-
Articles/Ads
Article A FEW WORDS ON BENEFIT SOCIETIES. ← Page 2 of 9 →
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
A Few Words On Benefit Societies.
conscious of their superiority in any department should have felt a jealous interest in keeping thc secrets of their success as far removed as possible from profane eyes . The traditions of Masonic secrecy in respect to the construction of certain buildings are a strong , and , it may be said , unquestionable example of this cautious preservation of an art from the prying gaze of
the outer Avorld . But let us look awhile at the early history of another race , scarcely less important in their influence in ciAdlization , and equally resolute and exclusive in the maintenance of their inward organization and secrecy . Sir Francis Palgrave , in his delightful real romance of the Middle Agesthe " Merchant and Eriar , " has given us an
ad-, mirable sketch of the Painters' Guild , from Avhich we gladly make an extract . Let us first , however , listen to his preliminary remarks on the general character of these mediaeval associations : —
" Religion was the foundation of the guild ; divine worship tho laws of the association . Superstition and credulity were intermixed with holy forms and ordinances ; yet the light of heaven pierced through the darkness . The members were constantly reminded that it was not to the contrivances of the wit , or the strength of the labouring hand , that man owes his daily bread . Industry , they were taught , might be the appointed means , but God's providence the only source of our subsistence ; its increase the result of His blessing , not of our frugality ; the alms , the
testimony of our gratitude to Him from whom the bounty , unmerited and undeserved , is obtained . Imperfect as these institutions may have been , how much better calculated were they than our own to ameliorate the condition of the lower and lowest orders of the community ! The modern operative belongs to a degraded , and therefore to a hostile order . His feelings , views , interests , all are , or are sedulously represented to him as being , in dire opposition to the manufacturer , the cotton-lord , the capitalist , whom ho considers as his tyrant aud his enemy . But in tho old time , the workman was the 'Brother , ' the ' Companion , ' the ' Gescll , ' of his employer , perhaps poorer in purse , inferior in station , younger in
age , but all united by the most kind and social bonds . They repeated tho same creed ; met in the same church ; lighted their lamp before the same altar ; feasted at the same board . Thus constituted they the elements of that Burgher aristocracy which equally withstood the levelling anarchy of the infuriated peasantry , and yet at the same time assisted in destroying the abuses which had sprung out of the servitude of the soil . " After the scattering of the Soman empire , and until the thirteenth century , these societies , subsequently so influential , had subsisted , with
A ery few exceptions , hy usage and prescription , rarely deriving any protection from thc State . Indeed , we find that attempts were occasionally made to suppress these Trade Societies , whose growing power excited the vigilance , possibly the jealousy , of the sovereign . These efforts did not succeed . In such cases , force is of no avail . The quicksilver divides beneath the pressure , but the globules run together again as soon as the pressure is removed . Voluntary combinations of all kinds are not unfrequently decomposed by their internal fermentations and discord ; but no external and adverse force , short of the complete dispersion or total
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
A Few Words On Benefit Societies.
conscious of their superiority in any department should have felt a jealous interest in keeping thc secrets of their success as far removed as possible from profane eyes . The traditions of Masonic secrecy in respect to the construction of certain buildings are a strong , and , it may be said , unquestionable example of this cautious preservation of an art from the prying gaze of
the outer Avorld . But let us look awhile at the early history of another race , scarcely less important in their influence in ciAdlization , and equally resolute and exclusive in the maintenance of their inward organization and secrecy . Sir Francis Palgrave , in his delightful real romance of the Middle Agesthe " Merchant and Eriar , " has given us an
ad-, mirable sketch of the Painters' Guild , from Avhich we gladly make an extract . Let us first , however , listen to his preliminary remarks on the general character of these mediaeval associations : —
" Religion was the foundation of the guild ; divine worship tho laws of the association . Superstition and credulity were intermixed with holy forms and ordinances ; yet the light of heaven pierced through the darkness . The members were constantly reminded that it was not to the contrivances of the wit , or the strength of the labouring hand , that man owes his daily bread . Industry , they were taught , might be the appointed means , but God's providence the only source of our subsistence ; its increase the result of His blessing , not of our frugality ; the alms , the
testimony of our gratitude to Him from whom the bounty , unmerited and undeserved , is obtained . Imperfect as these institutions may have been , how much better calculated were they than our own to ameliorate the condition of the lower and lowest orders of the community ! The modern operative belongs to a degraded , and therefore to a hostile order . His feelings , views , interests , all are , or are sedulously represented to him as being , in dire opposition to the manufacturer , the cotton-lord , the capitalist , whom ho considers as his tyrant aud his enemy . But in tho old time , the workman was the 'Brother , ' the ' Companion , ' the ' Gescll , ' of his employer , perhaps poorer in purse , inferior in station , younger in
age , but all united by the most kind and social bonds . They repeated tho same creed ; met in the same church ; lighted their lamp before the same altar ; feasted at the same board . Thus constituted they the elements of that Burgher aristocracy which equally withstood the levelling anarchy of the infuriated peasantry , and yet at the same time assisted in destroying the abuses which had sprung out of the servitude of the soil . " After the scattering of the Soman empire , and until the thirteenth century , these societies , subsequently so influential , had subsisted , with
A ery few exceptions , hy usage and prescription , rarely deriving any protection from thc State . Indeed , we find that attempts were occasionally made to suppress these Trade Societies , whose growing power excited the vigilance , possibly the jealousy , of the sovereign . These efforts did not succeed . In such cases , force is of no avail . The quicksilver divides beneath the pressure , but the globules run together again as soon as the pressure is removed . Voluntary combinations of all kinds are not unfrequently decomposed by their internal fermentations and discord ; but no external and adverse force , short of the complete dispersion or total