third degree the symbolic allusions to the temple of Solomon, and
the implements of Masonry employed in its construction, are extended and
fully completed. At the building of that edifice, we have already seen
that one class of the workmen was employed in the preparation of the
materials, while another was engaged in placing those materials in their
proper position. But there was a third and higher class,--the master
workmen,--whose duty it was to superintend the two other classes, and to
see that the stones were not only duly prepared, but that the most exact
accuracy had been observed in giving to them their true juxtaposition in
the edifice. It was then only that the last and finishing labor[63] was
performed, and the cement was applied by these skilful workmen, to secure
the materials in their appropriate places, and to unite the building in
one enduring and connected mass. Hence the _trowel_, we are informed, was
the most important, though of course not the only, implement in use among
the master builders. They did not permit this last, indelible operation to
be performed by any hands less skilful than their own. They required that
the craftsmen should prove the correctness of their work by the square,
level, and plumb, and test, by these unerring instruments, the accuracy of
their joints; and, when satisfied of the just arrangement of every part,
the cement, which was to give an unchangeable union to the whole, was then
applied by themselves.

Hence, in speculative Masonry, the trowel has been assigned to the third
degree as its proper implement, and the symbolic meaning which accompanies
it has a strict and beautiful reference to the purposes for which it was
used in the ancient temple; for as it was there employed "to spread the
cement which united the building in one common mass," so is it selected as
the symbol of brotherly love--that cement whose object is to unite our
mystic association in one sacred and harmonious band of brethren.

Here, then, we perceive the first, or, as I have already called it, the
elementary form of our symbolism--the adaptation of the terms, and
implements, and processes of an operative art to a speculative science.
The temple is now completed. The stones having been hewed, squared, and
numbered in the quarries by the apprentices,--having been properly
adjusted by the craftsmen, and finally secured in their appropriate
places, with the strongest and purest cement, by the master build