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Correspondence.
CORRESPONDENCE .
We do not hold ourselves responsible for the opinions of our Cor . respondents . All letters must "bear the name and address of the Writer , not necessarily for publication , but as a guarantee of good faith . We cannot undertake to return rejected communications .
" HISTORY OP A CRIME . " To the Editor of the FREEMASON ' S CHRONICLE . DEAR SIR AND BROTHER , —Will you permit me to express in your columns the extreme regret with which , in common with many friends of Bro . C . E . Meyer of Philadelphia , in this country , I have perused Bro . Brennan ' s serious and vehement incrimination of thafc
excellent and able brother in your last issue , and to enter a protest againsfc his utterly unwarranted assertions . The great front of Bro . Meyer ' s offending seems to be , ( exaggerated into the foolish use of fche word " Crimp , " ) the production of a portion of the well-known and oft-debated Bell Letter in 1874 . Whether or no that Letter is
good or valid evidence to the point it purports to establish , whether it has any evidential force or importance , is a matter about which , fairly enough , arguments might arise and opinions vary . But there ia not the slightest evidence of any kind , in effect or by implication , to show that Bro . C . E . Meyer did not receive and use thafc
letter perfectly btyn & fide , and the attempt to fasten on Bro . Meyer in 1887 a charge of mala fides , of fraudulent intent in supplying tainted or fictitious evidence to establish a moot point and supplement historical controversies , is as disingenuous as it is un-Masonic , as unfounded as it is unworthy .
To all Bro . Meyer ' s friends in this country such a protest will be quite needless , but as many of your readers may not know him , I have thought ifc well here , ( having expressed myself more fully elsewhere ) , to ask you to print this Masonio " caveat" against unbrotherly
animadversions and utterly unfounded asseverations . It is truly a most melancholy fact to realise that hardly any Masonic controversy has arisen which I can remember , and I am now an old man , but that hurtful development of pernicious personality is pretty sure sooner or later to crop up .
I am , Dear Sir and Brother , Yours very fraternally , A . F . A . WOODFORD .
THB NEW PHILADELPHIA THEORY .
To the Editor of the FRKEJCASON s CHRONICLE . DEAR SIR AND BROTHER , —Judging from the manner "A Student of Bro . Gould's History , " assumes to settle questions at issne , he seems to be a judge , who is accustomed to lay down tho law withont
troubling himself further . In the FREEMASON ' S CHRONICLE of 20 th of August my opponent writes : — * * * "I say that a close study for some days of all the evidence in respect of the two Patents granted to Coxe and Price has not only convinced mc of their absolute correctness , but has confirmed me in
an idea which has been gradually impressed upon my mind , that Philadelphian Freemasonry goes , so to say , behind Coxe ' s Deputation . " I heartily congratulate my opponent on having settled at last his new creed , viz .: that Philadelphia Masonry is older than Coxe ' s Patent . Bat mere saying so will not satisy me ; for if oven tho Lord Chancellor
had been the author of the above paragraph , I would have said to him , My Lord , if it had been a question of law , I would have bowed fco your decision , bnt rs ifc is a question of history , your Lordship ' s mere opinion is insufficient to establish the fact- I agree with your Lordship , that Coxe ' s Patent was authentic , and I never entertained
any doubt about it . Bnt with regard to Prico s Patent of 1733 , Bro . Findel , to whom we are indebted for the knowledge of many Masonic facts—in short , he may bo called the first trnthfnl Masonic historian we ever had—in the last two editions of his History of Freemasonry , has given his verdict against Price ' s Grand Mastership . Bro . Joseph
Robbins , of Illinois , who is a most impartial and unbiassed Masonic writer , reviewed the Henry Price controversy in tho Illinois Grand Lodge Proceedings of 1872 , and he also came to a conclusion against Price ' s claims . Bro . Gould , though he admits the possibility of Prion ' s claim for a Deputation in 1733 , at the same time reacts Price's
pretensions to having received a second Deputation in 1734 ; he also agrees with mo , thafc Franklin did not see Price ' s Deputation when ho was in Boston in 1733 . That point itself is significant . Again , the petition to Price in 1733 distinctly states , flint Price ' s Deputation bore tho dato of " tbo 13 th day of April 1733 . " Had
Pelham copied tho Deputation in 1751 from tho original document , he wonld not have elated it , " tho Thirtieth Day of April . " Still again , had Price beeu in possession of the original document in 1707 , ho would not have sent to England a copy thereof , taken from the Boston Record . Bufc , aba ! say somo of Price ' s apologists , " perhaps the
original Patent was destroyed before 17 ( 37 , " but in the first place , Price did not say that it was de .-frnyed ; . Mid second , if * it hnd been destroyed , he would have requested Charles Pelham to testify that he had copied the s-aid Deputation , in 1751 , from the origins ' . 1 authentic document . These facts , when combined with Price's other unfounded assertions , more especially his pretension to
having received a second Depn'ation in 1731 ; bis urging in 1755 to have Gridley appointed Grand Master for all America , nnd his claim iu 1767 to never having resigned his own Grand Mastership for all America . These , and other propensities to exaggeration and untruthfulness on the part of Price , which I havo shown iu former cwamnnications , requires something more on the part of a believer
Correspondence.
in Price ' s veracity than the mere statement , " that a close stud y of some days of all the evidence in respect to Price ' s Patent convinces me of its absolute correctness . " My worthy opponent has made some mistakes bt fore now , indeed , with few exceptions , all his hints and suggestions in his several
letters on " Philadelphia Claims , " are a tissue of mistakes ; his statement that the Pennsylvania Gazette of 26 tb of June 1732 , " seems to show that the [ Pennsylvanian ] brethren knew of [ Coxe ' s ] Patent and acted under it , " he now himself admits to havo been an error , by asserting that they acted by an authority which was older than Coxe ' s
Patent . Again , his statement , that " If Price ' s Deputation was a forgery , all I can say is , successive Grand Masters and Grand Secretaries in England , must have been a party to it , " is equall y illogical , for Price may have been guilty , while the English Grand Officers were guiltless of any complicity with Price ' s misdoings ;
there are other mistaken assertions and suggestions in the letter before me , which ifc is not worth while fco notice , save and except his newly discovered belief that Pennsylvanian Masonry antedates Coxe ' s Patent of 24 th June 1730 , which , for several reasons , I very much doubt whether he can furnish evidence to prove .
If , however , my good Brother can supply undeniable evidence to this effect , then , in the name and on behalf of our Pennsylvanian brethren , I nsk him to make haste and produce it , and let us know the precise year when the first Masonic Lodge was established in Philadelphia . The Pennsylvanian Masons have been foolod in 1831
by celebrating their then supposed first centennial in that year , Bro . Gould ' s History ( Vol . VI . p 430 ) informs us that " there are persons still living who took part in a solemn Centennial celebration by tbe G . L . of Pennsylvania in 1834 . " Our Pennsylvanian brethren have been particularly unfortunate in being repeatedly misled ; they
were tossed about hither and thither like a ship in a stormy sea . Bro . MacCalla , in January 1874 , declared up and down that Masonry in Philadelphia ori ginated in 1734 , and that Price was its father . A few months later he filled a number of columns in the Keystone to prove that Coxe was fche father of Pennsylvania Masonry , and
placed its origin after 24 th June 1730 . But now our English friends will have that neither Price nor Coxe was the father of Pensylvania Masonry , but that their real father was "Time Immemorial . " Our
Philadelphia brethren have wrongly celebrated , in 1834 , their first centennial anniversary ; they have wrongly celebrated their last semicentennial anniversary a few years ago ; tho question , therefore , is , in which year are tbey to celebrate their next centennial ?
Fraternally yours , JACOB NORTON . BOSTON , U . S ., 2 nd Sept . 1887 .
THE TIME IMMEMORIAL THEORY . To the Editor of the FREEMASON ' CHRONICLE . DEAR SIR AND BROTHKK , — -Had William Allen , of Philadelphia , and thoso who with him did so , any right to institute a Masonio Lodgo on the 24 th of February 1731 , under the claim of tho original ( time immemorial ) right every body of Masons had fco assemble and
work without a warrant ? Dr . Mackey , in his Encyclopedia of Freema onry inferentinllv denies that rhey had . In his article on fche " Ancient Masons" he says : — "For somo years tho Lodges of the Ancients appear to have worked on the independent system , claiming tho original right which every body of Masons hid to assemble and
work withont a warrant . . . But llris right had beeu relinquished by fcho four Lodges-- , when they organised tho Grand Lodge in 1717 . . . . This , however , tho Ancients maintained was' an illegal oz-gauisation , because , they said , five Lodges were required to organise a
Grand Lodge . But this was a mere assertion , with no regulation to support ifc . So finding they must do so , they iu 1757 organised a Grand Lodge , with the Earl of Blessingfcon as their Grand Master . " This on the ouo hand . On the other Dr . Mackey , who claimed in his above , mentioned work lo be . the original codifior of the Landmarks
of Freemasonry , and which ho extends in the samo to twenfcy-hvo in number , gives , as his ninth landmark , "The necessity for Masons to congregate in Lodges , " that is to say , hold what may be termed occasional Lodges for Hpeci . il purposes , without regularity in their such congregation , but when eireu-tstnnoes might require . Ho concludes his specification of this his ninth landmark thus : "Bufc
warrants or constitution , by-laws , permanent Officers and annual arrears ( by which I presume is meant annual dues ) , are modern innovations , wholly cat side the Inndmnrks , and dependent entirely on the special enactments of a comparatively recent period" — -. vhich we must probably understand to bo the organisation of 1717 , and subsequent legislation .
X . iw as he ! idini * v that . thin organisation ' s action precluded the subsequent exercise •: ( fch » principal feature of hia ninth landmark , aod thus rcinleivd it ('•¦ r-ov- r alter null and void , certainly Freemasons had no more rL'hf to exercise under- its conditions in 1731 in a British colonv than thev had in 173 !) and afterward until 1753 in the
Metropolis of Great Britain ; and doing so by them was illegal and unmasonic , and t <> be so determined b y nil law-abiding Brethren , rather than bv :-nch be nt anv time regarded as a rightful net . In Anitr ' efi , e-i «•<¦)! •¦ :. •in IV-ntivylvaiiia , , 'w in every other . State , Da . Mac-key has been regarded as t ' " - ! great Mnsonic law-giver , and
his Encyclopaedia , being his final woik , except in matters of persons and places wherein his knowledge has bsen found to bo defective , contains his final and matured thoughts on every subject it treats of . If this his decision then n-crardiri" - this ninth landmark is correct .
the Lodgo which by Bro . Mc Calla is claimed to give Philadelp hia the title to be regarded as tho Mother City of Pre'masonry in America was not only a sel . ' -constitnted Lodge , but at tbe time illegal , and doubly so , as its institution as a regular Lodge , that is a Lodge meeting regularly every month thereafter , complied neither with the
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
Correspondence.
CORRESPONDENCE .
We do not hold ourselves responsible for the opinions of our Cor . respondents . All letters must "bear the name and address of the Writer , not necessarily for publication , but as a guarantee of good faith . We cannot undertake to return rejected communications .
" HISTORY OP A CRIME . " To the Editor of the FREEMASON ' S CHRONICLE . DEAR SIR AND BROTHER , —Will you permit me to express in your columns the extreme regret with which , in common with many friends of Bro . C . E . Meyer of Philadelphia , in this country , I have perused Bro . Brennan ' s serious and vehement incrimination of thafc
excellent and able brother in your last issue , and to enter a protest againsfc his utterly unwarranted assertions . The great front of Bro . Meyer ' s offending seems to be , ( exaggerated into the foolish use of fche word " Crimp , " ) the production of a portion of the well-known and oft-debated Bell Letter in 1874 . Whether or no that Letter is
good or valid evidence to the point it purports to establish , whether it has any evidential force or importance , is a matter about which , fairly enough , arguments might arise and opinions vary . But there ia not the slightest evidence of any kind , in effect or by implication , to show that Bro . C . E . Meyer did not receive and use thafc
letter perfectly btyn & fide , and the attempt to fasten on Bro . Meyer in 1887 a charge of mala fides , of fraudulent intent in supplying tainted or fictitious evidence to establish a moot point and supplement historical controversies , is as disingenuous as it is un-Masonic , as unfounded as it is unworthy .
To all Bro . Meyer ' s friends in this country such a protest will be quite needless , but as many of your readers may not know him , I have thought ifc well here , ( having expressed myself more fully elsewhere ) , to ask you to print this Masonio " caveat" against unbrotherly
animadversions and utterly unfounded asseverations . It is truly a most melancholy fact to realise that hardly any Masonic controversy has arisen which I can remember , and I am now an old man , but that hurtful development of pernicious personality is pretty sure sooner or later to crop up .
I am , Dear Sir and Brother , Yours very fraternally , A . F . A . WOODFORD .
THB NEW PHILADELPHIA THEORY .
To the Editor of the FRKEJCASON s CHRONICLE . DEAR SIR AND BROTHER , —Judging from the manner "A Student of Bro . Gould's History , " assumes to settle questions at issne , he seems to be a judge , who is accustomed to lay down tho law withont
troubling himself further . In the FREEMASON ' S CHRONICLE of 20 th of August my opponent writes : — * * * "I say that a close study for some days of all the evidence in respect of the two Patents granted to Coxe and Price has not only convinced mc of their absolute correctness , but has confirmed me in
an idea which has been gradually impressed upon my mind , that Philadelphian Freemasonry goes , so to say , behind Coxe ' s Deputation . " I heartily congratulate my opponent on having settled at last his new creed , viz .: that Philadelphia Masonry is older than Coxe ' s Patent . Bat mere saying so will not satisy me ; for if oven tho Lord Chancellor
had been the author of the above paragraph , I would have said to him , My Lord , if it had been a question of law , I would have bowed fco your decision , bnt rs ifc is a question of history , your Lordship ' s mere opinion is insufficient to establish the fact- I agree with your Lordship , that Coxe ' s Patent was authentic , and I never entertained
any doubt about it . Bnt with regard to Prico s Patent of 1733 , Bro . Findel , to whom we are indebted for the knowledge of many Masonic facts—in short , he may bo called the first trnthfnl Masonic historian we ever had—in the last two editions of his History of Freemasonry , has given his verdict against Price ' s Grand Mastership . Bro . Joseph
Robbins , of Illinois , who is a most impartial and unbiassed Masonic writer , reviewed the Henry Price controversy in tho Illinois Grand Lodge Proceedings of 1872 , and he also came to a conclusion against Price ' s claims . Bro . Gould , though he admits the possibility of Prion ' s claim for a Deputation in 1733 , at the same time reacts Price's
pretensions to having received a second Deputation in 1734 ; he also agrees with mo , thafc Franklin did not see Price ' s Deputation when ho was in Boston in 1733 . That point itself is significant . Again , the petition to Price in 1733 distinctly states , flint Price ' s Deputation bore tho dato of " tbo 13 th day of April 1733 . " Had
Pelham copied tho Deputation in 1751 from tho original document , he wonld not have elated it , " tho Thirtieth Day of April . " Still again , had Price beeu in possession of the original document in 1707 , ho would not have sent to England a copy thereof , taken from the Boston Record . Bufc , aba ! say somo of Price ' s apologists , " perhaps the
original Patent was destroyed before 17 ( 37 , " but in the first place , Price did not say that it was de .-frnyed ; . Mid second , if * it hnd been destroyed , he would have requested Charles Pelham to testify that he had copied the s-aid Deputation , in 1751 , from the origins ' . 1 authentic document . These facts , when combined with Price's other unfounded assertions , more especially his pretension to
having received a second Depn'ation in 1731 ; bis urging in 1755 to have Gridley appointed Grand Master for all America , nnd his claim iu 1767 to never having resigned his own Grand Mastership for all America . These , and other propensities to exaggeration and untruthfulness on the part of Price , which I havo shown iu former cwamnnications , requires something more on the part of a believer
Correspondence.
in Price ' s veracity than the mere statement , " that a close stud y of some days of all the evidence in respect to Price ' s Patent convinces me of its absolute correctness . " My worthy opponent has made some mistakes bt fore now , indeed , with few exceptions , all his hints and suggestions in his several
letters on " Philadelphia Claims , " are a tissue of mistakes ; his statement that the Pennsylvania Gazette of 26 tb of June 1732 , " seems to show that the [ Pennsylvanian ] brethren knew of [ Coxe ' s ] Patent and acted under it , " he now himself admits to havo been an error , by asserting that they acted by an authority which was older than Coxe ' s
Patent . Again , his statement , that " If Price ' s Deputation was a forgery , all I can say is , successive Grand Masters and Grand Secretaries in England , must have been a party to it , " is equall y illogical , for Price may have been guilty , while the English Grand Officers were guiltless of any complicity with Price ' s misdoings ;
there are other mistaken assertions and suggestions in the letter before me , which ifc is not worth while fco notice , save and except his newly discovered belief that Pennsylvanian Masonry antedates Coxe ' s Patent of 24 th June 1730 , which , for several reasons , I very much doubt whether he can furnish evidence to prove .
If , however , my good Brother can supply undeniable evidence to this effect , then , in the name and on behalf of our Pennsylvanian brethren , I nsk him to make haste and produce it , and let us know the precise year when the first Masonic Lodge was established in Philadelphia . The Pennsylvanian Masons have been foolod in 1831
by celebrating their then supposed first centennial in that year , Bro . Gould ' s History ( Vol . VI . p 430 ) informs us that " there are persons still living who took part in a solemn Centennial celebration by tbe G . L . of Pennsylvania in 1834 . " Our Pennsylvanian brethren have been particularly unfortunate in being repeatedly misled ; they
were tossed about hither and thither like a ship in a stormy sea . Bro . MacCalla , in January 1874 , declared up and down that Masonry in Philadelphia ori ginated in 1734 , and that Price was its father . A few months later he filled a number of columns in the Keystone to prove that Coxe was fche father of Pennsylvania Masonry , and
placed its origin after 24 th June 1730 . But now our English friends will have that neither Price nor Coxe was the father of Pensylvania Masonry , but that their real father was "Time Immemorial . " Our
Philadelphia brethren have wrongly celebrated , in 1834 , their first centennial anniversary ; they have wrongly celebrated their last semicentennial anniversary a few years ago ; tho question , therefore , is , in which year are tbey to celebrate their next centennial ?
Fraternally yours , JACOB NORTON . BOSTON , U . S ., 2 nd Sept . 1887 .
THE TIME IMMEMORIAL THEORY . To the Editor of the FREEMASON ' CHRONICLE . DEAR SIR AND BROTHKK , — -Had William Allen , of Philadelphia , and thoso who with him did so , any right to institute a Masonio Lodgo on the 24 th of February 1731 , under the claim of tho original ( time immemorial ) right every body of Masons had fco assemble and
work without a warrant ? Dr . Mackey , in his Encyclopedia of Freema onry inferentinllv denies that rhey had . In his article on fche " Ancient Masons" he says : — "For somo years tho Lodges of the Ancients appear to have worked on the independent system , claiming tho original right which every body of Masons hid to assemble and
work withont a warrant . . . But llris right had beeu relinquished by fcho four Lodges-- , when they organised tho Grand Lodge in 1717 . . . . This , however , tho Ancients maintained was' an illegal oz-gauisation , because , they said , five Lodges were required to organise a
Grand Lodge . But this was a mere assertion , with no regulation to support ifc . So finding they must do so , they iu 1757 organised a Grand Lodge , with the Earl of Blessingfcon as their Grand Master . " This on the ouo hand . On the other Dr . Mackey , who claimed in his above , mentioned work lo be . the original codifior of the Landmarks
of Freemasonry , and which ho extends in the samo to twenfcy-hvo in number , gives , as his ninth landmark , "The necessity for Masons to congregate in Lodges , " that is to say , hold what may be termed occasional Lodges for Hpeci . il purposes , without regularity in their such congregation , but when eireu-tstnnoes might require . Ho concludes his specification of this his ninth landmark thus : "Bufc
warrants or constitution , by-laws , permanent Officers and annual arrears ( by which I presume is meant annual dues ) , are modern innovations , wholly cat side the Inndmnrks , and dependent entirely on the special enactments of a comparatively recent period" — -. vhich we must probably understand to bo the organisation of 1717 , and subsequent legislation .
X . iw as he ! idini * v that . thin organisation ' s action precluded the subsequent exercise •: ( fch » principal feature of hia ninth landmark , aod thus rcinleivd it ('•¦ r-ov- r alter null and void , certainly Freemasons had no more rL'hf to exercise under- its conditions in 1731 in a British colonv than thev had in 173 !) and afterward until 1753 in the
Metropolis of Great Britain ; and doing so by them was illegal and unmasonic , and t <> be so determined b y nil law-abiding Brethren , rather than bv :-nch be nt anv time regarded as a rightful net . In Anitr ' efi , e-i «•<¦)! •¦ :. •in IV-ntivylvaiiia , , 'w in every other . State , Da . Mac-key has been regarded as t ' " - ! great Mnsonic law-giver , and
his Encyclopaedia , being his final woik , except in matters of persons and places wherein his knowledge has bsen found to bo defective , contains his final and matured thoughts on every subject it treats of . If this his decision then n-crardiri" - this ninth landmark is correct .
the Lodgo which by Bro . Mc Calla is claimed to give Philadelp hia the title to be regarded as tho Mother City of Pre'masonry in America was not only a sel . ' -constitnted Lodge , but at tbe time illegal , and doubly so , as its institution as a regular Lodge , that is a Lodge meeting regularly every month thereafter , complied neither with the