Free Masonry - The Masonic Trowel

152 FREE MASONRY.
Paschal, describing the order of Jesuists, portrays with
a master hand the most prominent features of Free Ma*
sonry. With his work before me {CEubres de Blaise Pas*
ad. A un Provincial, Lettre cinqmeme.) I fill up the outline,
and suit the shading to the present subject.
Free Masonry, u which the first Masons received from
God," and which teaches " the skylle of becoming gude
and parfyghte without the help of fear and hope," doth
also rest on " the same co-eternal and unshaken foundation,
contain and inculcate, in substance, the same truth, and
propose the same ultimate end, as the doctrine of Christianity
taught by Divine Revelation." {Grand Chapter of
New-York. Town's Spec. Free Masonry, p. 13. 1st ed>)
" Speculative Free Masonry," say the grand chapter,
{Town, p. 23.)" evidently embraces, in body and substance,
the whole duty of man as a moral being." Who can doubt
this? Not the profane, surely, for having never entered
the sacred walls of a lodge room, it does not belong to
them to.affirm or to deny what is masonicaUy taught there.
Not the fraternity, for they see with their own eyes, and hear
with their own ears, and sanction by their highest official
documents, the matters quoted here.
• Neither can it be doubted, that " ever since symmetry
began, and harmony displayed her charms, our order has
had a being." The Master of the Lodge of Antiquity
must know, Mr. Preston, " the faithful historian of Masonry
;" and he asserts it, supported by the Grand Chapter of
Rhode Island, and Mr. Webb. {Preston, book 1. sec. 3.
Free Mas. Man. part 1. ch. 1.)
Free Masonry is, also, u the key-stone to all other arts
and sciences." {Hardie's Mon. p. 189.) It consecrated
the Sabbath as a day of rest. {Mas. Manual, p. 170. Hardie's
Mon. p. 111. Webb's Mon. p. 55. and F. M. Library,
p. 168.) And " includes within its circle almost every
branch of polite learning." {Preston, b. 2. sec. 4. Free
Mas. Mon. part 1. chap. 10. F. M. Library, p. 165.) It
teaches the seven liberal arts and sciences, besides the black
art, or " the art of wunderwurkynge, and of foresaying