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ANDERSONS CONSTITUTIONS OF 1723 - L ...ANDERSONS CONSTITUTIONS OF 1723 - L VIBERT, Masońskie
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A nderson ' 's C onst i itut i ions o f f 1723 Bro. LIONEL VIBERT Past Master Quator Coronati Lodge No. 2076, England Bro. Lionel Vibert, of Marline, Lansdowne, Bath, England, is author of Freemasonry Before the Existence of Grand Lodges and The Story of the Craft and is editor of Miscellanea Latomorum. He has contributed papers to the Ars Quatuor Coronatorum, notably one on "The French Compagnonnage," a critical and exhaustive treatise that is bound to replace Gould's famous chapter among the sources available to the rank and file of students of that important theme. After having devoted his attention for several years to pre-Grand Lodge Masonry, Bro. Vibert is now specializing on the Grand Lodge era the records of which are still so confused or incomplete that, in spite of the great amount of work accomplished by scholars in the past, a work "great as the Twelve Labours of Hercules" remains yet to be done. The paper below is one of the author's first published studies of the Grand Lodge era. To us American Masons, who live under forty-nine Grand Jurisdictions and to whom Masonic jurisprudence is an almost necessary preoccupation, any new light on that formative and critical period, and especially on Dr. Anderson whose Constitutions is the groundwork of our laws, is not only interesting but useful. THE GRAND LODGE THAT WAS brought into existence in 1717 did not find it necessary to possess a Constitution of its own for some years. Exactly what went on between 1717 and 1721 we do not know; almost our only authority being the account given by Anderson in 1738 which is unreliable in many particulars. Indeed it cannot be stated with certainty whether there were any more than the original Four Old Lodges until 1721; it would appear from the Lists and other records we possess that the first lodge to join them did not do so till July of that year; the statements as to the number of new lodges in each year given by Anderson are not capable of verification. It was also in the year 1721 that the Duke of Montagu was made Grand Master on 24th June, having probably joined the Craft just previously. The effect of his becoming Grand Master, a fact advertised in the dally press of the period, was that the Craft leapt into popularity, its numbers increased, and new lodges were rapidly constituted. Even now it was not anticipated that the Grand Lodge would extend the scope of its activities beyond London and Westminster, but Grand Master Payne, possibly anticipating the stimulus that would be provided by the accession to the Craft of the Duke, had got ready a set of General Regulations, and these were read over on the occasion of his installation. Unfortunately we do not possess the original text of them but have only the version as revised and expanded by Anderson. But we can understand that in a very short time it would be found necessary for these regulations to be printed and published to the Craft. Their publication was undertaken by Anderson, who took the opportunity to write a history of the Craft as an introduction, and to prepare a set of Charges; his intention clearly being to give the new body a work which would in every respect replace the Old Manuscript Constitutions. The work consists of a dedication written by Desaguliers and addressed to Montagu as late Grand Master; a Historical introduction; a set of six Charges; Payne's Regulations revised; the manner of constituting a new lodge; and songs for the Master, Wardens, Fellow Craft and Entered Apprentice, of which the last is well known in this country (England) and is still sung today in many lodges. There is also an elaborate frontispiece. The work was published by J. Senex and J. Hooke, on 28th February, 1722-3, that is to say 1722 according to the official or civil reckoning, but 1723 by the so-called New Style, the popular way of reckoning. (It did not become the official style till the reform of the calender in 1752.) The title page bears the date 1723 simply. Dr. Anderson was born in Aberdeen, and was a Master of Arts of the Marischal College in that city. He was in London in 1710 and was minister of a Presbyterian Chapel in Swallow Street, Piccaldilly, till 1734. He was also chaplain to the Earl of Buchan, and as the Earl was a representative peer for Scotland from 1714-1734, it was probably during these years that he maintained a London establishment. We do not know that the Earl was a Mason, although his sons were. When Anderson was initiated we do not know either; but it may have been in the Aberdeen Lodge. There is a remarkable similarity between his entry in the Constitutions of his name as "Master of a Lodge and Author of this Book," and in entry in the Aberdeen Mark Book, of "James Anderson, Glazier and Mason and Writer of this Book." This was in 1670 and this James Anderson is no doubt another person. It just happens most unfortunately that the minutes for the precise period during which we might expect to find [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ] |
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