The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1897-01-13
The CONSISTORY
COMMUNICATION
Masons of the Highest De-
gree Meet in the Tenn
pie To-Day.
A Brief Sketch of the Scottish
Rite on the Pacific
Coast.
Some of the Men Who Have Attained
Some of the Highest Hone rs.
Grand Registrar Kobe.

The annual communication OF the
Grand Consistory, masters OF the royal
secret, thirty-second degree, Ancient and
Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry OF
the State of California. will be held in the
Masonic Temple in this City commencing
at o'clock this afternoon.
The Grand Consistory represents one Of
the highest degrees. of Freemasonry and
it requires a perfection of knowledge of
Masonry and Masonic law to enable a
candidate to receive the degrees that will
entitle him to a place in that high body.
Outside OF the order there are but few
who have any conception of what the
beautiful work of the higher degrees is or
can appreciate it.
The Grand Consistory celebrated its
silver anniversary on the 18th of October,
1885, with a literary programme and
music, which was followed by banquet
IN the banquet hall of the temple. One OF
the grand ministers of state IN his annual
Grafton gave the following very interest
ing review of the Ancient and Accepted
Scottish Rite of Freemasonry of the Pacific
Coast:
Scottish Freemasonry in this as well as in
the mother countries of England, Scotland and
degrees of the so-called york Rite" From
the earliest times, since the so-calied Revival
of Freemasonry" in 1717. in the absorption
and modification of the Blue degrees, freed
from the strain OF alternate Stuart and Han
oyerian bias, which divided the followers OF
the rival contestants for the British crown in
the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and
which rent the Grand Lodge OF England for
seyenty-four years in twain into ''Ancients"
and "Moderns," with bitter hatred and at
! war with each other-with divided streams of
rad tn NIn
MES, that were never united in this country
until after the War OF the Revolution for
American independence, and which sew
cred al Masonic as we'll as political allie
glance to the mother country, when
american Union Lodge No. J." set up
for itself and formulated and modified its
rituals, lectures, charges and Jurisprudence:
each State improving and changing the work
to suit itself, and to assert its sovereign author
ity over its own territory. Thus we Inherited
American Permanently from our patriotic
fathers of the Revolution, at whose head as Its
noblest exemplar was the Father of his Coun.
try" the immortal Washington.
The spirit of liberty, equality and fraternity
pervaded the military lodges of Freemasonry
that accompanied the Continental Army, in
which many of the soldiers of our then French
| allies embraced the opportunity of becoming
mem bers, including Lafayette and other dis
tineuished generals and officers, and they
| affiliated with the brethren on their return to
France. where our patriotic brother, njamin
Franklin, WAS ambassador TO that country,
and while serving his own in that official ca
pacity was also actively engaged in Masonic
work in the lodges of Paris.
Our Scottish rite, including the rite of Per-
| lection came from France 10 America almost
| as early as the Blue degrees from Eng and and
Scotland; but Immediately after the Reign OF
Terror, when all the regular Masonic bodies
were wiped out of existence in France, and all
| authority ceasing, the deputy inspector-gen-
eral of the Grand Consistory of Paris, under
original patents of au thority, propagated the
rite in the French West Indies and along the
Atlantic coast OF America, when at Charleston,
s. c.. on May 81, 1901, there then being nc
other authority but themselves in the rite,
and those of the same rank, assumed full SOW
ereign powers and constituted themselves into
the "Supreme Council of the thirty third de-
gree of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish rite
of Freemasonry for the United States of Amer
ica," and from which all regular supreme