THE BUILDER DECEMBER 1917

FREEMASONRY AND THE MEDIEVAL CRAFT GILDS
BY BRO. OSSIAN LANG, GRAND HISTORIAN, GRAND LODGE OF NEW YORK

PART II

Ossian Lang was born October 29, 1865, of Scotch-English parentage,
at Bradford, Yorkshire, England; educated in England, France and
Germany; editor of several prominent educational magazines, "The
Social Center," New York City, 1912-1913, "The School Journal,"
Teacher's Magazine, and "Educational Foundations," New York City,
for twenty years, 1892-1912, "Young America," 1900-1901, and
contributing editor to "The Forum," 1902-1907; author of a number
of educational biographies, pedagogical studies, and story books
for children; served as President, Board of Fire Commissioners of
the city of Mount Vernon, N.Y., in 1910, Alderman, 1910-1912,
President, Board of Aldermen, 1912-1914, President, Recreation
Commission, 1915, President Board of Education, 1916; Master o
John Stewart Lodge No. 871, F. and A. M., 1910 and 1911, District
Deputy Grand Master, 12th Masonic District of New York, 1911-1912;
Grand Historian, Grand Lodge of New York since 1913; High Priest
Mount Vernon Chapter No. 228, R. A. M., 1906-1907; Grand Royal Arch
Captain, Grand Chapter of New York, 1911; Master of Phoenix Council
No. 70, R. and S M., 1906-1907; Correspondent Grand Council of New
York since 1913; Commander, Bethlehem Commandery No. 53, Knights
Templar, 1907-1908; also active in Scottish Rite Bodies.
LODGES OF "ACCEPTED" MASONS

Lodges of accepted Masons were to be found outside of London, as
well as in the bosom of the London Company, during the seventeenth
century. Admission was accompanied by a short ceremony consisting
of an oath of fealty and the communication of "certain signs" of
recognition. It appears, further, that the "Constitutions" were
read to the initiates. These Constitutions contained what purported
to be the "History and Rules of the Craft of Masonry." The
"History" was essentially the information contained in the later
Grand Lodge Constitutions of 1722-3, at least so far as the portion
relating to Britain is concerned. Many of the men admitted to
membership in the secret brotherhood were particularly interested
in the pursuit of the sciences and the study of history and
archeology, the names of some of these men appearing later on the
register of the Royal Society. A sort of connection between the
Lodges of these "accepted" Masons and the gild of operative Masons
is demonstrable in London. A "dual condition" existed in the London
Company of Masons, the members of the Lodge or Lodges of "accepted"
Masons there forming a distinct body. The Lodges of "accepted"
Masons appear to have no continuous existence, their history
representing rather a series of sporadic revivals of "an old
order." The final "revival" resulted in the formation of the Grand
Lodge of England in 1717, from which year onward we have a
continuous, clear and historic development of Freemasonry.

As the Grand Lodge was formed by representatives of Lodges which
appear to have been sheltered, before 1700, by the London Company
of Masons, we shall have to inquire somewhat further into the
history of that Company.

OF GILDS IN GENERAL

First, a word about gilds in general:

When and how craft gilds--or any sort of gilds, for that matter--
came into existence, is one of the many unsolved questions of
history antedating the invention of the printing press. At one time
it was quite generally believed that they represented an
Anglo-Saxon continuation, analogy, or adaptation of the Roman
colleges or solidarities of artificers. Since the publication of
Hallam's "Middle Ages," this guess has been abandoned, and the gild
is now looked upon as of AngloSaxon origin.*

In Saxon times, they were associations of neighbors or townspeople,
devoted more or less to religious and charitable purposes and
formed a sort of artificial family, whose members were bound
together by the bond, not of kinship, but of an oath. + They
assembled for common worship and feasting and served often also as
benefit societies and burial clubs. They acted in many cases as
private tribunals. Women were equally with men eligible to
membership. An oath of obedience to the gild ordinances was
administered to each

*The first gilds were distinctly Christian and essentially
democratic institutions. To judge from the Carolingian capitularies
of 779 and 789, in which the earliest mention is made of gilds,
they appear to have been regarded as dangerous to the State. After
the Conquest, they formed the basis of the corporations which the
Norman Kings recognized as established.
+ Gibbins, "Industry of England."


member as he or she joined. Gild day was the day of the saint to
whom the gild was dedicated, and formed the occasion for the annual
feast.

Gross, in an article on gilds, in the "Encyclopedia Britannica,"
gives this summary description, based upon a study of the oldest
ordinances: "Prayers for the dead, attendance at funerals of
gildsmen, periodical banquets, the solemn entrance oath, fines for
neglect of duty and for improper conduct, contributions to a common
purse, united assistance in distress, periodical meetings in the
gild hall--in short, all the characteristic features of the later
gilds already appear in these Anglo-Saxon fraternities."

The Norman Conquest marked a new era for the fraternities, as it
did for all England. The "Constitutions" of 1723, which indicate to
those who have "the Key of Fellowcraft" very clearly the evolution
of Freemasonry, record that "as soon as the Wars ended and Peace
was proclaim'd, the Gothic Masonry was encourag'd, even in the
Reign of the Conqueror."

Under Norman rule, the gilds were recognized officially as
established institutions and were invested with important
privileges. Only those who were members of some gild or "mistery"
were allowed to take part in municipal government. Gilds were in
many cases the chief or sole medium for acquiring citizenship in a
town. ++ As a result there was a rapid multiplication of gilds.
Life in a medieval town made membership in a local gild or
fraternity quite desirable. The merchant gilds and craft gilds
gradually rose in importance. Men naturally chose membership in the
particular organization in which they made their living or which
corresponded most satisfactorily to their personal interests.

The craft gilds were composed chiefly, though never exclusively, of
handicraftsmen or artisans. Aside from fostering more or less
mutual protection and advancement, they undertook the regulation of
wages and apprenticeship, and the schooling of their members in the
technique of their craft or "mistery." Some of them became
veritable seminaries of technical education.

In the course of time, conflicts arose between the master artisans
and workmen. The former ruled the gild. The journeymen or yeomen
struggling for independence began to set up separate fraternities
in defense of their rights, but these soon disappeared again, or
fell under the supervision and control of the masters' gilds.

At London, in 1375, the right to election to civic dignities,
together with that of electing members of Parliament, was
transferred from the Wards to the City Companies. "Thence forward,
and for many years, the Companies engrossed political and municipal
power in London." *

++ Ashley, "Economic History of England."

* Gross, in Ency. Brit., 11th edition: In or about 1475, corporate
franchise, which had belonged to the Companies, was restricted to
the liverymen of these Companies, representing "selection of a
superior class of householders to represent the rest." The order
issued by Edward IV, in that year, was that the Masters and Wardens
should "associate with themselves the honest men of their misteries
and come in their best liveries to the elections." The exclusive
power of electing the lord mayor, sheriffs, chamberlain and other
corporate officers, is held to this day by the liverymen of the
Companies, "being freemen of the city.


A further increase of the importance of the Companies resulted when
these obtained charters from the Crown. The charter from the King
or Queen gave to the Company a virtual monopoly of the trade it
represented. "No one was allowed to carry on any particular trade
unless he was a member of the Company. . . The quality of his goods
must satisfy the requirements of the Court of the Company.... The
Courts (of the Companies) also appointed some of their fraternity
to examine the work of their members and to see that no one carried
on his trade upon Sundays or Saints' Days." +

In Ditchfield's "London Survivals," we read that "the highest
personages in Church and State were eager to be enrolled as
members," the reason being that the Companies enjoyed valuable
municipal privileges and played a prominent part in the social life
of the city.

Many of the Companies had their own stately halls and have them to
this day. "These halls are the homes of ancient usage and customs
which have lingered on through the ages and seem to defy changes
wrought by utilitarianism and the modern spirit of the age." +

THE LONDON FELLOWSHIP OF MASONS

How did the gild of Masons fare? We find that, in 1356, rules for
the guidance of the Masons of London were passed before the Mayor,
Aldermen and Sheriffs of the city. The Masons' Fellowship, it
appears from this record, was a Company "by prescription" and had
its ordinances and by-laws passed and sanctioned, from time to
time, by the Court of Aldermen.

That the Masons' Company, first known as Fellowship of Masons,
existed at that time, is proved by the records at Guildhall, which
show that it was represented on the Court of Common Council, in
1375.

In 1530, the name of the Fellowship was changed to the Company of
Freemasons. This, so Conder reminds us, was about the time "when
Masons' fraternities connected with religious houses fell into a
state of collapse." The title, "Freemasons," continued down to
1653, when the designation "free" was dropped from the title of the
Company.

Perhaps we ought to add a few additional items of information
concerning the Company to round out our references to that
organization. I have gathered these chiefly from Parliamentary
Reports, particularly those of 1884:

The tendency of centralization of political government, which
gradually weaned the gilds away from the authority of the town
government and brought them under the rule of the crown, is shown
also in the history of the Masons' Company. In 1472, a coat-of-arms
was granted to the "Craft and Fellowship of Masons."* The earliest
royal charter now in possession of the Company


+ Ditchfield, "London Survivals."

*A copy of this oldest document now in existence is printed in
Conder's book.


was obtained from Charles II, in 1677, on "petition by the Master,
Wardens and Assistants of the Company of Masons in London." A new
charter was granted by James II, after "the Master, Wardens,
Assistants and commonality of the Company had surrendered all their
powers." The former charter by Charles II, after being "inspected
and approved by Queen Anne," was reissued, following a recital that
"by an Act of the fifth year of Queen Elizabeth, the art or
occupation of a Mason is reckoned as a distinct art or occupation,
and that all persons exercising the said art were enabled and might
be compelled to take apprentices to be instructed in the
occupation."

Members consist of freemen and liverymen. An applicant must be "a
male of full age and a subject of the crown." He may qualify either
by patrimony (if at the time of the applicant's birth his father
was free of the Company), by servitude (serving an apprenticeship
of seven years to a member of the Company), or by redemption (by
purchase). Membership may also be conferred as an honor. The
governing body, composed of the Masters, Wardens, and Court of
Assistants, has been for centuries the "admitting" authority; in
other words, it controls the "calling" to the livery The liverymen
represent a small, select body, who pay an admission fee of 15
pounds ($75.00).

Women are not admitted to membership, although eligible in most
gilds; the Tylers and Bricklayers' Company, for instance, in which
women can become members and are admitted to the freedom.

The annual election of officers takes place on St. Basil Day, June
14.
The membership consists principally of architects, engineers,
surveyors, builders, masons, and stone masons, but the Company has
always had also a considerable number of members not connected with
any department of the building trade.

It is characteristic of Anglo-Saxon gilds that persons not
identified with any trade, might and did obtain membership in
them.* Almost every craft gild had "gentlemen" among its members.
"Gentlemen Masons" is a designation met with quite frequently.

BROTHERHOOD OF ACCEPTED FREEMASONS

How can we now account for the existence down to the close of the
seventeenth century, within the bosom of the Masons' Company, of a
Lodge or Lodges of "accepted" Masons, all members of the Company
and given to literary, scientific, archeological and other pursuits
apparently in nowise related to operative Masonry ?

Other trade corporations had "gentlemen members," too, but nothing
like this. The oft-repeated statement that the non-operative
element formed a separate club, just because it was not interested
in mere trade regulations and shop talk, explains nothing. The
twelve principal livery companies of London would by reason of
their prominence and power have seemed to be far more attractive to
the gentlemen and scholars,

* Continental craft gilds were more distinctly and exclusively
associations of members of trades.


who joined the Masons' Company, which is number 30 among the minor
companies. Why did they not join the Merchant Tailors' Company, for
instance, which did much for the advancement of education? Why did
they join the Masons ?

A sort of answer may be derived from Conder's "Records of the Hole
Craft and Fellowship of Masons," where we read that the Masons'
Company, of London, preserved "the ancient traditions of the Guild
when the monastic guilds fell into chaos." The archaic character of
these traditions undoubtedly had much interest for antiquarians and
the searcher after curious things. However, that is a mere surface
view of conditions.

The search for the beginning of the "curious secret brotherhood"
yields equally unsatisfactory results, as far as explanation of its
connection with Craft Masonry is concerned. There are indications,
rather vague, that it existed during the reign of Henry IV
(1399-1413), and that it experienced a revival, some years after
the monastic gilds had collapsed--my own guess is that it was in
1570 or thereabout. After a brief period of intermittent activity,
it appears in Masons' Hall, in 1620, as Conder noted. Another
"revival" occurred soon after 1653. The "symbolic" portion left the
Company for good, soon after Ashmole's visit in 1682. Next we have
the final "revival" in the formation of the Grand Lodge of Accepted
Free-Masons.

Searching the "Constitutions" of 1723 for significant clues, we
shall find, for a starter, the following record:

"Now though in the third Year of the said King Henry IV while an
Infant of about four Years old, the Parliament made an Act that
affected only the working Masons, who had contrary to the Statutes
for Labourers, confederated not to work but at their own Price and
Wages; and because such agreements were supps'd to be made at the
General Lodges, call'd in the Act CHAPTERS and CONGREGATIONS of
MASONS, it was then thought expedient to level the said Act against
the said Congregations.... Nor is there any Instance of executing
the Act in that, or in any other Reign since, and the Masons never
neglected their Lodges for it, nor ever thought it worth while to
employ their noble and eminent Brethren to have it repeal'd;
because the working Masons, that are free of the Lodge, scorn to be
guilty of such Combinations; and the other Free Masons have no
Concern in Trespasses against the Statutes for Labourers."

The closing part of the latter sentence tells, as plainly as
anything can be told, that brethren of the Lodges, which constitute
the "curious secret brotherhood," within the bosom of the craft
corporation, had "no concern with trespasses against the statutes
for laborers." This disposes of the oft-repeated fallacy which
would have us derive Freemasonry from operative masonry. The book
of Constitutions is quite insistent on this point, as for instance
in a footnote, where we read:

"Many in all Ages have been more curious and careful about the
Laws, Forms and Usages of their respective Societies, than about
the Arts and Sciences thereof. But neither what was convey'd, nor
the Manner how, can be communicated by writing; as no Man indeed
can understand it without the Key of a Fellow Craft."

In other words: Whatever suggestions of craft origins you man find
in the "Laws, Forms and Usages," they explain nothing of the true
derivation which must be looked for rather in "the Arts and
Sciences," that is in the secret teachings of the fraternity.
"Without the Key" of a fellow or initiated associate member of the
operative body, "no Man indeed" can understand this.*

The Act of 1425 seems to have troubled the members of the Grand
Lodge of 1717-1723 more than they were willing to admit. They
printed it in full in the historical preface, added a lengthy
footnote to their comments on it, and tucked away a space-filling
"Postscript" between the "Charges" and the "General Regulations,"
an "Opinion of the Great Judge Coke upon the Act against the
Masons." The footnote is particularly interesting. It reads as
follows:

"That Act was made in ignorant Times, when true Learning was a
Crime, and Geometry condem'd for Conjuration; but it cannot
derogate in the least Degree from the Honour of the ancient
Fraternity, who to be sure would never encourage any such
Confederacy of their working Brethren. But by Tradition it is
believ'd, that the Parliament-Men were then too much influenc'd by
the illiterate Clergy, who were not accepted Masons, nor understood
Architecture (as the Clergy of some former Ages) and generally
thought unworthy of this Brotherhood; yet thinking they had
indefeasible Right to know all Secrets, by virtue of auricular
Confession, and the Masons never confessing anything thereof, the
said Clergy were highly offended, and at first suspecting them of
Wickedness, represented them as dangerous to the State during that
Minority, and soon influenc'd the Parliament-Men to lay hold of
such supposed Agreements of the working Masons, for making an Act
that might seem to reflect Dishonour upon even the whole worshipful
Fraternity, in whose Favour several Acts had been both before and
after that Period made."

The insistence that the Accepted Masons had no concern with trade
regulations is significant, as we have already pointed out. So is
the further intimation that "Geometry" and an understanding of
"Architecture" were a distinctive possession of the Accepted
Masons. Here we have, in my opinion, the principal explanation of
the puzzling connection which we have noted between the Masons'
Company and the secret Fraternity existing within its bosom.

*Grandidier is an example of how a non-Mason may err. It was he who
first declared that Freemasonry was derived from operative masonry,
in his essays on the Strassburg Cathedral, published in 1777. His
unfounded conclusion was adopted by scores of other writers, and
for many years shrouded the real history of our fraternity in an
impenetrable fog, which has not altogether lifted to this day.


ARCHITECTURE AS THE SOVEREIGN ART

I shall be very brief in my remarks on this point, as a fuller
discussion would carry us too far away from the specific purpose of
the present discussion.

The medieval churches were sermons written in stone, wood and
glass. They were veritable books, as Emile Male has most
convincingly proved in his remarkable work on "Religious Art in
France of the Thirteenth Century." Victor Hugo, though he doubtless
erred in some conclusions, has made the fact vivid and clear in
that remarkable chapter in his "Notre Dame de Paris," which is
headed "Ceci tuera cela." ("This will kill That.")

Those who have read Victor Hugo's book will recall the scene where
the archdeacon "threw open his cell window and pointed to the vast
church of Notre-Dame, the dark outline of its towers, its stone
walls, and its hip-roof silhouetted against the starry sky, and
looking like a gigantic sphinx seated in the middle of the town."
You will recall how "the archdeacon stood a while without speaking,
contemplating the stupendous edifice," and how "then with a sigh he
pointed with his right hand to the book lying on the table, and
with his left to Notre-Dame, and, looking sorrowfully from one to
the other, said: "Alas! this will kill that--cecituera cela." The
printed book will kill the art of writing in stone-- "printing will
kill architecture."

Then Victor Hugo goes on to explain. Let me pick out for you a few
sentences here and there, which may be helpful to our discussion:

"The human race has had two books, two registers, two testaments--
architecture and printing, the Bible of stone and the Bible of
paper. Up to the time of Gutenberg, architecture was the chief and
universal mode of writing. In those days if a man was born a poet
he turned architect. Genius scattered among the masses, kept down
on all sides by feudality, escaped by way of architecture, and its
Iliads took the form of cathedrals. From the moment that printing
was discovered, architecture gradually lost its virility, declined
and became denuded. Being no longer looked upon as the one
all-embracing, sovereign and enslaving art, architecture lost its
power of retaining others in its service. Carving became sculpture;
imagery, painting; the canon, music. It was like the dismemberment
of an empire on the death of its Alexander--each province making
itself a Kingdom."

Victor Hugo's characterization of architecture is true to fact,
particularly so far as the medieval age is concerned. Architecture
during that period was virtually "the one all-embracing, sovereign,
and enslaving art," commanding the services of all other arts.

LABORING TOGETHER IN UNITY

Back of this architecture--inspiring, shaping, regulating it--was
the all-powerful Church. Arts and sciences, political and civil
life, practically everything, was subject to the supreme rule of
theology as defined by the doctors of the Roman Papacy.
Individualism was submerged in and by the unity of the whole.
Western Europe constituted one ecclesiastic solidarity, a
brotherhood of men guided by the dogmas of the Mother Church.
Community life, as a natural sequence, had its center in the church
or cathedral. As all acts of civil life were profoundly penetrated
by the religious spirit of the age, this social center opened its
portals freely to every sort of cooperative undertaking. It served
as a place of reunion for the townspeople; fairs were held there;
discussions of grievances and plans for improvement were heard;
gossip and news, accounts of other lands by returned travelers, and
other matters of interest were unfolded; festivals, sacred and
profane, were celebrated; the prices of labor and merchandise were
regulated. Life turned around the church. No wonder, then, that the
building of a cathedral was an event affecting everyone in town and
claiming everybody's keenest interest.

A letter written by a French abbot to the Religious at Tutburg,
England, in 1145, gives an idea of what profound concern the
building of a church was to the whole community:

"Who has ever seen anything like this ? Princes, powerful and rich
men, nobles by birth, proud and beautiful women, bowed their necks
under the yoke of chariots loaded with stones, wood, corn, wine,
oil and other material needed for the building and the sustenance
of the workmen. One could see as many as a thousand men and women
in harness drawing the car, so heavy was the load it carried.
Advance was slow and laborious. There was no boisterousness, no
shouting. All labored in solemn silence, so great was the emotion
filling their hearts, conscious they were helping to do the work of
God."

THE CATHEDRAL COMMUNITY

The monastic orders, which occupied themselves with church
building, often furnished the principal artisans from among their
own numbers. The masons, carpenters, plasterers, plumbers, metal
and ivory workers, painters, glaziers, decorators, together with a
host of laborers, constituted a veritable craftsmen's city, under
the rule of a "master architect," or principal conductor of the
work. Usually a tent or frame structure was pitched against the
rising walls of the building, which served as a "lodge," or
headquarters. Here the principal artisans met to receive their
orders, discuss technical difficulties, settle disciplinary
matters, and unite in worship. The most important room of the lodge
was that set aside for the master of the work; there he designed
and gathered the models of the various portions of the edifice.

The families of the artisans lived in close vicinity to the church.
An interesting side-light on conditions is obtained from a record
made by Archbishop Leger, of Vienna, in 1050, telling how one of
his faithful, a physician named Aton, interested himself in the
improvement and beautifying of the "little houses" (domnuncula)
occupied by the women employed in gold embroidery for vestments and
other articles for divine service. A school for the children of the
craftsmen's city often grew up in the shadow of the cathedral and
developed in the course of time into an important foundation. In
short, the host of craftsmen, with their families, who were
gathered together for the building of a church, formed a center of
cooperation for divers industries and arts, laboring as a unit in
the service of the Great Architect of the Universe.

The form and spirit of such a union was just what our "secret
brotherhood" sought to cultivate. That explains, perhaps, why its
members affiliated themselves with Masonic gilds and particularly
the Masons' Company of London, considering, no doubt, the
traditions of the descendants of the cathedral builders best suited
for their own purposes.

THE "GEOMETRY" OF MASONRY

However, there is a deeper and more clearly defined reason. It is
suggested in the "geometry" of the Cathedral. Orientation, forms,
grouping, position,-- the building as a whole and every detail of
it, were regulated by a fixed code of symbolism. Nothing was left
to individual caprice. The cathedral, as we said before, was a
book, the Bible of the humble. The Bishop decreed what it was to
teach, the lessons it was to convey. Dogma, science, story, ethics
were spelled out in characters and signs having specific meanings
attached to them by the church authorities. The cathedral might
represent a biography, catechism, church history, an essay on
eternity, a martyrology, Bible story, combinations of divers
subjects, an Encyclopedia or a symphony; whatever it was, the same
rules and conventions were followed. Accordingly, there was
something impersonal about the product, much as about a modern
newspaper. Artists and artisans take their law from the master of
the work and they must submit to the dictates of the code, from one
end of Europe to the other. Art was organized as dogma was
organized, to the smallest detail.

The symbolism of the church services familiarized the faithful with
the symbolism of the building, as Male has shown. When the printed
book appeared and the recording of thought in buildings fell into
disuse, symbolic art declined rapidly. Architecture became a thing
of individual fancy. Cathedral symbolism would be beyond the power
of the present age to interpret and at least three hundred years of
the history of the human race would be largely unintelligible, if
the sacred traditions had not been zealously guarded and
transmitted from generation to generation by a secret brotherhood,
composed chiefly of architects, sculptors, painters, musicians,
poets and philosophers, who possessed the key to "geometry" and
knew the grammar of symbolism. This brotherhood is the same we met
with in Masons' Hall, at London, at Wiltshire and elsewhere.

The presence of students of the natural sciences in the lodges of
the brotherhood is easily explained. Vincent de Beauvais's "Mirror
of Nature" and the history of science in the medieval age were to
be read best in the carvings on cathedral facades. Besides, the
scientists were themselves attempting to build up a code of symbols
for the service of the developing physics and chemistry. There were
other reasons which we cannot discuss at this time.

A DISTINCTIVELY ANGLO-SAXON DEVELOPMENT

I have purposely left unanswered all questions relating more
directly to the beginning and development of the "symbolic"
fraternity which, in England, met under the shelter of the Masonic
craft gild, until the close of the seventeenth century. On the
continent it had no such connections. The reason, already
suggested, was that continental craft gilds were exclusively trade
organizations.

I have also refrained from touching the problem of the origin of
the symbology of the medieval church. This and other related
matters cannot well be considered here.

I trust, however, that I have made it seem to you quite natural
that, in London, the "symbolic" fraternity should have been
identified, in some sort of way, with the Masons' Company, until
the close of the seventeenth century. It probably is fairly clear
to you also now why a portion of that fraternity should have become
identified with the founding of the Royal Society "for the
Improvement of Natural Knowledge," and why the later formed Grand
Lodge of Accepted Free-Masons should in turn have drawn some of its
most valuable members from that society.

FINDINGS

If you accept my findings, we shall agree:

(1) That Freemasonry, as we know it, is in nowise derived from
operative Masonry.

(2) That a "symbolic" fraternity existed, whose members, under
Anglo-Saxon conditions, frequently chose to obtain the freedom of
the Masonic craft gild by "acceptance."

(3) That the explanation for the preference accorded to the Masonic
gild may be inferred from the aspect of cathedral building in the
medieval age, more especially the function of Masons, to give form
to symbols of predetermined significance, the brotherhood striving
to unite men of diverse interests and to preserve the "geometry" of
sacred things.

(4) That on the European continent the brotherhood had not even an
elbow-touch connection with craft gilds, the latter being
exclusively trade organizations.

(5) That the history of the "Laws, Forms and Usages" of the
Fraternity, while of less significance than that of "the Arts and
Sciences thereof," nevertheless is of considerable interest, and
serves to interpret much that could not otherwise be accounted for.

(6) That "Laws, Forms and Usages" are largely derived from
association with Masonic craft gilds and form merely the outer
shell or mold into which the substance was poured-which developed
into the kind of Freemasonry we know.

