Mark Coleman Wallace PhD Thesis - University of St Andrews

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letter or a Charter from the Grand Lodge of Scotland. And being shown a Book
Titled “Regulations of the Grand Assembly of Knights Templars held at
Maybole he Declares That it contains the Rules and regulations of that assembly
and all the Minutes of their procedure.
That after they had obtained their letter from Thomas Sommers then
Clerk to the Grand Lodge and afterwards a Charter they did raise several of the
Members to the Degrees of Arch, Royal Arch, and Knights Templar, but this
they did not consider as having been done under their Charter or as having any
connection with their Lodge No. 264, And that there are many Members of that
Lodge who are not higher then Master Masons and being Interrogated what are
the particular Ceremonys or forms that are followed out in making Masons,
Arch, Royal Arch and Knights Templars, Declares That they never used any
other ceremonys than those by which the declarent and Robert Ramsay were
initiated with these degrees by the Master of St James’s Lodge of Newton, but
that he considers himself bound by the terms of his own initiation not to reveal
any of these Ceremonys, to any person but those who inclined to be initiated
therein as he was because he understood himself bound in that manner by an
oath he had taken When he was himself initiated which he never saw committed
to writing, and which he administered afterwards in the same form and tenor
from his memory to those he initiated afterwards, and being interrogated if he
could now repeat that oath or the Substance of it, Declares that he thinks he
could but would wish to have some time to consult with some of his other
Brethren of St James’s Lodge where it was administered to him, whether he is at
liberty to divulge it or not, and he would rather on that account wish to decline it
at present. And being farther Interrogated whether in these higher orders of
Masonry there may be signs, Symbols or materials used of any kind in the
Compleating of their Instruction the Same objection to Exhibite and divulge,
that he has Stated to the Condescending upon the words of his obligation
Declares that he has the very same objections to this one as to the other.
Declares that sometime after they had obtained their Charter from the Grand
lodge the Declarent and said Robert Ramsay, John McClure Junior Mason in
Maybole and some others went to Tarbolton at desire of some of the Members
of St Davids Lodge there and initiated a number of the Members the Members
into these higher orders of Masonry which he thinks might be the number of
eight or Ten, and being Shown a Book Titled “Paine’s age of reason” and being
asked if he wrote for it to London Declares that he did write to London for it To
a Brother he had chose who accordingly sent it to him, and that the cause of his
writing for it was His having got a perusal of the Bishop of Landoff’s answer to
Paine’s Age of Reason and having read that Book, he could not understand the
Bishop’s reasoning till he had seen the book to which it was in answer. That
after having said book for sometime in his possession he remembers to have
given it to the said Robert Ramsay with instructions to him to read it by himself
as he considered it a production of dangerous Consequence to [Illegible] and to
return it to him so soon as he had read it, but which he never saw afterwards
until he saw it produced in the Grand Lodge of Scotland as he understood by
Wm. McAdam at Turnberry.