The Transition

As years rolled by and as conditions changed in Europe - fewer edifices to be erected and more craftsmen available to erect them-the lodges of Freemasons received fewer and fewer applications for apprenticeship. The old operative masons had begun their lodges primarily as a matter of business but had come to love the fellowship and teachings and rituals that developed in them, and they were fearful that a gradually dwindling membership could cause their lodges eventually to sink into oblivion.

Meanwhile, many men had become interested in the Freemasons, greatly admiring their moral rectitude and their steadiness of purpose. So it was perhaps inevitable, considering the declining circumstances of the Masonic lodges and considering the interest being displayed in them by non-Masons that the old builders would eventually accept other than builders into their lodges. There began an influx of artists, teachers, poets, mathematicians - the leaders of that time. It was this acceptance of non-operative Masons into the order that led to the present day title of Free and Accepted Masons, or Ancient, Free and Accepted Masons.

These non-operative members, of course, had no desire to learn the building art or to serve a long apprenticeship in it, nor was it any longer necessary that new members do so. However, these new non-operative members were taught the same old rituals of conferring degrees and they were obligated in the same manner as were their operative brothers. The non operative members came to be known as speculative masons and their ranks grew steadily while those of the operative members continued to shrink. In time the membership of the Freemasons came to be almost totally speculative and remains so today.

Through all those years and through all the changes the old rituals, bearing direct relationship to the operative character of the originators, were and are retained. The man who receives his first degree is still called an entered apprentice, in the second degree he becomes a fellow craft, and in the third and final degree he is made a master mason. Masonic lodges are still governed by masters and wardens.

Freemasonry continues to teach its members through the use of allegory and symbols, and these still have their base in the old operative art. Prominent symbols used in Masonry then and today are such implements as the square, the level, the plumb, the trowel, and other tools essential to the old builders in masonry. Over the years the Freemasons' use of these symbolic implements have given our language such terms as square shooter, on the square, etc., each devolving from Masonry's application of the square as an emblem of morality and virtue. The term on the level stems from Freemasonry's level being an emblem of equality. When a Mason stands morally erect he is said to be acting by the plumb.

So Freemasonry has indeed changed over the centuries, yet it can be said that the more it changes, the more it remains the same.