PREHISTORIC MASONRY

CHAPTER XXXI

THE JESUITS IN FREEMASONRY

The opinion has been entertained by several writers of eminence that theCompany of Jesus, more briefly styled the Jesuits, sought, about the endof the 17th and the beginning of the 18th century, to mingle with theFreemasons and to bend the objects of that Institution to the ambitiousdesigns of their own Order. This view has been denied by other writers of equal eminence, though it is admitted that Roman Catholic, if not jesuitical, features are to be found in some of the high degrees.

It is contended by one German writer that the object of the Jesuits in seeking a control of the Masonic Institution was that they might be thus assisted in their design of establishing an aristocracy within themselves, and that they sought to accomplish this object by securing not only the direction of the Masonic Lodges, but also by obtaining a monopoly of the schools and churches, and all the pursuits of science, and even of business.

But the more generally accepted reason for this attempted interference with the Lodges is that they thus sought by their influence and secret working to aid the Stuarts to regain the throne, and then, as an expected result, to re-establish the Roman Catholic religion in England.

The first of these explanations is certainly more satisfactory than the second. While there is a great want of historical testimony to prove that the jesuits ever mingled with Freemasonry--a question to be hereafter decided-there is no doubt of the egotistical and ambitious designs (Of the disciples of Loyola to secure a control of the public and private affairs of every government where they could obtain a foothold. It was a knowledge of these designs that led to the unpopularity of the Order among even Catholic sovereigns and caused its total suppression, in 1773, by Pope Clement XIV., from which it was not relieved until 1814, when their privileges were renewed by Pope Pius VII.

But I think that we must concur with Gadeike in the conclusion to which he had arrived, that it is proved by history to be a falsehood that Freemasonry was ever concealed under the mask of Jesuitism, or that it derived its existence from that source. (1) It is, however, but fair that we should collate and compare the arguments on both sides.
Robison, who, where Masonry was concerned, could find a specter in every bush, is, of course, of very little authority as to facts ; but he may supply us with a record of the opinions which were prevalent at the time of his writing. He says that when James II fled from England to France, which was in 1688, his adherents took Freemasonry with them to the continent, where it was received and cultivated by the French in a manner suited to the tastes and habits of that people. But he adds that " at this time, also, the Jesuits took a more active hand in Freemasonry than ever. They insinuated themselves into the English Lodges, where they were caressed by the Catholics, who panted after the re-establishment of their faith, and tolerated by the Protestant royalists, who thought no concession too great a compensation for their services.

At this time changes were made in some of the Masonic symbols, particularly in the tracing of the Lodge, which bear evident marks of Jesuitical interference. (2)Speaking of the High Degrees, the fabrication of which, however, he greatly antedates, he says that " in all this progressive mummery we see much of the hand of the Jesuits, and it would seem that it was encouraged by the church." (3) But he thinks that the Masons, protected by their secrecy, ventured further than the clergy approved in their philosophical interpretations of the symbols, opposing at last some of " the ridiculous and oppressive superstitions of the church," (4) and thus he accounts for the persecution of Freemasonry at a later period by the priests, and their attempts to suppress the Lodges.
(1) "Freimaurer Lexicon," art. "Jesuiten."
(2) "Proofs of a Conspiracy," p. 27
(3) Ibid., p. 30
(4) Ibid

The story, as thus narrated by Robison, is substantially that which has been accepted by all writers who trace the origin of Freemasonry to the Jesuits. They affirm, as we have seen, that it was instituted about the time of the expulsion of James II. from England, or that if it was not then fabricated as a secret society, it was at Icast modified in all its features from that form which it originally had in England, and was adapted as a political engine to aid in the restoration of the exiled monarch and in the establishment in his recovered kingdom of the Roman Catholic religion.

These theorists have evidently confounded primitive Speculative Masonry, consisting only of three degrees, with the supplementary grades invented subsequently by Ramsay and the ritualists who succeeded him. But even if we relieve the theory of the connsbn and view it as affirming that the Jesuits at the College of Clermont modified the third degree and invented others, such as the Scottish Knight of St. Andrew, for the purpose of restoring James II. to the throne, we shall find no scintilla of evidence in history to support this view, but, on the contrary, obstacles in the way of anachronisms which it will be impossible to overcome.

James II abdicated the throne in 1688, and, after an abortive attempt to recover it by an unsuccessful invasion of Ireland, took up his residence at the Chateau of St. Germain-en-Laye, in France, where he died in 1701.

Between the two periods of 1688, when James abdicated, and 1701, when he died, no one has been enabled to find either in England or elsewhere any trace of a third degree. Indeed, I am very sure it can be proved that this degree was not invented until 1721 or 1722. It is, therefore, absolutely impossible that any modification could have been made in the latter part of the 17th century of that which did not exist until the beginning of the 18th. And if there was no Speculative Masonry, as distinguished from the Operative Art practiced by the mediaeval guilds, during the lifetime of James, it is equally absurd to contend that supplementary grades were invented to illustrate and complete a superstructure whose foundations had not yet been laid.

The theory that the Jesuits in the 17th century had invented Freemasonry for the purpose of effecting one of their ambitious projects, or that they had taken it as it then existed, changed it, and added to it for the same purpose, is absolutely untenable.Another theory has been advanced which accounts for the establishment of what has been called " Jesuitic Masonry," at about the middle of the 18th century. This theory is certainly free from the absurd anachronisms which we encounter in the former, although the proofs that there ever was such a Masonry are still very unsatisfactory.

It has been maintained that this notion of the intrusion, as it may well be called, of the Jesuits into the Masonic Order has been attributed to the Illuminati, that secret society which was established by Adam Weishaupt in Bavaria about the year 1776.The original object of this society was, as its founder declared, to enable its members to attain the greatest possible amount of virtue, and by the association of good men to oppose the progress of moral evil. To give it influence it was connected with Freemasonry, whose symbolic degrees formed the substratum of its esoteric instructions.

This has led it incorrectly to be deemed a Masonic Rite; it could really lay no claim to that character, except inasmuch as it required a previous initiation into the symbolic degrees to entitle its disciples to further advancement.
The charges made against it, that it was a political organization, and that one of its deigns was to undermine the Christian religion, although strenuously maintained by Barruel, Robison, and a host of other adversaries, have no foundation in truth. The principles of the order were liberal and philosophical, but neither revolutionary nor anti-Christian.

As the defender of free thought, it came of course into conflict with the Roman Catholic Church and the Company of Jesus, whose tendencies were altogether the other way. The priests, therefore, became its most active enemies, and their opposition was so successful that it was suppressed in 1784.
There was also between Illuminism and the many Masonic Rites, which about the period of its popularity were constantly arising in Germany and in France, a species of rivalry. With the natural egotism of reformers, the Illuminati sought to prove the superiority of their own system to that of their rivals.

With this view they proclaimed that all the Lodges of Free. masons were secretly controlled by the Jesuits ; that their laws and their mysteries were the inventions of the same Order, of whom every Freemason was unconsciously the slave and the instrument.
Hence they concluded that he who desired to possess the genuine mysteries of Masonry must seek them not among the degrees of Rose Croix or the Scottish Knights, or still less among the English Masons and the disciples of the Rite of Strict Observance in Germany, but only in the Eclectic Lodges that had been instituted by the Illuminati. Such, says Barruel, was the doctrine of the Illuminati, advanced for the purpose of elevating the character and aims of their own institution.

The French abbe is not generally trustworthy on any subject connected, with Freemasonry, of which he was the avowed and implacable foe, but we must acknowledge that he was not far from wrong in calling this story of Jesuitic Masonry " a ridiculous and contemptible fable."
For once we are disposed to agree with him, when he says in his fervent declamation, " If prejudice did not sometimes destroy the faculty of reasoning, we should be astonished that the Freemasons could permit themselves to be ensnared in so clumsy a trap.

What is it, in fact, but to say to the Mother Lodge of Edinburgh, to the Grand Lodges of London and York, to their rulers, and to all their Grand Masters:
You thought that you held the reins of the Masonic world, and you looked upon yourselves as the great depository of its secrets, the distributors of its diplomas ; but you are not so, and, without even knowing it, are merely puppets of which the Jesuits hold the leading-strings, and which they move at their pleasure.'" (1)

I think that with a little trouble we may be able to solve this apparently difficult problem of the Jesuitical interference with Freemasonry.

The Jesuits appear to have taken the priests of Egypt for their model. Like them, they sought to be the conservators and the interpreters of religion. The vows which they took attached them to their Order with bonds as indissoluble as those that united the Egyptian priests in the sacred college of Memphis.
Those who sought admission into their company were compelled to pass through trials of their fortitude and fidelity. Their ambition was as indomitable as their cunning was astute.
They strove to be the confessors and the counsellors of kings, and to control the education of youth, that by these means they might become of importance in the state, and direct the policy of every government where they

were admitted. And this policy was on all occasions to be made subservient to the interests of the church.
At one time they had not less than an hundred schools or colleges in France, the most important being that of Clermont, which, though at one time suppressed, had received renewed letters patent from Louis XIV.

(1) "Memoires pour servir a l'Histoire du Jacobanisme," T.N., p. 291

It was this College of Clermont, where James II. was a frequent guest, led there by his religious feelings, that is said to have been the seat of that conspiracy of the Stuart faction which was to terminate either in the invention or the adoption of Freemasonry as a means of restoring the monarch to his throne, and of resuscitating the Roman Catholic religion in heretical England.
Now we may readily admit that the Jesuits were exceedingly anxious to accomplish both these objects, and that for that purpose they would enter into any intrigue which would probably lead to success. With this design there can be but little doubt that they united with the adherents of the Stuarts.

But this conspiracy could not have had any reference to a Masonic organization, because Freemasonry was during the life of James II. wholly unknown in France, and known in England only as a guild of Operative Masons, into which a few non-Masons had been admitted through courtesy.
It certainly had not yet assumed the form in which we are called upon to recognize it as the political engine used by the Jesuits. The Grand Lodge of England, the mother of all modern Speculative Masonry, had no existence until 1717, or sixteen years after the death of the king.

We are bound, therefore, if on the ground of an anachronism alone, to repudiate any theory that connects the Jesuits with Freemasonry during the life of James II., although we may be ready to admit their political conspiracy in the interests of that dethroned monarch.
During the life of his son and putative successor, the titular James III., Speculative Masonry was established in England and passed over into France.

The Lodge established in Paris in 1725 was, I have no doubt, an organization of the adherents of the Stuart family, as has already been shown. It is probable that most of the members were Catholics and under the influence of the Jesuits.
But it is not likely that those priests took an active part in the internal organization of the Lodge. They could do their work better outside of it than within it. In the Rose Croix and some other of the High Degrees we find the influences of a Roman Catholic spirit in the original rituals, but this might naturally arise from the religious tendencies of their founders, and did not require the special aid of Jesuitism.

After the year 1738 the bull of excommunication of Pope Clement XII. must have precluded the Jesuits from all connection with Freemasonry except as its denouncers and persecutors, parts which up to the present day they have uninterruptedly played.
In conclusion we must, I think, refuse to accept the theory which makes a friendly connection between Freemasonry and Jesuitism as one of those mythical stories which, born in the imagination of its inventors, has been fostered only by the credulity of its believers.

At this day I doubt if there is a Masonic scholar who would accept it as more it as a fable not even " cunningly devised," though there was a time when it was received as a part of the authentic history of Freemasonry.