West Indies, South America, and
California, and became an accomplished public speaker and a diligent
observer of social conditions.

Stephens and his six associates had witnessed the dissolution of the
local garment cutters' union. They resolved that the new society should
not be limited by the lines of their own trade but should embrace "all
branches of honorable toil." Subsequently a rule was adopted stipulating
that at least three-fourths of the membership of lodges must be
wage-earners eighteen years of age. Moreover, "no one who either sells
or makes a living, or any part of it, by the sale of intoxicating drinks
either as manufacturer, dealer, or agent, or through any member of his
family, can be admitted to membership in this order; and no lawyer,
banker, professional gambler, or stock broker can be admitted." They
chose their motto from Solon, the wisest of lawgivers: "That is the most
perfect government in which an injury to one is the concern of all";
and they took their preamble from Burke, the most philosophical of
statesmen: "When bad men combine, the good must associate, else
they will fall, one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible
struggle."

The order was a secret society and for years kept its name from the
public. It was generally known as the "Five Stars," because of the
five asterisks that represented its name in all public notices. While
mysterious initials and secret ceremonies gratified the members,
they aroused a corresponding antagonism, even fear, among the public,
especially as the order grew to giant size. What were the potencies of
a secret organization that had only to post a few mysterious words
and symbols to gather hundreds of workingmen in their halls? And what
plottings went on behind those locked and guarded doors? To allay
public hostility secrecy was gradually removed and in 1881 was entirely
abolished--not, however, without serious opposition from the older
members.

The atmosphere of high idealism in which the order had been conceived
continued to be fostered by Stephens, its founder and its first Grand
Master Workman. He extolled justice, discountenanced violence, and
pleaded for "the mutual development and moral elevation of mankind."
His exhortations were free from that narrow class antagonism which
frequently characterizes the utterances of labor. One of his associates,
too, invoked the spirit of chivalry, of true knighthood, when he said
that the old trade uni