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From whence could Moses, he leaving Egypt when you

The Origins of Freemasonry (part 3)

And now, in presence of this vast assemblage, before all the world, in the name of the Holy St. John, calling God to witness, I this day acquit them of all blame in the matter of that which they did, in admitting the Grand Lodge Visiting Committee, promising it will never be done again!

The second, and probably most formidable objection raised to colored Masons was that they emnated from Grand Lodges, existing contrary to the general regulations of Masonry, in States where there were previously existing Grand Lodges.

This objection will easily be refuted, when it is considered that under the government of England, whence the general regulations of Masonry take their modern rise, for the sake of the craft, prompted by necessity, the establishment of a Grand Lodge was permitted in Scotland and Ireland; and at one time, for a short period, probably Wales; although the Grand Lodges of England extended her jurisdiction over all of these provinces.

At the time, the Scotch, Irish, and Welsh, all had certain domestic, social, and political relations which seriously forbade their identity with the Grand Lodge of England; consequently, they severally established their own jurisdictions, all of which were cordially acknowledged and sanctioned by the Grand Lodge of the British Empire. I may be mistaken about the Welsh, but as to the others, I am certain.

And even now, in consequence of the peculiar position and relations of the two places, there exists in the Canada a Grand Lodge for the British Provinces of North America, extending over Nova Scotia, New Brunwick, Canada East, Canada West, and the Hudson Bay Country, Sir Allen Napier MacNab, Knight Baronet, Right Worshipful Grand master, with full power to grant warrants and establish Subordinate Lodges throughout British America.

This Grand Lodges jurisdiction, was established, not to suit the conveniency of the Most Worshipful Grand Lodge of England, but the conveniency and peculiar circumstances of the people of British North America, who demanded the right, which was readily conceded by the Most Worshipful Grand Lodge, thereby acknowledging the legality of such separate jurisdictions, all within the same political and Masonic dependencies.

And can there be a greater demand for an independent jurisdiction of Masonry among the Scotch and Irish than among the colored men of the United States? Certainly not.

Nothing like so great; as among them, it was a matter of choice, not wishing, for reasons better known to themselves, to be Subordinate to the Grand Lodge of England; while with us it was forced upon our fathers by necessity, they having applied to different Grand Lodges, at different times in different States, as in Massachusetts and Pennsylvania, for warrants to work under them, and were as often spurned and rejected.

What could, what should, or what would they do but establish an independent jurisdiction? If they desired to be Masons, they must do this; indeed to relinquish their rights as men, and certainly be less than Masons, and challenge the world to try us, prove us, and disprove us, if they can.

The late Chief Justice John Gibson, as Col. J.S. of this city, a high Mason, will bear witness, when Grand Master of Pennsylvania, was known to acknowledge that the colored Masons of Pennsylvania were as legal as the whites, but intimated that it would be 'bad policy' so to decide publicly.

Bad policy! Policy in Masonry! And wrong to do right! Cherubim shrink back from the portals or Mercy, drooping their golden pinions in sorrow; and Justice casts down her balances, and cases her sword in despair!

As the ultimum et unicum remedium, the last and only remedy, a resort has been made to prove that colored men in the United States are ineligible to Masonic privileges. And among the many who have made this attack, none stand forth with a bolder front than the honorable Jacob Brinkerhoof, of Ohio, ex member of Congress, who, in an elaborate oration delivered before the Masonic Fraternity of that State in 1850 or '51 on an occasion of a Communication of the Grand Lodge, declared that no man who ever had been a slave could ever be a Mason.

This coming from such authority, on such occasion, was eagerly seized hold of, and published in the news journals from Baffin's Bay to Behring Straits. It may have been sport to him, but certainly was intended as death to us;' and the honorable ex member of Congress, may yet learn that he is much more of an adept in legal than Masonic jurisprudence and much better adapted to State than Lodge government.

How will this bear the test of intelligent inquiry? Let us examine. Moses, as before mentioned, of whom the highest encomium is given, is said to have been learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and was not only the descendant of those who had been slaves, but of slave parents, and himself at the time that he was so taught and instructed in this wisdom, was a slave?

Will it be denied that the man who appeared before Pharoah, and was able to perform mystically all that the wisest among the wise men of that mysteriously wise nation were capable of doing, was a Mason?

Was not the man who became the Prime Minister and High Priest of Ceremonies among the wise men of Africa, a Mason? If so, will it be disputed that he was legitimately such? Are not we as Masons, and the world of mankind, to him the Egyptian slave, may I not add the fugitive slave, indebted for a transmission to us of the Masonic Records, the Holy Bible, the Word of God?

What says the honorable Jacob Brinkerhoof to this? Let a silent tongue answer the inquiry, and a listening ear give sanction to his condemnation.

But if this doctrine held good, according to the acceptation of the term slave, any one who has been deprived of his liberty and thereby rendered politically and socially impotent is a slave and consequently, Louis Kossuth, ex Governor of Hungary, bound by the chains of Austria, in the city of Pateya, was, to all intents and purposes, according to this definition, a slave.

And when he effected his escape to the United States, was (like Moses from Egypt) a fugitive slave from his masters in Austria and, therefore, by the decree of the honorable ex member of Congress, incapable of ever becoming a Mason.

But governor Kossuth was made a Mason in Cincinnati, Ohio, the resident State of Mr. Brinkerhoof, and therefore, according to him, the governor is not a Mason at all. He has been a slave! Is the Order prepared for this? Is Mr. Brinkerhoof prepared for it? No, he is not. Then what becomes of his vaunting against declarations to have a bearing. Let the deserved rebuke of silence answer.

But was the requisition that men should be free born, or free at the time of making them Masons, intended morally and logically to apply to those who lost their liberty by any force of invasion and unjust superior power.

No such thing In the days of King Solomon, as mentioned elsewhere, there were two classes of men denied Masonic privileges: he who lost his liberty by crime, and he who like Esau, 'sold his birthright for a mess of pottage,' a class who bartered away their liberty for a term of years, in consideration of a trifling pecuniary gain.

These persons were the same in condition as the Coolies (so called) in China, as the Peons of Mexico, both of whom voluntarily surrendered their rights, at discretion, to another. These persons, and these alone, were provided against, in the wise regulations concerning freemen, as Masons.

Did they apply to any others, the patriot, sage, warrior, chieftain, and hero, indeed, the only true brave and chivalric, the most worthy and best specimens of mankind, would be denied a privilege, of which, it would seem they should be the most legitimate heirs.

The North American Indians, too, have been enslaved, and yet there has not, to my knowledge, been a syllable spoken or written against their legitimacy; and they, too, are Masons, or have Masonry among them, the facts of which are frequently referred to by white Masons, or have Masonry among them, the facts of which are frequently referred to by white Masonic orators, with pleasurable approbation and pride.

But to deny to black men the privileges of Masonry, is to deny to a child the lineage of its own parentage. From whence sprung Masonry but from Ethiopia, Egypt, and Assyria, all settled and peopled by the children of Ham?

Does any one doubt the wisdom of Ethiopia? I have but to reply that in the days of King Solomon's renown and splendor she was capable of sending her daughters to prove him with hard questions. If this be true, what must been her sons!

A striking and important historical fact will be brought to bear, touching the truthfulness of this matter; and discarding all profane and general, I shall take sacred history as our guide.

Moses was quite a young man, and, consequently, could not have been endowed with wisdom, when, seeing the maltreatment of an Israelite by the Egyptian, he slew him, burying the body in the sane; when, immediately after, the circumstances having become know to Pharaoh, he fled into Midian, a kingdom of Ethiopia.

He here sought the family of Jethro, the Ethiopian prince and Priest of Midian, in whose sight, after a short residence, he found favor, and married his daughter Zipporah, Zipporah, being a princess, was a shepherdess and priestess, as all priests were shepherds, and Moses, consequently became a shepherd, keeping the flocks of Jethro, his father in law, watching them by day and by night, on hill and in valley. Here Moses continued to dwell until called by the message of the Lord to sue before Pharaoh for the deliverance of Israel.

(It is frequently referred to by modern writers, as an evidence of the reverses of circumstances in the life of man, who, with some degree of surprise, tell us that king David was once a shepherd, and attended flocks. This is no strange matter, when it is remembered that all princes in those days were priests, and all priests as a necessary part of their education, had to be shepherds.

As we may reasonably infer, there were two objects in view in the establishment of this singular mythological ordinance. The first was that the shepherd, by continually looking out for a change of weather, and thereby gazing up to the heavens, might keep his mind more fixed upon the high calling that awaited him, administering at the altar, and thus assimilate the person of his deity; and the second, that by attending the sheep, he might be impressed with their innocence, and thereby learn the true character that should distinguish him before the gaze of the inquisitive eye.

Of the seven daughters of Midian, the children of Jethro, all, as will be seen, were shepherdesses and consequently all priestesses).

Moses became a shepherd, consequently, keeping the flocks of Jethro his father in law watching them by day and by night, on hill and in valley. Here Moses continued to dwell, until called by the message of the Lord to sue before Pharaoh for the deliverance of Israel.

From whence could Moses, he leaving Egypt when young, have derived his wisdom, if not from the Ethiopians? Is it not a reasonable, nay, the only just conclusion to infer that his deep seated knowledge was received from them and that his learned wife, Zipporah, who accompanied him by day, and by night through the hills and vales, contributed not a little to his acquirements?

Certainly this must have been so; for the Egyptians were a colony from Ethiopia, and derived their first training from them, the former, as the country filled up, moving and spreading farther down the Nile, until at length, becoming very numerous, they separated the kingdom, establishing an independent nations, occupying the delta at the mouth of the river.

Where could there a place so appropriate be found for the study of those mysteries as upon the highest hills and in the deepest valleys? Is it not thus that the mysteries originated, the habits of the shepherds with their flocks, leading them to the hills and valleys?

It was also in Ethiopia where God appeared to Moses in a burning bush; and here where he told him, 'Put off thy shoes from off thy feet; for the place wheron thou standeth is holy ground.' And this 'holy ground' was in Ethiopia or Midian, the true ancient Africa. Truly, if the African race has no legitimate claims to Masonry, then it is illegitimate to all the rest of mankind.

Upon this topic I shall not farther descant, as I believe it is a settled and acknowledged fact, conceded by all intelligent writers and speakers, that to Africa is the world indebted for its knowledge of the mysteries of Ancient Freemasonry. Had Moses or the Israelists never lived in Africa, the mysteries of the wise men of the East never would have been handed down to us.

Was it not Africa that gave birth to Euclid, the master geomatrician of the world? And was it not in consequence of a twenty five years' residence in Africa that the great Pythagoras was enabled to discover that key problem in geometry, the forty seventh problem of Euclid, without which Masonry would be incomplete? Must I hesitate to tell the world that, as applied to Masonry, the word, Eureka, was first exclaimed in Africa? But, there I have revealed the Masonic secret and must stop!

Masons, brethren, Companions, and Sir Knights, hoping that for this disclosure, by a slip of the tongue, you will forgive me, as I may have made the world much wiser, I now commit you and our cause to the care and keeping of the Grand Master of the Universe.

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