If the Freemasons think it worth while, they will, no doubt, reply to
the _Morning Post_ through a better-qualified member of the Craft than
myself,[15] but, unlike the Jews, they can afford to treat the
superstitions with which they are assailed with contempt. It will
suffice here to quote what Lord Moira said on the subject in 1800:--
"Certain modern publications have been holding forth to the
world the society of Masons as a league against constitutional
authorities--an imputation the more secure because the known
constitutions of our fellowship make it certain that no answer
can be published. It is not to be disputed that in countries
where impolitic prohibitions restrict the communication of
sentiment, the activity of the human mind may, among other means
of baffling the control, have resorted to the artifice of
borrowing the denomination of Freemasons, to cover meetings for
seditious purposes, just as any other description might be
assumed for the same object. But, in the first place, it is the
invaluable distinction of this free country that such a just
intercourse of opinions exists without restraint as cannot leave
to any number of men the desire of forming or frequenting those
disguised societies where dangerous dispositions may be imbibed.
And, secondly, the profligate doctrines which may have been
nurtured in any such self-established assemblies could never
have been tolerated for a moment in any lodge meeting under
regular authority. We aver, therefore, that not only such laxity
of opinion has no sort of connection with the tenets of Masonry,
but is diametrically opposite to the injunction which we regard
as the foundation-stone of the lodge, namely, Fear God and
honour the King."[16]
To this it should be added that Masonic lodges--more or less
spurious--have not only been used by Atheists and Revolutionists for
their own sinister purposes, but also by their enemies. We learn from
Robison that even the Roman Catholic Church at one time tried to
capture them--possibly for ends not over-friendly to the Established
Church in this country--and that the Jacobites, who can scarcely be
called enemies of the Throne and Altar, were extremely active in the
Masonic Order during the eighteenth century.[17]