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Article ON THE INSTITUTION OF FREEMASONRY.* ← Page 9 of 13 →
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On The Institution Of Freemasonry.*
till over the world to inflame the ardour of the pious , and persuade or frighten , as the case might be , those who yet remained undecided . Great indeed were the results : the land was as one workshop , and a man feared he had lived in vain hacl he not contributed to erect or adorn a religious house . (
"William of Malmsbury " ) So profusely generous , indeed , were the grants made alike by prince , peer , and peasant , that it has been shown , to speak of England alone , that , at the death of Edward the Confessor , more than one-third of all the land was in possession of the clergy , exempt from all taxesandfor the most parteven from military service .
, , , ( " Henry's Hist , of Great Britain . " ) The Freemasons , as we have seen , were the instruments employed to effect these purposes ofthe Church ; and nobly they fulfilled their duty . Passing their earlier works in Lombardy ancl Germany , in which are to be discovered the germ of the Pointed ' style and its first development , I
would direct attention to the cathedrals of Strasburg , Friburg , Cologne , Antwerp , St . Ouen in Normandy , and that orbis miraculum , as Leland calls it , Henry the Seventh ' s Chapel in England . To mention all the works of the Freemasons were to speak of nearly all the edifices constructed during several centuries of that periodand would fill a
, volume ; but the above may serve for instances of their wondrous genius as designers , and of their mathematical skill as constructors ; astonishing us alike by the boldness of the outline and the grandeur of the masses , as by the lightness of the parts ancl the elegance of the execution ' .
In England , although I do not find that any additional privileges were extended to them by special enactment , few buildings were erected during the twelfth and three following centuries without the assistance of the members of the Craft : in fact , the requisite skill appears to the last to have been confined to them ; ancl some idea may be formed of
their numbers , when we see that , during the thirteenth century , no less than ten cathedrals were in progress simultaneously . ( " Dibdin ' s Tour . " ) Having thus briefly spoken of the origin and object of the fraternity of Freemasons ; traced , in some degree , their progress ; and mentioned the results of their labours , I
shall next attempt to bring together some few points of information regarding their internal government . As a consequence naturally resulting from the mystery with
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
On The Institution Of Freemasonry.*
till over the world to inflame the ardour of the pious , and persuade or frighten , as the case might be , those who yet remained undecided . Great indeed were the results : the land was as one workshop , and a man feared he had lived in vain hacl he not contributed to erect or adorn a religious house . (
"William of Malmsbury " ) So profusely generous , indeed , were the grants made alike by prince , peer , and peasant , that it has been shown , to speak of England alone , that , at the death of Edward the Confessor , more than one-third of all the land was in possession of the clergy , exempt from all taxesandfor the most parteven from military service .
, , , ( " Henry's Hist , of Great Britain . " ) The Freemasons , as we have seen , were the instruments employed to effect these purposes ofthe Church ; and nobly they fulfilled their duty . Passing their earlier works in Lombardy ancl Germany , in which are to be discovered the germ of the Pointed ' style and its first development , I
would direct attention to the cathedrals of Strasburg , Friburg , Cologne , Antwerp , St . Ouen in Normandy , and that orbis miraculum , as Leland calls it , Henry the Seventh ' s Chapel in England . To mention all the works of the Freemasons were to speak of nearly all the edifices constructed during several centuries of that periodand would fill a
, volume ; but the above may serve for instances of their wondrous genius as designers , and of their mathematical skill as constructors ; astonishing us alike by the boldness of the outline and the grandeur of the masses , as by the lightness of the parts ancl the elegance of the execution ' .
In England , although I do not find that any additional privileges were extended to them by special enactment , few buildings were erected during the twelfth and three following centuries without the assistance of the members of the Craft : in fact , the requisite skill appears to the last to have been confined to them ; ancl some idea may be formed of
their numbers , when we see that , during the thirteenth century , no less than ten cathedrals were in progress simultaneously . ( " Dibdin ' s Tour . " ) Having thus briefly spoken of the origin and object of the fraternity of Freemasons ; traced , in some degree , their progress ; and mentioned the results of their labours , I
shall next attempt to bring together some few points of information regarding their internal government . As a consequence naturally resulting from the mystery with