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GTontents . PAGE FBEMASOXS' MAGAZINE : — Antiquity o ? the Craft 201 le 204

Material for the Temp Masonic Jottings—No . 85 205 Summary of Masonic Law 206 Masonic Notes and Queries SOS Masonic Sayings and Doings Abroad 200 Correspondence 210 JVIASOXIC MIKEOE : — Masonic Mems 211

Royal Masonic Institution for Boys 212 United Grand Lodge 212 CEAET LODGE MEETINGS : — Metropolitan 215 Roval Arch 215 Mark Masonry 217 Scotland 217 Notes ou American Freemasonry 218 Obituary 220 Notices to Correspondents 220 List of Lodge , & c , Meetings for ensuing week ..... 220

Antiquity Of The Craft.

ANTIQUITY OF THE CRAFT .

LONDON , SATURDAY , sTSPTFMBEB 9 , 1 S 71

BY BKO CHARLES LEVI WOODBURY . ( Continued from page 181 ) . His leading architects were from Phoenicia , and probably many of the Craftsmen . The names of

several of the Masonic tools used in building the Temple are not Hebrew , —for instance , " the Plumb-line . " The marks which the Masons placed on the stones which they built into the wall , are not Hebrew letters . These marks are seen on the

old foundation stones still and one of our learned brethren , Maj . Ben . Perley Poore , in an address delivered at Washington , states that he has seen them . Our Pvt . Reverend Brother , Past Grand Master Randall , in one of his addresses , also stated a similar fact . The same marks found on

these stones are found cut by Latin Masons on the stones of Rome ; are found on the stones of the Gothic Churches built by the Freemasons of the middle ages ; are found on those of the Kni ghts Templar Chapels and Preeeptoi'ies . Many of them

are used by stonemasons to-day , and several of them are found among our own symbols . AVhat a line of derivation ! I said it was an imported art to Jerusalem . At Ispahan , in Persia , Sir Gore Ousely copied what he thought was an ancient

inscription in early Persian : it proved to be a lot of Masons' marks . It is not unusual to find usages and symbols adhering to a Craft through centuries , until even the meaning of the symbols is lost to <

those who continue to regard and perpetuate them . Thus , in Virgil , you find that the flying Trojans bore their gods on the sterns of their ships : so also did the Romans , as says Petronius in his description of the ship of Lycas ; and at this day ,

when the creed of the Roman mythology has been superseded for fifteen hundred years , every ship of commerce still bears on her stern carved symbols , cornucopias , and penates , exactly such as were then in use . The shipwright still carves them : it does not concern us whether owners or

sailors retain some ill-defined faith in their power as amulets . These Masons' marks , therefore , in a similar light , serve to trace the migrations of the art from one country to another , from an early period

in the history of the ancient world , and their importance in an antiquarian sense , even apai'fc from their deep significance to us as Craftsmen , can hardly be estimated . These Masons' marks are undergoing the

examination of the learned still , and , as philology opens the lost language of the ancient civilisation of the Bast , the origin of . the marks will be better settled . Many of them are thought to be lettez's of some now extinct alphabets ; and we must wait

the slow progress of many cognate studies before science can increase our light . * The chain of descent is important in connection with other things . A distinction is sought by many to be based on the phrase , " Speculative Masonry , " as

used in our Royal Art , tending to show that Speculative Masonry was peculiarly a modem invention , and separable from the Ancient Craft Masonry . The point , like all others , is one for argument and evidence , rather than a mere assumption that our traditions are false . Suppose that we admit that there is a distinction between the mere arts of

dressing stone according' to lovely artistic designs , laying wall , and drawing geometrical plans of architecture , considered in a material sense , and the creed of speculative opinion held by the initiates in this art , are we , therefore , bound to assume

that they did not hold these opinions ? If we show that much of the symbology now illustrative of those opinions , and that many of the usages now