-THE neutral disposition, rigid and reserved, neither speaks good nor evil-but the man tasting brotherly love, is warm to commend—it is an easy and cheap means of bestowing good gifts, and working good works: for, by a just praise to industry, you recommend the industrious man to those to whom he might never have been known; and thereby enlarges his credit and his trade by a just commendation of merit, you may open the paths of advancement, through those whose power might never have been petitioned -by a proper praise of genius and art, you may rouse the attention of those patrons, to whom the greatest merits might have remained undiscovered-it is a degree of justice which every man has a right to from his brother, that his virtues be not concealed.

-To shroud the imperfections of our friend, and cloak his infirmities, is christian and charitable, and consequently befitting a Mason---even the truth should not be told at all times; for where we cannot approve, we should pity in silence--What pleasure or profit can there arise by exposing the errors of a brother? To exhort him is virtuous---to revile him is inhuman to set him out as an object of ridicule, is infernal-

FROM hence we must necessarily determine, that the duty of a good Mason leads him to work the works of Benevolence; and his heart is touched with joy, whilst he acts within her precepts.--Let us therefore be steadfast and immoveable in our ordonnances, that we be proved to have a tongue of good report.

In the ceremonies of this day, we commemorate

the mighty work of the Creator, in the beginning, when the foundations of this world, of times and seasons, were established---the placing of the first stone of the intended erection takes its import from the emblematical tenor of the work, and not from our labour as mechanics---it did not require the hands of a Free and Accepted Mason to place it firmer on its basis than a stone-cutter or builder. But in this work we appear as the servants of the Divinity, supplicating for his approbation, and for prosperity to the undertaking: remembering the corner-stone of that building on which the salvation of the world was founded: remembering the mighty works of the Deity, when he suspended the planets in their stations, and founded the axis of the earth.

In such a work, it may not be esteemed prophane to use the apostle's words to the Corinthians, "According to the grace of God, which is given unto me,

as a wise Master-Builder, I have laid the foundation;" since my duty this day is a commemoration of the might, majesty, and benevolence of the Great Master of all, whose temple is the universe; the pillars of whose work are wisdom, strength, and beauty; for his wisdom is infinite, his strength is in omnipotence, and beauty stands forth, in all his creation, in symmetry and order--he hath stretched forth the heavens as a canopy, and the earth he hath planted as his footstool; he crowns his temples with the stars, as with a diadem; and in his hand he holdeth forth the power and the glory: the sun and moon are messengers of his will to worlds unnumbered, and all his laws are concord.

AN ORATION,

AT THE DEDICATION OF FREE-MASON'S HALL, IN SUNDERLAND, IN THE COUNTY OF DURHAM, ON THE 16TH DAY OF JULY, 1778.—BY BROTHER

W. HUTCHINSON.

Right Worshipful Grand Master,
And ye, my much esteemed Brethren,

INSTITUTIONS religious or civil, if not founded on the strictest rules of propriety, will sink soon into ruin.-By the perpetuity, we must necessarily distinguish the propriety of the institution.

FROM this argument men are led to determine, that our society is supported by the purest maxims; as it has continued through innumerable ages, unshaken in its principles, and uncorrupted by innovations.

We are not to search for our antiquity in the mythology of Greece or Rome, we advance into remoter ages. Religion was the original and constituent principle;—a recognition of the Deity first distinguished us from the rest of mankind; our predecessors searched. for the divine essence in the wonders displayed on the face of nature--they discovered supreme wisdom in the order of the universe-in the stellary system they traced the power, in the seasons and their changes the bounty, and in animal life the benevolence of God; every argument brought with it conviction, and every object confirmation, that all the wonders daily dis

played to the eye of nian, were only to be produced by some superlative being, and maintained by his superintendency. It was from such conviction, that men began to class themselves in religious societies.

No rational mind could confess the being of a Supreme, from whose hand such bounties were poured forth, and by whose miraculous power, such a complex existence as a man was sustained; (to whom even himself, is a system of insoluble miracles) without conceiving, that for the attainment of his approbation, we should fill our souls with gratitude, and imitate his universal benevolence.

IN Benevolence is comprehended the whole law of society, and whilst we weigh our obligations towards mankind, by the divine assay "Love thy neighbour as thyself," we must deduce this second rule, which includes all the moral law," Do unto all men કંદ as thou wouldst they should do unto thee."

THE natural wants and infirmities of human life, would very early be discovered, and the necessity of mutual aids become the immediate result:---but till those aids were regulated by religious principles, and man's natural ferocity was subdued, we may readily conceive few examples of Virtue took place. Our predecessors were the first who tasted of this felicity.

I MAY venture to assert, it was the only consequence which could ensue, whilst men were looking up to the Divinity through his works, that they would conclude the Sun was the region, where, in celestial glory, the Deity reposed.

WE discover in the Amonian and Egyptian rites, the most perfect remains of those originals, to whom our society refers.we are told they esteemed the soul of man to be an emanation of the Supreme, and a spirit detached from the seraphic bands, which filled the solar mansions, and surrounded the throne of Majesty-They looked up to this grand luminary, as the native realm from whence they were sent on this earthly pilgrimage, and to which they should, in the end, return; the figure of the Sun was at once a memorial of their divine origin, a badge of the religious faith they professed, and a monitor of those principles, which should conduct and ensure their restoration. How soon, or to what extreme, superstition and bigotry debased this emblem, is a research painful and unprofitable.

IT was a custom in remote antiquity, to consecrate and devote to the service of the Deity, places and altars: the many instances in holy writ need not be ennumerated to this assembly; it will suffice to mention, that several of them were named* EL, and BETH-EL, the literal translation of which, leaves no doubt of the consecration. From thence we derive the original composition of the two characters, the ARTIFICER and DEVOTEE; thence our present rules and maxims were deduced, and thence also arose the mixed assumption of these badges, of architects and religious.

IT is not to be wondered, that the first principles of natural religion should be extended hither from the Genesis, chap. xviii. ver. 18.