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

HAMILTON
HARLEIAN 317
systems of Masonry . The Mutter-Bund of
the Confederacy of Hamburg Lodges, which
make up this system, is independent of the
Grand Lodge. The two authorities are
entirely distinct, and bear much the same
relation to each other as the Grand Lodges
and Grand Chapters of the United States .
Hamilton, Hon . Robert M .A ., M .D .
Born 1820 ; died May, 1880, at Jamaica, of
which island he was District Grand Master .
This English gentleman was a member of
the Queen's Body Guard . He was appointed
District G . Master of Jamaica, November 5,
1858 ; District G. Supt . of Royal Arch Masons,
January 10, 1859; Prov . G . M . M . M .,
1877 ; and was a supernumerary member of the
Supreme Council, 33d, of England, and Prov .
G . Master of the Royal Order of Scotland .
Hand. In Freemasonry, the hand as
a symbol holds a high place, because it is
the principal seat of the sense of feeling so
necessary to and so highly revered by Masons
. The same symbol is found in the
most ancient religions, and some of their
analogies to Masonic symbolism are peculiar.
Thus, Horapollo says that among
the Egyptians the hand was the symbol of
a builder, or one fond of building, because all
labor proceeds from the hand . In many of
the Ancient Mysteries the hand, especially
the left, was deemed the symbol of equity .
In Christian art a hand is the indication
of a holy person or thing. In early Medieval
art, the Supreme Being was always
represented by a hand extended from a
cloud, and generally in the act of benediction
. The form of this act of benediction,
as adopted by the Roman Church, which
seems to have been borrowed from the symbols
of the Phrygian and Eleusinian priests
or hierophants, who used it in their mystical
processions, presents a singular analogy,
which will be interesting to Mark Master
Masons, who will recognize in it a symbol
of their own ritual . In the benediction
referred to, as given in the Latin
Church, the thumb, index, and
middle fingers are extended, and
the two others bent against the
palm . The church explains this
position of the extended thumb
and two fingers as representing
the Trinity ; but the older symbol of the
Pagan priests, which was precisely of the
same form, must have had a different meaning
. A writer in the British Magazine (vol.
i ., p . 565) thinks that the hand, which was
used in the Mithraic mysteries in this position,
was symbolic of the Light emanating
not from the sun, but from the Creator,
directly as a special manifestation ; and he
remarks that chiromancy or divination by
the hand is an art founded upon the notion
that the human hand has some reference to
the decrees of the supreme power peculiar to
it above all other parts of the microcosmusman
. Certainly, to the Mason, the hand
is most important as the symbol of that
mystical intelligence by which one Mason
knows another "in the dark as well as in
the light ."
Hand, Left . See Left Hand .
Hand, Right. See Right Hand.
Hand to Back . See Points of Fellowship .
Hand to Hand. See Points of Fellowship .
Hands, United . Clasped hands are a
symbol of fidelity and trust . A Spanish
work was published at Vittoria, in 1774,
where three hands are shown united in the
vignette on the title .
Hanover. Freemasonry was introduced
into Hanover, in the year 1744, by the
organization of the Lodge "Frederick" ;
which did not, however, get into active
operation, in consequence of the opposition
of the priests, until two years after . A
Provincial Grand Lodge was established
in 1755, which in 1828 became an independent
Grand Lodge . In 1866, in consequence
of the war between Austria and
Prussia, Hanover was annexed to the latter
country. There being three Grand Lodges
at that time in Prussia, the king deemed it
inexpedient to add a fourth, and, by a cabinet
order of February 17 ? 1867, the Grand
Lodge of Hanover was dissolved . Most of
the Hanoverian Lodges united with the
Grand Lodge Royal York at Berlin, and a
few with the Grand Lodge of the Three
Globes.
Haphtzlel. (Heb . ~t~' 13E1, Voluntas Dei.)
A covered word used in the Twenty-third
Degree of the A . A . Scottish Rite .
Har. The name of the second king in
the Scandinavian Mysteries .
Haram, Grand . The Seventy-third Degree
of the Rite of Mizraim .
Harbinger . The title of an officer in
the Knights of the Holy Sepulcher and
also in the Knights of St . John the 'Evangelist
.
Hardie, James . A Mason of New York
who published, in 1818, a work entitle
The New Freemasons' Monitor and Masonic
Guide. It evinces considerable ability, is
more valuable than the Monitors of Webb
and Cross, and deserved a greater popularity
than it seems to have received .
Harleian Manuscripts. An old record
of the Constitutions of Freemasonry, so
called because it forms No . 2054 of the
collection of manuscripts in the British Museum,
which were originally collected by
Robert Harley, Earl of Oxford, the celebrated
prime minister of Queen Anne and known
as the "Bibliotheca Harleian,' 7 or Harleian
Library . The MS . consists of four leaves,
containing six and a half pages of close
writing in a cramped hand, said to be that
of Randle Holmes, Chester Herald, who
died in 1699 . The MS . was first published
by Bro . William James Hughan, in his
Masonic Sketches and Reprints . The Manuscript
was carefully transcribed for Bro .
Hughan by a faithul copyist, and its correctness
was verified by Mr . Sims, of the
MS . department of the British Museum .
Bro . Hughan places the date of the record