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Hints On Masonic Reforms.—No. I.

HINTS ON MASONIC REFORMS . —No . I .

IT may be [ safely taken for granted that all mere human institutions , however pure and excellent their original principles , are subject , in the course of time , to a gradual incorporation of misconception , a constant accumulation of error , and frequent innovations , all of which tend to obscure , if they do not in the majority of cases actually defeat , the plans and intentions of their founders .

Free-Masonry , notwithstanding all that has been , said of it by transcendental writers , cannot lay claim to a Divine origin and , therefore , must share , in common with every other institution , established by finite creatures like ourselves , many grave errors and serious defects which , in some instances , have come to be regarded as part of the original . system , although in fact they are but innovations , or omissions , of modern date . To mitigate

similar evils in kingdoms , states , and societies , wise monarchs and rulers have recourse to occasional Reforms of a conservative character which , whilst eliminating the most obvious deformities and abuses , yet preserve , intact , the original features of the communities under their rule , thereby shaping their course to the requirements of the age and yet retaining—free from spasmodic change—the bequests handed down to them from the

practical wisdom of their ancestors . Where such judicious revisions have been systematically neglected history tells the tale , and records how easily good measures might have been adopted , in early stages of discontent , but have been , over and over again , ignored until , at last , when the power to enforce their reception has vanished , they have been surrendered with large changes and additions , such as were neither demanded nor

required ; and when this has been done it has always been too late . Unless something similar is in store for Free-Masonry , under the Grand Lodge and Supreme Grand Chapter of England , the signs of the times tell us that a speedy Masonic Reform is imperative in order to discard some of the anomalies and absurdities , now becoming encrusted in our system , or they will eventually be so burthensome and intolerable that Reform will ,

at length , become an impossibility—change will step in and , with ruthless violence , uproot the whole , making a clean sweep of good and bad together—and the superstructure our forefathers raised will come tumbling about our ears .

" When desperate ills demand a speedy cure , Distrust is cowardice , and prudence folly . " The nineteenth century is growing old—it has more than completed half its allotted span—yet What has Free-Masonry , as practised under the Grand Lodge and Grand Chapter of England , accomplished for itself , or for the benefit of mankind at large , during this eventful period ? We are now in the year of grace

1871 , more than half-a-century distant from that lodge of reconciliation , in 1 S 13 , which so wantonly reversed and destroyed the fundamental principles of the Order : discarded much that was pure and essential ; totally ignored the Christian belief—the faith of the country—and substituted for it , and the * more ancient usages of Free-Masonry , a mass of objectionable

puerility . As a recognised society , known by the name we bear , we have attained more than the patriarchal age of one hundred and fifty years—a century and a half of public existence—and the question must often recur to every thoughtful and earnest brother—In this period of time what progress has Free-Masonry ; made ? Since the year 1717 , it would require a library in itself to

chronicle the discoveries and inventions of the profane , in every branch of human thought and science , both for the use and luxury as well as the profit and pleasure of mankind ; but in the production of such benefits , derived from the hidden mysteries of nature and science , art or utility , the Free-Mason , as a benefactor to mankind , has little or no inheritance . Instead of being foremost in such inquiries , and leading the master minds of each

generation , following in tIik _ --,-.-al . c of our glorious brethren of the pre-Reformation era ; instead of diffusing the light of knowledge and cultivating the achievements of science — succouring the weak , sympathising with and encouraging the patriotic , and acquiring and dispensing wisdom as it advanced in years—all that Free-Masonry , under the Grand Lodge of England , can . boast- —in the place of owning it to her shame—is a patched and ¦ disastrous Constitution , rendering the position of the lodges , and ; brethren , holding under it , one of complete isolation .

Step by step—carefully taken as if there was a subtle purpos 6 concealed in every move—since 1813 , the rulers of the craft have deliberately cut off the English brethren from the aspirations and sympathies of the cosmopolitan order , and thus the Grand Lodge of England , professing the widest toleration , has at length become the most intolerant and sectarian of any Grand Lodge in the universe , and , in consequence , now stands aloneundignified j

, , derided , and ridiculed ; by the kindreds , peoples , and nations , . ' where Free-Masonry obtains , and who , in the early days of the eighteenth century , turned their eyes to our Grand Lodge as the source and fountain from which all masonic light emanated . On the continents of Europe , Asia , and America , Free-Masonry is identified with the spirit of the age ; human progress

is its goal . True to the traditions of the craft in the middle ages , when Free-Masonry was a term unknown , though its rites were practised by thousands of the brightest and best in every land , the Grand Lodges of the world ( always excepting- the Grand Lodge of England and some few obscure German lodges ) recognise their mission . Conservative in their tendencies , they yet keep pace with the age in which we live j and , discarding all

pretence to physical , yet propagate , by moral force , a spirit tending to emulate their brethren of old—thousands upon thousands of whom proved their devotion to the order by dying martyrs in its cause—and serving to re-kindle amongst the fraternity a reverence and love for the Christian faith , devotion to their country's cause , and that cosmopolitanism of principle whicli the Grand Lodge of England , ever since the accession of the