SIR R. STOUT AND THE MASONS.

Evening Star, Issue 8267, 12 July 1890, Page 2 (Supplement)

SIR R. STOUT AND THE MASONS.

* We have been asked to republish the following, which appeared in the Napier ' Telegraph ' : My attention has been called to a subleader in your paper referring to the formal installation of the Lodge L'Amour de la Verite, under the Grand Orient of France. Your article shows that you have never read

the c Hook of Constitutions of the Grand Orient,' This lodge was opened as a provisional lodge, at least eight months before anything was heard of the New Zealand Grand Lodge movement, so that your remarks as to the effect of this movement are as wide of the mark as your interpretation of the Grand Orient's principles. To show your readers what are some of the guiding principles of this Order, let me quote a few passages from its rules. It lays this down as its foundation : "La Franc-Masonnerie, institution essentiellement philantropique, philosophique, et progressive, a pour objet la recherche de la verite, I'etude de la morale et la pratique de la solidarite; elle travaille a l'amelioration materielle et morale, au perfectionnement iutellectuel et social de I'huinanite. Elle a pour principes la tolerance mutuelle, le respect des autres et de soi-meme, )a liberty absolue de conscience." I especially call your attention to the following:— "Considerant les conceptions metaphyßiqueß comme etant du domaine exclusif de l'apprqciation individuelle de ses membree, elle se refuse & toute affirmation dogmatique." No one can be admitted to a Grand Orient Lodge unless amongst other things the candidate is (1) of irreproachable character. (2) has means of honorable existence, and (3) possesses sufficient education to understand Masonic teaching. It is not Atheistic, as you will see from the extract I have given you. It is just like our State schools —Becular, leaving all religious views to the individual conscience, and I am not aware of any Atheists who I are members of bur lodge. They can be

admitted so far as their opinions are concerned. Sir, had you been a true Mason you could not have written the article, for the second quotation I have made from our rules is Masonic.

Let me only add that that the meeting was held on Sunday aa we could not get the hall on Monday, but it was once asked "la it lawful to do good on the Sabbath Day ?" Can you answer this question ? When newspapers cease to bo printed on Sunday evenings, and the newspaper offices are closed on the first day of the week, then will be the time for a journalist to find fault with a lodge meeting on Sunday. At present many of your brethren work on Sunday. Do you not think that you might try and reform your confreres before you begin to teach the members of the Grand Orient what you deem their duty in this respect.—l am, etc., Robert Stout. To which tho * Telegraph' replied editorially :—" Sir Robert's letter bears out every word that we said of that constitution, and all that Sir Robert can urge in its favor is that the principle upon which it is founded is no worse than that which regulates our State schools ! Sir Robert seems to be oblivious of the fact that that secular principle is antagonistic to Masonry as

known to Englishmen. . . . We desire to state that the order of the Grand Lodge of Ireland denouncing the Grand Orient of France for the adoption of the secular principle is still in force, and forbids the admission of its members into lodges under the Irish Constitution. That order is ideutical with those which were issued by the Grand Lodges of England and Scotland. The introduction of the Constitution of the Grand Orient of France into this colony creates a schism in the ranks of New Zealand Masonry, and diverts to a. foreign country funds which should be devoted to the good of those who belong to the same race as that from which Sir Robert and his officers spring."