                    MASONIC SPRING WORKSHOP 1982
                         THE SELF MADE MASON
                          THEME SPEECH #1

                        Bro. C. Gordon-Craig


The title theme for this workshop is "The Self Made Mason" and my
intention is to divide my views into two distinct groups as
follows:  this evening I wish to attempt to define some aspects of
Masonry its aims and objects, and what it is to be a Mason.  This
may seem superfluous and even fatuous but I would like to postulate
two paradoxes and one statement.  The first paradox is that we have
a highly refined and beautiful system of Craft work that does not
transform a man into a Mason.  Second that a man can be
superficially a member of the system without ever being a Mason. 
finally, that no man can become a Mason without making himself into
one on his own.  In other words:  one can be initiated, passed and
raised to the degree of a Master Mason and still not be a Mason;
the completion of the task requires individual effort, one has to
make oneself into a Mason.  The important corollary is that the
whole system of Masonry cannot exist without Masons.

Plainly such a discussion necessarily involves and includes
consideration of the aims and objects of Masonry and I trust you
will forgive me if I bring them under the light of scrutiny. 
Tomorrow evening, I hope to outline some practical suggestions as
to how one might attempt to become a "self-made Mason."  The
overall slogan I have adopted to tie all this together is
"usefulness to the Craft" and I trust the relevance of this quote
will become more clear as I progress.

I am well aware that the Annual Speaker at these workshops is
usually far more senior in the Craft than i am, and I must ask your
indulgence if I seem obvious at times in my argument:  I am still
approaching this vast edifice of Masonry with a childlike wonder
tinged with impetuosity.

Shortly before last Christmas my Father died at his home in New
Zealand and I had to return to look after his estate.  While I was
there, amongst his effects I particularly wanted to find his
Masonic Certificate and apron.  The first I put my hand on
immediately, it was right in the drawer where I knew my Father had
always kept it; the apron, however, was missing.  I looked in other
likely places with no result.  Finally, out of sheer obstinate
frustration, I took the house apart from top to bottom even to the
trunks and boxes in the basement:  still nothing.  This bothered
me; I knew my Father had set great store by it, and I knew he had
wanted me to have it after his death because he had told me so not
too long before.  Could he have changed his mind and taken it to
the grave with him?  I gave up the search though the matter was a
constant irritation in the back of my mind.  About two weeks later,
by sheer chance I came across it, in its case, propped against the
wall side of his favourite arm chair, just where his hand would
fall naturally on it.  In itself that was curious but not
remarkable.  However, shortly after that I travelled some way south
to visit a very senior cousin whom I had met for the first time at
my Father's funeral and who, to the best of my knowledge, had not
been in communication with my Father for over forty years at least,
and to whom I related this small anecdote since he is also a member
of the Craft and we were discussing what Masonry had meant to my
Father.  To my amazement, he interrupted me before I could recount
the dramatic conclusion of the finding, saying:  "I can tell you
where it was, alongside his chair."  "But how did you know," I
replied.  "That's where it would be," he answered enigmatically and
cryptically.  One curious happening was an oddity but two such
overlapping occurrences are not the workings of coincidence. 
Somehow in my Father's life Masonry meant sufficient to him that he
brought out his apron from the place where it was always stored for
longer than I had known, when conscious of his approaching end he
wanted it near him, and in some similarly mysterious manner, there
was some common understanding and recognition of an inner nature or
aspect of the Craft that had communicated itself to my Cousin. 
While thinking on these matters, I began reading my Father's
Scottish Constitution Craft Ritual and was struck by this form of
part of the apron charge in the Entered Apprentice Degree:

"You will observe that the apron is made of lamb's skin, and as the
lamb has been in all ages the acknowledged emblem of Innocence and
Purity, it will remind you of that purity of life and actions which
should at all times distinguish a Freemason.  I trust that you may
live many years to wear that badge with pleasure to yourself,
usefulness to the Craft, and honour to the Lodge in which you have
been initiated; and let me further exhort you never to disgrace it,
for you may be assured that it will never disgrace you."

Here, clearly, is the strongest possible statement of the dual
nature of the essence of Masonry, the two-way link that must exist
between the individual and Masonry, without which one cannot hope
to have any "usefulness to the Craft."

"A lawyer without history or literature is a mechanic, a mere
working mason; if he possess some knowledge of these, he may
venture to call himself an architect."

So says that great antiquary and Mason, Sir Walter Scott, in his
novel "Guy Mannering", and an historical awareness is surely
necessary to approach any definition of Masonry.  I have, however,
neither the time here nor sufficient boldness (even had I the
knowledge) to plunge beneath the murky waters of scholarly
speculation surrounding the ancient Operative Masons.  Instead,
perhaps, we should look first at the Eighteenth Century and the
beginnings of the first Grand Lodge.  Of this period, that great
Masonic historian, Bernard E. Jones has written:

"... there might well have been another idea -- that of forming a
friendly society which would watch over its members and their
families in time of illness or need."
In support of this concept, he cites several examples of friendly
society or benefit society lodges that came about in that early
era.  Without denying any of "the ancient usages and established
customs of the Order," I do want to single out for examination the
fraternal aspect of Masonry because here we can make a clear
distinction between the Craft and other societies that claim to be
of a benevolent or fraternal nature.  This willingness to assist
others is repeated and emphasized throughout the Ritual.

Do you seriously declare on your honour that you are prompted...
by... a sincere wish to be serviceable to your fellow creatures?

So asks the Treasurer before even the erstwhile Candidate is
admitted to the Lodge Room prior to initiation.  Again and again is
tressed the importance of "affection and brotherly love."  We
invoke the Supreme Architect of Heaven "that charity may spread
wide" and "that we may do good unto all men, especially those of
the household of our Masonic faith."  We exhort the candidate to
"be warned of the solemnity and importance of the step" he is about
to take, and advise him that those who are "moral and upright
before God, and of good repute before the world... when associated
together, naturally seek out each other's welfare and happiness
equally with their own."  This is, obviously, the crucial
difference between Masonry and those societies that are merely
fraternal by name.  It is all too easy to swear devotion to the
principles of brotherly love and charity and much more difficult to
put those principles into actual practice.  So many societies will
take any man on surface recognizances and with the slightest
lip-service to a pretence of spiritual or moral re-education or
training will claim pompously to have made him better.  Masonry
sets clear and high standards of selection and with its superlative
system of teaching, aims at making the good man better.  Yet unless
that good man also aims and works not only at making himself
better, but continues to work at developing himself, his usefulness
to the Craft will be little.

A beautiful system of morality, veiled in allegory and illustrated
by symbols.

When I mentioned recently to a friend and Brother that I wished to
include this often quoted passage, he advised against it, saying
"Oh no, it's too hackneyed."  But let us look at it again briefly,
The key word is "system":  Masonry is a system of morality, not a
system of faith or worship.  Masonry is not a religion, and while
it can be a great guide, it would be against the most fundamental
principles of the Craft to pervert it into a religion.  "The design
of the Masonic Instruction is to make its Votaries wiser, better,
and consequently happier."  The primary purpose of the degrees is
to teach but the precepts taught can be forgotten or become rusty
through lack of exercise.  "A... system of morality" says the
Ritual: a system depends on every component to keep it functioning
in balance and without members what would be the value of Masonry? 
Accordingly, it is necessary to consider the present position of
Masonry and its members in relation to the system.
" 'Yes, "veiled in all'gory and illustrated in symbols" -- the
Fatherhood of God, an' the Brotherhood of Man; an' what more in
Hell DO you want?' "

Kipling's mason is right as far as his personal lights are
concerned but Masonry is more than that:  it needs Masons. 
Essentially, the two questions we are studying are:  what is a
Mason?  What makes a Mason?

One of the fallacies to the system is, of course, that one
expresses a desire to join before one knows very much about what
one is joining, and occasionally there are some, such as the late
President Lyndon Johnson, who stop after taking the Entered
Apprentice Degree.  However, it is hard to think of a more rigorous
process of screening, a process designed not only to ensure that
the potential candidate is made of the right stuff, but also that
the vital core it there to be developed, that there is a positive
likelihood of usefulness to the Craft.  A potential candidate may
not be solicited, he has to show and express interest, he has to be
"unbiased by improper solicitation of friends and uninfluenced by
mercenary motives..."  The second question asked by the Treasurer
is vital for the point of our discussion:

"Do you seriously declare on your honour that you are prompted to
solicit the privileges of Masonry by a preconceived favourable
opinion of the Institution, a desire for knowledge, and a sincere
wish to be serviceable to your fellow creatures?"

The three important points for us here are the emphasis on
fraternalism or benevolent charity; on "a preconceived favourable
opinion", which must be based surely on the evident example of
known Masons and their work; and "a desire for knowledge".  This
"knowledge" must in its context refer specifically to Masonic
knowledge, and I postulate that id does not stop with the knowledge
contained in the Rituals, nor in the work of the Degrees, but is an
on-going, continuing knowledge that may not be even cumulative or
necessarily increasing, but an ever-present Masonic knowledge or
awareness that is gained from the constant everyday practice of
Masonry.

I have placed considerable emphasis on Masonic principles and
methods of selection because, as I intimated earlier, they seem to
me to mark an important distinction between our Craft and other
fraternal, or quasi-fraternal, organizations.  It is refreshingly
different in this permissive and liberated society where it may
seem sometimes to a pessimistic and jaundiced mind that no
standards remain, and no group has the right to challenge the entry
of any individual on any grounds to membership in its ranks other
than payment of dues, that a Masonic Lodge can retain and insist on
its ancient requirements, and what is more, enforce them
effectively.  Fraternalism, brotherly love, a spirit of mutual
trust and friendship, these can be built only when there is a solid
foundation and one which is known and respected by all members of
that system.
Theoretically, one might say that a candidate for initiation has
become a Mason by the end of the Entered Apprentice Degree.  It
would be even more theoretical to speculate at what point in that
degree this transformation from moth to butterfly occurs, possibly
immediately after the Obligation when he is addressed for the first
time "by that sacred appellation" of "Brother" but this line of
investigation is as useless and idle as that of the medieval
theologians who considered weighing the human body before and after
death in an attempt to prove physically the existence of the soul. 
It is plain and clear that one has not become a Mason by the end of
the First Degree:  is it any more realistic to assume that one has
become a Mason by the end of the Third Degree?  If not, when?  And
by what process?  The teaching system of formation contained n the
workings and Charges of the three degrees from Entered Apprentice
to Master Mason has surely to be one of the best designed, outside
of perhaps the Oxford University undergraduate tutorial system, yet
even with its instructions, exhortations and examinations, it will
not guarantee that the finished product is a Mason.  Recognizing
this the Grand Lodge of Alberta a few years ago adopted a "Lodge
Plan for Masonic Education", or an "Expanded Mentor Plan", which,
in its preamble states:

"It is the intent of this Plan to provide... our new Brethren with
the true spirit of Freemasonry and help them to learn to believe in
as well as to understand, its purposes and ideals."

In other words, a separate learning process may be necessary in
addition to the formal instruction received in the Lodge.  The
preamble to the Mentor Plan continues by listing some of the
benefits likely to accrue from its adoption:

"Every newly made Mason enters properly instructed and confident in
his membership.  The constituent Lodges are strengthened by more
zealous members and every Mason in the Jurisdiction may indulge his
need to participate and contribute to the furtherance of the
Craft."

Wise and thoughtful words, yet notice that phrase "need to
participate and contribute..."  The Mentor Plan too, while a most
admirable scheme and one worthy of the fullest utilization, still
is no guarantee of producing a recognizable package, tied with a
blue ribbon, and containing one guaranteed Mason in full working
order.

"...in leisure hours, that you may improve in Masonic knowledge,
you should converse with well-informed Brethren, who always will be
as ready to give as you to receive instruction."

The importance of Masonic education has been stressed for centuries
and Bernard E. Jones mentions a Report made in the early years of
the Nineteenth Century to the Grand Master of the "Moderns"
recommending "the institution of the Office or Degree of a Masonic
Professor of the Art and Mystery of Speculative Freemasonry..."  I
will return to the topic of advancement in Masonic knowledge rather
more fully tomorrow evening but again my point is that no matter
how well constructed a plan of Masonic education may be, none is
sure to make a Mason.  My own Lodge has instituted the pleasant
practice of presenting candidates with the appropriate volume of
Claudy's "Introduction to Freemasonry" on completion of each degree
yet these too have their limitations which Claudy himself
recognizes.

"Freemasonry giver her all -- and it is a great gift -- to those
she accepts.  But she gives only to those who honestly desire the
gift.  He who is not first prepared to be a Freemason in his heart,
that is, of his own free will and accord, can never be one."

There are many types of Masons:  a very old phrase was "Knife and
Fork Masons" which I believe referred to those who came only for
the Festive Board, and may date back to the Eighteenth Century when
there may have been some members who looked on the Craft as an
extension of a Coffee House or social club.  My late Father once
spoke to me of "Apron Masons" by which he meant those Brethren who
gave lip service to the forms but otherwise made no real attempt
"to enforce, by precept and example, obedience to the tenets of our
Institution."  By contrast I would like to focus a beam on another
type of Mason, "The Self Made Mason."

In this first section I have asked the question what makes a Mason? 
Can one belong to Masonry and be a member in it, and yet not be a
Mason?  We have a beautiful system but do we have a product?  We
have the mould, we have selected our ingredients with care, yet we
may not necessarily have built something that will last.  Obviously
there are limits to what a system is capable of producing, there is
a point at which the individual must do the rest.  A Mason is not
created or made:  he must make himself if he is to have any
usefulness to the Craft.  I am under the impression that there are
a greater number of Masonic trials than in former years and I am
sure that the statistics of those suspended for non-payment of dues
are scrutinized closely. These, of course, are matters of primary
concern to higher councils than I am privy to, but every Mason
should face the responsibility of helping not only other Brethren
but especially himself to become a better Mason.  I would like to
leave you to think on ways one can assist a Brother or oneself to
become a self made Mason and we will look further into this in the
next section.

Finally, I am highly aware that a clock cannot make itself.  Our
Masonic system did not make itself without the aid of Divine
Wisdom, nor do I believe any Mason can make himself without "the
continued dew" of the Almighty's blessing.  In the words of the
Psalmist:  "Except the Lord build the house, they labour in vain
that build it...."
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