Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
Spanish Freemasonry. An English Brother's Experience.
Spanish Freemasonry . An English Brother ' s Experience .
SPAIN ! Sunny Spain ! Lund of the troubadour and the guitar . The very mention of it tills our mind with visions of romance—the history of the Moorish occupation and its tragic conclusion , the pathetic farewell of Boabdil , last of the Moorish Emperors , and the triumphs of Ferdinand and Isabella , still the theme of poet and painter .
But why " Spain" in connection with Freemasonry , and especially with English Rulers of the Craft ? We shall endeavour to explain . The mystic art ia practised in the Spanish Peninsular beycnd a doubt , but we wonder howmany of our readers are conversant with the history of
Freemasonry in Spain . We know that Masonry is a progressive science whose brunches are universally spread over the surface of the globe , but do we realise that the story of its existence in Spain is as full of romance and tragedy as the
TIIK WOIISHIPI- 'UL MASTI . K AXD OFFICERS OF THF HOTSPUR LOWS-K .
history of the country itself ? Under the Napoleonic regime early in this nineteenth century , now so rapidly drawing to its close , Spanish Masonry , after much oppression , had a period of comparative rest and prosperity , and , as Findel ( the German Masonic historian ) remarks : " strange to say , held its meetings" ( at Madrid ) "in the same building as that
in which the Inquisition had just been holding its assemblies . " This happy state of affairs was , however , of but short duration , for on the restoration of Ferdinand VII ., the Inquisition was also re-established and Freemasonry prohibited under the severest penalties . " Members of the Fraternity were to
appear in ( he course of a month and deliver over their papers , " / mil if Ihcv Jailed lo do so , " would without any further ceremony be immediately hanged . " That this was
no empty threat , is shown by the historian ( Findel ) telling us only a little further on . Now , in 1825 , a whole lodge in Granada was suppressed , seven masters condemned to death and an apprentice , " who had just been initiated , to the galleys for live years . " Whilst in 1828 , "they sentenced the learned and philanthropic Marquis de Cavrilano to the gallows "
on . suspicion of being a Mason . But the enumeration of horrors is outside our present purpose , and we must refer those readers who are interested in the vicissitudes of Freemasonry in Spain to Bro . J . J . FindePs comprehensive treatise . It is some consolation to leant that long years of
oppression were not unrelieved by periods of tranquillity , during which , although it could only meet in secret and under the penalty of banishment from the country , the Fraternity continued to found lodges , to enter into Masonic
relationships with the brethren of adjacent nations , and to extend , as far as possible under adverse conditions , the bonds of brotherly love . It was in Spain that the subject of our present sketch—Bro . Arthur Connor Richardson , for the second time W . M . of the Hotspur Lodge , No . 1626—first saw the light in
Masonry , and although the conditions were somewhat modilied in comparison with those outlined above , the position of the Fraternity in Spain , even at the present day , is such that it is not carried on openly , though , to some extent , winked at by the authorities , and the circumstances of Bro . Richardson ' s
initiation may well serve as an illustration of the pertinacity , as well as the circumspection , with which Spanish Freemason r \ - is conducted to-day .
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
Spanish Freemasonry. An English Brother's Experience.
Spanish Freemasonry . An English Brother ' s Experience .
SPAIN ! Sunny Spain ! Lund of the troubadour and the guitar . The very mention of it tills our mind with visions of romance—the history of the Moorish occupation and its tragic conclusion , the pathetic farewell of Boabdil , last of the Moorish Emperors , and the triumphs of Ferdinand and Isabella , still the theme of poet and painter .
But why " Spain" in connection with Freemasonry , and especially with English Rulers of the Craft ? We shall endeavour to explain . The mystic art ia practised in the Spanish Peninsular beycnd a doubt , but we wonder howmany of our readers are conversant with the history of
Freemasonry in Spain . We know that Masonry is a progressive science whose brunches are universally spread over the surface of the globe , but do we realise that the story of its existence in Spain is as full of romance and tragedy as the
TIIK WOIISHIPI- 'UL MASTI . K AXD OFFICERS OF THF HOTSPUR LOWS-K .
history of the country itself ? Under the Napoleonic regime early in this nineteenth century , now so rapidly drawing to its close , Spanish Masonry , after much oppression , had a period of comparative rest and prosperity , and , as Findel ( the German Masonic historian ) remarks : " strange to say , held its meetings" ( at Madrid ) "in the same building as that
in which the Inquisition had just been holding its assemblies . " This happy state of affairs was , however , of but short duration , for on the restoration of Ferdinand VII ., the Inquisition was also re-established and Freemasonry prohibited under the severest penalties . " Members of the Fraternity were to
appear in ( he course of a month and deliver over their papers , " / mil if Ihcv Jailed lo do so , " would without any further ceremony be immediately hanged . " That this was
no empty threat , is shown by the historian ( Findel ) telling us only a little further on . Now , in 1825 , a whole lodge in Granada was suppressed , seven masters condemned to death and an apprentice , " who had just been initiated , to the galleys for live years . " Whilst in 1828 , "they sentenced the learned and philanthropic Marquis de Cavrilano to the gallows "
on . suspicion of being a Mason . But the enumeration of horrors is outside our present purpose , and we must refer those readers who are interested in the vicissitudes of Freemasonry in Spain to Bro . J . J . FindePs comprehensive treatise . It is some consolation to leant that long years of
oppression were not unrelieved by periods of tranquillity , during which , although it could only meet in secret and under the penalty of banishment from the country , the Fraternity continued to found lodges , to enter into Masonic
relationships with the brethren of adjacent nations , and to extend , as far as possible under adverse conditions , the bonds of brotherly love . It was in Spain that the subject of our present sketch—Bro . Arthur Connor Richardson , for the second time W . M . of the Hotspur Lodge , No . 1626—first saw the light in
Masonry , and although the conditions were somewhat modilied in comparison with those outlined above , the position of the Fraternity in Spain , even at the present day , is such that it is not carried on openly , though , to some extent , winked at by the authorities , and the circumstances of Bro . Richardson ' s
initiation may well serve as an illustration of the pertinacity , as well as the circumspection , with which Spanish Freemason r \ - is conducted to-day .