Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
Liberorum Latomorum Primordia Et Recentiora Vera.
perhaps run contrary to the opinions of many very valuable members of our Order ; but to SIIOAV that such opinions , as well as our OAVU , are not neiv , we will give an extract from the ** History of the Origin of Freemasonry , " by Brother Frederick Nicolai , a learned bookseller of Berlin , who published in 1782 , and to which we shall subsequently revert : —
" I see no reason that wo must necessarily attribute to Freemasonry a grey antiquity , to render it honourable ancl respected . Its present intrinsic condition , not what it formerly was , but what it is at present , makes every society respectable . Is it now venerable ? It is so in itself , and need not borrow a value from confraternities long since extinct ; and that it may be now and continue respected , ought to be the principal aim of each present member . "
The ordonnance of Parliament , in 1425 , under Henry VI ., by Avhich the meeting of the chapters and congregations of Masons is forbidden , because " by them the good course ancl effects of the Statutes of Labourers were openly violated and broken , in idolation , in subversion of the law , ancl to the great damage of the Commons , " can only he looked upon as the germ of our Combination Laivs but lately repealed . Such a vieAv is not slightly confirmed by a perusal of the statutes and regulations of the stonemasons of Strasburg , about the same period
( April 12 th , 1459 ) , which are declared to be based upon those of the Freemasons of Germany ; neither in the one nor the other are any other regulations found than such as are suitable for handicaft hardworking stonemasons . It is also corroborative that to the present clay in Germany , that land of operative guilds , Avhose very municipal and state governments were
originally based upon them , that , like all the other handicrafts , stonemasons have then * three degrees , each governed by special laws , and only communicated after examination and initiation ; but with this distinction from other trade societies , that to each degree of apprentice ( Bursche ) , journeyman ( Gesellen ) , and masterare appended certain secret signs of recognizance and
, intelligence , as methodical , and yet entirely differing from those in use for speculative Masonry . In this respect , Masons' marks , so frequently discussed in the pages of the Freemasons' Quarterly Magazine , gain a new and most important consequence ; instead of being the arbitrary and unmeaning mark of an individual , they most probably were the systematic designations of a guild
and a province , or a family and its dependencies , of a Bauhiitte and its members . This receives great confirmation from a curious work contained in the valuable old German library collected by Baron von Aufsees , as a portion of his museum of mediaeval antiquities , the centre of attraction for the antiquarian congress above mentioned , aud destined to form the nucleus
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
Liberorum Latomorum Primordia Et Recentiora Vera.
perhaps run contrary to the opinions of many very valuable members of our Order ; but to SIIOAV that such opinions , as well as our OAVU , are not neiv , we will give an extract from the ** History of the Origin of Freemasonry , " by Brother Frederick Nicolai , a learned bookseller of Berlin , who published in 1782 , and to which we shall subsequently revert : —
" I see no reason that wo must necessarily attribute to Freemasonry a grey antiquity , to render it honourable ancl respected . Its present intrinsic condition , not what it formerly was , but what it is at present , makes every society respectable . Is it now venerable ? It is so in itself , and need not borrow a value from confraternities long since extinct ; and that it may be now and continue respected , ought to be the principal aim of each present member . "
The ordonnance of Parliament , in 1425 , under Henry VI ., by Avhich the meeting of the chapters and congregations of Masons is forbidden , because " by them the good course ancl effects of the Statutes of Labourers were openly violated and broken , in idolation , in subversion of the law , ancl to the great damage of the Commons , " can only he looked upon as the germ of our Combination Laivs but lately repealed . Such a vieAv is not slightly confirmed by a perusal of the statutes and regulations of the stonemasons of Strasburg , about the same period
( April 12 th , 1459 ) , which are declared to be based upon those of the Freemasons of Germany ; neither in the one nor the other are any other regulations found than such as are suitable for handicaft hardworking stonemasons . It is also corroborative that to the present clay in Germany , that land of operative guilds , Avhose very municipal and state governments were
originally based upon them , that , like all the other handicrafts , stonemasons have then * three degrees , each governed by special laws , and only communicated after examination and initiation ; but with this distinction from other trade societies , that to each degree of apprentice ( Bursche ) , journeyman ( Gesellen ) , and masterare appended certain secret signs of recognizance and
, intelligence , as methodical , and yet entirely differing from those in use for speculative Masonry . In this respect , Masons' marks , so frequently discussed in the pages of the Freemasons' Quarterly Magazine , gain a new and most important consequence ; instead of being the arbitrary and unmeaning mark of an individual , they most probably were the systematic designations of a guild
and a province , or a family and its dependencies , of a Bauhiitte and its members . This receives great confirmation from a curious work contained in the valuable old German library collected by Baron von Aufsees , as a portion of his museum of mediaeval antiquities , the centre of attraction for the antiquarian congress above mentioned , aud destined to form the nucleus