Modern Freemasonry was not born in a day, but through a long passage from trade lodges to a society of men interested in morality, natural philosophy and brotherhood. This passage, which scholars call the shift from "operative" to "speculative" masonry, has some documented milestones worth knowing precisely.
Gentlemen in seventeenth-century lodges
The first known cases of non-masons being initiated come from seventeenth-century Scotland and England. On 20 May 1641 Robert Moray, a soldier and later one of the founders of the Royal Society, was admitted at Newcastle by members of the Lodge of Edinburgh who were there with the Scottish army.
The most famous English case is that of Elias Ashmole, antiquary and enthusiast of alchemy and astrology, whose name is linked to the Oxford museum that bears it. In his diary he noted that on 16 October 1646 he had been made a "Free Mason" at Warrington, in Lancashire, and listed those present. None of them seems to have been a working mason.
Why gentlemen joined lodges
The reasons are not directly documented, but the context suggests some:
- interest in architecture and geometry as noble sciences;
- the fascination of handed-down knowledge and signs of recognition;
- the wish for a space of sociability beyond religious and political divisions, in a century of civil wars;
- the appeal of Solomon's Temple, present in the legends of the craft.
24 June 1717
The traditional date for the birth of speculative Freemasonry is 24 June 1717, the feast of St John the Baptist. On that day four London lodges, which met in taverns, are said to have gathered at the Goose and Gridiron tavern near St Paul's Cathedral to form a Grand Lodge and choose a Grand Master, Anthony Sayer.
A clarification is needed. The main source for this account is the second edition of James Anderson's Constitutions, published in 1738, that is twenty-one years later. No minutes from 1717 exist. Some historians have therefore questioned the details, and some place the real organisation of the Grand Lodge a few years later. The date nevertheless remains a shared symbolic reference.
| Year | Event |
|---|---|
| 1641 | Robert Moray admitted at Newcastle |
| 1646 | Elias Ashmole made a mason at Warrington |
| 1717 | Traditional date of the Grand Lodge of London |
| 1721 | Duke of Montagu first noble Grand Master |
| 1723 | First edition of Anderson's Constitutions |
Desaguliers and the Royal Society
A key figure of the early years was John Theophilus Desaguliers, a clergyman of Huguenot origin, collaborator of Isaac Newton and Fellow of the Royal Society. He was Grand Master in 1719 and helped to give the new institution a learned and scientific tone. In 1721 the office of Grand Master passed to the Duke of Montagu, and from then on the top positions were often held by members of the aristocracy.
Anderson's Constitutions
In 1723 The Constitutions of the Free-Masons was published, compiled by the Scottish Presbyterian minister James Anderson. The volume contained:
- a legendary history of Masonry, from Adam to England;
- the "charges" of a Free-Mason, reworked from the Old Charges;
- the general regulations of the Grand Lodge;
- some songs.
The first charge: religion
The most discussed passage is the first charge, concerning God and religion. Whereas the old charges asked the mason to be faithful to the Church, Anderson wrote that it was now thought more expedient to oblige Masons only to that religion in which all men agree, leaving each to his own particular opinions. The Mason was to be a good and true man, a man of honour and honesty.
This formula had enormous significance. In an age of confessional conflict, the lodge became a place where men of different churches could meet. The text also specified that a Mason should be neither a "stupid atheist" nor an "irreligious libertine".
From two degrees to three
In its early years speculative Freemasonry essentially knew two degrees, apprentice and fellow, inherited from the craft. The degree of master appears in the 1720s and spreads in the following years, accompanied by the legend of Hiram. The three-degree structure, which today seems original, is therefore the result of a development.
Spread across Europe
From the Grand Lodge of London Freemasonry spread rapidly. In the 1720s and 1730s lodges appeared in Ireland, Scotland, France, the Netherlands, Italy and the American colonies. The Grand Lodge of Ireland is documented from 1725, and that of Scotland was founded in 1736.
In short
- Already in the seventeenth century Scottish and English lodges admitted non-masons such as Robert Moray and Elias Ashmole.
- The traditional date of the Grand Lodge of London is 24 June 1717, known mainly from Anderson's account of 1738.
- Desaguliers and then the Duke of Montagu gave the institution a learned and aristocratic tone.
- The Constitutions of 1723 required of Masons only the religion in which all men agree.
- The third degree, that of master, appeared in the 1720s.
