GMPDean

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PAUL DEAN 1783-1860

PaulDean1915.jpg

Deputy Grand Master, 1835-1837
Grand Master, 1838-1840


TERM

1838 1839 1840

NOTES

MEMORIAL

From Proceedings, Page VI-364; Moore's Freemason's Monthly, Vol. XX, No. 6, April 1861, Page 177:

The committee to whom was referred the subject of the death of a very highly valuable member of the Order to which we belong, beg leave to submit the following.—

With unfeigned sorrow the G. Lodge deplores the death of one of the most worthy and devoted of the ancient brotherhood of Masons, the Rev. Paul Dean, a Past Grand Master of this oldest of the Masonic institutions in America. The solemn event occurred Oct 1. 1860.

From his earliest connections with Masonry, and through all the trials and persecutions which the fraternity passed through during the vigor of his manhood, in this city, — this Commonwealth, and this country,— Bro. Dean stood forth a pillar of strength—a safe counsellor an unflinching and reliable friend of an institution he both honored and adorned.

He was a man of enlarged views, whose gentle nature, spotless reputation and moral dignity gave lustre to his Masonic character. He loved mankind and practised what he taught, both by precept and example, — universal benevolence and universal charity. Full of years, revered, beloved and honored, this good Brother has been taken from us, to be raised to higher degrees in the Lodge above, where the weary are at rest.

In view of this painful event to us, it is a fitting occasion for contemplating the happy results of a well-spent life, as exemplified in the calm, Christian course of our recently deceased Brother.

  • Resolved, therefore, that while we deplore the loss of one who was useful — so devoted and so thoroughly imbued with the genuine spirit of true Freemasonry, it behooves us to profit by the lesson of his unblemished career, that we may live as he lived, everywhere respected; that we may die as he died — everywhere lamented.
  • Resolved, That the M. W. G. Master be requested to address a letter of condolence to the bereaved family of the late Bro. Dean communicating the foregoing sentiments. And may God sanctify to them this dispensation of His righteous providence.

J. V. C. SMITH. Chairman.

From Moore's Freemason's Monthly, Vol. XX, No. 1, November 1860, Page 5:

DEATH OF REV. PAUL DEAN. Again we are called upon to place on record the death of one of our most aged and venerated Brethren, — one with whom we have been officially and intimately associated for a third of a century, — one whom we had learned to love for the goodness of his heart and the purity of his character; and to whom we have long been accustomed to point as a fit exemplar of the truth and fidelity of the true Mason.

The Rev. Paul Dean died of paralysis at his residence in Framingham, on the first day of October last, in the 77th year of his age, — and was buried from the residence of his son-in-law in Boston, on the third day of the same month. His death was so sudden, and the notice of his burial so short, that but comparatively very few of his Masonic Brethren were in attendance, or even knew of his decease, until after the funeral had taken place. Had proper notice been given hundreds would nave gladly availed themselves of the sad occasion, to pay their last respects to his remains, and to manifest their warm affection for his memory and his worth. A few, however, were there, and among them the Grand Master and other members of the Grand Lodge, to mingle their sympathies with those of the more immediate friends of the family, and to soothe by their presence the deep grief of the widow and the sorrow of the children.

Brother Dean was born in Barnard, Windsor Co., Vt., on the 25th March, 1783, where he passed his youth in agricultural labors, in attending school, in academic and biblical studies, and in school leaching. In 1806, he entered upon the duties of the Christian ministry at Montpelier, Vt.; from thence, in 1810, he removed to New Hartford, N.Y., and in 1813, he came to reside in Boston. He was for many years the pastor of the first Universalist Church in Boston, and, subsequently, was settled over the Bulfinch Street Church, where he officiated until by reason of his age and infirmities he was ^compelled to relinquish his pastorship for a less laborious and responsible field. Of late years he has resided principally at Framingham, employing his time in study, the cultivation of a small garden, and making himself generally useful, as occasion offered. He early became a life-member of the American Bible Society, and also of the American Colonization Society.

As a Mason his record is full and well made up. He was initiated in Centre Lodge, at Rutland, Vt., during the winter of 1805, and received the degrees of the Chapter at New Hartford, N. Y., in 1811. The degrees of Royal and Select Master, of the Encampment, and of the Ancient and Accepted Rite to the 33d inclusive, were conferred upon him in Boston. He was admitted to honorary membership in Columbian Lodge, Boston, and officiated as Chaplain of that body from 1817 to 1836, inclusive.

He was also Chaplain of the Grand Lodge for several years; Dist. Deputy Grand Master for the 1st District for three years from 1831; Deputy Grand Master in 1815-16-17; and Grand Master in 1838-9-40. He was a member of St. Paul's Chapter, over which he presided as H. P. for some years. He has also filled the offices of G. H. P. of the Grand Chapter of this State, and of the G. G. C. of the United-States ; Prelate of the G. G. Encampment; and President of the Convention of of H. P. of Massachusetts. And in all these various stations he acquitted himself with honor and to the entire acceptance of his Brethren. He was a true Mason — ever firm, consistent and faithful, in all places, an4 under all circumstances. And although his day of activity had measurably passed, he did not wholly cease from his Masonic labors while life lasted. Only about three weeks before his death he was in convention with his Brethren in this city, manifesting as much interest and zeal in the cause as in his more youthful days. As few Brethren among us have filled" a larger place in the Masonic heart and affections, so few remain whose departure will be more sensibly felt by the older members of the Fraternity, to whom his usefulness was best known, and by whom his many excellent qualities were, therefore, best appreciated.

BIOGRAPHY

(From 1916 Proceedings)

Brother Dean was born in Barnard, Windsor County, on the 28th of March, 1783, where he passed his youth in agricultural labors, in attending school, in academic and biblical studies, and in school teaching. In 1806, he entered upon the duties of the Christian ministry at Montpelier, Vt.; from thence, in 1810, he removed to New Hartford, N. Y., and in 1813 he came to reside in Boston. He was for many years the pastor of the First Universalist Church in Boston, and, subsequently, was settled over the Bulfinch street church, where he officiated until by reason of his age and infirmities he was compelled to relinquish his pastorate for a less laborious and responsible field. In later years he resided principally at Framingham, employing his time in study, the cultivation of a small garden, and making himself generally useful, as occasion offered. He early became a life-member of the American Bible Society and also of the American Colonization Society.

As a Mason his record is full and well made up. He was initiated in Centre Lodge, at Rutland, Vt., during the winter of 1805, and received the degrees of the Chapter at New Hartford, N. Y., in 1811. The degrees of Royal and Select Master, of the Encampment, and of the Ancient and Accepted Rite to the 33° inclusive, were conferred upon him in Boston. He was admitted to honorary membership in Columbian Lodge, Boston, and officiated as Chaplain of that body from 1817 to 1836, inclusive. He was also Chaplain of the Grand Lodge for several years; District Deputy Grand Master for the First District for three years from 1831; Deputy Grand Master in l835, 1836, and 1837; and Grand Master in 1838, 1839, and 1840. He was a member of St. Paul's Chapter, over which he presided as High Priest for some years. He has also filled the offices of Grand High Priest of the Grand Chapter of this State, and of the General Grand Chapter of the United States; Prelate of the General Grand Encampment; and President of the Convention of High Priests of Massachusetts. And in all these various stations he acquitted himself with honor and to the entire acceptance of his Brethren.

He was a true Mason - ever firm, consistent, and faithful, in all places, and under all circumstances. Few Brethren filled a larger place in the Masonic heart and affections. He died of paralysis at his residence in Framingham, on October 1, 1860, in the seventy-seventh year of his age, and was buried fro the residence of his son-in-law in Boston, on the third day of the same month. Note: A condensed version of this biography was published in the program for the Feast of St. John in December 1939, and appears beginning on Proceedings Page 1939-478.

From Proceedings, Page 1873-220:

REV. PAUL DEAN, BOSTON Universalist. Grand Chaplain, 1814, 1815, 1816, 1820, 1824, 1825, 1826, 1827, 1834.

R.W. and Rev. Paul Dean was born in Barnard, Windsor County, Vt., on the 28th of March, 1783. He passed his youth in agricultural labor, in attending common schools, in academic and biblical studies, and in school-teaching. In the year 1806 he commenced the Christian ministry at Montpelier, Vt.; from thence, in 1810, he removed to New Hartford, N. Y.; and, in 1813, he came to reside in Boston. He was for many years the pastor of the First Universalist Church in Boston, and, subsequently, he was settled over the Bulfinch Street Church, where he officiated for considerable time. Of late years he has resided in Framingham, Mass. He early became a life-member of the American Bible Society, and of the American Colonization Society. This faithful teacher in the Christian Church has also been a devoted and earnest Mason. Bro. Dean was initiated, passed and raised in Center Lodge, No. 6, at East Rutland, Vt., during the winter of 1805. He received the Chapter Degrees in Horeb R.A. Chapter, No. 7, at New Hartford, N.Y., in the year 1811. The Degrees of Royal and Select Master, and the Templar Degrees, were conferred upon him in Boston. He was admitted to Honorary Membership in Columbian Lodge, April 4, 1816, and officiated as their Chaplain, in 1817, 1818, 1819, 1820, 1825, 1826, 1827, 1829, 1834, 1835, and 1836. He has served as G. Chaplain of the Grand Lodge; was D.D.G.M. of the First District, in 1821, 1822, and 1823; Deputy Grand Master, in 1835, 1836, and 1837; and Grand Master of Massachusetts, in 1838, 1839, and 1840. He has held membership in St. Paul's R.A. Chapter, the Grand Chapter, the convention of High Priests, the General Grand R.A. Chapter of the United States; in the Boston Encampment of K.T.; and in the General Grand Encampment of the U. S. He has served as Prelate in the G. G. Encampment; in the G. G. Chapter as Chaplain, King and High Priest; in the Grand Council of Royal and Select Masters for Mass., as M.I. Grand Master; in the Grand Chapter of Mass., as Deputy and Grand High Priest; in the convention of High Priests, as President; and in St. Paul's R.A. Chapter, in 1818, 1819, and 1820, as High Priest. The numerous Masonic services, which Bro. Dean has rendered in the various stations he has filled, richly entitle him to the high estimation in which he is held by his brethren.
— Hist. of Columbian Lodge.

Brother Dean died at his residence in Framingham, Mass., on the 18th of October, 1860. The following letter from Brother Rev. Adin Ballou will be read with appreciation by those who knew Mr. Dean. It is a just tribute to the memory of a most excellent man, — of one who throughout a long life maintained an honorable and upright character.

HOPEDALE, MASS., Dec. 20, 1873.
JOHN T. HEARD, ESQ. : —

DEAR SIR AND BROTHER, — I cordially comply with your courteous invitation to furnish you a brief general reminiscence of the life, character and professional standing of the late Rev. Paul Dean, outside of Masonry.

My personal acquaintance with him commenced about fifty years ago. He was then in the ripeness of middle age, and at the zenith of his popularity. He had successfully officiated, for many years, as pastor of the First Universalist Church and Society in Boston, founded by the venerable John Murray, whose place of worship was in Hanover Street; but, with a select swarm from that "Old Hive," was locating himself in Bulfinch Street, where an elegant new church edifice welcomed his ministrations. There he remained preacher and pastor, useful, beloved, and revered, till the close of his public career as a settled clergyman.

He was a man of very comely figure, countenance, and deportment; of great personal dignity, suavity and politeness; in fine, eminently a Christian gentleman, perfectly welcome and at home in every domestic and social circle of his time, into which duty or propriety called him. In his own family, the homes of his parishioners, at the sick-bed, the funeral service, the marriage altar, the festive party, the graver public assembly, and on all the various occasions demanding his presence, he exhibited the same decorous self-respect, urbanity and adaptive courtesy, alike pleasing, agreeable and commanding. Hence he enjoyed uncommon reverence, affection and influence for personal excellences of character and geniality in domestic and social relationships, aside from his clerical merits.

In respect to these last, he ranked high among the contemporaries of his best days; not so much for intellectual learning, acumen, or profundity, perhaps, as for his graceful, persuasive and impressive pulpit oratory, the benignity of his sentiments, the moderation of his sectarian zeal, the candor with which he treated other denominations, and the practical piety and morality which he generally made prominent in his discourses. He had neither the natural aptitude, ambition or taste for sharp polemics, theological controversy, or vigorous proselytism, though well-settled convictions of his own doctrinal faith, as well as practice. But he had an instinctive aversion to all brusque, obtrusive and teasing methods of propagating religious tenets of any sort. If he erred in such matters, it was in being too moderate, unaggressive, conservative and cautious. This elevated him in the esteem of the clergy and respectable laity generally outside of his own denomination, but lowered him in that of many insiders, especially those of the then dominant wing, — between whose leaders and himself there very naturally arose a mutual dislike, that ended in almost utter alienation. They came out with what he deemed the new-fangled, unscriptural and absurd, doctrine of no future retribution, asserting, with positive confidence, the immediate salvation of all men at death, and other opinions, theoretical and practical, decidedly repugnant to those he had been accustomed to cherish. Moreover, they pushed forward their new notions, not only with marked ability and industry, but with an aggressive dogmatism, rough address, and assumptive air, exceedingly offensive to his sense of propriety. He was, therefore, alike disgusted with the matter and manner of their ultraism. The result was that he, and others of us who more or less sympathized with him in these views, left the Universalist denomination, and became known as Independent Restorationists.

This secession brought down upon his head some very unjust reproaches from his opponents, whose echo has hardly yet ceased over his grave. It also subjected his declining years to serious trials, from all which his translation to the higher life gave him, I trust, a sanctified emancipation.

In this particular connection I will merely add, that this Restorationist secession brought me for several years into intimate relations with him, partly in ecclesiastical and partly in secular affairs ; and, though we many times differed in conviction and judgment, I always found him a preeminently just, honorable, magnanimous and conciliatory man. He was kind, considerate, public-spirited and generous in his dealings, too often to his own worldly loss. Our last meeting was at the funeral of a mutual friend, a few years before his own decease. We participated in the services, and he breathed out the same divinely consoling sentiments which he had so devotedly advocated from his youth; but the debility and tremulousness of age marked his address, and gave distinct premonition that he must soon rest from his earthly labors. The interview between us was comparatively brief, but mutually pleasant and hallowed.

As a theologian, he was on several points peculiar and almost unique. Respecting the Godhead, he was nearer a Sabellian than anything else; believing in God as strictty one divine person revealed in three official manifestations, Father, Son and Holy Ghost. He held the atonement of Christ to have been sacrificially vicarious and meritorious, but not in the sense of penal satisfaction or appeasement of God's vindictive justice. Also, that it was the only ground of man's salvation, and designed to be completely efficacious for the reconciliation of the whole human race. It was seldom, however, that he expatiated on these doctrines, either in his public discourses or private conversation; preferring to use them practically, rather than as themes of polemical discussion. He rejected utterly the doctrine of endless punishment, and of any vindictive penalism; firmly maintaining the belief, that all the divine retributions, whether in this world or the next, are and will be mainly disciplinary, designed, with the accompaniments of atoning grace, to consummate the holiness and happiness of all human souls. He was equally decided and firm against the doctrines of no future retribution; immediate universal salvation at death; no sin in the soul only in the flesh; no real free moral agency in man; no intermediate state for souls between death and resurrectional perfection; no inborn immortality of the soul; and all kindred notions; holding that man will be the same responsible subject of moral law and discipline in the next life as here; that the conditions of spiritual regeneration will remain essentially the same, and that ages of ages may elapse with multitudes of souls, before Christ shall have subdued and reconciled all things to himself, so that God can be morally "all in all." These views he preached and contended for with marked distinctness, yet with uniform avoidance of obtrusiveness and controversial offence. As before stated, he was constitutionally and habitually averse to sharp polemical controversy, and only fought in that line when it seemed unescapable except with dishonor. The grand doctrines of the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man he steadfastly proclaimed throughout his ministry, as fundamentals of the true Christian religion; though he was too cautiously conservative to agree with me in carrying them out into the radical, moral and social reforms in which I have felt it my duty to engage. Nevertheless, our mutual respect and fraternal love remained immovable.

As an author, he has not left large memorials. A small volume of Lecture Sermons, delivered in the Bulfinch-street church, on Universal Restoration, in 1832; numerous occasional discourses and addresses, including one annual Election Sermon before the General Court, which, if collected, would make a much larger volume; with numerous editorial articles and contributions in the Independent Messenger, and other religious periodicals in which he was interested, comprise most of his published productions, which have come to my knowledge. But I trust that his manifold unpublished instructions, counsels and consolations, and above all, the more manifold good works wherein, through a long life and ministry, he exemplified his Christian discipleship, have a brighter and more enduring record. That record glows in the grateful memories of some appreciative survivors, and of thousands who have welcomed him to the blissful abodes of the immortal world. And brighter still, the Saviour he served and honored holds his worth indelibly inscribed in the Book of Life. Within the sanctuaries of Masonry, in its cherished archives of written and unwritten memoranda, on the heart-tablets of relatives and friends outside the mystic veils, who knew and loved him, and above all on the imperishable scroll of the celestial temple, may his name shine with serene radiance forevermore. And whoever, in mortal or immortal spheres, have registered against him any of the offences, faults or shortcomings incident to our common human nature in its best estate, let them be merciful as the All-Father is merciful, forgive as they would be forgiven, bleach them out with a magnanimous tear, and be as ready as he is for reciprocal blessedness in the mansions of heaven.

Finally, dear sir and Brother, if this fraternal tribute to departed worth, in whole or part, will serve your purpose, please make use of it at your discretion.

Very respectfully and fraternally yours,
ADIN BALLOU.

SPEECHES

AT THE CONSECRATION OF MOUNT HOPE LODGE, DECEMBER 1824

AT THE FEAST OF ST. JOHN, CLINTON, JUNE 1827

CHARTERS GRANTED

None.



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