difficult, but
nevertheless it may be affirmed that to the candidate who is, in the real sense,
"properly prepared", there are doors leading from the Craft that, when knocked,
will assuredly open and admit him to places and to knowledge that at present he
little dreams of. Finally, it rests with ourselves whether Freemasonry remains
for us what upon its outward and superficial side appears to be merely a series
of symbolic rites, or whether we allow those symbols to pass into our lives and
become realities therein. Whatever formalities we may have gone through in
connection with our admission into the Order, we certainly cannot claim to have
been "regularly initiated" into the "my stories and privileges" of Freemasonry,
so long as we are content to regard the Craft as merely an incident of social
life, and to treat its ceremonies as but rites of an archaic and perfunctory
nature. As we have suggested in an earlier Paper, the Craft was given out to the
world from more secret sources still, as a great experiment and means of grace.
It was intended to provide an epitome or synopsis, in dramatic form, of the
spiritual regeneration of man; and to throw out hints and suggestions that might
lead those capable of discerning its deeper purpose and symbolism into still
deeper initiations than those of a ceremonial order enacted within the Lodge.
For, in the same manner that on the external side of Masonic organisation we may
be called to occupy positions of honour and office in the Grand Lodge, so also
upon its internal side there are eminences to which we may be called that,
whilst offering us no social distinction and no visible advancement, are yet
really the true rewards, and the most valuable attainments of Masonic desire. To
this latter goal all may attain who truly seek to do so, and who prepare the way
for themselves by appropriating the truths lying beneath the superficial
allegory and the symbolic veils of the Craft teaching. And since there seems
today a genuine ard widespread desire on the part of many Brethren to enter into
a fuller understanding of what the Order conceals rather than reveals, this
Paper, for what it may be worth, is offered as a contribution towards the,
advancement of Masonic knowledge. Upon us Freemasons, who have the advantage of
a regular and organised system which provides and inculcates for us an outline
of the great truths that we hav e been considering, there rests the
responsibility attaching to our privileges and it must be our aim to endeavour
to enter into the full heritace of understanding and practising the system to
which we belong.
AMEN: SO MOTE IT BE.
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