The History of Initiation - The Masonic Trowel

179
LECTURE XI.
DOCTRINES AND MORALITY.
THE splendour and importance of the mysteries gave
them such a vast and overwhelming influence, even with
the principal nobility of every ancient nation, that the
high-born youth displayed the utmost anxiety to endure
the fatigue and danger of initiation, that they might be
assimilated with that distinguished society, into which
no other formula could introduce them. For this purpose
every peril was braved, and every risk cheerfully
encountered; and loss of life in the process was preferred
to the dishonour of remaining voluntarily amongst the
uninitiated and profane. Nothing but this unconquerable
principle could have induced men to press forward
through such a series of opposing difficulties as we have
just enumerated.
The candidate was now invested with a sword, a shield,
and a lance, and declared equal to the toil of combat,
hunting, and providing for his own subsistence, from
which latter duty his
parents were henceforth wholly
relieved, although he had now only attained his fifteenth
year. His shield was white, and termed "the shield ol
expectation." A specified period was assigned for his
probation in arms, and if he failed to distinguish himself
in battle before the expiration of this term, the phrase
Niding was applied to him, and he was shunned by all
his former associates. 1
This, however, did not often
happen ; and when he had performed any distinguished
achievement, he was permitted to have a design painted
on his shield, as a testimony of his prowess. This privilege,
however, led, in process of time, to innovations in
the device and fashion of the shield which endangered
1 The word Niding, amongst the Scandinavians, was esteemed so
contemptuous that it would provoke even a coward to single combat.
It was equal to giving the lie in our own country; and has now
merged into the phrase You are a good-for-nothing fellow. (Vid.
Mallet, vol. i. } p. 218.)