Free Masonry - The Masonic Trowel

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CHAPTER LVI.
It was the plan of the IUuminees to represent Free Masonry
as true Christianity: then easily showing Free Masonry
to be a bladder of wind, they entirely abolished all
regard for the gospel from the hearts of their pupils.
" Shall atheist* dare insult the cross
M Of our incarnate God ?
" Shall infidels revile his truth,
" And trample on his Wood ?
" What if he choose mysterious ways
" To cleanse us from our faults;
" May not the works of sovereign grace
" Transcend our highest thoughts ?"— Walts.
Philo (Knigge) to Cato (Zwack.)
(R. p. 121.) " WE must consider the ruling propensities
of every age of the world. At present, the cheats and
tricks of the priests have roused ail men against them, and
against Christianity. But, at the same time, superstition
and fanaticism rule with unlimited dominion, and the understanding
of man really seems to be going backwards.
(This was right in him.) Our task, therefore, is doubled.
We must give such an account of things, that fanatics shall
not be alarmed, and that shall, notwithstanding, excite a
spirit of free inquiry. We must not throw away the good
with the bad, the child with the dirty water; but we must
make the secret doctrines of Christianity be received as the
secrets of genuine Free Masonry.* But, farther, we have
* The Grand Chaplain, and the Grand Chapter of New-York, could
have had no suspicion, that, in publishing u A System of Speculative Masenry,"
they were most effectually aiding the schemes of Illuminism.