A VAIN DEFENCE.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XIX, Issue 25, 20 March 1891, Page 17

A VAIN DEFENCE.

perceive from a quotation given by our contemporary, the Dunedin Evening Star, that a condemnation of Freemasonry, repeated in the Lenten Pastoral of the Bishop of Sandhurst has been the subject of a protest made by the officials of certain Victorian Lodges. The protest is of the usual kind, denying in toto that there is any evil whatever connected with the system condemned, and claiming for it the highest possible share if not the monopoly of all Christian virtues. The London Times, nevertheless, a few years ago, emphatically contradicted the statement commonly advanced to the effect that the Society is one solely or even chiefly organised for benevolent purposes, and explicitly ascribed to it a wider field of action As to the disavowal made by English-speaking Lodges, moreover, of association with the openly declared atheistic Lodges of Continental Europe — its worth may be gathered from palpable facto. We pee, for inpfange, that the programme drawn,

up by the atheistic Lodges, avowedly for the destruction of Christianity, is adopted and fervently carried into practice in places where the English-speaking Lodges are influential. We see, besides, that, although, as in the case of the Grand Orient — now disowned by the Prince of Wales — the corporate intrusion of the foreign Lodges may be re&ist^d, individual members from such Lodg^w, without any ehangp of tenets, are welcomed, and embraced, and assigned a leading position by the mrmbers of English-speaking Lodges. The protestation, therefore, of English-speaking Lodges is of little avail. It consists of words plainly opposed by facts, and its value may easily be calculated. The protest of the Victorian Lodges, however, to which we refer, is chiefly remarkable for an appeal made in it to authority. The richness of the following passage, for example, is hardly to be surpassed :—": — " If Bishop Crane," says the protest, " were cognisant of the fact that the monarch of our own proud and mighty Empire is the ' Defender of the Faith,' and that the heir apparent is the elected head of the Masonic body in England, he would not, as a loyal subject, suppose his prospective sovereign to be one who would play the two-faced part of defender of the faith and destroyer of it."— Alas, for the title of " Defender of the Faith" borne by the head of a Church who, as such, has performed the duties of the office no better than they have been performed in England. Our contemporary the New Zealand Presbyterian, for example, in an article to which we have already alluded, attributes the necessity existing for General Booth's Bcheine, to the defalcation of the Anglican Church. " But that Church," says our contemporary, " fell, after the Revolution, into the sterility of spiritual death." And what, indeed, was to be expected under the guidance of a head so appointed, a head usurping a title that had been conferred upon a Catholic monarch by the Pope for a defence made by him of the Catholic faith ? The English monarch, as we see, had not even been able to defend the Church he himself had created. Even should the prospective sovereign of England wilfully play the part of destroyer of the faith, he would not do much worse than the actual sovereigns who, as we are told, permitted it to suffer the " sterility of spiritual death." We, however, accuse his Royal Highness the Prince of Wales of no such malign intentions. At worst, and as we indeed believe, also at best, he plays no more than the part played by other well-meaning men who join the Society — that is, that of being uiade tho reputable cover under whose unsuspecting shelter infinite mischief is done.

The other authority, to which appeal is made by protest, is that of King Frederick 11., of Prrssia, sometimes known as Frederick the Great. But possibly, the value of tbe opinions of the friend and pupil of Voltaire with respect to the injurious effect of any system on Chrstianity, may be too apparent to require comment. We fail also to see how the King alluded to was particularly qualified to pronounce judgment, as this protest tells us he did, respecting the acquirement of qualities necessary for the formation of a better husband and father. It would, indeed, be hard ti> find in history a potentate less authorised, either by circumstances or character, to offer an opinion worth having on the subject. By groundless claims, gratuitous demands, and an appeal to empty authority, therefore, do the Victorian Lodges reply to the Bishop's condemnation. But in every defence of Freemasonry offered the tactics and substance are the same. The vanity of the defence,, indeed, invariably justifies the condemnation made of the system.