stb-1992-11
EARLY MASONRY
IN
ENGLAND
by Bro. C.N. Batham
The year l717 saw the formation of the Grand Lodge
of England, the "Mother Grand Lodge of the World."
The history of Freemasonry after that date is quite well
known. But what about Masonry in England prior to
1717? This STB was extracted from an article written by
Bro. C.N. Batham and published under the title The
Grand Lodge of England (1717) and its Founding Lodges.
The article was published in Vol 103; page 22 of Ars
Quator Coronatorum (Transactions of Quatuor Coronati
Lodge #2076). Bro. Battham is an extremely well known
and outstanding Masonic historian and author!
--Editor
INTRODUCTION--FREEMASONRY
IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY
That famous Masonic historian, R. F. Gould,
once wrote: 'But our "Old Lodges" have, in
truth, been too much neglected and forgotten,
to the lasting reproach of the English Craft . . .
our premier Lodges yet await an adequate and
enduring memorial of their exertions as the
pioneers of Masonic progress ...' This paper
will not, by any stretch of imagination, provide that memorial but the gathering together
of material about those pioneers, culled from
masonic records some of which are not readily
available, may perhaps give brethren of the
present day an understanding of the debt they
owe to them and, at the same time, enable them
to explore some unfamiliar byways.
To do that, however, it is necessary first to
consider the masonic situation in the seventeenth century and it comes as a great surprise
to many brethren to learn that there is no
official masonic record of any kind prior to the
first edition of Anderson's Constitutions, published in 1723.
Certainly there are references to Freemasonry and to initiation ceremonies in the seventeenth century but they are all of a secondary nature. The first is by Elias Ashmole who
records in his diary that he and Col. Henry
Mainwaring were made 'Free Masons' at
Warrington in Lancashire on 16 October, 1646.
How long previously and where the seven
brethren present on that occasion were initiated is unknown. A copy of the Old Charges
(Sloane MS No. 3848) was made by Edward
Sankey and finished on the same date. 16
October, 1646. It seems certain that he was the
son of one of the brethren present at the meeting and these two facts indicate that the copy
was made for use in the ceremony, as brethren
of those days regarded the possession of a
copy of the Old Charges as essential for a
masonic meeting in which a candidate was to
be made a member of the Craft. It also strengthens the suggestion that this was not a meeting
of a permanent lodge but a private gathering of
a few friends who were freemasons, met together for the one and only time for the purpose of admitting two of their friends into the
Craft.
The only other reference to Freemasonry in
Ashmole's diary is on 10 March, 1682 when he
records that he was summoned to attend a
lodge in Masons' Hall, London, on the following day when six persons were admitted into
the 'Fellowship of Free Masons'. Although
there is no mention of Freemasonry in the
diary during the intervening thirty six years,
Ashmole must surely have maintained some
contact with the Craft as otherwise it is inconceivable that he would have been summoned
to a meeting after that considerable lapse of
time and to a lodge so far removed from the
place of his initiation. It seems likely that this
lodge in Masons' Hall was of a more permaent nature, though meeting only when the
need arose, as all the indications are that there
was a lodge within the Masons' Company of
London and there are apparent references to
acceptances into it at irregular intervals from
1621 onwards. There is, however, no official
record of this lodge nor anything to substantiate the claim sometimes made that it became
the present Lodge of Antiquity No. 2.
Randle Holme, Deputy Garter King-of-
Arms, was a freemason and was possibly
initiated in a lodge at Chester in or about the
year 1665. Some eight years later he wrote out
a list of twenty-seven members of the lodge,
including himself. In 1732, Bro. Edward Hall,
a member of a lodge held at the Swan, East
Street, Chichester, recorded that he had been
made a freemason in a Chichester lodge by the
late Duke of Richmond thirty six years earlier,
that is to say, in 1696. In 1705-6 Sir George
Tempest presided over a lodge in York that
probably dated back to 1693, if not before, and
there are subsequent references to it until it
constituted itself as The Grand Lodge of All
England at York in 1725. In 1704 Jonathan
Belcher, the first native-born American to be
admitted into the Craft and who subsequently
became Governor of New Jersey, was initiated
in London in what he describes as an 'old
Guilde Lodge' that obviously dated back to
the previous century.
That is all there is. Those six secondary
records are scanty enough though it has to be
borne in mind that, in the 1738 edition of his
Constitutions, Anderson stated that Sir Robert
Clayton summoned '... an Occasional Lodge
of his Brother Masters . . . to advise the Governors about the best Design of rebuilding that
Hospital [St. Thomas's] . . . ' and he then refers
to seven or more lodges of which there is no
other mention, but in view of his unreliability,
coupled with the fact that he goes on to say that
King William III ... was privately made a Free
Mason. . . ' . it is questionable whether any reliance can be placed on those statements.
Nevertheless there must have been considerable masonic activity in the seventeenth and
early eighteenth centuries that has gone unrecorded, activity that created widespread interest and suspicion amongst the public at large.
If there had not been that public interest, there
would not have been any purpose in including
a reference to Freemasonry in the scurrilous
sheet Poor Robin's Intelligence of 1676-7, nor
would some unknown person have found it
necessary in 1698 to publish a leaflet warning
'all godly people in the citie of London' of the
'Mischiefs and Evils practised in the Sight of
God by those called Freed Masons.' He continued: 'I say take Care lest their ceremonies
and secret Swearings take hold of you: and be
wary that none cause you to err from Godliness.'
In 1709 and 1710 Richard Steele published
essays in The Tatler in which he referred to
Freemasonry and, in the latter year, a pamphlet printed in London mentioned '... a certain Company called the Free Masons.' Finally, Robert Plot in his Natural History of
Staffordshire (1686) refers to Freemasonry
being ' . . . spread more or less over the Nation ',
and John Aubrey also refers to the Craft, even
though his statements are suspect, in his The
Natura1 History of Wiltshire (also in 1686).
ANDERSON'S THE CONSTITUTIONS
OF THE FREE-MASONS (1723)
It is against this sketchy background that
the first official reference to the Craft appeared in 1723. It was the first edition of
Anderson's Constitutions and was issued under the authority of the recently-founded premier Grand Lodge of England, the mother
Grand Lodge of the world. It was published
'... By Order of his Grace the Duke of Wharton,
the present Right Worshipful Grand Master of
the Free Masons...' who subsequently was
appointed the first Grand Master of the Grand
Lodge of France, the only person ever to
occupy that office in the two Obediences. The
Dedication was signed by the Deputy Grand
Master, Dr. J.T. Desaguliers, who had been
Grand Master in 1719-20 and was the only
Frenchman ever to achieve that high honor.
Anderson's publication consisted of a highly
imaginative so-called history of the Craft from
the time of Adam to the year 1721, a list of
Charges to be read at the making of new
brethren, the Regulations of the Craft, the
manner of constituting a new lodge, a list of
the Masters and Wardens of twenty lodges and
a collection of songs, including the 'Enter'd
Prentices Song' which is still sung at masonic
social boards. He refers to Freemasonry being
revived '... under our present worthy Grand
Master, the most noble Prince John, Duke of
Montague. ' But he gives no information whatsoever about the foundation of the Grand Lodge
of England.
The picture, then, is of lodges throughout
the country meeting irregularly as occasion
demanded, perhaps not surviving for any great
length of time, and of informal meetings of
groups of members of the Craft for the sole
purpose of initiating friends of theirs. There is
nothing other than brief references to their
ceremonies as, unfortunately for masonic historians, brethren of those days were pledged to
the utmost secrecy about all aspects of Freemasonry and so committed nothing to writing
if they could possibly avoid doing so. When it
could not be avoided, they destroyed such
writings as soon as they had served their
purpose. George Payne (Grand Master 171819 and 1720-1) complained that several valuable manuscripts ' . . . were too hastily burnt by
some scrupulous Brothers, That those papers
mightnot fall into strange Hands. 'These lodges
would have been aware only of other lodges in
their immediate vicinity and were entirely
independent and self-governing, as there was
no central authority to exercise control over
them. Means of communication had not substantially improved since Roman times and,
especially as no written records were kept and
all instruction was by word of mouth, there
must have been considerable variations in the
ceremonial details observed in those lodges.
Only two degrees would have been worked,
often both at thc same meeting, unlil some
lodges. but by no means all, began to work the
third degree in the 1720s.
*********************************
On page 4. Bro. Butham refers to the "Old
Charges" the folloing answer to "What are
the Old Charges" comes from the MSA Digest
"101 Questions about Freemasonry"
What are the "Old Charges?"
The firsl book of Freemasonry, printed in
1723. is known as Anderson's Constitutions.
In it appear six "Old Charges" which are a
statement of the old laws of operative Freemasonry concerning a Mason and his conduct.
These six Old Charges are titled: Of God and
Religion; Of the Civil Magistrate Supreme
and Subordinate; Of Lodges; Of Masters.
Wardens, Fellows and Apprentices; Of the
Management of the Craft in Working; Of
Behavior. The last, sixth Old Charge is cocerned with behavior: "in the Lodge while
constituted; after Lodge is over and the Brethren not gone; when Brethren meet without
Strangers, but not in a Lodge; in presence of
Strangers not Masons; at Home and in the
Neighborhood; towards a strange Brother."
Many "Books of the Law"--Constitutions.
Codes, etc.--of Grand Lodges print these Old
Charges. They can also be found in Mackey's
Encyclopedia and in the Little Masonic Library.
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