That Religion in Which All Men Agree: Freemasonry in American Culture

3. A Private World of Ritual, 1797–1825

84 In the early nineteenth century, American Freemasonry developed an extensive ritual life. The perfunctory ceremonies carried out in rented rooms of colonial taverns now took as much as several hours to perform , in elegantly decorated sanctuaries in permanent lodge buildings. Ceremonial dress, dramatic action, sensual imagery, mysterious symbols , and symbolic objects now came into play. This was especially true of the new Royal Arch degrees, which were higher than those previously available and whose initiatory steps advanced a select few along a path of moral and spiritual enlightenment toward the discovery of ancient wisdom. These rituals led the brotherhood back to its seventeenth -century longing for ancient wisdom and forward to romanticism ’s search for one’s true identity through deep feelings. Candidates were introduced to what they believed to be primordial truth, from the beginning of time; at the same time, the new ceremonies employed violent emotional attacks to break down the initiate’s defenses and allow him to arrive at an interior self.1 This new emphasis on ritual encouraged the creation of a separate ceremonial world. The transformation of Masonic rituals contributed to several significant developments amid the religious pluralism and social disorder of the early nineteenth century. In its emphasis on the recovery and restoration of ancient truth, postwar Masonry resembled Protestant primitivism . In the early nineteenth century, a variety of religious groups— including the Mormons, the Disciples of Christ, and the Landmark chapter 3 A Private World of Ritual, 1797–1825 A Private World of Ritual | 85 Baptists—embraced efforts to restore the church’s ancient foundations. This impulse signaled the failure of Enlightenment attempts to advance reason over primeval wisdom. At the same time, the revivalists of the Second Great Awakening sought to penetrate to the hearts of “sinners” and to provoke strong emotions in their congregants, who would thus reach their inner selves. Though taken from ancient times, Freemasonry ’s new rituals paralleled such forward-pointing tendencies in Evangelicalism . The evolution of this ritual world also contributed to the early nineteenth-century emergence of private spheres. Though historians have given much attention to the gradual development of a female world of pious domesticity apart from public life, the creation of Freemasonry ’s ceremonial life carved out a parallel realm for men. Taking place alongside rather than replacing the lodge’s public purposes, the new rituals marked a new movement of men between a homosocial private world and participation in public life. In the early years of the republic, this movement was paralleled by the efforts of women to enter into public life, as educators, editors, and moral reformers. Though Masonic men continued to be prominent in public life, as the century progressed, both Freemasons and elite women became identified with their respective intimate private worlds. new rituals The impetus for the revision of American Masonic ceremonies originated in England. Prior to the transformation in 1717 from a guild of craft masons to a fraternity of gentlemen, operative masonry had but the “meagre ritual” of two rites “intended to embody merely methods of recognition.” The new speculative Masons expanded these into three degree ceremonies.2 By the 1760s, however, some believed that the elementary nature of the new rites, coupled with the convivial ethos of the lodge, had resulted in their being “sunk into oblivion” through “inattention .”3 To remedy this situation, William Preston, an editor by trade and the master of several London Ancient lodges, worked with his friends to gather old Masonic documents, corresponded with Masonic leaders, and observed lodge ceremonies throughout England. He collated what he found, added his own thoughts and observations, and then worked his material into a system.4 Though forbidden to reveal the content of his three degree rites, which would have been “violating the Laws of the Order,” Preston designed his Illustrations of Masonry (1772) to “illustrate” that the “Craft” was intended to teach moral 86 | European American Freemasonry lessons and improve the character of its members through lectures and ceremonies.5 For the next hundred years, the many American editions of this work provided the foundation for American Masonic ritual life. Preston’s rituals for the three degrees—Entered Apprentice, Fellow Craftsman, and Master Mason—collectively known as Craft Masonry (and later as Blue Lodge Masonry, in reference to the traditional color of the regalia in lodges derived from English or Irish Freemasonry), took place in a large rectangular lodge room, which...