Table Of Contents.

TABLE OF CONTENTS .

PAGE F REEMASONRY AND ISRAELITISM 371 THE ABUSE OF MASONIC CHARITY 372 THE HIGH DEGREES 372 & 373 PROV . GRAND LODGE OF ESSEX 373 THE ROYAL ARCH CHAPTER OF IMPROVE

-* * 373 & 374 THE CRAFT— . Metropolitan 374 Provincial 374 & 375 ROYAL ARCH — Metropolitan 37 c Provincial ... ... ... ... ... 37 c O RDERS OF CHIVALRY

Red Cross of Constantine 375 BIRTHS , MARRIAGES , AND DEATHS 376 ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS 376 THE DEVELOPMENT OF SPECULATIVE

MASONRY ... ... ... 375 & ~ , JJ REVIEWS .. ' ... ^ MULTUM IN PARVO .. . 377 ROYAL MASONIC BENEVOLENT INSTITUTION ... 377

OBITUARYBro . William Pettifor 378 Bro . Lemuel Lyon ... ... ... ... 373 MASONIC MISCELLANEA ... 373 ORIGINAL CORRESPONDENCE — Halliwell ' s Poem Analysed 378 & 379 Was it Manly ? 379 " Freemasonry and Israelitism " 379 MARK

MASONRYConstitution of the Prov . Grand Mark Lodge for Middlesex and Surrey 379 & 3 S 0 Installation Meeting of Macdonaid Lodge ( 104 ) 3 S 0 Consecration of the Furness Lodge , Barrowin-Furness 380 & 3 S 1

SCOTLANDGlasgow 3 3 ! ANCIENT RUINS 3 S 1 MASONIC MEETINGS FOR NEXT WEEK 3 S 2 ADVERTISEMENTS 369 , 370 , 3 S 2 , 383 , & 3 S 4

Freemasonry & Israelitism.

FREEMASONRY & ISRAELITISM .

BY BRO . WILLIAM CARPENTER , P . M . & P . Z . 177 .

IV . The utterances of deep anguish found in those eloquent and touching strains which come down to us as the " Lamentations of Jeremiah , " bring vividly before us the awful

change which had passed over the beautiful land occupied by the two nations , Israel and Judah . The people had been carried captive into distant and strange countries ; the towns and villages were so devastated

that lions and other beasts of prey multiplied in the land ; the fortifications and wallsof the capitals , Samaria and Jerusalem , were thrown down , heaps of ruins marked the spots where the royal palaces and the

buildings of the princes and elders had seen many a clay of rejoicing and revelry , and the sacred edifice , which had survived the faith and piety it was intended to foster , was consigned to the flames . The prophet ,

looking beyond the devastation of his own nation , extended his sympathies to Israel , and forgetting in its present sad condition the bitterness and hostility which had , from tlie beginning , existed between the two

nations , saw only their common ruin , and his pathetic lamentations embraced them both— " Tlie Lord hath swallowed up all the habitations of Jacob , and hath not pitied ; He hath thrown down in his wrath

the strongholds of the daughters of Judah ; He hath brought down to the ground ; He hath polluted the kingdom and the princes thereof ; He hath cut off , in fierce anger , all the horn of Israel The

Lord was an enemy ; lie hath swallowed up Israel , He hath swallowed up all her palaces ; He hath destroyed his strongholds , and hath increased in the daughter of Judah mourning and lamentation ; He

hath cast off his altar , He hath abhorred his sanctuary , He hath given up into the hand of the enemy the walls of her palaces ; He hath made the rampart and the wall to

lament ; her gates are sunk into the ground ; He hath destroyed ancl broken her bars ; her kings and her princes are among the Gentiles . Mine eyes do fill with tears , my bowels are troubled , my liver is

Freemasonry & Israelitism.

poured upon the earth for the destruction of the daughter of my people" ( Lam . ii . ) . What a land ! what a mourning ! But how could such a condition of things be brought about , while the promises made

to the fathers remained on record ? Had not God promised to give the land to Abraham and to his seed " for ever "— "for an everlasting possession" ( Gen . xiii . 15 ; xvii . 8 ) ? Yes ; and these promises were

renewed to Isaac ( xxvi . 3 ) , and to Jacob ( xlviii . 4 ) . How are we to reconcile the facts with the promises ? There can be no more doubt that the promises were made than that the land was desolated and the

people deported into distant countries , various idolatrous people being sent into Israel , which is now trodden down by the foot of strangers , who wander through it as the children of the promise wander through

strange lands . " Is God a man that he should lie , or the son of man that he should repent ? " No , "Let God be true , ' and every man a liar . " In Him " there is no variableness , neither shadow of turning . "

He will " perform the truth to Jacob and the mercy to Abraham , which He has sworn to our fathers from the days of old " ( Micah vii . 20 ) . As truly as the threatening of punishment , in the desolation of their

land and the scattering of themselves throughout the earth has been fulfilled—as it is written on the pages of history , and as we have it before our eyes from day to day —so also will the promises of pardon and

restoration , and future and everlasting blessedness follow . " Fear not , thou , O my servant , Jacob , and be not dismayed , 0 Israel , for behold I will save thee from afar off * , and thy seed , from the land of

captivity ; I will make a full end of all the nations whither I have driven thee , but I will not make a full end of thee , but correct thee in measure , yet will I not utterly cut thee off" ( Jer . xlvi . 27 , 28 ) . " I will sift the

house of Israel among all nations , like as corn is sifted in a sieve , yet shall not the least grain fall upon the earth Behold , the days come , saith the Lord , . . . , and I will bring again the

captivity of my people Israel , and they shall build the waste cities and inhabit them , and they shall plant vineyards and drink the wine thereof ; they shall also make gardens , and cat the fruit of them . And I

will plant them in their own land , and they shall no more be pulled up out of their land which I have given them , saith the Lord God" ( Amos ix . ) It is herein that the word and faithfulness of God will be

vindicated . " It shall come to pass in that day , the Lord shall set His hand again tlie second time to recover the remnant of His people , which shall be left , from Assyria , and from Egypt , and from Pathros , ancl

from Gush , and from Elam , and from Shinar , ancl from Hamath , and from tlie islands of the sea . And he shall set up an ensign for the nations , and shall assemble the outcasts of Israel , and gather together the

dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth . The envy also of ] . " phi-aim shall depart , and the adversaries of Judah shall be cut off ; Ephraim shall not envy Judah , and Judah shall not vex Ephraim . . .

. . ancl there shall be a highway for the remnant of His people , which shall be left , from Assyria ; like as it was to Israel in the day when he came up out of the land of Egypt " ( Isaiah xi . 11-16 ) . See also Isaiah

xxvi ! . 12 ; Jer . 111 . 18-23 ; E / cck . xxxvii . 21-25 ; Amos ix . 14 , 15 ; Obad . 15-20 ; & c . I have quoted and referred to these passages , in order to show that the restoration of Judah and Israel to the land that was promised them for "an everlasting posses-

Freemasonry & Israelitism.

sion " does not rest upon any casual expression or ambiguous promise , but upon many expressions and promises that are clear , explicit , and incontestable ; and I take it that no one who has read history ,

which so demonstrably shows the fulfilment of the threatenings of punishment and dispersion of Israel and Judah , can doubt the ultimate and literal fulfilment of the promises of their restoration to the land of

promise , and their establishment and glory there . The remnant of Judah we know . They are amongst us , as they are amongst all the nations of which we have knowledge . They are with us , although they

are not of us ; and we can count , or have had counted for us , four or five millions of them , who , surviving the persecutions and sufferings of many ages , still- cling to Moses , and say , " If I forget thee , O

Jerusalem , let my right hand forget her cunning ! Let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth , if I do not remember thee ; arid if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief joy " ( Ps . exxxvii , 5 , 6 . ) . Everywhere ,

their identity may be recognised . They retain their tradidions , their ceremonies , their traits of nationality , of exclusiveness , and of type . They are to be found in every part of the world—in Europe , from Norway

to Gibraltar ; in Africa , from Algiers to the Cape of Good Hope ; in Asia , from Cochin to the Caucasus , from Jaffa to Pekin ; in America , from Monte Video to Quebec . In Australia , they live , as here ,

separate from other people in their usages and worship ; and they have given proofs of their power of acclimatisation under the tropics , where people of European origin have always failed to perpetuate themselves . These

are of Judah—the two tribes . But where is Israel—the ten tribes ? That is a question , which has occupied men ' s minds for centuries ; and there is no end of the discoveries that have been made of the hiding-place of these lost

tribes . That they exist we know , for " tlie sure word of prophecy" lias said that though they are sifted amongst all nations not a grain shall

fall to the ground . Did they return with Judah —the two tribes—when they went up from Babylon , and with them re-occupy the land ? We have no evidence of such a return . No

doubt while tlie Jews were captives in Babylon some few of the other tribes may have come down and become united witli them , but the nation did not do so . After Judah had returned , Samaria , the once capital of Israel , continued in

possession of the Gentile nations , who had been sent thither from the north , and who had united tlie worship of Jehovah with that of the false gods , and between whom and the Jews a complete alienation and antipathy existed . The Jews had no dealings with the Samaritans .

Where , then , is Israel ? The most remarkable circumstance attending their captivity , perhaps , is the difficulty , if not the impossibility , of finding them . They have been searched for in every quarter of the world , and every now ancl

then history records something touching the discovery of a portion of the long lost tribes . In Tartary , China , Japan , Turkey , Afghanistan , Burmah , Malabar , Abyssinia , Is orth and South America , and other countries , they are said to

have been found , the customs ancl traditions of various tribes or small communities of people leading to their identification with Israel . There is no doubt that the traditions and usages of certain bodies of people , in different parts of the

earth , bear a striking resemblance or afimity to the Israelites ; and it is not improbable that from the countries north of Assyria some portions of them have made their way thither , without much difficulty , as a glance at a map

will show ; but there is no reason to believe that the whole people , nor even the principal part of them , thus disposed of themselves . On the contrary , as we shall by-and-bye see , their destination appears to have been of a different kind , and to have been in a different direction ,