CHAPTER XXIX

ORGANIZATION OF THE GRAND LODGE OF ENGLAND


WE have now reached the most interesting portion of the history of
Freemasonry. We are getting away from the regions of legend and
tradition, and are passing into the realm of authentic records. And though
at this early period there is a sparseness of these records, and sometimes
a doubtfulness about their meaning, which will occasionally compel us to
build our hypothesis on the foundation of plausible conjecture and
reasoning, still, to whatever conclusions we may come, they will, of
course, be more satisfactory to the mind than if they were wrought out of
mere mythical and traditionary narratives.

It has already been shown that the Guild or Fraternity of Freemasons from
the earliest period of its history had admitted into its connection persons
of rank and influence who were not workmen of the Craft.

In this usage it followed the example of the Roman Colleges of Artificers,
whose patrons were selected to secure to the corporations a protection
often needed, from the oppressive interference of the government.

Thus, when after the decadence of the Roman Empire, architecture,
which had fallen into decline, began to revive, the Masons were employed
in the construction of religious edifices, the dignitaries of the Church
naturally became closely connected with the workmen, while many of the
monks were operative masons. Bishops and abbots superintended the
buildings, and were thus closely connected with the Guild.

This usage was continued even after the Freemasons had withdrawn from
all ecclesiastical dependence, and up to the 18th century non-operatives
were admitted into full membership of the Fraternity, under the appellation
of Gentlemen or Theoretic Masons, or as Honorary Members. The title of
Speculative Freemasons was a word of later coinage, though it is met
with, apparently with the same meaning, in one of the oldest Records, the
Cooke MS. But this is a solitary instance, and the word never came into
general use until some time after the organization of the Grand Lodge in
1717.

It is here used for the sake of convenience, in reference to the early
period, but without any intention to intimate that it was then familiar to the
Craft. The fact existed, however, though the special word was apparently
wanting.

The natural result of this commingling of Operative and Speculative
Masons in the same Fraternity, was to beget a spirit of rivalry between the
two classes. This eventually culminated in the dissolution of the Guild of
Operative Freemasons as distinguished from the Rough Masons or
Rough Layers, and the establishment on its ruin of the Society of
Speculative Freemasons, which at London, in the year 1717, assumed
the title of "The Grand Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons."

We are without any authentic narrative of the rise and progress of the
contentions between the rival classes in England, because in that country
the records of the Operative Lodges before the close of the 17th century
have been lost. But the sister kingdom of Scotland has been more
fortunate. There the minutes of the Lodges of Edinburgh and Kilwinning
exhibit abundant evidence of the struggle for pre-eminence which
terminated in the year 1736 in the establishment of the speculative
"Grand Lodge of Scotland."

As the subject-matter to be treated in this chapter is the history of the
establishment at London, in the year 1717, of the Grand Lodge of
England, it will be proper as a preliminary step that some notice should be
taken of the condition of Freemasonry during the first decade of the 18th
century in the south of England.

The lodges then existing in the kingdom consisted, it is supposed, both of
Operative and non-Operative members. We have positive evidence of
this in some instances, and especially as respects the lodges in London.

Preston gives the following account of the condition of the institution in
the beginning of the 18th century:

"During the Reign of Queen Anne, masonry made no considerable
progress. Sir Christopher Wren's age and infirmities drawing off his
attention from the duties of his office (that of Grand Master), the lodges
decreased, and the annual festivals were entirely neglected. The old
Lodge of St. Paul and a few others continued to meet regularly, but
consisted of few members." (1)

Anderson, upon whose authority Preston had made this statement, says
that "in the South the lodges were more and more disused, partly by the
neglect of the Masters and Wardens and partly by not having a noble
Grand Master at London, and the annual Assembly was not duly
attended." (2)

As the statement so often made by Anderson and other writers of his
school, that there was, anterior to the seventeenth year of the 18th
century, an annual Assembly of the Craft in England over which a Grand
Master presided, has been proved to be apocryphal, we must attribute the
decline of Operative Freemasonry to other causes than those assigned by
Dr. Anderson.

I have heretofore attempted to show that the decline in the spirit of
Operative Freemasonry was to be attributed to the decadence of Gothic
Architecture. By this the Freemasons were reduced to a lower level than
they had ever before occupied, and were brought much nearer to the
"Rough Masons" than was pleasing to their pride of "cunning." They thus
lost the pre-eminence in the Craft which they had so long held on account
of their acknowledged genius and the skill which in past times they had
exhibited in the art of building.

But whatever may have been the cause, the fact is indisputable that at the
beginning of the 18th century the Freemasons had lost much of their high
standing as practical architects and had greatly diminished in numbers.

In the year 1716 there were but four lodges of Operative Masons in the
city of London. The minutes of these lodges are not extant, and we have
no authentic means of knowing what was their precise condition.

But we do know that among their members were many gentlemen of
education who were not Operative Masons, but belonged to the class of
Theoretic or Speculative Freemasons, which, as I have previously said, it
had long been the custom of the Operative Freemasons to admit into their
Fraternity.

Preston, in his Illustrations of Masonry, in a passage already


(1) "Illustrations of Masonry," Jones's edit., 1821, p. 189. a
(2) "Constitutions," edit. 1738, p. 108.


cited, speaking of the decline of the lodges in the first decade of the 18th
century, makes this statement:

"To increase their numbers, a proposition was made, and afterwards
agreed to, that the privileges of Masonry should no longer be restricted to
Operative Masons, but extend to men of various professions, provided
they were regularly approved and initiated into the Order."

For this statement he gives no authority. Anderson, who was
contemporary with the period of time when this regulation is said to have
been adopted, makes no allusion to it, and Preston himself says on a
preceding page that "at a general assembly and feast of the Masons in
1697 many noble and eminent brethren were present, and among the
rest, Charles, Duke of Richmond and Lennox, who was at that time
Master of the lodge at Chichester." (1)

The statement appears, therefore, to be apochryphal. Such a proposition
would certainly have been wholly superfluous, as there is abundant
evidence that in England in the 17th century "men of various professions"
had been "regularly approved and initiated into the Order."

Elias Ashmole, the Antiquary, states in his Diary that he and Colonel
Mainwaring were initiated in a lodge at Warrington in 1646, and he
records the admission of several other non-Operatives in 1682 at a lodge
held in London.

Dr. Plott, in his Natural History of Staffiordshire, printed in 1686, states
that "persons of the most eminent quality did not disdain to be of the
Fellowship."

In the first and second decades of the 18th century Operative
Freemasonry appears, judging from extant records, to have been in the
following condition:

In the northern counties there were several lodges of Operative
Freemasons, which had a permanent character, having rules for their
government, and holding meetings at which new members were admitted.

Thus Preston speaks of a lodge which was at Chichester in 1697, of
which the Duke of Richmond and Lennox was Master; there was a lodge
at Alnwick in Northumberland, whose records from


(1) "Illustrations of Masonry," p. 189, Jones's edit.


1701 are extant; (1) and there was at least one lodge, if not more, in the
city of York whose preserved minutes begin on March 19, 1712. (2) we
have every reason to suppose that similar lodges were to be found in
other parts of the kingdom, though the minutes of their transactions have
unfortunately been lost.

In London there were four operative lodges. These were the lodges which
in 1717 united in the formation of the Speculative Grand Lodge of
England, an act that has improperly been called the "Revival."

All the lodges mentioned consisted of two classes of members, namely,
those who were Operative Freemasons and who worked in the mystery of
the Craft, and those who were non-Operative, or, as they were sometimes
called, Gentlemen Freemasons.

The ceremony of admission or initiation was at this time of a very simple
and unpretentious character. There was but one form common to the
three ranks of Apprentices, Fellows, and Masters, and the division into
degrees, as that word is now understood, was utterly unknown. (3)

From the close of the 17th century the Operative lodges were gradually
losing their prestige. They were no longer, as Lord Lindsay has
denominated their predecessors of the Middle Ages, "parliaments of
genius;" their architectural skill had decayed; their geometrical secrets
were lost; and the distinction which had once been so proudly maintained
between the Freemasons and the "rough layers" was being rapidly
obliterated.

Meantime the men of science and culture who had been admitted into
their ranks, thought that they saw in the principle of brotherhood which
was still preserved, and in the symbolic teachings which were not yet
altogether lost, a foundation for another association, in which the fraternal
spirit should remain as the bond of union, and the doctrines of symbolism,
hitherto practically applied to the art of architecture, should be in future
directed to the illus. tration of the science of morality.


(1) Bro. Hughan has published excerpts from the minutes. See Mackey's
"National Freemason," vol iii., p. 233.
(2) See Hughan's History of Freemasonry in York, in his " Masonic
Sketches and Reprints," p. 55. See also an article by him in the Voice of
Masonry, vol. xiii., p. 571 .
(3) This subject will be fully discussed in a future chapter on the history of
the origin of the three Craft degrees, and the statement here made will be
satisfactorily substantiated.


Long afterward the successors of these founders of Speculative
Freemasonry defined it to be "a system of morality, veiled in allegory and
illustrated by symbols."

Feeling that there was no congenial companionship between themselves
and the uncultured men who composed the Operative element of the
Association, the gentlemen of education and refinement who constituted
the Theoretic element or the Honorary membership of the four lodges
then existing in the city of London, resolved to change the character of
these lodges, and to withdraw them entirely from any connection with
Operative or Practical Masonry.

It was in this way that Speculative Freemasonry found its origin in the
desire of a few speculative thinkers who desired, for the gratification of
their own taste, to transmute what in the language of the times would
have been called a club of workmen into a club of moralists.

The events connected with this transmutation are fully recorded by Dr.
Anderson, in the second edition of the Constitutions, and as this is really
the official account of the transaction, it is better to give it in the very
language of that account, than to offer any version of it.

The history of the formation of the Grand Lodge of Free and Accepted
Masons of England, is given in the following words by Dr. Anderson, who
is said to have been one of the actors in the event:

" King George I. entered London most magnificently on 20 Sept., 1714,
and after the rebellion was over, A.D. 1716, the few lodges at London,
finding themselves neglected by Sir Christopher Wren, thought fit to
cement under a Grand Master as the centre of union and harmony, viz.,
the lodges that met.

"1, At the 'Goose and Gridiron Ale-house' in St. Paul's Churchyard.

"2. At the 'Crown Ale-house' in Parker's Lane near Drury Lane.

"3. At the ' Apple Tree Tavern ' in Charles Street, Covent Garden.

"4. At the 'Rummer and Grapes Tavern' in Channel Row, Westminster.

"They and some old brothers met at the said Apple Tree, and having put
into the chair the oldest Master Mason (now the Master of a Lodge) they
constituted themselves a Grand Lodge, pro tempore, in Due Form, and
forthwith revived the Quarterly Communication of the Officers of Lodges
(called the Grand Lodge) resolved to hold the Annual Feast and then to
choose a Grand Master from among themselves, till they should have the
honor of a noble brother at their head.

"Accordingly

On St. John Baptist's day, in the 3d year of King George I., A.D. 1717, the
Assembly and Feast of the Free and Accepted Masons was held at the
foresaid ' Goose and Gridiron Ale-house.'

"Before dinner, the oldest Master Mason (now the Master of a Lodge) in
the Chair, proposed a list of proper candidates, and the brethren by a
majority of hands elected

"Mr. Anthony Sayer, Gentleman, Grand Master of Masons,

Capt. Joseph Elliott
Mr. Jacob Lamball, Carpenter
Grand Wardens,

who being forthwith invested with the badges of office and power by the
said oldest Master, and installed, was duly congratulated by the Assembly
who paid him the homage.

"Sayer, Grand Master, commanded the Masters and Wardens of Lodges
to meet the Grand Officers every quarter in communication at the place
appointed in his summons sent by the Tyler." (1)

Such is the account of the transmutation of the four Operative to four
Speculative lodges, given by Dr. Anderson, who is believed, with George
Payne, Esq., and Dr. Desaguliers, to have been principally instrumental in
effecting the transmutation.

Meager as are the details of so important an event which Anderson, as a
contemporary actor, might easily have made more copious, they suggest
several important points for our consideration.

We see that the change to be effected by the establishment of the
Speculative Grand Lodge was not too hastily accomplished.

The first meeting in which it was resolved to organize a Grand Lodge took
place some months before the actual organization occurred.

Anderson says that the four lodges met in 1716 and "revived the
Quarterly Communication of the officers of lodges."

Preston says that they met in February, 1717, and that at this


(1) "Constitutions," 1738 edition. pp. 109, 110.


meeting "it was resolved to revive the Quarterly Communications of the
Fraternity."

This is a more accurate statement than that of Anderson. The meeting in
February, 1717, was merely preliminary. A resolution was adopted, or
perhaps more correctly speaking, an agreement was entered into, to
organize a Grand Lodge. But this agreement was not carried into
execution until four months afterward. There could have been no Grand
Lodge without a Grand Master, and the Grand Master was not elected
until the 24th of June following. The apparent disagreement of the dates
assigned to the preparatory meeting, Anderson saying it was in 1716, and
Preston that it was in February, 1717, is easily reconciled.

Anderson in his narrative used the Old Style, in which the year began on
March 25th, consequently February would fall in 1716. Preston used the
New Style, which begins the year on January 1st, and thereby February
fell in 1717. The actual period of time referred to by both authors is really
the same.

In an anonymous work (1) published in 1764 it is said that six lodges were
engaged in the organization of the Grand Lodge, but as the two additional
lodges are not identified, it is better to reject the statement as untruthful,
and to abide by the authority of Anderson, who, as Bro. Hughan says,
"clearly wrote at a time when many personally knew as to the facts
narrated and whose Book of Constitutions was really the official statement
issued by the Grand Lodge."

The fact that four lodges were engaged in the act of transmuting
Operative into Speculative Freemasonry by organizing a Grand Lodge,
while admitted as an historical fact by Lawrence Dermott, is used by him
as an objection to the legality of the organization.

"To form," he says, "what Masons mean by a Grand Lodge, there must
have been the Masters and Wardens of five regular lodges that is to say,
five Masters and ten Wardens, making the numbs of installed officers
fifteen."  (2)

But although Dermott very confidently asserts that this "is well known to
every man conversant with the ancient laws, usages, customs, and
ceremonies of Master Masons," (3) there can be no doubt that this point
of law so dogmatically proclaimed was the


(1) "The Complete Freemason, or Multa Paucis, for Lovers of Secrets."
(2) "Ahiman Rezon " p. 13.
(3) Ibid., p. 14


pure invention of Dermott's brain, and is entitled to no weight whatever.

As the Grand Lodge which was established in 1717 was the first one ever
known, it was impossible that there could be any "ancient laws" to
regulate its organization.

It is noteworthy that each of these premier lodges met at a tavern or ale-
house. During the last century Freemasons' lodges in England almost
universally had their lodge-rooms in the upper part of taverns. The custom
was also adopted in this country, and all the early lodges in America were
held in the upper rooms of buildings occupied as taverns.

The custom of meeting in taverns was one that was not confined to the
Masonic Brotherhood. The early part of the 18th century was, in London,
as we have already seen, the era of clubs. These societies, established
some for literary, some for social, and some for political purposes, always
held their meetings in taverns. " Will's Coffee House " is made memorable
in the numbers of the Spectator as the rendezvous of the wits of that day.

It will also be noticed that these four lodges were without names, such as
are now borne by lodges, but that they were designated by the signs of
the taverns in which they held their meetings. Half a century elapsed
before the lodges in England began to assume distinctive names. The
first lodge to do so was Friendship Lodge No. 3, which is so styled in
Cole's List of Lodges for 1767.

No difficulty or confusion, however, arose from this custom of designating
lodges by the signs of the taverns in which they held their meetings, for it
seldom happened that more than one lodge ever met at any tavern. "The
practice," says Gould, "of any one tavern being common as a place of
meeting, to two or more lodges, seems to have been almost unknown in
the last century." (1)

Two of the four taverns in which these four original lodges were held, and
two of the lodges themselves, namely, the "Apple Tree," where the design
of separating the Speculative from the Operative element was
inaugurated, and the "Goose and Gridiron," where that design was
consummated by the organization of the new Grand Lodge, particularly
claim our attention.


(1) "The Four Old Lodges," by Robert Freke Gould, p. 13.


But it will be more convenient while engaged on this subject to trace the
fate and fortune of the whole four.

In this investigation I have been greatly aided by the laborious and
accurate treatise of Bro. Robert Freke Gould, of London, on the Four Old
Lodges. After his exhaustive analysis there is but little chance of
unearthing any new discoveries, though I have been able to add from
other sources a few interesting facts.

The lodge first named on Anderson's list met at the "Goose and Gridiron
Ale-house," and it was there that, on the 24th of June, 1717, the Grand
Lodge of England was established. Elmes says that "Sir Christopher
Wren was Master of St. Paul's Lodge, which during the building of the
Cathedral of St. Paul's, met at the 'Goose and Gridiron' in St. Paul's
Churchyard, and is now the Lodge of Antiquity, acting by immemorial
prescription; and he regularly presided at its meetings for upward of
eighteen years." (1)

Dr. Oliver says that Dr. Desaguliers, who may be properly reputed as the
principal founder of modern Speculative Freemasonry, was initiated into
the ceremonies of the Operative system, such as they were, in the lodge
that met at the "Goose and Gridiron," and the date assigned for his
admission is the year 1712.

Larwood and Hotten in their History of Sign Boards, copying from a paper
of the Tatler, say that the Tavern was originally a Music house, with the
sign of the "Mitre." When it ceased to be a Music house the succeeding
landlord chose for his sign a goose stroking the bars of a gridiron with his
foot in ridicule of the "Swan and Harp," which was a common sign for the
early music houses. (2) I doubt the truth of this origin, and think it more
likely that the "Swan and Harp" degenerated into the "Goose and
Gridiron" by the same process of blundenng, so common in the history of
signs which corrupted "God encompasseth us" into the "Goat and
Compasses" or the "Belle Sauvage" into the "Bell and Savage."

In the list of lodges for 1725 to 1730 contained in the Minute Book of the
Grand Lodge of England, Lodge No. 1 is still recorded as holding its
meetings at the "Goose and Gridiron," whence, however, it not very long
after removed, for in the next list, from 1730 to 1732, it is recorded as
being held at the "King's Arms," in St. Paul's Churchyard.


(1) Elmes's "Sir Christopher Wren and his Times," quoted in the Keystone
(2) "History of Sign Boards," p. 445.


The "King's Arms" continued to be its place of meeting (except a short
time in 1735, when it met at the "Paul's Head," Ludgate Street) until 1768,
when it removed to the "Mitre." Eight years before, it assumed the name
of the "West India and American Lodge." In 1770 it became the "Lodge of
Antiquity." Of this lodge the distinguished Masonic writer, William
Preston, was a member. In 1779 it temporarily seceded from the Grand
Lodge, and formed a schismatic Grand Lodge. The history of this schism
will be the subject of a future chapter.

At the union of the two Grand Lodges of "Moderns" and "Ancients," it lost
its number "One" in drawing lots and became number'sTwo," which
number it still retains, though it is always recognized as the "premier
lodge of England," and therefore of the world.

The "Goose and Gridiron Tavern" continued to be the place of meeting of
the Grand Lodge until 1721, when in consequence of the need of more
room from the increase of lodges the annual feast was held at Stationers'
Hall. (1) The Grand Lodge never returned to the "Goose and Gridiron." It
afterward held its quarterly communications at various taverns, and the
annual assembly and feast always at some one of the Halls of the
different Livery Companies of London. This migratory system prevailed
until the Freemasons were able to erect a Hall of their own.

The second lodge which engaged in 1717 in the organization of the
Grand Lodge, met at the "Crown Ale-house" in Parker's Lanes near Drury
Lane. According to Bro. Gould, it removed about 1723 to the "Queen's
Head," Turnstile, Holborn; to the "Green Lettuce," Brownlow Street, in
1725; (2) thence to the "Rose and Rummer" in 1728, and to the "Rose
and Buffer" in 1729. In 1730 it met at the "Bull and Gate," Holborn, and
appearing for the last time in the list for 1736, was struck off the roll in
1740.

But it had ceased to exist before that year, for Anderson, in the list
published by him in 1738, says: "The Crown in Parker's Lane, the other of
the four old Lodges, is now extinct."  (3)

The third lodge engaged in the Grand Lodge organization was that which
met at the "Apple Tree Tavern " in 1717. It was there


(1) Anderson's "Constitutions," 2d edit., p. 112.
(2) Gould's "Four Old Lodges," p. 6.
(3) Anderson's " Constitutions," 2d edit., p. 185.


that in February of that year the Freemasons who were preparing to sever
the connection between the Operative and Theoretic Masons, took the
preliminary steps toward effecting that design. From the "Apple Tree" it
removed about 1723 to the Queen's Head," Knave's Acre; thence in 1740
to the George and Dragon," Portland Street, Oxford Market; thence in
1744 to the "Swan" in the same region. In the lists from 1768 to 1793 it is
described as the Lodge of Fortitude. After various other migrations, it
amalgamated, in 1818, with the Old Cumberland Lodge, and is now the
Fortitude and Old Cumberland Lodge No. 12 on the roll of the United
Grand Lodge of England. (1)

Of this third or "Apple Tree" Lodge, Anthony Sayer, the first Grand Master
of England, was a member, and most probably was in 1717 or had been
previously the Master. In 1723 he is recorded as the Senior Warden of
the Lodge, which is certainly an evidence of his Masonic zeal.

The last of the four old Lodges which constituted the Grand Lodge met in
1717 at the "Rummer and Grapes Tavern," Westminster. It moved thence
to the "Horn Tavern," Westminster, in 1723. It seemed to be blessed with
a spirit of permanency which did not appertain to the three other lodges,
for it remained at the "Horn" for forty-three years, not migrating until 1767,
when it went to the "Fleece," Tothill Street, Westminster. The year after it
assumed the name of the Old Horn Lodge. In 1774 it united with and
adopted the name of the Somerset House Lodge, and met at first at the
"Adelphi" and afterward until 1815 at "Freemasons' Tavern." In 1828 it
absorbed the Royal Inverness Lodge, and is now registered on the roll of
the United Grand Lodge of England as the Royal Somerset House and
Inverness Lodge No. 4. (2)

George Payne, who was twice Grand Master, in 1718 and in 1720, had
been Master of the original Rummer and Grapes Lodge. He must have
been so before his first election as Grand Master in 1718, and he is
recorded in the first edition of Anderson as having been its Master again
in 1723. At one time the lodge received an important benefit from this
circumstance, as is shown by the following record taken by Entick from
the Minutes of the Grand Lodge.


(1) Gould, "Four Old Lodges,"p.7.
(2) lbid


In 1747 the lodge, whose number had been changed to No. 2, was erased
from the Books of Lodges for not obeying an order of the Quarterly
Communication. But in 1753, the members having petitioned the Grand
Lodge for restoration, Entick says in his edition of the Constitutions that
"after a long debate, it was ordered that in respect to Brother Payne, late
Grand Master, the Lodge No. 2 lately held at the 'Horn' in Palace Yard,
Westminster, should be restored and have its former rank and place in
the list of lodges."

Payne, who was a scholar, had done much for the advancement of
Speculative Freemasonry, and the Grand Lodge by this act paid a fitting
homage to his character and showed itself not unmindful of his services to
the Fraternity.

Such are the facts, well authenticated by unquestioned historical
authorities, which are connected with the establishment of the first Grand
Lodge of Speculative Freemasons, not only in England, but in the world.
Seeing that nothing analogous has been anywhere found in the records of
Masonry, irrespective of its unauthenticated legends and traditions, it is
proper, before proceeding to inquire snto the condition of the Grand
Lodge immediately subsequent to its organization at the "Goose and
Gridiron Tavern," that the much discussed question, whether this
organization was the invention of an entirely new system or only the
revival of an old, and for a short time discontinued, one should be fairly
considered.

To this important subject our attention will be directed in the following
chapter.





CHARTER XXX

WAS THE ORGANIZATION OF THE GRAND LODGE IN 17I7 A
REVIVAL?


It has been the practice of at Masonic writers from the earliest period of its
literature to a very recent day, to designate the transaction which resulted
in the organization of the Grand Lodge of England in the year 1717 as the
"Revival of Freemasonry."

Anderson, writing in 1723, in the first edition of the Constitutions, says
that "the freeborn British nation had revived the drooping Lodges of
London," and in the year 1738, in the second edition of the same work, he
asserts that the old Brothers who met at the "Apple Tree Tavern"
"forthwith revived the Quarterly Communication of the Officers of Lodges,
called the Grand Lodge."

This statement has been repeated by Preston, Calcott, Oliver, and all the
older Masonic authors who have written upon the subject, until it has
become an almost universal belief among the larger portion of the
Fraternity that from some unknown or indefinite era until the second
decade of the 18th century the Grand Lodge had been in a state of
profound slumber, and that the Quarterly Communications, once so
common, had long been discontinued, through the inertness and
indifference of the Craft, while the lodges were drooping like sickly plants.

But in the year 1717, owing to the successful efforts of a few learned
scholars, such as Desaguliers, Anderson, and Payne, the Grand Lodge
had been awakened from its sleep of years, the Quarterly
Communications had been renewed as of old, and the lodges had sprung
into fresh and vigorous existence. Such was for a long time and indeed
still is, to a diminished extent, the orthodox Masonic creed respecting the
Revival of Freemasonry in the 18th century.

But this creed, popular as it is, has within a few years past been ruthlessly
attacked by some of our more advanced thinkers, who are skeptical
where to doubt is wise, and who are not prepared to aces cept legends as
facts, nor to confound trading with history.

And now it is argued that before the year 1717 there never was a Grand
Lodge in England, and, of course, there could have been no Quarterly
Communications. Therefore, as there had not been a previous life, there
could have been no revival, but that the Grand Lodge established in June,
1717, was a new invention, and the introduction of a system or plan of
Freemasonry never before heard of or seen.

Which of these two hypotheses is the correct one, or whether there is not
a mezzo termine - a middle point or just mean between the two - are
questions well worthy of examination.

Let us first inquire what was the character of the four Lodges, and indeed
of all the lodges in England which were in existence at the time of the so-
called "Revival," or had existed at any previous time. What was the
authority under which they acted, what was their character, and how was
this character affected by the establishment of a new Grand Lodge ?

As to the authority under which the four old lodges, as well as all others
that existed in England, acted, it must be admitted that they derived that
authority from no power outside of themselves "The authority," says Bro.
Hughan, "by which they worked prior to the advent of the Grand Lodge
was their own. We know of no other prior to that period for England." (1)

Preston admits that previous to the year 1717 "a sufficient number of
Masons met together within a certain district, with the consent of the
sheriff or chief magistrate of the place, were empowered to make Masons
and practice the rites of Masonry without Warrant of Constitution.'' (2)

Bro. Hughan substantially repeats this statement in the follow ing
language:

"A body of Masons in any district or town appear usually to have
congregated and formed lodges, and they had the 'Ancient Charges' or
Rolls to guide them as to the rules and regulations for Masons generally.
There were no Grand Masters or Grand Lodges before 1716-17, and so
there were no authorities excepting such as the annual assemblies and
the 'Old Charges' furnished in England."


(1) See Voice of Masonry, vol. xiii., p. 571.
(2) Preston's "Illustrations," p. 191, note.


He admits that "there were laws for the government of the lodges
apparently, though unwritten, which were duly observed by the
brotherhood."

This view is confirmed, impliedly, at least, by all the Old Constitutions in
manuscript, from the most ancient to the most recent. In none of these
(and the last of them has a date which is only three years prior to the so-
called " Revival") do we find any reference whatever to a Grand Lodge or
to a Grand Master. ldut they repeatedly speak of lodges in which Masons
were to be " accepted," and the counsels of which were to be kept secret
by the Fellows.

The only allusion made to the manner of organizing a lodge is contained
in the Harleian MS., which prescribes that it must consist of not less than
five Freemasons, one of whom must be a master or warden of the limit or
division wherein the lodge is held.

From this regulation we are authorized, I think, to conclude, that in 1670,
which is the date of the Harleian MS., nothing more was necessary in
forming a lodge in which "to make Masons or practice the rites of
Masonry," as Preston gives the phrase, than that a requisite number
should be present, with a Master or Warden working in that locality.

Now the Master, as the word is here used, meant a Freemason of the
highest rank, who was engaged in building with workmen under him, and
a Warden was one who having passed out of his apprenticeship, had
become a Fellow and was invested with an authority over the other
Fellows, inferior only to that of the Master. The word and the office are
recognized in the early English Charters as pertaining to the ancient
guilds. Thus the Charters granted in 1354 by Edward III. gave the London
Companies the privilege to elect annually for their government "a certain
number of Wardens." In 1377 an oath was prescribed called the "Oath of
the Wardens of the Crafts," which contained these words: "Ye shall swere
that ye shall wele and treuly oversee the Craft of ____ whereof ye be
chosen Wardeyns for the year." In the reign of Elizabeth the presiding
officer began to be called the Master, and in the reign of James I.,
between 1603 and 1625, the guilds were generally governed by a Master
and Wardens. The government of lodges by a Master and Wardens must
have been introduced into the guilds of Masons in the 17th century, and
this is rendered probable by the fact that in the Harleian MS. just quoted,
and whose coniectural date is 1670, it is provided "that for the future the
sayd Society, Company and Fraternity of Free Masons shall be regulated
and governed by One Master & Assembly & Wardens as the said
Company shall think to choose, at every yearely General Assembly."

A similar officer in the Sullen or Lodges of the old German Freemasons
was called the Parlirer.

We arrive, then, at the conclusion that in the 17th century, while there
were permanent lodges in various places which were presided over by a
Master and Wardens, any five Freemasons might open a temporary or
"occasional" lodge for the admission of members of the Craft, provided
one of these five was either the Master or a Warden of a permanent lodge
in the neighborhood.

I know of no other way of reasonably interpreting the 26th article
contained in the Harleian Constitutions.

But nowhere, in any of the Old Constitutions, before or after the Harleian,
even as late as 1714, which is the date of the Papworth MS., do we find
the slightest allusion to any exterior authority which was required to
constitute either permanent or temporary lodges.

The statement of Preston is thus fully sustained by the concurrent
testimony of the old manuscripts. Therefore, when Anderson in his first
edition gives the form of constituting a new lodge and says that it is
"according to the ancient usages of Masonry," (1) he indulges in a
rhetorical flourish that has no foundation in truth. There is no evidence of
the slightest historical value that any such usage existed before the
second decade of the 18th century.

But immediately after what is called the Revival the system of forming
lodges which had been practiced was entirely changed. Preston says that
among a variety of regulations which were proposed and agreed to at the
meeting in 1717, was the following:

"That the privilege of assembling as Masons, which had been hitherto
unlimited, should be vested in certain lodges or assemblies of Masons
convened in certain places; and that every lodge to be hereafter
convened, except the four old lodges at this time existing, should be
legally authorized to act by a warrant from the Grand Master for the time
being granted to certain individuals by petition, with the consent and
approbation of the Grand Lodge in communication;


(1) Anderson's "Constitutions," 1st edition, p. 71.


and that without such warrant no lodge should be hereafter deemed
regular or constitutional." (1)

We have this regulation on the evidence of Preston alone, for according
to the unfortunate usage of our early Masonic writers, he cites no
authority. It is not mentioned by Anderson, and the preserved minutes of
the Grand Lodge of England extend no farther than the 25th of November,
1723.

Still, as Preston gives it within quotation marks, and as it bears internal
evidence in its phraseology of having been a formal regulation adopted at
or very near the period to which Preston assigns it, we may accept it as
authentic and suppose that he had access to sources of information no
longer extant. As the Grand Lodge was organized in 1717 in the rooms of
the lodge of which Preston afterward became a member, it is very
possible that that lodge may have had in its possession the full records of
that meeting, which were in existence when Preston wrote, but have since
been lost. (2)

At all events the "General Regulations," compiled by Grand Master Payne
in 1720, and approved the next year by the Grand Lodge, contain a
similar provision in the following words:

"If any set or number of Masons shall take upon themselves to form a
lodge without the Grand Master's warrant, the regular lodges are not to
countenance them, nor own them as fair Brethren and duly formed, nor
approve of their acts and deeds; but must treat them as rebels, until they
humble themselves, as the Grand Master shall, in his prudence, direct;
and until he approve of them by his warrant."  (3)

If we compare the usage by which lodges were brought into existence
under the wholly Operative rules, and that adopted by the Speculative
Freemasons after the organization of the Grand Lodge in 1717, we will
very clearly see that there was here no revival of an old system which had
fallen into decay and disuse, but the invention of one that was entirely
new and never before heard of.

The next point to be examined in discussing the question whether


(1) Preston, "Illustrations," p. 191.
(2) Findel ("History," p. 140), says the regulation was adopted at a later
period, in 1723 This he had no right to do. Preston is our only authority for
the regulation, and his statement must be taken without qualification or
wholly rejected. Findel was probably led into his error by seeing the
General Regulation above quoted, which was very similar This was
published in 1723, but it had been adopted by the Grand Lodge in 1721.
(3) "General Regulations," art. viii. Anderson, 1st edition, p. 60.


or not the transactions of 1717 constituted a Revival will be the character
of the lodges before and after those transactions as compared with each
other.

During the 17th century, to go no farther back, and up to the second
decade of the 18th, all the lodges of Freemasons in England were
Operative lodges, that is to say, the larger portion of their members were
working Masons, engaged in building according to certain principles of
architecture with which they alone were acquainted.

They had admitted among their members persons of rank or learning who
were not Operative Masons or builders by profession, but all their laws
and regulations were applicable to a society of mechanics or workingmen.

There are no minutes in England, as there are in Scotland, of lodges prior
to the beginning of the 18th century. They have all been lost, and the only
one remaining is that of the Alnwick Lodge, the records of which begin in
the year 1701.

But the "Old Charges" contained in the manuscript Constitutions which
extend from 1390 to 1714, of which more than twenty have been
preserved, supply us (especially the later ones of the 17th century) with
the regulations by which the Craft was governed during the ante-revival
period.

It is unnecessary to quote in extenso any one of these Old Constitutions.
It is sufficient to say that they bear the strongest internal evidence that
they were compiled for the use of purely Operative Masons.

They were wholly inapplicable to any merely moral or speculative
association. Excepting those clauses which directed how the craftsmen
were to conduct themselves both in the lodge and out of it, so that the
reputation of the Brotherhood should not be injured, they were mainly
engaged in prescribing how the Masons should labor in their art of
building, so that the employer might be "truly served." The same
regulations would be just as applicable, mutatis mutandis, to a Guild of
Carpenters, of Smiths, or any other mechanical trade, as to one of
Masons.

But while these lodges were wholly Operative in their character and
design, there is abundant evidence, as I have heretofore shown, that they
admitted into their companionship persons who were not Masons by
profession. The article in the Harleian Constitutions, to which reference
has just been made, while stating that a lodge called to make a Mason
must consist of five Free Masons, adds that one of them at least shall be
"of the trade of Free Masonry." The other four, of course, might be non-
operatives, that is to say, persons of rank, wealth, or learning who were
sometimes called Theoretic and sometimes Gentlemen Masons.

But in the laws enacted for the government of the Craft, no exceptional
provision was made in them, by which any difference was created in the
privileges of the two classes.

The admission of these Theoretic Masons into the Fraternity did not,
therefore, in the slightest degree affect the Operative character of the
Craft, except in so far as that the friendly collision with men of education
must have given to the less educated members a portion of refinement
that could not fail to elevate them above the other Craft Guilds.

Yet so intimate was the connection between these Operative Freemasons
and their successors, the Speculatives, that the code of laws prepared in
1721 by Anderson at the direction of the Grand Lodge, and published in
1723, under the title of The Charges of a Free-Mason, for the use of the
Lodges in London, was a transcript with no important variations from
these Old Constitutions, or as Anderson calls them, the "Old Gothic
Constitutions."

As these "Charges" have now been accepted by the modern Fraternity of
English-speaking Freemasons as the basis of what are called the
Landmarks of the Order, to make them of any use it has been found
absolutely necessary to give them a symbolic or figurative sense.

Thus, "to work," which in the Operative Constitution signifies "to build," is
interpreted in the Speculative system as meaning "to confer degrees;" the
clause which prescribes that "all the tools used in working shall be
approved by the Grand Lodge" is interpreted as denoting that the ritual,
ceremonies, and by-laws of every lodge must be subjected to the
supervision of the Grand Lodge. Thus every regulation which clearly
referred to a fraternity of builders has, in the course of the modifications
which were necessary to render it applicable to a moral association, been
made to adopt a figurative sense.

Yet the significant fact that while in the government of Speculative
Freemasonry the spirit and meaning of these "Old Charges" have been
entirely altered, the words have been carefully retained is an important
and irrefutable proof that the Speculative system is the direct successor of
the Operative.

So when the Theoretic or Gentleman Masons had, in the close of the 17th
and the beginning of the 18th century, acquired such a preponderance in
numbers and in influence in the London lodges that they were able so to
affect the character of those lodges as to divert them from the practice of
an Operative art to the pursuit of a Speculative science, such change
could not be called a Revival, if we respected the meaning of that word.
Nothing of the kind had been known before; and when the members of the
lodges ceased to pay any attention to the craft or mystery of practical
stonemasonry, and resolved to treat it thenceforth in a purely symbolic
sense, this act could be deemed nothing else but a new departure in the
career of Freemasonry.

The ship was still there, but the object of the voyage had been changed.

Again: we find a third change in the character of the Masonic society
when we compare the general government of the Craft as it appears
before and after the year 1717.

This change is particularly striking in respect to the way in which the Craft
were ruled in their Operative days, compared with the system which was
adopted by the Speculative Freemasons.

It has already been said that prior to the year 1717, there never were
Grand Masters or a Grand Lodge except such as were mythically
constructed by the romantic genius of Dr. Anderson.

The only historical records that we have of the condition of Freemasonry
in England and of the usages of the Craft during the three centuries which
preceded the 18th, are to be found in the old manuscript Constitutions.

A thoroughly careful examination of these documents will show that
neither in the Legend of the Craft, which constitutes the introductory
portion of each Constitution, nor in the "Charges" which follow, is there
the slightest allusion, either in direct language or by implication, to the
office of Grand Master or to the body now called a Grand Lodge.

But it can not be denied that there was an annual convocation of the
Craft, which was called sometimes the "Congregations" sometimes the
"Assembly," and sometimes the "General Assembly." We must accept this
as an historical fact, or we must repudiate all the manuscript Constitutions
from the 14th to the 18th century. In all of them there is an unmistakable
allusion to this annual convocation of the Craft, and regulations are made
concerning attendance on it.

Thus the Halliwell MS. says that "every Master who is a Mason must be
present at the general congregation if he is duly informed where the
assembly is to be holden; and to that assembly he must go unless he
have a reasonable excuse."

The precise words of this most ancient of all the Old Masonic
Constitutions, dating, as it does, not later than toward the close of the
14th century, are as follows:

That every mayster, that ys a mason,
Must ben at the generate congregracyon,
So that he hyt reasonably y-tolde
Where that the semble' schal be holde;
And to that semble' he must nede gon,
But he have a resonabul skwsacyon.

The Cooke MS., which is about a century later, has a similar provision.
This manuscript is important, inasmuch as it describes the character of
the Assembly and defines the purposes for which it was to be convoked.

It states that the Assembly, or, as it is there called, the Congregation,
shall assemble once a year, or at least once in three years, for the
examination of Master Masons, to see that they possessed sufficient skill
and knowledge in their art.

An important admission in this manuscript is that the regulation for the
government of this Assembly "is written and taught in our book of
charges."

All the subsequent Constitutions make a similar statement in words that
do not substantially vary.

The Harleian MS., whose date is about the last quarter of the 17th
century, says that Euclid gave the admonition that the Masons were to
assemble once a year to take counsel how the Craft could best work so
as to serve their Lord and Master for his profit and their credit, and to
correct such as had offended. And in another MS., much earlier than the
Harleian, it is said that the Freemasons should attend the Assembly, and
if any had trespassed against the Craft, he should there abide the award
of the Masters and Fellows.

This Assembly met that statutes or regulations might be enacted for the
government of the Craft, and that controversies between the craftsmen
might be determined.

It was both a legislative and a judicial body, and in these respects
resembled the Grand Lodge of the present day, but in no other way was
there any similitude between the two.

Now, leaving out of the question the legendary parts which ascribe the
origin of this annual assembly to Euclid or Athelstan or Prince Edwin,
which, of course, are of no historical authority, it is impossible to believe
that all these Constitutions should speak of the existence of such an
Assembly at the time of writing, and lay down a regulation in the most
positive terms, that every Mason should attend it, if the whole were a
mere figment of the imagination.

We can account for the mythical character of a legend, but we cannot for
the mythical character of a law which has been enacted at a specified
time for the government of an association, which law continues to be
repeated in all the copies of the statutes written or published for more
than three centuries continuously.

In the establishment of a Grand Lodge with quarterly meetings and an
annual one in which a Grand Master and other Grand Ofiicers were
elected for the following year, we find no analogy to anything that had
existed previous to the year 1717. We cannot, therefore, in these points
call the organization which took place in. that year a "Revival." It was,
rather, a radical change in the construction of the system.

Another change, and a very important one, too, which occurred a short
time after the establishment of the Grand Lodge of England in 1717, was
that which had reference to the ritual or forms of initiation. During the
purely Operative period of Freemasonry it is now well known that there
was but one esoteric system of admission to the brotherhood of the Craft.
This we also know was common to the three classes of Masters, Fellows,
and Apprentices. There was, in fact, if we may use the technical language
of modern Freemasonry, but one degree practiced by the Operative Craft.

When the Theoretic members of the London lodges dissociated from the
Operatives in the year 1717 and formed the Speculative system, they, of
course, at first accepted the old method of admission. But in the course of
two or three vears they adopted another system and fabricated what are
now called the three degrees of ancient Craft Masonry, each one of which
was exclusively appropriated as a form of initiation to one of the three
classes and to that one only. What had formerly been a division of the
Fraternity into three classes or ranks became now a division into three
degrees. (1)

This was a most important change, and as nothing of the kind was known
to the Craft in the years prior to the establishment of the Grand Lodge, it
certainly can not be considered a correct use of the word to call an entire
change of a system and the adoption of a new one a revival of the old.

Bro. W.P. Buchan, in numerous articles published in the London
Freemason, about 1870, attacked what has been called the Revival
theory with much vigor but with exaggerated views. He contends that "our
system of degrees, words, grips, signs, etc., was not in existence until
about A.D. 1717, and he attributes the present system to the inventive
genius of Anderson and Desaguliers. Hence he contends that modern
Freemasonry was simply a reconstruction of an ancient society, viz., of
some old Pagan philosophy. This he more fully explains in these words:

"Before the 18th century we had a renaissance of Pagan architecture;
then to follow suit in the 18th century we had a renaissance in a new
dress of Pagan mysticism; but for neither are we indebted to the
Operative Masons, although the Operative Masons were made use of in
both cases." (2)

There is in this statement a mixture of truth and error. It is undoubtedly
true that the three degrees into which the system is now divided were
unknown to the Freemasons of the 17th century, and that they were an
invention of those scholars who organized the Grand Lodge of
Speculative Freemasonry, mainly of Dr. Desaguliers, assisted perhaps by
Anderson and Payne. But there were signs of recognition, methods of
government, legends, and some form, though a simple one of initiation,
which were in existence prior to the 18th century, which formed the kernel
of the more elaborate system of the modern Freemasons.

Bro. Hughan calls attention to the fact, if there were need of


(1) it is not necessary to enter at this time into an examination and
defense of this hypothesis, as the history of the fabrication of the three
degrees will be made the subject of a future chapter.
(2) London Freemason, September 29, 1871.


proofs, in addition to what has been found in the authentic accounts of the
mediaeval Freemasons, that in the Tatler, published in 1709, is a
passage in which the writer, speaking of a class of men called the "Pretty
Fellows," says that "they have their signs and tokens like the
Freemasons."  (1)

In fact, Bro. Buchan admits that the "elements or ground work" of the
system existed before the year 1717.

This is in fact the only hypothesis that can be successfully maintained on
the subject.

The Grand Lodge of Speculative Freemasons, which was organized at
the "Goose and Gridiron Tavern" in London in the year 1717, was a new
system, founded on the older one which had existed in England years
before, and which had been derived from the Operative Freemasons of
the Middle Ages.

It was not, as Hyneman (2) has called it, a Revolution, for that would
indicate a violent disruption, and a sudden and entire change of
principles.

It was not a Revival, as most of the earlier writers have entitled it, for we
should thus infer that the new system was only a renewal without change
of the old one.

But it was a gradual transition from an old into a new system - of
Operative into Speculative Freemasonry - in which Transition the later
system has been built upon the earlier, and the practical art of building
has been spiritualized into a theoretic science of morality, illustrated by a
symbolism drawn principally from architecture.

We thus recognize the regular descent of the modern Speculative
Freemasons from their older Operative predecessors, and we answer the
question which forms the heading of the present chapter.

But it has been said that in one sense at least we may with propriety
apply the word "Revival" to the transactions of the early part of the 18th
century. Operative Freemasonry, and what very little of the Speculative
element that had been engrafted on it, had, we are told, begun to decline
in England in the latter part of the 17th century.


(1) Voice of Masonry, April, 1873.
(2) In a work abounding in errors, entitled "Ancient York and London
Grand Lodges," by Lem Hyneman, Philadelphia, 1872. Its fallacies as a
contribution to Masonic history have been shown bv the incisive but
courteous criticism of Bro. Hughan.


If we may rely on the authority of Preston, the fraternity at the time of the
revolution in 1688 was so much reduced in the south of England, that no
more than seven regular lodges met in London and its suburbs, of which
two only were worthy of notice. (1) Anderson mentions seven by their
locality, and says that there were "some more that assembled statedly."
(2)

These were, of course, all purely Operative lodges. Thus one of them,
Anderson tells us, was called upon to give architectural counsel as to the
best design of rebuilding St. Thomas's Hospital, (3) a clear evidence that
its members were practical builders.

But this decline in the number of the lodges may possibly be attributed to
local and temporary causes. It was certainly not accompanied, as might
have been expected, with a corresponding decline in the popularity of the
institution, for if we may believe the same authority, " at a general
assembly and feast of the Masons in 1697, many noble and eminent
brethren were present."  (4)

But admitting that there was a decline, it was simply a decline of the
Operative lodges. And the act of 1717 was not to revive them, but
eventually to extinguish them and to establish Speculative lodges in their
place; nor was it to revive Operative Freemasonry, but to establish for it
another and an entirely different institution.

We arrive, therefore, again at the legitimate conclusion that the
establishment of the Grand Lodge of England in June, 1717, was not a
revival of the old system of Freemasonry, which soon after became
extinct, but its change into a new system.

What remained of the Operative Freemasons who did go into the new
association were merged in the Masons' Company, or acted
fhenceforward as individual craftsmen unconnected with a guild.


(1) Preston, "Illustrations.
(2) Anderson, "Constitutions," 2d edition, p. 107.
(3) Ibid., p. 106.
(4) Preston, " Illustrations," p. 189.





CHAPTER XXXI

THE EARLY YEARS OF SPECULATIVE FREEMASONRY IN ENGLAND


In the feast of St. John the Baptist, the 24th of June, in the year 1717, the
principal members of the four old Operative Lodges in London, who had
previously met in February and agreed to constitute a Grand Lodge of
Free and Accepted Masons, assembled at the "Goose and Gridiron
Tavern" in St. Paul's Churchyard with some other old Masons, and there
and then organized the new Grand Lodge.

This was accomplished by electing a Grand Master and two Grand
Wardens, after which the Brethren proceeded to partake of a dinner, a
custom which has ever since been continued under the name of the
Grand Feast.

As the written minutes in the record book of the Grand Lodge do not
begin before November, 1723, we are indebted for all that we know of the
transactions on that eventful day to the meager account contained in the
2d edition of Dr. Anderson's Constitutions, with a few additional details
which are given by Preston in his Illustrations.

Preston cites no authority for the facts which he has stated. But as the
meeting of the Grand Lodge was held in the room of the lodge which
afterward became the Lodge of Antiquity, and of which Preston was a
prominent member, it is not improbable that some draft of those early
proceedings may have been contained in the archives of that lodge,
which have been since lost. To these Preston would naturally, from his
connection with the lodge, have had access. If such were the case, it is
very certain that he must have made use of them in compiling his history.

I am disposed, therefore, from these circumstances, together with the
consideration of the character of Preston, to accept his statements as
authentic, though they are unsupported by any contemporary authority
now extant. (1)

The first indication of a change, though not purposely intended, by which
the Operative system was to become eventually a Speculative one, is
seen in the election as presiding officers of three persons who were not
Operative Masons.

Mr. Anthony Sayer, the first Grand Master, is described by Anderson in
his record of the election by the legal title of "Gentleman," a title which, by
the laws of honor, was bestowed upon one who can live without manual
labor and can support himself without interfering in any mechanical
employment. Such a person, say the heralds, "is called Mr., and may write
himself Gentleman." (2)

"Anthony Sayer, Gentleman," as he is described in the record, was
undoubtedly a mere Theoretic member of the Masonic association and
not an Operative Mason.

Of the two Grand Wardens who were elected at the same time, one was
Captain Joseph Elliot. Of his social position we have no further
knowledge that what is conveyed by the title prefixed to his name, which
would indicate that he was of the military profession, probably a retired or
half-pay officer of the army.

The other Grand Warden was Mr. Jacob Lamball, who is designated as
being a Carpenter.

Thus we see that the first three officers of the Grand Lodge were not
Operative members of the Craft of Masonry.

The choice, however, of a Carpenter, a profession closely connected with
that of the Masons, affords proof that it was not intended to confine the
future Speculative society altogether to persons who were not mechanics.

At the succeeding election in 1718 George Payne, Esq., was elected
Grand Master. He was an Antiquary and scholar of considerable ability,
and was well calculated to represent the Speculative character of the new
association.

The Wardens were Mr. John Cordwell and Mr. Thomas Morrice. The
former is described as a Carpenter and the latter as a Stonecutter.


(1) Preston is, however, sometimes careless, a charge to which all the
early Masonic writers are amenable. Thus, he says that Sayer appointed
his Wardens. But these officers were, like the Grand Master, elected until
1721, when, for the first time, they were appointed by the Grand Master.
(2) "Laws of Honor," p. 286.


While the choice of these officers was an evident concession to the old
Operative element, the election of Payne was a step forward in the
progressive movement which a few years afterward led to the total
emancipation of Speculative Freemasonry from all connection with
practical building. Northouck attests that "to the active zeal of Grand
Master Payne the Society are under a lasting obligation for introducing
brethren of noble rank into the fraternity." (1)

From the very beginning the Grand Lodge had confined its selection of
Grand Masters to persons of good social position, of learning, or of rank,
though for a few years it occasionally conferred the Grand Wardenship on
Operative Masons or on craftsmen of other trades.

In the year 1719 Dr. John Theophilus Desaguliers was elected Grand
Master, and Anthony Sayer and Thomas Morrice Grand Wardens.
Desaguliers was a natural philosopher of much reputation and a Fellow of
the Royal Society. Sayer had been the first Grand Master, and Morrice,
who was a stonecutter or Operative Mason, had been a Warden the
previous year.

In 1720 Payne was again elected Grand Master, and Thomas Hobby and
Richard Ware were chosen as Grand Wardens. Hobby, like his
predecessor, Morrice, was an Operative Mason or stonecutter, and Ware
was a mathematician.

In 1721 the Duke of Montagu was elected Grand Master. He was the first
nobleman who had served in that capacity, and from that day to the
present the throne of the Grand Lodge of England, as it is technically
styled, has without a single exception been occupied by persons of royal
or noble rank.

In this year the office of Deputy Grand Master was created, and the power
of choosing him as well as the Grand Wardens was taken from the Grand
Lodge and invested in the Grand Master, a law which still continues in
force.

Accordingly, the Duke of Montagu appointed John Beal, a physician, his
Deputy, and Josiah Villeneau, who was an upholsterer, and again
Thomas Morrice, his Wardens.

The Duke of Wharton, who was Grand Master in 1722, appointed Dr.
Desaguliers his Deputy, and Joshua Timson and James


(1) Northouck's " Constitutions anno 1784," p. 207. Entick
("Constitutions," 1756, p. 190) had made a similar remark.


Anderson his Wardens. Timson was a blacksmith and Anderson a
clergyman, well-known afterward as the Compiler of the first and second
editions of the Book of Constitutions.

In 1723 the Earl of Dalkeith was Grand Master, Desaguliers again
Deputy, and Francis Sorrel, Esq., and John Senex, a bookseller,
Wardens.

From 1717 to 1722 the claims of the Operative Masons to hold a share of
the offices had, as Gould (1) remarks, been fairly recognized. The
appointment of Stonecutters, Carpenters, and other mechanics as Grand
Wardens had been a concession by the Speculative members to the old
Operative element.

But in 1723 the struggle between the two, which is noticed in the records
of the society only by its results, terminated in the complete victory of the
former, who from that time restricted the offices to persons of rank, of
influence, or of learning. From the year 1723 no Operative Mason or
workman of any trade was ever appointed as a Warden. In the language
of Gould, "they could justly complain of their total supercession in the
offices of the society.

This silent progress of events shows very clearly how the Freemasons
who founded the Speculative Grand Lodge in 1717 on the principles and
practices of Operative Freemasonry as they prevailed in the four Lodges
of London, gradually worked themselves out of all connection with their
Operative brethren and eventually made Freemasonry what it now is, a
purely Speculative, philosophical, and moral institution.

Upon the coalition of the four Lodges into one supervising body, the next
step in the progress to pure Speculative Freemasonry was to prevent the
formation of other lodges which might be independent of the supervision
of the Grand Lodge, and thus present an obstacle to the completion of the
reformation.

This could only be accomplished by a voluntary relinquishment, on the
part of the four Lodges, of their independency and an abandonment of
their privileges.

The conference at the "Apple Tree Tavern" in February, 1717, and that at
the "Goose and Gridiron" in June of the same year, were what, at the
present day, would be called mass-meetings of the


(1) "Four Old Lodges," p. 33.


Craft. They resembled in that respect the General Assembly spoken of in
the old manuscript Constitutions, and every Freemason was required to
attend if it were held within a reasonable distance, (1) and if he had no
satisfactory excuse for his absence.

Attendance at these conferences which resulted in the establishment of
the Grand Lodge was open, not only to all the members of the four
Lodges, but to other Masons who were not, to use a modern phrase,
affiliated with any one of them.

"The Lodges," that is, the members of them, says Anderson, "with some
old Brothers." Preston calls them more distinctively Some other old
Brethren." Both of these phrases, of course, indicate that these "old
Brethren" were not among the members of the four Lodges, but were
Freemasons who had either, on account of their age, retired from active
participation in the labors of the Craft, or who had been members of other
lodges which were then extinct.

At the preliminary meeting in February, they voted, says Preston, "the
oldest Master Mason then present into the Chair." Anderson, writing in
1738, adds "now the Master of a Lodge," by which I suppose he meant
that the oldest Master Mason who presided in 1717 became in 1738 the
Master of a Lodge. I know of no other way of interpreting the significance
of the particle "now." They then "constituted themselves a Grand Lodge
pro tempore in due form."

This "due form," I think, could have amounted to no more than a formal
declaration of the intention to establish a Grand Lodge, which intention
was carried out in the following June by the election of a Grand Master
and Wardens.

The Freemasons of America are familiar with the methods pursued in the
organization of a Grand Lodge in a territory where none had previously
existed. Here a certain number of lodges, not less than three, assemble
through their three principal officers and constitute a Convention, which
proceeds to the election of a Grand Master and other officers, directs the
lodges to surrender the Warrants under which they had been working to
the Grand Lodges from which they had originally received them, and then
issues new ones. The new Grand Lodge thus becomes " an accomplished
fact."


(1) In most of the Constitutions that distance is defined to be not more
than fifty miles.


But this was not the method adopted in the establishment of the Grand
Lodge of England in the year 1717. Instead of the representation of the
four Lodges being restricted to the Masters and Wardens of each, all the
members, down to the youngest Entered Apprentice, together with
Masons who were not affiliated with any lodge, met together.

The chair, according to Preston, in the preliminary meeting in February
had been taken by the oldest Master Mason present. At this meeting the
oldest Master Mason, who at the same time was Master of one of the four
Lodges, presided. Then the Grand Lodge was duly organized by the
election of its first three officers.

But now it became necessary to secure the sovereignty of the new Grand
Lodge as the future supervising body of the Craft, and to prevent any
additional lodges being established without its authority, so that the
system might be perfected in the future according to the method which
was originally designed by its founders.

Almost the first regulation which was adopted at the meeting in June,
1717, was to effect this object.

Hitherto, as we have already seen, the Operative Freemasons possessed
a privilege derived from the Old Constitutions of the Guild (and which is
formally enunciated in the Harleian MS.) of assembling in lodges for the
purpose of "making Masons" under very simple provisions. There was no
necessity for a Warrant or permission from a superior Masonic body to
make such an assembly legal.

But now it was resolved that this privilege should be abolished. No
number of Masons were hereafter to assemble as a lodge without the
consent of the Grand Lodge, expressed by the granting of a Warrant of
Constitution or Charter authorizing them to constitute or form themselves
into a lodge. Without such Warrant, says Preston, no lodge should
hereafter be deemed regular or constitutional.

From this regulation, however, the four Lodges which had cooperated in
the formation of the Grand Lodge were excepted. They, so long as they
existed, were to be the only lodges working without a Warrant and
deriving their authority to do so from "immemorial usage."

The effect of this regulation was to throw an insurmountable obstacle in
the way of any new lodge being formed which was not Speculative in its
character and in perfect accord with the new system, from whose
founders or their successors it was to derive its existence.

Hence it was the most fatal blow that had as yet been struck against the
continuance of the Guild of purely Operative Freemasonry. No purely
Operative nor half Operative and half Speculative lodges, we may be
sure, would thereafter be erected.

From this time all lodges were to consist of Speculative Freemasons only
and were to form a part of the new non-Operative system, of which the
first organized Grand Lodge was the head and exercised the sovereign
power.

It is true that Preston tells us that long before this period a regulation had
been adopted by which "the privileges of Masonry should no longer be
restricted to Operative Masons," but allowed to men of various
professions; and it is also well known that there hardly ever was a time in
the history of Operative Freemasonry when Theoretic or non-Operative
persons were not admitted into the guild.

But this was taking a step farther, and a very long step, too. Membership
in the new society was no longer a privilege extended by courtesy to
Theoretic Masons. It was to be a franchise of which they alone were to be
possessors. Operative Masons, merely as such, were to be excluded. In
other words, no Operative Mason was to be admitted into the Fraternity
because he was an Operative. He was, on his admission, to lay aside his
profession, and unite with the others in the furtherance of the purely
Speculative design of the Institution.

So it has continued to the present day, and so it must continue as long as
the system of Speculative Freemasonry shall last. Operative
Freemasonry, "wounded in the house of its friends," has never covered
from the blow thus inflicted.

Operative Masonry, for building purposes, still lives and must always live
to serve the needs of man.

But Operative Freemasonry, as a Guild, is irrecoverably dead.

It is impossible to say for how long a time the meetings of the Grand
Lodge continued to be attended by all the members of the particular
lodges, or, in other words, when these assemblies ceased, like those of
the old Operative Freemasons, to be mass-meetings of the Craft.

But the rapidly growing popularity of the new Order must have rendered
such meetings very inconvenient from the increase of members.

Anderson says that in 1718 Several old Brothers that had neglected the
Craft visited the lodges; some noblemen were also made Brothers and
more new lodges were constituted." (1)

Northouck, writing in reference to the same period, says that the Free and
Accepted Masons "now began visibly to gather strength as a body," (2)
and we are told that at the annual feast in 1721 the number of lodges had
so increased (3) that the General Assembly required more room, and
therefore the Grand Lodge was on that occasion removed to Stationers'
Hall, nor did it ever afterward return to its old quarters at the "Goose and
Gridiron Tavern."

This unwieldiness of numbers would alone be sufficient to suggest the
convenience of changing the constitution of the Grand Lodge from a
mass-meeting of the Fraternity into a representative body.

This was effected by the passage of a regulation dispensing with the
attendance of the whole of the Craft at the annual meeting, and
authorizing each lodge to be represented by its Master and two Wardens.

We have no positive knowledge of the exact date when this regulation
was adopted. It first appears in the "General Regulations" which were
compiled by Grand Master Payne in 1720, and approved by the Grand
Lodge in 1721. The twelfth of these Regulations is in these words:

"The Grand Lodge consists of, and is formed by, the Masters and
Wardens of all the regular, particular lodges upon record, with the Grand
Master at their head, and his Deputy on his left hand, and the Grand
Wardens in their proper places."

Preston says that the Grand Lodge having resolved that the four old
Lodges should retain every privilege which they had collectively enjoyed
by virtue of their immemorial rights, the members considered their
attendance on the future Communications of the Grand Lodge
unnecessary. They "therefore, like the other lodges, trusted implicitly to
their Master and Wardens, resting satisfied


(1) Anderson, "Constitutions," 2d ed., p. 110.
(2) Northouck, "Constitutions," p. 207.
(3) There were at that time twenty lodges, and the number of Freemasons
who attended the annual meetings and feast was one hundred and fifty.


that no measure of importance would be adopted without their
approbation." (1)

But he adds that the officers of the four old Lodges "soon began to
discover" that the new lodges might in time outnumber the old ones and
encroach upon their privileges. They therefore formed a code of laws, the
last clause of which provided that the Grand Lodge in making any new
regulations should be bound by a careful observation of the old
landmarks.

It is unfortunate that in treating this early period of Masonic history
Preston should be so careless and confused in his chronology as to
compel us to depend very much upon inference in settling the sequence
of events.

It may, however, I think, be inferred from the remarks of Preston, and from
what little we can collect from Anderson's brief notices, that the Grand
Lodge continued to be a mass-meeting, attended by all the Craft, until the
annual feast on the 24th of June, 1721. At that communication Anderson
records that the Grand Lodge was composed of "Grand Master with
hisWardens, the former Grand officers, and the Master and Wardens of
the twelve lodges." (2) In all subsequent records he mentions the number
of lodges which were represented by their officers, though the Grand
Feast still continued to be attended by as many Masons as desired to
partake of the dinner and, I suppose, were willing to pay their scot. (3)

It was, therefore, I think, not till 1721 that the Grand Lodge assumed that
form which made it a representative body, consisting of the Masters and
Wardens of the particular lodges, together with the officers of the Grand
Lodge.

That form has ever since been retained in the organization of every
Grand Lodge that has directly or indirectly emanated from the original
body.

This was another significant token of the total disseverance that was
steadily taking place between the Operative and the Speculative systems.

Hitherto we have been occupied with the consideration of the


(1) "Illustrations," p. 193
(2) "Constitutions," 2d edition, p. 112.
(3) The only qualification for attendance on the feast was that the guests
must be Masons: therefore waiting brethren were appointed to attend the
tables, "for that no strangers must be there." - "Constitutions," 2d ed., p.
112.



transactions recorded as having taken place at the annual meetings. We
are now to inquire when these meetings began to be supple. mented by
Quarterly Communications.

Here an historical question presents itself, which, so far as I am aware,
has not been distinctly met and treated by any of our Masonic scholars.
They all seem to have taken it for granted on the naked authority of
Anderson and Preston, that the Quarterly Communications were coeval
with the organization of the Grand Lodge in the year 1717

Is this an historical fact? I confess that on this subject a shadow of doubt
has been cast that obscures my clearness of vision.

Anderson says, and Preston repeats the statement, that at the preliminary
meeting in February, 1717, at the "Apple Tree Tavern," it was resolved if
to revive the Quarterly Communications."

But these two authorities (and they are the only ones that we have on the
subject) differ in some of the details. And these differences are important
enough to throw a doubt on the truth of the statement.

Anderson says in one place that in February, 1717, they "forthwith revived
the Quarterly Communications of the officers of lodges called the Grand
Lodge." (1)

Afterward he says that at the meeting in June, 1717, Grand Master Sayer
"commanded the Masters and Wardens of lodges to meet the Grand
officers every quarter in communication, at the place he should appoint in
his summons sent by the Tyler." (2)

Preston says that in February "it was resolved to revive the Quarterly
Communications of the Fraternity." (3) Immediately after he adds that in
June the Grand Master "commanded the Brethren of the four Lodges to
meet him and his Wardens quarterly in communication." (4)

Thus, according to Preston, the Quarterly Communications were to apply
to the whole body of the Fraternity; but Anderson restricted them to the
Masters and Wardens of the lodges.

The two statements are irreconcilable. A mass-meeting of the whole
Fraternity and a consultation of the Masters and Wardens of the lodges
are very different things.

But both are in error in saying that the Quarterly Communications


(1) Anderson, " Constitutions," 2d edition, p. 109
(2) Ibid., p. 110.
(3) Preston, " Illustrations," p. 191.
(4) Ibid.


"were revived," for there is no notice of or allusion to Quarterly
Communications in any of the old records which speak only of an annual
General Assembly of the Craft, and sometimes perhaps occasional
assemblies for special purposes.

There can be no doubt that such was the usage among the English
mediaeval guilds, a usage which must have been applicable to the
Freemasons as well as to other Crafts. "The distinction," says J. Toulmin
Smith, "between the gatherings (congregations) and general meetings
(assemblies) is seen at a glance in most of the ordinances. The guild
brethren were bound to gather together, at unfixed times, for special
purposes; but besides these gatherings upon special summons, general
meetings of the guilds were held on fixed days in every year for the
election of officers, holding their feasts, etc." (1)

I do not see any analogy in these gatherings of local guilds to the
Quarterly Communications of the Grand Lodge spoken of by Anderson.
The analogy is rather to the monthly meetings of the particular lodges as
contrasted with the annual meeting of the Grand Lodge.

But if, as Anderson and Preston say, the Quarterly Communications were
"forthwith revived" in 1717, it is singular that there is no record of any one
having been held until December, 1720. After that date we find the
Quarterly Communications regularly recorded by Anderson as taking
place at the times appointed in the Regulations which were compiled in
1720 by Grand Master Payne, namely, "about Michaelmas, Christmas,
and Lady Day," that is, in September, December, and March.

The word "about" in the 12th Regulation permitted some latitude as to the
precise day of meeting.

Accordingly, we find that Quarterly Communications were held in 1721 in
March, September, and December; in 1722, in March, but the others
appeared to have been neglected, perhaps in consequence of
irregularities attendant on the illegal election of the Duke of Wharton; in
1723 there were Quarterly Communications in April and November, and
the December meeting was postponed to the following January; in 1724
they occurred in February and November; in 1725 in May, November, and
December, and so on, but with greater regularity, in all the subsequent
proceedings of the Grand Lodge as recorded in the Book of Constitutions
by Anderson,


(1) "English Guilds," p. 128, note.


son, and by his successors Entick and Northouck in the subsequent
editions.

Looking at the silence or the records in respect to Quarterly
Communications from 1717 to 1720; then to the regular appear ance of
such records after that year, and seeing that in the latter year the
provision for them was first inserted in the General Regulations compiled
at that time by Grand Master Payne, I trust that I shall not be deemed too
skeptical or too hypercritical, if I confess my doubt of the accuracy of
Anderson, who has, whether wilfully or carelessly, I will not say, attributed
the establishment of these Quarterly Communications to Grand Master
Sayer, when the honor, if there be any, properly belongs to Grand Master
Payne.

The next subject that will attract our attention in this sketch of the early
history of the Grand Lodge, is the method in which the laws which
regulated the original Operative system were gradually modified and at
length completely changed so as to be appropriate to the peculiar needs
of a wholly Speculative Society.

When the four old Lodges united, in the year 1717, in organizing a Grand
Lodge, it is very evident that the only laws which governed them must
have been the "Charges" contained in the manuscript Constitutions or
such private regulations adopted by the lodges, as were conformable to
them.

There was no other Masonic jurisprudence known to the Operative
Freemasons of England, at the beginning of the 18th century, than that
which was embodied in these old Constitutions. These were familiar to the
Operative Freemasons of that day, as they had been for centuries before
to their predecessors.

Though never printed, copies of them in manuscript were common and
were easily accessible. They were often copied, one from another - just
as often, probably, as the wants of a new lodge might require.

Beginning at the end of the 14th century, which is the date of the poetical
Constitutions, which were first published by Mr. Halliwell, copies
continued to be made until the year 1714, which is the date of the last one
now extant, executed before the organization of the Grand Lodge. (1)


(1) I take no notice here of the Krause MS., which pretends to contain the
Constitutions enacted by Prince Edwin, in 926, because I have not the
least doubt that it is a forgery of comparatively recent times.


Now in all these written Constitutions, extending through a period of more
than three centuries, there is a very wonderful con. formity of character.

The poetic form which exists in the Halliwell MS. was apparently never
imitated, and all the subsequent manuscript Constitutions now extant are
in prose. But as Bro. Woodford has justly observed, they all "seem in fact
to be clearly derived from the Masonic Poem, though naturally altered in
their prose form, and expanded and modified through transmission and
oral tradition, as well as by the lapse of time and the change of
circumstances." (1)

While these old constitutions contained, with hardly any appreciable
variation, the Legend of the Craft, which was conscientiously believed by
the old Operative Free Masons as containing the true history of the rise
and progress of the brotherhood, they embodied also that code of laws by
which the fraternity was governed during the whole period of its existence.

Though these Constitutions commenced, so far as we have any
knowledge of them from personal inspection, at the close of the 14th
century, we are not to admit that there were no earlier copies. Indeed, I
have formerly shown that the Halliwell Poem, whose conjectural date is
1390, is evidently a compilation from two other poems of an earlier date.

The Freemasons who were contemporary with the organization of the
Grand Lodge held those old manuscript Constitutions, as their
predecessors had done before them, in the greatest reverence. The fact
that the laws which they prescribed, like those of the Medes and
Persians, had invested them with the luster of antiquity, and as they had
always remained written, and had never been printed, the Craft looked
upon them as their peculiar property and gave to them much of an
esoteric character.

This false estimate of the true nature of these documents led to an
inexcusable and irreparable destruction of many of them.

Grand Master Payne had in I718 desired the brethren to bring to the
Grand Lodge "any old writings and records concerning Masons and
Masonry in order to show the usages of ancient times." (2) These, it was
suspected, were to be used in the preparation and publication of a
contemplated Book of Masonic Constitutions, and the


(1) Preface to Hughan's "Old Charges of British Freemasons," p. 13.
(2) Anderson, "Constitutions," 2d edition, p. 110.


Masons became alarmed at the threatened publicity of what they had
always deemed to be secret.

Accordingly, in 1720, "at some private lodges," says Anderson, "several
valuable manuscripts (for they had nothing yet in print) concerning their
lodges, Regulations, Charges, Secrets, and Usages (particularly one writ
by Mr. Nicholas Stone, the Warden of Inigo Jones) were too hastily burnt
by some scrupulous brothers, that those papers might not fall into strange
hands." (1)

Northouck, commenting on this instance of vandalism, which he strangely
styles an act of felo de se, says that it surely "could not proceed from zeal
according to knowledge."

Of course, it was zeal without knowledge that led to this destruction, the
effects of which are felt at this day by every scholar who attempts to write
an authentic history of Freemasonry.

The object of Grand Master Payne in attempting to make a -collection of
these old writings was undoubtedly to enable him to frame a code of laws
which should be founded on what Anderson calls the Gothic
Constitutions. Several copies of these Constitutions were produced in the
year 1718 and collated.

The result of this collation was the production which under the title of "The
Charges of a Free-Mason" was appended to the first edition of the Book
of Constitutions.

This is the first code of laws enacted by the Speculative Grand Lodge of
England, and thus becomes important as an historical document.

As to the date and the authorship we have no other guide than that of
inference.

There can, however, be little hesitation in ascribing the authorship to
Payne and the time of the compilation to the period of his first Grand
Mastership, which extended from June, 1718, to June, 1719.

In the title to these "Charges" it is said that they have been "extracted
from the ancient records of lodges beyond sea and of those in England,
Scotland, and Ireland, for the use of the lodges in London."

Now this admirably coincides with the passage in Anderson in which it is
said that at the request of Grand Master Payne, in the


(1) Anderson, "Constitutions," 2d edition, p. 111.


year 1718, "several old copies of the Gothic Constitutions were produced
and collated."

In fact, we thus identify the collation of the Gothic Constitutions in 1718
with the "Charges of a Free-Mason," published in the first edition of the
Book of Constitutions.

Nor do I feel any hesitation in ascribing this collation of the old
Constitutions and the compilation, out of it, of the "Charges" to Payne,
whose genius lay in that way and who again exercised it, two years
afterward, in the compilation of the "General Regulations," which took the
place of the "Charges" as the law of the Speculative Grand Lodge.

The valuable services of George Payne in the incipient era of Speculative
Freemasonry have not received from our historians the appreciation
which is their just due. His reputation has been overshadowed by that of
Desaguliers. Both labored much and successfully for the infant institution.
But we should never forget that the work of Payne in the formation of its
jurisprudence was as important as was that of Desaguliers in the
fabrication of its ritual. (1)

But to resume the history of the progress of Masonic law.

The adoption in 1718 of the "Charges of a Free-Mason," with the direction
that they shall be read as the existing law of the fraternity" at the making
of new brethren," (2) is a very significant proof of what has before been
suggested that at the time of the so-called "Revival" there was no positive
intention to wholly dissever the Speculative from the Operative system.

These "Charges" are, as they must necessarily have been, originating as
they did in the Old Constitutions, a code of regulations adapted only to a
fraternity of Operative Freemasons and wholly inapplicable to a society of
Speculatives, such as the institution afterward became.

Thus Masters were not to receive Apprentices unless they had sufficient
employment for them; the Master was to oversee the


(1) Dr. Oliver very inaccurately says in his "Revelations of a Square" that
"at the annual assembly on St. John's day, 1721, Desaguliers produced
thirty-eight regulations," but distinctly states that these regulations were
"compiled first by Mr. George Payne, anno 1720, when he was Grand
Master, and approved by the Grand Lodge on St. John Baptist's day,
anno 1721." The venerable doctor had here forgotten the Ciceronian
axiom - suum cuique tribuere.
(2) See the title of the "Charges" in the first edition of the "Book of
Constitutions," p. 49.


lord's or employer's work, and was to be chosen from the most expert of
the Fellow-Crafts; the Master was to undertake the lord's work for
reasonable pay; no one was to receive more wages than he deserved; the
Master and the Masons were to receive their wages meekly; were to
honestly finish their work and not to put them to task which had been
accustomed to journey; nor was one Mason to supplant another in his
work.

The Operative feature is very plain in these regulations. They are, it is
true, supplemented by other regulations as to conduct in the lodge, in the
presence of strangers, and at home; and these are as applicable to a
Speculative as they are to an Operative Mason.

But the whole spirit, and, for the most part, the very language of these
"Charges," is found in the Old Constitutions of the Operative Masons.

They have, however, been always accepted as the foundation of the law
of Speculative Masonry, though originally adopted at a time when the
society had not yet completely thrown over its Operative character.

But to apply them to an exposition of the laws of Speculative
Freemasonry, and to make them applicant to the government of the Order
in its purely Speculative condition, modern Masonic jurists have found it
necessary to give to the language of the "Charges" a figurative or
symbolic signification, a process that I suspect was not contemplated by
Payne or his contemporaries.

Thus, to work, is now interpreted as meaning to practice the ritual. The
lodge is at work when it is conferring a degree. To receive wages is to be
advanced from a lowes to a higher degree. To supplant another in his
work, is for one lodge to interfere with the candidates of another.

In this way statutes intended originally for the government of a body of
workmen have by judicial ingenuity been rendered applicable to a society
of moralists.

The adoption of these "Charges" was a concession to the Operative
element of the new society. The Grand Lodge of 1717 was the successor
or the outcome of an old and different association. It brought into its
organization the relics of that oid association, nor was it prepared in its
inchoate condition to cast aside all the usages and habits of that ancient
body.

Hence the first laws enacted by the Speculative Grand Lodge were
borrowed from and founded on the manuscript Constitutions of the
Operative Freemasons.

But the inapplicability of such a system of government to the new
organization was very soon discovered.

Two years afterward Payne, untiring in his efforts to perfect the institution,
which had honored him twice with its highest office, compiled a new code
which was perfectly applicable to a Speculative society.

This new code, under the title of the "General Regulations," was compiled
by Payne in 1720, and having been approved by the Grand Lodge in
1721, was inserted in the first edition of the Book of Constitutions,
published in 1723.

Anderson says that he "has compared them with and reduced them to the
ancient records and immemorial usages of the Fraternity, and digested
them into this new method with several proper explications for the use of
the lodges in and about London and Westminster. (1)

There certainly is some evidence of the handiwork of Anderson in some
interpolations which must have been of a later date than that of the
original compilation. (2) But as a body of law, it must be considered as the
work of Payne.

This code has ever since remained as the groundwork or basis of the
system of Masonic jurisprudence. Very few modifications have ever been
made in its principles. Additional laws have been since enacted, not only
by the mother Grand Lodge, but by those which have emanated from it,
but the spirit of the original code has always been respected and
preserved. In fact, it has been regarded almost in the light of a set of
landmarks, whose sanctity could not legally be violated.

George Payne, the second and fourth Grand Master of the Grand Lodge
of England, is therefore justly entitled to the distinguished reputation of
being the lawgiver of modern Freemasonry.

If we compare the Charges adopted in 1718 with the Regulations
approved in 1721, we will be struck with the great change that


(1) Title prefixed to the General Regulations, in 1st edition of "Book of
Constitutions," p. 58.
(2) This subject will be more fully discussed, and some of these
interpolations will be pointed out, when we come, in a future chapter, to
the consideration of the fabrication of the degrees.


must have taken place in the constitution and character of a society that
thus necessitated so important a modification in its principles of
government.

The "Charges" were, as has already been shown, applicable to an
association in which the Operative element preponderated. The
Regulations are appropriate to one wholly Speculative in its design, and
from which the Operative element has been thoroughly eliminated.

The adoption of the Regulations in 1721 was therefore an irrefutable
proof that at that period the Grand Lodge and the lodges under its
jurisdiction had entirely severed all connection with Operative
Freemasonry.

We may, indeed, make this the epoch to which we are to assign the real
birth of pure Speculative Freemasonry in England.

There were, however, many lodges outside of the London limit which still
preserved the Operative character, and many years elapsed before the
Speculative system was universally disseminated throughout the
kingdom.

The minutes of a few of them have been preserved or recovered after
having been lost, and they exhibit for the most part, as late as the middle
of the 18th century, the characteristics which distinguished all English
Masonic lodges before the establishment of the Grand Lodge. Their
membership consisted of an admixture of Operative and Theoretic
Masons. But the business of the lodge was directed to the necessities
and inclinations of the former class.

A common feature in these minutes is the record of the indentures of
Apprentices for seven years, to Master Masons who were members of the
lodge.

Speculative Freemasonry, which took rapid growth in London after its
severance from the Operative lodges, made slower progress in the
provinces.

Of the rapidity of growth in the city and its suburbs we have every
satisfactory evidence in the increase of lodges as shown in the official
lists which were printed at occasional periods.

Thus, in 1717, as we have seen, there were but four Lodges engaged in
the organization of the Grand Lodge.

These were the only Lodges then in London. At least no evidence has
ever been produced that there were any others. These were all original
Operative lodges.

Anderson says that "more new lodges were constituted" in 1719.

If he had been accurate in the use of his language, the qualifying adverb
"more" would indicate that "new lodges" had also been constituted the
year before.

In June, 1721, twelve lodges were represented in the Grand Lodge by
their Masters and Wardens, showing, if there were no absentees, that
eight new lodges had been added to the Fraternity since 1717.

In September of the same year Anderson records the presence of the
representatives of sixteen lodges. Either four new lodges had been added
to the list between June and September, or what is more likely, some
were absent in the meeting of the former month.

In March, 1722, the officers of twenty-four lodges are recorded as being
present, and in April, 1723, the number had increased to thirty.

But the number of lodges stated by Anderson to have been represented
at the Communications of the Grand Lodge does not appear to furnish
any absolute criterion of the number of lodges in existence. Thus, while
the records show that in April, 1723, thirty lodges were represented in the
Grand Lodge, the names of the Masters and Wardens of only twenty
lodges are signed to the approbation of the Book of Constitutions, which
is appended to the first edition of that work published in the same year.

Bro. Gould calls this "the first List of Lodges ever printed," (1) but I deem
it unworthy of that title, if by a "List of Lodges" is meant a roll of all those
actually in existence at the time. Now, if this were a correct list of the
lodges which were on the roll of the Grand Lodge at the time, what has
become of the ten necessary to make up the number of thirty which are
reported to have been represented in April, 1723, besides some others
which we may suppose to have been absent ?

Anderson did not think it worth while to explain the incongruity, but from
1723 onward we have no further difficulty in tracing the numerical
progress of the lodges and incidentally the increase in the number of
members of the Fraternity.

Engraved lists of lodges began in 1723 to be published by authority of the
Grand Lodge, and to the correctness of these we may safely trust, as
showing the general progress of the Institution.


(1) The "Four Old Lodges," p. 2.


The first of these lists is "printed for and sold by Eman Bowen, Engraver,
in Aldersgate St." It purports to be a list of lodges in 1723, and the
number of them amounts to fifty-one. In 1725 Pine, who was in some way
connected, it is supposed, with Bowen, issued a list for 1725, which
contains, not the names, for the lodges at that time had no names, but the
taverns or places of meeting of sixtyfour lodges, fifty-six of which were in
London or its vicinity.

On November 27, 1723, the Grand Lodge commenced in its minute-book
an official list of the lodges, which seems, says Bro. Gould, "to have been
continued until 1729." The lodges are entered, says the same authority, in
ledger form, two lodges to a page, and beneath them appear the names
of members.

This list contains seventy-seven lodges. Supposing, as Gould does, that
the list extended to 1729, it shows an increase in twelve years of seventy-
three lodges, without counting the lodges which had become extinct or
been merged into other lodges.

In the next official list contained in the minute-book of the Grand Lodge,
and which extends to 1732, the number of lodges enumerated is one
hundred and two, or an increase in fifteen years of ninety-eight lodges,
again leaving out the extinct ones.

These examples are sufficient to show the steady and rapid growth of the
society during the period of its infancy.

There is, however, another historical point which demands consideration.
At what time did the formal constitution of lodges begin ?

It is at this day a settled law and practice, that before a lodge of Masons
can take its position as one of the constituent members of a Grand Lodge,
a certain form or ceremony must be undergone by which it acquires all its
legal rights. This form or ceremony is called its Constitution, and the
authority for this must emanate from the Grand Lodge, either directly, as
in America, or indirectly, through the Grand Master, as in England, and is
called the Warrant or Constitution.

The Constitutions of the Grand Lodge of England, which are in force at
the present day, say: " In order to avoid irregularities, every new lodge
should be solemnly constituted by the Grand Master with his Deputy and
Wardens." (1)


(1) "Constitutions of the Ancient Fraternity of Free and Accepted
Masons," p.124.


This regulation has been in force at least since January, 1723, the very
words of the clause above quoted having been taken from the form of
constitution practiced by the Duke of Wharton, who was Grand Master in
that year, and which form is appended to the first edition of the Book of
Constitutions.

Anderson says that in 1719 "more new lodges were constituted; " (1) and
Preston states that at the meeting of the Grand Lodge in 1717 a
regulation was agreed to that "every lodge, except the four old Lodges at
this time existing, should be legally authorized to act by a warrant from
the Grand Master for the time being, granted to certain individuals by
petition, with the consent and approbation of the Grand Lodge in
communication; and that without such warrant no lodge should be
hereafter deemed regular or constitutional."  (2)

Now I think that on the establishment of the new Grand Lodge, when the
only lodge then existing in London had united in the enterprise of
modifying their old and decaying system, and of renovating and
strengthening it by a closer union, it may be fairly conceded that the
members must, at a very early period, have come to the agreement that
no new members should be admitted into the society unless consent had
been previously obtained for their admission. This would naturally be the
course pursued by any association for the purpose of self-preservation
from the annoyance of uncongenial companions.

If any number of craftsmen availing themselves of the privilege of
assembling as Masons in a lodge, which privilege had hitherto been
unlimited and, as Preston says, was inherent in them as individuals, and
which was guaranteed to them by the old Operative Constitutions, there
is, I think, no doubt that such a lodge would not have been admitted into
the new Fraternity in consequence of this spontaneous and automatic
formation.

The new society would not recognize it as a part of its organization, at
least until it had made an application and been accepted as a co-partner
in the concern.

The primitive lodges which are said by Anderson to have been
"constituted" between the years 1717 and 1723 may or may not have
originated in this way. There is no record one way or the other.


(1) Anderson, "Constitutions." 2d edition, p. 110.
(2) "Illustrations," p. 192


But it is, I think, very certain that the present method of constituting
lodges was not adopted until a regulation to that effect was enacted in
1721. This regulation is found among those which were compiled by
Payne in 1720, and approved the following year by the Grand Lodge.

It is a part of the eighth regulation, and it prescribes that "if any Set or
Number of Masons shall take upon themselves to form a lodge without the
Grand Master's warrant, the regular lodges are not to countenance them
nor own them as fair brethren and duly formed" until the Grand Master
"approve of them by his warrant, which must be specified to the other
lodges, as the custom is when a new lodge is to be registered in the list of
lodges."

This regulation was followed in 1723 by a form or "manner of constituting
new lodges," which was practiced by the Duke of Wharton when Grand
Master, and which was probably composed for him by Dr. Desaguliers,
who was his Deputy.

It would seem, then, that new lodges were not constituted by warrant until
the year 1721, the date of the Regulation, nor constituted in form until
1723, during the administration of the Duke of Wharton. Prior to that time,
if we may infer from the phraseology of the Regulation, lodges when
accepted as regular were said to be "formed," and were registered in the
"List of Lodges." (1)

This presumption derives plausibility from the authentic records of the
period.

In the earlier "Lists of Lodges" authoritatively issued, there is no mention
of the date of Constitution of the lodges. In all the later lists the date of
Constitution is given. In none of them, however, is there a record of any
lodge having been constituted prior to the year 1721. Thus, in Pine's list
for 1740, engraved by order of the Grand Officers, and which contains the
names and numbers of one hundred and eighty-one lodges, four are
recorded as having been constituted in 1721, five in 1722, and fourteen in
1723. No lodge is recorded there as having been constituted between the
years 1717 and 1721.


(1) In an article published in Mackey's National Freemason in 1873 (vol.
ii., p. 288), Bro. Hughan has said "that it is a fact that no constituted lodge
dates at an earlier period than the Revival of Masonry, 1717." I suspect
my learned brother wrote these lines currente calamo, and without his
usual caution. It will be seen from the text that there is no record of any
constituted lodge dating prior to 1721.


It is, then, very clear that the system of constituting lodges was not
adopted until the latter year; that it was another result of the legal labors
of Payne in legislating for the new society, and another and an important
step in the disseverance of Speculative from Operative Freemasonry.

We next approach the important and highly interesting subject of the early
ritual of the new institution. But this will demand for its thorough
consideration and full discussion the employment of a distinct chapter.