Correspondence.

CORRESPONDENCE .

We do not 7 toIcl ourselves responsible for the opinions of otw Cor . respondents . We cannot undertake to return rejected communications . All Letters must bear the name and address of the Writer , not necessarily for publication , but as a guarantee of good faith .

WHICH IS CORRECT ? To the Editor of Tiu : FREEMASON ' S CHRONICLE . DEAR SIU AND BUOTTTRR , —Tho question of identity of renderings in the sections of tho three degrees having been opened in yonr coiumns , tho inquiry may T think be advantageously extended . As to tho question of Bro . Pooro , tho word " nature" may seem more appropriate to the present time ; but it is not improbable that

the word " nation may havo boon adopted when the minds of all were excited by somo calamity , such as the earthquake at Lisbon , to which the British parliament gavo so large a grant , when its advocates wonld loudly proclaim that it did honour to that " nation" whence snch bounty had sprung . It is also tho movo ancient form . Bnt when wo apply tho same question of propriety to tho lectures

generally , what answers can wo obtain ? Or who shall decide ? I am not decrying Lodges of Instruction , for I feel tho greatest difficulty in recognising as a truo Mason any ono who has not duly studied there . I feci ho has never gone through tho stern discipline there meted ont , and which , as a means to an end , is invaluable . It was a frequent remark of my lato esteemed Preceptor , Bro . Thomas , that " few who had passed tho Chair ever entered a Lodge

of Instruction . " Wo naturally ask , " Why ?" I had formerly tho honour of knowing a distinguished Edinburgh Reviewer , and Christian man , who wrote a work " On tho Objections of Men of Science to Revealed Religion ; " the Sacred Volume affords the best answer . The same may be said of Masonic teachings . In teaching the truths of Christianity , the highest and noblest talent and crenins the world has seen have boon consecrated to the

work , and all philosophical systems havo been illustrated by tho great and wise . It may , therefore , fairly bo asked whether the neglected and degrading condition into which our philosophical teaching has fallen , as developed in our lectures , is not tho best answer to tho remark— " few ever enter . "

It is a matter of history that tho ancient philosophers adopted a mode of instruction to their disciples , something resembling our own , and judging by the remarks of Cicero , a system of esoteric and exoteric teaching was adopted by the quasi-Masonic Lodges of his day . It is , therefore , by no means impossible that tho idea may havo travelled down from remote times , and bo internal evidence

that oar body really had a philosophic origin , and that after its passage through the high-ways and bye-ways of timo , its first effort , in more favoured eras , was to expand its wings and fly to higher regions of thought and of human aim . It is , indeed , the proudest attribute of our body , that it claims to afford a philosophical teaching . Whatever , however , may havo been tho original canso of attach

ing philosophical teaching to our instruction , tho present adaptation is not ono of antiquity . Tho teachings in our lectures aro founded upon tho subjects taught iu the schools of tho latter Roman and Middle Ages , called tho " Trivium " and " Qnadrivium . "

The " Trivinm" includes what wero deemed the introductory and less noble arts , viz ., grammar , rhetoric , logic . Tho " Qnadrivium " closed this " circle of tho sciences" ( a phrase still in common use ) with mnsic , arithmetic , geometry , and astronomy : and then , as all was written in Latin , tho following lines fixed them in the memory .

Gram , ( loquitur ) , Log . ( docet ) , Rhet . ( verba colorat , ) Mns . ( canit , ) Ar . ( numerat , ) Geo . ( ponderat , ) Astron . ( colit astra . ) As shown in the fourth section of our second Leetcire , and the initial letters are still used by our brethren as a mnemonic , without knowing its origin . The most popular work upon tho Trivium and Qnadrivium was

written by Marcianns Capella , in the fifth century , and it remained in use at universities until the sixteenth century . Gregory of Tours , a bishop and historian , speaks of it as a book by which the grammarian learned tho rules of construction , the logician to arrange his arguments , the orator to persuade , tho geometrician to trace his lines , the astrologer to mark tho courses of the stars ,

the arithmetician to fix his numbers , and tho lover of harmony to adapt his words to the modulation of musical sounds . Cassiodorus , another writer on tho liberal arts , who flourished in the reign of Theodoric , A . D . 520 , gives nearly the same arrangement , and it is probably from his work that our Craft articles on the liberal arts aro obtained , for he takes them in the same order , grammar ,

rhetoric , logic , arithmetic , geometry , music , astronomy , and his de . finitions are almost identical with our own . His article on astronomy may be thus translated : " Astronomy is the chiefest and greatest of the sciences , and if wo study it with a sincere mind , it overwhelms our perceptions by its brilliant light . In such way we raise our minds to Heaven and curiously survey

( 'indagabile rations' ) with searching reason , the boundless extent of this vast machine , " & c , & c . The intelligent Mason will at once recognise tho st yle and language of different versions , and the other articles in our leetares on the liberal arts are almost literal translations .

In tho second section of the second lecture it is absurdly stated that geometry was first founded as a science at Alexandria , in Egypt . But it is a parody upon an answer from the same author , Cassiodorus . Q . Quid isti focernnt qui in iEgyptiacis partibus possidernnt ? Meaning what did they do ( in relation to geometry ) who lived in Egypt ? Ai Ubi Hili iluminig snperyenjentc . & c .

Correspondence.

"The Piivor Nile annually overflowing its banks , tec ., washed away tho landmarks . It continues nearly identical with our own version until the latter states , that the inhabitants " hearing of a Lodge of Freemasons held at Alexandria in Egypt . " But what Cassiodorus states is this : " In tho timo of tho taxing under Augustus , Hiram-Metricns , or Hiram-the-measurer , was sent down , so that henceforth

the studious person could know it by reading , and recognise tho boundaries with his eyes . " Aro wo children to bo taught to repeat that , as historical fact , a Lodgo of Masons existed at Alexandria , and that a Euclid was Master ? Is it possible a Preceptor can bo found with gravity to teach such

absurdity , or does he , with a wink , acknowledge that it is only a puerile lie ? It is idle pretensions liko these , not ono of which will for a moment bear tho tost of criticism , that has brought Masonic history into such deserved contempt . Thoro is nothing , however , to reproach ourselves with in using those definitions of tho liberal arts ; for , from the time of Popo

Gregory II ., A . D . C 01 , tho learned of all nations , including Alfred the Groat , Roger Bacon , Bacon the philosopher , and all kings and counsellers , to the timo of Oliver Cromwell inclusive , all studied from tho same book , tho last edition of which was published as lato as tho 17 th century . Why also ' mako snch a mystery of the origin of our teachings in

the liberal arts and sciences when , in tho last century , they could havo been obtained at every old book-stall in Grub Street . I havo not traced tho teachings in Ethics , such as Virtue , Honour , Mercy , & c . ; it could readily bo done , but they aro rather in the stylo of fine writing common in tho last century . I do not , however , complain of these ten subjects ; they are tho

salt of our teachings , trivial as they are . It is when we come to those in which Hebraic history is so ridiculously travestied , that wo ask why our intelligence is to bo so outraged . Why aro wo asked to listen to sheer idlo tales about Abraham and Isaac , Rebecca and Jacob , with a host of others ? Why aro we compelled , with all tho lights of science around us , to

listen to such a childish cosmogony as is detailed in the second section of tho second lecture , with all its goody twaddle ? Why is that beautiful and ancient Roman emblem , which St . Paul so well kno \ v how to appropriate iu ono of his most sublime addresses , to bo degraded by its connection with a narration disgusting to listen to , humiliating to repeat ?

Here is tho beginning , Lecture II . Section 3 : — " At that timo there lived a man of note , whoso natno was Gilead , who had many sons , and one in particular ho had by a concubine , whom ho called Jephtha . " " Gilead dying and his sons growing up , they oxpolled Jephtha from his father's house , saying , ' thinkest thou , the son of a bondwoman , to

inherit with us who are freeborn ?' " Jephtha being thus unworthily treated in his native country , and being of a bold and daring spirit , resolved to try his fortune in a foreign one , ho therefore repaired to tho land of Tob , whence he made incursions into tho neighbouring Gentile nations , often returning laden with rich spoil . " After a life of freebooting and slaughter , he

finally terminates his career by " the plunder of twenty Ammonitish cities . " Tho perusal of oven Biblical narrations , which at tho timo they were adopted might havo boon heard with admiration , but whendragged in uselessly aro , in tho present stato of human feeling , calculated only to excite disgust , is enough to make angels weep or wise men mad ,

and this is of them . In the first lecture , again , tho subject " freeborn " is explained by an absurd travesty of a Biblical narration of " Agar and Ishmael , and Sarah aud her husband . " If this word " freeborn" has any interest for Freemasons it is to be found in tho belief that it is really traditional , and the explanation may have reference to that edict of the Emperor

Caraealla , who , when ho granted the freedom of the City of Rome to all tho Roman world , limited it strictly to the "freeborn . " Can we wonder at tho remark , " few ever enter . " Shamo forbids mo to repeat tho Lecture . It may bo said that our Lectures teaeb . morality , but a morality liko this is a cold morality , a falso morality ; bettor leave it untaught

than teach it thus . It may bo said they teach the liberal arts and sciences . But it is the office of liberal teaching to train tho mind all round , to adapt it for the acquisition of exact and varied knowledge , and to prevent its being the victim of predominant or one-sided views . How then can we hope to improve the rising generation of initiates ,

and incite them to higher motives , to teach them to be men of hononr and truthfulness , by this farrago of old wives' fables , and which must often cause to blush the faces of many of onr esteemed Preceptors , whom custom enchains in its grasp . In thus speaking of an acknowledged difficulty I have only

endeavoured to confine myself to expressing tho feeling of humiliation which a visit to some of our Lodges of Instruction causes . Masonry ia by no means opposed to the ideas of tho present day . Never was such an Institution more wanted , for its members are citizens oE the world . It can adapt itself to all creeds and climes , and even yet wo may say of it ,

" Time writes no wrinkles on thine aged brow . " But let ns not forget also that since our teachings were written Bacon has lived , and that the ipse dixit of masters has passed away . _ Let us be content in our Lodges to inculcate great principles of

truth , and then men will bo found to live and dio for them . Freemasonry is as a neutral land , a commonwealth set apart in a serene region far above political contests , unapproached by party differences and political estrangements , but how is it to maintain its high character if its esoteric teachings aro

" To pain tho thoughtful , make tho thoughtless scoff . " W . VIN-EE BEDOOE , M . D ., P . M . 1329 . Formerly 2 ° m 8 < e , to the Minx Lodge oflmtnttiw ,