Mackey A G - Encylopedia of Freemasonry - The Grand Masonic ...

18 ADMIRATION
ADMONITION
take of the character of either of these, adjournments
are not applicable to them . The
rule which Bro. Moore lays down is undoubtedly
correct, but the reason which he assigns
for it is not sufficient . If a Lodge were permitted
to adjourn by the vote of a majority of
its members, the control of the labor would be
placed in their hands. But according to the
whole spirit of the Masonic system, the Master
alone controls and directs the hours of labor .
In the 5th of the Old Charges, approved in
1722, it is declared that " All Masons shall
meekly receive their Wages without murmuring
or mutiny, and not desert the Master till the
Lord's work is fanish'd." Now as the Master
alone can know when " the work is finished,"
the selection of the time of 1"k must be
vested in him. He is the sole judge of the
proper period at which the labors of the Lodge
should be terminated, and he may suspend
business even in the middle of a debate, if he
supposes that it is expedient to close the Lodge .
Hence no motion for adjournment can ever be
admitted in a Masonic Lodge . Such a motion
would be an interference with the prerogative
of the Master, and could not therefore be entertained.
The Earl of Zetland, when Grand Master
of En land, ruled on November 19, 1856, that
a Loge has no power to adjourn except
to the next regular day of meet* g . He said :
" I may . . . say that Private Lodges are governed
by much the same laws as Grand Lodges,
and that no meeting of a Private Lodge can
be adjourned ; but the Master of a Private
Lodge may, and does, convene Lodges of
Emergency ." (Freemasons' Magazine, 1856,
p 848 .
This prerogative of opening and closing his
Lodge is necessarily vested in the Master, because,
by the nature of our Institution, he is
responsible to the Grand Lodge for the good
conduct of the body over which he presides .
He is charged, in those questions to which he
is required to give his assent at his installation,
to hold the Landmarks in veneration, and
to conform to every edict of the Grand Lodge ;
and for any violation of the one or disobedience
of the other by the Lodge, in his presence,
he would be answerable to the supreme
Masonic authority . Hence the necessity that
an arbitrary power should be conferred upon
him, by the exercise of which he may at any
time be enabled to prevent the adoption of
resolutions, or the commission of any act
which would be subversive of, or contrary to,
those ancient laws and usages which he has
sworn to maintain and preserve .
Admiration, Sign of . A mode of recognition
alluded to in the Most Excellent Master's
Degree, or the Sixth of the American Rite. Its
introduction in that place is referred to a Mar
sonic legend in connection with the visit of the
Queen of Sheba to King Solomon, which states
that moved by the wide-spread reputation of
the lsraelitish monarch, she had repaired to
Jerusalem to inspect the rn ignificent works of
which she had heard so many encomiums .
Upon arriving there, and beholding for the
first time the Temple, which glittered with
gold, and which was so accurately adjusted
in all its parts as to seem to be composed of
but a sine piece of marble, she raised her
hands an eyes to heaven in an attitude of
admiration, and at the same time exclaimed,
" Rabboni! " equivalent to saying, " A most
excellent master hath done thisl " This action
has since been perpetuated in the ceremonies
of the degree of Most Excellent Master . The
legend is, however, no doubt apocryphal, and
is really to be considered only as allegorical,
like so many other of the legends of Masonry .
(See Sheba, Queen.)
Admission. Although the Old C es,
approved in 1722, use the word adm as
applicable to those who are initiated into the
mysteries of Freemasonry, yet the General
Regulations of 1721 employ the term admission
in a sense different from that of initiation .
By the word making they imply the reception
of a profane into the Order, but by admission
they designate the election of a Mason into a
Lge. Thus we find such expressions as these
clearly indicating a difference in the meaning
of the two words . In Reg . v.-" No man can
be made or admitted a member of a particular
Lodge ." In Reg . vi .-" But no man can be
entered a brother in any particular Lodge, or
admitted to be a member thereof ." And more
distinctly in Reg . viii .-" No set or number of
brethren shall withdraw or separate them .
selves from the Lodge in which they were made
brethren or were afterwards admitted members
." This distinction has not always been
rigidly preserved by recent writers ; but it is
evident that, correctly speaking, we should
always say of a profane who has been initiated
that he has been made a Mason, and of a
Mason who has been affiliated with a Lodge,
that he has been admitted a member . The
true definition of admission is, then, the reception
of an unaffiliated brother into membership
(See Affiliated Mason .)
Admonition. According to the ethics of
Freemasonry, it is made a duty obligatory
upon every member of the Order to conceal the
faults of a brother, that is, not to blazon
forth his errors and infirmities, to let them be
learned by the world from some other tongue
than his, and to admonish him of them in private
. So there is another but a like duty or
obligation, which instructs him to whisper
good counsel in his brother's ear and to warn
him of approaching danger . And this refers
not more to the danger that is without and
around him than to that which is within him ;
not more to the peril that springs from the
concealed foe who would waylay him and
covertly injure him, than to that deeper peril
of those faults and infirmities which lie within
his own heart, and which, if not timely crushed
by good and earnest resolution of amendment,
will, like the ungrateful serpent in the fable,
become warm with life only to sting the bosom
that has nourished them.
Admonition of a brother's fault is, then the
duty of every Mason, and no true one wila, for
either fear or favor, neglect its performance,