THE EVOLUTION OF THE LODGE
By BRO. R. J. MEEKREN, Assistant Editor

THE BUILDER SEPTEMBER 1925

In early days it appears that the lodge was a lodge of Masons, and
could not be formed or constituted without a certain number
present. The number required in general was seven, though in some
accounts six and even five were said to be enough in case of
necessity. These seven were the Master, two wardens, two fellows,
two apprentices, though other authorities said five fellows and two
apprentices; and yet another, two masters, two fellows and two
apprentices (or three masters, if there were seven present all
told). In all these variations there is apparent the underlying
principle that a lodge must include every grade and rank in the
Craft. Remembering that at that period the master was such only in
virtue of his being an employer or secondarily the master or ruler
of a lodge, that in grade or degree he was a fellow of the Craft,
it is clear there is no inconsistency between the requirement, five
fellows and that of master, wardens and two fellows, or again three
masters and two fellows.

This fact has been taken as indicating (with other considerations
supposed to tend the same way) that only one form or ceremony was
known before 1717. This does not follow. In the eighteenth century
everywhere, in Europe and Britain today, the lodge is always opened
in the First Degree, not as a lodge of apprentices but as a lodge
of Masons. It is first formed, which part of the ceremony is also
called "constituting" the lodge. Before Grand Lodges and the system
of chartering or warranting lodges this was a very practical piece
of business. It really was the same thing in intent and purpose as
the inauguration or constituting a new lodge today by a Grand
Master or his deputy. Only as at that time Masons met in their own
right, there being no organized outside authority they constituted
themselves, and after constituting a lodge it was opened. Then if
any business arose at which the apprentices were not competent to
assist, they were directed to retire, in a manner exactly analogous
to the withdrawal of all but Past Masters when the Worshipful
Master elect is invested with the "secrets of the chair" (in those
places where that ceremony is used as part of the installation). In
such withdrawal and the tiling of the lodge anew are to be found
the germs of the ceremony of opening the lodge in a higher degree.
Such secondary (and tertiary) ceremonies were naturally parallel to
the purging and opening of the lodge in the first place, but would
not repeat (and do not repeat except in America) that part in which
the lodge was formed or constituted; because it was not a new lodge
that was being opened, but the same, with some of its members
absent.

There is good reason to suppose that up until the time of the
Morgan episode, the same rule more or less held good in the U.S.A.
It is well known how through that storm of persecution Masonry
became dormant in many places, with the natural result that when
lodges revived there was much ignorance and uncertainty even about
quite essential things. Yet for a long time after it was the custom
in many places to open the lodge in the First Degree (as the
process came quite naturally to be described), that is, to open a
lodge of Masons. In other places the lodge was opened on any degree
according to convenience. Even when the idea began to gain currency
that the business of the lodge was the concern of the masters
alone, there still remained a tradition (which Morris for one tried
hard to make a living thing) that the lodge should always be opened
and closed in all three degrees for the sake of instruction. But
during the same time the idea grew up, and the writings of Morris
and Albert Mackey went far to definitely crystallize it, that there
was not one lodge of Masons working under a charter, but a lodge of
Master Masons, who had authority to convene at their pleasure
lodges of Fellowcrafts and Entered Apprentices, which, however,
were distinct entities of an ephemeral character. With this as a
premise, logic demanded that the initiate should no longer be
considered a member of the lodge, and scarcely even of the Craft.
Indeed, not long ago, someone made the extraordinary proposal,
quite seriously, that the presentation of the apron should be
deferred until the Third Degree, as the Entered Apprentice and
Fellowcraft were not really Masons !

The precise history of this change would be well worth inquiring
into more fully. For instance the prefacing of the first question
in the lectures by the phrase "As an Entered Apprentice" is
connected with this development, either as cause or effect, or more
probably both. But it has become so thoroughly a part of the law of
American Masonry as to be received almost as a "Landmark." In
itself, as Mackey argued, for he knew very well the custom was not
primitive, the change is of little practical moment under present
conditions in this country, as the stages of the two inferior
degrees are passed through so rapidly. Where a man has to wait a
year or more as is the rule in many foreign jurisdictions, between
degrees, the case is quite different, and in such countries the
Entered Apprentice is recognized fully as a Mason and a member of
the lodge, though often without the right to speak.

The interest of this evolution lies in its being an instance of how
imperceptibly an entirely new rule, even a fundamentally different
rule, may by degrees get adopted without anyone at any time during
the process being conscious of innovation. The lesson is that small
changes should be watched with a jealous eye, with a full
recognition of the danger to the old structure of employing logic
without adequate knowledge and the risk in attempting to reform
apparent inconsistencies, a tendency which should be curbed and
checked, for such inconsistencies are often most precious
indications of what the original ritual actually was in the past.
