Duncan's Ritual of Freemasonry.pdf - FatimaMovement

ORIGINAL POINTS.--Ancient Masonry
admitted twelve original points, which constitute
the basis of the entire system, and without which
no person ever did or can be legally received into
the Order. Every candidate is obliged to pass
through all these essential forms and ceremonies,
otherwise his initiation would not be legal. They
are--opening, preparing, reporting, entering,
prayer, circumambulation, advancing, obligation,
intrusted, invested, placed, closing.
p. 269
PENAL.--The penal sign marks our obligation,
and reminds us also of the fall of Adam, and the
dreadful penalty entailed thereby on his sinful
posterity, being no less than death. It intimates
that the stiff neck of the disobedient shall be cut
off from the land of the living by the judgment of
God, even as the head is severed from the body
by the sword of human justice.
[This applies as well to the Entered Apprentice's as to the
Royal Arch Mason's "Duegard."]
PHRASES OF ADMISSION.--When a candidate
receives the first Degree he is said to be initiated,
at the second step he is passed, at the third,
raised; when he takes the Mark Degree, he is
congratulated (advanced); having passed the
chair, he is said to have presided; when he
becomes a Most Excellent Master, he is
acknowledged and received; and when a Royal
Arch Mason, he is exalted.
SIGN OF DISTRESS.--In a society whose