The Present Position Of Freemasonry.

THE PRESENT POSITION OF FREEMASONRY .

No . IV . THE charitable outcome and development of English Freemasonry during the last thirty years have been alike a cause of admiration to friend and foe , and no doubt may fairly be held to account for the unexampled position

of our English Craft as before the Masonic world , and to some extent at any rate for that quasi-grudging recog , nition it has hitherto extorted from indifferent , sarcastic , and often openly hostile bystanders . Certainly it is in itself

a most striking fact , a most commendable reality , and one which does the greatest credit both to the motives and energy , the zeal and munificence of those who have given , as well as to the ceaseless

endeavours and labours of those who have organized and educed the giving . From our first entrance into Freemasonry , we have impressed upon us the heaven-born grace , the unfailing duty of Charity , that great virtue which serves

to shed a lustre on all things here , whether of earthly prosperity or worldly success . The things of earth , as we all well know , perish with the using of them , one and all . The wealth we create , and the possessions we heap up ,

are not only often very short-lived , but all pass away from us in time and in turn , and are only in themselves valuable after all , are only turned to a good use , only in truth profit us , or fructify rightly and duly , in so far and in so forth

aa they are used for the welfare of others , as well as for our own convenience , or pleasure , or comfort , as the case may be . Freemasonry , in more than one didactic exhortation which we shall probably call to mind , warns

all its adopted children , the " sons of the widow , " that there are countless inequalities of rank , condition , and wealth in life , which make up the necessary gradations of society , though all are compacted as it were by golden and adamantine links .

Some of the ablest writers have pointed out that these very differences and inequalities complete the motive power of the higher attributes of the greater virtues , and

Freemasonry adds that always needful caution , that all these gifts , and possessions , and positions , are at the best but ever accompanied by the greatest changeableness and the most striking uncertainty .

Prosperity , for instance , shines upon us glad and fragrant to-day ; adversity meets us on the way with its chilling blast to-morrow * Those who were basking in the sunshine of glad hours and fair day dreams but as

yesterday , may be the day after to-morrow , even by the sndden shifts often of fortune or fatality , reduced to the lowest ebb of poverty and distress . And therefore it is that our Masonic Fraternity , our kindly Brotherhood has wisely realized that sound

and certain teaching , and has sought to make provision for those various ills wbich affect and afflict humanit y , and for which Freemasons , no more than others , are ever free or exempt . In our admirable Fund of Benevolence , and in its discriminating administration by a conscientious and

feeling Board , we seek to offer relief to numberless pressing cases of misfortune , of want , of poverty , of sickness . We desire to help the afflicted family , and to cheer the destitute home . In our Provincial and Lodge grants , in our increasing number of local Institutions and special funds

The Present Position Of Freemasonry.

( may their number and means yearly increase ) , we strive to meet and assuage many pressing applications for immediate aid and countenance .

In our great Charities , for great they are m every sense , our benevolent Order once again desires to educate and watch over youth , and to relieve and compassionate the infirmities and needs of old age .

How well our Metropolitan Chanties do this , and carry out the object of their origin and work , let their past and present history attest , and let others proclaim their undoubted and abounding benefits more fitly than

ourselves , who support their efforts , and can testify to their utility . For it is an old . complaint against Freemasons that they are too self-laudatory . No doubt , at times in their history and life , when Freemasonry was exposed to

constant attacks and ceaseless antagonisms from those who , ignorant of its real teachings and aims , like all ignorant persons , were insolently aggressive , and both ridiculed its professions and maligned its practice , its defenders almost naturally fell , in their sense of the

injustice meted out to it , into a constant vein of loyal eulogium . But Freemasonry to-day , caring neither for praise nor blame , boldly adopts as a motto , " Si quaaris circmnspice . "

Nothing , as they tell us , " preaches like example , " and the example of Freemasonry in the great and beneficent work of Charity , may fairly be held up as an example to all

institutions and all bodies , whether civil or religious . It has indeed been hastily averred that its Charity is selfish at the best . But such an averment , by whomsoever made , is a mere paradox .

We do not relieve Freemasons simply because they are Freemasons , though the fact of their being all " brethren in Masonry " constitutes a passport to our Charitable funds and sympathies . But we relieve them because , being

Freemasons , they make a fair claim on our Masonic Charity . On many occasions Grand Lodge and local bodies have made considerable and seasonable grants for special circumstances and claims altogether outside Freemasonry proper .

But as Charity is a characteristic embodiment of Masonic principles , we seek to help and relieve our own brethren , who properly apply to us in the pressing hour of their need .

And therefore , amid the many claims of Masonry to admiration just now , and its many evidences of usefulness and good , none we venture to submit are so patent or so decisive as its ceaseless , untiring , unselfish charitable efforts , and results year by year .

For these are indeed , as we before remarked , both striking and effective , and are characterised in every respect by large-hearted munificence and true-hearted benevolence .

They proclaim loud-voicedly , even to our deafest opponents , that Freemasonry says what it means , and means what it says , and they serve , as we view it , moreover , to intimate to us all alike that whatever shall betide its

onward career , and its present state of marvellous material prosperity , or affect its position and prestige before other Masonic jurisdictions , its Charities , useful

noble , and valuable as they are , must ever tend to increase the attachment of its own Brotherhood , and attract to it the lasting admiration and recognition of a suspicious and , questioning often , but not altogether ungrateful world .