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CHARLES THEODORE GALLAGHER 1851-1919

CharlesGallagher1903.jpg

Deputy Grand Master, 1899
Grand Master, 1900-1902


TERM

1900 1901 1902

NOTES

BIOGRAPHY

From New England Craftsman, Vol. I, No. 7, April 1906, Page 221:

Most Worshipful Brother was born May 21, 1851 in South Boston, his parents having removed there from Dorchester some years before. He was educated in the public schools.

He took the first year's course at the Harvard Law School, receiving his degree as L. L. B. in Boston University Law School. He received the degree of A. M. in Dartmouth College. He studied law with the Hon. A. A. Ranney and was admitted to the bar in 1875. While a boy, in 1864, he served three months as drummer boy in the first unattached company of Massachusetts Volunteers.

He has always been prominently connected with South Boston interests and institutions, being for many years a trustee and on the board of investment of the South Boston Savings Bank, a director in the Mechanics' National Bank until its removal to Boston, connected with and attorney for the South Boston railroad till its consolidation with other street railroad corporations. He has been interested and active in many business, social and educational enterprises, among which may be mentioned: trustee of the Bird school fund and the John Hawes fund, under the latter managing a most flourishing evening school, where free-hand, mechanical, yacht and ship drafting, modelling in clay, drawing from life, water-color painting and short-hand writing are taught. He has taken an active interest in the schools of Boston and was for twelve years a member of the school board, serving on important committees, and four years presiding as its president. He is a trustee of Boston University, of Dartmouth College educational association and of the Franklin Fund of Boston, He is a manager of the Farm School at Thompson Island, a director of Dorchester Mutual Fire Insurance Company and of the Commercial Tow Boat Company one of whose boats is named for him.

He is a member of the executive council of the Boston Bar Association, a member of the Republican Club, the Exchange, Algonquin and University Clubs, and of the Boston Art club, of which he was president several years. In his profession, Brother Gallagher occupies a high place won by the wisdom of his council and integrity of his conduct. Although alive to the political interests of his city he has been unwilling to engage in contest for its offices. He served as senator in the legislature of 1882. He has been long prominent in Freemasonry and has done mud for its good name and material prosperity. He is a member of St Paul's Lodge of South Boston in which he was initiated December 2, 1873. He was Worshipful Master of the same in 1878 and 1879. He was Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts 1900-02. He was commissioner of trials In the Grand Lodge for several years and ha been for a long time a member of the board of directors. He is a Knight Templar and a thirty-third degree Mason. Brother Gallagher is an able and interesting speaker equally at home at the festive board or on occasions of dignified deliberation, his pleasing voice, his gracious manner and his eloquent words never fail to engage our closest attention or win our warm st admiration.


MEMORIAL

FROM PROCEEDINGS, 1919

From Proceedings, Page 1919-345, Grand Master's Address:

Since our last Quarterly Communication in, September Freemasonry has suffered a great loss in the passing away of one of its bright and shining lights. There are few if any members of our order more widely known or more generally ]loved and respected than was Most 'Worshipful Brother Charles Theodore Gallagher. He died on Sunday, September 28, at his home in Roxbury. Although for some years his intimate friends have known that he was not in the enjoyment of good heal&, the news of his death came as a great shock. A memorial will be presented by a committee at the Stated Communication, December 29.

No one can estimate or measure the value of his long and splendid service to Masonry. From his very first membership in this Grand Lodge, when he was an officer in Saint Paul's Lodge, of South Boston, he was especially devoted to it. Many biographical and historical a,ddresses and articles were delivered or published by him, and our printed Proceedings bear convincing testimony of his zeal and Masonic learning. He was a member of all the Masonic bodies of the York and Scottish Rite, and at the time of his passing away was one of the four Active 33° members of the Supreme Council from Massachusetts, and also Deputy for the State. He was Grand Master of the Grand Lodge in 1900, 1901, and 1902, and for many years has been a member of its Board of Directors.

My relations with him in recent years have been so close and intimate that a deep sense of personal loss makes words but too poor vehicles of tribute to his memory. It is in the silent chambers of thought and in the nobler resolves of grateful hearts that the lives of such men are truly honored.-

"No step is on the conscious floor !
Yet Love will dream and Faith will trust,
(Sinee He who knows our need is just)
That somehow, somewhere meet we must.
Alas for him who never sees
The stars shine through his cypress trees !
Who, hopeless, lays his dead away,
Nor looks to see the breaking clay
Across the mournful marbles play !
Who hath not learned, in hours of faith,
The truth to flesh and sense unknown,
That Life is ever lord of Death
And Love can never lose its own."

From Proceedings, Page 1919-452:

The assertion that "Death loves a shining mark" seldom meets with stronger confirmation than when in the early evening of Sunday, the twenty-eighth of September last, Charles T. Gallagher - widely honored and beloved - was numbered with those who have passed, from our earthly association.

Born in South :Boston Mar. 21, 1851, he entered life richly endowed, for his father was a man of inflexible integrity - a descendant of one, of the soldiers of Cromwell and his mother a woman of unusual brilliancy and intellect whose ancestors had fought in our Revolutionary War and in that of 1812.

That mother passed from earth while he was yet a babe in arms, but his father married two years later, an estimable woman descended from Mayflower stock and blessed with sound New England sense, and her training was the foundation upon which was reared the, sterling, character of later years.

When Brother Gallagher was but thirteen years of age the blood o{ hrs soldierly forebears asserted itself and in patriotic response to the call of the immortal Lincoln and the Union cause, he enlisted as a drummer boy in the United State Army and at the close of the war he continued his service with the Tenth and First Regiments of the Massachusetts Militia.

He organized the first Drum Corps in the Boston School Regiment in 1865, and in 1868 he was Captain of the Company which won the prize for excellence of drill. Brother Gallagher was a studious youth, and at an early age he had read extensively, his special delight being biography and history, and later in life he added to the natural richness of his mind by years of travel and study abroad, and the degree of A.M. was bestowed. upon him by Dartmouth College in 1894.

It was the desire of his father that he should enter the legal profession arid, although deterred for a while by ill health, he took up a course at Harvard and later at Boston University Law School, from which he graduated in 1875 with the degree of LL.B., being admitted to practice in Massachusetts the same year and in the United States Supreme Court in 1882. During the larger part of his professional life he was engaged. in civil trials and he participated in many important cases, but later he devoted his attention to corporation matters and the trusteeship of estates.

His law practice was wide and lucrative, but he found time for active participation in important industries and he fiIled many positions of honor and. responsibility in public affairs. The business and art and education of the old Bay State owe much to his interest and his wise counsel.

He was Vice-President and Director of the Commercial Tow Boat Company; Director of the Dana Hardware Company; Director of the Gilchrist Company ; Trustee and Vice-President of the South Boston Savings Bank; Director of the Dorchester Mutual Fire Insurance Company; Director at one time in a National Bank, two Trust Companies, a Railroad and a Life Insurance Company. He was a Director of the Boston Legal Aid Society; Trustee of the Roxbury Latin School; Trustee and Vice-President of the Dartmouth Educational Association; Trustee of Boston University; Trustee of the Farm and Trades School, and Trustee of the South Boston School of Art.

Twelve years he was a member of the Boston School Committee, and four years he was President of the Board. He was a Trustee of the Boston Art Commission; a Trustee of the Benjamin Franklin Fund; a member of the Suffolk County Court House Commission; a member of the Boston Chamber of Commerce; a member of the Museum of Fine Arts; a member of the Massachusetts State Senate in 1882; a member of the Webster Historical Society, and a member of the Bunker Hill Monument Association.

He was also Attorney of the South Boston Railroad and a Trustee of the Bird School, and notwithstanding all these demands upon his time and talent, he was a Director of the Algonquin Club; he was five years President of the Art CIub; he was one of the Executive. Committee of the University Club; an officer of the Boston Bar Association; a member of the Exchange Club, the Boston Athletic, and the Curtis Clubs; the Bostonian Society; the Massachusetts Historical Society; The Young Men's Christian Union; the Camden, Maine, Yacht and Golf Clubs, the Seapuit Golf Club of Osterville, and a charter and active member of Dahlgren Post No. 2, Grand Army of the Republic.

Brother Gallagher was a Republican in politics and was a delegate to the National Convention in 1884.

In religion he was a Unitarian, a regular attendant at the old Eliot Church in Roxbury and a Trustee of the Hawes Church in South Boston.

He was married in 1880 to Nellie A. Allen of Scituate, a direct descendant of Peregrine White, the first white child born in New England. The widow and three children - Capt. Merrill A. Gallagher, Miss Emily Gallagher, and Mrs. Alvin Morrison survive. He also leaves four brothers- William, Edwin, Sears, and Percival, and one sister- Mrs. Burnham.

Brother Gallagher's Masonic record was as follows: He was raised in Saint Paul's Lodge, of South Boston, on December 2, 1873, and was Worshipful Master in 1878 and 1879. He was Commissioner of Trials in the Grand Lodge for twenty years; Grand Director of the Corporation for a long period, Deputy Grand Master in 1899, and. Grand Master in 1900, 1901, and 1902.

He received the Royal Arch Degree in St. Matthew's Chapter November 13, 1899; the. Super Excellent in Roxbury Council November 26, 1900, and the Order of the Temple in St. Omer Commandery November 20, 1899. He was admitted to Massachusetts Consistory December 22, 1899; crowned a Sovereign Grand Inspector General 33° of the Northern Jurisdiction, September 18, 1900; elected an Active Member of the Supreme Council September 16, 1903, and at the time of his death he was Illustrious Deputy for Massachusetts and Most Illustrious Commander-in-Chief of the District.

What a busy, useful, and many-sided life! What a remarkable embodiment of genius and ability ! What a loss to this community and to the world ! From whatever angle we look upon Brother Gallagher he rises preeminent.

He was one of the school of lawyers who have given Massachusetts its reputation. By his strong personality, his wise counsel, his brilliant mind, his inflexible integrity and his indefatigable zeal and labor he has built for himself an enduring place in our institution and our personal love and has sent far abroad an influence that tells and will continue to tell most effectually for all that is best in our American civilization.

Rooted and grounded in honor, he stood ever firm to his convictions and naught could swerve him from the course which duty dictated that he should follow. He set for himself the highest standard of character, and he was intolerant only of what he deemed to be pernicious.

This Grand Lodge, the Scottish Rite, and all our Masonic bodies owe to him a debt beyond our reckoning. For many years we enjoyed the benefit of his professional training and knowledge and he transacted a vast amount of legal business for us, in court and out, without fee or reward, and this gift from his hand, together with the many biographical and historical papers he prepared in our behalf and his wise assistance in the shaping of our polity and action, mark him as one to whom we are under lasting obligation.

As Brothers and Masons we lay upon his bier the wreath of a gratitude and appreciation that knows no bounds. We shall ever continue to revere his memory and bless his name.

On every golden page of time,
'Writ large, so all the Craft may see,
Masonic Brethren have inscribed
Their faith in immortality.

We mourn when we are called to part
With men most manly tried, and true;
But look with trust to Lodge above,
Where ties of earth we shall renew.

'We bow our heads a while today,
A prince has fallen at our side!
We hear it whispered that "Our Chief,
Our foremost Counsellor has died."

Believe it not ! He laid aside
The earthly garment that he wore,
But he, our Brother, leader, friend,
Lives on, loves on forevermore.

Sound not the "Taps" - the call of night,
But rather sound the "Reveille";
For toward the morning has he gone,
Toward larger life that is to be.

Respectfuily submitted,
Edwin B. Holmes,
J. Albert Blake,
Dana J. Flanders

FROM COUNCIL OF DELIBERATION, 1920

From Proceedings of the Massachusetts Council of Deliberation AASR NMJ, 1920, Page 31:

Charles Theodore Gallagher was born in South Boston, May 21, 1851, and died in Roxbury, September 28, 1919. He came of the best old New England stock, his father being a descendant of one of Cromwell’s Ironsides and his mother a descendant of a family which had furnished soldiers in the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812. His mother died during his infancy, but he was fortunate in his stepmother, a most admirable woman, herself a descendant of Mayflower stock. Blessed thus in heredity and environment the lad grew to manhood, worthily responding to these good influences.

At the early age of thirteen he enlisted in the army of the Union as a drummer boy and served until the close of the war. With the return of peace he did not altogether lay aside his military interests, serving for several years in the Tenth and First Regiments of the Massachusetts militia.

From early life he was studious, showing particular interest in history and biography. Wide reading, a studious habit which never left him, and years of foreign travel and study, filled his mind with those stores of learning which were so freely drawn upon for the many historical addresses and papers with which he enriched the Craft and other organizations with which he was connected.

Early destined for the law by his father’s wish and his own desire, his legal studies were delayed by ill health, but he finally achieved his purpose and received the degree of Bachelor of Laws from Boston University in 1875. He was admitted to the Massachusetts Bar in 1875 and to practice before the Supreme Court of the United States in 1882. He gave his attention during the greater part of his life to civil cases, handling many of an important nature. His later practice consisted largely of corporation and trust affairs.

As befitted a man of such ancestry as his, ho was not content to be merely a successful legal practitioner. He was eminently a good citizen, interested and active in all that made for the betterment of society and the welfare of his fellow citizens. Education was one of his great interests. Twelve years a member of the Boston School Committee, one year its president, Trustee of the Farm and Trades School, Trustee of Boston University, Trustee of the Roxbury Latin School, Trustee of the Dartmouth Educational Association, — these are a few of the evidences of his keen interest in education.

Art, social life, and business profited by his activities. A mere list of the positions held by him on Boards of Directors and of Trustees is bewildering in the manifold activities which it suggests. One wonders how he ever found time for the discharge of the duties of his profession, so full were his days and nights of these numerous and varied interests.

When we add to this his extensive and varied Masonic services this wonder deepens. For many years he was a leading figure in Masonry, not only as the strong prop and support of the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts, but as an Active Member of the Supreme Council of the Scottish Rite for the Northern Masonic Jurisdiction.

His Masonic record is as follows:

  • He was raised in St. Paul's Lodge, of South Boston, on December 2, 1873, and was Worshipful Master in 1878 and 1879.
  • He was Commissioner of Trials in the Grand Lodge for twenty years; Grand Director of the Corporation for a long period, Deputy Grand Master in 1899, and Grand Master in 1900, 1901, and 1902.
  • He received the Royal Arch degree in St. Matthew’s Chapter November 13, 1899; the Super Excellent in Roxbury Council November 26, 1900, and the Order of the Temple in St. Omer Commandcry November 20, 1899.
  • He was admitted to Massachusetts Consistory, December 22, 1899; crowned a Sovereign Grand Inspector General, 33°, of the Northern Jurisdiction, September 18, 1900; elected an Active Member of the Supreme Council September 16, 1903, and at the time of his death he was Illustrious Deputy for Massachusetts and Most Illustrious Commander-in-Chief of the District.

This dry schedule, however, gives no adequate idea of the vibrant energy and extensive influence of Brother Gallagher. His administration as Grand Master was distinguished and brilliant, even in comparison with the great, line of Massachusetts Grand Masters. His activity did not cease with the laying down of office, but as a Director of the Grand Lodge he did splendid service up to the very end of his life. He not only aided by his advice, but he gratuitiously conducted legal affairs of moment to the Grand Lodge.

Illustrious Brother Gallagher left a wife, a son, and two daughters. His son survived him but a few months.

Brother Gallagher was buried from the First Church (Unitarian) in Roxbury of which he had long been a devoted and helpful member.

So passed from mortal sight one of the brightest souls within our circle of friends and brothers. His good work remains as an enduring monument. His memory is a precious heritage. His example is an enduring inspiration.

Respectfully submitted,
Leon M. Abbott, 33°
Frederick W. Hamilton, 33°
Arthur G. Pollard, 33°

SPEECHES

AT HALL DEDICATION FOR BELMONT LODGE, OCTOBER 1899

From Proceedings, Page 1899-90:

WORSHIPFUL MASTER AND BRETHREN: What pleasing considerations attend our present convention! Our memory naturally turns to the period of 1864, when a handful of Brethren, inspired with a love for our Order, constituted your Belmont Lodge, then in humble circumstances. Contrast it with this year 1899, thirty-five years after, when you meet with increased numbers, and in this comfortable and spacious Lodge-room, so thoroughly equipped and so beautifully decorated.

The parallel that suggests itself to our mind at this time is that at the former date we were on the last year of a war where Brother had striven against Brother of the same nation, and where suffering and mourning had been carried into thousands of households, both North and South. Our country, particularly the South, had felt the effects of the war that had "rushed through like a hurricane," that "like an army of locusts bad devoured the land." "The war had fallen like a water-spout and deluged the land with blood;" the smoke that had formerly risen peacefully through the trees of the grove then "rose from villages burned with fire and from blackened ruins spread over the naked land." But peace soon followed, as it has followed the war through which we have just emerged; peace, lovely peace, lovely as her children, where the farmer finds his barns filled with plenty," and the peasant laughs at the approach of winter."

How different the contrast between the two wars! The former one of fratricidal strife for the settlement of a great constitutional difference of opinion; the latter having for its result the subjugation of a nation which for centuries had been the opponent of every progressive, educational and civilizing idea. The Institution of Masonry has cause for congratulation that this, its enemy, has been brought low; this empire "flown with glory and swollen with pride," that has to its credit the destruction of the Aztec civilization, with its temples and ancient inscriptions in Mexico, and of the Moorish civilization, with its high development of the arts and sciences in Spain; this empire that attempted the destruction of the Republic of the Netherlands, the home of liberty and freedom of thought and conscience for the whole world; this empire that with its Armada sought to change the course of civilization, and reduce Protestant England, the fostering home of Freemasonry, to its own condition of ignorance, intolerance and bigotry.

Freemasonry is to be congratulated that this power that had placed our Institution under a ban not only within the borders of its nation, but through all its colonies, should to-day be humbled to the dust, shorn of its possessions, and left to live in history's memory as a nation that marked its growth with a trail of blood, and one that has for its dominant institutions the inquisition and the bull-fight.

Spain, the land of error, has fallen; Freemasonry lives and stands because it is the child of Truth. "The eternal years of God are hers."

We congratulate this town that periodically are to be gathered within these walls a representative Body of men of our Institution, governed by principles of friendship, morality, brotherly love, relief and truth — men who as they go abroad in the world will be known by their acts as men "to whom the burdened heart may pour out its sorrows," "whose hands are guided by justice, and whose hearts are expanded by benevolence." Let your actions among men be such that the Institution will derive benefit by your example before those who know that you are of the Order. It is not the profession and statement of goodness made by a man that produces an impression, it is his action and manner; it is that indescribable something that Mr. Ingalls spoke of in his description of Mr. Blaine — a personality that no painter can reproduce, no sculptor can mould, no biographer can relate, and' no poet can describe. It is the ego of the individual: in our case let that something be the development of character, "the diamond that scratches every other stone."

In your daily walks let the precepts you here learn and the reproduction of the emblems you here see, call to your minds the nobility of the Institution, so that you may each be a living example of the principles of your Order. May your Lodge increase in numbers and develop in influence; may your members prosper; may happiness abound; and finally, "when earth's last picture is painted," may we all "enjoy the happy reflections consequent on a well-spent life and die. in the hope of a glorious immortality!"

CENTENNIAL OF RISING STAR LODGE, DECEMBER 1899

From Proceedings, Page 1899-97:

WORSHIPFUL MASTER AND BRETHREN, LADIES AND FRIENDS: It is exceedingly gratifying to the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts to be received by Rising Star Lodge at any of it's Communications. It is a greater pleasure, however, to be received in the felicitous manner which you have shown both here and in your Lodge-room. What makes the welcome more to be appreciated is the fact that the head of your Lodge is one who stands in the eighth generation from that little soldier of Plymouth who commanded his army of twelve in the protection of the settlers, and that the welcome is extended in the presence of our Brother, the grandson of Paul Revere, that signer of charters, noble patriot, and active Mason during the latter part of the last century and first part of this. Particularly attractive and pleasant is it also that the Grand Lodge should meet Rising Star Lodge as one of its flourishing children on this centennial birthday, and be welcomed by it, strong and vigorous after all the vicissitudes and hardships through which it has passed.

The Brethren who formed your Lodge brought to it both the active experience and the spirit that came from those men of sterling worth, those lovers of liberty, who fought through the Revolutionary War. Masonry was a flourishing Institution during the War of the Revolution, particularly on the American side. There were numerous travelling or Army Lodges, of which many of the officers and soldiers were members. Outside of the army, in Boston, the St. Andrew's Lodge, at the Green Dragon Tavern, on what is now Washington Street near Haymarket Square, was considered by the British a nest of rebels where patriot plots were hatched.

In its Lodge-room, under the leadership of men like Paul Revere, John Hancock and Dr. Joseph Warren, were concocted, no doubt, many of the schemes which brought about the War for Independence; particularly the plan for the destruction of the tea in Boston Harbor, many of the so-called Indians disguising themselves there before going to Griffin's Wharf. The principles and spirit shown by such men and Masons had the effect to advance the cause of liberty, and develop and strengthen the individuality of the men performing the acts. Such names are noble in any land and any clime: Paul Revere, able and impulsive, who gave his time and talent to the cause of liberty; John Hancock, who devoted to it his entire fortune, then one of the largest in the Colonies ; and Doctor Warren, who gave to the cause his splendid talents, and his life at Bunker Hill. These men were all prominent and active in Masonry, Doctor Warren and Paul Revere being Grand Masters.

Many years before the Revolution, in 1734, the "many-sided Franklin" had received a charter from the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts and was actively engaged in making Masons in Philadelphia, he having been made a Mason three years before that time. The centennial of that charter was celebrated in 1834, the Hon. George M. Dallas delivering the oration on that day. In the biography of the many-sided Franklin it is erroneously stated, however, that he started the first Masonic Lodge in 1730. No charter in America dates back so far as that and Franklin was not then a Mason. If there ever was argument for it, the suggestion was very well dispelled in June, 1888, and again during the past year in the able and lengthy statement presented by our Recording Grand Secretary, Brother Nickerson, at the Communication in the old Grand Lodge. quarters in June last, before moving into the new Temple. Masonry flourished in the times prior to and when your Lodge was constituted. During the War of the Revolution, nearly every American General was a Freemason. For many years Benedict Arnold was excepted, but it has been found that he was a Mason and visited Hiram Lodge in New Haven, his name having been scratched from the records after his treason.

General Lafayette was made a Mason in one of the Army Lodges at Morristown, N.J., in the Valley Forge campaign, the Lodge being called the American Union Lodge, the paraphernalia being loaned for the purpose from St. John's Lodge near there.

Everybody of prominence, particularly on the American side, was active in Freemasonry, and it has been a source of pride to Masons from that day to this that we could point to the Father of our country as retaining his love for, his devotion to, and interest in, the Order almost to the time of his death; letters to various Lodges in this country being now in existence asserting his devotion to the cause of Masonry, written after he had laid aside the robe of office as President and delivered his farewell Address. On the day when the charter was granted to your Lodge the angel of death had already cast a shadow across the path of our illustrious Brother, although unknown to him or to any one else, and four days later he expired at Mt. Vernon after a short illness, it being more than.two weeks later before news of his death reached this part of the country. The centennial of his death will be appropriately observed on Thursday next by the Grand Lodge of Virginia, when representatives of the various jurisdictions will place their, memorials on his tomb, emblems being sent from Great Britain, as well as from all parts of this country. The Grand Lodge of Massachusetts will be represented by the Assistant Secretary of the Navy, Bro. Charles H. Allen, of Lowell, who will present, as a tribute from our Grand Lodge to the Grand Lodge of Virginia, a gavel, the head turned from a piece of the Washington Elm at Cambridge, under which Washington took command of the Continental Army, the handle being made from a beam of the Old South Church in Boston, while a silver plate, suitably inscribed, will describe the nature of the gift.

It was in the time and atmosphere of the men of the Revolution and the birth of our Republic, that the men who founded your Lodge lived and breathed.. They recognized the great principles of liberty as a part of Masonry, and they sought to perpetuate in this patriotic and flourishing town of yours the principles of our Institution; those principles which teach the highest moral attributes and the highest development of character; so that when the world knows that a man is a Mason, an assurance is given that he stands for an Order whose principles are found in the best and highest qualities of honorable citizenship, morality and integrity. Let these principles, inculcated by and in the men who formed your Lodge and who maintained your charter during all these years, come to you, let them be as a heritage, and like as those same principles were to your fathers, may they continue to be to you. May your Lodge and its members flourish. May happiness and prosperity abound, and when your successors shall celebrate the second centennial of a hundred years hence, may there not be wanting men who will point with pride to this day and its doings, as we do to the day of one hundred years ago.

RESPONSE TO W. M. ON RECEIVING THE CHARTER.

WORSHIPFUL MASTER OF RISING STAR LODGE: The ordinary formula on occasions when a charter has thus been presented, is to return it with the statement, "I find it to be in a good state of preservation and well kept." This noble and venerable parchment should not be passed over with so slighting an allusion.

When we think what this charter has passed through in the past one hundred years, I cannot refrain from paying a tribute to it and the men behind it. During the years of the anti-Masonic craze, the lights were not extinguished on your altar; there were men with strength of purpose and will, in whom the principles of right and justice had been so strongly instilled that they could not be swerved from their duty, who retained this charter, refused to surrender it, maintained their organization, and submitting to the taunts and jeers, but never the contempt, of their fellow citizens, maintained the Order in its integrity, and kept alive the organization of your Lodge.

We of this day can little understand what those men went through, because we cannot believe it possible. The craze that started in Western New York about seventy years ago, and: swept over the country, divided households, separated friends, broke social circles, and divided political parties with the most bitter animosities. With the unreason of madness the wave swept like an epidemic over the country, and it required heroism, unequalled by heroes in the presence of storm or battle, to stand before its movement; and it is due to the principles of our Institution that there were found men who nobly braved the flood and subdued it. The Grand Lodge in Boston continued to hold its sessions, and during the time of the excitement laid the corner-stone and built the Masonic Temple at the corner of Temple Place and Tremont Street in Boston. The procession, which marched from Faneuil Hall to the site of the corner-stone amid opprobrious epithets and jeering allusions, prevented actual disturbance at the ceremonies by the dignity of purpose and charitable forbearance on the part of the Masons to resent the insults which were thrown at them. The ceremonies having been performed, the enemies under the cover of darkness found sufficient satisfaction in placing an insulting word upon the corner-stone.

The Legislature of Massachusetts was appealed to by enemies of the Order to investigate the whole system of Masonry, but failed. In Rhode Island a Legislative Committee of five, no one of whom was a Mason, appointed to investigate Masonry in Rhode Island, after hearing more than one hundred witnesses and examining all newspaper and documentary evidence that could be furnished, devoting ten days at Providence and eighteen at Newport in taking testimony, reported unanimously that the insinuations, statements and charges that had been made against the Order were the falsest and blackest of calumnies, unsupported by proof of any kind.

Scenes like these were enacted in other parts of the country, with similar results; and these followed by the declaration of several thousand Masons stating their principles, published not long after, set this Institution, founded on principles of justice and truth, properly before the public, and it has continued to flourish from that day to this.

That your original charter should have been borne triumphantly through such tribulation and even worse, as the people of your town can attest, occasions more notice than comes from a passing glance; and I hand your charter back with the injunction that you keep it unsullied and unimpaired, and transmit it to your successor, and he to his, with an injunction similar to that imposed on the Grand Master at each succeeding Grand Lodge when he receives from his predecessor the urn containing a lock of the hair of our illustrious Brother, George Washington.

AT DEDICATION OF HALL FOR PHILANTHROPIC LODGE, MARCH 1900

From Proceedings, Page 1900-41:


Worshipful Master, Brethren and Ladies : It is not my purpose to detain you with a lengthy charge on the duties of the Brethren as is customary on similar occasions. Your well-known zeal and devotion to the Order during many years attest how unnecessary that would be. Our pleasure to-day is simply, in addition to the performance of the ceremonies of dedication of your new and beautiful Lodge-room, to bring to you all from the Grand Lodge our warmest congratulations on this most auspicious occasion. A Lodge with a charter dating back one hundred and forty years, endorsed later by that noble patriot Paul Revere, is indeed a unique and noble stone in the structure of Massachusetts Freemasonry; and when so brilliant a gathering as is here assembled meets to receive the Grand Officers of our Grand Lodge, we can indeed feel proud that in Marblehead our Institution has so flourishing and prosperous an exponent of its principles. Although the lapse of time and the vicissitudes of business and commercial life have caused several surrenders of your charter, yet we are proud that to-day a numerous body of the best men of Marble-head still keep the Lodge hearth warm and the fires burning on her altar. All honor to you, men of Marblehead, and all honor to your good ladies who have graced this occasion, and by their presence have encouraged your good work.

As an incident appropriate to this occasion I have a pleasant announcement to make, which is, that the famous letter signed by Dr. John Lowell and sent in 1760 to John Leverett, our Grand Secretary in Boston, has this day been placed in the possession of the Grand Lodge by John Lowell, Esq., a lawyer in Boston, son of the late Judge John Lowell, of our United States Circuit Court. This letter, addressed to the Grand Lodge, was never found in its archives, and for some unknown reason has always been in the possession of the Lowell family, possibly returned or borrowed on account of its list of names of the Brethren.

A few years ago the original was loaned to Past Grand Master Charles A. Welch by the late Judge Lowell, and a copy was made by our indefatigable Grand Secretary, who, zealous for our welfare, keeps watch and ward and in close touch with all our Masonic interests. Stimulated by his zeal, I have endeavored for some weeks past to gain possession of this document, and I have to-day received it from the present John Lowell and have brought it here to assist in gracing the occasion. It will be read in full by your distinguished townsman, W. Brother Trefry, in his Historical Address, but I take great pleasure in exposing it to your view, old and time-worn, but still with every word legible and all its historic value unimpaired. It will find a final resting-place with our valuable curiosities and antiquities in our new Temple. It will be prized in your behalf by reason of its associations, and for the fact that it is the first and only report of the first meeting of the Lodge at Marblehead, though our records show that the Wardens did bring the funds to the Grand Lodge, as there described, though the amount delivered was less, and the reason was satisfactorily explained. Let this document and the names of the noble men inscribed hereon be, with the names that your historian shall describe as great not only in their day and place, but in the nation and its history, a continuing encouragement to the performance of good and great deeds, as you recall their acts and emulate their examples.

May this, your new Masonic home, be the abode of piety, virtue and benevolence; may your Lodge prosper, its union strengthen, and the happiness of its members abound; learn to practise outside of these walls the great moral principles here inculcated ; recall the symbolic teachings of our ritual and ceremonials ; carry with you in your minds the picture of this beautiful interior, its decorations and adornments, and so live that

"When earth's last picture is painted . . .

We shall rest, — and faith, we shall need it,
Lie down for an æon or two
Till the Master of all good workmen
Shall set us to work anew.

"And only the Master shall praise us,
And only the Master shall blame;
And no one shall work for money,
And no one shall work for fame;
But each for the joy of the working,
And each, in his separate star.
Shall draw the thing as he sees it
For the God of things as they are."

AT DEDICATION OF HALL FOR PAUL REVERE LODGE, APRIL 1900

From Proceedings, Page 1900-77:

Worshipful Master and Brethren: What a pleasing convention is an assembly of Brethren, under any circumstances, to dedicate a Hall to the purposes of Freemasonry, Virtue and Universal Benevolence; but when such spacious apartments as these, so beautifully decorated, so conveniently arranged, and so thoroughly furnished, invite the presence of the Officers of the Grand Lodge to perform the ceremonies of dedication, we have indeed cause for abundant congratulation. This is especially true on this occasion, since the building itself is owned by one of our Grand Directors, a former Deputy Grand Master, R. W. Bro. Belcher, and who, with Brother White, his co-owner here present, has built and equipped these Halls for your purposes.

It is a disappointment that R. W. Bro. Belcher is not with us to enjoy the felicities of this occasion and take part in our ceremonies, for we depended on him to deliver the working tools of our profession to the Grand Master in behalf of the architect, before the ceremonies of dedication, as an appropriate feature.

You are to be congratulated, Brethren, oil the generous number of the Fraternity who have come together to witness this ceremonial; it evidences something more than the mere prosperity that Masonry has achieved in your city of Brockton. With a membership of between four and five hundred growing from the little number who, in 1850, worked under Dispensation as Paul Revere Lodge, you have indeed accomplished wonders in your development; and the presence of such goodly numbers to-day demonstrates an active and lively interest in that prosperity. It is not strange, however, when we consider that old North Bridgewater derived its rapid growth to Brockton from the manhood and womanhood it drew from the surrounding towns in Plymouth County; from that stout yeomanry of our Commonwealth, the finest-fibred quality of men and women, who, through generations of the highest principles of God-fearing morality and virtue, bred and developed in themselves and in their children's children, have in the past two generations found in the teachings of our Order in your town symbolical representation and reproduction of those same truths and precepts already implanted in them.

Your Lodge indeed bears a noble name, that of Paul Revere. Your ante-room contains his signature as Senior Warden of the Lodge of Rising States, a Lodge which he was instrumental in forming in the latter part of the last century, before he had been Grand Master of our Grand Lodge; and although the Rising States Lodge disbanded, yet the interest he had taken in Masonry and his devotion to our country's cause have been immortalized in prose and verse, and in commercial and industrial life he was second to none of his contemporaries. Proud indeed must you be to bear his name!

May the ceremonials of your ritual, that shall be performed within these Halls at initiations and otherwise, ever be as impressive and instructive as the ceremonials provided by the ritual of the Grand Lodge for dedication. Our work is not simply an entertainment; not merely a spectacle to please the eye; but every word and act has its significant and symbolical meaning, conveying to us instruction in the higher virtues and nobler traits of character such as we should apply in our daily walks of life. To teach men that they should be temperate, prudent and strong, that they should be honest, virtuous and truthful, that they should love one another, as naked precepts, convey no such meaning nor obtain so fixed an impression as the same teachings and precepts delineated by symbolical word and act, with attending form and ceremony. To state that one individual is ambitious, that another is jealous, and that a third is infamous, conveys a certain amount of information, and the application is soon forgotten; but when we see the character of Macbeth portrayed on the stage, when we witness the action of Othello, and when we behold the base and subtle intrigues of Iago, we can never forget the impression produced that Macbeth was ambitious, that Othello was jealous, or that Iago w;is a designing villain. So also with the teachings of the New Testament;— a mere statement of Bible truth conveys much less impression than when the same is illustrated by a parable describing the actors of the scenes, and relating the story that furnishes the example ; so it is with our own forms and ceremonies, whether in initiation or dedication, all have their meaning, all produce an impression that is fixed and lasting, and we go out " from this blessed retreat to mingle again with the world," carrying with us the best and highest thoughts for our own future action, indelibly impressed on our winds, and which we can never forget.

With the Masonic prosperity that is your portion you should be ever grateful that it is your good fortune to witness the development of our Order and the performance of its work, and receive these lasting impressions amid such convenient and enjoyable surroundings.

May the prosperity that you have shown since your organization continue; may these Halls ever be the abode of piety, virtue and benevolence; may your union strengthen, and may happiness abound. Remember that in your Lodge name you have a combination of the best type of American citizenship with that of the upright Mason ; remember that a great mission of Masonry in this our country is the development of those best and highest types of character that shall make good citizens as well as good Masons; remember that we are engaged in developing to the fullest extent Victor Hugo's ideal for the Twentieth Century: — MAN ! Remember

"The world wants men, large-hearted, manly men,
Men who will join the chorus and prolong
The psalm of labor and the song of love;
The times want heroes; —
Heroes who shall struggle in the solid ranks of truth;
The age wants scholars; —
Scholars who shall shape the doubtful questions of dubious years,
And lead the ark that bears our country's good
Safe to some peaceful Ararat at last."

AT DEDICATION OF HALL FOR WARREN LODGE, SEPTEMBER 1900

From Proceedings, Page 1900-130:

I thank you and the Brethren for your cordial reception, and am pleased to announce that the Officers of the Grand Lodge are here on this beautiful day, in the presence of this large and delightful gathering of ladies and Brethren, to dedicate your new apartments to Masonic purposes.

It is an especial pleasure for us to perform this duty for a body of Masons who have shown so' much enterprise aDd courage in overcoming misfortune as have the members of your Lodge. Your apartments and properties having been twice destroyed by fire, you have again arisen, as it were, phoenix-like, from the ashes of the last conflagration in 1899; saving, however, the charter that was renewed after the one destroyed in the previous fire of 1884, but in such condition as to be no longer serviceable. To take the place of that mutilated and defaced document I have brought with me, and I now present to you in behalf of the Grand Lodge, your charter renewed a second time, bearing the proper attestations by our Recording Grand Secretary R. W. Brother Nickerson, the face of it being a reproduction of the original, bearing the signature of John Dixwell, the Grand Master who studied medicine in the office of Dr. John Warren, a brother of the lamented Dr. Joseph Warren, who fell at the battle of Bunker Hill, both of whom were in their day Grand Masters of Masons in Massachusetts, and from whom your name of Warren Lodge is derived. The other signatures are of the officers of that day, and the charter members are here enrolled, the name of Bagley being found a number of times, one of them, Valentine Bagley, being the first Treasurer of your Lodge, made famous by the poet Whittier in The Captain's Well," a familiar landmark in this town for many years.

This charter you will carefully preserve and transmit to your successor in office, and I have no doubt that at each annual visitation of the Grand Master's Deputy, it will be found to be " in a good state of preservation and well kept."

From Proceedings, Page 1900-132:

The ceremony of dedication by the Officers of the Grand Lodge is always pleasant, representing as it does an encouraging feature of our Institution, evincing a spirit of progress and enterprise on the part of the Brethren composing the Lodge; but on this occasion there is an added interest and special feature when we consider the history of Masonry in this town and vicinity, — the trials and struggles through which the members have passed, your losses by fire, and the unholy crusade conducted here as in other parts of the country against our Institution and those who belonged to it, make this occasion one of especial interest to us all.

Through all vicissitudes you have retained your organization and kept your chartered rights inviolate. This manly struggle against adversity is characteristic of Amesbury and its people, if we read its history from the time when the "thirty families agreed to remove from Salisbury west of Powwow River," more than two hundred and fifty years ago, to the present day; in all its history, political, secular and religious, independence of thought and strength of character have been predominant features among the freemen of the town.

This is equally true of your Lodge and its members from the time of its formation, Dec. 11, 1822, and its constitution on St. John the Baptist Day, 1823, to the present time. The records of our Grand Lodge show that the Lodge was constituted on the latter date, and "after the ceremonies were closed the procession was again formed and proceeded to the well-provided table. The festivities of the day closed with great order and decorum." Let us hope this latter suggestion is not a reflection on the conduct of the Brethren in those days at other festivities.

The early history of your Lodge is replete with significant historical facts, a recital of which would carry to the Brethren throughout the Commonwealth acts which are certainly worthy of emulation.

Your Lodge is rich in relics of the past, and abounds in interesting gifts suggestive of events of later times. Your Master's gavel made from the frigate Constitution and other historical vessels begins a list which with the working tools of teak-wood from Admiral Dewey's flagship, — the Olympia, completes a span in the history of our Republic; while about your Lodge Room the evidences of kindly thought on the part of the Brethren of your Lodge and of those in this vicinity, bespeak a spirit that other Lodges may well emulate, and of which you should be justly proud; the chairs of the Officers, the pillars on either side of the Master's station, your beautiful altar, all gifts from your members, and the Tyler's sword from the Master of your adjoining Bethany Lodge, of Merrimac, are a part of the generous contributions; while in your ante-room is to be seen the reproduced original portrait of Valentine Bagley, restored through the kindness of his niece, and whose name, as I have said before, has been immortalized by the Quaker poet of your town.

The life and death of Valentine Bagley, which latter occurred in 1839, recalls to us those dark days in the history of Masonry when it required courage and strength of character for a member to assert his belief in our Institution and remain loyal to its tenets; but through all the misconceptions of our Order and the slanders that were uttered by its enemies, your Lodge retained its organization, holding its meetings "on the top of high hills or in deep vales," sometimes on the hilltops of New Hampshire and at others on the beaches of Salisbury, the charter being kept safely and preserved; at one time, if I am correctly informed, being retained by our venerable Brother Cowden, who is here present, aud concealed by him beneath the sheets of the bed on which he slept; thus your charter remained in its integrity unsullied, to be destroyed by the fire which devastated your Lodge Room on the morning of Feb. 29, 1884, when it was lost with all the paraphernalia of the Lodge.

It is a noble record for your Lodge that in the midst of those troublous anti-Masonic times, when the opposition was at its height, there were found members of your Lodge who publicly appeared in full regalia and performed the burial service at the cemetery on the occasion of the funeral of Valentine Bagley, your first Treasurer. Noble indeed are the names of those who so steadfastly stood by our Institution in your Lodge in those dark days. If their names do not already appear on your Lodge records with a tribute to their memory and work, the record of this dedication furnishes a convenient opportunity to now inscribe them as a roll of honor to be shown to your Brethren of the present day and to those who will come hereafter, for the great good your fathers have done.

"Our fathers to their graves have gone;
Their strife is past, — their triumph won;
But sterner trials wait the race
Which rises in their honored place, —
So let it be. In God's own might,
We gird us for the coming fight,
And strong in Him whose cause is ours
In conflict with unholy powers,
We grasp the weapons he has given, —
The Light, and Truth, and Love of Heaven."

Although your poet Whittier, whose name is respected and beloved throughout the world, was not a member of our Fraternity, yet in these chosen words from "The Moral Warfare " he has furnished to us as Masons an appropriate suggestion for the past and present. Indeed, in looking through his poems after many years for a reading of " The Captain's Well," abundant evidence is found of a loyalty on the poet's part to principles and virtues such as we claim for our Order and which might well have been penned by a poet-laureate of Freemasonry. In his lines on " Democracy " he says:

"The generous feeling pure and warm,
Which owns the rights of all divine,
— The pitying heart, — the helping arm, —
The prompt self-sacrifice, — are thine.

" Beneath thy broad, impartial eye,
How fade the lines of caste and birth!
How equal in their suffering lie
The groaning multitudes of earth!"

And again he speaks of those who remain:

" Still to a stricken brother true,
Whatever clime hath nurtured him."

Such sentiments demonstrate that the heart of the author must have been in sympathy and touch with the cardinal virtues and tenets of our profession, although he knew them not.

But the loyal, the patriotic and the good, whether poet or Mason, are engaged in a common work for the benefit of mankind and country. The higher and nobler principles of humanity, the relation of man to man and brother to brother, the " dependence which constitutes the strongest bond of society," generates in the well-meaning and well-thinking man the higher principles of patriotism and loyalty to country. More valuable to the State and Nation are "strong minds, great hearts, true faith and ready hands," than accumulations of wealth and treasure. As your poet has again sung:

"The riches of the Commonwealth
Are free, strong minds, and hearts of health;
And more to her than gold or grain,
The cunning hand and cultured brain.

"For well she keeps her ancient stock,
The stubborn strength of Pilgrim Rock;
And still maintains, with milder laws,
And clearer light, the Good Old Cause.
,br> "Nor heeds the sceptic's puny hands,
While near her school the church-spire stands;
Nor fears the blinded bigot's rule,
While near her church-spire stands the school."

With these thoughts and precepts in our minds, let us continue the good work in which we are engaged, not only in this Hall dedicated as it is " to Freemasonry, to Virtue and to Universal Benevolence," but when abroad in the world let the character of each one as it shines represent the teachings that he has here received, let him by example reproduce the truths that he has here learned, so that when the world shall know that a man is a Mason, he will be known as one to whom the burdened heart can pour out its sorrow, whose heart is warmed by justice and whose hand is expanded by benevolence, and to whom self-sacrifice for his country comes as a joy.

That you may flourish as a Lodge and prosper are the best wishes the officers of the Grand Lodge can give you, and we now express to you our hope that this Lodge Room may ever be the abode of piety and virtue; may brotherly love ever prevail, may no discord or contention ever mar your proceedings, may your Lodge flourish, its members prosper, and may happiness abound; and when the summons shall finally come to you and all of us may each receive the glad welcome of "Well done, good and faithful servant."

CENTENNIAL OF MOUNT ZION LODGE, OCTOBER 1900

From Proceedings, Page 1900-141:

Worshipful Master, Ladies and Brethren: A sublime and ennobling feeling accompanies the centenary of a Masonic Lodge. Each centennial has its pleasing advantages and incidents, but all inspire in us a common commendation arising from the feeling we have of respect that is due to a vigorous and strong old age. Peculiarly is this true in the case of Mount Zion Lodge where the strength and vigor, both in the personnel of members and in the numbers which you have paraded to-day, are appropriately in keeping with the traditions of your town and this vicinity since its settlement in 1686; when for twenty-three pounds sterling there were purchased twelve square miles from the Indians, including Rutland, Oakham, Hubbardston, a part of Princeton and Paxton, and your present town of Barre. A sturdy nature was possessed by the yeomanry who settled these hills, developed the farms and encouraged your infant industries; augmented by that magnificent civilization that came to Maine, New Hampshire, and a large part of Worcester County — the Scotch-Irish — mingled with New England customs, has furnished the best blood we have had in our Republic, and furnished more Presidents of the United States than any other race, not excepting the English; from them a community has developed that for strong manhood and womanhood can nowhere else be duplicated in o»«r country. It was shrewd on the part of Cotton Mather and his associates in Boston when they assigned the Rev. Mr. Boyd and his one hundred and odd families of Scotch-Irish to lands to the North of Massachusetts Bay extending from Worcester County to Southern Maine; the theory being that they would thus furnish a check to the incursions of the Canadian Indians and French who occasionally devastated the Massachusetts Bay settlements; what they did in developing the parts of New England where they came is historically recorded and needs no encomium of mine as to their sterling worth.

Stories of heroism in those early days are not wanting among the women as well as .the men. It is historical in your town that when the young man Perry married his wife in Martha's Vineyard and moved up here, having five children in the ten years following, he left with his wife for a visit to her home, and he dying within three weeks after, she returned alone, braving all the dangers of the wilderness, to her home and children in Barre, bringing his horse and property with her; she lived here to a ripe old age, and forms a landmark in the town's history.

Similar examples of physical endurance and personal heroism might be multiplied, and such acts developed a race of people naturally sturdy, strong, patriotic and liberty-loving, and it is no great wonder that the town of Hutchinson, named for the royal governor in 1775, should in 1776 be changed to that of Barre, the name of the famous colonel, a devoted friend of the colonies in Parliament.

The activity of the people too in the cause of freedom was proverbial; it was William Buckminster, of Barre, who fell at Bunker Hill protecting Colonel Prescott; and the men of this vicinity nobly took a most active and varied part in the war of the Revolution.

It was from this town, in 1781, in the case of the slave Quorke, that the Supreme Court of Massachusetts decided that property in a human slave was not recognized in this State.

Many are the incidents, historical and otherwise, of this kind which mark the character of the people for originality and tenacity of purpose; it is not strange, therefore, that the anti-Masonic craze, started in 1826, did not affect your Lodge till 1832, and even then was never strong enough to terrorize the members of your Lodge into surrendering this Charter, which I hold in my hand, which had been kept so successfully and prosperously by men like Daniel Ruggles, to whose tavern in 1809 went the Rev. James Thompson, prominent as a District Deputy and member of the Grand Lodge from that time to 1812, to deliver an oration; and men like Major Gardiner Ruggles who in 1842 reorganized the Lodge so that it was successfully carried on until March 15, 1855, when it was removed from Hardwick, the place of its incorporation March 11, 1800, to the present town of Barre. Among others of later date whose names are enrolled in honor in our archives, and whose portraits adorn our Temple at Boston, is Bro. Lucius R. Paige, so well known to you and to Masons generally in our State.

Great credit and honor are due to the men of those times from 1832 and previously, to 1842 when Masonry and its fate hung in the balance in our country, who kept your Charter sacred and inviolate, and who have transmitted it unimpaired through successive administrations, until it is to-day received by me from the Master of your Lodge "in a good state of preservation and well kept," with the original signature of Samuel Dunn as Grand Master and its proper attestation. It is a sacred thing and should be exhibited among your Brethren and to those who come after you as one of those emblems of fortitude among Masons when it meant something for a man to publicly avow himself a member of our Order.

God has abundantly blessed you in these hill towns with health, strength and vigor to wrestle with nature and develop from the forests and rocks beautiful towns and industries, with roads, landscapes and valleys that delight the eye; but you have been blessed also with " strong minds, great hearts, true faith and ready hands," fitting material from which to develop the upright Mason.

We come from the Grand Lodge congratulating you on the success of your endeavors, on the numbers of the Brethren, and the fine appearance that has been made to-day at these exercises. We are fortunate indeed that Dame Nature smiles upon us with so beautiful a day; and pleased are we indeed to carry back to our Temple in Boston and place upon our records a report of so successful an observance of the centennial of so prosperous a Lodge as Mount Zion.

To you, Worshipful Master, I return the Charter which you have presented to me, and I charge you to deliver it to your successor in office, with the injunction that it be transmitted to succeeding Masters, and that it shall always be "in a good state of preservation and well kept."

AT DEDICATION OF HALL FOR PHOENIX LODGE, SEPTEMBER 1900

From Proceedings, Page 1900-162:

Worshipful Master and Brethren: The dedicatory service in a Lodge-Room is always a cause for congratulation, as it evidences prosperity and success on the part of the Brethren of the Lodge. At times such feelings are not unmixed with sadness at remembrance of the causes that have required new rooms to be prepared, and peculiarly is this so in your case when we recall the unaccountable catastrophe by which the building standing on this spot was demolished, and from which the only article of furniture remaining intact is the chair which was occupied by the Grand Master in opening the Grand Lodge in Ample Form in the ante-room adjoining your Lodge. It is an interesting relic, and should be suitably inscribed and kept not only as a memento of that unfortunate occurrence, but also as a monument to your zeal and industry in rising "Phoenix"-like from the ashes of your consumed building to these new, convenient and well-appointed accommodations. It is fortunate, too, for you that you can retain your Masonic associations in so close proximity; for the Old Colony Lodge, from which you have grown, was organized in the Waterman house on the opposite corner, formerly the old tavern, and for many years held its Communications in the other building across the driveway from this building, where it remained until removed to Hingham.

But in addition to these historical associations you are indeed fortunate, and the Grand Officers bring to you the congratulations of the Grand Lodge, that you have so beautifully decorated, so well furnished and so comfortably arranged apartments as we have this day dedicated. Lodge-rooms may differ in size, appointments, architecture, construction, and conveniences, but the Lodge that is prosperous and successful is the one that has maintained the character of its members during its growth at the standard which we set for a true Mason.

We are fortunate and proud that with us to-day is our respected Grand Secretary, R. W. Brother Nickerson, who as Grand Master in 1873 constituted your Lodge; the example which he gave you has borne its good fruits: and it is not strange, for he is the embodiment of all that is good and great in Masonry, and -by his genial and kindly spirit and manner imparts to all who meet him a feeling of kindness and benevolence. He is not only an encyclopedia of Masonry, but is always open and free to impart his information to any of the Brethren who desire to have it. He has the universal respect of the Masons of our Commonwealth, and the hope is that he may be long spared to be with us to be of use and value to his Brethren.

Your growth from 1873 to the present time, from thirty-two in number to eighty-two, is not phenomenal, but it is a healthy growth in the community in which you live, and the character of the men whom you have made Masons is a good and sufficient guarantee of the success that you have made in the Lodge; for there is no need here to admonish you against taking into your Lodge those whose characters require them to be squeezed through its moral doors. Masonry should command the attention of the highest and best men in the community, so that when a man has acquired a favorable opinion of our Institution and voluntarily becomes a member of it, he should often be not only up to but above the standard which we set, so that our average should be continually higher than our standard ; but no suggestion of this kind is needed among the yeomanry of your town where the character of the Masons whom we meet is an index of the character of the Lodge. Care in receiving candidates, joined with the impressive work of our ritual, develops in Masons characters the best and noblest in the community.

Freemasonry is not servile to worldly success, but it does pay homage to the honest heart, the willing hand and the industrious brain. In its growth and history it has ever been an advocate for itself, for it has always advanced hand in hand with prosperity, enlightenment and advancement in the history of the world. The liberty-loving, educated and intelligent nations of Holland, Germany, England and America, have fostered and protected our Masonic Institution, while Spain and Italy, sunk in the lowest grade of modern civilization, have ever proscribed and forbidden it. Spain, with a record of having destroyed the Aztec civilization in Mexico and the Moorish civilization in Spain, that attempted to destroy the Netherlands, the home of freedom and liberty for the civilized world, and with its Armada intended to subject and reduce England to the condition of a mediaeval barbarism, has happily been relegated to the confines of ignorance and semi-barbarism among its hills, its pride and arrogance limited and humbled by the descendants of those whom she three centuries ago attempted to destroy. Spain goes into history having for her institutions the inquisition and the bull fight; the northern nations point with pride to free schools, representative governments and the Masonic Fraternity. But we deal with the present, and our duty is plain. A true Mason is one who, without proselyting or using vain repetitions as to his own goodness, shall by his acts and bearing so impress himself upon the community that he will be regarded as a man of high character, honest in all his dealings, industrious in all his works, for whom all who meet him shall maintain respect, and whose word and name shall be honored as reliable and trustworthy. Such was the relation of Masonry to the community in the days of our fathers, such as these were the Masons of Plymouth County in older times, and such are the descendants of those who settled and built it up. We follow in their footsteps with changed conditions, but similar problems, to continue the good work, remembering that

"New occasions teach new duties; time makes ancient good unconth;
They must upward still, and onward, who would keep abreast of Truth;
Lo, before us gleam her Campfires! We ourselves must pilgrims be,
Launch our Mayflower and steer it boldly through the desperate wintry sea."

AT DEDICATION OF HALL FOR NOQUOCHOKE LODGE, MAY 1901

From Proceedings, Page 1901-35:

W. MASTER, LADIES, AND BRETHREN: What abundant cause for congratulation we have that the storms of the night have been dispelled and in the bright sun and clear air we are enabled to enjoy the felicity of meeting such a numerous body of Masons with their ladies, not only in the Lodge-room, but in the open air, where under Heaven's canopy we have sat and feasted together! We of the Grand Lodge have enjoyed the hospitality of you all at the bountiful "clam-bake" which you prepared and of which all have partaken with so much apparent relish. "The Groves were God's first Temples," and in conjunction with the impressive ceremonies of dedicating, this Hail to Masonry and to high purposes, it is appropriate that a part of our service should be held in the Groves dedicated by nature to the Most High as his Temple. Your entertainment has been bountiful and we shall go back to our Temple in Boston feeling it proper to characterize it as we do the Feast of St. John — the Grand Feast. The Grand Officers are under great obligations for the zeal you have shown and the care you have taken to make this dedication a pleasant event for them. The delightful drive from Fall River through the country teeming with evidences of spring, the air fragrant with blossoms, and the earth hard under the wheels of our carriages has furnished indeed a delightful and enjoyable outing from the crowded and stifling conditions of city business life. We shall carry back to our Grand Lodge and place on our records our appreciation of what you have done and we have enjoyed.

You are indeed to be congratulated on the success you have attained since twenty-two years ago when R. W. Brother Nickerson, our Grand Secretary, and others came to New Bedford and constituted your Lodge. From a small number you have grown to your present membership of seventy Masons. You have kept the Ancient Landmarks in the little old Hall in the "deep vale" at the other side of the river, and now in your prosperity, not forgetting to accord to the Brethren of other surrounding Lodges credit for their generous assistance, you have grown onward and upward to the top of this high hill" where your conveniently appointed building stands as a monument to your zeal, care, and progress, and to the surrounding country is a landmark of an institution representing the higher and nobler qualities of the Masonic character. While we take just pride in the correct and impressive rendering of rituals whether of the degrees or services of this character, while we enjoy all that sociability and good-fellowship bring to us, we must not forget that above and beyond .all are the great moral truths that are inculcated by our Order, and should so live that from each Mason shall emanate in his contact with the world an evidence of the good principle that is in him; that all who deal with him shall know that by reason of his Masonry he is a better man and a better citizen — so that as this building shall be a monument to that Institution whose cardinal virtues are practised and whose tenets reach into every walk of life, so each Mason should in himself be a landmark of our beloved Order.

In the ancient ritual of dedication is provided a charge to the Brethren, which, though appropriate to the times when it was written is not necessary as an admonition to Brethren inheriting the traditions of morality and virtue from a yeomanry in a peaceful, quiet, pastoral, and fishing community, on ground that was historical before the landing of the Pilgrims; the character of the strong men and women who for conscience' sake seceded from the Plymouth Colony and settled in the district extending from Fairhaven into Rhode Island has left their imprint by heritage and tradition in the community here represented; and although the Quaker and the Baptist may no longer exist as they then did, the same sterling qualities of independent thought and action have shown themselves, and from them a type of character has developed from which the true principles of Masonry are easily and naturally evolved; it is from rural districts where the traditions are of the acts and lives of God-fearing men that great moral truths find their practice, and from such as these are the best type of Masons developed.

The Grand Lodge and the body of Masonry "are to be congratulated on having such a Lodge of such Masons in such a well-equipped Hall as we have now dedicated. May peace and prosperity be within your walls, may your Lodge and its members flourish, may your.union strengthen, and may happiness abound; and when we shall each be called to render his account in the Hall not made with hands may we receive the reward of "well done, good and faithful servant."

AT DEDICATION OF HALL FOR MAY FLOWER LODGE, JUNE 1901

WORSHIPFUL MASTER, LADIES AND BRETHREN: The Grand Lodge in its wisdom has provided by its ritual that the part of the dedicatory services relating to the charge written one hundred years or so ago may be omitted, and in place thereof the Grand Master may address the Brethren. Elevating and ennobling as are the sentiments in that ancient document, it is hardly appropriate to the present time except in such portions as admonish us to maintain a proper standard of character, with apt words of congratulation on the success of the Lodge and a hope for continued prosperity in the future.

This visit as the representative of the Grand Lodge, accompanied by the Grand Officers to perform the service of dedication, recalls a remembrance of the last visit I made to Middleboro' Four Corners, as it was then called, in the year 1864, the year in which your Lodge was instituted and worked under Dispensation. In those days, as a boy spending my summers among relatives in what was known as the Lowlands, where Middleboro' adjoins Halifax and Bridgewater, a trip to the '"Corners," which was the greatest place next to North Bridgewater known to the youth of that vicinity, filled the heart with delight and occasioned a subject for conversation and comment during the entire summer, and it was a great event if more than once in the summer a trip was made with some of the "men folks" who had business at this place; but from the hospitable nature of your reception, your entertainment in the Hall below so gracefully decorated, and your banquet so tastefully prepared and served by the daughters of your Brethren, all being provided, as I am informed, by your Unitarian Society, I feel that I shall look back on this day with the same feelings of pleasure and gratification, although in a different way, that I experienced in those childhood days of years ago. This country and its surroundings were always to me a source of delight, and with your treatment on this occasion the name of Middleboro' is one that ever will remain pleasant and agreeable in my memory.

Landing, as I used to, at Titicut, a station of your town on the Old Colony Railroad nearest to my destination, "the place of a great river," as the Indians called it, as they named your settlement there Namasket, - "a place of fish," the whole association, from that end of the town to East Middleboro' at the other, recall the most pleasing memories with delight. Your town is all a pleasant locality, and it is not surprising to find in the Plymouth Colony records as early as 1669, "Namasket shall be a township and to be called by the name of Middleberry," so attractive were the surroundings; half way between Plymouth and Mount Hope, the home of Massasoit, the Indian chief, it formed also a convenient rest for travellers. It thus became one of those good old colony towns, filled with the strength of the God-fearing men and women who came over in that staunch little ship that staggered and struggled into the Provincetown Harbor and landed her precious freight first on Clarke's Island and then on 'that rock that has become "the corner stone of the nation."

The founders of your Lodge who, in 1864, on March 8, received a Dispensation from Grand Master William Parkman, and organized a Lodge with J. Shaw, W. M., C. H. Carpenter, S. W., R. B. Barnes, J. W., with five others, if they were not all descendants of the Plymouth people, had in their hearts and the fibre of their character a regard and respect for that noble little band of pilgrims who settled these shores.

On the anniversary of the date of your Dispensation the By-Laws and Records were approved, and the charter for a Lodge was recommended to the Grand Lodge by a committee consisting of Dr. Winslow Lewis, Henry P. Perkins, and William Sutton; the first and last being familiar names in Massachusetts Masonry and in the annals of the Grand Lodge. It lacked only the presence of the venerable Marshall P. Wilder in place of Brother Perkins on that committee to have made the subject of the portrait in our Grand Lodge ante-room a fit accompaniment to your Lodge-room here. Dr. Winslow Lewis, a Grand Master of whom every Mason knows and his name being that of the Lodge of which our Recording Grand Secretary is an active member; William Sutton who next to Brother Nickerson probably did more in a financial way to uphold the credit of the Grand Lodge than any member up to his time, and for whom the Corinthian Lodge-Room in the old Temple was named as Sutton Hall. Twelve days later your Hall was dedicated and the officers installed; and it is pleasing to note that the following year when the District Deputy Grand Master of the then Seventh Masonic District made his report to the Grand Master, he states that your Lodge "has made good progress since receiving its charter, and I am assured by its members they intend to mark well the words of the Grand Master and allow no bad links to be woven into the chain of members."

It is not strange that the men who formed your Lodge selected so appropriate and beautiful a name as that of May Flower, the name of that little ship that withstood all perils of sea and came into Massachusetts Bay, providing a shelter before landing in its cabin for the men who wrote that famous compact which has. been happily declared the first Constitution or Declaration of Rights looking to the founding of an independent Commonwealth, that has been prepared in modern times; all the elements of a modern representative self-governing republic being found therein; and when they landed permanently on the shores their first work was to establish the meeting-house, the school-house, and the town meeting as institutions the principles of which have spread throughout the land and fixed the foundation on which a government "of the people" should rest. When they fall, when they cease to be the principles on which our Government rests, then our liberties are endangered and our form of government ceases to be the mighty bulwark of civilization of which we boast. They were indeed strong men who formed your Lodge and they lived in strenuous times. It was the closing year of the War of the Rebellion, that dreadful scene of carnage of which the present generation can know only by history, but which is to those of us who remember it crowded with memories of mourning, of bloodshed, of heroism, of privation and suffering, and finally the exultation of victory followed by lovely peace.

It was during your Dispensation that Gen. Sherman made his famous march to the sea, and Gen. Grant assumed full command of the armies; during the year following the memorable and bloody battles of Spottsylvania, the terrible fighting in the Wilderness, the capture of Atlanta, the dreadful slaughter of Petersburg, and the famous Sheridan's ride took place; on the sea the Kearsarge had sunk the Alabama, and the heroic Lieut. Cushing had destroyed the Albemarle. In that great struggle, as indicative of the character of the men who lived in this town and formed this Lodge, Middleboro' sent four hundred and six brave souls to the Union Army, of whom sixty-two laid down their lives.

Is it strange then that such men, living in such times, should have selected for the name of their Lodge the synonym of all that was good, virtuous, pious, brave, independent and strong? "They builded better than they knew" with their little handful, but the promise made to the representative of the Grand Lodge that no bad links should be woven into the chain of members, has certainly been kept, and the one hundred and thirty members which you show to-day evidence a body of men of which this Lodge or any Lodge or the whole body of Masonry may be justly proud.

You have prepared and fitted this building and these rooms tastefully and completely for your purposes; the decorations and furnishings delight the eye and are useful for your work, while all that electricity can do for effects of light has been added as a part of your paraphernalia. What thoughts indeed would come to the minds of the founders, could they be with us in these to them spacious and magnificent apartments, as they viewed the magical effects that please the eye and instruct the mind! But were they here they would be no strangers, for they would recognize our ritual and our work, they would join with us naturally in our devotion; for the principles which guided their lives were the same as ours; the tenets of our Institution and the virtues which we claim are unchangeable from one generation to another; and while we congratulate ourselves upon the success that you have achieved and the enjoyment that we have had, let us not forget the religious character of their origin and be guided by their example; let us repeat again as a tribute to their memory the words of Professor Everett at the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the landing of the Pilgrims, where, after speaking of what their ancestors had done for this country, what they had encountered in privations and sufferings and hardships, he concludes as follows:

"Nay, let the strain soar higher; still louder swell the song;
Claim all the starry honors that to our sires belong;
Two hundred years and fifty, brothers, this day have flown,
Since first from out the godless world our Fathers came alone.
Then France was flown with glory, and Spain was swol'n with pride,
And England rested in her might, and Rome the world defied;
The scoff of sword and sceptre, of mitre and of frock,
The seed of God in tears was sown this day on Plymouth Rock.
One-fourth of time's great cycle hath o'er the ages passed,
And the stroke of God's great vengeance the guilty finds at last.
Helpless the Roman tyrant is shaking on his hill,
And Spain before a stranger boy must bend her haughty will!
The plains of France are trampled in gore by steel-hoofed foes,
And England hears a warning in every breeze that blows;
At all the godless thresholds Death's equal footsteps knock,
But peace and joy and safety are ours on Plymouth Rock."

With the lapse of thirty years history has changed itself, but the theme there worked out by the poet is easily recognizable,. and applied to-day makes the parallel still striking between the Old World and the new.

The Grand Lodge takes pride in presenting its congratulations on your name, on your existence, and on your success. May these halls ever be the abode of peace and virtue, may brotherly love ever prevail among you, may your Lodge prosper, may its union strengthen, your members, flourish, and may happiness abound, ever remembering as a watchword those beautiful lines of Lowell where your Lodge name is immortalized:

"New occasions teach new duties; time makes ancient good uncouth;
They must upward still and onward, who would keep abreast of Truth.
Lo! before us gleam her camp-fires! we ourselves must Pilgrims be,
Launch our 'Mayflower,' and steer boldly through the desperate winter sea,
Nor attempt the Future's portal with the Past's blood-rusted key." </blockquote>

CENTENNIAL OF RURAL LODGE, JUNE 1901

From Proceedings, Page 1901-51:

W. MASTER, BRETHREN, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN: There is a touch of sadness in the celebration of the centennial of a Masonic Lodge when the circumstances of its formation and the incidents connected with the men who were the founders of the Lodge are so limited as to be almost unknown. The disastrous fire starting under the stairway of the Grand Lodge rooms in the old Winthrop House on the night of April 5, 1864, preventing all access to the upper part of the building, caused the destruction of everything belonging to the Grand Lodge, except the contents of a safe, and the record books which by chance were, at the house of the Grand Secretary, Charles W. Moore, at the time. In this conflagration all correspondence, petitions, papers, archives, and everything of written word or memento that would connect us with the century that has passed and bring us in close touch with the acts and feelings and almost with the faces and forms of those whose day we are celebrating, are lost to the world and to Masonry forever.

The history of the formation of your Lodge from the Grand Lodge standpoint is largely, therefore, a subject of conjecture. The number of Lodges at that time, however, was increasing rapidly; for during the year in which Rural Lodge was formed the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts issued fourteen Charters, eight of them on June 8 of that year, the remainder at different periods, three being in the State of Maine and one at Demerara in British Guiana. There had been no Charters granted for two years previously, and at the March meeting of the Grand Lodge in 1801 it was voted that no Charter should be granted to any Lodge until the same had been considered by an appropriate committee. That committee apparently did their work expeditiously, for on the 8th of June following eight charters were granted.

But the correspondence, the petitions, the discussions, the minutes and statements of what caused the delays and differences would be interesting reading, and would let a side light into the lives and character of those men that would be interesting if not instructive. Suffice it that Masonry was in a most prosperous and flourishing condition at that time. The causes of it have been the subject of conjecture, but so far as I know have never been analyzed historically, and it is left for us to infer that the reasons for the rapid growth were various. The soldiers of the Revolution returning to their homes and the walks of peace, having either enjoyed or seen the benefits of Masonic life in the Army Lodges during the war, were largely instrumental in forming new Lodges. Then, too, in Massachusetts the old differences that had existed between those Lodges owing allegiance to the Grand Lodge of Scotland and those to the Grand Lodge of England, of which the Lodge of St. Andrew, chartered in 1756, was of the former and the St. John's Lodge, chartered in 1733, was of the latter kind, had united in 1792, leaving but one Grand Lodge still having jurisdiction over all North America, except those portions in which Grand Lodges had been created.

Then, too, the interest shown in.and expressions of sympathy and wishes for the prosperity of the Masonic Fraternity published in letters written by Washington soon after he laid down the robes of public office in 1796, coupled with the universal expressions of grief and sorrow and Masonic demonstrations immediately after his death in 1799 —- all no doubt had contributed to the prevalence of the strong, friendly Masonic feeling in the country; and among the numerous Lodges thus resulting, at the beginning of the last century, is found your own.

Beginning in Randolph (as your historian has said, accidentally spelled in our Grand Lodge records "Rehoboth") it soon found itself removed to Quincy, where under the administration of Isaiah Thomas, Grand Master, on the 19th of September, 1804, it being a Wednesday, your Lodge met in this old meeting-house, was constituted, and an installation of its officers took place. An account of this Communication appears on the records of our Grand Lodge, but a fuller account I have seen in a newspaper published soon after, and it is interesting to learn that after the ceremonies there walked in the procession and graced the occasion at the banquet the late President of the United States, John Adams, and his son, then a United States Senator, John Quincy Adams. The Grand Master of New Hampshire was also present, while Past Grand Masters of Massachusetts Josiah Bartlett, and that noble patriot Paul Revere, took part in the proceedings. The toasts, beginning with the "Masonic Institution " following with the "Clergy " were all appropriately presented; but the one exciting the most notice apparently, as it referred so delicately with veneration and regard for our immortal patron, and which was received with enthusiasm, was the toast to the town of Quincy: "May the laurel of Mt. Vernon long continue to bloom on the brow of Mt. Wollaston;" and we know how that hope was realized, as soon after the presidential chair of Washington and John Adams was filled by the then United States Senator present at this gathering.

Appropriately to the mention of Mt. Vernon is the precious relic which has accompanied the Grand Officers here on this day and occasion. This lock of hair taken from the head of the immortal Washington, incased in this golden urn, fashioned by the hands of Paul Revere and by him suitably inscribed, the whole surmounting the mahogany inlaid casket also from his hands, was esteemed and revered by the Masons of that day as it was by the patriots of the country, as one shining through a light such as is given by painters to the pictures of the transfiguration, an object before which the most worthy might bend the knee and to which they might look as an inspiration for direction and aid: the effulgence of this light shining about that venerable head has come to us through generations undimmed and undiminished; before it we bow and to it we pay homage; when that light shall fail and shall cease to exist in the minds of Masons and patriots, when those feelings of veneration and respect for it that were held by our fathers shall no longer be held sacred, then our Institution, our own and constitutional government, shall perish from the earth. His name has come to us unblemished, because Nature kindly decreed that posterity should not by chance couple his name with dishonor, and "Heaven left him childless that all the Nation might call him Father."

A most interesting and extended address might be made on the relations of the American patriot to the American Mason, beginning with the time of the Stamp Act and the destruction of the Gaspee in Narragansett Bay, through the Revolutionary War to the time of the formation of our Government.

The Lodge of St. Andrew room, where the Massachusetts Grand Lodge met at one time, in the old Green Dragon Tavern, a property still owned by the Lodge of St. Andrew in Boston, was regarded by the British as the nest of sedition, for within its walls were concocted many of the schemes of strategy employed by the patriots at the time the British troops were occupying Boston, and while the strained and troublesome relations between the Colonies and the mother country were fomenting. It was from that Lodge-room the patriots disguised as Indians rushed up what is now Washington Street, giving the imitation war-whoop at the door of the Old South Church, where Sam Adams and others were addressing the populace, and made their way to Griffin's Wharf and. threw the hated tea into the tide.

The Committee of Public Safety, consisting of four Masons, two of whom, Paul Revere and Joseph Warren, were Grand Masters, were, the ones to whom only should be disclosed by patriots the movements of the enemy, etc. One of that committee, John Hancock, gave his fortune, and Joseph Warren his life to the cause of American liberty, and the breastworks over which Warren fell at Bunker Hill were laid out by Col. Richard Gridley, an engineer, who was a Deputy Grand Master of Masons. Paul Revere before taking his famous ride, took into his confidence John Pulling, of Marblehead, a member of the Lodge of that place. Although the Mason has ever been and ever will be a loyal subject, and will not be concerned in plots or conspiracies against Government; the same principles that may make him tenacious of right and justice, compelled those people to resist aggression, taxation without representation; and any attempt: to deprive them of constitutional rights against all of which their independent thoughts and characters revolted. Hours might be devoted to thus showing the relation of the patriot to the Mason, not only before and during the Revolutionary war but afterwards in the formation of our Government.

The great impetus given to Masonry after the adoption of the Constitution, which was at its, height one hundred years ago, found itself strengthening year by year until about the year 1826 when the so-called anti-Masonic excitement took place. That craze was purely political.

Following the adoption of the Constitution, political parties saw in their opponents only extreme dangers to the Republic. The followers of Adams and Jay feared the advanced views of Jefferson's followers, and saw in them only the excesses of the French Revolution; while in their turn the party of Jefferson readily traced the tendency of the Adams party to a supremacy not unlike that which their fathers had just overthrown. Each feared the other, and suspicion aroused their fears to a fever heat. The peaceful administration of different political parties had demonstrated. that no great danger was to be feared from the opposition, but the spirit of political controversy and the restlessness that exists among political parties found itself necessary to be recognized in some form.

This great organization, that had been so active and successful during and after the War of the Revolution, had excited suspicion by its popularity, and by the ignorant and envious was regarded as a menace to our institutions.

The disappearance of one William Morgan in 1826, near Niagara, divided his community into a small political disturbance. DeWitt Clinton was then Governor of New York and a Grand Master of Masons. Thurlow Weed was his political enemy, and immediately began so bitter an attack upon him and upon Masonry that it spread through New York, and finally became national. Morgan was known as a dissolute and disreputable character, and was under arrest when last seen as he was conveyed across Niagara River; Major Ben Perley Poore, so many years Washington correspondent of the Boston Journal, declared he saw him alive in Smyrna, Turkey, in 1839. Governor Clinton did everything in his power to assist in ferreting out and punishing wrong-doers charged with the abduction; there never was any legal evidence to maintain the prosecution against his abductors, and there was no evidence of his death; in fact the body found floating in the Niagara river and claimed as Morgan's was identified by the widow and son of one Monroe as his body. This latter event gave the opportunity to Thurlow Weed to make the historical remark: "It is a good enough Morgan until after election." Notwithstanding the absurdity of the facts charged, the political controversy grew in intensity until the anti-Masonic party in 1832 nominated William Wirt for President against Andrew Jackson, Past Grand Master of Tennessee, and Henry Clay, Past Grand Master of Kentucky. Jackson being elected, Wirt receiving only the electoral vote of the State of Vermont, political anti-Masonry saw its death-blow.

This, with the famous Declaration of over six thousand Masons in New, England, published Dec. 31, 1831, sounded the death-knell of the anti-Masonic crusade. No political contest in the North ever approached it in intensity and bitterness. No society, civil, military or religious, escaped its influence; no relation of family or friends was a barrier to it; no retreat was so sacred it did not enter; teachers and pastors were driven from their stations; children of Masons were driven from schools and members from their churches; families were divided; legislatures passed laws endeavoring to take away chartered rights and preventing meetings of the organization; investigations were set on foot which needed only the rack to place them on a par with the Spanish Inquisition. In Massachusetts the Grand Lodge surrendered its Act of Incorporation to the Legislature and proceeded to hold its property by trustees rather than engage in a controversy on the subject.

In one sense the anti-Masonic crusade was a blessing in disguise to the Institution. With its decline the best work of the Craft revived. The Craft had been purified by the withdrawal of time-servers, the over-timid, and those who had become members to subserve their own interests. Those remaining being men of the highest character and strongest wills, were as positive in their notions of keeping the Institution unsullied as they were in maintaining its principles; thus starting anew with such men, we can understand how the high character of Masonry has been kept to its present standard. Their ideas as to who should become members being transmitted from generation to generation, the present high standard has thus been fixed and maintained.

As Masonry has prospered during the past fifty and one hundred years, so has our civilization gone hand in hand with it. During the nineteenth century the world has witnessed the greatest development of modern history. While the greatest and grandest of developments have been made in commercial, industrial and scientific life, the principles of civil and religious liberty, of which Masonry forms so great a part, have been developed under the most favorable conditions. While the genius of our country's development has been demonstrated by its material growth, it has advanced in immortal principles, in great and sublime truths, in deep religious feeling, in the advancement and development of education, and in the higher ideals of mutual respect and regard, an advancement that has been made by its men of sterling worth and strength of character, by the enunciation of principles and the practice of precepts of morality, brotherly love, temperance, virtue, justice, truth;—our own cardinal virtues and the first principles of the true Mason.

To Rural Lodge, its Brethren and friends the Grand Lodge brings its warmest encomiums, it wishes for you a brilliant and prosperous future, and it will take to its records at the Grand Lodge in Boston a pleasing account of this day's doings, coupled with its congratulations on so successful and auspicious an event.

CENTENNIAL OF AURORA LODGE, JUNE 1901

From Proceedings, Page 1901-62:

WORSHIPFUL MASTER AND BRETHREN: On June 8, 1801, the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts chartered eight Lodges, — its jurisdiction, then extending over a considerable portion of North America. During the same year the Grand Lodge chartered fourteen Lodges in various parts of its jurisdiction. Of the eight Lodges chartered June 8, almost all are now in existence; among them Amity Lodge, of Camden, and Eastern Lodge, of Eastport, in Maine; Fraternal, of Barnstable, Pacific of Amherst, Mount Lebanon, of Boston, Rural, of Quincy, and others, with your own Aurora Lodge, of Fitchburg, are still in existence, working with the ancient emblems and inculcating immortal precepts. Yesterday we attended the Centennial celebration of Rural Lodge, at Quincy, and this evening we propose to attend the Centennial of Mount Lebanon Lodge, in Boston. In this way, you see, the Officers of the Grand Lodge are compelled to exemplify the principles of expansion, even without imperial attributes; three, centennials in twenty four hours, and three or four more during the month, if they all hold to their intentions, must be the excuse that, the Grand Officers give if they are obliged to limit their stay, and be deprived of the joys and pleasures of your later festivities.

The organization and charter of your Lodge in 1801 would be veiled in obscurity, so far as the records of the Grand Lodge are concerned, were it not that by good fortune, on the evening before the fire that destroyed all of the Grand Lodge property in the Winthrop House Temple, the Grand Secretary had taken to his home the record books which contained an account of the various organizations named. These, with a few relics in the safe, were all that were rescued from that disaster; all correspondence, petitions, letters, jewels and regalia being destroyed.

The fire starting under the stairway leading to the Masonic apartments, the upper floors were shut off from communication from the very first, and everything owned by the Grand Lodge, except what I have named, was lost. Thus a great deal among the records of the Grand Lodge relating to Aurora Lodge, in its formation and during the earlier years of its existence, has passed into oblivion, and all that we have, outside of the record of the issuing of your charter, is a clipping pasted in one of the books of our library, at the time of the fire, in private hands, describing the celebration of the Feast of St. John by your Lodge in 1828. But your name and deeds have lived and will continue to live, shedding ever a new light like the dawn that you hail in your name, on the principles and practices of our Order.

The relics in the safe and thus saved at that fire were not many; but there was one to which on entering your Lodge room I referred and which we have thought appropriate to bring with us, because it was presented to the Grand Lodge through the Grand Master who signed your charter. I speak of the lock of hair of George Washington contained in this urn.

Always appropriate at any Masonic gathering, it would be less appropriate at the centennial of a Lodge chartered before or after Samuel Dunn was Grand Master. Yesterday marked its first presence at any centennial so far as I can learn. It is with you to-day at the Centennial Celebration of Aurora Lodge, and will be borne in honored procession at the Centennial Celebration of Mount Lebanon Lodge this evening. At each installation of a Grand Master it is presented, with solemn injunction as to its custody, with words as appropriate and a charge as sacred as that with which the Grand Master is invested with the insignia of his office. A sacred obligation is placed upon each Grand Master to keep and transmit it to his successor in office. The venerable head from which this lock of hair was taken is enshrined with a glory that has shone through the generations that have passed since his time, and comes to us in memory undimmed in its lustre, and is to all who look to him and call him patriot, and to us who look to him and call him Brother, a beacon that has been as "a pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night;" a light that has guided us as Masons to all Truth, and will continue to guide us and our children's children in the steps of happiness. May it never fail! When that light fails, when there shall cease to be reverence, regard and respect for that glorious effulgence, then will crumble the foundations of our government and our beloved Institution, and all we hold dear in Masonry and liberty will perish from the face of the earth. Long may this relic be spared to us as a visible token of a great and noble memory on which we can look and toward which we can bow.

Posterity had no opportunity to place a blemish on the name of that immortal patriot; and "Heaven left him childless that all the Nation might call him Father."

Your Lodge has existed for one hundred years with an unbroken record. The spirit of the immortal Washington animated the Brethren during the formation period, and never more than in the dark and perilous times of the anti-Masonic movement, when it required strength of character and purpose for a man to announce himself a Mason; when it required strength of body with courage and determination, to retain inviolate your Charter, to hold meetings by night and in secret, and keep your chain of years unbroken, until we and you meet to-day, large in numbers and strong in organization, enjoying the respect and esteem of the community, to celebrate the Centennial of your Lodge's organization. The fanaticism of the anti-Masonic movement purged Masonry, weeded.out the weak and cowardly, and left in it the strong, the vigorous, the men of convictions and strong beliefs; and these men reestablished and renewed Masonry so that it has come down to us to-day strong and healthy, imbued with virile life, hopeful and confident for the future.

Reference has been aptly made to the presence of Masonic rites in the ancient Egyptian civilization. The question is naturally asked, Why have they been lost? Because of the difference in application between the ancient Egyptian and the modern Mason. Arts and sciences, skill of various kinds, mysteries and high thoughts were in those days confined to the Pharoahs, to wise men, to royalty and to the favored few. The great body of the people, the subject-class, had naught to do with anything above the hand-labor of the servile bondman. The mysteries of Freemasonry and her emblems found at the base of the obelisk were monumental inscriptions that died when the rulers and dynasties perished. In modern times with the diffusion of knowledge and the spread of Masonry among all classes and peoples and not limited to the favored few, their universality and extent is so assured throughout the world that they "can never, never, never die."

The problem met and faced in the past one hundred years has been one of development, and it has been a century of progress and advancement, as your Worshipful Master has said. But this advancement has not been made in the world in countries which have proscribed Freemasonry. The Latin nations under a bigotry and intolerance ruling over ignorance have ever been the enemies of the organization we profess; the Northern nations of Europe that have known liberty and our own that is the synonym of freedom for both conscience and body, have ever fostered Freemasonry and it has gone hand in hand with civilization and development; here the free school, the free church, the town meeting and representative government have grown with the needs of the people, and have advanced side by side with Freemasonry and its principles ; so long as there is free and intelligent civil government, so long Freemasonry will stand; and so long as Masonry uplifts and upholds the true development of the hand and heart of mankind, so long will good government, progress and advancement in civilization continue.

Let us practise the tenets of our profession; let us bear in mind that our great and whole duty, our moral and religious duty and our duty to our country forming a part, is to see that there is a development of high character and strong moral conviction, and that the application of it to life shall be of the highest capable in man. Let our Institution develop men of strong faith and high endeavor; men ready to do and dare in the great march of civilization; men who, possessing influence, shall use it to shape aright our destinies in public life, and in private duty shall be examples of what is noble and true.

We extend our warmest congratulations to you on having achieved the success you have shown, and we shall bear to our records at the Temple in Boston our appreciation of the good you have done and are doing in our common noble cause.

CENTENNIAL OF MOUNT LEBANON LODGE, JUNE 1901

From Proceedings, Page 1901-73:

W. MASTER, LADIES AND BRETHREN: The "great awakening" in Masonic interest that was taking place one hundred and more years ago, consequent largely upon the return of Revolutionary soldiers to their homes who had seen, if not themselves enjoyed, the benefits of the Masonic Institution during active service, found its expression in this vicinity during the year 1801 in the organization by the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts of fourteen Lodges: three in the State of Maine, one at Demerara in the Spanish Main, and the remainder in Massachusetts. Among the latter was the organization of that noble little body of men, who, recognizing the sturdiness of the cedar that grew on the scriptural mountain, took to themselves the name which you still bear, and as a part of the "great awakening" of their time we are to celebrate the centennial of their doing.

The manifest interest in Masonry, and the zeal for its advancement have been ably seconded and supported through the century past; the same spirit of generous emulation, the desire to excel, and above all to place your good old Lodge on the highest plane of success in all undertakings, has found a similar expression in your action this clay, developing as it has one of the most brilliant, successful, and enjoyable anniversary occasions that it has been, the lot of the representatives of the Grand Lodge to witness. It is delightfully pleasant always to enjoy the centennial ceremonies of any organized body, but when is shown a keen interest, a thorough preparation and organization such as you present this night in the elaborate program that is before me, the heart of the guest should indeed be full, and his expressions of gratitude co-equal to the occasion.

You have indeed a noble heritage, and you have nobly achieved the work committed to you in commemoration of your founders. They were worthy men of a worthy town, enlisted in a worthy cause, in behalf of a worthy Institution. They had all witnessed and many of them taken part in the development of a colony into a nation. They had seen their beloved town of Boston dwindle to five thousand inhabitants after the siege and rise again to five times that number. They had known either personally or intimately of the actions of the great Washington, their and our patron, and in addition to other causes, they were no doubt largely influenced by the generous words of commendation and hoped for success which he expressed in his letters to various jurisdictions, after laying down the robes of office as President, when he wished success to the Masonic Institution which he so dearly loved.

It was during the administration of Samuel Dunn, whose name appears upon your charter as Grand Master, that he received for the Grand Lodge from the hands of Martha, the widow of George Washington, a lock of his hair, which was placed in a golden urn fashioned by the hand of Paul Revere and by him suitably inscribed, the whole being kept in a mahogany casket, likewise the handiwork of Paul Revere. This sacred relic is at each installation transmitted from Grand Master to Grand Master with appropriate ceremonies and most solemn injunction as to its. care and custody. Appropriately to the time, for it would hardly be appropriate at any other year, I make the connecting link between the hand that is on your charter and the hand that received this precious trust, by bringing with me and presenting to your view to-night this graceful relic from that saintly head. Its memory is an inspiration to us as its form was to our fathers. Our homage goes out toward it, and when it shall cease to have our reverence the Institution we represent and all its principles will fail. Worthy and beloved of all Masons, all men and all people, Nature kindly provided that posterity should not sully his name, and "Heaven left him childless that all the nation might call him Father."

What miracles of change time has wrought in the past century. When your Lodge was formed this little city with its handful of a few thousand inhabitants, every man knowing every other man, the entire town almost self-observant from one end to the other, was almost without industries, had but little commerce, and was limited in almost every form of modern institution except churches, and absolutely unprovided with many things now regarded by us as necessities. The fifty-miles' radius from the State House was sparsely settled and the communities were pastoral and agricultural. Beyond the fifty-miles' radius there was little in common with the inhabitants of this section. To-day, within that fifty-miles' radius one-thirtieth of the population of the entire United-States resid.es. It contains one-twentieth of the wealth of the whole country, and one-fifth of the savings of the American people is to be found in Massachusetts Savings Banks.

Within the radius referred to more than two million people reside, a greater number than within the same radius of any of the great cities of the United States, excepting New York. The valuation of real and personal property owned by these people is more than $2,600,000,000, unfound in the same fifty miles' radius of any great city except New York. The same is true of the business transacted by the Clearing House of the Boston Banks.

We are apt to think of Philadelphia and Chicago as beyond and above Boston in all things, but here we have a striking object lesson of the marvellous growth and development of a people whose aim in life being guided by strict integrity and industrious application, has surpassed them both in material things; and while we are second to New York in all that I have named, in the total railway mileage within the fifty-miles' radius, for steam and street railway facilities, we have 2,894 miles against 2,606 miles for the same distance about New York city. All this wonderful development and growth have come from the fertile brain, the industrious hand, the high integrity and business standing of its commercial people. With a soil arid and rockbound, yielding little in agricultural products and no valuable minerals, our people have developed and fostered industries with the magnificent record I have stated, until our city stands as the great centre of New England, proud in the achievements of the past and hopeful with great promise for the future.

Among the men who formed a part of this great development, prominent and active in the history of our city and State, were men of your Lodge. They were men of sterling worth and character. They passed through the ordeal of fire in anti-Masonic times, and a sufficient number had sufficiently 'the courage of their convictions to maintain their loyalty to the principles of our Institution, so that when that political craze had passed, they were able to renew with fidelity and zeal their devotion to the ancient landmarks which they had never abandoned. All honor to them and their associates. May their names ever remain with you, a roll of honor for the distinguished services they performed. Cherish their memory and emulate their example, so that in the hour of need we may be made strong in our might to maintain the principles of right and justice and all we hold dear.

The great material prosperity to which I have alluded has of course carried with it the advancement of great principles, immortal truths, and the development and advancement of education and religion. Hand in hand with this development have gone the principles and precepts dear to us and taught by our fathers as they will be by our sons, principles and precepts which everywhere mark the cardinal virtues of the true Mason. One hundred years ago the first cotton mill was running with 250 spindles. Whitney invented the cotton gin, and one mill has extended to a thousand, and 250 spindles have become eighteen million. The first wool carding machine was in operation under American invention not three years beyond the past century. One hundred years after there are 2,500 wool manufacturers in the United States.

All the development in all branches of machinery, of manufacture, of metals, of glass industries, of furnace and mill products, of railway and electrical appliances, the handling of great supplies for domestic life and agriculture, the extension of commerce on the seas, the greatest development in these and other lines has been done in this our country during the past one hundred years. Not only in the arts and sciences and material prosperity, but in human thought and development, old prejudices have been eradicated, and this past century of civilization and humanity has closed with a complete emancipation and freedom for human thought. The problem for us is the century that we approach.

The divine attribute of the Mason is Truth. Our civilization having become fixed and no longer experimental, the duty of the future is to develop what we have achieved and apply it in the most honest and useful method for the further advancement of civilization, to the end that the next Centennial Anniversary of your Lodge will close what may be termed a Truth-seeking century. It will be the duty of the Brethren of the Craft to see that in our future progress, neither dishonesty nor fraud shall enter into the work of the hand or the expression of the mouth; that in the mart, the workshop and in the government; in science, literature and art; in the professions, and on land and sea, the methods employed shall be those of Honesty and Truth. The equitable adjustment that must take place in the relations of capital, labor, trades, occupations, markets and commercial highways must be borne out by thinking men governed by the most honest intentions. In the development of these great problems the principles of our Institution cannot fail to be a potent influence in stimulating the minds and characters of men in every station of life; and by the application of the great principles of Truth, the next century will close with a country no longer torn by differences or dissensions, but all will be "united" in one common purpose, with unselfish devotion to the public weal.

Not only in our own country, but in dealing with the world, the principles of reciprocity and mutual international assistance throughout the civilized world must be perfected and developed by the humanitarian influences of the English-speaking people ; and as they have encouraged civil and religious liberty, representative and constitutional government, free public schools, freedom of thought, and all that has been an encouragement to education, commerce, industry and the arts, so they have ever fostered and developed the Institution of Freemasonry and its principles, justly and properly to be regarded as the handmaiden of the highest and best civilization.

We point with pride to England, saved from the Spanish Armada, and Holland withstanding the atrocities of Alva and Philip, as being saved to civilization to foster and develop all we hold dear, and all that is great, noble and grand in the civilization and development of our race. May the light saved by them and transmitted to us continue to burn as a beacon that shall guide other less favored nations to Truth as part of the great plan of the. coming century. May this development go hand in hand with Masonry so that its influence may extend to all parts of the earth, demonstrating its universality, and that its precepts shall be equally extensive.

May we not say then with the great orator of the Landing of the Pilgrims:

"Advance, then, ye future generations! We would hail.you, as you rise in your long succession to fill the places which we now fill, and to taste the blessings of existence where we are passing, and soon shall have passed, our own human duration. We bid you welcome to this pleasant land of the Fathers. We bid you welcome to the healthful skies and the verdant fields of New England. We greet your accession to the great inheritance which we have enjoyed. We welcome you to the blessings of good government and religious liberty. We welcome you to the treasures of science and the delights of learning. We welcome you to the transcendent sweets of domestic life, to the happiness of kindred and parents and children. We welcome you to the immeasurable blessings of rational existence, the immortal hope of Christianity, and the light of everlasting truth!"

AT HALL DEDICATION FOR GEORGE H. TABER LODGE, JUNE 1901

Taber+Lodge.jpg

From Proceedings, Page 1901-109:

WORSHIPFUL MASTER AND BRETHREN: Ordinarily one of the most pleasing of the ceremonials which the Grand Officers are called upon to perform is that of the dedication of a new Lodge-room. It is pleasant and agreeable because it evidences a growth in interest among the Brethren and evinces a prosperity that is always a cause for congratulation. If this is true ordinarily, how much more so is it. in a case like the present, where we. are called upon to join with you in the dedication of halls and apartments devoted to Masonic purposes, in a building presented to you as a gift by one of your own townsmen and Brethren, at a cost, as I am told, of at least $50,000; and to perform it for a Lodge now named for so eminent and distinguished a Mason and beloved Brother as Right Worshipful George H. Taber; that good Brother for whom you have changed the name of your Lodge as a fitting monument to him during his lifetime.

This is the first change of a Lodge name, so far as known to us, in Massachusetts or New England. (Note: there are at least two other examples of which the Grand Master was not aware.) In fact, for the first time since my connection or acquaintance with the Grand Lodge, our Recording Grand Secretary, Brother Nickerson, appeared to be embarrassed; because he had to create a precedent in the form of endorsement to be made on your charter in changing the name from Concordia, the name he gave it as Grand Master. But the change and endorsement have been completed in all respects to the satisfaction of Brother Gillingham and myself as lawyers, having in effect all that the Grand Lodge had voted should be done under the attestation of the Grand Secretary; and in addition, apparently to make it entirely secure, Brother Nickerson required the Grand Master, the Deputy Grand Master and the two Grand Wardens also to sign the authorization.

I doubt if such a combination of circumstances as we meet to-day has ever existed in Masonic annals, and I doubt if any of us present will ever live to see it repeated. A Brother, Henry H. Rogers, a native of this town of Fairhaven, presenting a magnificent building to a Masonic Lodge named for a Brother now in his 93d year, the name of the Lodge being changed in his honor, and all being dedicated by the Grand Lodge, is a combination of events that not only calls for the warmest expressions of congratulation on the part of you as Brethren, but on the part of the Grand Officers who witness and perform the ceremony and take back to its Temple in Boston a record of the event. The causes of these congratulations have been a joy to us all in anticipation during the weeks that have passed. They have been spoken of in public and private with delight, have been referred to in our Communications with pleasure, and we have come here with hearts overflowing with gratitude and praise for those who have been not only donors to your Lodge and your town, but have thus become benefactors to our Grand Lodge and to Freemasonry in general.

Although the changing of the name of your Lodge was without precedent, a knowledge of the circumstances was sufficient, notwithstanding the usual prevalence of conservatism in our Grand Lodge, for the vote to be unanimous in favor of the change.

The fame of Brother Rogers as a benefactor had preceded him, and his name was coupled instinctively with that of Right Worshipful Brother Taber, who was remembered at our June Grand Lodge meeting, when the vote was taken, as the good Brother in his 93d year, who was escorted from the Grand Lodge at its March meeting. After the announcement was made by the Grand Master that Brother Taber was in his 93d year, that he had performed distinguished Masonic services, that he had never been ill, ashore or afloat, twenty-four hours in his life, that he never had expended five dollars in his life for doctor's services on account of sickness; as he walked out of the Grand Lodge he was accompanied by a burst of harmony from the organ pealing forth the music of "Auld Lang Syne," in which the entire gathering of Brethren joined in song. There could be but one response when the proposition came to change from even so sweet a name as that of "Concordia" to that of our present venerable Brother. When the Grand Lodge was called upon to act, its action was unanimous. And as he parted from us with the strains of "Auld Lang Syne" ringing in his ears, so we come back, from the Grand Lodge to this your Lodge named for him, bringing with us the same refrain and again repeating to him the beautiful sentiment "Should auld acquaintance be forgot?"

While it is your good fortune to be the recipient of such bounty as has come from Brother Rogers, the Grand Lodge - feels itself proud also to claim a part of the benefit that comes to it for the good that it is to Masonry. It desires to express its appreciation that the Almighty has placed it in the heart of our good Brother in his benefactions to have considered our Institution, from which are to be derived in this and every community the higher and nobler sentiments of Brotherly Love, Relief and Truth. We are proud not only that you as one of our children have received this benefit, but we feel still stronger the association and alliance with what is near and dear to him. We feel that warm touch of kinship by which he has allied us with his family; for in thus memorializing our Brother Taber one of his family, in the giving of this Masonic building to his name, he has placed Masonry in a class more closely to his heart than we could have ever presumed to place ourselves; and it is with pride without presumption that we claim a parallel with those noble gifts that he has already given to the town: the Millicent Library in memory of his daughter, the Town Hall a memorial to his wife, and here, as a memorial to another member of his family, this magnificent Masonic building. The gift in itself were sufficient, but to come with this spirit and with this alliance, will be ever to us a noble and glorious remembrance.

The name of Brother Rogers and that of Brother Taber would never have perished from the minds of those of us who know them, but their names now being placed imperishably in this monument, will not only never be forgotten by those of us here, but can never be forgotten so long as Masonry and the Grand Lodge exist. It is a monument to both of them, to the highest, noblest and best qualities that animate the heart of man on the one hand, and to the memory of an earnest, generous and beloved Brother on the other.

In attempting to pay a proper tribute to the work of the one and standing of the other, I find myself almost void of proper expression. The English language is too poor in adjectives to fittingly describe the gift and the occasion for it. In attempting to do so, I am confronted with the same feelings that arise in the presence of great emotions, either of, extreme joy or sorrow. "I sometimes think it half a sin to try to put in words the grief one feels" at the loss of a friend or at the happiness in the success of another. It is a time for quiet, peaceful meditation, with each one enjoying within himself the conscious satisfaction that comes from looking upon the faces of those who have been benefactors to their kind either with the heart or with the hand; and so I leave it to you, Brethren, to draw an inspiration from this day and from this happy combination of events, from the character of these men who have been your and our benefactors. As you continue your ceremonials and work in this beautiful building, in this Lodge-room so completely fitted and furnished, remember that it is all for the purpose of advancing humanity and human kind along the lines of noble deeds that shall develop high character; remember that the Institution of Masonry has a mission to do good in the world by making men better, nobler, stronger ; let this day and occasion be another stimulant to good acts and kind deeds; to the end that Masonry shall advance with progress, enlightenment, and the best and highest type of civilization.

Finally, my Brethren, with all your blessings and happiness, the Grand Lodge brings you its congratulations. May your Lodge flourish, may your union strengthen, may your members prosper, and may happiness abound; and when we, with our Brothers whose day we have come to celebrate, shall be called to our last reward, may each of us receive the word: "Well done, good and faithful servant, enter into the joy of thy Lord."

CENTENNIAL OF FRATERNAL LODGE, JUNE 1901

From Proceedings, Page 1901-73:

W. MASTER, LADIES AND BRETHREN: At the second centennial of the founding of the town of Barnstable, the distinguished orator of the occasion referred to the noble band that, settling on these sterile shores, laid the corner-stone of a Nation at Plymouth. He said: "I see the mountains of New England rising from their rocky thrones. They rush forward into the ocean, settling down as they advance, and there they range themselves, a mighty bulwark around the heaven-directed vessel. Yes, the everlasting God himself stretches out the arm of his mercy and his power in substantial manifestation, and gathers the meek company of his. worshippers as in the hollow of his hand." Appropriately adjusting this scholarly "and concise description of the landing of the Pilgrims, may we not in a figurative sense connect it by simile with the noble little body of men who founded Fraternal Lodge during that memorable year 1801, when our Grand Lodge chartered fourteen Lodges, — three in Maine, one on the Spanish Main at Demarara, and the remainder in Massachusetts?

What a great misfortune it is that the history of the Lodges formed one hundred years ago, with the causes that led to their formation, the petitions, correspondence, remonstrances, papers, and the general discussion which must have, taken place in each case, have been lost. Although they were destroyed in that unfortunate fire of April 5, 1864, when the old Masonic rooms over the Winthrop House with their entire contents were a prey to the flames, fortunately the record books of the Grand Lodge were at the home of Charles W. Moore, then Grand Secretary, and so were saved. But excepting the contents of a safe, everything else in the building, many things that would be interesting to us to-day in connection with this centennial, were wiped out in a night. It would indeed be interesting reading if we could have the variety of expressions of opinion that must have arisen concerning the organization of a list of Lodges so scattered as were the following:

Amity, Camden, Maine, March 10; Mount Lebanon, Boston, Mass., June 8; Forefathers Rock, Plymouth, Mass., June 8; Fraternal, Barnstable, Mass., June 8; Pacific, Sunderland, Mass., June 8; Aurora, Leominster, Mass., June 8; Eastern Lodge, Eastport, Maine, June 8; St. John's, Demarara, B. Guaina, June 8; Rural, Randolph, Mass., June 8; Sincerity, Partridgefield, Mass., Sept. 14; Sumner, Dennis, Mass., Sept. 15; United, Topsham, Maine, Dec. 14; Corner Stone, Duxbury, Mass., Dec. 14; Constellation, Dedham, Mass., Dec. 15, all in 1801.

Representing as they do every section of our State, and extending from the wilds of Maine into the tropics, their original papers might shed light on the action of the Grand Lodge this same year 1801, in refusing to grant any more charters to Lodges until a Committee had been appointed and favorable report being had thereon; also why charters were held up until eight were granted on the clay the founders of your Lodge received this venerable document under which you now work. All such questions must now be settled by the conjecture of the ingenious, for the evidence has been consigned to oblivion.

You have indeed kept your charter in a good state of preservation. Bearing as it does the signature of Samuel Dunn, it carries our minds back to the important event of his administration, to which we now appropriately refer, as it will be less appropriate after the present year with any centennial association; and that is the receiving by him as Grand Master from the hands of Martha Washington, the widow of our great patron and immortal Brother George Washington, a lock of his hair, which the Grand Officers have brought with them on this occasion, and which I now present to your view enclosed in this golden urn fashioned by the hand of Paul Revere, and by him suitably inscribed, the whole encased in the mahogany casket which accompanies it.

It is appropriate indeed to hold in one hand your charter, bearing the signature of Samuel Dunn, and in the other this precious, relic that was delivered to him from the hands of that noble matron. As this charter is transmitted from Master to Master of your Lodge with appropriate ceremonials and ritualistic direction, so each succeeding Grand Master receives from his predecessor this precious relic as a sacred trust, with injunction as solemn as that with which he receives the Emblems of the power and authority under which he performs his work. And so through successive generations it has come to the present Grand Master, who, holding it under this solemn obligation, feels that he can execute that trust no better than at occasional feasts and celebrations of great importance like this of yours, when the time is auspicious and appropriate, to present and display this relic that it may be an inspiration to those present as recalling the memory, of that great man whose person and presence were an inspiration to our fathers.

May we ever continue to reverence his name and all that we have of him that is mortal. As he and his name were the beacon which guided our fathers as "a pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night," so may the contents of this urn ever be a reminder of the watchword of duty which shall ever be upon our lips, evincing a devotion to the cause of Masonry, its principles and precepts, that shall reflect credit on the great and good name of him whom we immortalize as one of our patron saints. When Masonry shall cease to regard him and all he was, when the people of this country shall forget what he. stood, for, then indeed the light of liberty and freedom will have failed, and all that has been fought for will have been in vain. Happy indeed is the nation or people that can have so grand an ideal exemplified in one man, and happy indeed is an Institution that can have in one man so constant a reminder of so many virtues.

Our good friend who has so courteously and gracefully welcomed the Grand Lodge and its officers, who, by reason of his profession I am pleased to denominate not only as a Brother in Freemasonry, but also a brother in law, has expressed the great obligation which your Lodge feels for our presence. Let me reverse the shield. The obligation of thanks is on the part of the Grand Officers that they have been received by such a numerous and brilliant gathering of your members and friends; that they have been so hospitably entertained from the moment of their arrival to the present time. And, if prevailing threats are to be believed, the hours that are to come will find a continuance of your good-fellowship and feeling,. No! the obligation is on our part, and we are sorry to add with it our regrets that we cannot all remain and enjoy the festivities which are to reach their climax, as we understand, during the evening.

For all this kindness we express our sincere thanks. We are proud indeed of r your old Lodge and your present membership. Proud indeed of the men who have carried your charter through all these years, and, keeping it unstained and unspotted, now present it to the Grand Lodge for inspection after one hundred years. We return it to your custody, and hope, with the years that shall come, this rural community, wherein the strength of nations is found, shall, by the fraternal spirit which your name and organization display, be a potent factor in working out the great problems that shall present themselves during the coming century, with that spirit of brotherly love and fraternal feeling, that should actuate the dealings of all Christian and civilized men.

It is not my purpose to elaborate further, though a multitude of ideas naturally arise in the thought of what has occurred in Masonry and in our civilization in the past one hundred years. It is a noble history in both regards. But I am here in my official capacity only to express the appreciation of your good work, and carry back to our Temple in Boston a record of what you have done and are doing in the making of history. Placed between our W. Brother Chase, the historian of the past, and our good Brother Horton, the Reverend Grand Chaplain, who is to speak for the future, I thus find myself figuratively, in the matter of speaking, between the upper and under crust of the uplifting pastry of this feast. It Would be inappropriate for me to detract from the interest their presentations will inspire, or to divide my time with the space that is allotted to them in your program.

With such interesting and instructive literary presentations as shall be made to you, there remains nothing for.me to say for entertainment or instruction. I simply give to you in closing an expression of the exceptional appreciation the Grand Lodge feels for your efforts; offer praise, that, you have been so abundantly blessed; forecast the future with a devout hope that you may continue to prosper both as to Lodge and membership, and that happiness and fraternal feeling may ever abound. We will return to our Grand Lodge and there put upon our records an appreciative expression of what you have done in thus placing permanently on the Masonic landscape another landmark among the one hundred milestones of Freemasonry in our good old Commonwealth.

CENTENNIAL OF PACIFIC LODGE, JUNE 1901

From Proceedings, Page 1901-151:

WORSHIPFUL MASTER: What good fortune attends you and the Brethren, that you are able to present on this occasion a parchment so well preserved, with every line distinct and every signature legible? Particularly is this true when we note by the endorsements on it the wanderings of your Lodge and its charter through the towns of Sunderland, Leverett and Amherst, then to Boston, and its final restoration here. It is a satisfaction to have retained a Masonic charter; it is more than that and indeed a gratification, to hold a conserved charter tbat has had such a devious and at the same time so successful a life.

What a disaster to all of us that by the fire of 1864 in Boston the original papers, petitions, correspondence and everything pertaining to the Lodges prior to that time should have been destroyed. I cannot refrain from mentioning the fact at each centennial. If we could have the original petition with something of the correspondence, and even the remonstrances, if there were any opposed to your creation, we might know something of the origin of your name, and more of the individuals who formed the original organization. Certainly they must have been men of peace, and therefore peaceful men, when they selected the name of Pacific.

The Lodge being formed in this patriotic centre had its origin no doubt among Revolutionary soldiers who had seen or partaken of the benefits of Freemasonry in the tented field. To whatever extent this is true, they were indeed men of noble character and sterling worth. They appreciated the great principles of which we are justly proud and which are the cardinal virtues and tenets of our profession. These principles and tenets exist to-day as they existed then, and by a due attention to inculcating and practising these teachings of our Fraternity there can be but one result in the standard of character developed, and that is the highest, noblest and best in the community.

The founders of your Lodge who were past middle life at the time of its charter remembered the days of Louisburg, Crown Point and Ticonderoga; and remembered no doubt the naming of this District in 1759, (not a chartered town until 1776), when the inhabitants took for their name that of their patron and leader the great Amherst, who that year had accomplished results against the French and Indians where Pitt and Wolfe had failed. A grand man was Jeffrey Amherst, both before and after he was knighted at Staten Island in 1761. Having fought under Frederick the Great and acquired a military training, he was called by Pitt to command the Louisburg expedition, that place considered impregnable until captured by provincial New England troops in 1745. It being afterwards restored to France and rebuilt, until it was said by one of the ministers of France that its area had been covered with gold coins, the task devolved upon General Amherst to again reduce it, which he did in 1759; and that stronghold, with the Island of Cape Breton and Prince Edward Island fell into English hands.

Afterwards Ticonderoga and Crown Point surrendered to this military genius, with the result, as the historian Parkman says: *In 1760 half a continent changed hands by the scratch of a pen." No doubt the character and success of the man were the leading motives in the naming of this District for him. But as a bit of local color it maybe added, that after taking Ticonderoga and Crown Point, he opened a road from there to the Connecticut river; an undertaking in those days which certainly must have touched the hearts of the pioneers of .that time, who knew the perils and hardships of the trackless forests, and may have, attracted their attention toward him and thus won for you the historical name your town now bears.

The Grand Lodge is proud indeed to be welcomed by such a body of Masons, in such a town, and in such a centre of education and learning; for besides your own two colleges, you are located in a section where probably there are more higher educational institutions than within any similar radius in the United States or the world. It is a flourishing section and one wherein the successful Mason may feel justly proud to live. With the great antiquity of our Fraternity, with its historical associations, and the part that Masonry has taken in the. development of science and the useful arts, we cannot but feel a bond of sympathy in coming among you in the educational centre to join in this centennial celebration.

Although at the fire of 1864 all the property of the Grand Lodge in the Temple was destroyed except the contents of a safe, the record books were by chance at the home of the Grand Secretary on that disastrous night; in them, we find recorded that in the year 1801 your Lodge was chartered with thirteen others, three in the State of Maine, one in South America at Demarara, aud the remainder in Massachusetts.

In the same book of records, and but a few pages in advance of the record of your charter, there is found the record of a special meeting called by the Grand Lodge to consider whether they would take part with the civic authorities in a memorial service and procession on the death of George Washington. It is unimportant that the Grand Lodge declined to take part with the civil authorities and held their own service of mourning with exercises and procession. But at that meeting a committee, consisting of three Past Grand Masters: Dr.John Warren, a brother of the lamented Joseph Warren who fell at Bunker Hill, Paul Revere and Josiah Bartlett, was appointed to request a lock of hair of the late dead President and provide an urn for its safe keeping. Within a few days thereafter the Grand Lodge, through this committee, received from the hands of Martha Washington, the widow of George Washington, a lock of his hair, which was placed in a golden urn fashioned and suitably inscribed by the hands of Paul Revere, all placed in a velvet-lined mahogany casket, also the work of Paul Revere's hand. This gift of inestimable value was presented to Samuel Dunn as Grand Master, and his name appears upon this parchment which I hold and which you have brought for our inspection.

It is peculiarly appropriate during the centennial year of the Lodges chartered by Samuel Dunn that this sacred relic received by him should be exhibited on so important an occasion as this. I have, therefore, brought it with me, and I now present it to your view, a golden cluster from that blessed head, that shone in the darkness of tribulation through which our fathers passed, "as a light unto their feet and a lamp unto their path." This lock of hair is received by each Grand Master and transmitted by him to his successor under injunction as solemn as that by which he is invested with the insignia of his office. It is appropriate that your charter, so sacred to you, and this trust, so sacred to the Grand Lodge, should be borne aloft together before you as emblems of that inspiration which you draw from both, and of the devotion that you have to what they represent. When your charter fails, the light of your Lodge goes out; when the light from that head shall fail, and the name of Washington shall no longer inspire to deeds of greatness arid courage, and be a shining mark in the civilization of our country, then our country, its principles, its institutions, and all that it fosters and holds dear, shall fail with it. Cherish then these memories, and let them ever be as a beacon star in your lives, transmitting their remembrance to your children's children, as representing the same principles which have come to us through generations as the best guides to intelligence and truth.

Between your two historians, the one to review the past and the other to forecast the future, there is little that I can say that will interest or instruct. But as the problems of the past century have been worked out through great experimental genius in the development of science, the mechanic arts, commerce on the seas, education and learning on the land, and all the developments of metal products and electricity, we cannot at the close of the century fail to express our reverent recognition of God's bounteous goodness that we have been among those who have enjoyed the benefits and fruits thereof.

As these have been developed through honest endeavor although largely by experiment, they have now become fixed and settled as a part of our daily existence; things formerly unknown or classed as luxuries have become the necessaries of life, and all that has been wrought by the hand and brain has become a heritage that remains to be worked out by the men of the coming one hundred years.

In the execution of the great trust thus bequeathed to us, in assuming the responsibility for the use of what we enjoy, in the handling of the great engines of power used in the development of humanity, in the solution of the great questions of transportation, of labor, capital and industrial conditions, the application of principles must be made that shall be on the lines of honesty and fraternity. The development must be along the lines of absolute Truth, and nowhere in the civilized world, and to no institution can the eye look or the finger point for assistance with greater assurance of what is needed for the human race with more distinct advantage than to the Freemason and Masonic principles. This is true not only in our own country but in the progress of the Nations of the earth. Wherever development is to be made, the application must be made on right lines with the principles of immortal Truth. In thus being an active factor, our own Institution will develop and flourish; and may we thus hail the coming century as one in which our country may be prosperous, and advance in higher thought and action; in which the world may become nobler and better, "that all the nations of the earth may be at peace with one another:" then, will the Brethren appreciate the universality of our principles and rejoice in their extensive application. The part performed by Pacific Lodge and its members in the great problem "will be weighed in the balance" and may the historian of your second Centennial be glad that they "have not been found wanting."

CENTENNIAL OF MERRIMACK LODGE, JUNE 1902

From Proceedings, Page 1902-80:

W. MASTER, LADIES AND BRETHREN: If the Rev. John Ward, who, if I read history correctly, carved out of old Pentucket for the price of three pounds and ten shillings that part of this territory that is now known as Haverhill, could look on this scene and know what we know you know of Merrimack Lodge, his heart would indeed be full; to see exemplified and hear enunciated the precepts that he taught both in Old and New England, reproduced by a body of men in an organization unknown to him, but the natural product of his teachings, one hundred and sixty years after he founded this town, would indeed be the subject of congratulations on his part, as the old Grand Lodge of Massachusetts now gives its congratulations to you and to the Master and Brethren of your Lodge on thus having attained this one hundredth milestone in your Masonic life; congratulations that are indeed appropriate after what we have to-day seen and heard as an accomplishment by the Brethren during the period of your growth, from that little dozen men of 1802, to the three hundred and seventy-four members of to-day. Your Master might have added what we know at the Grand Lodge, that besides your own increase, you are the grandparent or parent of five other Lodges in this vicinity, all prosperous and flourishing.

You, in Merrimack Lodge, have done better than your four associates chartered in 1802, three of which were in Massachusetts, and one in the State of Maine, for none of them remain. Your Lodge was formed at a period when men's minds were quickened by the memories of the war of the Revolution. They were in the throes of establishing a government, a generation after peace had been declared. Not only with England and other foreign nations, but among themselves in their political parties, acrimonious discussion and an absolute want of confidence in each other's motives was the normal condition of public matters. The accession of Mr. Jefferson, as President, after Mr. Adams' defeat, gave rise to the belief on the part of the latter's adherents that it would not be possible for a republic to exist under the lead of those whom Mr. Jefferson represented, without falling into the excesses of a French revolution.

The conservatism of a Washington and an Adams had for twelve years been the policy of the government, and it was feared by their followers that the advanced and extremely liberal democratic principles of Jefferson and his followers would lead to anarchy, if not a complete disruption of the Union. But 1801 had passed, 1802 opened, and Mr. Jefferson had announced as a policy that "we are all Federalists, we are all Democrats, there is but one government, and that is the people." Thus pacific times were following a measure of confidence, and among the peaceful occupations the formation of organizations such as yours, devoted to high and noble aims, was a natural result.

Those who had taken part in the foundation and formation of the government were very generally Masons; a majority of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, all of Washington's generals, and a majority of the Constitutional Convention, besides almost every man of prominence in the States as United, was a Master Mason. In every town and village thus settled in the paths of peace, they eased the frictions of their political and personal differences, so that the period of 1801 and 1802 was a period of prosperity and success as evidenced by the establishment of Masonic Lodges, fourteen, if I recall, in 1801, and five in 1802, yours being one of that number. So the Grand Lodge has abundant cause for congratulation not only in what you have done, but that it can look back with pride at the work of one hundred years ago.

You are to be congratulated, too, for that loyal, devoted Masonic spirit shown here in collecting and keeping alive historical reminiscences of your part of our Institution. A Bible, a Square and Compasses, and an altar before which every Brother kneels, in continuous use during one hundred years, with other valuable and memorable relics and implements used in your Lodge-room, or forming a part of your decoration, surrounded by illustrations and portraits appropriate to your Lodge history, bear testimony to the loyalty and devotion that your predecessors have had in Masonry and in your Lodge, and that you, their worthy successors, are proud to maintain and conserve as an interesting feature of your celebration.

Dec. 14, 1799, the Father of his Country passed away. Immediately thereafter the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts received from the hands of Martha Washington, his widow, a lock of his hair. It was presented to the Grand Master, through a committee of three Past Grand Masters, with a solemn injunction to faithfully keep it and transmit it to his successor in office with like provisions; and from that day successively to each Grand Master that venerable lock of hair has been transmitted with as solemn a charge as it is possible to apply to any sacred relic.

It is about the only material thing that is made the special property and duty of the Grand Master for the time being to care for, and it is unusual for it to be taken away from its sacred resting place in the Vault of the Temple; but as appropriate to this occasion it has accompanied the Grand Officers, and I now present it to the view of all here assembled. The man who received this priceless relic was Samuel Dunn, whose name appears upon the charter of your Lodge as Grand Master. He transmitted it to his successor, and our records show that this has been done from one Grand Master to another, until I had the distinguished honor to receive it. This mahogany case, fashioned by the hand of Paul Revere, a Past Grand Master, with the golden urn on top, contains within it, under the glass, a lock of hair of George Washington. The golden urn and its inscription are also the handiwork of Paul Revere. The whole is brought, to be figuratively transmitted to each one of you, Brethren, to carry with it an inspiration, as Washington in the flesh was to the Masonic Brethren and to all the people of the United States; and as he especially was to your predecessors during his memorable visit to Haverhill in 1789.

As his name was known and as he was revered and honored in life, so to-day this memory of him is quickened in respect and reverence with devotion and loyalty, not only to him as a patriot, but as the highest, noblest and grandest of Masons. Providence kindly provided that his name should not by chance be sullied by descendants, but "Heaven left him childless that all the nation might call him Father."

Worshipful Master and Brethren, the problem that was given to the founders of Merrimack Lodge, in their daily and public lives one hundred years ago, was to interpret the blessings of liberty and establish a government. In the performance of it, they applied from their Masonic lives these principles which we hold dear, and interwoven with political forms were the tenets and cardinal virtues which we inculcate and practise. To what a general extent, civil, political and military, the members of your Institution were prominent in the affairs of the Revolution and the founding of our government, is a matter of history. They applied these principles to their daily lives, and above all inculcated the principles of "truth," that "divine attribute." "The eternal years of God are hers," and as they applied these principles to the foundation of our government, and as such principles have been maintained by Masons during the past one hundred years, so during the century that is to come, a similar application to the changed conditions of life must be carried out by Masons in the development of a government thus established.

The past century has seen a marvellous growth and development of everything that the ingenuity of brain and cunning of the hand can develop. The work has been in a sense experimental, but it has now become fixed and stable. The great relations that exist between men and aggregations of men, governed by the application of the mechanical powers' to commerce, industry and the arts, and to works of all kinds; the products of the earth and sky and sea, held as it were in the hand of man, creating great changed social conditions and problems, will require the mind of genius during the coming years to work out and assimilate - not only in governmental conditions, but in the great problems of the union of capital with labor and the relations in the industries of employer with employed; all these great questions of social development that come to our minds as we contemplate what has been done and what will be done, — all must be worked out successfully and rightfully only under the great divine principles of truth. The application of this principle of truth is the one on which we rely and to which we point with pride, as above all other Masonic virtues; and to you, Brethren, and to the Masons of the world, by the application of this principle to whatever comes from the mouth by way of speech, and whatever is done by the hand in the way of work, without deceit and without falsehood, with honesty in its broadest sense, is.presented the responsibility of the coming years for that "righteousness" that "exalteth a nation." If the fruits of the work shall be favorable, then, indeed, may it be said, one hundred years from to-day, that Masonry and Merrimack Lodge have done their part in this duty well. "New occasions" will "teach new duties," and time may make almost every form of "ancient good, uncouth," but we "must upward still and onward who would keep abreast of Truth," and if there is a dark and stormy sea, "we ourselves must Pilgrims be, launch our bark, and steer it safely " through it.

Proud in the strength and vigor of one of our children, we will carry back to our Grand Lodge a memorial of your achievements, and place it upon our records as an evidence of our appreciation.

CENTENNIAL OF CORNER STONE LODGE, JUNE 1902

From Proceedings, Page 1902-92:

Worshipful Brother Ford concluded his remarks by presenting to the Grand Master the original Charter of Corner-stone Lodge. The Grand Master replied as follows:

This is indeed the original parchment bearing the signatures of the Grand Wardens, the Deputy Grand Master, with that of Samuel Dunn as Grand Master, all attested by the Grand Secretary with the Grand Lodge Seal. Its writing and print are clear and distinct, and this venerable document is found to be in "a good state of preservation and well kept." Appropriate to the fact that the signature of the Grand Master on the charter is Samuel Dunn, I have brought with me to your Centennial exercises a relic more venerable and priceless than your Charter, but received by the hand of the same Samuel Dunn when he was Grand Master. I refer to this lock of hair of the immortal Washington, presented in 1800 by his "amiable widow," as the inscription says, to the Grand Lodge through Samuel Dunn, Grand Master, a few weeks after the death of the lamented President on Dec. 14, 1799 ; Samuel Dunn continued to be Grand Master through 1802 and so signed your Charter. This lock of hair was encased in this urn of gold fashioned by the hand of Paul Revere, who added to it the inscription thereon and also prepared the mahogany box, velvet lined, in which it is contained. This valuable gift is in the special custody, of the Grand Master for the time being, and is transmitted from Grand Master to Grand Master at successive installations under a most impressive charge to preserve it sacredly and transmit it to his successor in office with like injunction. This has been clone for the past one hundred years, until in its original condition it is now presented to your view, in company with the signature of him who received it originally.

As Washington was to the Brethren who formed your Lodge and to the people generally their foremost citizen; was worshipped as a father and respected as a leader and followed as a guide; whose manly form and mighty wisdom were ever the guiding star of their hopes and lives, — so to us their successors may this urn and all it contains with the sacred memories that cluster around it, be to us a beacon light for the future that shall guide our path. When that light shall fail, when the name of Washington and his memory shall cease to inspire devotion and respect and "urge man's search, to vaster issues," then may this our Institution, as well as all our institutions and all that we hold clear, be regarded as indeed in clanger. As has been said in other centennial addresses by me, nature kindly provided that posterity should not sully his name, for he left no issue; but "Heaven left him childless that all the Nation might call him Father."

The names borne on your charter are household words in this your old historic town, and wherever they have gone forth in the world, their names have been inseparably connected with that of Duxbury, Plymouth and the South Shore. They were sturdy men of strong natures and rugged fibre, exemplifying the highest and noblest traits of character. in their dealings with their fellow-men; and it is not strange when we trace their origin as from that noble band of God-fearing men and women who braved "the mighty Western sea," and settled on these bleak and cheerless shores in November of an approaching winter in 1620, solely for a principle. What a flood of historical recollection rushes to the mind when we contemplate the points of interest which we have seen to-day in the entertaining drives you have given us about your historic town. Deriving its name from Duxbury Hall in England, the seat of the Standish family, recalls that the redoubtable captain with his secretary, John Alden, and presumably the latter's fair wife, Priscilla Mullins, with Jonathan Brewster and Thomas Prence were permitted "to live in the towne in the winter tyme that they may better repair to the worship of God."

And we further learn that of the subscribers to the famous "compact" in the cabin of the Mayflower before they had landed — a writing which has been characterized as the first written Constitution of the world — from among those signers there settled and lived in Duxbury, Brewster, Standish, Alden, Howland, Francis Eaton, P. Brown and George Soule. I presume many of them came under that characterization, of what is found in Bradford's Annals of Plymouth Colony, written about A.D. 1632: "First those that lived on ye other side of ye bay (called Duxberie) they could not 'long bring their wives and children, to ye publick worship and church meetings here, but with such brethren, as, growing to some competente number, they sued to be dismissed and become a body of themselves; and so they were dismiste (about this time) though very unwillingly." And in this town, as with their brethren in Plymouth, they continued the construction and development of a nation whose "corner-stone" was Plymouth Rock.

Although many of the men of Duxbury have become famous in the history of the old Commonwealth and of our country, I will stop to note such characters as Col. Benj. Church, known in the wars with King Philip, and of Lieut.-Col. John Winslow, who directed the parcelling out of the Acadians from the Grand Pre valley and Basin of Minas in Nova Scotia. He was a kindly and humane but positive man of duty, and history has been misconceived by the readers of the poem of Evangeline. Of the whole six thousand or more deported, these two thousand persons were settled in the Grand Pre valley — ceded by France to England in 1713 — with a right to their language and religion. They had been kindly treated by the English, with more consideration, in fact, as to taxation than the provincial subjects, otherwise. For forty years or more these French, joining with the Indians, had conducted a continuous marauding and pillaging among the peaceful English settlers Of New England and Nova Scotia. The colonial records of France and the archives of the English abundantly testify to the settled policy of the church, through the priests, to foment trouble against the English rule. Finally, driven to desperation, rather than put the offenders to the sword, as was the natural custom of the times for dealing with such cases (the Acadians absolutely refused to take any oath to become loyal subjects of the English and kept up a warfare till it could not be longer borne), the New Englander simply deported the nest and all its brood from their villages in the Basin of Minas, as was done with others in other parts of Acadia, and distributed them along the coast where they could no longer unite to do damage — certainly a kind and merciful treatment considering that the aggressors were like the soldier who has violated a flag of truce,and it would not have been unnatural to treat them with more rigorous punishment. With the greatest deference to the respected poet who immortalized The Courtship of Miles Standish, I must disagree with the sentiments and statements of fact that have misled the civilized world in his story of Evangeline and the Acadian-valley. It is poetical and of beautiful sentiment, but Parkman's historical account must be depended upon for facts.

Many of the signers of your charter were among those who took part in the Revolutionary War, and the town of Duxbury, as late as 1840, had twenty-two persons between the ages of seventy-six and ninety-three who had taken active part in hostilities, while seventeen widows were at the same time receiving the bounty of the United States government for loss of husbands, the result of that struggle for independence. The industries of the North River and the South Shore, and of Duxbury and adjoining towns in sea fisheries and shipbuilding. have been immortalized in printed book and verse.

From 1700 to 1837 ship-building was a thriving industry, and in the latter year forty-six vessels were engaged in cod and mackerel fisheries alone from Duxbury. The strength of their character knit into their stalwart forms, they and their descendants have gone forth to people the whole land with those who can appropriately boast that they are descended from "a grist that was sifted to make a nation," can boast of their descent from

"Men of present valor, stalwart old iconoclasts,
Unconvinced by axe or gibbet that all virtue was the Past's."

As the Pilgrim Fathers laid the foundation of principle and character deep with the principles of freedom, and as those same principles were cemented with the blood of the fathers who formed your Lodge, and who during and subsequent to the war for independence assisted in the great work of erecting and maintaining this mighty nation which it is ours to enjoy; so we of the present day following in their footsteps, emulating their example, and maintaining their principles, will continue the heritage they have bestowed upon us, believing that no nation or people can advance in progress and exist for long without an adherence and devotion to the great principles which we teach and of which we are justly proud. Temperance, fortitude, prudence and justice, brotherly love, relief, and above all truth, that "divine attribute," as in the individual, must enter into the composition and development of a nation if it would endure and maintain its high standard among the other nations of the world. It is the province of the Mason in the problems that present themselves in a country of, by and for the people, where personal action and example are important as emanating from each sovereign, that in daily life, in State, national, or. international action, the action shall be guided only by the divine principles of right, of justice, and of truth.

To our Masonic home at Boston we will bear the memories of this day and its doing, and place them on our records as an inspiration for the day to come.

AT CORNER STONE LAYING IN ROXBURY, JULY 1902

From Proceedings, Page 1902-128:

In presenting the square, level and-plumb to the architect of the building the Grand Master spoke as follows:

To you, Brother Architect, are confided the implements of 
operative Masonry, with the fullest confidence that by your 
skill and taste an edifice will here arise which shall render new
service and honor to our Honorable Institution. May it be
blessed with Wisdom in the plan, Strength in the execution,
and Beauty in the adornment; and may the sun of righteous
ness enlighten those who build, those who possess, and those
who shall enjoy the hospitality within its walls.

The Grand Master continued as follows:

To you, Brethren of Washington Lodge, who act as our hosts on this occasion, there is no need of word of commendation of your past or admonition for the future — bearing on your banner the name of that illustrious patriot who was known as the foremost Mason of our land, and holding a charter, for more than one hundred years, bearing the signature as Grand Master of that other patriot Paul Revere, what object lessons in the higher duty of man can be wanted to inspire the noblest of actions?

Equally to you of Lafayette Lodge, your new banner, bearing his name and carried for the first time to-day in public procession, is a suggestion of him who risked fortune and life in the cause of liberty. He received the same truths and came under the same obligations that we do, in that memorable campaign of Valley Forge, a ceremony which completed ihe list of Masons among Washington's generals, for all of them are said to have been members of our Order.

The Mount Vernon Chapter of the Royal Arch recalls anew to our minds the living home and the last.resting place of all that was mortal of the immortal patriot, and it reminds us of that "far better and immortal part which survives the grave," and should ever "urge man's search to vaster issues."

The rational loyalty to a beautiful city, since become a part of our Greater Boston, inspired the founders of Roxbury Council to the selection of a name that, must^ever encourage to works of charity and civic pride those who are, and are to become, illustrious associates of your Royal and Select Masters.

To you, Sir Knights, who in escort, with well-filled ranks panoplied in the full regalia of the Order of Templars, have added so much to the brilliancy of this occasion, no suggestion other than high-minded devotion to duty and country can come to him who contemplates upon your banner the name of the martyred patriot Joseph Warren, Provincial Grand Master of or Grand Lodge at the time of his death.

To you all no lesson need be read as the teachings of this day. Within the walls to be raised above this corner-stone, may your organizations flourish, your members prosper, and may happiness abound; may the stranger within your gates find ever a hospitable welcome and a fervent God-speed, and may all who enjoy the ceremonials, from the Lodge to the Asylum, find new faith in. the words of the Holy Writings, whether inculcated in principles, described by tradition, seen by example, or taught in the life of the Crucified One.

Washington, Lafayette and Warren; three noble names! Familiar and inspiring indeed are they to the members of the Grand Lodge, as with that of Franklin, their portraits, occupying each his medallion in our Grand Lodge room, look down upon our deliberations and furnish examples of dignity, honor,, loyalty and courage in our legislation. Their faces will be to us in the future a pleasing reminder of the combination evidenced at this clay's doings. To, all gathered here as we have been under the skilful guidance of the Marshal for the occasion, to whom with his aids so much credit is due for its success, the Grand Lodge brings its welcome and benediction, wishing you all prosperity in your new home.

On this occasion, on this Warren Street, within view of the ancestral home of the Warren family, and within sight of the square where is designed to stand a perpetual memorial to the Bunker Hill martyr, no words can be more appropriate as a stimulant to nobility of life and action than the memory that comes to us of the brothers Joseph and John Warren, each at different periods Grand Master of Masons iu Massachusetts. Both also were orators of great merit and both physicians of distinction in Boston. Men whose lives have been the subject of extensive biographies cannot be considered in the limited time allowed at an occasion like this. A few prominent features of their lives may, however, be recalled as being of interest to us who are members of an Institution which they both loved so . well and adorned so nobly.

The younger brother, John, born in 1753, devoted his life to the practice of his chosen profession, being present at Lexington and following the' American Army in the New York campaign, where he did noble work as a surgeon. Among his fellow-townsmen in Boston he was highly esteemed and was in all respects the ideal public man. So accomplished was he in letters and public speaking that he was selected to. deliver the first Fourth of July oration in 1783, the same year that he was Grand Master, which latter office he filled in 1783-4-7 with loyalty and devotion to our principles. His oration as published portrays to-day the scholar and logician and entitles him to be classed with " Boston's hundred orators." Always one of the foremost in the practice of medicine and the application of new discoveries to the amelioration and assistance of his fellow-men, he was one of the founders of the Massachusetts Medical Society in 1781, and from 1804 to the date of his death in 1815 he was its active president. His name was a household word in our city, and the members of the medical profession speak of him to-day with reverence and respect.

But his memory is appropriate to us to-day as a Mason. Respected and beloved, he was in 1800 honored as chairman of the committee, consisting of himself and two other Past Grand Masters, to receive from Martha Washington the lock of hair of the immortal Washington which we reverence so sacredly, and guard so carefully in the golden urn fashioned by the hand of Paul Revere, and which is transmitted with solemn injunction, as to its custody from each Grand Master to his successor as it has come from Samuel Dunn, the Grand Master who received it, to the present incumbent of the chair. Besides being Grand Master for three years, our records are replete with evidence of John Warren's loyalty, and devotion to Masonic life. Younger by twelve years than his illustrious brother-, his life is less marked and prominent only because his years were spent in less troublous and historical times; but his "name and deeds are royal in a land beyond the sceptre" of rulers.

His brother Joseph first saw the light of day during the year
 1741. Born, as was bis brother, in the Warren home, then a
 farmhouse, within sight of this spot, he entered Harvard 
College at the age of fifteen, the same year that his father lost 
his life in the orchard near his house, where he fell from a
 ladder while gathering apples and broke his neck. A sad loss 
indeed to a young man full of life and ambition, thus cut off
 from the delightful influence and companionship of. a man of
sterling character, at the formative period of life. But the
deprivation added new responsibilities to the young man, for he
graduated at college in four years, and three years later re
ceived his degree of Master of Arts. Immediately commencing
the practice of medicine, he made himself distinguished by his
activity and skill during the smallpox epidemic in 1764; for 
his attendance was among all classes, the rich, the yeomanry, and
 the poor, impartially. In fact, if he was especially punctilious
 in his duty it was among those so unfortunate as to be neglected 
for want of means.

Thus, in addition to the respect and admiration he had won as a man of scholarly and cultured attainments, he became an idol of the people, who believed in him and sought his counsel and advice in matters public and private, as well as professional. His grace of manner and bearing made him the guest of the aristocracy, while he was ever welcome with Samuel Adams and his North End mechanics during the troublous decade immediately preceding the Revolutionary War. His natural love of liberty and his feeling for the oppressed led him to warmly espouse the patriot cause, and it was most natural that after the Boston Massacre of 1770 he should be made a committee with Bowdoin and Pemberton to suitably commemorate that startling event. He was active in all the participations of the patriotic Masons of the Lodge of St. Andrew, that met in Green Dragon Tavern on Union Street, near Haymarket square, and was one of the Committee of Public Safety, consisting of John Hancock and Paul Revere, and Dr. Benjamin Church, an active Mason,— to whom all design's of the British were to be discovered by the inhabitants.

He was probably the most conspicuous figure during the times immediately preceding the Revolution among all classes of people. He delivered in 1772 the second oration on the Boston Massacre, which, read to-day, is a marvel of logic, learning and law. Though not trained to the law, he possessed a full familiarity with its doctrines and. principles. Again in 1774, although his life was threatened repeatedly if he attempted it, he delivered the fourth oration in the Old South Meeting House, commemorative of the sad scenes of 1770, making his way to the pulpit by means of a ladder placed at a window in the second story. The gathering, crowding the church to its full capacity and all expecting violence, listened, to a most terrible denunciation and philippic against the wrongs of the mother country, closing with that memorable utterance: "Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God." He was unharmed, his life being spared to his enemies for a sadder revenge. Courageous and bold, and active by nature, he attracted an attention that placed him. continuously in prominence.

It was he who dispatched Thomas Dawes and Paul Revere, both Brother Masons, to Lexington and Concord to warn: Hancock and Adams, who were in hiding from the British, as well as to inform the Minute-Men that the destruction of stores and ammunition was intended, on the memorable night of April 18, 1775 ; Paul Revere choosing as his companion with the lanterns John Pulling, of Marblehead, another Mason. Warren followed himself and was sufficiently active at Lexington to lose an ear-lock of hair by a British bullet, as General Heath in his Memoirs reports.

Receiving his commission as major-general four days before the battle of Hunker Hill, he exhibited his characteristic modesty by refusing to deprive Colonel Prescott of his command, and with musket and powder-horn he fought in the ranks with the common soldiery, receiving his death-wound across earthworks designed and built under the direction of Richard Gridley, a Deputy Grand Master of our Grand Lodge. During the battle, although never having had military experience except at Lexington, by his courage and skill he won praises from and inspired awe in the veterans of Quebec and Louisburg who were with him.

He was buried in the trenches where he fell, but on the fourth of April in the next year his remains were discovered and taken to Boston, where a memorial address was delivered by Perez Morton of the Grand Lodge. Joseph Warren was Grand Master of Masons at the time of his death. The body was thrice buried, first in the trenches where he fell, second in the Granary Burying Ground, and finally in 1855 on Warren Avenue in Forest Hills cemetery. There was erected to his memory a marble monument, on Bunker Hill, succeeding the first placed there by King Solomon's Lodge in 1794; the column unbroken but white in its purity and full and upright in its miniature grandeur, indicative of his spotless life and sturdy character.

His name has ever been cherished in Masonic circles. At Masonic gatherings, while the first toast was and still is to the memory of-George Washington, the next was always to Warren, Montgomery and Wooster, recognizing those worthy Masonic
 patriots of New England; Montgomery who lost his life heroi
cally at Quebec in 1775, and Wooster, Master of the First Lodge 
and afterwards Grand Master in Connecticut, who was killed in 
battle in 1776; and it is recorded that under the corner-stone
 of the monument raised to the latter's memory was placed the 
bullet by which he met his death. Extended biographies of our
 hero have been written, but to us it is sufficient to record him
as an upright Mason clothed with the highest honors of our 
Fraternity at the time of his death. From his life and charac
ter we may draw an inspiration that shall teach us gentleness
of manner, courage in the performance of duty, heroism in
action, devotion to the cardinal virtues and tenets of our pro
fession, loyalty to country, and a patriotism that shall win, if 
need be, a martyr's crown. His life was gentle; and the elements so mixed in him, that Nature might stand up, and say to all the world, "This was a man."

AT THE CELEBRATION OF THE 150TH ANNIVERSARY OF WASHINGTON'S INITIATION, NOVEMBER 1902

Before the Grand Lodge of Pennsylvania, Nov. 3, 1902:

R.W. GRAND MASTER AND BRETHREN, AND OUR HONORED GUEST THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The cordial and hospitable welcome extended by you, R. W. Sir, in behalf of your Grand Lodge to the representatives of sister Grand Lodges cannot fail to arouse in every heart a warmth of response that can be but illy concealed in the embarrassment of attempting to make expression in set form of words; and which but for your interdiction of applause would be so demonstrative as to make my response seem tame indeed. Within the memory of my own age the hospitality of your State and this city of Brotherly Love, extended to the soldier from the North going forth to the victory or death of the Civil War, or returning from it with his shield, or borne on a bed of pain and suffering, has been proverbial, and made remembrance of you a household word in every soldier's family.

The generous treatment accorded the people of this and other lands during the Centennial Exposition of 1876 is within the memory of all, while the fraternal greetings and knightly courtesies invoked by repeated pilgrimages to your shrine are still warm in the memories of the Craft and give to your jurisdiction pre-eminently the right to welcome Masons and Masonry at so important an anniversary as this. But not alone the felicity and character of your reception, but also the high standard adopted and maintained in your jurisdiction in Masonic matters, its reverence of the landmarks, its rituals, its principles, its traditions and its history, warrant abundantly the opinion that all feel who have accepted, in such generous numbers, the invitation extended by you to them.

However unworthy may be the instrument that chance has selected to respond in behalf of the appreciative hearts that are warmed to your outstretched hand of benevolence, one cannot fail to detect.an appropriateness in selecting as sponsor for your visitors the old jurisdiction of Massachusetts, the senior in point of service of the Bodies called to your home; the vexed question of difference between us as to priority of charters being one which a guest shall not with propriety discuss. The deputation granted to Henry Price as Provincial Grand Master in 1733, which resulted in establishing the St. John's Lodge in Boston, gave jurisdiction overall North America to establish Lodges; and as thus, indirectly from successive charters, new Lodges and Grand Lodges grew as stems from the parent tree, the shoots being planted and transplanted, we may appropriately say to-day that Massachusetts in thus responding to your felicitous address answers for many of her children, her grandchildren, her descendants of the half-blood and even her collateral kindred, as well as for the stranger within your gates.

Equally appropriate may it be for the city of Boston to respond to a city that vies with her in the honor of claiming a Masonic Franklin, that name so intimately associated with him whom we this day honor, whose staff in civil life was no less potent than the sword of Washington in war.

Equally appropriate, too, that that centre, which before and during the War of the Revolution mingled so much of Masonry with its patriotic zeal, should be thus honored, on an occasion, that links its life so closely with the military and Masonic life of him whose anniversary we this day celebrate. It was in the argument of James Otis, a Brother Mason of the Second Lodge in Boston, against the writs of assistance, that Independence and Liberty were born. Of the Committee of Safety, to whom alone the designs of the British should be discovered, John Hancock, Joseph Warren and Paul Revere were Masons, the two last named being later Grand Masters of our Grand Lodge. Paul Revere, known of by every school-boy, who rode through "Middlesex village and farm, for the country folk to be up and to arm," chose to assist him in hanging the "lanterns aloft in the belfry arch of the North Church tower, one if by land and two if by sea," John Pulling, a member of Marblehead Lodge, while Joseph Warren selected William Dawes, another Mason, to perform the same errand as Revere, across country, from Roxbury. John Hancock, of St. Andrew's Lodge, of Boston, gave his fortune to the cause of the Colonies; and Joseph Warren, being at the time Grand Master of Masons, gave his life in the struggle for liberty at Bunker Hill, the fatal shot being fired across breastworks laid out by Richard Gridley as civil engineer, who took part in the battle and at the time was Deputy Grand Master of Masons.

From the Lodge-room of St. Andrew at the Green Dragon Tavern, "that nest where patriot plots were hatched," the disguises of Indians were assumed by the greater part of those who threw the hated tea into the tide, and the records of that Lodge which, at one entry, bears the laconic statement "Consignees of Tea took the Brethren's time," contain in the marg in of the recital for that active evening numerous capital T's significantly placed there by the Recording Secretary. It was to men active in these and similar patriotic scenes resultant from them, that Geo Washington came to assume command of the Colonial Army under the historic elm at Cambridge, opposite the Alma Mater of our distinguished guest. It needed not the slow growth of confidence to enable Washington to know and try these men, for he found already those *to whom the burdened heart could pour out its sorrows," "to whom distress could prefer its suit," with whom friendships and confidences existed at once with the hand-clasp, and with whom cooperation and action were immediate.

The orator and the historian have so repeatedly traced the parallel, the connection, and the close relation of Masonry with the formation of our government, that a single suggestion may suffice to recall it to your attention. How intimately were they associated can be assumed when we consider that all of Washington's generals, a majority at least of the signers of the Declaration of Independence and of the Constitutional Convention, were of our Institution; and the bond which "formed friendships and established connections " between the Masonic patriots of Boston and the great name which we this day invoke, may, indeed, with propriety, be renewed on this day.

And so coming from that jurisdiction, as its representative, in behalf of the assembled Grand Lodges here, I extend, in response to your princely welcome, a most earnest and appreciative expression of thanks. From the hearts of all comes the response, may your Grand Lodge flourish, may its numbers increase, may its members prosper and may happiness abound; and when your guests return to their respective jurisdictions, each shall there place on its records, so indelibly inscribed as to be the last erased, its memorial of this most fitting celebration of a most glorious anniversary.

In January, 1800, immediately after the death of George Washington, which occurred in December, 1799, Samuel Dunn, Grand Master of Masons in Massachusetts, received from Martha Washington, accompanied by a letter from Tobias Lear, Washington's secretary, a lock of the hair of that immortal patriot. Intimately associated with this presence I hope I may be pardoned if I assume to have thought it meet that it should grace the occasion where your comprehensive exhibit of Washingtoniana forms so interesting a feature. But I bring it, with all its hallowed associations, in its original receptacle, an urn of solid gold with the inscription on it and the mahogany casket in which it is contained, all fashioned by the hand of Paul Revere, that "curious artificer and scientific worker in metals" as well as in Masonry and public matters. Remaining in the custody of Grand Master Dunn during the years 1800, 1801 and 1802, it was by him transmitted to his successor with a solemn charge as to its sacred custody and care, which has been repeated with appropriate ceremonials to each Grand Master from then until it came to my hands in the year 1900. Thus authenticated, it appears before you a priceless relic; worshipped by the fathers as coming from that noble head which a more imaginative people would have beatified with the halo of a saint, but which, without, was still to them illumined with an effulgence that might well he likened to the glory of the Shekinah, whose generous rays should, beckon them out of the house of bondage and direct their paths toward the temple of happiness and the promised land of liberty. As this was to our fathers, so may it be to us and to our children's children, an inspiration to patriotism, loyalty and nobility of character, to higher thoughts and aims, to a fervent renewal of our obligations, and the inculcating of the teachings and practice of our cardinal virtues and the tenets of our profession as Masons. When the memory of that light shall fail, then, indeed, may we fear for the strength of our Institution, and that our liberties are indeed endangered. As was said of William the Silent and fervently quoted of another beloved ruler, till within but ^a little more than a year past, so closely tied to us as a Brother, "He lived, the faithful ruler of a brave people, and when he died, children cried in the streets." Nature kindly ordained that the. name of Washington should not be sullied by descendants, for he left no issue; but "Heaven left him childless, that all the Nation might call him father."

AT HALL DEDICATION IN DORCHESTER, DECEMBER 1902

From Proceedings, Page 222:

Worshipful Master and Brethren of Union and Rabboni Lodges:

The dedication of new apartments to Masonic purposes is always the cause of congratulation on the part of the Officers of the Grand Lodge, because it is an evidence of prosperity and success among the Bodies and Brethren who occupy and use them. You are indeed to be congratulated on the spacious and magnificent apartments which have been here prepared and which we have tried with the appropriate working tools and find to be so well ordered and designed for the work which you are to perform. They are in marked contrast with that modest Lodge described by W. Brother Upham in his remarks at the opening of this Communication, wherein he related how he waited in the kitchen of the house with the wife and daughter of the Brother who assigned an upstairs room to Masonry the night he was to take his degrees, and was received upstairs afterwards in a preparation room, practically a closet, about sis feet long and three feet wide; indeed, the whole surroundings and appointments were most primitive, and simple. To quote Kipling, he could, however, well say:

"We 'adn't good regalia,
An' our Lodge was old an' bare,
But we knew the Ancient Landmarks,
An' we kep' 'em to a hair."

They were sturdy, strong men, of high character, in those early days of Union Lodge, and it is with great pleasure that I perform this ceremony, in my present position, for that Lodge which was so dear to my own father aud which he visited frequently during many years of his life after his association with the old St. Paul's Lodge, of South Boston, in 1854. In fact, my first impressions and knowledge of Masonry came indirectly from Union Lodge. My thoughts go back to those childhood days when I used to hear my father describe, as he pointed from the windows of my grandfather's house on the "upper road," how as a young man he had seen men during the anti-Masonic times cross the fields opposite, at dusk, from different directions, apparently stealthily, to meet at the house of John Mears and there maintain your charter inviolate and keep your organization during those troublous times when it required courage and strength of character for a man to admit himself a member of the Institution. The son and grandson of that same John Mears are now members of the Lodge of St. Andrew. My father's first impressions of the Institution were obtained from observing these men. While they were maligned for being Masons, they bore in the community reputations for high character, morality and integrity second to none in the good old town of Dorchester. It was his habit to say that from the characters and lives of these men he derived those first impressions of Masonry which led him to become a member of the Institution as soon as he was able to do so.

My own remembrance of Union Lodge goes back to Field's Corner, when the refreshments of coffee and doughnuts were served after each Lodge meeting, and it was a delight to me to accompany my father to those Lodge assemblies and meet there the representative men of old Dorchester, a memory which adds not a little to the pleasure of this occasion.

While I have these tender associations for historical Union Lodge, I have also a warm spot in my heart for the Rabboni Lodge that shares with you these apartments. It is not generally known, but after making up my mind that I would join this Institution if it were possible, my thoughts naturally turned to the new Lodge filled with the younger element of South Boston, where the Rabboni Lodge was organized. Many of my friends were among its number, and I was naturally drawn toward it. It was by accident only, through the interposition of a friend of my father, that I was led to become a member of his own Lodge. The conversation with this good Brother, while it is personal, so impressed my mind with the idea that this Institution admitted of no proselyting that I cannot hesitate to repeat it. When he gravely expressed his surprise that I should apply to any Lodge other than my father's, I said naturally that my father had never spoken to me about Masonry and had not asked me to join, and I thought I would surprise him by getting into another Lodge; he said "No, he never will, as no Mason ever asks any man to join, but leaves him to form a favorable opinion of it himself in advance and make his own application. If your father ever knew you had the slightest idea in that direction you would have found him overjoyed to propose you to his own Lodge; and in fact it would break his heart if you went anywhere else."

So I became a member of the old St. Paul's Lodge instead of the younger Rabboni. But my frequent meeting with the Brethren of Rabboni Lodge, and the associations with them through my early active Masonic life, have endeared the Lodge to me, so that I feel a personal satisfaction in being able to dedicate for you also these premises that are to be occupied by you in association with the older Union Lodge.

You are fortunate indeed in having your Temple erected on historic ground; here, at Upham's Corner, deriving its name from several generations of the family of our good Worshipful Brother who addressed the Grand Officers so interestingly and who concluded by requesting the dedication of the building. It will stand as a landmark with the historical name that can never be effaced from the memory of the Dorchester resident by any municipal legislature or decree of any public board.

It stands directly on the line of communication kept open by General Washington between the old fort in Roxbury on Highland Park, where the standpipe is located, and the historical Dorchester Heights in South Boston during the siege of Boston. While diagonally across the street stands that generous God's acre wherein repose the remains of Dorchester's dead for more than two centuries, one stone marking the resting-place of one who was buried in 1638, probably the oldest marked grave of any of the English settlers on these shores. Indeed, a description of that burying-ground would be a history of the old town of Dorchester and its good people, and interesting, indeed it was in my younger days to hear from the lips of the old sexton in charge accounts of the families who were there buried, and to read on the tombstones the many quaint inscriptions in prose and verse that throw side-lights on the lives of the departed.

As we leave this spot to approach Boston over the same old line of the colonial troops by Dudley street which runs by this door, we pass at one point within a stone's throw of the birthplace of the two Warrens, John and Joseph, both physicians of eminence, and both at times Grand Masters of our Grand Lodge of Masons, the former being the younger of the two. The latter lost his life, as you know, at Bunker Hill, where, though commissioned as a major-general, he refused to take the command from Colonel Prescott, fought in the ranks with the soldiers, and was shot across the breastworks laid out by Col. Richard Gridley, civil engineer, who was at the time Deputy Grand Master of Masons. From that same Warren house Thomas Dawes, a Mason, was dispatched by Dr. Joseph Warren, on the night of the eighteenth of April, 1775, to accomplish the same purpose as Paul Revere was commissioned for.

Amid such hallowed associations, consecrated with our Masonry to higher, nobler and serious thoughts by the names and the lives of such men associated with him, who as Grand Master in 1796 placed upon your venerable charter the name of Paul Revere, we may feel justly proud of our noble Order and the part we have taken in this night's doings.

We are proud to quote the name of Paul Revere, who, in addition to his active public services, added not a little to the literature of our Institution. Appropriate to this time and place I will close by reading the charge written by his hand for occasions such as this ; and although some parts may appear inappropriate to our age and time, it is still an indication of the literary talent and Masonic fervor which our good Brother possessed, and from the reading of which we may draw an inspiration for our Masonic thought and work:

"How many pleasing considerations, my Brethren, attend the present interview. Whilst in almost every other part of the world political animosities, contentions and wars interrupt the progress of humanity and the cause of benevolence, it is our distinguished privilege, in this happy region of liberty and peace, to engage in the plans and to perfect the designs of individual and social happiness. Whilst in other nations our Order is viewed by politicians with suspicion and by the ignorant with apprehension, in this country its members are too much respected, and its principles too well known, to make it-the object of jealousy or mistrust.

Our private assemblies are unmolested, and our public celebrations attract a more general approbation of the Fraternity. Indeed, its importance, its credit, and, we trust, its usefulness, are advancing to a height unknown in any former age. The present occasion gives fresh evidence of the increasing affection of its friends; and this noble apartment, fitted up in a style of elegance and convenience, does honor to Masonry as well as the highest credit to the respectable Lodge for whose accommodation, and at whose expense, it is erected.

"We offer our best congratulations to the Worshipful Master, Wardens, Officers and members of the Lodge. We commend their zeal, and hope it will meet with the most ample .recompense. May this Hall be the happy resort of piety, virtue, arid benevolence; may it .be protected from accident, and long remain a monument of your attachment to Masonry; may your Lodge continue to flourish, your union to strengthen and your happiness to abound; and when we all shall be removed from the labors of the earthly Lodge, may we be admitted to the brotherhood of the perfect, in the Building of God, the Hall not made with hands, eternal in the heavens."

AT CONSTITUTION OF FRIENDSHIP LODGE, DECEMBER 1902

From Proceedings, Page 1902-231:

WORSHIPFUL MASTER AND BRETHREN: The constituting of a Lodge is ever a pleasing ceremonial for the Grand Officers to perform. But when it is done midway between the anniversary of the landing of that noble band of God-fearing men and women on the rock at Plymouth, that has become the cornerstone of a nation, and the day of the year when all Christendom unite in celebrating the feast of the Nativity, and again not far distant from the day devoted by our Institution throughout the world to reverencing the name of the holy St. John the Evangelist, we may indeed congratulate ourselves on the auspicious concurrence of these events with the consecration of your new organization. It will be a period easily and pleasantly remembered by us all and which we hope will augur well for the success of your undertaking.

After the graceful and impressive charge to your Master, Wardens and Brethren from our Past Grand Warden R. W. Brother Soule, little of impressiveness that I can say will add to the teachings of the evening. Isolated, in a measure, as you are beginning anew without Past Masters familiar with the traditions and doings of the Grand Lodge, naturally inspired with zeal for the enlargement of your numbers, I may add a word of suggestion for your consideration and guidance.

You should always be represented by your Master and Wardens at the Communications of the Grand Lodge, and they should not permit the tempting opportunity of electing a proxy to induce them to suffer their duties to be performed by another, unless, of course, circumstances are such as to so save them from making serious sacrifices. Thus will your Lodge be kept in touch with our proceedings and your officers made familiar with the doings of their associates. Unfavored by extended means of transportation, and the means of visiting other Lodges being thus limited, you will need to preserve more carefully the ritual of your work, and it will be well even when no candidate is presented that the work or lecture be carried on as usual. The excellent character of the Brethren whom you have joined with you is a sufficient guaranty of the quality of men whom you will receive as new members, but a word of caution may not be amiss to you as a new Lodge that quality rather than quantity is the best criterion of success, and that incases of doubt the benefit should be given the Lodge rather than the candidate.

In maintaining the integrity of our Institution do not let outside influences govern or direct your organization. All such social and pleasing associations should be subordinated to the principles of our Order. Remember that Masonry stands higher arid nobler than any other creation of the human mind, and that the reason for our existence is found in the sublime precepts and eternal truths that will be here taught. See to it that you and those who shall be joined with you are impelled only by a desire to practise the tenets of our profession and to illustrate its cardinal virtues.

Finally, my Brethren, live in peace. "Let not ill feeling or angry discussion. disturb the harmony of your meetings." Carry with you always the excellent teachings of this Communication, and take with you the congratulations, the good wishes and the compliments of the Grand Lodge at this Season of Peace and Good Will. May your Lodge flourish, your members prosper, and may happiness abound! And when we shall all be called to account for our doings on this earth, may we each receive the welcome plaudit of "Well done, good and faithful servant! "

AT CORNER STONE LAYING IN WEYMOUTH, JUNE 1913

From Proceedings, Page 1913-120:

It was a most fortunate happening that in 1899 Henry Fitz Gilbert Waters, the antiquarian of Salem, during his researches in England, came upon evidence that furnished the missing link between the George Washington family of Virginia and their English ancestors; until that time, three English counties claimed the ancestry of our foremost citizen, but by identifying Lawrence Washington, the Rector of Purleigh, as the father of John Washington who emigrated to this country in 1659, the ascending chain was made complete to his father, Lawrence Washington of Sulgrave who died in 1616. In examining the papers of the estate of Andrew Nowlin in the Archdeacon's Court at Essex, Mr. Waters came across a paper one and one-half by three inches covered with Latin script; by this the Rector of Purleigh was identified as the father of John the Emigrant who was the great grandfather of the Father of our Country, the father and grandfather being Augustine and Lawrence respectively: this Rector of Purleigh was a man of scholarly attainments, being a fellow of Brasenose College and a Proctor of Oxford University, and at the time of the Nowlin estate incident was a temporary Surrogate in the Archdeacon's Court; the remaining identity was comparatively easy from family and probate records.

WashingtonArms_Minories.jpg
TABLET IN CHURCH OF HOLY TRINITY, MINORIES, LONDON,
SHOWING THE WASHINGTON ARMS (BARS AND MULLETS)
IMPALED ON THE DARTMOUTH ARMS (STAG'S HEAD).
MEMORY OF "HONEST WILL LEGGE," WHO DIED 1670.
HE MARRIED ELIZABETH, DAUGHTER OF SIR WM. WASHINGTON,
AND WAS THE ANCESTOR OF THE EARLS OF DARTMOUTH.

Now note a remarkable coincidence descending from this same ancestor who died in 1616; in another line we find that five removes bring us to the second Earl of Dartmouth who founded Dartmouth College in New Hampshire in 1769; this second earl was President of the Board of Trade and Secretary for the Colonies in the Rockingham ministry at the opening of the Revolutionary War and when this Whig ministry went out and Lord North's Tory ministry came in, he ceased to have further influence politically, though up to that time he had been in friendly correspondence with Bowdoin and Pemberton of Boston, Benjamin Franklin and others, in mutual efforts to relieve the Colonies; we hear of him later, however, as one of the British Peace Commissioners at the close of the Revolution. A strange coincidence that these two great men, Washington and Dartmouth, should have thus been active on opposite sides of that great struggle without either knowing of his kinship to the other.

But you ask what bearing have these details on this day and occasion? On the walls of the Church of the Holy Trinity in the Minories at London there is a tablet in color with the arms of Washington impaled on those of Dartmouth ; thus placed by reason of the marriage of Elizabeth, daughter of William Washington, who was a brother of the Lawrence above named with one of the Dartmouths; the Washington arms contain the three white five-pointed mullets or rowells of heraldry and three stripes or bars, the color scheme being red and white. The crest is a spread eagle which was adopted on our national shield. All of this brings us to the historical discussion of the origin of our American flag, which has occasioned so much controversy and has been so varying in its themes. I have always believed that the stars in our flag came from this Washington origin; the Washington arms were well known in America before the Revolution and especially familiar to public men as a part of their education; the Committee of Congress to prepare a design for the flag consisted of Benjamin Franklin, well skilled in heraldic knowledge; Thomas Lynch, Junior, of South Carolina, a graduate of Eton and Cambridge University and a lawyer in London; with Benjamin Harrison, an educated lawyer, each of whom had acquired knowledge of heraldry; they knew that the "star" of heraldry calls for six points rather than five, as the latter are found in the Washington family arms and the adoption of the latter in place of the congressional order for stars is certainly significant; historians have other reasons for the same conclusion; but to me a most conclusive presumption arises from the fact that Washington never mentioned it; fully in keeping with that well-marked trait of his character, which was modesty in mentioning any compliment or praise for himself, even when a simple statement was necessary to historical accuracy; and as he was consulted at Cambridge by the Committee and knew of their doings, his silence on the subject is significant.

WashingtonArms_BookPlate.jpg
Washington's Book-Plate and Arms

The important part, however, which Washington had in creating the flag was causing the six white stripes to be sewed on the red flag of Old England which was raised Jan. 6, 1776, at Cambridge during the siege of Boston; this flag contained, of course, the Union Jack with the crosses in the corner, for the American at that time had not quite arrived at the stage of independence; still loyal to their sovereign and the crown, our fathers defied Parliament and its legislation and set up their thirteen stripes as independent of that power to tax and otherwise oppress them: it was still a political fight; it was the Whig of America against the Tory of both countries, but it was inevitable that the result should be the declaration on July 4 following, "That we are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown."

In a most appropriate manner you have selected this historical anniversary of the official birth of the stars and stripes, to crystallize in the memory by impressive ceremonies and place on the Records of our Grand Lodge, the laying of this corner-stone to your New Masonic Temple; the sentiments and principles of the flag and our beloved Institution are closely involved and if followed sincerely will lead to at least one glorious common result; devotion and loyalty to our country and its traditions; this is not the place nor will time permit the telling of the great and dominant part that Masons and Masonry had in the Revolution and during the formative period of our government; but anyone who is true to either our Institution or the flag, with all that each teaches in its deepest significance, will have accomplished all that good citizenship stands for as meriting association with the great Americans of those periods.

Probably no patriotic controversy has been so general nor so specific in local cases as have been the numerous contests and claims for the origin and creation of the original flag; when and where the first one was used, and what inspired it.

All such controversies, if conducted without acrimony, are beneficial as awakening a proper patriotic spirit; volumes would be required to rehearse the claims, the traditions, the published articles, and the original literature on this most interesting subject many of which conclude with "proofs strong as holy writ"; almost every original Colony claims "originality and first invention" and our own State is not behind in the procession; whether it is the Trumbull flag, one of the two of Bunker Hill, or the flag of the Men of Marblehead, or the Pinetree or the Bear flag, the flag of Putnam with its "appeal to Heaven," the "Liberty or Death" flag of White Plains, or the "Liberty" flag of Long Island, whether it is Connecticut with its Latin motto, or any one of the various flags carried by privateers from different States in their depredations against the enemy;— all may have some claim of right, as all have varying shades of difference in historical accuracy or patriotic effect.

Some important features are fixed and settled, however; and as these are of interest to this occasion, let us record and draw inspiration from them and from those who were actors at the time of this occurrence; there is no authentic evidence that Betsy Ross ever designed or had anything to do with the origin of our Stars and Stripes, so far as I can learn; she was an upholsterer and made flags as part of her business, and after the famous resolution creating the flag she made bunting of all sorts for the Army and Navy; but never before June 14, 1777, when Congress "Resolved, that the flag of the Thirteen United States be thirteen stripes alternate red and white; and that the Union be thirteen stars, white, in a blue field, representing a new constellation," had she done anything on the Stars and Stripes as claimed by her grandson in 1870, where he dates an act of hers in 1776 in support of it that could not possibly have happened till after June, 1777; and no doubt that was the year; but let us avoid this controversy; Philadelphia has a way of claiming a great deal that others doubt. I once heard a governor of Pennsylvania claim that George Washington was really of that State because he never did anything important in Virginia after he was sixteen years of age, and that his great work was in Pennsylvania; we all know the absurd assumption of seniority in chartered Masonry by Pennsylvania proclaimed within a few years, with no more evidence to support it than when in 1834 they appropriately celebrated their centennial a year after our own; their origin being based on the authority Benjamin Franklin obtained from our own chartered and regularly constituted Henry Price in 1734 which "was the beginning of Masonry in Pennsylvania"; before that date Philadelphia stood the same as Boston and Charleston and other places having many Masons, but who never presumed to claim they had any landmark existence.

When I recall such assumptions I am impelled to repeat the oft-quoted satirical tribute, "Philadelphia claims two noble native sons: Albert Gallatin of Geneva and Benjamin Franklin of Boston." However, dismissing Betsy Ross and her Pennsylvania claims, let us consider the unquestioned incidents worthy of record on this anniversary day.

The official flag as adopted by Congress was first raised on the sea; this was done by John Paul Jones on the Ranger that he fitted out at Portsmouth and of which he was given command by Resolution of Congress on the same day as the birth of the flag; the ladies of Portsmouth contributed the silk for the making; this flag was carried by him on the Ranger to Europe and was the first United States flag to be saluted by a foreign power, which occurred in Quiberon Bay on Feb. 14, 1778, by the French Navy. It is interesting to note here, that in our Library at the Masonic Temple is an original itemized account of the fitting out of the Ranger in Jones's handwriting signed by him and addressed to the Congress.

Jones was fortunate, too, in having the honor of first displaying any flag officially for our country on a sea-vessel, before the Ranger flag, for when lieutenant in command of the Alfred at Philadelphia, in the presence of naval officials of the Congress he broke out the Rattlesnake flag with its motto "Don't tread on me," the design calling from the worthy Franklin an extended analysis of the attributes of that much maligned serpent as an appropriate emblem for our struggling and abused people; this design and motto on a yellow ground was used as the admiral's flag of Ezek Hopkins while he was commander of the Chesapeake squadron. The Stars and Stripes improvised from material at hand, waved unofficially at Fort Stanwix, now the city of Rome, New York, on Aug. 2, 1777, and at Brandywine September 11 of the same year it was officially waved at that military engagement; these were the first occasions on land.

And thus we find our Institution honored by recalling the names of these men, pre-eminent in our national affairs, who lived and acted under its principles: Jones, the Scotch Freemason, whose activities in the famous Lodge of Nine Muses in Paris led that body to cause his bust to be made by the famous Houdon, a Brother member; Franklin, the founder of chartered Masonry in Pennsylvania through our own Henry Price, while Commissioner to France was for two years the Venerable Master of the same Lodge of Nine Muses; the present Earl of Dartmouth and the first of the family to officially visit the college in New Hampshire founded by the second Earl, holds the -honorable position of Pro. Grand Master for Staffordshire of the Grand Lodge of England; as such I had the honor to assist our late M.W. Baalis Sanford in conducting him to our Grand East in Boston during his visit to this country in 1904 to lay the corner-stone of the new Dartmouth Hall. All these men, devoted and loyal Masons, have by their lives and conduct reflected credit on our Order, and the association of their names should awaken us to renewed activities in maintaining the principles professed by them and by ourselves.

But it was many years before our "Old Glory" became the subject of final legislation fixing its present status. When Vermont and Kentucky were admitted to the Union both Stars and Stripes were fixed at fifteen by Enactment taking effect May 1, 1795; this flag was official during the war of 1812; various attempts were made to add to both stripes and stars, a Committee once reporting in favor of twenty of each, but April 4, 1818, a resolution was passed, "That from and after July 4 next the flag of the United States be thirteen horizontal stripes, alternate red and white; that the Union have twenty stars, white, in a blue field"; and "That on the admission of every new State into the Union, one star be added to the union of the flag; and that such addition shall take effect on the fourth day of July next succeeding such admission." Congressman Wendover of New York in his remarks favoring the resolution stated that as our States were increasing in number, the tallest pine tree in the State of Maine would not suffice for a staff on which to unfurl it.

But "Our flag is there, behold its glorious stripes and stars"; your new temple at its birth being thus decorated with it on the anniversary of its own natal day; there it floats in the welcome breeze, every star shining with a brilliancy that carries enlightenment to an advancing civilization; every stripe white with peace or red with the blood of kindred and fraternal affection; while the firmamental blue in its expanse speaks for a universality that is as broad as the charity of brothers. It floats to-day "O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave," safeguarding the rights and liberties of the loyal subject, as against the license of the Socialist, the violence of the anarchist, or the allegiance to any foreign prince or potentate.

It speaks for all the qualities that unite to make good citizenship: friendship, morality, brotherly love, relief, truth, and all the cardinal virtues; the citizen who is loyal to what it teaches and stands for is found consciously or unconsciously emulating what we by example and action endeavor to accomplish in practicing the tenets of our profession; and thus, without arrogating to ourselves any exclusive proprietorship in all it represents, we do claim that no Brother can be faithful to his obligations among us without being a better citizen, a better man, and more loyal if possible to the flag.

Your temple is thus founded on a grand basis; with such thoughts as we derive from the lesson taught by the exercises of the day you will in this community add a new light and a new significance to the advancement going forward; within the walls that shall arise above this corner-stone will be taught all that will mould to that end; and he who goes forth from its portals dedicated to all that we hold dear, will by his life and actions convince the world that it is better for his having been of our number; all honor, then, to the enterprise of your officers and members who by their thought, word, and action have made this building possible; and from its existence and the work that shall follow from it, they will enjoy the happy reward for their labors in seeing from the ashes of misfortune "Civilization on its luminous wings soar Phoenix-like to Jove."

"When Freedom from her mountain height
Unfurled her standard to the air,
She tore the azure robe of night,
And set the stars of glory there.
She mingled with its gorgeous dyes
The milky baldric of the skies,
And striped its pure celestial white
With streakings of the morning light;
Then, from his mansion in the sun,
She called her eagle bearer down,
And gave into his mighty hand
The symbol of her chosen land."

In the publication entitled Six Hundred Years, a history of the Church of the Holy Trinity in the Minories of London, is found the following pedigree, used by Brother Gallagher in his address, and which shows the relationship of the Dartmouths to George Washington. It is compiled from the Record annexed to the excellent account of the "Washington" research by Mr. Waters in the N. E. Historical and Genealogical Register for October, 1899.

WashingtonAncestry.jpg
Washington's Ancestry

Note: Since the above address was delivered, Henry Fitz Gilbert Waters, the antiquarian and genealogist referred to, died at Salem, Mass., the city of his birth, Aug. 16, 1913. He was born March 29, 1833; graduated from Harvard College in 1855 with an A. B. and an A. M., 1885. After college he taught in the Salem public schools, and enlisted in the Twenty-third Massachusetts Regiment in the Civil War. After his war service he was engaged in genealogical and general antiquarian research work in England. In this work he traced the obscure Harvard family, the ancestry of Roger Williams and as above stated, the ancestry of George Washington.

He belonged to many historical and educational societies and for many years was secretary of the School Committee of Salem.

AT THE CONSTITUTION OF ALGONQUIN LODGE, APRIL 1914

From Proceedings, Page 1914-100:

Within a few hundred feet to the north of this spot, on Washington Street, stands the old Davenport house, one of the oldest houses in Dorchester, if not the oldest, coming down from the ancestor, Thomas Davenport, who was among the first settlers, and who was a freeman of the town as early as 1640; in that house my mother was born; and about the same distance to the south on Washington Street my father spent his childhood, youth and early manhood in the old Withington house; across the street from this hall my father and mother were married in the old Codman Church, while their remains rest in the Codman Cemetery, a few hundred feet to the west on Norfolk Street, with others of my ancestry. Although born on the historical Dorchester Heights in South Boston, formerly a part of Dorchester, much of my time in my early days was spent with grandparents in this immediate vicinity, and the memories of its surroundings are hallowed by happy associations.

A few hundred feet further up Washington Street, near the old Codman mansion still standing on the hill, was the John Mears house, where in a room over the kitchen the loyal members of Union Lodge met by stealth during the bitter Anti-Masonic times and kept alive the old Charter bearing the signature of Paul Revere as Grand Master; and I have heard my father tell how as a boy he and John, the son of the old John Mears, used to hide in the bushes and see the members approaching the house across the fields from different directions to hold their secret meetings, the boys not then knowing the purpose of the caution shown. The younger John Mears passed away at Neponset within the past twenty-two years at the age of ninety-one, being at the time of his death the oldest member in service as well as years of the Lodge of St. Andrew, and his son Henry being now a member of that Body.

Many other interesting reminiscences of this vicinity might be recalled, but our purpose to-night is to welcome you as a Body into our fellowship as the two hundred and fifty-sixth of the Bodies that compose our Grand Lodge, the oldest chartered Masonic Institution on this Continent.

You have started under most favorable auspices, and the tender appreciation you have shown of the work of Wor. Bro. Cilley and his associates under Dispensation, with the evident care shown in the selection of your members, augurs well for the success and permanency of your organization.

But it is not in this regard alone that you have shown wise and discriminating purpose; the selection of your name evidences a wise and serious thoughtfulness; you have not chosen the name of an individual or that of a locality, you have been limited by no narrow consideration, but have selected a name indicating strength, antiquity and character; a type, an embodiment; something purely native in its Americanism and one that has a lasting meaning; the name of a great nation, extensive and strong, having for its dominion the greater part of the Continent this side of the Mississippi and extending to the Rocky Mountains beyond: ALGONQUIN — respected by the fathers as a fit design for the seal and arms of our Commonwealth where the Algonquin Indian, dressed as tradition describes him, upholds the power of the Bay State on its flag and on its public documents. On the appearance of our early settlers on these shores the domain of the Algonquin extended from Northern Canada to the land of the Cherokees in Georgia and the Seminoles in Florida, who were a part of the great Iroquois Nation, the deadly rivals and enemies of the Algonquins, and except for these Iroquois, whose seat was the Six Nations about the Great Lakes in New York and Pennsylvania, the Algonquins covered the eastern shores and the western country to the Great American Desert and Rocky Mountains beyond the "Father of Waters." You might have selected the name of many of its great chiefs whose names are found historically perpetuated in towns, countries, rivers and mountains, for many there were who were towers of strength, winning the respect and admiration of the white settlers by their wisdom, forethought, strength of character, power of organization, although at times wily and subtle in their strategy and cruel and inhuman in their dealings.

The old Sachem Powhatan, who was a great chief of thirty or forty tribes, with a body-guard, like that of an emperor, of two hundred Indians, caused his force and influence to be felt at Jamestown, Virginia, particularly when he captured their leader John Smith, the saving of whose life by Pocahontas formed one of the romances in the history of our early settlers; by him was formed the famous Powhatan confederacy of the Algonquin tribes of East Virginia, and it was not until after the marriage of Rolfe and Pocahontas that peace was made with this powerful chieftain.

AlgonquinImage.jpg
FACSIMILE REPRODUCTION OF THE ORIGINAL DESIGN
OF THE ALGONQUIN INDIAN ACCEPTED AND ADOPTED FOR
THE SEAL AND ARMS OF MASSACHUSETTS.

King Philip nearer home, son of old Massasoit, won the fear if not the respect of the settlers of Plymouth and Massachusetts Bay in the war that he waged over many years; which at times called for the services of almost the entire available men of the community to oppose him; he ravaged the settlements from Rhode Island to the Deer-field Valley and even as far as Weymouth; at one time Governor Winslow led a force of one thousand men against him and the cost of the war to the settlers is estimated at $1,000,000, which was a tidy sum for the seventeenth century.

Pontiac, Chief of the Ottawas, another tribe of the Algonquins, led his warriors against Braddock at the time of his defeat and death in 1755 at Fort Duquesne, and he continued a formidable ally of the French during the French and Indian War. His famous conspiracy against the English in 1763, when he organized and united the tribes over five hundred miles of territory, forms the title to a volume of Parkman's famous histories; under Pontiac's direction fourteen posts were attacked simultaneously and all but four captured; Major Gladwin saved Detroit to withstand a siege of five months, which was ended only by the Treaty of Peace in 1763. Pontiac, however, continued a dreaded foe on the frontier until he was murdered by an Illinois Indian.

Tecumseh, so-called because of his agility, (the name indicating flying-panther or something resembling a meteor flashing through the skies), was recognized as one of the greatest of Indian chiefs; his great talents for leadership and organization enabled him to unite the tribes from the Great Lakes South, even inducing the Cherokees and Creeks of the Iroquois tribes, the Algonquin's hated enemies, to join in the confederation against the Americans. He was allied with the English in the War of 1812 and, if history is to be believed, his action more than that of any other person prevented our capture of Canada during that war. Tecumseh captured Detroit, but in the retreat after Perry's victory on Lake Erie he was killed in the battle of the Thames. Although his name is associated with Tippecanoe, where his people were defeated by General, afterwards President Harrison, he was not with them, being then South on his mission of organization.

Names such as these might be multiplied, each exhibiting different traits of character worthy of consideration and which have been of sufficient importance to be adopted by whole communities in the nature of patron saints from whom physical surroundings are named.

You might have adopted the name of the great Sachem of the Massachusetts tribe of the Algonquins, Chickataubut; his jurisdiction extended from the Charles River to Weymouth and Canton, and history records that before pestilence carried them off he could have put three thousand warriors into the field. Neponset people appreciated him .sufficiently to name a street for him beginning at its centre and running in this direction toward Ashmont; the residence of an uncle on the corner of this street and Neponset Avenue recalls my association with the name. Chickataubut was a picturesque old character; Winthrop in his records says that in March, 1631, "Chicatobot came from Neponset on the South" and presented him with a hogshead of Indian corn; he was dressed in English clothes, and Winthrop gave him a dinner with a cup of sack and beer and gave his men tobacco; Winthrop says that the Sachem "behaved himself as soberly as an Englishman"; and that he afterwards gave him a new suit of clothes and had him again at dinner where the Sachem wished him to say grace before meat and give thanks after the dinner; be later received as a present from the Sachem "two large skins of coat beaver." All the grants of land in Dorchester and, in fact, in Boston and immediate vicinity came from this old Sachem Chickataubut, and when in 1685-86 people feared for the titles to their land by the coming of Sir Edmond Andros, they, like others about Boston, had their old grants confirmed by Wampatuck, called by the English "Charles Josias," who was a grandson of Chickataubut.

Among the local Algonquin tribes of this immediate vicinity were the Indians about Nonantum, now Newton and Natick, where in 1643 the apostle John Eliot, who came to Roxbury in 1639, began his famous mission among them, and persisted with such zeal that in 1654 he had translated the catechism and by 1663 the whole of the Bible into their Algonquin language. This was a wonderful achievement when we consider that there was no written Indian language and he was obliged to construct his grammar, with all the parts of speech, from conversation; the original of this grammar was shown me within a few days and it is a most interesting historical compilation. The language employed by Eliot was of course the Algonquian, the most widely extended and the most important Indian tribe, with the best linguistic stock on this Continent. The famous Iroquoian stock had also linguistic properties, but was limited to the old Five Nations of New York, made the Six Nations by the Tuscaroras, who were driven out of North Carolina in 1715 and came among them; these tribes extended through part of Pennsylvania and Ohio, although originally they came from the Lower St. Lawrence and were in possession of Montreal and Quebec when Jacques Cartier arrived in 1535; seventy years later the Algonquins had driven them out and had control of all that country. Although the Algonquian stock comprised forty distinct languages and dialects, the roots and foundations were so well denned that it was possible for a scholarly man with a zeal like Eliot to construct a language from it; and in this he was doubtless assisted by the language key worked out by the French missionaries of the seventeenth century in their years of association with the original Algonquin tribes in the St. Lawrence country. Eliot with his grammar and Bible "traversed the land for forty years in peril of the wilderness, in peril of the heathen, in hunger and thirst . . . to carry the gospel to the children of the woods who to him were the Children of God." He died in 1690 and is truly characterized on his tablet in Roxbury as "First among Puritan saints."

But all this is merely "by the way" and is put in this extended form because our jurisdiction is the only one in our country where Lodges are not numbered, and where it became early the policy to give names to Lodges, and the early records show that many names presented by Brethren were rejected by the Grand Lodge as being personal rewards or political in their nature rather than the embodiment of a sentiment or an appropriate idea; as I have been a strict constructionist of the old school on the traditions of our Grand Lodge it pleases me that you have selected your name with care; embodying an idea and a standard; giving a character to the Lodge and to our institution rather than a compliment to an individual, living or dead. And now you are duly organized by proclamation; you are ready to attend to all business that shall regularly come before you as such; you are to maintain the principles of our Order, and after the impressive ceremonies of installation and the instructions and charges given to the officers, the principles of which apply equally to all yourselves, there is no further admonition or preachment that can strengthen what has been expressed. Among the problems in our land it is for us to maintain and conserve the traditions and principles of our government and its laws, and the most powerful and conservative body to be depended on for this purpose is the Masonic Fraternity. All that we hold dearest from the formation of our government has been saved to us by maintaining principles broadly extended and widely diffused among all our institutions civil and political, and to the confusion of the enemies of our Republic at home and abroad. And it is our duty not only to continue the good work, but to inculcate the same principles even to our children's children, and by our lives to be examples such as shall encourage others to maintain the integrity of what has descended to us; so that in the world's instruction and development "intelligence shall blend with character and all be united in one common purpose, with unselfish devotion to the common weal."

AT THE 50TH ANNIVERSARY OF WILLIAM PARKMAN LODGE, MAY 1914

From Proceedings, Page 1914-128:

M. W. Brother Parkman was a personal and business friend of my father who also knew him as a Mason from his close friendship with many prominent members of the Lodge of St. Andrew, of which Parkman was a member from 1844 till his death Dec. 26, 1891, at the age of eighty years.

Among my father's personal friends in that Lodge were Brothers Dalton, Mears, and Leman who invited him to their gatherings and of course he met Brother Parkman there frequently.

Brother Parkman was a most remarkable man, and typified the sturdy old Bostonian character and nature. Solid men of Boston who "make no long orations," Solid men of Boston who "drink no strong potations." His ancestors had lived in the old North End from 1668 and it was there he was born May 8, 1811. At that time it was still the home of leading and influential people of the city and he imbibed the patriotic and public spirit of its surroundings. He graduated from the Eliot School, receiving a Franklin medal which was awarded only to scholars of the highest rank; he attended the English High School, and as a young man entered the hardware store of Joseph West on South Market Street, and in 1833 was a partner with Mr. West in the same business at Dock Square, where many of us remember him and the business house, until it was dissolved in 1878. In 1880 Brother Parkman retired from active business. During his business life he found time to contribute his valuable services to the public, and served in the City Council of Boston in 1856-1860, at a time when it meant something to be called to the responsible position of a City Father, as a member of the City Government was called. He served as a Trustee of the Boston Public Library, associated with Edward Everett and Robert C. Winthrop, men whose names in Boston represented all that was cultured, noble and great in public life, and whose characters shone among the leaders of national affairs; always interested in the best and highest ideals of government, he was for many years Treasurer of "A Republican Institution in the Town of Boston" organized in 1819, as a good government association, which has retained its organization though ceasing to do active political work. It is kept alive by inheritance to a member of the family or in the absence of such to whoever may be invited to succeed; thus I became, by calling, the inheritor of the place of Wm. Parkman in this interesting but little-known organization that annually dines and reproduces and keeps alive the traditions of old Boston as a sort of historical dining society. Mr. Parkman was also Treasurer of the Boston Marine Society which represented the commercial interests of Boston when shipping was a live and extensive industry.

I have referred to his public life and activities for the purpose of showing that the selection of his name in 1864 as that of your Lodge, (and of Wm. Parkman Commandery in 1870), was due not only to his active and devoted Masonic life but because his standing in the community generally represented strength and high character. Masonic work alone ought not to be a reason for building a lasting monument to a man, for it represents more than a mere reward for service; it should at the same time carry strength to the institution both in the Fraternity and to the world at large. Personally, I do not believe in raising monuments to living men; the possibilities are too many.

Without recalling the many important and leading positions held by Brother Parkman in Subordinate Bodies, it is appropriate to mention his responsibilities in the so-called higher positions of our Order; — another Treasurership he held was that of the Grand Commandery of Massachusetts and Rhode Island, and earlier, in 1861-1864, he was Treasurer of our Supreme Council of the Thirty-third Degree; later he became an active Thirty-third Degree member with such well-known Masons as Lucius R. Paige, Benjamin Dean, Charles Levi Woodbury, and Samuel C. Lawrence, they being the five active members of the Supreme Council of the Thirty-third Degree from Massachusetts.

It was during his three years' service as Grand Master of Massachusetts, 1863-1865, that our Grand Lodge apartments were destroyed by fire. This terrible disaster to our Fraternity occurred April 5, 1864, when the Winthrop House occupying the site of the present Temple in Boston was burned; — the two upper stories were occupied by the Grand Lodge, the remainder being used for hotel purposes by the Winthrop House. The blow was a crushing one to our Fraternity, losing as it did not only its home, but documents and archives of priceless historic and Masonic value. No discouragement was shown, however, and under the active efforts and enterprising administration of Brother Parkman as Grand Master the rubbish of the old Temple was cleared away and on October 14 of the same year the corner-stone of the new Temple was laid. Besides the usual activities of a Grand Lodge, the Civil War added details and cares which gave to Brother Parkman during his three years of 1863-1865 a most strenuous official life; among other things he granted deputations to numerous army lodges that were conducted in camp and field by Massachusetts troops, and the reports from the "front" in our proceedings of that day are interesting and unique; in addition, there was the process of re-building the Temple which was begun by him and was completed and the Temple dedicated by Grand Master Dame; President Andrew Johnson, a Mason, honoring the services with his presence. Recalling the dark days of the summer of 1864, and the Titanic struggle between the armies of Grant and Lee in the Wilderness, with daily reports of terrible losses in killed and wounded, and no apparent decisive successes by the Northern armies, the Brethren of Winchester had courage, indeed, to take upon themselves the formation of a Lodge with all that it meant in time and expense; but the atmosphere was charged with purpose in those days as it was with hero worship; and as public memorials were being erected to those who had attained eminence and made sacrifice for the public good, it is not strange that your founders, knowing the character and standing of Brother Parkman, his loyalty and devotion to the cause of Masonry in its then formative period and in re-building the Temple after its destruction, were imbued with the idea of adding strength to the organization as well as paying a tribute to one who in their eyes was a sort of hero, and thus adopted his name as a designation for their and your Lodge. In addition to his other attainments it should be added that Brother Parkman had a personal charm of manner that captivated all who met him; his was a kindly and lovable nature actuated by the kindliest of impulses; he was always ready to help the needy and direct the erring; — ready on all public occasions to represent a cause with felicity or maintain a position with strength and vigor; the rich, deep tones of his voice, cultivated in the choir of the old Cockerel Church on Hanover Street, with his pleasing personality, made him much sought for at public gatherings. I recall him as a man of medium height, well built, with a strong face, full head of hair, full chin beard, with a manner that could be aggressive against the strong, but mild and gentle with the less favored; one to whom his associates would be proud to defer as a leader; — and his personality, with his public services, his activities in Masonry, his courage to undertake the re-building of the Temple in times of great public stress, all combined to form a natural reason for selecting his name as a stimulus and example for those who should undertake the new work of the Lodge.

As the individual grows older his powers weaken, but as the collective body increases its years, it waxes stronger and its vigor increases; while it is said of the natural body "forty is the old age of youth but fifty is the youth of old age," of a collective body such as yours every milestone is a renewal of perpetual youth and its strength and ability create a greater usefulness, ever present and ready; and as you have advanced in fifty years to your present prosperity and numbers, so with the same impulses you will go on to your Centennial celebration where will be some of those present, who will take part in that important event. As you progress in this good work you will learn that "new occasions teach new duties," and that the tenets of our profession, its cardinal virtues, and the obligations you are under to each other and to the world, will call for independence of thought and action, requiring at times a nobility of character to take a stand in public doings and private affairs when our principles may be attacked or assailed.

"Once to every man and nation comes the moment to decide,
In the strife of Truth with Falsehood, for the good or evil side;
Then it is the brave man chooses, while the coward stands aside,
Doubting in his abject spirit, till his Lord is crucified."

By emulation of the good principles and actions exemplified by William Parkman in his life, and by the application of them in your daily lives, the future success of your prosperous Lodge is assured.


CHARTERS GRANTED


RULINGS

None.


Grand Masters