THE BUILDER September, 1925

A Devoted Life; Edouard Quartier-la-Tente

By BRO. S. J. CARTER, New York

Just seventy years ago a child was born in New York state destined,
through a life of unselfish service, to make an impression on the
Masonic Order as a whole that is much greater than his
contemporaries can easily realize. Always truly modest, and without
the least trace of self seeking or self assertion, his work was
done with no trumpet blasts of publicity, such as in America we
have come to regard as almost a necessity in furthering any cause.
All the more, therefore, should some attempt at a recognition be
made of what he attempted, even if his efforts seemed, as
undoubtedly they did seem to him at the last, to have ended in
failure. Some failures in this life are most glorious--as, for
example, that of the defenders of Liege to stop the German hordes
in the autumn of 1914.

Edouard Quartier-la-Tente was born of parents who had emigrated
from Switzerland. At an age when little more than an infant in arms
he was left an orphan, and through the good offices of the Swiss
Consul in New York he was sent back to the country of his
ancestors, and for some years was cared for by his grandfather. At
the age of seven he was again left alone in the world and was sent
to an orphanage in Neufchatel, where he remained till he was
thirteen. He however showed so much ability that after passing
through the elementary schools he was sent to the University of
Neufchatel where he took a theological course, and was eventually
ordained as a minister of the National Church. After some years of
pastoral work he was called to the chair of Practical Theology at
his Alma Mater. This was in 1888. Two years later he assumed the
direction of the secondary schools in the Canton, and was placed at
the head of the Department of Education and Publie Worship. These
posts he held till his resignation in 1922. During these years he
had been very active in the various movements for the preservation
of world peace in which Switzerland has taken so prominent a part.
He was President of the Peace Society, and was chosen to preside
over the Nineteenth Peace Congress held at Geneva in 1912.

His father had been a Freemason, and was a member of sincerity
Lodge No. 200, of Phelps, N. Y. Most likely it was through the
fraternal care of the members of his lodge that his infant son came
to be sent back to his nearest surviving relatives, but of this
there appears no record. At the age of twenty-nine the son followed
his father's steps, and sought admission to the Craft. He was
initiated in the lodge at Neufchatel in June, 1884, and a year
later, as is the custom there, was passed to the second degree. He
was not raised until 1887, for the sublime degree is not conferred
as a matter of course by our Swiss brethren, but only after the
Craftsman has proved his fitness to receive it. In 1897 he was
elected Junior Warden and the following year Senior Warden, a
Assistant Worshipful Master in 1899. The next year instead of
becoming Master of his lodge he was chosen as Grand Master of the
Grand Lodge "Alpina," the ruling body of the Craft in Switzerland,
an office he held for five years. It was during the tenure of this
office that the Swiss Grand Lodge, largely through his influence,
instituted an organization which it was hoped would lead to giving
more reality to the fundamental ideal of Masonic universality. The
conception was a simple one--no more than the formation of an inter
jurisdictional enquiry office--the International Bureau of Masonic
Affairs. It was carefully made clear that assisting in the work of
this Bureau involved nothing in the way of recognition or of
jurisdiction-- its sole function was the collection and
dissemination of accurate and trustworthy information. Yet in spite
of the obvious advantages of such a piece of machinery in view of
the disruptions in the Craft throughout the world, this project was
looked on with suspicion by many, and complete indifference by more
of the governing bodies of the Masonic world. In a personal letter
Brother Quartier-la-Tente said that but for the support and
encouragement of individual Masons from all over the world the work
could not have been carried on at all, and added that everywhere,
while generally the individual brethren believed in universal
Masonry, those of official rank seemed in many cases quite
indifferent or even hostile to the idea.

In the face of all this discouragement Brother Quartier-la-Tente
labored on, he became the center and mainspring of the Bureau, he
established personal relations with literally thousands of Masons
in every country, and among them most of those of the highest
ideals and most full of enthusiasm for the larger objects of the
Masonic Institution. His work began, rather tardily, to be
recognized; he received many honors; more and more the Bureau was
being used and being also found useful. And then the war broke out.
It was then that German Masonry, officially, for it does not follow
that all German Masons agreed, declared that it had nothing to do
with the Masonry of other countries--that Universal Masonry was not
only a delusion, but a snare, a will-o-wisp leading to the
bottomless morass of "Internationalism." German Masonry officially
was too much at the mercy of the German government, to be blamed as
a whole for these wild outbursts, by which it self-excommunicated
itself. But it was a great blow to the hopes of Brother
Quartier-la-Tente, especially when Swiss Masonry was also put under
the German ban because certain Swiss Masons, as individuals, had
protested against the outrages in Belgium.

PRISONERS OF WAR RELIEVED

But a new need arose, and the Bureau, providentially for some
thousands of Masons in dire need, was right where it could meet it.
Among the prisoners of war taken on both sides were a considerable
proportion of Masons. At first the arrangements for looking after
these prisoners were largely improvised by the government
concerned. One thing is certain, that while the Germans in the
hands of the Allies were at least given the same rations that our
own men received in accordance with International agreement; the
Allied prisoners in Germany were at the first subjected to such
severe, and at that time seemingly unnecessary, deprivations, that
it certainly gave the impression they were being systematically and
deliberately half starved. However that may be, these men were in
great need, and Brother Quartier-la-Tente turned the whole
machinery of the Bureau, and used all his great influence towards
the task of relieving this distress-- primarily among the Masonic
prisoners of war--but he did not confine his sympathies and
assistance to them. The Bureau became a center for the collection
of funds and the dispatch of parcels of food and other necessaries
to the Masonic prisoners, and also to make inquiries for those who
were missing. In spite of the official severance of relations
between Switzerland and the German Grand Lodges, many individual
brethren on the German side did not wholly follow their official
leaders in this matter. Brother Quartier-la-Tente was able to
establish lines of communication by which he was enabled to do an
enormous amount of good. The present writer can speak of this from
personal knowledge, as it was his fortune to be captured. At one
time owing to the miscarriage of several letters, his friends
became very anxious. An inquiry was made that reached Brother
Quartier-la-Tente through Masonic channels; and he managed in some
way to have a German Mason make a special trip of some hundred and
fifty miles to visit the camp where the writer was confined and
find out exactly his state of health and general conditions. This
was but one of many, no one knows how many, cases where our late
brother spared no pains or trouble to himself in the service of
those who could do little to help themselves during the continuance
of war. Those of us at least who came in touch with him then are
little likely to forget him.

POST-WAR DIFFICULTIES ARISE

After the war the question arose in an acute form as to the future
of the Bureau. For nearly twenty years Brother Quartier-la-Tente
had devoted most of his time and energy to the work, without
reward, and with little acknowledgment. It is not too much to say
that he was the Bureau himself. In 1920 the difficulties became
acute. There was a falling off in the voluntary subscriptions and
an increase in the outgo due to the general rise in prices. Besides
this he felt that the organization was impermanent so long as it
depended entirely on himself. At that time his letters showed
profound disappointment--even discouragement. It seemed to him that
he had labored in vain. He could not understand how it was that the
great majority of Masons seemed indifferent, and in the case of
those in official positions, so frequently even hostile to an
attempt to remove misunderstandings, ignorance of actual
conditions, and other obstacles to a closer union between the
sovereign jurisdictions throughout the world. The object seemed to
him so necessary, so fully and completely Masonic in all senses of
the term, that he was unable to believe that any Mason could be
indifferent to it, and wondered if perhaps it was because that the
movement had been initiated, and for a long time chiefly supported
by such a small group as that represented by the Grand Lodge
Alpina, relatively as insignificant in numbers, as Switzerland
itself is in point of size compared with its immediate neighbors.


THE INTERNATIONAL MASONIC ASSOCIATION FORMED

However the announcement that the Bureau would have to be dissolved
brought out protests from all over the world and promises of
support. The result was that the International Masonic Association
was formed into which the Bureau was merged. Brother
Quartier-la-Tente was unanimously elected to the office of
Chancellor of the new organization and so in some measure received
recognition of all he had done in the past.

Further than this it is perhaps better not to pursue the subject,
as, officially at least, English speaking Freemasonry has ignored
or condemned the International Association, and recent events have
made it a highly controversial subject. This attitude on the part
of the largest and wealthiest of the Masonic jurisdictions of the
world was of course a bitter disappointment to Brother
Quartier-la-Tente, and there seems little doubt that this
disappointment hastened his end.

Among his many Masonic honors and distinctions, notably several
honorary memberships in lodges in Great Britain, he had the
honorary rank of Past Senior Grand Warden in the Grand Lodge of
Maryland, and was an honorary member of the Masonic Veteran
Association of Washington, D. C.; he was also an honorary member of
a number of Supreme Councils of the A. & A. S. R. Perhaps his best
epitaph would be a sentence from one of his own letters: "As far as
I have been able I have given my heart and life to Masonry."

