THE RUFFIANS
As every Mason knows, at the heart of our mysteries lies a legend, in which
we learn how three unworthy craftsmen entered into a plot to extort from a
famous Mason a secret to which they had no right. It is all familiar enough, in
its setting and sequence; and it is a part of his initiation which no Mason ever
forgets.
In spite of its familiarity, the scene in which the Ruffians appear is one of
the most impressive that any man ever beheld, if it is not marred, as it often
is, alas, by a hint of rowdy. No one can witness it without being made to feel
there is a secret which, for all our wit and wisdom, we have not yet won from
the Master Builder of the world; the mystery of evil in the life of man.
To one who feels the pathos of life and ponders its mystery, a part of its
tragedy is the fact that the Great Man, toiling for the good of the race, is so
often stricken down when the goal of his labors is almost within his reach; as
Lincoln was shot in an hour when he was most needed. Nor is he an isolated
example. The shadow lies dark upon the pages of history in every age.
The question is baffling: Why is it that evil men, acting from low motives
and for selfish aims, have such power to throw the race into confusion and bring
ruin upon all, defeating the very end at which they aim? Is it true that all the
holy things of life - the very things that make it worth living - are held at
the risk and exposed to the peril of evil forces; and if so, why should it be
so?
If we cannot answer such questions we can at least ask another nearer to
hand. Since everything in masonry is symbolic, who are the ruffians and what is
the legend trying to tell us? Of course we know the names they wear, but what is
the truth back of it all which it will help us to know? As is true of all
Masonic symbols, as many meanings have been found as there have been seekers.
It all depends on the key with which each seeker sets out to unlock the
meaning of Masonry. To those who trace our symbolism to the ancient solar
worship, the three Ruffians are the three winter months who plot to murder the
beauty and glory of summer, destroying the life-giving heat of the sun. To those
who find the origin of Masonry in the Ancient Mysteries of Egypt, it is a drama
of Typhon, the Spirit of Evil, slaying Osirus the Spirit of Good, who is
resurrected, in turn rising triumphant over death.
Not a few find the fulfillment of this oldest of all dramas in the life and
death of Jesus, who was put to death outside the city gate by three of the most
ruthless Ruffians - the Priest, the Politician and the Mob. Which of the three
is the worst foe of humanity is hard to tell, but when they work together, as
they usually do, there is no crime against man of which they have not been
guilty.
A few think that Masonry, as we have it, grew out of the downfall of the
Knights Templar, identify the three Assassins, as they are called in the Lodges
of Europe, with three renegade Knights who falsely accused the Order, and so
aided King Phillip and Pope Clement to abolish Templarism, and slay its Grand
Master, A very few see in Cromwell and his adherents the plot-ters, putting to
death Charles the First.
It is plain that we must go further back and deeper down if we are to find
the real Ruffians, who are still at large. Albert Pike identified the three
Brothers who are the greatest enemies of individual welfare and social progress
as Kingcraft, Priestcr-aft, and the ignorant Mob-Mind. Together they conspire to
destroy liberty, without which man can make no advance.
The first strikes a blow at the throat, the seat of freedom of speech, and
that is a mortal wound. The second stabs at the heart, the home of freedom of
conscience, and that is well-nigh fatal, since it puts out the last ray of
Divine Light by which man is guided. The third of the foul plotters fells his
victim dead with a blow on the brain, which is the throne of freedom of thought.
No lesson could be plainer; it is written upon every page of the past. If by
apathy, neglect or stupidity we suffer free speech, free conscience, and free
thought to be destroyed either by Kingcraft, Priestcraft or the Mob-Mind; or, by
all three working together - for they are Brothers and usually go hand in hand -
the Temple of God will be dark, there will be no designs upon the Trestlboard,
and the result will be idleness, confusion and chaos. It is a parable of history
- a picture of many an age in the past of which we read. For, where there is no
light of Divine Vision, the Altar fire is extinguished. The people "perish" s
the Bible tells us; literally they become a mob, which is only another way of
saying the same thing. There are no designs on the Trestleboard; that is, no
leadership, - as in Russia today, where the herd-mind runs wild and runs red.
Chaos comes again, inevitably so when all the lights are blown out, and the
people are like ignorant armies that clash by night.
Of the three Ruffians, the most terrible, the most ruthless, the most brutal
is the ignorant Mob-Mind. No tyrant, no priest can reduce a nation to slavery
and control it until it is lost in the darkness of ignorance. By ignorance we
mean not merely lack of knowledge, but the state of mind in which men refuse, or
are afraid, to think, to reason, to enquire. When "The Great Free-doms of the
Mind" go, everything is lost!.
After this manner Pike expounded the meaning of the three Ruffians. who rob
themselves, as they rob their fellow craftsmen, of the most precious secret of
personal and social life. A secret, let it be added, which cannot be extorted,
but is only won when we are worthy to receive it and have the wit and courage to
keep it. For, oddly enough, we cannot have real liberty until we are ready for
it, and can only become worthy of it by seeking and striving for it.
But some of us go further, and find the same three Ruffians nearer home -
hiding in our own hearts. And naturally so, because society is only the
individual writ larger; and what men are together is determined by what each is
by himself. If we know who the ruffians really are, we have only to ask; what
three things waylay each of us, destroy character, and if they have their way
either slay us or turn us into ruffians? Why do we do evil and mar the Temple of
God in us? Three great Greek thinkers searched until they found the three causes
of sin in the heart of man. In other words, they hunted in the mountains of the
mind until they found the Ruffi-ans. Socrates said that the chief ruffian is
ignorance - that is, no man in his right mind does evil unless he is so blinded
by ignorance that he does see the right. No man, he said, seeing good and evil
side by side, will choose evil unless he is too blind to see its results. An
enlightened self-interest would stop him. Therefore, his remedy for the ills of
life is knowl-edge - more light, and a clearer insight. Even so, said Plato; it
is all true as far as it goes. But the fact is that men do see right and wrong
clearly, and yet in a dark mood they do wrong in spite of knowledge. When the
mind is calm and clear, the right is plain, but a storm of passion stirs up
sediments in the bottom of the mind, and it is so cloudy that clear vision
fails. The life of a man is like driving a team of horses, one tame and the
other wild. So long as the wild horse is held firmly all goes well. But, alas,
often enough, the wild horse gets loose and there is a run-away and a wreck.
But that is not all, said Aristotle. We do not get to the bottom truth of the
matter until we admit the fact and possibil-ity - in ourselves and in our
fellows - of a moral perversity, a spirit of sheer mischief, which does wrong,
deliberately and in the face of right, calmly and with devilish cunning, for the
sake of wrong and for the love of it. Here, truly, is the real Ruffian most to
be feared - a desperate character he is, who can only be overcome by Divine
Help.
Thus, three great thinkers capture the Ruffians, hiding somewhere in our own
minds. It means much to have them brought before us for judgment, and happy is
the man who is wise enough to take them outside the city of his mind and execute
them. Nothing else or less will do. To show them any mercy is to invite misery
and disaster. They are ruthless, and must be dealt with ruthlessly and at once.
If we parley with them, if we soften toward them, we our-selves may be turned
into Ruffians. Good but foolish Fellowcra-fts came near being intrigued into a
hideous crime. "If thy right eye offend, pluck it out," said the greatest of
Teachers. Only a celestial surgery will save the whole body from infection and
moral rot. We dare not make terms with evil, else it will dictate terms to us
before we are aware of it.
One does not have to break the head of a Brother in order to be a Ruffian.
One can break a heart. One can break his home. One can slay his good name. The
amount of polite and refined ruffianism that goes on about us every day is
appalling. Watch-fulness is wisdom. Only a mind well tiled, with a faithful
inner guard ever at his post, may hope to keep the ruffian spirit out of your
heart and mine. No wise man dare be careless or take any chances with the
thought, feelings and motives he admits into the Lodge of the mind, whereof he
is Master.
So let us live, watch and work, until Death, the last Ruffian, whom none can
escape, lays us low, assured that even the dark, dumb hour, which brings a
dreamless sleep about our couch, will not be able to keep us from the face of
God, whose strong grip will free us and lift us out of shadows into the Light;
out of dim phantoms into the Life Eternal that cannot die.
"SO MOTE IT BE"
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