appearance of antiquity, that for that cause and on that claim alone it
demands the respect of the world. It is no recent invention of human
genius, whose vitality has yet to be tested by the wear and tear of time
and opposition, and no sudden growth of short-lived enthusiasm, whose
existence may be as ephemeral as its birth was recent. One of the oldest
of these modern institutions, the Carbonarism of Italy, boasts an age that
scarcely amounts to the half of a century, and has not been able to extend
its progress beyond the countries of Southern Europe, immediately adjacent
to the place of its birth; while it and every other society of our own
times that have sought to simulate the outward appearance of Freemasonry,
seem to him who has examined the history of this ancient institution to
have sprung around it, like mushrooms bursting from between the roots and
vegetating under the shade of some mighty and venerable oak, the
patriarch of the forest, whose huge trunk and wide-extended branches have
protected them from the sun and the gale, and whose fruit, thrown off in
autumn, has enriched and fattened the soil that gives these humbler plants
their power of life and growth.

But there is a more important deduction to be drawn from this narrative.
In tracing the progress of Freemasonry, we shall find it so intimately
connected with the history of philosophy, of religion, and of art in all
ages of the world, that it is evident that no Mason can expect thoroughly
to understand the nature of the institution, or to appreciate its
character, unless he shall carefully study its annals, and make himself
conversant with the facts of history, to which and from which it gives and
receives a mutual influence. The brother who unfortunately supposes that
the only requisites of a skilful Mason consist in repeating with fluency
the ordinary lectures, or in correctly opening and closing the lodge, or
in giving with sufficient accuracy the modes of recognition, will hardly
credit the assertion, that he whose knowledge of the "royal art" extends