explains why Freemasons have always shown indulgence to the
Templars.

It was above all Freemasonry [says Findel], which--because it
falsely held itself to be a daughter of Templarism--took the
greatest pains to represent the Order of the Templars as innocent
and therefore free from all mystery. For this purpose not only
legends and unhistorical facts were brought forward, but
manoeuvres were also resorted to in order to suppress the truth.
The masonic reverers of the Temple Order bought up the whole
edition of the _Actes du Proces_ of Moldenhawer, because this
showed the guilt of the Order; only a few copies reached the
booksellers.... Already several decades before ... the Freemasons
in their unhistorical efforts had been guilty of real forgery.
Dupuy had published his _History of the Trial of the Templars_ as
early as 1654 in Paris, for which he had made use of the original
of the _Actes du Proces_, according to which the guilt of the Order
leaves no room for doubt.... But when in the middle of the
eighteenth century several branches of Freemasonry wished to recall
the Templar Order into being, the work of Dupuy was naturally very
displeasing. It had already been current amongst the public for a
hundred years, so it could no longer be bought; therefore they
falsified it.[315]

Accordingly in 1751 a reprint of Dupuy's work appeared with the addition
of a number of notes and remarks and mutilated in such a way as to prove
not the guilt but the innocence of the Templars.

Now, although British Masonry has played no part in these intrigues, the
question of the Templar succession has been very inadequately dealt with
by the masonic writers of our country. As a rule they have adopted one
of two courses--either they have persistently denied connexion with the
Templars or they have represented them as a blameless and cruelly
maligned Order. But in reality neither of these expedients is necessary
to save the honour of British Masonry, for not even the bitterest enemy
of Masonry has ever suggested that British masons have adopted any
portion of the Templar heresy. The Knights who fled to Scotland may have
been perfectly innocent of the charges brought against their Order;
indeed, there is good reason to believe this was the case. Thus the
_Manuel des Chevaliers de l'Ordre du Temple_ relates the incident in the
following manne