THE ARCANE SCHOOLS - Fort Myers Beach Masonic Lodge No. 362

himself with any lodge, thus contributing to the support of the
institution, and is then entitled to all the privileges of an
affiliated
Mason.
A rejection of the application of a Master Mason for membership by a
lodge
does not deprive him of the right of applying to another. A Mason is in
"good standing" until deprived of that character by the action of some
competent masonic authority; and that action can only be by suspension
or
expulsion. Rejection does not, therefore, affect the "good standing" of
the applicant; for in a rejection there is no legal form of trial, and
consequently the rejected Brother remains in the same position after as
before his rejection. He possesses the same rights as before,
unimpaired
and undiminished; and among these rights is that of applying for
membership to any lodge that he may select.
If, then, a Mason may be a member of a lodge distant from his place of
residence, and, perhaps, even situated in a different jurisdiction, the
question then arises whether the lodge within whose precincts he
resides,
but of which he is not a member, can exercise its discipline over him
should he commit any offense requiring masonic punishment. On this
subject
there is, among masonic writers, a difference of opinion. I, however,
agree with Brother Pike, the able Chairman of the Committee of
Correspondence of Arkansas, that the lodge can exercise such
discipline. I
contend that a Mason is amenable for his conduct not only to the lodge
of
which he may be a member, but also to any one within whose jurisdiction
he
permanently resides. A lodge is the conservator of the purity and the
protector of the integrity of the Order within its precincts. The
unworthy
conduct of a Mason, living as it were immediately under its government,
is
calculated most injuriously to affect that purity and integrity. A
lodge,
therefore, should not be deprived of the power of coercing such
unworthy
Mason, and, by salutary punishment, of vindicating the character of the
institution. Let us suppose, by way of example, that a Mason living in
San
Francisco, California, but retaining his membership in New York,
behaves
in such an immoral and indecorous manner as to bring the greatest
discredit upon the Order, and to materially injure it in the estimation
of
the uninitiated community. Will it be, for a moment, contended that a
lodge in San Francisco cannot arrest the evil by bringing the unworthy
Mason under discipline, and even ejecting him from the fraternity, if
severity like that is necessary for the protection of the institution?
Or