Masonic Exhibition And Soiree At Worcester.

their excellent friend the Mayor of Worcester . As they all knew , he added to the other qualifications lor the various capacities that he filled in the city , that of being an enthusiastic and experienced Mason . He was desirous that his year of office might be signalised by some special effort connected with Masonry . He communicated his views to him ( Sir Edmund ) , and he ventured to suggest an idea which had often occurred to him , that of a

Masonic conversasionc , to which they might all come , and which might be made interesting by the aid of a Masonic exhibition of works of art . The Mayor cordially concurred in that idea . To many minds a Masonic ball might have been more popular ; but a conversasionc was decided upon , and hc was happy to say that the idea was taken up cordially by the brethren throughout the province , and a great number of brethren formed a committee

to carry out that object . To those who were Masons that exhibition must be one of great interest . They flattered themselves that no such collection had been brought together in the Midland counties , or perhaps in England , specially connected with Masonry . Their non-Masonic friends also might study those objects with some degree of interest . He dared say it would suggest a great deal of speculation in their minds , and he was sorry ihey

could not indulge them with any exposition of their secrets . ( Laughter . ) But they could give them some little insight into their history and antecedents . He hoped their non-Masonic friends would go away with the conviction in their minds that whatever might be the usages and customs and history of English Masons , at any rate they might say ,

in the words of the old Masonic song , " There ' s nought but what ' s good to be understood of a Free and Accepted Mason . " Their signs and symbols all pointed to the fact that there was nothing in Masonry contrary to the great principles of religion and loyalty , or to those principles which they all recognised as being connected more especially with the Masonic body , brotherly love and unity . ( Applause . )

The MAYOR said he agreed with Sir Edmund Lechmere that they might all derive some good by studying the objects of interest which would be found in the exhibition . They were very much indebted to brethren at a distance and to Masons in every part of the country who had interested themselves so assiduously and earnestly in bringing that great collection of Masonic art together . He commended to his brother Masons a study of it .

He wished it to be known that people were never asked to become Masons . If they did so , it must be of their own free will and inclination . As far as he could ascertain that was one of the most beautiful collections of Masonic art ever brought together in this country . He was sure the ladies and gentlemen present would go away instructed and edified by what they had seen there in connection with Masonry . He joined with Sir Edmund Lechmere in bidding them a hearty welcome .

The Dean of YORK said he rose to address them , in obedience to the Provincial Grand Master . The object of the exhibition , as they had been told , was not to reveal the secrets of Masonry to the public generally ; but it was hoped to disabuse certain erroneous impressions which prevailed amongst the uninitiated as regarded Masonry , and at the same time to afford those who took an interest in Masonry some gratification by showing them

the treasures and records of the Craft in the present and the past . He thought the prejudices which existed in regard to Freemasonry were threefold . In the first place , it was assumed that they were a foolish body , that they adorned themselves in peculiar and fantastic dresses , and that there was really nothing to be said for them . He thought , however , that that exhibition would show those who had that feeling at least this

factthat if they were foolish people they would be surprised to see how large a proportion of foolish people tnere had been in the world . They would see in that exhibition that the . Masons went back to a very ancient date , that they had gathered in men of great position and of great eminence in all parts of the world . They wonld be atonished to find , perhaps , how many of those whose names were not altogether unknown in the pages of English

history had not been ashamed to be enrolled as members of a Masonic province . Perhaps the impression which would be made in their mind by the exhibition would be that after what they had seen there must be something in it . The next thing was that people were disposed to think they were a selfish people . They thought Freemasonry consisted in nothing much better than eating and drinking . They thought the life of a

Freemason was a life of an incessant and interminable festivity ; but if they would look at the records in the museum they would see what might be learned from the reports of the different branches of their Craft , they would see that they were far from being a selfish body , that they had the welfare of others very much at heart , that from generation to generation the one great object of their community had been to promote the welfare of

others . They would see that they had always had a watchful care for the young and had provided for them , as far as circumstances would allow , the means of a good sound useful education . ( Hear , hear . ) They would see that there were institutions connected with Masonry by which the aged and infirm were provided for , and their days of decay and decrepitude relieved . They would see also that there were ways in which the poorer members of

the Craft received substantial and timely benefit and help from their brethren . Therefore he was quite sure a careful study of the exhibition would disabuse at once any such impressions in the minds of those who might have entertained them . ( Applause . ) There was in the third place a lurking suspicion in some people ' s minds that the Masons must be a bad set ot people . No less a person than the Pope had told them that

they were communists , and they disregarded the holy ordinance of matrimony— ( laughter ) , — and he had implied that they were guiltyof so many transgressions of thc moral law and the laws of society , that he had altogether interdicted them . He thought the presence of so many of them on that occasion would be the best proof as to whether they disparaged the hol y ordinance of matrimony . The Masons rather flattered themselves that at

all events if they were not the most ornamental Order in the community they were quite as good as their neighbours . ( Laughter and applause . ) The records in the exhibition would show that they had ever been a body of upright and sober-minded people , who had had the best of all aims and objects in view , and had not been guilty of flagrant transgressions of laws either human or Divine , nor wandered in the devious paths of infidelity and

superstition . If they could disabuse those impressions which more or less lingered abroad concerning them a great deal would be done by such an exhibition as that to benefit Masonry in the outer world . As to the inner world it did a great deal to increase one ' s pride in the history and character of thc Craft to which he had had the honour for more that thirty years to

belong . He had great pleasure in visiting Worcester and seeing the exhibition . He congratulated the Grand Master and the Mayor , and all connected with that exhibition , on the great success that had attended their efforts . He hoped that gathering would form an epoch in the history of Freemasonry in the county and city of Worcester , that it would lead to an increase of members and to an increase of the more substantial benefits of

Masonic Exhibition And Soiree At Worcester.

stability , union , and good order , which were essentially characteristic of the body to which they belonged . ( Applause . ) An excellent programme of music was performed by Messrs . Svnver and Gilmer ' s Orchestral Band , under the conduct of Bro . A . W . G < ' mV . The guests in the meantime visited the exhibition or -trolled in o the lower hall , where refreshments were served during lhe whole of the evening , and the conversazione was maintained with spirit until eleven o ' clock , at which hour the company dispersed . On Thursday the Provincial Grand Lodge was held . A full report will appear in our next .

The Tu Quoque.

THE TU QUOQUE .

We lighted the other day on a very furious incrimination of Freemasonry , as delivered , or alleged to be delivered , by a Roman Catholic priest as an address in church , in reference to the recent Papal Allocution . It mav be said , as the Vicar of Bullhampton observed of a Nonconformist fri-ndl " if he says anything at all , he is , ol course , bound to say it ; " and we need not therefore scan too closely the logic of the preacher's rem irks , oi the verity of his vehement assertions . Hut the words have a curious air of ab-urd

unreality and unmeaningness about them , which induces us to advert to i hem to-day . To think that in 1 SS 4 such are the words of a Roman Catholic preacher , or any preacher at all , proclaiming to a listening congregation the message of truth and tenderness , sobriety , peace , and goodwill , is very Pain ' indeed . The whole tone of the remarks we now print for the infor mat'on ° f our readers is alike Jesuitical and specious , containing both the '' suggeslio falsi " and the " suppressio veri " in a marked degree . Here they are !

" Who a few years ago fired at the Emperor of Germany ? A member of secret societies . Who assassinated the Emperor of Russia ? Members of secret societies . Who perpetrated the horrible crime in Phoenix Park , in Dublin , two years ago ? Members of secret societies . Who fired at the

Kings o * opain and Italy ; Members of secret societies . We see the doings of these sects are in accord with their speeches . How then doubt any longer that they aim at the subversion of social order ? It so , the Pope is right , and nothing can be too strong to prevent Christians from joining Freemasonry , orany other society of the same kind . "

The attempt to make Freemasonry , and the secret societies identical is an old trick of our Roman Catholic assailants , but it is as useless , absurd , and impotent now ' as it has been in times past . Freemasonry proper has nothing * to do with secret political societies which ape its name , or attempt to utilize its system of organization . In some countries , indeed , foolish men have forgotten

the great and leading principles of Masonic neutrality , and have fatuitously mixed themselves up with social and political questions . But they form a miserable minority , and the vast majority of Freemasons in the world has uniformly disapproved of such a degradation and desecration of Freemasonry . But when the preacher thus attacks Freemasons , does he suppose they have no memory , no knowledge

of things as they have been , of things as they are ? To say nothing of the barbarous horrors and cruelties of the Inquisition , whose full fell extent we shall probably never know here , the Church of Rome has been distinguished by acts of deliberate persecution , from which all true and ingenious minds turn mournfully away with the blush of shame and the hatred of oppression . Who was it , as Cardinal Newman

pointed out effectively years ago at Oxford , that brought about the painful and unforgetable massacre of St . Bartholomew at Paris ? Who encouraged the savagery of Alba and the extermination of the Protestant Walloons ? Who alike trampled on the harmless inhabiianis of the Vaudois Vallies and the inoffensive people of the Cevennes ? Who set up the " Dragonnades ? Who gloried in the revocation of the Edict of

Nantes ? Who for years habitually persecuted the Jews in Spain , and condemned countless men and women to the fiery mercies of the Auto da Fe ? Indeed , wherever we go , we find traces of Roman Catholic cruelty and violence , enough to make us doubt both the verily and reality of religion . And out of whose body came that most hurtful and dangerous of secret societies , the ' * Illuminati , " but the Church ol Rome , A . Weishaupt , its founder , being a Roman Catholic Professor and a Jesuit ?

But yet we should not think of taunting Roman Catholics generally with these dire proofs of fanaticism and irrdigion . They are indeed facts . They preach and witness more powerfully than anything else of the extent to which intolerance in religious feelings will lead even , those who profess to be illuminated by a Divine Light . Neither should we have thought it well to recur to these painful subjects , were it not for the

irrepressible fanaticism , ignorance—yes , and impertinence—of someof our Roman Catholic assailants . Whatever else may be said of Freemasonry , its work and message to this world have been an outcome of sympathy , good will , and charity to all . It still lifts up its voice against the debasing practice of persecution for conscience sake every where , and , undeterred by menace , unaffected by opposition , moves on , asserting in unmistakeable tones its reverence for God and its love for man .

Freemasonry In York In The Eighteenth Century.

FREEMASONRY IN YORK IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY .

AS TOLD BY AN OLD NEWSPAPER FILE . BY BRO . T . B . WHYTEHEAD , YORK . I have been employing some few hours of leisure time within the past month in looking through the files o ! someof thc newspapers published in York during the last century , chiefly with the somewhat forlorn hope of

lighting upon allusions to our Cralt in this city before the revival year of 1761 . We know how bare these old provincial newspapers are , how curtly they conveyed their intelligence , and how brief were their leaders . Journalists of our day might perhaps , with benefit to the temper of the reading public as well as their own comfort , combine to revert to these manners and customs of their prototypes of thc eighteenth century .

Even as late as 1801 three of the nine weekly journals published in this broad county of Yorkshire were issued Irom the York Press , and in the previous century the printers of York had gained a pnstige and notoriety for good work which was second to none in the kingdom . The first

newspaper published in York was called the York Mercury , which made ils appearance on the 23 rd February , 1719 , and died in 1740 , being latterly the property of Thomas Gent , the celebrated York primer . In 1725 was started the York Courant , which in 1848 was merged in the York Herald ; and in 1772 Etherington's York Chronicle saw the light , and in 1839 was merged in thc