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WE know not what opinion the prqfanum ¦ milyiis of the House of Peers may hold with regard to the eloquence of our D . G . M . To ourselves , as far as we may judge from his speeches on Masonic business , he appears to have attained with singular success to the art of combining in a few telling sentences , useful with leasant and complimentary matter . And the loud

p applause , which is reported to have greeted his address to the W . M . elect of the Florence Nightingale Lodge at his installation some few weeks back , would seem to bear record to the fact that his Lordship ' s language on that occasion was especially felicitous . In congratulating Bro . FOEBES on the proud position which he occupied

and designating ¦ such position as one of the hi ghest honours to which a man could aspire , the D . G . M . proceeded to assert the general proposition that the election by a Lodge of an individual Brother to fill their chair is very proof of the object pf then - choice " having that within him which induces him to

study art and science , and to practise the strictest virtue . " In the instance of the Florence Ni ghtingale Lodge we can have no reason to disbelieve that the sentiment was strictly consonant with fact ; and , served up as it doubtless was , en reeliauffeeat the festive boardgarnished

, , with the choicest bloom of post-prandial rhetoric , and launched abroad on copious libations of social sillery , we may imagine it to have been fraught with imminent danger to the fraternal goblets , and to have had the usual effect , with its accompanying charge of the

Masonic columns , of driving the gallant W . M . as it were at the point of the bayonet , into the conviction that he had never before adequately appreciated his own eminence in talent and virtue . However , be it understood that in this instance , as aforesaid , we have no wish to cavil at the expressions ; only truthfulness forces into utterance the shadow of a fear , lestconfiding

, in the high character of the Brother whose installation he honoured by his attendance , the D . G . M . may have been led into that common error , which ere now has jeopardized the reception of little-go logic papers , oi arguing from the particular to the universal . There cannot but be Lodges ( their number may be

considerable ) whose high offices are inadequately filled . In such Lodges there must ever rankle a deplorable feeling of dissatisfaction and disappointment . To see ceremonies , in then- very nature most solemn and impressive , trifled with or slurred over , as if they were but an unimportant prologue to the drama of a

dinner ; to be witness , meeting after meeting , to a meagre and intermittent attendance on the part of those to whom a Lodge should look for instruction and example ; cannot but be rife with such results to the better thinking of the Brethren . We need scarcely allude to the still greater disgust

and annoyance , which must infallibly result from the presence in high places of a brawler , or dictatorial and ill-conditioned officer , or of one on whose character the sli ghtest shade of stigma rests . With regard to such a one—to an individual who , since his admission into

Masonry , may have been guilty of misconduct disgraceful to him as a man , —we unhesitatingly declare our opinion , that greater rigor observed hi his suspension or exclusion would be a boon to the Craft at large . But how to keep our Lodges free from those defaulters of a lesser dye , whose greatest crime after all may be , that they have not with sufficient seriousness considered the

responsibilities which are so indissolubly connected with the hi gh privilege of admission to our order , the answer is a simple one . To its source we should trace the tainted stream . The irrevocably false step was taken when such Brethren , who are rather an incubus than an advantage to the society , were proposedballotted

, for , and elected in open Lodge . We believe that the laxity , which prevails in some districts with regard to the admission of members into Masonry , has been the subject of animadversion in the hi ghest quarter . That great influence could not have been more worthily exercised . It is not sufficient that a candidate should be

asserted in vulgar parlance to be a tolerably good fellow . He knows that on admission he may indulge a lawful , nay , a laudable ambition of attaining to high station ; and his sponsors should be assured that he is determined to tread uncompromisingly the path of duty , sincerely conscious of the truth that our institution is based upon

the exercise of the most ennobling virtues . We can afford to be grateful for the wish that many entertain , of mingling with us for our social qualities . We have no desire to disguise our proud conviction of being pretty good company , but we deprecate being esteemed as a

mere gastronomic association . Let ambitious diners out hit off a line of then- own : let them establish an order of Heliogabalus : let the Bacchanalian orgies of the Trafalgar Trumps resound across the river-reach of Greenwich , and the hospitable halls of the Star and Garter overflow with the festive gatherings of the Richmond Runagates : but let us

, while scrupulously jealous of our character for harmony in every sense of the word , by careful practice disabuse the ignorant of the notion , that the principles of Freemasonry nourish to their fullest scope over the magic mahogany . The question . has also been mooted among thinking

men whether we do not descend unnecessarily low in the social status of the classes admitted , there being much diversity in this j > articular between English and foreign Masons : and , with all due reverence for every strand of that golden cord of charity , which links us hand to hand and heart to heart , it would certainly seem

undesirable that the idea of our Order should be degraded to that of a mere Benefit Society . But we are touching on a delicate subject ; it is susceptible of mach pro and con argument . We may hereafter revert to it ; but to explain our meaning satisfactorily would exceed the limits of this article . Let us hope that for

the present we do no bad service in bringing prominently before the notice of our readers the expressed opinion of one of the hi ghest authorities in the Craft , on the requisites to be sought in filling the official chairs of Masonic Lodges .