Female Freemasonry.

Female Freemasonry .

WHAT the future may bring forth in the way of readjusting the terms of equality or otherwise on which the sexes propose to live , is beyond our ken . When the first venturesome lady mounted the top of an omnibus , it was felt that anything was possible . One sees in imagination the fair sex invading every domain of that sex which is

sometimes described by those of a humorous turn as the stronger , and some clay there may possibly be a cabinet in which they predominate . But there is one domain of our own sex , which has hitherto kept itself free from feminine influence . Of course we all know that 200 years ago , the

Honourable Miss St . Leger was forcibly initiated into outmysteries , and the romantic story which was told in ' a way never before attempted by Brother Edward Conder , before the Lodge of Quatuor Coronati , on January nth , 18 95 , is perhaps the most authentic and the fullest account of an

incident regarded ever since by the Craft as one of its most cherished traditions . The curious will find Bro . Conder ' s researches in the published transactions of the Lodge p . 16 of vol . viii . And so far from any discredit to the Craft being supposed to have been involved , quite a number of Irish Lodges have put forward their claims to be the mother lodge of the lady in question .

French Freemasonry also furnishes us with a lady Freemason in the person of Mme . Xaintrailles , the story of whose initiation in the Lodge of Les F re res Artistes , by the W . M . Bro . Cuvelier de Trie , is told by Clavel in his Histoirc Pittoresquc , Paris 1843 . But these are the exceptions that prove the rule , and landmarks , ritual , and rubric , with one voice ,

decree that Freemasonry is a masculine ordinance . Shut out from the legitimate Craft , by any other that is to say than illegitimate means , the sex has by no means been content to forego the profit , and ; in their eyes , the excitement of belonging to a secret society .

Maconnerie / VAdoption is a French institution , and is an organisation especially intended for females . Its rise was due to a curious combination of circumstances . No country has suffered more , from the Masonic point of view , than France . The Order has alternately been patronised and

persecuted . It has been exploited for private and political ends by unscrupulous brethren , and some 150 years ago , it suffered , and perhaps more in this respect than in any other , from spurious masonry . Such charlatans as Cagliostro and similar impostors abounded and rites were invented with attractive ritual , in which men and women shared .

The legitimate art was in danger of becoming unpopular , a fact perhaps traceable to female influence . At least it was thought so , and in 1774 the Grand Orient sanctioned a " Rite of Adoption , " and the first lodge was opened in Paris in 1775 , under the protection of the Lodge of St . Anthony .

The Duchess of Bourbon presided , and was installed as the first Grand Mistress of the Adoptive Rite . Whilst the officers were all females , men were admitted , if Freemasons , and permitted to assist the sisterhood . There were four degrees—Apprentice , Companion , Mistress and Perfect Mistress . The

first degree is only prefatory and contains no legend . In the second , the temptation and fall of Eve , in the garden , is fitly introduced as the basis of the teaching The story of the Tower of Babel comes in in the third , and its

introduction has no reference , as some libellous persons have been heard to assert , to the well known loquacity of the sex . What teaching is connected with the incident is somewhat far fetched . In the last degree the several officers represent Moses and Aaron , their wives and daughters , and the journey

of the Hebrews is referred to as emblematic of a Freemason's earthly pilgrimage . The jewel of the Order is a gold ladder with five rounds . To the four cardinal virtues our sisters add four others , these being Honour , Charity , Truth and Wisdom . The lodge room is highly picturesque , and if ever a casual

stranger dropped in , he might be excused for thinking he had found his way to a fancy dress ball . In point of fact he would be correct in his surmise , for every meeting is followed by a corybantic entertainment , a notable feature of which is a banquet . The casual stranger referred to would

find a difficulty in understanding the conversation , for it is part of the cult to indulge in a symbolic language . Thus the sister in the east , when enquiring of Sister Junior Warden whether all the glasses in the south were duly charged , would ask if the lamps were trimmed . The lodge room is known

as Eden , and the doors are barriers . Water is called white oil , and wine red oil . During the Revolution so many worshipful sisters lost their heads— -in the literal , not the metaphoric sense—that when happier days came there was a difficulty in reviving

the Order , until the Empress Josephine was induced to lend it her patronage , and , in 1805 , she presided over the Loge Iinperiale iV Adoption des Francs Chevaliers , at Strasbourg .

Perhaps the most flourishing of all androgynous degrees is the one so popular across the Atlantic , though no branch ,, so far as we are aware , has been warranted in this country . This is the Order of the Eastern Star , invented by Brother Robert Morris , and introduced by him in 18 55 . It is supposed to illustrate womanhood in h \ e different aspects .

The filial relation is taught by the story of Jephtha's daughter , the perfect wife by that of Queen Esther . Then we have the widow in the beautiful pastoral of Ruth , the sister is exemplified by Martha , the sister of Mary and Lazarus , and the Martyr by Electra . Why the last is not quite clear .

Daughter , sister , wife and widow , are quite comprehensible , but martyrdom is by no means a necessary part of a woman ' s career . And we note , too , that womanhood in its most attractive aspect is omitted altogether , that is the fiancee .

We make the rulers of the Order a present of this suggestion , and would recommend for pattern , Margaret , the Virgin of Antioch . This article is headed " Female Freemasonry , " and it remains to justify the title . The connection with the Craft is maintained , by the fact that a necessary qualification is near relationship to a Freemason .

We have yet to allude to the " Mopses . " These came into existence as the result of a Papal excommunication , by Pope Clement XII . in 173 8 . Afraid to be in opposition to the Church and unwilling to abandon the Order , the brethren of the Catholic states of Germany founded what appeared to be

a new Order , but which was really the same as Freemasonry under a different name . The German word " mops" means a bull dog , and the name was supposed to signify the fidelity to their principles which characterised the members . In 1776 the Order became androgynous , but is now entirely extinct .

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