Mark Coleman Wallace PhD Thesis - University of St Andrews

maintained its early features of philanthropy, self-improvement, and general
merriment. By the end of the 1700s, however, freemasonry had grown on a
scale unrivalled by any other society, manifesting its remarkable ability to
synthesize the traits and aspects of many organizations and successfully market
itself to the public.
Freemasonry, for all its secrecy, mysteries, and assortment of
occupations and lifestyles, succeeded and survived where other societies
declined and disappeared. Unlike other organizations, it did not exclude
members based on cultural or economic standing. And the copious minutes
allow a candid look at the social mechanisms that allowed freemasonry to grow,
expand, and compete with academic, literary, and scientific associations.
The organisation exhibited a durability and resilience not demonstrated in other
societies; whereas other associations rose in popularity, reached a pinnacle, and
gradually were consigned to the societal and associational graveyard of
indifference and disinterestedness, masonic lodges endured.
McElroy notes that the prominent Select and Edinburgh societies failed
because of a “a gradual diminishing of interest in the members of the society
which was their common parent, the Select Society of Edinburgh…When the
Select Society began to suffer from the increasing lack of interest and the non-
attendance of its members, its dependent societies likewise suffered from lack of
support.” 202 Elaborating on this underlying principle of demise, McElroy argues
that “the process of decay and dissolution…was a gradual one brought about by
failing interest among its members, by its being too expansionist in forming
202 McElroy, Age of Improvement, 180.
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