for one
another, remind one of the spirit and habits of the Masons of that day.

[116] Now is as good a time as another to name certain curious theories
which have been put forth to account for the origin of Masonry in
general, and of the organization of the Grand Lodge in particular. They
are as follows: First, that it was all due to an imaginary Temple of
Solomon described by Lord Bacon in a Utopian romance called the _New
Atlantis_; and this despite the fact that the temple in the Bacon story
was not a house at all, but the name of an ideal state. Second, that
the object of Freemasonry and the origin of the Third Degree was the
restoration of Charles II to the throne of England; the idea being that
the Masons, who called themselves "Sons of the Widow," meant thereby to
express their allegiance to the Queen. Third, that Freemasonry was
founded by Oliver Cromwell--he of all men!--to defeat the royalists.
Fourth, that Free-masons were derived from the order of the Knights
Templars. Even Lessing once held this theory, but seems later to have
given it up. Which one of these theories surpasses the others in
absurdity, it would be hard to say. De Quincey explodes them one by one
with some detail in his "Inquiry into the Origin of the Free-masons,"
to which he might also have added his own pet notion of the Rosicrucian
origin of the order--it being only a little less fantastic than the
rest (_De Quincey's Works_, vol. xvi).

[117] Of the Masonic feasts of St. John the Baptist and St. John the
Evangelist much has been written, and to little account. In
pre-Christian times, as we have seen, the Roman Collegia were wont to
adopt pagan deities as patrons. When Christianity came, the names of
its saints--some of them martyrs of the order of builders--were
substituted for the old pagan gods. Why the two Saints John were chosen
by Masons--rather than St. Thomas, who was the patron saint of
architecture--has never been made clear. At any rate, these two feasts,
coming at the time of the summer and winter solstices, are in reality
older than Christianity, being reminiscences of the old Light Religion
in which Masonry had its origin.

[118] The badge of office was a huge white apron, such as we see in
Hogarth's picture of the _Night_. The collar was of much the same shape
as that at present in use, only shorter. When the color was changed to
blue, and why, is uncertain, but probably not until 1813, when we begin
to see both apron