Contents.

CONTENTS .

LEADER 215 Grand Festival 2 ifi The New Grand Ollicers 217 Grand Lodge of Mark Master . Masons 21 S History of the Royal Masonic Institution for lloys ( Contimicl ) , 220

Grand Lod . ^ e Quebec 220 Supreme Grand Chapter 221 Provincial Grand Chapter of Sussex 221 Peterborough Cathedral 221 The Masonic Exhibition at York ( Can . linxi-tt ) 221 l ! ovs'School Athletic Sports'Fund 221

CoRRESr-OVDEXCEOtir I . od ;^ e Numeration 223 Reviews 22 J Notes and Queries 22 ^ A Masonic T . ibrarv for Jamaica 224 Gould ' s History of J'Yeeinasonry . Vol . III . 22 . REPORTS UK MASONIC MEETIXC . S—

Craft Masonry 225 Instruction 22 ) : Royal Arch 220 Mark Masonry 22 ft Knights Templar 226 Masonic and General Tidings 227 Obituary 227 Lodire Meetintrs for Next Week 22 S

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THE Annual Festival of English Freemasonry look place on Wednesday last in the old Home of our Order , now happily restored , under the able and distinguished presidency of the Pro Grand Master , the Earl of

CARNARVON . I here was a large attendance of brethren . Lord HOLMESDALE took the chair at the Banquet , which passed over with much eclat . All the arrangements of the Stewards gave satisfaction , and the menu was much admired . Wc refer our readers to our report elsewhere .

«* # BY the time this number of the Freemason greets our readers at home and abroad , the Annual Festival of our great English Order will have become a thing of the past . Its ceremonial and its banquet will alike be of yesterday , and expectations will have become certainty and anticipation fruition .

Even the vexed question of Grand Lodge honours and preferment will have received a passing solution , and the hopes of the ambitions and the claims of the deserving must alike await consummation ami realization , at any rate , 12 months hence . It is often amusing to note and remember , as Festival succeeds to Festival , how many arc the applicants to high ofiice , and

how few arc the " prizes " to be obtained . The GRAND MASTER has not it in his power to meet a tithe of the anxious longings and ceaseless strivings for the " purple , " which he has to consider and satisfy each St . George ' s Day . Indeed , when to-day wc realize how many ardently desire ofiice and rank , and on what contradictory grounds they do so , we feel not only how

hard the duty and responsibility of the selection must be , but to judge by some good folks' " nervous agitation " in the matter , we should be inclined to believe that material advantages of no ordinary kind accompanied the rank and office so vehemently aspired after . When some good people complain of this person or that person being passed over , we philosophically

shrug our shoulders . It is impossible to please every one , and we must assume that care is taken and responsibility avowed in recommending certain nominations to the GRAND MASTER . TO put the square men into the square hole , and the round men into the round , is the greatest " Crux " alike of social management and governmental power . We should

therefore be tolerant and thankful towards our " Executive , " and taking cheerfully the " goods the gods provide us , " we may congratulate heartily those fortunate mortals and brethren on whom the " purple , " in its becomingness of decorative splendour and opportuneness , has cast its temporary brilliancy and shed its elevating distinction . # *

THE resignation of so high and important a member of the Executive as the GRAND REGISTRAR in the very fulness of his official aptitude and energy and power , cannot be passed over without a word of notice . There is no more important office in Grand Lodge than that of the GRAND REGISTRAR . Wc arc wont to look to him for legal advice , for quasi-judicial

deliverances , 111 respect of home grievances and colonial appeals . In Bro . MCINTYRE the Craft possessed a brother of singular intelligence , ability , stability , and trustworthiness . We were accustomed , and rightly so , to accept his advice unhesitatingly , and to agree to his decisions tmdoubtingl y . Few brethren possess a more thorough knowledge of the Book of

Constitutions , and his careful expressions of opinion ' * ex cathedra " were marked always by great lucidity , impartiality , and painstaking accuracy . We are very sorry to lose him indeed , though we doubt not that in Bro . PHILBRICK the Craft will find a conscientious and straightforward Mentor , and an able expounder of Masonic jurisprudence . But the retirement of Bro . MCINTYRE

( inopportune as we venture to deem it ) , raises other questions and points to other matters of some importance for Grand Lodge . The honours of Grand Lodge are admittedly " few and far between , " amid so many applicants , and it has been said " Carry out in Grand Lodge appointments the prevailing system of our Government office , a limited period of service . " We are

inclined to think that if developed with caution and moderation there is some meaning and reality in the suggestion . Many of our offices are yearly , some clearly fall under the rule " quamdiu , " & c . Now it seems to us , that with probably two exceptions—the Grand Secretaryship and the Grand Directorship of Ceremonies , —all the offices which do not annually change

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actually , and which are renominated year by year , may well come henceforth under the rule of a three , four , or five years' appointment . We are not insensible to the arguments which may be adduced against enforced change ; but as there is also something in the " fresh blood " and " new brooms " theory , and such seems the feeling of our generation , let us not

seek too rigidly to refuse any alteration simply because we ourselves are loo old-fashioned in our ideas , & c , to like to sec innovations introduced amongst us . In Freemasonry we must advance with the times , and not too doggedly

or obstructively set ourselves against slight and subsidiary variations in the existing state of affairs , whicli , whether abstractedly right or wrong , expedient or inexpedient to our subjective appreciation , commend themselves to the normal ideas of a present and younger generation .

# * # IT has been said in a contemporary that the POPE has been influenced in his recent illtimcd and inadvisable Allocution against Freemasonry , as far as Anglo-Saxon Masonry at any rate is concerned , by the information he has received from a noble and distinguished member of our Order who has left

Freemasonry . We entirely disbelieve the statement , and feel sure that our contemporary has been deceived . Nay , more than this , we think also we even ourselves -see whence this " canard " comes . It is a move alike subtle and clever . It is in fact loo clever , and liken " finesse " in that sometimes it is " finessing against your own partner . " We feel ourselves pretty sure

that wc arc indebted for this specious and highly ingenious explanation to that dark and yet most audacious of secret societies which , alike dangerous to the rights of the Throne and the liberties of peoples , has never ceased , since it inspired the Bull of 1738 , lo urge on violent and unscrupulous attacks against the Masonic Order everywhere . If Freemasons are the atheists ,

the libertines , the revolutionists such inflammatory appeals to bigotry represent them to be , they arc sure to " come to grief" if only left to their own devices . No earthly society can hope to prosper , even for a short period , which is permeated and distinguished by such pernicious principles as are ascribed to Freemasons in Roman Catholic Mandcmcns , Allocutions , and

Bulls , and which principles ( if well founded ) are antagonistic alike to every permanent principled government , order , law , and morality , and may be said to be abhorrent to GOD and Man . It is because Freemasonry is not , as an universal Order , amenable to such charges , that our irrcconciliable foes , despairing of fair means of opposition and overthrow , have to have recourse

to these mournful ebullitions of " habitual mendacity . If proof were needed how impossible it is for such really destructive principles of thought and action ( as arc vulgarly ascribed by ill-informed Roman Scribes to our oecumenical Fraternity ) , to endure even the criticism of public opinion in the world , let us cast our thoughts back to the history o ( the Illuminati .

Originating with a Roman Catholic Professor of Canon Law , and by profession a Jesuit of the first three grades , it covered with the specious words of liberty , reform , and equality the most pernicious maxims of morality , and the most destructive propaganda of social and political life . It sought in a whirl of infatuated virulence to substitute for the legal and

constitutional government of nations and men the irresponsible and fanatical rule of unknown and secret superiors . It was to attain to universal , material , and spiritual domination by the uprooting of all " lawful " authority everywhere . Well , like all other similar noisome efforts and

theories , it flourished for a little season and then disappeared for ever . The rule of the Illuminati , which at one time spread alike over the German and French people , passed away in about fifteen years , and is now an idle and despicable talc of the past . We shall recur to the subject of the last Papal Allocution before long .

* * WE have had some letters sent to us about the Ontario Grand Lodge , in reply to our request for information , but they are so violent in temper and vulgar in expression , that we think it better not to soil our pages with them . The question itself is not without difficulty . The Quebec Grand

Lodge based its secession on the reality of Provincial limits and government . The Ontario Grand Lodge , which has come out of the Grand Lodge of Canada , bases its programme on the same technicality of government and provincial limits . It would almost seem as if , according to MACKEY , who is quoted , the Grand Lodge of Canada is a " misnomer " now , as it is

a jurisdiction in one sense without a jurisdiction , in that , shorn of its former greatness , it practically , if we understand the Ontario case , only now really holds Masonic sway over the Province of Ontario . It was MACKEY , we believe , who advised the body to call itself the Grand Ledge of Ontario .

The secessionists , however , are in this great difficulty . On what principle , being under the admittedly lawful jurisdiction of the Grand Lodge of Canada , could they meet and form themselves into another Grand Lodge ? They contend they are in the same position as the Grand Lodge of Quebec . But are