a chronic curse over the city to warp every noble feeling of Christian
virtue.

Amongst the leaders of the secret societies, amongst the socialists
who plot the ruin of their fellow-citizens, and amongst the infidels
who blasphemously ridicule the mysteries of Christianity, we must now
seek the unfortunate Cassier, who has arrived in Geneva.





Chapter XIII.
The Secret Societies.




To outsiders Masonry is a mystery. When Masons speak or write of
themselves they give the world to understand the are but a harmless
union for mutual benefit, and for the promotion of works of benevolence.
That such is the belief of many individuals in the lower grades of
Masonry, and even of some lodges amongst the thousands scattered over
the face of the earth, we have no doubt; but that charity in its varied
branches has been either the teaching or the fact amongst the great
bulk of Freemasons during the last two hundred years we unhesitatingly
deny.

In the ceremony of making a master-mason, and in a dark room, with a
coffin in the centre covered with a pall, the brethren standing around