Resuming. Activity.

RESUMING . ACTIVITY .

THE " Seasonable " festivities may now be considered over , and like all other ordinary mortals we settle down once more to work . We are most of us just now engaged in stock-taking—in making up our balance sheets , ancl

calculating whether our credit is likely to be good during the year . These operations have to be conducted , not alone in a commercial , but also in a social and a moral sense , if indeed commercial stock-taking can in any way be

disassociated from moral considerations . Unhappily there are people who go in for credit on a fictitious foundation socially as well as commercially , but their discovery and disgrace are only a matter of time , and all the while they aro

assuming the air of success , and inducing people to believe in their unimpeachable honour and respectability , they are thinking of the true balance-sheet , locked in the private ledger of their own self-consciousness , and marked with

symbols of inevitable bankruptcy . Such a life of foreboding , of hypocrisy , of falsehood , is scarcely worth the living ; and perhaps but for the hope that somo day they may at last attain truly to what they now only pretend , few

men could bear it . They would summon all their courage , and with a resolution that shook all their body and soul would throw aside their smug assumption of moral and mercantile solvency , and , proclaiming themselves beggars

to the world , would pay the uttermost farthing and begin afresh on the lowest rung of the ladder , where they might even eat the bread and drink the water of affliction with a certain savour of safety and relish of untempted

obscurity . Hypocrisy is the homage which vice pays to virtue , and is often accompanied by the feeling that one of these days it may cease to be hypocrisy because of the attainment of the virtue which it simulates . So the trader

who goes into reckless speculation , and yet so lays his plans that he obtains a reputation for solid prosperity , may look with eager desire for the time when the prize that he is striving for may be gained , and the appearance of

substantial success be no longer fictitious . Even the dishonest dealer who begins by following some immoral custom of the trade , ancl then goes a little farther into crime on his own account , may wish that he may one day be able to afford to

take to fair dealing , and at last crown the edifice of a fortune by a genuine probity . Of course these things do not often happen . For the most part the life is infested by the lie , and if success be the result of fraud , it is a lying success .

Whether in a social or moral or commercial sense , the apparent benefits so gained resemble that illusive wealth bestowed by mocking fairies , of which every golden coin turned to a dry and withered leaf directly the owner thought

to buy with it that which he most desired . The preacher and the moralist may go on warning the world against the danger of making haste to be rich ; but the world has little inclination to stop and listen , for the truth is , that in the

tremendous pressure of the crowd that hurry towards the golden goal , preacher and moralist are often carried away also . The deceitfulness of riches may be the subject of a sermon from a pulpit orator who is known to be as eager

to make himself friends for the mammon of unrighteousness as any of the worst perverters of Scripture " among his congregation . We are all going together , not with unison

or many high sense with a united purpose , but in a fighting , frantic throng , fiercely seeking an opportunity to supersecfe each other in the tremendous business of " gettino * on "

Resuming. Activity.

which is the name we give to the act of devoting our lives to the acquisition of wealth , which some of the most successful in tho struggle have neither time to count nor heart to enjoy , till time is too short for counting , and tho

heart too worn and battered for much beside regret . It is perhaps a good thing for us that in the past year we have been suffering so generally from the effects of the feverish conditions that have previously atfected every department ,

not only of trade , but of industry . There have been fears lest we should altogether lose our position , both as the workshop of the world , and the centre of the world ' s commerce . Strikes and trades unions , and the resulting disputes

between masters and workmen , sent a vast amount of manufacturing enterprise out of the country , and made us competitors in countries where labour . vas cheaper and raw material was protected . There seems to be

some promise of amendment in all these respects . Business is assuming a more certain basis . Technical and general education is receiving earnest attention—¦ thanks , in a great measure , to the energies of the Craft

—and we have yet belief in the ability of the workmen that we shall still hold our own , and that there are still evidences that the elasticity of our enormous trade will keep us in the position of the foremost nation in the world ,

both in commerce and manufactures , if we are wisely patient and quietly sagacious enough to look well into our balance-sheet of the past year , and manfully determine to expunge every false entry , to investigate every

doubtful transaction , ancl , while honestly endeavouring to do our duty by each other , sternly demand that those whom we employ in our public service shall be held

responsible for their acts , or cease to derive any benefit from privileges which they cannot reasonably expect in return for thorough and efficient work . These thou edits

are suggested by the fact that the holidays are over , and that the Lodges are once more " settled down to work . " There is little doubt that those brethren who have the onerous task of dealing with the financial condition of

Lodges have taken their estimates , too , for the coming year , and we can only conclude with the hope that in Masonry , as well as in trade and commerce , the present year may be " better than the last , "

The Masonic Library.

THE MASONIC LIBRARY .

" " \ A / ^ wan t thinkers , wo want them , " said Coleridge , VV speaking of the bigotry and superstition of the Church in his day , and there is a sense in which the expression is applicable to Masonry . We want intelligent Masons , we want them . We want Masons

who can give a good reason for the faith that is within them . Masonry has a rich and varied literature , much of it as fascinating as romance , yet it is a fact that a very lar ^ e proportion of its members are groping in darkness so far

as a knowledge of its history , symbolism and jurisprudence is concerned . Ask the first man you meet to give you a definition of Masonry that will individualise and distinguish it from all other Orders , ancl the chances are

that he wonld be nonplussed . It might even puzzle him to explain the meaning of tho emblems he wears suspended from his watch chain . Many who pass as

bright Masons , who are proficient and brisk in degreeism , ritualism , and ceremonial , tho use of mystic signs and v . ords , would find themselves greatly confused