eyes steadily on the important object of your association. Let it open the affectionate embrace of large philanthropy, and lift up the hands of rational devotion! Let it exalt the capacity of the mind, refine the social sympathies, and form you for the noblest purposes of reasonable life!

RIGHT WORSHIPFUL MASTERS,

RESPECTED OFFICERS, AND BELOVED BRE

THREN!

You this day assemble to celebrate the increased reputation and usefulness of Masonry; and to pay the tribute of affectionate remembrance to its departed patrons and brethren. Let hilarity therefore be tempered with thoughtfulness. Forget not in the cheerfulness of the day to retain decorum in festivity, and innocence in mirth. Let virtue chasten your pleasures, and it will give them a higher relish.

WHILE you commemorate the wisdom and glory of SOLOMON, the fidelity of HIRAM, and the virtues of ST. JOHN, you will join also in celebrating the valour of WARREN and the wisdom of FRANKLIN. While you' praise departed worth, neglect not to honour

living virtue. And add to all your songs the chorus of acknowledgment and affectionate respect to our surviving patron and brother, WASHINGTON, "the friend of Masonry, of

his

country, and of man."

AROUND the altar of friendship do we thus yearly assemble, and bring our votive incense to that temple which our predecessors founded on the firm basis of virtue, and supported by the pillars of wisdom, strength and beauty. We meet not to drain the bowl of intemperance, nor to indulge the excesses of gluttony: But to renew the cordialities of friendship, the resolutions of love and good will. We assemble not to disturb the peace of mankind by the busier plans of ambition, nor to fabricate those arts of luxury which but augment the miseries of life: Our object is to enliven the kindly sensibilities of human nature, and all the sweet civilities of social intercourse.

CHILDREN OF LIGHT!

THE duties of your profession are interesting and important. The duties of society and of religion are also binding upon you. May you discharge them all with fidelity and honour! Then, when the events of time shall

be ended, and the retributions of eternity begin, when the MORNING STARS shall again sing together and the sons of GoD shout for joy, YE shall join the animating chorus and share the glorious triumph. Ye shall be deemed worthy to enter the doors of the celestial temple, to be adorned with jewels beautified with immortality, and advanced to glories incomparably more resplendent than any here below.

SO MOTE IT BE !

A

CHARGE.

Delivered before the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts, June 24th, A. L. 5795.

IN submission to the appointment, and in compliance with the request of the venerable officers and beloved brethren of this GRAND LODGE, I rise to give the customary masonic CHARGE. To make apologies now, would be ineffectual. And to intreat indulgence in behalf of what it is expected, I should enforce by authority, would but diminish the dignity of the precepts to be inculcated, and weaken the influence of the caution to be impressed. I cannot doubt the candour of the liberal; and need not fear the censure of the prejudiced. It will suffice if this respected audience be but convinced, from my honest developement of the character and simple statement of the duties of Free Masonry, that the principles upon which

the institution is founded are salutary, and that the morals it enjoins are pure.

To give to these principles and these morals their proper force, recollect, my beloved brethren, that I stand in the place, and speak by the authority of that divine Mason whose anniversary you celebrate. On this occasion you are to regard me as his representative. To his counsels you are invited to listen. "The same came for a witness, to bear witness of the light, that all men through him might believe." As the herald, commissioned to awake attention to the glories of the brightest scene, that ever dawned upon the earth, he calls for the reformation of those prejudices which preclude acknowledgment of the doctrines of heavenly truth, and those corruptions which prevent diffusion of the system of unbounded love.

LET your minds be open to conviction. Examine with the utmost freedom. Be willing to adopt what you find to be excellent; and in the best of causes to be the warmest of advocates.

THE duties of PIETY claim your first and chiefest attention. Their sacred spirit should sanctify, pervade, and influence all your