EVER BEARING IN MIND

Bro. Stanley K. Sproul, P.D.D.G.M.

Inaugural Address

(83-10-01)


Most Masons, after they have taken the obligations in the three
degrees, wonder about the penalties.  One may doubt, however, if
the majority are concerned about the severity or gruesomeness of
them.  First of all because they know that the laws of Canada
would not allow them to be consummated, and secondly, they do not
intend to violate their obligation.  However, this writer has
read some articles in preparation for this paper in which concern
was voiced.  In particular, in one case where the Master held a
high position in the church, that writer questioned the morality
of a Master in imposing those penalties on the candidate. (1)

Some people apparently are more concerned with these penalties
than this writer is.  In this paper, therefore, will be reviewed
the answers to these questions:

A.  When were the penalties incorporated into the obligations?
B.  Why were they added?
C.  Where did the penalties come from?
D.  What changes have been made in the penalties from their
inception?

A. SINCE  WHEN?

Penalties have been observed in obligations since the earliest
times ... We read in the Book of the Prophet Jeremiah:

Because you have refused the terms of our contract I will cut you
apart just as you cut apart the calf when you walked between its
halves to solemnize your vows.  Yes, I will butcher you, whether
you are princes, court officials, priests or people - for you
have broken your oath.  I will give you to your enemies and they
shall kill you.  I will feed your dead bodies to the vultures and
wild animals. (2)

Here we find that when a covenant or agreement was made, to seal
the deed, an animal, usually a calf, had its throat cut across. 
Its breast was cut open and the heart removed.  The carcass was
split into two sides.  The two contracting parties then passed
between the two sides, and the carcass was then left to the birds
of the air and the beasts of the field as prey.  It was an
accepted practice in those days that each party would
symbolically subject himself to a death similar to that inflicted
on the calf if he violated his agreement.  (3)

The oldest historical record of the obligation comes from the
Regius MS, written about the year 1390.  At that period the
lodges were purely operative.  The ceremony consisted of three
parts: an opening prayer, a reading of the regulations, and the
oath.  These regulations were a list of rules that the candidate
swore to obey, and as Harry Carr stated, were as much for the
protection of the employers, as for the guidance and control of
the Masons themselves. (4)

1 Quatuor Coronati, A.Q.C., Vol. 77, pp. 21-48. 
2 Jeremiah, 34.18-20.
3 Alberta, Grand Lodge of, Proceedings, 1969, p. 66.
4 Carr, in A.Q,C., Vol. 74, Supplement G 130.

A good true oath he must there swear To his masters and fellow
that be there He must be steadfast and true also To all these
laws, where'er he go And to his liege lord the King To be true to
him above everything.

And all the points here in before To all of them he must be sworn
And all shall swear the Mason's Oath Be they willing or be they
loath To all these points . . .  (5)

The oath was administered by one of the elders who held the
Bible.  The candidate placed his right hand on it and repeated
the oath, The right hand from time immemorial has had a special
significance as a symbol of fidelity.  The person taking an oath
either held it uprightly or placed it on something sacred such as
a relic or the Holy Scriptures. (6) We are told that in this
ceremony there was no preparation of the candidate nor were any
secrets communicated.  There was only one grade or ceremony.

In the late 1600's we find evidence of "words and secrets" being
passed to the candidate during the ceremony.  In the Melrose MS
No. 2 dated 1674 we find a reference to trade secrets, "ye
privilege of ye Compass, Square, Levell and ye plum rule" (8)
which are not to be revealed to non-masons.  Also in the Harleian
MS dated 1665 we find,

I, A. B. Doe, in the presence of Almighty God and my Fellowes and
Brethren here present, promise and declare, that I will not at
any time hereafter, by any Act or circumstance whatsoever,
Directly or Indirectly, publish, discover, reveal or make known
any of the secrets, privileges or Counsels, of the Fraternity or
fellowship of Free Masonry, which at this time, or any time
hereafter, shall be made knowne unto mee, soe helpe mee God, and
the holy contents of this booke. (9)

The first known reference that refers to a penalty occurs in a
text of the Edinburgh Register House MS in 1696.  In the
obligation in the Apprentices degree we find:

Under no less pain than having my tongue cut out under my chin,
and of being buried within the flood mark where no man shall
know. (10)


It thus appears that the penalties were added to the obligation
sometime in the late seventeenth century.

The Dumfries MS No. 4, c. 1710, contains details of four
penalties not in the oath but in the catechism that follows:

(a) A rope to hang me if I should betray my trust.
(b) A heart to be taken out alive.
(c) A head to be cut off.
(d) A body to be buried within the sea mark, and not in any place
where Christians are buried. (11)

5 Ibid.
6 Hawkins, in A.Q.C., Vol. 26, p. ii.
7 Carr, in A.Q.C., Vol. 74, p. 130.
8 Hawkins, Op.cit., p. 14.
9 Radice, in A.Q.C., Vol. 77, p. 33.
10 Sharp, in A.Q.C., Vol. 77, p. 30.
11 Carr, op.cit,, p. 131.

 
In the Chetwode Crawley MS dated 1730 we find the words uttered
by the last entered apprentice on his entry into the lodge after
receiving the word:

Here am I the youngest and last entered apprentice, as I am sworn
by God and St. John, by the square and compass and Common Judge,
to attend my Master's service, at the Honourable Lodge, from
Munday in the morning to Saturday at night, and to keep the keys
thereof, under no less pain, than to have my tongue cut out,
under my chin, and of being buried within the flood-mark, where
no man shall know.  (12)

Even at this early date the penalties could not be enforced.  In
1730 Samuel Pritchard, in his book Masonry Dissected, discussed
the ritual and obligation in minutest detail.  This caused quite
an uproar at the time, but proved to be a boon to historians who
thereby have a record of the ritual and practices of that time. 
We are told that the same obligation was repeated for the 2nd
degree.  The 3rd degree at that time was not as yet general.

All this under no less Penalty than to have my Throat cut, my
Tongue taken from the Roof of my Mouth, my Heart pluck'd from
under my Left Breast, then to be buried in the Sands of the Sea,
the Length of a Cable rope from Shore, where the Tide ebbs and
flows twice in 24 Hours, my Body to be burnt to Ashes, my Ashes
to be scattered upon the Face of the Earth, so that there shall
be no more Remembrance of me among Masons. (13)

B.  WHY WERE PENALTIES  ADDED?

There are a number of interpretations as to why the penalties
were added.  In the initiation ceremony of the early 18th century
there was a certain amount of "leg pulling" or "horseplay":

When first a Mason I was made,
What terrors then did me invade, 
Oh.' how I was alarmed!
But when the solemn scene was o'er,
My fears and terrors were no more,
I found myself unharmed.  (14)

This habit became so widespread, Desaguliers said, that the
following by-law was passed at Norwich in 1724: "That no
ridiculous trick be played with any person when he is admitted."
(15) This situation had existed from time immemorial in the
initiation ceremonies of all trades.  Were the penalties added to
bring more solemnity and serious thought into the oath? Bro. 
Arthur Sharp is of the opinion that they were incorporated with
the sole idea of disciplining those who joined the fraternity and
to prevent disclosure of Masonic Secrets." (16) Bro. Eric Ward
agrees and states that the secrets to be concealed were
"geometrical rules and methods peculiar to the trade of the
freestone masons."

The Hudibrastick poem of 1722 which relates to Free and Accepted
Masons, is an example.  It says:

Their sev'ral Rules and orders made,
Relating to the Mason Trade,
Shou'd be observed as long as Time,
As Records writ in Prose and Rhyme,
And by a solemn oath enjoin'd
The only Tye upon the mind.  (17)

12 Hawkins, op.cit., p. 16.     15 Ibid., p. 34.
13 Carr, op.cit., p. 132.       16 Sharp, Op.cit., p. 28
14 A.Q.C.,  Vol. 77, p. 29.     17 Radice, Op-cit., p. 33.


Bro. J. R. Rylands in his paper on the "Masonic Penalties" states
that they were intended to protect the charitable funds of the
lodge.  Anyone who could prove he was a mason and in distress had
a call on the charity of private lodges and on the general funds
of charity. (18) He argues that in genuine cases they were not
slow to make their needs known.  He suggests that by 1730 the
impostors had grown to such numbers and had caused such a drain
on the resources of the lodges that Grand Lodge was forced to
make certain changes such as reversing the words and signs of the
first and second degrees.  Harry Carr in a rebuttal states that
one of the penalties was in practice in the Craft in 1696, at a
time when the accumulation of charitable funds was almost
unknown. (19) He acknowledges that in the early Scottish lodges
particularly, they had a lively sense of duty towards those in
need.  But the amounts distributed were very small, "certainly
not large enough to warrant the introduction of Penalties as a
protection against unworthy applicants - who were in any case
well known to the lodges that granted them relief.  Travelling
masons, when they did receive charity, usually did not receive a
sum in excess of five pence in English money."  (20)

In Scotland the lodges had a "Mason's Word." This was essentially
of Scottish origin, having a purpose that did not exist in
England south of the border counties.  Thus Bro. Eric Ward states
that "the earliest reference to penalties comes from material of
Scottish origin such as the Sloane manuscript of 1700, and the
Dumfries No. 4 Manuscript of 1710.  These are clearly associated
with the 'Mason's Word'." He agrees that, with the introduction
of the "Mason's Word" into English Speculative Masonry in the
early 1700's, the need for secrecy to exclude outsiders
necessitated the requirement of punishment as the corollary of
exposure. (21) Next came the gradual adoption by a new genus of
non-operative Masons in England of customs and traditions, most
of which were of Scottish operative origin.  Amongst these were
the threats of terrible punishment of so barbaric a nature ". . .
as must have given the appearance of a strong measure of
authenticity to the claims of great antiquity."

There is one other theory advanced by Bro.  Fulke Radice.  He
asks the question

Did our predecessors of the 1720's first invent the penal signs
and then rummage among old records of trials, etc., to find a
corresponding punishment? This at first sounds outlandish, but
when one researches the punishments for Treason and Heresy during
the period of Henry VI to Elizabeth I, you find that the authors
of the penalties were very selective in those chosen. (22)

C. WHERE DID THE PENALTIES COME FROM?

Where the Penalties originated is difficult to say.  Most
authorities say they likely were adopted from punishments
inflicted on traitors and others, perhaps 200 years earlier. 
Bernard Jones quotes from old-time Punishments, by Wm.  Andrews
(1891), wherein the penalties are traced to the Court of
Admiralty for the Humber, during the reign of Henry VI (1421-71):

The court being met . . . all . . . were addressed as follows:
"You masters of the quest, if you, or any of you, discover or
disclose anything of the King's secret counsel, or of the counsel
of your fellows . . . you are to be, and shall be, had down to
the low-water mark,

18 Rylands, in A.Q.C., Vol. 77, p. 23.
19 Carr, in A.Q.C., Vol. 77, p. 35.
20 Ibid.
21 Ward, in A.Q.C., Vol. 77, p. 33.
22 Radice, Op.cit.


where must be made three times, O Yes! for the King, and then and
there this punishment, by the law prescribed, shall be executed
upon them; that is, their hands and feet bound, their throats
cut, their tongues pulled out, and their bodies thrown into the
sea."  (23)

Bro. Alexander Horne writes that the penalties probably began as
a backward glance to the Ancient Mysteries. (24) But as Bro. 
W.J. Collett states in his paper "The Mists of Antiquity", all 
initiation rites and instruction were transmitted by word of
mouth. It was forbidden that anything be written." (25) This
poses a question to which the answer will never be known. Some  
historians, like Dr. Stokely, think there was a connection
between these Ancient Mysteries and Freemasonry, and naturally 
they think the penalties have a connection with them.

It was not unusual for a convicted man to be executed and then
buried in the rough sands of the sea where the tide ebbed and
flowed so that his grave became washed from sight, nor was it
unusual to leave his body on the scaffold or cross for the birds
of the air to feed upon. (26)

Bernard Jones reports that six pirates were hanged at Wopping in
1557 on the shore at low-water mark.  They were left there until
three tides had overwashed them.  (27)

Naval punishments at the time were barbarous: ducking, keel
hauling, tongue scraping and tying up with weights about the neck
were common.  It was usual for a seaman who had slept four times
on his watch, to be locked to the bowsprit and then left to drown
or starve.  (28)

If a man was convicted of treason in the 14th, 15th or 16th
century, he would be hanged, drawn and quartered.  The case of
Thomas Kerver in 1444 is an example of this.  He was accused of
wishing the death of the King, Henry VI, in a discussion with
some of his acquaintances in or about the Abbey church.  At his
trial

. . . they found Kerver guilty on all articles.  Judgment was
delivered without delay.  Kerver was to be led to the end of
Reading town by the Austin Friars Church in a cart whence his
shame would be clearly visible to all through the middle of the
towns of Midenhead and Bray, from there he was to be drawn to the
nearest Berkshire gallows to be hanged, thrown down alive and
quartered.  His head was to go to the usual place on London
Bridge and his quarters to suitably high places in Maidenhead and
Reading, to the Welsh gate of Shrewsbury and to the highest gate
of Salisbury.  (29)

These punishments, gruesome as they may seem to us, were
perpetrated in the belief that "Touch or contact was a continuing
thing communicating good or evil as the case may be, and that
destruction of the thing which committed the crime not only
prevented a re-occurrence but also expunged the evil created.
(30)

It would appear from all of this that the penalties were part of
penalties enforced under the Laws of England.  "They were not in
themselves specifically Masonic, but were rendered appropriate by
careful selection of certain parts." (31)

Of interest in the Obligation are the words equivocation or
mental reservation. At a time in the history of Britain, when
there was religious persecution depending upon the religious
affiliation of the monarch, the church promulgated and defended
equivocation as a strategy for Catholics to employ when caught
between conflicting demands for loyalty to Protestant rules and
to Rome.  (32)

23 Jones, Freemasons' Guide .... p. 279.  28 Clowes, History,..   
                                              Vol, 2,p.26.
24 A.Q.C., Vol. 77, p. 58.    29 Meekings, ...History..,pp.338-9.
25 Collett, Vox Lucis, Vol. 1, p. 41.     30 Oliver, in A.Q.C.,   
                                              Vol.77, p.25
26 A.Q.C., Vol. 77, p. 58.                31 Ibid.
27 Jones, op.cit., P. 279.                32 Ibid., p. 39.

 1 60

D. CHANGES MADE IN THE PENALTIES

In 1813, the two Grand Lodges, the Antients and the Moderns,
signed the Articles of Union.  These articles were to be binding
on all lodges "for all time." However, as Bro.  Arthur Sharp
states, the Masonic ritual was not unified for some years.  "The
chief point of objection was the obligations, the Antients
maintaining that the new form was not as strong as the one they
took . . . Eventually the obligation in the 1st degree had to be
rendered more severe to suit the view of the Athol brethren."
(33)

The fact that these articles were to be binding for all time has
not meant that no changes have been made in the years since. 
Lodges under the Grand Lodge of Ireland have not included the
penalties in the obligations for more than 100 years. (34) The
Grand Lodge of Scotland has also eliminated the penalties from
the obligation.  In their ceremony at the conclusion of the oath,
the W.M. informs the candidate that in ancient times certain
gruesome penalties were included as part of the obligation, but
nowadays these penalties are omitted - only the penal signs of
the three degrees remain as a reminder of those penalties. (35)

The Grand Lodge of the State of New York was founded by a charter
dated 5th September 1781, signed by the Duke of Athol, Grand
Master of the Antients.  At a meeting of the Grand Lodge of New
York on May 5, 1932, it was resolved that a paragraph be added to
the esoteric work of each degree; that for the Entered Apprentice
Degree to read:


The penalty of this obligation comes down from a time when such
punishments were inflicted on heretics, pirates and traitors. 
Free and Accepted Masons are now taught that this Penalty is not
literal but symbolic of the physical suffering an honest man
would undergo rather than violate his solemn vow.  The true
penalty for violation of this obligation is to incur the contempt
and detestation of all honourable men. (36)

For the Fellowcraft Degree, the paragraph is similar with the
exception of the last sentence above, for which the following is
substituted: "The true penalty for violation of this obligation
is to be branded as a perjured wretch void of all moral worth."
(36) In the case of the Master Mason Degree, this last sentence
is: "The true penalty or violation of this obligation is to be
ostracized as unworthy the fellowship of upright men and Masons."
(36) It will thus be observed that the Grand Lodge of the State
of New York has not eliminated the penalty from the respective
degrees but has provided an explanatory statement to cover each
penalty.

In 1964 the United Grand Lodge of England approved the following
motion:

Inasmuch as serious difficulty, based on moral objections, is
felt by a number of Brethren owing to the inclusion of the
penalties in the obligations, the Grand Lodge, while opposed to
any considerable change in the ritual, would welcome any small
alteration that would remove such cause of offence.  The Grand
Lodge, therefore, hereby approves., subject to consent by the
appropriate authority, the following permissive variation in each
of the three Degrees, viz., in place of the words "under no less
a penalty on the violation of any of them than that of having",
the words "ever bearing in mind the ancient penalty on the
violation of any of them, that of having".  (37)

33 Ibid., P. 29.
34 Ibid., p. 24.
35 Carr, in A.Q.C., Vol. 74, p. 133.
36 A.Q.C., Vol. 77, p. 30.
37 Ibid.,, p. 63.

In 1969 David Little, P.G.M., Grand Lodge of Alberta, submitted a
motion that the following changes be made in the rituals of the
Grand Lodge of Alberta:

In the Canadian Rituals, in each of the three obligations, delete
the words "under no less a penalty on the violation of any of
them than that of having . . ." and substitute "ever bearing in
mind the traditional penalty on the violation of any of them,
that of having . ."

In the Ancient York Rituals, in each of the three obligations
delete "under no less a penalty than that of having . . ." and
substitute "ever bearing in mind the traditional penalty, that of
having. . . " (38)

The motion was carried.  With this change in our rituals, the
penalties continue to enforce the seriousness of the oath we have
taken, at the same time they are not taken literally as a
consequence if the oath is broken.

It would appear from this research that the penalties have been
part of our initiation ceremonies almost from the inception of
Speculative Masonry.  These ghoulish medieval penalties, to this
writer's way of thinking, do enforce the seriousness behind the
oaths that are taken, even when it is now clearly understood that
the penalties are only symbolic.


38 Alberta, Grand Lodge of, Proceedings, 1969, p. 66.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Alberta, The Grand Lodge of, "Report of the Committee on the Work
Proceedings, 1969.

Carr, Harry, "The Obligation and its Place in the Ritual.", Ars
Quatuor Coronatorum, London: Quatuor Coronati Lodge No. 2076,
Vol. 74, 1961.

Clowes, Sir W., History of the British Navy

Collett, W. J., "The Mists of Antiquity", Vox Lucis, Fiat Lux
Lodge of Research, Vol. 1, No. 2, Fall, 1981.

Hawkins, E. L., "The Evolution of Masonic Ritual", Ars Quatuor
Coronatuorum, London: Quatuor Coronati Lodge No. 2076, Vol. 26,
1913.

Jeremiah, 34.18-20

Jones, Bernard E., Freemasons' Guide and Compendium, London:
George G. Harrap & Company, 1973.

Meekings, C. A. F., English History Review Vol. 90

Oliver, Bruce W.,  "The  Masonic  Penalties",  Ars Quatuor 
Coronati London: Quatuor Coronati Lodge  No.  2076,  Vol,  77, 
1964.

Radice, Fulke "Masonic Penalties", Ars Quatuor  Coronatorum,
 Coronati Lodge No. 2076,  Vol.  77,  1964.

Rylands, J.R., "The Masonic Penalties", Ars Quatuor Coronatorum,
London: Coronati Lodge No. 2076, Vol. 77, 1964.

Sharp, A., "The Masonic Penalties".  Ars Quatuor Coronatorum,
Coronati Lodge No. 2076, Vol. 77,  1964.

Ward, Eric, "Masonic Penalties", Ars Quatuor Coronatorum,
London: Coronati Lodge No. 2076,  Vol.  77,  1964.



