down old ruined monasteries.-It is much to be wished, that those noblemen, &c. in whose possession ancient abbies stand, would on all occasons of pulling down or repairing, give instructions to their workmen, to preserve with care any antique marks, characters, or emblems they may find.-There are double walls, or hollow pillars, in which such things were deposited. -Few men will be at the expence of digging to the foundations of such buildings, where valuable marks and curious inscriptions would be found on the foundation or what was called the angle-stone, which formed a perfect cube.-This was a very ancient custom: the unbelieving Jews accused our Saviour of having stolen the mystic words, the Tetragrammaton, or Urim and Thummim, from the foundation of the temple at Jerusalem, which they said he carried concealed about him, whereby he was enabled to work his miracles.

Soon after the progress of Christianity in England, all Europe was inflamed with the cry and madness of an enthusiastic monk, who prompted the zealots in religion to the holy war; in which, for the purpose of recovering the holy city and Judea out of the hands of infidels, armed legions of saints, devotees, and enthusiasts, in tens of thousands, poured forth from every state of Europe, to waste their blood and treasure, in a purpose as barren and unprofitable as impolitic.

It was deemed necessary that those who took up the ensign of the cross in this enterprize, should form themselves into such societies as might secure them

from spies and treacheries; and that each might know his companion and brother labourer, as well in the dark as by day. As it was with Jeptha's army at the passes of Jordan, so also was it requisite in these expeditions that certain signs, signals, watch-words, or pass-words, should be known amongst them; for the armies consisted of various nations and various languages. We are told in the book of Judges, "that the "Gileadites took the passes of Jordan before the "Ephramites; and it was so, that when those Ephra"mites which were escaped said, let me go over, that "the men of Gilead said unto him, Art thou an "Ephramite? If he said nay, then said they unto "him, say now Shibboleth, and he said Sibboleth, "for he could not frame to pronounce it right. Then they took them and slew them at the passage of "Jordan."*

*THE application which is made of the word Sibboleth amongst masons, is as a testimony of their retaining their original vow uninfringed, and their first faith with the brotherhood uncorrupted. And to render their works and phrases more abstruse and obscure, they selected such as by acceptation in the scriptures, or otherwise, might puzzle the ignorant by a double implication. Thus Sibboleth, should we have adopted the Elusinian mysteries, would answer as an avowal of our profession, the same implying, Ears of Corn; but it has its etymology or derivation from the following compounds in the Greek tongue, as it is adopted by masons, viz. E.60, Colo, and A.005, Lapis; so Z.CoAdov, Sibbolithon, Colo Lapidem, implies, that they retain and keep inviolate their obligations, as the Juramentum per Jovem Lapidem, the most obligatory oath held amongst the heathen." The name Lapis, 66 or, as others write, Lapideus, was given to Jupiter by the Romans, "who conceived that Juramentum per Jovem Lapidem, an oath by Ju"piter Lapis, was the most obligatory oath; and it is derived either * from the stone which was presented to Saturn by his wife Ops, who "said that it was Jupiter, in which sense Eusebius says that Lapis reigned in Crete: or from lapide silice, the flint stone, which in

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No project or device could answer the purposes of the crusaders better than those of masonry:-the maxims and ceremonials attending the master's order had been previously established, and were materially necessary on that expedition; for as the Mahomedans were also worshippers of the Deity, and as the enterprizers were seeking a country where the masons were in the time of Solomon called into an association, and where some remains would certainly be found of the mysteries and wisdom of the ancients and of our predecessors. Such degrees of masonry as extended only to the acknowledgment of their being servants of the God of nature, would not have distinguished them from those they had to encounter, had they not assumed the symbols of the Christian faith.

ALL the learning of Europe in those times, as in the ages of antiquity, was possessed by the religious; -they had acquired the wisdom of the ancients, and the original knowledge which was in the beginning, and now is, the truth;-many of them had been initiated into the mysteries of masonry; they were the projectors of this enterprize, and as Solomon in the building of the temple, introduced orders and regulations for the conduct of the work, which his wisdom had been enriched with from the learning of the sages of antiquity, so that no confusion should happen during its progress, and so that the rank and office of each fellow-labourer might be distinguished and ascer

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making bargains the swearer held in his hand and said, "If knowingly I deceive, so let Diespiter, saving the city and capital, cast me away from all that's good, as I cast away this stone. Whereupon he "threw the stone away."

tained beyond the possibility of deceit; in like manner the priests projecting the crusades, being possessed of the mysteries of masonry, the knowledge of the ancients, and of the universal language which survived the confusion of Shinar, revived the orders and regulations of Solomon, and initiated the legions therein who followed them to the Holy Land:-hence that secrecy which attended the crusaders.

AMONG other evidence which authorizes us in the conjecture that masons went to the holy wars, is the doctrine of that order of masons, called the higher order, we are induced to believe that order was of Scottish extraction; seperate nations might be distinguished by some separate order, as they were by singular ensigns: but be that as it may, it fully proves to us that masons were crusaders.

As the intention of this lecture was not only to speculate on the ancient secrecy amongst masons, but also to treat of the secrecy of masons in this age, we must therefore turn our thoughts to the importance secrecy is now of amongst us, when there are no holy wars to wage, and nothing but charity and brotherly love to cherish among masons.

THis institution, which was first founded in the mysteries of religion, as we have before rehearsed to you, is now maintained by us on the principles of lending mutual aid and consolation to each other.-How should we be able to discern the brethren of this family, but through such tokens as should point them out from other men? Language is now provincial, and the

dialects of different nations would not be comprehensible to men ignorant and unlettered. Hence it became necessary to use an expression which should be cognizable by people of all nations. So it is with masons;they are possessed of that universal expression, and of such remains of the original language, that they can communicate their history, their wants, and prayers, to every brother Mason throughout the globe :---from whence, it is certain, that multitudes of lives have been saved in foreign countries, when shipwreck and misery had overwhelmed them: when robbers had pillaged, when sickness, want, and misery had brought them even to the brink of the grave, the discovery of Masonry hath saved them: the discovery of being a brother, hath staid the savage hand of the conqueror, lifted in the field of battle to cut off the captive; hath withheld the sword imbrued in carnage and slaughter, and subdued the insolence of triumph to pay homage to the craft.

THE importance of secrecy with us, is such, that we may not be deceived in the dispensing of our charities;--that we may not be betrayed in the tenderness of our benevolence, or that others usurp the portion which is prepared for those of our own family.

To betray the watch-word, which should keep the enemy from the walls of our citadel, in order to open our strong-holds to robbers and deceivers, is as great a moral crime, as to shew the common thief the weaknesses and secret places of our neighbours dwelling houses, that he may pillage their goods.---Nay it is still greater, for it is like aiding the sacrilegious robber to ransack the holy places, and steal the sacred ves