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Correspondence.
CORRESPONDENCE .
We do not hold ourselves responsible for the opinions of our Correspondents . All Letters must hear the name anl address of the Writer , not necessarily for publication , fait as a guarantee 0 / good faith . We cannot undertake to return rejected communications .
LET THE MILL GRIND . To the Editor of the FREEMASON ' S CHRONICLE . DEAR SIR AND BROTHER , —My attention having been , by accident , drawn to an article under this heading which recently appeared in your paper , I am moved to offer a few remarks thereon , and my excuse for troubling yon is , that I altogether dispute the " facts (?) " of the writer , and , as may perhaps be anticipated , disagree with his
deductions . In the first place , so far as I can learn , the thunderbolts ( or windbags ) launched by the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts were directed , not against the Antient and Primitive Rite , but against a seceding body therefrom , denominated the Reformed Egyptian Rite of Memphis .
As to fact second . It is now somewhat out of place , surely , considering the lapse of upwards of half a century , to challenge the legality of what was done or left undone by the compilers of tho Antient and Primitive Bite , or , as it was then called , the Rite of Memphis . Everybody knows that it never claimed to be anything else than a re-arrangement of pre-existing degrees or series of
degrees , which under various names and with many modifications , had even then been known and worked for the best part of a century . What was done by Marconis and his fellow labourers w . as to select , harmonise , and reduce to a system much that was rude , inharmonious , and to a certain extent chaotic , and Marconis certainly did this and did it well , keeping the one principle in view throughout , non
sectarianism . The Grand Orient of France having already two or three series of degrees of similar kind under its wing , naturally objected to the introduction of another and most formidable system , which would undoubtedly act disadvantageously to those working already , and it was not until Bro . Marconis and his friends had clamoured long and
loudly that the Grand Orient was induced to accept and recognise the Rite of Memphis . If , as the article copied from the Voice of Masonry asserts , the Grand Orient acted with bad faith , and cheated Bro . Marconis into surrendering the conduct of the Rite to it , with the full determination to strangle it , and to get rid of a dangerous rival , Bro . Marconis was surely justified , as soon as he found
out the nature of the conspiracy , in protesting against it , as he did , with all the energy and eloquence at his command , and in reassuming the position of guardian and protector to his threatened offspring . But I doubt if the Grand Orient had any such malevolent intentions . I am inclined to think that having , reluctantly no doubt , made np its mind to accept the Rite , it proposed to carry out the bargain with Masonic good faith . But vested interests , then as now ,
always clamouring against improvement or innovation , proved in the long run too much for the Rite and it was quietly shelved . The fact which testifies most strongly in favour of this theory , in opposition to that propounded by the writer of the article under notice is , that the Grand Orient received Bro . Harry Seymour , the then Grand Master of the American Body of the Antient and Primitive Eite , on his visit to Paris in 1862 : viseed his certificate of
appointment , and exchanged representation with America , and this state of things lasted until 1869 , when it was interrupted by Seymour , not by the Grand Orient withdrawing from tho Representation because the Grand Orient had chartered some bodies in America , over which country , he justly thought , the Grand Orient had no sort of jurisdiction whatever .
The alleged complaint of the Grand Orient that it had only intended to recognise the Rite of Memphis as a system of three degrees only ( the Craft degrees ) , is so manifestly untrue , on the face of it , that it is not worth contradicting ; it was doubtless an afterthought , adopted with the view of extricating the Grand Orient from a false position .
THE FACT is , the Rite of Memphis never proposed to work the Symbolic or Craft degrees , and the Constitutions adopted by the American Body , as by ourselves , expressly provide that "None shall be received into the Antient and Primitive Eite except he shall be a Master Mason in good standing under some Constitutional Grand Lodge . " Can anything be more exact and more opposite to assertion
of the writer in the " Voice ?" I have assumed for the purpose of the argument that Marconis did surrender his position of Grand Hierophant of the Rite of Memphis , or intended to do so , when he came to the arrangement with the Grand Oripnt . But , as another FACT , ho never did or had tho intention of doing anything of the kind . What ho did do was to disclaim
any right to control or work tho three symbolic degrees . And the Rite of Memphis , both in this conntry and America , has never to my knowled ge attempted to do so . And both in Egypt and in Ronmania , whore the Memphis Rite is worked , National Grand Craft Lodges , governing the Craft degrees , only exist at this clay . The next allegation I have to deal with isthat the first twenty-five
, degrees of the Rite of Memphis , or the Antient and Primitive Rite , were pirated from the Scottish Rite , my answer to which is that the Chapter and Senate degrees ( 4 to 20 ) , of tho Antient and Primitive Rite were compiled , partly from tho Primitive Rite of Narbonne and Koppen ' s Rite of African Architects , Von Hunde ' s Templar System
( . since adopted by the Grand Lodge of Sweden ) , and others , that it is needless to particularise . Now , all those systems existed before 1750 , and as Lacorne ' s compilation of similar degrees , under the title of the Emperors of the East and West , was made about the same time , it "say well be that some of the degrees in each system wove similar , if not identical . But Marconis certainly did not copy Lacorne ; the
Correspondence.
contrast between the dissolute dancing-master of tho profligate Regent and tho simple-minded , earnest , and eloquent Marconis , is too marked ever to rnn much risk of the one being confounded with tho other . And further , whether tho Scottish Rite has so small an opinion of the literary merit of its own ritual , or whether it never had any but the two , 18 ° and 30 ° , I do not know ; but it is certain it has never ventured
to print or to work any of its degrees save tho Rose Croix and K—h ; and if any curious brother will take tho trouble to compare the Ritual of both those degrees with their corresponding degrees of tho Antient and Primitive Rite , I shall bo very much disappointed if ho does not at once admit that Lacorne ' s version , or whoso soever it may be , is as little to be compared with Marconis as a Grub Street ballad
to Tennyson . I may not enter upon a dissection here , even if you were good enough to give mo space ; but if I may summarise my own impressions , the one is pious twaddle with a sonpeon of blasphemy , the other philosophic symbolism expanded from the Craft degrees . As to the Grand Lodge of this or any other country interfering with the Chivalrous grades , the notion is too absurd to be entertained
for a moment . Let every tub stand on its own bottom . Grand Lodge stands on too firm a base to need the aid of any of the Chivalrio degrees , who are , in their way , also independent , and need no support from Grand Lodge ; but if Grand Lodge of this , or any other conntry , do coquet , as it were , with high grade Masonry at all , it is important that tho favoured body should not abnso the indulgence
by seeking to thrust its own particular partizaus into Craft Grand Lodge Offices . That is what is the matter , both in Massachusetts and nearer home . Tho Scottish Rite Grand Officers cannot tolerate that any other body should have even a remote chanco of existence , and so plot and contrive that until they rule the CRAFT , as well as their own particular body , they never rest . This is the case , not
only in Massachusetts , but in half-a-dozen other States ; the same in Italy , the same in France , in Ireland ; where is it not the same ? Want of tolerance is tho besetting sin of tho Scottish Rite ; it learns no wisdom , apparently , from its frequent rebuffs , and shamelessly glories in setting Mason against Mason by its unmasonio interdic . tions and lawless expulsions . Now the roost rabid of its opponents
can say nothing of this kind against the Antient and Primitive Rite , or of its predecessor , the Rite of Memphis ( for the two are one , except in name ) . No interdiction of intercourse , no sectarian O . B ., no plotting for supremacy ; a full , healthy Ritual of 30 degrees , against a wretched compilation of two only .
Now , Sir , in common fairness let your readers judge for themselves if wo have not only a complete refutation of the statements put forth in the article in question , but if we are not also entitled to a word in defence , or possibly in retaliation . It is not pleasant to stand as a target for any one to fire at , and I therefore crave leave just to have one shot in return . Yours very truly and fraternally , JAMES HILL , 1604 .
ROYAL MASONIC INSTITUTION FOR GIRLS . To the Editor 0 / the FREEMASON ' S CHRONICLE . DEAR SIR AND BROTHER , —It is with very great pleasure I have to inform you that the Right Hon . the Lord Brooke , M . P ., E . W . Prov . G . M . of Essex , has very kindly consented to preside at the
approaching Festival of this Institution . I have also to inform you that it has been unavoidably necessary to change the date on which the Festival will be held , from Wednesday , 14 th , to Wednesday , 21 st May .
lam , Dear Sir and Brother , Yours faithfully and fraternally , F . R . W . HEDGES , Secretary . 5 Freemasons' Hall , London , W . C 11 th March 1884 .
THE PRIMROSE LEAGUE . To the Editor of the FREEMASON ' S CHRONICLE . DEAR SIR AND BROTHER , —Permit me to call your attention to the enclosed parngroph , re Primrose League . Without wishing to open your columns to political disenssion , I venture to hope it will not
be unwelcome reading to your Conservative readers , and as the League is formed somewhat ou Masonic lines , I hope it may induce many to inquire further . Trusting yon will be able to give the matter attention in your valuable paper ,
I am , Dear Sir and Brother , Yours faithfully and fraternally , DICK RADCLYFKE . " The Primrose League , which was founded in November last , is now firmly established , and is extending its branches far and npar .
Tho objects of the League are defined by the resolutions passed at the first meeting—viz ., tho Maintenance of Religion , of the E-bites of the Realm , and of tho Imperial ascendancy of Great Britain . The motto of the League is ' Imperinm et fjibortns , ' its seal Three Primroses , and its badge an Imperial Crown , encircled by primroses .
Tho union of a number of individuals under the same political bannnr has the effect of * directly pledging them io the support of certain definite principles , whilst the more energetic and zealous amoi « .-t
them do an incalculable amount of good service by advancing the interests of their party . Political organisations such as the Primroso League , to use Lord Salisbury ' s words , ' have a -wonderful power in bringing men together who did not know before their
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 Correspondents . All Letters must hear the name anl address of the Writer , not necessarily for publication , fait as a guarantee 0 / good faith . We cannot undertake to return rejected communications .
LET THE MILL GRIND . To the Editor of the FREEMASON ' S CHRONICLE . DEAR SIR AND BROTHER , —My attention having been , by accident , drawn to an article under this heading which recently appeared in your paper , I am moved to offer a few remarks thereon , and my excuse for troubling yon is , that I altogether dispute the " facts (?) " of the writer , and , as may perhaps be anticipated , disagree with his
deductions . In the first place , so far as I can learn , the thunderbolts ( or windbags ) launched by the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts were directed , not against the Antient and Primitive Rite , but against a seceding body therefrom , denominated the Reformed Egyptian Rite of Memphis .
As to fact second . It is now somewhat out of place , surely , considering the lapse of upwards of half a century , to challenge the legality of what was done or left undone by the compilers of tho Antient and Primitive Bite , or , as it was then called , the Rite of Memphis . Everybody knows that it never claimed to be anything else than a re-arrangement of pre-existing degrees or series of
degrees , which under various names and with many modifications , had even then been known and worked for the best part of a century . What was done by Marconis and his fellow labourers w . as to select , harmonise , and reduce to a system much that was rude , inharmonious , and to a certain extent chaotic , and Marconis certainly did this and did it well , keeping the one principle in view throughout , non
sectarianism . The Grand Orient of France having already two or three series of degrees of similar kind under its wing , naturally objected to the introduction of another and most formidable system , which would undoubtedly act disadvantageously to those working already , and it was not until Bro . Marconis and his friends had clamoured long and
loudly that the Grand Orient was induced to accept and recognise the Rite of Memphis . If , as the article copied from the Voice of Masonry asserts , the Grand Orient acted with bad faith , and cheated Bro . Marconis into surrendering the conduct of the Rite to it , with the full determination to strangle it , and to get rid of a dangerous rival , Bro . Marconis was surely justified , as soon as he found
out the nature of the conspiracy , in protesting against it , as he did , with all the energy and eloquence at his command , and in reassuming the position of guardian and protector to his threatened offspring . But I doubt if the Grand Orient had any such malevolent intentions . I am inclined to think that having , reluctantly no doubt , made np its mind to accept the Rite , it proposed to carry out the bargain with Masonic good faith . But vested interests , then as now ,
always clamouring against improvement or innovation , proved in the long run too much for the Rite and it was quietly shelved . The fact which testifies most strongly in favour of this theory , in opposition to that propounded by the writer of the article under notice is , that the Grand Orient received Bro . Harry Seymour , the then Grand Master of the American Body of the Antient and Primitive Eite , on his visit to Paris in 1862 : viseed his certificate of
appointment , and exchanged representation with America , and this state of things lasted until 1869 , when it was interrupted by Seymour , not by the Grand Orient withdrawing from tho Representation because the Grand Orient had chartered some bodies in America , over which country , he justly thought , the Grand Orient had no sort of jurisdiction whatever .
The alleged complaint of the Grand Orient that it had only intended to recognise the Rite of Memphis as a system of three degrees only ( the Craft degrees ) , is so manifestly untrue , on the face of it , that it is not worth contradicting ; it was doubtless an afterthought , adopted with the view of extricating the Grand Orient from a false position .
THE FACT is , the Rite of Memphis never proposed to work the Symbolic or Craft degrees , and the Constitutions adopted by the American Body , as by ourselves , expressly provide that "None shall be received into the Antient and Primitive Eite except he shall be a Master Mason in good standing under some Constitutional Grand Lodge . " Can anything be more exact and more opposite to assertion
of the writer in the " Voice ?" I have assumed for the purpose of the argument that Marconis did surrender his position of Grand Hierophant of the Rite of Memphis , or intended to do so , when he came to the arrangement with the Grand Oripnt . But , as another FACT , ho never did or had tho intention of doing anything of the kind . What ho did do was to disclaim
any right to control or work tho three symbolic degrees . And the Rite of Memphis , both in this conntry and America , has never to my knowled ge attempted to do so . And both in Egypt and in Ronmania , whore the Memphis Rite is worked , National Grand Craft Lodges , governing the Craft degrees , only exist at this clay . The next allegation I have to deal with isthat the first twenty-five
, degrees of the Rite of Memphis , or the Antient and Primitive Rite , were pirated from the Scottish Rite , my answer to which is that the Chapter and Senate degrees ( 4 to 20 ) , of tho Antient and Primitive Rite were compiled , partly from tho Primitive Rite of Narbonne and Koppen ' s Rite of African Architects , Von Hunde ' s Templar System
( . since adopted by the Grand Lodge of Sweden ) , and others , that it is needless to particularise . Now , all those systems existed before 1750 , and as Lacorne ' s compilation of similar degrees , under the title of the Emperors of the East and West , was made about the same time , it "say well be that some of the degrees in each system wove similar , if not identical . But Marconis certainly did not copy Lacorne ; the
Correspondence.
contrast between the dissolute dancing-master of tho profligate Regent and tho simple-minded , earnest , and eloquent Marconis , is too marked ever to rnn much risk of the one being confounded with tho other . And further , whether tho Scottish Rite has so small an opinion of the literary merit of its own ritual , or whether it never had any but the two , 18 ° and 30 ° , I do not know ; but it is certain it has never ventured
to print or to work any of its degrees save tho Rose Croix and K—h ; and if any curious brother will take tho trouble to compare the Ritual of both those degrees with their corresponding degrees of tho Antient and Primitive Rite , I shall bo very much disappointed if ho does not at once admit that Lacorne ' s version , or whoso soever it may be , is as little to be compared with Marconis as a Grub Street ballad
to Tennyson . I may not enter upon a dissection here , even if you were good enough to give mo space ; but if I may summarise my own impressions , the one is pious twaddle with a sonpeon of blasphemy , the other philosophic symbolism expanded from the Craft degrees . As to the Grand Lodge of this or any other country interfering with the Chivalrous grades , the notion is too absurd to be entertained
for a moment . Let every tub stand on its own bottom . Grand Lodge stands on too firm a base to need the aid of any of the Chivalrio degrees , who are , in their way , also independent , and need no support from Grand Lodge ; but if Grand Lodge of this , or any other conntry , do coquet , as it were , with high grade Masonry at all , it is important that tho favoured body should not abnso the indulgence
by seeking to thrust its own particular partizaus into Craft Grand Lodge Offices . That is what is the matter , both in Massachusetts and nearer home . Tho Scottish Rite Grand Officers cannot tolerate that any other body should have even a remote chanco of existence , and so plot and contrive that until they rule the CRAFT , as well as their own particular body , they never rest . This is the case , not
only in Massachusetts , but in half-a-dozen other States ; the same in Italy , the same in France , in Ireland ; where is it not the same ? Want of tolerance is tho besetting sin of tho Scottish Rite ; it learns no wisdom , apparently , from its frequent rebuffs , and shamelessly glories in setting Mason against Mason by its unmasonio interdic . tions and lawless expulsions . Now the roost rabid of its opponents
can say nothing of this kind against the Antient and Primitive Rite , or of its predecessor , the Rite of Memphis ( for the two are one , except in name ) . No interdiction of intercourse , no sectarian O . B ., no plotting for supremacy ; a full , healthy Ritual of 30 degrees , against a wretched compilation of two only .
Now , Sir , in common fairness let your readers judge for themselves if wo have not only a complete refutation of the statements put forth in the article in question , but if we are not also entitled to a word in defence , or possibly in retaliation . It is not pleasant to stand as a target for any one to fire at , and I therefore crave leave just to have one shot in return . Yours very truly and fraternally , JAMES HILL , 1604 .
ROYAL MASONIC INSTITUTION FOR GIRLS . To the Editor 0 / the FREEMASON ' S CHRONICLE . DEAR SIR AND BROTHER , —It is with very great pleasure I have to inform you that the Right Hon . the Lord Brooke , M . P ., E . W . Prov . G . M . of Essex , has very kindly consented to preside at the
approaching Festival of this Institution . I have also to inform you that it has been unavoidably necessary to change the date on which the Festival will be held , from Wednesday , 14 th , to Wednesday , 21 st May .
lam , Dear Sir and Brother , Yours faithfully and fraternally , F . R . W . HEDGES , Secretary . 5 Freemasons' Hall , London , W . C 11 th March 1884 .
THE PRIMROSE LEAGUE . To the Editor of the FREEMASON ' S CHRONICLE . DEAR SIR AND BROTHER , —Permit me to call your attention to the enclosed parngroph , re Primrose League . Without wishing to open your columns to political disenssion , I venture to hope it will not
be unwelcome reading to your Conservative readers , and as the League is formed somewhat ou Masonic lines , I hope it may induce many to inquire further . Trusting yon will be able to give the matter attention in your valuable paper ,
I am , Dear Sir and Brother , Yours faithfully and fraternally , DICK RADCLYFKE . " The Primrose League , which was founded in November last , is now firmly established , and is extending its branches far and npar .
Tho objects of the League are defined by the resolutions passed at the first meeting—viz ., tho Maintenance of Religion , of the E-bites of the Realm , and of tho Imperial ascendancy of Great Britain . The motto of the League is ' Imperinm et fjibortns , ' its seal Three Primroses , and its badge an Imperial Crown , encircled by primroses .
Tho union of a number of individuals under the same political bannnr has the effect of * directly pledging them io the support of certain definite principles , whilst the more energetic and zealous amoi « .-t
them do an incalculable amount of good service by advancing the interests of their party . Political organisations such as the Primroso League , to use Lord Salisbury ' s words , ' have a -wonderful power in bringing men together who did not know before their