pursuit of the necessary knowledge. And you, my brethren, who aim at future exaltation, qualify yourselves for well deserved preferment; remembering that ignorance and imbecility are rendered more visible by the glare of official distinction, and that the humblest situation is preferable to the highest, if the latter be not adorned with the essential qualifications of masonic talents and personal virtue. To members of every class, I would recommend the prosecution of earnest endeavours after the reputation of bright workmen, in all the labours belonging to their several grades of advancement; and to annex to the recommendation this solemn assurance, that after their greatest attainments in the noble science, they will have achieved but little, unless it strengthen and improve all their moral and social virtues.

Το you, my young brethren, I offer but one admonition. Temper your masonic zeal with a becoming prudence and discretion. Be cautiously attentive to the injunction addressed to you at your initiation, never to neglect your respective avocations for the business of masonry. A prudent distribution of your hours will soon convince you, that no such sacrifice is required; but that your duties as masons, are altogether compatible with the closest attention to your various pursuits in life.

And now, may that Almighty Being, without whose light and direction, we "grope for the wall like the blind, and stumble at noon-day as in the night," afford his divine assistance, in all our well intended and laudable exertions for the honour and usefulness of this benevolent institution.

Under the auspices of His all-seeing eye, may all our undertakings be confessedly conducted. Regulating our actions by the square of virtue, the plumbline of rectitude, and the level of propriety; keeping › our pleasurable gratifications within the compass of decency and moderation, and uniting our several associations with the cement of brotherly affection, may our terrestrial lodge become the emblem of the heavenly, and the innocent pleasures it dispenses, the harbingers of joys ineffable and eternal.