Grand Lodges, and other masonic authorities upon
every subject of Masonic Law, and of presenting them, without commentary,
to the fraternity.

But a brief examination of this method, led me to perceive that I would be
thus constructing simply a digest of decrees, many of which would probably
be the results of inexperience, of prejudice, or of erroneous views of the
masonic system, and from which the authors themselves have, in repeated
instances, subsequently receded--for Grand Masters and Grand Lodges,
although entitled to great respect, are not infallible--and I could not,
conscientiously, have consented to assist, without any qualifying remark,
in the extension and perpetuation of edicts and opinions, which, however
high the authority from which they emanated, I did not believe to be in
accordance with the principles of Masonic jurisprudence.

Another inconvenience which would have attended the adoption of such a
method is, that the decisions of different Grand Lodges and Grand Masters
are sometimes entirely contradictory on the same points of Masonic Law.
The decree of one jurisdiction, on any particular question, will often be
found at variance with that of another, while a third will differ from
both. The consultor of a work, embracing within its pages such distracting
judgments, unexplained by commentary, would be in doubt as to which
decision he should adopt, so that coming to the inspection with the desire
of solving a legal question, he would be constrained to close the volume,
in utter despair of extracting truth or information from so confused a
mass of contradictions.

This plan I therefore at once abandoned. But knowing that the
jurisprudence of Masonry is founded, like all legal science, on abstract
principles, which govern and control its entire system, I deemed it to be
a better course to present these principles to my readers in an elementary
and methodical treatise, and to develop from them those necessary
deductions which reason and common sense would justify.

Hence it is that I have presumed to call this work "The Principles of
Masonic Law." It is not a code of enactments, nor a collection of
statutes, nor yet a digest of opinions; but simply an elementary treatise,
intended to enable every one who consults it, with competent judgment, and
ordinary intelligence, to trace for himself the bearings of the law upon
any question which he seeks to investigate, and to form, for himself, a
correct opin