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Masons shall not confederate themselves in Chapters and Congregations.
Masons were accused of keeping secrets as long ago as the 15th century. In 1425, in the reign of King Henry VI, there was as Act of Parliament entitled ‘Masons shall not confederate themselves in Chapters and Congregations.’‘Confederate themselves’ here means meeting in secret, and Henry VI outlawed such meetings. Well, as he was only four years old in 1425, I feel fairly confident he had very little say in this. Here, from ‘The Constitutions of the Freemasons’ of 1723, is the lead up to this Act, (beginning from the second paragraph of page 33):
That in process of time, when Lodges were more frequent, the right worshipful the Master and Fellows, with consent of the lords of the realm, (for most great men were then Masons) ordained that for the future, at the making or admission of a brother, the Constitution should be read, and the Charges hereunto annexed, by the Master or Warden; and that such as were to be admitted Master Masons, or Masters of Work, should be examined whether they be able of cunning** to serve their respective Lords, as well the lowest as the highest, to the honour and worship of the aforesaid art, and to the profit of their Lords; for they be their Lords that employ and pay them for their service and travel.
** Cunning in the 18th century: skill, knowledge, smart, devious; in the 15th century: healers, diviners, and practitioners of Christian folk magic; this was written in the 18th century.
And besides many other things, the said record adds, that those Charges and laws of Freemasons have been seen and perused by our late Sovereign King Henry VI. and by the Lords of his honourable Council, who have allowed them, and said that they be right good and reasonable to be holden, as they have been drawn out and collected from the records of ancient times.
This footnote is associated with the above text:
In another Manuscript more ancient we read: “That when the Master and Wardens meet in a Lodge, if need be, the Sheriff of the County or the Mayor of the City, or Alderman of the Town in which the Congregation is held, should be made Fellow and Sociate to the Master, in help of him against rebels, and for upbearing the rights of the realm. That Enter’d Prentices at their making were charg’d not to be thieves, or thieves maintainers; that they should travel honestly for their pay, and love their Fellows as themselves, and be true to the King of England, and to the realm, and to the Lodge. That at such congregations it shall be enquir’d whether any Master or Fellow has broke any of the articles agreed to. And if the offender, being duly cited to appear, prove rebel, and will not attend, then the Lodge shall determine against him that he shall forswear (or renounce) his Masonry, and shall no more use this craft; the which, if he presume for to do, the Sheriff of the county shall prison him, and take all his goods into the King’s hands, till his grace be granted him and issued: For this cause principally have these congregations been ordain’d, that as well the lowest as the highest should be well and truly served in this art foresaid throughout all the kingdom of England.”
” Amen, so mote it be.”
In the very next paragraph as Brother Anderson’s ‘History of the Freemasons’ unfolds:
Now, though in the third year of the said King HENRY VI., while an infant of about four years old, the Parliament made an act that affected only the working Masons, who had, contrary to the statutes for labourers, confederated not to work but at their own price and wages; and because such agreements were supposed to be made at the General Lodges, called in the act “Chapters and Congregations of Masons”, it was then thought expedient to level the said act against the said congregations,,,
An entry in these 1723 Constitutions about this Act, written in a footnote referenced to the above, states:
Whereas by yearly Congregation and Confederacies, made by the Masons in their General Assemblies, and the Course and Effect of the Statutes for Labourers be openly violated and broken, in Subversion of the Law, and to the great Damage of all the Commons, our said Sovereign Lord the King, willing in this case to provide a Remedy, by the Advice and Assent aforesaid, and at the special request of the Commons, hath ordained and established, that such Chapters and Congregations shall not be hereafter holden; and if any such be made, that they cause such Chapters and Congregations to be assembled and holden, if they thereof be convict, shall be judged Felons, and that the other Masons that come to such Chapters and Congregations be punished by Imprisonment of their Bodies, and make Fine and Ransom at the Kings Will.
Incidentally, the ‘Statute of labourers Act’ of 1351 was put in place because of the economic difficulties that emerged after the plague of 1348 and was designed to combat rising wages, among other things, and the punishment for felony or treason in 1425 was to be hung, drawn and quartered.
Brother James Anderson’s ‘History’ continues form ‘the said Congregations’ above:
,,,yet when the said King HENRY VI. arrived to man’s estate, the Masons laid before him and his Lords the above-mentioned Records and Charges, who, ’tis plain, reviewed them, and solemnly approved of them as good and reasonable to be holden: Nay, the said King and his Lords must have been incorporated with the Freemasons before they could make such review of the Records; and in this reign, before King HENRY’s troubles, Masons were much encouraged. Nor is there any instance of executing that act in that or in any other reign since, and the Masons never neglected their Lodges for it, nor ever thought it worth while to employ their noble and eminent brethren to have it repealed; because the working Masons that are free of the Lodge scorn to be guilty of such combinations; and the other free Masons have no concern in trespasses against the statutes for labourers.
So as early as 1425 there were plots against masons. Anderson’s rebuttal, in a footnote associated with the above, marked the clergy behind this as ‘illiterate:’
That Act was made in ignorant times, when true learning was a Crime, and Geometry condemned for Conjuration (magic); but it cannot derogate from the Honour of the ancient Fraternity, who to be sure would never encourage such a confederacy of their working brethren. But by tradition it is believed that the Parliament-Men were then too much influenced by the illiterate clergy, who were not accepted Masons, nor understood Architecture (as the clergy of some former age) and generally thought unworthy of this Brotherhood; yet thinking they had an indefeasible right to know the secrets, by virtue of auricular Confession, and the Masons never confessing any thing thereof, the said clergy were highly offended, and at first suspecting them of wickedness represented them as dangerous to the State during that Minority,** and soon influenced the Parliament-Men to lay hold of such supposed arguments of the working Masons, for making an Act that might seem to reflect Dishonour upon even the whole worshipful Fraternity, in whose Favour several Acts had been before and after made.
** child king
Then we learn from the chorus of the ‘Master’s Song’ laid out in these early constitutions that the ‘secrets’ in question were those of the ‘Royal Art’ of stonemasonry; nothing remotely connected to rituals. This meeting was simply the operative masons’ private annual meeting, but it all seemed to have upset these Roman Catholic clergymen.
Pulling this all together, the ‘parliament-men’ of Henry VI were insinuating that Masons met secretly to set a wage for themselves which would have been in complete violation of the ‘Statute of Labourers Act’ of 1351,and the clergy also felt they had an indefeasible right to know the secrets of a stonemason (it normally took around 7 years to master the ‘Royal Art,’) by virtue of auricular Confession and became highly offended, accusing or suspecting stonemasons of wickedness and representing a danger to the State. The Religion in England at this time, as no doubt you are aware, was Roman Catholic Christianity. Stonemasons in Lodges, guilds or companies, apparently held annual meetings, and these were held in private, but as the chorus in the Master’s Song states, the ‘secrets of the Royal Art’ were ‘kept in a mason’s heart’ and ‘belonged in the Ancient Lodge.’
This will lead us into the next nugget, the real reason for secrecy, and it isn’t what you think,,,
These Masonic Nuggets form part of Neptune’s regular meetings and belong copyright of Neptune Lodge, but may be freely read in your open Lodge meetings provided credit is given to the copyright holder.
