Hasty Admission And Preferment.

HASTY ADMISSION AND PREFERMENT .

THE regulations of the Grand Lodge of England are most precise in regard to the admission and preferment of candidates , no one of whom is allowed to enter the . Order without having been proposed and seconded at one regular

Lodge , and balloted for at the next regular Lodge ( except in case of emergency ) , nor until his name , age , profession or occupation , and place of abode , with the names of his proposer and seconder , Have been sent in the summons to all

the members of the Lodge ; while no Lodge can confer more than one degree on any Brother on the same day , nor confer a higher degree on any Brother at a less interval than four weeks from his receiving a previous degree , nor until he has

passed an examination in open Lodge in that degree ; and although it has become the custom to regard the most trivial occasions as sufficient emergency for the relaxation of the first-mentioned portion of the laws , the other and more

important parts are strictly observed , and are regarded , it may safely be urged by nine-tenths of our members , as among the most essential parts of English Freemasonry , -while the

same may be said in regard to most of the Colonial and foreign Grand Lodges , where equally stringent precautions are in force to guard against the hasty admission of candidates and the speedy conferring of degrees .

Hence it is that the practice that hitherto prevailed under the Scottish Constitution , of allowing preferment at short intervals—in some cases even the conferring of the three degrees on the same evening , and that , too , without any

previous notification or proposition , either in open Lodge or on the agenda for the meeting—was so much objected to by other Constitutions , and was so often severely commented upon as ultimately to lead the Scottish Brethren to amend

their regulations , and make them more in conformity with what is recognised as proper in other quarters ; but this alteration has not been accepted by the whole of our Scottish Brethren without opposition , and it may even be that before

long we shall hear of a majority in the Grand Lodge of Scotland desiring to return to old practices , or at least allowing similar irregularities in special cases or in individual Lodges . We have devoted some attention to this subject in

the past , and have been the means of opening the eyes of many of our readers to what was regarded as a serious blot on the Freemasonry of Scotland , so that further , notice at the

present time is justifiable , in view of the possibility—remote though it may be—of a reversion to the errors of bygone days , with detrimental effects for every other Constitution , even if not for Scotland itself .

The opposition to the recent action of the Grand Lodge of Scotland , making an interval of fourteen days between the degrees compulsory , seems to have particularly upset the

Brethren of Lodge Neptune Kilwinning , No . 44 * 2 , Ardrossan , which has apparently been in the habit of relying largely on the seafaring community for its initiates , receiving the candidates as absolute strangers one minute and turning them out as

Hasty Admission And Preferment.

full fledged Masons an hour or so later . ' Can anything be more at variance with what we in England regard as Freemasonry ? and is it fair England should stand quietly by and allow a sister Jurisdiction to tolerate for a moment a

system so likely to prejudicially affect every other part of the ' Masonic system ? We contend it is not , and we believe the Masons of England would , support any representation made to , their neighbours in regard to so grave an irregularity .

But it is not only sailors who have been thus regularly hastened into Freemasonry by our Brethren across the border ,, for another wail of lament on the same subject comes from Lodge Dramatic , No . 571 , of Glasgow , the Worshipful Master '

of which is reported as having said , at a recent meeting , that if his Lodge was to be tied down to such a law they would , become bankrupt , implying , of course , that the Lodge had hitherto existed on fees received from candidates rushed into

Masonry , and taught to regard it as a mere social club , rather than as a peculiar system oi morality , veiled in allegory and illustrated by symbols , as we prefer to' consider it this ' side the Tweed .

We are not saying too much when we state that English Masons , as' a body , have no sympathy with such utterances as those of the E . W . M .- of the Scottish Lodge Dramatic just referred to , but all the same they will probably think with us

it is best to hear both sides of the story . The Master urged , in support of his contention , that their members were composed of intellectual men , quite capable of assimilating the lessons taught in more than one degree in one night , and ,

further , that Grand Lodge should remember that members of the dramatic profession may only appear in the city for a week , and may not be back again for three years , all which goes to prove the extent to which the evil of the past has

been practised , and the absolute necessity for a strong front being maintained by those of our Scottish Brethren who desire to improve the position and social surroundings of the Craft in their country .

We regard the instances thus brought under notice as exceptional , and by no means accept the opinions of the Ardrossan and Dramatic Lodge members as representative of the general body of Scotch Masons , yet we presume these

very peculiar views have the support of some influential Brethren , and there is no knowing to what length they may extend , or what may be done in furtherance of them if the idea once gets established that anything in the way of a relaxation of the new law is possible .

When we read of men of position in the Scottish Craft seriously stating that the new law will knock the feet from Scotch Masonry , and urging that such indecent haste as has been shown in the past in rushing candidates into Freemasonry

should be continued , in order that the coffers of an individual Lodge might be kept full ,. and common sailors admitted to the privileges of Freemasonry without due enquiry , or , indeed , any

preliminary consideration , then , as we have said before , it ia time for outside support to be offered to those in Scotland who think otherwise .