Masonic Notes And Queries.

" Tho indiscriminate admission into the Order of any class or denomination of persons cannot fail to operate injuriously , and to bring discredit upon the Craft ; but this observation applies with equal force to the Christian portion of the woi-kl as to any other . The whole tenor of our laws , as well as of the ancient charges , is to guard against the initiation of individuals whose conduct , character , or education would not reflect credit on Masonry : and it is greatly to be regretted that these regulations are not sufficiently attended to .

" Opinion of Fr . Grant , Trot : G . M . of Bengal , " In regard to the admission of Hindoos and Mussulmans into Masonry , as authorised in the communication just read from His Eoyal Highness the Grand Master of all England and its territories , I feel it to bo my duty to say a few words , in order to inculcate the greatest caution among all members of the Craft , as to the persons

belonging to the two great classes of natives of India proper to be recommended for initiation into our Order . " You are well aware , my brethren , that when a highly distinguished and respectable Hindoo was proposed for initiation by a member of one of our Calcutta lodges , an insuperable difficulty presented itself in the question of how he was to be obligated ? This was more especiall

y the case as he was understood to live at variance with many of the rules of the caste . How are wo also to reconcile a belief , in its full aud sufficient integrity , in tho G . A . O . T . U . with a system of gross idolatry , or a state of morals hinging mainly upon external observances ? Mussulmans have the Koran , and upon that book they may be obligated .

" As respects Hindoos again , supposing that candidates may satisfy us concerning a true belief in the Almighty Architect of the Universe and a future state of responsibility and rewards and punishments , upon what are we to obligate them ? The Teds , the Piirans , or their Commentaries ? Aud how are wo to reconcile certain anomalies with the calls and duties of Masonryand to arrive

, at a sufficient knowledge of the moral worth of those whom they affect , previous to recommending them for the fellowship and privileges and mysteries of tho Craft ? " As respects the question of moral character , there is

not , among ourselves , or Europeans in general in this country , a man whose conduct and habits of life are not known to his neighbours , and not one upon whom there is not a moral check through that chain of electric sympathy that binds our institutions and connects every man as a link to his follow , on the basis of a wholly domestic system that has stood the tost of ages , and a

common philanthropy utterly alien , as far as we are aware , to the systems of caste and polygamy . The consequence is , that moral flagrancy , or conduct palpably at issue with the moral sense , instantly thrills through all the links of our social chain . " What a mighty engine of moral influence and control have we here !

" Turn we now to the natives : what do we know of their conduct as moral agents , or of their social sympathies P Almost nothing ! Shut up as they are beyond our reach by a strict and impenetrable circle of exclusion and the darkest privacy , what can we know of their family aud domestic traits , thoughts , principles , and acts , or of their virtues and vices behind this iron

curtain . Of the tendencies of such a system , and some of the revolting anomalies which it gives rise to and fosters as in a hotbed , I need say nothing , for the results and effects are familiar to tho most superficial observers . " I am grieved to confess it , but still , after a residence of twenty-six years in this country , I am entitled to express an opinion upon a matter of such importance to

our ancient and honourable institution . Ancl is not the general disregard of the natives for truth so notorious , that while wc grieve at it , we cannot , at the same time , deny the fact ? Hero is an awful difficulty that meets us at tho very threshold of the question .

" Truth is the very rock upou which all moral principle and social security are founded . He whose name aud attributes are revealed in this blessed book open before me , has , as one of his most distinguishing titles , the name of the God of Truth . Our great adversary again , that mysterious being who is emphatically the Evil One , is , by a strikingly tremendous antithesis , also revealed

as the Father of Lies ! I trust the day is coming when his empire over the hearts of men hero will wither , and when truth shall , with the natives , be not merely a word but a quality , full of regenerative and salutary influences ; but , in the meantime , their laxity in this fundamental requisite of our institution offers a most serious obstacle to their admission into , or advancement iu , the

columns of Masonry . "Ton will readily understand how necessary it is to the keeping of a secret , that he to whom it is to be entrusted is a good man and true ! Am I not justified , in particularly putting you on your guard to seek beforehand , for satisfactory testimony that the native whom , you arc called upou to proposeor to recommend for

, Masonry , is under the tongue of good repute ? Ton are not , allow me to observe , my dear brethren , in this inquisition , to rest satisfied . with one native ' s report or recommendation of another native . " So and so is a very good man , " will one native testify for another , when a little more enquiry into details will show bow very widely you and he mny he at issuo concerning your mutual

notions of what constitutes a good man ! I am sorry to say , deeply sorry to declare , that , after all my experience of the natives of this country , it amounts , in the abstract , to this , that of all the natives whom I have ever known , two or three fingers would cover the names of those whom I could venture conscientiously to recommend for initiation into , or exaltation in , Masonry . "You cannot , then , I would again and again impress

it upon you ( and all over whom you have the influence in the Craft ) , in recommending or entertaining in lodges recommendations of natives for initiation into our Order , be too cautious iu making searching enquiry as to whether they are under the tongue of good repute or not , and while doing so , bear in mind that the standard of good repute is one thing with you , and another with

them , and that the safest plan is to consider your own minimum , of what you understand by moral goodness and good repute as their average maximum . In this way you may reach a practical average that may render it sale for you to propose or second natives for initiation . "But there is another point of view , which I have reserved any allusion to . I regard its affecting our columns

as a possibility , but nothing more . Nevertheless , the bare possibility of such a thing occurring renders it my duty to notice it . "A needy brother of base mind might , by a concurrence of circumstances , get into the chair of a fodge . To such a one natives of sufficient wealth , but otherwise wholly unworthymight address themselves covertl

, y , and enter into our venerable institution through the door of what I may be allowed to call Masonic simony . I cannot contemplate such a possibility without horror ; but I merely mention it to put you on your guard . Eoi-, thanks to the G . A . O . T . U ., I can say it with truth , and I feel proud to say it , that nothing of the sort has occurred while I have had the honour to holding the Provincial

Grand Hiram , and that I reckon it as one of the most fortunate circumstances of my life , that I am surrounded and supported by such an able , respectable , truly honourable , ancl honest body of worthy and true men . " " We do not think this article would be complete if wc did not joublisk the declaration made by Baboo Khettermohun Gangooly , previous to his initiation in Lodge Saint John .

" ' I am not a Pantheist or a Polytheist . I do not indentify my Creator with any one of his creatures . I believe in the existence and superintendence of one G . A . O . T . U ., whose wish is the happiness of all his crea-