Free Masonry - The Masonic Trowel

88 FREE MASONRY.
with reverence, and all the spiritual faculties are called
forth to worship and adoration.
" This order is, therefore, a positive contradiction of those
who know not God, and gives the most irrefragable proof
of the resurrection of the body ;"* even by main strength
raising upon his feet one who makes believe dead! O,
illustrious proof! worthy of the art; " whyche beeth the
skylle of nature, the understandynge of the myghte that is
therein, and its sondrye workynges." (Book of Cons. p.
16. Preston, b. 3. sec. 1. JP. M. L. p. 10.)
Those ceremonies, of which the stranger " can have no
conception, and which call forth the spiritual faculties to
adoration and praise" relate to an exhibition as nearly allied
to tragedy, as the mock heroic is to epic poetry. Both
the Monitor and the Chart give the following account of
this matter: " this section recites the historical traditions of
the order, and presents to view a finished picture of the
utmost consequence to the fraternity. It exemplifies an
instance, of virtue, fortitude, and integrity, unparalleled
in the history of man." {Chart, p. 36. JP. M. L. p. 184.
F. M. M. part 1, chap. 9.)
What is this unparalleled instance of virtue, fortitude, and
integrity ? No more than is represented by the Candidate's
dying in tragedia, rather than give up the Master's
word; which word, O Free Masonry! has not yet been
intrusted to him, and which, when he gets it, proves not to
be the word he died to save, but a substitute.
This would be a very ridiculous affair, were it not solemnized
by funereal extracts from the Holy Scriptures, (Eccles.
xii. 1—7,) always re£d on this occasion.
" Remember thy Creator in the days of thy youth, while
the evil days come not, nor the years draw nigh, when thou
shalt say, I have no pleasure in them.
* New F. M. Monitor, p. 158.