The Lost Key: An Explanation of Masonic Symbols

102The Lost Key292. This is the teaching of the ,Masonic Drama of the' ThirdDegree as it appliesfo the human race. In its application to theindividual it is very much the same. There is observable in theordinary child at first, while perhaps not a real, conscious touchwith the spiritual, yet a sort of sensitiveness to the spiritual whichis killed by the three ruffians of selfishness, ignorance andsensuality. The exuberant outbursts of youth at the time ofpuberty and for some time thereafter, that burning desire for somesort of “kick,” that characteristic which Shakespeare calls “FlamingYouth,” serves to kill out this spiritual sensitiveness and to bury itin the rubbish of desire, passions and, perhaps, vice. Later on, asthe judgment comes more to the front and the mind takes control,the grave of sectarian beliefs and dogmatism entombs the body ofthe slain intuitive faculty and nothing can raise it from this gravebut the honest search for truth assisted by that service to God andto humanity which is symbolized by the Lion’s Paw. Unfortunatelyit is not often that the body is so raised, for our desire for truth isusually but dim and our service but perfunctory. Nevertheless,even though it be not raised, yet the possibility of its being raised isthere could we but understand the Drama and learn its lessons.Until we do, the six foot grave of creed-bound sectarianism willhold us buried.293. The search for the body is symbolical of the first faint stirringsof that realization that something has been lost. There are nodesigns upon the trestleboard and the work on the Temple seemsto be purposeless, with great confusion and dismay among theworkmen. The more advanced of the mental qualities sense thatsomething has gone amiss and they seek for the lost touch with thespiritual wisdom. There is a wealth of detail in this Drama whichcannot be gone into without practically writing out the Legenditself. But what has been said is enough to give the real purposeand meaning of the drama and will enable any Mason to look