Free Masonry - The Masonic Trowel

ADDRESS TO THE FRATERNITY. 389
When men that have never been behind the curtain, attempt
to describe what is done there, your patience fails;
your indignation finds not how to restrain itself. But
Messrs. Stearns, and Barruel, and Robison, with ten thousand
more who are beginning to speak, have been behind
the scenes. You will not refuse to hear them ; otherwise
the world will hear them, and the retort ignoramus, will set
home effectually.
Again, you have not known much about Free Masonry.
It is a fact You compared the little you saw with the
character of the upright men in the lodges, and with the
purity of your own intentions, and thus Free Masonry has
been concealed from you. To make an inspection of her
volumes, an examination of her peculiar principles, and to
note the downward course of her tendency, as seen in her
European history, you have had neither the means, nor the
leisure, nor the inclination.
I have done it for you, rising early and watching late,
sparing neither labour nor pains, but bringing what knowledge
and what powers I possess, cheerfully and unremittingly
to the task,, in the exercise of that faithfulness which
looks towards immortality. It is not in the hearts of my
countrymen to condemn me unheard, or, having heard, to
doubt what I say.
And what do we find Free Masonry ?
This interesting question is yet difficult satisfactorily to
answer. To reply negatively is not difficult: " It is not
what it pretends to be:" but to tell what it t*, you can
see, brethren, is scarcely possible.
It is undoubtedly an imposture; but not on this account
do men, on their death bed, request its funeral honours. It
is a fearless hypocrite; but not for this do men bestow its
charities upon the widow and the orphan. It is the enemy
of divine revelation; but not on that account do men
of piety hallow its mysteries with their prayers, and fill its
husks with the bread of heaven.
What is Free Masonry ? Who can tell ?