THE HOLY BIBLE

The Great Light of Masonry 

This book has influenced the imagination of the world and the
history of the human race more than all the other books combined.
Nations live by it or die by quarreling with it. The sun never
sets on its gleaming pages. It goes to the castle of the King and
the cottage of the peasant alike, to the home of the rich and the
poor, learned and unlearned.

It colors the talk of the street and is woven into the web of the
universal literature. It talks to us in our solitude, consoles
our grief, rebukes our baseness, and gives new ideals to our
conscience. It is a pillow to the aching head, an inspiration to
the strong, a source of strength to the weak and a guiding light
to all.

It blesses us at birth, gives names to many, adds sanctity to the
marriage tie, writes an inscription of hope on our tombstone and
the best of our uttered prayers are contained in its storied
speech.

Generation after generation comes and goes, each with its
separate ideals and needs, each with its own form of expression.
The literature of yesterday is not the literature of today.
Famous books go out of fashion and are read only by scholars and
antiguarians; however, this immortal book is everlasting. It
talks in the speech and in the accents of each generation in
turn.

The silver cord of the Bible is not loosed nor its golden bowl
broken, as centuries slip by like beads on the thread of time.
The Bible is the master of the soul, wiser than reason, truer
than conscience, greater and more trustworthy than either reason
of instrinct.

How often this book has been torn to rags, refuted, destroyed!
But as the anvil outlasts all the hammers that smite it, so has
this immortal book lived on while those who sought to destroy it
are foregotten. Other books have their day and are forgotten.
They die, their language becomes obsolete, the world's thought
runs in new channels, they are left mere stranded wrecks on the
shores of time, but this book belonges to all the centuries and
outlives them all.

It has a lost Paradise at the beginning, a Paradise regained at
the end, with a divine redeeming process running through time,
linking both together.

It is yours my Brethren, a presentation from your Mother Lodge,
at the eve of your being raised to the sublime degree of a Master
Mason, to have, and to use, as a comfort, strength and support,
until time, with you shall be no more.
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