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 FROM THE 
 
 BENNO LOEWY LIBRARY 
 
 COLLECTED BY 
 
 BENNO LOEWY 
 
 18S4-1919 
 BEQUEATHED TO CORNELL UNIVERSITY 
 
Cornell University Library 
 HS397 .T98 
 Address at the installation of officere 
 
 3 1924 030 280 857 
 olin,anx °''^ 
 
017969 
 
ADDRESS 
 
 Installation of Officers 
 
 Prince of Orange Lodge 
 
 No. 16, 
 NEW YORK CITY, 
 
 December 29, A. L. 5866. 
 
 By Rev. STEPHEN H. TYNG, Jr., 
 
 CHAPLAIN. 
 
 BALDWIN & JONES, PRINTERS, 114 FULTON STREET. 
 1867 
 
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year I867, by E. E. THORNE, in the Office of the District Court of 
 the United States, for the Southern District of New York. 
 
COkRESPONDENCE. 
 
 Rev. Stephen H. Tyng, Jr., 
 
 Dear Sir and Brother: 
 
 At a Regular Communication of Prince 
 of Orange Lodge No. 16, F.-.A.-.M., holden January 3d, A. L. 5867, 
 the following resolutions were offered and unanimously adopted : 
 
 "Resolved, That the thanks of the Lodge be tendered to our Brother, Rev. 
 " Stephen H. Tyng, ]v..,for the very able and highly interesting Address delivered 
 " at the late Installation of Officers of this Lodge." 
 
 " Resolved, That a Committee of three be appointed to wait upon Brother Tyng, 
 " and request the manuscript for publication. " 
 
 In accordance with their duty, the undersigned, appointed as 
 such Committee, would respectfully request your favorable response. 
 
 Very truly and fraternally yours, 
 
 ELLWOOD E. THORNE, 
 JOHN P. ROBERTS, 
 GEORGE H. FERINE. 
 
 Rectory of the Church of the Holy Trinity, 
 New York, February 5th, 1867. 
 
 W.-.M.-.E. E. Thorne, 
 
 John P. Roberts, 
 
 George H. Perine, 
 
 Brethren : 
 
 The Address was written for our Lodge, and 
 
 belongs of right to you. Whilst I hesitate in permitting its publication 
 
 from personal motives, yet for the sake of the principles it advocates, 
 
 1 gladly consent. That it may be made useful is the only desire of 
 
 Your Brother in Masonic bonds, 
 
 STEPHEN H. TYNG, Jr. 
 
X" 
 
 »/ 
 
 Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of this book is in 
 the Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924030280857 
 
ADDRESS 
 
 Worshipful Sir, 
 
 Ladies, Gentlemen and Brethren : 
 
 I respond with pleasure to your call, as I 
 strive to answer every summons from the East. — 
 But I must remind you at the outset that you have 
 devolved the important office of addressing words 
 of welcome and explanation to our friends from 
 without, upon one whose ashlar is still very rough, 
 whose gavel is often idle, and whose trowel some- 
 times sadly spreads untempered mortar. Yet, whilst 
 I wear the apron, and, still more, the collar, may 
 my will bow most submissively to Masonic require- 
 ments and the orders of the Worshipful Master. 
 This service of reverence to our ancient ritual is as 
 peculiarly congenial to my feelings as it transcends 
 my abilities. I must, therefore, whilst as a servant 
 looking to the hands of the Master, crave the indul- 
 gence of the brethren, whose affection has thus 
 honored me in the Lodge. 
 
Just one year ago I was installed as the Chap- 
 lain of this Lodge. And I was then instructed 
 that " it was my duty to perform those solemn 
 services which we should constantly render to our 
 Infinite Creator," and which, when offered by one 
 whose holy profession is "to point to heaven and 
 lead the way," may, by refining our souls, strength- 
 ening our virtues, and purifying our minds, prepare 
 us for admission into the society of those above, 
 whose happiness will be as endless as it is perfect. 
 The insignia, which I have since that day worn, has 
 rebuked me many a time for slothfulness in the ful- 
 fillment of my mission. The open Bible is always 
 on my bosom, its love is in my heart, and its words 
 of life shall be on my lips. And now that I am to 
 speak, that must speak for me. The Great Light 
 must shine ; and in its light we shall see light. 
 
 Whether expressed or unexpressed, there is a 
 fear in the minds of many that an actual antagonism 
 exists between Masonry and Christianity. And the 
 question is often mooted whether a Christian, much 
 more a Christian Minister, can sincerely take part 
 in the work of Masonry. This objection does not 
 arise from any moral delinquencies on the part of 
 our members ; for it is conceded by all that the 
 morality of our Art is that of the Mosaic Law and 
 
7 
 
 the Christian Gospels. But it is supported by the 
 failure of Masons to distinguish sometimes between 
 Masonry and Religion ; between the method of our 
 acceptance with God, and the manner of our life 
 with each other. These are two totally different 
 relations. And whilst the Gospel reveals both, 
 Masonry is occupied almost exclusively with the 
 last. The Gospel gives both the motive of grateful 
 love and the line of its manifestation to men. — 
 Masonry applies, by every variety of analogical 
 illustration, the principles which have thus, by a 
 Divine pencil, been made plain. And so far from 
 a collision, there cannot be a more complete con- 
 cord than that which exists between a pure Chris- 
 tian faith and Masonic morals. But the mystery 
 of the temple can never be clearly understood and 
 enjoyed except at the feet of Him about whom 
 Moses in the Law and the Prophets did write. 
 
 But I desire to go beyond this general state- 
 ment, and answer this question more positively and 
 minutely, whilst I address myself for a while to 
 the mission of Masonry in the world of Religious 
 Thought. It cannot help exercising some decided 
 influence, and it should be the duty of all Crafts- 
 men to see that that influence agrees with our 
 ancient history and standards. 
 
8 
 
 I. First of all, Masonry contends for the abso- 
 luteness of Truth. The tendency of the times is 
 greatly averse to this fundamental principle of all 
 knowledge, all morality, as well as all Religion. 
 And so our fraternity are like the builders on the 
 temple's wall : whilst they wield the trowel they 
 must also bear the spear. We are compelled to 
 withstand all those lines of thought which would 
 depreciate the simplicity and fixedness of Truth. 
 The many new discoveries of science have discred- 
 ited old and long accepted theories. Geology has 
 time after time erased its records of the world's 
 birth ; for it has discovered still older indications in 
 the rocks of a Divine origin. And so Chemistry 
 and Natural History have denied their former very 
 positive assertions, as new facts and agents have 
 been brought to light. For centuries have the 
 students of matter chased Truth, alway receding 
 from their grasp ; until, at last, multitudes have 
 come to deny the existence of any positive, inva- 
 riable Truth. And the absurdities of alchemy are 
 regarded, for the day in which they were held, as 
 satisfying as the surer teachings of intelligent re- 
 search in our own times. The change in philoso- 
 phies has advanced among students of mind much 
 the same tendency. And the humility of Newton, 
 
who compared himself to a child picking peb- 
 bles on the beach while the ocean of truth rolled 
 beyond him, has given place to the arrogance of 
 little men exaggerating their own insignificant at- 
 tainments, and discrediting everything else. And 
 when you come to the world of spiritual and moral 
 thought, the absoluteness of truth is become, among 
 the class of whom I speak, almost a myth. Their 
 arbiter is the natural conscience. Whatsoever this 
 dictates is right and true. No allowance is made 
 for its perverted and fallen condition. No admis- 
 sion is permitted of its great need of illumination. 
 There is no standard of appeal from its decisions. 
 And however men may differ in their various 
 views of actions and emotions and principles, all 
 are equally virtuous if each is equally conscien- 
 tious : so that the sincerity of the Chinaman bal- 
 ances that of the Christian; and they are equally 
 children of the Truth, though most antagonistic in 
 their creeds and lives. The result of all such 
 thought is the annihilation of that which is the 
 corner-stone of our Temple. Somewhere there is 
 that which is invariable, inflexible, and most stable ; 
 to believe it is to be faithful — to deny it is to be 
 infidel; to act upon it is to be virtuous — to depart 
 from it is to become vicious. There is no uncer- 
 
lO 
 
 tainty in the teaching of our Order where this much- 
 despised yet sovereign Truth is enshrined. But the 
 fact of its existence is all that I just now affirm.^ 
 What is the testimony of our antiquity ? We are 
 not banded together simply for the purpose of social 
 recognition and mutual support. We have not 
 inherited merely unmeaning forms of ritualistic 
 display, which have nothing but their mysterious 
 secrecy to commend them. Think you there is 
 enthusiasm enough in humanity to continue for 
 so many centuries, amidst all sorts of perils and 
 persecutions, such an organization as this, designed 
 only, or even chiefly, for selfish ends. You make 
 Masonry a far greater mystery than we claim by 
 so supposing. And you have a problem to solve in 
 the existence of this confessedly ancient Order, 
 which will baffle all experience and negative all 
 knowledge of fickle human nature. Nay, it is the 
 love of the Truth, the adherence to the Truth, 
 which has constituted Masonry the miracle it is 
 among all the debris of man's social structures. — 
 Here it stands, just as complete, just as glorious, as 
 when, in the first temple's time, the Widow's Son 
 gave the binding Word. But what is the meaning 
 of all our symbolism } This is not continued for 
 the purpose of amusement and selfish gratification. 
 
II 
 
 These tools of our Craft, and the jewels of our 
 Order, have very solemn meaning. The Officers 
 of the Lodge, from the Tiler at the door to the 
 Worshipful Master in the East, are engaged on 
 very earnest work. This is no nursery for child's 
 play or levity. We wear our aprons, and display 
 our three great and three lesser lights, with very 
 serious ends in view. These are all efforts to 
 preach the Truth. Each is a crystal face of this 
 purest gem. And all are occupied in the manifes- 
 tation of that of which each symbol tells a part. — 
 How comes it, I ask again, that after such long 
 journeyings, and amidst so many adverse influences, 
 this traditional ritual remains so pure, so unaltered ? 
 Other schemes of man's device have had their day, 
 and fallen to rise no more. What is the talisman 
 which explains their destruction and the preserva- 
 tion of this ancient system? Everything in the 
 Lodge answers. Truth, " a Divine attribute, and 
 the foundation of every virtue." For "to be good 
 and true," to buy the truth and sell it not, "is the 
 first lesson we are taught in Masonry." 
 
 IL But a second feature of this mission of Ma- 
 sonry in the world of Religious Thought is its 
 maintenance of the existence and unity of God. — 
 It is not, nor does it pretend to be, a system of 
 
12 
 
 Theology. Its main purpose is the extension and 
 cultivation of man's truest happiness, by revealing 
 in very practical illustrations, a Divine Morality. 
 The relations to each other and the distressed, 
 which it inculcates, are impressed by motives drawn 
 from our higher responsibilities to God. And the 
 existence and moral nature of the Godhead are so far 
 declared and insisted upon as these common influ- 
 ences require. Beyond this, Masons may believe all 
 that there is in the Bible; less than this no Crafts- 
 man can accept. Its protest, therefore, against 
 Atheism is most positive. Its denial of the mate- 
 rial development of this world, and its affirmation 
 of the sovereign act of creation by Him whom it 
 styles the Great Architect of the Universe, are 
 equally uncompromising. For all the blessings of 
 life, it refers us to the Divine care; and for all the 
 comforts in the "starry-decked heaven, where all 
 good Masons hope at last to arrive," it points us to 
 the Divine compassion. You must enter the Lodge 
 in the name of God. And your own confidence, 
 when freely expressed, is met with the assurance 
 that such trust should fear no danger. You are 
 directed to that " ladder which Jacob in his vision 
 saw ascending from earth to heaven, the three 
 principal rounds of which are denominated Faith, 
 
13 
 
 Hope, and Charity : which admonish us to have 
 faith in God, hope in His salvation, and charity to 
 all mankind." You are charged that "there are 
 three great duties which as Masons you are to in- 
 culcate. The first is to God, in never mentioning 
 his name but with that reverential awe which is 
 due from a creature to his Creator; to implore His 
 aid in all your laudable undertakings, and to esteem 
 Him as the chief good." Need I go further in this 
 line of illustration? What is the groundwork of 
 our whole system except the construction of a 
 Temple for the Divine indwelling ? Solomon 
 started the work, and we still labor on the wall. 
 The same God whom the King adored, the cove- 
 nant I AM, is our God forever and ever. The per- 
 fections of Deity are also very clearly declared, so 
 far as is needful for the Masonic scheme, " Wis- 
 dom, Strength and Beauty are about His throne as 
 pillars of His work ; for His wisdom is infinite. His 
 strength is omnipotence, and His beauty shines forth 
 through all His creation in symmetry and order." 
 From Him, as a part of Himself, we receive that 
 Justice which, as "the standard or boundary of 
 right, enables us to render to every man his just due 
 without distinction." In conformity to this exalted 
 Being is the Mason's highest duty, as in His con- 
 
 2 
 
14 
 
 templation is his purest study. To Him he looks 
 as the giver of every temporal, mental and spiritual 
 blessing. And with Him he longs eternally to 
 abide ; and so he is exhorted, whilst as a Mason 
 " doing good to all men, especially to the household 
 of the faithful," to " imitate the Christian in his 
 virtuous and amiable conduct, in his unfeigned 
 piety to God; in his inflexible fidelity to his trust; 
 that he may welcome the grim tyrant Death, and 
 receive him as a kind messenger sent from our Su- 
 preme Grand Master to translate us to that all-per- 
 fect, glorious and celestial Lodge above, where the 
 Supreme Architect of the Universe presides." 
 
 III. A third feature of this mission of Masonry 
 is its unwavering confidence in the plenary inspira- 
 tion of the sacred Scriptures. Thus we ascend 
 from step to step in the things which as Masons we 
 are required to affirm. Whatever uncertainty may 
 surround the place where, the time when, and the 
 person by whom, the Bible was first introduced into 
 our assemblies, there can be no doubt that as far 
 back as we have any reliable written history the 
 Order has looked to the same Great Light. Its 
 historical books mark the different degrees iii our 
 attainment of Masonic mysteries. Its Mosaic Law 
 is the square of our conduct. Its prophecies point 
 
15 
 
 us to glorious revelations in the higher callings of 
 our Craft to be made more plain. With no narrow 
 spirit of propagandism, we place on our altar this 
 Holy Book in all its Christian completeness. We 
 open it at the Book of Ruth. We gather about it 
 at the hour of solemn obligation. We appeal to it 
 as the umpire of our Art. We teach the initiate 
 that it is the "Great Light of Masonry," because 
 we are ourselves taught that "it will guide you to 
 all truth ; it will direct your paths to the temple 
 of happiness, and point out to you the whole duty 
 of man." We hold it precious as the personal rev- 
 elation of God's Law and Love, as not simply con- 
 taining, but being, the Word of God. It is des- 
 cribed to us in our ritual as " the inestimable gift 
 of God to man," given to us as "the rule and 
 guide of our faith and practice," as "the moral 
 and spiritual tressel-board," on which the Great 
 Architect with his own finger drew His designs, 
 and which every workman is bound faithfully to 
 follow. And beyond all this, we have that un- 
 equivocal and unalterable rule : "A Mason is 
 obliged by his tenure to obey the Mora,l Law; and 
 if he rightly understands the Art he will never be 
 a stupid atheist, nor an irreligious libertine." The 
 one is fended from our altar by his disbelief in the 
 
i6 
 
 Deity — -the other cannot be made a Mason because 
 he denies the doctrines of revealed religion. There 
 lies before you this solitary Book upon whose pages 
 the sun never sets, whose beams of grace illumine 
 a sin-ensnared world, adapted to all experiences 
 of human life, adding joy to the marriage festival, 
 and substituting peace for sorrow at the funeral. 
 Childhood approaches it with traditional reverence ; 
 maturity leans upon it as a trusty and well tried 
 staff; and tottering age worships while it clings to 
 it as the friend faithful to uphold in the rolling 
 of Death's dark river. The World's Bible — the 
 Christian's Bible — the Open Bible — the Word of 
 the Living God — is the central thing of the Ma- 
 sonic Lodge and the corner-stone of the Crafts- 
 man's faith. 
 
 IV. The fourth and last point to which I 
 shall ask your attention is the collateral testimony 
 to the Gospel which Free Masonry affords. This 
 is all the Christian has a right to seek. And with 
 the abundance of this sort of evidence he should be 
 fully satisfied. You must remember that in our 
 progress as Masons we are supposed to be passing 
 from one part to another of the Temple which 
 Solomon built. And the symbols of each degree 
 are immediately connected with the porch or the 
 
17 
 
 inner chamber, as we take one after another more 
 advanced step. Doubtless in the religious thought 
 of the Jew all these representations were understood 
 as pointing to a Christ in the fulness of times to 
 come. But the application to the Nazarene of all 
 the former types was not clearly apprehended until 
 the veil of the Temple was rent in twain, and the 
 glories of the Holy Place were revealed to even 
 Gentile gaze. It cannot, therefore, be expected 
 that workmen still without this sanctuary should 
 perceive all those plainer manifestations of dis- 
 tinctly Christian truth which are the privilege and 
 responsibility of the Chapter and the Commandery. 
 We are traveling from the West to the East in 
 search of light. And it is enough for us, as Christ- 
 ians, if every Masonic step brings us nearer to Him 
 whom the Tabernacle and Temple, with all their 
 beauty, but partially prefigured. Just as the Mercy 
 Seat was the extreme attainment of Jewish hope, 
 is the Gospel, which Paul with great plainness des- 
 cribes as the propitiatory Ark above which the 
 Cherubim in adoring reverence bowed, the cul- 
 mination of the Masonic theory, and the logical 
 end to which every faithful brother at last must 
 come. And yet light pierces the dark curtains 
 which conceal from uninitiated sight the gracious 
 
i8 
 
 truth so sacredly preserved. Our present ritual is 
 full of passages which unerringly point to this fuller 
 manifestation. It is a truncated cone, which 
 nothing but that Truth our more excellent breth- 
 ren have attained, can perfectly and symmetrically 
 complete. And so, joyful in the present, we all 
 diligently apply ourselves to reach still higher de- 
 grees in the Craft. For the nearer you come to 
 the East, the sooner will you rejoice in the Perfect 
 Light. 
 
 The presence of the Holy Scriptures, which 
 are admitted by Christendom to foreshadow a 
 Savior, and which were appealed to by Christ him- 
 self as testifying of Him — should be enough to 
 silence the most prejudiced caviller. And the im- 
 mediate necessity which is laid upon every Mason 
 to search them, if he would grow in even our sym- 
 bolic knowledge, is a vast point of Christian gain. 
 Add to this the fact that our two only festival days 
 are the commemoration of two Christians' birth. 
 St. John the Baptist, and St. John the Evangelist, 
 the one who heralded and the other who leaned 
 lovingly on the bosom of Jesus, are honored in 
 the dedication of every Lodge, and are in their 
 lives and writings the parallels of the Mason's path. 
 Then the resurrection of the body, in the likeness 
 
19 
 
 of Him who was the first fruits from the dead, is 
 very unequivocally, whilst typically, impressed. 
 And in our instruction, "the emblems upon the 
 solemn thought of death, which, without revela- 
 tion, is dark and gloomy," are explained with the 
 statement that " the Christian is suddenly revived 
 by the evergreen and ever living sprig of Faith 
 in the merits of the Lion of the tribe of Judah, 
 which strengthens him, with confidence and com- 
 posure, to look forward to a blessed immortality, 
 and doubt not, but in the glorious morn of the 
 resurrection his body will rise, and become as in- 
 corruptible as his soul." And about all this is that 
 atmosphere of Love which is really Christianity, 
 and which has ever been and is now the grand ob- 
 ject of our Order in all its departments. In this 
 spirit of fraternal affection we receive every new 
 brother. We journey with him in the acquisition 
 of Truth, sympathizing in his trials, rejoicing with 
 him when he rejoices — with like aims and hopes 
 and fears. And when we gather about his grave, 
 we cast the evergreen in the place of darkness, ad- 
 monished by our Master, " that though like our 
 brother, whose remains lie before us, we shall soon 
 be clothed in the habiliments of death, and de- 
 posited in the silent tomb, yet through the merits 
 
20 
 
 of a Divine and ascended Savior, we may " confi- 
 dently hope that our souls will bloom in eternal 
 spring." Time will prohibit a farther review of 
 the more advanced gatherings of the Order, but I 
 think we should be surprised to find how these 
 principles of the Blue Lodge effloresce and fructify 
 in the Chapter and the Commandery. Certainly 
 there can be no reasonable doubt that Free Ma- 
 sonry not only recognizes, but inevitably tends to- 
 wards, that remedial scheme we are Divinely taught 
 to call the Gospel. 
 
 Holding forth so prominently these four great 
 features j contending for the absoluteness of Truth, 
 maintaining the Existence and Unity of God, 
 affirming the Inspiration of the Sacred Scriptures, 
 and testifying unerringly to the Christian Gospel 
 — it is .manifestly the mission of Masonry in the 
 World of Religious Thought, to oppose all that 
 contradict these gracious and glorious facts. And 
 yet its warfare is not one of noisy controversy and 
 contest. For majestic as is his calling, no Mason 
 is permitted to waste breath in its defence. If the 
 Institution cannot speak for itself after these cen- 
 turies of development, then no words of argument 
 can advance its claims. But who can estimate its 
 silent influence upon a single brother — and what 
 
21 
 
 a multitude of Craftsmen does it command. Is it 
 a little thing, that wherever the altar of our 
 ancient Art is set up, an open Bible should be 
 upon it ? Not so thinks that apostate body which 
 seals the Word of God lest its own usurpations and 
 pretensions should be thereby denied, else what 
 means those constant allocutions and bulls which 
 continually are aimed at, and as often fail to in- 
 jure, our valued Fraternity. Is it a little thing, 
 that, whilst Europe is plagued with rationalistic 
 thought and America is about entering on the strife, 
 there should be thousands already pledged to stand 
 by God's Truth — a great army of conviction ? Is 
 it a little thing, that in a pleasure-seeking, de- 
 praved society, blind to the intelligent joys of the 
 present and the more lasting bliss of the future, 
 there should be thousands of such rooms as these 
 dedicated to God and the Holy Sts. John, in 
 which men, bound by a vow to forsake all iniquity, 
 at very frequent intervals gather for mental, moral 
 and spiritual improvement ? Brethren, let us re- 
 joice in our privilege. Let the world deride and 
 scorn if it will. Our Great Master has suffered all 
 this before. It hated him before it hated us. Be 
 sure you cling simply to the Truth, and be careful 
 to manifest it by conversation and example among 
 
22 
 
 men. May every foot of your wall be built in 
 strict conformity to tlie square and the plummet. 
 May every action of your lives bear the scrutiny of 
 the All-Seeing Eye. "May your oblations of piety 
 and praise be grateful as the incense ; your love 
 warm as its flame, and your charity diffusive as its 
 fragrance." May the mystic letter which is alway 
 before your eye whilst in the Lodge, be your en- 
 couragement when burdened with responsibility, or 
 fearful with amazing dread. Thus traveling along 
 the level of time may you, through the merits of 
 your Great High Priest, " be admitted within the 
 veil of Heaven, to the full enjoyment of life 
 eternal." 
 
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