F.
A SHORT CHARGE DELIVERED TO THE MASTER, ON BEING INVESTED AND INSTALLED
WORSHIPPUL SIR, - By the unanimous voice of the members of this lodge, you are elected to the mastership thereof for the ensuing half-year; and I have the happiness of being deputed to invest you with this ensign of your office: be it ever in your thoughts that the ancients particularly held this symbol to be a just, a striking emblem of the Divinity. They said the gods, who are the authors of every thing established in wisdom, strength, and beauty, were properly represented by this figure. May you, worthy brother, not only consider it a mark of honor in this assembly, but also let it ever remind you of your duty both to God and man. And, as you profess the sacred volume to be your spiritual trestle-board, may you make it your particular care to square your life and conversation according to the rules and designs laid down therein.
You have been of too long standing, and are too good a member of our community, to require now any information in the duty of your office. What you have seen praiseworthy in others, we doubt not you will imitate; and what you have seen defective, you will in yourself amend.
We have therefore the greatest reason to expect you will be constant and regular in your attendance on the lodge, faithful and diligent in the discharge of your duty, and that you will make the honor of the supreme Architect of the universe, and the good of the craft, chief objects of your regard.
We likewise trust you will pay a punctual attention to the laws and regulations of this society, as more particularly becoming your present station; and that you will, at the same time, require a due obedience to them from every other member, well knowing that, without this, the best of laws become useless.
For a pattern of imitation, consider the great luminary of nature, which, rising in tile east, regularly diffuses light and luster to all within its circle. In like manner it is your province, with due decorum, to spread and communicate light and instruction to the brethren in the lodge.
From the knowledge we already have of your zeal and abilities, we rest assured you will discharge the duties of this important station in such a manner as will redound greatly to the honor of yourself, as well as of those members over whom you are elected to preside.
G
BRETHREN, - I flatter myself there is no Mason of my acquaintance insensible of the sincere regard I ever had, and hope ever to retain, for our venerable institution; certain I am if this establishment should ever be held in little esteem by the members, it must be owing to the want of a due sense of the excellence of its principles, and the salutary laws and social duties on which it is founded.
But sometimes mere curiosity, views of self-interest, or a groundless presumption, that the principal business of the lodge is mirth and entertainment, have induced men of loose principles and discordant tempers to procure admission into our community; this, together with an unpardonable inattention of those who proposed them, to their lives and conversations, have constantly occasioned great discredit and uneasiness to the craft; such persons being no ways qualified for a society founded upon wisdom, and cemented by morality and Christian love.
Therefore, let it be your peculiar care to pay strict attention to the merit and character of those who, from among the circle of your acquaintance, maybe desirous of becoming members of our society, lest, through your inadvertency, the unworthy part of mankind should find means to introduce themselves among you, whereby you will discourage the reputable and worthy.
Self-love is a reigning principle in all men; and there is not a more effectual method of ingratiating ourselves with each other than by mutual complaisance and respect; by agreement with each other in judgment and practice. This makes society pleasing, and friendship durable; which can never be the case when men's principles and dispositions are opposite and not adapted for unity. We must be moved by the same passions, governed by the same inclinations, and molded by the same morals, before we can please or be pleased in society. No community or place can make a man happy, who is not furnished with a temper of mind to relish felicity. The wise and royal Grand Master, Solomon, tells us, and experience confirms it, "that the light is sweet, and a pleasant thing it is to behold the sun." Yet, for this pleasure, we are wholly indebted to that astonishing piece of heavenly workmanship, the eye, and the several organs of sight. Let the eye be distempered, and all objects, which, though they remain the same in themselves, to us lose their beauty and luster; let the eye be totally destroyed, then the sense which depends upon it is lost also, and the whole body is full of darkness. So is it with that Mason who has not a frame and temper of mind adapted to our institution, without which the blended allurements of pleasure and instruction to be found in the lodge must become tasteless and of no effect. Likewise, let his conduct and circumstances in life be such as may not have the least tendency to diminish the credit of the society; and be ye ever disposed to honor good men for their virtues, and wise men for their knowledge: good men for propagating virtue and religion all over the world, and wise men from encouraging arts and sciences, and diffusing them from east to west, and between north and south; rejecting all who are not of good repute, sound morals, and competent understanding. Hence you will derive honor and happiness to yourselves, and drink deeply of those streams of felicity which the unenlightened can never be indulged wit a taste of.
For, by these means, excess and irregularity must be strangers within your walls. On sobriety your pleasure depends, on regularity your reputation; and not your reputation only, but the reputation of the whole body.
These general cautions, if duly attended to, will continually evince your wisdom by their effects; for it is known by experience that nothing contributes more to the dissolution of a lodge than too great a number of members indiscriminately made; want of regulation in their expenses, and keeping unseasonable hours.
To guard against this fatal consequence we shall do well to cultivate the following virtues, viz., prudence, temperance, and frugality; virtues which are the best and properest supports of every community.
Prudence is the Queen and guide of all other virtues, the ornament of our actions, the square and rule of our affairs. It is the knowledge and choice of those things we must either approve or reject; and implies to consult and deliberate well, to judge and resolve well, to conduct and execute well.
Temperance consists in the government of our appetites and affections, so to use the good things of this life as not to abuse them; either by a sordid and ungrateful parsimony on the one hand, or a profuse and prodigal indulgence to excess on the other. This virtue has many powerful arguments in its favor; for, as we value our health, wealth, reputation, family, and friends, our characters as men, as Christians, as members of society in general, and as Freemasons in particular, all conspire to call on us for the exercise of this virtue; in short, it comprehends a strict observance of the Apostle's exhortation, "be ye temperate in all things;" not only avoiding what is in itself improper, but also whatever has the least or most remote appearance of impropriety, that the tongue of the slanderer may be struck dumb, and malevolence disarmed of its sting.
Frugality, the natural associate of prudence and temperance, is what the meanest station necessarily calls for, and the most exalted cannot dispense with. It is absolutely requisite in all stations; it is highly necessary to the supporting of every desirable character, to the establishment of every society, to the interest of every individual in the community. It is a moral, it is a Christian virtue. it implies the strict observation of decorum in the seasons of relaxation, and of every enjoyment; and is that temper of mind which is disposed to employ every acquisition only to the glory of the giver, our own happiness, and that of our fellow-creatures.
If we fail not in the exercise of these virtues (which are essential supports of every lodge of Free and Accepted Masons), they will effectually secure us from those unconstitutional practices which have proved so fatal to this society. For prudence will discover the absurdity and folly of expecting true harmony, without due attention to the choice of our members. Temperance will check every appearance of excess, and fix rational limits to our hours of enjoyment; and frugality will proscribe extravagance, and keep our expenses within proper bounds.
The Lacedaemonians had a law among them that every one should serve the gods with as little expense as he could, herein differing from all other Grecians; and Lycurgus, being asked for what reason he made this institution so disagreeable to the sentiments of all other men? answered, lest the service of the gods should at any time be intermitted; for he feared if religion should he as expensive there as ill other parts of Greece, it might some time or other happen that the divine worship, out of the covetousness of some, and the poverty of others, would be neglected. This observation will hold equally good with respect to Masons, and will, I hope, by them be properly applied.
I would not be understood here to mean that, because these three moral virtues are particularly pointed out as essentially necessary to the good discipline and support of a lodge, nothing more is required; for social must be united with moral excellencies. Were a man to be merely prudent, temperate and frugal, and yet be negligent of the duties of humanity, sincerity, generosity, &c., he would be at most but a useless, if not a worthless, member of society, and a much worse Mason.
In the next place, permit me to remind you that a due attendance on the lodge for your own improvement, and the reputation of Masonry in general, is absolutely necessary. For your own improvement; because the advantages naturally resulting from the practice of the principles therein taught, are the highest ornaments of human nature; and for the credit of the community, because it is your indispensable duty to support such a character in life as is there enjoined. The prevalence of good example is great, and no language is so expressive as a consistent life and conversation. These, once forfeited in a Masonic character, will diminish a man, not only in the esteem of persons of sense, learning, and probity, but even men of inferior qualities will seldom fail of making a proper distinction.
You are well acquainted, that the envious and censorious are ever disposed to form their judgments of mankind according to their conduct in public life. So when the members of our society desert their body, or discover any inconsistency in their practice with their profession, they contribute to bring an odium on a profession which it is the duty of every member highly to honor. Indeed, instances of the conduct here decried I own are very rare, and I might say, as often as they do happen, tend still more to discover the malignity of our adversaries than to reflect on ourselves. For with what ill-nature are such suggestions framed? How weak must it appear in the eye of discernment to condemn a whole society for the irregularity of a few individuals.*
(* Though there should be Freemasons who coolly, and without agitation of mind, seem to have divested themselves of all affection and esteem for the craft, we only see thereby the effects of an exquisite and inveterate depravation; for the principle is almost always preserved, though its effects seem to be totally lost.)
But to return to my argument. One great cause of absenting ourselves from the lodge I apprehend to be this, the want of that grand fundamental principle, brotherly love! Did we properly cultivate this Christian virtue, we should think ourselves the happiest when assembled together. On unity in affection unity in government subsists; for whatever draws men into societies, it is that only can cement them.
Let us recollect that love is the first and greatest commandment. All the others are summarily comprehended in this. It is the fulfilling of the law, and a necessary qualification for the celestial lodge, where the supreme Architect of the universe presides, who is love. Faith, hope and charity, are three principal graces, by which we must be guided thither; of which charity of universal love is the chief. When faith shall be swallowed up in vision, and hope in enjoyment, then true charity or brotherly love will shine with the brightest luster to all eternity.
On the other hand, envy, pride, censoriousness, malice, revenge, and discord, are the productions of a diabolical disposition. These are epidemical disorders of the mind, and if not seasonably corrected and suppressed, will prove very pernicious to particular communities, and more especially to such and establishment as ours.
Now there is nothing so diametrically opposite to them, and so powerful an antidote against them, tempted to envy? Charity guards the mind against it; charity envieth not. Are we tempted by pride? Charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up. Where this virtue is predominant, humility is both its companion and its delight; for the charitable man puts on bowels of mercy, kindness, and lowliness of mind. It is a certain remedy likewise against all censoriousness; charity thinketh no evil, but believeth all things, hopeth all things, will ever incline us to believe and hope the best, especially of a brother.
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