The Evening dispatch. [volume] (Provo, City, Utah) 1891-1895, 1894-01-18
PROVO CITY. JAN. IS. 1894
MASONRY AS A MORAL FORCE.

Masonry has existed, and we have
authentic record of it for five thousand
years, and always as a humanizing,
elevating and benignant influence.
Caring In one hand relief to tie
wretched, confidence to the wavering
and hope to the dispairing, and in the
other food for the hungry. These
blessed influences are distributed to
the high, the low, the wise, the foolish,
the rich and the poor alike, and with
the most perfect impartiality. All ages
of the world, all lands and all ranks in
life have shared in the good gifts Ma
sonry have brought to man. Its blessed
lessons teach federation. hberality,
charity, the protection of the poor and
the wretched, the guidance of the foot
steps of the young, the safety Of
woman, veneration of the aged and the
virtuous, Masonry also teaches the
most exalted patriotism, regard fer
legal authority and devotion to home
and fatherland, which are charming
and useful traits in any citizenship.
She has advanced her banners wher-
ever civilization has penetrated. In
faraway India, in sealed China, in
Japan. in darkest Africa, in intoler-
aut Russia, in imperial Germany, in
France, Italy. England, in the wilds
of South America, in Mexico, but es-
pecially in our grand young republic
has Masonry shed her benignant light
with most effect. Her offices have
been worldwide, and always with
blessings to those who have been wise
enough to set up her altars in the
land.
No other earthly order Or influence
has been more potent, indeed half as
potent, in subduing this western wild
,erness and in setting up in these wild
erness wilds the banners of civilized
and christian government. In the days
when savsgery claimed these immense
mountain and desert regions, when
settlements we're sparse and widely
separated, when each man was law
unto himself, 1T was always a noted fact
that civilization and the law and order
influences in her wake were more
potent, were sooner and more perfectly
set up in those places where masonry
had first erected her sacred affairs.
The fact is her mission to the world
has been benefcent, but no where has
it been more valuable or greater than
here upon this western frontier.
Like the church masonry has had
her black sheep in the flock, but the
general membership has always con-
sisted of the best men in the COM
munities where it has been introduced
and it is not to be condemned because
unworthy men sometimes pass her
sacred portals. All patriotic moral
and legal influences in the land have
been placed under great obligations
to this silent, unheralded, but potent
body of men working ceaselessly for
the relief, upbuiiding and improvement
of their fellow men, as we'll as for the
gloriication, protection and dignifying
of womankind, the publication of our
homes and the security of their pre-
cincts. Masonry is great thing for
men, but for women its greater use
fullness and most perfect offices are
reserved.
We are glad to see young Utah fos-
te ring and caring for our noble
order. Every lodge set up but adds
that much more to the inviting infu-
ences so thickly scattered abroad in our
bright, sunny, young commonwealth.