that they profane the _worship_ of God. They claim (at least those
which seem to embrace the most numerous membership) to be, in some
sense, religious associations. They maintain forms of worship; their
rituals contain prayers to be used at initiations, installations,
funerals, consecrations, etc. They receive into membership, as we
shall afterward see, almost all sorts of men except atheists. Being
composed of Jews, Turks, Mohammedans, Mormons, and infidels, as well
as of believers in Christianity, they endeavor to establish such forms
as will be acceptable to their mongrel and motley membership. Hence
their prayers and other forms of worship are such as may be
consistently used by the irreligious and by infidels, and only by
them. We do not say that no Christian prayers are offered up in
Masonic lodges. No doubt some godly men, as chaplains, offer up
extempore prayers in the name of Christ; but such prayers are not
Masonic. They are not authorized by the Masonic ritual; they are
contrary to the spirit if not to the express regulations of Masonry.
Any member would have a right to object to them, and his objections
would have to be sustained. The only prayers which Masonry does
authorize, and can consistently authorize, are Christless--infidel
prayers and services. The proof of this declaration can be found in
every Masonic manual. (See Webb's Monitor, pp. 36, 80, 189, and
Carson's Monitor, of the Ancient and Accepted Rite, pp. 47, 61, 95,
99.) In all the prayers thus presented, the name of Christ is
excluded; it is excluded even from the prayers to be offered at the
installation of the "Most Excellent Grand High Priest." (Webb's Mon.,
pp. 183, 189.) The idea of human guilt is, also, almost entirely
excluded from these prayers; the idea of pardon through the atonement
of Christ is never once presented in them. In the prayer to be used at
the funeral of a "Past Master," it is declared that admission unto
God's "everlasting kingdom is the just reward of a pious and virtuous