Mexico weekly ledger., 1883-02-22
MARTINSBURG MASONRY.
New Hall Dedieated-.Grand Dinner.
DedicatOry Seryices.-Speech by
Judge s. NJ. Edwards.

tNSh I'm $3.50
Of being present at the dedication of
the new Masonic Hall at Martinsburg,
this county. The following Masons
from Mexico were present and took
part: j. Fred. Llewellyn, Judge S.
NJ. Edwards, Clark Barnes, Thos. B.
Buckner, J.J. Haden, Geo. A. Poteet
and r. S. Mcconnell.
The new hall is just completed, and
is one of the neatest in the State. 1t
will soon be elegantly furnished.
About fifty members compose this
lodge, which is called Social Lodge,
No. 266. The officers are: A. j..
w. NJ; j. Elder, S. W.;
J. E. Longmeyer, j. W.; f. P.
French, Treasurer; c. L. Martin,
Owing to the bad roads and high
water, quite a number of Masons were
prevented from being present. The
dinner was sumptuous and elegant.
All present bore abundant testimony
to this, After dinner, Judge S. NJ.
Edwards delivered the following
speech, which was well received:
LADIES, GENTLEMEN AND BRETHREN
You have just witnessed what l do not
doubt to the uninitiated may appear as
mere mummery, if not as mockery-the
solemn dedication of this hall in the name
of the Most High God--to virtue, to
charity, to Freemasony.
You have witnessed one of the rites of
an order that is both ancient, and honora-
BILE, and good, for there is no institution
existing among men founded on better
principles, or built on a more lasting
foundation than that of Freemasonry.
In presenting its claims to the world,
one needs not to employ the rounded pc
Rod, or the graceful flow of splendid
oratory, to command attention.
Every portal in its symbolic temple is a
mouth of %eloquence. Every jewel in its
ritual, a figure of surprising beauty. Its
covering is the bright arch-way to Heaven,
bedecked with stars. Its language is
love, and its truths are eternal.
1t is a matter of wonder that in this age
when human research has explored the
profound myteries of nature; when Sci
ence has gone down into the hidden things
of earth and deciphered the cryptology OF
rocks-when it has gone out into the blue
depths of space and measured the path
way of stars, that Freemasonry has re-
manned a profound secret locked in the
safe repository of the faithful breast.
1t would be matter of establishment
that this institution, if organized by man,
had come down through the ages wrap
ped in the solitude of secrecy, with not a
jewel gone or a light eXtinguished.!
This is an ancient order ripe with honor.
1t is ancient as having existed from time
immemorial, and honorable as tending SC
to render all men who will conform to its
principles. But l am not one of those
who would give it a birthplace amidst the
perennial blooms of Eden. I do not trace
IS origin from the mythology of the a n
| clients, or the Egyptian mysteries, as some
do. These, though religious in their ten
dency, were mere tests of physical endu.
rance, being subjected to torture that
man would not endure to-day. This, be-
cause the elements were their gods. But
ours is an intelligent-a moral God. W.
knOtc whom ICE serve. We look now, al
did the builders at Jerusalem, through
the same faith to the one true and lrins
God. 1t was at the building of the House
and City of our God that men were frs
taught to ''act upon the plumb" tt
stsquare their lives by the square of vir'
tue,'' and to eft their spirits as livins
stores for that house whose maker ant
builder was God" Here we were taught t.
expect life and immortality, in the resur
r%ection, through the strength of the "lioi
of the tribe of Juda."
1t is divine in its origin-GOd dion
fashioned "the House." Its ritual point
through the mists of a thousand years
with the precision of revelation itself, t.
the coming and merits of the world
Savior, and that, through His strength
we might be raised from darkness an
death to light and immortality.
Many societies resembling it hav
served their brief hour and passed away
They were of the earth, earthly-fo
what mortal can design like God? Wha
man can build like Him who laid tn
foundations of the earth and marke,
through the trackless wilds of space
pathway for the stars? What finite eve
conceived in such wisdom, erected i
such strength or adorned with sue
beauty, an edifice like Masonry?
Other orders and societies have felt tn
touch of time and faded from the worlG
but F~reemasonry has lived on. Neithe
the rage of fanatics, the sneers of tn
world, the hate of the devil, or the anath
emas of the Pope, have checked its cours
or clouded its usefulness. Dominion
and powers have crumbled and decayet
republics and monarchies nave revolte
and changed, the upheavals of societ
nave r~evolutionized even thought itseli
but Masonry has kept its even marc
along the centuries, and comes down t
SC gus to-day with not u single cope ston
eil5saedEwith not a single hieroglyphi
n car hight
Discord and di~sunioraay disrupt tn
u state, religion may have E@North ali
South, but hand will grasp hanosa Ma
sonic greetings, even across the 'blool
If chasm."
Its dominion is universal. From t
sacred Gauges to the glaciers of {
North, from the historic hills of jul
It to the silver mountains of the far Wes,,a
sound of the same mystic gavel is horr
q No test but that of full manhood, and
belief in the one true God. A creed
l. simple, so pure, so good, that it has col
mended itself to thinking men of eve
age, nationality and chinese that it m
" truthfully be said to "extend from t
o East to the West, and between the Nor
and the So;;th."
Its principles are so interviewer wi
religion, that we are constrained to p
1t to Deity a rational homage. The Mas,