order; but the patriot soldier who has been disabled for life in
defense of his country and liberty is excluded. The widows and orphans
of rebel Masons slain in battle, or righteously executed on the
scaffold, must receive "the benefits;" but the widows and orphans of
patriot soldiers who did not choose to join the Masons, or were
excluded by some bodily imperfection, or by wounds received in battle,
are left to the charities of "the ignorant and prejudiced." The Jew,
the Turk, the Hindoo, the American savage, and the infidel (provided
they are not atheists), are eligible to the boasted honors and
advantages of Masonry. (Moore's Constitutions, pp. 119, 123.) But if a
man have every intellectual gift and every moral virtue, and have some
bodily imperfection, he is excluded. A man may be as gifted and as
learned as Milton, as incorruptible and patriotic as Washington, and
as benevolent as Howard, but if he is physically imperfect he is
excluded from this association, which claims to be no respecter of
persons, but to be the patron of merit, and which professes to act on
the principle of the universal brotherhood of men.

3. Exclusiveness in about the same degree characterizes other secret
societies. The Constitution of the Odd-fellows' Grand Lodge of Ohio
provides that the candidate for membership must be "a free white
person possessed of some known means of support and free from all
infirmity or disease." (Art. 6, Sec. 1.) Substantially the same
qualifications for membership are required by the constitutions and
laws of other secret associations. (Constitution of Ancient Order of
Good-fellows, Art. 6, Sec. 1; Constitution of Improved Order of Red
Men, Art. 5, Sec. 1; Constitution of United Ancient Order of Druids,
Art. 8, Sec. 1.)

4. Not only are these associations exclusive and selfish in regard to