THE MYSTIC TIE
Adieu! A heart-warm, fond adieu! Dear Brothers of the Mystic Tie Ye favored,
ye enlightened few Companions of my social joy!
The immortal verse of Robert Burns, written in his farewell to his brethren
of St. James Lodge, Tarbolton, Scotland, first popularized, if it did not
originate, the three words now universally recognized by all English speaking
Freemasons as expressing the very essence of the Fraternity.
But to recognize is one thing; to define is quite another, as any man may
discover who attempts to describe a perfume, a sunset, a symphony, so another
may smell, see, hear with the speaker.
What IS the Mystic Tie? Is it an obligation, taken before an Altar? Is it a
Covenant, entered into between a man and men, before God and his fellows? Is it
a thing that one can hold in his hand and see with his eye? Is it a matter of
that land of the inner life, in which a man thinks the thoughts he never tells
and learns the truths he cannot teach?
To every man, even the most extrovert and obvious-minded, comes at times a
spiritual experience. Tongue-tied in the grip of emotion, few phrase it. But it
happens; and none who reads these lame words but will admit it to himself at
least, no matter how vociferously he denies it aloud.
It comes in as many ways as are men to whom it comes. One man stands before a
mighty mountain--his eyes follow its rocky fastness up, up, up to where austere
saw teeth of stone cut into the blue. Something in the might, the majesty, the
aloofness, the dignity, the timelessness of the mass passes from rock to heart
and sings therein a harmony which never quite dies away. Another cultivates a
rose garden and in the pure beauty of the blossom which bursts forth under his
ministering hands sees a vision not of the earth, earthy. A third kneels in a
cathedral and as the organ's deepest diapason sounds a note so low it is hardly
heard, so profound nothing else can be heard, and a shaft or sunlight strikes
through stained glass to pick out a bit of stone carving, feels himself close to
the eternal verities . . .
And others sit in a Lodge; a familiar. everyday, ordinary fact of
brotherhood's experience. They hear familiar ritual; they see familiar faces;
they engage in familiar actions. There is no element of surprise, or drama, or
great event, yet there is something present which is found nowhere else;
something that men come, and come, and come again, often all their lives
through, to get . .
As illusive as a half-memory or childhood, as hard to catch as a sunbeam, as
intangible as the hint of spring that sets the birds to flying north, it is as
strong as steel, as permanent as the earth, as certain and dependable as
gravity.
Brother Arthur F. Powell comes as near as may be to saying what is not
sayable;
"What strand is it that tugs at our hearts. taut when so many threads are
broken in the rough ways of the world?" he asks. then answers: "Ask what it is
in the wild that calls to the little wild things? What sacred secret things do
the mountains whisper to the hillmen, so silently yet so surely that they can be
heard above the din and clatter of the world? What mystery does the sea tell to
the sailor, the desert to the Arab, the arctic ice to the explorer, the stars to
the astronomer? When we have answered these questions, mayhap we may divine the
magic of Masonry. Who knows what it is or how or why unless it be the long
Cabletow of God running from heart to heart?"
We learn in school that a whole is the sum of all its parts. If, then, we
might list all the parts which compose the Mystic Tie, their sum should be the
definition of the whole. But it is not. Firstly, we cannot "list all the parts,"
since one man's list and that of his brother would differ even as our brother's
differ from ours. And secondly and finally. a whole which is the sum of all its
parts is material--and the Mystic Tie is not made of matter.
We all have the same number of letters in the alphabet: we all have access to
the dictionary which contains every word in the language--but we do not know how
to take of these and write a Psalm of David, or Sermon on the Mount. Wt have the
bricks and the stone and may even possess the plan--but the mortar of the spirit
to build them into something deathless--that escapes us. Modern musicians have
more notes to the scale than were known to Brahms and Beethoven and more strings
and brass and woodwind to sound them--but who writes symphonies as the Masters
wrote?
Still, we may try. knowing in advance that we must fail..
Ritual is a part of the Mystic Tie. How or why man must make rituals and
learn them, love them, preserve them, is as mysterious as anything in life--but
it has always been so. There is something deep within us which demands a set
form of expression: we may say the thought in a thousand ways but we do say it
in unison and in a special way. And this is true whether it be Freemasonry or
Church or everyday life which is filled with a ritual so common that we do not
think of it as ritual. "Good morning! How are you?"-- ritual. To smile on seeing
a friendly face-- ritual. The clasp of hand to hand; the familiar gathering of
family about a table; school, business, earning a living--all are rituals
without which life would be unlivable. The lover's kiss and the words which all
the world knows but which are invariably whispered as a secret --these, too, are
ritual. And so the ritual of the Lodge, with its old, old truths phrased in
stilted old-fashioned words and teaching anew every time it is heard what is
already known of all who hear it--this golden chain of sounds which die even as
they are born, and yet which never cease sounding once they have been taken into
the heart--they are a part of the Mystic Tie.
Teaching and learning ritual is a part of it. Long ago, answering some
question regarding the oral and the cipher method of teaching ritual, Dr. Joseph
Fort Newton, beloved and inspired brother, wrote:
"What is efficiency in the teaching of Masonry? Surely it is something more
than accuracy of the letter, valuable as that is. It is also the communication
of a spirit, and we submit that this highest and most precious result is better
achieved by oral instruction. It goes deeper, it stays longer, it touches parts
of our nature which are not reached by decoding a cipher. For example, we were
instructed in Masonry by a noble and gracious man to whom Masonry meant very
much--long since gone to join the white and silent people we call the dead--but
the impress of his spirit lingers still. He gave us something which no book can
give, because the finest truth is communicated only through personality--it
passes silently, mystically, from soul to soul. It is so in all education. The
best thing a lad gets at college is not from books, but from his contact with
strong men--as when Garfield said that the best university would be to sit on
one end of a log with Horace Mann on the other end. Inaccuracies may be
corrected, but we cannot think that the hours which we spent in fellowship with
the gracious man who instructed us in the days that come not back, were wasted.
Never! Perhaps we are sentimental. If so, we are glad of it. But we do feel that
to abandon the oral teaching of Masonry would mean the loss of something unique,
particular, and fine, and we know of nothing to take its place."
Friendship is a part of the mystic tie; that glory of life in which man finds
a man in whom he can trust, for whom he would labor, with whom he would live.
Not the greatest poet who has yet lived has been able to define friendship. We
know what it is, but we cannot explain it. Yet it is there, alive, vital, a part
of Lodge life, an integer in the whole, and so a part of the Mystic Tie.
Mystery is a part of it--indeed, is it not named for mystery? And Freemasonry
is so filled with mysteries! From whence came it, this chain of fraternity which
began we know not when and grew we know not how? And whither does it go? The one
as much a mystery as the other. Why do men seek that which does not advertise,
which is known so little, (and that little, so badly) by the outside world? What
unknown millions of men once trod its halls? Their names, their lives, their
acts, their influence--we know them not. True, we can sup with Ashmole and enter
St. Peter's with Wren; we can kneel with Washington in a Lodge in
Fredericksburg, and we can touch the hand of Lafayette in a Masonic procession
--at least in reading and in imagination. But the millions of unknowns who
stepped as we have stepped, who spoke as we have spoken, who pledged as we have
pledged, who lived and loved and died in Freemasonry, as we live and love and
will die--they are a mystery; a dear, bewildering, unknown and forever to be
unknown mystery but--a part of the Mystic Tie. The "secrets" of Freemasonry are
a part of it. Granted that those secrets are of use and value only to the
Freemason, the fact remains; men love that which is secret, that which sets them
off from their fellows; that which the uninitiated cannot share. Passengers on a
liner exclaim at the huge size of an iceberg, seldom realizing that there is
eight times as much ice below the surface of the sea as is visible above. So
with the power of the secrets of Freemasonry; the bond that lies within them is
eighty times eight tighter than is tied by their mere possession.
Quoting again from the so-very-quotable Dr. Newton, writing in The Builder:
"In the Old Charges of Craft Masonry the initiate was obligated to keep the
secrets of the Craft, by his honor as a man on the 'contents of this holy Book.'
What were those secrets in the olden time? They included the technical secrets
of his art--which have become symbolical secrets to us--and the Signs and tokens
by which he made himself known as a Master Mason when he went a-journeying.
Those secrets protected both the artist and his art. What are the secrets of a
Master Mason now? Not the wise and noble truths which the order teaches. Our
fundamental Principles are the common possession of thinking men and are the
foundations of the higher human life everywhere. Now what is secret in Masonry
is not the truth which it teaches. but the method by which it teaches it--its
ceremonial and symbolism, and the signs and token by which it protects the
privacy of its Lodge room that it may teach more impressively. Also, those signs
and tokens serve as a cover under which charity, brotherliness, and the busy
heart of love can work without ostentation--enabling us to serve a brother in
perplexity or need without wounding a heart already sore. Therefore, if those
secrets were surrendered, something beautiful and fine would he lost. In other
days it required some courage to be a Mason, and those old pioneers who faced
obloquy for their Masonic faith and fellowship, knew what they were about when
they took no risks of having their sacred secrets violated but kept them warm
and tender and true, passing them from mouth to ear down the years!" Of the
Mystic Tie, too the universality of Freemasonry is a part. Two and a half
million brothers in this nation--five million in the world. In every civilized
Country Freemasonry has grown and thrived until, alas, the idealogies of
Dictators who revere only force struck down the gentle Craft in conquered
countries. To be a part of anything important is always a bond: to be a part of
anything so universal so widespread, so essential to so many peoples in so many
lands and times-- surely this is a part of the Mystic Tie.
"My Mother Lodge!" Next to his family and his God many a man keeps thought of
Mother Lodge closely and dearer in his heart than anything else the world may
offer him. Its hall may be small and old. Its furniture may be shabby and
decrepit. The pictures on the walls may be faded, the carpet worn, the physical
side wholly drab. but the Mother Lodge itself is neither shabby nor drab, it
shines with a gentle radiance in the hearts of brethren who love it and the
light it sheds they will follow far. Surely it too, is a part of the Mystic
Tie..
So on these pages might run on for volumes and still the story would not be
told nor the arts listed show forth the truth of the whole.
None who have known it would think of denying the strength of the Mystic Tie.
None who have its cord about their hearts would loose it. None can wholly
comprehend it: none define, describe it. It exists; it works its gentle
miracles: it is as mighty as it is intangible. Perhaps that singer of
Freemasonry had a partial vision of it when he wrote "The Road":
So many men before thy Alter kneel Unthinkingly, to promise brotherhood: So
few remain, humbly to kiss thy rood With ears undefened to their mute appeal: So
many find thy symbols less than real. Thy teachings mystic, hard to understand:
So few there are in all thy far flung band To hold thy banner high and draw thy
steel, And yet--immortal and most mighty , thou! What hath thy lore of life to
let it live? What is the vital spark, hid in thy vow? Thy Millions learned, as
thy dear paths they trod. The secret of the strength thou hast to give-- "I am a
way of common men of God."
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