Indiscriminate Admission of Candidates

[In the Last Issue] we drew the attention of our readers to the evil effects of indiscriminate charity, and the likelihood, we may almost say the certainty, that Freemasonry will lose caste if relief is administered without careful inquiry into the antecedents, as well as the present necessities, of those who seek it.

Of equal importance is it that those who present themselves as candidates for admission into our Society should not be admitted indiscriminately.

Indeed, these two questions of ill-regulated almsgiving and the lax admission of new members are so closely connected, that it is hardly possible to discuss one of them fairly, in all its bearings, without touching upon the more salient points of the other.

The more careless we are in the bestowal of our alms, the likelier we are to have our ranks well filled with needy and unscrupulous adventurers. And, similarly, the more indifferent we are to whom we introduce into our Lodges, the greater will be the number of those who will abuse our charity.

All right-minded Masons are far less anxious for the numerical increase of the Craft than they are for its increased moral strength. Hence, it is we have viewed with so much satisfaction that at nearly every consecration of a new Lodge which has lately been held, the consecrating officer has made a point of enjoining on the members how necessary it is they should be cautious about whom they elect into their Lodge, not only for the peace and harmony of the Lodge itself, but likewise in the interests of Freemasonry generally.

Rightly enough was it said by Bro. Metham, in his recent able address before the Provincial Grand Lodge of Devon, that “a little leaven leaveneth the whole mass.”

A single objectionable brother in a Lodge is enough to set all the members at odds. Nor does the evil end even here. The obnoxious brother finds admission into other Lodges, where his propensity for stirring up unamiable feelings is not known, and, more often than not, he exhibits the same faults there as well as in his own Lodge.

Or he may possess still graver shortcomings than a mere tendency to squabble on all occasions; in which case, a part of the odium that attaches to him is necessarily reflected on those with whom he is associated.

It must be apparent, indeed, to all who concern themselves about the well-being of Freemasonry that it is impossible to exercise too much caution in the admission of new members.

The old saying, *noscitur a sociis,* is undeniably true. A man is known by the character of his fellows, and a society by that of its members. If the majority of Freemasons are found to be good sterling men, who always practice the morality they profess, then, as that system of morality is known to all men to be marvellously free from all blemish, the world will esteem us highly as a society that never wearies of doing good.

On the other hand, if Masons are found to be mere professors of a peculiar system of morality; if the charity they practice is practiced ostentatiously and with an eye to future profit; if, under the guise of brotherly love, they permit themselves to lose no opportunity of willfully misjudging the motives of their fellows, of promoting jealousy, of suggesting in secret what they dare not avow openly; if their boasted conviviality resolves itself simply into an excessive indulgence in the pleasures of the table, then, we say, the world will rightly set us down as a society of rank impostors, banded together for objects that are either blameworthy or beneath contempt.

Happily, as we have said, the world knows well enough that our system of morality is pure. It knows likewise that the principles of that morality are not only professed but practiced by the bulk of our society. We say bulk, because a society of men is no more likely, perhaps even less likely, to be perfect than a single individual. But if we cannot attain perfection, we may approach it, and the best way of doing this is to be cautious in our election of candidates.

We are led to indulge in these remarks—which, after all, are a mere collection of truisms—partly by reason of certain statements in Bro. Metham’s address, already alluded to, and partly by the description of a scene enacted in one of our Lodges, of a most disgraceful character, a description for which we are indebted to our contemporary, the *Ballarat Star.*

The scene is said to have occurred in the “Buninyong Masonic Lodge,” a name, however, we do not find in the Grand Lodge Calendar for 1876. It appears that some months since, a person was proposed for initiation but rejected by numerous black balls.

A Dr. Hallett, member of the Lodge and an old Mason, was not present, however. On the evening when the scene took place, he was in attendance, but a long delay occurred in opening the Lodge. Dr. Hallett, on some idle pretext, was called out by the late W.M., and no sooner had he left the room than the Lodge was opened.

Attempting to re-enter in a very few minutes, he was told the W.M. had ordered he should be refused admittance, though he had already signed the attendance register.

While protesting against such tyranny, Dr. Hallett was seized by a member “much taller and stronger than himself” and dragged forcibly from the door of the Lodge, to the serious damage of his right hand.

The cause of this outrage is said to have been the fear of the W.M. that Dr. Hallett might blackball the candidate, who was the intimate friend of the Master.

Taking the facts as narrated by our contemporary, we have no hesitation in describing the scene as a gross violation, not only of Masonic rights and privileges but of all decency and propriety.

It is almost needless to point out that the several acts which made up the above scene are each and every one of them in distinct violation of Masonic law.

The denial to Dr. Hallett of Masonic communication with the members of his own Lodge, his seizure and forcible removal from the door of the Lodge, the alleged excuse for this exclusion and violence—that Dr. Hallett might exercise his right of voting—and the barefaced attempt to dictate that he should vote either white or not at all, together form a terrible indictment against the W.M. of the “Buninyong Masonic Lodge” and his satellites.

We should like to believe the whole thing is utterly untrue, but we fear there is too much circumstantiality in the account for any such good fortune to befall us.

We are aware the account is *ex parte*; indeed, we are arguing upon the tale as it has reached us. But journals with a due sense of their responsibilities do not admit such intelligence into their columns unless it is duly vouched for.

But even if the details have been inaccurately given or unduly coloured, there is still forced upon us the belief that the working of “the Buninyong Lodge” must be flagrantly un-Masonic.

Even assuming that Dr. Hallett is a most obnoxious member, nothing could justify the outrage of which he is reported to have been the victim. There is a proper Masonic tribunal before which members guilty of un-Masonic conduct may be arraigned.

The W.M. had no right to sit in judgment on the merits of his own difference with Dr. Hallett, supposing there to have been one. A member, even of superior height and strength, has no right forcibly to remove from the door of a Lodge another who is neither suspended nor excluded from his rights and privileges.

And, lastly, the attempt to force a favourable ballot by excluding a member supposed to be unfavourably inclined towards the candidate was a monstrous invasion of one of the most sacred rights of membership.

We have no hesitation in saying that if this case is not brought under the notice of the District Grand authorities, our Grand Lodge should take the initiative, and forthwith order an inquiry; and if the case is proved, visit the offending members with the heaviest penalties sanctioned by the laws of Masonry.

No such ruffianly conduct would pass unpunished in any class of society. It certainly cannot be tolerated in Freemasonry.

Then the cases cited by our Bro. Metham, of the P.M. boasting at “the bar of a public-house, with oath following oath, that he had used a black ball and would use it even against the G.M. himself, if by doing so he could spite the Master of his Lodge”; of the drunken candidate who had to be supported through the ceremony of his initiation; of members admitted who could not sign their names, and the like—all these are so many more proofs of what we have said in the course of these remarks, and of what every officer who has lately consecrated a new Lodge has made a point of saying, that it is impossible we can exercise too great an amount of caution in the election of new members.

We have room in our ranks and a hearty welcome for the good men and true who may wish to join us. Let the selfish, the ruffianly, and the disreputable, who will trade on Masonry or violate the principles of the Craft in every act of their daily life, be rigidly excluded.

Had due caution been exercised in the Buninyong Lodge, the scene we have had described to us could not have happened.

Had the same caution been exercised in Devon, the spiteful P.M., the drunken candidate, and the members who cannot sign their names would have been impossibilities.

We are very far from placing the outrageous conduct in the Buninyong Lodge and the exceptional misconduct cited by Bro. Metham on the same level.

They all, however, serve to point to one and the same moral: Be cautious whom you introduce into the ranks of Freemasonry.

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